Guild Wars 2

How about a compromise.

Lets see how many Mastery points a mastery will cost as Account-Bound. (lets say 100)
Then turn it Character-Bound and have it cost half of those points (50).
Then have every time an alt attempts to learn a mastery that another character already knows, it will cost half of the last time. (from 25 to 13 to 7 to 4 to 2 to 1 and stuck there.).
The total grind required will be almost the same. You might want to learn a different mastery to an alt, and have it be cheaper afterwards for your main that might not have that many points left.

Or alternatively they could make it free to learn any mastery you’ve already learned once, but instead hide the trainer and/or have some special event to “win his trust” or something, to keep the Metroidvania challenge active!

Kite.2510:

How about a compromise.

Lets see how many Mastery points a mastery will cost as Account-Bound. (lets say 100)
Then turn it Character-Bound and have it cost half of those points (50).
Then have every time an alt attempts to learn a mastery that another character already knows, it will cost half of the last time. (from 25 to 13 to 7 to 4 to 2 to 1 and stuck there.).
The total grind required will be almost the same. You might want to learn a different mastery to an alt, and have it be cheaper afterwards for your main that might not have that many points left.

Or alternatively they could make it free to learn any mastery you’ve already learned once, but instead hide the trainer and/or have some special event to “win his trust” or something, to keep the Metroidvania challenge active!

Still no. That would take so much development time. Not only that its GOING to be account bound, theve already announced this. I dont care how much grind you try and get rid of, i dont want to do it per character, i dont want to do it across all my alts. I want this to be one and done like its going to be, because i swap characters halfway through playing. play for 30 minutes on 1 toon flop to another, then i might flop back. Having to grind it out on each character would be annoying as has been stated.

This game is incredibly alt friendly and me and my whole guild of almost 500 people cheered when it was announced to account bound. Why? because we all play multiple characters.

Not everyone likes Metroidvania either, i know i dont. But i dont mind this system, Why? because i only have to do it once.

While I enjoy having a large selection of characters to choose from, making each of them unique and seeing each of them progress at their own pace… no. Just no.

As I’ve said, I have a large selection of characters. Gearing all of them has been almost painful, the last thing I need is to grind the new zone ASAP on all of my characters to allow them to keep up. As I see it, all masteries are is a massive gating system (similar to, say, radiance on LOTRO) that serves no purpose other than to simply lock away content behind some grind. I don’t really want that in the first place. I don’t want to do it twice. I certainly don’t want to have to do it three, four or five times. How about those of us with ten characters? Twenty? Sixty four?

So, to put it in a word, 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?
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

Actually Ascended armors are account bound…
So do weapons and accessaries..

N.G.T.H.

(not going to happen)

They don’t need anymore character bound stuff. Stuff like masteries that could take 6 months or more just to max out one of them gets a big No. Look at the GW1 titles for Eye of The North, you check mark 1 of them and a buff pops up on one of the corners of your screen. Those aren’t account bound and took months just to max them to Lvl10 on one character.

There are a lot of people with more than 10 characters and i’m one of them. I mostly play my necros and Ele’s. I sure don’t want to get on my thief and take a year to master anything on that character. Back to GW1 i only mastered the EotN Titles/skills on one character and that was my Ritualist. After that. i never wanted to go through that process again on any other characters. I could see the same thing happen if Masteries went character bound in HoT.

If they make it character bound in any way shape or form I will not buy the expansion. I hated with the fiery passion of King Adelbern the current trait system and I’m still waiting for them to change it.

tevoro.1587:

If they make it character bound in any way shape or form I will not buy the expansion. I hated with the fiery passion of King Adelbern the current trait system and I’m still waiting for them to change it.

They specifically stated that the trait system will be redone by HoT.

Here are two things to think about:

Source

Source

So the system will be unlock masteries with mastery points and then train them by gaining experience. While unlocks are confirmed to be account bound, the training isn’t. However it isn’t confirmed to be character bound either. The information we got up to now can be interpreted either way.

