A few things I don't like about it...
a) Too complicated. Unnecessarily so. You pretty much have to start planning things out on paper to figure out if you have enough skill points to gain certain abilities.
b) Too restrictive. Over half the traits are now red (unavailable). This is massively limiting. You've gone from 20+ choices to ten. Further, this effectively creates a class-like system. The choices are now say 3-4 obvious choices per character class. Finally, this not further encourages specializing. The only way to be immune to stun is as an air wizard and put everything into air. You might as well make a tree-system.
c) Naming. I don't like that the names of the skills are different than the names of the abilities. Air, Earth, Water, Fire, Witchcraft, Way of the Ranger, etc. makes sense. Different name doesn't make it any cooler and just add more complexity.
I think there would be much better ways of dealing with the power curve from gaining a new spell skill -- and a ton of spells. Such as...
a) Scale lower level spell power down.
b) Better explain that in order to raise skills you need to save points.
c) Reduce the number of spell books available for sale or require quests for obtaining the ability to purchase them.
d) Start the NPCs with fewer spells.
e) Increase the cost of spells books.
f) Increase the action cost of spells, but do decrease the action points for having more skill ranks.
g) Make traits which give spell bonuses per type. For example: Elemental Affinity (Air), Elemental Affinity (Earth), etc. Same with ranger spells.
In any case, I don't see it as a positive. It now seems so restrictive that you might as well just make traits class abilities tied to the skills.
