Guild Wars 2

Woohoo!

Just wanted to share my first test for “Is it vertical or horizontal?”

If it will let an 80th level character come back to Queensdale and kill a plainswurm one-tenth of a seconds faster than they can now… it ain’t horizontal!

Looking forward to seeing people’s ideas!!

Some thoughts:

- Horizontial progression can and should be the biggest focus of this game. The entire system of coloring armor, various armor sets and inter-mixing with transmutation stones and not being forced into ‘sets’ for bonuses and instead utilizing runes is a huge plus.

- With that said, as was talked about in the Vertical progression where Ascended gear should take some measure of time to gain in however manner you want to get it, Horizontial progression can entail the grind / effort to get what you really want to look ‘good’. Legendary weapons are already a perfect example of horizontial progression across the board by doing everything you can in GW2.

- Specific Horizontial progression paths (Dungeons for dungeon tokens for specific armor sets) are fine, but is there a possibility for doing group events in the same zone as the dungeon for minor payouts of the same tokens? For instance killing the dredge commisour in Dredgehaunt cliffs can grant just a few Sorrow’s Embrace tokens like its dungeon counterpart as a daily?

- For the investment into the Fractal dungeon I am surprised there hasn’t already been consideration into making a Fractal Armor set…or is there? I like surprises so if I am onto something don’t tell me!

- The flamekissed incident did open a possibility for enhanced cultural armor. Maybe construct a manner to have each race embellish their cultural armor with effects, through mystic forging, tokens, etc.

I just had a cool idea of introducing dungeons to gear you might want (not gear you buy to salvage for money (assuming you have exotic gear already)).

1. Fix all the paths nobody wants to play. Take a look at length, rewards, difficulty, amount of silver mobs, boss difficulty (seriously take a look at their HP) and make the paths about 20 min long (could go for every path in the game).

2. Add vanquishing to dungeons. A longer version of the path (provided you’ve made them about 20 minutes now!) with more mobs where you kill everything for a better reward. Ascended possible reward, new cool vanquishing only items (fractals has its weapons).

It would potentially open up dungeons for everybody, newbies and non-80s (I hate seeing 80 as a requirement on LFG for lower dungeons), while still having that extra challenge for people who mainly do dungeons.

I think you also should get rid of the difference between lower dungeons and 70+, where people buy those 30 token rares and salvage. All dungeons should have the same sort of reward, but difference in stats and skins. You could maybe add some kind of universal token (play any dungeon, progress towards ascended or new vanquishing gear) in exchange for a dungeon’s token for those that don’t want the exotic armor, and if you don’t need or want those new kinds of weapons or armors there should be a viable cashing out option (2 <class> gear boxes), or maybe some minis, dyes, maybe even black lion keys?

This would fix the problem with unwanted dungeon paths, make a more distinct border between learning the dungeon and being a master at it, and also introduce dungeons to ascended gear among other things. Dungeons are a huge part of the game and need to stay relevant in the later stage of the game, not everyone enjoys Fractals.

However, it will require the devs to pay attention to feedback regarding rewards and how fun each path is compared to others. I feel like most paths are solid in their story and boss fight ideas, but many fall flat because they are too long, bosses have too much HP, silver mobs take too long to kill and then the daily reward is just not worth fighting for.

What do you think?

I would like to see a greater focus on customizing armor appearances. As I understand it, every set of armor that is released has 10 versions which means a crap ton of resources time, money, and manpower are needed for a single set of armor. This may not seem feasible so why not aim for the ability to customize the appearances of the armor?

Is it possible to add variations of the armor E.G: female phoenix armor with sleeves on both arms instead of 1 sleeve on the right arm, or removing the floating bits of feather as an option? Anything that allows current existing armor sets to be customized beyond a simple degree of dye channels could be a very big draw to me. Personally, I’d love to be able to remove the floating feathers (not the ones already connected to each other) on the phoenix set.

Another option could be to the ability to add particle effects so that I can set a “theme” for armor sets. Unlocking the ability to add a single particle effect on a single piece of armor could be a very nice reward outlet and adding different types of particle effects such as glowing embers, glimmer snow, or bolts of lightning could change an armor set’s “theme.”

Imagine a set of armor with the grenth hood and the darkness particle effects seen on the sunless weapons. We’d end up looking a bit more like Liadri the Concealing Dark but hey, it’s a theme.

The focus I’d like to see for Anet’s stance on horizontal progression is customizability of what already exists. Or rather, if Anet can add 2-3 variants of certain armor pieces on armor sets without having to sink 2-3 times the resources to add it. It was mentioned before the helmets, shoulders, and gloves are the least resource intensive (cheapest) for artwork. Why not give us variations of these artwork where we unlock a base item and can further unlock additional variant artwork, much like alternate costumes/appearances found in fighting games?

Sorry to sound dumb- but what does “horizontal character progression” entail?

Cosmetics? Traits? Stats? Would appreciate a list of things I can comment on because I would really like to help. =( I type walls of text with lots of information…enticing? No? Yea, I know. But hey, its a good read. Anyway, please answer what all I can discuss in “Horizontal Character Progression”. Thanks. =)
Oh!! And how do I get a signature that I can show?

It’s up! Hope the vacation is going well so far, Chris!

My ideas for Horizontal progression:

I like Knaif’s idea about a Fractal Armor set. Great horizontal progression specifically for Fractals. Out of game Leaderboards are alright, in-game bragging rights are better.

I would like to see the Achievement panel rewards expanded. Effects that go on top of armor sets (think flame-kissed flame effects that you can apply, but not flames)
Unique Achievement Dyes.
Unique Story Mode Items unlocked in Achievement Panel.
The Armor pieces in the Achievement Tab need to be filled in and should be dye-able.

PvP Horizontal Progression:
The ability to type /rank1 to do Bunny Emote, /rank4 to do Wolf Emote etc after you earn each one so you can emote all the ones you have acquired.

Housing Progression:
Actual Stuff to accrue via doing things in game for our housing instances.

Earn-able emotes for PvE. Titles are great and so are store items, but things we can earn inherently mean more.

New character phrases uttered in battle. It was mentioned by a user in the previous thread. I like it so much I wanted to echo that sentiment.

I guess it is about anything that does not increase the character level/strength – so mostly cosmetic.

Some general thoughts:

1. Remove Soulbound from any consumables. Actually remove soulbound period.

2. Have more skins that behave like the achievement point ones (i.e. reusable and easy to apply). Phase out transmutation stones (like already begun with fractal weapon skins)

3. Make storing skins more convenient – like the PvP locker.

4. Since RNG is the driving force for most expensive items (including legendaries) – pls reduce the impact of RNG and add more deterministic progress (like you did for the black lion scraps).

Just to have it in this thread again since most likly you won’t look at the old one: any update on fractals reset?

Horizontal progression assumes that the player achieves something and is rewarded with something that changes the physical appearance of their character/s.

Regardless of what that something is, I personally think the biggest issue here is the definition of an achievement. Is an achievement doing something difficult and overcoming a challenge or repeating an easy task for weeks/months?

Meaningful, challenging content with character build diversity and an alt friendly environment is what will build a passionate GW2 community.

Grinding, meaningless, easy repetitive tasks will chase everyone away.

