Expanded Weapon Proficiencies Beta Feedback: Engineer

[Rubi Bayer.8493]

Expanded weapon proficiencies are coming in 2024 during the second major update for Secrets of the Obscure, bringing a new weapon and skills for each profession. The expanded weapon proficiency beta event is live now and will run until 10:00 p.m. Pacific Time (UTC-8) on December 3.

You can leave your feedback for the engineer in this thread.

[Spart.6578]

Having arrows timing out is bad. It means you really have to set them up not too long before using them.

 

Shortbow Auto does not apply weakness when stated on the tooltip, only vuln.

 

Arrows can chain from each other when their radii overlap, but will not provide any bonuses of the starter arrow. Having the canisters required to be in the radius of the starter to provide boons means that we cannot really cover a large area with these effects. Consider increasing the range.

 

Being able to throw arrows into previously detonated arrows to cause them to chain is nice to pile on effects.

 

My biggest question is I'm not really sure why this weapon was designed. Engineers don't really need a support weapon and with no mobility options i'm hard pressed to see it in WvW, granted I don't really do WvW. These canisters do not have the unblockable tag which unsure if it will see any pvp support.

Edited November 28, 2023 by Spart.6578

[Dakmarios.8407]

Skills feel weak and to short of duration, radius too small......

I was going to write a long answer...but whats the point the weapon is worthless and Anet wont even care about the feedback, they never had and never will....I will just stay playing holosmith.

[Panda.1967]

The arrows all need to do something prior to detonating... even if all they do is set up a combo field... and detonate should be a blast finisher on ALL 4 arrows... Also there is some inconsistency on detonate skill recharge & activation... I've had it randomly put skill 3's detonate on CD the moment I place the arrow, and I've have Skills 4 & 5 immediately reset without detonating 3 times in a row... Immediately Immediately... like the moment the arrow appears on the ground it vanishes and the skill goes on full CD...

Edited November 28, 2023 by Panda.1967

[Pengu.7481]

feels like a clunky cheap knockoff trapper DH with none of the damage

[MrAmputatoes.6031]

8 minutes ago, Panda.1967 said:

The arrows all need to do something prior to detonating... even if all they do is set up a combo field... and detonate should be a blast finisher on ALL 4 arrows... Also there is some inconsistency on detonate skill recharge & activation... I've had it randomly put skill 3's detonate on CD the moment I place the arrow, and I've have Skills 4 & 5 immediately reset without detonating 3 times in a row... Immediately Immediately... like the moment the arrow appears on the ground it vanishes and the skill goes on full CD...

If the AOE touches any arrows that have detonated (and their effect is still on the ground) they will chain detonate.

[Sarako Mindweaver.2786]

The radius needs to be increased, I feel the auto attack should be a projectile finisher. I agree all 4 should be fields and the blast finishers.  Its not horrible but the numbers need to be tweaked a bit, in my opinion 

[Panda.1967]

21 minutes ago, MrAmputatoes.6031 said:

If the AOE touches any arrows that have detonated (and their effect is still on the ground) they will chain detonate.

I'm aware of that... the issue I experienced was NOT from that. I fired arrow 4 & 5 before detonating anything and both arrows just straight up vanished and went on CD immediately. no detonation... no nothing... arrow appeared for half a second and then poof... skill on CD.

Edited November 28, 2023 by Panda.1967

[Chingiz.6481]

I hope this weapon will be fully redesigned to be a good option for a ranged condi or power dps. This probably won't happen, but I hope...

[hugo.4705]

OK so here's my feedback for that new weapon: (Through I do think that it lacks utility/elite skills to be like other specs)

Character animations: Well, it is a bow so of course our character do basic bow shots, but i expected at least the character doing a gesture like pressing a button in its hands when detonating the vials missiles put on ground. But well the character isn't expressive at all. Even using hammer or rifle feels a little more lively.

Skills animations: The effect when he different vials explodes are pretty cool, but the basic bow shot, skill 1, is pretty bland, it lacks something surprising, like the character doing back flip or whatever when shooting the arrows, cause currently the characters is just shooting arrows like without motivation or style...

Mechanics: I do like the idea of putting bomb vials around, and anyone here would know if i say that it reminds me of a game with squid childs battling each others. I find it interesting that if the area of effects are on each others, it triggers a chain reaction, but if put apart, they can be detonated separately.

Damages and effects: I was surprised happily seeing the efficiency of the weapon, i definitely will adopt shortbow on my main character that is engie cause it is very efficient. It has all, a main skill that inflict vulnerability, and other that give what is needed: Cripple, Slowness, Weakness, Blindness... Even more vulnerability... and might! It even stun! Gosh my love ended with my Mechanist Hammer, I will embrace Shortbow Mechanist now.

