Guild Wars 2

The Acolytes summon something (Plague Carrier I guess, but the combat log says “Unknown using Explode”) that hits for 7,224 damage, slaps about six conditions on me, and destroys all my turrets, while I’m being swarmed by other things. And then the Acolyte walks away and fully heals itself. There are two of those things still in the courtyard and one is accompanied by a veteran captain.

Edit: and for reference, I have about 9k health while downleveled in that mission, rather than the 16k I have normally. A single 7k hit is not something to shrug off.

Level 79 Engineer. Heal bomber spec, up to date Cleric gear. I get dropped FAST by some of this stuff. It’s almost like I have Confusion on me, but I don’t. When I try to run, I get pulled back half the time by krait. When I do get away, the few NPCs that are still alive stand around and do nothing to help.

I have 7 characters. One of them is level 79.7. A couple more are above 70 and another high 60s.

Alts make dailies easier. They let you cover all the crafting bases (though they compete for resources unless you keep their crafting levels spread out). They give you some use for those 150 transmutation whatsits in your bank. They let you experience more of the game and better understand how other classes work and can be countered.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Kill a champion? Wayfarer’s Foothills, there’s the Champion Corrupted Wolfmaster. I think he’s probably the easiest champion to take solo for any class.

The champion ice wurm near the Vigil HQ is the easiest for ranged characters. Dodge the boulders it throws and you’ll go through the whole fight with zero damage — and it doesn’t throw them quickly enough to run out of endurance.

Overall, I do find some of the new dailies annoying, and often the difficulty depends on what kind of character you’re playing (so I switch. My necro is a conditional removal machine for instance.)

Overall though, I’m typically completing my set of five faster than I used to. Some of them are just gimmes. The ease of completing dailies always did depend on what area you were in, anyway.

I think you’re basically trying to do the impossible, but it’s an interesting attempt anyway, and interesting to see your opinion on it and peoples’ reactions.

I disagree with the definition of support though; I would say it’s generally understood to be “contributing to group survivability and effectiveness.” A self-heal may indirectly help the group, but if you make that argument you have to say that DPS also indirectly helps the group and the whole idea becomes too wishy-washy to really count for much.

So I’d include AOE heals, revives, AOE condition removal, AOE blocks and reflects, ally boons, fields, CC, boon stripping, weakness/vulnerability, and perhaps condition spreading as support.

It won’t happen, but I’d say:

Skritt
Tengu
Centaur

And with special guest star, golems.

“Prove the sun shines through you! Face me as another form!” (I have a screenshot somewhere of a a chat window full of that. You can hear Xolotl in way too large a radius.)

All of the Beetletun militia trainers. I always mute my sound when I’m crafting there. (Hold…. hold…. hold…. hold…. fire! You’ll never block me like that.)

A lot of weird laughs and “uhh…. uh-uh” in Divinity’s Reach. Sometimes they repeat way too frequently.

My least favorite mission.

This was my third time around it. It gave my Guardian a hard time in its former version, though my Mesmer has it much easier. But my engineer, this time?

Reviving Mira meant several episodes of tanking multiple brutes and thralls while constantly poisoned, in an environment where neither healing turrets nor the turrets from Supply Drop could stay up long enough to be useful, where even when I’d pause in my revive attempt to run off and heal I’d have to fight off a few chasers, and I could never whittle down enough enemies to make it any better. Elixir S auto-triggered FOUR TIMES during that mission.

And that was with a tanking build (Cleric’s gear and elixir-infused bombs) and playing the mission at level 77.

Those are all fun classes. I love my Asura engineer. When I plant a Big Ol’ Bomb, it’s almost as large as I am. I’ve seen some really creepy Asura necromancers as well.

I also have a Norn elementalist and a human necromancer. If asked to rank them in order of fun, well… I’d honestly have trouble deciding. But I’ve played my Asura engineer about twice as much as the other two, so that should count for something.

Engineer gives you a lot of variety, and is a great profession for a mad genius Asura. (Dynamics!!!) They even have golems as a racial elite. Some people think they’re weak, but I think instead they require a bit of skill and a lot of experimentation to find out what playstyles work best for you (again, an Asura trait…) As I leveled I went through four very different builds, and even within each build there’s a lot of flexibility to substitute different kits/gadgets/elixirs. Right now I have a tanky bomber build who’s kind of a prankster really.

