I would say 3-4-1-2, especially since backpacks are being often given in living stories.
I would like to point out that it is a grandmaster trait and it doesn’t work on conditions applied before its activation.
Also, 25% hp is low enough that anyone with some decent power can burst him down. Sure, it is strong versus people who specialize in conditions…but that’s exactly the point of the trait.
(and the wording has changed with the last patch – before it said that they were immune, so the trait may have been stealth changed)
Or people could have learnt about countering it instead of smashing keys at random and whining about the ress, since there are pretty straightforward counters…
By the way…
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Signet_of_Agility
Same cooldown, better active effect (it cures conditions too) and also has a passive effect. And it is instant. Assuming the wiki is right, obviously.
We have a toolbelt skill as well, sure. But we shouldn’t pay a price for our class mechanic – thus our utilities themselves shouldn’t be worse than other classes’ ones.Signet of Agility: Passive precision, refills endurance, cures one condition.
Elixir R: Revives players (oneself included), refills endurance, cures all conditions.Also note that Elixir R gives you these abilities between 2 different skills, meaning you don’t have to worry about refilling your endurance and then not having a way to cure conditions 5 seconds later. I really don’t see how you can claim that there’s a difference in usefulness between these two skills. Not to mention Engineers aren’t Thieves. These classes play differently and their skills should be treated differently.
Just to point out aswell that precision on the signet is like 13-15% crit chance…or was last i checked.
We may also point out that the signets’ active effects work on every ally on range (so a group endurance refill and a group single condition cleanse).
Why do you think it got nerfed? It’s all due to people whining about the ressing part of the skill – those same people who haven’t ever tried to counter it.
It isn’t like we can choose skills and toolbelts separately, so nerfing one of the two has repercussions on the other as well. I used P/S, bomb kit, tool kit and elixir R before.
Now i had to ditch it due to the lack of a stun breaker. Oh, sure, i can use the elixir gun in its place…and i can’t even put regeneration because i need that toolbelt for the stun break now.
Heh, this patch was terrible for bunker builds, between this, the static shield change (nerf, in my opinion) and other classes’ buffs.
I wonder why people don’t ever mention all the counters to the elixir R ress. Any control effect before the engi is downed, launch when he’s downed, or even waiting a couple seconds if you see him tossing the elixir should be enough. Heh, i should test that, but maybe even projectile blockers could work (you would destroy the tossed elixir before it gets on the floor, basically).
The problem is that people don’t bother at all with counters and we get nerfed because of other people’ incompetence.
Putting them on terrible skills is what destroys the class. The only decent one there is healing mist now.
The skills they’ve buffed are the ones no one used before because they were simply terrible. This can give some variations, but definitely no buff in the class as a whole.
The skills they have nerfed are the ones strictly related to bunker builds, instead, and this hurts quite a bit as far as survivability goes for those builds.
Regarding traits? The new firearms grandmaster traits are a waste of points, simply put. The only slight advantage there may be there is if you use flamethrower, elixir gun and you don’t want to bother getting traits for the main weapons. In that case you have 10 more points. But the flamethrower itself has got its problems in pvp (like retaliation).
Armor Mods? Oh, please. Autodefense bomb dispenser? Why even bother when you can get Grenadier instead?
Automated response seems to have been stealth nerfed, according to the new wording. Again, another trait used by bunker builds that got nerfed.
The only slight buff there would be Acidic Coating…in a line that is already crowded with those few things that can help the engineers’ survivability (backpack regenerator, automated response, protection injection – you know, to get protection, that useful boon we can’t reliably get).
And this without even considering what other classes have got instead.
Because throw shield has a 0.75s activation time. If you throw it this way instead of acting while they are stunned, you’re basically trading a 1s stun for a 1s daze + some damage. Since while dazed they can move, the second hit can be easily avoided – it travels on a straight line, after all.
But this made up situation was against a melee right? So you know they have to be next to you to attack, so you can get them directly in the path of the shield coming back. If they dodge away from it, or get out of the path, well that’s also time you’re hitting them and they’re not hitting you so the shield has done a good job of giving you an opening.
I also don’t quite understand how it’s trading 1s stun for 1s daze. You’re being very pessimistic and unfair to the skill. The stun has already happened. By throwing the shield you’re not erasing what stun was already applied. You’re adding onto it. If they broke the stun, you’re still not trading anything because the stun is gone regardless of what you do.
