I'd like to see Anet implementign a Talent System into GW2, as part of individual Character Progression Mechanic for the Game. Its basically Masteries, just with the difference, that these aren't universal Masteries which are for each person the exact same, but they are instead only useable per each individual Class instead.Talents are a way to strengthen the individual ROLES of each Class.Like I did have done this on my other earlier Class Progression Thread for increased Traitlines, I do this example here again with Thieves, to focus on only 1 Class, so that the length of the starting post stays as short as possible to make it more overviewable.You can write then naturally your ideas and thoughts about the topic in regard of any other not mentioned Class ;)

Thief Talents

Or so to say, the unique Masteries of a Thief I can think of, and for the start, each Class should have like 5 unique Talents to begin with, i think could be:

Eye of the Shadows

Enables Thieves to see hidden things, that only they can see in the World, which are hidden in the shadows, or by magic and can make them with this Talented revealed for the normal untrained eyes of others. This allows Thieves in Dungeons, Fractals and Raids to find unique Treasure Chests that contain unique rewards you will find only in these hidden chests, or hidden Shortcuts, or hidden Traps, that would stay otherwise invisible to the group

Rogue's Tongue

Enables to haggle with NPCs for discounts and get better prices for selling items to them by 15% and enables you to steal from NPC for a tiny chance of obtaining something random, if you steal successfully, while talking with NPC and distracting them.

Elegance of a Cat

Reduces for you your Fall Damage by 25% and makes you always perform a smooth Dodge Roll when you fall, not falling anymore flat on your belly, losing time this way. Makes your Movements also more silent, so that you won't be heard when you run, where other Classes would get heard and increases your Stealth Durations in dark places by 50%, whiel granting you Super Speed in Stealth

Burglar's Tools

Grants you access to a Grappling Hook tool, with that you can reach higher positions, where you won't get to with just jumping, and have not enough space for using a mount or where mounts simple aren't useable, so that you can reeach this way locations, that only you can reach. Includes also a Key Ring with Lockpicks, with that you can open closed things, that would stay otherwise closed for others, unless the door or chest is enchanted, then those lockpicks won't help and you need somebody else, who can remove enchants.

Disarmed Enemies

Whenever you Steal from intelligent species foes, you will disarm them now, what leaves them unable to attack for a while, until they regain their weapons.If the enemy was an unintelligent species, like a simple monster, then will steal lead to temporary reductions of their Power and Toughness Stats. Lets you use Steal Items now 1x more, before they get removed, if the attacked Enemy was from an intelligent species. (this includes other players in regard of PvP/WvW)

So, what are your thoughts about a talent System, so to say a specialized enhancement of the Mastery System that is designed this time specificly around each individual Class to strenthen each Class Role more, to expand each Classes individuality this way more?Would you like to see something like that gettingadded for better Character Progression in the future?If yes, what kind of ideas do you have for other Classes, while I focused myself here for my example only onto the Thief?

Burglar's Tool is all wrong.We should be able to use any single thing we find... aka junk... to try and open any chest we can with it. Just make it RNG on if we can break into the chest without actually having a key for the chest or not.Like the greater chest in Silverwastes. If I have scrap metal or any other junk item that I might make into a tiny little makeshift lockpick, I should have a chance to break into it.The highest the junk value is from NPCs, the higher chance is has on breaking into it.This means 20 copper junk will have a really low chance on breaking into it, but like the 1 gold or more items you get from black lion chests boosts the chances.

Hmm, I didn't think over junk items to be honest lol, but yes, this would work out naturally as well ;) good arguement ^^

As good as an idea these talents are they won't work in a MMO setting, everything you have listed sounds like it would be for a single player game.

But I'll play along with the idea:

For a warrior:

IntimidateIntimidate npcs to give lower prices and sell higher by 15%, also gives shout utilities a 10% chance to cause fear.

BreakdownThe warrior the ability to break open any chest but a high chance of also breaking the items inside (this is somthing you can do in Neverwinter Nights).

For Berserker - RageCauses the Berserker to enter a hissy fit were he start flailing his arms attacking everyone cause massive damage and kickback after Rage end s the Berserker will be put into a unbreakable stun that last 10 secounds.

For spellbreaker - Silance5% chance to cause spell casters Silance rendering them unable to cast spells. Unusable in wvw and pvp of cause.

Actally after wrighting themselves it's pretty fun thinking of unique and fun talents for classes.

Its clear that content designed for specificly only one class always looks like being designed for rather an offline game on the first look, but its the effects that matter.If you read my suggestions carefully, then you should realize, that I tried with my 5 Thief Talents to add in a few of them also something helpful or nice, that can be seen as "Group Support", so that others can also benefit from your Talents as a Thief, thus giving them a reason for why they should take you with you in the group.

