Guild Wars 2

Hi, here’s a suggestion for the problem of people being segregated by the Fractal levels.

- The party can enter the highest level any member has achieved.
- You get full rewards for the level you are entering.
- Each time you complete a level higher than your current maximum, your max is increased by one.

eg. My friend has reached level 10 of the Fractals. I have reached level 4. The rest of the party has also only reached level 4.

We can enter Fractals level 10. If we complete the set of 3 dungeons, then my friend will be level 11, and the rest of us will be level 5. We all get rewarded at level 10 rates.

You might say, “How can you let people go into higher levels that they haven’t earned?!”, but this is based on the attitude that “You need to spend the time completing levels 1-9 before you deserve to play level 10.” This is a pro-grind attitude and I don’t agree with it. We want to give people the ability to play with each other as conveniently as possible. Thus, it’s better to limit to the highest member rather than the lowest one.

Take these two scenarios:
- My friend is level 10, and he is stuck and cannot finish lvl11. I am level 4. Currently, to catch up so we can play together meaningfully, I have to play 6 sets of Fractals before I can even start playing with him.

- Under my suggestion, I still have to play 6 sets of Fractals to catch up – except they will all be level 10 runs, rather than 5-9. So actually I’ve had to play 6 more challenging sets of Fractals before I catch up! It’s supposedly a greater achievement, right? Of course, it also means I’ve been rewarded better as well, but it shouldnt be a problem as long as ANet scales rewards properly. (ie. My rewards are not so much better than going 5-9 that those who don’t have friends to “carry” them will complain.)

You might also say, “Why limit it at all? Why not let everyone choose whichever level they prefer?”, but this would defeat the purpose of the Fractals – to provide a source of progression for those who like to see numbers going up. Being able to skip to the last level instantly would destroy this feeling of progression. With my idea, people can play together, but at the same time, their own personal level will increase by one, so they can feel like they are working towards higher Fractal levels.

You idea is based on the fact there is 0 need for the damage reduction provided by the gear. Which in theory you should have from advancing in the dungeon.

Cause a guy who is on level 1 could enter a dungeon level 30.

If there is really a need for the gear. Said guy will die. If there is not … then i dont know what is the whole point of that place anyway.

The first point is to affirm the obvius:
Fractals of the Mist is a great dungeon, very rewarding, very funny, very innovative for the game and can get to difficults that can be difficults, specially if its your first time thereand dont know about how to do the things (dungeon or for new dinamics that comes with the game) . But also its making the community in “fractals”.
Of course we know the greater problems: If you want advance you need to play with people that can go to your max level (people with lower levels get segregated, and yours friends with lower levels are included). I want to play with my friend who is up: i cant hes not gonna advance, and since fractal is adictive they want to advance. Third: im up but im too much up or in a position between levels that not much peple have (happens sometimes lol) i cant get a fractal group: sad i cant play and level up, no fun for me i wanna level up, fractals is so funny but not now, i want to disconnect i dont like to wait lol. So our community has become “fractals”.

Ok, going to the solution: the solution posted in the first post solve some of the problems explained (i know they are obvius but this allow easy and fast capacity to measure how good or bad is the solution).
I want to play with my friend that is down and level up: i can.
I want to play with my friend that is up and he level up: i can.
For boths theres some point you need to understand, specially since someone explained it in the reply to the first post: agony enter at level 10 and got worst every tier. Yeah, well first without agony taking a friend whos not so familiarizated with the dungeon to a leveled up versio is a risk (not so big or patent but a risk) for boththe one who invite and the one who go. So yes all of the participants make a bigger effort, so what we do now about the reward, I personally would keep it this way: since this can help to much in necesity for gear, the ones whos level is minor than the level they are playing, get better loot than their max level, but not better than the next one, because other case its eliminating the point of going up for rewards, they have the opportunity to level up, get rewards, and play with their friends, and that make easy to get groups, so you can (if you survive the challange) level up faster since you get fasters groups, this part aplicate (on their own risk) to the ones their current level match up with the level been played: they groups faster, specially in the higher levels is more difficult to get groups. I know this make it less
incentives to doing it with higher levels players, but well you can is up to you, now notone is saying you you cant and separating you of your friends, but we cant give you all for free, do your best lol!!!.
Now explaining the tier difficulties: easy is your own risk if you put someone without agony resistence or the addecuate agony resistence, your own risk whatever happen like helping someon whos level is lower than the minimum of the dungeon, or when you 4 man it. Yeah in jade maw it can be worst than that, but is your risk, still to make sure you understand the risks: the max level of each player can be see in the confirmation window to enter fractals, and pass every fractal part. Good bye risk for not having enought information or mistaked information about your groups partner.
The solution is not perfect, but since theres not so great difference between level 1 and 9 the probability will be that the fractured community pass of been a each level is a fractal of the community (mantaining the analogy) to the fractals are for tier or may be every 2 tiers.
Have a nice day, and fix this issue lol.