Horizontal progression = things a character can achieve without making it more efficient in combat or in other gameplay mechanics compared with another character who doesn’t have these things

- increase the number of titles and diversify their acquirement process = it is fun to see a new title pop up on your screen “you have earned the […] tile”

- weapon/armor/gear skin wardrobe = a goal for all collectors

- costumes crafting

- in-game leaderboards similar to GW1 challenge missions

- further customization for armors and weapons (weapon dyes)

Serious Thought.5394:

Sorry to sound dumb- but what does “horizontal character progression” entail?

Cosmetics? Traits? Stats? Would appreciate a list of things I can comment on because I would really like to help. =( I type walls of text with lots of information…enticing? No? Yea, I know. But hey, its a good read. Anyway, please answer what all I can discuss in “Horizontal Character Progression”. Thanks. =)
Oh!! And how do I get a signature that I can show?

Vertical Progression entails a player’s power within the game going up in a vertical manor. This mean getting gear or items that up their stats.
Horizontal on the other hand keeps all players on an even field in terms of their power, however, you are moving towards a goal that is more towards a player’s cosmetics. It could also entail other things like skill acquisition, and titles, and lot of other things that don’t increase stats, but do provide differing avenues for a player to feel accomplished.

As far as cosmetic horizontal progression goes, the game could implement a wardrobe system. Having an easy means to store mutliple “looks” would foster the idea that multiple looks are desirable. The current system (skins transmuted over armor) fosters the idea that a player should get one look and one alone.

Calae.1738:

Horizontal progression assumes that the player achieves something and is rewarded with something that changes the physical appearance of their character/s.

Regardless of what that something is, I personally think the biggest issue here is the definition of an achievement. Is an achievement doing something difficult and overcoming a challenge or repeating an easy task for weeks/months?

Meaningful, challenging content with character build diversity and an alt friendly environment is what will build a passionate GW2 community.

Grinding, meaningless, easy repetitive tasks will chase everyone away.

Not necessarily. Some people enjoy farming(grinding to some), skill-appropriate(easy to some) tasks.

Just as what one person finds repetitive(boring), and game-breaking, another may find challenging(frustrating) content game-breaking, as well.

HORIZONTAL PROGRESSION
Horizontal progression can be a great substitute to vertical progression, because it does not (directly) invalidate past progression made by the player, allowing the player to continuously grow without wasting their effort in the past. In fact, this is a problem that could probably be toned down in current vertical progression systems as well.

THE FLAWS IN GW2’s MECHANICS FOR HORIZONTAL PROGRESSION

• They are generally under-developed;
• They aren’t as “visible” as they should;
• They aren’t as “tangible” as they should;

You might ask: what does Diogo means with the “visible” and “tangible” words?

I understand as “visible” any system where the progression can be easily identified or easily followed by the player:

• Gear stats are “visible” (vertical) progression because a player can look at them and directly compare to exotics or other previously equipped items and understand that they have made a progression.
• Achievements are “visible” because they have an entire UI dedicated to them, with bars that can be filled, points and stats that can be increased, a leaderboard system dedicated to them, and a section for long-term chest rewards and unlocked privileges.

So, why is GW2 lacking “visible” horizontal progression?

• Cosmetic progression is “visible” only when the items are equipped to your character. Skin collecting, however, is not a “visible” system – its progression can’t be easily followed by the player. When a skin is transmuted, the old skin disappears. When a skin is not used, it is usually wasting bank slot, which incentives the player to salvage it. When a new skin is obtained, it’s usually used for salvaging purposes or is immediately sold at the TP. No player feels that they are progressing this way.

Solutions to the problem, and other ideas to improve upon it:

• A Skin Wardrobe, where players can visualize all the skins they have collected, and work for long-term goals determined by the UI, like filling the wardrobe, filling completion bars and increasing points (probably through achievements), and gaining rewards out of that.
• Make unlocked collectible recipes and unlocked collectible dyes account-bound.
• A Hall of Monuments map. Even though the achievement system is already “visible” through the UI, it would be even more satisfying if it was “visible” within the world itself, with an incomplete statue of our own character that we would need to complete, several statues for the most important achievements, a collection the models for all mini pets and skins unlocked, etc.

I understand as “tangible” any system where progression leads to consequences that can be “felt” through game play interaction, be it from exploration, customization, experimentation, etc.

• Gear stats are “tangible” (vertical) progression, because they influence the outcome of battle encounters to your favor. When a character equips new gear, the player will feel the consequences of the new stats because battles will become easier as a result. The player gains this way a sense of progression within the normal game play flow.

So, why is GW2 lacking “tangible” horizontal progression?

• Any new non-profession skill added to the game is made to be underwhelming on purpose for the sake of “balance”. This means that said skill never ends up impacting the game play – it never brings any consequence to it. If players won’t experiment with them, if players won’t feel satisfied by using them, and if there’s no potential build in the making in order to take advantage on them, then any sense of (horizontal) progression is left unfulfilled, because the impact those skills have on game play is insignificant.
• Any new stat combo that is added into the game, that can’t be properly built for, will be left forgotten and, once again, no sense of progression will be “felt”.
• Any new mini-pet that is added into the game, and is quickly, automatically stored in the bank and left forgotten since then, does not create a “sense of progression” either.
• Generally unappealing and ignored equipment skins means that the majority of the player base will not feel a cosmetic progression upon acquiring them.
• The home instance as a whole, outside of a few tiny additions from the living story.
• The personal story and character’s personality traits, outside of a few automatically skip-able story instances (which I personally didn’t even like that they were skip-able).
• Dynamic events as a long-term consequence to the “living world”.

Solutions to the “tangible” problem (phew, this one is going to be big):

Non-profession Skills

• Redefine how to approach balance for all non-profession skills. Trying to prevent them from being too strong and discriminating some races over others is a noble cause, but making them too obviously underwhelming and they will not function as “tangible” horizontal progression. They should be on an average power level, and they should be allowed to shine in some scenarios, no matter how niche or story-driven those might be. Those scenarios should certainly be repeatable, though.
• As an example, the Spray skill is stronger in a niche scenario, which is interesting, but its base power level is too weak, which is unsatisfying and unrewarding. As another example, Light of Dwayna has an average base power level, and is thus sometimes picked up, but it doesn’t shines anywhere.
• Expanding on this, racial skills could be stronger on their respective territory, much similar to what GW1 did with EoTN pve skills. Light of Dwayna could be stronger on Krytan territory, Charrzooka could be stronger on Ascalonian territory, and so on. Dungeons could be excluded from this if needed, but it’s hard to demand this, because dungeons are also the most appealing places to test out new builds with those skills.
• As race discrimination is an important issue, consider a proposal to make all racial skills unlocked to all races, but gated by territory-context “quests” (hearts and dynamic events). Yes, this would come at the cost of some distinction between races, but let me ask you: which distinction exists now, when those skills are underwhelming and no one uses them? Let me ask another question: what is better for world immersion, underwhelming skills gated by race, or appealing skills obtained from exploring the world? Under mathematical terms, there would be more potential for world immersion if all races could obtain them (1. Because it would add less restriction for balance, and thus players would actually use and “feel” them, and 2. because they could be tied to territory and thus add personality to each map) than not (because it would remove race distinction, which barely even exists at the current place for the sake of race balance). Two points against one in favor of racial skills be made available to all races. But let me ask a third question: World immersion aside, how fun would it be to all players in GW2, if suddenly they had 24 (!!) new skills to try out, and 30 new skills (by including the racials they already had) buffed to become stronger? I can tell right now that I would personally love it, and make the gameplay a lot more refreshing, while Anet wouldn’t even need to design 24-30 new skills for this single purpose: they are already there. Anet would have to rebalance them and design “quests” for each of them, though.

