Vagrant.7206

This is part of what bugs me. Scrapper didn't exist in PvE for nearly its entire lifespan. We were left with a clunky core class while everybody else got to play with their new toys in PvE.

uhh holo says hi

I pretty much agree with this entire post. I don't have too much of a problem with heralds individually. But you can't escape them, you can't really block them, they're damn difficult to catch if you're not a thief or other rev, and they can chain enough skills to be nearly immortal without unblockables or condi. That's sort of a problem -- classes that can do a lot of damage should have trouble escaping or mitigating all damage.

They never nerf the real issues....like never, like with mirage, they nerfed elusive mind instead and chaotic interruption instead than Infinite Horizon which has always been the main issue with mirage, mindblowing design where you allow clones to apply main mechanic of the elite... The problem with mirage was much more fundamental to its design than those traits.

Stealth - CheckInvul - CheckBlock - Check (Holo)Mobility - CheckReliable Protection generation - CheckMultiple sources of Stability - Check My apologies, I seem to forget that engineer has 5 trait lines and 7 utility skills. :trollface: What you're describing is at minimum two separate builds, closer to three. (Prot holo, gadget holo, some elixir holo) Stealth - CheckInvul - CheckBlock - Check (Holo)Mobility - CheckReliable Protection generation - CheckMultiple sources of Stability - Check And here you are complaining that you don't have a port? All I can say to you is L2P... I did every time they changed or nerfed rev and necro, you don't see me here on forums creating threads to cry about it when I have every right to do it given the amount of nerf hammers my classes get. So again: L2P <----- https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Stability Well of powertrail of anguishInfusing terrorCharge lich form and chilled to the bone. just tidying up in your comment since all thats listed there is not possible in 1 build. ure listing 2 builds defences You got multiple sources too mass momentum and kinetic stabilizers in scrapperCrystal configuration eclipse from holosmith.From core: defense field rumble and toss elixir b, so yes you do have more sources than stab than necros. If reaper then we can take 3 maybe total but the shouts have a noticeable CD for use and foot in the grave is a must-have for SPVP and Pve.Defense field is scrapper. Scrapper has other tools to deal with CC's and stunlocks -- namely, hammer skills and certain gyros. Hammer has built-in blocks and evades, bulwark gyro can stabilize your health when CC'ed.Rumble is a 1-second stability + stunbreak. In other words, it's there solely to prevent a follow-up CC after stunbreak.Toss Elixir B is the one source of stability besides CC: Eclipse that is more than a second. It's 4s of stability, has to deal with projectile hate, and has a casting time. To add on to your last point -- Holo was the bandaid keeping the engineer class afloat in competitive play. This is the crux of the problem -- engineer as a whole needs a serious redesign because it's aged so poorly. Scrapper's basically a joke, and core engineer is just bad.

I don't know about this, but I certainly agree with the rest of your post. Evade frames, stealth, blocks, and even z-axis teleports make a massive difference in defensive capabilities.

