Elite Specialisation Iconography & Readability

[Mungrul.9358]

This one's bugged me since returning to the game in 2020 after a prolonged absence.

Basically, once you break away from the core professions, it's incredibly difficult to discern what elite spec a player is running (and let's face it, every player is running an elite spec), thanks to how indistinct each elite spec icon is.

There's no point trying to recognise what spec a player is playing by silhouette, as cosmetics make the very concept laughable, so your next best bet is to check the icon next to their nameplate.

 

And unless you've actually played the spec in question, I doubt there's many players that could name the spec by icon.

None of them have any call-back to the core profession icon, and a lot just turn in to amorphous Rorschach test blobs (hello Firebrand), and/or mirror other elite spec icons quite closely (hello Vindicator / Spellbreaker and Weaver / Scourge). This is compounded once you remove colour from the elite spec icons.

It's a complete mess from a graphic design point of view.

 

More often than not, I end up highlighting a player and seeing what buffs they have to see if those tip me off as to what spec they're running. It's that bad.

Is there any possibility someone at ANet could give these icons a refresh?

 

Heck, at this point in time, the core icon with the first letter of the elite spec overlayed in a corner would be more readable than this mess.

[Ashantara.8731]

I agree: new skill icons have gotten worse over the years with each expansion. You need to play the specs to actually memorize what they do as the icons themselves are often generic and don't provide much of a hint (if any).

Some professions are worse than others in that regard (you can basically see that different artists have worked on them), and I think a big issue is the fact that sometimes the artist tries to cramp too much symbolism into the icon rendering it completely "unreadable" in regard of its meaning.

Icons need to be simple and clear.

Edited January 20, 2022 by Ashantara.8731

[yoni.7015]

I can name every spec by icon and I am pretty sure the vast majority of players can do that as well. that’s really not difficult. 

Edited January 20, 2022 by yoni.7015

[Mungrul.9358]

Just now, yoni.7015 said:

I can name every spec by icon, that’s really not difficult. 

Bully for you 🙄

[Svarty.8019]

[Oh my bad, I was thinking about something else].

 

Edited January 20, 2022 by Svarty.8019

[Danikat.8537]

I've always had trouble recognising the elite spec icons and matching them up to core professions, but I thought it was mainly me.

Since I've been doing Fractals more, and therefore spent more time around people who care and ask about other people's builds than I usually do, I've noticed a lot of other people having the same problem. For example I'm using a soulbeast and I've had a few people ask why I'm not using an elite spec - the icon in the party window shows a pawprint and surely that's the icon for core ranger? They're often surprised when I say both the core profession and the elite spec have pawprint icons, but they're slightly different designs.

The other one I remember is someone thinking the dragonhunter icon is firebrand, because it looks sort of like stylised flames.

But there's also several people simply asking what profession someone is, presumably because the icon gives them no clue at all.

I'm not sure what the solution could be though. For me colour coding them would help, but I'm not sure if it's practical to do that everywhere the icons appear and it's no help for anyone who is colour blind (especially with the similar ones - like rangers and necromancers with their slightly different shades of green).

Edited January 20, 2022 by Danikat.8537

[Trejgon.9367]

I like to think I can recognize all espec class icon, but then I get them wrong way to often for comfort (the most stark one, was me seeing I think it was holosmith and thinking it was dead-eye by icon? or other way around.... 🤔

That being said I am not good sample here, as I have advantage of having years to learn base icons, then years to learn hot icons, then some time to learn pof icons as well - basically all the time between (base game adn) expansions, was the time I had to memorize new set. I guess it would not be this easy for someone who just started playing in pof era....

[Mungrul.9358]

3 minutes ago, Lord Trejgon.2809 said:

That being said I am not good sample here...

On the contrary, if you've been playing for years,  and yet still have trouble discerning what icon represents which specialisation, I think yours is a perfect example to illustrate just how bad these icons are.

[Trejgon.9367]

2 minutes ago, Mungrul.9358 said:

On the contrary, if you've been playing for years,  and yet still have trouble discerning what icon represents which specialisation, I think yours is a perfect example to illustrate just how bad these icons are.

Ah well if you look at it this way, then I guess - but for that I could raise an argument that the ones I tend to confuse are the ones I don't see that often. I don't have issues with icons of classes that are in general meta 🙂 

[Bakeneko.5826]

I fail to understand how you cannot learn icons just by playing the game? They aren't that hard to remember

[Mungrul.9358]

2 minutes ago, Bakeneko.5826 said:

I fail to understand how you cannot learn icons just by playing the game? They aren't that hard to remember

Again, bully for you 🙄

[Bakeneko.5826]

1 minute ago, Mungrul.9358 said:

Again, bully for you 🙄

You play the game from at least 2013, you had ~3-4 years to learn base icons, 4-ish years by now to learn HoT and 2-ish to learn PoF, 27 icons over 9 years is not hard... I really dont understand how some people fail to learn class icons that can be seen daily in lfg, party, squad or just by targeting in a game, they play regularly

[Sobx.1758]

3 hours ago, yoni.7015 said:

I can name every spec by icon and I am pretty sure the vast majority of players can do that as well. that’s really not difficult. 

,

29 minutes ago, Bakeneko.5826 said:

I fail to understand how you cannot learn icons just by playing the game? They aren't that hard to remember

Same, I don't understand how espec icons are supposed to be somehow hard to recognize. Most of them aren't even in the same ballpark as the especs of the other classes.

Edited January 20, 2022 by Sobx.1758

[Khisanth.2948]

I am just going to assume this is an indirect complaint about how terrible the EoD icons are. 😉

Fortunately there isn't really anything in game that actually requires knowing them anyway so ... meh.

