Guild Wars 2

By the tone of the OP he seems controlling and not fun to deal with. There is leading and there is whining. He is on the whining side. If you freaking out about people not in exotics for T1/2 then I am sorry to say your not as good as you think you are. If your trying to micro manage everyone it won’t work.

Calm down and actually talk to your group and no not in caps. People don’t like being yelled at especially in game. Call targets and go over fights before hand. Target players who are down that need to be brought up ASAP. It is a game and they are trying to have fun.

Swamp needs adjustment though, at the moment it is a tad too annoying for low tier players. Plenty of rage w/o mesmers or so.

The first lvls are easy, they can be pugged with non-80’s. I didn’t get past lvl 2 because everytime someone leaves it resets. And the replacements didn’t had access to lvl 3.

So if you are asking 80’s with exotics and still fail that many times, then i got to say sorry bro….it’s you.

I agree this is a fail but not for the same reason. Why cant we invite someone when someone DCs? its not like DCs are rare in gw2

You people are amazing…. every single one your posts.

So because I actually take the time to make a good balance group, make sure the gear is in check, and sit around waiting for people to learn the dungeon; give or take of learning it myself and offering some advice; since most of you agree that it takes players that are willen to learn or have a brain, that makes me an Elitist type.

Do you know how many post here I have laughed at because it was

A: “I beat it with Guildies.”
B: “Go do it with friends.”
C: “I didn’t have any issues with my PuG groups.”
D: “He’s talking like an Elitist so its him thats the problem.”

I want each and every one of you to open your mind for once and actually consider the situations that were indicated that makes this dungeon fail.

A: “I don’t have guildies or a guild to snap my fingers, as what you indicate to me as what you have to your ability, you do this dungeon whenever and successfully.”

B: "I don’t know any people that is playing Guild Wars 2, because the very few people that I did know, no longer play GW2 for whatever reason. Yet you people are are saying that its easy to snap your fingers and be-friend anyone. Sorry but that is NOT how the world works. So once again you are thinking about your own good fortune. There for your post is invalid to the situation at hand.

C: Again because I found many, unwilling or unintelligent, PuG players, that makes me an Elitist. Have you ever thought for once, outside the box, that the reason I make sure the group I set up is balanced and geared because I look for indication of players that know how to play the game and show they are experienced at the game?

No… because many of you are too busy to jump to the conclusion that its the OP that’s the problem. I am sick of it, people like you drive forums into redundant threads like this without actually providing any insight.

I bet you posters never thought once about the idea that, if people are not willing to learn, not motivate to do the dungeon, and just drop group because they are not “Breezing” threw the dungeon as many of you bad posters have put in this thread, they drop group thinking its the group and not them; then no that is dungeon being fail not me.

I promise you, most of the replies on this thread are unhelpful and if anything under sighted about the situation.

Finally, the conclusion that many of you are not willing to hear, think, or listen; the dungeon is fail when I have to spend 6+ hours, forming many groups to find motivated PuGs, willing to learn the dungeons themselves or find people that want work as a group.

Please by all means, keep posting what I mention about, your post are unproductive and useless to what the real problem is.

Also to add more, since I hit the 5,000 word limit in the last post.

Here are some real issues that make the dungeon extremely un-fun.

- When you find bad players that AFK during a dungeon run without saying anything and causes the group to replace that player but to do that, you have to leave the dungeon, losing any progression.

- When 1 or 2 players refuse to die because you get stuck in an area that has many mobs that respawn, infinitely, and thus instead of wiping as a team, so the whole group respawns, me or other players have to wait around doing nothing because we can’t respawn while 1 or 2 other players, play around to the point they are “Trolling” about not dieing.

- The Swamp dungeon is pure annoying because you can give hints what to do, but 100% of the extra info, the player has to learn themselves, as that extra info can only be learned by them because if you try to explain all the small details, like the traps, what mob snares, or the walls that pop and appear, they get bored and leave the group.

