Mechanist Feedback Thread

[Kyban.4031]

Mech should become untargetable once it has been defeated.  It currently clutters targeting from 0 HP until it finishes blasting off.

[Decinomicon.4619]

23 hours ago, DarkLancer.1902 said:

(beta 4 feedback)
The re-tuned Mechanist is still awesome, just not unreasonably so.  I like the increased support capacity, and the mech seems more balanced.  I don't feel like I can leave everything to the mech and be fine anymore. 

That said, there are a few issues:

1) Binding rocket punch to mace 3 was a bad idea. People who don't use mace will never see the rocket punch happen. Either bind it to weapon/kit skill 3, no matter what weapon or engineer kit is being used, or unbind it from any player control, but make mech command skills override anything else the mech may be doing. 

2) Having a stunbreak that takes so long to aim that the disabling effect runs out before it finishes casting is not good.  Stunbreak needs to be an instant thing, tap the key and it happens immediately, rather than having to aim the skill first. 

About that stunbreak thing, it is instant if you use instant casting in the game options. AOE's feel alot better to use with it turned on

[philvaneyck.1932]

First of all it's fun! But bring back the toolbelt, when Mech is'nt called, like Holosmith. And please bring customizable Mech options or Skins in Shop.

[Jariel.9274]

Mechanist Feedbacks pt.2 [sPvP]

I'm going to say in advance that all the suggestions/critiques I'm going to list here are just regarding sPvP mode. I have enjoyed the changes been made so far, but personally I think we're still a bit too far from the goal.

1) Playstyle: Mechanist still feels too much passive gameplay. Passive signets mechanic + Mech AI overshadow too much (in my opinion) the class itself. The mechanist feels more like a tool that helps the mech, and it should be the opposite. We need a more challenging and active gameplay, among all the new elites this one feels the one with the most passive gameplay.

2) Signets: The adjustment on Shift Signet was good and needed, a blink with stunbreak is something the class could take benefit from, although it shouldn't be the only stunbreak available (I know we've got one on F2 if we take GM trait Crisis Zone) but Engi in general has access to some stunbreaks through the toolbelt skills, if the toolbelt skills gets removed, we lose a lot of options when it comes to stunbreaks.

*Elite Signet: At the moment the activated elite signet (big laser beam pew pew) feels useless: first of all is too predictable, easy to dodge and still doesen't retarget enemies fast enough. At the moment the elite signet is better on passive gameplay due to the synergy with the other signets. Keep the elite signet on passive is useful also to recall the mech on the battlefield as soon it dies, since we can't afford to wait 50s, it's too much. Wasting this elite signet just to make the mech have a nice cool animation that does nothing is something we can't allow/afford.

3) AI Response: With the addition of the keybinds to recall the pet and attack the designated target, you get more control over the mech, although... We're still not there. In certain maps, for example Skyhammer, the terrain and obstacles are just too much of a challenge for the mech to followup the player. Sometimes you're forced to use the shift signet just to teleport the mech to you. A possibility would be to allow the Jade Mech to teleport to your position when the terrain feels to difficult to cross. Although I don't know if this would make the pet too powerful then. In fact, kiting the mech should still be intended and promoted.

4) Ranged attacks: Some of the ranged attacks are very slow, and they can hit the enemy if stealths as soon the laser cannons are used. I think it shouldn't be intended this way. The pew pew beams also follow up the enemy around a corner. I think if the ranged attacks would have a faster animation it might fix both of these problems... Again I don't know if this mechanic is intended or not.

5) Mace: Changes on mace felt good, although the autoattack chain still feels clunky. It might be beneficial adding a cone range to the autoattack chain, similar to sword AA. I mean, you're swinging a "baseball bat" around you so everything that comes in range should be hit...

6) Mech survivability and downtime: I'm still not convinced about breakbar in sPvP, in fact if the mech gains stability it doesen't get the breakbar broken (sorry for the wordgame). Another problem is that condi damage kills the jade mech way too fast. We can consider condi damage a counter against the pet, but it would be beneficial adding another tool of condi cleanse (without being forced to take Elixir Gun) either on the mace weaponset or on one of the other signets (Yes I know that shifting signet is condi removal). Last but not least, when the Mech dies, 50s of waiting is way too much, without your jade mech you're basically half of a class. I think a good downtime would be around 35/25seconds, at least no longer than 35.

7) Weapon set: Can the mechanist be the only elite spec that allows the engi to have 2 weaponsets like all the other classes? At least without the mech we can increase our utilities and compensate the loss of toolbelt skills.

8 ) Crit chance: Limiting access to the crit chance of the mech leads to the result that only certain builds could be played or certain amulets would be picked. I am not convinced about this choice, is it connected to PvE balance? Would be good to find a middle way or a balance in between, maybe make the crit chance scaleable based on the amulet you pick in sPvP.

I have left the bugs out of this topic, since it's feedbacks only, but ye the class (especially Pet mechanics) needs a good polishing and tweaks.

Edited December 5, 2021 by Jariel.9274

[Sifolstour.3210]

Ive played mechanist on both betas and i can say that the only significant improvement that ive noticed is the Crisis Zone skill (F2), the condi cleanease and stun break on it feels good but thats it.

 

The most important thing about players feedback from beta 3 was mecha death timer but reducing it to 50 seconds doesn't change anything. You cant stand 50 seconds waiting for the respawn, not even 1 so the best reliable way to call it down is using the elite signet skill and relying heavily on alacrity to use it immediatly after mechs death; that hits build diversity.

The nerfs that i noticed the most are on strike damage builds. Condi builds still manage to put some good numbers even with those nerfs cause the condi signet outshines its strike damage counterpart.

