ascended stuff is a mess
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One set for Low levels and another set for High levels? That part doesn’t make any sense. Unless you’re trying to mix up your builds intentionally you’ll be able to progress through all 100 levels with the same set. When “HoT fractals” first came out it used to be that Condi builds surpassed Power builds due to Toughness scaling, but that’s been normalized since.
Prior to HoT, you still has to grab Ascended gear to go beyond the first tier of levels. Though depending on how high you wanted to go you would need a handful of trinkets all the way to needing weapons and a few armor pieces that are ascended. Nowadays you can get all the way through mid 60’s in fractal level through AR in trinkets alone with no additional armor or weapon ascended. If you want to progress to the higher levels? Well then, you’ll need to invest your money/resources to do that; nothing new than how the process used to be.
Right now, there’s not much of an incentive to hit the higher fractals. So, if you’re wanting to go higher the expense is completely on you. As far as Raids are concerned they use the same gear as what you would use in Fractals unless you’re going for a specialized build (healer, tank, etc). Statwise, Weapon and trinkets make the biggest impact (over 10%) while Ascended armor doesn’t even make 2% worth of numeric difference over weapon and trinkets alone.
The pricing for it all? Yeah, I agree that it’s a bit on the expensive side for the armor. Though the cost for weapons is relatively cheap. Trinkets have a different currency cost, but they almost felt free.
After toughness normalization you can do just fine with a single ascended set. Zerker is pretty much the go to set for the majority of classes. Though it takes a lot more work to get a full set of condi gear.
You only need ascended stuff for the highest fractals. If you had done some proper forum research, you would have read how to get AR in a smart way starting with exotics, going over to ascended weapons and finally to ascended armor. Armor and weapons drop from daily fractal boxes too so it’s easy peasy to acquire that stuff. You also have to keep in mind that you gain very much gold from the daily chests in the range 1-20 and 21-50.
Took me 3 runs of the dungeon to get the bug.
You only need ascended stuff for the highest fractals. If you had done some proper forum research, you would have read how to get AR in a smart way starting with exotics, going over to ascended weapons and finally to ascended armor. Armor and weapons drop from daily fractal boxes too so it’s easy peasy to acquire that stuff. You also have to keep in mind that you gain very much gold from the daily chests in the range 1-20 and 21-50.
Well, thank you for making all kinds of assumptions about me and what I have done. Currently, I have been running my necro pretty much full zerk. I have weapons, trinkets and a couple ascended armor pieces that are also zerk. My AR currently is 90. I’ve run a few fractals over 50 and I’ll like to start running more. The real truth is that I have been doing some research/reading and it seemed to imply that Zerk wasn’t gonna work over fractal lvl 75, so that appeared to put me in a conundrum of zerk being ok for almost everything else but fractals over 75, which I guess aren’t worth running for the most part, or I am getting that idea.
But think about it, even outfitting a single toon with all ascended gear, AR not withstanding, is VERY expensive, and/or time consuming if you rely on random drops alone. For the player like myself, semi-serious… There simply is no way that I can manage to equip more than one of my toons with Ascended gear in a reasonable timeframe, say 4 months or so. This was not so true before HoT. Fractal drops were more frequent, and crafting costs for armor were cheaper. Now with HoT ascended is less the elite, and more needed to be competitive, the raid, and the higher mistlock instabilities almost mandate it. I am now zerk and a light armor profession for all high level content end of story. I have no real other options at this point….
ANET changed a fundamental aspect of the game… Exotics no longer cut it, but ascended is out of reach for most unless you want to play the same build for everything.
Making ascended required for content basically gates build variety and content availability…
(edited by Tspatula.9086)
Ascended is only required for Fractals, it is not required for any other content. If you were semi serious as you state gearing for ascended is relatively easy the hardest part of going for cheapest route is the time gate, the other option is to save gold and by excess mats off tp outisde of you daily crafted materials, this speeds up the process, or you can buy everything off the TP which is the most expensive way but also the fastest.
Myself using a combo of crafting mats and buying completed have completely geared 2 characters within the last month and a half an that was with a very casual time allotment of 1-2 hrs every other night. A little more during weekends. RNGsus smiled upon me twice giving me two pieces of ascended that I could actually use after stat swap.
