Guild Wars 2

Personally, I’d like stealth on Toss Elixir S.

Oidmetala.8426:

press f2 button like always and get the
pet skills on weapon skillbar

press f2 again to get weapon skills back.

its same like engi or ele then.
easy to play for each pve noob too.

and at least give a option to enable/disable pet self skill use
if u dont whant do them by urself.

for sure for self pet skill use the skills have to come instant when i press the button.

I like this idea. Press F2 to get your pet’s skills on your bar and then click the skill you want to activate then Switch back to weapons by either clicking weapon swap or F2 again. Me likey.

Lordrosicky.5813:

Anthrage.2519:

snip

You don’t give any evidence to support your claim to speak for “every ranger”. So a little bit of the pot calling the kettle black here.

1, The devs will have 100 times the data on what players prefer than your meaningless, unscientific and individual experiences.

2, They must know that some people hate keyboard and button management, I know I HATE it and that is why I would never touch ranger again if they added these skills.

Did you not read his full post? He clearly states that the things he suggests (we suggest) can be made optional.

Conan.8046:

ellesee.8297:

this thread is literally a giant congregation of whiners. if you don’t like the class, switch. if you don’t know how to play, learn. if your build doesn’t do damage, read the previous sentence and then google a new one.

if you don’t think engineer does good damage in dungeons, check out that thread where the guy spams 8.5k bomb auto attacks. then hang your head in shame, copy his build and quit posting here.

anyone who compares engis to ele needs to shut up. “Wah! Wah! Only Elementalists don’t need to waste all their utilities to do so.” last time i checked, the cooldown on attunement swapping is 9 times longer fully traited than kit swapping. furthermore eles and engis have different playstyles. no ele will come close to matching the dps of an engi, but they have huge partywide buffs and constant self heals.

a comment for a different forum, but to the guy who says mace/hammer damage is comparable to axe/gs warrior, lol. please stop.

comparing traits from different classes is idiotic. the reason why dogged march is an adept trait is because engineers don’t have the problem of being kited forever and ever and ever. but since it’s apparently the cool thing to do, check out dhuumfire, a grandmaster trait that’s worse than incendiary powder, an adept trait. funny how nobody mentions that. oh no engineer traits must be op then!!11

the only agreeable topic that that has any substance in this thread is that a full turret build is worthless. but you know that we’re not unique in this issue right? ever see a full spirit weapon guardian? how about a full glyph elementalist? some builds are just better than others. get over it. yes i agree turrets need to be worked on, but that can be discussed elsewhere instead of a cry thread that no dev will ever pay attention to.

Typical from a PVE player. 8.5k auto attacks with bombs….maybe with stupid buffs or something but in pvp…not gonna happen. If it did you would get hit with the nerf bat so hard you wouldn’t know what day it was.

In PvP it’s 2k crits. And for PvP it’s pretty good for an AoE auto-attack. Also this thread never said whether it was talking solely about PvE or PvP so his argument is quite valid.

VIVorcha.7853:

digiowl.9620:

In essence, the engineer has a workload akin to elementalists to maintain DPS. This by swapping between 3 kits and a weapon set to cherry pick skills from each.

Bingo.

Only Elementalists don’t need to waste all their utilities to do so.

And other classes can achieve greater DPS than us without working anywhere near as hard as we do.

That’s a flawed design if I ever saw one.

Elementalists are the jack of all trades, we’re the jack of no trades.

It seems like someone hasn’t seen the Ele forums yet.

If you want to play a class that can just prance around nuking everything, there’s your Warrior, there’s your Thief. As for me, I enjoy being creative and bursting things down with my many buttons.

Writetyper.1985:

Longbow 5 is a fair complaint – the only thing to differentiate it is the projectile – and I say this as a core warrior longbow user, but the longbow burst skill spends like 2 seconds travelling through the air and doesn’t do any damage on first contact anyway (short delay before it does).

The problem for me is, I can’t stop it from being cast in the first place. I would like to be able to stop the cast entirely. Most of the burst skills on the Warrior can be interrupted but this one, that provides a good advantage when fighting on a point, can’t easily be interrupted? I find that inconsistent.

Lately people have been having a go at the Necro, mainly because there are not enough differentiations between animations for the class. Right now I’m going to bring up a few gripes I have with other classes and some of their animations as well

I can’t tell the difference between Longbow 5 and the auto-attack on the Warrior until the skill actually fires. The auto-attack’s projects 2 arrows whilst the LB5’s pindown doesn’t. But waiting to see the arrow flying will already be too late to dodge it because the projectile for LB5 flies so fast. Finally, the Longbow burst skill seemingly has no cast time. For both skills, I feel they should be given longer cast times due to their powerful effects. It’s the difference between spamming dodge, knowing when to dodge and interrupting.

Mantra of Distraction. The problem I have with this skill is not that it has no cast time, it’s more that it has no sign that it has or is being used. The other mantras have effects attached to them but this Mantra doesn’t. No one knows what just happened unless you look at the Mesmer’s health bar to find out how much MoD he has left.

showatt.9413:

If we were to receive this change, it is very likely we will have reduced damage on our pet as being able to maul three times (4 stack of bleed each maul) with 2 feline is just downright overpowered. You can keep bringing up gw1 as a template, but the dev already stated numerous time they weren’t trying to create a gw1 remake and the notion of ‘because gw1 did this so we should’ is tedious as it is.

The thing about that is, I can already do that. I can even make their auto attacks bleed on crit keeping up 18 stacks consistently.

All I’m asking for (and I’m guessing the rest of the guys here are asking for the same thing) is that they should make it less automated.

Daishi.6027:

Another of A-nets legendary quotes.

I don’t really mind, personally but I really gotta ask? Why?

Clearly there are development issues since what is thought about at the table is not always what is then the end result when released, however every decision and every result has a reason and a why. I know a lot of people have sore feeling regarding what is said, and feel like they are being overly pandered to. But looking past that, would it really be a terrible idea to tell us what is being considered? Then if it changes just give us the reason why? Surely if it’s rational I don’t think anyone can realistically be mad about it?