Think about a Raid Group that can have due to a Thief in their Group have more rewards on the way due to finding some hidden unique chests that contain unique rewards you can get only from them, or which can safe them some time, by not having to fight of a larger amount of enemies potentially due to the thief knowing a hidden spot in the raid location, which will be useable as shortcut for your group to safe the time fighting those enemies off first.Or think about the Burglars Tools, where a Thief could infiltrate with the Grappling Hoch a place, where he could do something, like activating a trap, that will decimate foes for your group somewhere else, if used before startibg the battle, or weaken those enemies in a unique way, making this way the fights easier for your group.

A Thief, that can create longer lasting stealths in dark places surely will come in handy also too, especially when it increases significantly then the groups movement speed for that time as well, so that you can eventually reach some spots right in time, where you would be otherwise too slow to do something successfully undamaged, and thus losing your movement tempo, due to getting into combat, thus making such situations easier to do without complications.

In regard of your few ideas. I thought my concept of increased Traitlines to be only for the Core Classes, not for Elite Specializations as well too, because Elite Specializations are already there as Traitline as you require them currently to switch to said E Specs. So your ideas there would basically count all for the Warrior.E Specs would have access to those Talents due to them simply being part of the Core Class, so no need to differentiate here between Core and E Spec.

If I take myself time now to think over the Warrior next, I'd take such talents for the Warrior :3

Intimidate

Influences products to be sold from NPCs to you, so that they might sell you things, that they wouldn' normally sell to players and Shouts receive a 10% Chance to cause Fear (kind of upgraded your version to be more unique)

Strong Muscles

Enables you to lift up heavy things, that are too heavy for all other Classes, like Rock Boulders, big trees and whatever may lie in your way and block off your path, you can remove it out of your way with just your strong muscles of a true battle hardened warrior, letting you reach places this way, that wouldn't be open to explore otherwise for others or you

Iron Skin

Reduces Condition Durations for you in PvE by 15% and you become immune to Dazes, only Stuns, Knockdowns and Launches will still work on you as Hard CCsIncreases your Vitality and Healing Power for every Condition you suffer on in PvE.

Motivative Willpower

Increases drastically the Range of Banners and grants some Banner relevant unique new environmental Effects for you and your allies, while standing in their range.Banners with this Talent work now more like GW1 Wards, so that they will have also some negative effects on Enemies, if they stand in the Range of the Banners, like decreasing opposingly the Stats for the Enemy, which get boosted for your Allies.You can motivate now also NPCs to cheer them up, by just your presence being there , giving them Boosts, so that NPCs will have increased Health, and higher Stats plus Regeneration periodically every few seconds in your near. (this includes also Story related NPCs regarding Living Story, if a Warrior with this Talent is within you, then those NPCs will fight better and survive longer)

Leader of Legions

Gain access to a new warriror unique Mount, the War Beast, which is a ferocious huge lizard/salamander type of creature which has the ability to run on walls, so that you can reach this way unreachable locations and is able to see in the darkness, so that you can even lead away, where others would see nothing...While riding your unique Mount you will get access to unique Shout Skills worthy of a Leader of Legions with that you can enter a Combat, before getting off your Mount.

This is a really interesting idea. I think it needs some thinking to keep some parallelism between professions. Like, whatever profession you choose, you can have that NPC discount (with another name/lore). It doesn't need to be the very same, like "each profession will have a moving thing", just like thief has grappling hook while warrior gets a mount.

Still, I can't help but notice everything is really PvE focused. Not that I mind, but it'd also require a specific WvW mastery line, and maybe PvP too. It also needs some care as how it interacts with traits (your examples quote banners and shouts, which can already be traited).

I can see some drawbacks, but also work-arounds.

First of all it would be stupid to give only one class better npc prices. This would force every player to move their stuff to this class before selling, which would be a major annoyance. A possible work-around would be to give every class a similar trait (with different lore), so npc prices even out. This would make the +15% price the new default and to balance things ANet would have to nerf vendor prices by about 15% across the board.

Hidden short-cuts and treasures would require additional dev-work on all existing and upcoming content. While the thief would make these available to the entire squad, they're either good enough to be almost mandatory or just not worth the extra work. I'm not sure the engine supports effects that trigger when in a dark place / shadow. I remember making a race in Skyrim that would automatically gain invisibility when sneaking in a dark place and finding the sweet spot for a good light level was pretty difficult. I don't even know if in GW2 the server knows the light level or if it is just a client side thing.

Immunity to base mechanics (daze) sounds like a bad thing. You have to keep in mind that the class specific masteries would become the new "normal" way to play and everything has to be balanced around them. You can't just make an entire class immune to a specific condition or game mechanic. You would need to design specific mechanics only to counter them with the new mastery (kinda like HoT stealth or poison lore) which results in a +-0 play.

Immunity to base mechanics, currency increases (leading to hyper inflation), circumventing requirements (keys), etc work for some games, including MMOs that raise the level every few months and thereby introduce new mechanics, currencies and requirements, where old content gets obsolete. GW2 is not such a game. All old content has to stay relevant at all times. While the idea for profession based talents in GW2 is not inherently bad, your proposed implementation would be a disaster.