Zerker stats or marauder stats are the preferred for all Fotm levels due to the bosses being HP sponges, you can do other but the bosses hit like a wet noodle so toughness and Vitality is not needed. All that’s required is The appropriate AR.
Well, thank you for making all kinds of assumptions about me and what I have done. Currently, I have been running my necro pretty much full zerk. I have weapons, trinkets and a couple ascended armor pieces that are also zerk. My AR currently is 90. I’ve run a few fractals over 50 and I’ll like to start running more. The real truth is that I have been doing some research/reading and it seemed to imply that Zerk wasn’t gonna work over fractal lvl 75, so that appeared to put me in a conundrum of zerk being ok for almost everything else but fractals over 75, which I guess aren’t worth running for the most part, or I am getting that idea.
Zerk till level 100 is completely fine when you aren’t speedrunning or min/max everything. I did all fractals till 100 and every single one in ascended zerker gear with no group insisting on condi or anything else. At the moment fractals can be played like you want. Just have enough AR which is very easy to get till you climb up to level 100 and every group won’t have any problem with your participation. There are only few groups with restriction, they are the real minority not like pre-Hot when almost all groups wanted you to be zerker.
But think about it, even outfitting a single toon with all ascended gear, AR not withstanding, is VERY expensive, and/or time consuming if you rely on random drops alone.
Yeah but all players that are playing longer than one month know that you cannot rely on drops alone. If you want to have stuff in GW2 almost everyone goes farming gold all the way.
For the player like myself, semi-serious… There simply is no way that I can manage to equip more than one of my toons with Ascended gear in a reasonable timeframe, say 4 months or so.
One toon is enough to play. If you want more, you can do so and you will also learn to receive your second gear faster than your first. I hope I don’t need to explain that now…
This was not so true before HoT. Fractal drops were more frequent,
This is NOT true. You gain much more gold than before! And the droprate of ascended is the same like before. We have data of the guild [KING] – pre-HoT and at the moment.
and crafting costs for armor were cheaper.
See before: Prices are up, gold reward also. I doubt very hard that the time increased very much. Run all fractal dailies and you will swim in gold. Additionally or alternatively go farming 90%ish silver wastes and jump from map to map after vinewrath.
Now with HoT ascended is less the elite, and more needed to be competitive, the raid, and the higher mistlock instabilities almost mandate it. I am now zerk and a light armor profession for all high level content end of story. I have no real other options at this point….
Raids can be done in exotic armor as some have already proven. Even there, weapons are more important because the boost was about 5-12% (dunno about the exact data) but armor only 2%. Like you said, an armor is about 600-800 gold while one weapon costs about 50 gold. I by myself killed raid bosses in exotic armor with just ascended trinkets etc. and the weapons while the rest of my group also wasn’t full asc.
ANET changed a fundamental aspect of the game… Exotics no longer cut it, but ascended is out of reach for most unless you want to play the same build for everything.
Making ascended required for content basically gates build variety and content availability…
That’s not true. There are so many players out there equipped in full exotics, they play every day and their gear is enough for almost all of the content.
You are just putting pressure on yourself but in the end your written words are not the facts we have.
Took me 3 runs of the dungeon to get the bug.
(edited by Vinceman.4572)
You only need ascended stuff for the highest fractals. If you had done some proper forum research, you would have read how to get AR in a smart way starting with exotics, going over to ascended weapons and finally to ascended armor. Armor and weapons drop from daily fractal boxes too so it’s easy peasy to acquire that stuff. You also have to keep in mind that you gain very much gold from the daily chests in the range 1-20 and 21-50.
Well, thank you for making all kinds of assumptions about me and what I have done. Currently, I have been running my necro pretty much full zerk. I have weapons, trinkets and a couple ascended armor pieces that are also zerk. My AR currently is 90. I’ve run a few fractals over 50 and I’ll like to start running more. The real truth is that I have been doing some research/reading and it seemed to imply that Zerk wasn’t gonna work over fractal lvl 75, so that appeared to put me in a conundrum of zerk being ok for almost everything else but fractals over 75, which I guess aren’t worth running for the most part, or I am getting that idea.
