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Mechanist Feedback Thread


Fire Attunement.9835

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4 minutes ago, azarhal.3086 said:

The break bar feels kinda useless, PvE enemies with CC broke it in one attack on HoT map. I wish my CC broke enemies breakbar that fast. As it is currently balanced, it feels more like it's there to nerf the mech because it make it unable to do anything for 5 seconds and not there to help it.

The breakbar in my experience has been generally helpful, but I do think it goes down too fast. However, I don't think that's a fault of the mech's design as much as it is of breakbars. Breakbars are balanced for player attacks specifically, not AI attacks, and some mobs (like in the HoT zones) can spam CC to the extent that no player can. Of course, usually you can evade that CC, but the mech isn't really able to do that.

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I like the mechanist. For the most part it feels fun, but it does take some getting used to. Right now, the big thing I wouldsay is the lack of toolbelt skills. Also, there is really no reason to stow the mech as far as I found. Often, when I had the mech stowed, it would appear without me summoning it which was annoying. My advice would be to move the stow ability from f4 to f5, to be in line with the other elite specs for engineer. It would be especially nice is the f1 was changed back to the toolbelt skill for heal, because that is arguably the most important toolbelt skill and would allow you to take medkit, which is very useful for a support build. The f2-f4 would become the mech skills. Also it would be nice to have access to the f1-f4 toolbelt skills when the mech is stowed. So much of the core engineer traits revolve around the toolbelt, and to lose it completely sucks. Also, if stowing the mech gave you the toolbelt skills, it would make the trait that calls down an orbital laser beam when the mech is stowed actually useful. If the toolbelt was added back in some capacity, I think this spec would be perfect from a game design perspective (although I'm sure the balance would need tweaking)

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I think the Discharge Array F2 should be a lightning field - it literally says the golem becomes a lightning rod. I also can't seem to get a combo going from the mace 2 leap in Superconducting Signet. I think that must be a bug. 

 

Also, the player occasionally says "Rocket Punch!" when the golem uses its rocket punch AA. Is this intended, or is it meant to be for your own mace 3?

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-Been playing an engi since 2013 and put together my own build, been using it so long without any complaints that it's hard for me to pop into this new elite and be impressed by the new skills.  But, signets... signets are just never that cool-looking to me, and I only use them when necessary on any class.  Mostly for passive run speed.
-I've been using the condi-clear elixir on my toolbelt as a clutch, sometimes emergency condi clear in addition to the main Elixir C.  I don't like losing it, and I don't like having the toolbelt skills in general being attached to the golem no matter what kit you have on or what skills you have in 6-9.
-Idk if this is just me, but I feel like the mech also doesn't stay in my vision as well as I would like, I feel like it's hard for me to keep track of what it's doing sometimes, and I really wish there were more direct controls for it, so that it felt more like a tool.  With it auto-attacking by default, it feels like a ranger pet.
-General appearance of the golem: on its bottom half, the jade pieces look fine, but the jade on the shoulders/back/top part of the golem look really untextured, too light in color, and overall just kind of plastic-looking.  It doesn't look right and it doesn't match the bottom half of the golem, it's weird.  Maybe it's not completely finished yet or something, but the top jade parts need to be fixed to look more like the bottom ones.
-I do like the visual of the golem's elite skill beam, that looks pretty cool.

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8 hours ago, SeTect.5918 said:

Please let us dye away the green colour of jade on the mech.

Get a bucket of colour and throw the mech parts into it. Problem solved xD
No seriously, the green doesnt fit to engineer at all. And if we can dye the mech a bit, people that actually want the green can even keep it.

 

I was thinking this very thing when I was playing it. It'd certainly make up for Engi having only one pet VS Ranger's petting zoo. Being able to dye the golem's parts would be really fun.

Edited by Doggie.3184
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Here's my initial feedback.

The Mech

1. Visibility issue #1

Mech function icons are too dark and very difficult to see when the ability is ready from cooldown. We need a brighter indicator to show when the ability is ready for recast.

