It cannot be anything BUT a loss to build flecibility.
False.
The fact that Anet merges a lot of traits means that certain builds that required multiple very specific traits will now only need 1 grandmaster trait that has it all, meaning you have 2 extra traits up for grabs.
For example the meditation guardian: being a useful meditation guardian means you have to use up the entire Valor tree just to make your meditations shine. As a mediguard you are stuck to picking Meditation Mastery, Focused Mind and Monk’s focus to get the best out of your meditations, leaving you with little else to choose.
With the new system, I only have to pick the Meditation Mastery grandmaster trait at the end of the Valor tree and still have 2 other traits in the Valor tree up for grabs. So in this case and probably many other cases the new system adds flexibility.
This design does not add flexibility by any standard.
In fact, the design choice can be dumbed down to this:
That’s what the new design is. Less customiation – you cannot spec in more than three trait lines, unlike before, and you cannot use more than one adept or one master per line, unlike before.
However, you’re right in that they merged traits or added traits to the base use of skills. Thus the individual traits you use become more powerful. Players become more powerful at less expense. But on top of that, they give the players two additional trait points – which are restricted to your third trait line and can only be used for a minor trait and a major grandmaster trait – thus making players more powerful.
Less customization. More power.
Now tell me, is the open world being buffed to being able to combat this more power by the playerbase, or will things become even more rofleasy than it already is?
This is, through and through, a power creep by Anet’s move. One that costs customization for the sake of easier balance (supposedly for the sake of easier balance).
Mathematics dictates there is less choice because there are less possible trait combinations. Combining choices does not mean more choice.
Trait trees went from something like.
Pick three from 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9
To.
Pick one from 1, 2, 3
Pick one from 4, 5, 6
Pick one from 7, 8, 9
This was more of a change to make thier job of balancing easier and nurf builds than improving build diversity and flexability. Like they said in thier stream they want people to have to pick between x and y. Leaving you with less choices for them to balance.
But hey this is like the 3rd or 4th time they changed the system. Why not screw it up some more? Less is more NPE.
(edited by Mireles Lore.5942)
Mathematics dictates there is less choice because there are less possible trait combinations. Combining choices does not mean more choice.
It went from something like.
Pick three from 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9
To.
Pick one from 1, 2, 3
Pick one from 4, 5, 6
Pick one from 7, 8, 9This was more of a change to make thier job of balancing easier than improving build diversity and flexability. Like they said in thier stream they want people to have to pick between x and y. Leaving you with less choices for them to balance.
But hey this is like the 3rd or 4th time they changed the system. Why not screw it up some more? Less is more NPE.
Functionally though, everyone was shoehorned into picking 1,2,3 because they were “the best” so now we will actually see more diverse builds since you can’t take that combo now.
Traits should change HOW you play, and the old system failed miserably at doing that since it was just a checklist of the most efficient DPS options.
Functionally though, everyone was shoehorned into picking 1,2,3 because they were “the best” so now we will actually see more diverse builds since you can’t take that combo now.
Traits should change HOW you play, and the old system failed miserably at doing that since it was just a checklist of the most efficient DPS options.
How exactly are people not “shoehorned” to pick the best combos in the new system?
You can apply the same logic as if 3, 6, and 9 are new the best. There is less alternative to the “best” in this system.
It cannot be anything BUT a loss to build flecibility.
False.
The fact that Anet merges a lot of traits means that certain builds that required multiple very specific traits will now only need 1 grandmaster trait that has it all, meaning you have 2 extra traits up for grabs.
For example the meditation guardian: being a useful meditation guardian means you have to use up the entire Valor tree just to make your meditations shine. As a mediguard you are stuck to picking Meditation Mastery, Focused Mind and Monk’s focus to get the best out of your meditations, leaving you with little else to choose.
With the new system, I only have to pick the Meditation Mastery grandmaster trait at the end of the Valor tree and still have 2 other traits in the Valor tree up for grabs. So in this case and probably many other cases the new system adds flexibility.This design does not add flexibility by any standard.
