[Wasn't the Icebrood Saga supposed to be about Norn and Charr and not about just the Charr ?]

@Konig Des Todes.2086 said:TBH, I don't think humans have been ever used as plot devices in GW2.

Uhh... Did you miss like the entirety of LW3, PoF and LW4?

Where there was White Mantle (Humans) shenanigans, Shining Blade (Human Secret Society) stuff involving Lazarus (Who was notable due to what he did to Humans), Human Ministers and their treachery (Caudecus), a Human God going to destroy dragons to get more power to destroy more Human Gods and then an ancient pestilence that wiped out an old Human civilization being used again to try and eradicate more Humans.

[Returning Player is looking for a good Allround Class]

Ele is decent. Good damage, can play both Condi or Power builds in both Tempest and Weaver. Decent support with Tempest too. Usable in PvP (Dagger/Focus), WvW (Staff) and PvE (Scepter/Warhorn for Power Tempest, Dagger/Warhorn for Condi Tempest, Scepter/Warhorn and Staff for Heal Tempest and Sword/Dagger for Weaver)

Guardian is also great. Very good damage and support. Power Dragon Hunter is really strong. Condi Firebrand is also really strong. Support Firebrand is really strong.

The major downside to Guardian is it's kind of... Simple. As in it's really just a case of "Is your skill available? Press it". If you go soloing things in OW or do PvP it gets more exciting 'cause then you have to play well around your active defences to not get gibbed, but otherwise it's very straightforward to play.

Other classes that can play damage and support and are good in all 3 game modes:

Engineer - Holosmith is pretty good in PvP and PvE, Scrapper is the best support in WvW and is okay as a support in PvE. Though, it lacks a strong Condition build.

Revenant - Condi Herald is very strong in PvP as is Power Herald. Power Herald is decent in WvW (Though not as good as it was before Hammer got nerfed, obviously) for blobs while Condi Herald can roam decently. For PvE, Condi Renegade is strong, Alacrigade is strong and Heal Renegade is decent.

Though Rev also has the downside of PvE being kind of boring. Given how its energy mechanic works, a lot of it ends up being "Activate your Upkeep skill" > "Auto attack" > "Swap Legend" > "Rinse and repeat" with the occasional additional skill here and there...

That's about it really. The rest of the classes have at least 1 area where they're not doing so hot in...

Warrior - Decent in WvW and good in PvE but is struggling in PvP right now.Ranger - Good in PvP, Power and Condi Soulbeast is strong in PvE as well as Heal Druid. But it is kind of lacklustre in WvW (Except for roaming)Necro - Condi Core is strong in PvP. Power Scourge is good in WvW. But the class is subpar in PvE.Thief - Condi Core/DE is strong in PvP and roaming in WvW. But otherwise the class sucks in blobs and is mediocre in PvE.Mesmer - Boon and Power Chrono is amazing in PvE. But the class sucks in both PvP and WvW due to the recent nerfs that hit both Mirage and Chrono (Mirage, the spec based around dodging, only having 1 dodge. Chrono lost a lot of defence from no longer having Distortion as well as losing a lot of offense from no longer having self shatters)

[Replace "crippled" with "hindered"]

@Tukaram.8256 said:

@Taril.8619 said:

@Kulvar.1239 said:

@"Gundahar.2765" said:Honestly, im fed up with this political correctness. Don't use this, don't use that... In this day and age are people offended by everything? I'd have a word for that... Stop making everything offending or racial or anything. Its just stupid.

If you look hard enough, everything is racist/sexist/...

It really isn't.

Offense is rooted in the intent, not the means.

Heck, take a look at these forums for example, where any "Bad" word is replaced by "kitten" but posts can still be moderated because the intent of the word "kitten" is still being used offensively (I.e. "You're an absolute kitten") not because the word kitten is inherently bigoted.

It's one of the big failures of this oversensitive culture to not realize this basic principle. But instead they look to try and get everything banned because of some asinine idea that something such as a word is inherently offensive to them.

I have a kitten question for you (I actually used the word kitten there BTW). It took me ages to realize why so many people here used the word. I figured it was some new 1337 speak ha ha. But... what if I actually use the word kitten to insult someone? Personally I despise cats, of all ages. I could think of no more offensive insult than kitten. So... if I call you a kitten (actual kitten, not the word filter)... is it wrong?

If you mean, would your post get moderated? Yes.

Mods look at the intent of the post, not the actual language.

An interesting thought experiment is having 2 posts;

• One where you're calling somone a "Kitten" as a way of insulting them, knowing that if you used a swear word it'd get filtered anyway.
• One where you're calling someone a "Kitten" as a compliment, to suggest that they're cute like a kitten.

The only way to be able to tell these apart, would be the context surrounding them. But in theory, only the first post would get moderated. Though, it'd be interesting to see if mods read around the post enough to be able to not moderate the second post.

[Why doesn't all heals have a baseline of cleansing a condition?]

Heals with condition cleansing, trade off their raw healing potential for that additional utility.

Not to mention that PvP balance was (At least one point) considering cleanses as part of the balance for Conditions for a reason why Conditions bypass Toughness and Protection due to them dealing damage over time and could only be mitigated via cleanses and some runes. As such, it had limited availability to prevent Conditions becoming useless.