 

2. Visibility Issue #2

In large fights, it's impossible to find your mech and know what's going on. We need some kind of indicator icon above our mech so we know where it is and what it's doing. The indicator icon could provide a graphic to show what ability the mech is doing (normal attack or activating a toolbelt skill). Sometimes there's no animation and it's even worse not knowing if the mech is contributing to the fight.

 

3. Visibility Issue #3

Sky Circus needs more visibility. It's just a dinky little green ball. For an areal bombardment, I'd like it to be a bit more flashy. At the least, on par with Renegade Citadel Bombardment. The other two ranged skills, Spark Revolver and Core Reactor Shot are much more visible in comparison and they look really nice.

 

4. Usability issue

Playing 8 years of engineer, I'm accustomed to having 5 toolbelt/function skills. The 5th skill is used to activate the ultimate ability (Orbital Strike, Function Gyro, Holosmith). With only 3 abilities for the mech, I often confuse summoning and disbanding the mech as the 5th function skill instead of it actually being the 4th skill. It would be nice if you found a 4th ability to give the mech so the function skills remain consistent between specializations.

 

5. Combat Issue #1

The mech seems to pick targets of its own. If I target another enemy and activate a mech ability, it will continue to target whoever it is focusing on. This is counter-intuitive as I expect the mech to focus on my target.

 

6. Combat Issue #2

Sometimes the mech just sits there and does nothing. I'm thinking maybe it's stunned? But there's no feedback to inform me what happened.

 

7. Combat Issue #3

The mech is unable to determine if its ranged attacks can actually hit the enemy. For example, enemies on rooftops covered by walls and such. The mech will just fire blindly at the wall without doing any damage.

 

8. Mech Movement Sensitivity

The mech is a bit too sensitive to my movements. If I step away just a few feet, it stops what it's doing to run towards me. I feel there should be better elasticity here.

 

9. Mech Movement Issue

When mounting or using a glider, the mech disbands and then re-summons itself once I land or dismount. It seems to auto target a nearby monster as well, which puts me into combat that I may not want. I feel like it should just use its rocket boosters to keep up with me. It's a bit immersion breaking to see it depart and come back like that, and a bit annoying if it lands on an enemy and puts me into combat.

 

10. Small polish request, but I feel the battle mech should have some voice responses to certain activities.

 

The Mace

1. Usability

The mace is slow to use. The ability cast times are half what they actually are. Mace Strike is more like 1 second rather than ½. Rocket Fist is more like 1½ seconds rather than 3/4 second. The projectile is also very slow. Probably similar to Necromancer's staff attack projectile. Overall, it's just not a fun weapon IMO and the damage output is significantly weaker than pistol/pistol while exposing me in melee range. It also feels like it's missing that "engineer" signature to it. I feel like Energizing Slam should give super speed and Rocket First should give explosive knockback. Something along those lines to make it feel more like an engineers weapon.

Edited by Nate.8146
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After a few hours trying the mechanist, IMO, the golem pet thing it's a mess. i would prefer a summon system like the guardians spirits weapon, where you cast a specific golem tie to the mastery trait, and in a similar way, a golem ports in, do the skill, and then fly away/explode/idk. 

Mace also feels weird and slow, like even more slow than the scrapper hammer, and the confusion it's kinda bad.

Just my 2 cents for future conversations....

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I was really hoping the mech would operate more like ventari tablet so it would be positioned where we want it and it would be a platform to use skills from, but it is what it is I guess. If we are going with pet AI, then we need better pet AI and better tools. Here's my feedback.