Elementalists are actually kind of similar in a sense — they have attunements where engineers have kits — but play quite a bit differently. They’re really powerful once you’ve worked out how to make the most of your build/gear. Compared to an engineer, there’s less flexibility, a somewhat easier learning curve overall but more emphasis on tactics and combos, a higher penalty for just flailing randomly, and more potential for high damage. You’ll probably find both engineers and elementalists who say something completely different though. I’m running a Scepter/Dagger build, emphasizing fire, which I find works for me a lot better than the D/D builds a lot of people recommend.

Necromancers I think are a bit more straightforward but still fun. I thought the class was horrible the first time I dabbled in it, but after learning more about the game and ditching the axe, I grew to like it more. I’m doing scepter/dagger and staff epidemic build — pile conditions onto an enemy and spread them into AOE mayhem. (Being a condition build though, taking out buildings is horrifically slow.)

Gotta say, I just switched to a heal bomber build, and I’m liking it quite a lot.

I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it for leveling to 60 though because much of the survivability depends on investment in Inventions (toughness) and having Elixir-Infused Bombs. I’d probably recommend a Static Discharge power build to get there.

I don’t PvP, but in terms of fun factor for PvE:

— Engineers have a lot more variety. People on this forum will argue that it’s all meaningless because X is broken and Y is underpowered and grenades are hard and so on. But the truth of it is, you do have a lot of options which all will work, to varying degrees, and which all can be fun depending on personal preference. Kits mean you don’t even have to switch gear or builds to do something different from one fight to the next, and that does a lot to keep PvE interesting.

— In a typical fight, rangers are slightly less boring than Warriors. Warriors are slightly less boring than watching paint dry. In a more involved fight Rangers can be kind of fun.

In every MMO I play, I have serious alt-itis to the point where I don’t really have a main. Right now I have one of everything except a Warrior. Ranger is my lowest level because it’s not that interesting. Engineer is my second highest even though I started it last.

I like them. They’re both cute and creepy at the same time. It makes me actually want to summon them instead of switching to one of the more useful elements first.

I do kind of wish the “Spark” creatures were still generic floating balls though.

If this is the best thing you can find to complain about, I’d say either the class is doing pretty well or your priorities are skewed.

Yeah, I liked using it with Speedy Kits. But I also tend to toggle Grenade Kit off and on instead when I’d rather have Healing Turret on my bar, and it’s really not hard :P

Engineer also gets easier to level as you progress. At 20 you’ve only got one 10 point trait to work with (which ideally would be in Tools, so you can swap between Speedy Kits for running and Static Discharge for damage) but it keeps getting better and better from there.

Rezzet.3614:

you’s playing it wrong. if you focus on Auto attack use Air or fire attunement.need defense swap to earth. need cleansing and heals swap to water . cant compare somethingthat simple vs engineer’s orchestra session playstyle .

I disagree that elementalist auto attack with any of their weapons is worth sitting on for any length of time at all. If you’re not burning through cooldowns and building up Might, you’re not doing it right. (At least with S/D. D/D never felt right at all to be honest, and staff feels pretty weak for leveling except in a few situations.)

To bring this back to Engineers, part of why I find them easier — once you unlock enough stuff anyway — is that kit swap is 0-1 seconds, instead of the long cooldown Eles are stuck with. They’re not simpler necessarily, but I find tactical flow easier.

Engis also have a lot more control than Eles, and that helps too.

You know, if someone wants to reroll at 80 and level up again, it’s their choice. This is a game, and if rerolling to switch races is how someone wants to play, that’s not “doing it wrong.”

Frankly I’ve thought about rerolling my Engineer just to change her name. Currently she’s level 63 and I just keep playing. I might get to 80 and do it anyway. I actually enjoy leveling anyway.

I think Elementalist may actually be a little harder than Engineer.

With Engineer, you tend to wind up in a build where you’re using, say, your weapon and a kit, or two kits. You tend to use whatever skill makes the most sense at the time from a control/range perspective — for instance, with Rifle you use 2 to keep your enemy at range, 3 and 5 when they get close and 4 to gain distance or interrupt.

