Guild Wars 2

Although as Robert Hrouda points out, times are subject to how a team works together, etc. I would have to say that one hour average time.

This would give some leeway between 30 – 90 minutes.

Rob, what do you think about dungeon DR, then? If a really skilled group can beat a couple dungeon paths in 15m without skipping content, they get smashed hard by DR and actually get penalized for being talented players. My guild, for instance, has to afk during dungeons in order to drag the timer on so that we don’t get DR’d to oblivion at the end. We do AC and CoF and HotW and never skip bosses or mobs (specifically to try and waste time), and we still oftentimes get DR’d without adding in afk-time. It’s not fun at all being forced to do that.

Maybe a tweak to the DR timer is necessary, or is this punishment for being too good without exploiting intentional?

I think 30-45 minutes should be the “average” run.

A run that takes more than 1 hour should only happen if your group is really bad, a run that takes 20 minutes or less should only happen if your group is really good.

By bad, Wasabi Kitty means: full of people who get engrossed in really cool artwork and hold up the team.

And uh…that would be me.

Understood. That makes sense. When you guys examine and modify and track the trends of dungeons and then adjust DR, do you make note of it in the patches, or is this something that gets tweaked in the background without notification? I’m curious if the designers are in any state to make adjustments based on the past few months of data or if they’ve been doing it all along in the background.

Dear Mr. Hrouda,

I have only done 3 dungeons since the beginning of the game. (AC, CM and that firey thing from he-doubletoothpicks)

I have never had a good drop in any of them. Grey, white or blue. I did get a pirates hat…twice. Joy.

I think I may be jinxed.

In Guild Wars 1 we would keep a stack of charr carvings in our inventory and drop one on the ground periodically as a joke to show people the GREAT drops we were getting. Can’t even do that now. I do, however, show off my [ROCK] on occasion.

Basically CoE is when I started to feel like things were pushing it because of repeatedly having to do with Subject Alpha and especially the laser cannon fight. HoTW while of similar length is mostly straightforward and just long with bosses that have too much HP but nothing that makes you dread it, much like the umpteenth time Subject ALpha shows up

Yes.. an hr should be about the maximum and every dungeon should at least have a 30 minute casual path so that those guys can make at least minimal progress. No reason to not do so with the DR system implemented.

Yes.. an hr should be about the maximum and every dungeon should at least have a 30 minute casual path so that those guys can make at least minimal progress. No reason to not do so with the DR system implemented.You really need to fix Arah or at least increase the number of tokens to be commensurate with the time it takes. Nobody wants to run it, and for those willing to brave the difficulty/length and succeed we’d like to be rewarded appropriately.

Um, SE 3 can be done in twenty minutes with a good group.

20-30 minutes tops. Either less trash or even better give us an actual incentive to kill the trash. Some dungeons could easily fall into the 20-30 minute range if the bosses had some of their hp axed.

I don’t understand the point of hp sponges with 1 phase, e.g. SE 2, HotW 1/2/3. Some of them take longer to kill then the rest of the kittening dungeon combined. If you can master the gimmick mechanic for 3 minutes you can do it for 6 or 10 or w/e.

I find anything from 20-50 minutes to be fine for a dungeon run. Any longer than that and the dungeon better be fun, be interesting, or has worthy loot.

It kinda depends, for a fractal I dont mind 1-1.5hr since you have variation, but as others have mentioned 30-45mins is a nice time for casual playing so you can do dungeons when you have less time.

On the subject of loot versus “trash” mobs, I’ve experienced quite the opposite effect that people seem to be claiming here.

I run HotW (all paths & no skipping) just about every day. As far as time goes, that depends on the group, but the average for all three runs is anywhere from 2-3 hours.

Interestingly, the majority of rares I receive are from the mobs. Most rares I get from bosses or chests are mats like glacial cores. I hardly ever get any rare armor or weapons, which of course doesn’t seem right. To add to that, I don’t use MF gear. I do use omnomberry tarts (with powerful potions of svanir slaying), but that’s it. So I’m not sure what to think. But so far, killing mobs has been worth it for me.

Fractals are perfect imho in this department

We do 45min on all paths AC total and thats fine by me. Im having fun and thats what its all about. Autoattacking a boss because it has way to much HP is not fun its boring and tedious.
I don’t want to do 1 hour to do 1 path. Its a waste of time and no fun for me at all.

