Guild Wars 2

I think HOTS should be a good time to separate agony resistance from ascended armor set. I would like to see agony resistance become an account-wide stat just like magic find.

My reason for agony resistance being a bad thing tied to armor:
1. GW2 is advertised as a no-grind for stats game. However, to progress in fotm, you have to make ascended armors which are quite costly. And the ability to craft ascended armor has no correlation with one’s ability to do fractals.

2. Anet wants every profession to be versatile. However, with AR tied to armor, one has to stick to one set of armor which greatly limits build variety. If you want to switch from power to condie, you have to craft a complete new set of ascended armor. This is not fun.

3. I am also forced to run with limited professions. Heavy/medium/light gear type can only be shared among three professions.

4. Ascended armor is end-game gear. Being forced to put on AR in the infusion slot makes me feel awkward. Just in order to do fractals, I won’t be able to put other types of infusion in the slot.

With the new fractal line in the mastery system, I think there should be no problem for Anet to separate the AR progression from the gear progression.

Agony resistance on armor amounts to 30.
If you do not wish to invest in ascended armor you can still infuse your trinkets and make craftable AR essences.
I believe +10 to be a good threesold, on backpiece and rings, factoring amulet and other accessories you can amount to 60 (note that this is account bound). For the remaing, crafting ascended weapons is recommended, as it has a higher stats difference than armor to get to 70.

Please note that i am all for easing experienced players in fractals to use other classes. But not giving access to high level fractals for unprepared players.

Exos.3472:

Agony resistance on armor amounts to 30.
If you do not wish to invest in ascended armor you can still infuse your trinkets and make craftable AR essences.
I believe +10 to be a good threesold, on backpiece and rings, factoring amulet and other accessories you can amount to 60 (note that this is account bound). For the remaing, crafting ascended weapons is recommended, as it has a higher stats difference than armor to get to 70.

Please note that i am all for easing experienced players in fractals to use other classes. But not giving access to high level fractals for unprepared players.

I am not saying eliminating AR. I am saying separate it from armor. Make it work like magic find.

You still need to accumulate AR as an inexperienced player. However, you won’t be forced to craft ascended armor and use all the infusion slots for it.

See previous post.
If you are serious about fractals and want to roll different classes, you don’t need to craft multiple sets of armor.

I think it’s nice that ascended gear actually has a functional purpose, honestly.

Rising Dusk.2408:

I think it’s nice that ascended gear actually has a functional purpose, honestly.

Indeed if you remove it then its only a massive more expensive and only 5% better armor O.o

Rising Dusk.2408:

I think it’s nice that ascended gear actually has a functional purpose, honestly.

Yeah I would feel pretty screwed over if I crafted 2 ascended armors for nothing but the 5% dps plus.

60 AR on trinkets and 10 on weapons makes it easy for alts currently. Do wonder how it will work in later fractal levels though. Will be very annoying if we have to craft full ascended armor any time we want to use an alt of another gear type (heavy/medium/light). What’s also annoying is the rune situation. Even if you get full legendary from raids, trying out different runes or giving your armor to another profession that benefits from a different rune will be a problem.

Regardless, something needs to be done to make it easier for people to get into fractals. The offensive/defensive/utility infusion slot vs agony infusion slot is a pain to explain to new people interested in fractals. Reading the wiki doesn’t help them too much. As a guild leader, I’ve had to explain this many times so I know how unintuitive the current system is. +1 agony infusions drop frequently, but aren’t usable on the most common infusion slots. That’s just bad design.

Rising Dusk.2408:

I think it’s nice that ascended gear actually has a functional purpose, honestly.

It’s still the best armor in stats. The stats increase is very important in say WvW fights. I think you are tunnel visioning here.

Also, I felt terrible to have to put AR in every of my ascended piece, armor or trinkets. I could have put in other stats infusion instead.

Exciton.8942:

It’s still the best armor in stats. The stats increase is very important in say WvW fights. I think you are tunnel visioning here.

I don’t know. I literally only made ascended armor for fractals. I mean if you’re a huge WvW player/roamer and you need every stat for that, then sure, but I’m only rank ~500 and I do just fine in exotics.

Rising Dusk.2408:

Exciton.8942:

It’s still the best armor in stats. The stats increase is very important in say WvW fights. I think you are tunnel visioning here.