In my opinion removing rocket fist from mechs passive skills was a fail, specially now only being able to use it with the mace. Mech commands doesnt feel responsive cause (as an example) when i try to use crisis zone or sky circus the mech doesnt cast it on demand if the enemy runs away, so first the mech runs into your target and then, if it reaches the target it procs the skill, only being able to activate it immediatly if i detarget before using those skills.

 

Mechanist theme could have been implemented on the untamed to maximize its potential with the big diversity on ranger pets much better, and even liking it, i can only see mechanist viable on casual open world. But at the end of the day it is what it is.

 

Anyways thx for your work put on it.

 

 

[Eddy.7051]

Skills

• Profession Skills: Key binds should be limited up to 5 skills (not 6). It is too niche and inconvenient with only 2 out of 36 specializations to have F6 and F7 skills. Personally, I use F6 for Special Actions and F7-12 for drawing/stowing novelties.
• Move "Attack My Target" to the F1 slot and move "Return to Me" to the F2 slot. This should also be consistent across all Ranger specs to reinforce intuitive positions and key binds for these two skills.
• Move skills F1-F3 to F3-F5.
• Remove skill F4 Recall Mech. "Return to Me", Avoid Combat mode, and Shift Signet are already good enough disengages to get the mech out of danger to recover. The Crash Down skill should occupy the F1 skill slot while the mech is dead.
• Add the Ranger's "Stow pet" button to the Mechanist's skill bar UI. Players can click on the "Stow pet" button to remove their mech for roleplaying or aesthetic purposes, and it would be consistent and familiar with the Ranger's UI. It is unnecessary to have a brand new Recall Mech skill that occupies one of the F1-5 skill slots. Feel free to rename the "Stow pet" button to "Stow mech" on Mechanists.
• Condensing these skills should allow more space to have all profession skills in one row rather than two stacked rows.

Traits

• Adept traits (the first column) resulting in different arm shapes on the mech is terrific. The master (second column) and grandmaster (third column) traits should also result in visual customizations for the mech. This will make up for the lack of visual customization when everyone's mech needs to be green.
• Master traits: Change the shape of the shoulders and/or the 4 back rods
• Grandmaster traits: Change the shape of the chest and/or the helm

Edited December 5, 2021 by Eddy.7051
Added note about the Crash Down skill

[Lae.2948]

There are many problems with the current mechanist design, many of which I have outlined in my contribution via my previous posts, and I am very happy Anet have actually implemented our feedback.

The overwhelming theme that has constantly brought up by the community is that the entire trait line only affects the Mech -- if the mech if dead, stunned or doing it's own thing because of poor AI and no attack function -- you are effectively a core engineer with only two trait lines equipped.. 

My Suggestion to give it some more viability/flare:
In addition to the Mech -- and as a justification for losing the tool-belt -- the player could have an extra "pet/utility" slot where they could CHOOSE a  turret they would like to equip onto their shoulder (similar to iron-man)
The Mechanist could use it's jade technology to augment and retrofit one of their turrets via a shoulder/back-brace onto the player. It would look similar to war-machine or ironman's shoulder gun. 

This would allow the player themselves to not feel so useless in isolation, and it could vicariously revive some old skills they ought to be shown some love. 

It may also be a solution to the out-right removal of  jade siphon cannon, which could be added as an option in addition to the currently available turrets you could mount on your shoulder.

The current turrets available are: 
Rifle Turret 
Flame Turret
Thumper Turret
Net Turret
Rocket Turret
Healing Turret (this could help alleviate the problem with Med-kit having no heal in PvE & WvW)

From a balance POV, they would essentially carry over the same statistics, firing rate and cooldown as the normal turrets, and you could still overcharge them at the price of it being disabled for the length of the cooldown, which in it's current form depends on the type of turret selected. 

Just a thought. The Mechanist ALMOST feels really good... we're almost there. 
Kind regards, 

[Sifolstour.3210]

6 hours ago, UndefinedLime.2063 said:

In addition to the Mech -- and as a justification for losing the tool-belt -- the player could have an extra "pet/utility" slot where they could CHOOSE a  turret they would like to equip onto their shoulder (similar to iron-man)

That sounds pretty good XD. +1 for the turret on our shoulders when mech is not summoned 🙂 .

[SeTect.5918]

Overclock Signet also still is very underwhelming.

The cooldown is too high but its mandatory bc of the mech resummon. (In fractals, raids, open world, wvw and maybe pvp)

• Reduce Crash Down cooldown from max 50 sec to max 30-35 sec.
• Remove the Mech summon on Overclock Signet.
• Reduce Overclock Signet cooldown from 90 sec to 30-35 sec.
• Give Overclock Signet a small additional passive effect.

Problem Solved. And maybe also:

• Give Crash Down some damaging conditions (Bleeding, Confusion and maybe burning) so its usable as opener for condi builds.

[bethekey.8314]

I played a lot of sPvP on Mechanist in the Beta, all sorts of builds. I was impressed and encouraged by the amount/quality of changes done after the first set of betas, many in the right direction. I hope the next set can be equally as good.

