Another method to give pure melees something their hybrid children don’t possess is to replicate the long in place Specialization system available to casters (but not to their hybrid children).
Specialization would occur at level 30. The melee would train one point in all of his basic melee skills (not special attacks). Only one would be allowed to go over 50, and that one would cap at 200.
The specialization of a melee skill would result in better use of a weapon of that type. A chance, the same chance that casters get for their specialization, would be applied to each swing, which if successful would add additional damage to the blow. This damage would be equivalent to the reduction in mana cost that a caster gets, but would need to scale according to the delay of the weapon in order to prevent overpowering.