Guild Wars 2

They did ask. People asked for new traits to be unlocked by doing activities. Anet apparently said “if that’s good, then unlocking ALL traits by doing activities will be great!” The playerbase went “What? NO! That’s not what we asked for at all.” And then anet said “We’ve cleaned up the thread” and then nothing else for FOUR MONTHS, then pop in to say “You guys have some good ideas, we need to talk about this”. Then they act baffled why people are furious about a lack of communication.

BlueDragon.7054:

I don t want to sound rude but probably they will “think about it”, but nothing will be done, just like the fractal level reset. I think that the last answer about fractals was that someone was thinking about it. Just like what they are doing now, too much thinking but 0 actions. I hope I m wrong.

I very much doubt that you are wrong.

Update:

Character at 80, Zhaitan dead etc. Here’s what my new Lvl 80 Ranger has unlocked:

Line 1: III, V
Line 2: I, X
Line 3: II, V, X
Line 4: I, IV, VI
Line 5: III, XII

So out of 65 traits, I have 12 unlocked (and one of them I went out specifically for). And only one Elite.

Just think about all the build experimentation I can do!

The new character slot sale should bring a lot more attention to this issue. I know I hovered over the buy button for a while because of the trait system. Now I don’t want to actually start a character, in case there are new changes, and any I make at the moment will wind up ones in a horrible period of creation between two better systems.

Thanks for acknowledging the problem.
This is why I don’t start a new character.. I’d hate to struggle through this new trait acquiring system. Without this I’d probably just buy a new slot and start away…

by odin’s beard, a response from a dev after 38 pages and they will look at it.
stop looking and start doing something about it.
no try, do or do no, there is no try.

As a small solution, perhaps the skill point duels across Tyria could give a way to unlock traits. Maybe they could give a free barter for an appropriate level skill book once you have finished the duel. It’s far easier for players to travel and collect those skill points than to do mid level raid bosses, PvP, secret locations, jumping puzzles, etc.

Seeing the size of this thread I hope nobody will hold it against me that I didn’t read everything… I do hope that Anet-dev’s will take the time to gradually work their way through this thread, and if they do so, want to hereby thank them an applaud them for doing so… Having said this I will put up my thoughts regarding the Trait system…

Having read various thread in the ‘profession balance’ section on more complicated build options, as wel as the need for entry level play, and ‘noob toob’ equivalent strategies. I would like to suggest that the Trait system is used to achieve this…

But, I think that could only be achieved if the trait system is able to ‘exclude’ certain options at certain trait levels, while enabling certain play style options at higher levels. To achieve this I personally think that progressing in the trait system should disable the trait option on the lower levels in the tree that progress is being assigned.

This would make it possible to have ‘noob toob’ and ‘entry level rewarding’ traits in the lower levels of each trait tree, while making intermediate and high level options open up as one progresses in a tree, and by doing so ‘disabling’ the ‘noob toobs’ and ‘entry level rewarding’ play styles, for more high risk / high reward strategies.

It would also prevent being able to stack certain complementary traits, as the lower level traits blank out. Yet each player could eventually build a character at the level they are comfortable with…

Traveller.7496:

Isaiah Cartwright.8569:

Thanks everyone for giving us some feedback on this system we’ll meet internally and discuss this system some more as I think there are a lot of valid points being brought up here.

I’ll give you my bullet points:

- Revert the trait system so it once again starts at level 10. One trait point every five levels
- Scrap the trait acquisition system EXCEPT for Grandmaster traits. Those should be hard to get. If you can’t scrap it completely on Adept and Master traits, at least tone down the difficulty on those tiers.

The current system leads to a lack of experimentation and fun where people will only cherry-pick the traits they absolutely want to use and forget about the rest. This is probably what you were not going for.

A good and simple suggestion, though level 15 makes better sense than 10.

I so regret now with buying that new slot. Looking at some of the ways to open these traits is ridiculous. I don’t do WvW and i was there trying to get the dredge as allies to just open a trait. Th Dredge is already on our side so im lost and don’t know what to do. wait for someone to take over them and then i go kill or something? Or just fork out gold and skill points to open them. Simply put it, im not impressed with this way of getting traits.

This is probably the worst gaming decision I’ve seen in a long, long time. Completely changing how you get traits when the original design was a key feature to why GW2 leveling system is so good, all ruined, for what? It wasn’t even made account bound to promote world completion and/or a small gold sink. All this does is give people reasons to not make alts and not to buy the game. I’m very disturbed how this was even discussed and that it was given resources and time.