In fact, the design choice can be dumbed down to this:
- Players want better balance.
- Players want more customization.
- ArenaNet responds with “less customization, more power”.
That’s what the new design is. Less customiation – you cannot spec in more than three trait lines, unlike before, and you cannot use more than one adept or one master per line, unlike before.
However, you’re right in that they merged traits or added traits to the base use of skills. Thus the individual traits you use become more powerful. Players become more powerful at less expense. But on top of that, they give the players two additional trait points – which are restricted to your third trait line and can only be used for a minor trait and a major grandmaster trait – thus making players more powerful.
Less customization. More power.
Now tell me, is the open world being buffed to being able to combat this more power by the playerbase, or will things become even more rofleasy than it already is?
This is, through and through, a power creep by Anet’s move. One that costs customization for the sake of easier balance (supposedly for the sake of easier balance).
I asked this question on reddit as well, and didn’t get much in reply.
I think PvE (sans-HoT) will be so severely trivialized, that it wouldn’t feel like it is even worth playing outside of Exploration and Hero Points….just roflstomp through the entire game 1-handed with nothing to show for it…and even as a non-PvE’r this is very disappointing.
With the addition of the super-charged traits, with stronger mechanics, it would be a snorefest trying to 100% zones now.
(edited by Zietlogik.6208)
Functionally though, everyone was shoehorned into picking 1,2,3 because they were “the best” so now we will actually see more diverse builds since you can’t take that combo now.
Traits should change HOW you play, and the old system failed miserably at doing that since it was just a checklist of the most efficient DPS options.
How exactly are people not “shoehorned” to pick the best combos in the new system?
You can apply the same logic as if 3, 6, and 9 are new the best. There is less alternative to the “best” in this system.
Because many of the “best” options are now in the same tier together, forcing you to pick only one of them leaving your other slots available for traits that are not DPS related.
Functionally though, everyone was shoehorned into picking 1,2,3 because they were “the best” so now we will actually see more diverse builds since you can’t take that combo now.
Traits should change HOW you play, and the old system failed miserably at doing that since it was just a checklist of the most efficient DPS options.
How exactly are people not “shoehorned” to pick the best combos in the new system?
You can apply the same logic as if 3, 6, and 9 are new the best. There is less alternative to the “best” in this system.
Because many of the “best” options are now in the same tier together, forcing you to pick only one of them leaving your other slots available for traits that are not DPS related.
That doesnt mean there isn’t going to be a new “best” to take those builds place. There will always be a meta. What we are going to see now with less possible build combinations is everyone running the same “best” (meta) builds because there will be less of them.
Functionally though, everyone was shoehorned into picking 1,2,3 because they were “the best” so now we will actually see more diverse builds since you can’t take that combo now.
Traits should change HOW you play, and the old system failed miserably at doing that since it was just a checklist of the most efficient DPS options.
How exactly are people not “shoehorned” to pick the best combos in the new system?
You can apply the same logic as if 3, 6, and 9 are new the best. There is less alternative to the “best” in this system.
Because many of the “best” options are now in the same tier together, forcing you to pick only one of them leaving your other slots available for traits that are not DPS related.
That doesnt mean there isn’t going to be a new “best” to take those builds place. There will always be a meta. What we are going to see now with less possible build combinations is everyone running the same “best” (meta) builds because there will be less of them.
Some tiers have no “best” option from a DPS perspective. This improves diversity because you no longer “have” to have any 1 of the 3 from that tier and can select the one you like versus the one that performs best.
Obviously, any tier that contains a DPS option will have a “best” option that will be the meta. This change just reduces the number of tiers where a meta option exists.
Functionally though, everyone was shoehorned into picking 1,2,3 because they were “the best” so now we will actually see more diverse builds since you can’t take that combo now.
Traits should change HOW you play, and the old system failed miserably at doing that since it was just a checklist of the most efficient DPS options.
How exactly are people not “shoehorned” to pick the best combos in the new system?
