Taril.8619

So... I had a thought aboot some changes to Feef weapons. Probably broken. Very likely to never happen. Inb4 Auto Attacks cost 7 Init. Backstab - Now deals 20% more damage against targets under 50% life.Reason - Purely so that Dagger MH PvE continues to use Backstabs when possible, rather than devolving into Heartseeker spam gameplay sub-25% life. Dancing Dagger - Cost reduced to 2 init. No longer applies Torment nor bounces. Now has a Flip Skill upon landing:Shadow Dance - Cost 1 init. Shadowstep to the target hit by Dancing Dagger, apply Cripple and Torment to enemies in an area.Reason - Powercreep has left D/D in the dust now everyone and their cat seems to have an actual gap closer while D/D still only has Heartseeker, which is no longer as potent as it once was. Death Blossom - Now deals 4 instances of damage/bleed.Reason - 1 dagger hits twice (Twisting Fangs) so 2 daggers should hit 4 times right? Pistol Whip - Cost reduced to 3 init (4 in WvW/PvP). No longer attacks with the sword. Now has a Flip Skill upon landing:Fencer's Flurry - Cost 2 init. Slashes repeatedly with your sword. Evades attacks for the duration.Reason - Increases usability by reducing the upfront cost especially if a target blocks/evades the initial stun and allowing the sword attacks to be saved for a brief time for an opportune moment to unleash them. Slot 1 Skills now become Dual Wield skills and get updated attack chains (Damage co-efficients and cast times TBD via balance testing):Reason - I dunno. It'd be pretty cool. Dagger/DaggerTwin Strike - Slashes foes with each blade. 2x damage. Max targets 2.Dual Fangs - Stabs foes with each blade inflicting Bleeding. 2x damage. 2x Bleed 2s. Max targets 2.Mutilate - Thrusts both blades into enemies inflicting Vulnerability and Poison. 1x Damage. 1x Vulnerability 4s. 1x Poison 4s. Max targets 2. Dagger/PistolDastardly Strike - Clubs the enemy with your pistol and then slashes with your blade, inflicts Weakness. 2x damage. 1x Weakness 2s. Max targets 2.Debilitating Fangs - Stabs the enemy and then shoots them in the leg, inflicts Cripple. 2x damage. 1x Cripple 2s. Max targets 2.Viper Strike - Shoots the enemy in the vitals and then stabs them with a poisoned blade inflicting Bleeding and Poison. 2x damage. 1x Bleed 2s. 1x Poison 4s. Max targets 2 Pistol/PistolTwin Shot - Shoot with both pistols. 2x damage.Barrage - Shoot with both pistols twice. 4x damage.Focused Shot - Fire both pistols and gain Might. 1x damage. 2x Might 5s. Pistol/DaggerDeadly Shot - Shoot at an enemies vitals and then throw a dagger at them causing bleeding. 2x damage. 2x Bleed 2s.Demon's Sting - Shoot an enemy and then throw several daggers at them causing Torment. 2x damage. 3x Torment 3s.Misery Strike - Throw several daggers at an enemy and then shoot them twice in the vitals. 1x damage + 2x damage. 3x Torment 3s. 2x Bleed 2s. Sword/DaggerFencer's Slice - Slash with your sword and dagger. 2x damage. Max targets 3.Steel Flurry - Throw daggers while slashing with your sword. 1x damage. Max targets 3.Bandit's Edge - Stab with your dagger, removing boons and slice with your sword. Sword strike deals bonus damage against enemies with no boons. 1x damage + 1x damage. Boons removed 2. Damage bonus 20%. Max targets 3. Sword/PistolDuelist's Strike - Slashes with your sword and then clubs the enemy with your pistol, inflicts Weakness. 2x damage. 1x Weakness 2s. Max targets 3.Rogue's Assault - Shoots your target with a bullet that ricochets to up to 2 additional targets then slashes them with your sword. 2x damage. Max targets 3.Scoundrel's Thrust - Shoots your target twice and then stabs them with your sword, gaining endurance with a successful strike. 3x damage. Endurance gained 15. Max targets 3.