It's a similar case for Resistance which was implemented when they changed Conditions to stack as it is a boon that has limited uptime to combat Condition damage.

That said, Sigil of Cleansing exists and is a very effective means of cleansing

[What day do you normally do key runs?]

I do key runs when I remember to do them. Usually like Monday/Tuesday.

I don't insta-delete the character, there's no point especially if I'm saving that character slot for key farm characters, so I just use the same name over and over due to deleting it right before making a new one.

BLC come with guaranteed statuettes which makes it worthwhile for me to farm, since I can spend those on some neat things when I stockpile enough. Especially useful if I get lucky and open bonus statuettes.

Though, the past couple of weeks I've been running characters to level 40 for 2 keys, since I was also missing a few achievements for doing some races level 30 PS quests. I still have to do the Human one, but this week I leveled an actual Guardian and did the PS on them and thus got my weekly keys that way.

If I was really bothered, I could theoretically level up to 60 for the 3 keys, but man is that a slog (I also don't want to waste exp boosters just to get keys...)

[How to get to this point of interest]

Go north to the sea and then you should be able to see a cave underneath the Cathedral

[Crafting Disciplines transferable between characters]

Honestly, they should just cut the losses and make them account bound.

Earning a bit of exp for crafting a bunch of stuff is not a particularly huge part of the game. And if it was, you'd see bots leveling up via crafting (Given you can switch crafting disciplines at no cost... Grab one, level it up. Grab another, level it up. Grab another, level it up etc. Now your bot is level 80 and has a ton of crafted items to sell)

I'm not sure how profitable the crafting discipline boost is on the gem store, but it can't be doing that well can it? Since it's not particularly hard to simply have an alt sat around being level 500 in 2 disciplines that you simply log into whenever you need to use that craft and take your account wide crafting materials to create your account wide recipes. (It's just needlessly annoying to have to do so, as well as not be able to check recipes for other disciplines without relogging to a that character)

[double tap and death's retreat are too expensive]

@Tails.9372 said:

@"Taril.8619" said:3s prevents you only using stealth attacks or at the very least, chaining stealth attacks as much as possible (Such as exploiting stealth fields like Refuge or Smoke fields and Leap finishers)I said: "Your strongest attack should ideally still be your stealth attack

by full malice

" so if then why would you want to spam unboosted stealth attacks?

Because Thief =/= Deadeye.

Core Thief and Daredevil do not get the Malice mechanic.

If the general idea from you is that it's fine for every other Thief build to have their strongest attacks be auto attacks and DE's is full malice stealth attack (But otherwise auto attacks) then that's still not a particularly great scenario.

@Tails.9372 said:You're right, I wouldn't use a single target CC over an AoE skill vs. e.g. a group of multiple enemies. But I also wouldn't try to use an AoE over a CC skill vs. a single enemy if I'd rather want to see its BB broken so you really can't just generalise like that as the whole thing is rather context dependent.

It's not really. Unless the AoE skill does horrible damage per target (Which would probably make it overall deal too low damage to be considered worth using even against multiple targets I.e. A Power D/D build doesn't use Death Blossom because it doesn't do as much damage as Heartseeker even if it is hitting 3 targets) then people will still maximize their damage output by not making the Thief use initiative on CC skills (The same as people don't make the Rev use their Energy on CC skills) and instead the Thief will use their initiative on damage skills such as an AoE even on a single target.

Since, what you don't seem to realize is that Unload isn't the filler because it's filler. It's filler because that's what it's best to use initiative on. It's used over Headshot because it's not worth the DPS loss that is spending initiative on things that aren't damage, when again, any other non-Rev class can deal with the BB's at no cost to their personal damage (Thief can also help against BB's with utility skills too)

@Tails.9372 said:No, the baseline filler shouldn't cost initiative but if you have damage skills which add utility to the weapon set (e.g. a small scale AoE to a predominantly 1 on 1 based weapon set) then I don't mind it costing initiative as it wouldn't really have to compete with other "less damage focused" utility skills for the same situation.

But the thing is, that they would. An AoE damage skill would compete with utility skills because it becomes a choice of spending initiative on Damage (The AoE, even against a single target) or utility.

We already have evidence of Damage taking priority over utility by the entire P/P scenario you initially brought up. Where people pass up on Headshot during BB's because Unload is better use of initiative.

As long as there is a choice between damage and utility to spend initiative on, people will always go for the damage. Even if it's not the optimal damage such as an AoE damage skill being used against a single target, that's still better than no damage from a utility skill.

This is why there should be more things to promote varied skill usage within a kit, to allow for there to be less costs associated with spending initiative on utilities (Without simply tacking on a bunch of damage to the skill). While improving gameplay depth by making skill usage more diverse and less impacted by "In this situation, spend all initiative on X skill"

@Tails.9372 said:That would only be the case if the other skill also does BB damage on top of doing more damage than HS and iirc I said that redundancies should be avoided.

If redundancies are to be avoided, then you can pretty much delete Thief weapon skills except for 1 auto attack no cost filler and 1 damaging attack that costs initiative. Everything else will be redundant in PvE.