You can apply the same logic as if 3, 6, and 9 are new the best. There is less alternative to the “best” in this system.
Because many of the “best” options are now in the same tier together, forcing you to pick only one of them leaving your other slots available for traits that are not DPS related.
That doesnt mean there isn’t going to be a new “best” to take those builds place. There will always be a meta. What we are going to see now with less possible build combinations is everyone running the same “best” (meta) builds because there will be less of them.
Some tiers have no “best” option from a DPS perspective. This improves diversity because you no longer “have” to have any 1 of the 3 from that tier and can select the one you like versus the one that performs best.
Obviously, any tier that contains a DPS option will have a “best” option that will be the meta. This change just reduces the number of tiers where a meta option exists.
There will always be a best option when it comes to meta. Traits don’t all have to be DPS related to be meta. Taking those builds away doesn’t remove the nature of people taking whats the most effective and exluding the rest.
Taking away options didnt remove the bar and make all choices the same. In relation to DPS. There is nothing stopping people from picking the combo choice that gives the most DPS out of the entire system. Just like the previous one. Only difference is with the new system there will be less variations to those builds.
So how exactly does giving less choices improve diversity?
(edited by Mireles Lore.5942)
Functionally though, everyone was shoehorned into picking 1,2,3 because they were “the best” so now we will actually see more diverse builds since you can’t take that combo now.
Traits should change HOW you play, and the old system failed miserably at doing that since it was just a checklist of the most efficient DPS options.
How exactly are people not “shoehorned” to pick the best combos in the new system?
You can apply the same logic as if 3, 6, and 9 are new the best. There is less alternative to the “best” in this system.
Because many of the “best” options are now in the same tier together, forcing you to pick only one of them leaving your other slots available for traits that are not DPS related.
That doesnt mean there isn’t going to be a new “best” to take those builds place. There will always be a meta. What we are going to see now with less possible build combinations is everyone running the same “best” (meta) builds because there will be less of them.
Some tiers have no “best” option from a DPS perspective. This improves diversity because you no longer “have” to have any 1 of the 3 from that tier and can select the one you like versus the one that performs best.
Obviously, any tier that contains a DPS option will have a “best” option that will be the meta. This change just reduces the number of tiers where a meta option exists.
There will always be a best option when it comes to meta. Traits don’t all have to be DPS related to be meta. Taking those builds away doesn’t remove the nature of people taking whats the most effective and exluding the rest.
Taking away options didnt remove the bar and make all choices the same. In relation to DPS. There is nothing stopping people from picking the combo choice that gives the most DPS out of the entire system. Just like the previous one. Only difference is with the new system there will be less variations to those builds.
So how exactly does giving less choices improve diversity?
Summary: you have more diversity because you now have more VIABLE options than before.
Having more OPTIONS does not equal more diversity if no one uses them. Having less options in total but more viable options means you will actually experience build diversity because people will actually be using different builds.
The most DPS option is going to have large slot gaps that can now be filled with a plethora of non-DPS options, increasing diversity overall.
It’s like having an ice cream store with 50 flavors, all of which are terrible except 1. You take a step back and relaunch your ice cream store with 25 flavors, with 5 being great.
In your old store, you had more OPTIONS, but the customers only bought one of them so your cone diversity was non-existent. In the new store, you have less options overall, but because you have more than 1 good flavor now your cone diversity has gone up.
I think my favorite thing about this argument is that it keeps grouping 3, 3, 3.
We never had access to 9 traits before.
We could get 3, 3, 1, or 3, 2, 2 at best. 3, 2, 1, 1 also. We are adding, though, two whole traits on top of everything we could have before.
Yes, it’s on rails, and so the amount of customization is less than if we had 9 total before, but since we never did it’s not comparable.
I am curious, though, how many people complaining about the lack of customization actually watched the AMA? How many people here who feel the need to double up on Adepts or Masters realize that the thing they need to double up on aren’t there anymore, or can be done better or at least as effectively in a different trait?
If your build is actually ruined, though, come into my thread Whose builds are burned and why and actually explain how and why. Maybe it was unintentional and they can improve it.