- Also the whole group wipe thing so you can re-spawn, is probably the most dumbest idea to be implemented in a dungeon history. Since players cant respawn on their own, I have met players that find the same issues like me, when people by accident die in weird areas that players cannot reach to res those people, and causes everyone in the group to be annoyed at you because they now have to die, receive a repair bill, for you to come back alive.

I thought this dungeon was suppose to be rewarding, not a punishment?

I do agree that this dung is flawed in it’s concept. If you make something this gimmicky and frustrating for people who do not like the platform meets mmo design you should be scratching the back of your head. Although there is no written definition of what an mmo should be you know what to expect. As you know what to expect from a shooter or racing game.
You already had complain about disabled people with the vista’s and now you go overboard with this I wonder if you have a clear concept of what you want with this game. I can imagine that this is fun for a young generation. But I can also image that it’s not for the older.

To me this a direct result of getting rid of the holy trinity. It was inevitable this would happen.
You cannot challenge a single profession in one encounter you have to figure other ways to be challenging. And for area this was an idea. And since there is so much commotion about this one dung I would be wondering. I cant place my finger on it but for some reason the group feeling is gone. You can even read it in some of the replies. If you cant do it you suck.

Having said that. I just cant understand why this content patch has been launched. You have whole regions, dungs and not importantly professions being broken. Why leave all that and put your focus on this. Even this new dung is buggy as hell.

We did difficulty level 2 (including the Jade Maw boss fight) with a level 42 thief in our group last night… Definitely player skill > gear.

These dungeons are amazing. Nothing short. The future looks bright for GW2 if they keep adding more fractals.

@ Milkybars.1392

Quote: “You already had complain about disabled people with the vista’s and now you go overboard with this I wonder if you have a clear concept of what you want with this game. I can imagine that this is fun for a young generation. But I can also image that it’s not for the older.”

Comment: Could you clarify this?

easily the greatest experience i have had in a while….thank you anet ;D

Consider the following:

- Most players who are really dedicated to the game will be in guilds and not pugging. This generally means that the average skill level of the Puggers pool will be lower than the average skill level of players as a whole. (yes there are good players in the PUG pool).

- Good players understand Skill > Gear and composition any day of the week. Gear and composition make things a bit easier but are really not that important in GW2. Good players learned this by being good and doing things with sub-par gear and composition enough times.

- People who demand XX gear or XX class automatically remove many good players from their available PUG pool. There are really good players who are no XX class or don’t have XX gear.

- Many people see those types of group requests and avoid it because they question your ability. You are seen as needing XX gear and XX class to win because you are basically saying you do. As above, good players know you don’t need XX gear or XX class to win if you are a good player so the logical assumption is that you are bad (not saying you are).

tl;dr Saying “LFG _ Must have all exotics and be _ class” scares away many good players that are floating in the PUG pool and attracts people who are bad and believe gear and composition is the be all end all because they aren’t good enough without mechanical advantages to compensate for poor performance.

@ Unspecified.9142

I’ve been playing MMOs for 12 years, could you shed some light about your post?

Since Arenanet did admit clearly that Ascension Gear is an upgrade above Exotic and that as you go deeper into the dungeon, like really deep into the dungeon, that requires Ascension gear and Agony Infusionment to kill certain mobs.

Could you explain to me, how to avoid what you just argue against, on that certain type of post? Because I see no work around it and really why is your post, as many other posters, use the phrase “Gear Isn’t the Issue its skill”, because this dungeon just proves this argument wrong.

Also could you give me a better example how to find good players, because of the dungeon being new, its the new excitement, and I already found people that lie… yes LIE, about actually being experienced at their class, able to comprehend simple puzzles and team work, and their gear; I find alot of the PuG groups I form, failing alot.

So while its easy for you to say in your post your claims, the flaw in it self is that I am trying to find good players using different methods, while your post is a standard edition of what an in-experienced MMO player would say when they do not meet up with challenges like this.

I look forward to what you actually offer in your next post.

Don’t pug. Seriously everytime I pug I end up regretting it, and that’s not even in fotm.