Or is it that the process from being conceived is so big that saying anything would be redundant since it changes so often?

You might be a reasonable guy but have you seen some of the other people in this forum?

Durzlla.6295:

waka.9826:

showatt.9413:

waka.9826:

showatt.9413:

Atherakhia.4086:

Just change F1 to allow the pet to attack and recall.
Make it so F2 skills actually worked when requested.
Make F3 the secondary skill for each pet and allow players to set it to auto-cast so if ANet is serious about this somehow being too complicated, players can leave it on auto cast and nothing would change.

i agree f2 skill needs to work when requested.
Allowing players to determine when to cast the 2ndary skill of pets is just asking for ranger buff. And the ability to autocast it sounds pretty OP if you wanna know the truth.

Asking to be able to use our own skills is asking for a buff? Okay then engineer kits should be RNG as well, from now on you cannot choose which 1-5 skill you can use in kits, the game will choose for you. Fair play right.

Engineer isn’t using an AI pet. You’re asking the ability to decide when your pet should deal a secondary damage (with effect), in addition to the f2 skill, while essentially keeping the pet’s ability to deal damage on their own. Not to mention you have two pets to switch between.

Surely you can see this is very different to weapon kit?

You honestly think this is going to create balance issues for rangers? Oh please lol.

Yes, it WOULD be a huge balance issue, we could then get off triple blast finishers, have very on demand CC (all of which is hard CC) be able to bring 2 on demand AoE 3.5k heals, AoE 3s KD, etc etc. it’d be absolutely broken and the pet skills would have to be nerfed TO THE GROUND, and I’d MUCH rather have little control over it rather than have it nerfed…

First off, your 3sec knockdown has a 3 second castime (if not 2) and is easily avoided by strafing, your 3.5K heals those will definitely be nerfed for sure but everything else? Everything else seems fine. Triple blast finishers isn’t anything really. Engineers can do 6 or more in a row.

I could already do a 4 second KD (sometimes I make it 5 with my pig or 7s CC with a KD into a fear with the wolf then swap to pig) without direct control of the pet, having to not play Ai tricks and actually get a use out of MOMENT OF CLARITY would actually be a nice change of pace.

Dardamaniac.1295:

Dirame.8521:

Dardamaniac.1295:

Dirame.8521:

Darnis.4056:

jcbroe.4329:

Mammoth.1975:

One problem is that it would be much too easy to chain CC. You can do it now, but you have to know how to get your puppy into position to leap. Make it a button press and GG everyone can do it.

Because warriors, necros, and guardians have such a hard time chaining any CC they have….

Those classes can’t do it while CC’d themselves though; but ranger has a pet that can CC WHILE cc’d, the only exception being necro elite pet; which if you take out your elite to do AND your pet cc goes on a 45 second cooldown I’d be okay with.

Just like a Mesmer Phantasm can do damage whilst the Mesmer is CCed? Or a Necro could blow up his minions? or a Guardian can knock you down with his Spirit Hammer (activated skill which is instant cast)?

And really, isn’t that exactly why a Ranger has a pet? To support them when they are being pummeled? The only thing that changes when the skill is put into the players hands is the timing of when the skill is applied, it’s no longer guess work, it’s now planned. Isn’t that a good thing?

Just wrong

How?

I main Ranger in pvp and its not fun to put autopilot and spam 11111111…Rangers are too passive,its not just about the Pet control.Its everything,we dont have combos,we dont have Power builds…Traps were fine at some point,but then came BM…….I heal,dodge AI does everything for me…Now Spirits………You probably dont know that most Rangers hate this Spirit build,the most Spirit Rangers you see are not main,are disapointed Ele-Mesmers that want to play a easy build and win some matches

All my comments in this thread support what you are saying right now. Put more control into the player’s hands. Let them decide how passive or active they want to be.

However, the problem I see with the ideas I’ve suggested about putting pet skills on your utility bar is the fact that Rangers have two pets. How is Anet going to allow you to swap pets and swap utility skills at the same time? Especially when the F1 was probably built to fix that problem.

I guess this is where having a generic skill that allows you to do a particular thing with a pet, regardless of which pet, would be better suited.

Dardamaniac.1295:

Dirame.8521:

Darnis.4056:

jcbroe.4329:

Mammoth.1975:

One problem is that it would be much too easy to chain CC. You can do it now, but you have to know how to get your puppy into position to leap. Make it a button press and GG everyone can do it.

Because warriors, necros, and guardians have such a hard time chaining any CC they have….

Those classes can’t do it while CC’d themselves though; but ranger has a pet that can CC WHILE cc’d, the only exception being necro elite pet; which if you take out your elite to do AND your pet cc goes on a 45 second cooldown I’d be okay with.

Just like a Mesmer Phantasm can do damage whilst the Mesmer is CCed? Or a Necro could blow up his minions? or a Guardian can knock you down with his Spirit Hammer (activated skill which is instant cast)?

And really, isn’t that exactly why a Ranger has a pet? To support them when they are being pummeled? The only thing that changes when the skill is put into the players hands is the timing of when the skill is applied, it’s no longer guess work, it’s now planned. Isn’t that a good thing?

Just wrong

How?

Mammoth.1975:

jcbroe.4329:

Mammoth.1975:

One problem is that it would be much too easy to chain CC. You can do it now, but you have to know how to get your puppy into position to leap. Make it a button press and GG everyone can do it.

Because warriors, necros, and guardians have such a hard time chaining any CC they have….

Sure, but leap>fear>leap>stun isn’t supposed to be in the ranger toolbox, and it’s actually more consecutive CC than anything except a warrior can do. Canines could potentially need a nerf.

How is this not supposed to be in the Ranger toolbox when it is already in the Ranger toolbox?

Yes people can already persuade their pets to do that exact combo but wouldn’t giving them a sure fire way of doing it actually be a nice gesture? And even make it more predictable at that?

Darnis.4056:

jcbroe.4329:

Mammoth.1975:

One problem is that it would be much too easy to chain CC. You can do it now, but you have to know how to get your puppy into position to leap. Make it a button press and GG everyone can do it.