You’re spending almost all the time they are stunned to activate the shield throw – as i said before, its cast time is 0.75s. You will hit them with the first daze, but it is likely they’ll avoid the return shot, cause in the meantime the stun effect will be ended and they’ll be able to move (and since the shield travels in a straight line, they just have to kite the engineer a bit to avoid the second hit).
In terms of simply staying alive, sure, you may have got a couple seconds. But the stun is basically being wasted this way, and you won’t even inflict a reasonable amount of damage – just the shield throw damage and, assuming he doesn’t move enough, the attack you can do while he’s dazed for that second.
Imho, 2 seconds of stun were much more useful in that regard, whether for offensive or defensive purposes.
Edit: albeit, it seems that the throw shield could be bugged – it doesn’t always return, according to a thread in the bug forum.
the point of the toolbelt is to compensate for the loss of a utility when equipping kits, and is meant to add synergy between that kit and other chosen utilities. this is why many toolbelt skills on non-kit utilities seem weaker than teh rest.
This is just your opinion on the matter, though. I’ve yet to see any developer talking about the toolbelt in such a way.
Elixir R was, in effect, a one slot Elixir Gun. It was too powerful and needed to be fixed.
Again, just your opinion. The effect of Elixir R itself was still weaker than similar utilities – like thieves’ signet of agility (30s cooldown, refill endurance and cure a condition on every ally, plus a passive effect that gives 180 precision). It made up with the toolbelt, sure, but even that has its counters. If people don’t use them, well, this is just their fault. We shouldn’t be punished because other people aren’t able to use a knockback, fear, a launch or simply stop attacking for a couple seconds when required.
Now, personally, i would have liked to have seen the stunbreak/end regen have stayed, with the toolbelt skill changing to something less OP than a twice spammable self/group rez..
Again, see above. And it was usable a second time only with a trait conveniently placed in a non-tanking related tree – to take that, you would have lost some survivability anyway.
Elixir R did too much for a single skill
Seems like many people don’t understand this part: utility AND toolbelt. It is part of the class mechanic of the engineers. If it wasn’t better of a single skill, the engineer class mechanic would be useless.
And so it can’t be balanced by simply comparing the skills.
Blocking all melee and ranged hits for 2 seconds, from multiple sources, is easily better than expending your entire block to stun the ranger pet, or mesmer clone. This is the worst case scenario, obviously. I’m just making a point that there will me many times where the current Shield 5 is superior.
It seems to be a 1v1 toning down and a 1vX improvement.
The only case where there would an improvement is an 1vX with someone melee. That’s the theory. But even so, it is futile in practice. You’re already blocking, what use there is to stun them if you can’t act after that? If you’re using it just to block, then we’re talking about a 2s block on a 40s cooldown.
That’s just terrible, especially since the gear shield can block for more time, on half the cooldown.
This, again, is not giving the new shield #5 skill a fair shot. If you’re fighting one melee attacker, you stun them. I’m with you up until that point. Then you want to attack? Throw the shield instead of cancelling it. Preferably just as they break the initial 1s stun, now they have a daze they likely can’t get out of. Now you’re getting another 1 second of daze and damage, as well as another 1s daze and damage when it comes back.
Why on earth are you just cancelling it to attack them?
Because throw shield has a 0.75s activation time. If you throw it this way instead of acting while they are stunned, you’re basically trading a 1s stun for a 1s daze + some damage. Since while dazed they can move, the second hit can be easily avoided – it travels on a straight line, after all.
Imho, the shield nerf is quite relevant, in practice. Versus single opponents you have a 2s block on a 40s cooldown (32 if traited) instead of 3s blocking. If they’re ranged, you’re blocking less; if they’re melee, you will stun them for 1s instead of 2. You will have to cancel the skill anyway to attack them when they are stunned, though, so the only thing changing here is that you stun them for less time.
Versus multiple opponents there is the same problem. Sure, you can stun them, but any action will cancel the shield anyway, and it lasts only for 2 seconds in any case.
Basically, you can’t do anything either way while they are stunned.
It could have some use only if there is also some other ally along the engineer and all the opponents are focusing in melee on the engineer…but even in that case, we’re talking about a 1s stun on a 40s/32s cooldown – due of the duration, i don’t think it would be expected for enemies to be stunned more than a single time.
Overall, it seems quite a nerf to me.
the invuln was only op because you could use grenades in elixir s, why’d you think they all switched to elixir r when s got nerfed? you sound so desperate to be op.
An invuln skill is an escape mechanic. Necro doesn’t even get that. I cant believe that the other guy said that Elixir S is crap. I’d be happy to have Elixir S on my necro
And that skill doesn’t offer anything useful for escape purposes. You move at the same exact speed at your opponent – nothing prevents him from following you.