Gaws you ppl are sooo overreacting over this just because you’re lazy! While I’d rather see traits being only pve event based, not 100% map completion and wvw mix, I’d never change it back to what it was. At least some incentive was made to explore a bit more, and I like it. And for those complicated ones, just buy it! It’s not that kitten expensive.
Saying stuff like worst decision in the game etc is a bit harsh

DivineRequiem.2710:

Gaws you ppl are sooo overreacting over this just because you’re lazy! While I’d rather see traits being only pve event based, not 100% map completion and wvw mix, I’d never change it back to what it was. At least some incentive was made to explore a bit more, and I like it. And for those complicated ones, just buy it! It’s not that kitten expensive.
Saying stuff like worst decision in the game etc is a bit harsh

Lazy, I’ve completed 3 legendaries and done map completion twice, I think you’re just blind to the issue. I shouldn’t be forced to either PvE or spend gold so I can make an alt. You may want explore multiple times over on alts, not everyone else does though.

Well why such fuss than since most of you claim to be so hard working :L And since you’re so wealthy, how much does it actually hurt to spend some gold for those really time consuming traits? With 3 legendaries, even if you’d buy ALL of them , 43 gold? C’mon….. In most MMOs u gotta pay for each skill book, for main skills. And here you whine about this. I just find it redicolous

DivineRequiem.2710:

Gaws you ppl are sooo overreacting over this just because you’re lazy! While I’d rather see traits being only pve event based, not 100% map completion and wvw mix, I’d never change it back to what it was. At least some incentive was made to explore a bit more, and I like it. And for those complicated ones, just buy it! It’s not that kitten expensive.
Saying stuff like worst decision in the game etc is a bit harsh

Really? Overreacting? So, when you get 2 pts to apply to your Traits (level 36) you think we are overreacting when we are upset that we can’t unlock some of the adept traits until around level 59? How is that overreacting? That is a perfectly sound reaction to incredibly bad design.

All these Trait unlocks mean is that people will cherry pick the exact Traits they want and will not experiment at all. Why bother experimenting when there is a proven trait build that works? Everyone will have cookie-cutter builds.

Lets face it, every class has max of 3 rly good trait specs. That’s 21 traits all together, less than a half. So whoever complains about price, is down right lazy.

I agree that it’s not a perfect design, but some of arguments here are childish.

DivineRequiem.2710:

Lets face it, every class has max of 3 rly good trait specs. That’s 21 traits all together, less than a half. So whoever complains about price, is down right lazy.

I agree that it’s not a perfect design, but some of arguments here are childish.

I get the impression that you haven’t actually read the content of the posts in this thread.

But in any case, the “but you can just take what you want for a specific preplanned build and ignore the rest” argument has never made any sense to me, because it’s suggesting that a system that promotes not getting all of your traits isn’t bad design. At the very least it indicates that the whole thing isn’t working as intended, since they said these changes were meant to inspire build diversity.

While I’m here, I may as well add my 2 cents (again).

I think that one of the biggest problems with this system, outside of the unfriendly tiers and point allocations and lack of appropriate balancing, is how very inorganic it is. Basically you’re saying that if I want to get all of my traits on any character, I need to follow the exact same leveling path on every one of them (some people are calling this “promoting exploration” when really it more promotes repetition and linearity). Or otherwise grind up an inordinate amount of skill scrolls (brief tangent: if a skill is available to be bought and used at level 36 but can’t be obtained in the world until 59, what is actually the point of it being obtainable the latter way in the first place? In what case is the former option not superior?).

Compare it to how skill points work. I never intentionally seek out skill challenges when I’m leveling. They’re scattered all over the world and I run into them over the course of normal gameplay. I don’t have to drag myself to a particular map to make sure I’m getting the point to unlock the skill I want. I certainly don’t have to worry that I’ll be level 80 without all of or at least a significant portion of my utilities unlocked. It’s a system that supports map exploration without limiting it to a pre-determined path, and it means that I can level a bunch of different characters and they’ll all have a different experience. They also come along at a pretty steady clip, so again I never really feel like I have to intentionally seek challenges out (except possibly when I hit level 30 and want those elites).

If open world trait acquisition were more like that, I suspect it would have a lot less opposition.

GuzziHero.2467:

Gregori.5807:

The above comment came because he was hammered about it after saying this:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

GuzziHero.2467:

A question for you, Chris.

