Guild Wars 2

Which would be the better choice for survability? Given permanent Regeneration uptime, Troll Unguent (unless something else would work better? Spring’s water field is pretty nice alongside Greatsword #3), Signet of the Wild, and Natural Regeneration. (Are there any other sources of health gain that I’ve forgotten?)

My intention is to mostly play tank/support with the Ranger itself, with the pet doing the bulk of my damage. My damage would basically come in the form of Cleric or Sentinel gear, depending on the info I get here. I want to bring along the Guard shout alongside Runes of the Soldier for a somewhat-frequent-but-ultimately-probably-ineffective condition removal. That’s also the source of the permanent Regeneration uptime. It’ll also let me position the pet a little bit, and keep it durable via constant Protection. Plus I just love Guard overall, despite its (apparently) bad reputation. :P

As a side question, I’m guessing the stealth from Guard doesn’t do anything for a pet offensively like Jaguar’s Stalk does?

EDIT: Oh, I’ll probably use some Sigils for healing, as well, unless there’s a better option.

Thanks for the answers so far, y’all.

Norjena, I suppose a better way to put it would be that I’d just like to be able to use Greatsword + Sword/Dagger in PvE/dungeon content. I figure that a focus on survivability is the only way to make that work given that you’re always in melee range, but if there’s a different approach, I’d be grateful for info.

I love the durability of tank Necromancers, between the healing from lifesteals, the rampant condition removal, and the entire second health bar. However, I really, really, REALLY love the cosmetic aspects of Rangers, from medium armor to pet-naming to being the only class with access to Greatsword, Sword, and Dagger all together.

Is there any way at all to be similarly-durable, or am I outta luck on eating my cake and having it, too?

Really like your explanation, Jake, thank you.

Thank you to everyone else, as well, of course. :P

On my Charr, I want to use a light armor chest piece that doesn’t go down the arms much, but I’d like the arms to be fully covered regardless. Are there any light armor gloves and/or shoulders that, alone or combined, will cover the arms fully?

I’m looking around for information on tank Necromancers, and EVERYONE seems to swear by using a Focus in the offhand, instead of a Dagger. It seems to me that the condition removal and Weakness application on the offhand Dagger would be far, far more useful, but EVERYONE says to use Focus, not just as an “it’s better than Dagger” thing, but as an “OH MY LORD FOCUS IS AMAZING I LOVE IT SO MUCH” thing. Why on earth is this? What am I missing? Is it just for the Regeneration?

If you’re setting up other things for keeping up Protection, then…

With 4 Runes of the Earth and 2 Runes of the Traveler, you’ll have a 35% boost to Protection duration. With 15 in Wilderness Survival, you can dodge at least once every 8.75 seconds for 2.75 seconds of Protection, a 31% uptime. If you can spare a Utility Slot towards Stone Spirit, you can get 4 seconds of Protection every 10 seconds, a 40% uptime. That’s using only 15 of your trait points.

If you invest further and go 30 into Nature Magic for the Boon Duration boost, you end up with 3.25 seconds of Protection from dodging (37% uptime) and 4.75 seconds from Stone Spirit (47.5% uptime), plus the application from Runes of the Earth lasting 6.6 seconds (22% uptime).

All together, that’s 106.5% uptime, giving you a minor buffer if things don’t activate as efficiently as possible. Without anything in Nature Magic, that’s still an 89% uptime. If you put some investment into Vigor and other forms of endurance replenishment as well (Lightning Reflexes, Sigil of Energy, etc.), you can bump it up a little higher thanks to the Protection on Dodge.

EDIT: Just noticed I overlooked you saying Nature Magic VI was a given. If that’s as far as you go into the Nature Magic tree, that’s a 10% boost to Boon Duration, making dodge-granted Protection have a 33% uptime, Earth Runes have a 19% uptime, and Earth Spirit have a 44% uptime. In addition, Nature’s Protection gives 29% uptime. All together, that’s 125% uptime. If you take out the Earth Spirit, that becomes 81% uptime. Granted, that’s with each source activating immediately upon getting off cooldown, which will not happen, so that’s just the unrealistic best case scenario.

