How have insignias made anything easier?

The Idea is that if theres a armour skin that you really like from NF or future Chapters for example, but would like to change armour stats around but dont want to buy a new set of armour, you now have the option of swtiching around the stats of the armour using insignias instead of buying a completely new set of armour which technically will cost much less.

But the above idea is taking into account of the following:

-Plentiful/readily supply of insignias of all types for all classes ( in a month or two)

-Insignias remains affortable (its a free market so just beware since popular ones will be gone fast)

One thing that perhaps would work against players with insignias is that some players like to own multiple armours skins anyways which directly translates into more insignias to buy and mod-more headache in the short term. As i mentioned in an earilier post, the idea is good in theory but poor in implementation and practice.

A quick fix to this would be to significantly increase armour drops with insignias for players to salvage off and flood the market. BUT this will also mean that Runes will become affected and become even more worthless and Sup Vigor may Drop even further as well (not neccessary a bad thing) - in short more things becoming worthless in the game. Would be interesting to see how Anet whos good at balancing skills for PvP will balance the economy for PvE or let it fall into ruins.

Not at the moment. I'm not sure if FoW has been changed yet or not, but I'm certain that it WILL be eventually if it hasn't.

The insignias can only be used on armor that has a space for insignias, which means, no inherent mod. So far, all armors that accept insignias are sold "blank," with neither inherent mods nor inscriptions. Inscriptions will overwrite older ones, though.

Yes, and there is also a "radiant" inscription that gives inherent energy, like the old Gladiators armor for warriors. You can do anything with inscriptions and elonian armor that you could do with older armors.

Honestly, I don't see why they didn't make the Insignias retroactive.

Unlike the inscriptions, there are no hoarders of 'rare-skinned armours' that will cry if their collection's value is cut by half. In fact, which armour owner would complain about ANet ENHANCING their armour such that they have the option to change the stats if they wanted to?

If ANet wants to promote people buying NF, then make it such that only people who have access to NF can use Insignias retroactively, perhaps by applying an Armour Converter NPC, as someone has already mentioned in this thread.

Otherwise, it just feels like we're being penalized for being early adopters, like if we buy new shiny Elonian armour now, and some other upgrade for Chap 4 appears to make armour even MORE versatile, we'll just get left behind as always.

Can anyone confirm if new FoW armors are now blank with an insignia slot?

while i agree here...making insignias retroactive would do zero harm to the GW economy, i also understand from anets point of view the pain in the ass involved in making stuff retroactive.

I agree. That was one thing I was actually looking forward to when Factions first came out.

I really don't buy the idea that ANet put the insignia thing in to help players out with buying multiple sets of armor. There's two reasons why.

1. They say gold inflation is on the rise, what better way to get people spending money then having to purchase multiple sets of armor? Next to "rare" items armor is the most expensive thing in the game to get, its perhaps the best gold sink available.

2. No matter how easy it is to "swap" insignias in the long run if you have a set of armor for PvP and a Set for PvE, or different sets of armors for different builds its going to be cheaper to have the sets of armor then attempting to constantly replace insignias. I know my Necro switchs so often from MM, to blood spike, to Curses that I would be a very poor man without my extra sets of armor.

Insignias are a neat idea, I'll give ANet its props for thinking creatively. But constructively I really think it was one of those did we toss in something that was counterintuitive to what we are trying to accomplish? I say that because everything ANet seems to be doing is attempting to cut down the amount of grind (Yes when I say grind I mean farming) and then they toss this whole armor thing in, where you have to farm to get the insignias you want. Sure you can get it from the rune trader but what fun is that? I'm an adventurer i like to find my junk, and the less I have to go to that trader the better off I am. It would have been neat if the insignias were craftable because then it'd be on your own merits to get the materials to pump out those insignias. And if Anet didn't want people having high level insignias (if there is such a thing) put those crafters later in the game (hey it works for armor).

Anyway, like I said nifty idea, I like it. I hate the way it was implemented simple as that. Give me the old faction armor or even the FoW armor, it might cost me more but at least I don't have to worry about my crappy luck of IDing the one I need off salvagable armor.

Nice quote and so true,

can the impatient whiners pls leave the room? Already many insignias are at rune traders and in the end, all insignias will be there.

Yes, they will all be there when the useful ones get so expensive they are priced out of the range of most players. Just like ectos and black dye; and so far, i've seen more black dyes than radiant insignias.

then sucks to be those players.

I think the point is that you can change from a certain build to another without having to make loads of amror sets. But as you overwrite them b/c you don't want to risk destroying your armor (who would?) you lose the old one. thus in the end this is a money sink imo.

Insignias are very useful to pimp my heroes, i love em already. I also used 2 vitae runes to pimp my monk for more HP, since she uses 2 sup. runes and it comes in very handy. As for the stock, just refresh the screen a couple of times when u are at the rune trader, with a little patience you get what you want cos ppl are selling them already. After a month stocks will be back to normal anyway so who cares...