The Good

1. Adding in the pet controls was great. They feel responsive, commands interrupt pet actions to do what you say, when you say it. The AI can still be wonky at times, but setting the mech to "Avoid Combat" helps this a bit.
2. Whereas it was useless before, Shift Signet is amazing now. Maybe too amazing. I won't complain if you keep it this way, but it's semi-mandatory. I'd like to see some of the utility shifted into traits so that the utility slot isn't permanently given to Shift Signet. This will open up build options, something the Mechanist desperately needs.
3. Reducing the Mech's respawn cooldown was a good move. It no longer feels as punishing when it dies, especially with Overclock Signet and alacrity. This (and other reasons) makes Overclock Signet and alacrity feel essential to many builds, however.
4. I like the addition of Exigency Protocols to help solve the common "insta-death" issue with pet AI. The attempt to add in a Regeneration theme throughout Mechanist is also nice, but it falls short as the reliance on signets / lack of toolbelts reduce our access to Regeneration (see below).
5. The interaction between Sanctuary Runes, Alchemy, and the Barrier trait is great, but over-the-top. I am VERY concerned that Anet will kill this alacrity interaction without considering how much it propped up Mechanist this beta. Without Mace, barrier signet, and barrier traits, the alacrity uptime in PvP will be awful. This CD reduction was one of the only things making Signet-overloaded Mechanist bearable to play, as it increased frequency of meaningful button presses in the absence of kits, toolbelts, weapon swap etc. Consider adding in more innate sources of barrier (not reliant on Mace/Signets) or adding in an ICD somewhere in the alacrity combo. I'd prefer the former as needing Sanctuary runes is a crutch that further reduces build diversity.
6. Naming the Mech and having it stick is neat, thanks.

The Bad

1. Removal of Jade Siphon removed some of the Mech's character.
2. The ranged Mech auto-attacks are one of the only viable options. The melee bleed blades / fists feel identical, auto-attacks rarely hit (every class has tons of mobility now) outside of the F1, the bleed is unimpactful even on condi builds etc.
3. Ranged Mech auto-attacks are better than the on-use abilities in most situations. They are faster / track better and hit decently hard. Reliability is key here, and the slow-moving / long-cast / short AoE range on-use Mech abilities just aren't as reliable. Buff the reliability and/or effects of the on-use abilities while toning down ranged autos if you have to. These changes will go a long way toward skillful gameplay and reducing others' impression that the Mech AI is soloing them without meaningful input from the player.
4. Force Signet is now useless, much in the same way Shift Signet was.
5. I feel reliant on Signets over other utilities. Core skills are balanced around having a strong toolbelt ability (e.g. stunbreak, stealth, big damage). The lack of a toolbelt leaves Core skills feeling empty and Signets feeling mandatory, as they are balanced around not having a toolbelt component. This KILLS build diversity. Really, it feels awful. Without a weapon swap and incentive to choose many kits over signets, gameplay on Mechanist feels passive and slow. Without the trait that keeps Signet passives going after use, you're even encouraged to be passive. This Signet trait and alacrity are mandatory to just feel like you frequently have meaningful buttons to press.
6. Non-Signet healing abilities are either broken (Medkit) or come with the severe downside of not also healing your Mech. This continues the theme of Signet reliance and reduces build diversity.
7. The requirement of certain traits to get certain stats on your Mech limits build diversity and feels annoying. As a minor trait, let the Mech automatically inherit stats from the player / let us slot in a Mech amulet. This opens up slots for more interesting traits.
8. The Rocket Fist change was bad. It feels clunky and I can no longer setup my Mech's abilities with a stun, because the Mech will interrupt itself to also cast Rocket Fist.
9. Build diversity is further limited by the Mech auto-attack you choose. If I choose the ranged autos, how can I setup melee range Sky Circus, Superconducting Signet, Barrier, Projectile block etc? Do I have to hope my targeted enemy runs into the Mech's melee range? Do I have to tell my Mech to STOP attacking, return to me, and position myself on top of the enemy? How backwards is that?
10. Using Overclock Signet for damage comes at a huge tradeoff with Mech respawn and Signet recharge. Why is the damage so low then? This needs major buffs.
11. The Mech needs to be water-compatible in a water expansion.

 

Edited December 5, 2021 by bethekey.8314

[Greyforce.7956]

Overall I have enjoyed this beta playing Mechanist and will be looking forward to being able to do it again i feb. 2022. It will be my new main!

Input:

1. Do not let a Mech skill be bound to a engineer mace skill (3). This further reduces the usefulness of our limited pistol/rifle alternatives. Add it to all weapons skill 3 or perhaps make it a standard "toolbelt" no.4 skill after the 3 Mech skills.
2. The traditionel toolbelt should be available when the Mech is non active. The choice of a signet in a slot will then just return an empty toolbelt slot, since it has a passive effect. Otherwise the only option is to spec 4 or 5 signets for the build to work.
3. The Mech re-summon cooldown is still far too long. Without the Mech, a large part of your dps and tanking (its got hardly any of the scrapper tanking traits) is gone and if you specced deep into signets, you are a lame duck for 50 secs in all contents... 20 sec, no more! 

Edited December 5, 2021 by Greyforce.7956

[Nero.7369]

Well, a bit changed since last beta. But imo there are still plenty of issues and many of my last beta complains stilll apply.