But think about it, even outfitting a single toon with all ascended gear, AR not withstanding, is VERY expensive, and/or time consuming if you rely on random drops alone. For the player like myself, semi-serious… There simply is no way that I can manage to equip more than one of my toons with Ascended gear in a reasonable timeframe, say 4 months or so. This was not so true before HoT. Fractal drops were more frequent, and crafting costs for armor were cheaper. Now with HoT ascended is less the elite, and more needed to be competitive, the raid, and the higher mistlock instabilities almost mandate it. I am now zerk and a light armor profession for all high level content end of story. I have no real other options at this point….
ANET changed a fundamental aspect of the game… Exotics no longer cut it, but ascended is out of reach for most unless you want to play the same build for everything.
Making ascended required for content basically gates build variety and content availability…
1) Ok when HoT was launched, there was a problem with armor scaling in higher level. The armor was scaling so much that condition damage build was a must. But it’s been what like 2-3 months that they fixed that. So no you don’t need 2 armor set. Just play your zerk reaper up to level 100.
2) Jesus you are all over the place. You have a point beind all of this, but there is just so much misconception and errors that it’s just hard to follow you.
- Ascended Droprate for fractal are pretty much the same as pre-hot. The best source would be King for that. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/18IHVJao5j85KOp6lBTOgO8qs4VYD3Xty-jKPZo8o-Q4/pubhtml
Let’s keep it real doing a champion daily today is WAY easier and faster than doing a level 50 pre-HoT. It’s 3 vs 4 islands, level 50-80 are easier than the old level 50 and you can choose the easiest islands instead of the pre-hot randomness. Still the droprate right now it about 11-12% for armor and 3-4% for weapons. Pre-HoT it was 11-12% for armor and 4% for weapons. So ya weapons have a bit lower droprate, but it’s much easier to complete the content.
Ascended and weapons were as needed in high level fractal as they are now.
So your ONLY point right now is that ascended cost higher than before to craft and you are right. Mostly because precursor crafting skyrocketed the price of ascended material. But at the same time, this create some of the more profitable way to get gold. Like opening bags on a lower level character, gathering and selling ascended material.
To be honest I don’t find ascended to be really expansive. You just need to know your stuff and you will be alright.
Thaddeauz [xQCx]- QC GUILD
Put your mind to it and you will finish your ascended armor. I started this revenant 1.5 month ago. He finished ascended gearing after a month. And I am nearly done filling every infusion slot with +7 agony resistance. You dont need to blow wads of gold on the dual stat infusions, they are not worth the expense.
And you can buy +4 mainstat infusions with laurels, or +5 if you buy the wvw variant with pvp stats as well, but requiring 100 badges of honor per infusion as well for once you tire of fractals. and no longer need the AR.
Snip
There are always exceptions to every rule, that doesn’t make the exception THE rule.
Craft a set of trailblazer ascended armour, it’s a barely noticeable damage loss for condi builds, ppl love that kitten in wvw, and you can condi tank raid bosses or sabetha it won’t matter(as long as you know how to press buttons in a somewhat optimal order.
The idea that the ascended drop rate is the same as before HoT seems crazy to me. That or there is a bug that only effects some people. I don’t have a nice spreadsheet like above (started one after seeing that) but for myself, I used to get 1-2 chests per week doing a daily 49/50. (single fractal) Since the Patch, I’ve gotten maybe 2 (1 was from a recommended daily 19). Speaking with others they have had similar experiences. Though I have heard that some people are getting good/similar drops. Many others are getting garbage. That and doing higher level fractals (>=90) doesn’t seem to improve your chances by much if at all. Definitely not worth the increase in time. I’m curious how the spreadsheet was generated. I’m assuming it is across multiple people based on the numbers. I will say that for the first week post patch the numbers seemed decent but since then it has been barren. Either way, keeping detailed track of the chests now so that it is more precise. Maybe my RNG is in a lull.
Regarding the armor sets. I’m glad I’m not a new player having to craft from scratch.
(edited by rcs.4120)
With the advent of HoT the new fractal instabilities and raid, ascended stuff should have changable stats,
I’m just going to mention that you can change the stats of your ascended armor and weapons. Sure, you can’t right click and change it any old time, but it is possible.
https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Ascended_equipment
“Changing attribute prefix”
“Ascended weapons and armor can be put into the Mystic Forge to change the attribute bonuses of the item. These recipes create new items and destroy any upgrade component on the item in the process.”
