Guild Wars 2

First, let me say I didn’t hate the patch- it definitely brought some good changes, but many of the implementations were a bit shoddy and need to be revisited or iterated on before they reach their actual potential:

Condensing traits and hunting for them is fine, but the system needs revising. Not only is it boring going so long without them, but now scaled down characters are overpowered in lower level areas, trivializing the content and making it even easier/more boring than it was before to run champ trains, etc. Personally, I think staggering them that way was a mistake. You should just start getting them at 12 and get one every 6 levels after. Revert mob stats back to what they were.

Townclothes tonics and costumes need to be revisited. I don’t even use any of them, and I still think this was an unacceptably poor solution. Find a way to reintroduce those old clothes as actual skins just like you did with hats. I have no doubt it’s possible. Even if you have to redo them from scratch – that’s exactly what you should be willing to do for your players that paid money for them the way they were.

Fix the item name issue where it the name of the item is taken from the original piece instead of the current skin. This creates a lot of thematic mismatch wonkiness and issues with epic items having stupid names. Give items a “subheader” that contains a reference to the stats of the original piece for those that find it convenient. I.e. “Krytan Greatsword”, then below it in smaller letters "Berserker’s Greatsword of so and so).

The megaserver system is definitely better than empty servers, but it needs some iterative improvements so that you’re more likely to be mixed in ideal groups and, most importantly, find ways to encourage tactical group play over mindless zerging even in open world content. Mindless zerging really zaps you out of immersion and really isn’t good for the overall world-gameplay experience. The game’s engine also really isn’t well optimized for it.

Fix the Hero panel UI so that it always opens by default to equipment, but changing back and forth between the three sections is just a single click rather than multiple clicks.

I’ll probably think of more later.

I agree the Hero panel is clunky, definitely need to update that and I like your idea of it always opening to equipment. Maybe go back to how it used to be with the icons at the top showing an eyedropper for the dyes and the other for the armor, just add another icon up there for the wardrobe. Simple.

Megaserver system is great, I’m really liking seeing more people around, though I don’t think it was really that bad before, I’d see people at least every 10 min while in the open world. Though I do think there is a problem with it, and maybe I’m not understanding it correctly so this may not be true. But to my understanding, all zones are now using the Megaserver system. I remember before the system went live, people would recruit for WvW in cities and even use map chat to let people know when a zerg was going to attack. Can’t do that anymore without the other servers seeing, don’t really know who’s there with you. So I would suggest that the main cities remain World only maps, while the other zones are Megaserver. (Con: trying to find a group for a world event before the actual event, but you’re sure to find them on the world boss train)

I’ll be honest, I’ve played a lot since the update, but I still have no idea where my townclothes are, nor do I fully understand the outfit tab.

As far as the traits go, why change it up so much? Since we’re using 1 trait instead of 5 for each “tier” and we used to get a point every level, why not get them every 5 levels starting at level 15? That gives players 5 levels to start playing around with crafting, and starts the player out using trait points when they should be entering the next zone (exiting the beginner 1-15 zone).

As a separate thought that’s somewhat tied to that, I think we should learn to swap weapons at level 5, by that time people have unlocked and gotten used to their weapon’s abilities, and giving the ability to swap will allow them to equip a second set to unlock skills and switch back to the first set if needed a little earlier. Then at lvl 10, unlock a utility slot, this is a direct progression move (crafting is optional and may not serve as a sense of progression for many people). Then unlock utility slots every 10 levels, with the second at lvl 20, the third at 30, and hold the elite til lvl 40 (or 50). I find that on most of my characters, I skip grabbing any of the 6 point utility skills while leveling up so I can save up for an elite skill when it becomes available. Deferring the elite til later will not only allow players more freedom to choose those 6 point skills they want and use them but it pushes a point of progression later in the game. [Personal Story Spoiler] IIRC, the Battle for Claw Island is around lvl 50 which is a big turning point in the story, making the elite available at lvl 50 may be a nice companion piece to go along with that story quest to build it up even more (think, the first time you’re able to really use it, you’re in the midst of a large battle!)

Oh, and waypoints being contested. It makes people spend twice as much money waypointing into a map, then waypointing to where they want to go in the map. Why not allow players to waypoint where they want, and if it’s contested, move them to the next closest waypoint? (which that system needs to be fixed btw, half the time it wouldn’t even move me to a different one, and when it did, it’d usually be about 30 seconds after I’m already running around)