Just an idea: “Item Appearance Level”

What about special “item levels” that require something to do or spend skillpoints into them, and that unlock special shiny slots for them? E.g., that a part of an armor does only shine if the item level is above 5 or whatever. You can bind those levels on different requirements, like spending skillpoints, doing x events while wearing the gear, spending a certain amount of certain mats in it or whatever.

What’s the idea behind it? People would get something they could grind for, but it wouldn’t be in the way of any ‘casual player’ since there is no influence at all on stats.

To go even further: You could “unbind” those unlocks from the gear itself, i.e., that stats and appearance are something completly different (and no, Transmutation stones aren’t really the solution to it).

Stat Combos
For stat combos, they lack “tangible” consequences for several reasons.

• Customizing the stats of your gear is clumsy, unfriendly, time-consuming and gold-consuming. It goes against vertical progression, instead of flowing with it. This ties perfectly well with what has already been said for ascended gear, but let met expand a bit on it: it’s still a problem that exists in all lesser tiers in this game, even if to a lesser extent. Stat-experimentation should be streamlined across the entire game, or else any new stat combo addition will only excite legendary (and possibly ascended) players who can (or might be able to) swap stats with ease. Anet should create incentives for players to have fun with stat-experimentation since the very moment they start crafting their low-level characters. For that reason, any changes done to crafting and/ or to gear, in order to improve build experimentation, should also take into account all lesser tiers, like exotics, rares, greens, blues and white items.
• PvE game balance is a serious obstacle against horizontal progression via new stat combos. Until Anet fixes the “dps/ zerker” problem, any new stat combos will have a very hard time at creating “tangible consequences”. This is a very complex problem by itself, and should probably be discussed on its own CDI. But here’s a few suggestions:
• PvE’s mobs should auto-attack inbetween their slower skills, or have their slower skills be made the third attack of an auto-attack chain. This should affect most of the mobs in this game. The auto-attacking dps added to mobs won’t even need to be that high. It just needs to exist. This will change everything. One of the main problems from dps/ zerker gear is that all damage can be mitigated with a single dodge/ block/ blind. This change would make auras, chaos armor, retaliation and confusion useful in PvE. It would give a point to healing spells and defensive stats. It would create incentives for more CC as a form of defense. It would create more incentives for more kiting and anti-movement effects for more survival. It would indirectly make condition damage more useful, as melee zerkers would force themselves to take a break to survive every once and then while condition-mancers would have stronger natural stats and are able to keep damaging their foes while kiting. It would make support and control builds more desired. Finally, by giving bosses strong melee “cleave” (= aoe) auto-attacks, you’ll punish hard the mindless stack abusing strategy seen in dungeons. I feel the need to repeat the following: THIS WILL CHANGE EVERYTHING.
• But it won’t fix everything. That’s a complex topic that I won’t delve further for now.

Mini-Pets

• Create a slot in the hero’s page to store one or two of them. This way, they won’t be automatically added to the bank. Add the following option: “Always show equipped mini-pet”, which can be toggled on or off like hear/ hands/ shoulder equipment. Players will be more attached to their favorite mini-pets this way.
• Create achievements for the purpose of living story’s mini-pets and others not acquired from the gem store.
• Create a pokemon-ish mini-game involving collected mini-pets. GW2’s combat system is already pretty good for solo playing: use it, but with fixed skills and stats depending on the mini-pet used.
• Living World patches have been consistently adding mini-games to GW2. I’m sure one of them in the future could be a (permanent) mini-pet game.
• Add rewards and even more achievements for doing the mini-game. Leaderboards too.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Calae.1738:

Horizontal progression assumes that the player achieves something and is rewarded with something that changes the physical appearance of their character/s.

Regardless of what that something is, I personally think the biggest issue here is the definition of an achievement. Is an achievement doing something difficult and overcoming a challenge or repeating an easy task for weeks/months?

Meaningful, challenging content with character build diversity and an alt friendly environment is what will build a passionate GW2 community.

Grinding, meaningless, easy repetitive tasks will chase everyone away.

Not necessarily. Some people enjoy farming(grinding to some), skill-appropriate(easy to some) tasks.

Just as what one person finds repetitive(boring), and game-breaking, another may find challenging(frustrating) content game-breaking, as well.

If you target the game to a passionate hardcore player, they’ll make videos of achievements that seem impossible, create community sites, theory craft builds, rally players together in WvW as a commander and engage with developers on core gameplay systems.

A passionate player base is the backbone of any community.

Calae.1738:

Horizontal progression assumes that the player achieves something and is rewarded with something that changes the physical appearance of their character/s.

Regardless of what that something is, I personally think the biggest issue here is the definition of an achievement. Is an achievement doing something difficult and overcoming a challenge or repeating an easy task for weeks/months?

Meaningful, challenging content with character build diversity and an alt friendly environment is what will build a passionate GW2 community.

Grinding, meaningless, easy repetitive tasks will chase everyone away.

I came here to make this exact same point, thank you for articulating it so well.

I just want to mention it doesn’t necessarily have to be a visual change. New skills like in GW1 would be awesome. But as you say there needs to be something valuable to attain.

Right off the top of my head I would like to see soulbound to be banished from GW2. By all means keep account bound and turn everything soulbound to account bound on use.

It would make altoholics happy and you can’t play GW2 without having multiple alts. GW1 vets you know what I am talking about.

The only demographic I see being hurt are the TP flippers. IMO GW2 wasn’t supposed to be “Stock Market 2”.

Appealing Skins

• There are some serious issues with many of the skins in this game, be them technical or artistic issues. And no, I’m not talking exclusively about clipping issues, which I understand it is a complex issue. I won’t even mention it anymore.
• Technical: When you zoom out, many of the tiny armor details are lost or get incredibly blurred, making any ornamented armory look ugly whenever the camera is not too close to it.
• Technical: Some armor pieces seem to have better textures/ shaders/ whatever while others look incredibly plastic or paper-made, when they could otherwise look really awesome.
• Technical: There’s a shaders mod out there called SweetFX that makes GW2 look much prettier than it otherwise does with its default shaders. If GW2’s default options looked this good, more players would feel motivated to look better.
• Technical/ Design: The dye system was designed to paint different parts of each armor piece – it’s a very flexible system that allows you to make the metal, cloth and jewelry parts of your armor individually distinct from each other, yet for some unknown reason, some pieces use the same color for different parts, making them impossible to look great. More on this bellow.
• Design: Dyes with shaders (F&F, etc) look awesome, and sometimes can make or break a skin. Yet, they’re incredibly scarce and costly. For a game like GW2 where cosmetics are one of the core progression systems, the game should have its more appealing dye options more accessible and less obscure.
• Design: Dyes being soul-bound take away the motivation from working towards alt looks, especially when the best ones can take two digits worth of gold each on the TP.
• Technical/ Artistic: There’s a lack of diversity for many light and medium models.
• Artistic: Anet’s artists seem to have trouble working on some types of gear over others. There are plenty of heavy armor skins that look intimidating, powerful or majestic, plenty of female light cloth skins that look elegant, majestic or beautiful, yet the same can’t be said for, to give as an example, most of the male light clothes. I know this is very subjective subject, but there are specific types of armor for specific genders that seem to have an overabundance of details, lack cohesion, or simply lack any sense of power, intimidation, majesty or other stylish impression. Taking a low-level priest model and adding strips and jewels into it won’t suddenly make it appealing. Sooner that makes the character look like a Christmas tree than an intimidating and powerful individual. It’s hard to make a male character look like a strong, or enigmatic, or intimidating – or anything – spell caster, when most of their options simply consist of generic models over-ornamented with random stuff.

