Guild Wars 2

Ok I admit I’m angry and I need to vent,

but seriously, these Fractals levels are the dummest and most poorly conceived MMO progression system I’ve ever seen in an MMO.

It pisses everyone off (I’ve spoken to).

Lion’s Arch is a constant spam of LFG Fractals level 1 anywhere up to 20.

More Casual Guild Members are annoyed because more advanced Guild Members don’t feel like running lower levels after having done the Dungeon a bazillion times over the past two weeks.

Especially not if they want to do both the daily and progress at the same time.

Then you have me, an ex progressive guild member who happened to be away over the weekend to find that everyone else of has jumped 5 levels. None of them understandably feels like running the same levels again and again so I’m left to pugging them until I catch up.

And then we’re back to spaming LFG, LFG, LFG competing with everyone for players of different levels. Hoping that, out of a random fluke you might actually find 4 fellow players who want to do exactly the same level as you.

But after spaming for an hour….you just give up and do something else. But in the back of your head you know that you’re just falling further and further behind….

Even ignoring the Ascended Gear issues…this is by far the most infuriating and frustrating MMO progression system I’ve seen.

The biggest joke though is that there’s hardly a noticeable difference between the various levels inside a Tier so all the segregation really doesn’t serve a purpose.

What
A
Joke

/rant

gw2lfg.com

and happily ever after…

Don’t be a smug idiot. GW2LFG.com just makes it a little faster to find pugs, but it’s no dungeonfinder, and the nature of pugs is that you’ll be far less time efficient than if you were allowed to run with your guild mates.

Well you are not forced to do Fractals, do other stuff instead. As for ascended gear, they are only usefull in fractals, and they will add other ways to get them:
“Our intention is to deploy ascended components and gear across the whole of the game rather than focus it in one particular location” – Studio Design Director.

Jericho.5940:

gw2lfg.com

and happily ever after…

thats a joke in and amongst itself. using a website when a grouping mechanic should be included in the game. its a poor workaround for a big problem. maybe it shaves a few min off your LFG time but your still stuck spamming in LA and wasting tons of time trying to form a group. I agree with the OP that the fractals design was not properly thought out and it has indeed led to much frustration among players

I just want to do hard PvE. And not grind 20-30 levels for it.

I’m not at all upset with fractals because I recognize it is not a progression system. The problems you describe originate with the conflict between people that think it is and those that think it isn’t.

People won’t do a lower level fractal because they want the daily. Thats fine for them, but they can’t do another after the daily? OK, maybe not. So what; there are lots of people out there.

But you said a lot in your guild are on lower levels and nobody will help them progress… not even themselves? Don’t the people in your guild, I don’t know… work together to make the team stronger? Can’t one or two people do a lower level to help somebody catch up so that gasp they aren’t a lower level any more?

Here is where we reach the disparity in perception. The people that are tired of grinding it see it as a progression that must be done. Grinding should not be enjoyed, it must be repetitive, and there is no reward worth receiving except progression. They do the daily because that is the way you grind; anything else is a waste of time and does not further their goals. It is a contest and you win by being higher than other people.

The people that don’t look at it as progression to grind out just want to get to the higher levels because that is a natural offshoot of enjoying the content. They want to progress because it makes it easier to get groups, because the rewards are better, and they want to overcome the challenges. They aren’t trying to race, and they will play the content not for the daily—not for the grind—but for the fun.

If nobody is willing to do a lower level once in a while to help others catch up, then you have a downright kitteny guild. How many people are behind in their FotM levels? Probably less than 5 if there isn’t a full group. Nobody has an alt that could progress? Nobody is willing to take a main for a second round after the daily? You can’t find any people in the overflows to pug—spread into multiple overflow zones, it is easy to name drop guildies that can fit into a group. How low of a level are we talking? You can do level 1 with 3 people pretty easily, although it takes longer.

While I understand your frustration, I think it is largely misplaced.

^ I think the frustration is placed exactly where it should be, at the Designer. They should have known the customer base well enough by now. FotM appears to be a rushed response from them realizing, “ZOMG…. they blew through all our content in a couple of months???”

