CptnChumps.1932

I'm normally not the type to doom and gloom about new features but this weapon is just... really bad. I'm not sure what role its supposed to cover in a class that cannot weapon swap. It has some unique features with the chain reactions but they seem so lackluster and doesn't seem like there was a real intention put into what this was supposed to be. It either needs to be an all support weapon or a all DPS weapon. Engineer cannot really afford to have their only weapon slot filled by a hybrid utility weapon. I don't have any suggestions other than picking a direction and sticking with it. Whether that be a dps or support weapon. If it doesn't offer anything better in either purpose there is absolutely no reason to use it over the weapons engineer already has. -- As it stands I wont pick it over rifle as there's no damage to compare and hitting a moving target with nothing but ground based attacks in a movement based combat system is annoying. I'd just stick with rifle. -- I wont pick this over a mace and shield as now I only have some small healing and some might generation over having more barrier, more cc and 2 defensive cool downs that synergize well with heal scrapper and mech. -- Compared to hammer there is absolutely no reason to pick this either. I guess this could maybe work as a defensive weapon in WvW/PvP? Maybe? Thats a real stretch though and supppper niche but the only thing I could think of.

Looks interesting for sure! Looks very much like rev staff but more offensively oriented with some of the daredevil animations in there for the presumed auto attacks. I'm excited to see what kind of build will come out of this and what they're going to change in their traits to accommodate it. Only thing I don't like is the name 'Bullet Catcher', it sounds a bit too cheesy lmao

I've also had a pretty good time with full harrier's providing alac, regen, fury and low prot uptime. Since we can't really keep all 3 shades up at the same time I've been using just 1 or 2 for barrier/alac generation and saving the rest for rezzing when needed. I feel like they might be wanting to move shades to a more utility option but I'm just speculating after playing it for a while.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PSwAoiZlhyYx0YtYRN5FfB-zxIY1ojvU6qAyME6NC6IB8eAA-e Here's a Harbinger build that I've been using recently. Its pretty much the openworld build from Guildjen's website with different offhand and trait choices. You will get some insane barrier and healing with this build and it will be pretty hard to be killed considering how much passive and active healing you will be getting from just doing damage. Its a bit expensive if you dont have any cele gear but its by far my favorite open world necro build after the signet reaper gets nerfed after the patch. You can trade staff for dagger/warhorn if you need more life force and ridiculous healing but I like the range of staff a bit better for kiting purposes. There is a flex slot for what ever you need for the current encounter and you can replace the signet something else if needed since harb gets a decent instant shroud percentage at all times. I'd also recommend Tropical Peppermint Cake as a super cheap food that gives you some extra vitality and more health regen (i think it works on the blood bank trait? not sure yet). It wont be doing crazy amount of dps but you wont ever have to worry about dying if you can keep range and attack stuff. It really scales well when attacking multiple opponents as Parasitic contagion scales with your total damage output. Also since harb shroud doesnt replace your healthbar, Parasitic contagion will still heal you/grant barrier (thanks blood bank!) while you dishing out dps. So far I've soloed a lot of legendary bounties without even getting to half health. Maybe not the fastest kill but still works really well.

The scourge changes are interesting. I love the addition of Alac but at the same time the trade off of nerfing dps scourge really hurts. It already didn't top the charts in DPS but now I don't know where it will land. I'm hoping we get a re-work on how some the traits function so that the entire spec isnt nerfed just to add alac. Nerfing the ability to provide 10 person buffs is obviously going to be in line with other specs was coming so that im not as upset about. The biggest thing I see is the duration of sand shades. Cutting the duration to 8 seconds makes is INCREDIBLY spammy and now impossible to keep up 3 shades. Possible changes: - Aligning the duration with PVP durations - Changing Sand Sage to either give the full bonus baseline or just give scourge itself as a baseline and re-working that trait to something else. I'm still optimistic that this is moving a support scourge into more gamemodes other than being strictly for helping training/struggling groups and boneskinner. Right now it sits in a limbo too much versatility and doesn't add anything other than less dps a little bit of might and now full alac. Guess we will have to see how the changes shake out but there has to be a way to add alac to the class without nuking the rest of the spec. I'm left with feeling that Scourge might need a full rework to acclimate the new direction.

Just started playing firebrand recently and its still a big issue