Is it just me...

[thewallofsleep]

Or is the talent/skill/trait UI utterly awful? I hadn't played in quite some time, probably since early 2014. The trait/skill allocation UI was never very intuitive or comfortable to use, but now it's ridiculous. Hat weird circle thing they have now is obnoxious. I feel like a need a decoder ring to figure out how spec a character. It's almost enough to make me not want to play.

[zito]

It's pretty straight forward and simple imo. Top section is your skills, to your left is all your trait lines and skills and then you select which trait lines you want from a drop down menu.

[Svifnymr]

Or is the talent/skill/trait UI utterly awful? I hadn't played in quite some time, probably since early 2014. The trait/skill allocation UI was never very intuitive or comfortable to use, but now it's ridiculous. Hat weird circle thing they have now is obnoxious. I feel like a need a decoder ring to figure out how spec a character. It's almost enough to make me not want to play.

I don't know why it's so huge, let alone why the skills are laid out in a ring. It's all very linear now, so they really should have just put everything in long columns on one page to make comparison easier.

It's GW2 though, so expect them to change it again at some point.


Hopefully when they do so they'll also change the level up prompt, at least make them chained so they pop up as you complete one, when you're cycling through 78 bonus levels...

[thewallofsleep]

Is the current version on live the same version we'll see when HoT officially launches? I read an article where Johansen said the current system was being removed and replace for the expansion. I hadn't played in nearly two years, so I don't k ow how long the circular thing has been in place.

I'm not sure what's wrong with a standard tried and true talent tree.

[Kazgrel]

There is a lot of "noise" all over the screen/menus for the trait/spec/skill selection stuff.

That said, I'll deal with our current specialization system a hundred times over dealing with the garbage we had before with the "NPE", having to go all over everywhere to unlock skills (or farm skill points + gold). Fuck. That. Noise.

[Ayaz2810]

I haven't played gw2 in quite a while. Couple quick questions: is there any decent pve content yet? (Do dungeons matter at all now?) and are you still stuck with like 4-5 abilities that you can use at once? Those were the only 2 things that caused me to drop the game after a few months.

[Svifnymr]

Is the current version on live the same version we'll see when HoT officially launches? I read an article where Johansen said the current system was being removed and replace for the expansion. I hadn't played in nearly two years, so I don't k ow how long the circular thing has been in place.

I'm not sure what's wrong with a standard tried and true talent tree.

I'm not sure when that article was, but I'm pretty sure this system is the current one for the launch. It's a couple months old I think.

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That said, I'll deal with our current specialization system a hundred times over dealing with the garbage we had before with the "NPE", having to go all over everywhere to unlock skills (or farm skill points + gold). Fuck. That. Noise.

The main thing with that system (not sure how we would label the various systems we've had) was that you didn't need to get everything. They really messed up balancing the challenges against when you would be getting traits, and they certainly needed some baseline method to get stuff. Like you can unlock a single trait for free in each line, but extras needed finding or buying, or... whatever. Instead they just ditched the entire system.

The new system is fine except for no reset of points spent and the linear nature.

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I haven't played gw2 in quite a while. Couple quick questions: is there any decent pve content yet?

If you didn't like it before, you probably won't now. The game hasn't changed a lot. They are adding raids, so maybe that's what you want?

(Do dungeons matter at all now?)

Dungeons will matter even less than they did, except fractals and raids.

and are you still stuck with like 4-5 abilities that you can use at once? Those were the only 2 things that caused me to drop the game after a few months.

The ability system won't be changing anytime soon.

[Fencers]

Or is the talent/skill/trait UI utterly awful?

It is awful. I have rarely seen worse UI in a major market MMORPG.

Arena.net have historically been extremely poor secondary system designers. This is due to their production and development pipeline and the structure of TLs and engineers. It's kinda awful.

[kail]

It is awful. I have rarely seen worse UI in a major market MMORPG.

I found Wildstar's UI to be god awful, thankfully for that game complete overhauls via Addons are possible.

To the OP: I don't know when they did the specialization revamp, but the new system is pretty much straight forward. Pick three lines and decide on each sub-talent. At level cap, you have all three lines filled. I'd compare it to WoW's current tree but with more depth.

[Deleted]

It is, it definately is.

[Deleted]

I don't see what was wrong with just having a list or something. The circle thing is basically a line and for some classes you are forced to invest in skills you will never use just to get a skill at the end of the line.

Back in my day we just went to a skill trainer and bought a skill / signet of capture to go get our own skill and we (mostly) liked it.

[Malthanis]

Or is the talent/skill/trait UI utterly awful? I hadn't played in quite some time, probably since early 2014. The trait/skill allocation UI was never very intuitive or comfortable to use, but now it's ridiculous. Hat weird circle thing they have now is obnoxious. I feel like a need a decoder ring to figure out how spec a character. It's almost enough to make me not want to play.

Are you talking about the skills pane (with your weapon skills, utility skills, and traits) or the training pane (the circle/bar-filling stuff where you spend hero points)?

As for people referring to "skills they don't want" having to be purchased on the training pane to get to skills at the end of a given line of skills: I really don't see the big deal. Those points can't be spent on anything other than skills. Why wouldn't you unlock them? Not to mention the skills that "aren't meta" (or whatever other reason that could be dug up to not want skills) could very easily change in the future to make them desirable.