The good things from the last changes

• More Stunbreak options, F2 tho badly locked
• More Condicleanse option, F2 tho badly locked
• Boon Copy to Mech, this feels strong and good
• Instant cast of the Shift Signet
• Increased aoe radius around the golem
• Better control over the golem and the raction
• Shorter cd on resummon the mech

Basic concept issues

• Split Traits, Stats of the Mech and the Mechloadout. Why is this a bad thing? More variety and flexibility is needed here. Example: If you want the Condi Cleanse, Stability and Stunbreak on F2, we are also forced into a mech with, additional concentration and we cant go for exta condi damage or power dmg stats.
• It really hurts when the mech is dead. The cd reduction helps tho. Still i would suggest that we have access to weaker versions of the F-Skills, when the mech is dead. Because the really neded stunbreak and condicleanse are not available if the mech is dead.
• No access to any toolbelt skills is still an issue. Yes you said it's intended still i refuse. Imo it's bad design that when certain skills get rendered useless or cut us off access to important stuff. Just move the current skills from F1-F4 to F2-F5 and add a F1 Slot where we can choose a single toolbelt skill. Two examples: Med Kit feels needed for a good support, tho without the f1 and lacking selfheal this feels really bad. Also That you cant take our kinda only burst skill the grenade barrage feels bad.
• Think about adding a weapon swap for this elite spec or massively boost the Mechs loadout skills in. (At least this feeld really bad in a compeitve szenario). For example the Untamed has also Two weapons and two pets with 3 Skills and also the additional F-Skills. Yes the pets are probably a bit weaker. (Well okay in PvE probably a lot, but in wvw only a bit). The mech should make up for our second weapon set, that check that skills like Spark Revolver can keep up with skills like Rapid Fire. But in wvw it does like 1/3 of rapid fires damage and has a cooldown twice as long. And that on the full offensive loadout for the golem.
• Still heavily relying on mech position doesn't feel good. For most defensive skills and effects from traits the radius is increased to 600 which is good and prevents the issue. For the offensive skills like Discharge Array or Superconducting Signet it is still bad tho. Those should channeled around the target, or around the engineer imo.
• A better alac share concept is needed. We are kinda forced to complete the mace autoattack chain over and over and this can prevent us from using other skill just to keep up alac, this doesn't feel well.
• We dont't see our mechs conditions, hard to keep him alive when we dont see that our fellow has tons of huring conditions on him. Wouldn't be that important if we wont rely so much on the mech tho.
• Add the mech for underwater combat!

Other thoughts

• The Shift Signet feels a bit overloaded. Specially the boon copy could be a trait maybe a a minor one because this feels really mandatory. This should probably also pass all healing effects from us to the golem, so other heal skills can be used.
• Rocket Fist Prototype could need a bit more punching power. Feels a bit like a wet noodle. Maybe add another Stack of burn, or two for pve. Also it needs some supportive effect here like the auto attack and Energizing Slam
• Overall the mace is kinda nice, tho it kinda misses some punching power

Edited December 5, 2021 by NeroBoron.7285

[Adamantium.3682]

Mechanist was improved nicely from first beta, I think it is viable now across multiple builds but could use a bit more fine tuning. Here are some spots I think could use a final look before EOD. Support seems like it's in a great spot now, other builds could use a few adjustments IMO.

 

• Mech
  • The Mech still doesn't respond immediately all the time. Sometimes (mostly PvP) when it is not using the skill you commanded you have no idea if it's just buggy or breakbar down. It would be really nice QOL to put a small blue line somewhere, under its health bar maybe or vertical next to the summon/dismiss button to show remaining breakbar. Make it red when broken or something, just too hard to keep track of.
  • Attack/return commands along with near mandatory use of Shift Signet (more on that below) has functionally fixed a lot of the pathing issues even if they are still there under the surface.
  • There are still mechanics it dies too and it is very inconsistent and confusing. I assume there are still bugs here, but W4 no mechanics kill it W1 VG greens kill it.
  • Maybe it is not possible, but I'll echo something from my first set of feedback: it would be really cool if the mech could do combo finishers. It has some obvious leaps, blasts, whirls it would add another level to use those combos in the right spot. Right now the mech feels like just press the skills off cooldown (for dps) so some additional choice of effects with finishers would be really cool I think.
  • Underwater is broken, which seems pretty intentional with the depth charges skill. I have to trust this means there will be basically no underwater combat in the future. There is so little of it in the game now this doesn't really bother me but it does make the mech come across as a bit "unfinished".

 

• Mace
  • Better but can't compete in DPS builds. For now I am okay with the Mech rocket attack being bound to Mace #3 because vanilla weapons don't need any more help (and it would thematically makes no sense). Also this is how Holo heat works. However the mace as a whole is not competitive with pistols for damage. I would like to see some buffs to the auto attack so that it is worth using in place of grenade spam. I appreciate that there were buffs from beta 1 but it is not enough when pistol is still benching so much higher and it's so much easier to use (range). Mace requires melee so inherently more difficult to use even if stacking is prevalent. Requires elite spec. I think there is justification to make Mace better condi damage. I'd love to fill a rotation with Mace autos instead of Grenade autos.
  • The change to 1/2 + 1/2 stun on Mace #3 is sort of annoying, doesn't give you as big an opening as you had before. I understand it is more breakbar damage but the duration made it more usable in the past.

 

• Signets
  • I have a concern with signets on Engineer as a concept. The whole idea of signets is hold for a passive effect, or use for a more powerful effect and temporarily lose the passive. That's great and on every other class that choice exists. With Engineer that is simply not a real choice, there's just no other skills to use. To hold signets you are stuck using 1 weapon or possibly the one kit you brought to complement the signets (and the same skills for 9 years). There is no weapon swap or attunements to compliment your skills you have 5 weapon skills only. In practice this means we are back to kit builds because the sacrifice for using traditional signets is too great.
  • Shift Signet is incredible, basically required in almost any build. On one hand that is bad, a single skill should not be required in almost all builds. On the other hand nerfing Shift Signet brings it down the level of the other signets and falls into the dilemma above where signets are just not attractive on Engineer. Some choice could be opened up by putting the boon share passive on a minor trait.
  • Rectifier Signet does basically nothing for the Mech due to high health pool. A proportional increase to what this heals on Mech would be nice. As of now our other heals are better the only thing the signet has going for it is keeping Mech alive. But with such small numbers it doesn't do that.
  • Barrier, Superconducting, Force all have their uses but they are outclassed by other options. They need to be closer to Shift's level to be viable options in builds against the same old kits we've been running for years. Need better active and passive effects across the board.
  • Overclock signet gets a special mention, it's just so bad. I like the idea of an emergency recall for Mech but if the tradeoff is 90s!?!? cooldown then I would rather remove that from this signet. This should be basically a Prime Light Beam coming from the Mech with confusion in addition to the burning. Maybe pull enemies into the beam instead of a knockback. It's just such a cool looking/sounding skill but damage is bad and the cooldown is dreadful. The passive is neat but will not make or break a build to a get a few more seconds on each signet. I'd like to see the active buffed a LOT, and the passive improved as well. Maybe put the Mech recall on the passive somehow like in addition to signet cooldown the summon mech cooldown after it dies is like -50%.