It being better or not that what can be achieved on level 80 maps is irrelevant to my point. If you follow my posts in this thread, I initially made a comment in response to someone stating that Map Completion rewards being "Uncool" was a major factor in why Central Tyrian zones are less popular, by mentioning that at least they're better than what is achieved via playing a character whom already has 100% World Completion for which there is EVEN LESS reason to replay maps (Whilst more than likely, being a character you play more often than a bunch of freshly rolled toons being leveled up to 80 for 100% World Completion spam) To which someone pointed out the rewards they get from running a new toon through 100% World Completion (Which included a bunch of BL Keys), which was reinforcing my point about 100% World Completion characters have little reason to play old maps. If you stop adding in random stipulations like "By the time a character hits level 80" when I was commenting about doing World Completions and getting a plethora of Karma. Last I checked, you'll hit 80 way before you finish getting WORLD COMPLETION, by the nature of having to complete every single Central Tyrian map... Also, yes, my characters have independently funded their own Orr Temple vendor sets, without my capped toons earnings being factored in (Since they spend the Karma they earn regularly on LW items) Not everyone plays alts. Not everyone has room or desire to constantly create alts just to run old maps for keys. These factors limit player numbers. You multiply that "Single warm body" by the number of people who would end up doing this, say for example, a similar number of people as show up for Daily Achievement bonuses (Even accounting for the fact that most of the time people are split between multiple zones, i.e. Do events in zone X, do JP in zone Y and do a bounty in zone Z) and you have yourself a zone that is now alive and full of players. If you stop and talk with people, do events to progress Hearts when possible and otherwise actually interact with the game? Yeah. Just as alive as Daily Events does where people "Just rush from one event to the next on their roller beetle" If all you do is spam Silverwastes then no. But that's not taking into consideration things like not having the Map Completion bonuses being farmable. If ANet wanted to, they could put a daily or weekly event that opened up Map Completion bonuses (With extra loot) for players to earn on a specific map(s) and thus bring some population to said maps as people came to do their completion bonuses. Then they could add more Collections and Achievements. Problem solved (Except not really, given that some maps can be quite sparse when there isn't something like an event pushing people there. Especially when Collections and Achievements are once and done for the entire account and often can be completed via rushing from point to point on a Roller Beetle...)

Because characters whom already have 100% world completion get even less which makes it even more undesirable to go back to Central Tyria. I've made plenty of gold from selling the free Exotics from map completions or the Ecto's/Runes they salvaged into. Still better than a chance at getting some random scrap of cloth worth 20c that Map Rewards offers. I've been able to fuel several full sets of armour from Orr Temples, while having several hundreds of thousands left over just from map completion rewards. Which again, is better than what players with already 100% World Completion can get from Central Tyria (They're better off doing the Repeatable Hearts from LW3/4 or better yet farming Events in a LW3/4 zone that offers the Karma upgrade) Better than 0% chance at a BL key. People still farm level 10 PS quests just for that 1 key a week. Which is underwhelming and tepid gameplay. Why wouldn't people do those maps for chances for additional keys?

This really wouldn't do a whole lot. Outside some fun builds like Perma-Shroud Reaper. Since typically, your Shroud will deplete in ~10 seconds anyway (Sometimes a bit faster if you take damage, sometimes a bit slower if for example, you're cleaving with Reaper #1's)

key farms, map completion reward have a pretty high chance of getting BLC key, I got 14 keys the last time i ran through with an alt toon to get gift of exploration these days with power creep and mounts it can be done so much faster, and there's no weekly cap as I'm aware of, so you probably can have 2 world completion done in a week Though, that just reinforces my point. Characters whom already have 100% world completion, don't get so much out of going back. It's about rolling new alts to 100% world completion to get all the nice shinies such as a decent chance at BLC keys, guaranteed items (Exotics in the higher level zones) and a plethora of Karma. Existing characters are stuck just spamming events to maybe get some crafting mats from Map Rewards (Not map completion)

Stuff like additional world bosses and events doesn't necessarily have to progress a timeline. There could simply be additional stuff that happens within the same time bubble that they're stuck in. I think one of the issues isn't that Transmutation Charges aren't cool, but more that many people, mostly veterans, have already got 100% world completion and thus they don't get ANYTHING for going back and doing old zone stuff except the occasional Map Reward. For example, on my Thief, I had 100% world completion before HoT even released. In the years since then, what reason have I had to go running through Central Tyria on my Thief outside a handful of Mastery Points plopped into various maps? If I want more map completion rewards such as Transmutation Charges, I have to make new characters to complete maps with rather than playing my Thief...

