Guild Wars 2

Anymras.5729:

Even when using a full bar of gadgets, current Gadgeteer just doesn’t do enough – for which I blame the boons, as they don’t want to give too many of them or make them too strong for fear of stacking, I guess.
I definitely support making gadgets more useful, and this version seems pretty handy.

On a related note, I think the aspects of randomness in both Mine Field and Rocket Boots are problematic for each skill.

• Mine Field isn’t quite hit-or-miss, but I think it’d definitely be nice for it to be more predictable for the user – or even sort-of-controllable, possibly using a charge-up mechanic. What I mean by that: Set the positions of the mines to something akin to a five-pointed star, rather than leaving them randomly scattered. Tap the Mine Field button, Mine Field is placed at maximum dispersal; hold it and the dispersal zone narrows until the minimum distance is reached.

• Rocket Boots seems to send the user tumbling in unintended directions far too often for it to be reliable, in my opinion – what’s the use of using it to jet away when the tumble at the end, which doesn’t even act as an evade, has as much chance of sending you rolling back toward the enemy as it does of not? It’s not quite random, but it’s definitely awkward.

Indeed, both points I’ve brought up myself in the past.

The random formation of mines in the Mine Field ability has always been a negative. Absolutely nothing to lose by placing them in a 5 point star.

And yes, Rocket Boots need quality of life improvements. Technically you can cancel it, but it’s far from being a smooth ride. Like every player who uses them knows, the tumble at the end, as you put it, is very annoying because often sends you flying in a random and pointlessly different direction. Why on God’s green earth, I do not know why it’s capable of changing directions on its own.

What really needs to be done with Rocket Boots is to have an aiming template just like Fiery Greatsword 3 or Warrior Greatsword 3. And you will continue to go in that direction until cancelled. Then you’d have a perfectly working skill.

Gadgets are quirky, Engineer-like and fun.

They’re just not competitively strong, or are able to fit into many builds due to the Engineer’s design.

In April 2014 there was an actual Gadget affecting trait added.. increasing that to a grand total of two.

The only problem is that it’s severely undertuned, so much that it’s worse than many notable adept traits, as a grandmaster, even when using 2 Gadgets.

I simply propose a mega buff to this trait, befitting the granddaddy of all Gadget traits.

Current: Gadgeteer: Gadgets grant additional boons on use.

• A.E.D – 3 Seconds of Retaliation.
• Personal Battering Ram – 5 Seconds of Fury
• Rocket Boots – 4 Seconds of Vigor
• Slick Shoes – 8 Seconds of Regeneration
• Throw Mine – 6 Seconds of Aegis
• Utility Goggles – 8 Seconds of Might(5)

Proposed: Gadgeteer: Gadgets grant additional powerful effects.

• A.E.D – Regenerate Health when A.E.D is available. Effect ends while A.E.D is recharging. (117 Healing per Second)
• Personal Battering Ram – Hit up to 5 enemies, removing stability from those affected.
• Rocket Boots – Now breaks stun.
• Slick Shoes – Increased radius of oil slicks.
• Throw Mine – Mine Field is now ground targeted with 900 range. Multiple Red AoE indicators are placed at the start of the cast.
• Utility Goggles – Edit Converts all damaging conditions into boons for 3 seconds (thanks Phaeton).

Go go gadget build diversity. The stunbreaks can actually be good, and Mine Field can be a hell of a nuke for Engineers that favor Berserker.

Discuss new #GadgetMeta

Arantheal.7396:

Chaith.8256:

fluidmonolith.3584:

-try backpack regenerator. This gives you some reason to stay in toolkit (even if it’s not that much of a reason),

Actually, it’s no reason at all.

Backpack regenerator gives the Engineer a 10 second invisible buff when a kit is switched to. It doesn’t actually tick when you’re in a kit, as suggested by the tooltip.

Playing engi since ages now. Still I learned something today. Ty.

Yeah, somewhat counter-intuitive..

fluidmonolith.3584:

-try backpack regenerator. This gives you some reason to stay in toolkit (even if it’s not that much of a reason),

Actually, it’s no reason at all.

Backpack regenerator gives the Engineer a 10 second invisible buff when a kit is switched to. It doesn’t actually tick when you’re in a kit, as suggested by the tooltip.

zapv.8051:

Longbow rangers…

LMFAO.

Knockback, pewpewpewpewpewpewpewpew
Knockback, pewpewpwepwepwepwepwepew

Warrior: Berserker Stance, Staggering Blow, Earthshaker, Backbreaker, Staggering Blow, Backbreaker, Earthshaker.

The benefit to purity is that it’s not crit dependant, so any build can use it.

Phyrak.7260:

Much appreciated Chaith

One more question

I’m thinking of running my max lvl engi as cele FT build

What are your thoughts?