Umm... what? Your argument is that it is a class, just like everyone else? Yes, engineer can have multiple key presses. So can other classes. I am confused. Also, trail of anguish and infusing terror have the same recharge time as toss elixir b. And again, no cast time. And no ground targeting. And no projectile. Even the 30s recharge skills don't have to put up with that. Sure thing bub. also ive never had toss elixir B destroyed by projectile hate and i got 3k hours on engi alone. Guess you never played during the HoT days, or against an ele with a focus. I've seen my tossed elixirs destroyed many, many times. It's happened to me many times, especially during HoT days. You must not have played core engi in PvP much. Hell, I lost a Toss Elixir U the other day to a reaper who ran at me with Death's Charge. I started to cast the skill when he initiated the charge, and it went "poof"! Exactly that noise. Firebrand spits out stability like nobody's business. That's one of their biggest balance issues, honestly. Core guard has a shout for 6s. Firebrand only "kitten" out stability on their 85 second cd tome, and on Mantra (but then they don't have Renewed Focus). No core guard will ever run Stand Your Ground!. No Warrior will ever run Dolyak's Signet I'll give you this one, sure. kitten stop. You're embarrassing yourself. Maybe we should not complain about Necro stab uptime? Classic internet argument: "These skills aren't meta right now, therefore they aren't relevant." Elixir B isn't meta either, but I guess that's where this argument is going. Toss Elixir B is the only core engi skill with reasonable stability uptime, and I'm pointing out that it's pretty trash. Why not? It's pretty comparable to Engineer stab uptime. What are you even talking about? The closest holo had to "permanent stability" was when PoF launched, back when scourge was so stupidly powerful it corrupted everything. There's never been a point where engineer didn't have to worry about CC. yea holo should be free kill and ping pong ball, nothing in the game dosnt have stability (maybe except for thieves) but holo deserves to have none?seems biased to me .core engi as a whole have poor acces to stab besides toss elixir b and juggernaut gm trait. nerfing elixir U this hard was a bad choice on anets side but it is what it is. OP:holo is fine. slot elixir b and u get all the stab u need. sure u lack a block but kiting goes a long way. i dont feel different after nerfs. play safe, thats about it Actually, thief does have stab blinding powder from deception, consume plasma detonate plasma, and blinding powder is decently accessible 1 second of Stability on stunbreak should be a rule of thumb for all skills tbh, it's a healthy way to discourage CC spam and give people a chance to reply with something. I definitely agree with this. A lot of the problem with stunbreaks for engineer is that they don't provide any kind of defense against a follow-up CC. I've found Rumble to be more useful than Superspeed for this reason, despite the fact that it's on a 40s cooldown instead of 25s. Its generally not fair to pick on necro, because we have weak mobility for the most part and everyone zooms around us. Also keep in mind that scourge got hit with a big mechanical nerf that crippled scourge regarding shades, so not only do they not have a damage eating shroud, but they have to choose between giving you a barrier or saving themselves. Scourge did deserve a nerf, all pof specs do, but core necro is very slow and really easy to farm, and reaper is still pretty slow but has access to stab more easily available than scourge, but they also are super slow and everyone hits too hard so they need that cc and the stab they got to have a fair chance. I'm not saying necro stability and speed are the envies of other classes, because they clearly aren't. My point though is that necro does have some defenses that engineer (and holo) doesn't have. Z-axis teleports and return teleports are major defenses you can find in several necro builds, things which engineer has never had. Engineer also lacks the evade frames and sheer mobility of warrior and ranger in its main weapons, the two other classes that lack z-axis teleports. In other words, engineer is one of the slowest classes without z-axis teleports. It lacks evade frames in all of its skills. It has only one core stealth skill (which everyone complains about), and access to anything beyond 3s of superspeed for mobility (from toss elixir U) requires specializing for it. Its core design was victory through attrition, but getting ping-ponged in fights without stability makes that nearly impossible. A single revenant or firebrand can easily knock you around for more stunbreaks than you have. If you miss a dodge, you end up getting stunlocked by these classes/specs. Yeah and you have invis and invuln combined with stealth on holo All the pof classes and some hot classes need nerfed, because there is too much of everything atm too many ports evades invuln invis combined with mobility increasing abilities and then on top of that also having huge damage, and holo was contributing.Stealth and invuln on holo... you mean Elixir S? A core engi skill that's been in the game since the beginning? The only real change it's seen since HoT is a reduction in cooldown on toss elixir s. That's literally the opposite of powercreep. The skill has barely changed. Yes, the sustain was over the top. This is why I recommended reductions on heat therapy. The problem wasn't core engineer, it was holo, specifically. But now holo, and core engineer by extension, are getting ping-ponged in 1v1s because they lack stability. That's what happens when you nerf the core to hurt the e-spec. You literally just made my previous point stand:

