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Thoughts on the March 26th Patch

in Guild Wars 2 Discussion

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

Not good for engineers. Nerfed their most powerful build (which wasn’t that powerful anyway); nerfed many less common builds; buffed underpowered aspects to still be underpowered. Expect less diversity in engineers as more move to pistol/elixir/condition builds. There may be a few more turrets around, but expect the numbers to remain very low.

We got at least 1 buff...

in Engineer

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

The stun breaker on Elixir U made me laugh the most and realise they have really lost the plot, because you would only be able to take this as a secondary stun breaker.

As was said above you use your primary stun breaker as you are about to take a kitten ton of damage, why the hell would you make their life easily by taking double damage or limiting your dodge – Useless!

If they had to pick an Elixir for a stun breaker why not B or C at least it would have been useful!

QFT

enjoy your current engineer, patch day coming

in Engineer

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

KR was never a quirky trait effect. It was one of only two traits built around our core class mechanic, kit swapping; and of those it was the only one whose effects directly matched the class (Speedy Kits being a generic, any-class effect). It’s 100% understandable for Kit Refinement to be viewed as a deliberate piece of class design, not a quirky add-on.

Sadly, it turns out that ANet didn’t have any such coherent design for the class. The result: Kit Refinement has indeed turned out to be just another quirky Adept trait in a low value trait line.

New Flamethrower not viable.

in Engineer

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

I might keep it for PvE.

Let's build Theory craft in the new patch!

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Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

no, you missed the point. You can use turret. you just drop and overcharge at the same time. Its a large damage knockdown. Then blow it up. use it like a mesmer illusion. once it has done it’s job blow it.

Du’oh! So that’s what I’ve been doing wrong.

I always thought they were meant to be turrets because that’s what it said on the label and in what I thought were the instructions. I never realised that was all just marketing material from ‘Turret’, makers of high quality bombs for Engineers.

Now if only ‘Turret’ will keep improving the refresh rate on their bombs – those cooldowns between use are still way too high.

Forced into Nades and/or Toolkit?

in Engineer

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

I know FT and EG really well. I’ve been running FT/EG builds for the last couple of months and really enjoying them, even if they were less effective than Tool Kit and Grenade Kit builds.

Unfortunately this patch nerfed both FT (Flame Blast extra damage removed) and EG (KR proc loses Super Elixir, gains some glue) and removed the condition removals on their KR procs.

The overall result, Tool Kit and Grenade Kit (even with the KR nerf to its burst) remain so superior to other Eng options that it’s very hard to consider any build that doesn’t run at least one of these kits.

Kit Refinement restricts swapping

in Engineer

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

I think the conclusion is Kit Refinement is no longer a viable trait for active kit swappers if they use more than one kit. There are other traits that are now a better choice for kit-swappers (which isn’t exactly high praise for those other traits).

The only exception is possibly Med-kit: 5s reflect projectiles every 20s could be worthwhile if you didn’t have to avoid using other kits to be able to proc it reliably.

Shame really. Although kit swapping is a core class mechanic, we only have two traits that utilised it and one of those has just been nerfed out of viability for all except single kit builds.

Engineer patch notes:

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Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

Well, I enjoyed multi-kit builds for a while – they just seemed so ‘engineery’.

But it looks like I might be time to re-gear yet again and in this case go back the to sort of pistol/elixir build I used during levelling. Except they didn’t fix the kitten RNG on Toss Elixir B or S. (Like the Elixir U changes, though.)

Kit Refinement (effects post patch)

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Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

Agreed, KR is no longer a useful multi-kit trait. Can’t see where it would be worth taking on a single kit build either.

Forced into Nades and/or Toolkit?

in Engineer

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

Is ANet trying to force Engineers into Tool Kit and Grenade Kit builds?

I’ve been trying to make a go of builds that don’t use the Tool Kit (I much prefer mid-range play over melee) or the Grenade Kit (I prefer auto-targeting at range), but every patch this seems to get harder and harder to do.