So, yup, pretty fun to play! And to me, eventually the animations to be made better, and of course, skill icons, like vials (kinda like harbringer vials skills icons) and for bow skill maybe a static bow icon...

 

 

 

[Calen Elee.8452]

15 minutes ago, Chingiz.6481 said:

I hope this weapon will be fully redesigned to be a good option for a ranged condi or power dps. This probably won't happen, but I hope...

 

you better wait sitting bro 

[Drakensoul.1608]

25 minutes ago, Chingiz.6481 said:

25 minutes ago, Chingiz.6481 said:

This probably won't happen, but I hope...

hope so 2

but now for some feedback.

-I agree the numbers need more tweaking,

-the radius is to low 

-if you want to play the shortbow on suport Scrapper you need to detonate 3 then 2 to get the finisher to get quickness

-and at last all skills are groundskills with delay and this is not fun to play in my opinion

-as Engi main i can say we dont need another suport weapon

i hope that you change something about it or it will likely not be played pls anet.

 

[Bomboed.5697]

Don't waste time on this weapon trying to fix it. Just scrap the whole idea and rework it from scratch. There are literally nothing good in this weapon to be worth saving. The whole concept is bad and execution is even worse.
This is not what Engineer class needs and this is not what Engineer players want.

[Ovalkvadratcylinder.9365]

You seriously need to decouple the weapon from the idea that it needs to trade power for support.. Take guardian weapons as an example. Any weapon a guardian would pick for support can still be used for dps builds in different game modes because they scale so well with power.
The way youre reasoning about the engineer bow is so awkward and handickaping the class so much.

The skill effects are underwhelming
The need more more support weapons was NOT there at all
You lack mobility
You lack defensive boons
You lack active defenses
0 chance to use it for condi builds
0 power scaling
Actually worse support potential in WvW than the standard maceshield scrapper
Holy kitten this weapon sucks. It sucks so much more than pistol 

If youre gonna make boring wells again why not stuff thats useful. You couldve been creative, there are other ways to support than jsut healing. You couldve made it a CC weapon, Immobilize, soft ccs. hard ccs. 
This is just another jack of jack kitten weapon

[CoffeePlease.3082]

I mainly do instanced pve so this is just relating to pve feedback. I haven't done thorough testing inside instanced content yet but here are just my preliminary notes. 

General thoughts

* The damage would need to be brought up significantly for this to be a viable dps support weapon, it's just too weak. As it stands this appears it would just be a healer weapon. 

* Considering the damage is so low, and assuming it is meant as a pure healer weapon, I'd add an extra event of damage upon placing the arrow. 4 abilities that require ground targeting, waiting for the arrow to land, and then a follow up detonation  doesn't feel good on opener. Once your get into your rotation it speeds up significantly with the auto detonations, but it doesn't feel good at the start at least. The current total values of all 4 shortbow upfront damage events looks weaker than mace 2 on its own, let alone the auto attack chain and mace 3, plus the cc value and protection uptime of shield.

* And again, 4 ground targeted abilities just doesn't feel fun. Obviously just a personal opinion, but just putting it out there. It's one of the reasons I personally pushed back against the proposed scrapper changes that would make all gyros ranged ground target abilities. Assuming you are healing and running Elixir Gun and Mortar Kit, that's a lot of ground targeting. It's not hard, just not fun. 

Heal Alac Mechanist

* Mech Fighter doesn't seem to proc when using shortbow 3

* Usually running Inventions for the healing, but the first row of skills don't have any synergy. With the loss of shield skills while using shortbow, you don't have any way to apply protection via Over Shield, so your protection uptime appears to be 50% at best (may be missing something here, I haven't looked at some of the potential relic synergies to cover this loss).

Heal Quickness Scrapper

* Same issue with Over Shield from above. You can get 100% protection uptime if you take Expert Examination since you are also likely taking Reconstruction Enclosure in the Inventions line, but that still leaves a dead talent row in Inventions first row. 

* Applying quickness and might is fine. You can now give full Fury uptime as well if you trade out Monk relic for Relic of the Midnight King, but that is unfortunately sacrificing a good bunch of healing that you would otherwise get from Monk or Relic of Karakosa.  

 

[Dark Red Killian.3946]

The skills say “apply conditions”. When I look at each one there is one condition but they are non damaging conditions. I feel like they are missing a damaging condition. Like for the sand put bleeding, the green put torment, blue fire, and skill 5 do something like confusion..

