Mastery Revamp - If you could change one facet, how would you change/revamp the Mastery System?

[MokahTGS.7850]

If you could change or revamp one facet the Mastery System, how would you do that? I know that many people have issues with how the Mastery system is currently utilized and I think over all, that it is a good system that perhaps could be improved in various ways. Below is a poll of the various subsystems of the Mastery system. Pick one and then explain how you'd change or revamp that part of the system. I suggest that you pick one and go from there, as just saying the system as a whole needs to be redone is not realistically an option. If you like the system as is, of course pick that option, but please do explain why.

My choice: I would change the system to allow players to use any point in any mastery line. This would allow you to use PoF mastery points in HoT lines, or core game line, or however you wish. I know that the original design was to encourage play for those masteries in those specific areas, but in reality, the gameplay and content (i.e. Rewards) in those areas is what keep people playing there. Currently there are many Hero point trains that run in the HoT areas and you as a player are free to spend those hero points as you see fit, even on Elite Specializations from PoF. Why can't we do the same for Mastery Points?

At any rate, vote and discuss.

[Sylvari.2953]

Get rid of mastery points and only use exp to unlock mastery. I really don't enjoy collecting mastery points.

[MithranArkanere.8957]

The main problem the mastery system has is that it doesn't allow you to experience the game again without masteries.For many players, learning the abilities again and that progression is part of the fun.But if we had to train masteries again with all characters, it'd be a pain for many players.

The solution is having the cake and eating it too by having a system that combines both account and character unlocks, and making the character unlocks much faster, and skippable.

Change the mastery training system into a combination of account and character unlocks.

• First, you unlock the masteries like we do now.
• Then, you train the mastery with exp and mastery points, still like now.
• But a third additional step would be added for several of the masteries: You would have to spend Hero points to 'learn' the mastery with a character, in the Training panel.
  • You would go to the training panel, and under the Skills, Specializations and Elite Specializations sections there would be a new section called "Masteries", and under that section one entry per mastery set: Core, Heart of Thorns, Path of Fire, etc.
  • The interface for these would not be a circle, but a row of icon for each mastery line, and you would still need to train them in order. So Gliding would be a row of 6 icons, and you still can't get Ley Line Gliding without Advanced Gliding, but you can just click on Ley Line Gliding and pay for the entire line in one go, if you have enough hero points.
  • This extra step would only exist for masteries that add extra powers and world interaction abilities, not to those that just give general functionalities. So you would only need to train again things like gliding, stealth detection, poison immunity, using mushrooms and mounts, but not things like autoloot, fractal reward bonuses and legendary crafting.
• Re-introduce the Trainer NPCs to all starting zones and cities. Players will be able to talk with them and pay small fees of coin, karma and/or spirit shards to quickly get hero points and learn masteries with a character. Just like when buying hero points from the Heroics Notary, this unlocks random hero points that are used in the process of learning the masteries.

This way we get:

• The ability to experience the game again without masteries, and decide when we want to learn each one with each character.
• An use for all these surplus unused hero points we have all over the place.
• An opt out for those who consider it a grind.

---

Another possibility could be having some sort of button or checkbox in the mastery panel to disable individual masteries.

[zealex.9410]

Id reduce the xp needed and make it character bound.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

@MithranArkanere.8957 said:Change the mastery training system into a combination of account and character unlocks.No thanks, that defeats the value of the mastery system for me. Let's leave character progression to learning new specializations.

[Fallesafe.5932]

This is actually one of the best systems in the game right now. There's nothing that needs to be changed.

[MithranArkanere.8957]

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

@MithranArkanere.8957 said:Change the mastery training system into a combination of account and character unlocks.No thanks, that defeats the value of the mastery system for me. Let's leave character progression to learning new specializations.

If you read what I wrote, you'd see It would not affect you too much, since any mastery affected doesn't work in starting areas, and right after leaving an starting area you'd just have to talk with an NPC and get them unlocked anyways for a small cost as the trainer would be a few steps away. Even for players that are constantly making new characters it would not be that much of a problem considering the benefit of bringing back the exploration progress for many others.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

@MithranArkanere.8957 said:

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

@MithranArkanere.8957 said:Change the mastery training system into a combination of account and character unlocks.No thanks, that defeats the value of the mastery system for me. Let's leave character progression to learning new specializations.

If you read what I wrote, you'd see It would not affect you too much, since any mastery affected doesn't work in starting areas, and right after leaving an starting area you'd just have to talk with an NPC and get them unlocked anyways for a small cost as the trainer would be a few steps away. Even for players that are constantly making new characters it would not be that much of a problem considering the benefit of bringing back the exploration progress for many others.

If you read what I wrote, I don't want it. Not even a little.I understand why you'd prefer this change; I hope you understand why someone else might not.

