Engi has been in a sorry state for too long in PvP

[Melumi.6432]

Yes, everyone is happy that one-shot grenade meta is gone, even us Engi mains are too. But right now, I hate the state of Engi and many other mains do too.

• The new Spear has zero defensives - No mechanics, buffs or evades as a melee weapon. So you're pretty much dead after you engage. It's too predictable and slow, both power and condi.
• Scrapper can't actually scrap or duel because it needs to take firearms and explosives to do any semblance of damage. Oh and it can't support even after all the semi-support focused changes.
• Holo has been gutted and is super squishy. The small buff to Photon Blitz is minimal.
• Mech players attempt playing condi or support and promptly die 5 times in a row while they watch the mech run into the wall on Skyhammer - only to question why they didn't play creaper or mes support instead.
• Core can throw a Moa flask and run away giggling.
• Turrets in pvp, useless.
• Elite Elixir? Now you can become a lich too randomly!
• Peronsal Battering Ram, nerfed.
• Alchemy and elixirs, even with the recent buff to boiling point? Useless, unless you go Vass, that's it.
• Firearms rework? Never happened.
• Inventions, Tools? Too limited and niche.
• Elixir Gun? The easiest way to waste a slot for no reason.
• Flamethrower and Juggernaut? Just a few stacks of burning barring everything hits. Power? Tickles in 2024.
• Supply crate... pretty sure it's still on CD from the match before last.
• Mortar, chariots of fire is playing while the slowest moving balls in existence fly through the air.
• Tool Kit, try hiting a 130 prybar on the nearest jumping WB or Thief.
• Gadget skills barely see any use apart from Slick Shoes for the knockdown and stunbreak.
   

Please for the love of God can we get some reworks on the lesser used kits, traits and skills.
Please can we have a little bit of defense for duels, without having to sacrifice half our damage because we need to pick certain traits or utilities.
Return self-quickness (but balanced) back to scrapper so we can pick any other relic than Chronomancer. Stormsinger would be nice to use. Mech gets Alacrity and Quickness?
Please can Elixir X be a predictable transform without RNG.
Please do something to mortar kit so it has more impact and identity. Because grenades are simply stronger.

I would like Engi to be more expressive and fun for both the player and enemy to fight.

[Terrorhuz.4695]

I'll support any engi buff which won't encourage using nades or explosive entrance.

[RafSimons.9235]

thanks😭

[Myror.7521]

Say thanks to anet for balancing everything around grenades....... making it too strong....... needed it to get nerfed cause of that....... now cause of the Balance engi is semi good with hard burst skills but up to 0 self sustain aside blindspam by traitlines xD

[coro.3176]

7 hours ago, Melumi.6432 said:

Firearms rework? Never happened.

Look at this trait.

33% chance of 22 damage .. if you crit. That's not a typo. Twenty two damage. If you spec condi, you *might* be able to get it up to 100.

That's supposed to be a minor trait on the same level as Explosive Entrance, giving you a 0.9 power coef AoE explosion every time you dodge.

That is the kind of imbalance we are dealing with here

[RidleyDay.3056]

erm ackshually spear's final auto chain has .5s evade frames and can be stowed 🤓 that's 1.5s of evade frames with *checks notes* 0 damage output and otherwise impossible conditions to fulfill 🤔 i think that's still too much for engi though. can someone quick kill cmc in wvw while utilizing the evade stow please? the fact engi has literally anything is insulting to me and i'd like it removed ASAP

[Shagie.7612]

1 hour ago, RidleyDay.3056 said:

erm ackshually spear's final auto chain has .5s evade frames and can be stowed

Didn't they remove that from Ranger back in the day on greatsword, intentionally, because that's a really goofy thing to have?

Why do it again lol

[Lazze.9870]

10 hours ago, coro.3176 said:

Look at this trait.

33% chance of 22 damage .. if you crit. That's not a typo. Twenty two damage. If you spec condi, you *might* be able to get it up to 100.

That's supposed to be a minor trait on the same level as Explosive Entrance, giving you a 0.9 power coef AoE explosion every time you dodge.

That is the kind of imbalance we are dealing with here

Literally every class that has a bleed on crit trait got this.

Like this or this or this.

Edited August 24 by Lazze.9870

[Lazze.9870]

6 hours ago, Shagie.7612 said:

Didn't they remove that from Ranger back in the day on greatsword, intentionally, because that's a really goofy thing to have?