Overall it seems that the buffs (and bizzare nerfs) to under-performing kits, gadgets and turrets still leave too big a deficit compared to the Tool Kit/Grenade Kit, and to other classes. Take the last two patches:

  • 26 Jan: nice buffs to FT (especially when you include the Flame Blast bug) and EG were nice, but major nerf to Kit Refinement for these kits; Tool Kit gets a great confusion buff.
  • 26 Mar: KR is nerfed so hard it gets its own headstone; minor (aka ‘insufficient’) buffs to turrets; Grenades no longer require line of sight to auto target.

While there are a lot of options in the Engineers skill set, it seems we’re repeatedly forced into a Tool Kit or a Grenade Kit build for viability. Include a stun breaker and there is just only one utility slot left for so called diversity. The most obvious thing to put in that last slot? Tool Kit or Grenade Kit – whichever you don’t already have.

Where’s the build diversity in this?
Are we only ever meant to have two sorts of Engineers: ‘Naders and Pry Bar’ers?
Or should I just be grateful that at least we have those two options?

Flame Thrower, was fixed when it was broken.

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Zenguy.6421

Agreed. With the Flame Bast bug the overall damage output from the FT was adequate. The higher burst on Flame Blast was balanced by its cooldown and weaknesses in other areas of the kit. Not that it’s been nerfed :-(

So.. Kit refinement dead ?

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Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

Done. Glad you like it. :-)

RIP Kit Refinement

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Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

Once upon a time there was a humble trait called Kit Refinement. It came from a poor family of Adept traits, but overcame its lowly origins and rose to become a favourite choice for multi-kit engineers. Often these hard working patrons would put aside an extra 10pts in the Tools trait line just so they could hire Kit Refinement and its other Adept cousin, Speedy Kits, for their builds.

Then one day, instead of treating Engineers as merely an afterthought in their lofty schemes, the lords of the land, the ANet, turned the full might of their attention to the much maligned Engineers. “We shall help Engineers achieve their true place in the land of Tyria.” they said.

So the mighty ANet started to listen to the tales in the marketplace about Engineers, they tried sparring with a few Engineers, and even donned Engineer’s armour and tried out some of the Engineers tools in their mighty arenas. “Yes.” they said. “We finally see that some things are indeed not right with the Engineer. We will fix this.” And they started to make changes to the powers granted to Engineers.

But the prejudices of the mighty ran too deep for the fate of the lowly Kit Refinement. “What is Kit Refinement doing in so many builds?” the ANet asked. “Why is it that Engineers find it so useful? How are they getting such benefit from a mere Adept trait?” And so the fate of Kit Refinement was sealed.

The first warning Kit Refinement had of the change in its fate was when it received orders to slow down, to stop being so helpful all the time. But the orders were garbled and although Kit Refinement had to curtail its assistance to its more interesting but less powerful Engineer patrons, it was still able to do its work for the most powerful engineers.

The mighty Anet heard how their s instructions had been garbled, and how Kit Refinement was still helping the most powerful engineers, and they decided that was enough. “A lowly Adept trait should never be allowed such power! Return Kit Refinement to its lowly Adept status, and make sure it says there!

Now Kit Refinement wanders the back alleys of Tyria, hoping for a visit from a kindly Engineer; hoping against hope that some curious Engineer will try it out in a build, at least for a little while, so that it can get a brief taste, a brief reminder, of the glory it once knew.

.
As far as builds go, Kit Refinement is dead. There are now plenty of better traits to take than Kit Refinement – given the state of Engineer traits, that isn’t saying much.

So.. Kit refinement dead ?

in Engineer

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

Once upon a time there was a humble trait called Kit Refinement. It came from a poor family of Adept traits, but overcame its lowly origins and rose to become a favourite choice for multi-kit engineers. Often these hard working patrons would put aside an extra 10pts in the Tools trait line just so they could hire Kit Refinement and its other Adept cousin, Speedy Kits, for their builds.

Then one day, instead of treating Engineers as merely an afterthought in their lofty schemes, the lords of the land, the ANet, turned the full might of their attention to the much maligned Engineers. “We shall help Engineers achieve their true place in the land of Tyria.” they said.