Functionally though, everyone was shoehorned into picking 1,2,3 because they were “the best” so now we will actually see more diverse builds since you can’t take that combo now.
Traits should change HOW you play, and the old system failed miserably at doing that since it was just a checklist of the most efficient DPS options.
How exactly are people not “shoehorned” to pick the best combos in the new system?
You can apply the same logic as if 3, 6, and 9 are new the best. There is less alternative to the “best” in this system.
Because many of the “best” options are now in the same tier together, forcing you to pick only one of them leaving your other slots available for traits that are not DPS related.
That doesnt mean there isn’t going to be a new “best” to take those builds place. There will always be a meta. What we are going to see now with less possible build combinations is everyone running the same “best” (meta) builds because there will be less of them.
Some tiers have no “best” option from a DPS perspective. This improves diversity because you no longer “have” to have any 1 of the 3 from that tier and can select the one you like versus the one that performs best.
Obviously, any tier that contains a DPS option will have a “best” option that will be the meta. This change just reduces the number of tiers where a meta option exists.
There will always be a best option when it comes to meta. Traits don’t all have to be DPS related to be meta. Taking those builds away doesn’t remove the nature of people taking whats the most effective and exluding the rest.
Taking away options didnt remove the bar and make all choices the same. In relation to DPS. There is nothing stopping people from picking the combo choice that gives the most DPS out of the entire system. Just like the previous one. Only difference is with the new system there will be less variations to those builds.
So how exactly does giving less choices improve diversity?
Summary: you have more diversity because you now have more VIABLE options than before.
Having more OPTIONS does not equal more diversity if no one uses them. Having less options in total but more viable options means you will actually experience build diversity because people will actually be using different builds.
The most DPS option is going to have large slot gaps that can now be filled with a plethora of non-DPS options, increasing diversity overall.
It’s like having an ice cream store with 50 flavors, all of which are terrible except 1. You take a step back and relaunch your ice cream store with 25 flavors, with 5 being great.
In your old store, you had more OPTIONS, but the customers only bought one of them so your cone diversity was non-existent. In the new store, you have less options overall, but because you have more than 1 good flavor now your cone diversity has gone up.
How are we measuring viable? There are many viable builds we have outside of the ones that are getting nuked. We are losing a number of viable builds in return for something we havent received yet.
We have no idea how many viable options there will be until players get a hold of it, thats a really kittenumption to make that there will be more. What we do know, mathmatically there are less combinations of build leaving a lower probability of the diveristy of viable combinations.
Just because we have a bunch of non DPS options to fill doesn’t mean all those options will be viable or equal. There are better non DPS traits than others. If there is a clear choice of superiority meta will dictate it and that will be the best to use just like dps traits
Once again. We don’t know if the 25 new flavors they are releasing are going to have any less crappier flavors then the 50 we have now. But given the math we have a higher probability of getting less great flavors because there are less than them.
You assume there will be more viable options and greater viable diversity. Who knows, you could be right. But the math says the odds are not in favor of that happening. Not only are we losing builds but Anet doesn’t have the best track record when it comes to balance. Anet will have to be much better at balancing choices before that happens.
(edited by Mireles Lore.5942)
Someone somewhere made the point that even though we’re losing builds now, this revamp is being done so it can be built upon in the future. Does it matter what we lose now if in the end, we have way more than we would without the overhaul?
Summary: you have more diversity because you now have more VIABLE options than before.
Having more OPTIONS does not equal more diversity if no one uses them. Having less options in total but more viable options means you will actually experience build diversity because people will actually be using different builds.
The most DPS option is going to have large slot gaps that can now be filled with a plethora of non-DPS options, increasing diversity overall.
It’s like having an ice cream store with 50 flavors, all of which are terrible except 1. You take a step back and relaunch your ice cream store with 25 flavors, with 5 being great.
In your old store, you had more OPTIONS, but the customers only bought one of them so your cone diversity was non-existent. In the new store, you have less options overall, but because you have more than 1 good flavor now your cone diversity has gone up.
