Guild Wars 2

Swap Autotool Installation for the superior Protective Shield or Stabilized Armor, and spend your last 10 points on Protection Injection. The reason being that you have no active defense such as a stun breaker. I know that your build is aimed at PVE, but you still need to be able to survive enemies that can stun you or knock you down. Having incoming damage reduction during those times can be a life saver. Autotool Installation heals too slowly and for too little.

There is nothing wrong with coated bullets in a turret build. On packs of enemies your damage will be greatly increased with this trait.

Good luck and have fun.

Tested Elite Supplies + Mortar on target golems. It seems it increases the damage by 25%

Without Elite Supplies: 952 mortar #1 hits on heavy golem
With Elite Supplies: 1190 mortar #1 hits on heavy golem

Or break stun place Thumper and overcharge it.

+1

This was a huge miss.

With all of the work that we go through to get cool backpack skins, it would be great if a vendor sold a cheap backpack strap item to apply them to. Right now your only options if you are below level 80 are a guild backpack which costs 1 gold, or a personal story quest reward.

Ostricheggs.3742:

A lot of the changes seem to be a step in the right direction, but this one just took five steps back. Almost every build I can think of requires bringing R as its only stunbreak and defensive measure in general. A good 75% of viable tourney engineer builds would take a massive hit if this change goes through and I don’t wanna see that with how diverse we’ve been recently. It does need a nerf, but god kitten it we need a stun break!!!

I agree. Elixir R needed a different change. Also, the stun break on Rumble—as much as I love my turrets—is a terrible idea.

What frustrates me is when most people evaluate a skill they just assume that you have all of the traits that buff it. I think R is very strong in Alchemy builds, but outside of those it’s fine. Which is as it should be—if I dump 30 points into traits the skill(s) those traits affect should feel very strong.

Penguin.5197:

Grackleflint.4956:

So we lose 2 stun breakers: Rocket Boots and Elixir R, and gain 2 stun breakers: Rumble (a turret tool belt skill of all things) and Super Speed. The latter is interesting because we have two ways to gain Super Speed: Kit Refinement gives SS on equipping the Tool Kit, and the tool belt skill for Slick Shoes is Super Speed. Did we just gain 3 stun breakers? It will be interesting to see.

All that said, I don’t think this was the right way to spread out our stun breakers.

Nah we would still have two stun breakers since kits go on cooldown when we get stunned.

Also, I laughed when I saw the notes for always prepared.

Don’t they just get put on a global—something like a second? Or is it 4…dang, can’t remember.

Arkham Creed.7358:

Terrahero.9358:

Torment, they have got to be kidding.

Here’s Confusion, do stuff and take damage. Here is Retaliation, hit me and take damage. Here is Torment, so much as move and take damage. Whats next? Dam:nation? Deals extra damage if target stays logged in?

You never played the original Guild Wars did you? That was pretty much all mesmers did; if they weren’t canceling your skills outright they were making it hurt to do pretty much everything. Heck I still shudder at their “kitten ed if you do, kitten ed if you don’t” combo.

Wastrel’s Demise: Take damage if you use a skill.
Wastrel’s Worry: Take damage if you don’t use a skill.

Meta cr@p like this shows a lack of creativity.

So we lose 2 stun breakers: Rocket Boots and Elixir R, and gain 2 stun breakers: Rumble (a turret tool belt skill of all things) and Super Speed. The latter is interesting because we have two ways to gain Super Speed: Kit Refinement gives SS on equipping the Tool Kit, and the tool belt skill for Slick Shoes is Super Speed. Did we just gain 3 stun breakers? It will be interesting to see.

All that said, I don’t think this was the right way to spread out our stun breakers.

Rumble is the Thumper Turret tool belt skill.

Is an enemy in range of the turret when you double tap? The overcharge only triggers on the next attack the turret makes and it only attacks if it has something in range (240 radius).

Torment on Mesmers and Thieves is ridiculous. Now when you break stun and immob to move out of that Blurred Frenzy combo get ready to eat a crap ton of damage anyway. Now when you break stun and dodge to avoid Larcenous Strike, take a crap ton of damage. What the eff is going on?! This patch will make or break my interest if it doesn’t deliver. By deliver I mean really clean up our traits and spread the stun breakers out in a way that will truly promote build diversity.

