Finally, Playing Engineer All These Years Paid Off

There's a new Fortnite season; as always, it comes with a sizable content update. The brunt of the new theme revolves around heists in expensive resorts. Fortnite is big on doing heists. Maybe that focus is because the influential Crime Boss: Rockay City was released this year. A lot of weaponry adds scopes to known load-outs for longer ranges. The whole is all very tactical and precise.

Unfortunately for yours truly, I'm suffering from some visual impairment at the moment. I can barely see out of my left eye. That blockage makes it very hard to scout for targets at a distance. Precision is not on the menu right now, and the new sticky bombs are not powerful enough to pick up the slack. There is a sniper rifle that zooms in quite a bit to reduce some of that stress, but it has one major flaw. The gun's scope reflects sunlight, and if you've ever watched the 1994 masterpiece Léon, you'll know that you can't see that reflection until the very last second, lest you get spotted yourself. I'm struggling on the island right now.

Luckily, Fortnite has introduced a new item that seems to be way overdue for implementation. As the loadout item is called, a business turret comes in a sleek briefcase. When thrown, the case opens and deploys a sentry gun that scans the environment for enemies. If you stay within 50 meters, your little buddy will have your back. It doesn't sound like much, but let me tell you: I've had a high success rate with hucking that briefcase around, netting many Victory Royales in my current condition. Even a semi-blind person can win a game!

Granted, my many years of training have molded me for this exact moment. Throughout my gaming history, if a game had an Engineer class, then that's the one I would pick every time. Torchlight II, Planetside 2; you name it. When Torbjörn was still fun in Overwatch, I'd whack that double barrel all game. Even in the recent mobile tragedy, Ni No Kuni: Cross Worlds, I stuck around much longer than I should've because the engineer there was a tiny, cute girl.

I named that character "Constanze," after the best person in the anime, Little Witch Academia. I couldn't imagine playing Guild Wars 2 with anything but turrets anymore. I might not remember the deep political lore of tribes in a global power struggle, but I remember that my giant cat person could always rely on a few handy machines. Being a video game engineer runs in my blood. There's no rush quite like outplaying enemies without even needing to aim. Besides, you'll never be quicker or more accurate than the game. Work smarter, not harder!

In Fortnite, my current strategy is to use my map awareness to constrict my opponents. In a fight, even at closer range, I'm fully useless. However, I'm in business if I can maneuver myself into the last circles. I'll try my best to listen to where fights are happening and see where the circle will shrink. Once the area gets small enough, I will use one of two strategies. If the enemies are not close to me, I'll run to the zone and drop a turret at the closest edge of the new phase.

Just as my opponents try to get comfortable in the new circle, they'll be assaulted by the sentry's automatic aim and be forced to make rash decisions, letting me mop up more easily from a flank position. However, if my opponents and I are both going for the zone, I'll hide a turret around my starting position. That way, I'll be free to run with something watching my back, but my rivals will either have to run and take tons of damage or stay behind to destroy my contraption, which will still have them take zone damage!

 

To give you an idea of the effectiveness of my methods: On multiple occasions now, I'll be running when the Victory Royale pop-up suddenly appears. I never even had to fire a weapon! It's pretty satisfying to formulate a plan like that, execute it, and then spontaneously see it come to fruition. Despite having to watch everything through a blurry haze, I can still hang with the cool cats by using my tactical noggin and, of course, with the aid of my helpful little friend.

I'm not telling you how you should play Fortnite or how you'll be able to beat Ninja in the game. There is certainly some sort of "meta" out there if you're fully able-bodied and still possess incredible reaction times. I have none of those things right now. I am saying that you should give role-playing an engineer a chance. Even with just a business turret by your side, you can put in quite some work. Who knows, things may go better than expected for you in the battle royale world. See you, somewhat blurrily, on the island, but not if my turret sees you first.