flamethrower dps too high and gives perma stab

isnt stab supposed to be nerfed?why is flamethrower giving perma stab, paired with scrapper, it's impossible to CC

Flamethrower scrapper has been a meme for a long time. It's an easy to play build that demolishes inexperienced players.

It's not a good build, but it's also not fun to fight.

That build is super annoying, and should not exist as it's not healthy for the game. When everyone and their mother were crying about FB's stab application, and then access to stab was shaved across all classes, flamethrower somehow got under the radar. Now we have a skill that literally gives engi perma stab. I wouldn't have my hopes up too much though given the random "balance" changes that we have seen from anet in the past.

@Shiyo.3578 said:It's not a good build, but it's also not fun to fight.If the meta is full of gimmicks like spam and cc you get gimmick that counter it.Then again i haven't seen anyone use the build to its full potential, so many fields and combo finishers unused, shame.

@"ollbirtan.2915" said:That build is super annoying, and should not exist as it's not healthy for the game. When everyone and their mother were crying about FB's stab application, and then access to stab was shaved across all classes, flamethrower somehow got under the radar. Now we have a skill that literally gives engi perma stab. I wouldn't have my hopes up too much though given the random "balance" changes that we have seen from anet in the past.

Nothing flies under the radar....unless it's on purpose and with engineer there is always something flying "under the radar" and if it's something not already present...it will be put there "under the radar" , engineer is like guardian...they both have office immunity

Guardian has been nerfed a lot and it's actually not an S meta class anymore.

@"ollbirtan.2915" said:That build is super annoying, and should not exist as it's not healthy for the game. When everyone and their mother were crying about FB's stab application, and then access to stab was shaved across all classes, flamethrower somehow got under the radar. Now we have a skill that literally gives engi perma stab. I wouldn't have my hopes up too much though given the random "balance" changes that we have seen from anet in the past.

Why are people acting like this is something new?

The juggernaut trait existed from the very beginning of this game and it always provided perma stability, even back then in the time when stability didn't have stacks and could withstand endless CC for it's duration.

It always had this feature and honestly should stay, it is an iconic trait for flamethrower. Just because we see some more people run around with it because flamethrower damage didn't get nerfed and therefore is better in comparison, meaning that camping flamethrower is not as bad as it used to be anymore, we shouldn't gut the identity of juggernaut.

@Kodama.6453 said:

@"ollbirtan.2915" said:That build is super annoying, and should not exist as it's not healthy for the game. When everyone and their mother were crying about FB's stab application, and then access to stab was shaved across all classes, flamethrower somehow got under the radar. Now we have a skill that literally gives engi perma stab. I wouldn't have my hopes up too much though given the random "balance" changes that we have seen from anet in the past.

I know it existed since forever. The point is it was NOT toned down ---- unlike the rest of stab traits / skills in game.

@ollbirtan.2915 said:

@Kodama.6453 said:

@ollbirtan.2915 said:That build is super annoying, and should not exist as it's not healthy for the game. When everyone and their mother were crying about FB's stab application, and then access to stab was shaved across all classes, flamethrower somehow got under the radar. Now we have a skill that literally gives engi perma stab. I wouldn't have my hopes up too much though given the random "balance" changes that we have seen from anet in the past.

Why should it? Because it is finally seeing any kind of play, even if not really viable at high tier pvp?That trait was underperforming for almost it's entire existence, yet we should nerf it just because other stab traits/skills got nerfed?

This kind of balancing leads to absurd stuff like all hard CC skills getting all their damage taken away, leading to some skills which are now insanely bad since they already had other downsides like long casting times and being highly telegraphed.

Because the nerf to stab was supposed to be universal, so flamethrower stab application should have been also reduced. Also, having perm stab is in no way healthy for any game mode.

@Kodama.6453 said:

@"ollbirtan.2915" said:That build is super annoying, and should not exist as it's not healthy for the game. When everyone and their mother were crying about FB's stab application, and then access to stab was shaved across all classes, flamethrower somehow got under the radar. Now we have a skill that literally gives engi perma stab. I wouldn't have my hopes up too much though given the random "balance" changes that we have seen from anet in the past.

@ollbirtan.2915 said:Because the nerf to stab was supposed to be universal, so flamethrower stab application should have been also reduced. Also, having perm stab is in no way healthy for any game mode.

You realise that one of scrapper's trait lines is literally designed around perma stability, don't you?Mass momentum, object in motion, applied force... these traits have way too much synergy with juggernaut for this to not be intended design.

And I don't think that perma stability is really that problematic. It is 1 stack of stability every 3 seconds, you can either corrupt/remove the boon or use 2 cc skills in quick succession. Flamethrower also has the weakness that it is hard countered by a simple boon like retaliation.

@ollbirtan.2915 said:Because the nerf to stab was supposed to be universal, so flamethrower stab application should have been also reduced. Also, having perm stab is in no way healthy for any game mode.

