The Mechanist let down and improvement ideas

[Enxadachim.9450]

As an engineer main these are my takes on the Mechanist. 

 

Cool things

Signets

At a first glance, signets are amazing to bring new players into the engineering world by simplifying the class. 

 

Mace

IMO the mace skills look very cool and fit the class identity. 

 

Disadvantages

Pet AI

It was interesting to see how many times the Devs were mentioning how buggy is the pet AI is, this makes me even more worried about this new elite spec. 

 

Toolbelt skills

In my opinion toolbelt skills are the engineer differentiator and I feel like the elite made them useless because if you don't have the mech active you don't have access to them, letting us with 2 trait lines when inactive. (huge disadvantage) 

 

How to improve the elite spec

Let go of the Mech

(I'm considering playability over theme) 

 

I believe that the pet AI will be a headache in all game modes. IMO changing the mech skills into toolbelt ground target skills would make more sense because the player would have control and fit the overall class identity. 

 

TL;DR

The elite spec is cool thematically but makes the engineer a ranger with a mech.

 

The mech removes class identity by removing the toolbelt skills. Removing the mech and giving us the mech skills as toolbelt skills would be a way out.

 

Pet AI is a huge problem and when it dies you will lose one trait line and other traits in other lines since the mech will not use them

 

Does anyone else feel the same?

Edited October 22, 2021 by Enxadachim.9450
Added pet death consequence

[Xanadrine.4352]

How can people say its a let down without even having seen the skills yet? Not even played it yet? I for one am excited for the beta, the three I have been waiting for all at once. I like the engi idea I will see how it plays on the 26th, until then we really know nothing.

[ChronoPinoyX.7923]

5 minutes ago, Enxadachim.9450 said:

Does anyone else feel the same?

No

[Tabootrinket.2631]

11 minutes ago, Zuldari.3940 said:

How can people say its a let down without even having seen the skills yet? Not even played it yet? I for one am excited for the beta, the three I have been waiting for all at once. I like the engi idea I will see how it plays on the 26th, until then we really know nothing.

I think it’s because pet AI has already been the bane of some classes, and people hoped that giving pet as an elite would maybe lead to AI improvement.

However the very first thing the mech did was yoloing on the side of the screen making the dev muse about the AI

Edited October 22, 2021 by Tabootrinket.2631

[Sodeni.6041]

It looks AMAZING. I love elite specs because they change a class a lot and actually give engineers a pet. The mech has to be really strong to compensate for not having toolbelt skills, stab, etc but that's just balancing issues. I'm excited to play it in Pv.

[Xanadrine.4352]

26 minutes ago, Tabootrinket.2631 said:

I think it’s because pet AI has already been the bane of some classes, and people hoped that giving pet as an elite would maybe lead to AI improvement.

However the very first thing the mech did was yoloing on the side of the screen making the dev muse about the AI

Well they have time to work out the kinks. Hopefully they do because im completely hyped about this one. 

[Zzik.5873]

Look intresting. And weird/different to play wich is not a bad thing. But I really hope the mech is kimd of op, for the cost of removing our toolbelt...

[Ovalkvadratcylinder.9365]

42 minutes ago, Zuldari.3940 said:

Well they have time to work out the kinks. Hopefully they do because im completely hyped about this one. 

they had time to wrok out the kinks of the gyro ai too but they didnt. so ye lets hope it goes the same rout for this one

[Kusumura.8642]

1 hour ago, Zuldari.3940 said:

Well they have time to work out the kinks. Hopefully they do because im completely hyped about this one. 

Yeah, I think if we give them another nine years, they'll work out how to make Ranger pet AI not be so bad, too!

[Xanadrine.4352]

3 hours ago, Kusumura.8642 said:

Yeah, I think if we give them another nine years, they'll work out how to make Ranger pet AI not be so bad, too!

Well they did say in the livestream that the pet AI for the ranger elite had been improved because now you actually will use pet commands and control the pet. All the pet skills are open and keybindable with more direct control

[Obtena.7952]

Anyone that is suggesting Anet get rid of the golem at this point has little understanding of reality here. The whole espec is built around this mech. It's going no where. Accept it or continue complaining about it and not be surprised when Anet ignores it. 

For me, the toolbelt thing isn't that big a deal. The toolbelt has 5 skills. The "Jade Golem Toolbelt" has 3 skills plus the obvious new abilities it carries  that IMO, more than make up for the 2 other lost skills from the 'regular' toolbelt. 

Edited October 23, 2021 by Obtena.7952

[Renny.6571]

- Toolbelt skills when mech is stowed; mech skills replace toolbelt while its active. Simple and the most needed change.

- Mace autos should heal the golem on top of providing barrier on the 3rd chain skill. There's no synergy between the player and the golem atm.

- Reduce cd of mech by at least 50%. 100sec is way too long.

- Change traits to have some interaction with the player. There's only 2 traits that gave some benefit when the golem wasn't active.

Edited October 23, 2021 by Renny.6571

[Ultramex.1506]

Christ's sake, beta is next week and you can't even WAIT till then to give feedback? How are we gonna agree on something we only SEE but have not yet tested? Its like saying the food doesn't taste good from seeing a picture without tasting it first

[inci.3705]

35 minutes ago, Zuldari.3940 said:

Well they did say in the livestream that the pet AI for the ranger elite had been improved because now you actually will use pet commands and control the pet. All the pet skills are open and keybindable with more direct control

That's not improving the pet AI. That's removing the AI so that players can control an NPC!

Edited October 23, 2021 by dvomd.4307

[Lynx.9058]

After watching the twitch stream today, Mechanist is looking like the best done spec out of this round, and one of the top specs for the whole expansion.  I love it.

