Guild Wars 2

The April feature pack opened up build diversity by being able to change traits on the fly. No more having to go back to town to reset them for the next content. Bosses in dungeons could be traited for individually.

However, runes and sigils cannot simply be changed on the fly. They are bound to your gear and have to be either overwritten or salvaged to change. If you’ve put scholar or strength runes on your ascended set, it’s unlikely that you’re going to just throw away tens of gold each time you want to try a new build.

So, what I propose is something similar to how PvP handles runes and sigils. On the equipment screen, there will be a place to select your runes and sigils. Similar to how minis are bound, new runes can be bound and selected at any time or sold before binding. Maybe it takes 6 to unlock the rune to keep the numbers the same.

With this system, you can further customize your build for the content you’re about to play. No need to be stuck with some expensive runes that can’t be swapped or needing to buy a new set of the same gear just to use different runes.

Thoughts?

The only thing limiting/creating build diversity is ANet. They could make changes to Skills, Traits, Amulets, or Runes/Sigils to change build diversity.

Runes and Sigils are one of the smaller pieces impacting build Diversity. The other 3 are much more significant than Runes/Sigils.

You can carry various gear and weapons to swap on the fly. The only thing that is factually restricting your build diversity in this respect, is your willingness to use/fill your inventory. Thus, you can be accused as the problem just as likely as the runes/sigils load out. They cannot simply allow you to swap them at no cost. Otherwise what is the point of allowing them as drops to sell?

If you made things work like PvP, which is one of the worst ideas I have heard in a long time, we have no need for a trading post, no need for a player driven market, and no need for half of the game to exist. Once you have one of everything you want, what else is there to play or strive for?

Shockwave.1230:

The only thing limiting/creating build diversity is ANet.

That is not true. Throughout the games history, we have had “metas” change completely between updates. There have been times in which builds have changed entirely, and Anet changed nothing to create that. Players affraid to experiment in serious competition, outside of the “meta” is as problematic as anything Anet does or doesn’t.

coglin.1867:

Shockwave.1230:

The only thing limiting/creating build diversity is ANet.

That is not true. Throughout the games history, we have had “metas” change completely between updates. There have been times in which builds have changed entirely, and Anet changed nothing to create that. Players affraid to experiment in serious competition, outside of the “meta” is as problematic as anything Anet does or doesn’t.

Past metas don’t matter, build diversity is up to ANet. The best builds shake themselves out and become meta over time. What was previously meta that still is not, is so because it’s not as effective as the current meta builds. The more time that passes after changes that ANet makes to balance the more build diversity shrinks, because players get better at managing risk/reward those builds end up becoming the most used.

coglin.1867:

You can carry various gear and weapons to swap on the fly. The only thing that is factually restricting your build diversity in this respect, is your willingness to use/fill your inventory. Thus, you can be accused as the problem just as likely as the runes/sigils load out. They cannot simply allow you to swap them at no cost. Otherwise what is the point of allowing them as drops to sell?

If you made things work like PvP, which is one of the worst ideas I have heard in a long time, we have no need for a trading post, no need for a player driven market, and no need for half of the game to exist. Once you have one of everything you want, what else is there to play or strive for?

If the drops for runes were rebalanced, I think the market could still do well. If runes were unlocked for characters only and not account bound, there would still be a reason to continue buying them. In fact I think people would buy more runes because it’s not throwing money away when you change runes. Instead of just one or two sets, one might like to have many to choose from.

It works fine having extra exotics with different runes and sigils, but it’s not as practical when you’re using ascended/legendary gear. I can change the stats on bolt, but not it’s sigil when I’m changing from guardian (berserker) to my ranger (rabid). I can’t take my ascended gear from dungeons (scholar) and roam WvW with it (traveler).

Shockwave.1230:

coglin.1867:

Shockwave.1230:

The only thing limiting/creating build diversity is ANet.

That is not true. Throughout the games history, we have had “metas” change completely between updates. There have been times in which builds have changed entirely, and Anet changed nothing to create that. Players affraid to experiment in serious competition, outside of the “meta” is as problematic as anything Anet does or doesn’t.

Past metas don’t matter, build diversity is up to ANet. The best builds shake themselves out and become meta over time. What was previously meta that still is not, is so because it’s not as effective as the current meta builds. The more time that passes after changes that ANet makes to balance the more build diversity shrinks, because players get better at managing risk/reward those builds end up becoming the most used.

I think the current system of runes and sigils further reinforce the meta. If you’re going to spend hundreds of gold on your gear and put runes on it that cost 50+ gold, you’re going to want to put the “meta” runes on. There’s less room to play around with your build because you’re locked in.