(Uptime uptime uptime uptime.)

Only three Rune sets are capable of providing the Protection Boon themselves.

Earth
Forge
Grove

Forge is a minimum 12-second application versus a 60-second cooldown (maximum 20% uptime), and requires all six Runes to apply it. It also only triggers after falling below 50% HP, meaning you’ll have to be hurt a lot before it kicks in.

Earth and Grove operate the same way as far as applying Protection, but Grove gives a lesser Protection duration boost (which is also glitched to not work in the first place, according to the Wiki page), so you’d go Earth. This gives a minimum 4.8 second application of Protection versus a cooldown of 30 seconds (maximum 16% uptime), and activates 25% of the time you’re hit regardless of HP.

If you’re more likely to take many small hits versus a few big ones clearing out large chunks of your health at a time, Runes of the Earth are likely preferable to Runes of the Forge, despite the technically lower downtime. You can also get two extra runes onto your armor by using Earth, allowing you to get an extra 15% Boon Duration via Water, Monk, or Traveler runes. This brings the duration to 5.4 seconds, a maximum 18% uptime.

If you did end up getting Boon Duration from other sources such as food or trait lines, Runes of the Forge will get a larger benefit. But, given the necessary conditions to apply the Boon, Runes of the Earth may still be superior.

I’m going to be using these two Kits with a 30/0/0/10/30 trait setup. That means 30% to both Condition Duration and Critical Damage. I hop around between PvE and zerg-centric WvW. That being the case, would I be better off with Rampager gear, or Berserker? Without investment in the Firearms line, I won’t be getting Bleed on criticals unless I toss a Sigil in.

One concern I have is the upcoming Critical Damage change. Obviously, no one knows the exact specifics of how that’ll go down, but there’s some basic info on it, right? From what I recall, small amounts of Critical Damage won’t see much change, but piling it on will be less effective?

Tulbokz Hopecraft
Stormbluff Isle
PvE and WvW, but with a desire to use Greatsword and Sword/Dagger, kinda screwin’ myself on those fronts.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Toolbox.9375:

Pyroatheist.9031:

Toolbox.9375:

Pyroatheist.9031:

Toolbox.9375:

According to the Wiki, Warlock has a base of 438 an a coefficient of 1.65. Swordsman has a base of 672, and a coefficient of 1.925. Duelist, after combining all eight shots, has a base of 768, and a coefficient of 2.2.

Hate to rain on your calculation parade here, but that’s not how it works. Base damage isn’t something that actually exists.

Calculation for phantasms is as follows: (Level 80 exotic weapon damage) * (Skill Coefficient) * (Power) / (Target Armor) * (other modifiers such as crits or phantasmal strength)

Well, obviously, there’s criticals and other damage boosts to take into account, but are those different between each individual Phantasm, or did I cover the points of difference that would affect how they perform in relation to one another?

I miss the days when games had systems you could actually figure out and calculate through.

The system in this game is pretty simple actually, you were just doing it wrong I think.

I’m not 100% clear on what you did, as you didn’t show every step, but I believe you were using that base damage in the calculations. If you used that number, then every conclusion past that point is faulty.

The only thing I did with the base damage value was tack it on after the coefficient times Power calculations.

Yeah, so that makes them all wrong. Base damage is not a concept that exists in this game, full stop, end of story.

The way you need to do the analysis is simply assume a test value for both power and armor as your starting analysis. The armor value you won’t need to change at all, so just set that as 2500. Power you can start at 2000 as a good baseline. From that point, you’ll need to look at 2 things. The first is how the warlock scales with conditions, and how all of the phantasms scale with more power (as determined by the skill coefficient).

In that case, it sounds like the last calculation saying that the Warlock coefficient passes Duelist at 2 conditions and Swordsman at 7 would be correct.

Gonna go ahead and drop out of this, now, it’s frustrating as kitten and I abhor all modern game developers.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Toolbox.9375:

Pyroatheist.9031:

Toolbox.9375:

According to the Wiki, Warlock has a base of 438 an a coefficient of 1.65. Swordsman has a base of 672, and a coefficient of 1.925. Duelist, after combining all eight shots, has a base of 768, and a coefficient of 2.2.