Either that or remove all damaging attacks except auto attack and have weapon kits be simply 4 utilities.

Doesn't that sound exciting?

@Tails.9372 said:It's also the only skill where the main purpose is to do damage aside from Vital Shot which is redundant because it essentially just does the same thing but worse. But unlike with Vital Shot there would still be some use for the other skills if Unload wouldn't require to be "fueled" with ini.

Vital Shot isn't redundant. It provides damage output at no cost, which is used whenever you need to wait on init to regen.

It only would be redundant if you made Unload cost nothing too, because then it would simply be inferior to Unload and everyone will just make Unload the new auto attack skill.

[Traits and skills for leveling up an Engi]

@steki.1478 said:That's only useful for pistols and even then you'd mostly kill stuff with direct damage from skills (unless you use condi gear which I wouldnt suggest for leveling since there's many things that cant be damaged with conditions in core game).

Which is actually still pretty good... Pistols are decent for leveling.

Heck, you can power level in 3-4 hours with just P/P and Firearms and condi gear.

Also, there aren't that many things immune to conditions in the core game. It's mostly just destructables, but you can just plop down a Rifle Turret to deal with them.

@steki.1478 said:Damage modifiers will always be better than crit chance.

No?

A crit is literally a 100% damage modifier baseline.

So 15% crit chance is literally equivalent to 15% damage modifier.

This continues up until you reach 100% crit rate in which crit chance no longer scales and damage modifiers will become more potent.

@steki.1478 said:Also whats the point of bringing up both pistols and rifle, you cant use both in a same build. IP has big cooldown so I wouldnt rely on it. You also need to be in melee range for 15% crit chance and mobs would die from your ranged stuff anyway.

Because I mentioned Power and Condi builds?

Condi builds would use Pistols. Power builds would use Rifle.

You don't need to rely on IP's (10s) CD, it's just an added bonus. Just like Explosive Entrance (True, you can at least force additional procs by dodging for that, but it's also way less damage)

Being in melee range for the crit chance is a negligable downside when Blunderbuss and Jump Shot both want you to be in melee range to deal the most damage.

@steki.1478 said:You'd use short fuse for perma fury which is more consistent precision and uptime than firearms.

And it's only perma-fury if you're constantly swapping to Grenade/Bomb kit every 4s to get an explosion.

@steki.1478 said:Explosive temper requires no crit chance

It most certainly does. Ferocity does NOTHING if you don't crit. Since all it does is increase the damage of crits.

@steki.1478 said:big boomer has pretty much permanent uptime as well as gives some sustain so you dont need to spec for it elsewhere.

Unless you get hit by Champs/Vets to below their current health.

Also it's sustain sucks. Plain and simple.

All of your sustain will be coming from Healing Turret, especially if you use it properly and detonate it during its Water field for additional heals.

@steki.1478 said:Level 80 is a different story since bleeding from shrapnel has great synergy with whole firearms spec, but early on there's no point of focusing on condies and long cooldowns because they are slow and not as impactful as direct damage.

I disagree. Condi's are plenty strong, especially Burning. They can take things out very fast and quite safely.

Having leveled up many characters without boosts, Condi's are the superior way of leveling. They just perform much better overall. They kill at about the same speed for equal level mobs, kill far faster against higher level mobs and allow for better chaining of kills because of how much less you need to interact with enemies.

Heck, the last Engie I leveled, at about level 30ish, I literally just ran up to a mob that was 9 levels higher than me, used Blowtorch, ran up to the next mob, used Napalm and Glue Shot and rinsed and repeated constantly chaining kills against enemies 9 levels higher something that is literally impossible as a Power build (Because you do only Glancing damage) and killing them really fast.

Not to mention, as OP wants to play around with Engie, Firearms is the optimal spec for them to start with, because it is so useful for both Condi and Power builds, meaning they can focus on putting points into Firearms and then can put points into different utilities and use Rifles/Pistols as they pick them up to get a better feel for the class as a whole.

[Traits and skills for leveling up an Engi]

@steki.1478 said:I wouldnt call firearms the best core spec (like the comment above suggested), especially if you have access to only one or two specs early on and have low stats. Minor and condi traits are pretty bad for leveling, the only big benefit you have from it is increased crit chance and might on bleed (yet you dont have many bleeds and you lose the precision trait by taking the might one). Fury is also inconsistent.

Condi traits from Firearms are amazing. Chemical Rounds for 33% extra duration on your Pistol conditions (When you won't have access to Runes/Sigils/Expertise to get duration while leveling), Thermal Vision for bonus Condi damage and Expertise for using your primary Condition, more bleeds and more crits against bleeding targets (Pistol 1 is bleed and with Chemical Rounds you're getting free 66% duration on its bleeds) then Incendiary Powder for burn on crits and 33% burn duration (Meaning now your Blowtorch has free 66% duration)

For power builds, you get your free 15% crit from High Caliber, 10% crit from bleeding targets (Which you'll have high uptime from due to Blunderbuss and Shrapnel Grenade as well as the occasional Sharpshooter proc), some Fury uptime from No Scope. It's only the GM traits that are kind of meh for a leveling Power build, but even then Incendiary Powder does some decent damage because 8s Burning with 33% increased burning duration is still quite strong even without stacking what little Condi Damage you can get from leveling gear.