I don’t know. I literally only made ascended armor for fractals. I mean if you’re a huge WvW player/roamer and you need every stat for that, then sure, but I’m only rank ~500 and I do just fine in exotics.

if you wanna do things like hardcore objective oriented solo roaming, wvw infusions make it easy to solo tower lords, 250 camps, and even keeps. in addition you can fight the countless numbers of merely-ok players inside their camps when they run away from you, or things like killing yaks/sentries while under fire (because you can also get +x% damage to guards).

its pretty op, frankly. wvw ranks have added a lot of unnecessary power creep gates that honestly make the game a lot less fun for new players and ignorant players.

insanemaniac.2456:

if you wanna do things like hardcore objective oriented solo roaming, wvw infusions make it easy to solo tower lords, 250 camps, and even keeps. in addition you can fight the countless numbers of merely-ok players inside their camps when they run away from you, or things like killing yaks/sentries while under fire (because you can also get +x% damage to guards).

its pretty op, frankly. wvw ranks have added a lot of unnecessary power creep gates that honestly make the game a lot less fun for new players and ignorant players.

Those are all fair points. I hadn’t really considered using infusion slots for things other than AR, but that makes sense.

Good thing you can make infusions with AR and stats -.-

Ascended armor boxes have a fairly decent drop rate once you hit 40+. Not hard to gear up alts with that.

You can easily hit 55 AR with just an ascended weapon as well as trinkets.
20 from 2 infused rings.
10 from 2 tinkets
5 from amulet
10 from infused back
10 from weapon(s)

That will let you farm 40s which have a decent drop rate on ascended armor. Eventually you’ll get armor for your main and all your alts. Most people that frequent level 50 fractals have a bank filled with ascended armor chests.

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Ascended armor boxes have a fairly decent drop rate once you hit 40+. Not hard to gear up alts with that.

You can easily hit 55 AR with just an ascended weapon as well as trinkets.
20 from 2 infused rings.
10 from 2 tinkets
5 from amulet
10 from infused back
10 from weapon(s)

That will let you farm 40s which have a decent drop rate on ascended armor. Eventually you’ll get armor for your main and all your alts. Most people that frequent level 50 fractals have a bank filled with ascended armor chests.

I am not looking for band-aid solution. Rather, I am suggesting something better for general PvE and PvX players.

It is annoying that you have to either farm to craft ascended or run tons of fractals to get those ascended armor. I myself did probably 100 or so runs at fractal 50. I have to say the drop rate is not amazing. I can understand that since ascended pieces are the end-game gear and are for players that are pushing the that final small increase of powere.

I just feel with the new raid content becoming the new PvE endgame. It’s time to lift the elitist status off the fractal content. Make it more accessible and more fun to run.

Exciton.8942:

I just feel with the new raid content becoming the new PvE endgame. It’s time to lift the elitist status off the fractal content. Make it more accessible and more fun to run.

Didn’t Colin say they wanted raids as end-game for 10-man groups and fractals for 5-man?

For the record, I do not think that AR should be account-wide.

I have to agree with this. As an altaholic it’s going to be very tedious and expensive to get all of my toons (even just my ‘core toons’) fully capable of running fractals of all level.

I fully agree that AR should work similar to magic find apply to the account rather than the individual. Ascended equipment will still have its use due to its infusion slots.

Icdan Sevaen.4628:

Exciton.8942:

I just feel with the new raid content becoming the new PvE endgame. It’s time to lift the elitist status off the fractal content. Make it more accessible and more fun to run.

Didn’t Colin say they wanted raids as end-game for 10-man groups and fractals for 5-man?

For the record, I do not think that AR should be account-wide.

Well, let’s be honest. Even raid, as Colin said, won’t set any gear requirement. Why should fractals be the anomaly?

Plz tell me what’s the purpose of a gear requirement in this game? Just to help veterans to maintain their elitist status?

Exciton.8942:

Icdan Sevaen.4628:

Exciton.8942:

I just feel with the new raid content becoming the new PvE endgame. It’s time to lift the elitist status off the fractal content. Make it more accessible and more fun to run.

Didn’t Colin say they wanted raids as end-game for 10-man groups and fractals for 5-man?

For the record, I do not think that AR should be account-wide.

Well, let’s be honest. Even raid, as Colin said, won’t set any gear requirement. Why should fractals be the anomaly?

Plz tell me what’s the purpose of a gear requirement in this game? Just to help veterans to maintain their elitist status?

Yep, that’s the whole Reason. So we can keep our “Elitist Status”

What if your AR is your reward level and you need 1 to 1 reward level to fractal scale so you gain AR as you level through the scales.

This would mean if you are 100 on a guard you are 100 on all your classes without having to make 3 different sets of armor for light medium and heavy to then stuff AR infusions in… And they then convert versatile infusions to +5 to your stat of choosing

Cat Has Ducks.1982:

What if your AR is your reward level and you need 1 to 1 reward level to fractal scale so you gain AR as you level through the scales.

Would be a cool way to not limit alts and we could work through fractals roleplaying and trying all the instabilities.

