Guild Wars 2

I’ve been playing this game fairly consistently since launch, and I was open minded when they did the skill/trait rework a couple of years back. Now, though, that we’ve had plenty of time with it, I can honestly say the launch system was much better than what we have currently. I see numerous problems with the existing one:

-It’s too difficult to determine at a glance what each line is supposed to do for you and to lay out a path of advancement for yourself without a lot of outside research.

-It’s incredibly awkward to use the same resource for both traits and skills when they’re fundamentally different and are intended to synergize with each other, not be in competition with each other. It’s difficult to know which to prioritize at what times.

-Attributes coming from trait lines provided thematic cohesion that made it obvious what their intent was, and gave players some flexibility in enhancing or mitigating their stats based upon their gear choices.

-The training interface is just generally clumsy and overwhelming with skills and specs lumped in together, small icons with too much spacing between them, and no descriptive text anywhere.

-There’s somehow both more options and less choice on the part of the player, which is absurd. When skills were arranged by tiers and traits were separate, it was much easier to intuitively determine a path you wanted to go down, but you weren’t railroaded in the same way while you were doing it. This resulted in a much better sense of freedom, engagement, and creativity in character building.

-Elite specs use the same resource, but asymmetrically combine skills and traits and cost exponentially more than regular specs do. It’s silly requiring players to explore HoT completely and redo the exact same content for every character they want to unlock elite specs for.

-You don’t get to really enjoy a skill or trait line until you’ve completed that line. This creates a situation where you are punished for wanting to try out different things.

-Elite specs “unlock” right away in HoT but take an eternity to complete. They aren’t really usable until they’re completed, so this is incredibly silly and awkward.

-There was no reason why the addition of elite specs needed to remove the level of player choice we had before. They could have easily been worked into the existing system and should have simply required a different resource to unlock (i.e. Hero Points).

So, my opinion is that it needs to be redone, badly. The question is – how? I’m hoping we’ll hear something about this when news of the next expansion finally breaks.

-First, I think skills and traits should be separate again. I think this change was the silliest. They should not share the same cost resource, because trying to compare them with each other to determine where your HP should go is silly and awkward.

-I think that elite specs should be handled the exact same way as standard specs (completed in the same way using the same amount of resources for both skills and traits), but should require an investment to unlock them (this would be a great use for Hero Points)

-Attribute bonuses should be re-added to trait lines.

-Hero Points in HoT should be changed to grant 2-3 skill points. It makes sense for them to grant more than 1, but 10 is too many. It makes it too necessary to explore the HoT maps to get your elite spec.

I don’t understand. Skills and traits are already separate. As a mesmer I don’t have to be running Dueling traitline with HM to use mantras, it just happens to make them a much better choice.

I do tend to agree that the current trait system could be improved on, but that would mostly come from a revamp of the traits that each class has, balancing all 3 traits in each tier in each line to make all of them good choices instead of the current situation where a lot of classes will have tiers with no good choices, or a tier with 1 choice that is so far superior to the others you will take an entire traitline just to get that one trait.

OriOri.8724:

I don’t understand. Skills and traits are already separate. As a mesmer I don’t have to be running Dueling traitline with HM to use mantras, it just happens to make them a much better choice.

I do tend to agree that the current trait system could be improved on, but that would mostly come from a revamp of the traits that each class has, balancing all 3 traits in each tier in each line to make all of them good choices instead of the current situation where a lot of classes will have tiers with no good choices, or a tier with 1 choice that is so far superior to the others you will take an entire traitline just to get that one trait.

Skills and traits used to be acquired separately. You bought tomes to acquire traits, and hero points were just for skills. This works better because you advance them separately, rather than choosing whether to invest hero points in new skills or new traits at any given moment, which I find clunky and awkward.

Maybe while leveling up you have to focus more on 1 traitline and its skills but at max this system is better.

And unlinking stats from trait lines is one of the best changes they have done to date.

Linken.6345:

Maybe while leveling up you have to focus more on 1 traitline and its skills but at max this system is better.

And unlinking stats from trait lines is one of the best changes they have done to date.

I had mixed feelings about it, and actually slightly favored it at first. But now, I’m a lot less sure. At the very least, it needs to be clearer to players what the trait lines are actually intended to do for you.

Why do you think the system is better at max level?

Einlanzer.1627:

Linken.6345:

Maybe while leveling up you have to focus more on 1 traitline and its skills but at max this system is better.