My money is on, no it won’t, because adding Torment means that condi removal is even more important which forces us down the Alchemy line which effs build diversity in the a. One step forward, a rocket boot leap backwards.

Double tap it just like Healing Turret to immediately get the overcharge when enemies are in range. I’ve never had a problem with it even with an average connection speed. I understand your mileage may vary.

cheers

I’m starting to see a lot of Engineers take notice of the Thumper Turret because it provides three blast finishers while using only one utility slot. I’ve been using it in my quad turret build for a couple of months now mainly for stealth, and burst healing—but it’s easy to get other long lasting buffs too. Retaliation is another one of my favorites when I’m using the Elixir Gun.

Note: The third blast finisher is its overcharge ability “Thump.” The downside is that it can only be triggered when an enemy is in range of the Thumper Turret itself. The upside is that’s usually the best time to make use of buffs like retaliation, and your burst healing.

For example, say you’ve dropped your Healing Turret and overcharged it. You can then Rumble, Thump, and detonate for a total of 5-6K healing while sending your opponent flying. If you’re really fast you can detonate the Healing Turret in that time as well. Add Accelerant-packed Turrets for even more knock back and some damage.

I highly recommend practicing with it so you can see for yourself.

It will always be a point of contention between the full timer gamers and the part timer gamers. Full timers (8+hour a day—1%) and part timers (everyone else—majority of the populace) will always disagree on this. I don’t think subjective arguments about so called skill should enter into this. It’s elitist and asinine.

MrForz.1953:

Also, I played and mained Engineer before it was cool to do so. Sheer bunch of new HGH*409-Grenade junkies really gets me sick. It’s like “Hey man, I’m playing a class it’s called Engineer, I’ll show you a build I’m sure you never saw that before!” and this being said when the class is slowly getting popular.

Yep. Seeing a lot of variations on the name “H GEE H ENGINEER” in tPvP these days. They usually stand above Graveyard or Keep throwing grenades and trash talking in /map.

I think it has been mentioned before, but the main hand pistol excels at covering our more powerful conditions: immobilize, burning, vulnerability, etc—by tossing on bleed, poison, blind, and confusion. With the right traits it can even proc more bleeding, some burning, vulnerability, and even grant swiftness to us. It also has some other neat interactions. For example, if you have the Incendiary Ammo buff from the FT toolbelt skill the first 3 bounces of your Static Shot apply burning as do the first three hits from Poison Dart Volley. Also, Poison Dart volley is a great way to apply poison when you anticipate that someone is going to heal, and with the right build (high crit and might stacks) it hits very hard.

Our pistol will never be a powerhouse with a lot of front loaded damage. Anet wants us to use kits, and that is evident in how our MH weapons behave. Most of our builds tend to apply a lot of nasty conditions and then cover them or use CC to prevent our opponents from reacting.

This belongs in the bug forum, and its bug status is debatable at best.

I had a very similar set of gear gathering dust, so I tried the build out in pve. I have to say it is a blast to play. The trait set up is very nice, and the combination of the pistols with FT and EG is fantastic. Also, the amount of Cripple and Immobilization along with EG #4 allowed me kite a Champion level NPC to death.

I like playing as one…not because it’s polished, bug free, balanced, overpowered, faceroll, working as intended, etc. I chose the profession I like based on flavor, and play with people I like. Sadly the two reasons I play Engineer have little to do with Arenanet’s vision for the class or their ability to make it function as presented.

Hey Amadeus,

What kind of Ascended gear would you recommend for this build? By the way, thanks for sharing another build and video. Keep up the good work.

-G

Ostricheggs.3742:

Yea, evades in general are at times a bit over the top and it’s not just dodge rolls (I’m looking at you, rangers). It’s a pretty big balance issue, especially considering how important evades are. Vigor as well. Mesmers get a free vigor on crit trait for a measly FIVE points up their most important tree. Sigil of energy is used relatively ubiquitously for a kitten good reason.