Cat Has Ducks.1982:

What if your AR is your reward level and you need 1 to 1 reward level to fractal scale so you gain AR as you level through the scales.

This would mean if you are 100 on a guard you are 100 on all your classes without having to make 3 different sets of armor for light medium and heavy to then stuff AR infusions in… And they then convert versatile infusions to +5 to your stat of choosing

Yeah. Exactly what I am thinking about. Make AR an account-wide progression.

Also, I think they have said that fractals will be the place they expand small 5-man dungeon content.

I really can’t imagine how annoying the AR infusion requirement would be after the max level gets pushed higher and higher.

Lets make it even more trivial to do anything in the game and then complain about the lack of use for the relics.

Gating higher fractal levels behind gold gates is idiotic. +10 infusions are around 86 gold a piece.

So that’s 258 gold to slot your backpiece and 2 rings.

Now imagine fractals thet require not only a power set, but a sinister set because it’s got high toughness mobs.

You’re now looking at 516 gold.

And this is looking at the 70 AR for fractal 50. If the AR requirements increase above fractal 50, it’s going to get even more dumb.

The whole point of grinding fractal levels is to build up your skill with them. If some kitten can come join a fractal 50 because he’s a Trading Post baron or farms Silverwastes, but has done very little of fractals, that annoys me to no end.

Especially when fractals are not the most profitable to begin with, so the very people who aren’t making much gold leveling in them are the very people gated out by a gold grind.

Agony is a dumb gear check hid behind a stupid gold grind.

Ascended weapons are fine. The material costs are not outrageous.

Ascended armor, with its steep Bolt of Damask consumption, is stupid.

I don’t even understand what was wrong with exotic. Exotic was great. It was simple to switch around stats and experiment with builds. Now with ascended the time investment to switch builds is immense.

Although I am seeing some disagreements, but there is no one coming up with any counter argument to my 1-4 in the initial post.

Colin stated in raid announcement that it should all about the challenging content itself rather than enforcing certain type of entry requirement. I don’t see why fractals can’t be changed to follow the exact same philosophy.

Zenith.7301:

Gating higher fractal levels behind gold gates is idiotic. +10 infusions are around 86 gold a piece.

So that’s 258 gold to slot your backpiece and 2 rings.

Now imagine fractals thet require not only a power set, but a sinister set because it’s got high toughness mobs.

You’re now looking at 516 gold.

And this is looking at the 70 AR for fractal 50. If the AR requirements increase above fractal 50, it’s going to get even more dumb.

The whole point of grinding fractal levels is to build up your skill with them. If some kitten can come join a fractal 50 because he’s a Trading Post baron or farms Silverwastes, but has done very little of fractals, that annoys me to no end.

Especially when fractals are not the most profitable to begin with, so the very people who aren’t making much gold leveling in them are the very people gated out by a gold grind.

Agony is a dumb gear check hid behind a stupid gold grind.

Ascended weapons are fine. The material costs are not outrageous.

Ascended armor, with its steep Bolt of Damask consumption, is stupid.

I don’t even understand what was wrong with exotic. Exotic was great. It was simple to switch around stats and experiment with builds. Now with ascended the time investment to switch builds is immense.

Umm… you don’t need +10 infusions at all LOL

Exciton.8942:

I think HOTS should be a good time to separate agony resistance from ascended armor set. I would like to see agony resistance become an account-wide stat just like magic find.

My reason for agony resistance being a bad thing tied to armor:
1. GW2 is advertised as a no-grind for stats game. However, to progress in fotm, you have to make ascended armors which are quite costly. And the ability to craft ascended armor has no correlation with one’s ability to do fractals.

2. Anet wants every profession to be versatile. However, with AR tied to armor, one has to stick to one set of armor which greatly limits build variety. If you want to switch from power to condie, you have to craft a complete new set of ascended armor. This is not fun.

3. I am also forced to run with limited professions. Heavy/medium/light gear type can only be shared among three professions.

4. Ascended armor is end-game gear. Being forced to put on AR in the infusion slot makes me feel awkward. Just in order to do fractals, I won’t be able to put other types of infusion in the slot.

With the new fractal line in the mastery system, I think there should be no problem for Anet to separate the AR progression from the gear progression.

1) they’ve obviously deviated from that course of action. You can see it with the vertical progression they’re introducing with masteries, with the fact that ascended exists at all and AR which has existed for a while now.

It’s still not a grind game because it’s all optional as well. In fact you can experience all the fractals with 0 AR, it’s just extra optional difficulty levels that are opened with AR, which is hardly a grind compared to other games.

And, the fact that you use Colin’s responses about raids is a very clouded sense of reason as raids are actually going to enforce mastery requirements, which obviously goes against the ideals you’re trying to hold to.

