Guild Wars 2

They already did it.

Obtena.7952:

Yet to claim that Anet hasn’t paid attention to Engi for 1-2 years, just because they don’t do things you want them to isn’t being honest. I can’t stress this enough … there is nothing more nonsensical than to assume there is purposeful neglect. You better have a much stronger case for that kind of claim other than “don’t fix things we want”. That’s certainly not enough.

It’s not just “not fixing the things I want.” Take a look at the last year’s worth of balance patches (for engineers). Most of the changes are slight number adjustments. The most “significant” (in terms of programming effort) change was the turret one, which barely affected people’s builds.

I’m not saying changing some numbers doesn’t require thought or effort. But most of the numbers they changed have been relatively minor (in terms of overall effect). Basically, they’ve held us in place for the last year, despite many long-standing problems.

If you can’t rush to the worst conclusion you can think of on such flimsy observations that can be attributed to more realistic, non-nefarious reasons, there isn’t much reason to take you seriously, at all. There is zero value to that non-constructive criticism, other than concluding you’re just another typical angry player ranting on the forum.

1. Please stop attacking my person. It’s a really tired trope.
2. Again, I’m not rushing to the worst conclusion. You keep saying that, but the worst conclusion is assuming malicious intent. I’m not assuming that.
3. I’m not saying any one piece of evidence alone is enough. But there is a clear picture when you take it all into account. Thus, context matters.

Anyways, you’ve convinced yourself Anet doesn’t care because you observe certain things. The core problem with that is it’s completely irrelevant; there is a wide range of satisfaction with players. As I’ve already said, the solution in place for class changes is actually optimized based on business constraints. Anet already knows that a fraction of players feel negatively about balance, no matter what they do. How do you make your opinion different and meaningful? By accusing them of apathy? Let us know how that works for you.

1. Wait, you’re telling me you’ve polled a significant number of engineer mains? And the majority is satisfied? I’d love to see your data! Please, reference me.
2. Do you have access to their financials, their employee data, and team structure? If you do… why aren’t you an ArenaNet employee? If you don’t… why conjecture about their internal workings? That’s a weak argument to use.
3. If you’re going to make broad, sweeping statements such as these, back it up with evidence.

Obtena.7952:

I’m glad you point that out too, because not getting changes, particularly if they aren’t ready for a patch release ONCE in the history of the game, is a really bad example of Anet’s apathy.

Are you going to play ignorant of the larger context? I pointed out an entire year’s-worth of relatively meaningless “balance” and your takeaway is that there’s only been one problematic balance patch?

I get your point. I’m saying it doesn’t really make much sense if you look at the history of the game. Engi’s have got lots of changes over the last 5 years, so to look at a very short period of time in that, and conclude Anet doesn’t care, or aren’t competent is a disingenuous statement to make.

1 year is not a short time. 2 years is not a short time. This last year alone I can’t remember any meaningful changes to our profession. In 2 years, I can remember any fixes to engineer rifle, which we’ve complained about for a very long time.

This isn’t “current doldrums.” This is a longstanding issue. Don’t trivialize it just because some of us are becoming more vocal.

If you want to make some construction conclusions, I’m all for it but if your conclusion is that Anet doesn’t care … then what’s even the point of making a thread they won’t read? There isn’t any value in that.

1. I try pretty frequently to post in places where ArenaNet will see, both on these forums and in Reddit. Most of my posts die on Reddit, and get moved to the engineer subforums here, which is a graveyard for posts.
2. I concluded that my lone voice wasn’t loud enough. So I post here to get more people to pipe up. Maybe if more people can point out that there’s a problem (and stop kissing Anet’s tushy), then we can get noticed and something can be done.

Apathy isn’t what Anet is showing here. Engi does get changes to the class, just like any other over the course of the life of this game.

I’m glad you mentioned over the course of the game, because we were left out of this latest bit of balancing. It’s almost like they didn’t bother this time ’round.

• Last time we were included in a balance patch, they “fixed” a longstanding issue with turrets. Whether that “fix” was better is questionable, and it wasn’t a major priority on any engineer’s books.
• Before that, we have to go pretty much all the way back to November or December where we saw some slight buffs to condi damage, but not much affecting our rotations.
• I don’t even remember much before that because it mostly seems so minor and trivial, despite longstanding issues with our weapons, traits, and utility skills.
• Pretty sure that was a buff to physical damage of fire bombs and blunderbuss/jump shot in there (which aren’t major priorities either).
• That covers an entire year of engineer “balancing.” Some slight number tweaking.

My point in all this is that either we are a problem they keep putting off for no apparent reason, or they just don’t care. Either way, it has the same effect and leaves a pretty sour taste in my mouth.

Like I said, you took the WORST case, least logical possibility, latched onto it like it was the only truth that exists and dismissed any other possible, more reasonable and sensible explanation

So… out of my whole post where I indicate that they simply forgot about us (not maliciously) when they changed Plaguelands, and they have ignored us (again, I don’t think maliciously), you think I’m following the worst case, least logical possibility?