[AgentMoore.9453]

6 hours ago, Mungrul.9358 said:

Heck, at this point in time, the core icon with the first letter of the elite spec overlayed in a corner would be more readable

I'd be okay with that.

Ship it as a toggle so people could have (or not have) it handy, and that'd clarify quite a bit. GW1 had a form of this that was helpful, though in GW1 it was a bit easier because you just had the primary classes rather than a whole pool of elite specs taking up various letter combos. For a text distinction to work, it'd have to be unique per spec and easily recognizable - so maybe a tooltip that appears when you hover your cursor over someone's class icon might be the way to go with something like this.

[Mungrul.9358]

2 hours ago, Bakeneko.5826 said:

You play the game from at least 2013, you had ~3-4 years to learn base icons, 4-ish years by now to learn HoT and 2-ish to learn PoF, 27 icons over 9 years is not hard... I really dont understand how some people fail to learn class icons that can be seen daily in lfg, party, squad or just by targeting in a game, they play regularly

You ever do tech suipport?

Those times when a customer has made the team aware of a problem, they've been able to identify and replicate it, and all of the team except one are looking for a solution?

That one team member who's saying  "WORKS ON MY MACHINE"?

 

That's you, that is.

[Naxos.2503]

The only ones that legit give me trouble are Weaver and Mirage. The fact both are very popular picks doesn't help. All of the others are rather distinct I find. If it helps, add colors ? 

As far as people telling you that learning icons is not that hard, I feel that answering "Bully for you" really doesn't really help either. Your remark about the icons being unreadable is subjective. So is their opinion. If you want to make a remark that pertain to You, customer support is better suited. A forum is for discussion, opposite opinion is not only expected, but normally desirable.

Edited January 20, 2022 by Naxos.2503

[Ashantara.8731]

6 hours ago, Danikat.8537 said:

For example I'm using a soulbeast and I've had a few people ask why I'm not using an elite spec - the icon in the party window shows a pawprint and surely that's the icon for core ranger? They're often surprised when I say both the core profession and the elite spec have pawprint icons, but they're slightly different designs.

Ohhh, this thread is not about the elite specs' skill icons but profession icons? 😂 Okay, I think I have been sleep deprived lately.

@OP: I find the elite specs' profession icons easy to memorize and recognize.

[Sobx.1758]

53 minutes ago, Mungrul.9358 said:

You ever do tech suipport?

Those times when a customer has made the team aware of a problem, they've been able to identify and replicate it, and all of the team except one are looking for a solution?

That one team member who's saying  "WORKS ON MY MACHINE"?

 

That's you, that is.

And what about those times where almost nobody has any problem with differentiating class icons that are clearly not-even-close to how the others look, but one person starts pretending they're all the same, so they need to be changed?

"that's you, that is."

 

In what way are espec icons similar enough to make you confused about what class/spec they correspond?

[Bakeneko.5826]

1 hour ago, Mungrul.9358 said:

You ever do tech suipport?

Those times when a customer has made the team aware of a problem, they've been able to identify and replicate it, and all of the team except one are looking for a solution?

That one team member who's saying  "WORKS ON MY MACHINE"?

 

That's you, that is.

No. There is very little overlap in class icons. It would be like calling to tech support about non working PC, for tech to come into your office and find PC unplugged. You are creating problem, that doesn't exist without putting any effort to remove the problem to begin with https://i.etsystatic.com/9838792/r/il/0f261a/2871427497/il_794xN.2871427497_ceq1.jpg

Edited January 20, 2022 by Bakeneko.5826

[Khisanth.2948]

21 minutes ago, Bakeneko.5826 said:

No. There is very little overlap in class icons. It would be like calling to tech support about non working PC, for tech to come into your office and find PC unplugged. You are creating problem, that doesn't exist without putting any effort to remove the problem to begin with https://i.etsystatic.com/9838792/r/il/0f261a/2871427497/il_794xN.2871427497_ceq1.jpg

they are obviously all circles.😁

[Mungrul.9358]

58 minutes ago, Naxos.2503 said:

A forum is for discussion, opposite opinion is not only expected, but normally desirable.

I would agree with you, but when those opposite opinions consist of nothing more detailed than "I disagree with this statement", I feel they deserve to be dismissed.

Those sorts of reply aren't contributing to the discussion, they're simply trying to shut it down.

And that happens all the time in this part of the forum, because certain people have designated themselves gatekeepers of what should be discussed.

[Parasite.5389]

to try and bring this topic back on track;

why does the icon matter?

the only times you may need to know what Spec/Elite another player is playing is Competitive modes(WvW/PvP) or group content like Raids/Strikes and Fractals/Dungeons.

for the later; ask the player if you don't know, or mouse over their name in the party list and see their core profession and figure it out.

for the former; it doesn't really matter when they're trying to kill you, you probably wont have time to change your build to counter a specific threat.

Edited January 20, 2022 by Parasite.5389

[Mungrul.9358]

Okay, in an effort to de-escalate, I would suggest that as some people have agreed that there is a problem for them personally distinguishing isons, would anyone be against an option being added to the game so that Elite specialisations could be represented by a two-letter abbreviation instead of an icon?

[Linken.6345]

2 minutes ago, Mungrul.9358 said:

Okay, in an effort to de-escalate, I would suggest that as some people have agreed that there is a problem for them personally distinguishing isons, would anyone be against an option being added to the game so that Elite specialisations could be represented by a two-letter abbreviation instead of an icon?

Yes I am against it since it take resources that could be used for anything else then a none problem.