Hate to rain on your calculation parade here, but that’s not how it works. Base damage isn’t something that actually exists.

Calculation for phantasms is as follows: (Level 80 exotic weapon damage) * (Skill Coefficient) * (Power) / (Target Armor) * (other modifiers such as crits or phantasmal strength)

Well, obviously, there’s criticals and other damage boosts to take into account, but are those different between each individual Phantasm, or did I cover the points of difference that would affect how they perform in relation to one another?

I miss the days when games had systems you could actually figure out and calculate through.

The system in this game is pretty simple actually, you were just doing it wrong I think.

I’m not 100% clear on what you did, as you didn’t show every step, but I believe you were using that base damage in the calculations. If you used that number, then every conclusion past that point is faulty.

The only thing I did with the base damage value was tack it on after the coefficient times Power calculations.

And “simple” my backside. :P I miss games where you’d have a base damage stat, a value to apply to it through simple multiplication or addition, and a defense stat by which to divide the total by or subtract or some other simple calculation. None of this unique-to-each-power coefficient stuff, no diminishing returns, no having to account for eighty different variables to get one number. It’s like a game isn’t considered worthy unless it takes a doctorate in mathematics to figure it out, these days.

Pyroatheist.9031:

Toolbox.9375:

According to the Wiki, Warlock has a base of 438 an a coefficient of 1.65. Swordsman has a base of 672, and a coefficient of 1.925. Duelist, after combining all eight shots, has a base of 768, and a coefficient of 2.2.

Hate to rain on your calculation parade here, but that’s not how it works. Base damage isn’t something that actually exists.

Calculation for phantasms is as follows: (Level 80 exotic weapon damage) * (Skill Coefficient) * (Power) / (Target Armor) * (other modifiers such as crits or phantasmal strength)

Well, obviously, there’s criticals and other damage boosts to take into account, but are those different between each individual Phantasm, or did I cover the points of difference that would affect how they perform in relation to one another?

I miss the days when games had systems you could actually figure out and calculate through.

EDIT: Disregard everything in this post, it was a phenomenal waste of time and life.

I think I read somewhere that 7 conditions was the point at which Warlock overtakes the other high-damage Phantasms.

According to the Wiki, Warlock has a base of 438 an a coefficient of 1.65. Swordsman has a base of 672, and a coefficient of 1.925. Duelist, after combining all eight shots, has a base of 768, and a coefficient of 2.2.

Then, when considering attack rate, Warlock is 64.4 damage per second, 0.243 coefficient, Swordsman is 143 damage per second, 0.41 coefficient, and Duelist is 101 damage per second, 0.289 coefficient.

If you use Phantasmal Haste, Warlock goes to 75.5/0.284, and Duelist goes to 111/0.319. Swordsman is unaffected by the trait.

Phew. Now! From here, can gauge how it all works when taking into account Power and the number of Conditions.

-DPS at 1000 Power-

Swordsman: 553
Duelist: 390 (430 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 0 conditions: 307.4 (359.5 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 1 condition: 338.14 (395.45 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 2 conditions: 368.88 (431.4 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 3 conditions: 399.62 (467.35 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 4 conditions: 430.36 (503.3 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 5 conditions: 461.1 (539.25 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 6 conditions: 491.84 (575.2 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 7 conditions: 522.58 (611.15 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 8 conditions: 553.32 (647.1 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 9 conditions: 584.06 (683.05 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 10 conditions: 614.8 (719 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 11 conditions: 645.54 (754.95 with Phantasmal Haste)
Warlock with 12 conditions: 676.28 (790.9 with Phantasmal Haste)

So, at 1000 Power, it seems that Warlock passes by Duelist with 3 Conditions, and passes by Swordsman with 8 conditions. With Phantasmal Haste, Warlock overtakes Duelist at 2 conditions instead, and passes Swordsman at 6 conditions.

