[GW2] Engineer discussion

[NightZero88]

I went explosions and grenade kit, but I could never find specifics on conditions. They sounded like dots to me, so I'm assuming if something is on fire/poison grenade counts as condition?

If that is the case, I'm doing it all wrong gearing power this whole time. As an aside, I wish the '1' ability was an autoattack grenade throwing. I understand that it's more versatile since you can throw the suckers wherever you want, but I'm going to break my mouse spam clicking that thing.

I'm only level 28, but the entire scope of the engineer(pun totally intended) feels so awesome. Not only am I tossing death bombs at every turn, but I can heal and buff groups of people, jump all over the place like a madman, cc things...it's so much fun to play.

Has anyone higher level experimented with any of the other specific builds? I really loved the flamethrower for questing, but I couldn't clearly see what I should have been traiting for in order to improve it to be as good/better as grenades.

This is what separates the good players from the bad in GW2 and really really well in the engineer class. I am level 69 and am now getting the hang of what to do. I run pistol/pistol with the regular heal, grenade kit, flamethrower kit, elixer gun kit and the D-series defense golem. I've noticed that if you play smart you are GODLY in groups. For example, you have 3 blinds with this setup (number 3 or 4?) on the pistol/pistol, number 3 on the grenade kit, number 5 on the flamethrower. You have condition removal on the elixer gun (2 of them even), you have HoTs with elixer gun and it's F ability, you can buff with the regular heal F1 ability. Good damage in melee with flamethrower kit (does a crapton). Ranged AoE with grenade kit, ranged single target with pistols and you can debuff the enemy with elixer gun. I had specced into all power/precision but am now moving into +condition damage and +healing since I'm liking the support playstyle and with +condition your flamethrower wrecks mobs. I believe I'm 20/20/0/0/15 or so right now.

So here's what I do, oh man that guy is getting pounded while trying to rez: Knock back with flamethrower or toss a blind then help rez. Oh no, conditions on my whole party elixer gun to remove them all along with acid spray in case I miss. Quick debuff the boss with weakness from elixer gun, range blind with grenade kit, close range blind with flamethrower, toss out damage with flamethrower.

Now I'm sure all classes can do this but I don't see a lot of people actually doing it, maybe it's just different since with us switching it's so noticeable (like an ele) but it really goes a long way and makes dungeons so much easier when you are pulling out all the stops. I have a feeling once more people learn to play like this those crazy explorable dungeons will get easier. Hope this helps.

[Kelimbror]

That is definitely one thing I've picked up on...our ability to impact a group setting. Even if no one else notices it, I feel like a champ for tosses elixirs all over the place and generally making a mob of people much more effective. Not to mention being able to frost grenade large packs coming into the group, because as I play the Engi my eyes are constantly darting all over the screen and spinning around seeing everything that is coming in...setting up the group constantly.

It does seem that on their own, they might need a little more punch compared to the other classes, but I'm not even halfway to the top so I can't make a fair assessment in that regars.

[Cempa]

In other words seems peeps are discovering a cool support class..That shines at support...So if I speced Rifle and Flame Thrower and just nuked, I pretty much gimped my group?

[DrakeWurrum]

In other words seems peeps are discovering a cool support class..That shines at support...So if I speced Rifle and Flame Thrower and just nuked, I pretty much gimped my group?

Who cares about them, they're probably dead.

I personally look forward to speccing heavily into Tool Kit and Turrets, just to see how it works out. I only wish that I could spec for Tool Kit without losing a potential turret slot.


*sighs* If only kits took up the secondary weapon slot instead of utility slots. That would make them the most unique of all.

[NightZero88]

In other words seems peeps are discovering a cool support class..That shines at support...So if I speced Rifle and Flame Thrower and just nuked, I pretty much gimped my group?

If you never switch yes. Because then you would be playing the game like WoW and not like GW2. You can support with those weapons decently, the rifle has the net to immobilize enemies. The flamethrower as I said has a blind and a knock back. Also the firewall your teammates can shoot through for bonus fire damage and I think you may get flame shield if you stand in it but not sure. But really you need to be using ALL your slots. What do you have in your slots? Turrets/kits? Do you ever switch? If not you're not doing as well as you could and even worse if you don't do the things I mentioned with what you do have.

---------- Post added 2012-09-05 at 11:49 AM ----------

Who cares about them, they're probably dead.