Even that is arguable, given how the ridiculous energy costs of the class pretty much makes Charged Mists nigh mandatory because 50 energy after a swap when all utilities seem to cost 30-40 energy EACH is absurd so getting that 75 energy after a swap at least lets you use 2 skills before you're dead in the water waiting on regen... Energy really needs a complete rework. It's ridiculously punishing when trying to do something as ludicrous as using weapons skills and a utility like can you imagine? A class being able to use their skills? How stupidly broken would that be? Oh wait... Throw in the fact that Glint just bypasses the entire Energy system because lel why not (Making it the dominant Legend in anything but min-max DPS Raiding where you use all of 2 utilities which is the Upkeep skills of Shiro and Kalla) The way Energy works really just needs to be redone. So that utility skills (Such as Stunbreaks) can be usable, without also having to cost your ability to actually attack. Honestly, I've been pondering Rev getting a dual resource system. Energy and Pips. Where Energy is spent by utilities and generates Pips and Pips are spent by weapon skills and generate Energy. Meaning, your usage of skills flows into one another and allows for more diverse choices based on what is needed at the time (As opposed to "You have 4 weapon skills and 4 utilities. Better pick which ONE you want to use your entire resource bar on lelelelelel")

Yeah, even with reading about their background (You can ask the LW1 recap lady about each of them) it feels really awkward to be shoved alongside them since you really have no clue who they are or why they are seemingly replacing Destiny's Edge (Given that at the end of your PS it's DE that you're with to take out Zhaitan) Heck, even after HoT and LW3, I still have no clue about most of them. Like, who the heck is Braham (Other than Eir's son. A revelation that comes as a shock to most people, despite his surname being "Eirsson" literally following the traditional Norse surname of saying that he's the Son of Eir)? Why is he with me? Like, he gets some motivation AFTER HoT (Then becomes Emo Braham, the worst character ever) but before then? Rox? All I know is she REALLY want's Braham's D. Marjory? Uhh... Apparently she's Kasmeer's GF? Though she doesn't come across as caring that much about her... Kasmeer? She's like an Ex-Noble because her father got caught/tricked or something? Taimi is the only one I understand, since she's a decent character and has a lot of time spent understanding her background and motives and fleshing out her character (Improved by the fact that she's also prominent in PoF) Actually, the main cities had not partaken in the fight against Zhaitan. It was fought entirely by the Pact, which was a gathering of the 3 Orders - The Order of Whispers, The Vigil and The Dormand Priory. These orders are not manned by the main army of any city, but are filled by soldiers whom CHOOSE to join up with them in order to explicitly fight against the Elder Dragons. Each cities army is instead focused on defending their actual cities and their realm against the local threats (The ones you'll do Hearts and Events in zones against). I.e. Charr are dealing with Ascalonian ghosts and the Branded, Sylvari are dealing with Risen and the Nightmare Court, Norn are dealing with the Sons of Svanir and Jormag's influence as a whole, Asura are dealing with the Destroyers and Inquest, Humans are dealing with Banditos and Centaurs. Which is why they were questioning helping. They are barely holding off these threats with their full military might AND not to mention 3 cities are fighting against Elder Dragons anyway (Branded = Kralkatorrik, Jormag = Jormag, Destroyers = Primordus), so why should they divert any military away from defending their own citizens and the Elder Dragons that are on their doorstep to go fight against this other Elder Dragon that's halfway across the world from them? Hence why your PC has to make the arguments that include how far Mordremoth's reach has extended (Reaching into Ascalon territory already) and how it's going to be a major threat to ALL cities due to how it will be able to attack any stronghold or settlement whenever it wants (Even being able to attack them ALL simultaneously)... Though, it does feel like the attack from Mordremoth's Shadow during the meeting did the most to convince the leaders... Being a first hand view of how pointless their defences are against Morty given that in the middle of the Sylvari capital, with military envoys of all the races alongside leaders (Whom in the case of the Charr, Norn and Humans are no slouches in combat) that they were basically at the mercy of the Commander to fight back the Mordrem threat that just appeared out of nowhere. Well, Trahearne wouldn't show up, because he was off leading the Pact and while it's not made particularly clear (Until LW3) but your PC has left the Pact which is devoted to fighting the Elder Dragons, so you can form a new guild with the new characters which is dedicated to fighting the Elder Dragons... Yeah, I don't know either... While the other members of Destiny's Edge are off serving their leaders, given that aside from Caithe, they all hold pretty important positions (Rytlock is a Tribune and seems like Smodur's right hand, Logan is Jennah's top military general, Eir is important enough to Knut that she can go talk to him whenever) though, Eir and Caithe both have a tendency to go off and do their own thing. Eir because it's a very Norn trait to seek personal glory and Caithe because... Well, you've seen her past, she's dealing with a lot (Bearing in mind she seems to be in love with Faolain, the leader of the Nightmare Court which doesn't help things either) Actually, for HoT and onwards, the MC does have a voice. So you no longer have someone stuck to your butt just to make random comments when you progress through stories as your Character can make their own comments. Story tends to make more sense though, especially since throughout HoT you're mostly on your own and just with the remainder of the group that didn't trek into the heart of maguuma in the airships. That said, Emo Braham does show up and he's the worst...

