So... are engineer turrets ever going to be looked at, or no? Will we ever get a statement from the team on this?

[Tulki.1458]

For years still, and even following the recent balance patch (which apparently looked at the state of the entire game...?) the entire turret skill category on engineer has been neglected.

We still have these problems which are unique to turrets:

- Rotation delay (can't hit moving targets)

- No health bonus in PvE unlike necromancer minions, which get ~71% bonus health

- All projectiles pierce turrets by default

- Cannot be affected by boons, CAN be affected by conditions

- Can only overcharge once per CD, compared to necro minions which can use their chain skill multiple times

- Rocket turret tool belt skill is unusable indoors (it hits the ceiling and explodes - why doesn't this just fire in a straight line like everything else?)

- Thumper turret tool belt skill only grants 1s stability on a 38s cooldown (it was never changed after stability got reworked years ago, unlike everything else that gives stability)

 

These are all completely setting aside the balance issues of the skills themselves, around damage and cooldown. And why they don't scale with player stats when renegade skills do, even though both of them are pretty much functionally identical. Balance-wise, they're completely out of whack. Not enough health or armour to even survive one or two stray attacks from non-vet mobs at level 80. It just doesn't make any sense.

 

If you look at the wiki, many skills around turrets have not seen a single change in years. The thumper turret tool belt skill has been the same since 2013 (!!).

 

This is a whole skill category for a profession, that has gone completely neglected for years. Balance patches avoid even addressing that they exist, but they do. Every new player sees these skills, probably trains them because they're a defining characteristic of engineers, and then find that they're either completely busted or that their balance is so disconnected from the rest of the game that they are killed in a single shot or would have to survive for literal minutes just to kill a single non-veteran mob. And even worse? An elite skill is also based on turrets and shares all of the exact same problems with them. Supply Drop is literally only ever taken because of the stun, because the turrets that spawn out of it are completely worthless.

 

We've seen reworks to skill categories before. Thief traps were entirely replaced. Guardian spirit weapons were reworked. Scrapper gyros were reworked. Warrior banners were reworked.

 

What is the team's plan here? Is the team just unaware that these exist? Is there a systemic replacement in the works? What's going on? Stuff like this suggests to players (especially new ones who will encounter these skills and try to use them) that ArenaNet just doesn't care about the integrity of class skills. I haven't seen anyone from ArenaNet say anything about these skills, but surely they know the problems? This is baffling.

Edited May 24, 2021 by Tulki.1458

[Conncept.7638]

ANet nerfed all player spawned AI years ago, stating that AI was fine for casual content but unhealthy in any competitive or challenging environment, turrets have been just how they are ever since.

[Dawdler.8521]

Anet did look at turrets and massively improved them long ago. 

They're just not called turrets, they're called gyros.

[Quench.7091]

It feels like Experimental Turrets gives things that should be built into the turrets and that we're missing a trait that makes the turrets survive long enough to throw up their shield from Experimental Turrets in fights with more than 2 people.

[Imba.9451]

Considering the amount of times Anet does react to ANYTHING in this forum, I highly doubt they will react to this.

Funnily enough, I played Engi today and thought exactly the same. I love deployables, but turrets are just useless.

[MrForz.1953]

1 hour ago, Tulki.1458 said:

- Rocket turret tool belt skill is unusable indoors (it hits the ceiling and explodes - why doesn't this just fire in a straight line like everything else?)

 

 

Hah, there was a time it used to be just like that. A Surprise Shot with a channel time that dealt more damage.

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

The devs don't like AI companions because they take up server resources. I think that's part of why Ranger got an elite class that could disable the pet completely.

 

Every class went through many nerfs to any kind of AI kit, especially Mesmers.

Edited May 25, 2021 by Hannelore.8153

[Imba.9451]

12 hours ago, Hannelore.8153 said:

The devs don't like AI companions because they take up server resources. I think that's part of why Ranger got an elite class that could disable the pet completely.

 

Every class went through many nerfs to any kind of AI kit, especially Mesmers.

Wasn't mesmer changed because basically everyone summoned 3 strong illusions and never used shatters, because having those 3 big bois up was simply stronger and Anet deemed this "not fun"?

Additionally, all they do (as do minions) is auto attack their target until it's dead.

I am not knowledgable enough about how much this takes from the serves. To me, as a complete pleb, it simply seems like this is much of a factor.

Edited May 25, 2021 by Imba.9451

[Kontrolle.3514]

Those AI dont belong to such games. They either carry bad players by broken design or are complete useless. There is nothing in between like the last 20 jears of MMOs prooved. 

 

But they are inevitable in all MMOs, like assasins/thiefs aka "oneshot out of stealth" classes. 

The crowd demands such things and the vicious circle of endless crying and nerfing and crying will continue until we evolve and stop asking for things that are unhealthy for us and the games we would like to enjoy.

[Styopa.2538]

Devs: "What turrets?"

