Balance patch preview for Engineers

[Calen.8945]

4 hours ago, Piogre.2164 said:

I know the big subject of discussion here is the scrapper changes, but I'm curious about the Reactive Lenses change.  The most useful part of that trait is the automatic stunbreak.  Now that it's tied to your heal skill, is the stun break going away, or does it turn your heal skill *into* a stunbreak?

I don't understand their logic with this change. This trait was great in PVP, for a free stunbreak, but now I can't see how you can still have the stunbreak if it's on the heal skill.

[Stealfish.3912]

Also, in regards of removing negative effects of elite speccs (for example druid pets less stats, soulbeast no petswap etc.), why is "Overheating" as Holo still so overly punishing?
You lose 7961 HP and every toolbelt skill gets an extra 15sec on their current cooldown ( https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Overheat ).
This must be the most punishing effect that you can get for misplaying your class mechanic. (Maybe Im wrong on that, please correct me if Im wrong.)
I agree that it fits thematicly with the class design, but at least the numbers could get tuned, or one of the two negative effects removed.
Don't get me wrong here, I don't want it completly removed because its part of the skill ceiling for holo, but failure happen, and it shouldn't mean almost certain death vs. a decent oppenent in pvp or wvw, if you misplay once.
A good change in my opinion would be, how "Overheat" works when you are traited into "Photon Blasting Module" ( https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Photonic_Blasting_Module ).
There you only get a 5 second penalty on toolbelt skills, and only the DoT damage (~3980) is applied.
So if this would be baseline, PBM needs some little extra effect to compensate for that, and this would be a nice change/buff for Holo imo.

Edited September 23, 2022 by Stealfish.3912

[SleepyBat.9034]

18 hours ago, Bomboed.5697 said:

Quick summary:

1. Scrapper is probably ruined
2. Turrets are still useless
3. Most of Gadgets are still useless
4. Not a single change for Pistols

Some Gadgets are still useless.

I guess they decided Scrapper has had enough time being king of the hill as a support in WvW.

18 hours ago, santenal.1054 said:

The active stunbreaker on heal skill and toolbelt skill condi cleanses are really strong, making the tools traitline verry good (probably gonna get nerfed eventually). The baseline cooldown reduction of static shield is also good.

Oh is that what that meant? When you take that trait in Tools your heal becomes a stunbreak? I did not see that one coming.

[wasss.1208]

6 hours ago, Piogre.2164 said:

I know the big subject of discussion here is the scrapper changes, but I'm curious about the Reactive Lenses change.  The most useful part of that trait is the automatic stunbreak.  Now that it's tied to your heal skill, is the stun break going away, or does it turn your heal skill *into* a stunbreak?

Every passive stunbreak got a 300 second cooldown 2 and a half years ago, but this trait. It was clearly an oversight, which they fix now, as they don't want any passive lifesavers amongst the traits.

On heal effects usually proc at the end of the healing cast, so it probably won't turn our heal into a stunbreak. And neither it should. Turning your heal skill (that can get as low as 14,5 sec cd) into a stunbreak, for a minor trait, as well as getting blind removed, one damaging condition cleansed, and 5 seconds of resistance, is pretty strong.
These all untraited... if traited, it also adds protection. If you are running Anticorrosion plating, you can cleanse up to 6 conditions when you heal, get resistance, and protection. This trait alone, combined with Med-kit gives us ~30% uptime on resistance, and ~20% prot, with Gatgeteer. I can see potential in this trait, considering, that SD is pretty weak, and the other trait is situational.

[santenal.1054]

35 minutes ago, SleepyBat.9034 said:

18 hours ago, santenal.1054 said:

The active stunbreaker on heal skill and toolbelt skill condi cleanses are really strong, making the tools traitline verry good (probably gonna get nerfed eventually). The baseline cooldown reduction of static shield is also good.

Oh is that what that meant? When you take that trait in Tools your heal becomes a stunbreak? I did not see that one coming.

That is what I hope it does (difficult to imagine)

Things I'm wondering about:

Would that make heal skills instant ?

Maybe they will remove the stun breaker part?

Maybe lesser utility goggles will inherit the new condi cleans of Utility goggles ?

Edited September 17, 2022 by santenal.1054

[Perceptor.7189]

I find funny how on the stream they talked about "changing things in order to feel right" (or something like that), but changing gyros to targeted areas witch are almost incompatible with the current scrapper kit. The original idea was to have gyros on top on you all the time because you could use your hammer skill to procs the areas effects.

So my quesntion would be: What it's going to happend to the combo procs of the hammer?? I'm going to be able to proc 3 times the fire field with rocket jump now that the blast gyro it's a bad copy of big ol´ bomb?? And what about the water field with the medic gyro?? And why should i use the medic gyro now if i can just cast my healing turret and also have a an aoe healing + water field and also regen??