[Kazgrel]

Are you talking about the skills pane (with your weapon skills, utility skills, and traits) or the training pane (the circle/bar-filling stuff where you spend hero points)?

As for people referring to "skills they don't want" having to be purchased on the training pane to get to skills at the end of a given line of skills: I really don't see the big deal. Those points can't be spent on anything other than skills. Why wouldn't you unlock them? Not to mention the skills that "aren't meta" (or whatever other reason that could be dug up to not want skills) could very easily change in the future to make them desirable.

Regarding the specializations/traits, it could be much simpler; basically use the pane that we use to select what traits we want to use. Spend 5 or whatever hero points to unlock the first minor. Then you have to unlock the adept tier, but you can pick which of the three you want first (vs. being force to unlock them in a specific order). Only when you unlock all 3 can you move up to the master tier.

Players end up having to spend the same amount of points, but they have the possibility of completing the desired build a little bit faster. It would work a little cleaner than the weird ass circle thing they have going on.

For slot skills, basically have a mix of the old and new. Have the separate categories like we do now, but then have all of the skill listed to where it's pick and choose, vs the circle thing. Elite skills locked until 31 as they are currently. Hero point costs would remain the same, but it allows people to pick up the skills they want a little faster.

I'm a fan of the revamp (because I fucking hated that "NPE" shit; it turned away a lot of folks I tried to get to play the game after they got into it for a bit). But it's not perfect. Then again, no game really is.

[Malthanis]

So you're basically saying that traits and skills should be unlocked separately, rather than a single Water (using an Elementalist line for example) line of traits and skills? I could see how that would work better. We'd pretty much do away with the Training pane in favor of a "click to unlock" method straight from the Skills pane.

The only thing that I think may throw a wrench in there is the extra skins unlocked by the elite specialization lines. The Training pane gives them a little more flexibility on what they can offer, I think.

[Kazgrel]

So you're basically saying that traits and skills should be unlocked separately, rather than a single Water (using an Elementalist line for example) line of traits and skills? I could see how that would work better. We'd pretty much do away with the Training pane in favor of a "click to unlock" method straight from the Skills pane.

The only thing that I think may throw a wrench in there is the extra skins unlocked by the elite specialization lines. The Training pane gives them a little more flexibility on what they can offer, I think.

That's probably the reason we have the weird wheel of wonders system, so that they could intertwine things like cosmetic rewards, titles, etc., into the mix. Those could simply be tied to a certain unlock in the system I described. Ex. You unlock all adept tier traits in tempest, you then get a title in addition to being able to put points towards getting the master minor trait. Unlocking all master majors gets you an armor skin, etc.

[ro9ue]

They need to throw money at whoever designed the Diablo 3 UI and get them on this game. The UI team for Diablo is the best in the business.

[Deleted]

I hate how they wanted me to relearn skills (by spend skill points AGAIN) I've unlocked ages ago when "overhaul" launched. I'm happy I've given up on this game long time ago.

[Deleted]

I hate how they wanted me to relearn skills (by spend skill points AGAIN) I've unlocked ages ago when "overhaul" launched. I'm happy I've given up on this game long time ago.

You hate how they forced you to literally press a few buttons when rejoining the game?

I recently rejoined. I logged in, opened the hero panel, clicked a few times and I was back to where I was beforehand.

Of all complaints this one is very petty. I played WoW for a very long time and every time I quit + rejoined I had to spend an hour configuring all of my addons. I will be doing the same thing in Legion. Astounding how someone who plays MMOs doesn't have the patience to click around a menu for 30 seconds.

[Kazgrel]

They need to throw money at whoever designed the Diablo 3 UI and get them on this game. The UI team for Diablo is the best in the business.

What part of the D3 UI do you have in mind? I find the interface of both games being great when in combat.

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You hate how they forced you to literally press a few buttons when rejoining the game?

I recently rejoined. I logged in, opened the hero panel, clicked a few times and I was back to where I was beforehand.

Of all complaints this one is very petty. I played WoW for a very long time and every time I quit + rejoined I had to spend an hour configuring all of my addons. I will be doing the same thing in Legion. Astounding how someone who plays MMOs doesn't have the patience to click around a menu for 30 seconds.

That's one reason I will likely never play wow again. It takes longer to download and set up add ons/UI mods than it does to install the game from scratch.

Meanwhile I can come back to GW2 (or D3 since it was brought up) and be up to speed in minutes.

[Deleted]

You hate how they forced you to literally press a few buttons when rejoining the game?

I recently rejoined. I logged in, opened the hero panel, clicked a few times and I was back to where I was beforehand.

Of all complaints this one is very petty. I played WoW for a very long time and every time I quit + rejoined I had to spend an hour configuring all of my addons. I will be doing the same thing in Legion. Astounding how someone who plays MMOs doesn't have the patience to click around a menu for 30 seconds.

I don't mean traits. I mean skills. Repaying for something I should own is not cool. It might be a small thing, but when you combine all the small things that annoy me in GW2, you can gather a whole bag.