You’re making the assumption that “flavors YOU like” and “flavors that are good” are the same thing. People wouldn’t be angry over losing things if they weren’t using them. Many players are naturally going to look up whatever is best and pick that, but those are not the only “viable” builds, nor are they the only ones anyone ever uses.
Let’s say a character can use either greatswords or axes, and by some miracle the weapons are perfectly balanced and equal. They each have an improvement trait; one that raises greatsword damage by 10% and one that raises axe damage by 11%. Though small, this is an obvious imbalance where one choice is better. As a result, more people will take axes. However, there will still be players who use greatswords because they think the skills are more fun, or they just like the look of them better. Likewise, the axe advantage is small enough that competitively, individual player scale is going to by far make a bigger difference. This new change solves the imbalance by removing greatswords entirely; you, as an axe user, are declaring that this is perfectly fine because it hasn’t personally inconvenienced you.
Using the same metaphor, it was more like out of 50 flavors, 5 were best, 25 were good, and 20 were kind of confusing and weird. Half your customers only order 2 or 3 of the best; they only have so much time/money for ice cream and so never even bother with the other 2 or 3 “best” because they don’t bother digging for them, and just go with what they know is good. The 25 good ones are still regularly ordered, and the 20 off ones have a small fanbase.
Now the store changes and only serves the top 5. For someone who only ordered that 2-3, to them, they have more best options they never even knew about. Life is great, they have twice as many choices and they’re all good. The other half of customers has been screwed over because their choices are gone; their only options are take the popular kind or get out. You telling them they have more variety with 5 than there ever was with 50 is not going to convince any of them. (I’m using vague ‘half’ numbers because let’s face it, neither of us has any idea what actual percentage of players used what variety of builds)
One of my main PvP characters is a ranger with a non-standard hybrid build. It is in no way meta. I have beaten other players using meta builds because I was better than them, and been beaten by other players using even more out-there builds because they were better than me. Forcing everyone into a meta build won’t change that, and will have almost no impact on PvE or WvW. It will simply kill diversity for the unfavored percentage, not as a side effect of improving the system, but simply because it is easier and more profitable to sell the 5 most popular flavors than to stock 50 for everyone.
(edited by ExtraCosmic.9082)
I like the new UI a lot — it’s much clearer and easier to use. But I still think there’s room for more customization in the new system.
Illustrated here! http://imgur.com/a/UVRYY
Assume these things remain as already seen in the design:
But these things change:
Since you still have to unlock tiers in order, this means you may choose:
Personally I’d love the flexibility of my proposed system, and I think it’s nearly as simple as the one Anet have already shown us. There’s a built-in tradeoff too, since buying multiple traits in a lower tier means you’ll miss out on the T3 minor. Or both T2 and T3 minor if you get all three tier 1 traits.
Not sure how realistic this is, either. It would likely require a lot of rewiring under the hood since Skill/Hero Points & especially the number of challenges around the world all assume we’re also spending those points on the minors as well.
(edited by Lakshmi.5941)
I’d suggest instead of asking for double adept/major traits in a line (I think it’s safe to say it’s just not going to happen. They put too much work in this new system to change it) make suggestions for better Grandmaster traits. The devs clearly want feedback on the kinds of traits classes get, but the likelihood of them changing the entire new mechanic just isn’t high.
On that note, it would’ve been nice for ANet to actually run this by us first BEFORE they went and put all that work into the new system, then we could’ve possibly avoided this entire mess.
I personally don’t like how limiting the new system looks like it’s shaped up to be; I’d rather they’d have given us the extra points/allowed us to continue to choose traits at each level and where to allocate our points, rather than this all-or-nothing approach that they seem to be adamant on ramming down our throats…
Also, I don’t want to be presumptuous so while there probably were people who found the current system confusing/difficult, I personally dislike changes made for the sake of making things more ‘simple’, given it wasn’t that complicated to begin with. I didn’t have any qualms with changing the traits from the old ‘30-30-0-0-10’ system to the ‘6-6-0-0-2’ system but it was just sort of unnecessary to me…
(edited by Usagi.4835)
People will keep complaining about balance even if it was brought down to two professions with no choice in build at all. And we have a lot of mindless QQ when it comes to balance. And a vocal minority gets to dictate balance for everyone, throughout all (unrelated) gamemodes.