@steki.1478 said:Explosives have consistent dps buffs, amazing minor traits, great fury uptime and adds to burst damage with passive procs so it's definitely the strongest spec for direct damage.

I'd say Explosives is significantly worse while leveling than Firearms.

Glass Cannon sucks because you can easily be hit below the threshold, Explosive Temper sucks because you won't have high crit chance (Only 20% from Fury if you took Short Fuse and then a few percent from whatever Precision you can scrounge together on leveling gear), Shaped Charge sucks because you won't be stacking Vuln particularly high (Most trash mobs will die too quickly) and Big Boomer has a lot lower impact when your leveling and so damage isn't high to begin with (Not to mention, the times where it'll be useful, strong mobs, are times where it's easy to get hit low and no longer have it active)

At level 80 when you have a build together, Explosives becomes really good, but Firearms is easily the best core spec because it provides a strong foundation of condi duration and crit chance (The crit chance can then be used by Explosives to fuel Explosive Temper getting those crits with the bonus Ferocity and then using Shaped Charge and Big Boomer to help take out Champs/Legends in higher level events)

[Will Legndary Armory Eventually Ruin Economy?]

@keenedge.9675 said:

@Taril.8619 said:Since, one of the main draws for Legendaries right now, is the shiny skins. So as long as ANet keeps churning out new Legendary items, people will keep wanting the shiny new skins.

There are no glamorous skins for gen 1 weps and few for legendary armor.

That's one up for player taste.

I see plenty of people running around with gen 1 weapons. Most if not all of which still provide auras/footfalls. I especially see tons of Twilight/Sunrise/Eternity (Far, far more than I see Exordium)

In fact, I barely ever see any gen 2 weapons it's all gen 1...

@keenedge.9675 said:As said elsewhere, this benefits a tiny percentage of the game. Effort best spent fixing persistent broken map events in the core zone.

It depends on if it's the same team that works on UI features such as Wardrobe/Armoury that also works on things like events.

If it's different teams, then it's not really a case of either/or. If it is the same team then yeah, bug fixing would probably be preferred by more people.

[double tap and death's retreat are too expensive]

@Tails.9372 said:

@Taril.8619 said:Since stealth attacks are inherently limited (Due to the Revealed mechanic, which can only be bypassed via DE Elite)Revealed only lasts for 3 sec. so it's not that much of a limiting factor.

3s prevents you only using stealth attacks or at the very least, chaining stealth attacks as much as possible (Such as exploiting stealth fields like Refuge or Smoke fields and Leap finishers)

@Tails.9372 said:

@Taril.8619 said:In your "Ideal" case, the strongest skill to use for damage during, is auto attacks.Again not really, that's just what you're reading into it. If you are in a 1 on 1 fight and the AA of the weapon in question does AoE damage while its strongest attack vs. a single target costs initiative then you would have to alternate between the two. Same goes for weapons which have a single target AA vs. multiple enemies (asuming the weaon even has an AoE skill).

But then we're right back to you'd never use the CC skills, because you have damaging skills that cost initiative so it's better to use your initiative on the damage skills.

Your "Ideal" case is having damaging skills that don't cost initiative. That's not me "Reading into it" differently, that is what you have explicitly wrote multiple times:

@Tails.9372 said:Signets of Power crit based for pistols would actually solve (parts of) this issue by making Unload more spammable because then you would get one ini every time you hit a crit (assuming you use the corresponding signet) giving you a reason to alter between Unload and HS instead of just having to spam unload like how it is rn.

@Tails.9372 said:That's not an issue with the "toolbox approach" but one with the devs slapping an ini cost on something that really shouldn't have one.

@Tails.9372 said:Like I said there would be more of a reason to use other skills if Unload would actualy generate initiative instead of consuming it

Your entire argument with P/P as an example, thus far is that if Unload could be cast for free or could gain initiative from being used, people would actually use CC skills like Headshot.

But if there are other skills that do cost initiative that provide damage, people will use them instead of Headshot. This is because Headshot uses initiative which could be spent on those damaging skills instead.

If no damaging skills cost initiative (I.e. The only damaging or best damaging skill was auto attack) then sure, people could use CC skills because they're not competing with damaging skills for initiative usage, at that point initiative is only used for CC skills and mobility skills.

But this is also a very stale gameplay, it's as stale if not more so than the current spam fiesta (It's basically on par with Reaper Shroud gameplay... Actually no, it's worse than Reaper Shroud because at least Reaper uses skill 4 on cooldown)

@Tails.9372 said:

@Taril.8619 said:Unload is the filler skill, since it is the most effective thing to spend initiative on, because it's the most damaging skill available to the weapon set.No it's the filler skill because the weapon set is geared towards 1 v 1 combat and dishing out damage is the most effective thing to do in a default (as in the enemy is not doing anything which warrants an action from the player) situation.

This isn't contradicting what I said. It's the filler skill because it's the most effective thing to spend initiative on. Since the goal of the build is to kill things and Unload is better than the other 3 init skills at making things be killed.