2) As has been said many times, the control/support/damage roles are far more about skills than they are gear choices. Sure support can be bolstered by gear to become more of a healer, but the strongest support is the active support you can do with say reflects, stealth, might, vuln, fury, and then more niche or specific skills like Transfusion, Frost Spirit, EA or banners. Control really has almost no gear dependencies other than maybe some condi duration but that’s what 25% max on those conditions compared tot he 50% you can get from food, not a huge deal. Now damage is heavily influenced by gear, but because those other two aren’t you’re free to use damage gear while you do the other two, and gear has become far more of an ease of play choice than a role choice.

3) Focus on trinkets/weapons, I have a set of 60 AR trinkets and at least 2 of every weapon type ascended with AR. I can swap gear freely and hit 70 on any character, heck I’ve made characters and had them running fractal 50s within a day.

4) Choices, choices, again the idea that there is no vertical progression and there is no grind at all was a lie from the get go. We all know it, quoting the original intentions gets us nowhere. You want max stats, well you can get the stat + agony stuff, it just costs to do so. But, its’ money that honestly comes at a pretty rapid pace if you play the game. Playing about 2-3 hours a night, often in PUGs or thrown together groups of friends/acquantences I’m still pulling in well over 100g a week with a little added selective crafting (all of like 5 minutes). It’s not even close to the required devotion of any of my previous games.

Now… I say all that but I totally agree that AR is dumb, and that a split from it being character/gear bound to something account would be simply amazing. I just felt the need to play devils advocate and have a little fun

I don’t think there’s a completely right side to this argument though. I think many people do want a progression system, I think people do feel tied to their ascended armor in a positive way and would be disappointed if all that work was changed to be less meaningful to them. I think those are just as valid as he contrary opinion (which I share with you OP) in that it’s just not fun and very stifling. Hell I have trinkets/weapons to swap around but I find it a pain and will often favor playing my normal professions over the professions I want to at the time simply because I’m too lazy to swap that stuff around all the time.

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Zenith.7301:

Gating higher fractal levels behind gold gates is idiotic. +10 infusions are around 86 gold a piece.

So that’s 258 gold to slot your backpiece and 2 rings.

Now imagine fractals thet require not only a power set, but a sinister set because it’s got high toughness mobs.

You’re now looking at 516 gold.

And this is looking at the 70 AR for fractal 50. If the AR requirements increase above fractal 50, it’s going to get even more dumb.

The whole point of grinding fractal levels is to build up your skill with them. If some kitten can come join a fractal 50 because he’s a Trading Post baron or farms Silverwastes, but has done very little of fractals, that annoys me to no end.

Especially when fractals are not the most profitable to begin with, so the very people who aren’t making much gold leveling in them are the very people gated out by a gold grind.

Agony is a dumb gear check hid behind a stupid gold grind.

Ascended weapons are fine. The material costs are not outrageous.

Ascended armor, with its steep Bolt of Damask consumption, is stupid.

I don’t even understand what was wrong with exotic. Exotic was great. It was simple to switch around stats and experiment with builds. Now with ascended the time investment to switch builds is immense.

Umm… you don’t need +10 infusions at all LOL

You do if we’re talking about not using ascended armor and only 1 weapon. Which is what a post just above us said…

The only way I’d agree to this would be if ascended armor was given some other functionality then as opposed to only having a very slight stats increase.

Otherwise, the answer for me is a no I disagree with this.

Purple Miku.7032:

The only way I’d agree to this would be if ascended armor was given some other functionality then as opposed to only having a very slight stats increase.

Otherwise, the answer for me is a no I disagree with this.

It’s really mindblowing to me that actually there are quite a few players like you who actually sees linear gear progression kitten important and wants gear upgrade to be very meaningful. I thought games like diablo 3 or just the good old WoW would suit that concept way more.

Plz let me know what you think you would lose if the AR and ascended armor are separate. You can still do whatever level of fractals. It only helps that you can now play different professions and different armor stats more easily. Swapping different weapons would also be easy. You can even put in other infusions for their benefits.

Plz tell me what you lose to make you upset.

@OP,

I completely understand your position, and can’t deny how beneficial it would be to players just starting out, or working on their AR.

However, how do you propose players with literally hundreds worth of AR spread across multiple armor/weapons/trinket sets be compensated for the time, effort, and/or gold they’ve already put in which would be marginalized? Not to mention non-AR infused loadouts they have as well….

It’s fine to have a view point, but I don’t see you taking into account the segment of the player base that would gain little to no benefit from what you propose, and in fact, void their (considerable) commitment they’ve shown.