How does that make sense? I’m suggesting the most plausible case is that they don’t care. I even have evidence. Where’s yours?

Why should anyone listen to that kind of dribble? What’s better is that you think I don’t have meaningful to say … that’s ripe.

First of all… Drivel. If you’re going to insult my argument, at least get it right.

Second of all, you either aren’t reading my posts properly, or you’re just hearing what you want to hear:

• I think they’re forgetting about engineers until we became a nuisance in some significant way (typically via OP-ness).
• They have rebalanced other classes’ less used weapons and skills (warrior, most commonly), yet fail to rebalance many of the longstanding issues we have (for well over a year or two now)
• I don’t perceive this as malice. I perceive it as apathy.

Obtena.7952:

You don’t need to tell me anything if this thread is the kind of message you want people to take from what you are saying.

You took the worst of many possible outcomes, then assumed it was THE reason for what you observed without considering more simple and logical ones. Let me wonder why someone would do that … certainly not to have open and fair discussion.

The fact is that anyone thinking that a dev team is purposefully ruining a particular class has an axe to grind.

Again, don’t twist my words. I think they just don’t care about the class as long as the overall meta seems balanced. If you can’t notice the pattern, you’re missing the larger picture:

• Engineer gets a bit too powerful (IE turrets, gyro dazes)
• Engineer gets nerfed excessively hard (Turrets a joke, Traits in scrapper all borked)
• ANet says job well done and leaves it alone.

This is a pattern. Any time the class seems to be the slightest bit overpowered, ANet hits us hard with the nerf hammer and then disappears. They don’t bother tempering the nerf with fixes to our broken traits (scrapper dazes come to mind) or anything else.

The longstanding issues with the class (turrets, weapons, gadgets, traits, etc) have been around for an unusually long period of time compared to say… the warrior, which they spend an inordinate amount of time balancing and correcting issues.

Again, I’m not saying this is intentional on their part. It’s apathy towards our class.

You assume too much … though that’s par for the course considering most of your posts in this thread. The fact is that you don’t know how long it takes to change something or what is being worked on.

You’re also assuming what is being worked on. Pot, kettle. I just happen to have evidence of past behavior.

And I’ve seen how fast they can change something when they dedicate effort to it. I’ve been around a while.

We all get your play here; it’s the typical goading we see from people that really don’t have much more to say other than they aren’t happy.

Do you have something meaningful to say, or would you like to conjecture more about me?

You’re thread might have been better if the original complain held more water.

My complaint was more evidence of the apathy. I’m not sure why people aren’t perceiving that.

Eastcorn.5901:

Doesn’t qtfy benchmarks put Engineer as the second highest DPS against small targets?
Less than 1K DPS below condition daredevil.

Benchmarks are here: http://qtfy.eu/benchmarks/

IMO, most of the benchmarks are pretty stupid given that they assume absolute perfect timing and placement. Reality is much messier, and the engineer has the single most complicated rotation. It can be simplified of course, but that still also assumes the enemy is standing still (which is exceptionally rare)

The problem with engineer is that their playstyle has been stagnant since HoT released. There has been little overall variation in anything. If you haven’t played in >1 year then this shouldn’t matter, but for us experienced engineers it is kind of frustrating.

Since before HoT released? Hell, the PvE playstyle was stagnant long before that! The only difference HoT made was making us all trade in our handy dandy rifles for hammers.

Eastcorn.5901:

GW2 has too much of the latter strategy. The abundance of boon application and passive durability rewards it generously. I only hope the next set of elite specs promotes more offensive play.

Oh hun, were you around when engineer turrets were king? Back then I would’ve definitely agreed with you. Now… not so much.

We actually see a variety of builds right now. Some are high-risk, high-reward (IE ele, thief), others are durable and tough (engineer). The problem is that there’s very little diversity in these builds right now. When I say thief, I automatically assume D/P, because that’s the standard. Same for engineer and the hammer. We could really use more diversity.

asuitandty.8526:

Oh, comon. You have to be really paranoid, or delusional, if you think any game company is vindictive enough to punish that one group of players that plays that one particular class. Grow up. You’re not a martyr for playing an engineer, and you’re never going to be.

Don’t twist my words.

I never said they were being vindictive or punishing us. I said they just don’t care about the class. It’s the class full of junk ideas (scrapper is an appropriate name) that were never brought to fruition.

“Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.”

I’ve recently come back to the game, and I’ve been having a blast on my engineer. I’ve caught up on all the Heart of Thorns and story content, which was challenging (in a fun way), but never very hard. I never felt like I was playing a class that was “broken”. I’ve worked out a fun build, pretty easily mind you, and I see many other ways to play as well.

I’m glad you had fun. The majority of PvE (even HoT) can be reasonably played with most classes and most builds provided you aren’t braindead. Generally when people complain about balance, they’re not talking open-world PvE, but PvP, WvW, and high-end PvE (Raids/Fractals) instead.

Perhaps the class isn’t for you. Perhaps you need a more positive attitude.

