Guild Wars 2

I seriously think this fight after fractal mist level 20+ really needs nerfing to be honest. It is ‘barely’ puggable, it requires such a finely tuned team with plenty of reflection skills and awesome survivability skills against the onslaught of the elementals.

Even on lower fractal levels this fractal is pretty difficult but it really is getting crazy now, without enough reflection skills the boss can literally wipe out a player with ease, that really isn’t the problem though ~ its the 20+ elementals that spawn which is – how about lowering the amount spawned so its a more manageable size? Not to mention, the chances of it bugging are high too.

Everyone just skips this fractal if its the first one anyway ~ and most pugs who get this end up failing the entire run wasting everyones time ~ which leads to players building up frustration aimed at the game/developers. I can see this level of difficulty in scale 50 – 70+ but not at 20, come the fractal changes later this month/Feb if this particular fractal isn’t changed so it can be easily puggable like the rest then expect major QQ from all sides. Just imagine all the players who are at scale <10 suddenly try to do 20s or higher…lets not even talk about AR here.

The shock factor alone will put many players off because of the range of difficulty. Simply put here, the fight needs everyone to bring A-game to this fight, requires far too much from the average players ~ and certainly requires too much from a pick-up group – please consider removing some of the elementals so the fight, will still be a challenge but something that is going to be a brickwall for most players.

Its among the hardest of the fractals but its far from impossible. Tips I can give:

1) Always keep moving (the obvious one) to avoid the burn damage on the floor
2) When the elementals spawn ignore and take down his shield ASAP to stop him regen’ing health (he munches on a human when he has a shield on)
3) Bunch up during the elemental spawning period and AOE them down. If anyone has a blind save it until this point.
4) Combo fields are your friends. Ask the party whether they use fields beforehand- theyre not essential but they make any fight a little easier.
5) Save your endurance for when you really need it.
6) The more agony resistance you have, the better. If you still havent got your two rings and the backpack(so 15AR minimum) then go back and grind 10 until you get them (or can ‘buy’ them).

The problem here, everyone knows the strats ~ everyone at this level knows the fight.

What your quoting here, is so much harder to do in practice. Your talking about combo fields when the ‘average’ player doesn’t probably even know what that is..

Also, bunching up during the elemental phases is inviting AoE spam. As for AR, that isn’t the problem because everyone should have at least 15AR by now anyway.

Sure, its not impossible but it is the most difficult boss probably in the game right now. And that spells trouble soon, even if experienced players have a tough time. How about trying it with random pugs? How many times is that pug going to listen to anyone? How many times is the pug going to have certain skills equipped? Etc…etc…etc – the entire fight requires almost a pro level player ability in order to succeed, and even then ~ the wrong party make up can always contribute to failure too.

Again, simply put ~ come the changes to fractals soon ~ this fight needs to be nerfed so the casual players and pugs can actually do it. Either that, or add in literally a million different levels so this one hardly ever appears.

Agreed. Did it at lev37 with pugs and it was hard as ****. The reason they should nerf it is not because its just hard but because EVERY single team skips it. What’s the point of having such a low amount of fractals when everyone wants to skip dredge, cliffside and shaman… At 30+ these three are just annoying kitten pain

^ This anet, this alone should give you enough of a reason to make changes if so many groups just wants to skip. Case and Point in the MMo industry ~ if you create content that the players want to skip/ignore/avoid – then your doing something wrong.

The reason people skip is because of the disparity in difficulty and time it takes to complete the fractal.

Swamp and Water is basically a free fractal. There is nothing challenging about these 2 and that’s where the real problem is. I would argue that swamp and water be removed or resdesigned to be as long and hard as the others.

Ascalon is just badly designed. I would not design a fractal where NPC’s are fighting NPC’s. That’s just bad game design.

NO don’t nerf it. This fractal is not so hard, it’s well balanced. Don’t make this game too easy and for casuals only….

If you have problems with this fractals at lvl20 with pugs then don’t pug. Play with your guild or make friends that are at the same fractal level.Improve your AR by farming lvl 10. If you still fail then 20 is your max level and just play the lower levels.

I really really really HATE it when people say things like “make this easily puggable”

NO

Form a team… develop a strategy… execute that strategy… AND GET BETTER…

Stop asking to make things easier instead of working to improve.