However, I’m sure you’ll have more than 1000 Power if you’re focusing on Phantasms. It takes 7 conditions for Warlock’s coefficient to pass Swordsman’s, and passes Duelist with just 2 conditions. So, in general, you’ll want to takes those two numbers as the base amount needed to surpass their damage (7 for Swordsman, 2 for Duelist), but you may want to run your own Power score through to find out the specifics.

This is all going off of Wiki knowledge exclusively, though, and I’m not 100% certain how each number comes into play, so I may be off.

tl;dr
7 conditions to do more damage than Swordsman
2 conditions to do more damage than Duelist

So, there are a few specific skins for Greatsword and Dagger that I really, really like.

I also like the concept of the Ranger’s pet. Partly because it seems like a rather versatile mechanic, with many different effects and roles (damage, tanking, support) available, and partly because I’m a friendless loser and that virtual companion fills a void in my life that I can otherwise never realistically fill!

So, I’d like input from more experienced Rangers out there… How could I make something work within those confines? Seems to me like it’d be along the lines of one of those bunker beastmaster builds, but I’m not even entirely certain how those work. Could be that I should be using an entirely different approach!

My primary intention is just PvE and, occasionally, dungeons. I enjoy WvW, but I’m admittedly pretty easily overwhelmed in fast-paced duels, and to my knowledge, Ranger is kitten-poor in zerg scenarios. I’d love to be told I’m wrong on that, though. Alternatively, I could just try to get better at fast-paced fights. Maybe head into PvP for practice or something.

Anyway, question asked! Hopefully someone else has ideas, because I’m not quite up to snuff on every little consideration that has to be made in GW2 for a successful build.

That sounds more like an Elite than an Always-On Trait kinda thing. If such a trait were to be implemented, it would almost certainly become a must-take because of just how much firepower that adds. The only balancing approach would be divide the pet’s damage up, and given that people aren’t too fond of the fact that Ranger’s damage is divided up for the pet already… I don’t think that’d go over too well.

Azreell.1568:

A major problem with the pet always being out is he will never move properly.

Look at the new event and how it’s designed. It is literally impossible regardless of how much micro management you do to keep him alive during certain phases. He will simply just run over stuff he isn’t suppose to.

The new LA event is just an example of how flawed the ranger pet mechanic is.

Beyond making them immune to such damage (doubtful and would present a whole new set of problems) they need to do something because once again as it stands this is the only class in game whose primary mechanic is a liability in most pve encounters.

I was doing fine keeping my pets alive by switching to ones more suited to the fight. Most of the fights, I had a devourer out for the ranged attacks, and during the fight with what’s-his-name that reflects all ranged attacks, I switched it out for a bear. My drake wasn’t too shabby in that fight, either.

Though, to be fair, I probably wasn’t putting out as much damage as other ranged-attack users. The reflect-y guy was debatable given that a LOT of people were completely locked down from the lack of ranged capability plus their inability to survive in melee range.

My personal concern is that, if they set up a permastow ability that boosts your personal damage output, Ranger gameplay will be largely balanced around a stowed pet, and active pets will get left in the dust even moreso than they are now.

Ranger’s unique mechanic IS their pet. I like Ranger because of the pet gimmick, and I’m sure most others chose it for the same reason. There are plenty of other classes well-suited to pure damage output. What needs fixing is the control you have over the pet (responsiveness, options such as deciding where it stands/what abilities it uses/dodging and the like), and its overall effectiveness in cases where it isn’t quite up to par. Some minor boosts to the Ranger itself are fine, too, but not to the point where the Ranger can stand alone. That defeats the purpose entirely.

In either hand. I’d just like to know the best aspects of axes, how they play into the overall playstyle, etc.

Is #1’s bouncing all that handy?

Does #2 have any real benefit, or does the spread make it hard to really utilize?

It seems #3 is pretty potent with both Chill and Weakness, does it have any other strengths OR are those conditions not as useful as they seem on paper?

Can #4’s travel time get in the way of its function, and is pulling an enemy to you really all that wise?

How useful is #5 overall? There are a lot of aspects to it, which ones are the most noteworthy?