Perhaps you shouldn’t tell me how to live my life.

Tomiyou.3790:

And especially don’t listen to these salty engi mains saying that it will only get nerfs.

You do realize the OP experienced many of these early nerfs? And we’re warning him that it’s still happening?

Go ahead and touch him.

Not in a naughty place, mind you.

Obtena.7952:

That’s one way to look at it. Here is another … it wasn’t forgotten about; there is something in development.

You assume because you don’t see it, it’s not happening. Not good.

If you can’t recognize ANet’s pattern of nerfing engineer and then promptly ignoring it, then I’m not sure what to tell you. Our traits (including scrapper) are all sorts of borked, most of our core weapons are very lackluster, our gameplay is still clunky, and we’ve had these complaints for several years now. At some point, you have to recognize this pattern.

If they were going to change Elixir X, I think they would’ve made a note of it somewhere, or at least indicated a fix coming for it. Granted, it’s not a skill I care much about (I’d prefer they fix rifle), but the silence is deafening.

Your best bet is taking advantage of thief’s mobility and +1’ing an engineer, popping out when their AoEs are active, popping back in when they’re not. Run away when you’re hurt, come back when you’re not, and wear them down.

Nobody ever said it was going to be a fair fight.

DeceiverX.8361:

Has the possibility of them just not knowing their counters or how to PvP come to mind?

I generally end up in the platinum/gold range. If a thief doesn’t know their counters at this level, that’s kind of weird.

The point of this thread is that I’ve noticed since the latest round of balance patches, more thieves seem willing to engage in a 1v1 with me as a scrapper. It’s somewhat brazen.

Hi there! Engi main here!

Used to be a point in time where D/P thieves would just generally avoid or ignore me on my scrapper hammer. Now they regularly try to 1v1 me, although I generally win the fight and they run away, not without hurting me badly though.

Do you think this meta will hold? It almost seems like the buffing is a bit too extreme for thieves at the moment.

There is a build, but it’s very much a glass cannon. It’s worthless against any necro with half a brain, and it’s more fragile (and less mobile) than D/P thieves.

https://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Engineer_-_Flamethrower_Condi

You can do some really nasty condi damage before enemies even realize what’s going on. If you swap out elixir S with purge gyro and use sneak gyro as your elite skill, you can survive a fair bit of time. But that’s only if you’re really lucky — hammer engis and necros will ruin your day, and other condi builds can be really dangerous. D/P thieves will wreck your day if they sneak up on you.

Engineer is in a really tough spot right now. Scrapper hammer (which is really just a power tank) is the only viable build for most PvP combat. Rifle and pistol need some upgrades in PvP to make them more viable.

Phineas Poe.3018:

I don’t think the situation is as dire for us. Warrior doesn’t even have one viable build in platinum-ranked PvP or the daily/monthly ATs.

You’re kidding right? I see these three builds ALL the time:

• https://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Berserker_-_Ragezerker
• https://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Berserker_-_GS/Mace_Burst
• https://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Berserker_-_Macebow

I just lost a match to a Ragezerker in platinum.

Frost.5017:

In a way its kinda funny that the mechanic that gives us access to the most skills and in a very fluid/flexible way is one of the most complained about as restrictive to the class.

It’s restrictive because right now, if we aren’t playing at least 1 kit (and generally 2-kits is optimal), our DPS is atrocious. The problem is that taking kits isn’t really optional right now, if you want to be a serious player. At least ele gets to change its utility skills.

I agree with this proposal.

OriOri.8724:

Still though, the longer they put off a true balance patch, teh more work it will be since they will have more elite specs to balance. It needs to happen before the second expax drops in my opinion.

Honestly, if they did minor balance patches every week or two, they could take much longer to make the big overhaul balance patches.

I’m just sad that this is what took them so long to make. Another trench coat. We know they love warriors and all… but come on.

Nirvana.8659:

At this point,i can see them buffing rifle and shield together right before announce the new elite specs,exaclty like they did with kit revamp before announcing HoT stuff.
I say that because,again,that 2 weapons are totally useless.

The point here,it’s just too strange for me have to wait literally years to see a buff to core weapons .

Oh a bump warning….I’mnot worried,you need it.

At this point, I’m not sure I can expect that. After over 2 years of this, they go and make improvements to warrior rifle without even making a nod to ours.

Phineas Poe.3018:

Leave it to the tempest on your team, stick to the side points, and try and pull 1v2s in your favor. I don’t think it’s particularly bad advice to help in team fights whenever possible, but we are one of the better duelists at the moment and are capable of forcing their power roles out of team fights and relieve pressure off home/mid by frequently contesting if not absolutely pestering far.

I’ve noticed this as well. Sitting on the enemy’s home is incredibly disruptive given that we can handily tank 1v2s for a fair bit of time. I’ve won several matches just by being disruptive like that.

Odokuro.5049:

So people who aren’t running a meta build and comp, aren’t trying to win, I got it.