 

[SleepyBat.9034]

1 minute ago, santenal.1054 said:

Maybe lesser utility goggles will inherit the new condi cleans of Utility goggles ?

Who said they were changing Utility Goggles? I only saw they were changing Lesser Utility Goggles.

[santenal.1054]

14 minutes ago, SleepyBat.9034 said:

Who said they were changing Utility Goggles? I only saw they were changing Lesser Utility Goggles.

On the video it says: "Utility Goggles: now also removes one damaging condition"

In the forum notes it says: "Lesser Utility Goggles: Increased resistance duration from 2 seconds to 3 seconds. This skill now removes one damaging condition in addition to its other effects."

Both are probably true.

 

Edited September 17, 2022 by santenal.1054

[Styopa.2538]

17 hours ago, Arheundel.6451 said:

I mean...after 4 years of scrapper meta, 2 years of unkillable scrapper roamer grenade spammer cele god super sayan mode...you should have expect changes coming. Furthermore scrapper is not ruined at all...simply now people will have to use brain on where and when to use the gyro wards..rather than superspeed facetank their way to victory....at least for you there is no casting time on these wards

You know there are other game modes than wvw, yes?

[Exalted Quality.8534]

What’s the point of superspeed if gyros are now ground-targeted stationary spells. This is, by far, the worst patch preview I’ve ever seen. This will destroy scrapper as many have said.  Clearly you guys don’t even play the game. 

Also the over shield nerf. Enough with that already…you leave pistol in a pathetic state and keep nerfing shield.  May I remind you that engis have the fewest and worst weapon choices in the game.  

[SleepyBat.9034]

11 minutes ago, Exalted Quality.8534 said:

What’s the point of superspeed if gyros are now ground-targeted stationary spells. This is, by far, the worst patch preview I’ve ever seen. This will destroy scrapper as many have said.  Clearly you guys don’t even play the game. 

Also the over shield nerf. Enough with that already…you leave pistol in a pathetic state and keep nerfing shield.  May I remind you that engis have the fewest and worst weapon choices in the game.  

They didn't nerf Over shield, they removed the 20% cool down reduction part and made it baseline. That's not a nerf.

[Bomboed.5697]

The main problem of these changes is that Anet decided to completely remove one playstyle and did not provide anything to replace it.
I can understand that Scrapper was very effective AT SOMETHING. Maybe too effective. This "something" was being support in WvW.
Okay, if something is way too effective - tune it down. But Anet decided to completely remove the whole thing. So my question is: what the point of Scrapper now? It has low damage, it is not tanky enough and it is no longer a good support.

I always imagined Scrapper as tanky bruiser. I mean, the whole HAMMER part screams about it. For me Scrapper should be less mobile, but very durable melee fighter that provides protection and barriers to allies and deals good consistent damage. But Anet decided to turn it into a superspeed and quickness buff machine for some reason. Only to remove it later without any good compensation.

Once again Scrapper is a spec without niche and without role.
 

[Coolster.2536]

I don’t know if the Coolant Blast changes makes it worth taking over Engi’s other heals. They all have very good utility, and we can get condi cleanses through Alchemy + Inventions (which a lot of PvP/WvW Engi builds use one or both of them) and other heal skills. Since Holo is kind of a high-risk, high-reward spec, I really think Cauterize should be a skill that increases your damage. I think it either giving extra stacks of Afterburner or reducing your current heat are good ways to give Coolant Blast it’s own niche that competes with our other heals.

 

Making Gyros stationary is a really bad change. It’s probably fine for Medic Gyro/Defense Field, Purge Gyro, and Shredder Gyro, but it really neuters Blast Gyro, Bulwark Gyro, and Sneak Gyro. No one is going to stand in Blast Gyro for 3 seconds, waiting to get stunned, I don’t see how Bulwark Gyro would even work… and Sneak Gyro is now just a better Smoke Bomb. Plus they give Superspeed, a mobility effect, at the beginning of the cast on skills that encourage sitting inside of them…

 

I’m sad that mine field no longer removes boon, but cripple is fine on it. I like the Utility Goggles change though. It has potential to be a really good stunbreak. Not sure about putting Reactive Lenses on heal. None of our heals are instant cast, so you can’t really make use of the stunbreak.

[Mild Disaster.2596]

They could at least offer career scrappers a free name change and character slot expansion.

[Milar.4930]

Stationary wells??? Wow,they found a way to make scrapper even worse? Amazing  😕

 

So guess I'll need to find a new main   😪

[BenaSPACE.6028]

I for one, welcome our new Gyro mechanics.