I'm not entirely sure what this has to do with my post... Irregardless of if Core is Balanced or not, you cannot simply buff Core without indirectly buffing the E-Specs. Since E-Specs have access to everything that Core has. If the case is that Core is too weak, then what will still need to happen is to bring E-Specs DOWN to the same level as Core and then buff Core which will simultaneously buff the E-Specs. As that will achieve the desired result of all 3 sub-classes being in a similar power level, whilst not making anything broken as a result (While also keeping the class on par with other classes) Of course, the idea of Trade-offs should still err less towards stat debuffs (Such as is the case for Berserker and Scrapper) and more towards trading class mechanics for functionally different ones. So you're not "Nerfing" an E-Spec, but rather you're having the E-Spec become its own thing, not "Core but with extra goodies"

The issues with the idea of "Just buffing Core" are that: 1) It leads to power creep, especially if new E-Specs are released that are in a stronger state than Tempest (Since, do you continue to buff Core up to that level?) 2) It is exceedingly difficult to buff Core, without indirectly buffing all E-Specs that have access to literally everything in Core. E-Specs can use all Core weapons, all Core utilities and any combination of 2 Core specializations. So what would you buff to buff Core and Core alone? The only suggestions I've seen have been about adding a "Core E-Spec" either as a replacement for the 3rd Spec (Meaning all builds would be 2 Core Specs and 1 E-Spec) or moving E-Specs into an independent 4th Specialization slot (Meaning all builds would be 3 Core specs and 1 E-Spec) and then putting all the buffs to Core into that "Core E-Spec" Meanwhile, it still would be better design for E-Specs to be tuned as to be something different to Core. Neither more or less powerful, but opening up a new way to play or a new type of build. Through the "Tradeoff" of having a different class mechanic replacing the Core one (Such as how Scourge has F skills replacing the Shroud transformation or how Chrono has unique Shatters replacing the Core ones) and/or having the traitline + utilities focused on a unique build (Such as how Druid has a focus on healing allies which is different to most of their Core Specs that are purely damage focused)

Would be an interesting way to improve their usability in PvE. It would also allow for some more consistent proccing of Death Nova. A potential solution to this could be to have the Bone Minions leap at your target before their detonation. So that they have mobility on their active command like the other 2 melee minions (Shadow Fiend has the shadowstep and Flesh Golem has its charge). Also, it would be kind of hilarious to be flinging exploding fleshy monstrosities at people xD

Yeah... It triggers me every time I go to do Daily LW3 maps and there are those Mercenary Pistoleers whom are P/P Mesmers. Who even get to use Unload but stacks Confusion per hit... Yup. At the moment, Pistol is pretty much focused around that stun. That and it's the only alternative OH for a Condi build. So, a power build will typically only use Pistol for PvP and if they want the extra breakbar damage in PvE.