Remember when WvW ranks were character bound? Yeah let’s not do that again.

SirPuddlesworth.6783:

In my honest opinion; in doing (^) this it’d allow more people to pour hundreds of more hours into their game, defining and shaping EACH one of their characters just how they want to, it would allow for some truly diverse play-styles that i have been searching for in Gw2 for a while, i have my own little secret built using traits, though if i could combine that with masteries this could make for some really revolutionary gameplay changes.

No, that just makes it a massive grind and totally repetitive. I am not going to relevel masteries for each of my 24 characters.
Account based masteries pool total like WvW skill points with option to invest in the masteries you want for each character is the optimal choice.

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

NOOOOO!!!
That completely kills it! That would be a nightmare for altaholics like me. I was so relieved when I heard Masteries are account-bound, that way I don’t have to regrind my masteries over and over and over and over again.

This. I’m a pretty hard-core altaholic, and account bound masteries is a great relief.

if that happens I know that I will only go to the new map on 1 character.

Just like WvW used to be, I won’t bother doing it over and over again for each and every character I have

So i have to redo it 12x?

no pls NO!

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 precisely the kind of mindset that holds this genre back. Catering to players who can only see the “reward” or “the reason” and not enjoy the experience itself results in an inevitable decline in game quality – for they get nothing more than a shallow part of the overall experience.

Progression is NOT content. It is NOT something to do. It is a reward for doing the actual content – the things you are supposed to be doing anyway because they exist and because you enjoy them.

Duke Blackrose.4981:

Progression is NOT content. It is NOT something to do.

Exactly, but that is something he just doesn’t seem to realize.

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

Duke Blackrose.4981:

Progression is NOT content. It is NOT something to do.

Exactly, but that is something he just doesn’t seem to realize.

So… I assume you don’t like progression then? Is that your problem? Is that why you want all masteries to be unlocked and completed immediately if possible, so you have another point on your todo-list crossed out?

“Founded on the idea that the journey is the goal, the Heart of Thorns expansion continues the Guild Wars 2 tradition of challenging the conventions of MMOs to fulfill the promise of what online worlds should be.” Source
Maybe GW2 just isn’t the right game for you.

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

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.

Meant it as in a sense of achievement.

Maybe that wasnt the best word though.

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

Duke Blackrose.4981:

Progression is NOT content. It is NOT something to do.

Exactly, but that is something he just doesn’t seem to realize.

So… I assume you don’t like progression then? Is that your problem? Is that why you want all masteries to be unlocked and completed immediately if possible, so you have another point on your todo-list crossed out?

“Founded on the idea that the journey is the goal, the Heart of Thorns expansion continues the Guild Wars 2 tradition of challenging the conventions of MMOs to fulfill the promise of what online worlds should be.” Source
Maybe GW2 just isn’t the right game for you.

I don’t mind progression, but once I progressed I don’t want to do it over again and again and again just to get to where I already was on another character. At least levelling alts is varied, different ways to level, using different classes, using different builds, different gear. I like the idea of a finished character, and once it’s finished it should stay finished. And I have always managed to make an alt that stands out from the others, so I don’t just grind to get something I already had.

And gw2 is the right kind of game for me, precisely because Masteries (and many other things) are account bound in this game. Maybe this isn’t the right game for you.

And you kinda shot yourself in the foot with that qoute, because of the “challenge the conventions of mmos” part. What better way to challenge the convention than make an mmo that isn’t about grind for a change. So far that is exactly what Anet has done, why would they stop now.

Then tell me, how long, as in hours directly contributed to leveling the masteries, should it take in your opinion to complete all masteries? That’s a question I want to ask each one supporting the account-binding of masteries. How long should it take to complete, so that it isn’t grindy, yet a meaningful achievement (As in achieving something, not necessarily connected to achievement points)?

