I’m really enjoying getting outside the box with everyone and looking at new traits that may also make sense such as the Critical Strike Chance and the combined Damage traits.
INTRODUCING THE “RANGE” TRAIT
Another potential trait substitution I would like to throw in the ring is Range. If we are to combine Melee Damage and Ranged Damage into a single Damage trait it makes a lot of sense to me to introduce a Range trait that really helps widen our playstyle spectrum AND still allows us to have a character with both Armor and Range that is not completely OP.
I have been thinking a lot about how the game designers might be implementing hand item wearable mechanics and (as complete speculation) could possibly see these mechanics as:
- Projectile Foe
- Melee Foe
- Aura Foe
- Aura Ally
- Single Target Foe
- Single Target Ally
HOW DOES THE RANGE TRAIT AFFECT HAND WEARABLES?
Now the interesting part is how does the Range mechanic affect each of the potential hand wearable mechanics? I have provided below examples of how they might work with Range.
WHAT ARCHETYPES DOES THIS LEAVE US WITH?
So we can take a pretty simple approach to changing the original trait mappings which actually looks quite reasonable with the new Damage and Range traits incorporated. Basically, swap Melee Damage with Damage and swap Ranged Damage with Range. This looks like:
We are now staying fairly close to the game designers original traits and have still managed to nerf the original Armor-Ranged Damage unit that was seen as OP and identified by @Caacao .
This will then give rise to the following potential archetypes. Note, as recommended by @notorious_BTC it is less confusing for a new user if there are fewer starting Archetypes so this time I have suggested only 8no. different archetypes. However, NRG dictates whether they are Greedy or Swift.
CONCLUSION
Finally a few pro’s and con’s on what I’ve outlined in this post.
Pro’s:
- Armor-Ranged Damage unit is nerfed
- Deviation from original dev trait mappings is not significant
- Range gives a lot more variation to spells, projectiles and auras, variation is interesting and exciting!
Con’s:
- Hand wearables may not play out how I have identified here
- Implementing Range for each hand wearable may be slightly trickier than a flat Ranged Damage
Another lengthy post from me but this has been such an interesting topic to get into! Would love to get some feedback from @coderdan and @NyanKong to see if how I have imagined the hand wearable mechanics working is anywhere near what is planned?
Again, always appreciate everyones input 
I think we’re getting close to one of the longest forum threads!