I personally look forward to speccing heavily into Tool Kit and Turrets, just to see how it works out. I only wish that I could spec for Tool Kit without losing a potential turret slot.


*sighs* If only kits took up the secondary weapon slot instead of utility slots. That would make them the most unique of all.

I'd like to use turrets but picking them up causes such a long CD it's crazy, you can't move them around freely enough. Also, they get slaughtered way too easily because they'll shoot mobs before I do so they'll go straight for them and smash them. I suppose if you get that talent for 30% less damage to them and use the toolkit F ability to repair it might work better but it still seems to much of a hassle and not nearly as good as the other options.

[Xuvial]

I'd like to use turrets but picking them up causes such a long CD it's crazy, you can't move them around freely enough. Also, they get slaughtered way too easily because they'll shoot mobs before I do so they'll go straight for them and smash them. I suppose if you get that talent for 30% less damage to them and use the toolkit F ability to repair it might work better but it still seems to much of a hassle and not nearly as good as the other options.

Thumper Turret
Has a ton of health and a pretty nifty CC.

[Kelimbror]

In other words seems peeps are discovering a cool support class..That shines at support...So if I speced Rifle and Flame Thrower and just nuked, I pretty much gimped my group?

Yes. The engineer has the distinct ability to turn a group of mere mortals into gods.

Even the arguably best Elite Skill, the supply pack, is best utilized in a group setting

[Deleted]

Dual Pistols is the way forward for me. Sick condition damage, still have great support via elixir+supply crate + 'nade kit, medic kit. My teammates happily invite me to spvp as a roamer and I get invited to dungeons all the time due to the sick support I provide (even though other classes can do it better) player > class

[Eskulap]

Who cares about them, they're probably dead.

I personally look forward to speccing heavily into Tool Kit and Turrets, just to see how it works out. I only wish that I could spec for Tool Kit without losing a potential turret slot.


*sighs* If only kits took up the secondary weapon slot instead of utility slots. That would make them the most unique of all.

The turret build can be ... useful, to an extent. It makes for a great diversion/distraction when there's a metric f-tonne of mobs to deal with. I'm actually running a support explosion/bomb-kit build (awesome-possum), but yesterday, while running the human path of AC explorable, we just found that Hodgins has no self-sustain and I figured I might as well give turrets a try (even if we had one member taking care of him all the time, getting pounced by 2 scavengers just had him reduced to a bloody pulp). Equipped with self-repair, 30% reduced damage and explosion+pushback on destruction, they've really fared quite well. The combination of the healing, rocket and thumper turret, together with a well placed supply pack, was just amazing. The amount of passive control around Hodgins (together with well timed overcharges on both rocket and thumper) was so big, that we barely had to worry about him at all. (In the end it still took us about an hour to complete the event, but I must say I haven't had as much fun since WoW BC in a 5-man dungeon.)

However, on the other side of the coin, those same turrets become completely useless whenever there's any aoe involved, as they drop faster than you can say "selfdestruct." It's a niche build, all in all, but what it does, it does well. I guess I might've gotten even more out of it with the Tool-kit + increased damage traits on them (my build hasn't got that one), but I doubt it would have helped their survivability more than a tiny bit.

[DrakeWurrum]

Eh. When there's aoe involved, that's when I make sure I have Thumper and Flame slotted, imo. Still a shame that Tool Kit takes up a slot.

[Riavan]

What level are you? How do you even use toolkit without nearly being dead every time?

And to everyone, this stuff about "support", BAH, tons of classes, have tons of support skills, whether its yells, banners, heals, boons etc.

[Rooflesstoofless]

What level are you? How do you even use toolkit without nearly being dead every time?

And to everyone, this stuff about "support", BAH, tons of classes, have tons of support skills, whether its yells, banners, heals, boons etc.

Kind of wondering the same thing, tbh. I have a engineer sitting there gathering dust in my character slot since I tried out being a ranged warrior and it can offer good support (banners) all the while still being able to have decent ST range (rifle) and ok AoE ranged (longbow) abilities.

