Guild Wars 2

Title pretty much says it all. I am giving up on unlocking traits, there are some things I can’t do and some things I wont do just to unlock traits and I play so infrequently that I have no real chance to get help in doing some of those things anyhow. So, I want to thank whoever is responsible for this change, you are giving me a reason to quit playing games and just read more…

Hang on for a bit. There may very well be changes coming to that system.

You can always opt for buying the traits. But wait, you want them for free, of course.

Charleston Chew.1209:

You can always opt for buying the traits. But wait, you want them for free, of course.

Skill points is not as easy as gold.

alvinjason.3109:

Charleston Chew.1209:

You can always opt for buying the traits. But wait, you want them for free, of course.

Skill points is not as easy as gold.

True, but they are available through PvP or just flying around with the world boss chain.

alvinjason.3109:

Charleston Chew.1209:

You can always opt for buying the traits. But wait, you want them for free, of course.

Skill points is not as easy as gold.

Yeah but you need 800 SP to unlock all the XIII traits on all classes, ANOTHER 800 SP to unlock XI and XII, and then ANOTHER 800 to unlock the master traits, AND THEN ANOTHER BLOODY 480 to unlock the minor traits, on top of 344 Gold

Skill points will be really plentyful later on, to the point that gold is not as easy as skill points.

And you really shouldn’t buy all the traits. Unlock the ones that are easy for you by doing stuff, buy the ones you need and don’t feel like unlocking the other way.

BaconCatTheGreasy.9542:

alvinjason.3109:

Charleston Chew.1209:

You can always opt for buying the traits. But wait, you want them for free, of course.

Skill points is not as easy as gold.

Yeah but you need 800 SP to unlock all the XIII traits on all classes, ANOTHER 800 SP to unlock XI and XII, and then ANOTHER 800 to unlock the master traits, AND THEN ANOTHER BLOODY 480 to unlock the minor traits, on top of 344 Gold

Wow so expensive. lel didnt know it was that expensive if we’re counting all classes. But as a wvw player who roams alot and say makes a new toon, it was easier before. I thought they want this to do whatever you want take charge of your fun kinda game, but forcing these is kinda annoying I’m out of SP scrolls atm and I’m gonna be looking on farming them just to trait.

Who uses all the traits though? It sounds like a long term goal to get them all unlocked its a lot like going for all the say staff skins in the game.

BaconCatTheGreasy.9542:

alvinjason.3109:

Charleston Chew.1209:

You can always opt for buying the traits. But wait, you want them for free, of course.

Skill points is not as easy as gold.

Yeah but you need 800 SP to unlock all the XIII traits on all classes, ANOTHER 800 SP to unlock XI and XII, and then ANOTHER 800 to unlock the master traits, AND THEN ANOTHER BLOODY 480 to unlock the minor traits, on top of 344 Gold

Sure, if you want every trait, including the ones you’ll never use, or almost never use and assuming you can’t do some of the in world events, many of which are quite doable.

I mean there’s a chest in Kessex Hills that’s quite easy to get. The boat in Straits is quite easy. I don’t know. Get the ones you can, and buy the rest that you want, maybe?

Alfwyn.8704:

And you really shouldn’t buy all the traits. Unlock the ones that are easy for you by doing stuff, buy the ones you need and don’t feel like unlocking the other way.

That advice only really works on veterans who have already experimented with all the traits for a the profession in question; you can’t really tell someone on a new character, playing a class they’ve never experienced before, to “buy the ones you need”, because how can they know what they need without trying it first? A lot of traits only sound good on paper and tend to turn out to be rather lackluster when actually used.

Anet claimed they made the change to encourage more experimentation and build diversity, but it seems like such a backward way to go about it: limiting options to encourage diversity.

Pandaman.4758:

Alfwyn.8704:

And you really shouldn’t buy all the traits. Unlock the ones that are easy for you by doing stuff, buy the ones you need and don’t feel like unlocking the other way.

That advice only really works on veterans who have already experimented with all the traits for a the profession in question; you can’t really tell someone on a new character, playing a class they’ve never experienced before, to “buy the ones you need”, because how can they know what they need without trying it first? A lot of traits only sound good on paper and tend to turn out to be rather lackluster when actually used.

Anet claimed they made the change to encourage more experimentation and build diversity, but it seems like such a backward way to go about it: limiting options to encourage diversity.