Can you confirm whether or not there has been any discussion about player feedback about…

- the new trait system
- the megaserver
- roleplaying and what seems to be Anets attempt to destroy it?

Cheers!

Hi Guzzi,

I don’t want to want to derail the thread, but yes absolutely we have discussed player feedback about these areas of the game.

But seriously let’s not derail the thread.

Chris

I’m glad that something I said had an effect, in its strange little way!

It is good to finally have acceptance of our concerns.

HeHe I am glad too that someone finally looked in here ..

Thanks Chris :-)

Kohlteth.3715:

HeHe I am glad too that someone finally looked in here ..

Thanks Chris :-)

:o

How did you know my name is Chris? (Chris White, in a strange-yet-true twist! ).

DivineRequiem.2710:

Gaws you ppl are sooo overreacting over this just because you’re lazy! While I’d rather see traits being only pve event based, not 100% map completion and wvw mix, I’d never change it back to what it was. At least some incentive was made to explore a bit more, and I like it. And for those complicated ones, just buy it! It’s not that kitten expensive.
Saying stuff like worst decision in the game etc is a bit harsh

True for vets but you are forgetting about the player who just got the game. They don’t have a clue what to do or the gold/skill points to do it. The old trait system they at least had a chance. It was a natural progression.

As it sits right now, vets power lvl to 80 and just buy what they need. THEN start the game. Is this right?

Daggos Skelito.2910:

DivineRequiem.2710:

Gaws you ppl are sooo overreacting over this just because you’re lazy! While I’d rather see traits being only pve event based, not 100% map completion and wvw mix, I’d never change it back to what it was. At least some incentive was made to explore a bit more, and I like it. And for those complicated ones, just buy it! It’s not that kitten expensive.
Saying stuff like worst decision in the game etc is a bit harsh

True for vets but you are forgetting about the player who just got the game. They don’t have a clue what to do or the gold/skill points to do it. The old trait system they at least had a chance. It was a natural progression.

As it sits right now, vets power lvl to 80 and just buy what they need. THEN start the game. Is this right?

Actually, I’d say 80% of the vets now just don’t roll anymore alts and either are focusing on their characters from before April and this screw-up or have just left the game altogether. I know I have 2 post April update alts that got to 36 and just stopped because of this. I may try to finish them IF they fix this debacle otherwise they’ll just be extra storage for my main who only logs in for the new LS(which is a few hrs every 2-4 weeks).

Traits Unleashed

The goal of the March patch was to simplify the trait system and make it more intuitive for new players to use. While it succeeded in doing so an unintended consequence is that it inadvertently detracted from the sense of progression gained from Guild Wars 2’s “Skill Tree” — It’s Trait System

Guild Wars is a game about “Active-Combat” – High-Mobility combat that relies more on a sense of game knowledge, skill; that is, anticipation and reaction. The current trait system delays Master & Grandmaster traits until level 60 and 80. While leveling up most of the time you’re adding passive statistics that feel meaningless. This is a problem.

Passive statistics ie) Power & Condition duration – do not mesh well with the concept of an active system. Players want to feel like their trait choice was meaningful. They can activate “For Great Justice” and get an immediate X to Y Response.

The current trait system has 3 Power-Spikes access to different trait tiers at levels 30, 60 and 80. Guild Wars 2 is a game about customization and making _your own character.

Imagine trying to play a hack’n’slash game like Torchlight or Diablo when yet not being able to customize your “build” until level 30. While I understand the effort to separate the game into three “thirds” — That is, a beginning, middle and end-leveling experience; I believe that the Guild Wars 2 experience is about getting to know all your profession’s traits sooner rather than later.

Leveling up in Guild Wars 2 is a pivotal part of the GW2 experience and it’s one that is lacking because of the current trait system. There is currently far too long of a grace period between which the times it takes to unlock traits (30) and the next tier of meaningful traits (60). — 30 Levels; I would wager is something akin to 25-30 hours of play for most players.

Fundamentally, I would argue that the choice to receive double trait points at level starting at level 66 and continuing until 80 is a choice that should be scrutinized. Why wait to distribute double the traits after level 66? What makes level 60+ any different from the rest of general PvE gameplay?