Because warriors, necros, and guardians have such a hard time chaining any CC they have….

Those classes can’t do it while CC’d themselves though; but ranger has a pet that can CC WHILE cc’d, the only exception being necro elite pet; which if you take out your elite to do AND your pet cc goes on a 45 second cooldown I’d be okay with.

Just like a Mesmer Phantasm can do damage whilst the Mesmer is CCed? Or a Necro could blow up his minions? or a Guardian can knock you down with his Spirit Hammer (activated skill which is instant cast)?

And really, isn’t that exactly why a Ranger has a pet? To support them when they are being pummeled? The only thing that changes when the skill is put into the players hands is the timing of when the skill is applied, it’s no longer guess work, it’s now planned. Isn’t that a good thing?

VIVorcha.7853:

Dirame.8521:

VIVorcha.7853:

Ha, you’re seriously claiming Engineers are one of the best DPS classes? And WITHOUT might stacking?

Yeah, that’s just… no.

Who said anything about best? SD doesn’t might stack but can still burst people from 100% to 0, The Bobomber build doesn’t use might-stacking and I can burst people from 100 to 0.

Tattoohead did. Reading threads is a wonderful thing.

First off, no need to be condescending. Second off, you didn’t clearly reply to anyone.

Conan.8046:

Dirame.8521:

VIVorcha.7853:

Ha, you’re seriously claiming Engineers are one of the best DPS classes? And WITHOUT might stacking?

Yeah, that’s just… no.

Who said anything about best? SD doesn’t might stack but can still burst people from 100% to 0, The Bobomber build doesn’t use might-stacking and I can burst people from 100 to 0.

Good DPS and Good burst are not the same.

SD fills both those slots quite nicely. It has great damage per second because it very short window between static discharges.

Vena.8436:

Dirame.8521:

GW1 gave you full control of your pet at the cost of one (or more) of your skill slots being used as a pet skill slot. Why can’t it be done here.

1.) They were useless in anything short of B/P (which was PvE) or IWAY (which was W/R not R/X).
2.) The control you were slotted came at the cost of your utility, which in this case, adding MORE buttons, completely circumvents. You give them more control without taking anything away. Therein, the developer is perfectly correct that adding more buttons does harm rather than good.
3.) In GW1 the actual control over the pet AI (sans abilities) is identical now as then: attack, defend, sit.

If you want, to say, add in utility skills which let you fire off #2, that’s a different matter entirely. Just adding more buttons would simply imbalance the class and just plain nerfing the ranger to counteract it would make anything but Beastmaster strictly inferior.

I’m not for adding more buttons (I know I didn’t clearly state that). I would rather have the option of putting one of their skills on my utility bar so I have a better sense of what the pet is going to do next.

sorrow.2364:

Necromancer, hands down.
None of them has a real use, except for Last Gasp.

I don’t know what you on about but I love Gluttony, Target the weak, Barbed Precision, Furious Demise, and Protection of the Horde. You won’t miss them until they are gone.

In PvE, Parasitic Bond really good as well.

showatt.9413:

Dirame.8521:

showatt.9413:

Dirame.8521:

It was an 8 slot skill bar. We had fewer skills but freeform selection.

In that case it’s most probably a technical issue than a game design one.

I really don’t understand such a technical limitation. What would be limiting them to not do something like that? Especially when the pets themselves have special skills that they use when they feel like it.

The fact that this little change is fairly insignificant, and the effort to make this change outweigh the benefit by tenfold certainly doesn’t help.

Thank you for sharing your knowledge but as a person who loves this game I would not call improving the connection between the player and the game “fairly insignificant”.

When I first tried the Ranger, everything I did with the class felt automatic (and not the good kind). There was a major disconnect between me and the game and I absolutely loathed ranged weapons because of this. I literally had to stumble upon the “stowing/swapping trick” in order to get a better sense of when my pet will use it’s signature ability (not the ones you can activate but the other skills like the Canine knockdown or the Moa heal) so I could better control it.

Changing the system to make you take control of the actions of the pet (quite similarly to what is being done now with Ranger signets in GW2) would make me feel more in control of the action. This change may not be as important as introducing better rewards for PvP but it is definitely not insignificant and will ultimately make the Ranger a lot more involved when playing it.

showatt.9413:

Dirame.8521:

It was an 8 slot skill bar. We had fewer skills but freeform selection.

In that case it’s most probably a technical issue than a game design one.

I really don’t understand such a technical limitation. What would be limiting them to not do something like that? Especially when the pets themselves have special skills that they use when they feel like it.

showatt.9413:

Wombat.3510:

I think they should nerf ranger weapon damage by 50% and give them more pet control.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TAryFIuRxmQ

Dirame.8521:

NevirSayDie.6235:

showatt.9413:

you do realize if you give ranger more control of their pet is just gonna make them OP right? You’re asking the ability to control when your pet blow their secondary skills. Does that mean I get to decide when my fern hound is going to heal me as well as knock people down? That my lynx will be able to maul the enemy twice?

This is likely the reason. If they did give rangers more control over pets, it would change balance no differently than a straight up buff.

They could add more control while simultaneously nerfing rangers in some other area again, but the entire ranger subforum is filled with hate posts every time nerfs happen.

GW1 gave you full control of your pet at the cost of one (or more) of your skill slots being used as a pet skill slot. Why can’t it be done here?

Different framework + modified engine. Having not played gw1 I assume you have more skills to use, and having one of your skills replaced by a pet skill slot isn’t as problematic as it would have been in gw2?

Coming from a game design background a lot of decisions dev made are based on technical reasons. Not all, of course, but a lot.

It was an 8 slot skill bar. We had fewer skill slots but freeform selection.

NevirSayDie.6235:

showatt.9413:

you do realize if you give ranger more control of their pet is just gonna make them OP right? You’re asking the ability to control when your pet blow their secondary skills. Does that mean I get to decide when my fern hound is going to heal me as well as knock people down? That my lynx will be able to maul the enemy twice?

This is likely the reason. If they did give rangers more control over pets, it would change balance no differently than a straight up buff.