With Ele, autoattacks are pretty much terrible and you need to memorize strings of long skill rotations across multiple attunements to pull off combos. Your effectiveness can vary widely depending on whether you get it right — from “two wolves just facerolled me” to “I just wasted five ettins and a moa that wandered into range.”

Well, I did my part last night. I’d gotten to level 62 and was slumming in the starting Norn area, doing some DEs. On one of those “defend the dude doing stuff” events, I popped healing, rocket and net turrets and proceeded to grenade spam everything into paste.

A Guardian asked me how I “made stuff,” and how much I liked playing Engineer. Told him I liked it a lot, but it’s rough at first and has a steep learning curve. Still I could tell the guy was thinking about rolling one.

ZerudaXei.1892:

Which one is better? Dual Pistols or a Rifle?

That depends on how you play it, the stats you go for, the skills and traits you use, etc.

I would say: try them both from time to time and use whichever one you enjoy more. I was a fan of pistols for 50-some levels and then recently switched to rifle and there’s no reason I might not switch again sometime.

General rule of thumb: if you use pistols, go for Condition Damage rather than Power. If you use Rifles, go for Power rather than Condition Damage. But at low levels it doesn’t much matter.

ZerudaXei.1892:

What are your favorite skills to unlock? Like the Flame Turret, Healing Kit, etc.

You’ll want to unlock everything, eventually. You’ll have plenty of skill points to throw at it. The Engineer is a versatile class and I frequently change what I have on my bar for different situations.

I recommend getting Healing Kit and Healing Turret both — the turret is better I find, but the kit is handy for faster travel.

ZerudaXei.1892:

And finally, what do you think is the best race for a Engineer?

There are a couple recent threads on this. It comes down to personal choice. Mine’s an Asura. I can’t stand playing Charr because of the run animation and I hate their capital city and one of their early zones.

ZerudaXei.1892:

I’m thinking about restarting my Engineer, and moving it to be Charr for it’s race.

If you have an unused slot, and you haven’t played a Charr yet, start a new character there instead. See which one you prefer. If you do switch, be sure to use the bank (conveniently accessible from all crafting stations) to transfer your coins and anything that’s not soulbound to your new character.

ZerudaXei.1892:

Also, if you’re feeling so generous, I’m very new to the game, and wondering what the best way to level is, but this isn’t the place for that, so!

My general advice:

— gather everything you can.
— craft as a way of earning XP and providing yourself with basic gear, but be aware of when it’s cheaper to buy stuff from the auction house than it is to acquire the materials to build it yourself.
— hit every World Completion spot you can get to.
— keep your gear reasonably up to date, but don’t overspend on rare gear.
— try to be a few levels ahead of the personal story missions. Visit other zones in your level range and below. Some story missions can be surprisingly nasty.
— finish daily achievements if you can; you get extra stuff.
— don’t attack Champions alone. With rare exceptions, they will murder you before you scratch their health bars. (Once you get used to dodging, some can be soloed with caution — like the big worm under the Durmand Priory.)

For engineers:

— I recommend putting your first 10 trait points (which you get starting at level 10) into Tools. This will let you choose Speedy Kits, which gives you a big speed boost whenever you switch to a kit. (Since you can switch to Healing Kit for free with no cooldown, or other kits with 1 second cooldown, you can run fast forever outside of combat.) And then for combat, you can switch that trait to Static Discharge, which is a nice bit of damage every time you use a toolbelt skill. Rifle Turret gives you a short-cooldown toolbelt skill that’s perfect for it — much better than the actual turret itself.

— Like I said, try everything :P Don’t get discouraged; try switching your gear, skills, traits, etc. until you find what works best for you.

As an addendum to my previous post: I’m around level 55 or so now and just switched to power/precision rifle in place of condition pistols, and I no longer bother with static discharge. I’m happy with the change.

It’s not too much of a stretch to say that, at some level ranges, some builds work better than others. Doesn’t mean there aren’t multiple builds that can work across a wide range of levels, but still — you’re an engineer, never stop experimenting and optimizing.

Right now I am running mostly healing turret, grenades or bombs, rocket turret, elixir U, supply crate.

10/15/0/10/10 Incendiary Powder, Hair Trigger, Invigorating Speed, Speedy Kits.

Asura: “exemplifying excellent engineering.”

They are the golemancers, the tinkerers, the makers of things that explode.

Asura have 47% higher engineering aptitude than Charr, and they look better doing it.