I think you are missing the point. Many players only use a ‘zerker’ build in PvE and WvW (although there are many useful builds). This way, just unlock what you need for your build and move on.

Dusty Moon.4382:

Pandaman.4758:

Alfwyn.8704:

And you really shouldn’t buy all the traits. Unlock the ones that are easy for you by doing stuff, buy the ones you need and don’t feel like unlocking the other way.

That advice only really works on veterans who have already experimented with all the traits for a the profession in question; you can’t really tell someone on a new character, playing a class they’ve never experienced before, to “buy the ones you need”, because how can they know what they need without trying it first? A lot of traits only sound good on paper and tend to turn out to be rather lackluster when actually used.

Anet claimed they made the change to encourage more experimentation and build diversity, but it seems like such a backward way to go about it: limiting options to encourage diversity.

I think you are missing the point. Many players only use a ‘zerker’ build in PvE and WvW (although there are many useful builds). This way, just unlock what you need for your build and move on.

Trait unlocks were billed as being there to encourage build diversity, and here you are, encouraging everyone to use a cookie-cutter build.

You can read what traits do before you unlock them.

Some will be utterly uninteresting. Skip those (unless doing the world exploration thing sounds fun to you).

Some will be interesting enough to try out. Buy those (unless doing the world exploration thing sounds feasible to you) and see if they work for you.

Once you have a complete set of workable traits unlocked for your build, keep those.

Consider slowly expanding your trait kitten nal, either through buying more unlocks, or through doing the world exploration things (if those seem fun to you at that time). Experiment with your newly unlocked traits to see if they could replace one of your older ones.

If you wish to change your build, you can work towards that by first unlocking the relevant traits (in the manner you choose), and then changing your build when you have them all. This is not all that different from collecting or buying the crafting materials you need for a new set of exotic armor with different stats.

Do NOT look at unlocking all 65 traits as something you NEED to do before you can even start enjoying your character. That is simply a mistake.

Guhracie.3419:

Dusty Moon.4382:

Pandaman.4758:

Alfwyn.8704:

And you really shouldn’t buy all the traits. Unlock the ones that are easy for you by doing stuff, buy the ones you need and don’t feel like unlocking the other way.

That advice only really works on veterans who have already experimented with all the traits for a the profession in question; you can’t really tell someone on a new character, playing a class they’ve never experienced before, to “buy the ones you need”, because how can they know what they need without trying it first? A lot of traits only sound good on paper and tend to turn out to be rather lackluster when actually used.

Anet claimed they made the change to encourage more experimentation and build diversity, but it seems like such a backward way to go about it: limiting options to encourage diversity.

I think you are missing the point. Many players only use a ‘zerker’ build in PvE and WvW (although there are many useful builds). This way, just unlock what you need for your build and move on.

Trait unlocks were billed as being there to encourage build diversity, and here you are, encouraging everyone to use a cookie-cutter build.

I agree with this completely. Ultimately the trait update makes experimentation far less likely, which is bad for the game over all.

Having to unlock traits just kills experimentation, and experimentation is the mother of build diversity.

edit: ninja’d

Jornophelanthas.1475:

You can read what traits do before you unlock them.

Some will be utterly uninteresting. Skip those (unless doing the world exploration thing sounds fun to you).

Some will be interesting enough to try out. Buy those (unless doing the world exploration thing sounds feasible to you) and see if they work for you.

Once you have a complete set of workable traits unlocked for your build, keep those.

Consider slowly expanding your trait kitten nal, either through buying more unlocks, or through doing the world exploration things (if those seem fun to you at that time). Experiment with your newly unlocked traits to see if they could replace one of your older ones.

If you wish to change your build, you can work towards that by first unlocking the relevant traits (in the manner you choose), and then changing your build when you have them all. This is not all that different from collecting or buying the crafting materials you need for a new set of exotic armor with different stats.

Do NOT look at unlocking all 65 traits as something you NEED to do before you can even start enjoying your character. That is simply a mistake.

Without practical experience in the game using those traits, it’s actually quite difficult to know which ones will perform the best for one’s playstyle, and which ones are not as useful as they sound.