Ascended Weapon: Original Ascended Weapon, Orichalcum Imbued Inscription with the desired stats, 5 Glob of Ectoplasm, Anthology of Heroes
Ascended Armor: Original Ascended Armor Piece, Gossamer Insignia with the desired stats, 5 Glob of Ectoplasm, Anthology of Heroes
Searil Hebion| Tarnished Coast
Snip
There are always exceptions to every rule, that doesn’t make the exception THE rule.
What are you trying to say with that comment? I still don’t get it after having read it three times now.
Thaddeus and I have shown you that you are incorrect in almost all points you have made.
The idea that the ascended drop rate is the same as before HoT seems crazy to me. That or there is a bug that only effects some people. I don’t have a nice spreadsheet like above (started one after seeing that) but for myself, I used to get 1-2 chests per week doing a daily 49/50. (single fractal) Since the Patch, I’ve gotten maybe 2 (1 was from a recommended daily 19). Speaking with others they have had similar experiences.
The thing is, your personal experience is correlated to a very small sample size. Till today you could have received less than 50 daily fractal champion chest out of one account referring to the change of december 15th. I don’t take the other into account because the drop rates are very low. 11% are about 5 or less chests so having 1-2 isn’t that far from that number. Personally, I have gotten 2 since december patch and I have made about 40 runs in the champion cateqory, also a very small sample size. It would be around 4 chests what is totally fine concerning simple statistics. Let’s meet again after 5000 chests, ok?
Took me 3 runs of the dungeon to get the bug.
The idea that the ascended drop rate is the same as before HoT seems crazy to me. That or there is a bug that only effects some people. I don’t have a nice spreadsheet like above (started one after seeing that) but for myself, I used to get 1-2 chests per week doing a daily 49/50. (single fractal) Since the Patch, I’ve gotten maybe 2 (1 was from a recommended daily 19). Speaking with others they have had similar experiences. Though I have heard that some people are getting good/similar drops. Many others are getting garbage. That and doing higher level fractals (>=90) doesn’t seem to improve your chances by much if at all. Definitely not worth the increase in time. I’m curious how the spreadsheet was generated. I’m assuming it is across multiple people based on the numbers. I will say that for the first week post patch the numbers seemed decent but since then it has been barren. Either way, keeping detailed track of the chests now so that it is more precise. Maybe my RNG is in a lull.
Regarding the armor sets. I’m glad I’m not a new player having to craft from scratch.
Well that’s the thing. It’s rng. It’s been about 45 days since the update so even if you did the daily 50+ everyday since then. That’s a really really low numbers and most people probably didn’t do one each day. A low enough number to not be relevant.
And keep in mind that pre-hot we received our ascended directly in the fractal and most people were pinging their ascended loots. So even if you didn’t get an ascended a particular run, you still saw other people getting one often. Trying to figure out a drop rate with low numbers and memory only is doom to fail.
Thaddeauz [xQCx]- QC GUILD
The idea that the ascended drop rate is the same as before HoT seems crazy to me. That or there is a bug that only effects some people. I don’t have a nice spreadsheet like above (started one after seeing that) but for myself, I used to get 1-2 chests per week doing a daily 49/50. (single fractal) Since the Patch, I’ve gotten maybe 2 (1 was from a recommended daily 19). Speaking with others they have had similar experiences. Though I have heard that some people are getting good/similar drops. Many others are getting garbage. That and doing higher level fractals (>=90) doesn’t seem to improve your chances by much if at all. Definitely not worth the increase in time. I’m curious how the spreadsheet was generated. I’m assuming it is across multiple people based on the numbers. I will say that for the first week post patch the numbers seemed decent but since then it has been barren. Either way, keeping detailed track of the chests now so that it is more precise. Maybe my RNG is in a lull.
Regarding the armor sets. I’m glad I’m not a new player having to craft from scratch.
It’s you. More precisely it’s your selective memory.
There is no way you consistantly got 1-2 ascended drops pre HoT from fractals per week. Not unless you were lucky for x amount of years straight.
