Guild Wars 2

I have 8 total characters, one level 80 for each of the professions. Why is that a bad thing, kite? Each character is completely different, so the game felt different each time. To have to grind masteries for each character would suck. Account-bound stuff is the smartest thing Anet has done. It makes my account relevant, not just one character.

no no no…

/15char

I give up!
See you guys at the review scores!

Kite.2510:

I give up!
See you guys at the review scores!

Good Kite a wise choise I only have 7 80s working on my last engineer so Im more normal then the rest of em

LordArrgh.8073:

yes please give characters some way to be unique. Since all the things went account bound I haven’t really had much use for this game please give the characters something. And yes I also have 9ish lvl 80 characters. I would be fine with character bound Masteries …or even better can we go back to making everything character bound like it is supposed to be please?

I’m so glad you are not a dev.

Kite.2510:

How many alts do you people have?
I don’t want to be rude, but having 12 alts in any MMO is not exactingly normal.
My cousin was playing WoW from launch for more than 8 years continuously and still plays whenever a new expansion comes up, and he still only manage to level up and gear properly 6 of them!.. IN 8 YEARS!

You people having so many alts was the game’s fault at launch for not having enough end-game content. But if you start whining about every single progression mechanic becoming account-bound the game will never get it! The process of the game that will suffer the most and become the most grindy and mindless would be the process of making new characters!!!
Instead, making the Masteries Character bound would mean much less grind for the individual, and the option for more strategic decisions for the alts!

That’s why I stopped playing wow. It’s incredibely alt unfriendly.
The fact this game has so much account based progression and is so alt friendly is what makes it great.

Kite.2510:

IMO, A-nets biggest mistake was to put the idea of account bound masteries in your heads so early in the first place!

No it was great of them. Now I can rest easy without fear of my alts getting ruined by an alt-unfriendly system.

character binding = bad
account unlocks = good

Kite.2510:

How many alts do you people have?
I don’t want to be rude, but having 12 alts in any MMO is not exactingly normal.
My cousin was playing WoW from launch for more than 8 years continuously and still plays whenever a new expansion comes up, and he still only manage to level up and gear properly 6 of them!.. IN 8 YEARS!

You people having so many alts was the game’s fault at launch for not having enough end-game content. But if you start whining about every single progression mechanic becoming account-bound the game will never get it! The process of the game that will suffer the most and become the most grindy and mindless would be the process of making new characters!!!

I do not make alts for end game. I make them so I have options. I like to swap and change professions depending on my mood and the needs of the group. It has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with progression or giving me something to do. There is plenty of stuff to do in GW2 because I don’t care about the progression, so my mind isn’t blinkered by it.

Kite.2510:

Instead, making the Masteries Character bound would mean much less grind for the individual, and the option for more strategic decisions for the alts!

IMO, A-nets biggest mistake was to put the idea of account bound masteries in your heads so early in the first place!

This makes absolutely no sense. Whether mastery progression is character bound or account bound would make no difference to someone who only has one character. But it will make a big different (for better or for worse, depending on your preference) to someone with multiple characters.

As to Anet ‘putting’ the idea in our heads, you can speak for yourself. Anet never put any such idea in my head, I have been into making alts, for the purposes of having options, way before I started playing GW2, or GW1 for that matter. I made alts in WoW for the exact same reason: to have options.

So please, do not speak for or label everyone the same way. Some may make alts for something to do, but many make them for other reasons.

I have 10 lvl 80’s
This suggestion gets a big no from me.

Are you…what? No. GW2 is a heavy alt-friendly game. We don’t want an abundance of work, to actually enjoy the game.

Hm….

Currencies have gone from characters to an account wide wallet.
WvW progression went from characters to account wide.
Ascended items were changed from soulbound to accountbound.

And now masteries have been announced as account wide. It fits with the general direction ArenaNet has been taking the game.

For which I applaud them.