The same with skipping bosses, we skip all me can because we don’t care for the lousy rewards. But if u want to do long dungeon runs just kill every mob there is… If that take to long skip some trash if that takes to long get some skills and skip more. I dont see the problem at all.

Robert Hrouda.1327:

DR is a system we continue to examine and modify as trends progress. DR isn’t meant to punish good teams, but to act as a safety net for if an exploit happens and a fix isn’t immediately available.

You should probably look into the length of DR hitting on the 5th run in 2 hours then.

Myself and many organized groups can run almost every single path of every dungeon in 20 minutes or less. I’m actually glad that Fractals don’t have DR because alot of times we’ll speed clear 4 dungeon paths, then do our fractal daily while DR resets.

If you watch my videos, all AC can be done easily in under 20 min per path, all TA can easily be done under 20 min per path, CM1/3 can easily be done under 20 min and CM2 can be done in about 20 min, SE1 and 3 can be easily done under 20 min, CoE1/3 can be done in about 20 min, HotW 1 can easily be done under 20 min and HotW3 in about 20 min, CoF 1 and 2 can easily be done in under 20 min.

Most of these I do in under 15 min regularly. Really the only dungeon that takes longer then 20-25 min for a path in a dedicated and organized group in full exotics + dungeon builds is Arah.

Yes speed runs do involve skipping trash in between event/boss areas, but considering trash isn’t required to be killed and there is no reward for taking time to kill them, I don’t really think it should be considered an exploit which decreases the time of a dungeon run that hits DR. I mean running past mobs isn’t anymore of an exploit then running past mobs in any other area or game.

Simple. One hour of grinding must give you something between 75-100 silver at least.
Less than that is not worth your time except if you’re doing it for fun.

Halo.8976:

Simple. One hour of grinding must give you something between 75-100 silver at least.
Less than that is not worth your time except if you’re doing it for fun.

People should be playing for fun, rewards should just be a bonus you accumulate as you play. Besides if you start building off of a concept like that, things inflate like crazy unless you have a good gold sink that also proves worthwhile to the players (useable rewards for instance, example; siege weapons, potions, temporary special effects, etc.).

On topic:

I believe that there should be a variety of dungeon lengths; some should take 20 minutes, while there should be others that take like an hour to burn through.

Dungeon content should be varied too; jump puzzles, fighting, labyrinths, team puzzles (having different players stand on different combinations of switches, maybe even having parties split up on different routes where they have to “toss” an item across to each other to progress, etc.). I would love to see more dungeons where there are huge sections of it where you don’t really fight at all, but have to find your way through a colossal maze of tunnels; broken up by small fights here and there and maybe one boss fight at the end (heck switch it up a bit and put the main boss fight in the middle of the dungeon run and have it be a jump puzzle at the end that gets you to the chest/reward).

Just a few dungeons that are more about exploring than battling your way through random hordes of enemies would be a nice change.

The amount it takes dungeons seem fine and well balanced but Arah

I think 1hr 30 – 2hrs is too much to spend in one setting

Sollith.3502:

People should be playing for fun, rewards should just be a bonus you accumulate as you play.

Dungeons in GW2 are tool of grind (explorable mode) and it’s not fun. I.e. = all not fun, repetitive, mindless tasks should be highly rewarded.

Halo.8976:

Sollith.3502:

People should be playing for fun, rewards should just be a bonus you accumulate as you play.

Dungeons in GW2 are tool of grind (explorable mode) and it’s not fun. I.e. = all not fun, repetitive, mindless tasks should be highly rewarded.

Something that isn’t fun, where the loot reward isn’t just a bonus, means that the design is flawed and should be reworked.

The question should then become; why isn’t this fun, and how can it be made so?

I think MMO designers need to look broader now, look at games like L4D where people put hundreds of hours into just like five levels over and over again. What kept them playing and some players going back to it? Look at FPS’s what keeps people playing the same maps over and over again without any real “loot” or vertical progression? How do we bring those elements over in a way that benefits MMO’s?

Robert Hrouda.1327:

DR isn’t meant to punish good teams, but to act as a safety net for if an exploit happens and a fix isn’t immediately available.