I doubt that, even the good insignia's are cheaper than crap at the rune trader.

Honestly, there are two ways to resolve this as I see it:

- Increase rune and insignia drops dramatically

- Only allow player characters to use runes and insignias

Personally, as unpopular as it may be, I much prefer the latter option. One of the main problems abounding now is the the fact that each character created will not simply need one or two sets of runes/insignias. They will need a good dozen to equip not only themselves but their heroes as well ... per character since heroes aren't account based. So that's 4X a dozen insignias and up to 5X a dozen runes EVERY TIME YOU CREATE A NEW CHARACTER. As you can see, this places the gross majority of runes and insignia usage on NPCs, which is just plain wrong in an MMO game.

Removing that from heroes will indeed weaken them slightly, but will have the joint result of increasing supply for player character usage and encouraging players to play with other players because of the slight edge they have over heroes.

Give it a month....

If Insignias rise in price = sigh Anet >_>
If Insignias remain cheap and are plentiful = phew

I think the problem here is that currently, we've not had a chance to fully use the Insignia system, so very few of us can actually realize the potential in such a system. But mark my words...the Insignia system will benefit players in the longer-term. In time, we'll find that being able to pluck out one insignia and pop a different one in its place is going to be far more versatile than the armor systems of Proph or Factions. The cost will be dramatically lower to redo a character's armor, the ease of swapping armor bonuses will be easier, and most importantly, it will allow for a much deeper level of customization that players will eventually embrace once they understand it.

The biggest problem with the insignia system currently is the risk of destroying the item. This was THE BIGGEST issue in Prophecies and Factions when you wanted to get new armor. There were times in the past when I lost every single rune out of four pieces of armor except a minor Expertise. I got nothing but wood and cloth. Superior Marksmanship rune? Scoff! We've all gone through that crap. I've had guildies in the past who screamed for joy in guild chat when they were lucky enough to salvage their Sup. Vigor.

The solution? Introduce a feature that players have been asking for since the very first players got their very first runes and finally made it to Lion's Arch:

Guarantee that player armor will never be destroyed when swapping out runes and insignias.

That way, all you'd need for armor modification is the new insignia and an Expert Salvage Kit. When you want to switch up your armor bonuses for whatever reason, expert salvage the existing insignia/rune out of there and pop on the new one.

The market pressure for certain insignias and runes will decrease because people will be able to keep their current runes and insignias. The only cost is the initial insignia/rune cost, and then in the longer-term, you'll be paying 400 gold after 25 armor piece changes--that's around 6 times per character if you have four characters total...I think. My math kind of sucks sometimes.

And really, you shouldn't have to change your hero armor all that much. If you feel compelled to re-equip them that much, to the extent of possibly blowing 15k+ at any given time, you really should re-evaluate what the hell it is you're doing. So that 6 times per character really becomes primarily for you, and maybe once or twice for your heroes. Pretty good deal if you ask me.

Plus, whatever happened to people sticking with their armor for a while?

In Factions, I just upgraded my Prophecies Necro to the Canthan +energy set. She'd been using Crystal Desert collector's armor for around a year, maybe more.

My Prophecies Ranger has been using the Druid armor from Drok's up until a few weeks ago when I decided that she was getting a new look and outfitted her with the Canthan +energy fur set.

My Prophecies Warrior has been using Glads armor from Drok's since he got the Drok run ages ago.

My Assassin is using Kaineng armor.

My Ritualist has +energy chest and leggings, and 30 AL Seitung Harbor wrist and foot gear.

They all do just fine, and re-equipping my necro and ranger was a pain in the ass only because of needing all of those different materials for the new armor. It would have saved me a hell of a lot of time if I had been able to just use an expert salvage kit to replace one bonus with another. For all of those who say that the Factions armor system is better, try dealing with having to run back and forth between the crafter, the materials vendor, Xunlai storage, etc. In Kaineng. I wanted to shoot something. Or kick a kitten into an electric fan.

BINGO! /Signed!!!!

That's indeed would be an improvement. Regardless, I like this system better than the previous two.

Lets see here, considering my Warrior has 3 sets of armor, my necro has three sets of armor and my monk 2 along with various spare parts for other characters crafting armor isn't that much more difficult then attempting to find the insignias.

Oh and heres a tip to ease your "burden" on crafting new armor. Go to the storage open it and leave it open before visiting all the other places that way you don't have to make multiple trips back to the storage facility. But isn't it lovely that the insignia system now makes us travel all the way over to the rune trader to buy the insignias. Talk about adding another step in a long process.

Uhm ... did I hear that right? You can actually open up your storage window by the Xunial agent and then roam around town with it open and pull items from it without running back to the storage folks? I'm actually being serious, I've never tried it before.

Also for swapping insignias you'll have to overwrite them in your armor because if you try to salvage them out you have a crapshoot/coin flip chance of destroying your armor, which is really stupid.