If you want “easily puggable” enter a lvl 10 instance… don’t enter higher tier instances and demand they be brought down to your level.

The only reason people skip those fractals is because the others are too easy. Buff Swamp and Water.

Level 20+ fractals are NOT “casual” content and are NOT meant to be breezed through by a team of randoms. There is plenty of casual content in the game. Why would you take the small amount of high-tier content away from those who enjoy it? That’s pretty selfish.

I concur with the general sentiment of leaving it be for now, until broader tweaks follow.

I recently saw people complaining about fractal 50 difficulty, which boggles the mind.
As of right now, the FoTM is designed with an infinite difficulty in mind. I hope no one is actually taking this to mean that we are supposed to send the Fractal Difficulty Scale into integer overflow.

There are two barriers, the hard ceiling and the soft ceiling that should prevent you from further progress.

The hard ceiling is something that is, for all appearances, impossible to overcome. This is meant to be there, you are not meant to go further. The Jade Maw agony around 50 seems to be a good example of this. I’m not at this level. Some have claimed to be on a higher level. Revive orbs may work to get around this. Who knows, but I feel reasonably sure that at some point, guaranteed agony and/or damage will serve as an instant party wipe to the extent where further progress is extremely impractical.

The soft ceiling is based on your party’s overall skill, tactics, and cohesion. For some (non-level 80, new players, etc.) the soft ceiling in any given individual fractal may be scale 1. For some it may be 20. For some, 30.

If you have hit your soft ceiling, asking it to be moved just for you and others that are stuck there is flat out selfish. I don’t run the fractals with PUGs in general, so I understand there’s a disparity in thought process, but this boss is not challenging at all for my party throughout the entire 20-29 scales. This isn’t meant as criticism – organization is difficult in a pickup group – but merely to state that you should adjust your strategy. Attempt to band your group together into a more cohesive unit. Find a reliable community of players to play in. Shouldn’t gamers as a whole want challenges that require more and more team cohesion and strategy? Or should everything be lowered to a standard where 5 random, uncoordinated but passably skilled individuals should pass? If the bar is indeed lowered, what happens when you hit your next soft ceiling? Will you post again, requesting a nerf, this time for scale 30? 40?

The message I send is this: It is a much healthier mindset to rise to the challenge, as opposed to pleading for things to sink to your level.

Learn to dodge properly for yourself, and bring powerful potions of elemental slaying – easily the cleverest things you can do to beat him. I have taken to give away those potions, and I had some very close clears which would be otherwise impossible if I didn’t perform a potion giveaway(10% more survivability 10% more damage in last fight… priceless.. oh wait just a bit more than 1 silver.)

Honestly this fight is only hard in pug groups and low level.

Can do this on 39 no problem and with guildies the sky is the limit.

Not everything that requires skill requires a nerf. Leave It.

TsukasaHiiragi.9730:

It is ‘barely’ puggable, it requires such a finely tuned team with plenty of reflection skills and awesome survivability skills against the onslaught of the elementals.

That means Anet has succeeded.

Encounters don’t need to be all pug-friendly. There is a lot of people asking for hard content for organized groups/guilds, and high level fractals are tuned for them.
If you want to pug, do lower level fractals.
Enforcing easymode is very bad.

I’m only on level 30 but I personally like dredge and grawl for loot.

I think the best advice I can give is this;

Learn where to stand/move, when to dodge, etc. Positioning matters a lot.

Learn not to be aggressive ALL the time. If a team member is down, it makes no sense to keep attacking the shaman so that more adds spawn. Two people with high(er) survivability can dodge/run interference while two others revive.

Adjust your build so you have more survivability. Heck I’m a pretty squishy thief with only 15k health and 2400 armor. But I use a crit build and P/P – SB combo. With 66% chance to lifesteal on crit, those weapon combos give me a LOT of health depending on if single target (p/p), or multiple targets (sb). I see so many players running glass cannon but not using lifesteal foods even though they have high crit chance.

As a thief I can duck out of combat/agro at will. I understand that. If my team is all good on health, I often do just that. If someone goes down, I’ll refuge them and let someone else revive while I go elsewhere and distract the shaman more often then not and we do just fine.