Furthermore, does it do well with Power or Condition? Or should damage not even be a consideration, and the focus should be more on its utility?

Any and all other input is appreciated.

I do wish it were possible to save names across each different pet. It’s sometimes hard to remember if I’d named my feline Pneumatic Holepunch or Motorized Stapler after I come back from using my bear, RemoteControl Anvil. I don’t like to be inconsistent!

Unfortunately, I doubt it can change at this point. Doesn’t seem like the kind of thing that could simply be patched into place.

Sic ’Em, Signet of the Wild, and Signet of the Hunt… Can all of these be stacked together for one big hit (and a bunch of smaller-bigger hits?) If so (or even if not), has using this utility set been successful for anyone, in situations conducive to a purely offensive pet focus?

So, in most games I play, I like to be able to switch things up on-the-fly to fill a variety of needs. Being able to support my team if we’re not quite making it, being able to stay alive in really dangerous situations, being able to take out enemies quickly and efficiently if necessary…

Obviously, most want this kind of all-purpose setup, but I’m not talking about doing all of them at once. What I strive for is doing one of those things at a time, but very well, even if it means I fall far short in other areas.

I know it’s possible to reset your traits pretty quickly and cheaply, but I’d rather not having to make it to a Trainer every time I want to switch things up.

Unfortunately, I’m not having a whole lot of luck finding a setup that works for that, here. I figured Engineer was my best bet to accomplishing such a thing. What I’ve been looking at so far is something with 30 in Alchemy, as it has some very nice traits for all types of roles. HGH for offense, Cleaning Formula 409 for defense/support, and plenty of other bits for each role.

I’m not sure what to do with the others, however. Originally, I tried a 0/20/20/30/0 setup, where the “offense mode” was focused on Flamethrower utilizing HGH and Juggernaut. Unfortunately, even with all the Might I could stack through that, and the damage boosts for Flamethrower… The very same trait layout with NO Might stacks yielded higher damage using Grenade Kit instead, essentially meaning all the traits I’d selected were useless. (I was using Rampager gear, if that matters.)

So, that approach appears to be a bust. Would anyone else have other ideas for how to accomplish such a thing? Would a different class be better suited to this endeavor? Gear isn’t a problem, I intend to carry different sets for each role… I just want to be able to switch without heading back to a city.

I guess that’s their indirect approach to ensuring that Grenadiers are at a disadvantage. X)

I love to be versatile in any game I play. I don’t care to cover every situation at once, though. Rather, I like being able to switch out gear, skills, whatever the game in question allows, in order to cover different roles, whatever seems most helpful for a team.

I know you can pretty easily and cheaply switch out your traits, but I’d like to be able to change on a whim without finding a Trait Trainer. For this, I need to find a trait distribution that works well for all the roles I want to cover. Primarily, all-out damage or all-out defense.

Originally, I intended to do this with Engineer, using 0/20/20/30/0, going with a Tankcat-esque build for tanking, an Elixir and Elixir Gun-heavy setup for support, and an HGH/Flamethrower setup for damage… But, after trying the damage setup, I found that my fully Might-ed and traited Flamethrower was doing less damage than Grenade Kit with the same exact traits, and with far less range to boot.

I could change over to a 30/0/0/30/10 setup to take Grenadier alongside HGH instead, but the Explosives tree doesn’t really lend itself at all to defense/support. I like the Alchemy tree because of the versatility of the traits inside being handy for all three approaches, but Explosives is pretty much a one-trick-pony.

So, my question is: Are there any other options like this, with trait lines that lend themselves to a variety of situations? It doesn’t have to be Engineer, I can level a new character.

I’d like to go down the Firearms tree instead of Explosives for a variety of reasons.

Can Juggernaut’d Flamethrower come anywhere near Grenadier’d Grenades in terms of overall effectiveness?
Range OBVIOUSLY goes to Grenades, but can the Might-stacking bring Flamethrower close for damage?
Could the rapid hits of Flamethrower #1 be utilized in some manner?
Does the Flamethrower’s ability to hit through obstacles give it any real advantage, or are Grenade explosions large enough to do the same thing?