Well, to be blunt, Flamethrower is only the best at causing you retal damage. It can neutralize points in PvP, but that’s about the only redeeming quality. There are better options for power, hybrid, condi, defensive, and utility builds.

It’s a casual kit, if you have fun using it in open world PvE or tagging things in WvW then keep doing that.

Phyrak.7260:

The tool kit could do with some cast time buffs

I’ve been experimenting on my high lvl engi so I know what to do when I lowby get to the 80’s

What gear would you recommend?

Well, if you’re aiming to PvE, then Berserker all the way.

If you’re aiming to WvW, I’d suggest a primary of Celestial stats (Helm, Chest, Legs give more bonus stats as Celestial compared to Shoulders, Hands, Feet.) Mix the rest with whatever you feel comfortable with – either Celestial, Berserkers, or Knights/Cavalier/Soldier.

This makes you durable & sustainable enough to not hate life, while being primarily offensive.

If you want to PvP, you should either use my Rabid or Celestial build that was linked.

Phyrak.7260:

No plausible way to make a decent melee ‘whack-a-mole’ esque build sticking/ bouncing between guns and the tool kit?

With my current build – running soldiers/carrion with engineer runes

When I get home I’ll link my current build for you to check out

Thank you

-Phyrak

Carrion and Soldiers are woefully underpowered stat sets for Engineer. And Superior Runes of the Engineer are again, woefully underpowered. I suggest you use something that’s just gonna do more.

See the major thing is that Hip Shot is very reliable, ranged and packs just as hard a punch. Harder, in fact, if you consider the time when you’re casting and subsequently missing the Tool Kit autoattacks, you could be blasting away safely.

The time to Thwack someone is when you’re predicting impending damage, and there is projectile blocking effects around. IE: 1v1ing a Wall of Reflection or Swirling Winds Guard/Ele, respectively, who you have on the ropes.

style.6173:

I can’t tell if this is serious. You want to buff ele? It already needs a serious nerf in PvP.

Same goes for engi.

*Note: I am speaking about PvP only here.

Yeah .. Tornado has approximately 0.00000001% interaction with any mechanics that cause Ele and Engi to be OP in PvP.

You could literally double it’s damage or swing timer and it wouldn’t affect PvP because Fiery Greatsword and Crate.

Most of these NA and EU comparisons in playstyle seem really inaccurate and trash talkey.

EU doesn’t play conquest while NA plays deathmatch, it’s simply a difference in strategies on how to out rotate your opponents.

NA prefers to snowball off of kills, EU prefers to delay with bunkers and use portal plays.

The biggest oversight some EU players see when they look at NA gameplay, ‘omg, nobody even watches their home point.’

That’s simply because with the 5 dps comp, once the 1man advantage has overwhelmed another point, then they send back a player to fight on the neutralized point, in a favorable matchup.

@ OP, cast my vote for Ranger

Make it much more solid, please and thanks. Perhaps a similar damage reduction as to the Warrior’s Rampage elite. Inherent toughness, inherent condition reduction (cripple, chill, immob, anything would help. Currently, both on the Ele and Engi, using Tornado often forces you to cancel it one second later to avoid soaking too much damage.

I’d say least played class in competitive scene is Ranger. They’re just not super unique snowflakes right now in the fact that:

• Power Ranger < Thief/Mesmer synergy.

• Res-bot Ranger < Res-bot Warrior. But both are proven to function.

• Survival Condition Ranger – still loses against the godmode D/D Ele on side nodes, and can’t teamfight or downed body cleave as well as other professions.

Tool Kit is in most good builds. Unless you’re asking for a build that is built specifically around spending the majority of your time thwacking people with Tool Kit, which I have to say is regretfully never a good option.

Edit: Non-PvE builds ahead

Tool Kit builds:

• Celestial:

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fdAQFAUlUUpEr1XxkLseNCbBNyx0GRuxq85IEgkC-TJBHwAAuAAGeAAl2fAZZAA

• Rabid:

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fdAQJAqalUUpEr1XxkLseRCbBNqxAqNIyOWlPfgAkUA-TJxHwAT2fYwDA4YZAAnAAA

• Berserker

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fdAQFAUlUUpmqVWxkLseRCdBNywMFQ3gFUBRtwPFAA-TJBFwACuAA12foaZAAPAAA

Nitesky.6427:

Many strong comps don’t run thief/necro/mesmer either.

Lol what. With exceptions, all the strongest EU comps run Thief and Mesmer. They have great efficiency together.

And without exceptions, all the strongest NA comps run Thief. There’s a shortage of high tier Necro players but if people would master the profession, pretty much every NA comp would run a terror Necro as well.

Necros, Thieves, Mesmers, these are the professions that rip Cele builds apart when played properly. Since NA has many cele Eles/Engies, it’s only logical, my man.

Seems like a good idea.

For things like: Elemental Attunement, Evasive Arcana, Cleansing Ire, Empathic Bond, Sleight of Hand, Incendiary Powder, Grenadier, Deceptive Evasion, I feel like they should be less of a no-brainer to pick up.