They could add more control while simultaneously nerfing rangers in some other area again, but the entire ranger subforum is filled with hate posts every time nerfs happen.

GW1 gave you full control of your pet at the cost of one (or more) of your skill slots being used as a pet skill slot. Why can’t it be done here?

Personally, I think Anet should replace the shouts with skills that directly influence your pet’s next attack. Like a skill called Pounce would make the next attack knockdown the target, a skill called Maul will make the next attack bleed the target or a skill called Snarl will make the pet fear targets away.

The pets could still have some of their signature moves but, direct control just puts the skill more in the player’s hands.

EDIT: OR instead of all that jazz I just mentioned, make pet selection part of skill selection. Basically, if you select a pet, some of the available skills you have for your utility bar will include skills they use. So if you have a Moa, you can put his heal on your bar or if you have a Canine, you can put his knockdown on your bar. These would replace shouts of course.

VIVorcha.7853:

Ha, you’re seriously claiming Engineers are one of the best DPS classes? And WITHOUT might stacking?

Yeah, that’s just… no.

Who said anything about best? SD doesn’t might stack but can still burst people from 100% to 0, The Bobomber build doesn’t use might-stacking and I can burst people from 100 to 0.

VIVorcha.7853:

Consider the fact that Engineers need to might stack to achieve the DPS that other classes can get without might stacking. I think that’s a pretty serious flaw.

And the fact that certain skills are totally useless without traits is also a flaw (IE Toss Elixir B )

I might-stack so I can surpass my average damage not to reach someone else’s. Maybe for Power builds we probably need to might stack but, it’s isn’t really that necessary because we have enough skills and tricks that make our damage quite formidable without might-stacking.

One thing I noticed about this game is that, multiple sources of damage is better than depending on one skill to do all your damage. So something like Static discharge that depends on multiple skills is better than depending on Eviscerate which just a single skill. This is because for multiple skills, your average damage is always going to be greater and your chance of hitting also greater than that of a single attack skill. And if there’s anything an engineer is good at, it’s creating multiple sources of outgoing damage.

Funny, I play my Engineer because I know I can take those hammers. Maybe not those fears but I can definitely take those hammers.

MonMalthias.4763:

@Dirame:
Best Burst healer in the game still probably goes to Elementalist, yeah, as digiowl has mentioned.

A full Water attunement combo with 15+ Water in Scepter/Dagger or Dagger/Dagger is around 6-7k plus depending on how much Healing Power you have. Evasive Arcana, Cleansing Wave and Heal on Water Attunement also scale 1:1 with Healing Power; on shorter overall cooldowns – and this is without using the 6 skill on top of that.

Blasting a Water field will always be constrained by the base value of 1320 and 0.2 scaling; whereas this scaling limitation is bypassed by the Elementalists’s 1:1 ratios.

Nope, I already spent time calculating this. If I wanted to specc as a support Engie, I only need Healing turret, 3 blast finishers, Rune of Water, and an elixir gun to beat the Ele.

With PvP stats;
Mine gadget (or BoB), Healing turret detonate, Acid Bomb = 4791
Super Elixir = 1255 impact heal (not counting regen ticks)
Healing turret AoE heal = 3214
Rune of Water AoE heal = 1384
= 10644

Whilst a Scepter dagger Ele in PvP can only do 8K excluding regen ticks

And all of those are on a 20-30 second CD.

If we were talking mobile heals, the Ele would win because the only thing the Engie can do effectively whilst the team is moving is Healing turret and Super Elixir and that would come to about 7.4K in PvP.

The idea behind torment is it forces you to put yourself in a bad position for your enemy. If you stop, you die (because you’re easier to hit), if you move you die (because torment kills you).

Regardless, the change you suggest would be great for Thieves and maybe Condi Warriors and very little for Necros due to the fact that the immob doesn’t last very long. Also, in high tier games, people rarely ever stand still unless they are on a ledge far away from melee range.

Personally, I want templates and balance..

Leuca.5732:

Dirame.8521:

First off, the skills used do a lot of damage on their own. The combination of all those 4 things makes the combo a very potent one. If people got used to seeing it, yes they will instantly know how to counter it but if you make them waste all that stuff before you try to land such a combo, it’s just glorious.

Sure you need 4 skills but it was a fun combo for me to land.

They don’t individually do a lot of damage sans CE, meaning if they “waste” stuff to avoid CE and succesfully do so, you didn’t really gain anything because unless you went from Fire into Earth, you’ve wasted 3 finishers, two of which actually contribute better to fast spikes than the slow one you’re trying to pull off. Again, burning your Grandmaster trait slot for nothing but some extra immobilize is not even close to being optimal.

CE’s cast time will forever make it somewhat useless unless they make the damage OP or turn it into a channeled effect skill.

If you don’t feel it’s ‘optimal’ that’s up to you. The other two skills are on a short cooldown so I can easily use them again after a few seconds so for me it’s just an additional way to burst not “the only way” as you guys seem to be alluding to.

Also the Arcanes definitely do a lot of damage, else they wouldn’t be used in several burst builds.

VIVorcha.7853:

Also, think about PVE content: Is there a single role that an Engineer can fill that another class can’t fill better?

The answer: no.

Support. Best Burst Healers in the game. Best Vulnerability stackers in the game.

VIVorcha.7853:

Engineers are good at stacking might on themselves, but not so great at doing it for a group. Stacking might on yourself is not inherently useful unless the result is that you can out-DPS other classes.

Not good at might stacking for other people? I can get up to 18 stacks on my team when fighting on a point.

They have 3 ways of gaining stability. A trait that gives them stability when you try to CC them, Balanced stance and Rune of Lyssa.

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

Dirame.8521:

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

Dirame.8521:

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

BlackBeard.2873:

Yea, the skill-ceiling on the ele is VERY high. However, there is the whole risk vs reward thing. Even playing at the skill-ceiling you will be barely par with other classes played at the mid-level. You literally have to outplay your opponents just to keep up.

THIS.

Combine our very low health, low defense and poor damage then go against other classes and just see how easy they have it. High health, great defense and damage that makes ours look pathetic.

