Scrapper in SOTO

[August.5934]

As you guys know, The thing that makes Scrapper a scrapper is the hammer we wield and the support of gyros and that is all about scrapper. At our current state, we lack damage in our one and only weapon; Hammer. Since the we can't weapon swap and the only way to "swap" is by sacrificing our 1 utility slot for kit to furter increase our dmg.

Long ago, i heard that in the upcomming expension scrapper gonna get reworked and i am still waiting to see what kinda of rework it's gonna be... but ... after SOTO release, we can use hammer on any other spec... really hyped for hammer holosmith but what about our scrapper?

Maybe using sword we could have abit more uptime in our quickness build but that's it! Nothing new to scrapper and i am very certain that Shortbow Scrapper isn't gonna be as fun as with hammer... and asking for DMG buff or CD reduction for scrapper also doesn't seem to help but there could be one thing that would greatly help scrapper to be more fun!

and that is....to give scrapper a weapon swap! A very simple and very effective change!

So my question is, Do you guys want to have weapon swap on scrapper? 🙂 

[jason.1083]

Don't even consider using sword with Scrapper, if it's kept the way it is it will be useless compared to hammer for you. 

About shortbow, we don't know yet so we'll see. 

Giving a particular elite spec a weapon swap while others are kept unchanged is very unlikely, if you want a buff for scrapper your probably should be asking for longer gyro durations (except blast gyro to get the stun timing) and making function gyro be a bit more of a class mechanic than a skill, namely make it into a fixed cooldown skill and bake stability/quickness/superpeed into it regardless of the selected trait. And for all the quicknes scrappers out there, replace the leap finisher requirement from Kinetic Accelerators with whirl finisher, so it actually makes sense for scrapper to choose the weapon/skills they come with instead of a bunch of core stuff. 

[August.5934]

15 minutes ago, jason.1083 said:

Don't even consider using sword with Scrapper, if it's kept the way it is it will be useless compared to hammer for you. 

About shortbow, we don't know yet so we'll see. 

Giving a particular elite spec a weapon swap while others are kept unchanged is very unlikely, if you want a buff for scrapper your probably should be asking for longer gyro durations (except blast gyro to get the stun timing) and making function gyro be a bit more of a class mechanic than a skill, namely make it into a fixed cooldown skill and bake stability/quickness/superpeed into it regardless of the selected trait. And for all the quicknes scrappers out there, replace the leap finisher requirement from Kinetic Accelerators with whirl finisher, so it actually makes sense for scrapper to choose the weapon/skills they come with instead of a bunch of core stuff. 

🤣

[jason.1083]

Well not exactly the same as I'm saying but close enough I guess, the well uptime is particularly important because scrapper is heavily focused on combos by nature, unlike holosmith and mechanist. I don't think the hammer needs it's cooldowns lowered though, and function gyro doesn't need more damage, it needs to be more reliable and have more effects to really be embraced as a class mechanic. 

 

Also when I say focused around combos I don't mean always focused in completing alone, scrappers are great providers of fields that others can use. 

Edited August 7, 2023 by jason.1083

[August.5934]

1 hour ago, jason.1083 said:

Well not exactly the same as I'm saying but close enough I guess, the well uptime is particularly important because scrapper is heavily focused on combos by nature, unlike holosmith and mechanist. I don't think the hammer needs it's cooldowns lowered though, and function gyro doesn't need more damage, it needs to be more reliable and have more effects to really be embraced as a class mechanic. 

 

Also when I say focused around combos I don't mean always focused in completing alone, scrappers are great providers of fields that others can use. 

Sadly, Scrapper has no class mechanics 😔

 

[Alcatraznc.3869]

To be honest Hammer damage isnt exactly bad and you can stack might + vulnerability with your auto attack.  But again, adding a weapon swap isnt going to do anything. Hammer being a power weapon there is only one power weapon that you can use that isnt completely trash when used outside of your spec which is the rifle. But even the rifle damage isnt exactly game changer. Rifle 2 and 5 can fit into a rotation, rifle 4 is going to be used for CCs. And then what ? You're stuck with rifle for another 5 seconds of doing underwhelming damage before changing to Hammer again. 