@Tails.9372 said:This however only leads to stale gameplay if the enemy you're fighting against is essentially an immovable target dummy. The more "active" the enemies are the more you would be inclined to use other skills such as engagement / disengagement skills (which is something P/P is lacking entirely) or CC to keep them form moving (if possible) which, if executed right, generally works rather well for the gameplay they were aiming for.

Aside from the fact that in PvE, as you've stated, people are actively avoiding using other skills such as CC for BB's because it costs too much DPS to use init on something that isn't Unload and thus it's better to rely on other classes whom can access CC skills at no cost to deal with BB's. The same situation as for Rev too.

In PvP, things are more dynamic because it's less focused on pushing out maximum damage and more about burning through enemies defensive options, making non-damaging skills more rewarding in certain situations (But then when it comes down to burning a players HP, it's right back to spam the 1 skill over and over again and then people cry nerf because all they see is 1 skill being used over and over and killing them)

[double tap and death's retreat are too expensive]

@Tails.9372 said:

@"Taril.8619" said:That's essentially saying that your ideal scenario is one where the best damage skill, is auto attacks.Yes and no, you're forgetting how (in case of DE) malice works. Your strongest attack should ideally still be your stealth attack by full malice and you only get malice by using ini which would still require you to use your utility skills to build it up as the AA doesn't generare malice.

This still doesn't change things.

Since stealth attacks are inherently limited (Due to the Revealed mechanic, which can only be bypassed via DE Elite)

In the meantime, between stealth usages, you have a baseline selection of weapon skills.

In your "Ideal" case, the strongest skill to use for damage during, is auto attacks. Something that either doesn't cost or actually generates initiative.

This is so that using utility providing skills is viable because they're no longer competing with damage skills (Though, even in the scenario where the only damaging skills are stealth skills and auto attacks, people would determine if the cast time of utility providing skills and the damage of the stealth skill is worth the cast time or if it is simply better to do an auto attack chain)

@Tails.9372 said:Not quite, there is no issue with utility skills competing for initiative. Like I said in the example I gave earlier you would still be forced to alter between Unload and Headshot in order to take down bigger BBs. The issue for P/P specifically is that Unload essentially is the "filler skill" while the game acts as if it isn't. Vital Shot is just a redundant skill which should have been replaced by Unload through the dual wielding system but the devs decided to focus on simplicity rather than practicality which is the main cause of the issues P/P is suffering from.

Except, Unload is the "Filler skill" due to the way that initiative works. The whole concept of spamming the most effective skill.

Unload is the filler skill, since it is the most effective thing to spend initiative on, because it's the most damaging skill available to the weapon set.

Just like Heartseeker is the most effective thing to spend initiative on for D/X - This includes for DE where you have Malice boosting Backstab's damage, it's still more effective to spend initative on Heartseeker than to spend initiative on CnD or Black Powder in order to access Backstab.

The only deviation from spamming the most effective available skill, is in DE when using alternate means to access stealth (Stolen skills, Shadow Gust, Hide in Shadows, Shadow Meld or Silent Scope) free of init in order to access the stealth skill. Though, this is only relevant for weapons where the stealth skill is high damage such as Rifle, D/X and P/D (For S/X, P/P and SB it's not notably damaging enough even with Malice boost to be worth trying to utilize)

This is literally the entire issue of shared resources. Which is the case for Thief with Initiative and Rev with Energy. Shared resource costs promotes using only the most effective skills and no other. This typically means the most damage per cost at the expense of things like CC. It will always exist so long as either shared resources or singular "Best" skills exist.

If your answer to this issue is simply remove the resource cost off the most damaging skill to spam, then people will simply move to spamming the next most effective skill for the resource cost, because that's the inherent way that the mechanic works and is seen in a plethora of other games that utilize shared resource systems (Though, many of them utilize a priority similar to Rev due to also having skill CD's like Rev)

[double tap and death's retreat are too expensive]

@Tails.9372 said:

@"Taril.8619" said:Heck, you even go on to explain the flaws in this "Toolbox" approach later in your post, when talking about P/P and how even when a BB comes up that would warrant use of Headshot, Unload, the best single target damage skill you have is still the better optionYes but that is not because "Unload does more damage than Headshot" but because Unload is too cost intensive which makes the CC skill a non option as the game "punishes" you for using it. That's not an issue with the "toolbox approach" but one with the devs slapping an ini cost on something that really shouldn't have one. Like I said there would be more of a reason to use other skills if Unload would actualy generate initiative instead of consuming it even if the other skills e.g. Headshot do less damage then Unload.

But this is again, you highlighting the flaw with the "Toolbox" approach.

You'd only consider using the CC skill, when it's not competing for resources with your main damage skill.

That's essentially saying that your ideal scenario is one where the best damage skill, is auto attacks. Then we could use all the utility skills we'd like. Which of course, is true, because they're no longer competing with resources for damage skills.

If the best damage skill costs initiative, irregardless of how much, it will always be competing with any utility providing skills and thus be a DPS loss to utilize anything but the best damage skill. How much of a DPS loss it ends up being is determined by the costs of the skills and just how much damage the best damage skill does over auto attacks (Which you will be using while you regen init)

The "Toolbox" approach only works when none of the skills are competing for resources. Hence why it is completely fine for classes other than Thief and Rev. Since then there's no loss of damage to use the more niche skills in the times they are relevant. An example would be Ranger's best weapon, GS where your optimal damage is Maul and your filler is auto attacks. But you have Swoop for mobility, Counterattack for defence and Hilt Bash for CC. That is "Toolbox" design.