Appealing Skins (Again)

• Example 1 for underwhelming armor: Male Light Armor from the nightmare dungeon. If we look at its artwork, it makes male humans look intimidating, “evil” and very, very mysterious/ enigmatic, especially with the mask skin that takes the pupils out of their eyes and adds a face tattoo. Looks very otherworldly, and isn’t that an awesome recipe for an appealing magical individual? But when we look at the model that exist in-game… Oh my. First, the mask skin does not even exists, and it’s incredible how much of a difference that makes, stripping the entire other-worldly, surreal feeling from it. The result is an ordinary male-looking guy within a weird dress. It’s clashing and not very pretty. And then the horns have lost their symmetry from the artwork, and look something hunted from a random animal instead. And then the chest hole seems somehow bigger in the model than in the artwork, giving way too much emphasis on their skinny chest (or worse, on their hairy chest!). It just… doesn’t works. Yet, the artwork version looks great.
• Example 2: Male Light Armor again, this time the Winged set that can be crafted at rank 225+ in Tailor. While the female version looks incredibly awesome (as usual), the male version is another disaster. The artwork for this piece of armor gives a very stylized, ancient/ mystic look to spellcasters. Again: wouldn’t that make an awesome recipe for awesomely-looking spellcasters? Again: the in-game version does not even come close. In fact, this one is so poor, that I can’t stop feeling that it was rushed or no real effort was put into it. First, it looks as if made of plastic or paper – it has a very fake feeling into it. Second, the feathered strap through the body looks like a toy instead of real feathers. It could’ve been a beautiful detail, but it’s ugly and it sticks. Third, it’s not even possible to dye the armored part of this piece of gear individually from the cloth part, for no apparent reason (isn’t the point of GW2’s flexible dye system to prevent something like this from ever happening)? Forth, when we look at the artwork, the shape and the curves of the hood are more stylized than their model version, looking very appealing in paper while being completely forgettable in-game. Fifth, the artwork for this piece of armor has some magical runes/ words ornamented within the cloth or the armor (if my memory does not fails me). This is yet another very appealing detail that could have made the armor piece look awesome, but which barely if even exists in the actual model. All of this adds up to the point that a cool-looking drawn set looks really bad in-game.
• The solution for this? Anet should make a “skin pass” – go through most of the armor sets that already exist in the game, compare them to how they were envisioned by the artists, and improve their models in an attempt to make them as impressive as possible as they are on paper.
• I used to think that GW2’s artists couldn’t simply draw male scholar armor, but the few artworks available in the net have shown me that the problem lies in the actual models and not so much on the artists.
• If Anet is unsure of this “skin pass” solution due to time or budget restraints, and the uncertainty of being well-received by the player base, why not target such changes for a future patch that would introduce – say, ascended pieces to dungeons and the like? This way, in a single patch, players would not only replay dungeons for their ascended stats – they would also do so for the improved skins (if they haven’t stored them already)!

Other topics

• The problems with personal story, home instancing and world exploration/ dynamic events are also complex on their own, and I’m tired for now. I’ll just skip them and let other discuss solutions for it in the meantime.
• I’m also interesting in making a comparison between GW2’s crafting and the crafting of a game called Vagrant Story (made by the Final Fantasy Tactics team, btw), which felt a lot more personal and satisfying. Vagrant Story’s crafting allowed you to dismantle all the small parts of your gear, re-combine them the way you wanted, and ultimately give you an option to rename them. I can’t express by words how great of a system this is for horizontal progression. It’s very personal yet flexible and there’s plenty of opportunity for experimentation. Perhaps a system like this should be taken into account when discussing or implementing an ascended/ craft system to change stats. Vagrant Story also allowed you to create stronger gear by fusing together several pieces of unnecessary gear, kind of like mystic forge, but with less RNG and more “visible”. This one feels great for vertical progression.

CONCLUSION
By lacking visible or tangible progression (be it vertical or horizontal), the player won’t feel that they are progressing at all, even if the progression is clearly there in the game.

That’s why Anet keeps throwing new horizontal progression items each patch (new stat combos, new skins, new recipes, new mini-pets), yet players barely feel that they are progressing their own characters. Why is that? There’s a disattachment here between Anet and the community, for while Anet believes that they are expanding the game with horizontal progression at a steady pace, the player base does not feel that progression in practice. This is all because many of the new horizontal progression items that Anet is adding to the game lack a “visible” progression rate and a “tangible” consequence rate.

Thank you for reading.

Here’s a few things that I’d like:

1) Skin Locker for PvE with all the skins I’ve put on a character.
2) Account-bound Legendary Dyes which put special effects on my gear (fire, mirror, glow, black hole, electricity, etc)
3) Minipet slot with Visibility checkbox (like we have for helm)
4) Inventory Bag Type: Shared Bag – same items across all characters to keep from constantly having to hit Bank. Could put my unlimited gathering tools, Salvage-O-Matic, etc in there

Just a few quick thoughts, don’t want to blow up everybody’s screen… (wink wink Diogo! :-P)

Earned Build & Equipment Tabs

Here is an example of what I would consider Horizontal Progression that has nothing to do with cosmetics, but rather with evolving the flexibility of the character. I’m partially quoting a comment I made on another thread about adding extra stored build/trait tabs.

Make extra build tabs a one time upgrade, like a bank tab or commander tag. Make it expensive, make us work for it but make it a permanent evolution of our character. Allowing characters to progress beyond 80 not by power but flexibility is an idea that to me would be a game changer and I dream of the day it gets implemented.

The mechanics are simple: Out of combat only and with a small channeled switch animation, swaps build as well as armor/weapon sets and skills.

Maybe this would be considered Diagonal Progression since the character isn’t growing in power, just an earned ability to adapt to situations or group compositions as they change whether in WvW, PvE, or sPvP.

The ways to earn an extra build tab could be interesting too. Maybe something that needs to be crafted from hard to find materials, a bit like ascended items. This would ensure the tabs aren’t just bought but earned through playing multiple aspects of the game.

If there is no limit to how many extra build tabs you could have you could continue to refine your character well past the time it takes to settle on any cosmetic changes or having all gear be best in slot.

EDIT: Link to original post discussing this idea.
Multiple trait / gear tabs?

Diogo made good points. One of them touched on the home instance. That could use a heck of a lot more customization, per all the threads on housing, trophies, and so forth. Adding a few nodes is hardly the same as developing a Caudecus Manor of our very own … /dreams.

Horizontal progression, chasing looks, that’s one of the core things about this game that drew me in. It offers such beautiful art that I can crave more, more, more. It can’t be the only thing the game has to offer, of course, but the game does offer solid mechanics, lore, cooperative play, all that good stuff. It’s time to deepen the immersion by providing more differentiation and individuality.