That combined with the fact that I’m not going to pay more than what it used to cost to unlock a whole tier for a single trait, and I’m faced with doing HotW with a grand total of two traits unlocked. Does that sound enjoyable to you?

plus, it’s totally boring and definitely not improving the gameplay AT ALL.

how are you supposed to experiment and get better with your profession if you have to go unlock traits all the time.

edit: also, there are people who hate pve and just want to play wvw. fortunately i am not one of them, but it would drive me so mad, i would stick my head inside anets windows and shout: i am mad as hell and i won’t take this trait crap anymore!

i will not even start with the not so few people who actually have mutliple toons of one profession (i got 3 eles, 2 guards, 2 warriors, etc. PLUS i got a second account over at NA). i leveled 8 lvl 80s and i did so with joy, mostly, but since trait update, i didn’t even touch my newly created toons anymore, i hop straight to pvp and just level them to the level, when they can equip shoulders and helmets and all that stuff.

Unless you like world completion and world bosses. I mean, it is not all that hard to try to actively unlock all traits, just time consuming.

ok, and now imagine that you do so with multiple characters. the same crap every time you start a new one. hell yeah.

Guhracie.3419

That combined with the fact that I’m not going to pay more than what it used to cost to unlock a whole tier for a single trait, and I’m faced with doing HotW with a grand total of two traits unlocked. Does that sound enjoyable to you?

You control this choice. Do not pretend someone else forced you into this position.

After all, coin and skill points are just play money.

Jornophelanthas.1475:

Unless you like world completion and world bosses. I mean, it is not all that hard to try to actively unlock all traits, just time consuming.

Karka Queen is the only world boss that unlocks a trait, I believe. Guess how easy it is to find dungeon groups or do wvw objectives without traits? How much time needs to be consumed by this system? It’s exactly the same for each profession, so how many professions should new players have to slog through this system on? It’s not just world completion and world bosses, it’s dungeons, group events, bugged events, jumping puzzles, personal story steps, and map completions.

People like me who like to play many alts, replaying content on different characters instead of repeating it on the same characer will be practically ‘done’ with a character by the time we unlock all traits. And while getting there, the ride was less fun than it was with characters played before the change, because we had far less toys to play with.

Enjoying new characters takes stockpiled skill scrolls and heaps of money nowadays.

Jornophelanthas.1475:

Guhracie.3419

That combined with the fact that I’m not going to pay more than what it used to cost to unlock a whole tier for a single trait, and I’m faced with doing HotW with a grand total of two traits unlocked. Does that sound enjoyable to you?

You control this choice. Do not pretend someone else forced you into this position.

After all, coin and skill points are just play money.

Anet forced me into this position when they changed a perfectly fine system into this wreck that you’ve obviously never even attempted.

Guhracie.3419:

Jornophelanthas.1475:

Guhracie.3419

That combined with the fact that I’m not going to pay more than what it used to cost to unlock a whole tier for a single trait, and I’m faced with doing HotW with a grand total of two traits unlocked. Does that sound enjoyable to you?

You control this choice. Do not pretend someone else forced you into this position.

After all, coin and skill points are just play money.

Anet forced me into this position when they changed a perfectly fine system into this wreck that you’ve obviously never even attempted.

When the Tradepost price for Linen or Silk quintuples as a result of the addition of ascended armorcrafting, did you refuse to pay the new market price, insisting on the older, cheaper price that nobody is willing to accept any more?

When Unidentified Dyes stopped dropping from plant nodes, and the laurel price at the laurel vendor went up with the April feature update, did you refuse to spend the higher laurel price on Unidentified Dyes, claiming that if you could harvest them for free before, you will not be paying anything for it?

Manasa Devi does have a point, that a number of the trait unlocking accomplishments are quite taxing, especially if you need to do it again for each and every character that wants the corresponding trait. In this respect, I second the earlier poster’s hope that ArenaNet may adjust or rebalance what tasks are exactly required for trait unlocks.

For example, what if the first three adept traits would be unlocked for free, so that all three trait slots in that line can at least be used as soon as they become available?

Guhracie.3419:

Jornophelanthas.1475:

Unless you like world completion and world bosses. I mean, it is not all that hard to try to actively unlock all traits, just time consuming.

Karka Queen is the only world boss that unlocks a trait, I believe. Guess how easy it is to find dungeon groups or do wvw objectives without traits? How much time needs to be consumed by this system? It’s exactly the same for each profession, so how many professions should new players have to slog through this system on? It’s not just world completion and world bosses, it’s dungeons, group events, bugged events, jumping puzzles, personal story steps, and map completions.

Sorry no – all the Orr events unlock traits also….