I did an AC explorable, path 2 yesterday with some pugs.

We had a necro that died nonstop. He was dead more than he was alive. A warrior who was just completely useless. An elementalist who was “staff only” (as in, useless) and a mesmer who was decent.

It took us forever to do that dungeon simply because they just kept dying, over and over and over again. And this is the easy path in an easy dungeon.

Shadowlancer.7102:

@ Milkybars.1392
Comment: Could you clarify this?

There was post a while ago about people not able to complete maps because they couldn’t do the vista’s. The reason was that certain people have certain depth perception, color and physical disadvantages. And what I meant about the younger/older, is that things get more difficult to do when older. And I am not even talking about the grand papa’s and mama’s. Yes they play mmos also

Yup… Shadowlancer, please… You don’t need Agony, not for the first few difficulties of the dungeon anyway. So no – gear is not an issue, and if you only take “full exotics” then you are doing it wrong. Half of the people lie about their gear anyway, according to you.

Dungeons are also supposed to be only doable with a group with good teamwork, so I’d say: a dungeon well done!

Tip: I never join anyone who requests any specific profession or gear. The ability to speak and read English gets you far.

@ Milkybars.1392

Could you do me a favor, I have re-read your post a alot and its still very confusing.

Could you polish up your post grammatically because its very hard to read and be very detailed and specific about what you are pointing out and who you are directing to? Thanks.

@Shadowlancer, I feel offended by your comment and I see you are doing a good job of getting your thread locked. Gj.

@ Taikanaru.5746

If the thread gets lock, it gets locked, just proves how hard a person that bothers to enjoy the game, goes threw great lengths, too enjoy the game.

Just a “constructive” suggestion, but perhaps the misconception that you need full exotic geared level 80 characters, which is preposterous by the way. Is actually backfiring against you and attracting players who also lack the common sense to know better than to think that way?

In my experience, the skills of those with this belief about dungeons has been usually a lot lower than those that simply knew the content and were competent at playing their class as opposed to those that used gear as a crutch

I’ve beaten the first few levels multiple times with mixes of level 40s to level 60s with no sign of exotic gear apart from my own, and I have far from a full set (most of my accessories are blues or greens). Skill > Gear in this dungeon, like most of the others. Misplacing your faith in your equipment is your downfall.

I also don’t get the jump from “my teams sucked” to “the dungeon sucks”.

Shadowlancer.7102:

I just spent a couple of hours working with people on these dungeons threw pure PuGing (Pick Up Groups). Half the people that join, lie about having full exotic gear, don’t follow orders, suck at puzzles even after explaining to them what needs to be done, or just sit there and act dumb.

I agree this is a pure PvE dungeon and its impressive but this is not PuGable and after trying 2 months forming my own guild for such dungeons like this. I wasn’t able to make guild nor find a decent guild dedicated to this cause.

An absolute fail and boring patch for the next 2 months. GG Arenanet.

This is what I’m getting from your opening post:

• “LFM for Fractals. Must have full exotics etc etc” … I can’t speak for everyone, but I do know from friends and guildmates that they have a tendency to avoid people who impose such restrictions; and I can also say that most of these friends are also well geared with one of them who has acquired a Legendary weapon.

Unspecified.9142 made a few points and I feel those are valid to certain degrees. I know I follow under the last three bullets. I pug content often when guildies and friends aren’t around, but I also scrutinize those who might be looking for specific professions, level requirements, or gear sets. Nine times out of ten, those people who end up requesting for specific kinds of players end up being bad themselves. Not all of them, but I just have undesirable experiences with those kind of folks. The only exception would be for certain situations that require a certain ability from a certain class that makes a certain encounter much more certainly easier. In the case of GW2, I could probably see the request for any professions that can provide Stability for the whole group in the event you end up the Cliffside Fractal, at least until the punishment for being blown off the edge is a bit more to manageable.