 

/only a little bit kidding.

[Shroud.2307]

Make them like Conjures except that allies cannot pick them up. Maybe add a flip over skill on the Utility Bar that grants a new skill while the Turret is held as well.

Place Turret -> option to pick up and gain 1 - 5 new skills in place of weapon skills, dropping it destroys it.

There, it's still a Turret and AI but can also be player controlled for more reliability and versatility.
Next step is buffing/fixing the Toolbelt skills.

[Tulki.1458]

3 hours ago, Kontrolle.3514 said:

Those AI dont belong to such games. They either carry bad players by broken design or are complete useless. There is nothing in between like the last 20 jears of MMOs prooved. 

 

But they are inevitable in all MMOs, like assasins/thiefs aka "oneshot out of stealth" classes. 

The crowd demands such things and the vicious circle of endless crying and nerfing and crying will continue until we evolve and stop asking for things that are unhealthy for us and the games we would like to enjoy.

 

FWIW, I agree with this. As they are, turrets promote passive gameplay which isn't interesting.

But then the solution is to make them useful and active, not to ignore them completely.

[Imba.9451]

4 minutes ago, Tulki.1458 said:

 

FWIW, I agree with this. As they are, turrets promote passive gameplay which isn't interesting.

But then the solution is to make them useful and active, not to ignore them completely.

I beg to differ. There are people who really enjoy using deployables and summons in all kind of games.

[ThrakathNar.4537]

7 hours ago, Imba.9451 said:

I beg to differ. There are people who really enjoy using deployables and summons in all kind of games.

Even if people enjoy summons, it doesn't change the fact that, in their current state, turrets take away effort from the player. As they currently are, the player using them is able to afk, as this is how they're designed, passive effects.

 

Of course the easy solution to this is not to make them passive effects or just neglect them for several years, but rather to improve their active effects, bring back turret overloads using the ammunition system (you have 2/3 charges when placing down a turret, the first 1/2 are overloads, the final charge is a detonate skill).

[Kontrolle.3514]

8 hours ago, Imba.9451 said:

I beg to differ. There are people who really enjoy using deployables and summons in all kind of games.

 

there are also people enjoying oneshotting other players out of stealth in all kind of games.  Is this good for a mmo? No it isnt. 

[Stalima.5490]

On 5/24/2021 at 9:35 PM, Tulki.1458 said:

- Rocket turret tool belt skill is unusable indoors (it hits the ceiling and explodes - why doesn't this just fire in a straight line like everything else?)

 

one might say... You've hit your damage ceiling 🤣

[Kodama.6453]

I gave up all hope for turrets to ever get meaningful changes at this point...

 

I love them thematically. Engineer is my main since launch and I used exclusively turrets all my way to level 80 with my main and was walking around with them for quite some more time at level 80. I really wanted to be the guy who puts down a little fortress to protect an area.

 

But even if they actually never were really worth it when it comes to damage, Anet still managed to keep nerfing them into the ground. They seem to just pretend that they no longer exist and hope that the players are forgetting them, too.

 

I get that the passive playstyle is a problem. But Anet also never did anything to change them to a more active playstyle, like they did with spirit weapons for example. They just killed them.

Edited May 26, 2021 by Kodama.6453

[Imba.9451]

5 hours ago, Kontrolle.3514 said:

 

there are also people enjoying oneshotting other players out of stealth in all kind of games.  Is this good for a mmo? No it isnt. 

Two different things entirely.

You can react to deployables. You can only guess when to expect a strike from invisibility. If you joticed someone going invis next to you that is.

[Kontrolle.3514]

On 5/26/2021 at 2:23 PM, Imba.9451 said:

Two different things entirely.

You can react to deployables. You can only guess when to expect a strike from invisibility. If you joticed someone going invis next to you that is.

 

 

? I dont know why you are arguing? I mean didnt you get the point? I try again.

 

On 5/26/2021 at 12:39 AM, Imba.9451 said:

I beg to differ. There are people who really enjoy using deployables and summons in all kind of games.

 

Just because people are asking for and enjoy broken mechanics in a game is not a reason to actually implement them. So they are not two different things at all. Both are broken concepts for mmo games by definition. Both havethe same problems in all kind of games.

[Kodama.6453]

19 minutes ago, Kontrolle.3514 said:

 

 

? I dont know why you are arguing? I mean didnt you get the point? I try again.

 

 

Just because people are asking for and enjoy broken mechanics in a game is not a reason to actually implement them. So they are not two different things at all. Both are broken concepts for mmo games by definition. Both havethe same problems in all kind of games.

Then anet should still commit to rework turrets to have a different mechanic which is not passive, instead of letting them be dead skills in our arsenal for years already.

 

They are just nerfing them to the ground and hope that we forgot they exist since we are never using them.