I really feel sorry for you OP. I think Anet made a mistake in forcing players to unlock the traits. It’s too tedious and costly. It really takes the fun of the game and makes it more grindy. I hope they reverse the change or at least make Grandmaster traits the only ones you have to unlock.

Just imagine you have to do that for every toon. It would be a pain in the butt. I’m fortunate that I didn’t have to go through all that. Hopefully, Anet will listen to the customer’s response and re-evaluate this change. Remember GW2 was marketed as being able to max out real fast so you can just start having fun.

Jornophelanthas.1475:

When the Tradepost price for Linen or Silk quintuples as a result of the addition of ascended armorcrafting, did you refuse to pay the new market price, insisting on the older, cheaper price that nobody is willing to accept any more?

When Unidentified Dyes stopped dropping from plant nodes, and the laurel price at the laurel vendor went up with the April feature update, did you refuse to spend the higher laurel price on Unidentified Dyes, claiming that if you could harvest them for free before, you will not be paying anything for it?

Manasa Devi does have a point, that a number of the trait unlocking accomplishments are quite taxing, especially if you need to do it again for each and every character that wants the corresponding trait. In this respect, I second the earlier poster’s hope that ArenaNet may adjust or rebalance what tasks are exactly required for trait unlocks.

For example, what if the first three adept traits would be unlocked for free, so that all three trait slots in that line can at least be used as soon as they become available?

A player controlled market is utterly different than one Anet controls externally. But I absolutely did refuse to buy cloth at the prices they went for a year ago, because it wasn’t something I was able or willing to pay.

I also refuse to buy 1 unidentified dye for 5 laurels. I can obtain the colors I specifically want on the trading post for considerably less than that. Again, another system that is not completely externally controlled by Anet.

Those both have acceptable alternate choices. Traits are just a cluster of kittens.

Dusty Moon.4382:

Guhracie.3419:

Jornophelanthas.1475:

Unless you like world completion and world bosses. I mean, it is not all that hard to try to actively unlock all traits, just time consuming.

Karka Queen is the only world boss that unlocks a trait, I believe. Guess how easy it is to find dungeon groups or do wvw objectives without traits? How much time needs to be consumed by this system? It’s exactly the same for each profession, so how many professions should new players have to slog through this system on? It’s not just world completion and world bosses, it’s dungeons, group events, bugged events, jumping puzzles, personal story steps, and map completions.

Sorry no – all the Orr events unlock traits also….

Oh, sorry! Please show me where the Orr events are on the World Boss schedule?

Jornophelanthas.1475:

Manasa Devi does have a point, that a number of the trait unlocking accomplishments are quite taxing, especially if you need to do it again for each and every character that wants the corresponding trait.

Not only are some of them quite taxing, the totality of the new system completely takes charge of the direction your play takes you, unless you want to pay for them. You have to go out of your way to locations you might not want to visit for a long time to come during the natural course of play. Or pay for them, which you might not be able to if you haven’t got stockpiled skill scrolls and plenty of handy cash.

Pandaman.4758:

Anet claimed they made the change to encourage more experimentation and build diversity, but it seems like such a backward way to go about it: limiting options to encourage diversity.

Unfortunately they do a lot of that. Tell us one thing, then do something else. They want build diversity? Then why destroy the boon duration rune combos? Why reduce and rename a major damage component that actually supported non-zerker builds.

This trait chase is just another example, and it’s directly against the original design of the game. I can see it, if we were chasing down new skills, or elites but this setup is awful for new players and a lot of altoholics aren’t happy either.

I wont be making any new character.

I have a few lvl 80s, and a couple more almost there that were grandfathered in, and therefore haven’t had to unlock the traits, but then I started a new character to play with my son’s new character, and holy mother of all things sloggy, the new trait system is gawdawful.

Now I understand why eotm is stuffed full of underleveled players spamming the 1 key, everyone is just getting to 80 so they can go start unlocking the character they want to play.

This was a terrible decision on Anet’s part, imho. To put unlocks in crazy places 20 levels above the appropriate level, to depend on dungeons or group events is game destroying for people who either don’t have big guilds, or in my case, are playing with kids who don’t have the patience to leave their character parked somewhere for days on the off chance an event chain will happen. And setting the “buy” price so high that it is prohibitive for new/inexperienced players gates the game in such a way that new players are, for the most part, crippled until lvl 80.

