Guild Wars 2

I know the info about druids is very limited atm, im just asking for your opinions.

Will the new specialization have traits and skills focused on healing and supporting?

most likely yes, while ranger is not my most knowledge about profession, i do believe they are lacking a bit in that aspect, and druids are often associated with support/light healing, and a staff goes well with that theme as well

We’re obviously lacking the information to provide a definitive answer, but my guess would be that it will be a more “support” oriented specialization, although “healing” is probably a bit of a stretch – seeing as Guild Wars 2 specifically lacks a dedicated “healer” specialization, and Arenanet’s intention does not seem to be to add one. Although, one could assume that if the Druid specialization’s primarily purpose would fall into a dedicated “support” role, healing will probably be a light part of that, but maybe not in the typical fashion you’re thinking of.

If we use the original Guild Wars as any inspiration – which I’m sure they’ll (developers) do to some degree – I suspect that we’ll see some combination of some of the Ranger’s “Nature Rituals” from the Wilderness Survival attribute (which will primarily act as offensive skills, such as “Winter” (Converts elemental damage to cold damage for creatures in range) or “Pestilence” (When any creature in range dies, conditions on this creature spread to any creature in the area with a condition) and provide AoE changes to the battlefield, shifting odds in the player’s group’s favor, or allowing certain synergies. Combined with this, we might see some more support oriented skills that draw inspiration from the Restoration Magic or Communing attributes that the Ritualist utilized in Guild Wars.

These are obviously just estimated guesses, and I’m also sure we’ll see skills that draw inspiration from the classic Druid abilities such as weather/element manipulation and the ability to control fauna and flora in the vicinity.

If you look at the data mined artworks
http://imgur.com/a/cIOW3

you see one unknown ranger one which most likely corresponds to the elite specialization. This is a picture of animals. It is hard to deduce anything from it, but I will give a wild guess on the theme… : transform? (A bit like the Norn racial skills)

PS: we can also see the name of the warrior and engineer’s elite (berserker and forge) as well as something which looks like a staff (but can be a riffle) for the thief