I don’t think that’s what he’s trying to say. I think what he’s trying to say is that most builds that deviate from the meta have some hard counters that are currently in the meta. Playing a build which has a high chance of being hard countered is a poor strategic decision, and could cost your team. Obviously, you can play around it with skill, but you’re ultimately handicapping yourself.

(IE: Most necro builds hard-counter our condi build. Many classes have very heavy condi removal and reflects, leaving pistols relatively unusable. Rifle’s been bad for quite a while too)

miriforst.1290:

In a way i still don’t know if i am to laugh or to cry at the realization that they managed to make explosives boring. Hell they even managed to make orbital strike underwhelming and meh in my opinion.

They managed to make ROCKET BOOTS and PERSONAL BATTERING RAMS underwhelming. How do you do that?

Obtena.7952:

… and? That’s just want I call “game evolving”. Again, you can’t conclude that Anet doesn’t recognize these skills interact, just because they changed something so they are not anymore.

Generally, when they don’t update something that probably should have been updated too, it’s an oversight. As in, the balance team forgot about Engineer’s Elixir X.

I’m sorry my mesmer brothers. Engineers feeling the pain too.

Why? What’s the reasoning?

• https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/mesmer/Mesmer-Balance-changes-20-6 – Mesmers feeling left out
• https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/engineer/Does-the-balance-team-care-about-engineer/6610424 – Engineers feeling left out

Also, can we point out this juicy tidbit from the patch notes?

Mark Katzbach

In this update, we have taken a look at a few underperforming weapons for the warrior: rifle and torch. […] The rifle lacks in sustained pressure because three of its abilities focused on utility.

People have been complaining about engineer rifle for over 2 years (We only have 3 core weapons), but it’s warrior rifle that needs updating.

Alek Seven.2374:

I feel like Engineers are nerf dummies like the one in Lion Arch Aerodrome.

Hey guys, we need to nerf something, can we try on engi first ? And leave it like this after ill be done.

Yep, and warriors are their go-to for buffing.

Obtena

For instance, you haven’t considered that doing so would lead to paralysis by analysis. I mean, if Anet took every change they made, then looked at how it affected ALL the other classes, then made decisions to proceed if something wasn’t ideal, nothing would ever get changed.

This isn’t about how one skill affects the entire meta, though. Elixir X used Plague as a literal analogue to the Necromancer’s, and now they are no longer in sync because ANet didn’t recognize that the two skills are intertwined.

Crinn.7864:

Vagrant.7206:

It shows that they aren’t fully cognizant of how the changes they make in one class affects another class.

But Elixer X isn’t related to plague at all.

old Plague was a corruption skill that granted a transform.
Elixer X is a elixir skill that grants 1 of two possible transform.
There is a difference between Plague the corruption skill, and Plague the transform.

Transforms aren’t class unique, just as boons and condis aren’t class unique. The plague transform was never changed, Anet just removed the transform from the corruption skill.

I refer you to the change to Plague:

> Plague (Elite): This skill has been reworked and has been renamed to Plaguelands.

They forgot that Elixir X also uses Plague (Elite). Even the wiki for Elixir X links to the Plaguelands effects. The Plague transform isn’t supposed to even exist any more, but they forgot about Elixir X.

How would it even work anyways? You have a 50% to go into a transform otherwise drop a PBAoE?

Simple. They remove plague from Elixir X.

My thoughts exactly. And what does updating or not updating skills have to do with balance anyway?

It shows that they aren’t fully cognizant of how the changes they make in one class affects another class.

Fun? That’s arguable.

Desired in endgame content? Generally most raids won’t turn down a competent engi, but you’ll get a very swift boot if it’s obvious you don’t know what you’re doing (a bad necro is better than a bad engi).

• Our gameplay in PvE hasn’t changed in years. Core engineer is generally more potent, but the same unintuitive trait design. We are considered “top tier” DPS if you know how to rotate properly, but it’s a boring playstyle where you’re basically playing the piano.
• PvP scrapper is at least interesting. It’s mostly a power tank, but quite good for teamfights.

Ah, I’ve had a similar issue with the downed #2 skill for a long time. Certain skills seem to have issues unpredictably.

Try posting in the bugs forum, maybe they can help you.

ibThuggin.1758:

Nope I didn’t even use it, and the thing is you should still be able to rez right? I can’t even do that, it’s really weird and it’s happened about 8 of my ranked matches.

Hrm. When rezzing, are you clicking on your ally’s name or icon? You need to have them targeted to use the function gyro on them (I hate it, but that’s how they designed it). Same goes for finishing enemies — you need to have them targeted/selected to activate it.

There’s about a 20 second cooldown timer from when you last used function gyro. Maybe this is what you’re experiencing?

Now, it would be nice if there was some kind of cooldown timer we could see, but you can only use it once every 20 secs or so. Wait for the little gyro to spawn by your head to know when it’s ready.