Along those lines: town clothes like all the NPCs have. More merging of town/combat looks as we’ve seen happening already. More account-wide use of skins: I adore the gas mask and doubt I’ll ever use it while I have only one to decide which of my 2 warriors, 2 guardians, 1 thief, 1 engineer, 1 ranger, 2 mesmers, 2 necromancers, or 1 elementalist get it. That was bad design to limit it to just one armor weight. Far better to make it like the Zenith items, in my opinion. We’re only playing one character at a time, what harm in letting us have the look we want on each? The gas mask isn’t even a gem store item, there’s no lost money for the company in letting us duplicate it across our account.

In case anyone wonders how I wrote six massive posts in under six minutes, yes, I have written and saved the whole thing before hand in preparation for this thread.

:P

While many people may be talking about dungeons, i am one of those people who really dislikes them and wouldn’t do a dungeon even if you have me 1000 gems per day for it.

What i do like though is the open world.
Anet has made a beautiful world, which unfortunately is totally empty, all the hard work that has been put in those maps is going to waste because noone has much reasons to go back there.
There is neither a challenge due to the bad downscaling nor is there any reward.
After playing since release, i still haven’t done world completion or done all jp’s, simply for the reason that if i do it all, there’s nothing left to do.

It would be nice if there were some initiatives to make people go back into the world, not force them, but encourage them.
Examples are:
- Fix downscaling, make lowlvl areas challenging to even lvl 80’s
- Allow for world exploration reset, maybe create some headquarters for the Tyrian Exploration Society where we can reset it, and reward people with certain tokens for completing it again that can be exchanged at the Society HQ.
Or have it work like the books in GW1 that made people go back doing missions.
- Make certain items drop in regions that are unique to the region.
Minipets for example, make an account bound minipet for each region (kryta, maguuma, shiverpeaks, etc.) that only drops there.
- Have some map wide events, like the current scarlet invasions, but unique to the map and not involving scarlet

Serious Thought.5394:

Sorry to sound dumb- but what does “horizontal character progression” entail?

Horizontal progression tends to fall into two categories:

“Fluffy” Progression
These are non-mechanical markers of your progress/effort. Cosmetic options and titles come up a lot but there are also deeper fluffy options like rank within the Three Orders or even access to exclusive zones. Many of the items sold in the Gem Store fit this description – being able to summon a bank in the field is convenient, but it doesn’t let you kill plainswurms faster (see earlier post).

I also tend to lump treasure buffs in this category – Increase magic find, increased crafting crit, increased harvesting crit… If you look at the benefits your server earns through WvW there’s a gold mine of soft bonus mechanics that could be accessed in new ways.

“Crunchy” Progression
Its possible to add a wider (hence “horizontal”) range of choices with equivalent mechanical impact. The big constraint is “overall impact”. Ideally the new options reach into new effects or create new types of gameplay but you can at some risk try to create ones that are situationally stronger than existing choices.

While new Weapons, new Skills, and new Traits come up constantly, there are other “slots” on your character that could also lead to some great new toys for players…

New Runes, Sigils, Foods, and other Consumables or things that occupy those slots could provide great ways to fine tune characters without pushing them over the intended effectiveness range.

Oh!! And how do I get a signature that I can show?

For that you need to go into your profile. Click “Forum profile” under you account name in the upper right of each page while you are in the forums.

This is a bit of a re-post of points I made in the original threat right before it was locked (with some details added).

Part 1 – Horizontal progression – Cosmetic

In my experience, cosmetic horizontal progression is in a similar place as the ascended gear. There have been lots of great skins introduced in the game, but I’ve barely been able to bring myself to use any of them because I would only want to use then on best-in-slot gear, and I haven’t been able to bring myself to craft best in slot gear. I have several issues with the vertical progression associated with ascended gear (I think swithcable stats or some kind of unlock system are adeqate solutions).

Summing up the issue, it goes like this with skins as they currently are.

• I can only get one of one type of skin per world event
• I only want to use a skin on best in slot gear that I would keep using
• I only want best in slot gear for a build/stat combo that looks like it will remain relevant
• We are always one balance patch away from a build/stat combo getting nerfed, it has happened several times already

In that paradigm it is nearly impossible for me to actually commit to using a skin. I still collect them, but they are all collecting dust in my bank. This, to me, speaks of a fundamental flaw in some aspects of design. Ultimately you would want players to get their skins and use them immediately, not to be paralyzed about the prospect of having to spend X amount of gold to buy cash shop items to keep using their skins when the game evolves.

I truly believe that horizontal progression is at odds with and hindered by ANet’s monetization strategy. Many of the services offered to players in the cash shop should simply have been quality of life improvements added to the game, to players costed in gold rather than gems, and at a much lower price.

I think skin lockers like those that have been suggested elsewhere resolve this issue for me regarding cosmetic progression. There could be a moderate cost associated with producing a new duplicate skin if it is judged necessary to tax the players who want use the skins multiple times, but it should be affordable to even casual players. Skins are a great draw to almost all players but players shouldn’t feel punished if their one single use skin was used on a piece of gear that was obsoleted by a patch, or other change.

In my personal experience, the current state of legendries and legendary crafting is fine. Legendary armor, Dyes, Back pieces etc… are all items that could (should?) be pursued and could be very interesting. I strongly feel that the stat-changing ability of current legendries should be transposed to ascended weapons and armor. The only “core” aspect of legendary gear should be the unique look.

WAAAHOOOOO!!!! It finally started.

• I would like to have 20-40 new skills for each class. Each class already has 40-60 skills counting weapons, so that would be 80-100 total skills to choose from. I think this would be a fun, TCG-esque system.

• To help accomplish this, I would like PvE skills to be separate from WvW/PvP. This would allow us to go crazy with our builds, and you would still have WvW to help players transition to the PvP skill-set. I don’t think this would cause balance problems because certain skills are already more useful than others; such as reflects, condition-removal, and Warrior’s banners.

• In order to do this, PvE difficulty needs to be raised. ArenaNet has been making progress on this but the game still isn’t there yet. Currently in PvE, it feels like your build doesn’t matter because content is easy, and hence any new skills added would seem somewhat pointless.

TL;DR:
(1) Rollout 20-40 new skills for each class.
(2) Separate PvE from PvP/WvW so these skills can be as fun as possible.
(3) Make PvE more challenging so our build choices matter.

EDIT: As an afterthought, I think the most challenging aspect of this suggestion is,“How does everyone unlock the new skills.” Every character already has loads of extra skill points so you would unlock the new skills instantly. Does anyone have any Thoughts/Suggestions on this?

Again… I posted this at the end of the other thread, right before it was closed.

Part 2 – Horizontal progression – Weapon skills

Other kinds of horizontal progression should cover skills and skills and utilities acquisition.

When I first heard of the skill system for GW2 (as an avid GW1 player) I never imagined that it would be so static. For instance, I fully expected that although swords would come with 3 skills, that there would be more than 3 “sword” skills with multiple types of swords with different skill combos to be found. I expected some swords would be more offensive and others more defensive.

For example:

• Bonetti’s rapier: (1) Auto attack, (2) Riposte, (3) Bonetti’s defence.
• Gladius: (1) Auto attack, (2) Gash, (3) Hamstring.