I’ve already stated my estimate: 10 to 20 hours of leveling (not unlocking or goofing around) per character. That’s an amount of time that allows even casual gamers to have all masteries on 1 or 2 characters while giving frequent players the possibility to have a whole deck of maxed out characters.

Also: Yeah, you’re right. GW2 isn’t about grind at all. It’s either about praying to the gods of R, N and G or about grinding enough to pay for someone elses luck. Is that any better? No, and that’s why they’re bringing alternate ways for precursors. I sincerely hope that other RNG-items will get the same treatment as them.

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Then tell me, how long, as in hours directly contributed to leveling the masteries, should it take in your opinion to complete all masteries?

Impossible to tell for me at the moment because I don’t know yet what exactly levelling masteries will be like.

But if I have to guess.
If it’s character bound and varied, about half the time it takes to level a character to 80. Variation is key here. It’s what keeps levelling alts fun (for me anyway). I can level in many different ways: exploration, dungeons, events, wvw, spvp (by getting tomes) and because most of the levelling involves combat, using different professions/weapons/builds makes it all the more varied.

If it’s not varied and involves very specific tasks (go to exactly x zone, do exactly x for x amount of time) then it should take even less time. Sure it may be fun once or twice but after that it gets tedious. This is the more likely case which is one of the reasons I don’t want it to be character bound. I doubt you learn other languages by smacking a dinosaur in the head. ^^

If it’s account bound and varied (best case scenario for me) then it might as wel take months.

This is of course a wild guess, I’d have to wait and see what exactly is involved in levelling your masteries.

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Then tell me, how long, as in hours directly contributed to leveling the masteries, should it take in your opinion to complete all masteries? That’s a question I want to ask each one supporting the account-binding of masteries. How long should it take to complete, so that it isn’t grindy, yet a meaningful achievement (As in achieving something, not necessarily connected to achievement points)?

I’ve already stated my estimate: 10 to 20 hours of leveling (not unlocking or goofing around) per character. That’s an amount of time that allows even casual gamers to have all masteries on 1 or 2 characters while giving frequent players the possibility to have a whole deck of maxed out characters.

Also: Yeah, you’re right. GW2 isn’t about grind at all. It’s either about praying to the gods of R, N and G or about grinding enough to pay for someone elses luck. Is that any better? No, and that’s why they’re bringing alternate ways for precursors. I sincerely hope that other RNG-items will get the same treatment as them.

Well I agree with you but your hours is abit low. Seeing as its account bound i would expect it to take bettwen 270hours and 540hours at the very least.
Divide that by 9 1 for each profession.
If its rng involved I would expect it to take quite awhile longer if all the rng stuff is account bound

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

Duke Blackrose.4981:

Progression is NOT content. It is NOT something to do.

Exactly, but that is something he just doesn’t seem to realize.

So… I assume you don’t like progression then? Is that your problem? Is that why you want all masteries to be unlocked and completed immediately if possible, so you have another point on your todo-list crossed out?

“Founded on the idea that the journey is the goal, the Heart of Thorns expansion continues the Guild Wars 2 tradition of challenging the conventions of MMOs to fulfill the promise of what online worlds should be.” Source
Maybe GW2 just isn’t the right game for you.

Don’t put words in my mouth. My statement was that progression is not content and that players who emphasize progression over content are only hindering their enjoyment of the game and further limiting an already stagnant genre. Progression is fine and dandy. When implemented effectively and in a way that respects the player and fits the overall design and design philosophies of the game.

The original fault of Guild Wars 2 was that it had nearly zero progression of any form. Not traditional vertical progression and not the fantastic horizontal progression that defined the series with Guild Wars 1. It had nothing to hold goal-oriented players at all.

Ascended gear and trait-locking were both laughable attempts at progression, as they were done sloppily and in a way that does not respect the game’s intended audience (and it is, to be fair to Arenanet, difficult to do so, as it is impossible to compromise between horizontal and vertical progression using existing conventions, and it is foolhardy to attempt to appeal to both crowds at once).