There’s no reason to largely affect balance, so, any power gains to builds that all of a sudden no longer had to pick up these ‘must have’ traits, those builds will have to be checked for balance. Even though it’s likely to still be the same traits everyone uses, it could help engineer a closing of the gap between really good and really bad trait lines.

But honestly – if some of the god tier traits had some of the godliness shifted away from the trait itself and toward the abilities, it would definitely be enabling in the creation of new builds.

http://www.twitch.tv/chaithh/c/5470129

After watching this clip like, 60 times, it’s pretty clear that it’s usually a simple matter of the servers being slow to update the Engineer’s new facing when in high movement situations.

Aethyl.7519:

Without getting in the whole “you are forced to use kits or not” ongoing war, a subject where I have my own thoughts, but won’t be expressing them here, I will just get back to the subject at hand.

Yeah sorry about spurring that guy on, I really don’t care about that non-issue at all.

Although when I think of a Hammer or Mace on the Engineer for melee purposes, to be honest, it really makes me cringe when I’m thinking about actually using it in a non-pve situation.

Engineer doesn’t have the proper skill set to be good at melee.. at the moment. Engineer is a survivable class because it has good sustain and you can drop AoE as you reposition yourself out of harmful situations.

If there was an Engineer playstyle or weapon that put the burden on the Engineer to gap-close, and eat punishment in order to melee an opponent, I hope that weapon brings lots of condition removal, gap closers/retreats, and snares, because the rest of the Engineer profession is really unsuited to prolonged 130 range combat.

My Idea for an Engineer Hammer:

Hammer 1)

• Discharge: Chain. Send an arc of electricity along the ground, hitting up to three foes in a line. 1/2 Second cast, range 600.
• Paralyze: Chain. Send an arc of electricity along the ground, crippling up to three foes in a line. Cripple: 2 seconds. 1/2 Second cast, range 600.
• Deaden: Chain. Send out a shockwave in a cone, dazing foes. Daze: 1/4 seconds. 1/2 Second cast, range 600.

Hammer 2)

• Fulminate:
  Strike nearby foes, the first causing vulnerability, and the second hit causing weakness. Vulnerability (5): 10 seconds. Weakness: 5 seconds. 1 Second cast, roots Engineer. Radius: 180. Targets: 3. 8 Second cooldown.

Hammer 3)

• Simulacrum: Fire a slow, arcing lightning hammer that stuns on impact. Simulacrum lingers for 5 seconds at the target location. Stun: 2 seconds. 3/4 Second cast, range 600. 15 Second cooldown.
• Attunement: Teleports the Engineer to the location of the Simulacrum. Removes Cripple, Chill, and Immobilize. 1/2 Second cast time.

Hammer 4)

• Static Force: Cause the ground to swarm with static, immobilizing enemies. Immobilize: 1 seconds. Combo Field: Lightning. Static Force duration: 3 seconds. Interval: 1 second. Unblockable. 3/4 Second cast. 240 Radius. 600 Range. 30 Second cooldown.

Hammer 5)

• Stray Voltage: Leap in the targeted direction direction, evading attacks and damaging foes in a line. Evade 1 second. 20 Second cooldown.

That’s the kind of hammer I would like! Totally power based, can do fine from 600 range as long as it goes in once every 8 seconds, and has defensive tools for the Engineer.

Ability for Engineer to get up very short vertical teleports by attuning to the hammer toss location would pretty much allow berserker builds to juke and survive similar to how Mesmers do, except not usable while CC’d. I would cream myself if that became a thing.

Anymras.5729:

Chaith.8256:

Anymras.5729:

Being able to not trigger reflection with mainhand weapons, not Kits, is something we should be able to do, but can’t.

The Engineer is balanced around having at least one Kit. If your gameplay experience is ruined because you can’t slot one kit to circumvent projectile hate, then I think it’s more on you to pick up literally any kit (except grenades) and proceed to attack through the effects.

See, this is just going to lead to this same, stupid circular crap where I go “We shouldn’t have to use Kits,” and you go “We’re balanced around them,” and I go “That’s stupid, why are we balanced around a completely optional set of skills,” and you go “That’s how it is, deal with it or play a different class,” going by my previous experiences having this same conversation, albeit with others.

I don’t want that conversation. Instead, I’m going to say that I disagree, and always have disagreed, with the Engineer being balanced in that way, would disagree with any class in any game being balanced in that way, and that I have no interest in debating the point, as I will not be persuaded into thinking that it’s fine, just as I am unlikely to persuade others into thinking that it’s not.

Sorry man. I’m just telling you how it is. You will never be happy with only one bar of skills because every profession in GW2 has two, baseline.