A toggle-able option would be cool for people that wanted to progress exactly the same way every time and have to earn the masteries over and over and over again.

If not, I have to say I agree though with the naysayers. Account bound is the only way to go if only a single way can be implemented. I don’t want to have to grind through the maps every time. I want to get to events that are profitable after I have earned the mastery points once.

dobri.7820:

training the masterys maybe charracter bound: so I may like to train one mastery whit one of my toons. but once unlocked it is useble for all of my toons
but this is a flavor and I dont think it will be done

Actually, that was how I pictured it, but I also realize that we don’t know enough to be sure if it will work this way or not.

Anyway, it’s pretty clear that the majority want masteries to be account-bound.

However, for people like the OP, they also plan on releasing enough masteries to keep going. You will be able to go through it all again when they release another region.

Masteries should be account-bound

Specializations character bound.

When I play an alt I want to have a new journey and skip content that I’ve done before. Masteries being account-bound let me not worry about redoing anything while I explore an old area on an alt and I still get to progession a bit on them while searching for their specialization.

I believe in the coding department there has to be only one option – going soul or accountbound. The masteries is a whole system, an architecture, it’s not just a simple flavor text to update, it’s a design choice and the consequence is building the code and future development around it. So basically giving an option to choose soulbound vs accountbound in game is like building two games seperately. I don’t believe any manager is going to approve such an idea especially that we’re seeing more and more unifying in game happening with recent patches.

Account unlocks really kill the level of achievement progress in this game.

Besides things like Currency and skins.

iKeostuKen.2738:

Account unlocks really kill the level of achievement progress in this game.

Besides things like Currency and skins.

We don’t even know wether Masteries will grant achievements at this point.

I’m torn on this matter. I sort of agree that jungle masteries like gliding or mushrooms, might be more interesting as character-bound masteries. They haven’t explained how you even get a glider, never mind how you get better at it through the mastery systems. And why do you need a certain mastery to figure out how to properly bounce on a mushroom? But I’m getting off track.

However, we have been told that there are other masteries out there, like finding precursors easier. These should definitely be account-bound, as the system could be abused if each character could achieve all the benefits of something like this.

Is there a way to properly separate these two things? Doubt it. Nothing is coming to my mind that wouldn’t push the expansion back another month or two, and nobody wants that.

A big “no” to character-bound from me, too. I play this game instead of any of the other MMOs out there precisely because it lets me freely choose which character I feel like playing right now, without having to worry about if it’s the character that “needs” this content or not. If I feel like playing my ranger, I can do that and gain the dungeon tokens that I need to outfit my latest elementalist. If I feel like playing my mesmer, I can take her to Dry Top to gather materials for the ambrite weapon my necro wants to have. I don’t have to worry about “wasting” time on the character I feel like playing because I really need to “work” on another character’s build and equipment.

Making masteries account-bound fills the same niche. If I feel like playing my thief today, I can take her into the Heart of Maguma and advance on my exploration masteries, so tomorrow my guardian can continue to explore the place where the thief left off today. I don’t have to re-do all the exploration I did today just because I feel like playing a different character.

If I want character-bound progression, I can play my ESO characters (which get a lot less play-time precisely because of character-bound progression), or go back to LotRO, or whatever. I play this game because it’s different, and a lot more fun for a multi-character person like me.

While I like the account-based method myself, I wouldn’t actually have an issue with character-based either. I’ve actually wondered if the points themselves will unlock account wide but then you have to level each character in the mastery track.

Let’s be honest. This is basically their version of raising the level cap. Giving you it all by account almost feels like cheating. It’d be like another game who raises a level cap from say 80 to 90, making all your alts 90 when you ding one. As someone who has a bunch of alts, I can see it being tiresome sometimes, but at the same time, why should me maxing out 8 characters in masteries take the same as someone who only has 1 character? It seems like I SHOULD have to spend more time to max out all my characters.