The Mastery system sounds much more promising, as it is much more free form and does not invalidate existing content, nor effect World vs. World balance. And it allows players to define their character to a great degree. I love this and am fully behind it – on paper.

I cannot support character-bound masteries, however. It’s conceptually awful. Progression is beneficial when players actually make progress – as in broadening their horizons. Retreading the same ground on every alt is not progression, but rather regression, and it makes for a dull experience, especially if you’re like me and have 8 alts, with plans of making as many as 18 after Heart of Thorns.

The better idea is to expand the pool of masteries, to give exciting new forms of progression while not punishing players who enjoy alts.

And if you insist that this is not the game for me, I would advise you to actually take a look at the type of game Guild Wars 2 is – both philosophically and in practice. Guild Wars 1 was a horizontal progression type of game where skill and adaptation were more emphasized than progression – perfect for my needs. Guild Wars 2 is in a similar vein, as it emphasizes mechanical skill and freedom of playstyle. It has not, nor has it ever been, intentionally unfriendly to alts. And seeing as how masteries were announced to be account bound, the burden of proof is on you to change that, and thus the game, as described, is not right for you. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here trying to ruin the experience of alters everywhere.

If it was made Character Bound and some of have alts, They might as well take away Character slots forever.

If you hate people with extra heroes then ask to remove Character slots for good, If you do not like Account Bound, If that’s what you wish.

I do not want to repeat performances the same time over and over. I have extra Charcaters mostly for ideas and Character Style and Looks. I treat Guild Wars 2 Character Customization of the skins like Champions Online’s Hero Customization (Cryptic Studio Game), I already have my hands full on Leveling my heroes and map completion I do not want more full hands.

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!

Well to people´s defence.. its not hard to make alts and fully equip em in exotics in a week… IF you do it a “casual fast” way by kitten ing about in EoTM an hour or 2 a day. If you PVP on a regular basis you can stock up with so many tomes of knowledge to have a lvl 80 alt thats fully geared in exotics in less then 20 mins and since the new daily system you can get the tomes pretty darn fast in pve aswell if you want to.

Sonic the Hedgehog.5169:

If it was made Character Bound and some of have alts, They might as well take away Character slots forever.

Um… what? I fail to see how it’s really different from unlocking waypoints in the map, or new skills for a new alt, or unlocking new traits in the new system. It can still be done, and some people enjoy doing the same thing over and over again. Hate the proposal, sure, but don’t hyperbolize like this. It’s not the ultimate end-of-the-world idea.

all this says to me is one playthrough of HoT and your done
then its just back to having nothing to accomplish any more

The more account-bound stuff we get, the better.

saventis.1485:

all this says to me is one playthrough of HoT and your done
then its just back to having nothing to accomplish any more

Aint that what usualy happens with games?
But with them being able to extend masteries endlessly adding new lines add more abilitys further along an existing ones, I cant see how you would get done so fast as you seem to imply.

Linken.6345:

saventis.1485:

all this says to me is one playthrough of HoT and your done
then its just back to having nothing to accomplish any more

Aint that what usualy happens with games?
But with them being able to extend masteries endlessly adding new lines add more abilitys further along an existing ones, I cant see how you would get done so fast as you seem to imply.

To add to this, if any of the HoT masteries are behind any amount of RNG, this could be quite bothersome past the first few alts you make. Who wants to rely on RNG several times to unlock masteries on their characters?

Linken.6345:

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Then tell me, how long, as in hours directly contributed to leveling the masteries, should it take in your opinion to complete all masteries? That’s a question I want to ask each one supporting the account-binding of masteries. How long should it take to complete, so that it isn’t grindy, yet a meaningful achievement (As in achieving something, not necessarily connected to achievement points)?

I’ve already stated my estimate: 10 to 20 hours of leveling (not unlocking or goofing around) per character. That’s an amount of time that allows even casual gamers to have all masteries on 1 or 2 characters while giving frequent players the possibility to have a whole deck of maxed out characters.