  1. We need bindable attack and return buttons.
  2. Add a "guard location" button that roots the golem in place and attacks targets that come in range.
  3. We need a way to teleport the golem back to us.
  4. Remove the golem legs and just make it float like a jade construct. It looks weird transitioning from jets to walking. It already floats on top of its legs so not really sure why it has legs at all. Would be better to just have it zip around with the jets constantly.
  5. It's very very cool that the arms change when you select the first trait. I don't want to sound like I don't appreciate that, but it's weird that the 2nd and 3rd traits don't change the way the golem looks. That would really  be the cherry on top of this concept.
  6. We need toolbelt skills back.
  7. Mace is floaty and boring. skill 2 feels really out of place. Skill 3 needs more oompf to the sound and animation. Sounds could be the biggest problem. Sounds like I'm hitting someone with a pillow.
    1. Overall this feels less impactful than guardian mace (which I've always had a slight beef with). It's almost like the animations were designed to be faster but slowed down for balance reasons.
    2. I like the idea of a "techy" mace. So why not make skill 2 mess with gravity or something and apply a float when it lands or something interesting.
  8. Rolling Smash/Explosive knuckle - Increase the ranges. It's very annoying having the mech take 30 minutes to waddle over to the target.
  9. Crisis Zone - This skill has no animation?
Edited by BeardRex.6739
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I am really loving the Mech! 

The only things I would improve are:

1- name changing the Mech to allow numbers and symbols

2- possibility to recolor the mech

3- weapon swap would make the combat more adaptable and interesting 

For the rest I absolutely love this spec! Thank you! 

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I tried it underwater and the single ability we get instead of being able to have a Mech really doesn't make up for losing the toolbelt skills. 

I also tried Mechanist with Mace without the Mech around and I'm not feeling that underpowered. I'm probably not going to solo Champions without the Mech, but I did fine against Veteran level enemies and small groups. I don't feel the lost of the toolbelt overland personally.

Edited by azarhal.3086
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Easy and boring. Just sat there with a rifle while daddy mech beat my bullies.  The lack of interaction with the mech is what makes it boring.  I would be okay with removing auto attacks for more significant burst on the skills, which I think is healthier than a ranged auto that crits for 3k.

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Not sure if anyone else mentioned this yet, but similar to most ranger players, I put my mech on passive since I do not want the mech running around wild attacking things when I got hit without a mount.

 

Then I found out an issue, if my F1-F3 skills are on cooldown, there is no way for me to command the mech to do normal attack. I guess I can still press F4 to stop the mech from attacking...

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I enjoyed playing this Spec. Although I think the numbers could be tweaked down a bit as right now it seems like in group plays you do significant more  damage than anyone else.

The trait line felt like it gave the Mech some good versatility. I didn't have much trouble synching it with other traits.

I liked the signets, specially the movement one. The ability to teleport with your Mech to the location felt like a nice activation.

The mace felt...The mace plays exactly like the Holomancer's sword. The effects are a bit different but the game plays feels the same.  Having skill 2 activate differently would make the weapon feel more distinct from the sword.

The skill and mechanic to send the mech away felt weird. My mech kept glitching and falling out of the sky randomly if I had it active and started gliding or jumped on a mushroom.

The one thing though that I kind of wish for, was different Mech models.  Not different skills just different looks for the Mech, maybe even some color options. Having the ability of just dropping a second mech to replace the old one as oppose to having it rocket  into space would feel better imo.

 

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Bug:  Jade Mech pet name.  This may have already been mentioned, but there seems to be an issue with the naming of the Jade Mech. I like that I can change its name to like how Zojja has Mr. Sparkles or Taimi & Scruffy, but the name change does not appear to last. It will stay for the battle, but reverts back to default if I mount, glide, or stow the mech, etc.. Hoping the name I assign can stick around throughout instead of having to redo the name every few minutes.

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So far I like it.

 

I have tested Marauders build and vipers build and the vipers build blows the marauders away. 

Few issues I have are...

 

-Move "Recall Mech" to f5 so you can put "Return to Me" on f4 

 

-Fix the pathing. on fractals 24, first boss, the golem will sit in the middle platform during updraft phase when you have to just up the updraft to each platform to kill a veteran on each one.

