Guild Wars 2 - Page 267

On August 31 2012 22:15 Flicky wrote:
(Ok well, here's a first draft)




My History
As a fan of the engineer in PvP I was desperate to find fun builds for it. In the first beta I played a very escape-heavy build with low general tankiness. In weekend 2 I played Burning Swiftness & 3 Kits, with 3 Kits undoubtedly being the better of the two. In weekend 3 I played a Rifle Power build of my design alongside the previous two. However, something (I still don’t really know what) happened to the 3-Kit build and it just felt useless come Launch. Seeing as I got the Burning Swiftness and 3-Kit builds from Team Paradigm’s Teldo, I returned to the source and got this current build from him while he streamed. So without further ado, let’s take a look at his build piece by piece and go into how to play.
Note – while this is his build, I can only specify how I use it and what I’ve figured out. Odds are he does things differently and knows things I don’t. Teldo hasn’t had anything to do with the writing of this guide. Also, I love this build and absolutely think it’s the best I’ve come across for point defence.

Introduction
The Engineer is very adept at defending points – the profession excels at keeping people off points and surviving in the meantime. With correct play and a bit of luck you can hold points without issue in most 1v1s and keep the point for enough time for help to arrive if outnumbered. This build is based around such point defence, using the condition damage options of the pistol with the control offered by the shield and kits to whittle down any foes. It isn’t consistently mobile, but there are options to get you to places if they need you to help.
Due to this, the basic play style is to find a point and hold onto it while others roam or battle elsewhere. I prefer to take the aggressive point (the one nearest the enemy base) but if you have another ally who is doing better there, let them keep it. It doesn’t really matter.
As for the guide, I am assuming you know the tooltips so I am just describing how they can be used. I am using the order as Teldo describes with default hotkeys but will offer my hotkeys later.

Abilities
1 Explosive Shot
This is your simple long range attack. It’s used to keep pressure on an enemy from a distance. Please note that it is not your main source of damage in close/mid range. Note that it does cause a weak bleed on all targets hit.

2 Poison Dart Volley
This deals decent damage and the 33% healing reduction is very useful. While the condition damage is very useful all fight, remember to use this to help finish off fleeing or low health enemies. If you can have the poison on someone before they heal (happens a lot as people aren’t familiar with the game yet) it can ruin any chance the enemy has of taking you down. I prefer to use this early on in a fight so that it is back off cooldown again as the enemy gets into critical health zones. The pressure it causes early on in a fight seems too good to ignore.

3 Static Shot
Admittedly, I don’t really have a good time to use this. It makes the next single attack miss which is something to bear in mind. Usually I used it just as additional damage. I have tried using it to stop being interrupted while stomping but I’m not sure it actually works.

4 Magnetic Shield & Magnetic Inversion
Reflecting all projectiles is very useful. You’ll learn when to use this just by playing. My favourite is when I see Mr Condition Ranger pop quickness and Rapid Fire. Note that pressing 4 again during this cast will push back all enemies Guardian style. Knowing where your knockbacks are is key for this build. You can either use it in a knockback combo to neutralise a point, save your skin with it (with this combination 4->4 you can reflect all ranged damage and prevent all melee damage) or use it to interrupt a stomp or revive. I rarely see engineers actually use the pushback, but remember that if you’re fighting a ranged character, the reflect aspect may be more important to save. Use this skill wisely.

5 Static Shield & Shield Throw
This skill is good for saving your skin. If you can interrupt Thousand Blades or Pistol Whip with it, you’ve gained the advantage instantly. It’s also very helpful to use if you’re in danger. Combine it with a knockback (Big Ol’ Bomb is my favourite) to buy time or help defend the point. You can also throw the shield by pressing 5 again which can interrupt spells. I have thrown the shield after stunning but I’m unsure if it is intentional or not. Usually I shield throw if I find the enemy stopping with melee after seeing me cast.