So the mighty ANet started to listen to the tales in the marketplace about Engineers, they tried sparring with a few Engineers, and even donned Engineer’s armour and tried out some of the Engineers tools in their mighty arenas. “Yes.” they said. “We finally see that some things are indeed not right with the Engineer. We will fix this.” And they started to make changes to the powers granted to Engineers.

But the prejudices of the mighty ran too deep for the fate of the lowly Kit Refinement. “What is Kit Refinement doing in so many builds?” the ANet asked. “Why is it that Engineers find it so useful? How are they getting such benefit from a mere Adept trait?” And so the fate of Kit Refinement was sealed.

The first warning Kit Refinement had of the change in its fate was when it received orders to slow down, to stop being so helpful all the time. But the orders were garbled and although Kit Refinement had to curtail its assistance to its more interesting but less powerful Engineer patrons, it was still able to do its work for the most powerful engineers.

The mighty Anet heard how their s instructions had been garbled, and how Kit Refinement was still helping the most powerful engineers, and they decided that was enough. “A lowly Adept trait should never be allowed such power! Return Kit Refinement to its lowly Adept status, and make sure it says there!

Now Kit Refinement wanders the back alleys of Tyria, hoping for a visit from a kindly Engineer; hoping against hope that some curious Engineer will try it out in a build, at least for a little while, so that it can get a brief taste, a brief reminder, of the glory it once knew.

.
As far as builds go, Kit Refinement is dead. There are now plenty of better traits to take than Kit Refinement – given the state of Engineer traits, that isn’t saying much.

(edited by Zenguy.6421)

1 more day, hows everyone feeling!

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Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

No, you’ve got it all wrong. . . . He’ll die under questioning in a police cell.

Living World => different on each server?

in Living World

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Zenguy.6421

Will we ever see longer lasting differences between servers depending on how each server community handles each Living Story (this or later stories)?

One of the core ideas behind GW2 is that the world responds to player actions. The most obvious examples of this are major event chains where areas of the world become hostile or friendly depending on the success or failure of events along the chain. However, this is a short term effect.

The ‘world changing’ (e.g. Living Story) arcs have the potential to make each server’s community’s actions in the world of Tyria have lasting effects for their server. That doesn’t seem to be how it plays out at present (e.g. the Lost Shores event had only one outcome: The Ancient Karka is defeated).

Is this something that we may see in the future?
This would certainly make GW2 an even more interesting environment than it is already.

(Beyond the direct effects on the worlds themselves, this may stimulate movement between severs as people try out the different paths (during the events) and resulting environments (after the events). If less active servers go down the less favourable event paths, this may have a balancing effect as they may become more interesting places to explore as a result.)

Rox, the Charr

in Flame and Frost

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

Aaargh! Now all I can think to say when I meet Rox is “Hello Kitty!”

"It doesn't care that I'm there"

in Flame and Frost

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Zenguy.6421

I remember a part of ANet’s MMO manifesto where Ree talks about how other MMOs don’t care about your actions, and how in GW2, the NPCs would remember the player for their actions.

a few years later, cue Flame and Frost, more specifically the Lost and Found achievement. now i find this mechanic to be quite nice, aiding NPCs to find their lost belongings, but here’s the thing: the NPC doesn’t even remember that you did it. you talk to them again once you deliver the item, and instead of making any mention that you’ve already delivered the item, it repeats the same text from before, asking you to find an item you can’t even pick up anymore because you’ve already delivered it.

would it be hard to give NPCs whose belongings you’ve returned a different dialogue expressing their thanks or something? just anything that represents that the NPC remembers that yes, they have the item they lost now, and it’s this adventurer standing right in front of them that got it back. it would make it much more rewarding on a story perspective, and it doesn’t sound like a hard thing to do (after all, you already have a system that prevents you from picking an item you’ve already delivered, the same system could be used to determine which dialogue you get).

it just feels like a huge wasted opportunity, that the so called “living story” can’t even be bothered to acknowledge that the player just did something to change the life of that NPC.