Rev also has "Toolbox" design, but because of the Energy system, everything (Including F skills and utilities/elites) has a shared resource cost and thus, anything that is not optimal damage is not used because of how it will be a damage loss (Especially if it causes you to run out of Energy before your 10s Legend swap CD is ready) - It has CC skills and mobility skills available, but is actively disuaded from using them due to the shared cost.

Thief would be in exactly the same situation if their weapon sets had more emphasis on niche skills. It'd still revolve around Heartseeker, Unload, Repeater, Weakening Charge, Skirm Shot/TRB spam at the cost of using utility providing skills. That is unless you either dismantle the Init system completely, or make every weapon into Sword where its best damage is auto attack and everything else is pure niche utility.

[NPC dialogues - longer repeat interval]

I don't know if you've heard, but life is a trial, Koda the judge and kodan the jury.

[double tap and death's retreat are too expensive]

@"Tails.9372" said:Which wouldn't even be much of an issue if they would take more of a "toolbox" approach when designing the weapons sets. One skill being the best choice for single target damage wouldn't be an issue at all if the other skills had other uses like an AoE / CC / other kinds of utility. This way every skill would get some usage and "the best skill" would really be "the best skill for the situation at hand". In this scenario issues only arise if the weapon set in question is plagued by redundancies which, ideally, should be avoided regardless.

It would still be an issue.

Especially given that the game is predominantly focused around single target, it ends up with the optimal single target damage skill being the best skill to use in most situations.

Even if scenarios occur where other skills can be useful, the game as a whole is still pushing for maximum single target damage (With the main exception being something like WvW or OW Metas where AoE can be more sought after)

Heck, you even go on to explain the flaws in this "Toolbox" approach later in your post, when talking about P/P and how even when a BB comes up that would warrant use of Headshot, Unload, the best single target damage skill you have is still the better option (This is also true of Rev, where they're incentivized to not use their CC skills for BB's either due to how much DPS it costs them to do so, while other classes whom don't have shared resources with their damage and CC skills are free to use their CC skills where applicable)

This is the underlying problem of shared resources and singular "Best" skills. To optimize, you want to cut out any usage of non "Best" skills to get the most out of your resources.

Hence why having the best usage of skills being more inclusive due to interaction with each other is more desirable. Where you WANT to use that CC because using it to CC something makes this other skill deal enough damage to outperform your filler skill. You WANT to apply this otherwise redundant condition effect, because doing so improves this other skill.

So gameplay optimization ends up being less "This is the best skill to use, I'll mash it forever" and more thought about "What combo of skills do I want to use? Is there any mechanics that I can capitalize on (Such as BB's or PvP opponents running out of Cleanse/Breaks)? How can I best utilize my kit to perform the best?"

As opposed to spamming Heartseeker because its your best single target damage skill and even outperforms CnD + Backstab (Even in DE with Malice bonus it's better to just spam HS and use one of your other ways of gaining stealth to use BS, which of course you'll be running plenty of due to it being necessary to run Rifle which is the higher DPS weapon)

PvP at least creates some interesting decisions, because things like swapping to Shortbow to get access to Infiltrator's Arrow and Choking Gas provides utility that is worth more than raw damage. But within weapon sets themselves, it's very much focused down to 1 skill being useful with a 2nd one having some occasional use if you're lucky.

[What Is The Best Race]

Norn.

Norn ladies have... Lovely apples. While also looking pretty BA at the same time.

Norn males look pretty swag in some heavy armour sets.

[Thief 3rd espec "Trickster"]

@"Dave.6819" said:I just want thief to get a healer spec already. It wouldnt fit thief but atleast it would be useful.

A healer spec could fit Thief. Bard or Chemist could be a healing E-Spec that would be suitably "Thief" flavoured.

Bard being an extention of typical Rogueish charisma, utilizing words of power and music to mend wounds and apply boons.

Chemist being an extention of Thief's Venom usage, going from Venoms to Salves and Poultices is not a big leap (Not to mention the already existing synergy between Venoms and life gain with Leeching Venoms)

These days even in PvE DPS we are starting to fall short.. so just give us some useful spec and people wont have to say "Thief useless sorry i wont take you to raid i prefer BS/DH".

Really, for usefulness, we'd need to be looking for some Boonshare, ideally incorporating either Quickness or Alacrity or both. Quickness and Alacrity would allow Thief to take a spot in end game PvE in lieu of Firebrand or Alacrigade (Both would allow replacement of Chrono), well, so long as 100% uptime was possible as that is the standard set by these 3 E-Specs. Other boons would promote use in WvW Blob battles, where pure healing doesn't cut it (As seen by Druid's low popularity in WvW)

[Traits and skills for leveling up an Engi]

Pistol/PistolFirearmsHealing TurretBomb KitFlame TurretRocket Boots

That's the most effective leveling build in my opinion.

Run at things, set them on fire, run to the next thing as they melt.