Why do it again lol

Yup, they did.

I haven't tried engie spear, but consistentcy in class balance doesn't exist at Anet HQ. Sometimes it bumps in one direction, sometimes in another.

Edited August 24 by Lazze.9870

[Arheundel.6451]

On 8/23/2024 at 4:21 PM, Melumi.6432 said:

Yes, everyone is happy that one-shot grenade meta is gone, even us Engi mains are too. But right now, I hate the state of Engi and many other mains do too.

• The new Spear has zero defensives - No mechanics, buffs or evades as a melee weapon. So you're pretty much dead after you engage. It's too predictable and slow, both power and condi. What Bulwark gyro, gadget tool, spectrum shield, photon wall and more? Most other professions use defensive utilties to stay alive
• Scrapper can't actually scrap or duel because it needs to take firearms and explosives to do any semblance of damage. Oh and it can't support even after all the semi-support focused changes. No! You want to burst and duel, when those are two different roles requiring different specs, so you want sidenoder sustain and +1 burst dmg....yeah, that's called OP
• Holo has been gutted and is super squishy. The small buff to Photon Blitz is minimal. Anything is squishy if built for dmg, if you want more sustain then drop dmg
• Mech players attempt playing condi or support and promptly die 5 times in a row while they watch the mech run into the wall on Skyhammer - only to question why they didn't play creaper or mes support instead. Mech engineer was like ranger 3.0 on a condi spec before the nerfs, make it less braindead now if you want changes 
• Core can throw a Moa flask and run away giggling. Core ele can throw a tornado and die
• Turrets in pvp, useless. Elite turret is definetely no useless and plenty fof pvp engies use other turrets...if you want to see really useless utilities search for conjures
• Elite Elixir? Now you can become a lich too randomly! Better than a jihad tornado
• Peronsal Battering Ram, nerfed. How exactly is nerfed? Not OP enough?
• Alchemy and elixirs, even with the recent buff to boiling point? Useless, unless you go Vass, that's it. You don't know what useless really mean
• Firearms rework? Never happened. Yeah no...pretty popular for pve/wvw ...I wish to do that dmg like grenades does
• Inventions, Tools? Too limited and niche. Everything is niche...that's why you use different builds to accomplish different things
• Elixir Gun? The easiest way to waste a slot for no reason. Again...you don't know what waste of slot means, let me show you: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Conjure_Flame_Axe
• Flamethrower and Juggernaut? Just a few stacks of burning barring everything hits. Power? Tickles in 2024. https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Flamethrower Few stacks of burning...yeah right and you forget the remaining condis engi got access to, compared to professions who only have burning/bleeding as main condis dmg
• Supply crate... pretty sure it's still on CD from the match before last. https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Conjure_Fiery_Greatsword I have been waiting since last year for the CD to end...and even then its usage is completely worthless
• Mortar, chariots of fire is playing while the slowest moving balls in existence fly through the air. Yeah...not like engis has access to quickness...oh wait ....and slow moving balls?......let me show what real slow skills look like: https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Searing_Salvo . people can literally walk out of the radiou and still have time to spare by the time, this projectile hits the ground
• Tool Kit, try hiting a 130 prybar on the nearest jumping WB or Thief. Ttry use Magnet maybe? 6 x stacks of confusion on 15s and you want more?
• Gadget skills barely see any use apart from Slick Shoes for the knockdown and stunbreak. https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Conjure These never seen usage since launch in 2012

Please for the love of God can we get some reworks on the lesser used kits, traits and skills. No problem here but...what you ask below are not "unused traits and skills"
Please can we have a little bit of defense for duels, without having to sacrifice half our damage because we need to pick certain traits or utilities. Can't have super sustain and super dmg, that's called broken OP spec and engi saw enough of that
Return self-quickness (but balanced) back to scrapper so we can pick any other relic than Chronomancer. Stormsinger would be nice to use. Mech gets Alacrity and Quickness?Return self-quickness? what is this then?