Good point.

Nice idea, ANet, for NPCs to remember our actions. Now please follow it up with some dialogue coding.

enjoy your current engineer, patch day coming

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Zenguy.6421

All because one time at band camp a dev’s second cousin saw a photo-shopped picture of 24k damage.

Worth the read for this sentence alone. +1

+2

1 more day, hows everyone feeling!

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Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

There’s still hope. Overall the last patch was more buff (albeit to low strength abilities) than nerf for Engs. It’s just a shame they made such of mess of the KR changes that they effectively reduced multi-kit builds.

(It’s also a shame we’re so critically dependent on one or two oddly placed individual traits for the viability of builds outside ‘nades and elixirs. It’s hardly surprising ’nades and elixirs are our predominant builds, given these are the only ones with coherent trait paths. Firearms is coherent, but the flexibility tax on our weapon damage means that even 30 in this path is still underpowered.)

3 1/2 weeks into the game

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Zenguy.6421

Right now I suck at dodging lol

The #1 tip for mastering the Eng: Learn to dodge!
The trick is to watch the enemy’s animation for their big attack(s) and then dodge out of the way before it hits. After a while you’ll develop the knack of spotting the dangerous animations and dodging clear of their effects – when you do it will make the biggest difference to the amount of damage you take.

Dodge is the major damage reduction mechanic in GW2, its superior to literally everything else – It can’t hurt you if it doesn’t hit you.

3 1/2 weeks into the game

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Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

The Eng class is probably not be the best intro to GW2, because: a) that they have the steepest/longest learning curve by far; and b) you will be less effective than other classes for most of that time.

However, starting with an Eng is the GW2 equivalent of starting on Hard mode. It’s more challenging/frustrating at first, but it forces you to master the game faster. End result, you learn better gameplay and better survival habits than those who start on easier classes (e.g. Eng players are often the best dodgers in the game, because they’ve had to be).

Elixir S and U question

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Zenguy.6421

There doesn’t seem to be any logic to having cast times on our elixirs or their toolbelt toss skills.

All our elixirs and their toss skills are insta-cast, except for Toss B, drink C, drink U and Toss U.

  • Why the 1/2s combat penalty on those skills?
  • Are they really superior (even combining drink + toss) to the equivalent skills of other classes?

What if...everything was a kit?

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Zenguy.6421

Which is why it’s worth considering putting all of the Gadgets into a kit that takes only one utility slot.

Asura Engineers running Elixir S

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Zenguy.6421

Great story :-)

Anet Engineer players?

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Zenguy.6421

Tbh I think the only time devs play the engineer is in sPvP and not WvW or PvE. Seems to be shaping up their behavior towards this profession.

Sums up the game in general. Just about every balance decision is done based on SPVP performance and meta.

But don’t you see? That’s where the money is! Why wouldn’t a business concentrate most on what brings in the revenue? Am I right? Right? … No?? ok.

Not sure you’re right there. GW2 has made, and no doubt still makes, far more revenue from account sales and PvE/WvW add-ons than it’s likely to do from SPvP for a very long time.

Arena PvP may be a growing area of e-games, but its still tiny compared with the huge following and spend on open world MMOs. I’ve not seen any GW2 population figures, but from all accounts SPvP numbers are very small compared with PvE and WvW. What are the overall figures? Over 3 million GW2 accounts purchased (at an average of say US$50/account)? Then there’s the add-on spend by those who only play PvE and WvW. Even if PvE and WvW players are spending far less per month, than the SPvP’ers, there’s so much more of them that the numbers have to be hugely in their favour. Also, where does GW2 get most of its SPvP players? It’s safe bet that its primarily from GW2 WvW and PvE, and will be for a long time yet.

It’s one thing to know how to make money from people once they get into SPvP. But if those players never get to SPvP in the first place because they’re put off by issues along the way, then ANet won’t get any SPvP revenue from them at all.