Just as the break-points themselves (30, 60 & 80) have “Power Spikes” so do Professions themselves. Each profession has certain Traits, for example; [Deceptive Evasion – Dueling X (level 60)] Mesmer that have come to define them and represent a solid, meaningful choice

About me; I’m currently leveling a level 61 Ranger, 60 Thief, 56 Engineer, & 56 Warrior. My characters are grandfather’d onto the old system so I chose to question some of the changes with regard to the trait system of the April 15th feature patch.

Was just talking to some friends about this while we leveled up characters in EotM. It’s not fun and it’s a pain in the kitten forcing players through content they’ve already played through to unlock traits on new characters.

I wish there was something more I could say on the alt leveling experience, but I’ve had to take a small break from that to deal with some WvW stuff and life stuff. I will say though that being where I’m at with my necro, I feel like I should either try to press hard to level 80 or start the trait hunt now and see how feasible it actually is to do (solo-ish). Basically I won’t be asking for help with any of the ones that are supposedly in my grasp to get and will only be helped if there are others already there to do said event.

hmmm how dare this leave front page

Kohlteth.3715:

hmmm how dare this leave front page

People are tired of shouting at a brick wall?

I have 3 theories on what the devs will do next:

1. Chris will give our 4+ month feedback to the devs and we get a new CDI to discuss how to improve it. Not just "change it back or Devs suck, but actual discussion.

2. We get a “improvement” for the Traits system that the devs haven’t told us about with the September Feature Patch.

3. We have no changes and just learn to deal with it

My bet is on the CDI myself. Chris has done a great job this weekend relaying A-Nets willingness to discuss things we feel need fixed. Hopefully his enthusiasm for what we as a community can provide will translate into a meaningful discussion on this topic and others.

Galphar.3901:

I have 3 theories on what the devs will do next:

1. Chris will give our 4+ month feedback to the devs and we get a new CDI to discuss how to improve it. Not just "change it back or Devs suck, but actual discussion.

2. We get a “improvement” for the Traits system that the devs haven’t told us about with the September Feature Patch.

3. We have no changes and just learn to deal with it

My bet is on the CDI myself. Chris has done a great job this weekend relaying A-Nets willingness to discuss things we feel need fixed. Hopefully his enthusiasm for what we as a community can provide will translate into a meaningful discussion on this topic and others.

4. Anet have noticed than another big MMO released the date for their new expac this week, an MMO that may draw people back from GW2 due to people being puppied off at Anet for zero communication ( not me as I hate wow, blizz really screwed the kitty with dead servers) , and decided to actually say something to attempt to retain people’s hope and dreams for GW2 and keep people here.

removes tinfoil hat and grins

Kohlteth.3715:

Galphar.3901:

I have 3 theories on what the devs will do next:

1. Chris will give our 4+ month feedback to the devs and we get a new CDI to discuss how to improve it. Not just "change it back or Devs suck, but actual discussion.

2. We get a “improvement” for the Traits system that the devs haven’t told us about with the September Feature Patch.

3. We have no changes and just learn to deal with it

My bet is on the CDI myself. Chris has done a great job this weekend relaying A-Nets willingness to discuss things we feel need fixed. Hopefully his enthusiasm for what we as a community can provide will translate into a meaningful discussion on this topic and others.

4. Anet have noticed than another big MMO released the date for their new expac this week, an MMO that may draw people back from GW2 due to people being puppied off at Anet for zero communication ( not me as I hate wow, blizz really screwed the kitty with dead servers) , and decided to actually say something to attempt to retain people’s hope and dreams for GW2 and keep people here.

removes tinfoil hat and grins

I say IF people want to leave GW2 for a MMO like WoW then they should never have played GW2 in the first pace(2 different games, 1 trinity and grind the other GW2).

Whether a game has an expansion they just announced or there’s a new game coming out, I feel A-Net must stay true to what got them here and keep trying to evolve the genre of MMORPGs and not worry about what the “Other” games are doing. It’s what made A-Net successful with GW.

You need to review EVERY SINGLE TRAIT IN THE GAME. Sick of useless traits.

Galphar.3901:

I have 3 theories on what the devs will do next:

1. Chris will give our 4+ month feedback to the devs and we get a new CDI to discuss how to improve it. Not just "change it back or Devs suck, but actual discussion.

2. We get a “improvement” for the Traits system that the devs haven’t told us about with the September Feature Patch.

3. We have no changes and just learn to deal with it

My bet is on the CDI myself. Chris has done a great job this weekend relaying A-Nets willingness to discuss things we feel need fixed. Hopefully his enthusiasm for what we as a community can provide will translate into a meaningful discussion on this topic and others.