 

Of course some will say "but just slot a kit" which in the end defeats the purpose of weapon swapt because the goal is to replace the kit with the weapon swap. 

 

Also this is something not many people mentioned but assuming we do get a weapon change, I can bet Anet is going to go and nerf all our kit one way or another to "compensate" for that. So yeah sure, all the grenade haters are going to praise Anet for that, but they are just going to kill the only kit that is currently performing well and dig an even deeper hole for all our other kit. 

 

Also, this is hard for me to even suggest something as far as Scrapper goes because I dont know what Anet wants the Scrapper to be and Anet themselve dont know what they want Scrapper to be. When they planned to make gyro a 900 ground target skill and people responded negatively to that change, Anet stated they will leave our gyro as is BUT they will be changing it again in the future. And only....god I guess knows what Anet might be cooking or trying to cook for us.

[draxynnic.3719]

FWIW, I have seen some people expressing excitement at the prospect of mace/shield for support scrapper - the leap finisher is a bit less awkward to use (and provides barrier) and there's also a blast finisher. So scrapper isn't getting nothing from weaponmaster training.

I very much doubt that scrapper will get weaponswap, since it still has core engi stuff, including kits.

[August.5934]

2 minutes ago, Alcatraznc.3869 said:

And then what ? You're stuck with rifle for another 5 seconds of doing underwhelming damage before changing to Hammer again. 

hoping to use shortbow or a reworked Holosmith Sword...

[Alcatraznc.3869]

1 minute ago, August.5934 said:

hoping to use shortbow or a reworked Holosmith Sword...

I wont raise my hope high so that I'm not disappointed if sword is left in that state.

 

As for shortbow, we dont know yet but my guess would be either a condition weapon or a hybrid weapon kinda like what grenade kit is. We can just wait and see for the relase/potential test session

[August.5934]

You guys really gotta stop looking at engi's kit! Ele got whole 4 slots of kits if you look at that way! Fire, water, electricity, Earth! each with 5 set of weapon skills while not losing a single utility slots. Yes, i must admit that i am not a fan of grenade nor kits because kits does no dmg... beside grenade, other kits are very much underwhelming in both gameplay, damage & support.... Engineer kits isn't fun to play with.

[August.5934]

10 minutes ago, Alcatraznc.3869 said:

As for shortbow, we dont know yet but my guess would be either a condition weapon or a hybrid weapon kinda like what grenade kit is. We can just wait and see for the relase/potential test session

Not a fan of condi but it could be useful for many other who likes it but a reminding, Scrapper is not a condi spec. It's purely Power dmg & Support kit. So unless scrapper gets a weapon swap or a spec rework, Scrapper not gonna be able to enjoy the new change, we be staring other licking candies while having a drooling face! 😭

Edited August 7, 2023 by August.5934

[jason.1083]

19 minutes ago, August.5934 said:

You guys really gotta stop looking at engi's kit! Ele got whole 4 slots of kits if you look at that way! Fire, water, electricity, Earth! each with 5 set of weapon skills while not losing a single utility slots. Yes, i must admit that i am not a fan of grenade nor kits because kits does no dmg... beside grenade, other kits are very much underwhelming in both gameplay, damage & support.... Engineer kits isn't fun to play with.

Well, I don't like kits either haven't used one in years (except mortar kit in WvW). And yes Elementalists get 4 weapon skill bars without taking up any utility slots, that's why I commented on another thread about Engi/Ele getting weapon swap and I said Elementalists should definitely not get a weapon swap, that would be 8 skill bars for them, 40 weapon skills + all their utilities. 

Personally I don't think engi needs a weapon swap, but our skills have to be balanced for that playstyle, and that goes for every engi spec, not just Scrapper, you might say that Holo and Mech do have a more defined class mechanic, and yes they do, but even these specs struggle to run kitless builds. 