You keep saying this and talk about "Typical Necromancers have X, Y and Z" meanwhile, I've played equal numbers of games to the ones you've mentioned that DON'T portray Necromancers in that specific way (Heck, even in some of the games you've listed they're not portrayed in the way you consider "Typical") The thing is not shoehorning a particular theme into a class, but a mechanic. A Thief that heals can totally work though. They can do things like steal health potions from the enemy to give to their allies Healing Seed. Provide stealth to allies to prevent them from being attacked (Also, they could apply healing to allies they stealth Merciful Ambush and Shadow Refuge), they could shadowstep to enemies and provide a pulse of AoE healing to allies Shadow Saviour or could even apply life leeching poisons to allies weapons Leeching Venoms Oh wait, all those examples are from THIS GAME. Also, nothing about Necromancer's mechanics are specific. Hence why there's such a range of portrayals of Necromancer among fantasy. Some using corpses, some not. Some being tanky, some not. Some raise the dead, some do not. Again, the only thing that is specific to Necromancer and the only thing that is required for something to be a Necromancer, is the use of "Death Magic" in whatever form that might take. Be it something like GW1's raising of hoards, PoE's summoning of Zombies/Skeletons/Wraiths/Burning Skulls, City of Villains Dark Magic powerset that is standard Blaster/Corrupter damage kit with procs of Blindness, Dungeons of Dredmor's ability to turn into a Lich or even Dragon Age: Origin's entirely CC orientated Death Magics that don't do anything offensive, they just control enemies by putting them to sleep or stunning them and there's no raised dead. Just like there's nothing specific to any other class outside of the theme of their abilities i.e. Warrior wearing heavy armour and whacking stuff with a melee weapon, Wizard/Sorceror casting spells, Bards singing songs/playing instruments, Thieves stealing stuff, Paladins being pretentious jerks using light themed spells alongside martial weapons and heavy armour etc. Hence why portrayals of all these other classes also differ heavily between games, because class designers have different visions of how the class will work in their game and sometimes they combine multiple classes together taking bits from each, sometimes they copy an existing design as a template (Such as a D&D class from a specific edition) and other times they just try and think of stuff that's cool and then fit it to work.

Mechanically speaking, you can easily turn ANY mechanic into one that fits another class. You just have to think up some thematic way of getting the same end effect. Hexes? > Rogue uses Poison > Warrior uses debilitating Shout > Paladin smites with divine justice > Wizard uses arcane jiggery pokery etc. Health as a resource? > Rogue doesn't have "Health" they have "Luck" and once their luck runs out, they get hit and die. Hence, they can spend this luck for power > Warrior your standard Berserker archetype > Paladin makes and offering to the divine (Think: the practice of self flagellation which has been prevalent in many religious cultures) > Wizard casts spells so powerful they drain their very life essence etc. Minions? > Rogue calls in their Thief Guild buddies > Warrior calls in their Fighter guild buddies > Paladin summons up holy spirits > Wizard conjures elementals etc. No mechanic is inherently related to a class. It all comes down to how you colour it and what lore you use to substantiate it. Hence why "Zergling Necro" is literally just Mesmer. It has taken the mechanic and made it pink with butterflies and voila, it's now suitable for a Mesmer. Classes are entirely defined by how their skills are animated and justified. Which is why I've played plenty of Warlocks that summon Demons that play identically to Necromancers just instead of Zombies and Skeletons being summoned and "Death magic" spells, it's Demons and "Demon magic". I've also played some Wizard types that summon Elementals and use "Elemental magic". Just as I've played Wizards and Sorcerors that use their health as a resource (Notably, in Warhammer Online where Bright Wizard and Sorceror classes unique mechanic was that as they cast spells, they build up Power and the higher their power the greater the chance for spells to "Backfire" and deal damage to themselves with increasing damage too but at the same time, the stronger their spells would be) I've also played things like Engineers that "Hex" because they throw vials of acid and poison as well as bombs to debilitate enemies (Sometimes these Engineers could even build small machines that could run after enemies and nibble at them until they were detonated by the Engineer), even Bards have "Hex-like" effects through debilitating songs (Such as Dirge in EQ2) as well as the occasional poison coated dagger. So, complaining that a class doesn't "Mechanically feel like a class" is silly. Given that literally any mechanic can be utilized by literally any class because nothing is directly related. At best, there are some stereotypical archetypes that lean on specific tropes (Such as Necromancers raising the dead) but that's not a necessity and stems a lot from how popular Tolkein's fantasy design became (Since it has influenced a large portion of fantasy, from class archetypes to races (I.e. Elves are tall, slender, beautiful, Dwarfs are stout, muscular and 90% beard, Human heroes always have an Elf GF, Orcs are ugly, savage beasts etc) as well as the minutia of various classes such as how Archers are typically Elves because for some reason dexterity/agility is considered the stat needed to use a bow as opposed to strength to actually draw a powerful bow, or how Wizards often have robes, pointy hats and a staff (Ignoring the fairly notable part of the trilogy where Gandalf fights a Balrog with a SWORD but whatever...)) as well as influence from D&D (Which often parallels Tolkein's designs)