Edited May 27, 2021 by Kodama.6453

[Lynx.9058]

I really wish they'd improve turrets.  They were great for low level stuff but have become completely useless for me at 80, and I kinda based my entire character around them.

I loved playing classes like Robotics Agent in Global Agenda, which were heavily turret focused, and was hoping for something similar here, but there's just no point in even slotting these abilities after the early level grind.

Some changes I think we need:
1. Remove the rotation speed limit on turrets so they can track moving targets.

2. Give turrets some kind of health/survivability boost so they can withstand random hits like ranger pets.
3. Change the repair/wrench toolkit so that it actually benefits turrets.  You're supposed to be able to hit your turrets with the wrench to repair them, but it doesn't even seem to work, or at least doesn't repair enough to be worthwhile.
4. Add a threat/taunt component to thumper turret so we can use it more effectively as a tank in pve/solo pve.  I used it a lot for this purpose while leveling as most enemies would go for the turret over me or my other turrets, but towards the higher levels they just ignore it now and it doesn't do anything else useful or worthwhile.  This combined with being able to repair turrets with the wrench kit would at least give us a way to fight tougher enemies solo.

 

[Imba.9451]

5 hours ago, Kontrolle.3514 said:

 

 

? I dont know why you are arguing? I mean didnt you get the point? I try again.

 

 

Just because people are asking for and enjoy broken mechanics in a game is not a reason to actually implement them. So they are not two different things at all. Both are broken concepts for mmo games by definition. Both havethe same problems in all kind of games.

By wich definition? You say it's broken. Any argument to back that up?

There are deployables in all kinds of games. Are they always broken "by definition"? If yes, how so? Just because you prefer a more active playstyle?

[Ivantreil.3092]

A long time ago, talking about pre-HoT days, Turret Engineer was actually a legit strat that suppressed cap points in PvP, the build eventually was complained a lot for being so oppressive on a game where your objective is to stay in a circle to get points, that and also how no Skill Ceiling was required to play said build.

 

Turrets ended being nerfed to oblivion and the rest is history, eventually they got a mini buff on the toolbelts not being obstructed by the detonation skill and being available all the time, but even then, that was barely anything good.

 

• * Heal Turret no longer used after their most recent heal supply nerf (sad considering it was taken as the best Heal Skill we had and the only turret worth the usage by a long time).

* Thumper turret sees play in Protection Holo.

* Rifle Turret sees play in raids power kitless builds, but only for the toolbelt skill, the turret itself is worthless.

* Rocket, Flame & Net Turret never have seen the day of the light, only if you consider Supply Turret as seeing play.

 

Anet will never touch the turrets ever again, even less now that these unbalanced utilities are generators of Bot/AFK strategies, in fact, your best hopes are that they get deleted and swapped by an entire new set of utilities.

[HnRkLnXqZ.1870]

We have had so many threads with complaints and suggestions by now, I fear they run a special filter on the forums that insantly blocks every post that contains the word 'turret'.

 

In my opinion, they do not even have to improve any of the skills drastically, just undo the  May 26, 2017 Engineer Turret Rework patch. For those of you who have not been here so long:

 

The original turrets had two activation tiers. At first you deployed them, then you had the option to overcharge them manually + the option to detonate them. 

 

In that cursed patch, ANet wanted to eliminate the "summon a turret for the sake of detonating it" mentality. In addition they wanted to make turrets easier to use, as the manual overcharge confused a lot of new players. So they automatically overcharged every turret after deployment. 

 

What the patch succeeded on?

Turrets are easier to use for new players, no confusion with the overcharge anymore. 

 

What the patch did not succeed on?

1.) The regular abilities are often more useful than the overcharged ones. This is an oversight and fueled the rumor that ANet does not have an active Engineer player among their ranks until today. We knew about this fact, but in their opinion the overcharge was the better option - always. There was no reason not to overcharge 🙁.

2.) The manual overcharge allowed us to have control over our turrets. We were able to time the overcharges with certain situations and attack-patterns. For example the Flame Turret's overcharge causes an area-blind. So you were able to place it for burn-stacks and use the blind-overcharge when the enemy was about to launch their attack. 

3.) While overcharged, the turrets do not process their regular abilities. For a class that relies on fast paced combat, this is horrible.

4.) Stuff like the Heal Turret, required perfectly timed placement-overcharge-detonate cycle. In addition it was also possible to separate the different stages, depending on the situation. The auto-overcharge mostly ruined builds which utilized the HT for group-healing :S. 

 

-

 

There is very little hope for a happy end. The biggest problem is the most common one as well - they have never been really reworked. The skills are basically in the development state of 2013. Good luck finding someone in the team who still knows anything about that skill-type. So if they ever dare to touch the turrets, they probably have to rebuild the system from scratch.

[Matoro.9708]

No, the devs have never addressed it, do not care, and will not do anything about it. They care even less about it than the end of Icebrood Saga. I have long moved onto other games that do a better job of providing the fantasy I wanted.