Edited August 7, 2023 by jason.1083

[draxynnic.3719]

7 hours ago, Alcatraznc.3869 said:

I wont raise my hope high so that I'm not disappointed if sword is left in that state.

 

As for shortbow, we dont know yet but my guess would be either a condition weapon or a hybrid weapon kinda like what grenade kit is. We can just wait and see for the relase/potential test session

Considering what they did with untamed hammer, I could see sword getting some bonus when used by non-holos. Maybe half of the bonus for the yellow heat level.

7 hours ago, August.5934 said:

You guys really gotta stop looking at engi's kit! Ele got whole 4 slots of kits if you look at that way! Fire, water, electricity, Earth! each with 5 set of weapon skills while not losing a single utility slots. Yes, i must admit that i am not a fan of grenade nor kits because kits does no dmg... beside grenade, other kits are very much underwhelming in both gameplay, damage & support.... Engineer kits isn't fun to play with.

Grass is always greener on the other side. Elementalist attunements have their own issues, including but not limited to: every weapon being either ranged or melee, you can't weaponswap to switch from ranged to melee*; skills being balanced on the assumption of having twice as many of them so they're individually weaker; some attunements on some weapons not being worth using with a given build (water if you don't have healing power, air if you're not power based (and even then if using staff), earth is weak without condition damage but does at least generally have defence skills) but you're stuck with having them as part of your 'power budget' anyway; and a tendency in general for different attunements to do similar things except with different conditions or healing attached. Engineer kits, until the reign of a balance lead who didn't care about them, may have taken a utility slot but offered flexibility that elementalists could only dream of.

*No, hammer doesn't count. 600 range, slow projectile speeds, and how catalyst hammer works in general make it effectively still a melee weapon in practice even in air or fire. Might have a chance if they increased the range and projectile speed.

[August.5934]

37 minutes ago, draxynnic.3719 said:

Grass is always greener on the other side. Elementalist attunements have their own issues, including but not limited to: every weapon being either ranged or melee, you can't weaponswap to switch from ranged to melee*; skills being balanced on the assumption of having twice as many of them so they're individually weaker; some attunements on some weapons not being worth using with a given build (water if you don't have healing power, air if you're not power based (and even then if using staff), earth is weak without condition damage but does at least generally have defence skills) but you're stuck with having them as part of your 'power budget' anyway; and a tendency in general for different attunements to do similar things except with different conditions or healing attached. Engineer kits, until the reign of a balance lead who didn't care about them, may have taken a utility slot but offered flexibility that elementalists could only dream of.

*No, hammer doesn't count. 600 range, slow projectile speeds, and how catalyst hammer works in general make it effectively still a melee weapon in practice even in air or fire. Might have a chance if they increased the range and projectile speed.

As you say, Grass is indeed greener on other side. A simple understanding: Ele got 4 elements -> Each weapon type has 20 skills -> Every set of those weapon types provides boons, support, dmg -> Fire (Dmg/condi), Water (heals, boons), Air (CCs, DMG, Debuffs), Earth (Defensive ability, Protections, little bit of condi, Shields).

With everys set of weapons having different 20skills provided on weapon slots, Ele also have a full 5 slots of utility skills to support them even more. Ever since the beginning of Ele existance, it has always remain on top of every meta with both power & condi viability, both in PVP & PVE. 

Engineers on the other hand, without 1 engineering kit (Grenade kit), the entire spec becomes dead and suffers from power creep. Atm, with only one spec stand at top and that is condi holosmith but watch that build again! holo legit striped all it's defensive support and every boons just to deal higher condi dmg by using every kits he could find with insane button spamming. In PVP meta every build there is, uses Grenade kit and it's because of grenade kit that spec could reach on meta, without any grenade kit.... it's hard to even reach any goal.

i am sorry mate, but ele can't even begun to compare to engineer, otherwise ele be bullying us by standing on our face everytime they walk.