Many players have suggested a trait that unlocks a second weapon set by foregoing the use of Kits. But Arenanet has never acknowledged the concerns of players like you that simply want to use one weapon set and not have to ever switch.

vincecontix.1264:

Chaith.8256:

vincecontix.1264:

Also I dont think celest engi are strong than rabid condi ones.

Well I agreed with just about everything you said right before that part. Celestial Engies definitely have a small leg up on the Rabid counterparts due to the far superior CC.

Phanta, Reevz, Backpack, Myself, lots of players on NA who share the opinion that Cele is better in more situations than the condi variant. It’s not a huge upgrade in strength, it’s just the CC becomes far too lethal. Remember on NA we’re fighting a bunch of Eles, Engies, and Necro/Thief. The Overcharged Shot is so deadly.

hmmm so you think rifle is stronger than pistol/shield?

In the context of having it in a package with Celestial and Intelligence Sigil, yeah! But marginally.

Anymras.5729:

Being able to not trigger reflection with mainhand weapons, not Kits, is something we should be able to do, but can’t.

The Engineer is balanced around having at least one Kit. If your gameplay experience is ruined because you can’t slot one kit to circumvent projectile hate, then I think it’s more on you to pick up literally any kit (except grenades) and proceed to attack through the effects.

vincecontix.1264:

Also I dont think celest engi are strong than rabid condi ones.

Well I agreed with just about everything you said right before that part. Celestial Engies definitely have a small leg up on the Rabid counterparts due to the far superior CC.

Phanta, Reevz, Backpack, Myself, lots of players on NA who share the opinion that Cele is better in more situations than the condi variant. It’s not a huge upgrade in strength, it’s just the CC becomes far too lethal. Remember on NA we’re fighting a bunch of Eles, Engies, and Necro/Thief. The Overcharged Shot is so deadly.

The Gates Assassin.9827:

Not to mention, why would a grenade kit be pushed out of a power role thematically and instead pushed into a condi role instead? Who hears “GRENADE!” and thinks “Oh, slow death time”. I never understood why a class that is based around explosions and firearms would dominate the condi scene alongside necromancers. It would also still have grenade barrage, which is 100% a power engineer’s weapon, not condi. It wouldn’t make any sense to nerf the damage of grenades.

I’m so tired of the realism logic

Anymras.5729:

To this, I have to ask:
Is it wise for a class to have only ranged weapons without using their utility slots to acquire alternatives, leaving them hamstrung by enemies with Reflect, such as Earth Elementals in the Plains of Ashford? To have only two main-hand land weapons, and one water weapon, leaving them without options for a great many things unless they used their Utility skill slots to make up for the lack? These were issues before Perplexity was even a thought, and will continue to be issues until the Engineer is given actual choice in weapons.

Hold up just a second, man. Engineer having only ranged weapons? I wish that were actually the case. First of all, I don’t count a ranged auto-attack as being proof of a weapon being range focused if all the other abilities are hugely range adverse. Don’t forget that the Rifle has 2 high-damage dealing attacks that aren’t affected by anti-projectile mechanics.

When I play Rifle, I have a ranged auto attack that’s optimal up to 900. Awesome. I have a Net Shot that, in my opinion, is completely wasted if used on an enemy over 400 range. We have a Blunderbuss which does optimal damage at 200 range. We have an Overcharged Shot that has a range of 400. And a Jump Shot that only does 2/3rds of the damage if used on an enemy outside of 240 range.

Evaluation of Optimal Range for Rifle: 100-400.

Pistol/Pistol, or Pistol/Shield? Optimal Range: 200-600 (due to Poison Dart Volley accuracy and for ability to blowtorch/shield abilities on demand.)

Bombs? Straight up, optimal range of: 0-240.

Flamethrower? 100-400.

Tool Kit? Optimal Range of 0-200.

Grenades? Optimal Range of 0-600. Only exceptions being un-aware foes walking in straight line, computer controlled A.I, and people trying to complete objectives.

From my point of view, I think Engineers need to have more freedom outside of Grenades to attack optimally at 600-700 range.

I would bust a nut to have a completely power focused skirmishing weapon that is optimal at the 600-900 range. Power Engineer playstyle desperately needs it due to their fear of standing in AoE, and everything on Engineer needing 0-400 range to be effective.

The Gates Assassin.9827:

Chaith.8256:

bethekey.8314:

Chaith.8256

A reasonable shave would be to reduce the conditions, but that messes with the Rabid builds directly, hitting them even harder, in fact. Shrugs. A shave to the power damage of grenades in PvP would be smarter.

Explain this? It’s not like every engineer meta has been primarily strong condition damage combined with either power (hgh) or defense (rabid with backpack regen/shield/toolkit). 100 nades was an unintended game mechanic gimmick.

The fact is that grenades and bombs are our damage kits. Excluding static discharge, power builds rely on grenades just as much as condition builds do.