Ah right, for all those Altoholics crying: Let’s make everything account bound!
How about account bound armors? Who wants to craft new ascended armors for each alt aniway?
And account bound map completion? Heck yes, we’ve already seen all that stuff!
Account bound character-level? Sure, no more need for grindy leveling!
Account bound personal story? Less grind, more of what’s left after everything is account bound.

…

Right. There’s nothing left.

My Opinion: I want masteries to be character-progression. I want to feel how my character grows stronger and masters content that was impossible just a while ago. Having my asuran dynamics-professor research a new way to glide through the air and moments later every character on my account can fly? No thanks. Just no.

Insert lame gif of some guy shouting no

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Ah right, for all those Altoholics crying: Let’s make everything account bound!
How about account bound armors? Who wants to craft new ascended armors for each alt aniway?

LOL… even on my newest account, yes players can actually have many alts and several accounts, I’m going straight for Ascended gear for the account binding. You folks asking for character progression obviously aren’t much of a WvW player. We had the first Masteries in game and the character binding was a lousy experience. Thankfully, Anet heard the overwhelming player feedback on character Masteries and made the proper changes to account Masteries.

I’d prefer way more account unlocks and reduced “binding” of any sort. If you wish to be snarky, I’ll say that players asking for more binding sound like there are asking for there snowflake to be extra special.

Funny thing is ascended armor is already account bound.

Yikes no. I’m still praying they make traits account bound (and pretty much won’t make a new character until they do).

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Ah right, for all those Altoholics crying: Let’s make everything account bound!

Ascended Armor = account bound
Armor/weapon skins = account bound
Dyes = account bound
Commander Title = account bound
WvW rank = account bound
Achievements = account bound
Currency = account bound

Does the game suffer from it? No.
/argument

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Ah right, for all those Altoholics crying: Let’s make everything account bound!

Ascended Armor = account bound
Armor/weapon skins = account bound
Dyes = account bound
Commander Title = account bound
WvW rank = account bound
Achievements = account bound
Currency = account bound

Does the game suffer from it? No.
/argument

The difference with those is that they aren’t such a big part of gameplay.

The clossest thing to be account bound an also be part of gameplay is the Ascended armour and it’s Stat combinations, and it actually DOES cause problems.
They are very hard, expensive and time consuming to make/find, thus they have this “account bound” status… BUT it’s also a big pain to swap them to other characters, as you have to remove them from yours, bank them up, withdraw them with the other character, change whatever runes need changing, ???, profit!
I would rather have cheaper-faster ascended items, for all of my characters, than having to swap the same gear around with 2 other characters whenever they need them!

Making things Character-Bound isn’t a disability.
It’s a trade-off!

Kite.2510:

How many alts do you people have?
I don’t want to be rude, but having 12 alts in any MMO is not exactingly normal.
My cousin was playing WoW from launch for more than 8 years continuously and still plays whenever a new expansion comes up, and he still only manage to level up and gear properly 6 of them!.. IN 8 YEARS!

You people having so many alts was the game’s fault at launch for not having enough end-game content. But if you start whining about every single progression mechanic becoming account-bound the game will never get it! The process of the game that will suffer the most and become the most grindy and mindless would be the process of making new characters!!!
Instead, making the Masteries Character bound would mean much less grind for the individual, and the option for more strategic decisions for the alts!

IMO, A-nets biggest mistake was to put the idea of account bound masteries in your heads so early in the first place!

I have 55 and I wouldn’t mind character bound but I also don’t mind the thought of account bound. It’ll make no difference to me.

Kite.2510:

How many alts do you people have?
I don’t want to be rude, but having 12 alts in any MMO is not exactingly normal.
My cousin was playing WoW from launch for more than 8 years continuously and still plays whenever a new expansion comes up, and he still only manage to level up and gear properly 6 of them!.. IN 8 YEARS!

