I was just reading through the 'ask cryptic: December 2012' and I came across the question about re-species tokens.

This reminded me of something I mean't to suggest a long time ago but forgot to.

Basically as it stands people typically wan't to change race down to either it being traits or species (not sure if there is any other reason actually). Stahl mentioned that Cryptic were unsure as to whether they wanted to add that or not and were still discussing traits.

So if we are unable to change race why not allow people to earn additional traits as they progress?

A simple trait gain per level milestone (entire ranks, the jump from ensign to lieutenant for example) would suffice and would let people to eventually get more of the traits that they liked. It would also show an additional maturity to the character and yet make more use out of the trait system that after character creation gets ignored. I understand that they don't give significant bonuses but thats probably more of a reason to do it rather than not to.

Also it would provide a means for people to not re-roll characters because they wanted different traits than what they currently have picked.

You know, instead of giving us more traits, I would prefer a method that will allow us to change one or two existing traits. Since giving more traits is total BS because that will give veteran players a massive advantage over new guys. Not quite what one would want in a F2P environment. But the ability to change traits to make up for mistakes when choosing would be very nice indeed.

So your suggesting that you would rather your character to completely change rather than progress and grow?

The only issue with letting you change traits would be that it would come in the form of C-Store unlocks. Gaining the traits naturally as you progress simply lets you enjoy more of them as you go, and like I said earlier makes sense as you do tend to learn more as you progress in life rather than simply change altogether.

Also it was said a long, long time ago by the dev team that the traits were minor buffs that were almost invisible in what they affect so based on that response it would hardly be 'OP'.

Besides why shouldn't a level 50 be more powerful than a level 10? The logic in the level 10 being able to go anywhere near the 50 is ridiculous and undermines the whole concept of an RPG.