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Kinetic_Battery

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Mech_Core:_Jade_Dynamo

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Elixir_U

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Radiant_Arc_(non-holosmith)

Do you know how much quickness ele get?
Please can Elixir X be a predictable transform without RNG. So nobody would ever pick tornado, we need a drawback for getting the chance of having either Rampage or Lich Form and the possibility of getting the worst/most useless skill in existence is enough 
Please do something to mortar kit so it has more impact and identity. Because grenades are simply stronger. Yeah only have a chill/poison field lasting 5s on a 15s CD so...not a chance, mortar is already 10x stronger than 3/4 of elementalist elites

I would like Engi to be more expressive and fun for both the player and enemy to fight.

It's still hard to fight good engies who abuse superspeed/quickness grenade spam in PvP...in WvW between bulwark gyro, elixir S , spectrum shield etc etc...good engies have more than enough sustain if used properly. A good balance is where players put effort to get good results and damage or sustain is obtained at the expense of the other. 

When you buff Professions like engi with access to almost everything,  the class can be quickly abused by average players to get results far above their actual skill level and I am talking about people who spent 1 x week on it

Edited August 24 by Arheundel.6451

[Etaoin.4362]

If they would at least return bruiser scrapper to even a fraction of its viability in competitive modes, I would be so happy…

Seriously, I’d be glad to have the grenade burst style toned down if it means we can get buffs to engineer elsewhere.

[coro.3176]

11 hours ago, Lazze.9870 said:

Literally every class that has a bleed on crit trait got this.

Like this or this or this.

phew, good thing they nerfed them all by 66% back in 2020. Players might have been getting an extra ~21 effective damage per crit instead of the ~7 they're getting now.

[Kuya.6495]

I agree with OP but wasn't shortbow holo meta like two cycles ago or am I misunderstanding that "long time" is just hyperbole for "has no build in the spvp meta currently"?

[Goosekilla.2796]

Yeah also that mortar scraper build with shredder gyro. Was very meta about 6 months ago. I wrecked a lot of sh** in solo q with that not so long ago.

[Terrorhuz.4695]

14 hours ago, Kuya.6495 said:

I agree with OP but wasn't shortbow holo meta like two cycles ago?

"Meta" is a bit of a stretch. Some players were toying with it and it wasn't half bad, but that's as far as it went.

[Saiyan.1704]

23 hours ago, Arheundel.6451 said:

When you buff Professions like engi with access to almost everything,  the class can be quickly abused by average players to get results far above their actual skill level and I am talking about people who spent 1 x week on it

I've met casual "average" Engi's and the actual Plat1 Plat2+ Scrapper/Holo players. There's a huge skill level difference there.

Engi are not Willbenders who face roll their keyboard for kills. Engi's skill ceiling is simply much higher.

[bethekey.8314]

Engineer players after almost a year of irrelevance and stray nerfs to core skills hardly even played (Magnet, Elixir X, Personal Battering Ram):

On 8/23/2024 at 8:21 AM, Melumi.6432 said:

I would like Engi to be more expressive and fun for both the player and enemy to fight.

On 8/24/2024 at 10:02 AM, Etaoin.4362 said:

I’d be glad to have the grenade burst style toned down if it means we can get buffs to engineer elsewhere.

Thief players after their latest infinite stealth gets toned down:

[Arheundel.6451]

On 8/24/2024 at 12:08 AM, coro.3176 said:

Look at this trait.

33% chance of 22 damage .. if you crit. That's not a typo. Twenty two damage. If you spec condi, you *might* be able to get it up to 100.

That's supposed to be a minor trait on the same level as Explosive Entrance, giving you a 0.9 power coef AoE explosion every time you dodge.

That is the kind of imbalance we are dealing with here

Look at this trait https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Arcane_Precision...with the addition of a 3s CD 

[WingSwipe.3084]

Engibros are engi-nearing their limits.

Ya'll need to have devs do a deep dive in the profession and start untangling a good 60-70% of your kits.

Engis deserve to have good builds in PvP that arent kitten.

[Arheundel.6451]

23 minutes ago, WingSwipe.3084 said:

Engibros are engi-nearing their limits.

Ya'll need to have devs do a deep dive in the profession and start untangling a good 60-70% of your kits.

Engis deserve to have good builds in PvP that arent kitten.

Only after they nerf grenades

[WingSwipe.3084]

10 minutes ago, Arheundel.6451 said:

Only after they nerf grenades

It should be a viable playstyle but not an opressive one.