I did think it could be cool to add a switch button for shortbow, to go from ground targeting support arrows to combat damage arrows (while in combat). It basically switches your skillset and you can be more dps oriented. The arrows can be canisters still but the canisters spray out their magic as they are being shot. You can have directional line of sight arrows, enemy targeting arrows, or big aoe effect arrows. Let’s face it. I think most engineers were really hoping for some good ol condi damage shortbow skills with lots of mobility. 

 

[ericpeggy.8206]

I thought number is easy to adjust, so I focus on mechanics.

In PvE: You should use skill 2, 3 and 4 in the same position, that's very boring.

In PvP, WvW: All shortbow skills are too slow, you can't use it to hit a moving person.

If you just use a bow to shoot yourself, you should use arrow to be a weapon directed.

Probably make the order of the chain have a purpose, or increase skill radius.

Edited November 28, 2023 by ericpeggy.8206

[Zzik.5873]

Im en engi main, and a healer main at that... I dont see any situation were I would pick this joke over an actual weapon set, specialy mace + shield...

ANET DONT NERF MACE + SHIELD, rework from the groundup the shortbow and make an actual real weapon please.

[Spart.6578]

You lose too much to use a bow that you can not swap from. This weapon is not needed.

[Dark Red Killian.3946]

I would gladly wait for a rework, if it means a better weapon. I was so excited for shortbow as an engineer main since the beginning. I liked the revenant shortbow skills. I was not at all having fun with this in the beta. 3/10. Makes me wonder how many mini expansions GW2 can last.

[Zzik.5873]

14 minutes ago, ericpeggy.8206 said:

I thought number is easy to adjust, so I focus on mechanics.

In PvE: You should use skill 2, 3 and 4 in the same position, that's very boring.

In PvP, WvW: All shortbow skills are too slow, you can't use it to hit a moving person.

Probably make the order of the chain have a purpose, or increase skill radius.

Or make another weapon lol

[Decinomicon.4619]

As someone who plays a support engineer a lot, I do not see a reason to run this weapon. It's clunky to use, and it doesn't provide anything new to the table. The actual effects of the canisters (not the visual effects) are underwhelming. It does not excel in damage or support, it is outclassed by every other weapon engineer has, it isn't even a side grade to something. 

So that begs the question, who was this weapon for? Because it certainly wasn't engineer. What is the point of this weapon? All the other profession weapons have a purpose, I am not seeing one for shortbow.

[Bomboed.5697]

This weapon just proves that nobody in anet team actually play Engineer. They hate this class and have no idea what to do with it.

[Love.1975]

I find it difficult to even provide constructive criticism for this. Shortbow has near zero synergy with Engineer's trait-lines and specialization. Having 4 skills to target with such small radii and range just doesn't work. The chain reactions are underwhelming. Cooldowns are long. Effects are blockable/easily cleansed.

Faster animations, shorter fuse times, wider radii, stronger conditions/boons, pulsing conditions, longer field uptime, traits that actually benefit the bow could be steps to save it...but honestly, this is VERY poorly designed and executed compared to the other classes. Severely undertuned.
 

PvE clearly has better alternative options over the bow. Shortbow initially felt like something that could really have a place in PvP/WvW...but current state it isn't even a threat or benefit.

• Skill 1 - Arc Detonator
  • Pros:
  • Cons: Small radius, Low damage, Slow fire rate and no synergy with other bow skills. Applies wrong condition.
• Skill 2 - Essence of Animated Sand
  • Pros:
  • Cons: Small radius, small barrier, small chain, unnoticeable condition (Cripple), long animation.
• Skill 3 - Essence of Living Shadows
  • Pros: Great conditions.
  • Cons: Small radius, small heal, long fuse time. Having all conditions (Weakness and Blindness) pulsed would be better.
• Skill 4 - Essence of Liquid Wrath
  • Pros:
  • Cons: Small radius, 1 condition (despite saying conditions...plural), yet another skill with might...
• Skill 5 - Essence of Borrowed Time
  • Pros: Great conditions.
  • Cons: Small radius. Having all conditions (Slow, Stun) pulsed would be better.

 

Edited November 28, 2023 by Love.1975

[OddFinrir.6801]

1 says it inflicts weakness instead of vulnerability. The weapon is also just way too slow. It seems like it's for ranged support, but you basically need to spam everything and even if you don't, you still end up stuck on very weak auto attack. It really feels like it was meant to be a kit and not a weapon. They need to have more effects when they are first placed, even if it's just damage.