 

• Traits
  • Overall traits are good there's a couple head scratchers I will mention but you can fill out 2-3 decent builds from what is here now. I think the grandmaster traits are the messiest right now.
  • To counter the Mech skins/dyes complaint in every other post I would like to see the Mech Frame traits and Mech Core traits also affect the Mech skin like the Mech Arms do. It would be variety and more identifiable counter play in PvP. I'm not against skins/dyes but it just doesn't seem like how pets work in this game so this would be a nice compromise IMO.
  • Instead of toughness/vitality being added on every single minor trait now it's just 2/3. I don't know why this wasn't fully addressed. It's just stretching the functionality out to multiple places for no reason, put it all on one trait and free up a spot for another ability.
  • Mech Frame: Channeling Circuits - Crisis Zone should be a lightning field. It's just a small ring of white (red to enemies) very hard to see when it is active and where it is in the heat of combat.
  • Mech Core: Jade Dynamo - Jade Mortar is just not good, very low condition damage. This is the grandmaster skill for condi Mech it should be impactful but this one is bad. It seems it does more damage for power builds for some reason, hits hard with decent multiplier but it's in the condi trait line. The trait effect should be 100% of mech attacks are explosives just to start with but I have my issues with this being in condi trait line at all. This is a really cool and unique effect using another trait line for the mech so I like that but if you look closer at the explosives on hit effects they lean mostly power outside of one bleed (gain fury, ferocity, big boomer). This whole trait seems to lean more power in a condi line which is confusing.
  • Mech Core: J-Drive - Sky Circus damage it does is really low and the CC is okay but nothing to write home about for a grandmaster. The passive of this trait for the Mech to call down attacks when "away"... well the goal is to never have him away. So this part of the trait should not activate. If it does activate it should be massive damage but I would rather see it changed to something rewarding with the actual mech itself, which is the whole point of the spec. Another issue the signet passive being permanent. This is really tricky and fits in with my previous comments on signets. This feels very necessary to use signets effectively, you just can't hold on to them for their passive effects when you have nothing else to use on your skill bar. I would really like to see this move to a minor trait and make room for a fresh new effect (two new effects if we also drop the whole aerial bombardment thing).

 

I'm encouraged by the good work done between betas, I really look forward to playing the release version of Mechanist, hopefully with some of the above adjustments. Thanks for reading!

Edited December 5, 2021 by Adamantium.3682

[Dark Red Killian.3946]

I am not sure if this has been mentioned, but I have sat back and read people’s comments throughout the two betas, and I have only just touched Mechanist a few times myself. I main engineer since day one of this game. Can we change the mech F1-F3 skills to be no longer tied to which trait you select, but the skill you choose for 6-9. Signets tied to new mech skills. Core engi skills are toolbelt skills that the mech uses. This way you can keep functionality of toolbelt skills. F4 is added and F5 would be summon mech.

[DragoTheWise.7256]

After playing this round, I feel like the Mechanist is getting close, but still needs some work. I want to tackle first the items that were highlighted on the forum post prior to the beta.
1) Lack of easy-to-use pet controls-

It was nice to have the added pet controls. From a support perspective, it can still be a little clunky for specific positioning since a lot of barrier/boons come from the mech.

Suggestion: It may be good to put the signets activate abilities always on the Engi just to help a little bit and transfer of the "power" to the Engi player.

2) The Mech Command skills (F1, F2, F3) can feel unreliable

I didn't have any noticeable issues on the commands, so thank you for fixing them up.

I do find the change to rocket punch good/bad. The good is that you can decide when to use it make the Engi more in command of the mech and the two working together. The drawback is that it is now bound to mace. If the Engi uses other weapons, they will lose out on that ability.  But in the end, that may be OK making the mace have OK damage but good utility versus the other weapons which would simply have way more damage.

3) Too much power is loaded into the Mech, instead of the Engineer player.

Honestly, these changes coupled with the signet passive shares didn't feel like more power was transferred to the Engi player, it just made the mech weaker and just gave the mech what the Engi got from signet passives. I still don't understand the note about crit capping when the Engi has to really push precision in order for that to work without traits/other sources of crit % don't transfer to the mech. It just doesn't seem to work out for power builds.

Suggestion: At this point, it may just be better to have the mech 100% get all of the Engis stats and then adjust the traits/skills accordingly. I said previously I liked the holosmith route to making/forging your holoforge via the traits, but a difference I'm realizing is that middle tree kinda hampers flexibility due to each trait along that column gives the Mech the 100% of a set stat inheritance. Holosmith wasn't anchored with this issue and really had that "lightsaber" customization feel and gave the holosmith flexibility. The Mech could be like that too, but the stat inheritance needs to go from that middle column and integrated as part of the Mechanist as a whole with 100% stat inheritance. This will take a bit of tweaking on the mech itself but it could also free up some of those traits to give something to the Engi Player instead.