6 Healing Turret/Cleansing Burst
F1 Regenerating Mist/Detonate Turret
Healing Turret is pretty cool. If you’re on the run, remember to pick it up right away. That’s the hardest part of the turret, remembering to take it with you or destroy it. It provides decent healing when left down but I find it better to drop it, pick it up again and use the Toolkit skill to get some regeneration. If you’re battling against conditions, it can be best to leave the turret down to use Cleansing Burst to cure everything off you. Remember that Regenerating Mist is a Water Field which, combined with your physical attack, will cast Regeneration. Detonate Turret is also a Blast Finisher which you can combine with Bomb Kit to stealth yourself or with Regenerating Mist for a burst heal.

7 Flamethrower
F2Incendiary Bullets
1 – Flame Jet Useful for some AoE damage, remember that you need to hit the last tick to get burn off. If you swap to Flamethrower and want burning up, this can be used.
2 – Flame Blast – Not really found a use for this yet. It deals some damage.
3 – Air Blast – Your most reliable knockback. You must be able to swap to this kit and use the pushback at all times. Try to count the cooldown so you know when it's up. This will help you cap points, interrupt heals, revives, stomps and save you from escapes. Remember, this can AoE if you aim properly and your enemies are placed sufficiently.
4 – Napalm – Can be thrown down for burning chance. If you swapped to Flamethrower you can drop this before quickly swapping out.
5 – Smoke Vent – I use this if I need to survive against a melee who is really close by and I have few other options. I have tried to use it to stomp being interrupted during stomps but it doesn’t seem to work.
Incendiary Bullets are good for some extra condition damage and a very easy way to put more pressure on.

8 Bomb Kit
F3 Big Ol’ Bomb
1 – Bomb – Hurts, can be worth dropping in a standard “Drop every bomb” rotation if an enemy is close. I generally use it if I’m 2s off an important bomb cooldown and it isn’t worth swapping the kit out.
2 – Fire Bomb – Does big AoE burning. Try and have this down as much as possible when fighting in close range.
3 – Concussion Bomb – Use in general bomb rotations in close range. The bomb confuses foes so bear that in mind.
4 – Smoke Bomb – Very similar to Smoke Vent on Flamethrower. Doesn’t seem to blind downed foes but is useful for escaping and surviving longer. This is a smoke field so with a blast you can Area Stealth and with a Physical Projectile you can blind.
5 – Glue Bomb – Use to help you kite. This is also one of your best escaping skills so if you need to return to your point but you’re getting attacked, use this with Smoke Bomb.
Big Ol’ Bomb is amazing. Big range AoE knockback and high damage. Plant this to help keep or neutralise a point well. It’s also very good for surviving. The blast field isn’t very easy to time so don’t count on it saving you without practice.

9 Elixir R
F3 Toss Elixir R
Remember this ONLY removes stuns. Nothing else is removed so save it until you’re certain you are stunned, otherwise it will be wasted. Anyway, tossing the elixir is why you want this, removing conditions is ok, but you can revive allies and, more importantly, yourself with this toss. It will heal 20% of downed health (total) each second for 6 pulses. This is a significant amount and more often than not you will be able to self revive with about 7000 health. You can also use this on allies if you need to, either combined with your own revive if you really need them up, or throw it at them so you can deal damage while it revives them for you. Keep an eye on them though. This is also a Light Field which with Blast will give Area Retaliation and with Physical Projectiles will remove conditions. This skill is amazing.

10 Supply Crate
Supply Crate is basically the only viable choice just because of how good it is. The turrets are incredible 1v1, you get loads of healing from it (5-6000), it stuns AND it’s a Blast finisher. You should not lose any 1v1 with this skill up.

Side Skills
Remember that if you are out of combat you can swap skills around. Most useful for this is swapping to Med Kit to give yourself swiftness (skill 5) or Slick Shoes for the same reason.
NOTE – If you have a Healing Turret out when you swap to Med kit it will destroy the turret and put the kit on the same cooldown as a Turret would be (20 seconds). This can be horrible if you get caught with it, especially if you don't understand why it's happening. This means that you will likely get stuck with the Med kit (learn how to use it) and you will not get your speed bonus.