I can’t speak for other professions though. My mesmer and guardian are both only in low teens in fotm (they’re alts, not my main so I haven’t focused on getting them further). I imagine a big role for guardians is to provide defensive buffs, regen, and condition removal to the party in ranged fights considering their range damage is sub-par at best.

Shaman is only harsh to glasscannons (thing that is wrong btw).

I have a tank ele and a GC mesmer.

WIth Ele at 26 (staff) i don t even risk to go downed..(unless all my team does .-.)
Mesmer at 10 its a pain…..

LordByron.8369:

Mesmer at 10 its a pain…..

then you play it wrong…
clones and distortion are your friends

I’ve been with groups who destroyed this thing at 20+, and others who nearly wiped 5 times. It’s really not THAT hard, but people can’t seem to do the right things to complete it.

Don’t run through lava. Use reflection or be ready for some intelligent dodging. Kill the shield then kill the elementals. This means STOP attacking the boss while any elemental is still alive. Stay close to one another except when you are “farting fire” (as my guild calls it). If you’re gonna rez someone, make sure something to reflect projectiles is present, or at LEAST make sure the boss is not facing you.

Blind is also super helpful against the elementals. All guardians should be set up with 15 points in Radiance at 20+ for blind spamming.

LordByron.8369:

Shaman is only harsh to glasscannons (thing that is wrong btw).

I have a tank ele and a GC mesmer.

WIth Ele at 26 (staff) i don t even risk to go downed..(unless all my team does .-.)
Mesmer at 10 its a pain…..

Mesmer at 10 is a pain? Seriously? I’m not trying to be a butthead, but mesmer at 20+ is a MASSIVE blessing for the whole team. SO many times, the clones absorb agony shots and damage that would otherwise be aimed at the team.

Properly traited mesmers also deal bucketloads of damage.

My only real compliant is that the elements apply immobilization, similar to Tar when it says they should be giving(and I think they do still) bunring. I’d like to see the fractal without immobile on the elements first and then see how it plays out before any futher changes.

The Shaman requires no such nerf.

At level 20+ it better be hard for the people that are using fractals for progression with their guild or team.

Thats why fractals were created in the first place! If you want dumbed down group content run dungeons/events or do lower level fractals there is no reason at all for them to nerf the fractals because YOU cant pug them.

If anything they should make the other fractals harder at 20+ for people that are doing progression and want a challenge after all thats the whole point of fractals to begin with.

I’m pretty sure the reason why people skip dredge/grawl ones is because those are long, they skip cliffside because it was buggy. The water and swamp is favored because they are very short due to little fighting. Time is the primary factor, because the longer you stay, the more opportunities are there that you’d get disconnected, which means you’ll have to start over.

The only one I could see people complaining about is the uncategorized one because it’s easy, but very time consuming, and doesn’t give the kind of loot dredge or grawl do.

So let me get this straight.

Because the fight requires tight teamwork and preparation before rushing in, otherwise PUG’s and the average player will fail it, it should be nerfed?

Things like this make me laugh, especially when people say stuff like “what’s the point of having a guild?” Pretty sure this is a good reason to have one.

Thing is, if everything is supposed to be doable by PUG’s and the average player, how do you create encounters that require tight teamwork and preparation, and are challenging for well-organised groups?

Very useful is Potion of Elemental Slaying for reduce elemental damage and Omnombery Ghosts (live steal) witch with aoe into grubs work like insta heal.

Don’t nerf it, just add more fractals for a less chance to get this one

The problem here, everyone knows the strats ~ everyone at this level knows the fight.
What your quoting here, is so much harder to do in practice. Your talking about combo fields when the ‘average’ player doesn’t probably even know what that is..

I do believe this statement contradicts itself.

I would argue many people at 20 don’t know the fights, because many people at 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18,19 don’t know the fights either.

Can be easily countered with projectile reflection. No, not only guardian, every class has that kind of skill..

The fight requires you to pay attention. It’s far from impossible.

If you are always having trouble with it, maybe the problem is right here.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/The-biggest-problem-with-Dungeons/first#post341547

LFk.1408:

I concur with the general sentiment of leaving it be for now, until broader tweaks follow.

I recently saw people complaining about fractal 50 difficulty, which boggles the mind.
As of right now, the FoTM is designed with an infinite difficulty in mind. I hope no one is actually taking this to mean that we are supposed to send the Fractal Difficulty Scale into integer overflow.

