I was never a fan of hard modes, they ruined the end game in wow for me (its not the same when you first need to kill/farm a boss on normal mode to get loot to fight a tad harder version of the very same boss again for better loot) I realy hope this "Hard Mode" style is nothing like that.
I'm a huge supporter of "one difficulty troughout" for MMOs, hard modes are just a cleavrly disguised time sink that takes away the feeling of accomplishment by downing a boss for the first time and just serve to make the end game so very repetetive.

Hopefully "normal mode" will be like the storyline solo missions, something everyone can for lore etc do but not much in the way of a fight(hell toss in parley part for the crafters I guess) , and then make the "hard mode" the difficult party based fight.

For the weapon art; I sort of like it, however I wish they didnt look so bloated, the glow effect is subtle enough for me, the weapons just look like they would'nt be practical to use.

Either way can't wait for the patch to come to see how it all turns out =)