Norn make good laborers and farmhands.

Asura, though I am a little envious of Hidden Pistol sometimes. (I can’t stand the Charr run animation though.)

Yeah, I would think a rifle/toolkit build would work well, given that most of the rifle’s power is at close range anyway.

How does Tankcat work in PVE? To read the description it seems like a very PVP-centric build (which admittedly can be scary good in the right hands).

thomson.6405:

Pistol sucks for pve and leveling

thomson.6405:

the other kits are just bad in pve

thomson.6405:

All that talk about engi being versatile is rubbish

This is exactly the sort of advice I would ignore:

— I’m doing great leveling with pistols.
— I mostly use bombs, not grenades. I use elixir gun more than grenades now, in fact.
— I switch kits according to what I’m going to face. All the talk about engi NOT being versatile is rubbish.

Juicymarmalade.3187:

I tried using bombs but I always have to be in melee range or near melee range to hit enemies because they explode so quickly after being dropped that they blow up before the enemy can walk into them from further away and so I get hit a lot. Is there any remedy for this?

Open up with a ranged weapon first, and switch to bombs when they’re near. Or take advantage of distractions (thumper turrets! other players!) and run in and bomb like mad.

Also, you might have noticed you can run faster fowards than backwards; you can kite melee enemies in circles with your enemies behind you. That works better if you trait explosives for wider radius.

Personally I think it’s a little crazy to use bombs primarily when soloing. But there’s usually a place for them on my bar.

Don’t rely too much on other peoples’ build advice, but try different things and see what you like. Engineer is about versatility, so don’t lock yourself down too much. So many people are like “Power rifle! Bombs! Yeah!” but I’m doing better personally with a condition pistols build.

Try everything. Until you’re level 60, ignore all the people saying grenades are weak without the grandmaster traits. I’ve found them very useful, and the toolbelt skill is some lovely damage.

But 10 points in Tools really is the best way to start, IMHO. Switch between Speedy Kits and Static Discharge depending on your needs at the time.

I recommend getting both Healing Turret and Health Kit, and try grenades and bombs and flamethrower and toolkit and everything else that you can along the way. Leveling in other races’ lowest level areas is an easier way of picking up some more skill points and branching out.

What I’m using right now:

dual pistols, condition + precision

10 Tools (Static Discharge for combat, Speedy Kits for travel)
10 Firearms (Hair Trigger)
5-10 Alchemy so far (but I may rethink that when I hit 40 to invest more in Tools or Firearms)

Health: Healing Turret for serious combat. Health Kits for less serious, for underwater, or for travel. Health Kit + Speedy Kits = very easy perma-swiftness.

Rifle Turret: only used for its toolbelt skill with Static Discharge. The turret itself is lackluster but the toolbelt skill makes it worth a slot.

Bombs or Grenades: I usually have one of these kits equipped. I use pistols more than either of these, but the toolbelt skills for both kits are excellent.

Thumper turret: a survivability tool. A crowd of enemies can beat on this longer than you will survive them beating on you. It’s also a fantastic way to pack a crowd of enemies together closely to plant a Big Ol’ Bomb among them.

Supply Drop: I’ve read this is almost the only elite skill choice. I do plan to try others when I have the points to spare, but I will confirm it is fantastic. Drops a flame turret, net turret, healing turret, and a bunch of bandages. Keeps you alive and enemies busy. I don’t think I have ever died while I had this in play.

Time is the Eternal Alchemy’s way of letting other races think they have a chance at becoming as awesome as the Asura.

<i>“make an engineer” “go past lvl 20”. “Really EXPLORE the class”</i>

As frustrated as I’ve sometimes been with my Engineer… yes.

My engineer is just level 28 and I’ve already tried so many different things, it feels like different characters almost. I’m now on a dual pistols condition build, but it’s very fluid. Bombs and/or grenades when I want to take out roadblocks or siege engines. Static Discharge, Healing Turret, Thumper Turret, and elixirs or bombs for DEs and general hunting. Health kit and Speedy Kits for travel. Flamethrower when I want to play with that. Tool Kit… maybe not as much now that I’m off rifle, but who knows, I might change out all my gear before the end of the day because I’ve done that several times already.

Your mother’s IQ is so low, a Necromancer once mistook her for his pet.