You people having so many alts was the game’s fault at launch for not having enough end-game content. But if you start whining about every single progression mechanic becoming account-bound the game will never get it! The process of the game that will suffer the most and become the most grindy and mindless would be the process of making new characters!!!
Instead, making the Masteries Character bound would mean much less grind for the individual, and the option for more strategic decisions for the alts!

IMO, A-nets biggest mistake was to put the idea of account bound masteries in your heads so early in the first place!

I disagree with this. People with Alts need to be considered in design because lots and lots of people have them (not just altoholics, I actually barely know anyone with only one character).

What this means is that when designing masteries the developers need to be aware that if they are character bound, everything they do needs to be done more than once. You yourself suggested scaling down the grind required.

But designing something with the constant factor of “this needs to be fun on repetition” in mind limits what designers can do. Account bound goals can be made exactly as challenging/easy, long-term/short term, expensive/cheap as it is fun and rewarding to make them. The developers are free to do whatever they want, and even free to make mistakes, because even if some particular goal is miscalculated, at least people only have to do it once.

That said, as with traits, I think there should just be an option on creation saying “Your account has earned the right to unlock X number of traits for this character, would you like to do this?” That way everyone’s catered for. Though I get the impression that the mastery system will be too integrated with things like collections and achievements to actually do that, which I think is a reasonable trade off.

I don’t know much about the mastery system but 1 thing i really loved when I came back is that now we have mutual bank storage for all characters.This is a perfect example of how we are now able to enjoy the game,rather than switch characters and arrange inventory for hours..
Wouldn’t mind if world completion unlocked account wide too if you have gained 90% world completion on a few characters.Because each time I reroll I have to worry (and focus) on map completion,instead of exploring and socializing
Perhaps they can make it so that the third playthrough focuses on socializing and that you gain experience for your role within an alliance or something

Maybe they should have some kind of individual character development (not saying it should be the mastery system) also things that unlock account wide regardless..
Gliding for example,I think i would perfer to have that unlocked account wide
because otherwise you need to focus on unlocking it for all the characters instead of enjoying the game.Now it would be like a family car,sometimes you drive it,sometimes your sister uses it to go to the mall.

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Ah right, for all those Altoholics crying: Let’s make everything account bound!

Ascended Armor = account bound
Armor/weapon skins = account bound
Dyes = account bound
Commander Title = account bound
WvW rank = account bound
Achievements = account bound
Currency = account bound

Does the game suffer from it? No.
/argument

Ascended Armor: Yes, they’ve changed that (August 2014 I think). Don’t know why though. It’s like sharing my underwear with my sister. Unwashed…
Skins: They have no influence on gameplay, so I can ignore the fact that legendaries get copy + pasted on lvl 1 twink’s white weapons.
Dyes: Why are they not use-once items? Well, again no influence on gameplay, so I can ignore it.
Commander Title: Commanding is an ability that the player has. Not the character. Making the commander title account bound makes sense.
WvW Rank: It’s supposed to show your knowlege of WvW and since that is bound to the player, the closest representation of playerbound ingame would be account bound.
Achievements: I’d like to repeat some of the achievements on my alts, but I guess because of how achievements are tied to account-points it’s impossible to get the reward multiple times.
Currency: Gold isn’t accound bound. You can use it on the tp and send it to other players. About the other currencies: The only reason they’re bound at all is to force you to play specific content to get rewards.

There are certainly things that make sense to be account bound, because they reflect the player’s skills and achievements, rather than the progression of his character. The ability to lead an army through WvW is the best example for that. On the other hand knowledge like the language of other races or how to penetrate the shell of a mordrem are not bound to the player’s knowledge (Except if you really understand that language without having the game translate it for you). Instead they are bound to the character’s experiences and studies. They should be character bound.

Tipsy.5802:

…

Maybe they should have some kind of individual character development (not saying it should be the mastery system) also things that unlock account wide regardless..
Gliding for example,I think i would perfer to have that unlocked account wide
because otherwise you need to focus on unlocking it for all the characters instead of enjoying the game.Now it would be like a family car,sometimes you drive it,sometimes your sister uses it to go to the mall.