They dont even have to be good to beat a ele most of the time and THAT is the problem. We have a very high skill requirement just to be as good as at best a person bashing buttons on another class and Anet thinks this is okay…

Poor damage? I think we aren’t talking about the same class.

Yes. All the “damaging” skills such as Churning Earth can EASILY be avoided. If you want REAL damage you have to go full zerker and even then its still not going to be the same as other classes plus with the fact we have like 10.5k health without any vit buffs you dont kill them and unless they are full zerker then you wont you are pretty much dead.

Funny thing about Churning Earth, as a none Ele player, I figured out how to land it without using Lightning Flash.

I have to thank the Ele that used Scepter/Focus on me. He enlightened my gameplay quite a bit.

Magnetic Grasp, Churning Earth, Arcane skills (blast and Wave) + Elemental Surge = 5 second immob enough to land CE on a single player.

So you need 4 skills and 30 points into Arcane and take Elemental Surge to land ONE skill – you think that is okay? What about the classes with plenty of ways to avoid damage – Aegis, Invul and such?

First off, the skills used do a lot of damage on their own. The combination of all those 4 things makes the combo a very potent one. If people got used to seeing it, yes they will instantly know how to counter it but if you make them waste all that stuff before you try to land such a combo, it’s just glorious.

Sure you need 4 skills but it was a fun combo for me to land.

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

Dirame.8521:

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

BlackBeard.2873:

Yea, the skill-ceiling on the ele is VERY high. However, there is the whole risk vs reward thing. Even playing at the skill-ceiling you will be barely par with other classes played at the mid-level. You literally have to outplay your opponents just to keep up.

THIS.

Combine our very low health, low defense and poor damage then go against other classes and just see how easy they have it. High health, great defense and damage that makes ours look pathetic.

They dont even have to be good to beat a ele most of the time and THAT is the problem. We have a very high skill requirement just to be as good as at best a person bashing buttons on another class and Anet thinks this is okay…

Poor damage? I think we aren’t talking about the same class.

Yes. All the “damaging” skills such as Churning Earth can EASILY be avoided. If you want REAL damage you have to go full zerker and even then its still not going to be the same as other classes plus with the fact we have like 10.5k health without any vit buffs you dont kill them and unless they are full zerker then you wont you are pretty much dead.

Funny thing about Churning Earth, as a none Ele player, I figured out how to land it without using Lightning Flash.

I have to thank the Ele that used Scepter/Focus on me. He enlightened my gameplay quite a bit.

Magnetic Grasp, Churning Earth, Arcane skills (blast and Wave) + Elemental Surge = 5 second immob enough to land CE on a single player.

SilverUniverse.7103:

Dirame.8521:

I don’t play Ele

what am i supposed to say about this? no. seriously.

and btw, there are people who still use the 0/10/0/30/30. it’s not a ‘dead’ build, people are just exploring other builds and how viable they are. i have my own version for my staff ele for group support.

Excuse me for being a skeptic but I’ve seen the perception of Eles go from Eles are weak to Eles are Op tanks to Eles have OP burst to Eles are weak again. And one of those shifts was not caused by any dev interference.

Gorni.1764:

Dirame.8521:

With regards to long CDs for stacking might, I’ve got to ask, is Dragon’s tooth longer than 6 s recharge? Is Phoenix not 20 seconds? is Ring of Fire not 15s? And is Evasive Arcana not on a 10second CD? Yes, Earthquake is on a 45 second recharge but in less than the amount of time it takes for your initial 12 stacks of might to fade away, you can stack 6-9 more.

do you even play ele?
let’s assume you have 30P in arcana and hence 9s recharge rate on attunements. You do your rotation once then everything is on CD. You switch from earth to air and water then back to fire – dang! phoenix isn’t ready yet … well 3 stacks through dragons tooth at least – switch to eart – oh noes i got no energy for dodge left – no might for me – maybe next time – i will have all my CDs ready – switch to fire, lay ring of fire, get feared … no might for me again

I don’t play Ele but I’m taking the stance of devil’s advocate here. The reason I speak so confidently is because I’ve seen people do well with some the speccs that many of you consider bad and I also speak like this because at beginning of the game, this was the same talk that came from the community before someone figured out how to play Eles properly.

Gorni.1764:

Dirame.8521:

When you set up a burst on your own, sure it’s hard to land (that’s the same thing for every class) but have you ever tried teaming up with your teammates to land combos? Timing a Stun at the right time for Churning Earth to land is just glorious when doing it with your teammates. You guys believe that all skills should be made and built to be used in solo play but some skills are just amazing for group play and Churning Earth is one of them.

So in your opinion the ele should suck when played solo?

What? How does what I said equate to Ele should suck in solo play? The guy mentioned landing Churning Earth and I said setting up Churning Earth solo is quite difficult on your own so outside help is nice. If there’s anything to take away from what I said it would be; “We need more skills that focus on team coordination and it’s good that Churning Earth can’t easily be used solo in PvP”.

Gorni.1764:

Where are the elementalists in tPvP – what do you think is the reason that there are none?

The reason there are no Eles in PvP is because a group of top level teams decided because bunker Eles got nerfed they are not worth playing anymore and everyone else followed them. When in actual fact, that Ele build is still quite potent.

Example, there was a time when I was running two Necros in PvP with a group of friends and the other team were running two Eles. One burst and one bunker. They sent the bunker to our point to hold it uncapped. It took a while for us to kill this guy. In a team fight, Necros couldn’t even corrupt his stability because he had so many boons. They won that match.

But nope bunker Eles suck, let’s all play burst Eles because we can one-shot things YAY!

Gorni.1764:

Dirame.8521:

Ele is more of a CC oriented class

that made me giggle … especially because you compared it with warrior.

I never said Eles had more CC than Warriors. I just said they were quite CC oriented because frankly you need all sorts of CC to land your burst as an Ele.