My advice to anyone asking about any class:

Try it! Try all the different weapons. Try different tactics, gear, etc.

If you love it, great!

If you hate it, drop it for now, and maybe come back to it later when your perspective on the game has changed, the class might have been updated, new guides might have been written, etc.

Malvado.1460:

lets focus on fixing their bugs 1st

Wow, who knew the UI artist moonlights as a gameplay programmer? No wonder…

You mother’s IQ is so low, she can’t spell IQ.

You’ll all be praising my krewe for having developed the Golem Rehabilitation Universal Broadcast System (G.R.U.B.S.).

To be honest, there seems to be a lack of guidance in the Ranger forum compared to many others I have looked into. I shelved my Ranger for a while because I was just fumbling with picking stuff that seemed more or less okay, but lacked synergy.

The closest I’ve seen here have been arguments about shortbow vs. longbow, and comments about pets (which, I feel, led me down a less than optimal path anyway).

I found some build suggestions on another site and mine actually was not far off from a decent build; with different pets (hello devourer!) and more emphasis on traps I am suddenly more effective. (Though that information wasn’t terribly complete either, in terms of gear/stats.)

Granted, I mostly am interested in PVE. But it seems to me like most things learned in PVE are applicable to WVW, and someone bad at PVE is generally not going to be good at WVW either.

Dredlockrasta.8269:

50 kills in WvW is hardly a challenge, and takes probably 30 minutes tops. Stop acting like it was so hard.

Nobody said it was hard. They said they have no interest in WvW. There’s a difference.

ProxyDamage.9826:

Sure, legitimate complaint, I agree and whatnot, just… Why would you click the skill button…?

Reaching from WASD over to 0 isn’t always the easiest thing to do, and sometimes your mouse cursor is close enough that it’s easier than reaching.

I have 6 characters in here, a couple in their 70s. I have never done any grinding.

Try that in WoW.

DoctorOverlord.8620:

To be fair there is a difference between dodging an attack and managing to get the Evade proc. You can dodge early and you still have avoided the attack by no longer being in the area the mob is striking but you don’t proc the Evade and thus it doesn’t count.

Exactly. Dodging early is often BETTER than waiting for the Evade proc. You have that much more time to maneuver or counterattack while your enemy is still in their attack animation.

OTOH, sometimes with ranged attacks timing is more important. But typically, I don’t worry about dodging except for big attacks, to put space between me and my enemy, or to proc other effects (e.g. caltrops, healing). My Thief dodges a lot and has the endurance to do so. My Necro tends to just burn stuff down and uses dodging mainly to make more space while kiting.

I don’t like this one so much because it feels the least natural. With all the other types, it’s something I was doing anyway (though sometimes I had to go out of my way to find more events or more enemy types).

Some character types don’t rely on dodge very much, especially vs. melee enemies. And when you are dodging melee enemies who are rooted during their animations, dodging “too early” is tatically better than dodging at the “right” time anyway.

To finish this one I wound up fighting a bunch of moas and hoping they’d use their cone attack which lasts a couple seconds. It felt very unheroic and unexpolorer-y.

If anyone here has played DragonRealms and practiced Armor skill by lying on the ground getting beaten… pretty much this :P

Homonavn.6348:

Better than nothing! Stop focusing on the negativ guys… Hey, Nothing was nerfed.. be happy!

While I totally agree with you, these are gaming forums here. There’s kind of an imperative for people to be extremely negative until the devs get tired of hearing it, which makes the players more negative, which… yeah.

I’m a recent new Necro, level 30 so far, using an AOE condition build.

Scepter/Dagger primary, Staff secondary. Consume Conditions, Epidemic, Blood Is Power, and the run speed signet.

The idea is to stack conditions (mostly bleeding, via Blood Is Power and scepter autoattacks) on the toughest enemy in a group, and spread them to weaker enemies with Epidemic. Other skills supplement your AOE or punish enemies for conditions on themselves or on you. I’ve found it very survivable — comparable to or maybe better than Guardian.

For traits, I’m going 30 Curses (lots of bleeding-enhancing stuff plus precision + condition) and at least 20 Blood Magic (siphoning on crits, vitality + healing).

I have lowbie Elementalist and Necro characters. They’re the last two classes I have started.