 

[draxynnic.3719]

6 hours ago, August.5934 said:

As you say, Grass is indeed greener on other side. A simple understanding: Ele got 4 elements -> Each weapon type has 20 skills -> Every set of those weapon types provides boons, support, dmg -> Fire (Dmg/condi), Water (heals, boons), Air (CCs, DMG, Debuffs), Earth (Defensive ability, Protections, little bit of condi, Shields).

And how much of that are you actually using on a single build? Water heals (I don't think there's any weapon where water weapon skills provide much in the way of boons apart from regeneration), so apart from hammer and scepter, water doesn't do much unless you're specced for healing (and then you'd want to stay in water permanently if you weren't forced to swap to something else for boons). For DPS builds, power builds usually use fire/air, and condi builds use fire/earth. There's a reason celestial is so popular, because without it, there's generally only two attunements you actually use, with the aforementioned exception of hammer and scepter.

6 hours ago, August.5934 said:

With everys set of weapons having different 20skills provided on weapon slots, Ele also have a full 5 slots of utility skills to support them even more. Ever since the beginning of Ele existance, it has always remain on top of every meta with both power & condi viability, both in PVP & PVE. 

 

Engineer has the toolbelt, unless you're playing mechanist. Elementalist utility skills are mostly pretty lacklustre, while engineer utility skills are usually the best in the game (deservedly so, it's how engineer is balanced). There are cases where one skill from a kit almost beats an elementalist utility - utility-oriented kits like toolkit and elixir guns are like having three or so utilities in one slot. Having 20 weapon skills doesn't really mean a lot when when elementalist is balanced in such a way that you either have to use all of them to match what another profession can do with 10, or you only actually use two attunements in practice. And then you fall into the issue where other professions have the choice of slotting a melee weaponset and a ranged weaponset (or kit) and be prepared for a range of situations - elementalist is stuck with either being melee or close to melee on all attunements, or ranged on all attunements.

I play both, I've experienced the problems of both, and while I'm not saying that engineer doesn't have problems (I hate how dominant grenades are...), claiming that elementalist is better because attunements don't occupy utility slots is glossing over so many problems that elementalist has in turn that it's just not credible.

6 hours ago, August.5934 said:

 

Engineers on the other hand, without 1 engineering kit (Grenade kit), the entire spec becomes dead and suffers from power creep. Atm, with only one spec stand at top and that is condi holosmith but watch that build again! holo legit striped all it's defensive support and every boons just to deal higher condi dmg by using every kits he could find with insane button spamming. In PVP meta every build there is, uses Grenade kit and it's because of grenade kit that spec could reach on meta, without any grenade kit.... it's hard to even reach any goal.

i am sorry mate, but ele can't even begun to compare to engineer, otherwise ele be bullying us by standing on our face everytime they walk.

 

Engineer has been beating elementalist hands down in endgame PvE playrate since EoD, and I think it was there beforehand as well. Alacmech is still considered to be the best alacrity build in the game - alacdps tempest only just started to exist at all, while alacheal tempest needs to swap out of the healing attunement in order to keep alac up, and both have pretty tight application radii for alacrity. Quickscrapper isn't on top of the list for quickness builds but I think it's around third or fourth after firebrand and herald - catalyst is, suffice to say, lower. DPS-wise, riflemech has had its wings clipped but is still one of the easiest builds to do enough damage to get through content with, and for those willing to play complex rotations, holosmith is competitive with elementalist builds for damage while having higher health and armour which generally makes it more survivable as a selfish DPS in a typical group composition.

Personally, I don't play either in endgame PvE. I don't play engineer there because I don't want to have to take grenade kit. I don't play elementalist there because... the attunement system and all its drawbacks, basically.

PvP is a bit more nebulous - elementalist makes up for its low health and armour by having a lot of self-sustain, and that approach works better in environments that aren't endgame PvE. If we're tracking across the life of the game, both have had their proverbial time in the sun. In more recent times, support tempest is one of the few support builds that works in sPvP situations, so it has that. Catalyst was pretty overtuned and then it copped stiff nerfs that bled over into nerfing core ele pretty hard as well. While it does indeed suck that engineers are stuck with using grenade kit, grenade kit engineers can still be pretty devastating.