4) Related to #3: Boons on the Mech are an immense amount of potential power,

This change was nice, but pretty much makes shift signet mandatory and really loads down shift signet. Don't get me wrong, I kinda like really like turning the signets up to 11 since there isn't a tool belt nor a weapon swap for the engi, but this functionality should just be part of the Mechanist without requiring a signet.

Suggestion: Make the boon copying part of the Mechanist minor traits.

I do like the addition of inheriting the passive from signets was a good addition.

5) The Mech can die suddenly in some content, leaving you with a long 'penalty' cooldown.

The penalty is still a bit too long. I am glad that the CD was pulled down, but it would be nice to do another 20s reduction.

I do like the additions for more effective regen as this is the first trait that benefits the Engi, will touch on that later.

Suggestion: Reduce the CD even further.

 

Now for more thoughts/suggestions, this is strictly from a PvE perspective-

General Feedback for Support and Condi play: I was able to play the Mechanist more both on support and condi DPS as these two seem to be the better routes to take while power is still lacking. I won't comment on power further as I didn't really touch on it this time. In general, both support and condi feel good to play though support more so than condi. Condi Still need to have at least two kits due to Engis limited choice of utility skills since we no longer have a tool belt.

Support Suggestions:

• I don't know why the alacrity duration was reduced for Channeling Conduits on barrier proc. This forces a bit more just sitting on mace auto which isn't as engaging. I would like to see the duration reverted back to 1 sec or even a little bit more to 1.25s.
• Have the barrier signet active ability always on the Engi. With the shift to wanting the engi player holding more power, it would probably be more reliable for the barrier/projectile blocker to simply always on the Engi given the Engi player more control.
• I don't think I saw any changes, but I would still like boon duration percentages to apply to the Mech.
• I am still a little worried about this against the 10 man alacrity professions. It won't be a problem in 5-man content. I didn't get a chance to test it in fractals, but still something to think about when balancing professions.

 

Condi Suggestions:

• Just like under Support, have the condi signet active ability always on the Engi. Same reasoning as before more control and power to the Engi player.
• Last Condi trait still feels a bit weak. The mortar doesn't do a lot of condi damage but I think what really should be changed is explosion chance to be increased to 100%. The 33% just feels too low to be impactful. Perhaps try 66% first and go from there.
• Would like the Mech to inherit condi duration % increases.

 

The rest for both support and condi felt good and I do like the buffs/positive adjustments that were given this round.

 

Specific Feedback:

I want to wrap up with more specific feedback regarding the spec.

• More traits to affect the engi player- With a push to give more power to the Engi player, it would be nice to have some of the traits to affect the Engi player. The grandmaster minor was a nice touch, but I feel that a few more should affect the Engi. When the Mech is dead, it really is a Specialization that is then kitten to just two trait lines and that just doesn't feel good. So much is lost/unusable that we haven't seen anywhere else. Without a toolbelt nor weapon slot, the Engi really relies on the Mech to be alive 100% and the loss is just too punishing.
• Pump up signets a bit more due to lack of toolbelt and weapon swap- I doubt we will get a weapon swap and we may not even get any portion of our toolbelt back. If this is truly the case, the signets need to be amazing. Other classes have two weapon slots + their  profession mechanic to work well with signets, the Mechanist not as much. Giving up our entire tool belt, the thing that has given us flexibility due to lack of weapon swap for years, is a big change and needs to be considered with it being entirely removed. One suggestion would be to just make the passive on the signets always on even when they are activated without the need of the J-Drive trait equipped. This could also allow that final trait to have some extra tuning. Another thought is just to add additional functionally to all of the signets to make them more impactful. Giving up our tool entire tool belt needs to have a greater transfer of power/utility to somewhere else to the Engi Player.  
• Return tool belt F1 or do something for medkit- I still suggest at least moving the skills over by 1 to the right in order to allow our heal skills to keep its tool belt skill. Medkit is the obvious example of what is affected by the complete loss of our toolbelt. The medkit works well with support focused Mechanist but is just punishing to not have that self heal available. Allowing at least the F1 available could also allow a little more flexibility given back to the Engi. A Cond DPS would be able to bring AED to assit with CC bars in raids, for instance. I understand that we won't get the full toolbelt back, but having the healing skill toolbelt ability is just too important. Even if we don't get the F1 back, something at least needs to be done for Medkit to get our self heal back.
• Better tooltips/UI- Tooltips still differ between what is on the skill bar for the mech vs what is in the trait window. While some folks will notice this and know where to look, the majority of players will not notice this and make improper decisions based on this false tool tip stats. We also need a breakbar to be displayed for the Mech. World bosses/Open world and even some busy raid bosses can make it difficult to see if the Mech is broken or not.

 

Final Notes:

Despite the wall of text I put up, I am really looking forward to playing with the Mechanist again. This round of updates were going in some good directions and I feel optimistic that more changes will do it good by the time EoD launches. It is a fun spec but has some rough edges that I can tell ya'll are really trying to smooth out. I will miss my Mech buddy, but look forward to reuniting again once the X-pack rolls around. I'm hoping that we are giving a bit more flexibility so that I can play with a variety of builds and find some that are fun to play.

[Overedge.2435]

Like in my previous post after the first beta, I've tried not to read too much of others' feedback before typing this post, in an attempt to not color my own thoughts and opinions.