Drop rate research has sufficient data now that we can draw comparisons. It comes down to:
- pre HoT the possible chests from difficulties 31-40 and 41-50 would end up with a higher total chance of getting a chest for that day (while taking substantially longer than fractals now)
- post HoT you have 1 decent chance at ascended in your master chest from difficulty 51-100 (which is similar to the 41-50 pre HoT) though as mentioned fractals take a fraction of the time. Not to mention the powercreep that came with HoT has made fractals even more a pushover than before.
Well, thank you for making all kinds of assumptions about me and what I have done. Currently, I have been running my necro pretty much full zerk. I have weapons, trinkets and a couple ascended armor pieces that are also zerk. My AR currently is 90. I’ve run a few fractals over 50 and I’ll like to start running more. The real truth is that I have been doing some research/reading and it seemed to imply that Zerk wasn’t gonna work over fractal lvl 75, so that appeared to put me in a conundrum of zerk being ok for almost everything else but fractals over 75, which I guess aren’t worth running for the most part, or I am getting that idea.
The “truth” is that you basically have no idea about fractals (you mention yourself that you are just starting 51+), have been reading around on who knows were picking up subjective opinions and have about as much agony resistance as someone who has full trinkets with weapons and 0 ascended armor.
If you dislike zerker (which is fine ever since they changed the toughness on fractal 50+ enemies) then make a condiset and be done with it. Condi works fine on any and all pve content (except objects). There problem solved.
Not in the mood to go through any of your other nonsense since other posters have already taken appart the stuff that is bogus.
- pre HoT the possible chests from difficulties 31-40 and 41-50 would end up with a higher total chance of getting a chest for that day (while taking substantially longer than fractals now)
Don’t you really mean similar amount of time? The data is from daily chests which require 3 fractals so marginally faster… And given the mistlock instabilities are a limited set of, what I understand to be, the least fun of the lot from pre-HoT, looks like the overall effort turns out to be the same.. but that’s just an opinion from a newb like myself. I’m too green to understand anything about this very complex game….
So assuming a 12% drop rate for armor that’s minimum 10 champ chest per piece, or 60 champ chests for one armor set. Assuming one can even find any LFMs for fractals over 60, personally I have been trying for the last week or so, found essentially none. Yes, I KNOW, I can put up my own LFMs, but since don’t have a lot of experience (3 >50 fractals) I feel that I should not be leading, for now, Cyninja I am sure you agree with this given my newb status.
So, lets say 10 min per fractal, which seems reasonable, plus 10 min of buffer for the set or 40 min per champ chest. For a set of ascended armor we are talking about 40 hours minimum game time which can be accomplished in a minimum of 60 days of continuous game play. Realistically, we are really talking about 90 days if you could find a >50 party every day you wanted/could run them… far longer for me based on the availability of LFMs. At least one can change the stats of any drop, and to the person who reminded me if this, are you expecting me or anyone to change stats that way on a weekly or daily basis depending on whether you are joining a raid or a high level fractal? Of course I can do the 20-50s and have my armor set in…. 600 days… not bad.
So Vince, while you state your most awesome exception to the basic rule that ascended is needed for the raid, you are awesome, but your exception still relies on others to have ascended equipment, and let us not forget that the next phases will be harder and less likely that exotics will cut it.
Prior to HoT there was no content that required ascended anything to be competitive, and I fully admit that I had spent the vast majority of my time playing WvW, which Anet let deteriorate to the point where it’s currently a pointless game mode, so now I am trying to get gear and find some other interest in this game.
Of course, all of you posting about how everything is fine already have plenty of ascended gear and are working on gearing alt #4 or extra ascended set #3 or… I realize now that I made a big mistake, playing so much WvW has left me with zilch, well 2 ascended armor chests, 4 weapons and 10 rings (not infused) with healing stats, maybe 5 or so that were useful, oh and not a single precursor. That’s putting roughly 20 hours a week.