There are two barriers, the hard ceiling and the soft ceiling that should prevent you from further progress.

The hard ceiling is something that is, for all appearances, impossible to overcome. This is meant to be there, you are not meant to go further. The Jade Maw agony around 50 seems to be a good example of this. I’m not at this level. Some have claimed to be on a higher level. Revive orbs may work to get around this. Who knows, but I feel reasonably sure that at some point, guaranteed agony and/or damage will serve as an instant party wipe to the extent where further progress is extremely impractical.

They should have either cap fractal to 50 or not gate us to 50 when the hard cap, at this moment is 80.

Shaman is a cakewalk compared to Cliffside arm seals. Try pugging it with no heavies or without leaving one alive on either side. I am surprised why more people dont cry foul on that one.

The strategy is to equip condition removals skills asap and reflection if u have them (not all classes have them). Kill the elementals as they spawn. As a mesmer I can use my focus to group the elementals together with “Into the Void” and use Phantasm Warden

We’re not being elitist are we? Surely not..

TsukasaHiiragi.9730:

..Case and Point in the MMo industry ~ if you create content that the players want to skip/ignore/avoid – then your doing something wrong.

A sound argument.
Understand that personally I enjoy a challenge, especially when it comes to bosses; I’m always attempting to solo this and that.
However, if most people would rather skip it.. Then something’s not quite right.

I wouldn’t say to nerf it; whilst I like a challenge, the one thing I can’t abide is mechanics that leave the player with no viable counter other than to grit their teeth and bear it “because-it’s-meant-to-be-hard”.
Specifically I am referring to the Shaman’s one aoe blitz ability – it has no cast time, no animation, it just casts instantly over the area the targeted player happens to be in, causing upwards of 5k damage and there’s not a blasted thing you can do to avoid it preemptively.

Give this ability an animation and cast time – it doesn’t even need to be long, just not instantaneous – and I’ll be content.

TsukasaHiiragi.9730:

Again, simply put ~ come the changes to fractals soon ~ this fight needs to be nerfed so the casual players and pugs can actually do it. Either that, or add in literally a million different levels so this one hardly ever appears.

I got a question: Why should a casual player/pug be able to do everything in the game?

Actualy that fight is prty easy, every team have 1 guardian or elemental usualy or even thief, when he buble, stand under him, pop up projectile reflecting / destroyng skill, AoE all, shaman need to be chilled or imobilize, even in chill he will barly move, AoE will destroy his shild and adds around. If u lack AoE then focus on shild first. That is what we use usualy and tbh its working just fine in high lvl fractals.

Hickeroar.9734:

LordByron.8369:

Shaman is only harsh to glasscannons (thing that is wrong btw).

I have a tank ele and a GC mesmer.

WIth Ele at 26 (staff) i don t even risk to go downed..(unless all my team does .-.)
Mesmer at 10 its a pain…..

Mesmer at 10 is a pain? Seriously? I’m not trying to be a butthead, but mesmer at 20+ is a MASSIVE blessing for the whole team. SO many times, the clones absorb agony shots and damage that would otherwise be aimed at the team.

I may be unlucky but sahaman seems to always ignore my clones unless i use decoy.

Properly traited mesmers also deal bucketloads of damage.

Really who cares about damage against shaman…and elementals dies fast enough anyway at any level where you btw would prefer to have AoE.
You have to keep your dps at bay to help the party if you know how it works…..
I may not be the best mesmer out there, but i’m quite experienced in fotm….enough to almost never die to shaman <.< with a balanced build.

With a glasscannon its more difficult.

@sanel….actually guardian seems to have problems with their staff attack not counting to take out shield.
elementalist only AoE against shield is meteor….and is slow as hell.
Also you require more than a 3 second skill to survive enough……ele has 4 u.u
(magnetic grasp, arcane shield, armor of earth, mist form)
A scepter ele would be better maybe ( i’ve still to learn that weapon properly).

Rooting is a better option actually when possible.
The hard part are those few seconds taking down the shield as a TEAM.
That is the only hard task, then is easy.

