The War Within Engineering Specialization Guide and Builds

This guide is here to help you navigate the different Engineering specializations in War Within, so you can make the most out of your Engineering experience.

I'll show you the best ways to spend your points, and highlight which paths might not be worth your time. By the end, you'll have a solid foundation to start crafting your own build.

Table of contents

Engineering Specializations

War Within introduces three new Engineering specializations, unlocked at levels 25, 50, and 75. Each one offers unique perks that can significantly impact how you approach Engineering.

Here's a quick look at the four main Engineering specializations. Each one hones in on a specific aspect of Engineering

Engineered Equipment

This specialization covers all your gear crafting needs in Engineering, including Profession Equipment, Bracers, Guns, and Goggles.

Devices

This specialization focuses on crafting Explosives, Tinkers, and other Devices.

Inventing

Inventing is a mix of general Engineering bonuses, Reagent Crafting, and Cogwheel Crafting. The top nodes boost your skill, Ingenuity, Multicraft and Resourcefulness

Max Quality and Concentration

Before diving into how to spend your knowledge points, it's important to understand the role of Concentration, so you understand why I believe it's important to specialize in one recipe and prioritize boosting your Engineering skill first.

Concentration lets you craft an item at a quality one tier higher than your base skill would normally allow. The amount of Concentration needed depends on how much skill you're missing, but there's always a minimum amount of Concentration required.

For instance, even if you're only short by 1 skill point, you'd still need around 150-300 Concentration to craft max rank item (depends on if it's gear or consumable). Since Concentration regenerates at about 240 points daily, you're limited to crafting 1-2 item per day at max quality until you max out your build. (unless you get lucky with Ingenuity procs).

Dedicated Crafters

If crafting is your main focus, aim to master at least one recipe to the point where you don't need to use Concentration. This will allow you to craft more efficiently and handle larger orders without waiting for cooldowns.

Casual Crafters

If crafting is more of a leisurely activity for you and you're not planning to produce large quantities, it's okay to diversify and learn a variety of recipes. However, even for casual crafters, starting with a strong foundation in one area is generally more effective before expanding into others.

Choosing a Specialization Build

Here are two sample builds that focus on different aspects of Engineering. Choose the one that best suits your playstyle, and feel free to adjust it to fit your preferences.

1. Crafting Engineering Combat gear

This build is designed for crafting high-quality Engineering Combat gear, whether for personal use or for fulfilling orders through the crafting system.

2. Selling Reagents

This build focuses on producing high-quality Engineering materials to sell on the Auction House.

Build 1: Crafting Engineering Combat gear

First, decide which gear you want to prioritize:

  • Hunters: Go with the Gun. Weapons provide the biggest upgrade.
  • Personal Crafting Orders: The Gun or the Profession Equipment is your best bet, as they will be in higher demand than Goggles or the Bracer.
  • Everyone Else: Start with Goggles, then move to the Wrist.

Example Build

If you want to craft a Gun first, your build would look like this:

Adjust the sub-specializations according to the item you choose. This is just an example.

  1. Engineered Equipment (10 points) - To unlock a sub-specialization.
  2. Calibrated Chaos (10 points) - To unlock Guns.
  3. Guns (30 points) - It's important to max this out first. The final node unlocks the Enchanted Crest optional reagent slot, enabling you to boost the Gun's item level.
  4. Engineered Equipment (+30 points) - This will give you +skill to every Engineering Equipment and also teaches you the blue Engineering Tool recipe.

At this point, you should already be able to craft the Gun at max quality using Concentration and Q3 materials. If you're crafting it for personal use, you can stop here and start investing points into Goggles and Wrist.

However, if you want to reach max quality Guns without using Concentration, you'll need to invest 40 points into Inventing and then max out Calibrated Chaos. Calibrated Chaos only gives +5 skill point on the last node, you actually get Resourcefulness from investing points into it, which is why we leave it for last. (gnomes I think can skip this since they have +5 skill point)

Build 2: Selling Reagents

The goal of this build is to craft Q3 Engineering parts without needing to use Concentration.

Spending Knowledge Point

This is the order how you should spend your points:

  1. Inventing (10 points) - To unlock the Parts the sub-specialization
  2. Parts (40 points) - To gain skill points, multicraft and you will also learn the four Cogwheel recipes.
  3. Inventing (+30 points) - To get more skill points.

At this point, you can already craft all parts at max quality without using Concentration. From here, you can choose to focus on boosting Resourcefulness by investing points into Scrapper, or you can start investing in Ingenious to craft Q3 parts using Q2 materials and Concentration.