Other specs and elite skills aren't important, so you can experiment as you go. Eventually, you can even drop Bomb Kit when you don't need Fire Bomb + Smoke Bomb to help deal with things and can rely more on just Blowtorch + Glue Shot to melt through multiple enemies.

A fun build if you like high APM gameplay is;ToolsHealing TurretRifle TurretPersonal Battering RamRocket Boots

Where your goal is to be spamming toolbelt skills a bunch and triggering Static Discharge to zap things. For secondary spec post level 45, Firearms because it's literally Engie's best core spec. After 70 pick whatever, nothing else really has much synergy since there's no Explosives for Explosives, Inventions is whack and there's no Elixirs for Alchemy...

Finally, you can do the standard meta Power build;RifleFirearmsExplosivesHealing TurretRifle TurretGrenade KitBomb Kit

Which is more focused around switching into Grenade Kit for Shrapnel and Poison grenades, swapping to Rifle for Blunderbuss and Jump Shot and then using Bomb Kit as filler for auto attacks. 3rd spec post 70 is again, whatever due to lack of synergy.

[Should clones and phantasm be indestructible?]

@"Allarius.5670" said:I think the bamboozle effect is largely the source of the issue. At all levels it can lead to frustrating UI clutter. As a defensive mechanic that is really kind of interesting and cool, and probably a reason why many of us think the profession is conceptually awesome, but I don't know of a way to make it feel "healthy" for the game or profession. Unfortunately it just seems to punish new players, and players that don't understand the counterplay, in a very disproportionate fashion, where at higher skill levels the AI is cleaved and their pathing manipulated so they become an unreliable resource.

Most likely, yes.

Since Clones will be kept squishy, primarily to allow for newbies to be able to counterplay Mesmer clones hiding the true Mesmer (Even more so with Mirage which has Axes of Symmetry and Illusionary Ambush to emphasise this by teleporting the Mesmer and all their clones to random locations around their target. Even though I personally LOVE this mechanic purely because it allows one to retarget Clones after the initial target dies and thus keep them active)

Given that the counterplay to Shatter is... Dodge when the clones stop attacking and start running at you (Though, this has less leeway when using Sword or Axe clones that are often in melee range anyway)

Meanwhile, on a gameplay level, all it does is serve to punish new players whom can't tell the real Mesmer easily and then punish Mesmers when more experienced players can tell the real Mesmer easily (Or have enough AoE that it doesn't matter)

Even in PvE, mobs are largely immune to the bamboozle effect and are only really impacted by specific target breaking skills (Mirror Images, Axes of Symmetry and Illusionary Ambush) and occasionally their janky AI in OW that makes them target switch for no reason.

I suppose it could be worse for balance. It could be the freaking White Mantle Mesmers and their BS killing them only to have them poof into butterflies and then pop up as the real Mesmer at full health with the "Illusion" still having the same health and damage as a real enemy... Gosh now that would be super frustrating for everyone to play against...

[double tap and death's retreat are too expensive]

@Tails.9372 said:

@"Taril.8619" said:ANet's "Solution" to every problem is always "Hey, lets increase its init cost!"Which in some cases even has the opposite of the intended effect e.g. increasing the ini cost of unload makes the build even more reliant on unload because now you can't afford to use anything else. This seems to come from a fundamental failure to understand how the build works in the first place. Iirc. the devs said that they increased the CD and ini costs of some skills because they want the player to "feel" the impact of using their most powerful skills. Issue is that this just doesn't work for some weapon sets, especially if the class in question is not based on a CD but a "mana" like system. There is also no comunication with the players on these issues meaning that even if they identified that there is an issue they generally don't seem to understand why that is which oftentimes leads to "solutions" with make you question "why?" e.g. giving the pistol trait piercing instead of ricocheting.

Yeah...

The thing they're forgetting is that with the Init system and no CD's, you're incentivised to use the most effective skill over and over. Making that skill less effective often doesn't put it below other skills and if it does, it simply shifts the gameplay to using the new most effective skill.

It's one of the reasons I think they should utilize their "Combo" design that they've used in other classes, such as Elementalist Fire Sword 3 and Fire Dagger 5, Warrior Hammer 2 and 5, Ranger Dagger 4 and Sword 2/3 and GS 2/5 etc.

Where skills gain bonus effects when used together, either because of applying a specific condition, or providing named skill bonuses. So as to promote using a variety of skills to obtain maximum value.

Instead of continuing this trend of not knowing how resources work (Since a similar issue plagues Rev, whereby you only spend Energy on the most effective skills and ignore the rest. Which results in things like PvE Renegade using basically just Impossible Odds, Soulcleave's Summit, Chilling Isolation and Citadel Bombardment/Orders from Above depending on if DPS or Alacrigade. Never mind the other 6 utility skills, 3 weapon skills and other F skills they're not important because of how shared resources work)

@Tails.9372 said:

@"Taril.8619" said:To be fair, a lot about DE Rifle doesn't feel like sniping.And yet the name of the e-spec literally translates to "sniper" in some languages. It's like giving thief a torch for their next e-spec, calling the whole thing "pyromaniac" and then only using the torch to light up some bombs you throw at your enemies.