Umm... what? Your argument is that it is a class, just like everyone else? Yes, engineer can have multiple key presses. So can other classes. I am confused. Also, trail of anguish and infusing terror have the same recharge time as toss elixir b. And again, no cast time. And no ground targeting. And no projectile. Even the 30s recharge skills don't have to put up with that. Sure thing bub. also ive never had toss elixir B destroyed by projectile hate and i got 3k hours on engi alone. Guess you never played during the HoT days, or against an ele with a focus. I've seen my tossed elixirs destroyed many, many times. It's happened to me many times, especially during HoT days. You must not have played core engi in PvP much. Hell, I lost a Toss Elixir U the other day to a reaper who ran at me with Death's Charge. I started to cast the skill when he initiated the charge, and it went "poof"! Exactly that noise. Firebrand spits out stability like nobody's business. That's one of their biggest balance issues, honestly. Core guard has a shout for 6s. Firebrand only "kitten" out stability on their 85 second cd tome, and on Mantra (but then they don't have Renewed Focus). No core guard will ever run Stand Your Ground!. No Warrior will ever run Dolyak's Signet I'll give you this one, sure. kitten stop. You're embarrassing yourself. Maybe we should not complain about Necro stab uptime? Classic internet argument: "These skills aren't meta right now, therefore they aren't relevant." Elixir B isn't meta either, but I guess that's where this argument is going. Toss Elixir B is the only core engi skill with reasonable stability uptime, and I'm pointing out that it's pretty trash. Why not? It's pretty comparable to Engineer stab uptime. What are you even talking about? The closest holo had to "permanent stability" was when PoF launched, back when scourge was so stupidly powerful it corrupted everything. There's never been a point where engineer didn't have to worry about CC. yea holo should be free kill and ping pong ball, nothing in the game dosnt have stability (maybe except for thieves) but holo deserves to have none?seems biased to me .core engi as a whole have poor acces to stab besides toss elixir b and juggernaut gm trait. nerfing elixir U this hard was a bad choice on anets side but it is what it is. OP:holo is fine. slot elixir b and u get all the stab u need. sure u lack a block but kiting goes a long way. i dont feel different after nerfs. play safe, thats about it Actually, thief does have stab blinding powder from deception, consume plasma detonate plasma, and blinding powder is decently accessible 1 second of Stability on stunbreak should be a rule of thumb for all skills tbh, it's a healthy way to discourage CC spam and give people a chance to reply with something. I definitely agree with this. A lot of the problem with stunbreaks for engineer is that they don't provide any kind of defense against a follow-up CC. I've found Rumble to be more useful than Superspeed for this reason, despite the fact that it's on a 40s cooldown instead of 25s. Its generally not fair to pick on necro, because we have weak mobility for the most part and everyone zooms around us. Also keep in mind that scourge got hit with a big mechanical nerf that crippled scourge regarding shades, so not only do they not have a damage eating shroud, but they have to choose between giving you a barrier or saving themselves. Scourge did deserve a nerf, all pof specs do, but core necro is very slow and really easy to farm, and reaper is still pretty slow but has access to stab more easily available than scourge, but they also are super slow and everyone hits too hard so they need that cc and the stab they got to have a fair chance.I'm not saying necro stability and speed are the envies of other classes, because they clearly aren't. My point though is that necro does have some defenses that engineer (and holo) doesn't have. Z-axis teleports and return teleports are major defenses you can find in several necro builds, things which engineer has never had. Engineer also lacks the evade frames and sheer mobility of warrior and ranger in its main weapons, the two other classes that lack z-axis teleports. In other words, engineer is one of the slowest classes without z-axis teleports. It lacks evade frames in all of its skills. It has only one core stealth skill (which everyone complains about), and access to anything beyond 3s of superspeed for mobility (from toss elixir U) requires specializing for it. Its core design was victory through attrition, but getting ping-ponged in fights without stability makes that nearly impossible. A single revenant or firebrand can easily knock you around for more stunbreaks than you have. If you miss a dodge, you end up getting stunlocked by these classes/specs.