[FrizzFreston.5290]

@zealex.9410 said:Id reduce the xp needed and make it character bound.

Same. Or at the very least have the option available. I feel like making it account bound has greatly reduced the incentive for me to even remotely get a similar quality experience playing with another character, and the first playthrough is the best fun you get and after that it's just.. well meh. I like progressing my characters, and having every progression connect on my account have made my character feel alot less like individuals.

[MithranArkanere.8957]

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

@MithranArkanere.8957 said:

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

@MithranArkanere.8957 said:Change the mastery training system into a combination of account and character unlocks.No thanks, that defeats the value of the mastery system for me. Let's leave character progression to learning new specializations.

If you read what I wrote, you'd see It would not affect you too much, since any mastery affected doesn't work in starting areas, and right after leaving an starting area you'd just have to talk with an NPC and get them unlocked anyways for a small cost as the trainer would be a few steps away. Even for players that are constantly making new characters it would not be that much of a problem considering the benefit of bringing back the exploration progress for many others.

If you read what I wrote, I don't want it. Not even a little.I understand why you'd prefer this change; I hope you understand why someone else might not.

The usual reactions to something that only affects you if you engage in it are either being happy about it or not caring about it.

Not wanting something that doesn't really affect you but that would benefits others is not something that many can understand. Disregard, discount, ambivalence... that would be understandable.

[Steve The Cynic.3217]

I could use a couple more Central Tyria mastery insights (you know, just visiting spots on maps), but apart from that it's just fine.

[OriOri.8724]

My biggest complaint about the mastery system is more lore complaint than gameplay really, but I was sad when the "mastery" system came out, but you didn't gain any mastery experience for using that particular mastery line. For example, gliding doesn't give you any mastery experience at all.

So, I would change it so that completing tasks relevant to a mastery line gives you mastery experience in that line, regardless of which line is currently active and being leveled through the regular method.

So, if you didn't have ley line gliding unlocked, anytime you were gliding anywhere, you would receive experience towards the gliding line, even if say Raptor line was the currently active one. Trading with Nuhoch vendors would increase that line, as well as using nuhoch wallows (if unlocked) and hitting enemies detected with stealth detection. So on and so forth.

I know that ANet could get this balanced in some way so that it doesn't trivialize earning masteries too much, and this would make the system so much more immersable for me. Imagine riding around on your raptor, and you finally spent enough time riding it to unlock canyon jumping because "you learned how to master your raptor"

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

@MithranArkanere.8957 said:

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

@MithranArkanere.8957 said:

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

@MithranArkanere.8957 said:Change the mastery training system into a combination of account and character unlocks.No thanks, that defeats the value of the mastery system for me. Let's leave character progression to learning new specializations.

If you read what I wrote, you'd see It would not affect you too much, since any mastery affected doesn't work in starting areas, and right after leaving an starting area you'd just have to talk with an NPC and get them unlocked anyways for a small cost as the trainer would be a few steps away. Even for players that are constantly making new characters it would not be that much of a problem considering the benefit of bringing back the exploration progress for many others.

If you read what I wrote, I don't want it. Not even a little.I understand why you'd prefer this change; I hope you understand why someone else might not.

The usual reactions to something that only affects you if you engage in it are either being happy about it or not caring about it.

Not wanting something that doesn't really affect you but that would benefits others is not something that many can understand. Disregard, discount, ambivalence... that would be understandable.

Your proposal does affect me. Really. First, it means more effort to unlocking masteries, because I play more than one. Second, it means ANet needs to devote resources into changing the mechanics and maintaining them, which means fewer resources for something else.

So again, I grant that you prefer this change. I would appreciate it if you would accept that others don't have to agree.

[MokahTGS.7850]

@Steve The Cynic.3217 said:I could use a couple more Central Tyria mastery insights (you know, just visiting spots on maps), but apart from that it's just fine.

I'd love a bunch more of these, especially if the did more lore behind them.

[Ohoni.6057]

Not that any change would be awful, I just can't think of any that I would really need. My only problem with the old system was that I couldn't get the spirit shards until after clearing the raid trees, which I never did. They fixed that with PoF though.

I guess if I could make a minor suggestion it would be to unify the XP gain, so that you could gain XP for the PoF masteries while on any map, but I get why they keep the points separate, because otherwise I would have been able to get halfway through the PoF trees as soon as I started, and by now have enough total points to probably get halfway through the next expansion if they'd let me. That wouldn't work.

I do suppose it would be nice if once you did have more of a specific point system than you'd ever need (like you'd maxed out the HoT masteries) but had some HoT points left over, it would be nice if you could spend them on something, just decent junk like loot chests or whatever to make them have a little value.