Also: Yeah, you’re right. GW2 isn’t about grind at all. It’s either about praying to the gods of R, N and G or about grinding enough to pay for someone elses luck. Is that any better? No, and that’s why they’re bringing alternate ways for precursors. I sincerely hope that other RNG-items will get the same treatment as them.

Well I agree with you but your hours is abit low. Seeing as its account bound i would expect it to take bettwen 270hours and 540hours at the very least.
Divide that by 9 1 for each profession.
If its rng involved I would expect it to take quite awhile longer if all the rng stuff is account bound

Well, since I’m supporting character-bound masteries my estimate was for character-bound. That’s why I was asking for your estimate on a timeframe to level all account-bound masteries, because I seriously can’t think of an appropriate timeframe to level all masteries on an account-bound system that’s both fair to casuals and at the same time not immediately finished by more frequent players.

Now your estimate is 270 hours to 540 hours of playtime directly contributed to leveling the masteries. Let’s assume that a player plays 2 hours a day (Type /age and divide your total hours played by the days your account exists. The result should be about 2 or 3 hours for “hardcore gamers”.), in that case, after substracting the time needed for tasks like recycling, standing around, doing something else that’s not leveling masteries, let’s assume that the player spends 1 hour a day on leveling masteries. That’d make 270 days to 540 days until you leveled all masteries. That’s about 1 to 1.5 years. Now multiply this by 3 or more and you have the time it takes a casual player to reach that point.

Considering that there’s content gated behind the masteries that’s 1 to 1.5 years of not being able to access that content. I won’t even comment on Windu’s suggestion of several months directly contributed towards leveling masteries. If that isn’t grind, then what is?

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Considering that there’s content gated behind the masteries that’s 1 to 1.5 years of not being able to access that content. I won’t even comment on Windu’s suggestion of several months directly contributed towards leveling masteries. If that isn’t grind, then what is?

Setting aside speculation on the time it will take to max out all masteries (something I’m sure they’ve considered and will probably be in the region of months or years for most players) you seem to have the idea that there is content gated behind the maximum level of a mastery. That’s a massive and, I believe, incorrect assumption. If you need to max out your masteries to access content (especially group content) then it’s fair to assume that it’ll be something your average player will be able to do quickly enough. It seems far more likely to me that you’ll need a rank or two to access the content, the other ranks will be for convenience or speed or flavour.

For example, imagine I need gliding to access a boss battle or other major piece of content. Having rank one or two would be enough to get across a gap in the map at its narrowest point, higher ranks will just allow me to access the battle from more places on the map, across larger distances.

In the case of history or language masteries, you might need basic Mursaat to access vendors (basically pointing at stuff, jingling your coins and saying “how much?”) but as you become more proficient with their language they will converse with you more freely, giving more lore and flavour in your interactions.

Gilosean.3805:

No thanks.

We already have character-bound-hunting with traits. And character bound skills too. I have absolutely no interest in yet another character-bound system that would just mean I have to replay X amount of content to get back to where I started.

This. Having to endlessly regrind old content for each character does not constitute ‘replyability’. If the content is good gameplay and makes you want to do it again for the fun of it….that’s replayability. I think worming these pve masteries like wvw masteries will be great.

I dont like being locked out of content nor do i like meaningless progression. I like to enjoy the content with complete characters. So i am thankful its account bound. I only have to suffer through the progression grind once that way. Good content should stand strong on its own. There is no need to lock it behind progression.

Unfortunately the MMO genre is plagued by this grindy mindset and players seem to enjoy/need it to a certain degree. I do admit it helps keep people invested in the game if they have spent a lot of time and grinded through a lot of progression. So i can see why anet has done it. Im just grateful they avoided more gear progression and are making masteries account bound. That makes it bearable for players like me.

spoj.9672:

I dont like being locked out of content nor do i like meaningless progression. I like to enjoy the content with complete characters. So i am thankful its account bound. I only have to suffer through the progression grind once that way. Good content should stand strong on its own. There is no need to lock it behind progression.