Introducing skill variety within weapons could be a great way to introduce build diversity. This seems very long term.

Horizontal Progression – Elite Skills

I also feel that a good avenue for horizontal progression would be to have a long and hard look at Elite skills in GW2.

There is a pretty big difference in philosophy regarding the role of elite skills in GW1 and GW2: GW1 elite skills were build defining and the majority of GW2 elites are not.
GW2 elite skills have such high cooldowns that they are often an afterthought (with some exceptions like war banner in a banner build on warrirors). In general, GW2 elites are in an odd place, they have low uptime, high cooldown, and their impact is debatable across different play types (PvE, PvP, WvW).

It would be nice to see some progression related to class skills and class elites in the following forms:

• Class-related personal story elements
• Class-related crafting

This would lead to unlocks of new and reworked elites (think necro guild, warrior guild, etc.).

I really would like to see “build-around-me” elites that really help define a build. These elites could have a lower immediate battlefield impact than something like the Guardian tomes, but a more sustained and reliable impact on gameplay.
For example (forgive me if my examples aren’t the best but you’ll get my point):

• A skill like GW1’s broadhead arrow (i.e., a low cooldown source of daze) could open up more controlling builds for rangers.
• Warriors could have elite battle stances that either increase adrenaline gain or reduce the cooldown on certain types of skills.
• Necromancers could have an elite effect similar to aura of the lich (on a signet with with a drawback maybe?) that could really support minion master builds.

I think that there is a lot of potential to be found in elite skills, and in as much as it doesn’t strictly involve a level/stat/gear upgrade I think it’s something that should seriously be considered as a key aspect of horizontal progression.

I’m probably forgetting a few things but I’ll probably end this post here.

Thanks for reading.

Taken from my thread located here for easier to read and or lazy people

Retroactive Account-Wide Rewards Locker

Alright, I know all of you have been begging for a locker of sorts to store those skins that are from past events etc. Some of you just trashed them because of the other skins and rewards that come out and you just cannot store them on a mule account because, let’s face it…Eventually we get bored and want to play that mule and most of us don’t want to spend gems for another character slot. The “create a new guild storage” objective gets old really fast with the other things we try to store just so we can store the skins on the toon and the junk from that toon in the guild stash.

So, looking at what we’ve been requesting since, I do believe the early release days, We’ve demanded Wardrobe Lockers for our Town clothes, The Back Item skins we get(IE: Sclerite Shell Backpiece Skin). A similar to the sPvP locker would probably not be as easy as you think however, what if we had requested, nicely mind you, account wide achievement rewards such as the Hellfire and Radiant sets if we had unlocked them already. We can take out any time we please if we unlocked the achievement in order to get, say, the full META achievement from the dragon festival in order to unlock the Shattered Holographic Wings. As long as you did get this meta achievement completed to the fullest, you would unlock the back skin for your entire account and withdraw it as much as you like much like the said Hellfire & Radiant armor skins as well as the Zennith Skins.

The Armor Skins, Miniatures, Birthdays Celebrated Minis would be the only things that would count. Jetpack skins or Super Adventure Box weapons would not. Only Specific Meta Rewards.

Meta Events That Would Count:

The Nightmare Is Over:
Antitoxin Injector Skin

Blood And Madness:
Mini Candy-Corn Elemental Miniature

Twilight Assault:
Slickpack Skin

Boss Week:
Wings of The Sunless

Queen Jennah’s Jubilee:
Miniature Watchknight

Dragon Bash:
Holographic Shattered Dragon Wings Cover
Dragon Helmets

Shadow of The Mad King
Mad Memories Back Cover

Super Adventure Box:
All Back Covers

The Nightmare Within:
Gas Mask Skin
Miniature Toxic Nimross

The Above Were Examples——

Progression in this could make it less frustrating in making bank space…and it indeed will be, a step in the right direction.

For another purpose in the progression we can’t just talk about characters and leveling but also guilds progression horizontally. The guilds that actually have members can get through rough times. Sure new guilds can get the Guild Bounty Training to catch up, but what happened to Alliance systems…why does representation exist and only benefit just 1 guild when we have 5 slots. Eventually it will stress one player into choosing one guild ultimately making his other 4 slots in a guild gather dust. It makes no sense. Guild Progression needs to be addressed

Chris

Sorry to sound dumb- but what does “horizontal character progression” entail?

^^ It would be very helpful if you included a definition of “Horizontal Progression” in the OP. Asking a basic question never hurts either. i.e. “What is one of your favorite examples of Horizontal Progression from another game?”

Commander tags in WvW:

• Right now anyone can purchase a Commander tag for 100g and that’s fine, but an idea to consider for commander tags could be different colors to differentiate progression in WvW. Ideally it would be tied to WvW accomplishments and could also include input from other players on their server (other players could dedicate a small percentage of their Wxp to a particular commander for instance). Tags would start at the default purchasable blue, then progress through raritys: green>yellow>orange>pink>legendary. Each level of progression could give more functionality (larger group formation? map movement?) as well as visibility.

• Transferring to a different server would reset the tag to the default blue.

New Skills:

• As much as I like the idea of adding new skills as horizontal progression, I think care needs to be taken so the game doesn’t suffer from ability bloat, entry barriers to new players and of course balancing issues that arise with the addition of each ability.

Cosmetics:

• In addition to the other ideas that have been floated here I would like to propose that additional customization options like new hairstyles and face options could be unlocked through achievements rather than gem store purchases

Thank you for these topics, Chris. Don’t work too hard over your holiday!

Hi Chris. I made a post in the “Suggestions” part of the Forum regarding a possible Wardrobe System. It would be nice if you could have a look. Link below:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/suggestions/Wardrobe-System-Idea

The biggest things I want to see (and to be honest, expected in the game on release):

• Proper player housing. There was all this awesome artwork circulating on the internet about these sylvari houses that we could own. There was talk about your house being updated and expanding based on your accomplishments in the world. I really don’t feel at home in GW2 until I have my own house, with interactive furniture, ability to upgrade and decorate, and all that.
• Much more diversity in skills. I really feel we should be able to customize our weapon skills. Right now we get weapons with sets of skills, but no way to customize them. I don’t like that we get sets of skills, but usually 3 out of 5 are not seeing any use (esp on thief, as all skills compete for initiative points). I don’t understand why the biggest selling point of Guild Wars 1 didn’t make it into GW2. I feel that I do not have enough customization abilities for my character in GW2 and that all of the characters of the same class are mostly the same.
• More cultural/dungeon armor. Ascended made all the armors except one obsolete, so we need many more new armor skins of ascended quality. A whole new tier of dungeon gear and cultural armor.

Besides that, I really would like to see more faction based stuff. Pick a side to work for and build up a reputation. Each with its own reward in titles, gear, minis, and of course quests that are only available for you and people that progressed in the same faction.

Factions shouldn’t just be a race, but instead subgroups within a race. And the three Orders are something that really can be expanded on too. At the moment, I just don’t feel that any of the choices I make matter (if I get any choices at all – in the living story I don’t, except with that election, which was rather limited and nothing I could influence on an individual scale). I would like to see more meaningful choice, with exclusive content (quests, items, titles) only available to those that followed a specific path.

To me horizontal is all about broadening options available to the player. There’s tons of substantial potential in there, and some stuff that gw2 already does well.

