A powerful survivor who excels at locking down areas and controlling fights through turret placement. Engineer's TR12 turrets inherit all his items and become an additional source of damage, healing, and on-hit procs that scale with every item pickup. He rewards good positioning above almost any other survivor. His weak points are poor mobility and a primary attack that struggles against flying enemies.
Engineer's most important skill decision is which turret to run. TR12 is better for passive defensive builds with Bustling Fungus; TR58 is better for aggressive mobile builds. Both inherit all your items. Always redeploy turrets after picking up new items - they do not auto-update.
Both turrets deal similar total DPS and inherit identical item loadouts. The choice is about playstyle and which items you are building.
Always redeploy your turrets after picking up new items. Turrets snapshot items at placement time and do not update automatically. A turret placed at Stage 1 with 2 items will still have only 2 items in Stage 4. Pick up an item, then immediately replace your turrets.
Engineer is unlocked by completing the Engineering Perfection challenge: complete 30 stages total. Any survivor, any difficulty, any order. Progress accumulates across all runs.
Play as any survivor. The Engineering Perfection challenge is not limited to Engineer.
Complete 30 stages total across any number of runs. Stages count whether you die or complete them.
Progress carries between runs. Any stage completion counts - Stage 1, Stage 5, Void Fields, all count equally.
After 30 stage completions, Engineering Perfection completes and Engineer is permanently unlocked.
Play on Drizzle and loop past Stage 5 (Sky Meadow) for the fastest progress. A single looping run can complete 10-15+ stages in one session. You do not need to beat the game - just reach each next stage.
100% Calculated: defeat a teleporter boss within 5 seconds of it spawning. Use Artifact of Command for Crowbars and Focus Crystals. Stack enough burst damage to delete the boss before it can react.
Zero Sum: fully charge the teleporter with zero enemies remaining on stage. Kill everything including the boss, sweep the stage, then charge. Easiest on early stages where enemy counts are low.
Better With Friends: recruit 12 minions at once. Engineer turrets, drones (Strike, Gunner, Healing, Missile), squid turrets, and Happiest Mask ghosts all count. Buy drones from drone bays across multiple stages then count them together.
Engineer's item strategy is unique: you are effectively itemizing for 3 characters simultaneously (yourself + 2 turrets). On-hit proc items like Tri-Tip Dagger and AtG Missile fire from every turret shot, tripling their effective proc rate. Bustling Fungus is Engineer's signature item for TR12 builds.
The definitive TR12 Gauss Auto-Turret item. Turrets are stationary and always trigger Bustling Fungus's heal zone after standing still for 1 second. Turrets, Engineer, and the Bubble Shield zone become a passive healing nest that sustains the whole team. Useless on TR58 Carbonizer since those turrets move.
Adds 2 extra Bubble Shield charges and reduces its cooldown. A single Hardlight Afterburner gives near-100% Bubble Shield uptime. Two effectively makes the shield permanent. Highest value per item slot for defensive Engineer builds.
18% chance per kill to drop an ammo pack that resets all cooldowns. Resets both the 30s Turret cooldown and Bubble Shield immediately. Effectively free turret redeploys and on-demand shield refreshes. Surprisingly high value on Engineer specifically.
10% bleed per hit. Both TR12 and TR58 inherit this and apply it on every turret hit. Two turrets each hitting independently create overlapping bleed stacks that drain high-HP targets rapidly. One of the best per-item DPS gains on Engineer.
10% missile on hit. Both turret types proc AtG on every shot since they inherit all items. Two TR12 turrets each firing 3x/s at 10% proc rate generate a steady stream of missile procs on top of turret cannon damage.
Adds an extra charge of your special skill. TR12 can place 3 turrets at once instead of 2. Three turrets tripling your item-inherited DPS is an enormous upgrade. A second Lysate Cell enables 4 simultaneous turrets.
Adds an extra Pressure Mine or Spider Mine charge (up to 4 max). More mine deployments between cooldowns means more area denial. With Spider Mines, four always-active mines plus extras create near-continuous AoE coverage.
Attack speed increases both turret types' fire rates, multiplying all on-hit item procs proportionally. TR12 turrets go from 3x/s to faster, increasing bleed, AtG, and Ukulele proc frequency. Also speeds up Bouncing Grenade charge time.
Engineer's loop is positioning-first. Find a good chokepoint, place both turrets with overlapping fire lanes, drop Bubble Shield over the teleporter, layer mines at the entrance, then support with Bouncing Grenades. Engineer does not move much during a fight - his turrets and mines do the work.
Secondary: Spider Mines once unlocked - no arming required and active tracking makes them more reliable than Pressure Mines in dynamic fights. Utility: Bubble Shield for the defensive teleporter strategy. Thermal Harpoons for aggressive mobile builds. Special: TR12 Gauss Auto-Turret for Bustling Fungus synergy and higher proc coefficient; TR58 if you prefer mobility.
Redeploy after every item: This is the most important habit on Engineer. Turrets snapshot items at placement. Pick up an item and immediately replace both turrets so they inherit the new item.
Turret placement angles: Place turrets so their fire lanes overlap at your expected engagement zone but they do not point directly at each other. Two TR12 turrets facing the same direction at a chokepoint is far more effective than two turrets covering opposite directions.
Bubble Shield on Bubble Shield: Stack Pressure Mines or Spider Mines directly on the surface of a Bubble Shield for a pre-armed defensive position. Enemies walking into the shield to attack you trigger the mines immediately.
Bandolier priority: Bandolier is unusually strong on Engineer because it resets both the 30-second turret cooldown and Bubble Shield simultaneously. A Bandolier proc lets you immediately redeploy destroyed turrets and refresh your shield mid-fight.
Lysate Cell is essential: A third turret effectively adds 50% more item-inherited DPS to your setup. This is one of the highest single-item efficiency gains in the game for Engineer. Priority pickup whenever available.
Complete the Engineering Perfection challenge by finishing 30 stages total. Any survivor, any difficulty, progress is cumulative across runs. A single long looping run on Drizzle can account for 10+ stages at once.
No. Turrets snapshot the items Engineer has at the moment they are placed. Picking up a new item does not update existing turrets. You must destroy and redeploy your turrets for them to inherit new items. Build this habit immediately.
TR12 is generally better for item-stacking builds because of its higher proc coefficient (1.0 vs 0.6) and Bustling Fungus synergy. TR58 is better if you want mobility or are running items that benefit from the 50% slow laser. For Bustling Fungus builds, TR12 is the clear choice.
Bustling Fungus first for TR12 turret healing sustain. Hardlight Afterburner for near-permanent Bubble Shield. Lysate Cell for a third turret. Tri-Tip Dagger and AtG Missile for on-hit procs from all turrets. Bandolier for cooldown resets on kills. Soldier's Syringe to increase turret fire rates.
Spider Mines are better in most situations once unlocked. They require no arming time, actively seek enemies, can be thrown directly onto targets for instant damage, and can be stuck to allies for mobile delivery. Pressure Mines deal more damage when fully armed (900% vs 600%) but require pre-planning and careful placement to reach that damage.