Guild Wars 2

With the change to fractals to always put an easier one at the start, every party I have been in is still rolling for the swamp fractal because it’s easier.

This needs to stop. A party should be locked into their first fractal when they start it so that going to the mistlock hub and back won’t change the first fractal. It should also have some sort of punishment for players who disband their party to try and work around this.

if people wanna roll swamp let them…. heh

besides swamp got “buffed”

Mossman is rather nasty now

There’s no incentive not to do it.

Swamp is by far the fastest, and there is no loot compensation or anything for doing the other ones.

Best way to go around this is giving each fractal an amount of points, so that it always tries to even out your points (while still randomizing).

So lets say you roll swamp first, your chance to roll dredge next will be higher than.
That would be a good incentive in my opinion.

eekzie.5640:

There’s no incentive not to do it.

Swamp is by far the fastest, and there is no loot compensation or anything for doing the other ones.

Best way to go around this is giving each fractal an amount of points, so that it always tries to even out your points (while still randomizing).

So lets say you roll swamp first, your chance to roll dredge next will be higher than.
That would be a good incentive in my opinion.

you get dredge almost every run anyway…. at least i been getting dredge every day past 3 weeks or so…lol

Cynz.9437:

eekzie.5640:

There’s no incentive not to do it.

Swamp is by far the fastest, and there is no loot compensation or anything for doing the other ones.

Best way to go around this is giving each fractal an amount of points, so that it always tries to even out your points (while still randomizing).

So lets say you roll swamp first, your chance to roll dredge next will be higher than.
That would be a good incentive in my opinion.

you get dredge almost every run anyway…. at least i been getting dredge every day past 3 weeks or so…lol

Maybe it’s already in place then

puts on tin foil hat

The plot thickens.

eekzie.5640:

Cynz.9437:

eekzie.5640:

There’s no incentive not to do it.

Swamp is by far the fastest, and there is no loot compensation or anything for doing the other ones.

Best way to go around this is giving each fractal an amount of points, so that it always tries to even out your points (while still randomizing).

So lets say you roll swamp first, your chance to roll dredge next will be higher than.
That would be a good incentive in my opinion.

you get dredge almost every run anyway…. at least i been getting dredge every day past 3 weeks or so…lol

Maybe it’s already in place then

puts on tin foil hat

The plot thickens.

oh idk if they did… maybe i am just that (un)lucky, depending how you view it haha
me and a guy i run fractals with always compete in who gets more mining bags every run xD

eekzie.5640:

So lets say you roll swamp first, your chance to roll dredge next will be higher than.
That would be a good incentive in my opinion.

So if you’ll still have a chance (doesn’t matter how small) to get dredge, why would you spend noticeably more time in non-swamp fractal?

It could work only if this was certain – like (if Swamp=first, then Dredge=third). But this won’t happen x)

I haven’t “rolled for swamp” in ages, ppl would leave my party, but me and a guildy felt, if they weren’t good enough to “play it live” then we didn’t want them anyway…

I agree it is stupid to have a random starting fractal that everyone wastes time resetting. However

“This needs to stop. A party should be locked into their first fractal when they start it so that going to the mistlock hub and back won’t change the first fractal. It should also have some sort of punishment for players who disband their party to try and work around this.”

Players disband their party and restart because there already is a penalty for returning to the observatory and restarting. Adding one punishment after another to make players do something unpopular is only going to make everyone waste time finding even more elaborate work rounds. It just annoys paying customers and that’s bad from a service company surely?

A better solution would be to change these fractals so that they have something approaching similar length and difficulty. It’s all been suggested before, including which encounters should go, and through elegant design a great many problems would be solved, would they not?

They tried to get it to stop by
1: giving us a set selection of fractals that only happen as the first one
2: giving us a meta achievement category for each of the fractals, including the old ones, to encourage “playing it live” otherwise you wouldn’t get those achievements at all if you rolled for the easy ones every time.

Either way, pugs will be pugs. Go with a group of people you know who also want to run it truly random, since it doesn’t even matter anymore. Rolling swamp as first was simply there to minimize the chances of getting the three longest fractals in a row. Now you’re guaranteed a long fractal, and a medium fractal, along with your short fractal. So going for swamp simply minimizes your risk of having the longest of the short ones first. You can still get dredge, or you can get aetherblade retreat which can be quite fast on its own.