I know this seems kind of crazy, but assuming those people who skim through LA map chat haven’t added you to their ignore list, I bet you can get a competent group together who is willing to cooperate, brainstorm, and eventually complete the content in a suitable time frame by putting in a simple request: “LFM for Fractals”. That’s it! None of that “80’s only” or other tacked on requirement stuff that makes you look like an Elitist. I can’t say for Fractals specifically since I have yet to pug it, but for previous dungeons, I know I have bumped into some pretty good players of varying gear levels. Most of the times, they’re pretty friendly and open to any suggestions to what makes the group work.

If people claim that they can complete the first few difficulty settings as a level 30-something in so-in-so gear, maybe you can open up your pool of players a little bit more.

Lastly, Fractals is still new. You really shouldn’t expect to one-shot anything in that dungeon since people are still learning the encounters, regardless if you group with your guild members or a bunch of random people in Lion’s Arch. At some point, someone will pick up and say “Oh we got this, and I’ll show you how too!”

I’ve managed to complete Fractals lvl 1-2 being on lvl 38-39 with 2 friends and 2 pugs. There were 2 lvl 80, one 60 and one 50. All of us doing it for the first time. We didn’t have too much trouble, we did die and we got wiped once when we lost our way underwater. I can’t say about other people gear but mine was green/blue nothing special. Also the classes were completely random we didn’t ask anyone special, we just wanted to get someone to play and it turned out great.

After my original party disbanded I wanted to play more, so I was waiting until someone was looking for a party member. I did join and got kicked out straight away why? Cause the character I wanted to play as wasn’t lvl 80. When I said to who ever invited me that it doesn’t matter, I received a reply that im a noob and don’t know how to play. How can they actually know how do I play if nobody will give me a chance? The same applies to other people without lvl, class or gear.

I understand your complaint about people being unable to learn the mechanics of it and failing all the time, but that’s a problem with people you choose. Give chance to everyone not only exotic 80s. Maybe you will get someone good, if not you always have option to kick and get someone new.

The gear argument is not completely correct. You don’t need ascended gear for lower lvls, you will need it later on but you don’t need it straight away. I’m assuming from your post that you didn’t manage to complete lower lvls, why do you care about gear?

Also you asking for someone who has to be lvl80 and this and this class and this and this gear is just plain wrong. Everyone is getting upscaled to lvl 80 when you enter the dungeon, and ok maybe it’s not as good as full exotic armor set and maybe some people are missing traits, but in the end of the day all that won’t make any difference cause if they suck those few points and traits wont save them or you.

And just to let you know I’ve been playing GW1 since lunch and was in top50 guilds, started to play GW2 on lunch as well.

Ps. If you cant find any good people to play worse case change server, its still for free.

I love it when people who think they can contribute to a thread by reading the first post, or first page, and actually believe they can reply to a thread without reading the whole thread.

Kinda defeats the purpose of the Forum Rules about not repeating things already being discussed or passed discussion and a waste of my time repeating things that has been discussed or have been updated to the latest topic of discussion.

Shadowlancer, could you explain in detail what makes you think I, or anyone else did not read the entire thread? Thanks. I certainly read everything in this thread, just so you know.

Also – people CAN contribute to a thread even if they didn’t read one or two lines said by the almighty you that were apparently so godly important that they must not be missed or their opinion becomes invalid.

I’m currently on a small “coffee, stretch and get ready” break from Fractals. However, i did reach difficulty level 8 with half friends, half PuGs. To be quite honest, some people indeed suck at jumping puzzles. So? Just be patient.
Some people do not follow orders. I don’t either, i find that ordering and being the boss can be quite annoying..especially in a dungeon that everyone is discovering. Just shouting orders and barking at people for learning will only get yourself angry and them sick of you.
Not full exotic. Oh no…unless you’ve reached a high difficulty level, exotic gear is really not an issue.

Be chill and stop asking for the perfect group. I had my share of players unable to react / respond / think (fast, not in general). And yet…made it this far and will go on further.

Seriously, i think the problem is you and not the dungeons i pucked to level5 without having a group that has failed dooing a boss so far.