Its obvious ANet are focussing on making SPvP more attractive so they can get up-sell SPvP to more of their customer base. However, with PvE and WvW being the primary “try it, see if you like it” zones for GW2, too many of teh potential PvP players are too put off by class imbalances in those zones to even consider trying SPvP with their favourite character/class.

Which brings us all the way back to how important it is to fix class imbalances in PvE and WvW as these will still be the primary source of new SPvP players.

Good Build for Solo PvE in General

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Zenguy.6421

+1 to using the FT in PvE. The last patch improved it’s viability to the point that it’s now my go-to PvE kit/weapon.

To all Asura Engineers - Which Elite??

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Zenguy.6421

I only we could name our elite Golems.

Anet Engineer players?

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Zenguy.6421

Its good if there arent! Then they wont see how Awsomely OP class we can be

Sure Eng can be awesome.

  • But how many actually achieve that with their Eng?
  • Do we achieve that level of awesomeness more than other classes? No we don’t. If we did we’d dominate the SPvP boards – and we don’t.

Thanks for your comment. Now please stop making posts that are likely to attract teh attention of ANet’s class nerfing team.

p.s. Why does the Eng forum get all these ego pumped “we’re OP” posts? We seem to get them far more than any other GW2 forum.

Light field+throw wrench = condition remove

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Zenguy.6421

Don’t write off combos that quickly. They’re useful for us Engs as we have rapid access to skills to make us of them, and they add that bit extra to our effectiveness (and we need every bit of that we can find).

PvP Survey - Eng 1st/2nd weakest class

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Zenguy.6421

Rerroll ran a survey on the SPvP forum seeking player opinions on (t)PvP and the results are here (scroll to near bottom for two pie charts showing Class results).

Eng Summary:

  • Which class is strongest?’ Eng scored worst with only 1% of votes (c.f. Warrior with 5%)
  • Which class is weakest? Eng scored 2nd worst with 17% of votes (after Warrior at 46%)
  • Which feature should be 1st priority? Improve game balance (27%)

ANet’s response to the survey:

Just wanted to say this was awesome! We’ve seen this and we think it’s pretty cool to see some of your opinions on the current state of the game. Thanks to everyone who participated!

Thanks for taking the time to show us you read it.
Hope it was helpful in some way.

Ya! It really was helpful. The survey mirrored a lot of things we’ve seen on the forums – but had it all in one spot.

It was also nice to see we have a good “read” on the playerbase – some of the things you guys rated as big issues are things we also consider to be our top priorities!

Here’s hoping this leads to ANet giving more attention to the Eng class.

Light field+throw wrench = condition remove

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Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

The condition removal on the EG light field definitely procs solo with rifle, pistol and EG, and at a decent rate too. Haven’t tried it with Tool Kit.

The shield effect should pop up when you throw the wrench, but that doesn’t mean you’ll benefit from the effect unless you’re close enough to the target:

Projectile finishers apply their effect either to the target foe or to allies adjacent to the target.

(edited by Zenguy.6421)

Good Build for Solo PvE in General

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Zenguy.6421

I also spend more time in Pve than anywhere else. Here’s some suggestions for PvE levelling your Eng:

  1. Learn to dodge. That’s right, really learn to dodge. Why? Because the engineer is so squishy compared to the Warrior (far less blocks and worse armor) and the Ranger (no pet to draw off agro) that avoiding damage in combat is an essential Eng skill.
  2. Learn to use kits a lot. Eng’s Weapons are nerfed because we get a lot of our effectiveness from our kit skills – so much so that most Engs probaly spend more time in kits than out of them (the exception would be the Pistol/Elixir Eng, and even then they make liberal use of the Tool Kit). As part of this, master kit/weapon switching and chaining skills from different kits/weapons for greater effect.
  3. Master the grenade kit – it’s probably the most effective kit in PvE (and elsewhere).
  4. Try out a Pistol/Elixir build with Tool Kit.
  5. Try out a Flamethrower/Elixir Gun build.
  6. Try out all the other Eng kits and weapons.
  7. Once you’ve done 3, 4, 5, and enough of 6 decide which combination you most enjoy and build around that.