Can I haz this OP build pl0x?A video attached to it on how to use it properly would be also appreciated. Thx http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PeQAQlZw+YWsLmKe+SarNA-z5gfGNKB6VB4xBThat looks like an old build from vanilla PvP. Would be fairly decent, although somewhat lacking in the DPS department.

When you get ping-ponged in teamfights, not really.

You mean this, right? It won't see use in PvP because PvP doesn't allow racial skills, but it might be useful for somebody in WvW. Blocks and immob are not that useful in PvE, in most circumstances. Honestly, I'm surprised I don't see hidden pistol on charr engineers in PvE, because of its toolbelt skill.

A range increase would be fine. Reflects/projectile destruction would not be. Warrior is already a favorable matchup against engineer, adding additional projectile annoyance would make it even worse. GS is one of the most used warrior weapons in PvP.

I can't play with pre-nerf Elixir U. ive fought eles alot. i also dont mindlessly spam toss elixirs into lightning focus 4 since i know it dosnt work. thats why it dosnt happen to me And not once in your life has an ele cast that skill at the same time you cast yours?

Umm... what? Your argument is that it is a class, just like everyone else? Yes, engineer can have multiple key presses. So can other classes. I am confused. Also, trail of anguish and infusing terror have the same recharge time as toss elixir b. And again, no cast time. And no ground targeting. And no projectile. Even the 30s recharge skills don't have to put up with that. Sure thing bub. also ive never had toss elixir B destroyed by projectile hate and i got 3k hours on engi alone. Guess you never played during the HoT days, or against an ele with a focus. I've seen my tossed elixirs destroyed many, many times. It's happened to me many times, especially during HoT days. You must not have played core engi in PvP much. Hell, I lost a Toss Elixir U the other day to a reaper who ran at me with Death's Charge. I started to cast the skill when he initiated the charge, and it went "poof"! Exactly that noise. Firebrand spits out stability like nobody's business. That's one of their biggest balance issues, honestly. Core guard has a shout for 6s. Firebrand only "kitten" out stability on their 85 second cd tome, and on Mantra (but then they don't have Renewed Focus). No core guard will ever run Stand Your Ground!. No Warrior will ever run Dolyak's Signet I'll give you this one, sure. kitten stop. You're embarrassing yourself. Maybe we should not complain about Necro stab uptime?Classic internet argument: "These skills aren't meta right now, therefore they aren't relevant." Elixir B isn't meta either, but I guess that's where this argument is going. Toss Elixir B is the only core engi skill with reasonable stability uptime, and I'm pointing out that it's pretty trash. Why not? It's pretty comparable to Engineer stab uptime. What are you even talking about? The closest holo had to "permanent stability" was when PoF launched, back when scourge was so stupidly powerful it corrupted everything. There's never been a point where engineer didn't have to worry about CC. yea holo should be free kill and ping pong ball, nothing in the game dosnt have stability (maybe except for thieves) but holo deserves to have none?seems biased to me .core engi as a whole have poor acces to stab besides toss elixir b and juggernaut gm trait. nerfing elixir U this hard was a bad choice on anets side but it is what it is. OP:holo is fine. slot elixir b and u get all the stab u need. sure u lack a block but kiting goes a long way. i dont feel different after nerfs. play safe, thats about it Actually, thief does have stab blinding powder from deception, consume plasma detonate plasma, and blinding powder is decently accessible 1 second of Stability on stunbreak should be a rule of thumb for all skills tbh, it's a healthy way to discourage CC spam and give people a chance to reply with something.I definitely agree with this. A lot of the problem with stunbreaks for engineer is that they don't provide any kind of defense against a follow-up CC. I've found Rumble to be more useful than Superspeed for this reason, despite the fact that it's on a 40s cooldown instead of 25s.