@ Lord, actualy i always run with my guardian friend, he pop up his shild and reflecting wall after it. Meteor shower is way to slow, thats why i do have Ice Bow that do crazy amount of dmg combined with MS. When i drop IB, one of m party member pick it up an use only skill 4 then discard it. Also, Lava font do nice dmg. If u traited in staff mastery from arcane, filed is longer so u can do massive dmg with it to adds.

Tbh, if u going with pug i would advice sceptor / focus. It do nice dmg , u can use air for taking down buble stacks prty nice, earth for dmg on boss and fire for aoing adds, it is also the best combo for survival since u do have air skill 4 for destroying projectiles and skill 5 on earth for invurnability (Obsi). Ofc i could be wrong, but if someone have some nice advice please post it)

As Sanel said (were grouping together), we didnt have any special issue there (at level 28 now), surely sometimes you’ll fail but it is far from undoable. Pugs may have more trouble if they refuse to communicate, this fight is not a solo effort, its a team fight and requires team synergy. Pull out your condition removals, chills, snares, immobilizes, projectile deflectors/destroyers.

So far all of our teams were a 3 man steady setup (necro, ele, guard) + 2 pugs, its only the skill and communication that caused troubles, never the profession of the pugs we got.

Synergy (at least on the majority of the party) is the key….

never nerf it, doned many time at lvl 30 is a fantastic battle (alwais wich pugs) ele and guardian in team is important

i use a support ele 0/10/10/30/20 wich staff utility mist form, armor of earth and arcane shield, my work is heal and dispel condition when all in cd or worm come out can do dps

as i said my staff ele could tank alone the boss at lvl 26 while another player was ressing the rest of the party died (not downed) during shield part….(and was even happy to have time to have time to charge my elemental b4 next shield).

I m just saying that you shouldn t think that because for your tank class, shaman is quite easy, glasscannon players won’t have any trouble,,,,,

Meteor shower is fine btw you it hits multiple time, its best staff skill to deal with shield AND elementals at the same time….you won t take down the shield alone btw….

Other useful skills in this fight for parties that may not have the “required” ele or guardian.

Thief – Dagger Storm – The reflect and the bouncing nature of the daggers is pretty good at getting the attention of the adds and then reflecting their shots while the party tosses big burst and AoEs

Necromancer – Plague – Use darkness, paint elementals, collect life force. Curses necros are especially nice in this role as they also chill and weaken the elementals.

Our party uses these elites one after the other in any “mob rush” situations and it usually makes things pretty easy. I (the thief) generally go first as I’m specced for conditions/selfheal so I can tank most waves of anything when in a storm. Once my storm is up, our necro triggers plague and jumps in, with a large number of the mobs still on me, he keeps them blinded while I and the rest of the party finish them off.

I didn’t have so hard a time with this battle through the 20’s. Except 29 seemed like a spike in difficulty. We made it through after a couple wipes though.

I have a question for anyone that might know. What is the best way to take down the bosses shield? Does it have anything to do with dps? Or is it basically just a hit count where needs 30 hits to drop or something? Just wondering if I should equip a faster but weaker weapon for this.

Its definetly need some nerf at 30+
Barely doable with PUG, without 2-3 guardian…
Tried lots and not noob party (we got the mid-chest earlier), but can’t survive to 40% boss HP)…
After some “changes” (warrior and mesmer leaved us) and luckily got 2 guardian, we done it without downed, WITH 4 PLAYER! (level 34)
BTW at level 20 I do it with turned off monitor, only using my face… :P
Anyway at 36 the dredge fractal got a huge difficulty-spike too… try it!
And do not say its not for PUGs please… Some don’t have that luxury to not PUG… :s

Does not need a nerf. Its just fine as it is. People always skip this fight and never learn how to do it. I’ve done it lvl 48 without guardians.

48 with PUG? Without guardians? Nice!

laharl.8435:

I didn’t have so hard a time with this battle through the 20’s. Except 29 seemed like a spike in difficulty. We made it through after a couple wipes though.

I have a question for anyone that might know. What is the best way to take down the bosses shield? Does it have anything to do with dps? Or is it basically just a hit count where needs 30 hits to drop or something? Just wondering if I should equip a faster but weaker weapon for this.

hit count…
conditions doesn t count.

In this battle you need dps only on elementals, for lava shaman and his shield your dps is worthless…mostly because its better to have slow dps to recover your CD b4 next phase.