Now if it isn’t working and it was the first time you used it, that’s a bug that you need to report on the bugs forum.

insanemaniac.2456:

no, i am not poisoning the well by pointing out the essence of what is wrong with how these forums have factually interacted (or attempted to interact) with the devs as a likely reason they do not post here, and yes, you are part of the problem when you post threads like your recently disappeared one. it is not irrelevant. it is not preemptive, it is reactive. i am not ridiculing or discrediting you.

if anything i am calling you out for being rude in a way that anet will not, cuz they will delete your rudeness and they will not respond to it. get off your angry horse and have a civil, profound discussion and a year or 2 later you might be able to look back and say “this patch note was quite obviously spawned of the discussion i had so long ago”. and if you cant handle that kind of a turnaround time, i suggest finding another gaming company to hound that is more in line with the flexibility you desire, because after nearly 5 years around here i can tell you with confidence that that isnt anet.

• I’ve played Guild Wars since a few months after Prophecies released. I’ve seen just how fast they can respond to something if it is a priority to them — it can take them days, or even hours to respond if something is a big priority. I know GW2 is a larger endeavor, so I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt that it takes longer. But it doesn’t take 2 years longer if they care.
• You realize they haven’t engaged in polite engineer conversations either? Sometimes kissing a person’s butt isn’t what it takes for them to notice you. I’m all in favor of having a polite, civil discussion — if they bothered to even show up.
• I wasn’t aware ArenaNet had a merger with Valve. Please tell me more about ArenaNet time. /s

as for warrior axe, all i have to say is 2 things.

1. after these patch notes, this weapon didnt see any significant lasting uptick in its usage. people tried it out for a day or 5 but ultimately the changes amounted to nothing because its dps and utility are still swirling in the gutter, and thats what this is, swirling. something else is probably holding anet back from actually making significant changes that would bring this weapon up because number tweaks just wont do it.

I know that warrior in PvE is still condi heavy, as that’s the general meta consensus, so the changes to axe aren’t meaningful in PvE (yet).

But I have noticed a significant uptick in axe warriors in PvP. It dropped a bit after people tried it out, but I still see it regularly now.

1. am i talking about engi rifle or warrior axe?

You said they don’t make improvements to existing core weapons. I pointed out how wrong you are. I didn’t even bother to mention the improvements they made to thief shortbow!

My point still stands. They do make regular improvements to core weapons for other classes. Rifle has languished for 2 years, and at best we get some weird, irrelevant buffs to skills that aren’t the source of the problem.

Lokki.1092:

Vagrant.7206:

Lokki.1092:

Anet should put this info in the game somewhere. Because this is just plain not how conditions work in every other MMO. It runs counter to what most people assume coming from any other game.

If you played GW1, you might realize that this is how conditions have always worked in the series. They ignored most evasion/block skills and persisted through invuln skills. Just look up 55 monk if you’re bored some time. I don’t even have to Google to point out that not all MMOs work the way you insist.

To other points though: conditions are designed (at least in theory) to be a ramp-up style of damage. It would be kind of pointless if you could wipe them perfectly clean with an invuln skill, because ramping up takes much more time and effort than direct skills. As it stands, there are plenty of tools to deal with conditions in PvP, and you need to learn how to use them.

I wasn’t saying there was no way to deal with conditions. Simply pointing out that the way conditions work in the guild wars series is not intuitive at all. I honestly cannot think of any other major MMO, or any other game that handles status effects in the same way as GW2.

Most other MMOs don’t have downed-state either. You hit 0 health and you’re dead, generally. So, if you were bad at defending/healing yourself, you still have a chance to come back into the fight.

The thing is, the conditions were already on you when you hit the invuln skill. I’m not sure why this seems unintuitive. If I’m bleeding from a bullet wound and I put on a bulletproof vest, it’s not like the bleeding will just go away (as amazing as that might be).

Its completely understandable why it would be confusing to use an invulnerability skill then die while “invulnerable” for anyone who hasn’t played the guild wars series.

It’s just not something most players are used to. Saying “Git Gud” doesn’t help at all.

I have this thing I call “learning.” The first time I went down while using Renewed Focus, I realized it was conditions that did it. I didn’t make the same mistake again. If you’re telling me that it is hard to learn… well, I’m not sure what to say.

insanemaniac.2456:

no, it isnt ad hominem, its literally what happens. the last time a dev was around here, he asked for feedback, got more than im sure he needed because random people crawl out of the woodwork when a red post appears, couldnt really act on it because his managers told him “just do a feedback thread kitten” or something without allowing him enough time or resources for 1 class

Two things:

• You implied I would jump down his throat in an unproductive manner. That doesn’t address anything that I said, nor is it productive (irony!). That kind of meets the criteria for ad hominem (or at the very least poisoning the well).
• That thread you’re referring to was this one. This thread was posted over 2 and a half years ago now, and was just telling us how scrapper was going to play out once HoT released. The problem is not that thread… the problem is that was probably the last time we ever saw a dev on these forums. Two and a half years. They have had a presence on other profession subforums every few months or so. The thread wasn’t even unstuck until I specifically requested it a few months ago.

the thing about anet is that they seem to have so much that they want to do that they dont have resources to also constantly overhaul small parts of the game over and over and over to satisfy endless complaints.