It's happened to me many times, especially during HoT days. You must not have played core engi in PvP much. Hell, I lost a Toss Elixir U the other day to a reaper who ran at me with Death's Charge. I started to cast the skill when he initiated the charge, and it went "poof"! Exactly that noise. Firebrand spits out stability like nobody's business. That's one of their biggest balance issues, honestly. Core guard has a shout for 6s.Dolyak's signet grants 8 seconds. Dolyak stance grants 6 seconds.Armor of earth grants 6 seconds.Trail of Anguish grants 6 seconds. Infusing Terror grants 6 seconds.And bear in mind, none of these skills have cast times (seriously, they're all instantaneous, I didn't bother to include the non-instantaneous stability skills), nor doi any of them have awkward ground targeting. Nor do they have to worry about projectile destruction. Toss Elixir B is the only core engineer skill which grants more than a second of stability, and it has several conditions attached to it. Stability is effective when you can predict or read an enemy's attacks -- a cast time and ground targeting on it makes it substantially worse. One of my ongoing complaints about the "Toss Elixir" skills is this kind of thing. It should be more like "smash elixir," where it's a PBAoE.

In other news, the sky is blue.

Try using Toss Elixir B with all the projectile destruction and reflects that fly around. It also has super clunky ground targeting and casting time, and the stab only lasts 4 seconds. :smile: I don't know how many times I've had a toss elixir skill rendered moot by random projectile destruction. Non-prot holo builds are super glassy, they can easily be taken out by core power mesmers. Prot holo builds lack teleports and it's very easy for core mesmer to juke them.

Nothing surprising here. A lot of the things core engineer was sold on (IE turrets) were guttered, and kits have been left in the dust with e-specs. They're mainly only used for their most powerful skills -- have been for a while. They nerfed grenades and bomb kit a long time ago, which used to be staples of PvP and PvE, respectively. E-gun is primarily used for its stunbreak and heals/condi clears in PvP. Tool kit hasn't been relevant since pre-HoT. Flamethrower was only relevant in condi builds and certain hybrid builds. Gadgets were always more of a sideshow than a primary draw. They seemed like one-off ideas from the devs, still feel like that. You can really see a lot of the design of vanilla GW2 in engineer's kits. Almost every skill has one, maybe two functions. Very few have more than that. They all have lengthy casting times and obvious windups. This is why they're so irrelevant in most of PvP these days, the e-specs are spam-happy. Elixirs are one of the few groups of skills that ANet has consistently updated in engineer's core skills (except for Elixir R). They've been essential in most engineer PvP builds.

Sounds like someone got destroyed by a meme core engi build? Generally a good way to see if something is "op" is if everyone and their dog starts playing it (I'm looking at you FB). Theres a reason no one plays core engi OMG NOT THE SMACK :o This whole thread was meant as a sarcastic poke at people claiming other specs are OP, like Firebrand. I don't think anybody genuinely believes core engi is OP.

Spellbreaker. That's your solution.

Most of engineer has a stability problem. We get ping-ponged in teamfights currently. The problem is that many of our stunbreaks are on long cooldowns, and rarely prevent a second, follow-up CC. Most other classes have stunbreaks that feature an evade, an ammo system, and/or some other defense... ours almost exclusively stunbreak once. Superspeed is the closest skill we get to other class stunbreaks, due to its low recharge. Notice how it has absolutely nothing else going for it besides move speed?

It might be unpopular opinion coming from me but I find ( mechanic wise )Scrapper and chrono to be HORRID for the game.Scrappers barrier is one of the biggest kitten statcheck mechanisms in the game. Holo is basicly engi with 2 weapon sets. Holo>Scrapper design wise.Chrono F4 and chronophantasma can QUADRUPLE the phantasms cast, its gonna be always bad mechanic. For all its flaws mirage can be balanced with its current iteration. Mirage>chrono.Cant say for druid.Feel free to agree or disagree. Scrapper needs to be redesigned. It was a flawed design to begin with, and it's only gotten more arbitrary. Its profession mechanic is increasingly less valuable.