[MaLong.2079]

40 minutes ago, Bomboed.5697 said:

The main problem of these changes is that Anet decided to completely remove one playstyle and did not provide anything to replace it.
I can understand that Scrapper was very effective AT SOMETHING. Maybe too effective. This "something" was being support in WvW.
Okay, if something is way too effective - tune it down. But Anet decided to completely remove the whole thing. So my question is: what the point of Scrapper now? It has low damage, it is not tanky enough and it is no longer a good support.

I always imagined Scrapper as tanky bruiser. I mean, the whole HAMMER part screams about it. For me Scrapper should be less mobile, but very durable melee fighter that provides protection and barriers to allies and deals good consistent damage. But Anet decided to turn it into a superspeed and quickness buff machine for some reason. Only to remove it later without any good compensation.

Once again Scrapper is a spec without niche and without role.
 

It looks to me like ANET don't see group play and individual play as different situations. If 5 scrappers apply too much quickness in a  group setting then their solution is to remove quickness completely even though that quickness is by no means overpowered when the scrapper is alone.

What should be changed is how much quickness/healing/stab etc scrappers apply to others and make it less than what the scrapper gets as the source.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

At least Prime Light Beam is getting damage back, so at least one positive thing for you engis in this patch, but there is a lot of nerfs in there for sure.

[BenaSPACE.6028]

10 minutes ago, BenaSPACE.6028 said:

I for one, welcome our new Gyro mechanics.

After thinking about it, I do think there are some changes I would urge to help make these more in-flavor, though.

 

Bulwark Gyro - Strictly provides barrier in its area, rather than transferring damage to the Scrapper

Blast Gyro - Delay reduced to 2 seconds from its current 3.

 

I think this might make things work a bit better.

[Udohem.8613]

I’m curious what are peoples opinions on how this will affect scrappers in PVE? I know this was meant to target WVW and PVP but I’m curious to see how this will affect rifle scrapper in open world. Does it make the quickness application make more sense since it will be ranged?

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

8 minutes ago, Udohem.8613 said:

I’m curious what are peoples opinions on how this will affect scrappers in PVE? I know this was meant to target WVW and PVP but I’m curious to see how this will affect rifle scrapper in open world. Does it make the quickness application make more sense since it will be ranged?

It won't. People stack on bosses and the wells have a large radius. Beyond that you get the superspeed on the first pulse, which is enough with sneak gyro for skips.

[Noah Salazar.5430]

Lastly the biggest problem I have now is that the elite gyro is now a worse shadow refuge ON AN ELITE SKILL. if you place the well down and sit in it you will only be able to exit the well with 1-3 seconds of stealth

Edited September 17, 2022 by Noah Salazar.5430

[Firebeard.1746]

22 hours ago, EriskRedLemur.7153 said:

Idk, I get that made it mobile and advantage over every other support but there were other ways to nerf scrapper

Counterpoint: mantras are also something that triggers around you. So basically they're just telling everyone to play mesmer/healbreand + any other type of mobile support. Also auras work the same way. Looks like they gave druid some more mobile support options as well.

 

They're basically saying "stop playing this in competitive play anymore" which feels awful. I'm fine with nerfs when nerfs are warranted, but my pet peeve in mmo balance is when devs take it upon themselves to nerf professions into oblivion without give them no new niche to fill and/or make them ineffective in their niche. They're basically saying "eff your class and all the time you put into it". Imo, if scrapper was a competituve support then that should still be a viable role.

Edited September 17, 2022 by Firebeard.1746

[HazyDaisy.4107]

12 hours ago, Piogre.2164 said:

I know the big subject of discussion here is the scrapper changes, but I'm curious about the Reactive Lenses change.  The most useful part of that trait is the automatic stunbreak.  Now that it's tied to your heal skill, is the stun break going away, or does it turn your heal skill *into* a stunbreak?

Good question. 

 

They noted something similar on a thief trait Hard to Catch where you'll now gain just endurance by using a Shadowstep, whereas before (currently) it was break stun and gain endurance when disabled, so for the thief case it looks like they've deleted the stun break portion. 

 

It'll be interesting to see what happens with the near identical case of Engi, because if they take away the stun break portion of Lesser Utl Gogs they'll be messing with a trait and a lesser effect.

[Kaizz.7306]

On 9/16/2022 at 5:23 PM, AliamRationem.5172 said:

I don't like the nerf to gyro mobility.  The mechanist nerfs were welcome, though.

Yeah I could honestly care less about mechanist nerfs. I already told my guild if HAM and PAM get nerfed, I'm just going back to PHolo anyway, it's way more fun. The nerf to gyro mobility actually makes me sick because I just know the whole spec is going to fall apart again, and it's one of my favorites.