And unlinking stats from trait lines is one of the best changes they have done to date.

I had mixed feelings about it, and actually slightly favored it at first. But now, I’m a lot less sure. At the very least, it needs to be clearer to players what the trait lines are actually intended to do for you.

Why do you think the system is better at max level?

becouse all core skills are unlocked with the hero points you get while leveling up.
something you dident get before unless you grinded out extra hero points.

Now with the stats unbound from trait lines no matter what line you take you got max in the stats you want instead of getting forced into extra healing power, condition damage or boon duration for example, even if you armor/item focus was something else.

Linken.6345:

Einlanzer.1627:

Linken.6345:

Maybe while leveling up you have to focus more on 1 traitline and its skills but at max this system is better.

And unlinking stats from trait lines is one of the best changes they have done to date.

I had mixed feelings about it, and actually slightly favored it at first. But now, I’m a lot less sure. At the very least, it needs to be clearer to players what the trait lines are actually intended to do for you.

Why do you think the system is better at max level?

becouse all core skills are unlocked with the hero points you get while leveling up.
something you dident get before unless you grinded out extra hero points.

Now with the stats unbound from trait lines no matter what line you take you got max in the stats you want instead of getting forced into extra healing power, condition damage or boon duration for example, even if you armor/item focus was something else.

But see, I think that’s a bad thing, because it sort of defeats the purpose of hero challenges in the core world. It’s kind of more interesting to seek out and do these as opposed to just passively getting a lot of points as you level.

I get where you’re coming from with the attributes and traits. I’m not sure whether I agree or not. I’ve kind of waffled about it a lot. As I said above, the trait lines having stat boosts kind of made it concrete what they were meant for, which I think was a good thing in a lot of ways.

Einlanzer.1627:

Linken.6345:

Einlanzer.1627:

Linken.6345:

Maybe while leveling up you have to focus more on 1 traitline and its skills but at max this system is better.

And unlinking stats from trait lines is one of the best changes they have done to date.

I had mixed feelings about it, and actually slightly favored it at first. But now, I’m a lot less sure. At the very least, it needs to be clearer to players what the trait lines are actually intended to do for you.

Why do you think the system is better at max level?

becouse all core skills are unlocked with the hero points you get while leveling up.
something you dident get before unless you grinded out extra hero points.

Now with the stats unbound from trait lines no matter what line you take you got max in the stats you want instead of getting forced into extra healing power, condition damage or boon duration for example, even if you armor/item focus was something else.

But see, I think that’s a bad thing, because it sort of defeats the purpose of hero challenges in the core world. It’s kind of more interesting to seek out and do these as opposed to just passively getting a lot of points as you level.

I get where you’re coming from with the attributes and traits. I’m not sure whether I agree or not. I’ve kind of waffled about it a lot. As I said above, the trait lines having stat boosts kind of made it concrete what they were meant for, which I think was a good thing in a lot of ways.

No it made you pigoned holed into trait lites to boost your main stats if you wanted to max them now you can take any line for the traits you want not the stats

I’m on the fence, can’t really decide either way. Find good and bad about both the old and the new trait system.

For example, I felt it made much more sense the old way to unlock the first tier of traits, and spread points out and try many different ones. And as you leveled higher and unlocked next tier you could try specializing more etc.

But at the same time, I really like that with the new system I can save up my heropoints and just unlock one entire traitline in one go, and get something to base my build around. Example for Guardian to get Valor unlocked right away to run meditations, makes leveling a whole lot easier.

In this regard, I feel the old system was better for new players, and the new system is better for veterans ?

I’m also undecided on the whole HeroPoint issue, most of my guildies etc are WvW players first and foremost, and they loved that they could just save up tomes from PVP and level to 80, and not need to get hero points to play the character etc, I can see this point.

Similarly if you’ve already got 100% map completion, or several times already. How much fun is it to go around and get all the HP’s ?

But on the other hand, if you unlocked say “half”, and had to do hero points for the rest, at least you could get something running, of setup a build before hand, and then get the rest as you needed. But this would make it even harder for people to get teh Elite Spez, that doesn’t like doing the HP Marathon ?

In a way, I do kind of miss the old system where you had own “Trait Points” separate from the HeroPoints, but don’t really know how they should implement that in the current system ?