Been a long time since I played the game, and I recall HGH builds being pretty popular and powerful. Are they still potent? Are there any HGH builds that use Rifle, Pistol, or perhaps Flamethrower? Can any of those three come even close to other kits?

A friend of mine uses Guardian (I’m afraid I don’t know the build, really… He uses Signets, I know that much. Not much of a minmaxer, just sorta threw somethin’ together), and I’m not sure what to use alongside him. I currently have a Rampager-gear Grenade Kit Engineer (had made an Engineer for the turrets and the promised versatility, initially, but turrets are garbage and I’m not really seein’ the versatility as much as I’d like), but I’m wanting to change to a different race, so I might as well consider other classes as well. XD

Is that even enough information to go off of? What classes do Guardians play well with in general? x_X

The technology to do it in real life is absolutely there, it just hasn’t been combined into that exact package yet.

I’m actually working on a little single-shot turret toy that can be thrown around, right now. XD Not capable of sticking to walls, but I could definitely see how it’d be possible.

Not that any of that matters, though, because this is a video game. You can’t form a raincloud above your friends’ heads, either, and the water most certainly wouldn’t cause their wounds to close.

Love that video, but I wouldn’t say it’s very accurate. The turret lived far, far too long, and was actually able to accomplish something.

This is more like it.

I actually don’t use HGH or Static Discharge at all in my build, but as I said above, I’d just completely cut the game off at that point. Such a thing would make it clear that the developers are just plain targeting Engineer builds for cats and giggles. I don’t have the time or patience to deal with that.

…

I don’t think I need to say much.

(As far as OTHER people’s Engineer names go, I’ve never seen any clever ones. )

Sigh, uninstall, and unbookmark everything GW2-related.

GuilguiS.2738:

1) Switch Autotool Installation with Rifled Turret Barrels and make it give turrets one stack of a specific boon every 3 seconds(max 25) instead of healing, ex:
Riffle Turret – Increase the fire rate by 2% per stack.
Healing Turret – At 10 stacks every attack gives 3 secs of vigor, at 20 sec removes one condition, at 25 stacks gives 3 secs of protection.
Thumper Turret – At 10 stacks every attack removes a boon, at 25 stacks gives a Knockdown every 10 secs.
Flame Turret – Gives a 2% chance to blind on every attack per stack.
Rocket Turret – Increase rate of fire by 1% per stack.
Net Turret – At 10 Stacks every attack criples foes for 5 secs, at 25 stacks every attack chills foes for 3 secs.
The stacks reset when the turret dies.
This trait would need 75 seconds to take full effect so it should not be OP and pretty counterable. This would give us incentives to keep our turrets alive.

YES

Though Net Turret’s specific boosts seem a bit odd, given they’re already immobilized for the same amount of time. Chill only sorta adds something, while Cripple is mostly pointless unless they have something to remove only the Immobilization (or otherwise remove just one condition at a time).

Anyway, the basic premise of gradually-upgrading turrets is one I’ve pushed MANY times. It seems to me that it would be one of the absolute best available approaches to making turrets worthwhile.

Granted, with the new five-minute time limit, it also seems that such a change could get really frustrating. I suppose it somewhat adds a new level of awareness and prediction needed to be able to get the most out of turrets, but 75 seconds is a considerable length of time to have to think ahead, and I’m fairly sure most of us Engineer players aren’t psychic. Note that I am not against 75 seconds; I think that’s a perfectly acceptable length of time for the full buff to take effect, and wouldn’t mind something even longer. It’s the time limit that I’m speaking against, if anything.

TF2 Engineers didn’t used to be able to move their turret, and yet they were still able to hold down an area and be considered a valuable member of the team.

Delving further into the TF2 Engineer versus GW2 Engineer comparison, even TF2’s highly-spammable Minisentry is far more capable than all of GW2’s turrets combined. I know that TF2 is far faster-paced than GW2, but at least in TF2, you can’t just outright ignore the Sentry Gun. In GW2, feel free to stand in the crosshairs of any turret you like; they won’t do anything meaningful.