What people? People who've explicitly played the exact games you have and no others that show Necromancers in a multitude of different lights (Including actually in games you've listed such as PoE which doesn't necessarily fit any of your classifications of "Necromancer". Heck, I've played several seasons as a Zombie build where I summoned one giant Zombie who gained my Strength so I stacked Strength out the wazoo and thus was one of my tankiest characters, running around with this giant zombro who pummelled things) Not to mention, class crossover. Mesmer has the playstyle of a "Zerglings" type character, in the way that they constantly pump out weak AI (Clones in their case) that rush at enemies and in many cases stack debuffs on their targets until it's time for the Mesmer to blow them up. That's literally a Necromancer trope build that just happens to not be on Necromancer (Though, Necro still has some potential with it, what with Death Nova and Bone Minions, though with less support than general Mesmer gameplay) A lot of what you state is intrinic of Necromancer, often finds its way to "Sorcerer" archetypes (Hexes, Blood magic, Dead zones etc) that have nothing to do with "Death" at all and are just Mages like Elementalist but with some emo spells. I've played plenty of games where Necromancer have few tough minions (City of Villains, Everquest, Path of Exile, WoW's Death Knight can qualify as a Necromancer) I've played plenty of games where Necromancer summons vast hoards. I've played plenty of games where Necromancers used Hexes and could support. I've played plenty of games where Necromancers were very selfish and were basically a 1 man party who just raised whatever they needed. All that makes a "Necromancer" is having Death magic. That's literally the meaning of the name. Necro meaning Death. Mancer meaning practicioner of magic.

Target specific enemies above all others. Mordrem Snipers/Stalkers like to hit hard. Tendrils do a PBAoE that can one-shot a Berserker Thief. Bristlebacks can channel an attack on you that will likely kill you if they start it (As it will follow you even if you stealth, or go behind a wall...) In PoF, Marksmen/Weaponeers can hit pretty hard (They're more sniper enemies...). Basically, if the enemy wants to stand very far back, or right behind you... Stab 'em first! Also, while Signet of Malice is the meta choice for Thief, I find that Withdraw provides better sustain because it also works as an additional dodge (Also, cleanses Torment which some enemies stack up on you pretty quick) not to mention with no cast time for its burst heal it can come in clutch as full glass cannon where your health pool might not last through a 1s+ cast time heal. An Offhand Pistol can also provide a lot of defence as always, due to Black Powder providing a bunch of Blinds from the Smoke Field it creates and if you just auto attack while spamming Black Powder, many things just can't hit you.

According to their post: "As part of the fix, we have restored all EU player accounts to their standing at roughly 2:40 AM PT on May 11. " Sauce: https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/105323/the-eu-servers-are-currently-down-for-maintenance#latest

The Year is 5973. HL3 is due to release tomorrow. GW2 EU servers are still down. :(