Worst of all it appears like not a lot of thought has been put into it from a-net. I wouldn’t consider cutting the invulns on dodge just yet but I would definitely think about hampering access to vigor as well as the strength of it in general (that isn’t to even mention protection, why that thing hasn’t been nerfed is beyond me)

I like you Ostrich, but sometimes I feel like you really want to make the Engineer inaccessible to anyone who doesn’t have 8 hours a day to play (just going off of your 2000 hours played since release that you mentioned in the Engenious podcast). Constantly shouting about how OP we are, and now an offhand remark about nefing Protection. Stop helping, man. Protection is one of the few defensive buffs we can reliably count on, and even then only when there aren’t 1 or more S/D thieves prowling the map. So, ease up. Not everyone can put in the 40/week you do.

This is the best Engineer game play video of all time. I’m also pretty sure each and every one of those people in the zerg deserved exactly what they got.

Ederyn.3107:

There is no BRUST AT ALL!!

RIFLE TURRET BRUST WAS TOO STRONK!

Edited my post. Sorry about that, ayden.

When 6 Runes of the Centaur are equipped and you pick up your Healing Turret while moving the full cooldown of the Healing Turret (20 seconds) is activated rather than reducing the cooldown by 5 seconds, which is what should happen when you pick it up.

This happens whether or not you immediately pick up your Healing Turret, as long as you are moving and have 6 Runes of the Centaur equipped.

I can never resist trying a build out that has a new twist. Conditions have been running rampant in tPvP lately so what I found intriguing is the idea of having a massive health pool so our 25% mark is close to what most people have at 40-50% health and how that relates to Automated Response.

I played six matches and have to say it’s a fun and effective build. The Thumper Turret provides 3 blast finishers in one utility for good burst healing. I found myself using Smoke Bomb and Rumble (Thumper Turret toolbelt skill) to stealth before entering team fights so I wouldn’t immediately draw aggro. I was also using Smoke Bomb and Healing Turret>overcharge>detonate to kind of reset things if I felt too pressured. The lack of a shield made me feel very naked, but I started to get used to the Rifle’s CC—especially Overcharged Shot. Elixir X is something I had only used in Spirit Watch until last night. I’m not sure how I feel about it, but it did allow me to capture some points I wouldn’t have been able to otherwise.

Thanks for sharing your build. [edited to give credit to aydenunited]

Penguin recently posted his current sPvP build. It uses a very high health pool to trigger Automated Response much earlier than most. We have a lot of “at 25% health” triggers. Pushing our health pool as close to 30K as possible means that these trigger at 7.5K health which is a decent amount. I’m gonna play with this idea and see what I can come up with.

Personally for me it’s the enjoyment I get from the challenge of making a build work for my own style. In PvP surviving was my first challenge, so my builds focused completely on staying alive. As I got more comfortable with the profession, I started giving up some of my defense for offense so I could win a 1 vs. 1 and some 1 vs. 2 fights. If you want to survive 1 vs. X then you have to spec entirely for surviving, but I have teammates to help win those fights so I prefer a 50/50 split between offense and defense.

If the engineer’s abilities just don’t hold your attention any more, there’s nothing wrong with moving on to another profession. I’ve considered it a few times, but I’m not interested in re-training my muscle memory for something new.

Lastly, we all get bored with our own builds so sometimes it’s a good idea to see what other people are playing. Adopt someone else’s build for a few days and really try it out.

marnick.4305:

Karast.1927:

I know some people think that themed traits should be locked into themed trait lines.

All turret traits in inventions, all elixir traits in alchemy. But by having those traits in other lines it incourages use of traits and utilities outside of the primary trait lines.

Actually it doesn’t. It only encourages min-maxing one type of skill by branching into other trait lines. If all turret traits would be in one line, you’d have to pick your top three, and get another top three in another line for another set of skills entirely. As such, you’re much more inclined to have diverse builds.

Second offense of the current system, is masking broken skills behind several must-have traits that make them either balanced or OP. Skills should be functional without traits to begin with. If a kit is broken without 3 traits, the kit has to be buffed.

I couldn’t agree more.

Karast.1927:

yeah but your not using acclerant pack turrets if your using a turret build. The turret KB is best used when detonating turrets, if your running a turret build, you want your turrets up as much as possible, not on cool down. That is a completely different way of using turrets.

Thats my main point. If that trait was inventions I more than likely wouldn’t use it. Inventions focuses on keeping turrets alive and increasing their damage.

Also you can only have 3 major traits. So unless if they combined everything something has to give.