If there is a CDI for trait unlocks at this point, I’d be incredibly unhappy. This thread has every bit of information they need in order to know where the forum community stands on the current iteration of the trait system. Seriously. It’s all right here. A CDI after this thread was essentially ignored for four months would be insulting.

After levelling 2 chars to 80 under the new system and now having a lvl 60 guardian on a completely new account (so that there is no help whatsoever from my main account):

• In principle the idea of unlocking traits via challenges is good.

• Traits tiers come too late. Start at lvl 15, 1 trait point every 5 lvls, Master at lvl 40, Grandmaster at lvl 60.

• Sort the current unlocking challenges in 3 tiers, called adept, master and grandmaster. If you beat a challenge you get a token which you can exchange at the trainer for one trait of the corresponding trait tier of your choice.

Advantages: You don’t have to redesign the challenges. The good part (exploring) remains. Experimenting with builds is easier because for acquiring a new trait you don’t have to best a specific challenge, any challenge of the corresponding tier will do. You get tiers earlier, giving you more time to become accustomed to them.

I made this proposal as realistic as possible. There are more advanced solutions in this thread which would be even better but taking into account the amount of ressources necessary my solution would already help a lot and be easy to implement.

DivineRequiem.2710:

Gaws you ppl are sooo overreacting over this just because you’re lazy!

How is it lazy to be disappointed at a trait level up to see a big empty slot for your trouble. Not to mention all the levels in between being pointless since you get more skill points mapping than you do for a level up.

Levelling up should be “Yay!” not “Sigh, 4 more levels to go before I get an empty slot with no trait to put in it!”

Paul.4081:

Levelling up should be “Yay!” not “Sigh, 4 more levels to go before I get an empty slot with no trait to put in it!”

Could you please put the above quote, on those responsible for changing the trait system, desks.
Make sure they can see it every minute of the day!

Daggos Skelito.2910:

Paul.4081:

Levelling up should be “Yay!” not “Sigh, 4 more levels to go before I get an empty slot with no trait to put in it!”

Could you please put the above quote, on those responsible for changing the trait system, desks.
Make sure they can see it every minute of the day!

Seconded.

GW2 has some woefully dead levels, and it’s not just the 6-level spread between trait points. I’ve never been a fan of point-every-level for the sake of micromanagement, since respec’ing a character was always a chore for it. But getting to an empty slot and realizing the one you want is 5 levels and 100% zone completion away is just brutally demoralizing.

I think the best way to illustrate what the last few posters have said, and a possible fix would be not to show us the really nice car that we can have someday, but show it to is from behind a glass and a moat. In essence, at level 30 we get all of the wizz-bang LOOK YOU CAN HAS TRAITS, and then no…not really. maybe later. After you do A LOT of stuff. And the traits that you can get easily are more like the Pinto sitting next to the real nice car.

PookieDaWombat.6209:

I think the best way to illustrate what the last few posters have said, and a possible fix would be not to show us the really nice car that we can have someday, but show it to is from behind a glass and a moat. In essence, at level 30 we get all of the wizz-bang LOOK YOU CAN HAS TRAITS, and then no…not really. maybe later. After you do A LOT of stuff. And the traits that you can get easily are more like the Pinto sitting next to the real nice car.

Hahaha such a perfect comparison. Well done.

What I would like to see changed.

1) Revert back to the old trait system via paying for books at your class trainer.
2)For all new traits they should keep the new system in tact so you have to earn them.
3)Once a new trait is unlocked make it available for all characters once they are of the proper level across all classes. None of this waiting for the Risen High Wizard event to spawn for 5 different characters or more. This would mean any trait that would be linked to beating the Risen High Wizard would be unlocked after completing the event one time.

This would make getting traits not as big of a chore as it is now. The way they are now it feels like a punishment to make a new character more than a gift. I would go out on a limb here and if you polled the main reason why people are not making a new characters it would be because of the new trait system.

To be honest I made a new character and I plan to level him to 80 and pray the change comes through because I do not plan to go after any traits that do not come from normal play.

I wonder if the character slots being on sale is because very few are being bought currently.

Lazuli.2098:

I wonder if the character slots being on sale is because very few are being bought currently.

I almost didn’t buy one at the sale price. I got one, just in case the gamble pays off and they make new character trait acquisition not suck.