• New weapon skills and utilities
• New Traits
• New skins
• Dyes – seriously, can we get glowy dyes?
• Faction reputation – earnable minis, finishers, etc
• Guild progression – halls, new social functionality, banners to plaster about, etc.
• Non-combat utility stuff like account wide xp or crafting xp bonuses
• Home instance customization
• Special titles

Anyway, there’s tons – and it only starts with combat related stuff. One point I’d particularly go after that gw2 missed out on is faction reputations. They tend to be something you can work towards at your own pace and that offer a bit of something to show off your love of a particular faction – themed gear, pets, etc. I know I’d personally be slaving hard to earn that endless skritt tonic and skritt-themed finisher. We have so much potential for that and only a bit of it – like the order armors. Yet you really don’t have to do very much to ‘earn’ those armors.

I also hate to bring it up.. but even if they’re utterly uselessly slow (as fast as a movement signet only), mounts! Holy cow. People utterly ADORE mounts. One of the best feelings I ever got playing WoW was finally getting that netherdrake for my warlock. Plus it’d let us be less shoehorned into movement speed traits. Those could just be ‘in combat’ sorta dealies.

But why stop there? You could factionalize all the major cities and orders and other groups and let people work their way towards free teleports to each of them, special date nights with Queen Jenna or hunting parties with Rytlock or any other crazy stuff that comes to mind. Maybe the dredge have special communist themed rifle abilities to earn. ‘Firing Squad’, yes?

I know those are ‘fluffy’ kinds of options, but one of the better options discussed in the vertical progression thread was letting people undertake an epic quest to unlock stat combos for their gear. That’d be pure horizontal, and very compelling.

Other things.. well, how about getting dungeon master unlocks explorable modes on all your characters? How about finishing all the jumping puzzles gives you a small movement speed upgrade? Make the bazaar love you and get to use those awesome movement abilities out in the rest of the world. How about leveling one of every race to 80 gets you access to special diplomat-themed quests?

Possibilities are endless. If horizontal really is the focus going forward I’m excited.

my suggestions:
PVE skin locker
mini pet slot on ui
Sub-classes based on the current classes
player housing with associated crafts an a way to display achievements like slayer etc
new weapons for existing classes
guild housing
a build template (not really progression in itself but if you want to promote diversity it is sort of a must)

Tyops.5894:

When I first heard of the skill system for GW2 (as an avid GW1 player) I never imagined that it would be so static. For instance, I fully expected that although swords would come with 3 skills, that there would be more than 3 “sword” skills with multiple types of swords with different skill combos to be found. I expected some swords would be more offensive and others more defensive.

For example:

• Bonetti’s rapier: (1) Auto attack, (2) Riposte, (3) Bonetti’s defence.
• Gladius: (1) Auto attack, (2) Gash, (3) Hamstring.

Introducing skill variety within weapons could be a great way to introduce build diversity. This seems very long term.

I like your suggestion, but I just want to point out build diversity doesn’t matter when PvE doesn’t require you to have a good build to begin with. I think they should find ways to raise PvE difficulty in addition to adding a plethora of new skills.

Tyops.5894:

I truly believe that horizontal progression is at odds with and hindered by ANet’s monetization strategy. Many of the services offered to players in the cash shop should simply have been quality of life improvements added to the game, to players costed in gold rather than gems, and at a much lower price.

I like this idea. Players can always convert gems into gold, so it does not remove that aspect of it for players who want to pay. If nothing else, it will change players perceptions of the Gem-Shop.

Hello there, i’d like to contribute with my 2 cents:
1)Add some sort of Hall of Monuments-like structure where characters can display achievements related stuff: like many of us suggested, having something to track down and display what we’ve done so far it’s a nice feature to have. Gathering nodes are a good start, i’d like to see more stuff in that direction (Slayer achievements, explorer, jps, LS related and so on). GW1 HoM was something really well done imho.

2)Add new Titles for the already existing achievements (jps, slayers, explorers and so on)

3)Release a new set of armor skins with each LS arc, so that we’ll end up with a whole new set upon arc completion: doing so we’ll get 1 new piece of armor every 2 weeks and a whole new set every 3 months. This amount of work should be manageable .

3) Adds some way to improve/modify slightly some of the existing armor skins (t3 light human cultural->flamekissed is a good example of that) using recipes involving skill points and something else. Doing so the amount of work on Your end will be less than making a new skin from zero and at the same time we will get some more customization (and new goals). The same thing can be done for Orders Armors, Dungeon Armors, Cultural Armors and maybe a new Pact Armor.

4)PVE Locker: as many of us suggested, it’s a highly needed feature. Getting the Emperor title for example give us 90 armor pieces (iirc). That’s 90 new skins that occupy 90 slots in our bank/bags. We really need one place to store skins that we’ve earned through the game, so that we can collect them and use them on demand.
This should have been a core feature given that the endgame in GW2 is purely cosmetic.

I’ll add more things later, thanks for giving us this opportunity.
Best regards

My Wishlist:

- Like many others, I’d like some type of system (PvE skin locker, wardrobe tabs, something) implemented that allows me to change to more than one outfit without sacrificing my stats and/or running another complete set of gear. I don’t mind if more options are required by gem unlocks, I’d gladly pay.

- Mini Pet slot on UI; ideally with some type of on/off ability like “show helm”.

- Options via UI to have alternate weapon set-ups/trait builds that can switch out of combat only (i.e. as an elementalist, I understand that I can only have one weapon/no swaps in combat, but out of combat, I have to open my bag, swap out my weapons, and if switching from two to 1-handed, my off-hand item goes to default first available spot in bag, which I then have to find and put aside so that I don’t somehow lose it, etc. If I could store that weapon as “secondary” (or in other class cases, 3rd/4th/etc), then it’s not taking up a bag slot and I can swap to it (with perhaps a long CD and/or gem unlock), ideally this would also automatically switch traits (even if only swapping the selective traits and not requiring a complete build change, though that would be even nicer).

- Personal story completion should reward characters the ability to buy cosmetic armour from all 3 orders; after all – we’re “Pact” and I’m the Commander – if I can lead them, why can’t I dress like them? Besides, choosing an order and later learning that the “look” you like best is a different order really sucks, and the story meshes so well with the ability to have all 3.

- Crafting panels to have “main item type” with selectable specifics (i.e. for a tailor, show “masquerade coat” and when selected, then the option to pick “Carrion”, “Berserker”, etc.). The current list system is so long and clunky. It would also be really nice to have (or at least the option to turn on/off) the item level in brackets in the list, for easy searching.

- Trading Post to have search features by armour type (heavy, medium, light) – still surprised this isn’t already in-game.

- Class specific armour styles. I want to see beautiful armours available only to each specific class, have them each stand out. Ideally I’d like this to be something along the lines of a long, challenging, multi-zone “epic” quest, but since this is a horizontal progression discussion thread, I’d even be happy with gemstore options and just graphically different.

- “In-between” armour graphics with more variation. Light armour shouldn’t always be a skimpy bikini outfit or something from the 1800s – sure, show some skin, but have some nice looking stuff in the middle for the ladies. Medium armour shouldn’t all be 98% trench coats and the sort. Simple isn’t necessarily bad, I’ve seen so many good looking NPCs that I’d love to see options for players in-game.