Ultimately, after the fourth beta, I feel like Mechanist is different from before, but not necessarily better. Please keep in mind that my thoughts come from the viewpoint of someone who primarily plays WvW these days. My short-and-sweet summary of the Mechanist is thus: The tradeoff for the mech is too much, in no small part due to how poor the pet system in Guild Wars 2 is -- that's meant as a fair assessment, not a snide insult: even your own beta previews had bugs, so you are aware of it.

1. I understand that the original idea was the have a powerful pet, and the weaker engineer was the tradeoff. But because of the zerg mentality that has been promoted in WvW with every single balance patch, this pet is doomed to failure. Core rangers can swap to their other pet if their pet is killed. Soulbeasts can merge with a dead pet to revive it. Mechanist is put on a long cooldown unless they pop their ultimate, but the mech will just quickly die again right after. The breakbar means nothing when the standard engagement starts with a field of red circles filled with CC. In smaller encounters it's fine, but havoc is all but dead because what can a group of 5-10 do against the blobs of 30+ that dominate the maps? I've seen some posts where people suggest the mech is used as an exo-suit, similar to a necromancer shroud, as opposed to a pet. At first I was dismissive of this, but I feel that overall, changing to something like this would be a much better choice than a pet.
2. In the Mechanist reveal, the comment was made that the developers would love to see a five-signet build. However, our attack skills are balanced around having kits (much like our utility skills are balanced around having the toolbelt, but that's another issue entirely). I constantly see people complain about how overpowered the grenade kit is, and you know what? As someone who runs it, I 100% agree -- it's basically our only option for a power build because everything else is weak in comparison. As a serious question, does anyone in the development team play engineer? I feel that many of the decisions made for the Mechanist were very tone-deaf in regards to balance. The effect from Mech Core: J-Drive that states "Signet skills gain improved passive effects and continue to grant their passive bonuses while recharging" needs to be moved to a minor trait and available to all Mechanists regardless of major traits. Consider it a fair trade for losing our entire toolbelt.
   1. The aerial bombardment from J-Drive should become an ammo skill located somewhere on the toolbelt area when the mech is away, and should be ground-targeted. The automatic firing is nice but makes it impossible to escape combat.
   2. As a side-note, I can begrudgingly accept the loss of most of the toolbelt if other factors are altered to make the payoff equal to the cost. However, at least the healing skill's toolbelt ability, especially with the Med Kit, needs to remain available. F1 - healing toolbelt, F2-F3-F4 - mech skills, F5 - summon/dismiss mech, F6-F7 attack target/return to me.
3. Continuing on the above suggestion to make stronger signets more readily available in exchange for losing our class mechanic toolbelt, I suggest allowing Mechanist to have a normal weapon swap. You were able to remove weapon swap from the Warrior/Bladesworn, after all. This gives us more options to encourage not relying on a weapon kit, and also helps towards making up for lost attacks from the missing toolbelt.
   1. On that note, tying the mech's rocket punch to mace 3 was a terrible idea. I don't have a solution for you, but that was definitely not it.
4. The mech must be usable underwater. I know underwater isn't a huge focus, but as a standard reminder that needs to be reiterated over and over again: Without the mech, the Mechanist is half a class. Only two effective traitlines, no toolbelt, and no weapon swap. Remember what I said earlier about the cost of the tradeoff not being worth the payoff? Compare a ranger without a pet to a Mechanist without one: no significant loss to the ranger's power and still plenty of synergy from three full traitlines.
5. Explosives is primarily a power-focused tree. Why does the Mechanist condi traitline synergize with Explosives? This is another example of what makes me feel like there aren't any/many engineer players on the development team, or at least not ones that play competitively. Sure, Firearms and Explosives are gonna be used in open world together, but it's difficult to fit both on a competitive build if you want to, you know, live. 
6. While some matchups are better than others, any class with a bit of mobility and kiting ability is going to shred it. Neither the mech nor the Mechanist can keep up with a longbow ranger, who can simply whittle away at the mech (and again after it's resummoned), and then do the same to the Mechanist. I tried fighting a dune roller and couldn't touch him, both myself and my pet were simply too slow, whereas my scrapper would have torn it apart.

I'm sure I'll think of more, which I'll add via edits later. I honestly don't really have anything positive to say about the Mechanist -- it's plagued with too many issues, both from balance and from system limitations. Ultimately:

The Mechanist isn't worth the cost of admission. Signets can be powerful, but don't fully make up for the loss of both toolbelt abilities and the loss of weapon kits required in order to slot them. The mace is underwhelming and is basically necessary in order to take advantage of all of the mech's abilities. The Mechanist's heavily pet-focused traits leave the player's character too weak when the pet is not available, making it easy for high-mobility and high-power enemies to neuter the Mechanist by focusing the pet down first. I feel that the vision the development team has for the Mechanist cannot be realized within the confines of Guild Wars 2.

[Rising Blade.9206]

addition of f6-f7 is nice, going to be a pain finding a suitable keybind for it though. was still decent and the same like the last beta, looking forward to release.

still has the issue of alchemy traitline being dead for the spec.

pet attack bound to weapon skills seems like a neat idea, though don't like the fact that rocket punch is bound to mace 3 only.  would be nice if you could modify the bound skills or just make it that all weapon skill 3 procs golem rocket punch.

[Limbo.4087]

Minor traits in Tools core specialization 
still do not work in conjunction with the new specialization

[Ghostpilot.6237]

7 hours ago, Limbo.4087 said:

Minor traits in Tools core specialization 
still do not work in conjunction with the new specialization

And Static Discharge fires into the dirt.  I don't know why they haven't made Static Discharge target on its own after all these years.