Sigils, Runes & Amulets
Sigils are Earth on Pistol and Superior Accuracy on Shield. Sigil of Earth is very strong on all condition builds with some crit chance and seeing as this build has about 45%, you’ll be getting the proc a lot. The Shield sigil is just 5% crit chance for the extra procs from your traits and sigils to gain some more consistent damage.
Runes are Earth for the toughness and condition damage. This makes you very tanky (so you don’t get owned by bleed) and the extra condition damage means you can own them with bleed. Basically the whole set is conducive to outlasting and whittling down your opponents. The protection bonuses you probably won’t notice but they do help. The Magnetic Aura is very helpful against ranged classes but it’s best to think of it as bonus survivability for now. Remember that if you get the bonus Aura, not to use your Magnetic Shield.
Amulet is the Rabid Amulet with Rabid Jewel. It has more bonus toughness, precision and condition damage. It should be clear why you want this one.

Traits
Explosives – III, V, VIII (300 Power, 30% Condition Duration)
Firearms – III, IV (200 Precision, 200 Condition Damage)
Inventions –
Alchemy – VI, I (200 Vitality, 20% Boon Duration)
Tools –

Explosives
Forceful Explosives
Having a larger bomb range not only makes damage on point more reliable, but it means Big Ol’ Bomb is even better. On top of that it increases the control your Smoke and Glue bombs offer.
Incediary Powder
This gives you some additional burning damage. With this and all the other on-crit effects you can load up a lot of conditions easily. Keeping burn up means a lot of damage.
Short Fuse
20% less bomb cooldown means more bombs. That’s simple enough really.

Alternatives – "Shrapnel" can help keep bleed up during long bombing periods but normally they’re bleeding anyway. "Trait XII" may be useful but is more of a team-fight skill and not worth the damage loss.

Firearms
Infused Precision
Swiftness on crit. This is mostly to give you Vigor from the Invigorating Speed trait in Alchemy.
Rifled Barrels
This increases the range of your pistol by... well a bunch. A really good skill, I reckon you can play without it but honestly I’m used to having Rifled Barrels so I can’t really remember the old range. I think you could end up being outranged or kitable without it but I’m not sure that’s a big deal. It seems like a quality of life trait really.
Alternatives – "Fireforged Trigger" for cooldown on Air Blast is good and "Napalm Specialist" for longer burn can be helpful. I guess "Precise Sights" could work if the vulnerability stacks well enough.

Alchemy
Invigorating Speed
Gives Vigor (endurance regeneration) when you gain swiftness. Combine this with Infused Precision and you’ll be dodging for days. Very useful for point defence.
Protection Injection
Very useful against Hundred Blades & Pistol Whip builds. Saves a lot of damage throughout long fights and lets you survive burst and kill setups.
Alternatives – "Fast Acting Elixirs" could get your Toss Elixir up in time for a second revive but usually your opponent is dead by then or you have recovered fully. "Acidic Coating" will only help if you’re fighting melee so it’s situational. "Blood Injection" could help out with some extra damage but you don’t have a lot of Vitality in this build. "Backpack Regenerator" could be very handy if you’re stuck in long-drawn out fights.

Dealing Damage
As you are stacked with condition damage, the main way to hurt your foes is you load them up with Bleeds, Burns, Poisons and so on. The goal is to try and keep as many of this up at all times. At long range simple pistol shots with Incendiary Ammo or perhaps a Napalm field will keep bleed and burning up. Poison you only have one skill for but it shouldn’t be too tough to keep on your opponent. As soon as your opponent is close range, bombs become the best way to hurt them. Keep Fire Bomb up as much as possible and drop some bombs down. If both you and an enemy are low, Big Ol’ Bomb becomes a great damage option. Remember that cooldowns on bombs often mean it's best to swap out of the kit to maximise damage.