I had no problem with a PuG.

People are too quick to blame game design for their own failings. The game has areas of different difficulty for a reason.

I made it with PuGs (+TS) to level 8 by now and we had a lot of fun. We did no gear checks or anything like that, it is totally unneccessary. I seriously don’t get your problem.

I have no problems with pugs as well. Perhaps it is an aftereffect of leading multiple AC firstimers, but I find most people I work with to be a pleasant experience.

I did a pug yesterday with a group of people. NONE of us had ever done FoTM.

1 never listened. 1 ran around like an overly excited kitten with a ball of string (lvl 40 something), 1 level 74(VERY undergeared), me a support engi, and 1 really smart person.

We failed our first fractal, due to a BUG. Cliffside fractal, some of us fell off, but the others couldn’t see us to rez us….and since we couldn’t waypoint…

We left and reset, got snow fractal, underwater fractal, and charr fractal.

Succeeded just fine. Ran into a few bumps/wipes in the underwater (stupid pirranahs). When I ran the pug, I advertised any level and never asked about gear. We went in knowing we had no clue what to do. We looked at everything we came across and communicated what we saw/thought in chat best we could.

It was a BLAST! Best dungeon I’ve ever run. Although Arah is pretty awesome XD

PS: @ Shadowlancer, After reading your posts (yes all of them I promise) I think I can see why your parties might fail. If the attitude you have towards people in this thread at all reflects how you treat your fellow party members, they might be failing just to make you miserable. Returning the favor and all. People don’t just randomly “take orders” from someone they don’t know. You are just another pug person, you have no authority over anyone else in your party, so treat them like they are equals. Instead of Ordering EXPLAIN what happens and what needs done, then trust them to do it. You might find people to be more compelled to listen.

I have completed a total of 5 fractals, all with PUGs. The only times I have been in a group that failed it was because of crashes or bugs. The first time I went in we finished the entire series of 3; we started a second run and I crashed as the 2nd level loaded. I eventually was able to get the game started again but obviously couldn’t get back in. The group disbanded shortly after that.

Fractals of the Mists is a very PuG-friendly dungeon at the entry difficulty level. In fact, it is far more forgiving than most other explorable modes in terms of mob damage and health. Being level 80 with full exotics is definitely not a requirement.

I love the fact Shadow can’t get figure out hes the problem. It is quite funny.

You may have played MMO’s for 12 years, but that hardly makes you a good party leader. And by your obvious “avoidance” of that makes it quite clear – You ain’t as good as you think you are. My advice, join a pug, be quiet, and follow orders from someone who can lead.

The dungeon seems very good and enjoyable with a group you know. I wouldn’t suggest PuGing since you’re going to come up with people that have no idea what they are doing. I’m sure there are exceptions but don’t count on them, try to find a core party you can challenge the place with.

Hrist.8972:

The dungeon seems very good and enjoyable with a group you know. I wouldn’t suggest PuGing since you’re going to come up with people that have no idea what they are doing. I’m sure there are exceptions but don’t count on them, try to find a core party you can challenge the place with.

I have done 5 fractals, 4 story mode dungeons, and a small handful of explore mode dungeons. All have been PUGs and all have been decent to very good experiences.

sbr.8170:

Hrist.8972:

The dungeon seems very good and enjoyable with a group you know. I wouldn’t suggest PuGing since you’re going to come up with people that have no idea what they are doing. I’m sure there are exceptions but don’t count on them, try to find a core party you can challenge the place with.

I have done 5 fractals, 4 story mode dungeons, and a small handful of explore mode dungeons. All have been PUGs and all have been decent to very good experiences.

I didn’t deny for something like that to be possible, it’s just that you shouldn’t really expect this to be the case. Seemingly the original poster has had very bad experiences with PuG in this dungeon, he just needs to realize that things can and probably will work out less favourably in high end dungeon like this.

I’ve PUGed to level 4. No major problems.

Biggest thing is if you’re not a patient and nice person yourself, don’t ever PUG.

