Guild Wars 2

https://youtu.be/Ypl3N-lQsNg?t=35m32s

In the dragonhunter stream today (linked above at the relevant time) it was mentioned at the very end that the “vision of the future” is to replace the roman numerals labeling traits with unique symbols. This immediately strikes me as terribly inconvenient and inefficient, especially when it comes to sharing builds. I regularly share build info in the following format:
6 2 0 0 6
II X XII, III, IV V XI
These are just made up but you get the idea. See how compact that is? It’s an easy to type and reference guide that takes almost no letters to share.
Changing the trait labels into images would require people to type out the name of the trait, or some abbreviation of it and then to go hunting and hovering the mouse over every symbol to find the corresponding trait.

I know this is just a concept mentioned off the cuff but I really hope you guys don’t pursue this seriously!

Couldn’t you just use 1, 2 and 3 (top to bottom) to represent the Adept, Master and Grandmaster, given how we’re locked into the different tiers?

For example:

Air: 2, 3, 1 woud represent One with Air, Tempest Defense and Bolt to the Heart.

I’m incredibly excited for the trait icons. I suspect that they’ll make for much faster identification when making a build than roman numerals, and use up much less screen space than the current scrolling list of traits & their names.

As well, making quick nomenclature is still pretty easy. The only trick is making recognizable abbreviations for the names for each specialization, within on the context of that profession. TheDaiBish’s Air-231 is pretty compact, though I personally prefer Air-MBT for Middle Bottom Top.

If we could ping the traits, that would remove the need for numbers or TMB designations.

Marty DiBergi: Why don’t you just make ten louder and make ten be the top number and make that a little louder?

Nigel Tufnel: [pause] These go to eleven.

Menus especially should focus function over aesthetic, if there will be symbols there should also be clearly labeled numbers to prevent difference of interpretation about which is 1 2 3 etc. Which… is already in place now.
IMO this is a case of fixing something that isn’t broke. I’d rather see graphic redesign work on the hero accordion menu since its inelegant and inconvenient.

Personally I like the Roman Numerals….but my opinion is purely for aesthetics.

notebene.3190:

Marty DiBergi: Why don’t you just make ten louder and make ten be the top number and make that a little louder?

Nigel Tufnel: [pause] These go to eleven.

I read that in a British accent! Absolutely hate when I try to jokingly respond with, “this amp goes all the way up to 11,” and nobody gets it ._.

Maybe II looks too much like 11, and we don’t want to confuse anybody :P
Carry on….