I will agree it’s how we, the community of players, has responded to this update that is making it far far worse. It’s pretty well documented on the forums that our behavior toward each other has become strained and more hostile. I’ve never experienced such rudeness and appalling behavior until FotM came out. We could and should be a much more tolerant, generous, and thoughtful community.

To the Op, lead by example is the best advice I can give. With hope, our efforts will be rewarded. Otherwise, it’s knowing we’re doing good, that will be the reward in itself.

Prima.3512:

Well you are not forced to do Fractals, do other stuff instead. As for ascended gear, they are only usefull in fractals, and they will add other ways to get them:
“Our intention is to deploy ascended components and gear across the whole of the game rather than focus it in one particular location” – Studio Design Director.

….Ascended gear has better stats, not just agony resistance.

Even tabbing out and using the lfg website isn’t foolproof. There isn’t always someone on the level you want, the group has filled, etc. It IS difficult to find a group. My husband and I are looking for a new guild because the people in ours have quit logging on. There isn’t ever more than 4-5 people online anymore in our guild. It’s also difficult to find a guild unless you just join one spamming in LA.

My perception of this is that this is an experiment. They made a three ring circus and the plebeians took a big bite out of it. People like to be better than their counterparts..it really does matter to them and they like shinies they can show for their effort. They get to see what kind of reward system people like, one way to make dungeons dynamic, what kind of material we like in a dungeon, how players react to certain obstacles..etc

Ditton.3149:

My perception of this is that this is an experiment. They made a three ring circus and the plebeians took a big bite out of it. People like to be better than their counterparts..it really does matter to them and they like shinies they can show for their effort. They get to see what kind of reward system people like, one way to make dungeons dynamic, what kind of material we like in a dungeon, how players react to certain obstacles..etc

I like to show people I am better than them by playing better than them, superficial titles and items are pointless both in and out of the game. Relying on numbers because you don’t have a good reaction time nor anticipation abilities is laughable and I look down on players whom want a system like that and rely on it in order to “be good”.

OT:
They could have handled this much better than they did; a few players asked for a feeling of progression, and I only remember a very, very small minority of even those players even asking specifically for gear treadmilling.

They dropped the ball on this one… Not to mention, it was difficult enough to find a group for specific dungeons before, now even grouping within guilds is severely fractured and difficult to do.

i dont agree with you, I also dont feel like adding anything to it because all you people do is use it as a podium to yell about how you hate the new progression in stead of talking about anything remotely interesting.

FYI they are looking at this. The posted something on the reddit interview yesterday:

“Hi Cesmode,
Yep there is no doubt that the fractal level system is causing fragmentation. We are currently looking at solutions, one of which is to set the levels into tiers whereby all those within that tier say 1-5 can participate. This has implications on reward and difficulty which is why we are still looking into it.
Chris”

http://www.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/13tuac/im_the_studio_design_director_on_guild_wars_2_ama/

Prima.3512:

Well you are not forced to do Fractals, do other stuff instead. As for ascended gear, they are only usefull in fractals, and they will add other ways to get them:
“Our intention is to deploy ascended components and gear across the whole of the game rather than focus it in one particular location” – Studio Design Director.

That’s just simply not true. Ascended items are best in slot (assuming they have the stats you want) everywhere in the game. The added Agony resist also makes them essential for higher level Fractals.

I like it, even if the dungeon chooses not to grace me with drops.

Also I saw a man try to drive a nail in with this forehead. I think that was the stupidest idea I’ve seen. You need to get out more, there’s plenty more stupid things to see.

I like it too, and i don’t give a crap about the levels per say, what i like is that the difficulty raise. And i found the difficulty to be very well set in the fractal, well a lot better than what i’m used to see in most mmo, this mean having mobs with a higher hp bar. At least in the fractal difficulty scale come from many factors, and ask better team work, so this was well done by Anet.

And the constant spam is a good thing to me, it mean people like to play the fractal. It mean i can find group play a lot more often than in other dungeons too. They just need a lfg tool, tha’ts all.