Balance will not improve, if anything you’ll see even more clone builds. And when the QQ brigade gets something nerfed again, you might not even have any alternatives anymore. It’s already a situation where you don’t really have 3 choices of traits per major slot. Often it boilds down to two, or just one real choice. And in some cases all choices are terrible and you might as well skip that tier.
We shouldn’t have our traits be limited with this. It really gets rid of a lot of options.
I’m actually more concerned with not being able to hybridize specializations. What if I want to be kind of good at Fire, Earth, Air, Water and Arcane instead of really good at Fire, Earth, and Arcane?
All in all though, it does have potential to be a pretty cool system.
I’m actually more concerned with not being able to hybridize specializations. What if I want to be kind of good at Fire, Earth, Air, Water and Arcane instead of really good at Fire, Earth, and Arcane?
All in all though, it does have potential to be a pretty cool system.
That was never really a thing, though.
Your options were:
Be good at two things and bad at a third.
Be good at one thing and fair at two things.
Be good at one thing, fair at another thing and bad at two more.
Be good at one thing and bad at everything else.
Be fair at three things and bad at a fourth
Be fair at two things and bad at the other two.
That was your build choices.
I’m actually more concerned with not being able to hybridize specializations. What if I want to be kind of good at Fire, Earth, Air, Water and Arcane instead of really good at Fire, Earth, and Arcane?
All in all though, it does have potential to be a pretty cool system.
That was never really a thing, though.
Your options were:
Be good at two things and bad at a third.
Be good at one thing and fair at two things.
Be good at one thing, fair at another thing and bad at two more.
Be good at one thing and bad at everything else.
Be fair at three things and bad at a fourth
Be fair at two things and bad at the other two.That was your build choices.
This is horse manure.
What you said makes kind of sense for the stats we currently get for trait allocation but we will not get those stats points in the new system. however its still a gross exaggeration though.
Currently going 2,2,1,1,1 may make you a complete generalist by stats but it could make a completely solid build based off the traits. Most might not do that though and would stick to the more popular 3,3,1 type of build. So now the stats will say you are completely focused in to a couple types of stats but the traits are mostly focused in to creating a different kind of solid build. The one trait all by itself in one line doesn’t make you bad at what it does, it complements your other traits to make those even stronger. The fact remains that currently there are lower tier traits that are better for some builds than taking a higher tier trait. So taking one or more lower tier traits at the expense of taking a second grandmaster does not make you bad at something. It makes you amazing at what you building for.
It cannot be anything BUT a loss to build flecibility.
False.
The fact that Anet merges a lot of traits means that certain builds that required multiple very specific traits will now only need 1 grandmaster trait that has it all, meaning you have 2 extra traits up for grabs.
For example the meditation guardian: being a useful meditation guardian means you have to use up the entire Valor tree just to make your meditations shine. As a mediguard you are stuck to picking Meditation Mastery, Focused Mind and Monk’s focus to get the best out of your meditations, leaving you with little else to choose.
With the new system, I only have to pick the Meditation Mastery grandmaster trait at the end of the Valor tree and still have 2 other traits in the Valor tree up for grabs. So in this case and probably many other cases the new system adds flexibility.This design does not add flexibility by any standard.
In fact, the design choice can be dumbed down to this:
- Players want better balance.
- Players want more customization.
- ArenaNet responds with “less customization, more power”.
That’s what the new design is. Less customiation – you cannot spec in more than three trait lines, unlike before, and you cannot use more than one adept or one master per line, unlike before.