P.S. despite the not stellar DPS scepter/focus ele seems really strong in this fight if you have someone other to dish DPS to elementals at least.

Its a weaker version of guardian.

madfox.5894:

48 with PUG? Without guardians? Nice!

mesmer is way better on this fight than guardian.

ppl just fail in avoiding arrows, than fail with bubble destroying.

For me personally on level 38 events with girls and shaman is harder than final boss. Event is more like CC + dps check and sometimes party does not have enough dps. Boss is just a boss, on 38 like on 10, just fire elementals hits harder.

I think it is fine as it is. I like the challenge (and tbh except fractals, everything in this game is kitten easy)

I learned more about my class and what I was capable of at lvl 26-38 grawl and dredge fractals than I did anywhere else in the game before or since. I love them and can’t wait to learn them on other classes besides my mesmer.

yarpen.1364:

Boss is just a boss, on 38 like on 10, just fire elementals hits harder.

Except there is a LOT more of em, really… If I AOE em, I may survive their focussed damage, if the boss not hit me too… If I am lucky I can rally a few times…
Boss hits with arrow about 10-12k HP to a clothie, agony not really counts (for me)… I cannot evade everything and the boss seems adjusted to not miss so much nowadays…
Maybe a PUG is not really good in this, maybe some just hide in this phase :s my fault, but I do fractals with one friend of me and 3 pickups, and it’s a real pain sometimes, but this is what we got…
And if someone say skip, usually I kick/quit, because I think skipping is not a way of play (maybe some CD on fractal lobby’s teleport should do the trick, 5-10 minute would kill those nasty skippers)
One sure thing: This event has a really tough scaling compared to the other fractals (level 30+)…

madfox.5894:

yarpen.1364:

Boss is just a boss, on 38 like on 10, just fire elementals hits harder.

Except there is a LOT more of em, really… If I AOE em, I may survive their focussed damage, if the boss not hit me too… If I am lucky I can rally a few times…
Boss hits with arrow about 10-12k HP to a clothie, agony not really counts (for me)… I cannot evade everything and the boss seems adjusted to not miss so much nowadays…
Maybe a PUG is not really good in this, maybe some just hide in this phase :s my fault, but I do fractals with one friend of me and 3 pickups, and it’s a real pain sometimes, but this is what we got…
And if someone say skip, usually I kick/quit, because I think skipping is not a way of play (maybe some CD on fractal lobby’s teleport should do the trick, 5-10 minute would kill those nasty skippers)
One sure thing: This event has a really tough scaling compared to the other fractals (level 30+)…

yes there are plenty of them but main problem is that ppl don’t think and use good skills in not good time.

Using WoR as guardian when we have only boss and all in party are alive is just waste of cd. Save it to bubble phase and use it to block elementals.
As mesmer with feedback you can even make it a lot better. Bubble, use iberserk + two clones from dodge → cast feedback on boss → change to sword focus, start to melee boss with frenzy → bubble should be off now, elem shoot at themselves.
No blink back, cast some iwarden and 4rd skill to block elementals and start clearing them.
Those two classes have great tools for this fight. As warrior all you need to do is melee elems to death. If its impossible, just use bow, it has great aoe. Using rifle on this fight imo = kick

Elem or ranger with trap should always chill boss in bubble. Chilled boss does not move at all (or move so slowly that it does not matter).

Still you need as any class, even mesmer with tons of reflect, learn how to dodge arrows. If you want to avoid them by block/reflect all the time you need not pug group with specific class choice and probably some voice communication.

MadRage.1584:

Can be easily countered with projectile reflection. No, not only guardian, every class has that kind of skill..

Not that I disagree with the idea or sentiment, but not every class has access to reflection, and certainly not every class has easy access to it.

Necromancers have zero projectile reflection, Thieves only have an Elite for reflection, and Warriors would have to trait to get any reflection.
Blocking projectiles is a different story, though.

Never really had a problem with him if the group is good. Just keep your distance and his agony arrow shot is so easy to dodge and/or reflect. The hardest part is when the elementals spawn. At that part all you need to do burn his shield down with quick attacks (d/d thief auto attack works wonders here) and then aoe the hell out of the elemntals. Save your reflects and stability for the elementals because they will immobilize you and that’s when they bring the pain.

Rinse, repeat, profit.