Replacing Turrets: A Better Idea

[Vagrant.7206]

So, as pretty much any engineer main (and even non-main) knows, turrets are hooooot garbage, with maybe an exception for thumper in PvP and healing turret. A thought occurred to me -- what if we gave turrets the same treatment gyros got? Let's take the AI out of the question, and make turrets about enhancing your character in some way.

 

But turrets can't (and shouldn't) be the same as the gyros. Gyros were converted into wells. What would be a reasonable conversion for turrets? It hit me -- signets!

 

It makes sense in my mind. Each turret should become an enhancement of some sort. Passively, they could add extra damage/conditions to your regular attacks, and when activated they greatly increase their output. For examples:

 

* Rifle turret (passive) fires a regular surprise shot at your target every 5 hits. Rifle turret (active) adds a surprise shot to every attack for the next 10 hits. Cooldown for 30s.

* Flame turret (passive) adds burning damage to your attack every 5 hits. Flame turret (active) makes all attacks deal burning damage for 5 seconds. Cooldown for 30s.

* Net turret (passive) adds cripple to your attack every 5 hits. Net turret (active) makes the next 5 hits deal 1 second of immobilize and blind. Cooldown for 45s.

* Rocket turret (passive) fires a tracking missile that dazes every 10 hits. Rocket turret (active) stuns the next 3 hits. Cooldown for 45s.

* Thumper turret (passive) does PBAoE damage every 5 hits (450 radius) around the engineer. Thumper turret (active) knocks the target enemy down for 3 seconds. Cooldown for 30s.

* Supply crate and healing turret are the tricky ones that I can't really work out. I think healing turret should just become healing bomb that passively regens, but I'm not sure about supply crate.

 

Some of the toolbelt skills still need to change (Rocket turret and net turret in particular are bad toolbelts), but this change would not affect the toolbelt, and I think it would make the turrets far more valuable than their current state.

[Noah Salazar.5430]

Well ther was actualy idea to replace them with mech-scorpions, so turrets at last culd be mobile

but also x2 health pull culd be nice

same as dmg multiplicators

 

other idea was to make turrets some kind of bannerslave kit

while alive

flame turret +150 condi dmg

Rifle turret +150 precision

Rocket turret +150 power

Net +150 expercise

thumper turret +150 ferocity

for all team (no stack with other engineers)

[Vagrant.7206]

> @"Noah Salazar.5430" said:

> Well ther was actualy idea to replace them with mech-scorpions, so turrets at last culd be mobile

> but also x2 health pull culd be nice

> same as dmg multiplicators

>

> other idea was to make turrets some kind of bannerslave kit

> while alive

> flame turret +150 condi dmg

> Rifle turret +150 precision

> Rocket turret +150 power

> Net +150 expercise

> thumper turret +150 ferocity

> for all team (no stack with other engineers)

 

The problem with them being banners is that most banners are not that relevant outside of PvE. If we want to make turrets relevant, we should be attempting to make them useful in every mode.

[Dawdler.8521]

The turrets will never work because you dont have room for them. IMO it should be a turret building kit.

[Taril.8619]

So... Turrets become Virtues?

 

I dunno... I mean, it could work since it bypasses the AI nature of them which means ANet will actually allow them to be at all relevant... But it kind of defeats the purpose of being "Turrets" as well as the fantasy of being an Engineer that sets up defences (But I guess ANet will never let that be a thing anyway...)

 

I guess at the end of the day, Turrets are always going to be kind of meh in their design. Since, as long as they're actual Turrets, ANet won't let them be at all relevant and if they're changed from being "Turrets" to something else, then it'll just be essentially replacing Turrets with a completely different skill...

 

To be honest, I still wish they'd make Turrets better as Turrets. Along with changes to make them less set and forget so they can be actually allowed to be viable.

 

For example;

 

- If they worked similarly to the Turret thing you get in Kourna where they constantly drain health (Similar to Spirits) but you can use (a buffed) Tool Kit to repair them.

- Allow Magnet (Tool Kit 5) and Magnetic Shield (Shield 4) to pull Turrets to you so you can move them.