At first blush, the idea sounds great: the core masteries are rather lackluster. Fractal masteries have no value outside of fractals, legendary masteries have no value for those who don't want to unlock specific skins (or who don't like extended scavenger hunting).

However, the specific examples are problematic. One class shouldn't have access to more or even different loot than another: even if everyone in the party can share, people outside the party can't. And if the loot ends up being trivial or the same for each prof, then what's the point of investing the extra dev resources into adding the mechanic?

Similarly, buffing the base class in combat increases the complexity of balancing fights, classes, and 'roaming' (whether in open world or wvw).

It's quite possible that there's no specific class-oriented mastery that would fit well with GW2. However, it could work the other way around: make the acquisition of prof-mastery points dependent on skilled use of the prof. For example, for thieves, a puzzle that requires stealth or a battle that requires managing initiative just so. The mastery itself could include something like: allow thief to use heavy or light armor skins — it's not unique to thieves, but it is something of interest to many players.

tl;dr intriguing idea that's really hard to balance for a cooperative MMO, in which all profs are supposed to have equal opportunity to thrive.

Bluntly, I feel this isn't a good idea and there's no way this would ever be considered.

I feel the flavor added would not be welcomed by most players. Something else I thought about though, regarding profession-based talents, is a way to add a bit more spice, polish and intrigue is if we use such a system for dungeons and fractals. So the profession talents would all be flavored for additions to 5 man content aimed to alter paths, some loot, difficulty of some foes and things like that.

I'd probably say it should be limited to mid fractals or lower so less meta choices are made for these profession talents but the goal is to make the instances more fun and varied. What those specific talents could do? You could definitely add a few chests inside a dungeon that can be picked by thieves or finding the keys off of mobs, there are several puzzles that require teamwork to solve but perhaps an engineer can bypass them much easier. There could be NPCs along the way that are too afraid or unskilled to fight and a warrior can train and inspire them to come along and provide assistance or an injured and broken spirited NPCs that needs the sanctuary of a guardian's help.

If all fractals and dungeons were amended to facilitate many of these talents, then the aim for team composition would likely be for all unique professions.

I like the OP's suggestions, most if not all of the masteries I have encountered in other MMO's and so already have experience with, and considering that classes have become very homogeneous over the years it would be nice to create a wider table of unique differences once again, I personally enjoy the depth and immersion of systems such as this.

Its the point with these talents to make each class more individually unique.If it would have been the plan to give every class access to a talent, that lets them get also too +15% increased gain from selling stuff to npcs or buying from them something, then this effect cpould just be a generic normal Mastery that is shared between all your characters of your account, but then it is not anymore a class specific talent.

I can understand that many people don't like talents, if it sounds too focused on PVE only.. but it is easier to start of such a system first only with PvE in mind, see what works and from this point on think over it, how the workign stuff might get adapted, so that certain Talents that were previously limited to PvE only, might work as well for WvW.Does PvP really need such kinds of Talents? I dont think that PvP is really the game mode for such a classic typical RPG feature as like Talents. Ad if proper PvP games ever would have been in need for Character Progression mechanics like this, especially here in the GW2 pvp, where you have directly everythign on max when you enter PvP and everythign that ypou need to unlock for PvP is only equioment skins and some upgrades to increase your potential build diversity...

I personalyl think, its not in the duty of a Talent System to have to cover with its effects all game modes.No, I think its much better, if a Talent System stays focused completely on PvE only aspects and WvW will receive its very own WvW related class specific Talents (under a different term, lets call it "War Abilities",) that are then there designed for WvW only to define better the unique roles of each Class for WvW, which is a different type of idea that I support already for a longer while.With this differentiation does not then exist also later any confusion over effects for PvE and those for WvW,. when both sides woth provide their very own class specifics for each Mode, because not everythign that will work for PvE, can also work for WvW too and vice versa

those talents are not broken enough :cookie: u guys need to add easy access to damage and aoe or cleave spamable to them and boon stacking to make sense in this game.

Altough those talents would be fun if this game were deisgned in other way, not how this game is working.I actually can imagine burglar tools having its effect working pretty balanced on the WvW walls... but not in the lamewars gameplay.

@Aeolus.3615 said:those talents are not broken enough :cookie: u guys need to add easy access to damage and aoe or cleave spamable to them and boon stacking to make sense in this game.

Lol, can I take this as a compliment, that i did something right? xD

@Orpheal.8263, those tallents are actually more than fine, like i said i can imagine those talents working even on WvW, but they are not for this lamers game or how gw2 is builded for.Actually expect some of those mechanics(one or two) to be avaliable on the project TL, from ncsoft, wich is re-remake of lineage.

Something like this sounds like it would take the Devs 9 times as long to release content. I don't think the Devs will be changing Masteries in such a way.

Good luck.