There is also toss elixir s, sure. But it gives a random effect between stealth and stability, so you can’t actually rely on it, even if stealth would be useful for escape purposes.
An invulnerable skill that is basically useless, since you can’t do anything during that duration. 3 seconds of delaying your death.
The trait uses it automatically at 25% hp. Again, 3 seconds of delaying your death, especially since it also interrupt skills when it gets activated (like the healing ones, you know…the ones you would use when you’re getting low on hp).
It is extremely noticeable in both its activation and ending, so everyone can just kill you when it ends.
And while we’ve got medium armors (144 armor more than light ones) necromancers have got the highest hp tier (3290 more hp than engineers). Overall, necromancers have got the upper hand stats-wise.
Gonna quote him.
And the shield change is just harmful. If you have more than a single opponent – and that is basically the only case where it would have been better – a single second of stun won’t save you at all, especially since they also reduced its duration from 3 to 2 seconds. And you have to cancel the skill to do something while the opponent is stunned, so even if now it works for the full duration, it is just useless.
Basically, they just moved stunbreakers to some underused skills. And more often than not, they were underused because they are useless.
Overall, a nerf. Especially for the bunker capabilities of the class….that is, the only decent role it still had.
Warriors won one too some time ago. I suppose they were fine back then, right?
When the OP says “This puts the Engi class in a bad position in tPvP in my opinion”, a day or two after the new engis won a pretty big tournament, I start to question the logic.
I’ll repeat myself: warriors were able to win that tournament as well in the past. Did that meant they were powerful and almighty at that time?
No, they weren’t, exactly as they aren’t now.
Simply put, that tournament doesn’t prove anything.
Crazy, cause the “new” engineers just won the SOAC profession tournament, at least NA, perhaps EU too.
Warriors won one too some time ago. I suppose they were fine back then, right?
The shield one was definitely a nerf, anyway. But not regarding the fix, but mostly because of the reduced stun duration.
Melee attacks were blocked anyway in almost all cases – the offender was stunned for a couple seconds. Now it is better only if there are many people attacking you at the same time…but if there are all those people focusing on you, you’re screwed anyway even if you stun them for a single second.
(edited by Manuhell.2759)
And none of that functionality has changed, only the stun break. It sucks that you have to now slot something else or something in addition to R if you want a stun break. Rocket boots lost the stun break too. Healing mist got some, so did rumble (but why? >.<!)
Regardless, the nerf to R is not unwarranted, and we have myriad new options to go with it.
It’s not my problem you think that throwing nades and self rezzing in a GC spec is the only place for engies in the meta.
Learn to adapt. I sincerely wish I could devote more than a few nights to this game a week.
And the cast time on the actual utility. That, in an utility that now has the only use of refilling endurance, makes it even more useless. It leaves you open to interrupts, but more than everything gives you a delay on when you’ll be able to use that endurance.
We’ve got other stun breaks, sure. But i won’t slot a turret just to destroy it because i need the stun break. I will have to use the elixir gun just because healing mist is the only decent stunbreaker there, and overall is still a nerf over my previous build.
They basically forced people to change their builds, since we are already pretty strict with utility slots. And the alternatives aren’t as good as the ones there were before. So, basically, it is still a nerf.
Beside that, despite your wrong assumptions, i don’t even use grenades or a GC spec. I simply don’t find any sense in this way of balancing.
You can’t simply compare a skill and his toolbelt to another utility and whine that the first is stronger. If it weren’t so, our class mechanic would be useless, since all it does said mechanic is simply to give us more skills.
And so they can’t simply be balanced seeing what the other skills do, cause it would be comparing a skill and a class mechanic versus a skill.
I swear the people making this list have never fought a competent engie, Eggs included.
As if the elixir R nerf broke our class.
One skill could: stun break, end regen, and revive … twice.
It can still end regen and revive…twice.
Kittens. All of you.
As if R was our only defensive skill.
Two skills. Utility+toolbelt. And the toolbelt is part of our class mechanic, anyway – if utility+toolbelt weren’t better than other classes utilities – and it isn’t so for many of them anyway – then our class mechanic is useless, if not harmful. It isn’t like warriors’ weapons are weaker just because they also have a burst skill, after all. And so shouldn’t our skills.
Anyway, for the toolbelt to be used twice, it has to be properly traited.
And even then, it has some counters – knockback before the engi was downed, launch after he was downed, even waiting some seconds if you saw him tossing it was enough.