I can’t get behind this suggestion. I got the game BECAUSE OF Engineer Turrets, thinking they would be long-term point-defense abilities, and hoped they could be boosted up to be real monsters with enough time investment (like TF2’s Engineer). They’re already a huge disappointment, being so incapable and now having a 5 minute time limit. What you’re suggesting would obliterate the last of what makes them Turrets, changing them instead into the same kinds of run-of-the-mill abilities that every other class has. Click button, get immediate effect, wait for cooldown to expire. With the way things are going, I’m sure Arena Net has no intention to make them what turrets should be (and are, in most other games that implement turrets)… But a change like this would dash all remaining hope.

It’d be nice if they could implement the extremely simple idea in this thread.

1UP, here. I’ve only gotten to play it a tiny bit with my friends so far, but what I played was really fun. Problem is, I’ve gotten really busy lately, and haven’t really had a chance to spend much time with it. I’d really like to be able to mess with it some more before it’s gone, but I don’t foresee that happening if it’s out within the month.

I definitely agree with this suggestion! It’d even make the 5-minute time limit a non-issue, something that really only prevents farming without having much of an impact on their actual usage, given that you can pick it up and immediately replace it.

And the low turret health means that it’s still entirely viable for an enemy to just take out the turret in order to get a considerable window of opportunity against a newly-defenseless Engineer. Kill a Rifle Turret immediately after placement, and that’s 30 seconds (going off of the flat 10 second additional cooldown variation) of reduced Engineer firepower. Other turrets, the enemy gets an even bigger break!

I love this idea. Minor change that’s obviously workable given how Trap utilities work (and possibly others? Not certain.), makes Turrets FAR less frustrating and more viable, and yet doesn’t make them overpowered. Even compliments their current state, health and all! I would definitely like to see this idea enacted.

Ayestes.1273:

Maybe there is an alternative path of relying information to the devs

Kidnap one and lecture them on Engineer bugs until they’re able to list every single one from memory?

At least then you could be absolutely sure that they are aware of the bugs and just ignoring us out of sheer malevolence.

Zinwrath.2049:

Toolbox.9375:

My HOPE is for a hefty redesign of turret functionality, that makes them into a long-setup definitely-worth-the-wait powerful point-defense tool. I’ve tossed around numerous ideas to that end; Boons from Toolkit’s autoattack, permanent and stackable power increases from the Overcharge, gradual power growth over time…

My prediction, though? The Rifle Turret’s damage boost is going to be 10% at best. The Thumper Turret’s Cripple application is going to be reduced before it goes live for whatever reason they decide. Flame Turret will get maybe 50 extra range. Net Turret might apply one stack of Vulnerability for three to five seconds. Rocket Turret will only get a boost in its Toolbelt ability, reducing the cooldown to 45 seconds. And Healing Turret, heck, I foresee that getting its Blast Finisher detonation removed to stop all the blatantly-overpowered heal combos from it.

I’m enjoying Engineer, but frankly, most developers botch up all attempts to implement turrets in their games, and Arena Net is FAR from an exception.

You can trait net turret already to add 5 stacks of vulnerability for 8 seconds.

Just adds insult to pre-existing insult, then.

My HOPE is for a hefty redesign of turret functionality, that makes them into a long-setup definitely-worth-the-wait powerful point-defense tool. I’ve tossed around numerous ideas to that end; Boons from Toolkit’s autoattack, permanent and stackable power increases from the Overcharge, gradual power growth over time…

My prediction, though? The Rifle Turret’s damage boost is going to be 10% at best. The Thumper Turret’s Cripple application is going to be reduced before it goes live for whatever reason they decide. Flame Turret will get maybe 50 extra range. Net Turret might apply one stack of Vulnerability for three to five seconds. Rocket Turret will only get a boost in its Toolbelt ability, reducing the cooldown to 45 seconds. And Healing Turret, heck, I foresee that getting its Blast Finisher detonation removed to stop all the blatantly-overpowered heal combos from it.