Unfortunately the MMO genre is plagued by this grindy mindset and players seem to enjoy/need it to a certain degree. I do admit it helps keep people invested in the game if they have spent a lot of time and grinded through a lot of progression. So i can see why anet has done it. Im just grateful they avoided more gear progression and are making masteries account bound. That makes it bearable for players like me.

I think it’s all a matter of perspective, you see the progression as a barrier that blocks access to the content, I see the progression as a reward that unlocks new content. It’s kind of a “is the glass half empty or is the glass half full” thing.

I think they’re aiming for it to feel like a reward rather than a barrier, that’s one of the reasons it’s account bound but ultimately, whether or not it feels like a grind depends on how long it takes to unlock access to the content.

BunjiKugashira.9754:

I won’t even comment on Windu’s suggestion of several months directly contributed towards leveling masteries. If that isn’t grind, then what is?

The thing is, if it’s varied and account bound, it doesn’t really matter if it takes long (for me). I can just continue playing the game like I used to without worrying about alts falling behind. I don’t have to specificaly spend time on each of my alts and do specific stuff to make sure there masteries are up to snuff. I just continue to play like I usually do and the mastery levels come by themselves over time (of course if I start to hardcore grind for masteries, it will go a lot faster). Also remember that I said it was just a wild guess, I have no idea what exactly we have to do to level our masteries.

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

…

Also remember that I said it was just a wild guess, I have no idea what exactly we have to do to level our masteries.

“The ability to train Masteries is unlocked at level 80 for all players that own Heart of Thorns. When this ability is unlocked, your character’s experience bar will change to become a Mastery training bar while in PvE zones.” Source

This. We’ll have to get exp. You can judge yourself if getting exp is diverse enough to spend months or years on or not.

To be honest, while I don’t know how they have structured the masteries, I wouldn’t really mind character based unlocks specifically made for them. It would be a great RPG element to it. (But a forced RPG element)

Since WvW has account wide WvW point acquisition, it also has has character “bound” customization. You just unlock point account wide while allocating them per character. Each character has the same amount of points, while also having fully different “builds”.

So, If they keep masteries akin to WvW, you will merely unlock points account wide, while unlocking masteries akin to your character.
Then it will be up to yourself if you add that extra unlock requirement onto it, in order to have something more of an RPG element to it.

That said, I don’t believe that many players these days are “hardcore” (so to say) Role players enough in order to make their own rules within the game world, let alone actually hold yourself to them.

Either way, if that’s true then it basically already is a compromise, and I must say that unlocking points through simple playing without being limited per character is a nice plus.

That said having a story element to certain masteries does sound awesome. Like an unlock of some kind that only happens when you fight a flying mordrem boss where you simply need your glider and only then you embark on a quest to get one. Sure that does sound awesome per isolated case. On the other hand, making the system more complicated just so you have different type of unlocks might not be a great way to do so.

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

…

Also remember that I said it was just a wild guess, I have no idea what exactly we have to do to level our masteries.

“The ability to train Masteries is unlocked at level 80 for all players that own Heart of Thorns. When this ability is unlocked, your character’s experience bar will change to become a Mastery training bar while in PvE zones.” Source

This. We’ll have to get exp. You can judge yourself if getting exp is diverse enough to spend months or years on or not.

We know our experience bar is replaced by a mastery bar, but do we know it is exactly like getting exp or does filling this bar involve some more specific tasks?

But if it is just like getting exp, I couldn’t be happier. I can just continue doing my dungeons, wvw, events, guild missions, map exploration and whatever new content HoT brings (like adventures) while getting my masteries.

Gilosean.3805:

No thanks.

We already have character-bound-hunting with traits. And character bound skills too. I have absolutely no interest in yet another character-bound system that would just mean I have to replay X amount of content to get back to where I started.

This! ^^

We already have a character bound system for world exploration achievements, we have it with other achievements as well which made no sense whatsoever in the development of the original game especially when trying to do things like build a legendary weapon.