Nah, the Mastery is more about the abilty to fly and less about the glider as an item. So the right analogy would be you learning how to drive and once you’ve learned it your sister is entitled to drive the car to the mall without having a license herself.

No.

/15characters

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Ah right, for all those Altoholics crying: Let’s make everything account bound!

Ascended Armor = account bound
Armor/weapon skins = account bound
Dyes = account bound
Commander Title = account bound
WvW rank = account bound
Achievements = account bound
Currency = account bound

Does the game suffer from it? No.
/argument

Ascended Armor: Yes, they’ve changed that (August 2014 I think). Don’t know why though. It’s like sharing my underwear with my sister. Unwashed…
Skins: They have no influence on gameplay, so I can ignore the fact that legendaries get copy + pasted on lvl 1 twink’s white weapons.
Dyes: Why are they not use-once items? Well, again no influence on gameplay, so I can ignore it.
Commander Title: Commanding is an ability that the player has. Not the character. Making the commander title account bound makes sense.
WvW Rank: It’s supposed to show your knowlege of WvW and since that is bound to the player, the closest representation of playerbound ingame would be account bound.
Achievements: I’d like to repeat some of the achievements on my alts, but I guess because of how achievements are tied to account-points it’s impossible to get the reward multiple times.
Currency: Gold isn’t accound bound. You can use it on the tp and send it to other players. About the other currencies: The only reason they’re bound at all is to force you to play specific content to get rewards.

There are certainly things that make sense to be account bound, because they reflect the player’s skills and achievements, rather than the progression of his character. The ability to lead an army through WvW is the best example for that. On the other hand knowledge like the language of other races or how to penetrate the shell of a mordrem are not bound to the player’s knowledge (Except if you really understand that language without having the game translate it for you). Instead they are bound to the character’s experiences and studies. They should be character bound.

I like how you say WvW rank is ok to be account bound but not mastery rank its the same thing 1 for wvw 1 for pve.
You most likely lead those huge armies with 1 toon in wvw before it got account bound shouldent it only be availiable to that toon to then?

Linken.6345:

…

I like how you say WvW rank is ok to be account bound but not mastery rank its the same thing 1 for wvw 1 for pve.
You most likely lead those huge armies with 1 toon in wvw before it got account bound shouldent it only be availiable to that toon to then?

I’m saying I can see how a certain rank (WvW levels) that’s representing how well you know WvW is bound to your person. However I can not see how knowing the language of the Hylek is bound to your person.

Ask yourself this question: Who is it, who knows the language of the Hylek? Is it you, or is it your character?
If it’s you -> make it account bound.
If it’s your character -> make it character bound.

Edit: The WvW Rank is being progressed simply by playing WvW. The ballista-perks have nothing to do with how often you’ve used a ballista. The masteries will be different. You actually choose one mastery and train that specific mastery.

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Nah, the Mastery is more about the abilty to fly and less about the glider as an item. So the right analogy would be you learning how to drive and once you’ve learned it your sister is entitled to drive the car to the mall without having a license herself.

and thats ok if she is able.
perhaps they should have named it paths
The paths will unlock account wide
yet each character starts at a basic lvl of mastery and then can go to advanced/expert lvl from there..
They have said that in order to glide higher ,for example, your character needs to become better at it first.
So I guess there will be both character/account bound stuff related to it.

Tipsy.5802:

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Nah, the Mastery is more about the abilty to fly and less about the glider as an item. So the right analogy would be you learning how to drive and once you’ve learned it your sister is entitled to drive the car to the mall without having a license herself.

and thats ok if she is able.

I don’t know where you’re from, but in Germany it’s not ok to drive a car if you didn’t learn it yourself. Doesn’t matter if someone else in your family has a license.