If you demand things that are way too much… full exotic gear at level 1 for example is laughable requirement.. you will also fail with PUGs. Know what’s realistic but don’t expect to do it with Superman speed with no snags, and there’s really no issues.

Hrist.8972:

sbr.8170:

Hrist.8972:

The dungeon seems very good and enjoyable with a group you know. I wouldn’t suggest PuGing since you’re going to come up with people that have no idea what they are doing. I’m sure there are exceptions but don’t count on them, try to find a core party you can challenge the place with.

I have done 5 fractals, 4 story mode dungeons, and a small handful of explore mode dungeons. All have been PUGs and all have been decent to very good experiences.

I didn’t deny for something like that to be possible, it’s just that you shouldn’t really expect this to be the case. Seemingly the original poster has had very bad experiences with PuG in this dungeon, he just needs to realize that things can and probably will work out less favourably in high end dungeon like this.

I didn’t intend to disagree or argue with you.

I have heard a lot of people complaining about PUGs but my limited experience has been the complete opposite. Of course that could change on the next PUG (or 10) that I join, especially since i have never joined one that has required certain class/level/gear.

Done fractals till lvl 11 (there’s a post about the drops we got in this subforum) and I can tell you 1 thing, gradually increases difficulty, adds more mechanics, more rewards, and the most important:
The instance teaches you how to do it, and how to be better at it, a.k.a you improve with the instance at the same time.

This is a well love design, and it has all my respects, when we got to 10, we smiled to side to side when Agony kick’d into the mechanics.

Shadowlancer.7102:

I love it when people who think they can contribute to a thread by reading the first post, or first page, and actually believe they can reply to a thread without reading the whole thread.

Kinda defeats the purpose of the Forum Rules about not repeating things already being discussed or passed discussion and a waste of my time repeating things that has been discussed or have been updated to the latest topic of discussion.

Translation:

“The resulting consensus is that the fault lies with me, and that in many ways my elitist ways are in fact the reason behind my failure and why the groups I’m forming are formed in a manner based on a delusion that gear = skill, however rather than take this feedback and adapt myself to better tackle the issue, I shall instead start to bring up forum rules in an attempt to threaten those that would disagree with me into shutting up and putting up.

Or to better summarize, force them to read an entire thread on a matter of which reading less than half of the first page more or less, will give them the proper insight into both me as a player and the majority response, and then base their replies off of that

TL;DR: You’re trying to avoid the answer you’ve been given now and are being stubborn.

“gear does not guarantee skill or competency”

http://8.media.bustedtees.cvcdn.com/9/-/bustedtees.f2d9c4f9-dfee-4dd4-8a77-ad0f1f07.gif

I thought these were easily the best encounters in the game aside from a few isolated bosses in a few Exp modes. Aside from the DC bug this goes to show that the system can work. I’ve had an incredible amount of fun just learning the encounters. They’re not perfect and sometimes get a little repetetive with how long some of then are (Svnair Shaman) but it’s such a leap in quality from the previous explorable modes its just uncanny. Truly hats off to a great job on this one for sure in my book.

By far the best dungeon in the game and the best pve content in the game. I’m at difficulty 5 right now and all done with pugs. The only one i had/have problems (cuz its annoying n stupid design is the swamp)

@ Shadow

You say you take the time to check everyone on gear/tactics/builds etc. Yet you failed everytime. Seems like you’re doing something wrong. Since this dungeon is kind of a joke. Except some of the encounters/mechanics (eg. the swamp, which needs player understanding, cooperation and coordination), all 9 possible rooms are extremely easy. Gear does not show how experienced you are so I assume you’re probably coming from WoW or other similar game that has gear checks before dungeons. It doesn’t work like that here. And since I don’t hear anyone else complaining that they can’t complete the fractals, I’m gonna go ahead and say that the problem is you and the people you found. Maybe you lack leadership skills.
I have completed first 2 levels with a level 30 in the group and I am currently at level 7, all done in PUGs with not so much as a single wipe (except the one time we quit because one of us got disconnected). The dungeon is amazing, fun and very well built. I sincerely can’t figure out what’s wrong with your team setup, and all the 15 pugs you’ve been with have a single common denominator.