Edit: Also, proposing gold/relic/infusion refunds is meaningless as it’s highly likely this segment of the player base has already exhibited that they value the AR more.

Zenith.7301:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Zenith.7301:

Gating higher fractal levels behind gold gates is idiotic. +10 infusions are around 86 gold a piece.

So that’s 258 gold to slot your backpiece and 2 rings.

Now imagine fractals thet require not only a power set, but a sinister set because it’s got high toughness mobs.

You’re now looking at 516 gold.

And this is looking at the 70 AR for fractal 50. If the AR requirements increase above fractal 50, it’s going to get even more dumb.

The whole point of grinding fractal levels is to build up your skill with them. If some kitten can come join a fractal 50 because he’s a Trading Post baron or farms Silverwastes, but has done very little of fractals, that annoys me to no end.

Especially when fractals are not the most profitable to begin with, so the very people who aren’t making much gold leveling in them are the very people gated out by a gold grind.

Agony is a dumb gear check hid behind a stupid gold grind.

Ascended weapons are fine. The material costs are not outrageous.

Ascended armor, with its steep Bolt of Damask consumption, is stupid.

I don’t even understand what was wrong with exotic. Exotic was great. It was simple to switch around stats and experiment with builds. Now with ascended the time investment to switch builds is immense.

Umm… you don’t need +10 infusions at all LOL

You do if we’re talking about not using ascended armor and only 1 weapon. Which is what a post just above us said…

Infused rings and backpack with +5 = 30 AR
Ascended trinkets and amulet = 15 AR
Ascended weapon = 10 AR

That’s 55 AR and guess what? Level 50 fractals have the same daily reward chest as 41 through 49 so if you can clear those, you’re not missing out on anything. People do level 50 since if you have enough AR then you don’t need to worry about an instability.

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Zenith.7301:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Zenith.7301:

Gating higher fractal levels behind gold gates is idiotic. +10 infusions are around 86 gold a piece.

So that’s 258 gold to slot your backpiece and 2 rings.

Now imagine fractals thet require not only a power set, but a sinister set because it’s got high toughness mobs.

You’re now looking at 516 gold.

And this is looking at the 70 AR for fractal 50. If the AR requirements increase above fractal 50, it’s going to get even more dumb.

The whole point of grinding fractal levels is to build up your skill with them. If some kitten can come join a fractal 50 because he’s a Trading Post baron or farms Silverwastes, but has done very little of fractals, that annoys me to no end.

Especially when fractals are not the most profitable to begin with, so the very people who aren’t making much gold leveling in them are the very people gated out by a gold grind.

Agony is a dumb gear check hid behind a stupid gold grind.

Ascended weapons are fine. The material costs are not outrageous.

Ascended armor, with its steep Bolt of Damask consumption, is stupid.

I don’t even understand what was wrong with exotic. Exotic was great. It was simple to switch around stats and experiment with builds. Now with ascended the time investment to switch builds is immense.

Umm… you don’t need +10 infusions at all LOL

You do if we’re talking about not using ascended armor and only 1 weapon. Which is what a post just above us said…

Infused rings and backpack with +5 = 30 AR
Ascended trinkets and amulet = 15 AR
Ascended weapon = 10 AR

That’s 55 AR and guess what? Level 50 fractals have the same daily reward chest as 41 through 49 so if you can clear those, you’re not missing out on anything. People do level 50 since if you have enough AR then you don’t need to worry about an instability.

For the love of god, we are talking 70 AR because that’s where you’ll start when they introduce the new fractal scales. Don’t be so dense.

Exciton.8942:

I think HOTS should be a good time to separate agony resistance from ascended armor set. I would like to see agony resistance become an account-wide stat just like magic find.

My reason for agony resistance being a bad thing tied to armor:
1. GW2 is advertised as a no-grind for stats game. However, to progress in fotm, you have to make ascended armors which are quite costly. And the ability to craft ascended armor has no correlation with one’s ability to do fractals.

2. Anet wants every profession to be versatile. However, with AR tied to armor, one has to stick to one set of armor which greatly limits build variety. If you want to switch from power to condie, you have to craft a complete new set of ascended armor. This is not fun.

3. I am also forced to run with limited professions. Heavy/medium/light gear type can only be shared among three professions.

4. Ascended armor is end-game gear. Being forced to put on AR in the infusion slot makes me feel awkward. Just in order to do fractals, I won’t be able to put other types of infusion in the slot.

With the new fractal line in the mastery system, I think there should be no problem for Anet to separate the AR progression from the gear progression.

Ok, you wanted to counter-argument 1-4. Let’s see.