Tipsy.5802:

perhaps they should have named it paths
The paths will unlock account wide
yet each character starts at a basic lvl of mastery and then can go to advanced/expert lvl from there..
They have said that in order to glide higher ,for example, your character needs to become better at it first.
So I guess there will be both character/account bound stuff related to it.

Yes, that’s exactly what I want. Unlock it and then progress it with my character. And not becoming better at it account wide.

Tipsy.5802:

I don’t know much about the mastery system but 1 thing i really loved when I came back is that now we have mutual bank storage for all characters.This is a perfect example of how we are now able to enjoy the game,rather than switch characters and arrange inventory for hours..

Not sure if I’m misinterpreting your message, but the bank has ALWAYS been shared storage. All the way back in GW1 with the Xunlai banks, a character could easily trade weapons (or armour) they found on one character and give it to another, so long as it wasn’t soulbound. The wallet did change things in that money was now an account pool, rather than needing to be deposited then withdrawn to transfer, and tokens from dungeons and WvW go directly there instead of clogging up an inventory slot.

And again, we don’t know the ins and outs of the mastery system, really. We got a taste of it in the PoI segments, but no clear way in how they start, just how to use active ones. We just need to see how important each mastery is to doing stuff, and how complicated unlocking them would be. For instance, I think learning the language of the races would go better as an account-locked barrier, because as much fun as a cipher may be (my guess on how unknown languages will be presented*), I don’t want to have to code-break them each and every time. Maybe it will be better to keep mastery account-bound, as waypoints and the story will still be character-locked.

*In my head, I imagine the behind the scenes function will be something like a Caesarian code. Set n=random, and you don’t know which of the 25 versions you will land on. Makes it extremely difficult for casual codebreakers to crack it like that.

Bunji, your logic presumes that a player will play through the entirety of Heart of Thorns content without ever swapping to a different one to experience a different play style, or fill a specific party niche, etc.

Yes, there are a few people who might play the expansion like that, but for those who ever change character, it’s not fair to them to reset their progress when they just wanted to bring their guardian instead of their ranger to help out the group. The same false logic plagued Fractals before they made personal reward account-bound.

Kite.2510:

I would rather have cheaper-faster ascended items, for all of my characters, than having to swap the same gear around with 2 other characters whenever they need them!

There never was such a choice. You could have either soulbound (as it was previously) or account bound gear, but at the same price in both cases. Anet was completely unwilling to make ascended gear cheaper, no matter how much we asked for it.

Kite.2510:

Making things Character-Bound isn’t a disability.
It’s a trade-off!

As you can see, in this case it definitely wasn’t a trade off, but only a disability.

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Tipsy.5802:

…

Maybe they should have some kind of individual character development (not saying it should be the mastery system) also things that unlock account wide regardless..
Gliding for example,I think i would perfer to have that unlocked account wide
because otherwise you need to focus on unlocking it for all the characters instead of enjoying the game.Now it would be like a family car,sometimes you drive it,sometimes your sister uses it to go to the mall.

Nah, the Mastery is more about the abilty to fly and less about the glider as an item. So the right analogy would be you learning how to drive and once you’ve learned it your sister is entitled to drive the car to the mall without having a license herself.

Actually, as you have said, it’s about the ability, not the gear, so even better analogy would be you learning to drive in one car, and once you got the license, being able to drive other cars (your alts) as well.

I’d really hate it if i had to get a new license every time i decide to use a different car.

You know you won’t find a consensus to this?
This always will be opinion vs opinion.

Masteries are going to be acc bound – live with it.

If I had my way I would have only one character with the ability to change to any profession, while out of combat. As this is not possible I have to make alts. Not to level, or progress, or to have something to do with my time. But so I can play different professions, to have options, to enjoy different playstyles.

Some people create alts for role playing purposes. They too do not want character bound progression.

The only people I see, who want character bound progression, are those who find no enjoyment in the actual activities themselves. They don’t enjoy the world bosses, dynamic events, dungeons, fractals, WvW or sPvP. All they want is a shopping list so they have something to do. And quite frankly, I do not think Anet should be catering to these people. They might as well just go and play Cookie Clicker.

