Specializations: Were they fun? Did they Change how you play your profession in a meaningful way? How were the improvements to the previous Specializations? (Dragon Hunter, Tempest, Chronomancer, Reaper)?
I have able to play the Chronomancer, Herald & Tempest so far on BWE2. Chronomancer definitely has an adjusted play style that will be interesting and challenging to learn. I cannot comment on the Revenant play difference with or without the Herald other than Herald brings some much needed mobility to the Revenant, but that is a matter for the Rev subforum. The Tempest has had the least amount of play style difference. It seems unbalanced and inconsistent, again a matter for that subforum.
As a concept I think the specializations seem a good framework for character development and provide some interesting variety.
How is the difficulty of the new hostile mobs, and are they fun and exciting?
The new mobs in VB are challenging. I find the new CC in equal measures interesting and frustrating. With the new verticality, I do think there should be the possibility of players using CC to knock NPCs off edges as a technique. The increased level of difficulty means that it is hard to run solo across parts of the map.
With the Opening of two new outposts, we are adding in a bunch of new events. Are they fun?
The mechanics of the events seem to provide a nice chain of different kinds of events so that they are not entirely monotonous. However this is a good place to bring up a point of significant frustration. The map is clearly designed to hamper foot travel as incentive to earn masteries. However as one moves around the map it is impossible to tell whether an event is happening above or below one’s present position. The map really needs mini-map tiers set like in cities, as well as up/down carrots indicating the direction to travel vertically to find the event.
Do the new events bring you more into the world?
I have never been terribly event/story/lore driven so I cannot comment on that part of things.
Mastery System: ?How is the progression?
The progression is slow. I have seen people comment on both sides of the equation, some liking the length it takes to unlock masteries, others opposing. I have been able to unlock 2 tiers of gliding and 1 tier of itzel/mushrooms playing casually. So far I think the pace has been decent. I am a little concerned that at the higher levels the pace will slow down enough to be frustrating to people that cannot devote several hours each day to GW2.
How is it using the mastery abilities in the current area?
The system seems to work well from what I have seen of it. I Like the fact that the mushrooms will place you where you need to go without needing movement adjustments. Gliding is just fun. Pure, simple pleasure.
Do you care about experience and mastery points?
I do, and mastery points have made experience points relevant again. However note my concern above. Developers have already weighed in on tomes not counting towards Mastery point progression. I think if the current requirements are kept, it might be worth considering an xp version of the wxp drip/drop/etc that do function towards mastery experience. The mastery point side of things will really depend on how the points are given. If acquiring them is too hard in addition to the long xp grind, this could get frustrating, but if the points are too easily achieved the . . . shall we say more focused players will get bored easily.
Does it provide a good framework to add more masteries in the future?
I think this model of contextual masteries can work for future content, especially as account wide progression.
Do you want to learn as many masteries over time to overcome challenges later in the future?
Um, yes. But that is as much because I am mildly OCD when it comes to checking off electronic boxes.
Other Feedback
Visibility is really awkward with the smoke particles. With the settings turned to best appearance the smoke is almost silver and moving through smoke can make a screen flare almost as if the full screen gamma is too high for a moment.
16GB RAM; AMD Radeon 6970M 2GB VRAM