The mech fits, some people don't like or want pets but there's other specs/professions for them to play in that case.  I'm going to be making a second engineer just to capitalize on the asura-golemancer theme with the mechanist spec.  It'll feel like playing gaige with deathtrap all over again, I'm super excited for it and so far I haven't been excited for much in this game beyond my base engineer/char scrapper.

I'm not super fond of the weapon choice.  Mace looks ok, but we're still left with only two offhand options: shield (which is pretty useless when you're not doing pvp, let's be honest) and pistol, which still has the completely useless pistol 5 skill.  So really we only get one offhand ability that's worth using and I think that really cuts into the playstyle.

Engineer really needs some work in terms of weapon availability.  We've got the fewest weapon options in the game for any spec, and I get that they justify that because we have kits but it's still not enough.

[Obtena.7952]

7 minutes ago, Ultramex.1506 said:

Christ's sake, beta is next week and you can't even WAIT till then to give feedback? How are we gonna agree on something we only SEE but have not yet tested? Its like saying the food doesn't taste good from seeing a picture without tasting it first

It's easy for people to do when they see something they don't want, regardless of how it plays. Look at people complaining Untamed is still trash because it's not a 'pet-less' Ranger spec. 

[Obtena.7952]

15 minutes ago, Renny.6571 said:

- Toolbelt skills when mech is stowed; mech skills replace toolbelt while its active. Simple and the most needed change.

- Mace autos should heal the golem on top of providing barrier on the 3rd chain skill. There's no synergy between the player and the golem atm.

- Reduce cd of mech by at least 50%. 100sec is way too long.

- Change traits to have some interaction with the player. There's only 2 traits that gave some benefit when the golem wasn't active.

yes to the toolbelt (though I doubt Anet has ideas for Signet toolbelt skills).

No to the mace heal (though agree with mech/player interaction)

100 is long, but I have no doubt that even 50 is too long. the fact is that the spec is deficient without the mech out, for any amount of time (less so with your toolbelt idea)

yeah I dislike that the traits are so mech oriented ... but I can see why it's like this because why would anyone take this spec if they didn't want to love playing mech?

[Lynx.9058]

11 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

yeah I dislike that the traits are so mech oriented ... but I can see why it's like this because why would anyone take this spec if they didn't want to love playing mech?

It reminds me of gaige the mechromancer from borderlands 2.  You could do a bit on your own, but the entire point of the character was the co-dependence on your mech, it was the powerhouse and you were there as support for it.  Kind of a symbiotic relationship.

 

[Renny.6571]

4 minutes ago, Lynx.9058 said:

It reminds me of gaige the mechromancer from borderlands 2.  You could do a bit on your own, but the entire point of the character was the co-dependence on your mech, it was the powerhouse and you were there as support for it.  Kind of a symbiotic relationship.

 

Except you can barely support your mech. 4shrug

[Lynx.9058]

Just now, Renny.6571 said:

Except you can barely support your mech. 4shrug

I'm wondering if we'll be able to throw on the wrench and repair the mech like we can with turrets.  That might make a currently unused kit somewhat useful.

[Renny.6571]

Well, that was one of the suggestions I posted just above. Make the specialization weapon interact with the golem. Rewatching the VoD, the pulsing barrier GM trait is unique per game mode, so it's most likely nerfed in wvw/pvp and it directly competes with the 20% signet effectiveness which is the only support interaction the kit has with the golem.

[Nephalem.8921]

10 minutes ago, Lynx.9058 said:

It reminds me of gaige the mechromancer from borderlands 2.  You could do a bit on your own, but the entire point of the character was the co-dependence on your mech, it was the powerhouse and you were there as support for it.  Kind of a symbiotic relationship.

 

In reality the mech was complete garbage in endgame and just used as a meatshield. Well tbf most of the pet spec enthusiasts are probably open world only players anyways.

It has lots of design issues. how can you get boons on it in a group setting. how does it survive vs reduction ignoring aoes etc.

[Lynx.9058]

4 minutes ago, Nephalem.8921 said:

In reality the mech was complete garbage in endgame and just used as a meatshield. Well tbf most of the pet spec enthusiasts are probably open world only players anyways.

It has lots of design issues. how can you get boons on it in a group setting. how does it survive vs reduction ignoring aoes etc.

In reality if anything is even 1% less effective than another thing it gets called absolute garbage.

The gaming world would be a better place if min-maxers would just quit whining and just enjoy the game.

Edited October 23, 2021 by Lynx.9058

[Nephalem.8921]

5 minutes ago, Lynx.9058 said:

In reality if anything is even 1% less effective than another thing it gets called absolute garbage.

The gaming world would be a better place if min-maxers would just quit whining and just enjoy the game.

It could not kill anything in higher difficulty settings, gaige was just anarchy there for years until they buffed it to be just somewhat usuable. I would enjoy the game if some devs would even try to use at least simple excel sheets so this stuff doesnt happen.

Gw2 engine is really really bad for pets. No boonshare. unresponsive. Struggle to hit moving targets. Dont share modifiers from gear.

[Lynx.9058]

11 minutes ago, Nephalem.8921 said:

It could not kill anything in higher difficulty settings, gaige was just anarchy there for years until they buffed it to be just somewhat usuable. I would enjoy the game if some devs would even try to use at least simple excel sheets so this stuff doesnt happen.

Gw2 engine is really really bad for pets. No boonshare. unresponsive. Struggle to hit moving targets. Dont share modifiers from gear.

well we already know that giving the mech boons and it using our stats is happening.  The struggle to hit moving targets shouldn't be a problem with the ranged option it has, either, though that does limit you to one of three talent choices just to avoid that issue.