 

-"Discharge Array" sometimes when i use this command, the golem sits just out side of the range that the circle needs to apply the conditions.

 

-The damage of "Sky Circus" sucks. Needs a buff. The utility is decent though but not amazing.

 

-Mech death is too punishing. Lower base cool down to 60-70 seconds. The class is useless without the mech you are an engi with only 2 trait lines without it.

 

-"Jade Dynamo" needs to improve the 33% explosion chance to 50% or do away with the chance entirely.

 

-Give us weapon swap in combat >:D (kidding but not kidding :P)

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After messing around in PVE with the mecanist here are my thought:

 

-If you spec with a zerk build coupled with the Explosive trait, the golem deals a lot of damage, which is nice. I have found overall the range option reduces the cluncky AI path finding, allowing it to more often deal damage rather than move around. However the survivability is complete garbage. While it does have 42k HP, that number quickly vanish the moment your golem is targetted by a champion. Against foes with AOE attack / small wave of Vet or Elite mob, the golem loses too much HP easily and after you are forced either to heal it if you're running the healing signet, or to recall it for repair and wait hours for the CD to refresh. 

 

-Using Berserk gear means you're paper, everyone knows that but the Mecanist survivability when the golem isnt on the field is just.....complete garbage and the damage is poor.  I've tried using grenade and kite but you're just a worse version of core engi and the signet doesnt provide much help.

 

-A boon support build, using all the middle skill in the Mecanist trait coupled with the Elixir trait can potentially be viable. I'll do some more testing but the F3 skill coupled with Celerity + Mace auto attack + Alacrity can give some nice barrier and group Alacrity. Maybe with a Power/Precision/Ferocity/Concentration gear set, it can fit a group.

 

-The elite signet is a must have.

 

-I think the shadow step signet could be an instant break stun cast, it wouldnt make it OP and it would give a bit more survivability.

 

-I think the golem control should be the following :

F1 : order the golem to engage the target

F2: first skill

F3:second skill

F4: third skill

F5: order the golem to come at your side

F6: recall the golem for repair

While the F1 is just me wanting a dedicated agro button (if it's not implemented it's ok I wont cry) I genuinely think a proper button to ask your golem to come and stay at your side is a must, especially considering how heavy the punishement for letting it die is.

 

I still have more testing to do but overall my main complain is the survivability and the damage output when the golem isnt on field. It is already hard to survive on your own but you also have to maintain the golem alive while using its cluncky AI and movement. 

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Look, the game is turning out GREAT...but you HAVE to let these guys change the Mech COLOR!  All I see are these big GREEN glowing mechs bouncing around...

Please, give them an option to somehow change the "color" or glow..even if its just like a set 5 colors....otherwise this just looks so over the top generic!

 

thank you, and great job so far.

🙂

Edited by Wrain.6792
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  • Wrain.6792 changed the title to I dont even PLAY an engineer and this needs to be fixed anet :( please!

As mentioned before - mechanist should be given his tool belt back when no mech active - giving it away is a bit too much for 100s cooldown. And there are a lot of skills on tool belt that are essential to engie gameplay (like bandage self, and most of the stun breaks are on toolbelt).

 

2nd of all, this cd is just enormous.. mechanist is an engie with a pet, industrial version of a ranger, but ranger gets 60s cooldown on his pet dying, and always has the second one to swap to. Mechanist on the other hand is half the core engie on mech dying.

 

And one another thing - do not send back the mech when mounting up! It goes on a 10s cd whenever you mount (given he's full health) which is just plain annoying. Rangers always have their pet active. The moment they dismount, it's up.

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First, I want to say I've absolutely fallen in love with the spec: mechanist checks the boxes of everything I wanted from the third engineer elite spec and then some! It feels GREAT in open world for the most part (as much as expected for a beta, at least) and benchmark is alright. I do have some feedback though. I've been discussing with a lot of people even before beta started so it might be a bit lengthy. I've divided it into three sections: bugs, weaknesses/kinks, and conceptualization. 

