Ashgar.3024

It could use some help in group content as it currently lacks any meaningful cleaving potential and Rifle is way too clunky to use on most raid fights. But the kit is actually insane for openworld. If you struggle with mobs reaching you, try a build using Shadow Arts traits and learn how to kite using the About Face camera keybind allowing you to Rifle 4 Forward. If that fails just play P/P with the renewing gaze, be quick or be killed and Invigorating Precision traits and mash Unload lol.

Head Shot (Pistol 4) is literally the best CC in the game cause its spammable. If you pool your initiative decently well sharing Basi Venom then spamming 3-4 headshots just anihilates breakbars. Paralyzation Sigil is a must on your OH Pistol for PvE because of this as well.

I used to play Cele Holo in openworld but now i just use my quickscrapper build. Just as durable and much burstier.

Yep can confirm this works lol. Its pretty funny and sad at the same time.

And you need to accept Mecanist is the most unhealthy spec for the game right now and needs tweaking. Its not even nearly as rigid as you make it sound anyway, i routinely play Power Alac Mecanist and it still does great DPS despite using Support Mec traits. That build is even encouraged by Snowcrows so its not like its some weird niche homebrew either. https://snowcrows.com/builds/engineer/mechanist/power-alacrity-mechanist

What? If anything Mec should be closer to Spellbreaker than Berserker in your example. It has the utility tools while the main purpose of Holo is Damage, just like Berserker (and even then Berserker is better off now as it can also provide Quickness). It can't heal support, it doesn't boon support either. Yes it can selfishly maintain Might, Fury, Prot, Vigor and Regen on itself if built for it in PvP or Open World but there's a reason you never see anyone run Hard Light Arena, Spectrum Shield or the Alchemy traitline when playing as a DPS in a raid, cause all of this is utterly useless when you have a dedicated healer in your squad. A spec having Solo/PvP play tools doesn't make it a support spec lol.

I think that aspect of the class is currently in a good state. Pet Management is supposed to be part of it and while you can't pet swap like on Ranger, OC Signet exists. Keeping your Mec alive is about the only thing that separates good and bad Mecanists atm.

Gonna go on a limb here and say you never stepped into a Raid. You need to be able to hyperspecialize into a specific role to be of any use in that content. Besides its not like pure DPS Mec doesn't generate a ton of Might, Fury and even its own Quickness, on top of having constant self-healing ticking on himself, the most overloaded movement ability in the game (Shift Signet) and huge amount of CC (Rifle 3+Rocket Punch autoproc and Rifle 4). Its not a massive coincidence that in about any Strike or Raid pug you can join there's usually 6-7 Mec players while playing Holo in that content is borderline considered griefing.

I can't think of an Engi build where using your skills is a DPS loss lol.

Imo Holo should also have a viable Condi (Burn+Bleeding) or at least hybrid variation being a pure DPS spec and all. I messed around with Burn Holo and its actually pretty fun mechanically, numbers just aren't there. Mec and Scrapper being primarily 2 different flavors of boon and heal supports would be fine by me. Its easily the most fun/interactive variations of these Elites and rounds out Engi as the "swiss army knife" Profession of the game really well.

Believe it or not the game is a LOT less powercrept now than it used to be. Guess people don't remember Staff Weaver benching 50k+, the 10man boon meta, Firrebrand and Scourge being walking gods for 4 years straight etc. Only real balance/design issue with the game atm is Mecanist, and its still a lot more tame than what Firebrand/Scourge were at their peak.

Its literally poor man's Scrapper. It needs to bee redesigned so it doesn't overlap with an Elite. Same thing with the Acro line on Thief

Power Holo still does less DPS than Power Mecanist despite being a fairly more difficult build, being melee and having a risk/reward factor tied to it. From a pure logical PoV this looks a bit silly. (On a sidenote Staff Daredevil is also underperforming).

To each their own, personally find the PvP leggos a lot less cumbersome to make (i have full sPvP max tier legendary medium armor and the backpack). Currently sitting on 300 LIs just cause i can't be bothered to grind the rest of the rquirements for the raid sets. I think the "do whatever you like at least competently and you'll eventually get legendaries" the game has is pretty good actually. In other games you're often pigeonholed doing 1 or 2 thing to have any chance at optimal gearing. Also as others pointed out pretending a fresh account will clear 7/7 wings the as soon as they decide they want to start raiding is very disingenuous.

It was supposed to be a tank as early HoT raids attempted to bring back the trinity until the tanking role got more or less phased out in profit of boon support roles. Tanks are technically supports anyway. Now they're actual bruisers+boon supports.

If you've been playing for a decade and never managed to farm any legendaries, you haven't been very active.

That's a good point, didn't think of that.

Judging by Reddit... Lets just say maturity and age aren't necessarily always tied. Either way, my point is that most people eventually reach a point in life where they can't commit to obsessing over reaching 99% benchmarks or being the first to kill whatever boss or just being "the best like no one ever was" in a video game. If you don't realize the amount of time and personal bandwith this requires... it just means you haven't gotten there yet. Which is fine. I just think complaining about the game changing is an easy copout. There's plenty of room to play this game "hardcore" still, even if Anet doesn't necessarily balance its content to be a pseudo-eSport for 2 weeks then nerf it into the ground like say... WoW does. I mean heck, people still speedrun Super Mario 64.

Yeah, its called growing up and getting responsabilities Like it or not no studio will ever be able to afford designing a game to the satisfaction of a minority who demands said game to be their secondary (or even primary) job and their entire personality. Only game that got away with that was WoW in its early days cause it happened at a very specific time bubble of the internet that can never happen again. Its the video game equivalent of the Grunge movement from the '90s. In the meantime Speed Running and community ran events are a good middle-ground. Get involved in those if you care that much about showing off your video game performances.

Lol at the end of PoF the game was much more powercrept. Only different is that only like 5 builds were dominating everything else. Anet is just taking these 5 builds and spreading their strengths across other elites.

Specter's burst does require some timing based on your squadmate's positioning though. Its just different. Not that i disagree the spec could use some tweaks to make it a bit less simplistic (like Scepter 2 and Shadow Squall being worth pressing for example.)

Yeah this is the patches blindspot. Holo needs more sustained DPS. Besides buffing Big Boomer also buffs Rifle Mec putting us right back at square one anyway, lol. I think its the traits they should look into, specially the GMs as currently the only one really worth using is Enhanced Capacity Storage Unit. Turning the effect of Crystal Configuration : Storm into a minor or at least making it not compete with Crystal Configuration Eclipse (which is a bigger damage buff anyway as it severely improves Big Boomer and Scholar uptime) could be something worth exploring as well. Or at least look at the Condi traits so a Condi or hybrid build is at le considering on fights where the Power Holo damage profile doesn't really work.

That would be really good yeah and would mesh with the rest of the kit really well.

Tools is really, really, really situational so probably that, yeah. Bit the same issue as the Acro line on Thief, it shares a theme with an Elite but the Elite blows it out of the water completely. In this case Tools -> Scrapper. For Thief its Acro -> Daredevil.

Tell that to the angry Mecbot main who's confused by all my posts.