Feedback:User/Marvalis/making PvE-only skills accessible to alts

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PvE skills have become a part of the metagame in many area's. Since the metagame is always evolving, there is a need for different professions to play the game. This leads to the creation of 'alts' so that people can find groups more easily to play the game.

Examples:

  • manly spike PvE-only skills needed:
    • Air of superiority
    • IAU!
    • mental block
    • finish him
    • great dwarf armor
    • dwarven stability
    • ebon vanguard assassin support
    • YMLAD!
    • technobabble.
  • Snoway PvE-only skills needed:
    • IAU!
    • mental block
    • ebon battle standard of honor
    • finish him!
    • ebon escape
    • snow storm
  • terraway PvE-only skills needed:
    • BUH!
    • IAU!
    • mental block
    • FH!
    • Pain inverter
    • ebon battle standard of wisdom
    • radiation field

To get those PvE-only skills you have to do long quest chains regardless whether you have done them before or not. When creating an alt, you have to do the EoTN quest chain just to get the PvE-only skills. This is time consuming, does not add any fun to the game, and is bad game design. Remember, preparing for fun is not fun.

Suggestion: Make PvE-only skills accessible to alts so that it is not required to spend ridiculous amounts replaying campaigns or quest chains to obtain PVE-only skills required by the current metagame. Here are a few suggestions how this can be done:

  • Make PvE-only skills account-wide. This should probably also include the progression title linked to that skill. For example, you only need to do the quest to get BUH! once, and the deldrimor title is account-wide. That also means that players who want to buy certain armor do not have to farm rank 5 anymore on their alts.
  • Make PvE-only skills 'unlockable' and add PvE-only tomes to the game. Just like we have profession tomes right now, make it so people can use a tome to acquire PvE-only skills unlocked on another character.
  • Allow people to buy PvE-only skills after completing the quests required for that skill on another character. Alternatively, just allow people to buy those skills. The NPC that sells the skills should be accessible, for example in Lions Arch, Kamadan and Kaineng City and/or in the guild hall. The price should be significantly high enough to discourage new players from buying it. For example, 10.000-15.000 gold seems reasonable. I would be glad to spend 10k if it saves me ten hours of questing time I am not interested in.

PvE-only skills have had a very disturbing effect on the game. They have added 'grind' to an otherwise grind-free game. They have become a requirement for the metagame. Most PvE-only skills are unbalanced and overpowered compared to regular skills. It only seems reasonable that players do not have to spend a lot of time repeating the skill quests they have already done on another character.

The reason why I wrote this article is that I needed to get BUH! and Tryptophan Signet so I can do keystone spike for UBway. My warrior still needs air of superiority for 100b in FoWsc. If my warrior tries to get into a team without those skills then he is just not good enough. My assassin needed battle standard of honor and IAU!. The list goes on. There are many PvE skills required for the metagame. Being forced to get them all on every character is not fun. The kurzick/luxon bureaucrat is very useful for the faction skills, and the faction skills are account-wide. All PvE-only skills should be implemented like this.

Today I just got kicked out of a party because my mesmer didn't have pain inverter...