So I get it, thanks for all the tough love here in the fractal/raid/dungeon forums. I guess the one thing that the HoT paradigm has brought is entitlement to the “haves” and disdain for the “have-nots”. Oh wait, that’s always been around… LOL
Don’t you really mean similar amount of time? The data is from daily chests which require 3 fractals so marginally faster… And given the mistlock instabilities are a limited set of, what I understand to be, the least fun of the lot from pre-HoT, looks like the overall effort turns out to be the same.. but that’s just an opinion from a newb like myself. I’m too green to understand anything about this very complex game….
?? Fractal 50-80 are easier to do than the old level 50 (Mobs do less damage and get more damage from you). You used to need to do 4 islands per daily, now you only need 3. You used to only choose the first Islands and the remaining was random. Meaning that you could end up with Swamp (easiest island) and like Dredge, Colossus and Mai Trin for a freaking long daily. Right now you could do 3 Swamp in a row. It’s WAY easier to complete a daily now than it used to. It really depend on the skill of the group, but it used to take between 45-90min per fractal daily 50 in pugs. (20-30min in good group). Right now it take about 30min for normal pugs. So it’s now easier and faster to complete a daily 51+ than it used to be to complete a level 50 daily pre-hot.
So assuming a 12% drop rate for armor that’s minimum 10 champ chest per piece, or 60 champ chests for one armor set.
It’s more 8-9 champion per pieces. So 50 champion chest for one set of armor. But it doesn’t matter because it’s rng. It can take you 30 champion or 90 champion depending on your luck.
Assuming one can even find any LFMs for fractals over 60, personally I have been trying for the last week or so, found essentially none. Yes, I KNOW, I can put up my own LFMs, but since don’t have a lot of experience (3 >50 fractals) I feel that I should not be leading, for now, Cyninja I am sure you agree with this given my newb status.
Wait what???? Ok first why over 60? Champion daily is 51 to 100 why limit yourself ot 60. 2nd it’s super easy to find a fractal for a champion. Most people are doing 56-67-77 for 3 easy swamp. And personnally, I don’t see why you stop yourself for starting a fractal LFG. You are not leading a Train here, you are just starting a LFG and ppl will join. No pressure on you dude you are leading nothing.
So, lets say 10 min per fractal, which seems reasonable, plus 10 min of buffer for the set or 40 min per champ chest. For a set of ascended armor we are talking about 40 hours minimum game time which can be accomplished in a minimum of 60 days of continuous game play. Realistically, we are really talking about 90 days if you could find a >50 party every day you wanted/could run them… far longer for me based on the availability of LFMs.
Well it can vary from 15 hours to 70 hours depending on your luck tbh. With the average being between 25 and 38 hours. And again, the availability of LFG is just a made up problem. Post your freaking LFG and you will wait 5-10min at worst. It usually take me 5min to fill a group. Now you just have a bunch of people looking at the LFG all hoping for someone to post. This is ridiculous.
At least one can change the stats of any drop, and to the person who reminded me if this, are you expecting me or anyone to change stats that way on a weekly or daily basis depending on whether you are joining a raid or a high level fractal?
Again with your made up problems. Why would you need 2 freaking armor for fractal and raid? Explain that one to me because I do both raid and fractal and I have the same armour for the last 2 years.
Thaddeauz [xQCx]- QC GUILD
So Vince, while you state your most awesome exception to the basic rule that ascended is needed for the raid, you are awesome, but your exception still relies on others to have ascended equipment, and let us not forget that the next phases will be harder and less likely that exotics will cut it.
If I reflect myself correctly, I will be far away from an exception to the basic because I survived the raid in partially exotics.
The problem with raids is not the raid itself, it’s the people making wrong correlations. Ofc groups want to have the best equipped and skilled players if they are pugging and searching for mates to clear the raid. But when it comes to execution of the content you will realize fast that people are dying and failing the bosses mostly due to mechanics and not because the lack of appropriate gear. The first steps I tried so hard with my asc gear, died, failed etc. and later on I was able to kill bosses with a good amount of time left with my toons in exotics. It is way more about learning and adapting the mechanics than being perfectly geared.
And trust me, it doesn’t really matter that much if you have exotic or ascended gear when you trying to find a pug group or guild. The search for raid group is not so easy and for newer players even harder because many solids groups have already formed and you have no access to them. To go against that you have to be very active and search intensively although it is annoying and maybe frustrating in the first place.