Yeah .. I really think that Berserker/Power Engineer is PvP obsolete. It’s too inefficient because there is no damage focused kit Engineer has that’s focused on pure power damage. With Celestial amulet to complement the way conditions are inseparable from the PvP oriented weapon sets and traits, it’s…. way too comparable of damage as when building purely for power.

But I do want relatively viable options to complement most amulet types. So I’m aware that nerfing the power component of Grenades would hurt people that wear Berserker amulets and use Hybrid weapon sets that everyone’s forced to run.

I’m not really sure, man.

I don’t agree. The problem of celestial engineers did not exist until the patch where celestial and strength runes came into play. Fix what caused the issue, don’t nerf what was fine before. Power nades and SD 100 mines are some of my favorite builds to play for engineer, far and away more fun than celestial or condi. The application of conditions needs to be more skillful. That’s all. We don’t need to nerf power builds on engineer (god that’s a weird sentence to have to say). Nerf IP, Strength runes and some of the sigils. Leave the rest of the fair engi stuff alone.

When Celestial stats were rebalanced to match PvE, I consider that an awaited unlock of old content. I think Engineer should have always been balanced around having the proper itemization for its native hybrid damage type.

Also.. With might runes, cele engies get 9 stacks of might. Eerily similar to the 6-9 stacks of might they get without might runes. The runes are hardly a problem.

I think the proper nerfs to cele engineer extend past pillaging the amulets and runes.

bethekey.8314:

Chaith.8256

A reasonable shave would be to reduce the conditions, but that messes with the Rabid builds directly, hitting them even harder, in fact. Shrugs. A shave to the power damage of grenades in PvP would be smarter.

Explain this? It’s not like every engineer meta has been primarily strong condition damage combined with either power (hgh) or defense (rabid with backpack regen/shield/toolkit). 100 nades was an unintended game mechanic gimmick.

The fact is that grenades and bombs are our damage kits. Excluding static discharge, power builds rely on grenades just as much as condition builds do.

Yeah .. I really think that Berserker/Power Engineer is PvP obsolete. It’s too inefficient because there is no damage focused kit Engineer has that’s focused on pure power damage. With Celestial amulet to complement the way conditions are inseparable from the PvP oriented weapon sets and traits, it’s…. way too comparable of damage as when building purely for power.

But I do want relatively viable options to complement most amulet types. So I’m aware that nerfing the power component of Grenades would hurt people that wear Berserker amulets and use Hybrid weapon sets that everyone’s forced to run.

I’m not really sure, man.

Well, good thing that there is no mace or hammer for Engineer then. Perplexity balance crisis avoided!

No sign of new weapons on the horizon either.

style.6173:

Engineers only need 2 changes:

1. Nerf to celestial. That will help with the ele problem as well
2. Nerf to turrets. While not effective in coordinated teams, they are OP in any uncoordinated game. That applies to ALL hot join, ALL solo queue, and 75% of team queue. Remember that most team queue is just pug as well.

Can’t nerf Celestial without removing the hybrid option for Rangers, Warriors, Guardians, Mesmers. They aren’t even the best at anything right now, but in some cases they do get used once in a blue moon.

Honestly, for the majority of the professions, Celestial is more inefficient than a condition amulet, or berserker. Soldiers amulet often can be made to provide similar levels of offense and defense.

I’ve tried to make functioning hybrid builds on every profession. For it to actually be good, you need: High condition application, well scaling sustain, and high power damage.

I really think that the outliers that make the Celestial builds, are the Elementalist D/D weapon abilities and Engineer Grenade abilities.

Simply adding Celestial Amulet and might stacks on to a profession that has good scaling from healing (see defensively traited Guardian) doesn’t turn it into a good Celestial build.

I defer to Phanta’s take on D/D Ele right now:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/balance/Spvp-Elementalist-D-D-celestial-needs-nerf/first

Once Drake’s Breath is shaved down from 3 seconds of burning, base, per tick, to a more reasonable 2 seconds per tick, and Lightning Whip is limited to hitting as fast as it’s intended, it’ll be a fair shave to the Ele’s condition application, and sustain.

For Engineer, it’s pretty much the fact that Grenades do everything. The only ranged pressure you’re going to get on the Engineer profession (excluding auto attacks), a huge array of cover conditions, and lots of power damage.

A reasonable shave would be to reduce the conditions, but that messes with the Rabid builds directly, hitting them even harder, in fact. Shrugs*. A shave to the power damage of grenades in PvP would be smarter.

I’d say if a patch came out that:

1.) Reduced Battle Sigil from 3 stacks of might, to 2. (Edit: In PvP)

2.) Reduced Drake’s Breath from 3 seconds burning per tick, to 2 seconds.

3.) Altered Lightning Whip so it can’t be made into attacking faster than intended.

4.) Reduced the damage of Shrapnel and Freeze Grenades by 15% in PvP.

5.) Undo the recent change of making Frozen Burst (D/D Water 3) into a blast finisher.