Yeah. Heck, even the Mark system is akin to that of working as a "Spotter" which traditionally points out targets for the Sniper (Though, it's usually a second person with a pair of binoculars, not the Sniper themselves doing the spotting)

It feels like whomever came up with the idea of Deadeye and whomever designed the kit of Deadeye were working in completely different offices...

@Tails.9372 said:

@"Taril.8619" said:Ironically, having high ini cost attacks that fire a single powerful shot would be more "Sniper" likeIsn't that what malice is there for?

Yeah, but that's only 1 shot every so often. With your filler being a bunch of pew pew spam skills, either spamming 3 init Skirm Shot or triple tapping for TRB.

[Just a thought - new way of revealing new elite specializations]

I mean, if we're just talking about revealing them, not accessing them? Sure why not.

You could even go one step further and sneakily add in some new events that work similarly to the Legendary Bandit Executioners, where the big angery boss guy is using a new E-Spec as the reveal/teaser.

As for accessing them... Pretty much every way of allowing access to E-Specs is going to be awful...

HP's are awful because they're tedious to run around picking up just to access your new E-Spec (Also, if you have a bank of HP's from doing Core/HoT/PoF map completions you may even be able to insta-unlock a full E-Spec anyway)

Locking behind collections or quests is also tedious, when people have to play tons of hours to get the new class features that are a primary incentive for the expansion that's not going to go down well.

Simply handing people the new E-Specs is also kind of lame. Though at least it wouldn't take any focus away from playing the actual content.

[Should clones and phantasm be indestructible?]

@Allarius.5670 said:Nowhere else in the game do you see destructible AOE except in the case of Renegade. They appear to be designed on the edge of what is classified as persistent and one-off pulsing AOE.

It's worth noting that Scourge also utilizes an exception case with its Sand puddles. Since they're persistent but are non-destructible. Of course, their radius is so small that you need to take like 1 step and you're out of their effect, but they're still able to zone out that area for 20 seconds while the Necro can use them as a point of origin for their F skills.

@Allarius.5670 said:If clones are to be changed to be invulnerable, then their persistence needs to be removed. For example, only have them generate when a shatter is activated. Tack on being untargetable in this example and they operate only as a shatter delivery mechanism, but would also need a 0.5 sec shatter delay to allow counterplay at melee range (and possibly a damage tweak).

Yeah, invulnerable but non-persistent clones would need a pretty significant overhaul. Given that their persistence is integral to Condition builds due to their capability to apply fully damaging conditions (As opposed to power attacks where they do basically 0 damage), even more so for Mirage and Infinite Horizon shenanigans.

Not to mention, various skills and traits that work off of them; Illusionary Leap, Mirror Blade (Somewhat, if used at range it can bounce between your clone and the target), Desperate Decoy, Fencer's Finesse, Escape Artist and Self-Deception are all reliant on having Clones be persistent in order to have their full effect. Between clones having an effect while they're attacking, to being part of the "Bamboozle" effect of Mesmer to trick players into targeting clones.

[double tap and death's retreat are too expensive]

To be fair, this is an issue with Feef as a whole.

ANet's "Solution" to every problem is always "Hey, lets increase its init cost!"

Meanwhile, everything is seen as a problem because when Feefs use skills, everyone complains.

@Tails.9372 said:

@"jgeezz.7832" said:The range of the rifle is bull kitten any way, a ranger can out range a gun LOL but it can.Outrangeing a gun isn't an issue, I'm fine with LB outrangeing a pistol. The issue is that the LB is outrangeing a sniper rifle which really shouldn't be a thing. DE rifle doesn't make you feel like you're actually sniping, especially the need to constantly jumping around for Silent Scope is stupid. But if an NPC has a SR he instantly gets what feels like 30k+ range. The only time in game where it actually feels like you're sniping is during the sidequests in FS...

To be fair, a lot about DE Rifle doesn't feel like sniping. Such as the filler attacks being spraying shots out (Spamming Skirm Shot in PvP or TRB in PvE), rolling around like an idiot for Silent Scope and the mediocre range when not kneeling...

Ironically, having high init cost attacks that fire a single powerful shot would be more "Sniper" like, given that the idea of a precision weapon like a sniper is to make few but effective shots, not spray and pray.

Though, this could be tricky to balance as it could lead to a case where the burst damage is too high in PvP (And/or it could mean that Guardian takes a huge dump on DE Rifle by spamming out Aegis to block these big burst shots)

[Replace "crippled" with "hindered"]

@Kulvar.1239 said:

@"Gundahar.2765" said:Honestly, im fed up with this political correctness. Don't use this, don't use that... In this day and age are people offended by everything? I'd have a word for that... Stop making everything offending or racial or anything. Its just stupid.

If you look hard enough, everything is racist/sexist/...

It really isn't.

Offense is rooted in the intent, not the means.

Heck, take a look at these forums for example, where any "Bad" word is replaced by "kitten" but posts can still be moderated because the intent of the word "kitten" is still being used offensively (I.e. "You're an absolute kitten") not because the word kitten is inherently bigoted.

It's one of the big failures of this oversensitive culture to not realize this basic principle. But instead they look to try and get everything banned because of some asinine idea that something such as a word is inherently offensive to them.