However, you’re right in that they merged traits or added traits to the base use of skills. Thus the individual traits you use become more powerful. Players become more powerful at less expense. But on top of that, they give the players two additional trait points – which are restricted to your third trait line and can only be used for a minor trait and a major grandmaster trait – thus making players more powerful.
Less customization. More power.
Now tell me, is the open world being buffed to being able to combat this more power by the playerbase, or will things become even more rofleasy than it already is?
This is, through and through, a power creep by Anet’s move. One that costs customization for the sake of easier balance (supposedly for the sake of easier balance).
You missed something that you probably haven’t thought of. The bonus points for trait lines which were not scaled are gone and therefore more of the players stats will be scaled. Maybe they will change scaling, maybe they won’t.
I’m actually more concerned with not being able to hybridize specializations. What if I want to be kind of good at Fire, Earth, Air, Water and Arcane instead of really good at Fire, Earth, and Arcane?
All in all though, it does have potential to be a pretty cool system.
That was never really a thing, though.
Your options were:
Be good at two things and bad at a third.
Be good at one thing and fair at two things.
Be good at one thing, fair at another thing and bad at two more.
Be good at one thing and bad at everything else.
Be fair at three things and bad at a fourth
Be fair at two things and bad at the other two.That was your build choices.
This is horse manure.
What you said makes kind of sense for the stats we currently get for trait allocation but we will not get those stats points in the new system. however its still a gross exaggeration though.
Currently going 2,2,1,1,1 may make you a complete generalist by stats but it could make a completely solid build based off the traits. Most might not do that though and would stick to the more popular 3,3,1 type of build. So now the stats will say you are completely focused in to a couple types of stats but the traits are mostly focused in to creating a different kind of solid build. The one trait all by itself in one line doesn’t make you bad at what it does, it complements your other traits to make those even stronger. The fact remains that currently there are lower tier traits that are better for some builds than taking a higher tier trait. So taking one or more lower tier traits at the expense of taking a second grandmaster does not make you bad at something. It makes you amazing at what you building for.
You can claim that build exists but every playstyle has a clearly superior build to your 22111 that works the same way. No adepts and a only a few Majors traits are playstyle defining currently. If you massively spread out your points like this you have most of the time a no clear playstyle mediocre at best build.
The only ways to make a good build with a spread like this are because dungeon builds mostly care about %damage traits and some of those are erroneously lower than their value to dungeon builds. Bolt to the heart being a prime example which is why it is being moved up.
The big thing this change is doing is raising the floor. There will be a smaller gap between the effectiveness or the best builds and the worst builds as well as a raised average build. Yes, there are less total choices but it should create a scenario where there are more reasonably viable builds while also adding additional viable playstyles through new traits and new technologies.
(edited by gaspara.4079)
On that note, it would’ve been nice for ANet to actually run this by us first BEFORE they went and put all that work into the new system, then we could’ve possibly avoided this entire mess.
The only feedback they’d be likely to get would be negative reactions against change, plus fence-sitting while asking for more details. The desirability of this new system very much hinges on what traits are available where, and what they do.
I’m actually more concerned with not being able to hybridize specializations. What if I want to be kind of good at Fire, Earth, Air, Water and Arcane instead of really good at Fire, Earth, and Arcane?
All in all though, it does have potential to be a pretty cool system.
That was never really a thing, though.
Your options were:
Be good at two things and bad at a third.
Be good at one thing and fair at two things.
Be good at one thing, fair at another thing and bad at two more.
Be good at one thing and bad at everything else.
Be fair at three things and bad at a fourth
Be fair at two things and bad at the other two.That was your build choices.
This is horse manure.
What you said makes kind of sense for the stats we currently get for trait allocation but we will not get those stats points in the new system. however its still a gross exaggeration though.
Currently going 2,2,1,1,1 may make you a complete generalist by stats but it could make a completely solid build based off the traits. Most might not do that though and would stick to the more popular 3,3,1 type of build. So now the stats will say you are completely focused in to a couple types of stats but the traits are mostly focused in to creating a different kind of solid build. The one trait all by itself in one line doesn’t make you bad at what it does, it complements your other traits to make those even stronger. The fact remains that currently there are lower tier traits that are better for some builds than taking a higher tier trait. So taking one or more lower tier traits at the expense of taking a second grandmaster does not make you bad at something. It makes you amazing at what you building for.