1) The stat increase is 5%, you do not use ascended armour for stats. You don’t need to craft any ascended armour at all to progress in fractals. You can do level 49 fractals with 55AR from trinkets and your backpack. Furthermore you can get 70AR on trinkets, backpack. If you do not want to use AR on those and want the 30 from the armour, well that’s a choice you will have to make (omg, you have to decide…)

2) Anet does not really want every profession to be anything. You may want to have different stats for certain different encounters in which case you can either make more sets of ascended or just put enough AR on trinkets, backpack and have multiple exotic sets.

3) You’re not forced to run with limited professions. In fact you only need one light, one medium and one heavy set. Or you could – once again – have a fractals running set of trinkets which give you 70AR and equip your alts in exotics.

4) You don’t have to put AR on anything. Actually if that is your concern, acquire a set of backpack, trinkets, rings that you use exclusively for fractals. Load these up with 70AR worth of infusions. Store them in your bank. Build your chars for wvw, pve, whatever you want to. Then before you go into fractals, replace the 6 pieces of gear on your character of choice and rock on.

Exciton.8942:

Purple Miku.7032:

The only way I’d agree to this would be if ascended armor was given some other functionality then as opposed to only having a very slight stats increase.

Otherwise, the answer for me is a no I disagree with this.

It’s really mindblowing to me that actually there are quite a few players like you who actually sees linear gear progression kitten important and wants gear upgrade to be very meaningful. I thought games like diablo 3 or just the good old WoW would suit that concept way more.

Plz let me know what you think you would lose if the AR and ascended armor are separate. You can still do whatever level of fractals. It only helps that you can now play different professions and different armor stats more easily. Swapping different weapons would also be easy. You can even put in other infusions for their benefits.

Plz tell me what you lose to make you upset.

Go drink some water, clear your head, and come back and read my post again. Who here is upset besides you? You need to re-evaluate your thought processes before deciding to translate them into text online.

Anyways, yeah I’d like there to be some linear gear progression! I don’t necessarily want a lot of it and it’s bad in some forms but I don’t see a reason for it to be nonexistent. I do in fact find it more enjoyable for the items that I acquire in-game to have intrinsic value, so to take away the primary functionality of ascended gear without giving it another one would make it significantly less valuable and worthwhile to craft. Exotic gear is too easily accessible and I like the fact that there’s an option to go for something better and consequently I also like the fact that there’s content that requires it. I also don’t care in the slightest if that boils your blood either. Get over it, people like different things than you. That’s the way the world works.

And I never said anything about losing anything from your proposed change. I just don’t find it a good thing to devalue existing content by removing functionality for it. I’ll take your rhetorical question and turn it around, how about?

Plz tell me what you would lose if they separated AR from gear and gave ascended armor a new functionality?

I agree with your sentiment Miku, but I disagree with it gaining a new functionality. I think it becoming more powerful would be worse for the game, the fact that it’s power is limited is a good thing, it’s stronger in fractals, a limited area of the game and again that’s a good thing. I’d rather see it limit our progression in one area of the game than to create power creep or prevent play in the larger portion of the game.

Of course my personal opinion is I liked the idea of just grab some exotics and you’re off, no need to progress further just enjoy the content. I can see how that doesn’t sit well with some though, I’d admit I used to be of that same mind “just give me something meaningful to work on,” but I’m just far more casual now.

That’s fine it doesn’t need to be more powerful, I just don’t think it should be left as this obscenely expensive unsalvageable-by-conventional-means equipment that gives a tiny bonus to attributes. The infusion part of it is the primary reason I made it to begin with and the secondary reason to help justify getting it being that it gives me a negligible edge in combat.

I’m more casual these days too but that’s just because I have nothing else to do other than learn how to play different classes. This would be fine, but the level of enjoyment and motivation is pretty low when there aren’t any new enemy mechanics/environments to explore.

The idea of making every single thing in this game as easily accessible as possible doesn’t sit well with me; I don’t see what the problem is with having a small bit of content pleasing those that do enjoy some form of progression. Catering to the majority is logical, but completely shafting anybody out of that majority isn’t a good call imo.

Zenith.7301:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Zenith.7301:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Zenith.7301:

Gating higher fractal levels behind gold gates is idiotic. +10 infusions are around 86 gold a piece.

So that’s 258 gold to slot your backpiece and 2 rings.

Now imagine fractals thet require not only a power set, but a sinister set because it’s got high toughness mobs.

You’re now looking at 516 gold.

And this is looking at the 70 AR for fractal 50. If the AR requirements increase above fractal 50, it’s going to get even more dumb.

The whole point of grinding fractal levels is to build up your skill with them. If some kitten can come join a fractal 50 because he’s a Trading Post baron or farms Silverwastes, but has done very little of fractals, that annoys me to no end.