If anything since they are making legendaries more available in this they should redact their original design requirements to make the map available across all toons by using a system similar to what SWTOR uses in which all characters on an account can be made to come from the same family name so that they can share the data like map exploration from the same account. That way it’s visible to all characters and achievements like the one needed to make a legendary can be used by all characters.

I think it’s amazing that this hasn’t happened before. It’s just another way that they didn’t do things in a new way until HoT to set their game apart. The current system and the one suggested by the OP is the equivalent of having character bound reputation systems with character bound gear options once you reach max reputation with a faction. It’s not welcome in games that are truly supposed to be on a different path.

Kite.2510:

…or at least some of them!

Are you serious? Even Mrs. Obama has doubts about your OP.

It’s a good argument, but not worth the cost in my opinion.

And to be honest, some of my characters are just not as good at clearing things as some of my others, but they’re still fun to play. I want to be able to unlock Masteries with my “good” characters first, to help along my “for fun” characters.

Palador.2170:

It’s a good argument, but not worth the cost in my opinion.

And to be honest, some of my characters are just not as good at clearing things as some of my others, but they’re still fun to play. I want to be able to unlock Masteries with my “good” characters first, to help along my “for fun” characters.

That too is a problem and until they take PVE combat balance seriously it will remain even after the launch of HoT.

Jaxom.7310:

segman.3560:

account bound is the best thing happened to this game, not only masteries; this is why me and probably many other ppl chosen gw2 – because they want to play the game, not to grind each and every character

short, simple, perfect. +1

This^, I actually despise the leveling process in all these types of games. I get no joy from running around, on low level characters, having to grind the same maps and levels and mobs for each character. I also have a full roster of characters in spite of this. I can deal with the leveling process as a necessary evil for making players learn to play their characters…but there is absolutely no need to have masteries be character bound. If you want to grind something that bad…be my guest and repeat quests and such over and over and over again to your heart’s content…..just stop trying to make the rest of us join your grind fest.

Just to throw in something short..

If legendary weapons were not tired to map completion.
There would be 4 threads a day asking for Account Wide Map Completion.

Swish.2463:

Just to throw in something short..

If legendary weapons were not tired to map completion.
There would be 4 threads a day asking for Account Wide Map Completion.

Not in my case. Completing maps (hearts, vista’s, poi’s, skillpoints, waypoints) are a great source of experience for my alts.

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

Swish.2463:

Just to throw in something short..

If legendary weapons were not tired to map completion.
There would be 4 threads a day asking for Account Wide Map Completion.

Not in my case. Completing maps (hearts, vista’s, poi’s, skillpoints, waypoints) are a great source of experience for my alts.

Not saying it’s a good idea and for obvious reasons it’s not.. kinda like this topic

But people would complain none the less

No thanks. Not even one.

I like the account-bound direction they’re going in. I’m sorry to say people who like grinding in a completionist way for multiple characters are the minority.

Personally the one thing I can stand doing is 100% Map completion, and that’s because that’s how I level up. Without it I guess I would go do WvW or something. But that’d leave me really stuck.

I think the new traits we got are a good example of how character bound progression when it comes to abilities and traits can be extremely tiresome if you have over 8 alts.

Leveling masteries will be the same als leveling your character. Heck, you even have to do the same things to level them! So asking for mastery-progression to be account-bound is the same as asking for characterlevels to be account-bound. Because leveling your alts to lvl 80 is way too much of a grind…

Why not open a new thread and ask for levels to be removed completely? Because kitten grind…

BunjiKugashira.9754:

Leveling masteries will be the same als leveling your character. Heck, you even have to do the same things to level them! So asking for mastery-progression to be account-bound is the same as asking for characterlevels to be account-bound. Because leveling your alts to lvl 80 is way too much of a grind…

Why not open a new thread and ask for levels to be removed completely? Because kitten grind…

Lol. Now you are just being ridiculous.