The account bound direction Anet is heading in is the best decision I have seen them make so far.

segman.3560:

You know you won’t find a consensus to this?
This always will be opinion vs opinion.

Masteries are going to be acc bound – live with it.

Basically yeah. I might as well stop discussing it ^^

Astralporing.1957:

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Tipsy.5802:

…

Maybe they should have some kind of individual character development (not saying it should be the mastery system) also things that unlock account wide regardless..
Gliding for example,I think i would perfer to have that unlocked account wide
because otherwise you need to focus on unlocking it for all the characters instead of enjoying the game.Now it would be like a family car,sometimes you drive it,sometimes your sister uses it to go to the mall.

Nah, the Mastery is more about the abilty to fly and less about the glider as an item. So the right analogy would be you learning how to drive and once you’ve learned it your sister is entitled to drive the car to the mall without having a license herself.

Actually, as you have said, it’s about the ability, not the gear, so even better analogy would be you learning to drive in one car, and once you got the license, being able to drive other cars (your alts) as well.

I’d really hate it if i had to get a new license every time i decide to use a different car.

Go grab yourself a glider, climb to the roof of the highest building you can find and jump. Only if you hit the ground hard enough will you understand the difference between a character ability and a player ability. It’s the character that’s learned how to fly and not you. It’s you who’ve learned how to evade branches to not crash the glider and not your character.

TaCktiX.6729:

Bunji, your logic presumes that a player will play through the entirety of Heart of Thorns content without ever swapping to a different one to experience a different play style, or fill a specific party niche, etc.

Yes, there are a few people who might play the expansion like that, but for those who ever change character, it’s not fair to them to reset their progress when they just wanted to bring their guardian instead of their ranger to help out the group. The same false logic plagued Fractals before they made personal reward account-bound.

What you want is not the same masteries unlocked on all your alts, but the ability to change your class at any given time. Alts are just a tool to you to achieve this.

I know that feeling. I have a mesmer that’s just a tool for porting jumping puzzles. I don’t enjoy playing her the tinyest bit. Of course I’d like for her to have everything unlocked without me lifting a single finger. But for my true alts I’m glad that I can play the story over and over. I’m glat that I can see my alt grow from a tiny little existence to a hero of Tyria. And I’d love it if I can see him grow even beyond that in HoT.

And let’s be realistic here. A complete playthrough of HoT will probably take about 10 or 20 hours. After that? Play it with the next alt. Oh wait… There is nothing to do no matter what alt I choose.

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Astralporing.1957:

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Tipsy.5802:

…

Maybe they should have some kind of individual character development (not saying it should be the mastery system) also things that unlock account wide regardless..
Gliding for example,I think i would perfer to have that unlocked account wide
because otherwise you need to focus on unlocking it for all the characters instead of enjoying the game.Now it would be like a family car,sometimes you drive it,sometimes your sister uses it to go to the mall.

Nah, the Mastery is more about the abilty to fly and less about the glider as an item. So the right analogy would be you learning how to drive and once you’ve learned it your sister is entitled to drive the car to the mall without having a license herself.

Actually, as you have said, it’s about the ability, not the gear, so even better analogy would be you learning to drive in one car, and once you got the license, being able to drive other cars (your alts) as well.

I’d really hate it if i had to get a new license every time i decide to use a different car.

Go grab yourself a glider, climb to the roof of the highest building you can find and jump. Only if you hit the ground hard enough will you understand the difference between a character ability and a player ability. It’s the character that’s learned how to fly and not you. It’s you who’ve learned how to evade branches to not crash the glider and not your character.

TaCktiX.6729:

Bunji, your logic presumes that a player will play through the entirety of Heart of Thorns content without ever swapping to a different one to experience a different play style, or fill a specific party niche, etc.