Especially when fractals are not the most profitable to begin with, so the very people who aren’t making much gold leveling in them are the very people gated out by a gold grind.

Agony is a dumb gear check hid behind a stupid gold grind.

Ascended weapons are fine. The material costs are not outrageous.

Ascended armor, with its steep Bolt of Damask consumption, is stupid.

I don’t even understand what was wrong with exotic. Exotic was great. It was simple to switch around stats and experiment with builds. Now with ascended the time investment to switch builds is immense.

Umm… you don’t need +10 infusions at all LOL

You do if we’re talking about not using ascended armor and only 1 weapon. Which is what a post just above us said…

Infused rings and backpack with +5 = 30 AR
Ascended trinkets and amulet = 15 AR
Ascended weapon = 10 AR

That’s 55 AR and guess what? Level 50 fractals have the same daily reward chest as 41 through 49 so if you can clear those, you’re not missing out on anything. People do level 50 since if you have enough AR then you don’t need to worry about an instability.

For the love of god, we are talking 70 AR because that’s where you’ll start when they introduce the new fractal scales. Don’t be so dense.

If you would read you would notice it’s been stated multiple times that once you have enough AR for 4x fractals you can farm them to get ascended armor chests.

Mourningcry.9428:

@OP,

I completely understand your position, and can’t deny how beneficial it would be to players just starting out, or working on their AR.

However, how do you propose players with literally hundreds worth of AR spread across multiple armor/weapons/trinket sets be compensated for the time, effort, and/or gold they’ve already put in which would be marginalized? Not to mention non-AR infused loadouts they have as well….

It’s fine to have a view point, but I don’t see you taking into account the segment of the player base that would gain little to no benefit from what you propose, and in fact, void their (considerable) commitment they’ve shown.

Edit: Also, proposing gold/relic/infusion refunds is meaningless as it’s highly likely this segment of the player base has already exhibited that they value the AR more.

This is like the same thing when old players complained that new players can play the game for less money and even for free. But remember we have already been able to experience and benefit in the old system for a long time. You didn’t really lose anything. That’s number one.

Number two. Separating the AR from the armor does not mean lose either the AR or the armor. You still maintain all the work you did before. It just a QoL improvement for everyone.

Purple Miku.7032:

That’s fine it doesn’t need to be more powerful, I just don’t think it should be left as this obscenely expensive unsalvageable-by-conventional-means equipment that gives a tiny bonus to attributes. The infusion part of it is the primary reason I made it to begin with and the secondary reason to help justify getting it being that it gives me a negligible edge in combat.

I’m more casual these days too but that’s just because I have nothing else to do other than learn how to play different classes. This would be fine, but the level of enjoyment and motivation is pretty low when there aren’t any new enemy mechanics/environments to explore.

The idea of making every single thing in this game as easily accessible as possible doesn’t sit well with me; I don’t see what the problem is with having a small bit of content pleasing those that do enjoy some form of progression. Catering to the majority is logical, but completely shafting anybody out of that majority isn’t a good call imo.

You feel bored because of lack of new content. Setting and maintaining a gear check doesn’t solve your problem. As I said, obtaining ascended armor is mostly about farming which has nothing to do with one’s ability to do fractals.

There is no need to suggest me how to maintain a fifty-five AR and how to farm ascended items. Already have full set of ascended for all armor tiers and some more boxes in storage.

What I am suggesting here is simply a QoL change that should really benefit everyone. Nothing is removed from current system. It’s merely a divorce between AR and ascended armor. No one loses anything. It surely benefits new players more than veterans. But I don’t see anything wrong with that.

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Zenith.7301:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Zenith.7301:

Wasabi Kitty.8247:

Zenith.7301:

Gating higher fractal levels behind gold gates is idiotic. +10 infusions are around 86 gold a piece.

So that’s 258 gold to slot your backpiece and 2 rings.

Now imagine fractals thet require not only a power set, but a sinister set because it’s got high toughness mobs.

You’re now looking at 516 gold.

And this is looking at the 70 AR for fractal 50. If the AR requirements increase above fractal 50, it’s going to get even more dumb.

The whole point of grinding fractal levels is to build up your skill with them. If some kitten can come join a fractal 50 because he’s a Trading Post baron or farms Silverwastes, but has done very little of fractals, that annoys me to no end.

Especially when fractals are not the most profitable to begin with, so the very people who aren’t making much gold leveling in them are the very people gated out by a gold grind.

Agony is a dumb gear check hid behind a stupid gold grind.

Ascended weapons are fine. The material costs are not outrageous.

Ascended armor, with its steep Bolt of Damask consumption, is stupid.