We’d pretty much see all of the Celestial builds brought in line without neutering the possibility for Celestial stats on any of the other 6 professions.

Arantheal.7396:

High risk, high reward.
Surprisingly, some of us like this concept

Well, judging by how many people like Rampagers, I would tend to disagree.

So just Carrion/Rabid but no Vitality or Toughness?

That’s … actually less defensive than Berserker or Rampager, how is one supposed to survive on that setup? The Power/Precision secondary stat doesn’t really increase pressure that much compared to how much faster you will die.

Engineer with Cleansing Water

Crate Healing Turret + Drop healing turret = Condition b-gone spray

Yeah. This is a pretty big exaggeration.

Nobody disputes that Feline Grace is good, but for the fact that 2/6/0/0/6, 6/0/2/0/6 are commonly used across EU/NA, it means that the 2/0/0/6/6 is clearly not choking the diversity of Thief builds.

Also, go home with your cross profession comparisons. This isn’t the ‘hypothetical broken combo’ thread in the Profession Balance forum, nobody wants to discuss a Necro or Warrior with this Feline Grace trait here.

NinjaEd.3946:

Anyone see the list for the American qualifiers for this upcoming tournament?

See anything strange?

(pulled off front page; https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/citizens-of-tyria-meet-your-champions/)

Representing North America: The Abjured

Heavily favored to take the North American Invitational Qualifier, the Abjured showed up on Sunday in full force, taking the final series against the The Uncivilized Rough Boys in a 3-0 sweep. Can the Abjured help bring the first international tournament win back for North America, or will Europe take their third consecutive event?
•Phantaram – Elementalist – United States
•Ostrich Eggs – Engineer – United States
•Magic Toker – Thief – United States
•Wakkey – Elementalist – United States
•Five Gauge – Engineer – Canada

unlucky.9285:

lol… gave up on necro till they actually give it sustain >.<

Having a top tier Necro on our team would greatly improve our skirmishing battle strength over a 2nd Engineer. Clearly some are reading into the comp too much to support opinions on balance, too. That’s a dangerous path. Something to note is that all 5 of us are playing our mains and tend not be at our peak when multi-classing, except Wakkey’s Warrior.

The Game Slayer.7632:

Prysin.8542:

Alienmuppet.1942:

To all those crying nerf; I tend to think if you think something should be nerfed, try playing it yourself for a few days and then see if you think the same. I’m not saying there isn’t a case for it, I just think often people cry nerf because they often lose against players that have developed more skill – and to succeed at all with ele you do need to have developed some good reflexes and timing.

One might try to defend the ele by pointing to it’s light armor, but the near 100% uptime of protect make such a argument weak as said protection is worth CLOSE to 2750 armor (through calculations done a long time ago, 2750 is roughly 30% reduced damage to a medium armor class). Meaning that in reality the ele is boasting nearly 5k armor on a near “permanent” basis. In comparison, that is 650 more armor then a heavy armor class can achieve even if using full ascended gear, food and stacks in WvW.
That say’s A LOT.

I don’t think you understand how armor or protection works at all. Nor how long eles get protection for.

Saying eles get near 100% uptime on protection is like saying necros have near 100% uptime on deathshroud.

Stop lying, and stop over exaggerating.

Uhh. My man, you should research more into the optimal defensive attunement rotation for the D/D elementalist. Earth Attunement itself is 6.5s protection buff by itself, when used on a 10s cooldown. Add Elemental shielding to the mix, which gives 4s of protection on Shocking, Frost, and Fire Aura (earth 3 leap through fire field), protection can be put up pretty much indefinitely. Throw in Armor of Earth on top.

The reasoning why players may falsely claim Ele has infinite protection is because if the Ele wants to blow through his cooldowns, he can re-apply prot way faster than anything can remove it. I’m not saying it makes sense for any Ele to prioritize the protection boon this much, but, an example:

For example like…. (Leap through Fire field = 4s prot, Earth Swap = 6.5s prot, Armor of Earth = 8s prot, Shocking Aura = 4s prot, Frost Aura, 4s prot.

So, explain why you think I am exaggerating and or/ lying? If you can spare 1 Aura to supplement your Earth Attunement every time, that’s pretty much full protection uptime.

Archaon.9524:

Both air+fire AND celestial+might stacking are problems…they’re the 2 faces of the same medal, double proc counters reterded condition bunker meta so just nerf both and we should be fine. Only removing double on crit procs (Even on autos) would just make celestial spam even stronger…every nerf on sustained dmg is actually a buff for bunkers…so you need to tone both of them down or this is gonna be even worse

So sigil critting berserkers, sigil swapping celestial bruisers and bunkers who benefit from damage nerfs need nerfs.

For such a juggling act, I really don’t get the vibe that all these things can be implemented at once, which is the fair thing.