Lessee…

I remember a certain post by Gaile Gray about our issues...

“We’ve been making some gradual changes to pistol and rifle, hoping to bring them a bit more in line with hammer. As for Jump Shot, it’s difficult to land both the first and second attacks consistently unless you’re cleaving a downed player. To address this, we’ve moved some of the initial damage to the end of the attack, making it easier to spike. The total damage done by the skill will be the same.”

That was back in December. The balance team promptly did virtually nothing to lead to what they actually promised. If they don’t have the time, they shouldn’t bring it up, or at the very least indicate it’s not really a concern.

there may not be a dev employed by them who actually has a grip on the intricacies of balancing all (or even 2) classes in a profoundly inspirational way. so they do look for feedback, but it really actually does get drowned out in kitten like “put 1 sec of burning on flamethrower 1”, “double the damage on blunderbuss”, “make turrets great again /cry”, “gyros without daze are trash give it back”, etc etc.

I can’t speak to their financial status (I know next to nothing about it), but perhaps that’s what hiring people is for. Maybe a math guy with some creativity. Or using community liaisons like WP or some of the Twitch streamers who have their fingers on the pulse of the game. Just throwing ideas out there.

But they don’t seem to make any sort of approach to the matter. The time between the last balance patch and this one was about 6 months, probably the longest time between balance patches, and it’s been gradually getting worse. Whatever they’re doing, they’re really not paying attention.

being angry about it and toeing the line of flaming doesnt make people (devs are people too) want to read your stuff, and quite frankly you are that here, and you are that in other threads where you get all up in arms about engi being forgotten. thats not ad hominem.

Not fulfilling promises makes people disappointed. Huh. Who would have thought.

Or consistently nerfing the class I main while making constant tweaks and improvements to others, while ignoring ours. Might make a person irritated. Nah.

But don’t worry! Me expressing frustration is clearly the reason they hurt us! It’s my fault! I should repent of my ways!

/s

i aint sayin kitten about rifle being fixed or not, itll probably remain the same as it ever was – adequate for core/pve, useless for pvp because everything else is better. and thats not because anet hates it, its because they can choose to either spend time on rifle or spend time on holosmith. tough choice i know, but someone is forcing it, be it the managers, the investors, the players, or the devs.

You do realize there was a significant period of time where rifle was the PvP meta for engineers, right?

I don’t think they hate us. I think they don’t care. The only way to make them care is to keep our voices loud and consistent, and use our wallets appropriately. Hyperbole is just one of the tools to get them to pay attention.

turrets on the other hand. turrets literally could not function without the toolbelt. now they can. why would anet bother to change such entrenched functionality if they planned to leave engi with the toolbelt forever. and there is an expansion coming soon.

I don’t disagree on this point. Turrets functionality needed tweaking to make them better. But adding perfume to garbage doesn’t make it not smell like garbage.

as we have seen, they do not bother changing things that are “viable” (but maybe not “good”) when they dont literally have to change it to keep it functioning for future plans. see rifle, explosives, grenades, elixirs H R C and toss U, and anything else that is outdated by elite specs (especially in settings where the things were once meta, such as grenades and 3-4 kit engi in pvp) or anything else across the entire game that functions passably but gets complained about for not being good enough.

Except you’re demonstrably wrong on that. Warrior weapons are a great example. Just recently they brought up the axe’s viability, even though it wasn’t that bad compared to rifle.

insanemaniac.2456:

they don’t post here cuz a million people, like you, would jump down their throats and draw them into unproductive heart wrenching discussions about how it’s the end of the world that they aren’t the savior you’re looking for.

Cheers!

also, you wanna talk forest? dont forget about the expac coming up. at this point, we need to see holosmith and how it affects our standing before we can give any reasonable feedback. it’s there, the plans for it are becoming more and more concrete, and we’re still in the dark cuz anet refuses to show us unfinished products. this is prolly the last or 2nd to last balance round before things change drastically. and anet moves glacially.

So… you’re telling me rifle will somehow be magically fixed with the next expansion? Despite the fact that it’s been woefully underpowered for years now and many people have (rightfully) pointed this out? It doesn’t take a genius to recognize that an expac won’t necessarily fix old content.

…I can’t believe you would make a forest/trees comment and link wp while saying they took 1 thing from it and not mention holosmith lol

• Holosmith is leaked information. We don’t even know if that’s the final specialization, and there’s no point on speculating about it because they’ve been so tight-lipped.
• Do you actually expect holosmith work to fix rifle issues? Or our core trait issues? Last I checked, elite specializations have their own weapon and trait lines unaffiliated with core trait lines.
• You’re also implying that power creep is a good thing with this comment. I don’t know if that was your intention.

miriforst.1290:

And i’m not even sure what they should do with it, other than give it fair treatment in cases like the evade added to vault in beta but not to jumpshot (which also has a long cooldown and cannot be used multiple times).

