Higher Level Traceries a Downgrade?

[Elaelin]

I just received my first quest tracery in Gundabad. The purple tracery which goes to a higher level is a downgrade from my previous teal tracery? Is this a bug or is the new system working as intended? Not sure what to do if upgrading a tracery downgrades it. Do I just save them until next level cap increase and use them at that time or is this a known issue and the traceries will be corrected to at least stay the same vs. providing a lower benefit?

[LagunaD2]

I just received my first quest tracery in Gundabad. The purple tracery which goes to a higher level is a downgrade from my previous teal tracery? Is this a bug or is the new system working as intended? Not sure what to do if upgrading a tracery downgrades it. Do I just save them until next level cap increase and use them at that time or is this a known issue and the traceries will be corrected to at least stay the same vs. providing a lower benefit?

A tracery has two bonuses (or groups of bonuses).

The more powerful bonus, often buffing one or more class abilities, depends only on the rarity. Take the "Single target damage" Word of Power tracery, for example. The percentage damage bonus is the SAME for all versions with the same rarity. An uncommon Moria tracery and an uncommon Gundabad tracery will have IDENTICAL bonuses. Likewise for purple, teal and gold quality. In addition, the differences between rarities are relatively small. This is an important feature of the system, allowing low-level characters and/or alts to obtain nearly the best bonuses relatively easily.

Since you switched from a teal to a purple, the "active" bonus will go down, slightly.

The second type of bonus on a tracery is a passive stat bonus. This goes up with the item level of the tracery (and how much you've enhanced the slot it's in). As you enhance your new purple tracery, you should find that the stat bonus gets larger than what the teal had, because the item level will be higher.

[Elaelin]

So the system is working as intended and this is not a bug or a typo on the tracery? A higher level tracery is a downgrade? I am so confused. It makes very little sense to take away our traceries next cap increase and only give us traceries that are downgrades. Maybe they should do away with legendary weapons and just adjust all of our skills to match what the legacies used to give us? That way my mini would not have to take a step back on buffs and cool downs. Giving me higher tactical mastery doesn't really help with cool downs and buffs. It really doesn't do much for outgoing heals either. The tactical mastery will make solo landscape play easier I guess (assuming I get the correct random drops that let me upgrade the tracery). Maybe that is the goal? Thanks for responding.

[Halphast]

So the system is working as intended and this is not a bug or a typo on the tracery? A higher level tracery is a downgrade? I am so confused. It makes very little sense to take away our traceries next cap increase and only give us traceries that are downgrades. Maybe they should do away with legendary weapons and just adjust all of our skills to match what the legacies used to give us? That way my mini would not have to take a step back on buffs and cool downs. Giving me higher tactical mastery doesn't really help with cool downs and buffs. It really doesn't do much for outgoing heals either. The tactical mastery will make solo landscape play easier I guess (assuming I get the correct random drops that let me upgrade the tracery). Maybe that is the goal? Thanks for responding.

Here's a quick example that is not taken from an actual tracery but just shows how it works.

Fake Damage Tracery!
+35% damage
+20334 Physical Mastery.

The tier of the tracery affects skill bonuses and percentages like that damage percentage. So purple might give 33.1% damage, cyan/teal might give 35%, gold might give 37%, REGARDLESS OF LEVEL.

The level of the tracery affects the character-stats. So level 121-130 might give 20334 Physical Mastery, level 131-140 might give 22126. So you have to choose what's more important to you. For me the small stat bonus is not enough to give up my gold traceries from 121.

It's really confusing to me but yes this seems to be working as intended. It doesn't really matter right now since you can use 121 traceries when you're at level cap. But the problem is the NEXT time they raise the level cap, above level 140 you won't be able to use those 121 traceries anymore. So we need a good way to get cyan/teal or gold traceries at the 131+ level which doesn't seem to be possible yet.

[ParrotGuy]

The second type of bonus on a tracery is a passive stat bonus. This goes up with the item level of the tracery (and how much you've enhanced the slot it's in). As you enhance your new purple tracery, you should find that the stat bonus gets larger than what the teal had, because the item level will be higher.

I've actually tried that. Being stat traceries, I figured I'd benefit from replacing teal level 121 words of craft and heraldric traceries with purple level 131 ones. When I made the switch on my first LI, the stats were actually lower than with the teal one. I checked and double checked that the slot level wasn't different, but nope, it was the same as before (465). So unless I'm mistaken somehow or it's a bug, seems like teal level 121 is always superior to purple level 131?

[TobiasEstForte]

This is what happens when doing no reading on a subject and just making assumptions.

To ensure both Minas Morgul and Gundabad traceries are to last until lvl 140 as stated on their tooltip, they are going to be of equal upgrade value until lvl 141. This accounts for only Minas Morgul vs Gundabad mind you, when concerning quality (colour) naturally the potential stats/bonuses are going to be different in order to give incentive for upgrading the quality (Not upgrading to Gundabad). Otherwise what would be the use in farming/receiving Minas Morgul traceries if they are to be obsolete a mere month later?

Many of us have known about this since the LI revamp was on bullroarer, and we had to re-affirm this when being taunted for farming golden traceries at 130 which will be "replaced" by "better" purple traceries - with no regard to the fact that Gundabad's were simply better without the context of future, already-informed-about upgrades.

There is no bug. Simply a lack of informing oneself.

[Fegefeuer]

This post almost makes me cry. People is awaking :')

Yes OP, it's a downgrade.