Yeah, fractal is easy to complete unless you got disconnected or hang. What do you need is not an exotic equipment or great skilled player but a great teamwork :p

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Don’t pug. Seriously everytime I pug I end up regretting it, and that’s not even in fotm.

I did an AC explorable, path 2 yesterday with some pugs.

We had a necro that died nonstop. He was dead more than he was alive. A warrior who was just completely useless. An elementalist who was “staff only” (as in, useless) and a mesmer who was decent.

It took us forever to do that dungeon simply because they just kept dying, over and over and over again. And this is the easy path in an easy dungeon.

Realy? Staff only Ele’s are useless? Are you sure? Because I did the level 1 fractales with a guild group and didn’t die once. Guess what? I’m a Staff Only Ele. I’m fairly certain my group wouldn’t say I was useless in there or dead weight. I certainly didn’t hide either. Frequently I had the bosses chacing me because I did too much damage to them and they got all pissed at me for it :P

The probem I see with all of ANet’s dungeons is they focus too much on doing more damage to make it more challenging. That tends to be a bad thing for inatly squishy classes like Ele’s. It forces us to use Vit/Toughness gear to survive. If we HAVE to use those stats on gear, why bother making gear without it?

For the OP, It’s not that hard to find a good guild fully capable of running dungeons. There are plenty already dedicated to them. Mind you, I’d never join one of them, I join guilds for Community, not to find “Elite” players to group with. My only guess is, they don’t want you, be it your attitude, lack of skill on your part, or whatever. Oh, and you didn’t say how you “know” they were lying to you about their gear and how to play their class. Perhaps they do have Exotic Gear and know how to play there class but arn’t as good at dungeons (totaly different then sPvP, WvW and world PvE)

The problem you seem to be saying you are having has nothing to do with the Dungeon and more to do with Players concidering you are complaining about the Players not the Dungeon Mechanics. That being the case, Fractals arn’t a Failier, your groups are.

That being said, I would like to see the lower level fractlas be easier, room enough for higher difficulty at higher Fractal Levels.

Sorry you had a bad experience, OP. I liked the new dungeon a lot. Yesterday was the first time I set foot in a dungeon since Arah explorable back in early September. It felt great not being one-shot by everything. I really hope future dungeons will follow suit.

IMO, FoTM does fail, but it isn’t because the enemies are extremely hard or anything. The biggest problem with the dungeon are the cheap tactics and the fact that you can’t self rez unless everyone in the team dies.

Normally you would want to go with either cheap tactics or an inability to rez. But this combines both at the same time, which makes for a very unpleasant dungeon. For example, while doing the underwater fractal there is a pathway that you have to go through that is extremely dark and does high damage in this darkness. The only way to go forward are to grab luminous plants and go from luminous plant to luminous plant.

Problem is, with 5 people and only 2 or 3 plants at each point, someone dies from the darkness. Or they die because the krait in that area use nothing but stuns and sinks and immobilizes. So you have to go back to rez them, but they die immediately since they’re in the darkness without protection, and you’ll likely die if you go there since krait will be around their carcass. So the team dwindles down from 5 to 2 or 1, and those few can’t fight off the vet kraits that await them at the end and then they get killed. Restart event. Then, if someone manages to get forward far enough to hit the checkpoint, they have to suicide themselves so the whole team can arrive and respawn finally.

So you have an obstacle with nearly instant-kill pitfalls that requires most of the team to make it to the end to have a chance, and make it so once someone dies they can’t come back unless everyone dies or someone else manages to rez them but will most likely die in that same spot anyway. That isn’t fun. Dying because someone grabbed the plant you were going to grab along the way isn’t fun. Dying because some invisible krait from behind a sea structure decided to fragment sinks isn’t fun. It’s more like trial and error where the whole event fringes on your weakest link.