Again, this is not to say that engineer doesn't have problems. Most kits have been power crept, turrets apart from the healing turret are pretty much only taken for their toolbelt skills because the turrets themselves were boonsmited in all modes back in 2015 and never fixed, and that's just off the top of my head. But if we're focusing on kits - kits really just need a few buffs so that they're all competitive again. As long as that is done, I'd take kits and utilities balanced to be competitive against kits over attunements and weak utilities any day of the week and twice on Sundays.

[JohnnyRico.8591]

On 8/7/2023 at 6:22 PM, draxynnic.3719 said:

And how much of that are you actually using on a single build? Water heals (I don't think there's any weapon where water weapon skills provide much in the way of boons apart from regeneration), so apart from hammer and scepter, water doesn't do much unless you're specced for healing (and then you'd want to stay in water permanently if you weren't forced to swap to something else for boons). For DPS builds, power builds usually use fire/air, and condi builds use fire/earth. There's a reason celestial is so popular, because without it, there's generally only two attunements you actually use, with the aforementioned exception of hammer and scepter.

Water doesn't do much unless specced for healing? Not sure about that. At least in WvW, the most common build I run into is Fire/Earth cata after the earth line changes, mostly cele, mostly scepter/dagger. Dagger 4/5 does some pretty respectable healing in cele. 2500+ from Cleansing Wave + 3 condi removal, 1500+ from detonating frost aura, and the ability to use the elite and run both of those skills again if under pressure. Dagger is core, so applies to all ele specs, just giving an example using cata. And if you are running fire, the frost aura is also removing condis. Agreed that water doesn't provide boons outside regen. Water is mostly focused on condi removal and healing.

On 8/7/2023 at 6:22 PM, draxynnic.3719 said:

Engineer has the toolbelt, unless you're playing mechanist. Elementalist utility skills are mostly pretty lacklustre, while engineer utility skills are usually the best in the game (deservedly so, it's how engineer is balanced). There are cases where one skill from a kit almost beats an elementalist utility - utility-oriented kits like toolkit and elixir guns are like having three or so utilities in one slot. Having 20 weapon skills doesn't really mean a lot when when elementalist is balanced in such a way that you either have to use all of them to match what another profession can do with 10, or you only actually use two attunements in practice. And then you fall into the issue where other professions have the choice of slotting a melee weaponset and a ranged weaponset (or kit) and be prepared for a range of situations - elementalist is stuck with either being melee or close to melee on all attunements, or ranged on all attunements.

What engineer utility skills are best in game? Two of my most played classes are engi and ele, so I would agree that ele utility skills aren't the best, but saying engineer utility skills are best in game is a reach. Elixir U is incredibly good. Rocket boots are up there too, although these days it just allows engi to keep up with the mobility creep. Turrets except heal turret are in dire need of a rework, the gadgets besides rocket boots are very situational. I think elixirs are probably the strongest engi utilities, because the game is so boon centric now, but that doesn't mean they are best in game. As someone who for years preferred multi kit engineer builds, I can't see how any kit can be like having 3 utilities in one. 

If you go back far enough in the pre-HoT/early HoT days, kits were good, and a bit more difficult to play because of it. Playing the piano and remembering cooldowns of your other kits was challenging, but the payoff was having the jack of all trades feel and being able to adapt to a number of situations. That has been blown away with the power creep though. Minus some cd changes and minor number changes up or down, kits really haven't changed. Not one kit has a reliable mobility skill in a game that has added mobility tenfold through leaps/teleports/dashes etc. (unless you count acid bomb pushing you backward). There are very few boons provided through kits in a game that has become extremely boon centric. You can run specific traits to get a little might out of e-gun, or stab/might from flamethrower. That's about it.