We kinda already do have player housing with the Home instance(s) which you can get various Nodes for (Such as Gathering nodes or LW nodes) The only thing that's really missing from them is the ability to decorate them and some ameneties that would be useful (Such as a Bank, TP access, Crafting stations, the WP dude who lets you travel to any City etc) - Though, such things are hard to implement, given that they sell tickets to places like the ship in Gendarran Fields that have all the ameneties for Gems (In the form of temporary access no less. While the Home Instance TP they sell for Gems is permenant) That is, unless they start selling stuff like "2 Week Bank Access Ticket" to let you have these ameneties temporarily... But at that point, you're basically paying more just to have a slightly different background to the airship/lily of elon (Which, to be fair, LoE is permenant too making Airship tickets pointless anyway...) Beyond that, and for purely cosmetic stuff... They'd have to implement the groundwork to allow for placing of objects in the home instances. Presumably they'd also have to figure out if they want Home Instances to be character specific or account wide as well as if they'd let you put the same item in all Home Instances or just the one races (Meaning to fill out all 5 races Home Instances, you'd have to buy 5x everything you wanted across each of them) and THEN they'd have to spend time developing the items to put into them. Given that they're producing more Outfits these days because making individual armour sets is "Too much work" (Due to Light/Medium/Heavy armour having different frames while Outfits are a 1-Frame-Fits-All deal) I'm not sure if they'd be able to justify the work needed to get such a thing going.

The limitation is due to the fact that they can use kits. Meaning, they can have up to 5 additional weapon sets worth of skills available to them (With Kits having the added advantage of not having a 10s CD to swap between) The trade off for this potential, is only being able to use a single weapon set during combat. It is a similar reasoning for Elementalist too, whom also cannot swap weapons in combat due to their 4x weapon skills from their Attunements.

There's plenty of classes whom have E-Specs that do the same thing that their core class does. But better. Elementalist's core mechanic is swapping attunements. Tempest gets the additional ability to Overload attunements while Weaver gets to combine 2 attunements at once. Tempest: you get a longer cooldown, so you can't switch as quickly.Weaver: you can do 2 elements at once, but to change the second element to what you want you have to switch more - all the while having useless combinations. So you lose a lot. In fact, weaver is ultra-clunky. So 'better' does not apply. Not on ele.And yet... Every competitive build runs either Weaver or Tempest. Because they outperform Core. Implying that yes, even with their "Tradeoff" with clunkiness/additional swap cooldown, they still outperform Core.

Honestly, what should be the case is that E-Specs should focus on providing something different than the core. Such as having a completely different functionality of the core mechanic (Such as is the case for Chrono and Scourge, the former getting different shatters and the latter having Shroud become a series of F skills) or providing a new build type for a class (Such is the case for Druid, having a spec and weapon that provides a lot of party support utility) Rather than trying to slap on stat nerfs to elites to stop their outright superior version of the same mechanic making them outright better. Since, if the E-Specs are focused on a completely new build type for a class (Such as Druid) or provide a new take on the classes core mechanic, then there only needs to be a level of equiable balance between E-Specs and Core to then have people pick a build based on what they prefer to play as opposed to right now where you 99.99% of the time pick an E-Spec because it's outright stronger. Of course, such balance is also marred by the nature of how many Core weaponsets are absolute garbage while many E-Spec weapons are much better designed (Or help round out a build archetype that doesn't have 2 weapon sets available in its core because some classes don't have a very good selection of weapons for both Power and Condi based builds), meaning that even if Core and E-Specs ended up being equal and only had different gameplay mechanics, you'd still end up picking E-Specs a lot of the time just to get a better set of weapons (I.e. Necro for a Power build has... Axe/Focus + GS and for Condi build has Scepter/Torch +... ???)