So, no, it wasn’t overpowered at all. And now is near useless by itself (and extremely weaker than the only other full endurance refilling skill, thief’s signet of agility).
The second skill is part of the class mechanic, though. It must be an added bonus, else our class mechanic actually hurts us. So comparing an utility+toolbelt to an utility is useless.
Do you take in account the thief class mechanics when comparing the skills? No.
Are warriors’ weapon skills weaker because they have a burst skill? No.
Are other classes’ skills nerfed because they have a class mechanic? No.
So why should it be so for engineers?Also, there are quite many counters for toss elixir R anyway, and using it for the condition removal instead pf the ress is basically wasting it.
You sound ridiculous. Elixir R is fine.
It isn’t, and i’ve explained why. If you don’t know how to argument, simply don’t post.
So, basically, you want them to change how the whole burst attack works, but just when and if you can gain an advantage by doing so. Seems kinda pretentious.
Especially since the trait, as it is worded, is already working perfectly.
Well, the matter is, it does work properly. There is a reason if it written as “when the adrenaline is spent” and not “when a burst skill is used”, after all.
If they changed how the adrenaline was spent it would be a general change, not just related to this trait. That would means you would spend the adrenaline even when blinded or simply missing. Seems kinda worse.
Except toolbelts aren’t as good as utilities – and when they are even comparable, the utility get nerfed to being subpar instead (hi, elixir r), we don’t get a second weapon slot when not using kits and our main weapons damage is nerfed due to the mere existance of kits. So using a full turret/gadget/elixir build means shooting yourself on the foots, since you already paid a price for kits, even if you don’t actually want to use them.
And if you use it to stop a stomp, you’ll get stomped anyway. Because any decent opponent is aware of our liability, thus they’ll stomp us as soon as we’re downed. Whereas other classes can gain time in other, better ways (be it making the opponent move with fears or knockbacks or having ways of moving themselves).
Actually, it does make sense. Adrenaline is not spent if the burst skill does not connect with any enemy target, and blind prevents you to do just that, since your attack misses.
The second skill is part of the class mechanic, though. It must be an added bonus, else our class mechanic actually hurts us. So comparing an utility+toolbelt to an utility is useless.
Do you take in account the thief class mechanics when comparing the skills? No.
Are warriors’ weapon skills weaker because they have a burst skill? No.
Are other classes’ skills nerfed because they have a class mechanic? No.
So why should it be so for engineers?
Also, there are quite many counters for toss elixir R anyway, and using it for the condition removal instead pf the ress is basically wasting it.
(edited by Manuhell.2759)
It makes it easier cause by pulling them in your position, they’re already above you and can stomp you immediatly, so you won’t even be able to actually charge your third skill.
Basically, whereas other classes’ downed skills may buy them some seconds, ours make us even more in danger.
By the way…
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Signet_of_Agility
Same cooldown, better active effect (it cures conditions too) and also has a passive effect. And it is instant. Assuming the wiki is right, obviously.
We have a toolbelt skill as well, sure. But we shouldn’t pay a price for our class mechanic – thus our utilities themselves shouldn’t be worse than other classes’ ones.
(edited by Manuhell.2759)
The alternative stunbreakers aren’t that good, though. The only acceptable one is the healing mist, i may say. Thus, while this opens some variations (like with the aforemented elixir gun) i would say overall is a nerf, especially compared to some other classes.
That would make it quite useless.
It is a grandmaster trait and it works only below 25% hp (that means, in the best case, something like 6500 hp). And it doesn’t remove conditions already applied anyway.
Also, it is the alternative trait to HGH.
Except that usually you’re against other bunkers, like guardians, that
1)may have various means of getting stability
2)can block, either by active skills or aegis
3)can dodge anyway when needed
and those will render all those knockbacks useless – especially stability.
On the other hand, since we’re a bit lacking in the stability compartment, we are weak to that same tactic. Maybe they won’t kill us, but they’ll simply maintain the node under their control, and that’s all that matters.
The problem is that it doesn’t take in account the real damage done by the skill, just the power of the attacker.
A single strong attack can do much more damage than a weak multi-hit attack (like the flamethrower’s one), but the latter will take a lot more damage from retaliation.
Retaliation is simply flawed in its design.
Taking just power in account, it is useless versus bursts and absurdely strong versus weak multi-hit skills.
Using the flamethrower autoattack is a suicide in pvp. Too weak versus a single person, should be used versus two or three opponent to be decent, but by doing so any area retaliation – and there are quite many ways to gain that – means killing yourself in a couple autoattacks. Heh, even a single opponent with retaliation is enough to make that attack useless.
