Feedback: Engineer skills WITHER and LEECH

I think the Engineer class and idea is great. I've been thinking about the the primary damage skills Wither and Leech, especially since seeing several people claim Engineers need to do more damage. While I'm underwhelmed with Engineer damage, I'm not really in favor of simply adding some point blank, insta-cast AOE skills for this class. Here are my thoughts from a lvl 13 engineer:

The most efficient way to use these skills against regular mobs is to fire one off against one mob, then manually target another. That is because regular mobs die in 2 or 3 seconds using these skills and autoattack together. Wither takes 10 seconds for full damage, while Leech takes 6 seconds. A player is thus lucky to get half damage out of either skill. More problems arise when mobs are bunched together, making manual targeting difficult, and because we cannot predict which mobs our commando and operative buddies will kill. It is also a bit counterintuitive, keeping mobs ALIVE longer so you can fully damage and KILL them. Just when you finally DOT 2 mobs while you attack a third one, you can die because all 3 mobs are trying to KILL YOU too (happens to me).

That said, these skills do tend to do max damage on high hp enemies and bosses, which can sometimes live through multiple casts. Are they worth it for that purpose? Probably not. I've all but stopped using them at lvl 13. But maybe the solution isn't to just turn the engineer into a PL enchantress with L33tning and Fire Blast.

Instead, some skills, like the Operative skill Amplify Pain, have an effect better for bosses (armor debuff) and another for general play (crit buff). Could that be applied to Wither and Leech somehow? Here are some ideas:

1. Add some other effect to the skill that doesn't depend on DOT (slowed movement, root in place or a hit debuff?).
2. If the skill ends early, have its remaining duration "infect" one nearby enemy. No other enemy? No infection.
3. Add some kind of bonus if the skill finishes on a mob (a stun, knockdown or mini-pain explosion, maybe?)
4. Shorten duration and increase potency (most direct).

One of these would make the skills more useful. I'm sure there are a bazillion other ideas too. Post your thoughts!

Orrrrr you can just use transference like the rest of us

Honestly I think that the engineers are fine the way they are. They were designed to increase the survivalbility of your group while depending on the other two classes for damage. Every class was designed to be dependant on the other two for certain things, which is what makes playing the game with other people fun. Take it from a lv 21 operative, I love playing with other people and I know that the people I play with depend on me as much I do them. Any changes to the classes at this point would throw off the balence of the the whole game.

I agree engineers are star legands healers they are not for straight damage if u were to make them more powerful then what's the point in groups however for the people that disagree I think having a few rare weapons with overpowering damage stats wouldn't be a bad idea

Lvl 13 engineer

The biggest problem with Wither and Leech is that they are not Area of Effect (AE) skills (please correct me if I am wrong!). This leads to wasted casts when you or one of your partners kills an effected before sufficient DOT is dealt. In such a case, Wither and Leech still contributed damage, just maybe not enough to make the skill worthwhile.

As a level 20 Engineer, I still use Wither and Leech, though they are relegated to the second Skill panel. I use them in tandem on bosses and other big baddies, such as the healer squid-heads in the later Delta-7 zones. Those and pretty much any other situations where you just have to keep the DOT up, or else...

And as the illustrious Flowman alluded, the rest of us do indeed use Transference. That and Empathy are the Skills that I spam...and so should any other self-respecting Engineer, in my opinion! :)

I agree that Transferrence is a "better" skill. But simply advising people to use a different skill does not address the issue. Surely it was not intended that any class would have two skills with little practical use outside bosses and "big baddies" (as artfully described by thequickone). Maybe I am wrong, but those guys make up about 5% of the enemies a character encounters, and maybe closer to 3% on some maps.

I also agree that simply increasing Engineer skill damage is probably not the best solution. That's why I like the suggestion of slowed movement at cast, a knockdown if it finishes, infection if it doesn't, or something. It needs to be supportive, but not an AOE meteor bomb.

Thanks for the discussion.

Meteor bomb sounds like a spell from Golden Sun. I miss Golden Sun :(

Not to flood with posts, but I just did some testing with Wither, Leech and Transferrence all at lvl 1 in Dynastar Labs - Black Projects. Here is what I found:

Wither and Leech do about the same damage at lvl 1 on these mobs. When first cast, the enemy does an animation like it is being hit, but NO damage is applied. Instead, there is about a 2 second delay. After the first 2 seconds, Wither applies damage (10-12). It then applies damage again after seconds 4, 6 and 8. It does not apply damage after the 10th second, which means it does damage 4 times total. Total damage is 40-48 over 10 seconds (with a 12 second recharge from the time you cast it).

Leech follows the same process over 6 seconds, and it heals for the same amount it damages. That means it applies twice. There is a 2 second delay when you cast it, followed by damage/healing at seconds 2 and 4. No damage/healing at second 6 when it ends. Total damage/healing 20-24 (with a 15 second recharge from when you cast it).

Transferrence is different altogether. It applies AOE damage (24-32) instantly when cast to all mobs near your target (don't know the exact range between mobs, but you can cast it 12m away). After about 1 second, it applies the same damage again. The second time, however, any characters standing near the enemies are also healed for the total damage dealt by the second packet. Total damage is thus 48-64 per mob, while total healing is 24-32 per mob, all over about 1 second (with a 10 second recharge from the time cast).

Any of these skills can also critical hit anytime its damage applies. A critical hit adds 50% of the damage to that hit.

So the good news is that Wither actually does its full damage after 8 seconds, and Leech after 4, because they do not do anything in the last 2 seconds. The bad news is that they also do nothing in the first two seconds. If your enemy dies during that time, you just blew a skill and did no damage. Transferrence is almost always a good bet because there is just a second between the damage applications.

EDIT: After some further testing, it appears the effects of Wither and Leech are also REDUCED by armor. I was doing 3 damage on mobs in Delta 7 - Big Bug Blast. So it seems saving these skills for bosses is like saving a toothpick for a tank fight.

Have you noticed that the meteor bomb skill cast by the engineers are kindof like the one commandos have?They seem the same, BUT the engineer one takes forever to detonate (about 4-8) seconds. The real bad one that makes them different is that the spell dies with the target. The commandos' spell still detonates even though the target dies before detonation, BUT the engineers' spell doesn't detonate when the target dies before detonation. That leads to a wasted spell.

Just a note, we're making a slight tweek to wither and leach to make them tick when applied. This will mean the first tick of the dot hits instantly instead of on the second after being applied. We're still keeping an eye on these abilities and will make further adjustments as needed. We do not intend to replace these abilities at this time.