Edited August 26 by WingSwipe.3084

[shion.2084]

My recommendation for grenades is that they should not be allowed to work with snap to ground target.   Make users of them have to skill shot to use them, not just run in any direction and hit the attack button, knowing they'll aim behind perfectly, or jump shot and hit attack button.   The sticky target thing is what makes nades oppressive.   If someone gets really good free-hand using them... then fine, that's skill.   These silly back forth jiggle attacks that rely on snap to target need to go.   With that done, you can fix the rest of engi to make it somewhat viable.   They gave us a whole alchemy rework which basically just gave an alternative to tools, but didn't really improve on it.  Giving another give or take identical capability that you have to give up one trait line for... is putting you no further ahead in terms of power, just diversity.  

The next fix is to stealth, port, invuln tanking in general.   Any time someone ports, comes out of stealth, or invulns, there should be a debuff to damage for a period of time after.  This will stop folks from porting from out of possible sightline (behind walls), Or launching a bunch of axes while stealthed and nuking OR doing the engi stealth to stun to grenade barrage.  Ports invulns invisible should be used for strategic positioning and escape, not to unload damage and remove agency.

Edited August 26 by shion.2084

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

On 8/23/2024 at 11:15 PM, Shagie.7612 said:

Didn't they remove that from Ranger back in the day on greatsword, intentionally, because that's a really goofy thing to have?

Why do it again lol

Id imagine its because engie has less active mitigation and fewer buttons for dealing with incoming damage on its melee options than ranger does. 

Greatsword on ranger was pretty heavy kitwise, but most of engies weapons either suck at providing mitigation or don't do it at all. If you want a close range engie as anet seems to want, I'd imagine it needs something. 

Opinion subject to change if its abusable ofc

Edited August 26 by Azure The Heartless.3261

[shion.2084]

23 minutes ago, Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

Id imagine its because engie has less active mitigation and fewer buttons for dealing with incoming damage on its melee options than ranger does. 

Greatsword on ranger was pretty heavy kitwise, but most of engies weapons either suck at providing mitigation or don't do it at all. If you want a close range engie as anet seems to want, I'd imagine it needs something. 

Opinion subject to change if its abusable ofc

The reason Engi tends to have less defensives, health, condo-removal, etc. is that in order to do any sort of meaningful damage you must take traits and traitlines that focus on buffing damage.  Our skills without these are useless and you might as well not play, because you won't be competitive in running support, bunkering, AOE condi bunker.  You don't have ports or the stealth or the movement skills of other classes that focus on those things.  

To do damage that could help with scrapper your health is between 15500 and 18300.  You have no significant condi removal, you have one stun break, you have no port, no invuln.  You probably aren't running stealth after the gyro nerf....   So you give up everything for your big 8k grenade barrage every 21 seconds.  You get a block from your main weapon and a reflect for defensives... and you probably take energy sig's to dodge and a stability every 35 seconds if you take bulwark (not meta... as it reduces your damage and your supposed to take shredder).  If you go for the meta, you get no stability... none.

And this would all be perfectly fine if it were the case that other classes made the same defensive and mobility trade-offs to get that kind of damage.

So in essence there are things you could take to cover the engi liabilities, but our damage is so poor that it wouldn't matter that you could live a bit longer because you would do nothing of value.

[Arheundel.6451]

1 hour ago, shion.2084 said:

The reason Engi tends to have less defensives, health, condo-removal, etc. is that in order to do any sort of meaningful damage you must take traits and traitlines that focus on buffing damage.  Our skills without these are useless and you might as well not play, because you won't be competitive in running support, bunkering, AOE condi bunker.  You don't have ports or the stealth or the movement skills of other classes that focus on those things.  

To do damage that could help with scrapper your health is between 15500 and 18300.  You have no significant condi removal, you have one stun break, you have no port, no invuln.  You probably aren't running stealth after the gyro nerf....   So you give up everything for your big 8k grenade barrage every 21 seconds.  You get a block from your main weapon and a reflect for defensives... and you probably take energy sig's to dodge and a stability every 35 seconds if you take bulwark (not meta... as it reduces your damage and your supposed to take shredder).  If you go for the meta, you get no stability... none.

And this would all be perfectly fine if it were the case that other classes made the same defensive and mobility trade-offs to get that kind of damage.

So in essence there are things you could take to cover the engi liabilities, but our damage is so poor that it wouldn't matter that you could live a bit longer because you would do nothing of value.

Which other professions do not invest traits/utilities to do dmg? Elixir S is an invulnerability...