Sometimes, players won’t even go back to rez you if 1 or 2 die. Instead, they’ll just continue on the event without you, making sure you get no rewards. That’s arguably worse, because then someone is left out and not because the other players don’t want to rez him, but because he’s too much of a problem to rez.

This is ignoring many of the bugs that occur, such as how if a player falls into laval during one of the events, there is no way to rez that player again. The game will sometimes try to teleport you to a safe place, but this only works on the dead player’s screens. Other players still see your carcass in the midsts of a death trap; unable to save it. Of course, this happens quite often since the place with the lava is a jumping puzzle with nearly invisible holes in the only pathway you can take.

Look, you can take instant death mechanics and put them into the game. That’s cool. You can make places that have no zerg ability due to the lack of rezzing. That is also cool. But you can’t put them both into the same place, since then it becomes a source of neverending frustration fueled by misfortune more than any lack of skill.

I pugged to level 10. Hate the player, not the game.

cleared lvl 6 to 10 with a pug hmm you were unlucky it happen

@Shadowlancer,

I’ve read quite a few posts in this thread, but not all of them. I’ll add my thoughts and well…you can do what you will with the information.

I’ve run approx. 25 Fractals so far (not in game atm so I cannot look up the exact amount). I’ve gotten to Difficulty Level 3 with my decked out level 80 Guardian. The other 16 I have run with my Elementalist. I started him in the Fractals at level 78, weaing a full set of Rare level 65 gear. While I did hit level 80 during one of those runs, I was still in level 65 Rare gear until this evening when I made my level 80 Exotic Jewelry set and picked up some Sorrow’s Embrace gear with my tokens. I reached Fractal difficulty Level 5 on my Ele, still geared in Level 65 Rare gear.

Side Note: My Elementalist is a Staff Ele.

Level 80, decked out in full exotics, is not necessary for Fractal Difficulty Levels 1 – 5 (I could not speculate about later difficulties as I have not reached them yet).

One of the last posts I read from you mentioned you had 15 runs with PUGS that you did not approve of and had many problems. During each of these runs did you learn anything about the Fractal dungeons you were in? Did you learn the mechanics? How about when to dodge or cast interrupts or crowd control? If so, did you pass along this information to the members of your party during each run?

There are 9 Fractal dungeons in all. Every time you enter into the Fractal Lab, each and every ‘round of 3’ that you do will be random. Your first time into the Fractals at difficulty level 1 could get you Cliffside, Volcano, and Ascalon (Charr). Your next 3 at difficulty 2 could be completely different. Your level 5 difficulty could be the SAME EXACT fractals you did at level 1 difficulty.

The point is…the 9 total Fractals will be randomized every time you enter and at every difficulty level. That being said…you will see the SAME Fractals over and over again. You will get to know the mechanics very well and know what exactly is needed to complete each one (with varying changes based upon difficulty level).

Teamwork is key to Fractals. If you have no ability to give information via Voice Chat then if you alone know what is needed to be done to be successful then you better brush up on your typing skills and be ready to explain it to everyone in the team.

Amongst all of those runs I have done so far, each and every team has been successful and the class make-up and gear did not matter.

Take this into consideration if you will: Difficulty level 1-10 is most likely preparation for the harder difficulty levels where you WILL need Ascension Gear. Before acquiring it, most of the gear you have or your teammates have (within reason) will not matter inside the Fractals. I would assume that at Difficulty Level 9 and 10, gear may start making a difference, but at that point you should know each and every fractal like the back of your hand and can explain what is needed to be done quickly and efficiently.

Consider also the fact that the Fractals scale up everyone in the team to level 80, just like WvW. ArenaNet kept every single level in mind when creating these dungeons and even a level 1 could go in and be successful (however I wouldn’t recommend it).

I can understand your frustration with PUG’s that seem to have no coordination or learning skills. It happens and it can be the downfall of any group. Unfortunately because you are very passionate about this situation and being successful, the onus falls upon you to ensure it IS successful.

Good Luck to you and I hope you find the success you are looking for.