SilverUniverse.7103:

Dirame.8521:

SilverUniverse.7103:

Dirame.8521:

So the fact that you guys can stack and insane amount of might in just a matter of seconds does not factor into your builds?

this is a rotation for 12 stacks
Dragon’s tooth—>ring of fire—>phoenix (in field)—>dodge roll (swap earth mid-roll)—>earthquake

this skill gives 12 stacks and heals
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Empower

Empower may be easier but it lasts for 10 seconds whilst Ele rotation lasts for 20s and I believe that is increased by boon duration.

And that doesn’t even answer my question.

ok then,

yes, might stacking is considered into a build, just like any other build on any other profession. but bear in mind that you’re running an obvious rotation that can easily be cancelled at any point, using your attack skills more for stacking might than attacking your enemy (because nobody is stupid enough to stand under dragon’s tooth AND wait for you to hit them with EA AND earthquake).

a single interrupt will stop you from might stacking, your main source of damage since you’re almost always built for survival and almost guaranteed to have a minimum of 30 points between water and arcane. even if you specced more for glass cannon, your attacks are so obvious that even if you didn’t die in a few seconds your target can waltz out of range before it hits them

on the other hand, a skill like empower can be thrown before you make contact or can be used without interruption with only 2 seconds of stability required. remember this is 12 stacks of might in 2 seconds and healing your party on a 20 second CD, with a shout on 30 seconds that stun breaks and gives stability if required. an ele has to go through a rotation in order to gain the same thing, putting skills on 6/15/20/10/45 seconds CD for the respective skills. your ele needs stability? 90 second CD. want to spec for the stability trait? do even lower damage.

the aggressive play style of the ele would be justified if it was high risk high reward, and it sort of is when you run glass cannon. but the reward is the same as other classes and you die a lot faster than anyone else.

you can feel proud of yourself knowing that you need to have so much more skill to do the same as others, but that’s like cutting your own legs off and trying to live a regular life, while shouting at others “get on my level”

I have a might stacking build for my Engie, it uses Flamethrower and Elixir Gun. I get about 18 to 20 stacks of might on the build and how I manage to complete my might stacking combo is by intermingling CC chains with blast finishers, allowing me to stack might without getting interrupted.

Updraft, Dragon’s tooth, Ring of Fire, Phoenix, Earthquake. And that’s not even mentioning the fact that Eles have easier access to stability than Engineers.

Gorni.1764:

the ele-rotation has a higher cooldown (standard attunenment CD is 15s) and also requires good timing, a specific build, a target for dragon’s tooth and energy + infight-state for dodge-roll … Guards stand there chanelling and also get an additional heal. It’s just ridiculous in comparison.
This pretty much sums up Anets idea of “balancing”

I personally feel that Attunement recharge shouldn’t be affected by traits and should have a lower standard cooldown (8 seconds) as this will take a lot off pressure people to put at least 20 points into Arcane.

With regards to long CDs for stacking might, I’ve got to ask, is Dragon’s tooth longer than 6 s recharge? Is Phoenix not 20 seconds? is Ring of Fire not 15s? And is Evasive Arcana not on a 10second CD? Yes, Earthquake is on a 45 second recharge but in less than the amount of time it takes for your initial 12 stacks of might to fade away, you can stack 6-9 more.

Dirame.8521:

Dirame.8521:

Poor damage? I think we aren’t talking about the same class.

The damage might not be poor but very hard to land and has high CDs. Like the op I consider myself as a quite experienced player. I almost only play ele since release and also hit lvl42 yesterday (98% of games with ele). But still about 70% of my Fire Grabs tend to miss – is it my fault, or not? You can laugh at any ele that starts chanelling churning earth in tPvP. You will be dead or CCed into oblivion before the chanel is half over – and using CDs to grant stability or Lightning flash just to try to land a spell that is easy to read and therefore easily dodged, blinded, blocked, etc. is just not worth it. Leaving these 3-4 burst-spells aside you don’t have anything you can do until their CDs are ready. Our sustained dmg is poor. You are busy to survive anyway once your spells are on CD. While other classes continue to spam their spells with CDs ranging from 6-12s (or no CD at all like thieves) which perfectly harmonizes with weapon-switch-CDs you have to struggle to survive.

Yesterday I played warrior PvP for the first time. I didn’t even really know the exact mechanics or CDs of the spells (only from duelling warriors) but I literally steamrolled over every elementalist and most other players I encountered. I just smashed my buttons perma-CCing them while eles were struggling with their (considered the best ele-burst-build) fresh-air-s/d build. I laughed at the dmg and never had to use any defensive CD – not even a dodge roll and the eles just dropped continuosly to zero health. (I mean … 7s CD on a 3s stun that crits for 4-5k wtf). I could even easily tank 2 people with berserker-amulett …

Until yesterday I had the exact same thoughts like the OP. I thought that maybe I am just a mediocre player, but suddenly totally owning with a class i never played before raised some doubts…

When you set up a burst on your own, sure it’s hard to land (that’s the same thing for every class) but have you ever tried teaming up with your teammates to land combos? Timing a Stun at the right time for Churning Earth to land is just glorious when doing it with your teammates. You guys believe that all skills should be made and built to be used in solo play but some skills are just amazing for group play and Churning Earth is one of them.

Warrior is now a bruiser class. They endure pressure and push forward. They will go down but it will take time. Ele is more of a CC oriented class with a minor in evasion and a major in active sustained healing. In order for an Ele to take down a Warrior, they will have to survive through their stability which can be from 10 – 20sec depend on how the Warrior is specced. If they can survive that, the Warrior becomes a lot easier to take down.

Daecollo.9578:

Dirame.8521:

Daecollo.9578:

Nerf Sigil of Paralization instead?

Why do we have to Crowd Control someone to deal damage where every other class does not?

Obviously Skull Crack is powerful, but its ST. Most of the complaints of it come from Asura which have a different animation then all the other races. Where if I use it on my Sylvari for example, its very easy to see because it has a unique animation.

If I use it on an Asura, it looks exactly like an auto-attack swing.

Every class has to crowd control in order to do damage or in order for the damage to stick. For Necros it’s the Fear chain, for Engies it’s the knockbacks, for Thieves it’s that nasty BasV.

Yeah.. whatever what skills are those?