I have to agree mostly.. But the one problem I see with it, is jumping in to fractal 30 right away to get the level 30 reward…
I’d much prefer to see it tier based.. you are still stuck in tier 1-9 until you have beaten it 9 times… then finally you can go in to 10-19.
Otherwise this idea is great!

I don’t see fractals spliting up the community any more than leveling zones do already. A level 5 levels in level 5 zones, and should stay away from level 10, and up zones. A level 30 can level in level 30 zones, and is free to revisit lower level zones. Fractals work the same way.

will be good if we can play with our friends that are on upper level and i like the idea of increasing your level by doing so but i disagree on the part with the awards
players should be awarded based on their personal level

Arxen you’re wrong.
I generally leveled in areas 5-10 levels above me, consistently. I leveled a LOT faster that way.

Arxen, even if theres difference in character levels, you can play dungeons, etc with them, not all people do but you can, same with 5-10 leveles of difference, i have done that, but the more important problem is that even if what you said aboyt character levels was complitly true (thats not the case), fractals is splitting the level 80 community principally, what means that is splitting a same level community group that is right now the one with more population, and the one whos gonna grow even more because of the game progression, so is splitting the game community significativly more, and that need a fix, a fast and decisive fix, y alredy stated above what i think about the post autor solution so im not gonna repeat it, my original post is too big alredy.

within my guild its already extremely fractured.
We try to run together.. but I tend to run more often… I stopped, havn’t beaten 11 yet because i’m waiting for other guildies to catch up. for 3 days been going back and doing 10 and under over and over to level them up… it takes a long time.

Well, my solution seems like it would be beneficial for the pre-agony levels, which would probably cover a lot of the casual players who are complaining about being left out.

As for the agony levels, I guess this is probably a problem with gated content and the agony mechanic itself.

The agony mechanic could be altered to be always avoidable/stoppable by a variety of skillful player actions (eg. all agony attacks can be evaded, blinded, interrupted, etc.) which means agony resist gear is there just to make it less painful when you mess up.

If this was done, then it’s quite possible for non-geared players to succeed at higher level fractals if they play skillfully. Agony resist will only benefit if you mess up.

An other possibility is to make the fractal level an account level. It is quite depressing to be lvl 18 on your main and come back with a reroll and have to do lvl 1 and searching for hours a groupe that in the end never come (yesterday evening) juste because very few people need the lvl 1 now.

Rieselle, there are only two unavoidable agony attacks in the game.
The jelly fish swallow.. (as far as I’m aware, there is no way to prevent being swallowed) and cthulhu’s love child’s stage switch.

I’m stuck on lvl 1 fractal after given up on the whole thing.

Problems:
- A person DC’s … entire group is screwed, no way back in, if say you did 2 fractals but didn’t do the 3rd yet and can’t manage to 4 man it, you do not go up a lvl
- A person drops out for whatever reason … again no way to replace them, so either 4 man it or start all over AGAIN.
-having to level all my 7 toons was bad enough, now I am expected to level them all again for a dungeon? Come on you’ve got to be kidding right?
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As to the people above comparing map zones lvl differentiation to fractal levels you forgot one major thing. I can go solo a map just fine. For a fractal I have to find 4 people my level, all of which cannot DC or quit before finishing a set of 3 fractals, or all that time is wasted.

Possible solution: Allow 5 repeated completion of a fractal level to unlock the level two levels above. e.g. complete lvl 10 five times to unlock lv12 if you could not find a lv11 group.

This would work due to the daily chests for completing even numbered fractal levels. People would gladly repeat those for the ‘dailys’ and extra relics so its easier to find parties for these levels.

If you could find a group of odd lvl, you can unlock the next level with one play. If not, you can just repeat your current lvl knowing at least you can progress with at most 5 more repeats rather than having to wait for your specific level group.

Hurray! From Izzy’s post it seems they are implementing my solution

The only difference is that rewards seem to be based on your personal fractal level, and not the fractal you’re running, but I can live with that.

Overall I think it’s the best solution for everyone. I’ve looked at the reaction thread to Izzy’s post, and I feel I can refute every objection that people have brought up :P But I wont bother here because I should be spending my time playing the game :P