Ultimately, the Eng is not a class that can just sit in one build. Good Eng’s regularly swap around weapons, kits, utilities, traits and even gear to suit whatever they’re doing: roaming/farming, one set-up; soloing a Champ, another; AC run a third; CoF run a fourth; etc.
What does that have to do with levelling? Levelling is your opportunity to learn the different abilities available to the Eng – make use of it (otherwise you’ll end up like me, having to go back as a L80 and spend time learning things I should have just tried out while I was levelling).

(edited by Zenguy.6421)

Opinions on Elementalists?

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Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

Have you considered asking any Engs what they think? Eles have it easy compared to Engs.

There, did that make you feel better? :-)

[edit] p.s. Engs have even less weapons that Eles.

(edited by Zenguy.6421)

To all Asura Engineers - Which Elite??

in Asura

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

I experimented with the Golems while I leveled – I’m an Asura, what’d you expect?
But the Supply Crate is an overall superior elite, which is why it’s pretty much the only elite you’ll see Eng’s using. Learn to use the Supply Crate and it will be your friend.

Tip for the day: Supply Crate is a blast finisher; drop in on top of a friendly combo field for the added combo effect.

Mortar range ( now with trait fixed )

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Zenguy.6421

Mortar should be a kit. If in doubt, compare it with the Grenade kit which is 100% portable with no CD.

Engi's in Dungeons

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Zenguy.6421

Nice run. What I couldn’t see was why the Spider Queen didn’t move – it didn’t seem to have any CC on it most of the time.

Hows the aoe nerf going to affect Engineer?

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Zenguy.6421

We have strengths? I thought the design principle for the Eng is that it doesn’t have any strengths but makes up for that with lots of flexibility.

Back on topic, it does sound ominously like Grenades could get nerfed. Hopefully the nerf won’t affect FT, given they’ve just buffed it and its still a little under-whelming.

Engineer Ruined Me

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Zenguy.6421

Yeah, the weapon swap delay is just wrong.

Every time I feel frustrated with my Eng I go back and level my Guardian a bit further. The way he does so much more damage, so much faster, while being so much more robust, is refreshing. Then, after a while, he gets to be same-old same-old, and I go back to my Eng.

Sadly, the latest patch damped my enthusiasm for my Eng – I’d just mastered a FT/EG based multi-kit build when the nerf to KR broke my freshly learned rhythm (turned out the KR visuals were helping me track which kit/weapon I was in). As a result my Guardian is finally about to hit 80. Fingers crossed the 26 March patch will refresh my enthusiasm for my Eng. (Don’t get me wrong, I still like my Eng, just don’t feel like trying to master anything else about it until after the patch, just in case that breaks something I’m using once again.) Till then it might be time to start a second alt -Ele maybe, they don’t seem to have too long CD on their attunements.

Names for Elixirgun and Flamethrower?

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Zenguy.6421

Eric and Nigel.

ANET, if you're listening..

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Zenguy.6421

I’m glad you like the Engineer class. I’m glad you love it just as it is. I’m glad you really enjoy it in tPvP – you’ve clearly put a lot of effort in with it there. That’s awesome.

There are also lots of people like me who either don’t PvP or do so only on a casual basis. (I don’t know the numbers, but I get the impression tPvP is the least represented area in GW2, WvW next, and PvE the most played.) For us PvE and WvW players, the Eng still needs a lot of work.

What if...everything was a kit?

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Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

  • Leveling: Modify skill acquisition for Engs to make some kits accessible as 1 skill point utilities. Modify some kits to start with a subset of skills, with the remaining skills purchased separately.
  • Build diversity: Keeping the 6 slot for Healing/Med Kit and distributing the stun breaks across more kits would mean we’d have to chose 3 kits out of a full range of 8 kits for our utility slots. The range of options and diversity of play styles this would allow would make us more diverse in play not less.