Max Gladius.6930:

I haven’t “rolled for swamp” in ages, ppl would leave my party, but me and a guildy felt, if they weren’t good enough to “play it live” then we didn’t want them anyway…

some ppl just want to be done with it considering that chances of getting maps like cliffside or dredge are pretty high

try to run high lv fractals, i had runs in the past where we got every possible crappy map and runs were unnecessary long

and should i remind you, rewards were pretty bad.. and still are to certain extend

if you gonna penalize ppl for rolling swamp might as well make path choice random in every dungeon out there and every p1 should have extra 100+ scaled up mobs just to be “fair”

Cynz.9437:

Max Gladius.6930:

I haven’t “rolled for swamp” in ages, ppl would leave my party, but me and a guildy felt, if they weren’t good enough to “play it live” then we didn’t want them anyway…

some ppl just want to be done with it considering that chances of getting maps like cliffside or dredge are pretty high

try to run high lv fractals, i had runs in the past where we got every possible crappy map and runs were unnecessary long

and should i remind you, rewards were pretty bad.. and still are to certain extend

if you gonna penalize ppl for rolling swamp might as well make path choice random in every dungeon out there and every p1 should have extra 100+ scaled up mobs just to be “fair”

If you have a good team (prior to this horrendously buggy update) you could do any of the fractals in any order….

Max Gladius.6930:

Cynz.9437:

Max Gladius.6930:

I haven’t “rolled for swamp” in ages, ppl would leave my party, but me and a guildy felt, if they weren’t good enough to “play it live” then we didn’t want them anyway…

some ppl just want to be done with it considering that chances of getting maps like cliffside or dredge are pretty high

try to run high lv fractals, i had runs in the past where we got every possible crappy map and runs were unnecessary long

and should i remind you, rewards were pretty bad.. and still are to certain extend

if you gonna penalize ppl for rolling swamp might as well make path choice random in every dungeon out there and every p1 should have extra 100+ scaled up mobs just to be “fair”

If you have a good team (prior to this horrendously buggy update) you could do any of the fractals in any order….

and? what is your point? most groups running 48 were pretty good actually, they still would rather roll swamp knowing that 2nd and 3rd map might end up really long thanks to scaling

as said before, if players try to get swamp by all means so badly…maybe issue is not players but the fact that maps are bad designed

why the hell would you, as dev, punish players for bad designs YOU made?

just an example: 99.99% of the thieves won’t use traps simple because traps are really bad designed and are outshined by other utilies… should devs now punish thief players for not using traps? get real

i think the maps from same tier just need slight redesign so they are on paar with swamp in difficulty, time and reward level

take water as an example: most ppl don’t actually like underwater combat (some classes are also incredibly weak underwater); most ppl don’t have underwater weapons with AR making jelly fight quite pita; most ppl hate the dolphin phase with passion since at high level the place is swarmed with kraits so the only way you can pass by is to sacrifice 4 ppl that keep rezzing you so you can make it through

and water is actually ok, many groups i ran with didn’t care if it was swamp or water

FOTM is supposed to be a group of 4 random instances, not Swamp+3 Random Instances.

You can just make your own LFG with something like “LFXM – Level X – NOT ROLLING SWAMPLAND” and then play the game. If you liked your pug add them to your friendlist and keep playing with them.

Problem solved.

Game should keep track of which fractals are abandoned most frequently, and then make those have an easier T2/3/4 Fractal than the most ran T1 fractal would have.

Nosoyelarty.7268:

You can just make your own LFG with something like “LFXM – Level X – NOT ROLLING SWAMPLAND” and then play the game. If you liked your pug add them to your friendlist and keep playing with them.

Problem solved.

Or how about Anet fixes something that is clearly being exploited?

What I love about rolling swamp is, aside the obvious “quickness factor”, that swamp is easily doable with 3 players (at least the first part & bloomhunger). Thsus by rolling swamp we can already begin while looking for 2 other players to join.

I like being able to do it, but I understand that by doing so I will probably never play again underwater and the other tier 1 fractals.

Underwater and Ascalon are not difficult or particularly long fractals. You spend more time waiting to roll swamp and completing it than you would simply accepting the tier 1 fractal you get.

In my opinion the whole concept of random fractals is absurd because it allows lucky streaks (while possibly making the run really long). Especially with the instabilities.