[Enkidulgaa]

Best way to support I've found is to go deep into alchemy to get the trait that makes elixiers remove conditions and then 10 points into tools for "create an effect when you equip a kit"
Take healing elixir, elixir R, B and elixir gun
When you equip the gun, it automatically drops the number 5 healing AoE beneath you, then you can cast it to stack them. superb healing+condition removal+perma weakness on 1 mob+easy ranged rez

[Deleted]

Got my Engineer to level 48, starting to get a little tired of him. Though perhaps i'm just tired of levelling? I'm not sure... I've been tempted to level up a Guardian/Mesmer but I get irritated after 5 minutes and log back on my Engineer, and proceed to do not a whole lot.. Anyone else feeling this way or are you guy still enjoying the Class?

[DrakeWurrum]

There are some mechanics I would love to see improved, I admit. I especially wish that kits took up a second weapon set kind of deal instead of utility slots. :|

[Kelimbror]

There are some mechanics I would love to see improved, I admit. I especially wish that kits took up a second weapon set kind of deal instead of utility slots. :|

Getting kinda annoyed at this as well. I hope they consider changing it. I would even be happy if you could only have your weapon abilities and then one kit to swap, but being able to swap between two kits would be amazing as well.

I mean, elementalists have 4 stances and weapons...engineers kinda got shafted in that regard.

[DrakeWurrum]

It would probably remove some of the Engineer flavor if you only had access to one other kit (outside of Med Kit as being part of the heal slot), and would require a re-working of some tool belt skills, (and hell, they'd probably have to add a new flavor of utility skills, besides gadgets and elixirs and turrets - why, for example, aren't there a whole range of mine utilities?), but I think it would be worth it overall for the improved mechanical cohesion.



Seriously would love to see several utility skills in a "Mine" category. We've got the single Mine tool right now - but what about, instead of a mine that knocks back, a mine that cripples? A mine that bleeds? A mine that blinds? A mine that chills?
There's a lot of room for innovation here with a fun handful of utility slot skills. It would be similar to the way traps work for Thieves and Rangers, I suppose, but with the added flavor that you can choose to detonate them, and with how you can just toss it under someone's feet from a distance.

---------- Post added 2012-09-07 at 10:51 PM ----------

Bah, Flamethrower's auto attack needs to have a 600 attack range. 425 feels far too short, especially relative to how large the animation is. Anyways, thinking to go for this build with my Engineer. Heavy focus on Flamethrower, Elixir Gun, and Elixirs to fill the remaining slots. Feels kinda right for a Charr. Gives me a good mix of survivability, offensive power and control, and supportive utility, I'd like to think. Total jack of trades.

[Vespian]

Bah, Flamethrower's auto attack needs to have a 600 attack range. 425 feels far too short, especially relative to how large the animation is. Anyways, thinking to go for this build with my Engineer. Heavy focus on Flamethrower, Elixir Gun, and Elixirs to fill the remaining slots. Feels kinda right for a Charr. Gives me a good mix of survivability, offensive power and control, and supportive utility, I'd like to think. Total jack of trades.

I agree, the range is ridiculous (in a low sense :P), especially, indeed, due to the animation length, constantly misguiding your senses. I only use the flamethrower (lvl 10) on AoE packs, because it definitely packs a punch when you get entire groups in one go, but single target, I'm currently sticking to pistol/shield. I like shields.

[Riavan]

So I've been 80 for a day or so now, I'm feeling slightly less weak than I was during leveling, I still see some other classes pwn mobs a lot faster than me though (rogue/warrior/ranger/guardian in particular)

My build is rifle + 2 offensive turrets and grenade kit.

Story quests are still hellahard.

Yeah the flamethrower ranger does totally throw you off with the animation, also sometimes it seems to aim wonky, into the ground and etc and it makes me worry its not doing the proper range thing infront.

Also being "good at support" isnt a good thing, you get nothing for that, the events don't actively reward you for being helpful, esp in zerg moments, you want to be doing as much damage as you can as quickly as you can so you don't get a bronze medal.

I'd really like them to make the first skill in the grenade kit, auto castable even tho it doesnt have a target, more of an "enable-disable" type thing, spamming 1 with ur finger is kinda weird when nothing else really requires it in the game.

[Synbaby]

Is there a site with a little bit more breakdown on stat weights? Right now at 38, I have my stats stacked precision>power>toughness>vitality. I'm sitting at 3996 health. At what point do I want to worry about getting more toughness/vitality? Out in the world, I'm not dieing at all. But when I do my personal story, I feel like my survivability is kind of weak. And yes, I dodge dodge dodge, and kite kite kite.