I’m enjoying Engineer, but frankly, most developers botch up all attempts to implement turrets in their games, and Arena Net is FAR from an exception.

Well, yeah. It’s obvious to we the players, but-… Something tells me that the actual fix put forth isn’t going to have anything to do with any of those suggestions. XD Probably going to be something wacky like redirecting damage from the Engineer to the turrets, without any health increase on the turrets themselves.

MarkillerX.3796:

Toolbox.9375:

I’m currently using a Rampager build with Grenade Kit, combining straight-up damage and conditions and benefiting from Precision twofold, from the critical hit damage and the condition application on critical hits. I’m currently using a 30/10/0/0/30 setup.

I have to wonder, though, if a Berserker build relying solely on direct damage would be superior. I’m not exactly sure where to find all the figures for doing that math.

My desire overall is to just obliterate anything in a group at range. Lobbing grenades into zergs on WvW, predominately.

I only run PvE though
But I use Berserkers, and was wondering the same thing. I use 30 or 25 firearms, though, instead of might stacking.
Why the 30 in Toolkits?

For a variety of very bad reasons.

One, I love the name of the line. I had Inventions boosted up for the same reason, for a time, and hope to do that again once turrets get reworked. XD

Second, I wanted the Toolbelt cooldown reduction, particularly for Elixir R, which I-… Never really use.

On the slightly-more-reasonable side, I like a lot of the traits in there (Kit Refinement is an obvious one, Speedy Kits is nice to have, Power Wrench is really handy, and I sometimes switch in Static Discharge for all-out demolition). On top of that, the critical damage is very potent.

I’d probably get better results out of Firearms or Alchemy. XD

I’m currently using a Rampager build with Grenade Kit, combining straight-up damage and conditions and benefiting from Precision twofold, from the critical hit damage and the condition application on critical hits. I’m currently using a 30/10/0/0/30 setup.

I have to wonder, though, if a Berserker build relying solely on direct damage would be superior. I’m not exactly sure where to find all the figures for doing that math.

My desire overall is to just obliterate anything in a group at range. Lobbing grenades into zergs on WvW, predominately.

I wouldn’t want to see the Toolkit go, either. XD I use every ability it has, and shoving it onto a Mace instead would mean losing at least one of its abilities, and losing the “stagger” you get from having both a shield and the Toolkit.

As far as turret suggestions go, my absolute favorite was having turrets increase dramatically in power based on their health percentage, with them spawning at low health (about the amount of health they have now, basically). Such an approach would…

-Make them more durable due to their higher health pool.
-Give them a true “area denial” role.
-Improve synergy with the Tool Kit.
-Give Autotool Installation a more prominent effect, particularly when combined with Deployable Turrets.
-Prevent the turrets from being immediately powerful, solidifying them as a “setup required” ability type that is truly unique to Guild Wars 2, while still having a viable role in plenty of content throughout the game.

Their range is short enough that people can still combat an Engineer in the PvP modes, especially given that the Engineer is giving up a Utility Slot for each turret he has set up. Engineers are thus left with only their weapons to combat attackers; not terribly potent at long range, as most Engineers know, and not effective enough overall to stand on their own, without extra Utility abilities. This is most certainly an acceptable tradeoff.

I thought of such a build, myself. Explosive Descent and Kit Refinement, in regards to their Grenade Barrage effects, share a cooldown. So you can’t land and then switch to Grenade Kit for two boomshowers.

Invincibility via Gear Shield. o_o

It’d be nice if they could toss it into the options, make it so that you can set all kits to work that way. XD I much prefer that system! I often forget which kit I’m in, and end up using a weapon skill when I meant to do something else.

damny.9342:

As far as I know this isn’t available in PvE.

Drat. ;-; Alright, thank you. Time to sift through available hats to find one I like. XD

I’m wanting to get the hat seen in this picture.

Unfortunately, I’m not seeing it anywhere in the auction house, and the “Commando Bandanna” from the level 73 Story Mission turned out to be a different item. The Wiki is lacking a bit on information, so I’m wondering if anyone has personal experience with the item.