I strongly disagree. I used Accelerant-packed Turrets in all of my turret builds because in PvP and to a limited extent in PvE it acts as a gap creator, stomp interrupt, and a burst interrupt. I tend to stay close to a turret so that if my opponent stuns me and is setting up their burst I can detonate that turret and interrupt them. Yes, it sucks to lose the damage output and put my turret on cooldown, but I just saved myself from dying. In PvE the same tactic can be used when an enemy has just CC’d me and my health is low.

Nobody I have ever talked to uses Accelerant-packed Turrets in the manner you’re describing, or the manner I think you’re describing—drop turret immediately detonate to get knockback. The majority of us turret players place them with the intent to do damage or cc our enemies and detonate them strategically.

The only time I have ever put a turret down for the sole purpose of immediately detonating it is to push opponents away from a downed ally, and even then it’s the healing turret which I also overcharge to cleanse conditions and create a water field.

Malkavian.3751:

Implement raids – These raids do not need to be a gear treadmill grind like WoW, however, I believe dungeons that are 10+ man would really improve the game. These should require more coordination than 5 man dungeons.

And by more you mean “some.” The zergfest needs to stop to keep this game alive.

Would it be possible to implement some options to change our pointer? It is currently very easy to lose in a fight with a lot of particle effects. It also punishes players who use right click and hold to turn because when you right click your pointer disappears. The latter is probably a bug.

Please add some options to make the pointer larger, brighter, etc.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/suggestions/Engineer-Trait-Bloat/first#post2193223

I started a topic in the suggestion forum about Engineer Trait bloat and would like to know what the Engineer community thinks. Yes, my post does mention turrets and the explosives trait line—but bloat affects all of our trait lines—especially Explosives and Firearms. Please hop over and share your thoughts.

One of this month’s changes in the Engineer Explosives trait line (Explosive Powder:
This trait now functions with detonating turrets.) highlights a problem with the way our traits are laid out. We have some bloating in certain lines and Explosives is one of our biggest offenders currently—specifically at the Master and Grandmaster tiers.

For example, if you’re running the bomb kit with grenade kit (a popular and effective option) you have to decide between Explosive Powder, and Short Fuse due to Grenadier at the GM tier being necessary to bolster grenade damage post 30% dmg nerf.

If you’re running a turret build and want Accelerant-packed Turrets, but you would also like to use Bomb Kit or Grenade Kit, you have to make even harder choices. Short Fuse is considered a must in a Bomb build and some Grenade builds given the fast pace of most fights. Now a Turret focused build with Bombs or Grenades has to choose between Explosive Powder or Short Fuse. If Explosive Powder is chosen, then they have to forgo Short Fuse because the only way to benefit fully from Explosive Powder is to select Accelerant-packed Turrets because without it, turret detonation does no damage.

The Adept tier is a non issue because there are currently two desirable traits: Incendiary Powder and Forceful Explosives. One is used mainly in direct damage (rifle or pistol) builds, and the other is used in Bomb or Grenade builds.

So you can see at the two higher tiers there is bloating. I know that a turret user doesn’t have to take all of the traits that affect turrets, but in my opinion, they should be able to and get a decent benefit from it. As it stands, the traits are spread out too much (more so now) and offer little benefit.

This makes talk of build diversity come across as disingenuous.

Is the intent to force players to make hard choices? If so, please make those choices matter. Currently—at least for the Engineer—trait selection is more focused on avoiding useless or broken traits than choosing ones that make our builds more effective or engaging.

Suggestion: Consolidate traits such as Forceful Explosives and Explosive Powder. Consider making some weak traits baseline for the skills they affect (Accelerant-packed Turrets)

Thanks for reading.

Exactly right, Ayden. I was at PAX a couple of years ago and a couple of foul mouthed kids jumped the queue in front of me. I had been waiting patiently in line for a panel discussion for nearly an hour. I laid into them and told them to get the hell out of line. The trash talk dried up, they turned red, and got out of line. This is what happens to video game trash talkers who step into the real world and think they can pull the same crap. Balkan has it backwards. It’s the in-game trash talkers who are terrible.

Harpoon Turret (underwater version) needs testing.

Nice episode, but wow—turrets were thrown under the bus faster than a Thief can hit his #2 key.

Procs Shrapnel 100% of the time. obviously a bug
Works with Forceful Explosives and Explosive Powder.