St Nap Yppah.1752:

Chaith.8256:

Rampage is better than Elixir X, even with the cooldown difference. As an Engi, I’d trade any day, but I believe both of them need some polish.

Your comments as an engineer are so useful in a warrior forum discussing a warrior skill.

Rampage is a useless skill and a reduced cool down will not help it. The skill needs to be totally reworked, not just tweak some of the attributes of it as they have done. It also needs to feel like it has smooth play not some trash chucking handicap giant.

Lmao. Don’t get so annoyed because someone maining a profession posts in another class forum.

At least rampage is consistent in what you get, and has synergy with distracting strikes. More redeeming things than Elixir X. But apparently you like to ignore half of what people say, because I’ll repeat.. they both need a lot of polish. They’re bad. I agree with you.

For reals, man. My Charzooka should be at least 2000 range with that barrel it has. When I see someone with a popgun, it’s so tiny and annoying I think that the player using it has to be such a weiner – the range on it should be like 200.

The Gates Assassin.9827:

tanztante.6532:

The Gates Assassin.9827:

Sizer.5632:

Great idea, except for the fact that it wouldnt do a thing to classes not based on autos. So basically all those thieves running fire/air sigils would move to doing it on s/f eles.

+1 to this problem needing to be addressed
-1 to this particular idea

S/F ele is straight up stupid and OP vs anything that’s berserker. The build itself needs to die. Unless there’s some other build with this complete lack of counterplay, I think this holds up for every other build in the game.

srsly, what are u even talking about? sf ele is a 1shot enemy for mesmer/teef combo, even for teef alone. it’s all about the pentiums baby

What crap S/F Eles are you talking about? Any good SF ele knows how to burst a thief. Most of your health can be gone in one shot with no animations. Berserker classes can’t survive on luck vs classes with no counterplay, especially when blind isn’t a viable option to reduce damage. Maybe S/D can handle it better, but even top rank players have said “I run S/F ele because the only way to beat something with as little counterplay as a S/D thief is with something with even less counterplay”. Not to mention mist form + obsidian flesh + lightning flash is a great way to survive against mesmer thief combo.

Yeah, playing with The Abjured for a few weeks, I can tell you that within the team, the majority opinion on S/F Berserker Eles are that they are not able to hold up in high tier. Ostricheggs was really wanting to use his S/F Ele which he has tons of experience on, but it was not optimal in actual practice.

The strongest argument against them is the fact that while Obsidian Flesh is a very strong cooldown, they can’t survive the onslaught that is rotating through continuous fights in the conquest gametype.

They essentially fall off too fast when their big cooldowns are done – they are an extremely huge liability in the face of being hunted by a D/P Thief or even consistent sustained damage.

See, the counterplay to S/F Ele is massive. It just doesn’t lie in dodging their Air Swaps, which admittedly makes them a bit of an outlier, rather it lies in popping them like a pimple.

I think D/D Celestial is harder to counter. Phanta beats Engies using crate consistently, has huge 1v2 delaying power. Countering a D/D Ele on a micro level is easier than a S/F Ele, but if you look at the big picture, S/F Ele is easily shut down and prevented from wreaking havoc on your team.

Amstel Steel.2058:

In the end it really just looks like a loophole that was worked around instead of fully integrated as it is not even listed as a working mechanic on the wiki page.

Just because we agree it’s a loophole, that’s reason enough for it to go away. Aftercasts are put in the game for a reason, circumventing them could hardly be officially condoned by Anet.

It’s a flaw in the system that can be used to bypass the intent of the aftercast rules. Maybe a 5% buff to the skills that no longer can have their aftercasts bypassed, if Anet is feeling charitable, but it seems like an obvious thing to tighten up on.

Amstel Steel.2058:

Would it be better to have more consistency with a bindable cancel action key with clear intentions across a clear set of skills instead of the workarounds for certain situations in using the stow weapon and esc keys we now have?

I would be very surprised. There aren’t very many skills in which you can avoid the aftercast to be balanced across all weapon kits, and justify making this an intended feature.

shimmerlessEU.6841:

A lot of players (cough Chaith cough) who would’ve rightly kittened and moaned for the good of the game two years ago have given up and warped themselves into thinking things like this are normal. Hell they’ve added more AoE if anything (Thief dagger autos lulz).

Keep fighting the good fight, you stallion

I honestly think that players adapted and stopped trying to revive through Grenades, Wells, Hammer Trains, Lich spam, and so on.

Players felt that way strongly before, but I’m not so sure that remains to be the overwhelming consensus.

Aberrant.6749:

Chaith.8256:

Booms.2594:

chaith why are you even talking when you play the 2nd most broken spec in the game? and btw the first most broken spec also uses neither air nor fire sigils. like seriously I’m trying to understand why youre complaining about it but i really dont know.