- Maybe replace Box of Trash (Skill 2) on Tool Kit for a skill that has a secondary effect of being able to Overcharge Turrets.

- Make Turret active skills provide active effects instead of blowing them up (So that there's more relevance on keeping Turrets alive as opposed to just set them down then blow them up after a few seconds).

- Most importantly, **make turrets scale off your stats**, for the most logical way to deal with the issue from a while back when Bunker builds in PvP were doing relevant damage due to Turrets and their independent stats.

 

Get a bit of TF2 Engineer gameplay all up in this game, whacking your stuff with your wrench inbetween shooting at enemies with a pistol and shotgun...

[Malhavoc Adhamar.3675]

Since the ammo concept has now been firmly ingrained across multiple classes, if not all ,to some degree, then it could be implemented for turrets. Rather than having health they would now have an ammo count that reduces with each auto attack, with overcharge using up half of the total ammo. The turret would detonate once it reached zero ammo, with the tool kit able to replenish ammo (possibly even moving them via magnet pull as already suggested) and hard CC being able to further reduce the ammo count to enable counter play.

 

I'd also look at adding turret upgrades to some of the existing traits across the trait lines so that it gives something core engi would be able to specialise in.

 

[Lynx.9058]

What if the turret was a backpack that you just carry around and it fires at your targets?

[Vagrant.7206]

> @"Taril.8619" said:

> So... Turrets become Virtues?

>

> I dunno... I mean, it could work since it bypasses the AI nature of them which means ANet will actually allow them to be at all relevant... But it kind of defeats the purpose of being "Turrets" as well as the fantasy of being an Engineer that sets up defences (But I guess ANet will never let that be a thing anyway...)

>

> I guess at the end of the day, Turrets are always going to be kind of meh in their design. Since, as long as they're actual Turrets, ANet won't let them be at all relevant and if they're changed from being "Turrets" to something else, then it'll just be essentially replacing Turrets with a completely different skill...

>

> To be honest, I still wish they'd make Turrets better as Turrets. Along with changes to make them less set and forget so they can be actually allowed to be viable.

>

> For example;

>

> - If they worked similarly to the Turret thing you get in Kourna where they constantly drain health (Similar to Spirits) but you can use (a buffed) Tool Kit to repair them.

> - Allow Magnet (Tool Kit 5) and Magnetic Shield (Shield 4) to pull Turrets to you so you can move them.

> - Maybe replace Box of Trash (Skill 2) on Tool Kit for a skill that has a secondary effect of being able to Overcharge Turrets.

> - Make Turret active skills provide active effects instead of blowing them up (So that there's more relevance on keeping Turrets alive as opposed to just set them down then blow them up after a few seconds).

> - Most importantly, **make turrets scale off your stats**, for the most logical way to deal with the issue from a while back when Bunker builds in PvP were doing relevant damage due to Turrets and their independent stats.

>

> Get a bit of TF2 Engineer gameplay all up in this game, whacking your stuff with your wrench inbetween shooting at enemies with a pistol and shotgun...

 

I believe that was the original intention of engineer, but it just never panned out that way due to balancing issues revolving around AI in GW2. In TF2, it works because the sentry has limited detection radius, is easily destroyed from distance, and you can LOS it easily. It also takes a lot to upgrade fully. But in return, it does crazy damage and area denial. Ultimately, you can't have the tradeoffs present in TF2, so you can't have the perks either.

 

Hence why I figure it just ought to be attached to your engineer. Like a backpack turret or something.

 


 

 

[Kodama.6453]

Turrets definitely need help and getting rid of the AI portion of them seems like the best way to ensure that they are allowed to be viable in any game mode.

But I don't agree with the signet approach.

 

Especially with the effects you suggested here, you could overload every 5th attack of yours with effects. Bonus damage from both rifle turret and thumper turret would be hard to balance, either the damage would be so low that they stay not viable or the damage is high and you will burst probably too hard.

 

It also doesn't really fit thematically in my eyes. If any of our existing utility skills should get reworked into working like signets, then it should be gadgets, considering that almost all of them (except throw mine) are some kind of equipment you wear on your body like boots, goggles, the personal battering ram....