RELAX everyone, the leveling goodies for new and vet players alike turns out to be class-specific loot and has NOTHING to do with fixing traits. Aren’t you all breathing a sigh of relief now?

/endsarcasm

I was thinking about the b-day prezzies and how they give us more “jump to level 20” scrolls (although they don’t stack with older ones). I was remembering back to how it was a fairly neat thing for people making alts who didn’t want to slog through those early levels, but not be made too over powered too early.

And now they are frankly pointless. The only benefit to getting that level 20 bump is that i can get a few utilities and all my weapons skills unlocked faster. yay? This is one of the problems with changes like this to the trait system while keeping things like these level scrolls in the game in some way. They don’t hold the same meaning to the player since the payoff to using them is nil.

VOLTCIEAGE.3029:

lol just keep leveling , come back to traits when you are 80. Any party wont take you for dung . go for hearths and story, there is no need for traits.

… worst advice/input ever.

Mister zeeRo.8561:

VOLTCIEAGE.3029:

lol just keep leveling , come back to traits when you are 80. Any party wont take you for dung . go for hearths and story, there is no need for traits.

… worst advice/input ever.

Yeah. Someone’s never leveled a mesmer/ele/engineer to 80 without traits. I’m so glad I didn’t get another character slot in this sale. I guess I’ll be checking back in six months to see how the trait feedback is coming along.

Guhracie.3419:

Mister zeeRo.8561:

VOLTCIEAGE.3029:

lol just keep leveling , come back to traits when you are 80. Any party wont take you for dung . go for hearths and story, there is no need for traits.

… worst advice/input ever.

Yeah. Someone’s never leveled a mesmer/ele/engineer to 80 without traits. I’m so glad I didn’t get another character slot in this sale. I guess I’ll be checking back in six months to see how the trait feedback is coming along.

Sad that it seems to come to this for so many with the new trait fiacso

Guhracie.3419:

Mister zeeRo.8561:

VOLTCIEAGE.3029:

lol just keep leveling , come back to traits when you are 80. Any party wont take you for dung . go for hearths and story, there is no need for traits.

… worst advice/input ever.

Yeah. Someone’s never leveled a mesmer/ele/engineer to 80 without traits. I’m so glad I didn’t get another character slot in this sale. I guess I’ll be checking back in six months to see how the trait feedback is coming along.

Don’t remind me of leveling a Mesmer with little to no traits…those first 40 levels were hell in the old system, I don’t even want to imagine the leveling now. Ele and Engineer I didn’t have as many problems leveling with, but I think that’s mostly due to my WvW leveling on the ele and abusing Turrets on the Engineer early on.

Wayfinder.8452:

I doubt anyone will be happy when the changes (if any) arrive 6 months from now in the next feature pack. Simply too slow.

Yes and no. Yes I will be unhappy but given the current system it would take me 6 months to finish unlocking the GM traits for all 9 characters anyway.

Having to do this the first time around and my first reaction is nope.

This was poorly done and i’d rather any “new” traits are the only ones we have to go search for. Base traits should be automatically unlocked for everyone.

I had a sudden urge to try out this new trait system, so I rerolled an engineer I previously deleted and leveled it to 80.

WORST EXPERIENCE EVER!

I don’t get traits until 30 (which makes me as fast as a mesmer until then, with my rocket boots), then I learn that I have to do some stupid event or pay to gain what is really a QoL thing for engineers, and at that point I realize I have to do this stupid event-hunting or skill point/gold grinding just to unlock my traits…

Okay, so I complied with Anet’s dumb enforcement of PvE, and sought out events and jumping puzzles… only to realize that I was severely undertraited in all approaches, which made things similarly difficult for me to complete them.

I had 3 traits when unlocking HGH through HotW. I’ve done many HotW runs, but this was by far the worst – I was lucky enough to have a patient and strong PUG to carry me, even as the second engineer in the group.

Why doesn’t Anet just spend the time implementing better tooltips + tutorials? Why wasn’t the story designed around teaching a player how to use certain skills and combos? This is the reason why this trait system was implemented, no? Either it was to force the population to play PvE, which is supposed to make sure that players know what they are doing before they enter endgame content…

They forget that those who refuse to play along with this stupid trait concept would just go to EotM/Fractals/WvW/PvP to farm gold + skill points.

I know my feedback is a bit late (as shown by the 40 previous pages in this thread), but I hope they still mean something and I’m not alone in feeling alienated with my toon