In this article of The Scrying Pool, Mattsta speculates about the Engineer specialization coming in Heart of Thorns.

With this new utility type, I thought what better way is there to add action to a class than by introducing an entirely new type of utility focused solely on passive abilities. I call this new utility type Schematics and the best example of this new utility type lies in the Schematic of Flight.

Schematic of Flight — Option 1: Grants a 25% increase in movement speed. Turrets become immobile and can attack. Option 2: Grants a 10% decrease in movement speed. Turrets gain flight and follow you but cannot attack.

The first thing you will notice with the Schematic of Flight is that there are two options. While this is similar to the Signets that many professions use, Schematics are unique in that there is no active effect. Both of the options that you see for a schematic are passives. Instead of activating a Schematic, you are simply switching between the two passive effects.

In the announcement trailer, we see the Engineer wielding a hammer followed by a small fleet of helicopter looking turrets. The Schematic of Flight is how I see these turrets gaining flight. In this way, those flying turrets are not a new type of turret but the normal turrets under the effect of this schematic.

When Option 1 is in effect, the turrets function exactly as they do now for the Engineer. When switched over to Option 2, the turrets gain mobility by being able to fly but at the cost of not being able to attack.

It is not only the turrets that are affected by this schematic, as the player’s movement speed is also tied into it. Essentially, when the turrets gain mobility the player loses some mobility and vice versa.

This is how the Schematics are completely passive but are designed to introduce more action to the profession. For each benefit that a schematic gives, it also grants a similar negative. In the case of the Schematic of Flight it is the turrets mobility and ability to attack vs mobility of the player. Players will need to swap between schematics’ options in order to get full use out of them.

Schematic of Jury Rigging — Option 1: Gadgets can be used a second time within a short time. Increased cooldowns. Option 2: Effectiveness of gadgets are reduced. Reduced cooldowns.

Schematic of Ammunition — Option 1: Skills for Weapons/Kits that have cooldowns activate faster. Cooldowns for these skills are increased. Option 2: Skills for Weapons/Kits that have cooldowns have their cooldowns reduced. Cast times for these skills are increased.

Many of these schematics would be based on the other utilities. Flight affects turrets, Jury Rigging gadgets and Ammunition weapon kits (as well as normal weapon skills). This is to help prevent pure passive builds, such as builds for other professions that use all signets for their passive effects. It is also to align with the Engineer as it currently exists where many builds focus on one utility type such as kit builds or turret builds.

Both the Schematic of Jury Rigging and Ammunition are designed to do very similar things, affect the timing of abilities. Jury Rigging does this by giving gadgets a second use at the cost of an increased cooldown, something that would be helpful if using rocket boots to get across the map. The other option is quicker cooldowns at the cost of reduced effectiveness. Utility Goggles is a good example here, as the duration of its fury and blind immunity would be reduced but would allow for a much quicker cooldown for its stun break. This supports the active use of these schematics, where players would be switching them based on the current situation.

The last schematic I want to show is a little different as it is a heal skill that replaces the Elixir H heal skill.

Schematic of Preservation — Heal on toggle. Option 1: You take reduced damage. Nearby allies occasionally gain Protection. Option 2: Regenerate health. Nearby allies occasionally gain Regeneration.

Because it is a healing skill, this is the only schematic that doesn’t have a negative effect tied to it. While all of these schematics would have a short cooldown, the healing skill has a more substantial cooldown as the Mechanic would heal whenever the schematic is toggled from one option to the other. Due to this, there is no negative effect to prevent getting stuck with an unwanted negative effect due to needing to heal.

While I won’t be going into traits too much, introducing an entirely new utility type will mean a set of new traits replacing traits that were used exclusively for Elixirs. To keep with the idea that swapping should be something encouraged, I imagine many of these traits would be triggered on the swap. For example, one trait might give a small amount of stability whenever a schematic is toggled to the other option.

Do you think the Engineer needs more action? Are Schematics something you would be interested in using? Maybe you would like using the two passive type of utility for a different profession? Let us know what you think.

Matt "Mattsta" Adams will maybe get his first Legendary with the upcoming precursor collections.

While dungeon progress continues ever onward, I completed the Ambrite collection! If that wasn't exciting enough, the achievement points from the collection put me at 20,000 achievement points and the next big reward chest! The next weapon set in my sights is the Corrupted set, of which I only need about 80 gold more to finish. What are you currently working on while we wait for Heart of Thorns?

If you have a question for me or a topic you would like to see talked about here, leave a comment below. You can also tweet your question and topics to me on twitter @MattstaNinja. Also, check out my site Mattsta.Ninja that focuses on guides and more for Guild Wars 2.