Being able to choose the first fractal (insert swamp) is the only thing besides daily chest that makes people repeating daily high level fractals. The newly added veteran wolves make it a bit harder than before, but as long as it includes one single fight people are always going to prefer it. The OP has obviously never done too many high level dailies or wouldn’t be suggesting locking the first fractal. If you are so keen on playing a randon first one, get a party of friends and convince them to do so. Don’t punish other players just because you have a problem with something that makes everyone’s lifes easier. You are welcome to do Herpies, Dredge and Cliffside and enjoy 2+ hour runs with PUGs.

Bacon, your starting to sound like the people from the reddit post claiming that full zerker armor and stacking up are exploits. There are much bigger problems to be fixed so just deal with your petty ones.

I think the people that are still rolling for swamp do not understand why people used to do it and why it does not really matter as much anymore…It will just take time for the playerbase to adapt & some superstitious players will still roll for swamp…

Edit: though if I were to get a fractal that is a mid-duration as the first one, I would still reroll…

LostBalloon.6423:

I think the people that are still rolling for swamp do not understand why people used to do it and why it does not really matter as much anymore…It will just take time for the playerbase to adapt & some superstitious players will still roll for swamp…

Edit: though if I were to get a fractal that is a mid-duration as the first one, I would still reroll…

Swamp rolling is not going to end. On top of still being the fastest choice it is also the least affected by pretty much any instability. I would say it will be the other way around, people who temporarily stopped rolling swamp will after a while return to their old habit.

ATMAvatar.5749:

Underwater and Ascalon are not difficult or particularly long fractals. You spend more time waiting to roll swamp and completing it than you would simply accepting the tier 1 fractal you get.

It is actually much quicker than before to roll swamp, because the fracs pool is now not 1/9 but 1/4 or 5.

Ascalon at higher levels with new very courageous npcs is a bit annoying fractal, especially when said npcs pull 4 groups of vets.

Though the last boss is now easier than bloomhunger.

BaconCatTheGreasy.9542:

Nosoyelarty.7268:

You can just make your own LFG with something like “LFXM – Level X – NOT ROLLING SWAMPLAND” and then play the game. If you liked your pug add them to your friendlist and keep playing with them.

Problem solved.

Or how about Anet fixes something that is clearly being exploited?

It is not an exploit. Do not call everything you dont like is exploit.

IceVyper.6810:

Being able to choose the first fractal (insert swamp) is the only thing besides daily chest that makes people repeating daily high level fractals. The newly added veteran wolves make it a bit harder than before, but as long as it includes one single fight people are always going to prefer it. The OP has obviously never done too many high level dailies or wouldn’t be suggesting locking the first fractal. If you are so keen on playing a randon first one, get a party of friends and convince them to do so. Don’t punish other players just because you have a problem with something that makes everyone’s lifes easier. You are welcome to do Herpies, Dredge and Cliffside and enjoy 2+ hour runs with PUGs.

Sorry to disappoint you but I regularly did 40+ and my personal level was at 50 before the reset. I know what I am talking about.

Nosoyelarty.7268:

BaconCatTheGreasy.9542:

Nosoyelarty.7268:

You can just make your own LFG with something like “LFXM – Level X – NOT ROLLING SWAMPLAND” and then play the game. If you liked your pug add them to your friendlist and keep playing with them.

Problem solved.

Or how about Anet fixes something that is clearly being exploited?

It is not an exploit. Do not call everything you dont like is exploit.

I didn’t say it was an exploit. I said it was being exploited. It’s clearly not intended and should be removed. FOTM is billed as 4 random instances, not Swamp+3 Random Instances.

4 instances take too long. Especially with boss fractals like Mai Trin.
I don’t have 3 hours a day to complete one single fractal for 1 gold piece. It’s madness.

Swamp should be the only fractal in the first pool.

BaconCatTheGreasy.9542:

I didn’t say it was an exploit. I said it was being exploited. It’s clearly not intended and should be removed. FOTM is billed as 4 random instances, not Swamp+3 Random Instances.

To my knowledge it wasn’t called 3 Random Instances + Maw either.

OP is wrong to think that most would be happy with such a step. Additionally it’s not proportional to what has happened with dungeons for example. Offer incentives that make people want to do different paths.