So yeah, I can work with the current system, but I do miss a few things from the old every now and then. The one thing I don’t miss is stats linked to trait lines.

If anything, they could rework how the minor traits worked. Assemble all 3 into 1 minor at the start of the trait-line, that could give a clear idea what the trait-line was about. Would make it a bit easier to see at a glance what the trait abilities was as well.

Many of us who have been here since day one, know how the trait/mastery system has devolved into the mess that it is today.
As O.P. said, before the rework and because these were the main focus of your character’s specialization – in the absence of elite specialization- traits were way more impactful on your character. Also, they offered better synergies between them and thus there were far more combination than there are now with Elite Specializations.
HoT did nothing but to reduce the build combinations and even ruin some options for playing differently than the intended purpose of Druid, Chronomancer, etc.

I hope ArenaNet seriously focuses on a new system that is way more versatile before shipping out a new expansion. If not they must add more synergies between the vanilla Masteries and ideally rework some of them. Regardless the 3 lines of Masteries with 2 other combinations for each, needs to go ASAP! It offers too little choice especially considering most of them are already limited as they are in terms of utility and effects.

Fosio.8217:

Many of us who have been here since day one, know how the trait/mastery system has devolved into the mess that it is today.
As O.P. said, before the rework and because these were the main focus of your character’s specialization – in the absence of elite specialization- traits were way more impactful on your character. Also, they offered better synergies between them and thus there were far more combination than there are now with Elite Specializations.
HoT did nothing but to reduce the build combinations and even ruin some options for playing differently than the intended purpose of Druid, Chronomancer, etc.

I hope ArenaNet seriously focuses on a new system that is way more versatile before shipping out a new expansion. If not they must add more synergies between the vanilla Masteries and ideally rework some of them. Regardless the 3 lines of Masteries with 2 other combinations for each, needs to go ASAP! It offers too little choice especially considering most of them are already limited as they are in terms of utility and effects.

I also want to re-emphasize how borked I think it is to use the same resource for both skills and traits. They should not be in competition with each other when you are leveling a character.

I’m in between on my preference of the trait systems.

I think I like the current trait system better than launch as a whole. I think the layout is easier to understand and it looks a little nicer. It’s quicker to check your traits at a glance and to switch between them. Still, I do miss the option to choose adepts/masters in place of masters/GMs. I’m glad that stat points are no longer tied to the traits because I don’t feel that a trait line should be labeled as “if you are playing a power build you must take this line,” even if that’s often still the case.

The training process I agree is a complete mess. It’s very punishing if you don’t already know what skills and traits you want as you can’t experiment (outside of pvp lobby) without permanently unlocking said traits and skills. The redeeming factor is that by 80 you’ve unlocked everything anyway so any mistakes are temporary. Unfortunately if you -do- make a mistake and choose a trait line that doesn’t synergize well with your preferred weapons or playstyle, you’ll feel it all the way to 80 (or at least until the late 60s, early 70s when you start to get lots of excess points). I think a refund hero points option would be useful pre-80. Give it two confirmations so people won’t do it by mistake.

Glacial.9516:

I’m in between on my preference of the trait systems.

I think I like the current trait system better than launch as a whole. I think the layout is easier to understand and it looks a little nicer. It’s quicker to check your traits at a glance and to switch between them. Still, I do miss the option to choose adepts/masters in place of masters/GMs. I’m glad that stat points are no longer tied to the traits because I don’t feel that a trait line should be labeled as “if you are playing a power build you must take this line,” even if that’s often still the case.

The training process I agree is a complete mess. It’s very punishing if you don’t already know what skills and traits you want as you can’t experiment (outside of pvp lobby) without permanently unlocking said traits and skills. The redeeming factor is that by 80 you’ve unlocked everything anyway so any mistakes are temporary. Unfortunately if you -do- make a mistake and choose a trait line that doesn’t synergize well with your preferred weapons or playstyle, you’ll feel it all the way to 80 (or at least until the late 60s, early 70s when you start to get lots of excess points). I think a refund hero points option would be useful pre-80. Give it two confirmations so people won’t do it by mistake.

Alternatively, just make the system more front heavy, give lots of hero points early so you can unlock lots of things and experiment.

Agreed, hate that you basically have to plan out what you’re going to use the first 40 levels from the get go. Example Guardian likely going for Meditations + Valor and ignore everything else until those are maxed out + next trait line.