[Steve The Cynic.3217]

@"OriOri.8724" said:I know that ANet could get this balanced in some way so that it doesn't trivialize earning masteries too much, and this would make the system so much more immersable for me. Imagine riding around on your raptor, and you finally spent enough time riding it to unlock canyon jumping because "you learned how to master your raptor"

I'm inclined to think that this would result in Amnoon being populated mostly by people riding raptors in circles until they earned enough mastery experience to unlock the next level. A better example would be to grant mastery experience for participating in and completing mount races (at least that does something more advanced than just riding). And perhaps to have more than one race track in each zone. (Not so simple, though - the raptor race covers quite a large area.)

The advantage of the current system is that it is easy to understand and has clearly defined criteria for how you earn experience toward the selected mastery.

[Sarrs.4831]

Very happy with the Mastery system as it is. It's gotten much more generous with points since HoT and that was probably my only complaint.

The one thing I'd like to see would be repeatable masteries to give you things like +karma%.

[OriOri.8724]

@Steve The Cynic.3217 said:

@"OriOri.8724" said:I know that ANet could get this balanced in some way so that it doesn't trivialize earning masteries too much, and this would make the system so much more immersable for me. Imagine riding around on your raptor, and you finally spent enough time riding it to unlock canyon jumping because "you learned how to master your raptor"

I'm inclined to think that this would result in Amnoon being populated mostly by people riding raptors in circles until they earned enough mastery experience to unlock the next level. A better example would be to grant mastery experience for participating in and completing mount races (at least that does something more advanced than just riding). And perhaps to have more than one race track in each zone. (Not so simple, though - the raptor race covers quite a large area.)

The advantage of the current system is that it is easy to understand and has clearly defined criteria for

how

you earn experience toward the selected mastery.

It might need a few tweaks, but I still think its a very superior system. I just fail to grasp how killing enemies teaches me how to master my glider or my raptor.

[Menadena.7482]

The experience requirement I have no problem with as you are learning how to use the mastery. My beef is with the points. Especially at later tiers (look how many people had trouble getting the rabbit because they were having problems getting ravine jump).

I see 3 possible solutions:1) Get rid of the MP requirement entirely but keep the xp requirement (increase the xp if you need to).2) Require 1 MP for each level, just have increasing levels of XP.3) Allow you to substitute a certain amount of additional XP for the mastery point requirement. Which means eventually if you did enough in the zone you would have the mastery, rather than saying 'you must do x'.

[Majirah.5089]

I really like the mastery system in this game. I like progression without increasing level caps or gear tiers. It also gets me into parts of the game that I otherwise probably wouldn’t have gone to. Getting the mastery points can be fun to work towards.

If I had to change one thing: it would be nice to have a few more core insights, but not necessary.

[Rauderi.8706]

I'm okay with the general hoop-jumping and XP grind of the Mastery system. But, I do remember what it was like early on, even during beta, and what I've seen from new players I brought in.

Early in the Mastery experience, it sucks. It sucks hard.Especially for Heart of Thorns. Especially.

The XP requirement in those early stages really hinders exploration, and overall, the Masteries behind used to gate content (as if the clock itself wasn't bad enough...) really make a game rooted in the joy of exploration feel . . not so joyous.

[Elva.6372]

I despise leveling alts now because of the mastery system, it took a lot of the freedom this game was so great at when it was released.This goes hand in hand with the way the TRAIT system has been changed.

I dislike that my level 80 alt's get nothing from experience in huge portions of the game world. That EXPERIENCE should count for something. I'm still stuck a few points shy of completing Central Tryia, largely because it involves game content I find unenjoyable. The rollover XP bar should advance Mastery tracks.

[juhani.5361]

@Mea.5491 said:Get rid of mastery points and only use exp to unlock mastery. I really don't enjoy collecting mastery points.

Completely agree. Points seem totally unnecessary, especially since so many of them are locked behind irrelevant activities like spoon collecting or wardrobe purchases or rifle shooting or...

[chrisjfinlay.5614]

I personally think some of the XP requirements are a little high, about the only thing I'd change. Not drastically, but just drop them a little.

[Steve The Cynic.3217]

@OriOri.8724 said:It might need a few tweaks, but I still think its a very superior system. I just fail to grasp how killing enemies teaches me how to master my glider or my raptor.

Killing enemies doesn't teach that, of course. For that matter, making cheeseburgers shouldn't make you better at fighting, nor at mastering your glider, but it does. (Each level of crafting that you gain gives current-track experience. My max-Chef was level 2 when she went directly into DR and trained Chef up to 400. She was level 18 at the end of that just from the XP gained for gaining Chef levels.) It's a common feature in RPGs.

So yes, from an RP-lite point of view, it is not correct that experience is all heaped into one big pot that is used for whatever you're trying to learn, but from a practical point of view in a game, it makes a lot of sense.