Honestly, the biggest thing would be giving it more counterplay to the counters (fun!) or changing the fundamental mechanics of how it works.

Biggest problems the rifle faces right now are projectile hate, CC breaking, and generally poor damage:

• For hip fire, the best suggestion I’ve heard is actually changing the attack to work more like a shotgun so that it can’t be reflected. I’m also in favor of adding a cripple here (like 1/4 to 1/2 a sec depending on distance), and scaling damage by proximity. This change would also give the rifle some AOE capability too.
• For net shot, it needs to have a pulsing immobilize to be effective. Otherwise, it can be easily condi cleansed or dodged out of.
• Blunderbuss should likely be changed to an explosive shot that launches or cripples people. It could be unblockable as well.
• Charged shot needs to be unblockable, period. It’s kind of absurd otherwise. The self-knockback should be changed to an evasive roll like it is for warrior.
• Jump shot should have an evade, lower cooldown, and higher damage. As it stands, it is not useful for getting around, getting away, or dealing damage.

I think these changes would bring Rifle back in line with its original design philosophy, and at the very least make it viable in PvP, and much more useful in PvE.

Aeolus.3615:

on wiki says it avoid CC… wich is totally lie since ive been interrupted and even KD quite some times while in midle of Renewed focus… wonder if some skills are bugging in some circunstances.

Likely a lag problem. If a person CC’ed you (on their screen) before you activated renewed focus (on their screen), it’s possible for you to get CC’ed when you think you’re safe.

Nirvana.8659:

with my sentence about the 9 peoples commenting,I meant to say “only 9 peoples commented”,so may be open a thread on reddit will work better,for visibility and for ammount of reply.

In any case,i feel is depressing to see our only power weapon for core engineer be in that state , after 2 years,untouched .

I mean,they touched the core weapon of every single class,every single class,to make some adjustment.
And of course….we are invisible untill we make a post of 1000 peoples commenting,or some youtuber with big visibily speaks of it,or someone is able to open a thread on reddit and gain enough reply.

This is painfully stupid,the balance should be spontaneus,especially in that case.

Also because , from what i see , there is no more “big” youtubers playing engi , no offense to any streamer , but i’m old school 4 years old (well since right after the beta) engineer main , and i lost track of all the major streamer that used to play this class,especially after HoT .

Part of the problem is their forum mentality. Since they never post in the class subforums (or even seem to bother to read them), these threads never get viewed. If you try to post in the forums they do actually read about engineer woes, your thread gets moved here to the graveyard. It’s almost like a trolling joke of theirs.

Post on reddit, and you might have a chance to get seen, but even that’s relatively slim. You’ll barely get traction, and most people will use the same tired complaints about engineer — that we’re already top DPS tier, why are we complaining? Or that scrapper is “OP” or some other complaint from people that don’t play engineer to any great extent.

The class is suffering greatly, but most other players can’t see the forest for the trees.

Also, I’d point out WoodenPotatoes video about how screwed up engineer traits are for the power bomber. You know what ArenaNet took from that whole video? That flipover skills should be detonate, instead of the toolbar skill. That’s all they did, and that wasn’t even a major complaint of his either — he pointed out how negligible the DPS of the turret was in the first place.

bearshaman.3421:

Vagrant.7206:

Kain Francois.4328:

Why would you even want to play GW2 using nothing but a single weapon set ever for over 1,000 hours? I’ll never understand players who hate kits.

I want to point out that when the balance “team” feels like doing something, they only seem to balance weapons people can equip. Our kits have been barely touched, despite being our most important source of DPS.

I’d also love to be able to free up some of my utility slots for something else too. I haven’t played with some of the gadgets in years.

Last balance patch they touched flamethrower considerably, and said that they were looking at giving the kits more “purity of purpose” I believe was the phrase, so more changes are likely forthcoming. Which may mean we won’t need all the kits just to do damage, but can focus on the kits that let us do damage inside of whatever build we are doing (power, condi, etc).

The problem though is that kits are part of the package deal for engineers. At this point, our base weapons are so weak that any kind of considerable nerf to kits (for either power or condi) results in overall weakening of the class if they don’t boost our base weapons.

For example, the number of players who cried foul about the change to flame blast was significant, as it was one of the more potent power skills. Now it’s a “meh” condi boost.

Scellow.1596:

There is no sense of grind in the game, time spent on game/progression doesn’t reflect on your character, only the skins does, think about it!

Wait, you revived a year old thread to point out the obvious?

Lokki.1092:

Anet should put this info in the game somewhere. Because this is just plain not how conditions work in every other MMO. It runs counter to what most people assume coming from any other game.

If you played GW1, you might realize that this is how conditions have always worked in the series. They ignored most evasion/block skills and persisted through invuln skills. Just look up 55 monk if you’re bored some time. I don’t even have to Google to point out that not all MMOs work the way you insist.

