Guild Wars 2

Elite specializations were a really cool idea, and I actually didn’t mind the way they were implemented. It made me feel like I was truly growing my character, even at Lv80. However, the power creep was unreal.

Generally classes had at least one “mandatory” specialization tree before HoT. Warriors it was Discipline, Thief it was Trickery, Necromancer Soul Reaping, etc. Some would argue that certain classes had more than one. With the introduction of Elite Specs and the power creep they bring, they have pretty much become a must take on every class — effectively adding another mandatory trait line. We can dig into the specifics as to why this is on a per-class basis, but I wanted to theorize about a solution that came to mind:

What would happen if we could use the skills (utility, healing, elite) from our elite specialization without actually taking the trait line? In my mind, Warriors would certainly get a lot better. Head Butt is massive.

Would that help build diversity? What else can we think of to start down a healthier path?

Well yes and no. While you close the gap with elite and core specs with more power creep (though it is not as big as one might think), you also limit it in the long turn. Bringing out a balanced elite spec will become harder with every new elite spec. The amount of new combinations will be so massive players will find something utterly broken and it will kill build diversity.

What could open new diversity is more elite specs in general and just good balancing. While those are given I think they need some actentuation. The final thing that could be done is some meaningfull drawback to elite specs. To be honest in this season I prefer core necro over reaper because the shroud seems better for the current meta also extra corruptions don’t hurt. But the lack of range and dark path which I lost in reaper shroud won me over. So if you get pro and cons of equal values core specs can earn a place in some cases (though the chances will be smaller since exclusivity of skills and such).

Great discussion. I completely get what you’re saying. My thought process here was based around GW1. They had so many skills to choose from, and build diversity was rather good in that game. You had a lot of room for innovation, as you could take an idea and really flesh it out. It wasn’t always the most viable thing, but it was decent and fun. In GW2 I no longer get that feeling.

I agree with the point you make though — it’s possible that in the future other specializations will come out with no reason to take them. In my mind, this expresses more of a fundamental problem with how the game works rather than with having there be more skills to choose from. It’s silly, in my mind, to believe that we can continue adding specializations and now run into redundancies, unbalanced lines, etc. So many traits change things like… +25% movespeed, 10% damage, etc. They are huge changes in the way you play.

In my mind, I would much rather see skills unlocked independently of specializations. I would be 100% fine if the next expansion unlocked skills from professions, gave me a new set of skills (e.g. “Rage” skills for Warrior) that I had to unlock via quests, and rebalanced existing specializations to increase build diversity.

Its done the way it is so specs have individuality, identity as well as do you know in gw1 with every expansion they had skills that were so similar or just better versions of existing things.

the skill count may have been high but so was the amount of skills that were totally redundant.

it also makes balance much MUCH easier. you only need to balance x/y/z/a/b/c elite spec vs core trait lines instead of against all the others. it keeps everything core relevant instead of making it totally redundant over time and keep the class identity and individuality that x/y/z/a/b/c elite spec is supposed to bring.

Elite specs are the way they are pretty much so Anet can balance them against each other. That’s why you can explicitly only use one at a time, and why the weapon/skills are tied to the trait line.

They really should have introduced two elite specs per profession with HoT, but that’s Anet for you.

JediSange.1645:

Elite specializations were a really cool idea, and I actually didn’t mind the way they were implemented. It made me feel like I was truly growing my character, even at Lv80. However, the power creep was unreal.

Generally classes had at least one “mandatory” specialization tree before HoT. Warriors it was Discipline, Thief it was Trickery, Necromancer Soul Reaping, etc. Some would argue that certain classes had more than one. With the introduction of Elite Specs and the power creep they bring, they have pretty much become a must take on every class — effectively adding another mandatory trait line. We can dig into the specifics as to why this is on a per-class basis, but I wanted to theorize about a solution that came to mind:

What would happen if we could use the skills (utility, healing, elite) from our elite specialization without actually taking the trait line? In my mind, Warriors would certainly get a lot better. Head Butt is massive.

Would that help build diversity? What else can we think of to start down a healthier path?

Elites was a good Idea, but the way how was implement wasn’t.
The new weapons, habilities and traits really should be allowed after upgrade the client to HoT, but not via one single trait line(specialization).
They should share the new traits between all 5 trait lines(specialization) and prevent the OP combination of everything in one line that we see now.