Guild Wars 2

I realize this is something of a “first world problem” but nonetheless I hope that ANet weeds out many of the passive damage increase traits over time.

With the trait system being at the heart of GW2’s RPG system it needs to add depth to combat. And very few passive damage increases do that. Instead they are often limited to a particular weapon set or particular abilities. Nonetheless they are bad from a game-design point of view as they rarely create interesting choices.

I know at times it can be hard to differentiate between what is an acceptable form of a passive damage increase and what is not.

+5% Damage to Dagger attacks or +10% Pistol damage for example are bad examples of passive damage increases.

+7% Critical Strike Chance when hitting a target from the back or sides is a borderline example. While it is essentially a passive damage increase it also has a situational component to it. It also has some interesting interactions/syngery with other traits.

Fury is a boon that also little more than a damage increase however as a boon is is susceptible to removal and extension, thus again making it a good trait.

Ideally all traits should add some sort of depth, no matter how little, to combat and passive damage increases rarely do that.

I liked how in Beta, Ele’s had a Trait that cause Lava Font to fire projectiles. That was pretty cool.

I think skills need more to them as well. Kinda like how in GW skills would do something else if a condition was met (Shatterstone > Teinai’s Crystals > Teinai’s Prison)

For example, Backbreaker:

Knocks down foe. If target is Weakened, this attack in unblockable.

TheDaiBish.9735:

I liked how in Beta, Ele’s had a Trait that cause Lava Font to fire projectiles. That was pretty cool.

I think skills need more to them as well. Kinda like how in GW skills would do something else if a condition was met (Shatterstone > Teinai’s Crystals > Teinai’s Prison)

For example, Backbreaker:

Knocks down foe. If target is Weakened, this attack in unblockable.

Problem is that gw1 had more skills and builds were based on skill synergies an conditioning of effect based on previous effect, i.e. “if target is poisoned mantis leap knocks down”. GW2 builds are based on different weapons usage and utility skill selection and traits further reinforce those selections, mostly.