First of all, we’re talking about an utility+a toolbelt. And together they must be better than a single utility, else our class mechanic is useless.
Second, while it works indeed both as a revive field and a condition removal field, it has got quite an appropriate cooldown (one too high for a condition removal, thus usually it isn’t used for that purpose, but just for the reviving part).
Third, the revive field has got quite some counters, be it knockbacking the engineer before he gets downed or even launching it when he get downed. Heh, even dpsing him may be enough to avoid the revive. Or simply avoiding to attack him if you’ve seen it tossing it.
Anyway, the utility itself now is quite useless. If you need endurance is because you need to dodge immediatly, not after some cast time.
(edited by Manuhell.2759)
It would solve some logical problems with turret builds…as things stand now, either you can heal them or bring 3 turrets, since the tool kit will spend a slot. Albeit, they’ve got far worse problems.
Albeit, since that kit is also our only real melee weapon, if devs don’t want to add one of those, putting kits could be another viable choice.
Oh, and toolbelts aren’t comparable to utility slots anyway. And even when they are, the utility slot gets nerfed instead to compensate for it (Elixir R anyone?).
The necro one works with every weapon and is a grandmaster minor trait, though.
Dunno, i can’t see it much useful if it only works with pistols and rifles.
If it worked with any weapon/kit, on the other hand…
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/aetherblade-pirates-look-up/
The airship came from the southwest.
Cantha is located to the southwest.
Also, if rapiers were unseen in Tyria, they must come from somewhere else…
Oh, that sure is interesting. Guess they forgot to write about that change.
Yep, i was discussing this in teamspeak just now (and i didn’t notice they removed the stun break fron rocket boots). Our stun breaks aren’t exactly what i would call awesome now.
Mh, they reworded Automated Response as: Condition Duration is reduced by 100% when health is below 25%.
Oh, right, didn’t notice they removed the stun break on rocket boots. Meh.
Basically, the only nerf there seems to be the elixir R one. Annoying, but overall we are better now.
Mh, Acidic Coating description has got a typo. Blindess. Lol.
Well, in the end they were correct indeed.
If anything, after reading these reactions, i would say them moving it to grandmaster minor is quite justified. Since that is the place for build-defining traits.
One example: moving BOTH grandmaster traits to master traits in the engie Firearms tree is … lulwhat OP.
Actually, no. Any trait that gives piercing, beside that one, is at most a master trait and also give other benefits – either working on multiple weapons or reducing recharge.
Regarding Juggernaut, it had a different effect when they created it and thus they gave it a grandmaster slot; The current effect could be compared with warriors’ Forceful Greatsword…that is a master trait.no.
the point isn’t what level the trait is on, it is what you get for the point cost.
20 trait points for a permanent 180 power, 200 toughness, 200 precision, and 380 condition damage is a lot, especially from sPVP standards.
as for forceful greatsword, it doesn’t have the toughness. it is not in the same league as unconditional 200 toughess, 180 power, 180 condition damage.
Regarding Coated Bullet, you get 2 skills with piercing attack – the autoattack and a skill terrible to aim.
Regarding Juggernaut, first at all, it strictly requires the user to stay in the flamethrower kit, either for building up stacks of might or for the toughness bonus. That means you’ll have to stay on it most of the time just to maintain those might stacks and when you aren’t doing that, you also lose part of the bonuses.
And being boons, they can be stolen or removed.
This is true for Forceful Greatsword as well, but the greatsword is a main weapon; they don’t rely as much as engineers on swapping weapons. Also, while they don’t get extra toughness, they get a 20% reduction on recharge – something we can get as well, but spending another trait. They also have heavy armor and the highest tier of hp though, unlike us – so the extra toughness can be seen as a way to make it easier to stay in near-melee range. Cause if we’ve got to stay in the flamethrower kit, we’ll have to fight in that range.
Juggernaut made sense as a grandmaster with the old effect. Now it would be fine as a master trait.
(edited by Manuhell.2759)
One example: moving BOTH grandmaster traits to master traits in the engie Firearms tree is … lulwhat OP.
Actually, no. Any trait that gives piercing, beside that one, is at most a master trait and also give other benefits – either working on multiple weapons or reducing recharge.
Regarding Juggernaut, it had a different effect when they created it and thus they gave it a grandmaster slot; The current effect could be compared with warriors’ Forceful Greatsword…that is a master trait.
Nothing, basically. I would take them with a grain of salt.
Well, it is written there that those are unofficial patch notes and that things may change in the live game. I would take them with a grain of salt.