These having passively enhancing effects makes sense for me, but not so much for turrets.

And gadgets are also a utility type that needs changes, so this would be the best course I think.

 

Personally, I would like to keep turrets as some kind of summon to fortify a point.

I posted an own idea for a turret rework some weeks ago, turrets would still be summons you place on the battlefield, but they wouldn't auto attack any longer.

The flip skill isn't the detonation anymore, but the new skill that the turret will perform. These turrets will collect charges over time, but unlike other charges, these will all get consumed at once when you activate the skill. The power of the skill would be determined by the amount of charges you have collected.

 

* Healing turret will steal heal when placed, then also perform a healing burst with a water combo field when activated (healing and duration of the water combo field scales with the charges).

* Rifle turret would face the direction you are targeting and then attack in a cone with constant ticking damage.

* Rocket turret would attack a marked circular area with an unblockable rocket barrage.

* Flame turret would create a fire stream and begin to spin, basically i would look like the spinning flamethrower attack from Sabetha, it would apply burning and slow to the enemy.

* Thumper turret gets reworked into tezzla turret, it is a tesla coil (name tezzla to make it a pun with an Asuran name), once activated it will create an electric shockwave ccing enemies around (low charges -> cripple, medium -> daze, high -> stun).

* Net turret gets reworked into chemical turret. We have 2 power damage focused turrets with rocket and rifle, I think having 2 condition based turrets would be best and net turret doesn't really provide that much except single target cc. Chemical turret will apply poison in the idea to enemies and also provide some boons for allies (maybe this could serve as a source of resistance?).

* Supply crate gets reworked into assembly turret. Supply crate doesn't work well with this system, while this new turret could also fill a niche many want: the robot army. Assembly turret will spawn robot drones attacking enemies in the area, the number of drones created scales with the charges.

 

However, this system might be a bit too complicated. Another approach could be to rework turrets into the same mechanic that spirit weapons are now. They become untargetable summons which will perform an attack in the selected area. These new attacks could do the same thing I already listed above, just without a charge system to make the attacks scale.

 

 

[Samug.6512]

I like the idea. Engi is the only core class that is missing some kind of passive utility skills. Although I already see a balance issue here, as Engi has multiple abilities that can hit multiple times, biggest offenders being nades and flamethrower.

[draxynnic.3719]

> @"Malhavoc Adhamar.3675" said:

> Since the ammo concept has now been firmly ingrained across multiple classes, if not all ,to some degree, then it could be implemented for turrets. Rather than having health they would now have an ammo count that reduces with each auto attack, with overcharge using up half of the total ammo. The turret would detonate once it reached zero ammo, with the tool kit able to replenish ammo (possibly even moving them via magnet pull as already suggested) and hard CC being able to further reduce the ammo count to enable counter play.

>

> I'd also look at adding turret upgrades to some of the existing traits across the trait lines so that it gives something core engi would be able to specialise in.

>

 

That is an interesting idea - we lost manual overcharges because there wasn't enough room on the bar to have toolbelt skills, overcharges, AND detonation, but this could essentially roll the overcharge and the detonate into one skill. Could possibly even make the overcharge use ALL the remaining ammo, with a scaling effect depending on how much ammo there was remaining. (This should probably be a 'diminishing returns' thing, so that overcharging a healing turret with 5 charges (for example) provides less overall healing than letting it tick three times and then overcharging with 2 charges.)

 

So, working through the various turrets, the effects could be:

 

Healing: Turret delivers a pulse of healing and condi removal and then explodes, blasting its own water field. Healing and condition removal increases with increased charges.

Rifle: Turret fires all remaining ammunition, with each shot after the first dealing reduced damage, and then explodes.

Flame: Turret generates a blinding smoke field and then explodes, blasting its own field. Duration of field is increased according to the number of remaining charges.

Net: Turret fires an electrified net and then explodes. Net deals damage according to the number of charges.

Thumper: Turret explodes, launching foes. Damage and area increases with the number of charges.

Supply Drop: All relevant overcharges occur simultaneously.