 

Bugs (that I've noticed so far)

  1. Mech loses its name when it is dismissed and resummoned. 
  2. Mace autoattack third chain skill doesn’t apply barrier to nearby allies (it didn’t initially have this bug, but it appeared after a patch shortly after beta launch). 
  3. The mech has some tracking issues when using a movement skill in its F1 slot: it may run to the side of a target before it decides to use its leap.
  4. If you make a mech cast a command skill while you're running and you stop moving during its cast, it will get stuck in its animation loop. 
  5. The F1/F3 skills are unaffected by alacrity for some reason.
  6. Middle grandmaster’s F3 skill produces less duration than indicated fury. 
  7. Mech command F1/F3 skills have really dark portraits that, with no cooldown numbers, are really hard to tell the remaining cooldowns of because the decreasing black indicator blends in with the pictures. 
    1. I also believe F1/F3 are supposed to have cooldown number indicators on their buttons like F2.

Weaknesses/Kinks

  1. Should buff the damage values of mace skills power-wise and/or condi-wise to make them less deceptively weak about their offensive capabilities. Very promising weapon, but it doesn't deal enough damage to shake up engineer as much as it should. 
    1. Also mace auto's third strike is a little janky, it appears to strike a little too early in the skill cast duration with an awkwardly fast animation and then has an awkwardly clunky aftercast. 
  2. Make mech inherit your non-stat-based percent bonuses e.g. bonus condition duration from sigil of malice or nightmare runes (including specific condition duration bonuses from things like smoldering sigil or serrated steel) and bonus boon duration from sigil of concentration or monk runes, etc. to increase the efficiency and sensibility of player gear setups. 
  3. The mech kinda needs a fortifying bond style trait that grants it a copy of your boons and also possibly a percent of your incoming healing as well. Slight theorycraft here, but replace the third minor’s toughness/vit transfers with giving the mech a copy of your boons and possibly a percent of your incoming healing and move the toughness/vitality transfer completely to the second minor to reduce the redundant stat transfer increase on minor 2 and 3 and increase consistency of the mech’s strength with guaranteed boons (based on yours, of course). 
    1. It’s honestly more thematic to have an effect like this alongside the jade transfer skill anyway.
    2. If it becomes problematic, remove the ability for the mech to double dip in the power bonuses from might that transfer from you to it. 
  4. Buff superconductor signet active to compensate damage lost by dropping a kit for it.
    1. Slight theorycraft here as well, but I think either doubling the base confusion duration OR making a second field appear around the character when the mech is active would remedy this. 
    2. Benchmarking with condi mechanist winds up being too akin to core engineer with four kits because the active of this skill is too weak to justify dropping a kit for it, even with its passive stat bonus. 
  5. Increase the cast speed of the mech attack skills granted by minor traits, or make command skills prioritize over them (and interrupt them if necessary).
    1. Currently the mech will prioritize casting the minor trait skills over commands, so making them cast faster would mean less lockout of the mechanist’s commands at random.
  6. Make the jade buster cannon have better target-lock and offensive efficiency.
    1. The latter part is explained more thoroughly in Conceptualization point 8.
  7. Sky circus in general feels like rather weak damage: I find myself taking jade mortar over it for power, even though sky circus is supposed to be the power line grandmaster.
  8. More of a pathing thing, but the mech needs to be less tempted to use its out-of-combat movement rockets that wind up making it slingshot itself around you at random when moving in a non-straight path.
  9. Lastly, the mech summon shouldn't root you, and mech dismiss shouldn't need an animation. It's not like you could dismiss mech faster to prevent its death resulting in longer cooldown, since the cooldown scales based on remaining HP anyway.