And almost all of the really good ones have been merged with something else and then bumped up to a higher tier. There are very few build defining adepts in the new system. Most of them are flavor, do I want to be able to do this, or that? And that is really how it should be. The concept of using two adepts instead of a master or a grandmaster just showed the lacking quality of traits that already existed. So they fixed them. Universally, my experience with this change has been that lines I was heavily invested in have gotten stronger and lines I was not heavily invested in I could dismiss because I gained so much more elsewhere. I only have one build that’s been shot full of holes and it wasn’t a very good, nor strong build to begin with. That’s for 12 characters.
If you can’t find something that works for you, I suspect you’re not actually trying to.
If you can’t find something that works for you, I suspect you’re not actually trying to.
That is not the case for everyone, I have little actualy use for any of the grandmasters in Defense for example, they don’t fit my playstyle as much as the lower tiers do.
I understand they may swap some of these around, but currently, i tend to avoid an entire subset because they don’t fit right.
This change is about balancing, removing bad builds and OP builds, and at the same time opening the door more more viable diversity.
Yes, being forced to have one trait from each tier will break some builds, but I believe it will open the door to other builds that will take their place. And now stats are not tied to the trait lines, we should (in theory) gain access to more builds than we had before, while at the same time increasing the odds these new builds will be viable. It also allows Anet to keep a tighter control on balancing, which is very important.
The removal of stats from traits AND the limitation of the traits within their tiers are both good moves in my opinion. There will be collateral damage, but I think the end result will outweight the cost.
(edited by Rin.1046)
This change is about balancing, removing bad builds and OP builds, and at the same time opening the door more more viable diversity.
Yes, being forced to have one trait from each tier will break some builds, but I believe it will open the door to other builds that will take their place. And now stats are not tied to the trait lines, we should (in theory) gain access to more builds than we had before, while at the same time increasing the odds these new builds will be viable. It also allows Anet to keep a tighter control on balancing, which is very important.
The removal of stats from traits AND the limitation of the traits within their tiers are both good moves in my opinion. There will be collateral damage, but I think the end result will outweight the cost.
We have very different opinions then, I never really balanced any of my builds around the stats in the first place. So this is nearly a non-factor for me, I based my traits on my playstyle, now it will be the opposite almost.
The new system means there is much lower finite amount of trait combinations overall, many of which will more than likely be unviable, limiting the amount even further. (Warrior defense tree for example, every single warrior not using a mace, will have the same trait pretty much, there are only 2 options overall in the end of the line, how is that diverse?)
And with how the buffs seem to be looking from the AMA, they most definitely are NOT trying to remove OP builds overall, they are creating an amount of new ones to take a stand. Power creeping the entirety of every class (pretty much the game) in a single patch.
(side note: they are also not appearing to be making any older PvE content any more difficult, so these buffs will just cause PvE to become a trivial task)
The thing with “playstyle defining” is that by definition, people have different playstyles. Not everyone played their character based on the traits they chose. Some went in with a play style already in mind, and picked traits based on that idea. That’s being eliminated in favor of telling you what play styles you can have.
It continues to baffle me that people keep saying “we actually get more options” apparently based on the idea that another two meta builds outnumbers a thousand lost other builds. They say “viable” as if only the meta builds are playable, when I’ve seen more players comment that they didn’t use ANY traits at all because they thought they were just an optional decorative thing, than I’ve seen players complain that they can’t progress because their build doesn’t work.
We’re not getting “more viable diversity”, considering that almost any build was viable in almost any gameplay. Frankly I don’t think we’re even getting more meta diversity. They’re adding a few new pre-made metas to replace the at least as many being cut, and adding nothing to replace the absolutely everything else being cut. But the metas are being made superficially stronger, and that’s enough to intoxicate people who didn’t play anything else.
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