You seem to never get tired of making bad points. I’m posting because I wasn’t going to let that “use stone heart” gem pass by. It’s got nothing to do with the fact that my builds are perceived as broken or not. Also if you read, you’d know I don’t complain once about fire/air. I think in light of incendiary powder, nightmare runes, etc, fire/air raise zerker builds so there is a similar component of damage that can’t simply be dodge rolled.

IP was put in there to make up for the rubbish aa damage and can be cleansed. Nightmare runes fear you can stunbreak out of. Fire/air not so similar other than it’s RNG.

I don’t personally have much of a problem with fire/air, but I can understand why others don’t like it since it can be so much of a random immediate burst.

Indeed, there’s the option to counter with condition cleansing and stunbreaks.

My point, however, was that it’s not able to be evaded. And it does significant pressure , or blows significant defensive cooldowns over time. But we’re on the same page.. mostly. I don’t have a problem with Air/Fire, but that’s only because in the cross-profession arms race, it’s only fair that zerkers have that baseline pressure, same as condition users.

Rampage is better than Elixir X, even with the cooldown difference. As an Engi, I’d trade any day, but I believe both of them need some polish.

Booms.2594:

chaith why are you even talking when you play the 2nd most broken spec in the game? and btw the first most broken spec also uses neither air nor fire sigils. like seriously I’m trying to understand why youre complaining about it but i really dont know.

You seem to never get tired of making bad points. I’m posting because I wasn’t going to let that “use stone heart” gem pass by. It’s got nothing to do with the fact that my builds are perceived as broken or not. Also if you read, you’d know I don’t complain once about fire/air. I think in light of incendiary powder, nightmare runes, etc, fire/air raise zerker builds so there is a similar component of damage that can’t simply be dodge rolled.

BlackBeard.2873:

I also get annoyed by things like stow-weapon on abilities making them much stronger than they should. The biggest offenders are ele lightning whip and memser GS auto. Perhaps just move the SoR proc (for ele) to the end of the LW skill, and remove the mesmer after-cast and spread the damage out over the whole duration.

Stow weapon to increase raw dps and sustain churns my stomach as well. I am really put off by the idea of having to do that to maximize your competitiveness.

Booms.2594:

not the zerker’s fault that youre specced for killing condis

Lmfao

Not being specced into Stone Heart is part of being specced into something that can actually function in PvP. The meta builds do quite better against zerkers, I can assure you.

That’s like telling a Mesmer to l2P and use all the condi removal traits if they are depressed about dying to conditions. Useless.

Weakness is pretty hard to come by, and can get removed. It’s definitely not a matter of being built to kill condition builds instead of zerker builds.

This is actually hilarious watching people try to act like there’s abundant counters to Fire & Air sigils. I’m not even strongly against them, because I don’t think a moderate level of unavoidable damage is bad for the game. But don’t act like they’re shut down by someone bringing a troll build with a ton of weakness, or Stone Heart Eles, lmfao.

Firebird.8324:

I would suggest the in game mechanic that pretty much destroys it. Take the fact that these procs occur “on crit”, that means if you apply weakness or go into earth on ele and take the “no crit” trait or otherwise spec to make it hard for the enemy to crit you would be much better off than making baseless arguments on the forum.

That’s the worst advice I’ve ever heard.

Of course people with weakness will attempt to keep it on as much as possible. Most can’t. Use Stone Heart grandmaster on Elementalist? Okay, solid advice, the probability of that ever happening is a steady 0%.

Black Box.9312:

Chaith.8256:

Bhawb.7408:

Power creep is bad. If one single field out of every single one is obviously far stronger than all the rest, it should be nerfed. The game has had enough power creep already.

Power creep is the gradual unbalancing of a game due to successive releases of new content.

Fire Fields, the same since 2012.

Power creep is actually when balancing is centered exclusively on the strongest abilities. When everything else is constantly buffed to match the current strongest, it eventually becomes a game of number inflation.

So yes, buffing everything around fire fields would most certainly contribute toward power creep.

You can literally copy paste something from a wiki and not please some people with your definition sometimes. (Which is what just happened.)

coglin.1867:

So how many of the top PvP players use fire field on the engineer? Got a link to one of these OP might stacking engineer builds?

They only thing they typically use is sigil+ runes. The reason they are so tough is they have great ranged damage, invulnerability to get out of bad spots, and lots and lots of CC and blocks. In my opinion, it seems that most of you do not even seem to actually know why you dies to certain professions.

Here is the play that actually is “meta”

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IsX2frBkYfw

This is what engies are and have been doing for a while, how is might a problem with these builds??

Really though. Better link every blast finisher in the game that Engineer has, and compare with other classes. D’oy.

Bhawb.7408:

Chaith.8256:

Power creep is the gradual unbalancing of a game due to successive releases of new content.

Fire Fields, the same since 2012.

And increasing the power of every field to match the obviously too strong fire fields contributes to power creep.

Yeah, I dunno if you’re just using my post as reference, but I am not supporting that a bunch of other fields get buffed.