[BlackSheep.2195]

Simple and direct, Engi without toolbelt isn't Engi,  bring it back with new signet tool belt skills or you will make all Engi utilities useless.  The tradeoff is there, we can't use mecha + tool belt. By the way Mechanist is amazing, I can't wait to play it.

[Adamantium.3682]

Condi signet could be nerfed about 15-20% but place on both Mech and Engi

Reward good placement to double drop

[SeTect.5918]

1 hour ago, Adamantium.3682 said:

Condi signet could be nerfed about 15-20% but place on both Mech and Engi

Reward good placement to double drop

I dont think they should make it like that. 

They should 

 - Swap the passives of gm1 and gm3 trait, so condi builds keep the passive bonus after activating, bc power builds dont need this trait that much + power builds also get a better passive then.

- place the active effect on both mech and Player but only let targets get affected by one of them at the same time.

- no nerf or buff to the General conditions on the condi signet.

[FalsePromises.6398]

I liked the mechanist during the beta, felt solid and the better boon synergy with shift signet was pretty nice. I'm glad that a dps benchmark that dropped a kit for shift signet was doing well. That said, I do think there's some things I'd adjust.

1. Sky Circus is still really weak damage from what I saw. Could definitely use a damage buff. Side note: you could also make this skill a ground targeted leap, which would make a lot of sense given it's in the ranged mech skill line: giving the mechanist access to an easy ground targeted mech reposition would be KILLER since your mech doesn't stay in predictable or advantageous positions when at range.
2. I still think that there's room for improvement on barrier signet so as to not just be a support-only signet: adding pulsing stability onto each pulse for 1 second duration would greatly increase the "utility" aspect of dps mechanists that was so proudly proclaimed in their trailer and help give support mechanist the last little bit of stability they need to be full and well rounded. In my opinion, one stability skill for one stack that's packed with so many other effects that it's only usable once every 40 seconds is a bit of a bite in the butt (referring to crisis zone's command skill). 
3. Overclock Signet seems to be at an awkward place with one skill that's weak and should have a low cooldown and another effect that's strong and should have the current cooldown. I think a good fix to that would be to keep the current jade buster cannon values (or maybe slightly tone them up) and either reduce the base cooldown to 30 seconds and make the mech recall function triple its cooldown OR keep the same cooldown but give it a 66% cooldown discount when you use it for the buster cannon instead of the recall. This will encourage the use of the buster cannon more freely without fearing being locked out of your elite recall effect if your mech dies shortly after using the cannon (and would also make the cannon much better dps). 
4. The mech calldown and dismissal/death is still a bit awkward and slow. The mech will often crash down and sit there for 3 seconds before doing anything (without even doing the crash down animation either), and the dismissal is like 3-5 seconds long. I think for mech death, an explosion might be a lot more sensible (because if we're being real, there's no benefit to dismissing your mech in-combat since the cooldown scales by remaining health, so there's not any worry about clunkiness out of combat with the dismissal animation). 
5. I don't know if mech does this since there's been some back n forth debate on whether or not it's legit, but if it doesn't already, please make the mech inherit your condition duration and boon duration percentages instead of concentration/expertise. It'd make optimizing gear and builds so much more sensible. 
6. I do kinda agree with the guy above me now that I think about it: swapping the signet/explosive passives for grandmaster top and bottom would make a lot more sense since condi relies far more on using signet skills than power does and power could benefit far better from explosive skill procs in explosives line. Gosh, even the orbital strike passive in explosives you'd get would make a lot more sense tied to a power trait that has its own form of orbital strike passives rather than a CC/burn skill trait. Regardless, even if power builds want that signet passive, the jade mortar is strong regardless of power or condi, whereas the sky circus is purely a power skill, so it'll make sense to make the jade mortar have the signet passive and the sky circus the more power-benefitting one. 

All that said, love the touch-ups to the mechanist between the two betas, I am genuinely impressed that so much was fixed in so little time. Only other things I could possibly think of were maybe to tone up some mace damage, but honestly it's already quite a strong support weapon so I'm not upset if it stays where it is... but it does deserve some more damage, condi and power, if that can be packed on. Spread a little bit more burning on it and a little higher power coefficients, and that could probably remedy it. 
 

Side note: ADD A "COPY MY BOONS TO MY PET" COMMAND INTO THE RAID TRAINING AREA CONSOLE!!! Like the one ranger already has 🙂 Please and thank you 🙂 

Edited December 7, 2021 by FalsePromises.6398

[Kodama.6453]

Thinking about mechanist some more, what really strikes me as weird on the spec is the lack of/mismatched combo potential. Skills which would make sense to be combo finishers aren't, fields are generally rare even on skills it would make sense on and there is also a weird case of a field type being granted just for thematical reason but without any good gameplay combo potential.

Changes which could get made to improve this (not all need to be done):

• Mech Arms: Jade Cannons: auto attacks have a 20% chance to be projectile finishers
• Mech Command: Rolling Smash: leap finisher added
• Mech Command: Jade Mortar: leaves behind a fire combo field which ticks burning (remove 3 initial burn stacks?)
• Mech Command: Barrier Burst: water combo field added
• Mech Command: Sky Circus: blast combo finisher added
• Force Signet: blast combo finisher added
• Superconducting Signet: replacing lightning field with an ethereal field (more synergy for additional confusion stacks)

Edited December 7, 2021 by Kodama.6453

[Naxos.2503]

I still feel like Confusion, and especially Confusion on Engineer is far too weak to be used in place of the double pistol combo. There should be a better way to support confusion for the mace to be viable as a condi weapon.