And some questions:

  • Wouldn’t this force Engs who don’t want to take kits to take kits? That’s right. It’s what we have to do right now anyway – our weapons are so nerfed there are no viable non-kit builds. Eng’s have to take kits to be viable, lets just accept this and design for it.
  • Wouldn’t this make our UI even more complicated (Engs are hard enough to play as it is)? No. It would actually make our UI more consistent and easier to follow. Yes it would be different to other classes, but we have that already, only this time it would make more consistent sense in play.
  • Wouldn’t this force Eng’s to always be doing multi-button combos? You’re catching on. Eng have to do multi-button combos all the time right now just to be viable. This gets that right up front, so players can start learning how to master it right from the early days of running their new Eng.
  • Wouldn’t this end up being just a different version of the Ele attunements with toolbelt skills thrown in? That’s exactly what we’ve got right now, but with the added complication that the current version is not so well organised. Doing it this way tidies up that mess, while still giving us our toolbelt abilities, all in a more consistent logical structure.

Now if Turrets and Gadgets (as well as the Mortar and Elixir toolbelt skills) were in better shape, then putting everything into kits would be OP. But they aren’t, so this seems like a much less radical and far more sensible step than it might appear at first glance.

What if...everything was a kit?

in Engineer

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Zenguy.6421

Good idea. It would need a couple of changes (see below) and serious balancing on the Elixir Kit. But it would make the UI for the Eng a far more consistent and breathe much needed life into some languishing areas of the Eng skill set.

  • Turret kit: There’s been several discussions on this, and IMHO no strong argument against making turrets a kit. 5 turrets (excluding Healing Turret which has its own slot) = 1-5 skills, easy. The only losses would be on the toolbelt skills: a) the turret specific toobelt skills would need to be replaced with a) a ‘no turrets placed’ toolbelt skill such as Net Attack or Rocket, and b) Detonate All Turrets whne turrets are active. The obvious auto attack is to place a Rifle Turret.
  • Gadget kit: The biggest problems gadgets have is their overly long CDs. Making them a kit would balance this with access to more gadgets. 5 gadgets = 1-5 skills. Again the gadget specific toobelt skills would need to be replaced with a single toolbelt skill or perhaps two, one for kit-equiped (e.g. Super Speed) and one when not equiped (e.g. Analyze). As for auto-attack, either disable it on this kit or change Goggles so that it works as a non-damaging auto-ability (e.g. immune to stun and blind while you’re in the auto ability but not using any other gadget).
  • Elixir kit: This would be great but need careful balancing as giving us access to all Elixirs (except H) under one utility slot would be OP at the current elixir specs.
    5 elixirs (excluding elixir H in the healing slot) = 1-5 skills, easy. For the toolbelt skill, have it be one elixir toss when the kit is equipped and another when it isn’t. As with the Gadget kit, the auto-attack will need to be disabled on this kit or include a passive place holder that handles the long cooldown on elixirs.
  • Mortar Kit: This doesn’t deserve to be an Elite as it’s no better and arguable worse than several of our standard utility kits. Solution: make it a standard kit and split the Elixir X into two separate Elites (which removes the RNG unreliability that stops people taking Elixir X). This would make it Eng only, but the seamless place and retrieve would more than make up for the few times someone else wants to fire an Eng placed mortar. For a toolbelt skill, give it Rocket from the Rocket Turret utility.
  • Toolbelt Skills: The changes above would reduce our current range of toolbelt skills from 20 down to 11. We could get this back up to 16 by making a different toolbelt skill available on the other kits when they are equiped/not-equiped (here’s some suggestions: Bomb Kit add Shockwave, Grenade Kit add Mine Field, Elixir Gun add a Toss Elixir, FT add Throw Napalm, Tool Kit add Launch Personal Battering Ram). With all the suggestions above, the only toolbelt skills lost would be Surprise Shot and three Toss Elixirs – this last would be more than made for by doing a better job (i.e. less RNG) with the Toss Elixirs that do remain. If the toolbelt changes when each kit is equiped/not-equiped then players may actually end up with access to more toolbelt skills in play than at present.
  • Stun breaks: The best solution seems to be to leave the stun breaks within the kit skills and give access to them by allowing kit swapping while stunned.
    Why not provide stun breaks on the toolbelt skills for specific kits? Because this will force Engs to take those specific kits reducing diversity.
    Why not leave all the stun breakers in Elixirs and Gadgets? Because again that forces Engs to take those specific kits reducing diversity. Better to redistribute the stun breaks across more kits.
    Wouldn’t this be a major buff to Kit Refinement? Yes. Solutions: a) only allow kit swapping to kits that contain a stun breaker; and/or b) modify KR so it doesn’t proc if switching while stunned.
    Could someone potentially get access to 3 stun breaks by taking 3 kits with stun breaks? Yes. Solutions: a) leave it be; and/or b) code a global cooldown of say 5s on the Eng stun break effect (just, please, not like the mess that is the current KR cooldown).

