Not content with releasing a new look for Lion’s Arch, there were plenty of changes made in the patch, with a new specialization system replacing the existing skills and traits system. Players will now choose from up to three different specializations depending on their level. Each specialization will offer a variety of traits that will provide passive abilities based on the way you play. Different specialization and traits can be chosen for each of the the main game modes: PvE (Player versus Environment), PvP (Player versus Player) and WvW (World versus World).
Changes were also made to combat with changes to attribute points and conditions. All conditions have been reworked to deliver proper damage in large scale combat and have their maximum stacks increased to 1500, which should not be reached under normal circumstances (players should be able reach that against world bosses though!). Many skills and traits for all classes have been updated, please refer to the patch notes for more details and for the full change list.
With these changes, Guild Wars 2 is gearing up for their next expansion, Heart of Thorns. After recent complaints regarding their standard pricing of USD $50 for the expansion pack (with base game bundled), ArenaNet announced that existing veteran players who registed the core Guild Wars 2 game before January would receive a new character slot (worth roughly USD $10 if purchased in-game) while players who bought the core game between January 23, 2015 and June 16, 2015 were entitled to a full refund of the core game upon pre-purchase of the expansion or account closure.
Will these be enough to placate the players to buy the expansion pack? Personally I will most likely buy the standard edition as I really admire their payment model with no monthly subscription fees and I have gotten more than my money’s worth on the core game. I believe this payment model deserves our support considering how much we save on monthly subscription fees!