Right now it does just that – punish good teams. Many a time we’ve been hit by DR just for playing the game.

Short answer; 30-45mins minimum sounds like a good target. anything less, to me, isn’t an experience.

A vary on dungeon length is also good if done properly. some longer, some shorter. The tricky part, as with anything, is making them ALL worth playing.

I am fairly new, but experienced enough with the game to be getting a larger picture of the community. I feel the dungeons so far (the few I have done) are a good step in the right direction to making content varied in methods of completing the tasks. (ie, fractals each having a slight unique task, or AC having the traps event and so on)

I often enjoy longer runs with a prepared team.
I enjoy exploring, and clearing. Difficult content. Unique content. parts that make me think before I leap. puzzles and more.

I don’t want to start a debate about it here, but especially so in a game like this, I’m saddened when people want to just skip immediately to the end of a dungeon as fast as they can for tokens or whatever. I love the journey more so than the quick satisfaction of the destination. and again, personally, I am saddened that only a few months after release thats the extremely overwhelming vibe I get from the major population.

I hope there is a way to reverse this. For the entire point of playing, I feel, is about enjoying the journey.

Have fun, people.

When you’ve done these dungeons so many bloody times you remember every pull, you WANT to get it over and done with ASAP. Trust me on this one.

30-45mins sound like a good runtime for the dungeons.. any longer and it eats away any restricted playtime which can be used for crafting/pvp/wvwvw

Robert Hrouda.1327:

Our targets have been in the past to shoot for a 30-45 minute explorable dungeon path for the desired skill group.

Emphasis mine. Not sure if anyone else noticed this. Wondering if it implies that the desired skill group may be different for different dungeons. So some dungeons are intentionally tuned easier and casual players can hope to finish in 30-45 minutes, while others are tuned more difficult and hardcore/skilled players can hope for that timing…

You can chiice a dungeon/path for the time you can spend in the game….
That unfortunately isn t true for fractals…

First of all they are slightly too long (45 min for a fast run should be enough).
Second if you don t have enough time you choose for example to play fractal lvl 1….then you have the dredge fractal .-. for example or the underwater.

Those even if you play well require more time for sure.

Anything in the 30-90 minute range is fine by me. I don’t mind setting aside 2 hours to learn a new explorable path without wiki’ing it first—anything longer and I start to get really tired.

I’d also say 30-45 minutes. I haven’t tried any of the dungeons yet, because I don’t know long they will take. (How long does doing a low level fractal take (all three round total)?)

Halagaz.6085:

You should be able to begin and finish them whenever you feel like it, i play mmo since 1998 and im’ from the old school. I don’t see why you should put a quantity of time. We used to be able to go into a dungeon, party in our way deep inside and leavev when we feel like it, it was the good time i guess.

This is ideal for me too. Asheron’s Call 1, for example. The dungeons were just “there”. You got in as deep as you could manage and for as long as you wanted. The deeper in you got, the more chance of good loot. Have to go suddenly? No problem.

Failing that ideal case, then 20-30 minutes MAX. And no more than 45 minutes to “learn” a dungeon.

Anywhere around 30 minutes is my ideal dungeon. Its about balance. I dont want to be chained to a computer for hours. I’ve got a life and other things that I do during days or weekends. But playing gw2 is a great diversion. With dungeons not being overly long I’m able to run one or two then go do something else. Its about moderation and balance. Players who grind away at mmo’s end up hating them or getting burned out on them. They have mmo-ocd. I’ve known and still know a lot of players with that ocd. Get out and live a little.

Some people are so afraid because those power hungry MMOs that spawn powerful armors/weapons at every month that they think they need to grind like crazy to have always the top shinies. And arenanet don´t help much with these ascended thing.

So when they found a game where grinding or not eventualy you will get to the top they can´t understand, and need to do what they are addicted to do. GRIND.

Just stop grind, enjoy the game, there are a lot of things to do and if you don´t try to make this game another tipical MMO it will be a game to play for years, just like GW1.

30 minutes for a perfect dungeon run is ok. 1 hour for first time is ok. Make some longer dungeons with much more reward just to piss of gold farmers it´s ok too.

30-45 minutes seems fine for a PUG consisting of a mix of experienced players and first-timers depending on the path.