- Long hair fix. I love long hair on my toons, but I can’t stand entering combat stance and finding that it all disappears into her back 50% of the time I’m playing. If I have the option to have long hair, make the graphics work so that it’s realistic (or at least it lays on my skin, not disappears through it).

Nike.2631:

Tons of very helpful information. Thanks.

And thanks to everyone else, I +1d everyone above this post that gave/tried to give an answer to me =).

Hopefully I got this right:

1) Difficulty stages in PvE. I agree with a few posts already made that PvE can be done with little input- an easy example is a Ranger can fully trait its pet with Autoloot on and just afk in a zone(not all , but quite a few). Easy skillpoints, levels, money and all for no risk(assuming done right). My suggestion would be to expand the living world a bit to allow for tiers of mob difficulty like the Vet/Champ/Leg mobs and stuff. It doesn’t have to be new maps (would love that) as that would make World Completion more difficult, but it would be nice if in some hard to get to location in every map you had a small section of mobs at the highest map lvl (so map says 15-25, these mobs are 25) that are tiered up or maybe a tower of tiers up. Quick Summary attempt Add corner to each map that has tiered up or multiple up-tiers of mobs and maybe rename them a bit so you can tell like (Cursed Shore example) Risen Noble would become Adept Risen Noble and (if multi tiers) the next level would be Master Risen Noble and the next Grandmaster Risen Noble (kind of like our traits)- Vet/Champ/Leg mobs would have Adept Vet/Champ/Leg Risen Noble. The tier of difficulty would be something like a 10% increase in stats on said mobs?

2) Skin lockers. Others have posted, I don’t think I need to say much. Something like the way we can pull Zenith weapon skins from our Achievement Panel would be an easy-ish way to implement said change while also satisfying a vast amount of your player base, even if this “Skins Locker” only allowed said change with Gemstore obtained or Achievement-ed Skins.

3) Map Specific Drops. Already being done with crafting items and some weapons. Would be nice for extra cosmetics to be zone specific.

I want to add more, but can I post about skill/trait/weapon changes? I want to add more diversity and I have an idea on how it can be done .

DiogoSilva.7089:

HORIZONTAL PROGRESSION
Horizontal progression can be a great substitute to vertical progression, because it does not (directly) invalidate past progression made by the player, allowing the player to continuously grow without wasting their effort in the past. In fact, this is a problem that could probably be toned down in current vertical progression systems as well.

THE FLAWS IN GW2’s MECHANICS FOR HORIZONTAL PROGRESSION

• They are generally under-developed;
• They aren’t as “visible” as they should;
• They aren’t as “tangible” as they should;

You might ask: what does Diogo means with the “visible” and “tangible” words?

I understand as “visible” any system where the progression can be easily identified or easily followed by the player:

• Gear stats are “visible” (vertical) progression because a player can look at them and directly compare to exotics or other previously equipped items and understand that they have made a progression.
• Achievements are “visible” because they have an entire UI dedicated to them, with bars that can be filled, points and stats that can be increased, a leaderboard system dedicated to them, and a section for long-term chest rewards and unlocked privileges.

So, why is GW2 lacking “visible” horizontal progression?

• Cosmetic progression is “visible” only when the items are equipped to your character. Skin collecting, however, is not a “visible” system – its progression can’t be easily followed by the player. When a skin is transmuted, the old skin disappears. When a skin is not used, it is usually wasting bank slot, which incentives the player to salvage it. When a new skin is obtained, it’s usually used for salvaging purposes or is immediately sold at the TP. No player feels that they are progressing this way.

Solutions to the problem, and other ideas to improve upon it:

• A Skin Wardrobe, where players can visualize all the skins they have collected, and work for long-term goals determined by the UI, like filling the wardrobe, filling completion bars and increasing points (probably through achievements), and gaining rewards out of that.
• Make unlocked collectible recipes and unlocked collectible dyes account-bound.
• A Hall of Monuments map. Even though the achievement system is already “visible” through the UI, it would be even more satisfying if it was “visible” within the world itself, with an incomplete statue of our own character that we would need to complete, several statues for the most important achievements, a collection the models for all mini pets and skins unlocked, etc.

This is a really great post in general. It also raises an important point: other games that have successfully monetized cosmetics give you virtually unlimited space to store your skins, and you don’t lose skins when you changing appearance.
Adding a PvE locker would add depth to the game, and create a cool “gotta collect ’em all” element. ArenaNet really has no excuse because the UI/model already exists, and they would still make money from Transmutation Crystals.

Oh and-

4) Race change. It would be nice if we could do this, even if it was 1200 gems or something. Could be done like the Makeover box (name right?) where you change absolutely everything about your characters appearance except for the race. I would even be very willing for an item like this to force me to re-earn my race specific skills. It is a far more enticing item than any other simply because if I wanted to have a level 80 asura thief, but I was a level 80 Charr thief with no slots left to use, I would be forced to delete my Charr and anything that was bound to that character THEN go through the trouble of getting all of that back on my Asura. Its harder than it sounds, especially if you have an ascended trinket or some such.

1) New skills/traits. This could technically be perceived as vertical, but I would say it just gives us new options. Being able to more precisely tune a build to play how we want would be amazing.

2) I’m not interested in the cosmetic aspect of this game because all the high quality skins released for legendaries/ascended items tend to be so over the top bright/shiny/silly. Release some more serious/dark armor and weapon skins and I might be more inclined to pursue the cosmetic rewards. Hardly anything in this game appeals to me as a Norn Necromancer. For example, some higher poly count Godskull weapons or Shadow Armor. Sadly, those are the best looking items if you’re going for a tribal blood shaman look of sorts.

Horizontal Progression: Moving Forward by Looking Back

Before launching into all-new ideas, I wanted to highlight a system we have presently that could be greatly improved on with a little polish.

Runes/Sigils Revamp
I think you’ll find that if you go into the Trading Post and look at all of the Superior Sigils or all of the Superior Runes and sort by price from lowest to highest, you get an excellent guide to which need to be enhanced, and at the top end which may be a little too good. Many of these can be tweaked with tiny adjustments to their existing code/purpose and increase horizontal diversity by offering more competitive choices and fewer no-brainer options.

For example the Superior Sigil of Rage has been found nearly worthless by the community – it is one of the lowest priced of all Sigils other than the monster-specific damage Sigils. With a change as small as reducing its internal cooldown to 25 seconds (from 45) you could give it a new lease on life. This would give it a maximum up time ratio of 12% (with the 10% you’ll never actually sustain that, but bear with me). With quickeness now offering only a 50% compared to the 100% it granted when this Sigil was designed, you could gain as much as a 6% damage gain when the stars align. That makes it very comparable to the much more highly regarded Superior Sigils of Force (a flat +5% at all times). Many under-performing Sigils and Runes could be brought up to competitive levels with just a review of internal cooldowns.

At the other end of the scale you have powerhouses like the Runes of Lyssa. Setting a cap on the number of type of conditions removed (5?) and causing it to randomly pick some-but-not-all Boons (again, 5?) would be more consistent with the capricious nature of Lyssa and undo some power creep this Rune Set has experienced since launch.

While there are a couple obvious outliers because of how they enter the system (Runes of Karka Slaying), using the “player Review” implicit in the Trading Post pricing could open up a lot of meaningful options without introducing hundreds of new items to track.