To other points though: conditions are designed (at least in theory) to be a ramp-up style of damage. It would be kind of pointless if you could wipe them perfectly clean with an invuln skill, because ramping up takes much more time and effort than direct skills. As it stands, there are plenty of tools to deal with conditions in PvP, and you need to learn how to use them.

Ookamikun.6472:

I do agree that most of the outfits fit a rougue character than a ranger or even an engineer.

That’s sort of the thing. Thief gets all the design love for medium sets, generally.

They just don’t seem to know what to do with engineer or ranger, which is strange, because they have a whole previous game to draw upon.

Kain Francois.4328:

Why would you even want to play GW2 using nothing but a single weapon set ever for over 1,000 hours? I’ll never understand players who hate kits.

I want to point out that when the balance “team” feels like doing something, they only seem to balance weapons people can equip. Our kits have been barely touched, despite being our most important source of DPS.

I’d also love to be able to free up some of my utility slots for something else too. I haven’t played with some of the gadgets in years.

Nirvana.8659:

9 peoples reply to this topic.
Peoples are fine with rifle i suppose.
It must be me nad this 8 peoples more unable to play it,that’s the only my conclusion.
And this is sad , would be nice have the community of this class partecipate to bring this topic to the eyes of someone in the Anet.
May be reddit works better for it anyway.

Honestly… just take an eyeball at the different players you encounter on a regular basis (at max level).

You’ll see primarily necros, warriors, and guardians. Those are the classes that ANet has been kindest to.

Engineer was never a popular class. Even at launch, I never saw that many (maybe 5-10%). But with the almost constant battering over the last few years, I see maybe one other engineer in 20 fractal runs (and that’s being generous). The population of engineer mains is tiny.

Then extrapolate how many people care enough to post on the forums, and you’ve got about the 8 people you see here.

This video has been particularly relevant to me lately, and it’s over 4 years old:

oy
9 people reply and you think anet gonna be all up in here promising changes??
thats not how this works
pretty sure the community at large is disappointed in rifles current state, but we said this 2 years ago, 1.5 years ago, 1 year ago, 6 months ago, 3 months ago, and nothings changed.
you get 900 people saying change it and maybe anet will look into it more urgently.

That aint happening, and you know it. Most people who mained engineer have moved on. I’m just a too kitten stubborn fan of the franchise to leave. But honestly, I feel more and more depressed every time I see an update and I’m willing to move on when I see something to hold my attention for longer.

Notice how many people complained when they took away the engi farm in Lake Doric. Notice how none of those people posted on this forum. Because engi isn’t their main.

Ivantreil.3092:

Frost.5017:

Gayle.1807:

What I liked about the engi-farm? I had an application for my engineer. Well, in engineer parlance…back to the drawing board.

Engie’s problems aren’t in the design concept – they lie with having a massive amount of skills and traits that have been left behind with respect to the game’s evolution and power creep, or outright nerfed to make HoT choices/options more appealing.

If you are looking to be able to deliver near 30k dps by doing almost entirely auto attacks, engineer isn’t the profession for you. If you were looking for a profession with a very high skill ceiling, offered the highest amount of player flexibility/creativity, and demanded a high amount of player control/input and most importantly HoT (and the design philosophy that it was based on) was never released; then engie was the profession for you.

Except… we actually have a build for deal 30k with aa, power bomb engie, and you kittening know it.

The difference between the two builds is really quite staggering.

One’s perhaps the simplest rotation in the world, and the other is so ludicrously complicated, I’ve never seen it performed in real world scenarios.

Both charr and asura’s racial skills synchronize well with engineer gameplay, especially their toolbelt skills of their racial skills. Human’s racial skills are subpar (at best).

As far as unique emotes/animations, there are some unique “audio” files. If you drop a healing turret as a human female (what I play), she’ll sometimes say “Dispenser up and running.” which is a reference to the engineer from Team Fortress 2. I think human male says the same thing as well.

That said, that’s the only unique audio I recall. I think some of the turret skills might also have other audio files associated with them, but I use them so infrequently I can’t remember.

Just played a match against a full 5 man team and my team had one duo que, rest were PUGs.

Yes, this was unranked. But seriously? How is this good matchmaking? They were clearly a guild team communicating via VOIP, and we only get a few disorganized pubbies. I know it’s unranked, but this is really bad matchmaking. The result was determined before we even started.

Haleydawn.3764:

Vagrant.7206:

Can we also mention that engineers lose all their legendary effects when they use a kit?

Can I just point out how kittening annoying that is? I’m working on Flameseeker Prophecies right now, and I don’t know if I’ll bother playing even when the expansion decides to come out. Too many longstanding issues that they’ve collectively shrugged their shoulders at.

Agreed. But it’s because kits are considered as bundles. Any player that picks up a bundle loses the effects of the equipped legendary, with a few exceptions of thrown projectiles. (Necromancer death/reapershroud for example, deathshroud will throw my incinerator blade, but reaper shroud loses my Twilight footfalls). Very inconsistent.

The thing is, any infusion effects mounted on the weapon persist with a kit. So infusion effects work with kits, but legendary effects don’t. WTF ANet?