Robbed this from the Somethingawful forums. Its a breakdown of the skillset selection and how they are restricted.

and what the UI will look like

Cool! Thanks for posting this, it's cool to actually see it. Not sure I like the elite on the end though....

Edit: Then again, this is Guild Wars we're talking about, where they let you set up a hotkey for EVERYTHING. I work better with ctrl 1-5 than I do with 6-0. 6 7 and 8 aren't that bad, thanks to GW1, but it's still a LOT slower than 1-5. 9 and 0 would just be... bad.... hah....

It's not been specified if it has to be in that order. The graph is just to demonstrate the breakdown of where the skills come from.

This game is looking like it has absolutely everything I could ever hope for in an mmorpg... and with no sub fee.  I always defended mmos and their sub fees but guild wars 2 is looking to change the genre completely imo.  I was hesitant for a while that arenanet were reaching a bit too high, but after each video and interview I watch/read I am becoming more and more convinced that this game will absolutely blow my mind.  The amount of things to do, the awesome combat system and skills, dynamic events, EVERYTHING about this game, not having to search for groups as everyone benefits for just participating.  The only thing that was touched upon in this excellent thread that worries me is the availability of elite gear in combination with the loot system, but Im sure arenanet will figure out a way to build a strong economy while also giving players the chance to actually obtain this gear.  Man I cant wait to play this game, I may not need to purchase another one for a very long time after this drops.  Its also very difficult for me to justify paying any sub fees for an mmo right now when I know that guild wars 2 just exists lol.

Welcome to the club =) I'm also curious as to gear issues, but I'm really not that worried. People farm for MONTHS for a set of cool looking gear in GW1, so I'm pretty sure they have the hardcore player at heart too. They may use a different system though, instead of gear directly dropping, you do something else to get the strongest gear. Maybe as very difficult high-end quest rewards, or you crafting like in GW1 where you collect rare and expensive materials. Or maybe it just drops =P probably with a lower than ever rate, but since you may not be so dependant on running raids or such to get the gear, it'll still be easier to get (or just as easily).

I dunno, maybe they've even talked about this a little and I missed it =P Okay, back to GW1 =)

I remember something about you applying stats to gear yourself and that the rare gear is purely aesthetic. So you basically create your own sets so stat wise its not difficult to max out but if you want the sexy stuff it could take a while.

Also found this bit of info about the marketplace:

Marketplace
The marketplace can be used to sell and buy items without the need to find a buyer or seller first. While items can only be put up for sale when in-game, it is possible to browse, bid, or cancel auctions and offers when out of-game and logged into a web browser. A sale can be completed whilst the seller is offline, with the money going into an account bank. The marketplace is capable of displaying the history and trends of item values.

This effectively makes it the same as the WoW auction house which imo is the best thing about that game. The addition in GW2 however is you can use the web interface to bid for items without the need to log in to the game.

WoW's AH is the only good thing about that game =P It's very cool that you can browse and buy while out of the game though, a nice interesting touch. That's the kind of thing they'll probably put in with the iPad/iPhone program.

Where did you hear about the 'rare gear being purely aesthetic' thing? I'm not doubting it, but I was wondering if it was some random forum somewhere, or if you remember it from an official post?

Edit: I did a quick google search and stumbled on guildwars2guru. The general consensus is that no one knows =P Some people infer from the devs' comments that progression will be horizontal (aesthetic) and others believe it will be vertical (power). Personally, if they're going to mention at all that there will some form of armor progression, I'm pretty sure that means they won't stick with what they did in GW1 (horizontal) and incorporate a more vertical approach. Especially since there are transmutation stones. But they also said they don't want people to grind an instance for weeks and get 1 armor piece. So who knows how they'll do it.

Yeah I'm not sure where I heard it from tbh. It may just have been the impression I got from reading a dev interview so yeah its certainly not definitive.

I've just re-read the info Rainbird has on the first page and it seems the devs have put an emphasis on creating custom sets by applying the set bonus's to pieces yourself to complement the transmutaion and colour dyeing....I guess that would be a "spherical" approach :P

This is what I got from it. All the armors will have different stats, but you're able to customize them with additional stats as well. We'll see if I got it right.