[Pet classes] Magus / Engi (WL/SH)

[ChicagoJoe]

And all the classes should survive and noone should die. And yet we play a game of 10s morale pumping and morale bombing encounters where most players rush to front line to drop that extra few dps numbers on equally eager opposition.

You want your turrets/demons to survive in a heat of a front line battle? Build for it.
Reinforced casing + Well oiled machine would be a good start.


No class should have it all and not suffer for it.

I think it is disingenuous to even suggest engis/magus "have it all". By forcing those tactics you reduce damage or cc abilities even more.

These posters are suggesting changing to bring the classes back to mere respectability. They already suffer from fluff damage and morale that requires concentration over time that can be interrupted.

Hell, choppas/slayers just got an AOE boost to a tactic. WL and Melee Squigs are already crazy op, with tactics giving multiple bonuses? Pounce/extra damage no cooldown? Maybe we should all just play the few meta classes that have been consistently championed.

[NSKaneda]

Hell, choppas/slayers just got an AOE boost to a tactic. WL and Melee Squigs are already crazy op, with tactics giving multiple bonuses? Pounce/extra damage no cooldown? Maybe we should all just play the few meta classes that have been consistently championed.

We (magus/engie, I play both classes) have enough aoe in aoe tree to seriously dent enemy in funnels, keeps, scenatios, cities.. Open battlefields depend on situation but relocation is always the key. Playing it as pressure-applying mobile artillery unit, mid to long range, not caring about single targets since I hunt warbands - mass applying dots until the screen is yellow with ticking dots and then opening my aoe attacks - believe me, I get my share of kills. It's not burst, it takes time to set up - but it's the front lines that buy me that time. And by the time my front lines start loosing health my dots start ticking. And ticking. And ticking. And they tick fast with mid range flamer* turret. Now it's simple matter of applying pbaoe and using aoe where enemy hp bars start dropping.

And dots tick. And tick. And you get your kills

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You can of course go for flame turret/blue horror* close quarters. With tinkerer / demonology tank build where you don't have the range and preferably no pet tactic - you won't have the time to take micro manage it.. Or going with insta-summon for those moments when fights reach stale mate. You want your ticks to spread then but honestly you don't need the range so it's a game of summoning pet -dotting all in sight - aplying pbaoe - rifting. From behind tanks so that your mdps can take care of business you're acting like a big git to da choppa generator. Tanks htl and push to disrupt heal line/casters, dps eat (a chunk of) front line, you get your renown and medallions.

That's how order guilds used to play with engies on Karak Norn and destro did the same. Then ppl started to blob to prevent rifting and bombing made it's way on the battlefields.

Both tactics work in RoR even better since RoR devs gave engies and magi love they deserved by making all three paths viable. But having those handicaps prevents them from having all - burst, aoe, survivability. You can only choose two
(and even then you won't be as bursty as BWs/Sorcs. Their role is crit spike, your is applying pressure, overwhelming healers and utility.)

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* In the heat of a battle sometimes I confuse blue horror with flamer because flame thrower seems like more visually logical choice for a short range option. And I'm used to flame turret on engie ^_^"

[Malin8]

You know, even tanks can't stand in BWs Rain of Fire and brush off the dmg. Get real. Relocate, recall. Standing in aoe and expecting it to be a nuisance one can brush off while applying their own aoe (should it be a nuisance as well?) is ....... [fill in the blank]

I am not even going to entertain this, youre factually retarded.

[wraithghost]

I wouldn't reply to him most people will see the utter rubbish he writes and have a good laugh. Wanting a turret that doesn't instantly die is somehow wanting it all .

the fact is compared to other classes its way to easy to shut down our damage with absolutely no thought whatsoever and constantly re-summoning the turret is not particularly fun either.

[Crumbs]

Yeah was about to suggest a solution by asking him to wrap his head in duct tape so that we can continue normal discussion

[martholomew]

I don't mean to be "that guy" but it really does feel like the Devs here have zero interest in any adjustments to Magus/Engi.

I 100% agree that the pet damage buffs need to go. Or at least give us a tactic that we can slot that makes us have that damage buff WITH OR WITHOUT a pet active, that builds up as we stay stationary and reduces as we move.

[medvtank1]

The way I look at it now is that the pets are just a detriment to the class. We do less damage than other aoe classes while also having to think about a squishy non-mobile pet that take 8 seconds(ish) to give us our normal damage. This game has huge wb v wb fights with lots of aoe being thrown around with forts, bigger pop and cities. The magus pet does no damage and I have began to just summon it somewhere hidden and play within the radius.

