Category points… raise skill cap instead of .2 bonus.

[lukep]

As an alternative, have it give +1 level to all talents instead of a mastery boost. So your level 6.5 Shield Pummel becomes level 7.8, your level 1.3 Riposte becomes 2.6 and your level 0 Assault becomes 1.3.

[Strongpoint]

I actually had the idea: Increase mastery by 0.5, and reduce cooldowns by 20%. This is quite a considerable boost, but not necessarily more powerful than an entire new category or inscription slot.

First thought : That's how you get a brawler that double strikes every turn barring the ones where he uses more powerful attacks

Second thought : Oh, so now I can have time shield permanently while getting even larger speed boost from the sustain

Third thought : Almost permanent barrier, permanent healing light, considerably boosted providence, more frequent healing light and everything with increased power

-20% to cooldowns is a huge boost for some talent trees

As an alternative, have it give +1 level to all talents instead of a mastery boost. So your level 6.5 Shield Pummel becomes level 7.8, your level 1.3 Riposte becomes 2.6 and your level 0 Assault becomes 1.3.

Like it as a small buff, at least that allows to save some talent points for one-point wonders. But it's not much better than the current system

[Crim, The Red Thunder]

Since talents can now scale up safely past level 5, I think that increasing the talent level limit based on the mastery of the tree would work and be a nice boost to talent mastery. So spending a category on a tree you have at 1.3 mastery would increase the mastery to 1.5 AND let you spend up to 6 points in all of it's various talents.

The formula would be something like mastery 1.4 let's you train up to TL 6, 1.6 up to TL 7, etc., but you have to spend extra points to actually train up -- you're already getting an increase in effective talent level from the mastery.

Add this to removal of the 'one cat point per category' cap in the infinite dungeon (at least) and that sounds useful enough. In theory (not necessarily easily) you could eventually have cat points with no use or function. Especially on low, already specialized classes. (Anorithil comes to mind, as does alchemist. Others exist.) Being able to add an extra (or possibly, several extra) cat point on top of the norm allows these extreme late-game characters to specialize a bit more, and offer a more competitive edge with the ever tougher ID monsters.

[Delmuir]

I agree that reducing cool downs is a bit overpowered… more so, it would demand a redesign of some skill categories (Stone for example).