Subjectively, the Elementalist feels awkward and slow to me, and doesn’t really meet my expectations. Staff is for sure a support weapon, not very good for soloing. D/D doesn’t feel right and isn’t so great for leveling, I find. S/D is a bit better but still, more often than not, I feel like cycling through attunements so I autoattack as little as possible doesn’t quite get me to the killing speed of my other characters — more work for mediocre results. A glass cannon without much of a cannon.

My Necro though… I died once from getting WAY over my head, and once or twice from falling damage. But I’ve been clearing hearts and doing events 3-4 levels above my own level and don’t have a problem with it. Against things my own level it’s hardly any effort at all. I’ve been going with a condition build, S/D and staff.

My only complaints about Necro so far:

— the sounds for staff are pretty hideous. While I use it to open fights at range and in zerg group events, I don’t think I could stand to use it as a main weapon.

— I wish Scepter 2 would just center on your selected target and catch any nearby enemies; I’m kind of lazy about targeting while kiting.

I thought the Toy Ventari were ridiculous… changed my weapons and tactics and learned to take them out, with some risk.

Then I encountered the Princesses. ::shudder::

I can take them out with my Mesmer thanks to condition damage and clones. But this makes me seriously not want to play my Guardian at all until the event is over.

And when I do fight off a whole pack of them, whether with my Guardian dying twice or my Mesmer, I’ve fought entire packs of Toy Ventari and gotten a couple of socks. Yay, I guess?

A few things:

Staff and GS clones tend to hang back where you are. The phantasms move in (even the staff phantasm for some reason) and tend to get themselves killed. With a staff condition build, I find it’s better to get clones onto an enemy early, then get a phantasm out later if needed to take advantage of the large pile of conditions on them. It doesn’t make sense to bring one out early unless you just need a distraction or more shatter fodder.

I really like Mirror Images. I’m also working toward Duelist 20 for clone-on-dodge too, though I’m not strictly doing a shatter build. Getting clones out fast is always useful.

Illusions 20 gives staff/GS attacks an extra bounce, which is a huge help with DPS and boons. Focus your attention and your clones’ on the toughest thing there and let the bounces burn down the rest. If they’re equal, don’t focus fire on a single enemy and have three clones expire together while enemies still live.

Get some of the traits that punish enemies for clones’ death.

Chaos Storm is a poor AOE attack, but good defense/support for your clones as well as other allies. When things get close and you’re kiting at short range, you can use it as combined offense and defense.

Sometimes it makes sense to tank for your clones a bit, especially if you’re particularly mobile and/or have defenses at the ready.

All that said, Mesmer AOE is weaker most other classes, but you really shouldn’t have trouble with 2-3 enemies at a time, or with chain pulls.

Kasama.8941:

That awkward moment when you rally, and start reviving your own clone…

I’ve done that. The first time I was just wondering what would happen. After that… I don’t really have an excuse.

Ranger is dull, Mesmer is fun. Go Mesmer!

Miku Lawrence.6329:

Staff needs power, even to a higher extend than Condition damage. The latter being nonviable in PvE…

How is Condition nonviable in PvE? My DPS as a staff Mesmer went up quite a bit when I swapped out some of my power gear for condition.

Staff is my main weapon, and I alternate between greatsword and sword/focus for the other.

I’m not actually all that fond of sword/focus, but focus 4 really does make world exploration better, and there are times when sword helps finish things off. (I want to like scepter, but it’s worse.)

As for traits, early on I would say Illusions 5 is good to have, and Chaos generally helps with survival… but mostly they aren’t important until you can unlock something that really compliments your weapons and style. (Illusions 20 is great for staff and greatsword, Dueling 20 for shatter builds, etc.) Respeccing traits is cheap, and happens automatically when using the more advanced trait books anyway, so feel free to experiment.

I tend to treat Power, Vitality, Condition and Precision as roughly equal, and choose gear to make up for what isn’t boosted by traits. I don’t think the balance there makes as big a difference as simply keeping up to date gear and using good tactics does though.

nbennet.5827:

It is always amusing to hear that “I don’t understand what is happening, therefore it must be some kind of hack or exploit!”

Confusing the enemy is kind of the Mesmer’s thing.

Sylvari Guardians can look pretty cool — you can often blend armor colors with your bark/pattern colors so it looks like the armor is something you’ve grown.