There's plenty of classes whom have E-Specs that do the same thing that their core class does. But better. With very few being actual sidegrades that provide something a bit different for the class. For example: Elementalist's core mechanic is swapping attunements. Tempest gets the additional ability to Overload attunements while Weaver gets to combine 2 attunements at once. Warrior's core mechanic is about gaining Adrenaline to fuel Burst skills. Berserker instead has Berserk skills and Spellbreaker gets Full Counter in addition to normal Burst skills. Ranger's core mechanic is about having a pet to deal damage. Soulbeast also has a pet to deal damage, but can also merge to get better personal stats (Also, fully heal the pet) Necro's core mechanic is about building up Life Force to then enter Shroud which drains it while providing a new stronger weaponset. Reaper does the same thing but with a stronger weaponset. Guardian's core mechanic is having 3 virtues that are essentially Signets. Both Dragonhunter and Firebrand have the literal same mechanic, only stronger. Thief's core mechanic is being able to steal items of enemies. Daredevil does the same thing but with a shorter CD unblockable steal that gives 50 endurance (At the cost of its range). Deadeye gets stronger steals and the Malice mechanic. Engineer's core mechanic is having toolbelt skills. Both Scrapper and Holo also have toolbelt skills and have far stronger F5 skills than is obtained by Elite skills. Mesmer's core mechanic is shattering their clones. Mirage has literally the same shatters (Literally, all Mirage does is provide a different dodge that lets you use Ambush skills. That's the entire E-Spec.) Revenant's core mechanic is invoking a Legend. Both Herald and Renegade do the same thing, but have a unique stronger Legend they can use. Essentially, Druid and Scourge are the only ones that do something notably different. Druid provides a completely different playstyle to core Ranger and typically builds in a different way (More support than DPS). While Scourge provides a unique mechanic for utilizing Life Force that isn't just entering a Shroud that drains it over time while replacing your skills. With maybe Chrono being a possible include here, given that it provides unique Shatters, which have a different behaviour (Doesn't shatter from self) and some different effects (F1 dealing more damage to Slowed enemies, F2 having built in CDR, F3 also providing Slow and F4 being a massive DPS CD as opposed to a bunch of Distortion)

Though, unfortunately, it's a trend among modern day MMO's to really devolve Tanking and Healing roles into their bare minimum... Which often makes a lot of them no better than GW2 and it's very crude system it has had to implement in order to be able to make things like Fractals and Raids somewhat functional. Too many games these days have you "Tank" by sitting there in "Tank Stance" and that's about it. Since they automatically give you like +1000000 threat modifier and then mechanics are "When boss does big attack, you press CD button" and the rest of the time, you play exactly like a DPS (Only with crap damage since otherwise DPS players cry when you outperform them...) While in the same vein, they also have been stripping down healing mechanics too, with reduced need to spot heal, cleanse, apply shields/barriers and more emphasis on "That person will live until the next AoE, so I won't heal them until I do my AoE heal" - With some still using small AoEs that need people to stack for, while others have given AoE's such large radii that no-one has to think about positioning ever... It's one of the core things that's missing from Trinity games these days. Devs have catered too much towards DPS and have forgotten how to make things actually interesting for Tanks and Healers, as a result they end up trying to make Tanks and Healers play like DPS but with occasional extra buttons to press (Defensive CD's, AoE Heals respectively) I've played most MMO's. Many of which, throughout their lifespan. Back in the day, healing was more interactive. With cleanses, single target heals, resource management, cooldown managment and a plethora of other mechanics (Such as back in TBC era WoW where Paladin could use Hand of Sacrifice to take damage in order to break a Sleep effect a boss applied and continue healing while the big AoE was being charged up) These days, much more focus is on unavoidable AoE damage and being responded by having healers spam AoE heals...

The only "Nerfing" I'd do, would be to alter some stuff to being baseline. Such as Lingering Curse's ability change for Scepter and actually making Scepter have condi's that last for any amount of time ever. Otherwise, it'd be more along the lines of buffing Blood/Death up somewhat. Maybe with an overall rework to specs as a whole, things might get shuffled a bit. (For example, one could argue that traits such as Death's Embrace, Siphoned Power and Close to Death thematically fit into Death Magic what with being centred around things being closer to death.) However, such a thing might simply shift the power to 2 different specs to be dominant... True, at best with the current Death Magic specialization, one might be able to create a "Tank" build, if there was an E-Spec to support it. But that's not really a particularly enticing option as opposed to a more general purpose spec. I'd argue that Sinister Shroud, Soul Barbs, Death Perception and Dhuumfire are all major DPS modifiers. One could also argue that Gluttony and Soul Battery are significant DPS increases due to how increased Shroud uptime impacts overall damage output. Yeah, Curses is rather jank. Not helped by the fact that Scepter is really bad without Lingering Curse and it's literally the only MH Condi weapon that Necromancer has so it's not as if you can lean on another option in lieu of the trait...