I was just curious about the damage it deals, and trait interaction so I tested this in the Mists. I would love to see this trait moved out of the explosives line into alchemy and changed to create poison fields rather than do damage.

I would avoid using cookie cutter builds or so called “top tier” builds as a beginner. The meta is very different at high levels of play so you won’t get similar results. Even more due to the fact that your teammates will be inexperienced as well until you reach higher ranks. (ignore that last fact if you’re going to play with experienced players)

Use a build that covers the basics:
Some mobility and escapes (stun breaks)
Consistent Damage
Control

This is what I would use for a starting point. You can fill it out to your own personal taste.

http://tinyurl.com/m87hovj

This gives you a decent amount of condition damage for your Pistol attacks, high toughness and health, good up time on Protection, a stun break, and a moderate amount of condition removal. This will allow you to get familiar with the Engineer as you’ll be durable and have time to get used to how we fight.

Rune of the Mad King ravens. I can’t find one single image or video, which is mind boggling. Is the effect that crappy? Is anyone using these?

danbuter.2314:

tigirius.9014:

2) any game most notably in a title that’s supposedly making huge wads of dough all the time.

Except that it’s been confirmed here and elsewhere that NCSoft has taken most of the money gw2 has made and put it into Wildstar. They did not give it to anet for bug fixing or anything else.

Can you cite your source?

note: Dontain’s youtube video doesn’t count because he got it wrong.

Yeah, just spend 20-30 trait points and it’s great! If you don’t want to put points into the Alchemy trait line use another stun breaker, like…Elixir R…OK, well then how about Elixir U, it’s a stun…hmmm. It’s also bugged. You could always use Rocket Boots…but that has a self CC component. You should just use Utility Goggles. Yeah, there you go. See, everything is fine. No pigeon holing going on here. Nope.

…none at all

Stun Breakers are not an answer to a combo that can be repeated 2-3 more times within the cooldown of most any Stun Breaker. This thread is not over, in fact, it’s just getting started.

Privilege cries the loudest when the underprivileged join the conversation.

tigirius.9014:

Spart.6578:

Could Minefield also be fixed regarding speedy gadgets? Apparently that reduces the cooldown on Minefield when the tools trait line should be reducing the cooldown on it.

I had not noticed that thanks! Yeah they definitely need to do something about how it throws the mines and the cooldown on the toolbelt.

I would prefer the mines be thrown in a shape in front of me, right now they just go everywhere there’s no pattern and sometimes they are far too far apart to be effective.

Agreed. Right now the only way to ensure that they don’t spread out too much is to use terrain. If you place them on a narrow bridge or catwalk they will cluster together. For example, the bridge to Altar in the Temple of the Silent Storm map. There are plenty of other examples, but it really shouldn’t spread out so much in the first place.

I support this, as do a lot of Engineer players already. Let’s hope they’re reading and considering a big positive change to gadgets.

That’s about a 9 on the tension scale there, rube. What I want is Thieves to L2P to their strengths. Stick to team fights, roaming, back capping, and secondaries. If you don’t think any of those matter or aren’t enough you’re a greedy glory hound that just wants it all.

Maybe have a “clash” mechanic where players have to stop what they’re doing and rapidly tap A and D. Whoever taps faster wins and rips the other player’s mask off.

Arganthium.5638:

because you can’t cap points while stealthed.

I kid…a little, but seriously—stop painting it as a weakness in conquest mode. Thief is made to be a vulture; picking off the weak or unsuspecting and roaming to trash trebs and steal npc kills. AND THE PROFESSION IF EFFING FANTASTIC AT IT.

Thief also could use some toning down so they can’t dance in and out of a group, nab a kill, and disappear.

chungiee.8764:

Grackleflint.4956:

I tested inertial converter in the mists. It has its own cooldown of approximately 90 seconds.

p.s. this was a pain in the kitten to test

Haha thanks for your efforts! Glad someone could clear that up for me as I would have no idea how to go about testing that lol.

Now just to figure out how to make use of this knowledge…would be nice if there was something visual to tell me if Inertial Converter will get used so i can plan whether to Toss that Elixir R for condi heals :p.

Thanks again – your awesome.

You’re welcome, and I agree—there should be a visible countdown for traits that have cooldowns.