Surviving
You have high toughness and multiple healing options so survival is more a case of being tanky than mass-sustain. If you are low you won’t blast back up to full like a guardian, it’s more about stopping yourself getting there. While you’re not super susceptible to burst, it can and will happen to you. In that case it’s about timing interrupts and dodges - remember you have vigor up quite a lot of the time. Big Ol’ Bomb can be used to predict the burst and save yourself, as can Static Shield. You have plenty of knockbacks if necessary, lots of condition removals and some blinds. However, your ace in the hole is Toss Elixir R. If you know you’re about to go down, toss it on the floor and get right back up. This is a rather ghetto heal but it’s incredibly effective as, odds are, your opponent can’t do the same. Sometimes if I’m at 1500-2000 health I just throw it down anyway, stand in it and wait to die. All that and I haven’t even mentioned the Supply Crate.

Point Control
Basically combine the first two – defending points is what the build is made for so you shouldn’t have too much trouble. Whittle down your opponents and don’t die. The key part of Point Control is that you can neutralise points with all your knockbacks as so on without your enemy being able to do much about it. Make sure you don’t waste any skills and with timed Air Blast, Big Ol’ Bomb and Magnetic Inversion you can neutralise a point out from under their nose. It might take two rounds of cooldowns but it will happen.

Team Fights
You won’t really be part of the big team-fights with this build (Graveyard fights for example) but you may get caught in some fights while defending points. I find in this case you can run rampant with bombs and try to load conditions up on enemies. By virtue of being the guy pissing off the other team by not dying at Waterfall, you’ll often get focused here which can leave your allies to clean up. Remember a lot of your surviving skills can be used to assist allies and to save a pushback for stomps/revives. Toss Elixir R on team-mates, blind and immobilise foes with bombs and maybe drop some of your combo fields down. I find myself in more of a support role in this case, either by helping keep enemies off your team or stopping them supporting your target.

Mid Map Combat
You probably won’t be fighting between points very often but if you do, I suggest trying to run towards your point while throwing conditions on your chaser. Drop bombs to deal damage to those behind you, remember Magnetic Shield and use knockbacks to get away. Remember that while you are trying to make it to a point, you can easily deal a lot of damage to a chasing enemy while en route, just don’t compromise your goal to kill them. One rookie mistake I see a lot is people just trying to flee from an enemy without returning any damage. This usually ends up with the person running dying for nothing.

Hotkeys
My Hotkeys for this build are as follows:
1-5 as normal
Heal Skill - Healing Turret – Mouse 4
Utility 1 – Elixir R - Q
Utility 2 – Flamethrower – E
Utility 3 – Bombkit – R
Elite – Supply Crate – T
Toolkit 1 – Turret Skills - Shift+M4
Toolkit 2 – Toss Elixir R – Middle Mouse or F1
Toolkit 3 – Incendiary Ammo – Shift + E
Toolkit 4 – Big Ol’ Bomb – Shift + R
As far as I’m concerned, you can use whatever you want as long as you can get from your kit hotkey to 1-5 very easily. I have Flamethrower on E because swapping to kit then using Air Blast (3) is incredibly easy. No need to make your hotkeys complicated.

Final Notes
This is an early draft of the guide. Looking back at it, it perhaps has too much information but I think that’s more due to the fact that it’s early on in the game so a lot of people don’t know this sort of thing. Please give me feedback on the guide and the build (including spelling/grammar) and let me know what you think of it. If you think it is too long, I can try and write a short version.

As this isn’t a build of my design (if it comes across as looking like it is please tell me where in the text so I can fix it, I will not take credit for Teldo’s build), I haven’t been able to answer every reason for why things are chosen and due to the early state of the game; I won’t be very good at defining why things weren’t chosen. If you have any other questions or need some help with playing the build, let me know and I will absolutely happy to help (you may need to PM)

Again, any criticisms or improvements you can suggest, let me know. If I feel happy with the final product I am likely to make more of these. Let me know if you think it’s too serious or could do with some humour. I will be trying to pretty this up with some pictures and so on.
If you want comparisons between this and other builds, please note that it may take some time if I haven’t tried the other build yet.