Conceptualization

  1. Add stat bonuses for either you or your golem onto middle column traits to complement their functions (for top, middle, and bottom respectively: expertise, concentration, and either ferocity or precision)
  2. Make either or both the alacrity and barrier 10 man: currently we’re in a place where both of those roles are full squad coverage by a single build (healscourge 10 man barrier, alacrigade/mirage 10 man alacrity), and having mechanist do both of those roles but neither with 10 man cap makes it not quite fit in the existing meta. 
    1. Ignore this if there’s long term plans to make all alacrity sources into 5 man cap though, since suspiciously specter also fits the 5 man alacrity formula.
  3. GREATLY reduce cooldown of mech after death. Max remotely reasonable duration is 60 seconds (50 seconds scaling with remaining lifepool) and the most amicable cooldown would be 10 or 20 seconds (no scaling with remaining lifepool). 
    1. Keep in mind ranger pets are at worst locked out for 60 seconds after death and rangers STILL get a spare pet they can swap to (and if they time it right, in a way that can cheese-prevent the death of their original) or consider soulbeast just reviving pet for free every 10 seconds.
    2. If we compare this kind of spec to soulbeast in particular, they don't scale cooldowns based on pet health, and soulbeast straight up has 10 second cooldown on their pet revive even if dead. The mechanist is just as vital a mechanic and should be just as forgiving, and if it's OP in competitive modes then it can be nerfed via split balance.
  4. Based on the first column middle trait, make might pulse around the mech automatically while in combat instead of on hit to reduce the inconsistency of its uptime.
  5. If the previous point is not applied, increase the might duration from mechanist traits by 20% baseline (from 10 seconds to 12 seconds) to give it a little more independence and reliability (and less dependence on the wonkier core might generation skills like HGH elixir gun 4/5, flamethrower turret with experimental turrets trait, or heaven forbid fire field blast combos... shudder).
  6. Squeeze in an effect on a trait (probably middle grandmaster) that makes barrier slightly heal on each application (either everyone it is applied to or just you) so you’re not painfully handicapping yourself from most all self healing when you take medkit and don't have access to its toolbelt heal skill. 
  7. Make Discharge Array (golem top row F2 command) 300 radius instead of 240, and make the golem get closer to cast it so that it gets better cleave value.
    1. Remember, the mech doesn’t have as-precise movement and positioning as a player, so that has to be made up for with larger radius skills.
    2. If area denial in competitive modes becomes a concern with this skill, halving its duration and doubling its pulse rate would probably remedy it.
  8. Reduce base cooldown of overclock signet to 30-45 seconds so that the jade buster cannon isn’t such a poor efficiency skill.
    1. If you’re worried about the mech resummon aspect becoming overpowered, instead you could make the skill go on bonus cooldown if used in such manner, or make it a flip skill that changes based on whether or not your mech is alive (with separate cooldowns for each version). This would put less risk behind using overclock signet for offensive purposes and still make the mech resummon not cheap. 
    2. The jade buster cannon skill itself should try its best to face the target BEFORE activating the beam, instead of making it turn during its cast (especially since pet AIs have a weird way of which direction they want to face). 
    3. IF the mech respawn cooldown becomes 10-20 seconds though, remove the respawn aspect from the overclock signet entirely and just make it the jade buster cannon. Make the target the signet is casted on determine which enemy the cannon faces, and give it a shorter animation/cooldown so it becomes a worthwhile offensive skill. 
  9. Squeeze in a trait bonus that buffs confusion damage and/or duration somewhere so as to give the condition builds a little more unique identity from core. 

Again, love the spec and all the uniqueness put into it, it's what makes condi engineer feel more whole than its ever felt in open world: the golem complements it perfectly with its burst/cc capabilities making sequential mobs less of a speed bump, and its aggro-holding capabilities make fighting groups much easier to handle with more predictable/stable enemy positioning for using area damage skills. Love all the work and ideas that have gone into it so far, and it can only get better from here, regardless of what happens. Makes me very excited for the expansion.

Edited by FalsePromises.6398
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