Atm all you have working for you is “Do whatever is rolled first, cause I say so”. There’s no incentive to do water over swamp and simply ‘locking’ people into something will just make them unhappy.

You might be surprised if I tell you that when I roll, if water pops I’ll ask the group if it’s ok, usually one says it’s not so I keep rolling and I can understand why they say that.

Make drops unique to each fractal. Problem solved (especially considering how much drops there are in swamp).

BaconCatTheGreasy.9542:

With the change to fractals to always put an easier one at the start, every party I have been in is still rolling for the swamp fractal because it’s easier.

This needs to stop. A party should be locked into their first fractal when they start it so that going to the mistlock hub and back won’t change the first fractal. It should also have some sort of punishment for players who disband their party to try and work around this.

Stupid people do stupid things no matter how hard the developers try to prevent them from happening. And sadly, the majority of the game population consists of stupid people that insist on continuing to do stupid things.

Instead of restricting player usability, how about we just change the tier 1 fractals to be a bit more balanced so that people don’t care which one they get?

Kojiden.8405:

Instead of restricting player usability, how about we just change the tier 1 fractals to be a bit more balanced so that people don’t care which one they get?

So basically pander to the entitled millennials?

BaconCatTheGreasy.9542:

So basically pander to the entitled millennials?

Or being reasonable? I see there’s a thread about dredge fractal being too long/annoying/hard. Should they stop whining as well? Fractals were divided by tiers rather poorly.

Kojiden.8405:

Instead of restricting player usability, how about we just change the tier 1 fractals to be a bit more balanced so that people don’t care which one they get?

Why won’t we start with balancing tier 3 first? Say, cutting Dredge to half a size? Because people rolling for swamp is a minor problem compared to that.

BaconCatTheGreasy.9542:

With the change to fractals to always put an easier one at the start, every party I have been in is still rolling for the swamp fractal because it’s easier.

This needs to stop. A party should be locked into their first fractal when they start it so that going to the mistlock hub and back won’t change the first fractal. It should also have some sort of punishment for players who disband their party to try and work around this.

Here is an idea, how about you let others play the way they like, and they will let you play the way you like. Stop being so uptight.

It’s amazing how many people feel the need to “force” their views on others of how things “should be played” are running around.

BaconCatTheGreasy.9542:

With the change to fractals to always put an easier one at the start, every party I have been in is still rolling for the swamp fractal because it’s easier.

This needs to stop. A party should be locked into their first fractal when they start it so that going to the mistlock hub and back won’t change the first fractal. It should also have some sort of punishment for players who disband their party to try and work around this.

Then drop party and go make your own, and maybe you won’t feel entitled to tell the entitled mellenials how to play within mechanics given to them. Problem solved.

Those that feel like getting the chance to do harpy → colossus → dredge → molten bosses with you can tag along.

(sorry for my English which is not my mother tongue)

How about a “random daily-map-rotation” for each level of fractal?

I mean, for a given day D, if someone lauches a given level L, he will always get the same maps rotation.

But the day after D+1, the map rotation for the same level L will be one again randomized so that the maps may change for this day.

There are however many pros (gather people around a given level of fractal, encourage people to experiment higher levels) and cons (time-gating due to difficulty of some daily map rotation) which may be discussed.

Max Gladius.6930:

I haven’t “rolled for swamp” in ages, ppl would leave my party, but me and a guildy felt, if they weren’t good enough to “play it live” then we didn’t want them anyway…

Is not about people being good or bad, but that people have different stuffs to attend to in their real life and other stages seem to be a waste of time considering how long FOTM may take if you’re unfortunately been put into a bad group.

I think the best way to eliminate rolling for swamp is to either make swamp longer or add fractals that are equally short.

If the choice is to make swamp longer, add a section with some trash mobs beforehand.

If the choice is to add equally short fractals, I recommend cutting the krait portion entirely from the underwater fractal. That would make it a puzzle and a boss, just like swamp.

Another addition could be the first part of the dredge fractal with just the switch puzzles followed by a boss. (Trash mobs would obviously have to be reduced as well, but I’ve always thought that all the normal mobs and veterans in each of the switch rooms should be replaced with an elite or champion mob with more interesting mechanics that fit better with the puzzle.) That would also be a puzzle and a boss.

Splitting up the dredge fractal would also allow the developers to take the rest of the dredge fractal, shorten it and perhaps put it in the medium or long tier.