Yes, there are a few people who might play the expansion like that, but for those who ever change character, it’s not fair to them to reset their progress when they just wanted to bring their guardian instead of their ranger to help out the group. The same false logic plagued Fractals before they made personal reward account-bound.

What you want is not the same masteries unlocked on all your alts, but the ability to change your class at any given time. Alts are just a tool to you to achieve this.

I know that feeling. I have a mesmer that’s just a tool for porting jumping puzzles. I don’t enjoy playing her the tinyest bit. Of course I’d like for her to have everything unlocked without me lifting a single finger. But for my true alts I’m glad that I can play the story over and over. I’m glat that I can see my alt grow from a tiny little existence to a hero of Tyria. And I’d love it if I can see him grow even beyond that in HoT.

And let’s be realistic here. A complete playthrough of HoT will probably take about 10 or 20 hours. After that? Play it with the next alt. Oh wait… There is nothing to do no matter what alt I choose.

Guess your rank 500 WvW aswell after 10-20 hours, remember this is a long term goal in pve just like the WvW ranks are for that style.

Food for thought maybe our characters talk among themselfs learn from eachother so all know how to do what ever mastery we may unlock.

BunjiKugashira.9754:

And let’s be realistic here. A complete playthrough of HoT will probably take about 10 or 20 hours. After that? Play it with the next alt. Oh wait… There is nothing to do no matter what alt I choose.

This is the kind of mentality that developers should NOT be catering too, because no matter how much content they give them, it will never be enough. Plus, they will hardly notice it because all they will be focused on is the progression. The moment the level cap it reached, or max gear is aquired, or all achievement points gained, they will be complaining unless more progression is added. They cannot see the content for the progression and will never be satisfied.

There is nothing stopping you creating an alt to do the story again. That will always remain character bound. But progression systems like levels and masteries really don’t need to be. As to there being nothing to do, I can only suggest the content Anet has provided us just isn’t to your tastes. I am often able to find something to do that doesn’t revolve around progression.

Granted it is not the same system, but the Mastery system is largely based on the WvW system. That was originally character-bound and most people hated it (including me) as it limited the usefulness of alts and for me meant I would only ever play as my main in WvW. I’m glad that the Mastery system will be account-bound. I have 9 lvl 80 toons (will be 10 with Revenant), each of which I play regularly. I don’t want to have to do everything 9 times just to be able to play where I like.

No and NO.

I have 7 80s. With Revenant I’ll have 8. I have zero interest in re-grinding the masteries to be PvE effective in HoT on each character like I had to regrind Sunspear, Lightbringer, and EOTN titles to be PvE effective on multiple characters in GW1.

Zero. kittening. Interest. One and done forever, thanks.

If you want replay-ability in PVE just redo world exploration + HoT on each character. Go re-run any HoT dungeons, you’ll need to for the new legendaries and their mats anyway.

Account bound just makes sense from a “path of least resistance” mind set.

Making the game harder for players with more Alts is not a good marketing decision, even if some limited number of players would like it better.

If its easy to put in a button so you can turn it off yourself then sure, but no help from support when you notice how grindy it is.

Fine, have it your way then. If it gets account bound I’ll just write it off as yet another bad decision by ANet and find something else to keep me occupied. Probably some good old dungeons. Or map exploration. Or testing maps for weak spots to dive beneath the map. Seriously, if you want something to be done right you gotta do it yourself. I should start making my own game…

That being said I’ll leave you alone here and follow Kite through that window.

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Fine, have it your way then. If it gets account bound I’ll just write it off as yet another bad decision by ANet and find something else to keep me occupied. Probably some good old dungeons. Or map exploration. Or testing maps for weak spots to dive beneath the map. Seriously, if you want something to be done right you gotta do it yourself. I should start making my own game…

That being said I’ll leave you alone here and follow Kite through that window.

They’ve already announced that it is account bound. They did that at the expansion announcement at PAX South as I recall.