whats going to be done about flamethrower?

in Engineer

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

+1 to nakoda’s advice about spamming <Tab> to nearest enemy when using the FT on slopes.

The FT has got a lot better – and it still needs a bit more. Right now it’s really only viable (i.e. adequate, not great) in PvE. In WvW its very limited. PvP I couldn’t, say as don’t play that yet.

Not-hipshot rifle animation

in Engineer

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

We throw clumps of 6 grenades further than we can shoot with a rifle! Of course we shoot funny, it’s the only explanation.

Now if Eng’s learnt to shoot properly . . . sniper Eng here come! – Well it’s a nice dream.

whats going to be done about flamethrower?

in Engineer

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

FT #1 is an AoE weapon, that works best when aimed at an area rather than an individual. If you are using it to take out a single target keep aiming at the area the target’s in, because the auto-targeting is unreliable.

I especially hate it when fighting an enemy that’s chasing me round in circles and I keep missing with the FT even though the flames are on target. The solution is heavy use of the strafe key for movement so I stay facing the enemy – the resulting movement speed is lower (half the time it’s like I’m backing not strafing) but keeps the enemy in the FT damage zone.

Precusor plans?

in Black Lion Trading Co

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

Also they need to nerf cof path 1 to the ground in order to stop the massive inflation of high end items (since every path is generating bucketloads of gold). It’ll be better for the economy if farming mats becomes as effective as farming gold.

This ^

Gem Store Item: Trait Reset

in Black Lion Trading Co

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

Test results:
Training Manuals only work when unlocking a trait tier for the first time. Once you’ve unlocked the trait tier you can’t use that level of book again on that character. When you’ve unlocked all the tiers the only way to reset traits is to visit a trainer.

Opinions, best way to make money on the TP

in Black Lion Trading Co

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

A key principle used by all successful entrepreneurs, traders and speculators is “affordable loss”. The principle of affordable loss means: invest only as much as you can afford to lose at the time and still stay in business. Stick to this principle as you try out different tactics for making money on the TP and you’ll benefit from the ones that work out for you and survive the ones that don’t.

Hows the aoe nerf going to affect Engineer?

in Engineer

Posted by: Zenguy.6421

Zenguy.6421

All of Bombkit is AoE
All of Grenade Kit is AoE
All of FT is AoE
All of Pistol is AoE (maybe minus Poison Darts)
Half of EG is AoE
All of Kit Refinement Effects are AoE
All of the Engineers comparable burst options are AoE

I would say AoE nerf would affect us pretty good. Most professions in GW2 have alot of AoE focus but usually with an option for single target DPS. We don’t really have a Single Target DPS option.

QFT.

It really comes down to which AoE they’re are going to nerf. Everything that hits multiple targets? Only those effects with a defined area/radius? Only ground targeted attacks? AoE from melee? Direct AoE damage only? . . .

Personally I agree with nerfing AoE and am looking forward to its effects, especially in WvW battles (which are pretty much just ‘AoE Wars’ atm). I only hope the change ends up helping Eng’s balance against other classes, or if not that this is more than made up for with other Eng buffs. We’ll find out in a week . . .

(edited by Zenguy.6421)