I don’t know any thief skill that has a huge windup+animation.

Necro attacks all look the same.

Engineer grenades all look the same.

……..

redslion.9675:

To deal damage as an engi I never had to cc anyone.

As a warrior, without cc I have to be sure the enemy has a REALLY good reason to be in my reach, like staying on the point.

“In order for damage to stick”

Think about it this way; in any fight, you don’t want your opponent healing or else he just resets the damage you just did. This is where CC comes into play. The reason a Necro fear chains is because he doesn’t want you healing or cleansing (or attacking him) and that’s the same reason an Engie would do it.

I actually fought a condi Warrior who built around combining CC chains with condi pressure. When it worked, it worked really well.

Amineo.8951:

Not only guardians needs to be buffed, elementalists needs too, both have one ’’rival’’ class that does better than them, warrior tank better than guardians and necros applies conditions much more faster than an elementalist, they should adjust these 4 classes to make those more balanced and not as powerful as the others, as i said the vitality of guards is way too low, and the conditions of elementalists are far less effective than necros.

Elementalists are not supposed to be like Necros. Guardians would be 10 times harder to kill with more health. And warriors don’t have the same level of team support as Guardians do.

Classes don’t need to be the same to be on the same level.

Bash.7291:

Jericho.4521:

Where is all this guardian whining coming from all the sudden? Is it warrior envy or something?

Ive always had a few things I would like to see changed on guardian, but there is some really random QQ coming from this thread for some reason. Guardians are still in a pretty decent spot, I think the issue is that we don’t really fit into the current condition bunker meta too well. But honestly, I cant see this trend lasting too much longer, necros got toned down, spirit rangers got hit this last patch. The only thing making warriors OP is their passive signet, which I wouldn’t be suprised if it got toned down too.

I think people really need to calm down and realize we are at a good fairly balanced (but still needing some slight fixes cough cough zeal) spot, and that some of the condition builds need to be toned down some.

The passive Signet really isn’t a big deal. Poison and burning nullify that passive healing really easily. People complain about it because, in the down time that they are either not attacking or are being stunned, the Warrior is slowly ticking upwards.

Sarius.6983:

Posters here have pretty much hit the nail in the head with the current meta and guardian problems as of late.

In a nutshell, we do sacrifice a lot and in return we get subpar compared to other classes that are given defaults and exceed when focused on their build.

I just really really hope that if the devs are going to do something about it, they don’t just put a bandage, and so and don’t do anything else.

I do feel like the guardian does need a bit of a deeper pass , particularly on traits and their lopsidedness.

Altruistic healing and Shout remove conditions really keep the Guardian stay alive for quite a while in a team fight and just a little longer when fighting solo. The Guardian also buffs the team a lot better then the Warrior can; AoE protection and AoE stability is really good.

If we wanted though, we could move the Warrior into bunker position and have the Guardian as power booster support with staff (and any other weapon combo) and condi removal with shouts.

XelNigma.6315:

I keep seeing posts where people say Spirit rangers are OP, but iv looked at them and their traits, I just dont see what the fuss is about. I either need some gameplay to see what’s up or have some one explain it to me.

I have a question for you guys:
Would you rather have fragile but short cooldown turrets, or tough but long cooldown turrets?

It’s all about fighting on a point. Their storm spirit does crazy amounts of damage, their Sun spirit basically allows them to spam one and win, and their Stone Spirit pretty much gives them infinite protection.

SilverUniverse.7103:

Dirame.8521:

So the fact that you guys can stack and insane amount of might in just a matter of seconds does not factor into your builds?

this is a rotation for 12 stacks
Dragon’s tooth—>ring of fire—>phoenix (in field)—>dodge roll (swap earth mid-roll)—>earthquake

this skill gives 12 stacks and heals
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Empower

Empower may be easier but it lasts for 10 seconds whilst Ele rotation lasts for 20s and I believe that is increased by boon duration.

And that doesn’t even answer my question.

BlackBeard.2873:

Dirame.8521:

BlackBeard.2873:

Yea, the skill-ceiling on the ele is VERY high. However, there is the whole risk vs reward thing. Even playing at the skill-ceiling you will be barely par with other classes played at the mid-level. You literally have to outplay your opponents just to keep up.

Is this really a bad thing for the Ele? I mean, only today someone showed me not to underestimate Scepter/Focus. Even if I wasn’t playing a class I was familiar with, he still showed me how a skilled player could turn a loathed weapon combo into a major asset.

Yes, this is a bad thing. When you face someone of equal skill or even slightly less: you lose. You have to play better than your opponent to just make it an even fight.

How is it a bad thing for class to require skill? The complaint should be that other classes require no skill rather than your class requires more. If someone told me my class required a lot of skill I would be proud because I play that class.

Like I said, the other day, someone whooped my kitten with Scepter/Focus. You guys who consider yourselves “pro” at eles don’t even use that weapon combo and this guy made Scepter/focus look like the best thing since sliced bread. Just by great positioning and an amazing use of skills.

Also on the same day, someone else was using the 0/10/0/30/30 build which everyone considers to be dead (and really it isn’t) and this guy was surviving against 3 people. Even after we stunned him and tried to burst him.

So no, be proud that your class takes skill.

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

Dirame.8521:

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

BlackBeard.2873:

Yea, the skill-ceiling on the ele is VERY high. However, there is the whole risk vs reward thing. Even playing at the skill-ceiling you will be barely par with other classes played at the mid-level. You literally have to outplay your opponents just to keep up.

THIS.

Combine our very low health, low defense and poor damage then go against other classes and just see how easy they have it. High health, great defense and damage that makes ours look pathetic.

They dont even have to be good to beat a ele most of the time and THAT is the problem. We have a very high skill requirement just to be as good as at best a person bashing buttons on another class and Anet thinks this is okay…

Poor damage? I think we aren’t talking about the same class.

Yes. All the “damaging” skills such as Churning Earth can EASILY be avoided. If you want REAL damage you have to go full zerker and even then its still not going to be the same as other classes plus with the fact we have like 10.5k health without any vit buffs you dont kill them and unless they are full zerker then you wont you are pretty much dead.