I don’t even understand what was wrong with exotic. Exotic was great. It was simple to switch around stats and experiment with builds. Now with ascended the time investment to switch builds is immense.

Umm… you don’t need +10 infusions at all LOL

You do if we’re talking about not using ascended armor and only 1 weapon. Which is what a post just above us said…

Infused rings and backpack with +5 = 30 AR
Ascended trinkets and amulet = 15 AR
Ascended weapon = 10 AR

That’s 55 AR and guess what? Level 50 fractals have the same daily reward chest as 41 through 49 so if you can clear those, you’re not missing out on anything. People do level 50 since if you have enough AR then you don’t need to worry about an instability.

For the love of god, we are talking 70 AR because that’s where you’ll start when they introduce the new fractal scales. Don’t be so dense.

If you would read you would notice it’s been stated multiple times that once you have enough AR for 4x fractals you can farm them to get ascended armor chests.

lol, farm RNG low droprate chests, that sounds like a brilliant plan instead of crafting them yourself in a fraction of the time. Maybe you’ll tell me to go farm Charged Lodestones from CoE/Orr sparks next.

I don’t need you telling me what I can do to get the things, I’m sitting at full ascended sets for all the classes which I have at 80.

I hated the process. I’m a GW1 player. I know many of you are new to this franchise and bring with it your crappy treadmill cravings, but some of us do remember what Guild Wars 1 used to be. Much better than this carrot on a stick RNG grindfest.

And yet nothing of this has to do with the fact that you’re grinding a completely different objective (ascended gear, infusions) just to advance in fractal content.

It’s pathetic. If you have the skill to clear the content, no crappy agony aura tied to a gear check should be stopping you. It’s garbage design.

Agony used to be a thing when it was tied to certain attacks you could dodge, so you could stand out as a player in dodging attacks that would come close or outright down you. But then they implement Maw/Trin/Molten Duo pulsing agony checks, unavoidable, and apply that same concept to every 10th level of the fractal tiers. It then becomes a gear gate.

Even in GW1 without infusions you had the means to skillfully overcome the Mursaat. Not the case here.

GW1 =/= GW2

Maybe someday people might learn the difference.

Taku.6352:

GW1 =/= GW2

Maybe someday people might learn the difference.

I still gave up all hope on that

When I first heard of agony I thought it would be a pressure element. Like a long duration condition which would give effects like max health loss, slower speed, slower cooldowns and so on.

Without agony resist it would last 1-60 minutes depending on the scale so every mistake would stack up. Agony resist would shorten the duration down to minimum of like 30 seconds.

The number of people who oppose QoL features that don’t harm them in any way will never cease to be amazing.

Hyper Cutter.9376:

The number of people who oppose QoL features that don’t harm them in any way will never cease to be amazing.

It’s pretty common.

Part of these people’s investment is “I suffered to get this ascended item, so other people should suffer too. My only justification for doing that tedious ascended grind was the necessary benefit to do fractals, so I need to feel like my suffering has given me an advantage over those who don’t suffer through the grind like me.”

It’s everywhere, even in real life. “Oh, these entitled people, in my time we had to do suffer through x to obtain y. They should, too!”

In fact, since most of these people would find making ascended a turn off if it didn’t give them these benefits, it speaks more to the poor design of it that makes the process not enjoyable and stupidly expensive (for armors; weapons don’t suffer nearly as much since you can farm components unlike cloth, especially lower tier cloths).

There should be more involving ways to earn the gear, and I must say I liked the approach of handing out ascended gear on achievements, like the living story, maybe even world exploration should do so as well.

Tie achievements to dungeons and reward ascended items for doing a boss in a more difficult manner. Give the option to turn on an instability specific to bosses.

It would be pretty similar to Wildstar’s optional objectives during a raid boss fight that gives extra rewards upon achieving them.

Hyper Cutter.9376:

The number of people who oppose QoL features that don’t harm them in any way will never cease to be amazing.

I don’t think this is a QoL thing as much as just “man that’d be nice to not have to do on my alts”. QoL to me is making annoying little things better, not removing progression from the game, that’s a bit too extreme to be labeled as just QoL. I mean can I say it’d be a QoL change if they let me get sinister trinkets without having to get the achievements? What about if I wanted to get a legendary without all the work? At what point is it QoL and at what point is it a bit over the top?

Hyper Cutter.9376:

The number of people who oppose QoL features that don’t harm them in any way will never cease to be amazing.

Devaluing the objective usefulness of an item and by-design progression of a mechanic is not a mere QOL change. This change, for whatever quality of life it might bring, actively weakens the case for even getting ascended gear (something ANet doesn’t want) and actively damages the ability of someone to enhance their gear further by playing Fractals a lot.