For me the problem isn't isolated to thief. It also includes mesmer, rev, and ele builds that are particularly heavy on evades and can stall captures for very long times with specific skills. Part of the problem is that, unlike blocks, there's not much you can do while an enemy is evading. There are a few, very select skills (primarily AoE CCs) that can effect evades, but they're rare and usually on long cooldowns. Evade is effectively an invuln in most cases, so why not treat it like an invuln? :smile: lol bunch of bunker standing on the node and facetanking damage, if you DARE to dodge anything you lose the node. The two dodges everyone gets aren't the problem. The problem is offensive skills with evade frames in them (IE pistol whip, blurred frenzy, surge of the mists). It's having your cake and eating it too. You can stall a point with offensive equipment even if you aren't a bunker. Better skills that make more sense include withdraw, riposting shadows, illusionary riposte. These skills are intended as defenses or counters. Good? having people able to contesnt nodes is good.What the hell do you want to happen, have 3 weaver on each team just afking on a node or what ? Hardly. Skills should be dangerous. Pistol whip should hurt. But with reward, should come risk. :smile: Hence, if you miss, you shouldn't get evade frames (or you shouldn't contest the node). Corona burst has to land to get the benefits, why not do the same with other skills? As it stands, the pistol whip spam thief can fumble as much as they like with relative impunity (Same goes for heralds, some mesmer builds, some ele builds btw, I don't think the problem is just thief). The window to hit them is tiny. personally I dont get whyFull counterScepter blocksword blockall 3 last long, They should be reactive block, make it last 0,75s. you see hit coming you block, not run around in immunity mode for 2s daring anyone to hit youI don't disagree with this. This irks me too.

For me the problem isn't isolated to thief. It also includes mesmer, rev, and ele builds that are particularly heavy on evades and can stall captures for very long times with specific skills. Part of the problem is that, unlike blocks, there's not much you can do while an enemy is evading. There are a few, very select skills (primarily AoE CCs) that can effect evades, but they're rare and usually on long cooldowns. Evade is effectively an invuln in most cases, so why not treat it like an invuln? :smile: lol bunch of bunker standing on the node and facetanking damage, if you DARE to dodge anything you lose the node. The two dodges everyone gets aren't the problem. The problem is offensive skills with evade frames in them (IE pistol whip, blurred frenzy, surge of the mists). It's having your cake and eating it too. You can stall a point with offensive equipment even if you aren't a bunker. Better skills that make more sense include withdraw, riposting shadows, illusionary riposte. These skills are intended as defenses or counters. Good? having people able to contesnt nodes is good.What the hell do you want to happen, have 3 weaver on each team just afking on a node or what ?Hardly. Skills should be dangerous. Pistol whip should hurt. But with reward, should come risk. :smile: Hence, if you miss, you shouldn't get evade frames (or you shouldn't contest the node). Corona burst has to land to get the benefits, why not do the same with other skills? As it stands, the pistol whip spam thief can fumble as much as they like with relative impunity (Same goes for heralds, some mesmer builds, some ele builds btw, I don't think the problem is just thief). The window to hit them is tiny.

For me the problem isn't isolated to thief. It also includes mesmer, rev, and ele builds that are particularly heavy on evades and can stall captures for very long times with specific skills. Part of the problem is that, unlike blocks, there's not much you can do while an enemy is evading. There are a few, very select skills (primarily AoE CCs) that can effect evades, but they're rare and usually on long cooldowns. Evade is effectively an invuln in most cases, so why not treat it like an invuln? :smile: lol bunch of bunker standing on the node and facetanking damage, if you DARE to dodge anything you lose the node.The two dodges everyone gets aren't the problem. The problem is offensive skills with evade frames in them (IE pistol whip, blurred frenzy, surge of the mists). It's having your cake and eating it too. You can stall a point with offensive equipment even if you aren't a bunker. Better skills that make more sense include withdraw, riposting shadows, illusionary riposte. These skills are intended as defenses or counters.