I think it was a mistake. While I’m still playing with my lvl 80s, the kids have mostly moved on to other games because leveling just wasn’t fun anymore.

I know how you feel OP I have been trying to unlock the traits on a character for a while now and for some reason they make getting the traits impossible. I do not think they should force dungeons on people just to get traits for one and they do with most of them. Then forcing you to group up with people just to get them is like telling people they HAVE to play in a group of people they do not know just to get your personal character where you want it. My build and traits have nothing to do with other players so why should I be forced to work with them just to get the traits. And to hear people say their easy to get thats bull crap. I have never been able to get past a dungeon with even a group….much less by myself so there goes over half of the traits. Then they say you can guy them. Alright lets attempt to get the kitten skill points and gold it takes to open them that sounds doable. NOT. Come on if its something personal with MY character I think getting them during our personal story would be a better idea. Make them a bit more do able.

Developer response (in a different thread):

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Game-Updates-Traits/page/41#post4358626

Pandaman.4758:

Anet claimed they made the change to encourage more experimentation and build diversity, but it seems like such a backward way to go about it: limiting options to encourage diversity.

Yes, very strange.

When I made my first character under the new system, I basically watched Nike’s dungeon warrior guide and unlocked the traits for that plus a couple for bows. And I haven’t experimented with traits/builds at all.

On my pre-change characters, mesmer + necro + ele, I experiment quite a bit.

I’ve a post-change guardian who’s missing traits I want to try out, like Right Hand Strength, because I haven’t gotten to doing whatever is needed to unlock it.

BaconCatTheGreasy.9542:

alvinjason.3109:

Charleston Chew.1209:

You can always opt for buying the traits. But wait, you want them for free, of course.

Skill points is not as easy as gold.

Yeah but you need 800 SP to unlock all the XIII traits on all classes, ANOTHER 800 SP to unlock XI and XII, and then ANOTHER 800 to unlock the master traits, AND THEN ANOTHER BLOODY 480 to unlock the minor traits, on top of 344 Gold

This is assuming that you purchase every trait for every class, a fair amount of the traits are easily obtainable just by playing the game. If a person has the ability to come to the forums then they also have the ability to look up which traits are considered “must haves” by most people and which traits are only going to be mildly helpful. I don’t think it’s too much to ask of a mmorpg player to do a little research when deciding what they want for their character vs what they need. A person can flush out one build initially for a low cost that will get them through the vast majority of the game while they work on the rest of the traits that they want. It does limit build experimentation a little bit based on time, but no more than having to acquire gear for the different builds would.

Hey Oimmuk, these changes came about due to a lengthy CDI (Collaborate Design Initiative) about vertical and horizontal progression in GW2. There were changes to the system in the April Feature Pack of this year, and while it incorporated several suggestions made by the community, it also caused various problems… The initial changes have been recognized by ANet and they have made a pass through the levelling system as part of the September Feature Pack, coming in under a week …

So I would want to advice you to hang in there just a little longer, things might well change for the better in a few days … also! You can visit your profession trainer (I think) and unlock traits for a relative small amount of silver (except for the elite tier 3 traits). So the trait hunt is either optional, or a way to save yourself some silver by doing other things in the game. My suggestion would be to do those traits through content that you like doing or feel achievable of doing on your own, and just buying the other traits from the trainer ^^.

Hope you will stay with us for just a couple more days, to see if the September feature pack solves some of your issues, and hopefully you can live with buying a couple of traits as a convenience option

Morte.5916:

Pandaman.4758:

Anet claimed they made the change to encourage more experimentation and build diversity, but it seems like such a backward way to go about it: limiting options to encourage diversity.

Yes, very strange.

When I made my first character under the new system, I basically watched Nike’s dungeon warrior guide and unlocked the traits for that plus a couple for bows. And I haven’t experimented with traits/builds at all.

On my pre-change characters, mesmer + necro + ele, I experiment quite a bit.

I’ve a post-change guardian who’s missing traits I want to try out, like Right Hand Strength, because I haven’t gotten to doing whatever is needed to unlock it.

I made a necro post-patch, still have plenty of locked traits, bought all the ones I wanted that were tied to WvW and dungeons. Unlocking the rest is too expensive and time consuming for the sake of experiementation. My Pre-patch toons I’m forever trying new builds. The experience of levelling necro without traits was tedious and dull, progression felt arificically laboured, slow and grindy thanks to the dead levels.

This trait system is awful.