This depends on what the intended purpose trait is supposed to be.

CC for its damage reduced but traits like impacting disruption, terror and lightning rod still exist.

For juggernaut it can be seen that the intended purpose of the trait is to make you a juggernaut hence the pulsing stab.

I mean if you have seen the teatime with CMC when him, Angeels and Teapot are talking about lightning rod he goes into how even though lightning rod is breaks the paradigm the whole point of the trait is to do damage on CC and the choice is actively made to slot it against something else hence why its fine.

I think this line of thinking applies here.

There are probably splits or changes that can happen to flamethrower itself, e.g. lowering the damage of flamejet, or some changes to things like the interval to increase counterplay, but the actual juggernaut traits premise of perma stab is likely fine.

We live in a timeline where people are complaining about flamethrower engineer.What a world we live in now.

in low division it's so funny they play all enge flamethower

@Kodama.6453 said:

@ollbirtan.2915 said:Because the nerf to stab was supposed to be universal, so flamethrower stab application should have been also reduced. Also, having perm stab is in no way healthy for any game mode.

Not that I necessarily agree with the idea that flamethrower is a huge problem, but it sure sucks to play a class that has no access to retaliation, boon strip/corrupt and relies heavily on CC setups, huh? Just hit them with 2 CCs within a 3 second window so they can stunbreak and laugh in your face? There's no real way to defend perma-stab even on a joke build like this. It's a bad design for PvP any way you slice it.

@Sigmoid.7082 said:

@ollbirtan.2915 said:Because the nerf to stab was supposed to be universal, so flamethrower stab application should have been also reduced. Also, having perm stab is in no way healthy for any game mode.

I forgot to point out that I don't have issues with FT damage / animation etc. Damage is fine, range is fine ---- perma stability, however, is not.

Nuuuuu how else are they gonna have a safe commune for things on stronghold or Temple :p

@Vancho.8750 said:I think people have an issue with flame jet cause it kinda works like normal auto attack chain but without the animation, so the flame animation should change colour when it is about to hit people with the burn. I'm not sure about the scaling of this since usually the damage of the weapon is spread between all skills, but most of the skills on it are not really that high impact, like they are there to support the basic attack, it is kinda weird weapon.

The burn inst the issue.

@"ollbirtan.2915" said:I forgot to point out that I don't have issues with FT damage / animation etc. Damage is fine, range is fine ---- perma stability, however, is not.

Yet there is a perfectly reasonable thought process as to why it can be perfectly fine. I don't think juggernaut is ever not going to provide high to permanent stab since that is the purpose of the trait.

The arguments against it in this thread boil down to "but other classes/skills...". Its the exact same argument that was made against lightning rod when it was over performing..yet a damage nerf curbed those complaints and a potential upcoming change to its weakness uptime will further do so.

Same with the recent thread about terror.

If an argument is to be made about it it needs to be exactly what about perma stab in the builds that use this makes it a problem instead of , again, but other classes/skills...".

@Sigmoid.7082 said:

@Vancho.8750 said:I think people have an issue with flame jet cause it kinda works like normal auto attack chain but without the animation, so the flame animation should change colour when it is about to hit people with the burn. I'm not sure about the scaling of this since usually the damage of the weapon is spread between all skills, but most of the skills on it are not really that high impact, like they are there to support the basic attack, it is kinda weird weapon.

@Vancho.8750 said:

@Sigmoid.7082 said:

@Vancho.8750 said:I think people have an issue with flame jet cause it kinda works like normal auto attack chain but without the animation, so the flame animation should change colour when it is about to hit people with the burn. I'm not sure about the scaling of this since usually the damage of the weapon is spread between all skills, but most of the skills on it are not really that high impact, like they are there to support the basic attack, it is kinda weird weapon.

Does it matter?

It would be better for me to say the burn isn't an issue for how its currently being used. So even adding a new animation wouldn't solve the "problem"

Hereis my understanding on the "problem". The util is used on scrapper to have "high sustain" through continuous strike damage being converted into barrier. If this is what people are actually complaining about, which i assume it is since this is almost a complete and overwhelming majority of of the use cases I have seen or experienced with this build, then the burn isn't the issue with the auto since its condition damage isn't converted into barrier. Its essentially a power build. Hence why i feel confident in saying the burn isn't the/an issue.

I mean even from a mathematical standpoint even when combined with incendiary ammo you will get less out the kit as a condi build than you would as a power build damage wise.

Feel free to correct me if and where my analysis is wrong.

@Sigmoid.7082 said:

@Vancho.8750 said:

@Sigmoid.7082 said:

@Vancho.8750 said:I think people have an issue with flame jet cause it kinda works like normal auto attack chain but without the animation, so the flame animation should change colour when it is about to hit people with the burn. I'm not sure about the scaling of this since usually the damage of the weapon is spread between all skills, but most of the skills on it are not really that high impact, like they are there to support the basic attack, it is kinda weird weapon.