Not only do we have to worry about the pet but we must use the auto summon tactic to be even remotely useful in anything but a funnel.

Some suggestions could be

1- Tactic that gives us 30% base damage whether pet is summoned or not (vs the 40% with 8x stacks) - people might say this is op but if we even want the pet dmg helping us we would also have to use the auto summon tactic.

2- Increase range of the Pink Horror as the basically 5 feet we can move is useless

3- Allow pet to Receive AOE heals from groupmates.

4- If you are within a certain distance of your pet, it gains X toughness and X Wounds- this would make it so a player who is playing around turret will have stronger turret but if you move away it is easily killed (easy as it is now)

[ChicagoJoe]

I don't mean to be "that guy" but it really does feel like the Devs here have zero interest in any adjustments to Magus/Engi.

I 100% agree that the pet damage buffs need to go. Or at least give us a tactic that we can slot that makes us have that damage buff WITH OR WITHOUT a pet active, that builds up as we stay stationary and reduces as we move.

I think for the devs to entertain changes we have to lay it out for them cleanly and simply and follow the exact same format they have required. Things like experience with the classes, impact w/wo gear, similarity of proposed changes to existing skill abilities of other classes, impact to small scale, open rvr and city. Bitterstone folks are extremely knowledgeable and could add a bunch.

It would be good to all get behind the proposed changes. Personal war stories can be overdone and will take away from the message. Here are my summaries of some of the proposed changes.

Changes to pets: one or more options
1. Reduce AOE damage to pets and/or
2. Increase pet wounds and/or ability to get healed
3. Decrease time to get stacks and/or
4. Reduce cost/time to deploy pet (maybe combine redeploy/extra wound into single tactic) and/or
5. Remove damage stacks entirely, increase raw damage for all abilities, keep AOE/Range/Dodge/Disrupt mods with turrets

Loner tactic (WL/Squig have Loner/Terri. Aggress - both of those offer 25% damage decrease AND removed cool down on most impactful closer/finisher
1. Increase damage 25% and another benefit like reduced or no cooldown on focused fire, landmine, flashbang and/or
2. Increase damage by 25% and range by 10'
3. ???

Moral changes
m4 from trees instant cast rather than require 4 secs of concentration, maybe core m4 instant cast as well. Just about every other meta class has instant cast M4s, except for SW, who need

Some individual power or tactic suggested changes
Rift/Magnet - functionally inferior to get to da choppa which causes damage, instant cast, can be cast on the move, grants speed bonus, and doesn't create immunity to those pulled. Need suggestions here. Instant cast would be helpful.

Item changes
Warlord gear doesn't need AA bonuses on two pieces, and could benefit from more hp regen or increase range by 5 feet
2 weapons have significantly weaker procs on than some 2H weapons (avoidance, hp regen, etc - offer a 2 weapon set that grants a similar proc to mirror RDPS 2Her.

[doxifera]

Since Magus and Engi don’t have "Loner" tactic (which can be implemented - tactics give 8 stacks of pet buff, in return we lose the damage and skills of the pet) and alternatives, need to either reduce the AOE damage received by Demon/ Turret by 90%, or make the Demon/ Turret susceptible to group heals and buffs.

[Starx]

Since Magus and Engi don’t have "Loner" tactic (which can be implemented - tactics give 8 stacks of pet buff, in return we lose the damage and skills of the pet) and alternatives, need to either reduce the AOE damage received by Demon/ Turret by 90%, or make the Demon/ Turret susceptible to group heals and buffs.

Pet is actually worthless in city and im almost 100% sure its a dps loss to use it at all.

First thing is you actually have to run a tactic to make the pet usable, a tactic slot which either lowers your damage by ~10% or removes your ability to ever have AP in fights that last longer than 8 seconds because this class has WONDERFUL AP management (G-d forbid you dont have an AP ritual in your group). Then besides the tactic slot, you have a GCD to summon and AP, GCD to resummon. How long are you actually going to be in range?

Literally its just **** better to get a few more tentacle spams in, and have the extra tactic slot i guarantee you. Any situation where you can actually use your pet to any effect in city you can just raw 2 sec summon it but that's really only going to be very specific situations on defense in stage 1 near the end. Fights in city are too mobile to ever entertain dealing with this shitty class mechanic and im almost certain its better to actually not use a pet at all besides maybe a precasted flame prior to an engagement if you have time, but being a pseudorange class that basically has the same range as a choppa in AoE fights idk.