So the fact that you guys can stack and insane amount of might in just a matter of seconds does not factor into your builds?

Just think about it, the fact that your class can stack might pretty well means that, you can go for less power and more survivability.

VIVorcha.7853:

You should probably try an argument other than “you’re the only one who holds that position”, because that’s clearly not true.

I would understand disagreeing on some of my points, but saying “NO L2P ENGI IS PERFECT RITE NAO” is just being ignorant and disregarding blatant issues.

A few people have echoed your sentiments but the angle you’re coming from is a wrong one. Saying that we don’t have lot of builds is very different from saying we have to work hard to make those builds work extremely well for us. If your argument was just that it’s really hard to get the best out of the Engie, I would have very little argument with you but when you say we don’t have a lot of builds? I’ve got to laugh at that one.

BlackBeard.2873:

Yea, the skill-ceiling on the ele is VERY high. However, there is the whole risk vs reward thing. Even playing at the skill-ceiling you will be barely par with other classes played at the mid-level. You literally have to outplay your opponents just to keep up.

Is this really a bad thing for the Ele? I mean, only today someone showed me not to underestimate Scepter/Focus. Even if I wasn’t playing a class I was familiar with, he still showed me how a skilled player could turn a loathed weapon combo into a major asset.

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

BlackBeard.2873:

Yea, the skill-ceiling on the ele is VERY high. However, there is the whole risk vs reward thing. Even playing at the skill-ceiling you will be barely par with other classes played at the mid-level. You literally have to outplay your opponents just to keep up.

THIS.

Combine our very low health, low defense and poor damage then go against other classes and just see how easy they have it. High health, great defense and damage that makes ours look pathetic.

They dont even have to be good to beat a ele most of the time and THAT is the problem. We have a very high skill requirement just to be as good as at best a person bashing buttons on another class and Anet thinks this is okay…

Poor damage? I think we aren’t talking about the same class.

Daecollo.9578:

Nerf Sigil of Paralization instead?

Why do we have to Crowd Control someone to deal damage where every other class does not?

Obviously Skull Crack is powerful, but its ST. Most of the complaints of it come from Asura which have a different animation then all the other races. Where if I use it on my Sylvari for example, its very easy to see because it has a unique animation.

If I use it on an Asura, it looks exactly like an auto-attack swing.

Every class has to crowd control in order to do damage or in order for the damage to stick. For Necros it’s the Fear chain, for Engies it’s the knockbacks, for Thieves it’s that nasty BasV.

Mrbig.8019:

ensoriki.5789:

You can’t interrupt Withdraw either or be hit during it.
I aint even mad.

It’s different.

Withdraw is istant cast and evades for 3/4 sec, on the squishiest class in the game.

Usually withdraw is the only sustain any competitive thief build will ever achieve ( unless you play cruuk’s build).

Shelter has been there from day 1, along with guardian, at the top of the food chain for a reason.

Withdraw is on the squishiest class, shelter is on the toughest class BY DESIGN.

You can interrupt Shelter. Unblockable Marks, Wail of Doom, Magnet Pull, anything that can go through blocks. And when you interrupt it, it goes on a FULL COOLDOWN. None of those things can interrupt Withdraw and even if you manage to somehow interrupt it, it will be back up in 3 seconds, which one were you saying is balanced again?

MonMalthias.4763:

• Number 1: is that the updates are insanely slow for PvP, while for PvE they’re obviously very very frequent, quick, of very high quality.

Funny, some PvEers will disagree with the “high quality” part of that statement.

m walker.7836:

Bas.7406:

Dear Spirit Rangers,

We understand how you feel. There is a support club for the rest of us already.

Signed
Minion Mancers, Spirit Weapon Guardians, Turret Engineers, and Conjured Weapon Elementalists.

Um. I don’t think you don’t. Running spirits is the only useful build the ranger has for GROUP play. Every other build is single target (besides trap ranger but why bring that when you could have a necro) and complete crap compared to other classes. However the spirit nerf is fair and hopefully people can stop whining about “Spirit Ranger OPness”

Guess what you need to do now when you play Spirits? Put them in a safe place.

VIVorcha.7853:

I find it appalling that you can’t realize the difference between “high-skill, high-reward” gameplay and “high-difficulty, moderate reward”.

Compared to other classes, Engineers have a disadvantage. Half of our skills are bad. We can’t weapon switch. We have no synergy in 4 out of 5 of our trait bars. Our class has absolutely no synergy with its mechanic.

Show us the builds you consider high skill with moderate rewards.

There’s actually plenty of synergy between Toolbelt skills and utilities.

Tool Kit 5 + Minefield + Rifle 5 = Explosive (Swap Minefield for Big Ol Bomb, same thing)
Regenerating Mist + Blast finisher
Net turret Toolbelt Immob + Grenade Barrage
Thumper turret toolbelt + Overcharged shot = no self CC
Super Speed + Box of Nails = Leaving the competition behind.
Throw Napalm + Airblast = 7 second burn on everyone
Throw Wrench (or Rifle turret toolbelt) + Light field (EG 5 or Elixir R toolbelt) = Definite condi removal for allies in front of you.

There’s definitely some I didn’t mention but there you go.

Angewaire.6319:

If engineer is that good, if it lacks nothing and it’s playable class that can compete with others on equal terms , explain me this – WHY SO FEW OF US PLAYS IT!
( if anyone wants to do % math , exclude 1 engineer from each match [me])

Why did people complain that Eles sucked during launch and then 5 months later complain that they are OP?
Why did people complain that Rangers sucked at launch but few months later everyone’s complaining about BM and Spirits and passive condi removal?

I’ll tell you why, because they didn’t know how to spec or play the class and that’s the same situation here.

I personally did not like the Engineer initially. I never played them, I never touched them, I never even looked at them until I joined a guild that told me I needed to play the Engie so I did. Fast foward a few months later after practicing with it and getting acquainted with the skills and traits, I started to find what the possibilities were with the class and it just blew up from there.

Another thing is, people will always play the simplest classes. Engie is far from the simplest class.