basically fractals is a set of 10 mini dungeons. When you enter you get 3 random ones in a row. Finishing all 3 increases your fractal level.
Even level fractal levels (2,4,6,8,10, and so on) Also have a 4th fractal at the end of them which is always the ocean fractal (jade sea themed)
Fractals are usually pretty short, each one taking 5-30 minutes based on how good your party is, and which fractal you get.
The ascended gear comes in the form of rings and backpacks.
The rings are random drops from the daily chests. These daily chests can contain rings starting at fractal level 10. At level 20 you can start to get infused versions of these rings from the chest. Infused versions start off with an innate 5 agony resistance (a type of resistance that lowers the damage of a fractal only boss condition.)
The backpacks can be made in the mystic forge with large amounts of ecto and t6 materials. Or eventually bought and upgraded in the forge using materials gained from fractals, and fractal relics (fractal relics are much like dungeon tokens, you get them as you complete fractals)
Ascended gear has higher stats than exotic gear. And some hard to find stat combinations are present on the ascended gear. Power/Tough/Vitality rings for instance are quite rare in exotic form (only the WvWvW gear and some very rare exotics)
Ascended gear can also be infused. There are 2 types of infusion. Innate infusion and normal infusion. Innate infusion will change the name of the item directly. You can create innate infused rings and backpieces in the mystic forge. You can also receive the rings as daily rewards past fractal level 20.
The second type of infusion relies on putting an infusion inside an infusion slot (much like you would put a gem into a normal accessory) these infusions can be bought for fractal relics, or made in the mystic forge.
When people refer to “doing their fractal daily” they mean doing an even number fractal level in order to get the daily reward chest (and thus a chance at a ring, or other better loot)
Fractals have multiple daily levels. 2,4,6,8 make up the first level. If you do fractal level 2 and then fractal level 4, you will only receive 1 daily chest, that of the level 2 fractal. However if you then do fractal level 10, you will receive another daily chest, that of the fractal level 10.
Agony is a new condition caused by some skills from bosses in fractals. It rapidly drains your hp and has no cure. The only way to mitigate this damage is agony resistance gained by infusions (of either variety) on your ascended gear. Agony will start to show up at fractal level 10.
That’s about it for the ascended gear. I recommend entering the fractal portal and talking to the golems. One of them has a second buy tab with a list of ascended rings, this will help you see which rings you may want, as well as familiarizing you with their stats and so on. I would also check the wiki (http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Main_Page) when it comes to any and all mystic forge recipes.