I agree having 20 weapon skills does not mean much. Running a solid build in the current iteration of the game means having one button press do x number of impactful things and trying to repeat that with as many skills/abilities as possible, not just having a bunch of random skills. Having said that, I can run the arcane line with ele and attunement swapping will get me fury, a small heal, and more boons. I can also get boons while disabling an enemy based on attunement, and another spell cast while dodging on a 10s icd, with the icd being separated by attunement. All of this is packed into one line. To me, that is pretty good design, not overpowered, and doesn't need changing.

In contrast, engineer has 3 individual traits (all in separate lines) for grenade kit, flamethrower, and medkit. The grenade kit trait is a requirement for usability reasons, the flamethrower kit requires camping the kit, which seems counterintuitive to engineer playstyle, and medkit is used by heal scrappers, and that's about it. There are two traits affecting kits as a whole. Backpack regenerator gives you a small heal for camping the kit, again an odd requirement for engineer, and streamlined kits is kind of like evasive arcana, except all kits share the icd and it is 20 secs, not 10. So if you like running multiple kits, in a fight you'll basically get a random effect, and it is hopefully what you are looking for.   

Disclaimer: not talking about PvE, as I do not participate all that much outside open world stuff.

   

[draxynnic.3719]

15 hours ago, JohnnyRico.8591 said:

Water doesn't do much unless specced for healing? Not sure about that. At least in WvW, the most common build I run into is Fire/Earth cata after the earth line changes, mostly cele, mostly scepter/dagger. Dagger 4/5 does some pretty respectable healing in cele. 2500+ from Cleansing Wave + 3 condi removal, 1500+ from detonating frost aura, and the ability to use the elite and run both of those skills again if under pressure. Dagger is core, so applies to all ele specs, just giving an example using cata. And if you are running fire, the frost aura is also removing condis. Agreed that water doesn't provide boons outside regen. Water is mostly focused on condi removal and healing.

Looks like you're talking about cele builds there (it is WvW after all). Cele builds ARE speccing for healing, albeit not as much as, say, harrier. There's a reason cele is so popular on elementalist - with nearly every weapon set having a bit of power, a bit of condi, and a bit of healing, cele is the one option that actually makes decent use out of everything.

But consider how useful medkit is without healing power, then imagine if you were forced to take medkit and flamethrower as a set. That's pretty much elementalist dagger in a nutshell. Water heals, other attunements do damage, but outside of celestial you can't really take advantage of all of the attunements in one set.

15 hours ago, JohnnyRico.8591 said:

What engineer utility skills are best in game? Two of my most played classes are engi and ele, so I would agree that ele utility skills aren't the best, but saying engineer utility skills are best in game is a reach. Elixir U is incredibly good. Rocket boots are up there too, although these days it just allows engi to keep up with the mobility creep. Turrets except heal turret are in dire need of a rework, the gadgets besides rocket boots are very situational. I think elixirs are probably the strongest engi utilities, because the game is so boon centric now, but that doesn't mean they are best in game. As someone who for years preferred multi kit engineer builds, I can't see how any kit can be like having 3 utilities in one. 

Oh, turrets are garbage and seriously need a rework. But let's consider elixir gun. You've got a stunbreak (that also applies regen in an area), a healing field that cleanses, and an escape skill that leaves a damaging field (even though it's most commonly used for the damaging field and the escape part is an inconvenience). Compared to utilities on other professions, that's almost the equivalent of three utilities in one slot right there. I could go through the other utility skills, but the general theme they have in common is that where engineer is concerned, utility skills need to be competitive against the option of having another weaponswap. Where some of those options, like elixir gun and toolkit, have skills that are individually equivalent to utility skills on other professions, just with the complication that you need to use the kit in order to access them.

Those skills that don't meet those standards (like most turrets) in competitive are often that way because there was some point where they were oppressive and had to be nerfed. Even the weaker utility skills for engineer, though, are two-for-one deals, apart from mechanists, whose signets are insanely overloaded if measured by the standards of other professions. But they need to be, because every utility skill on engineer has to be competitive against taking one more kit to be used, and that's a balance pressure that utilities on other professions don't have.