Prior to HoT there was no content that required ascended anything to be competitive, and I fully admit that I had spent the vast majority of my time playing WvW, which Anet let deteriorate to the point where it’s currently a pointless game mode, so now I am trying to get gear and find some other interest in this game.
As I said, nothing has changed to the worse site. The opposite counts, you can play more fractal levels without asc gear than before HoT. You got more maps which all can be played in exotics, raids also. There is still no heavy need to get asc gear. You are creating the pressure on yourself!
Of course, all of you posting about how everything is fine already have plenty of ascended gear and are working on gearing alt #4 or extra ascended set #3 or… I realize now that I made a big mistake, playing so much WvW has left me with zilch, well 2 ascended armor chests, 4 weapons and 10 rings (not infused) with healing stats, maybe 5 or so that were useful, oh and not a single precursor. That’s putting roughly 20 hours a week.
I repeat myself: Go for your first gear. Go making little steps. At first you work for one armor piece, then the next and so on. Afterwards you go play with your asc gear for a while and you will have fun. While doing so you are earning the mats for your next goal by the way. See above: Why making pressure? You don’t have to.
So I get it, thanks for all the tough love here in the fractal/raid/dungeon forums. I guess the one thing that the HoT paradigm has brought is entitlement to the “haves” and disdain for the “have-nots”. Oh wait, that’s always been around… LOL
Stop whining, take action. That is all I can say to your last statement.
Took me 3 runs of the dungeon to get the bug.
Thaddeus beat me to the he majority of the reply points, and I only have this to add:
Of course, all of you posting about how everything is fine already have plenty of ascended gear and are working on gearing alt #4 or extra ascended set #3 or… I realize now that I made a big mistake, playing so much WvW has left me with zilch, well 2 ascended armor chests, 4 weapons and 10 rings (not infused) with healing stats, maybe 5 or so that were useful, oh and not a single precursor. That’s putting roughly 20 hours a week.
Do you know what us Fractal veterans had on day 1? RNG. You had to endure the agony (literally) of level progression and hope you got a ring in your drop. On top of that you were extremely lucky to get a ring that dropped in the stat combination you wanted. We didn’t have Pristine relics, and Guild Commendations and Laurels didn’t exist. Nowadays, you can walk into Fractal for your first time ever and already have a full set of ascended gear head to toe.
You only have 2 armor boxes, 4 weapons, and a selection of 10 rings? A lot of players new to Fractals would kill to have a head start like that. Though, you more or less discredited your thread by stating you invested your time in WvW. The reason we have a hoard of boxes and trinkets? We spent our time grinding the old fractals and dungeons relying on rng drops and accruing gold to craft what we needed from scratch.
So yeah, a lot of the veterans here have gone through the trials of having no gear at all with no way to get it. If you wanted to progress your level for the better rewards you either had to play the low levels over and over again until you got the drops or learn to dodge a lot since you would be tackling content with less AR than what was needed.
As far as Raids needing it? Still no. They give a team an edge and about a 10% damage boost on paper. However, even a coordinated team can clear the bosses with plenty of time left on the counter with relative ease.
As stated multiple times, Raids do not require Ascended gear it just makes it easier, a 10 man team has cleared in exotics which is roughly 10% difference than ascended, a 5 man team has cleared in full ascended. These have been proven and they a re relevant to show that not everyone needs to be in ascended, is it ideal? Yes. But not required, the only content that actually requires ascended is FOTM. And even in that instance you only need one set.
Do you know what us Fractal veterans had on day 1? RNG. You had to endure the agony (literally) of level progression and hope you got a ring in your drop. On top of that you were extremely lucky to get a ring that dropped in the stat combination you wanted. We didn’t have Pristine relics, and Guild Commendations and Laurels didn’t exist. Nowadays, you can walk into Fractal for your first time ever and already have a full set of ascended gear head to toe.
This forum is fun! I too remember having to walk 10 miles in the snow to get to the fractal entrance… or you guys do… I guess. I believe the appropriate response from you was supposed to be “get off my lawn”.
Wait what???? Ok first why over 60?
Obviously a typo, but feel free to continue to pile on, you do seem to enjoy it.
Obviously a typo, but feel free to continue to pile on, you do seem to enjoy it.
Ok so when you give your opinion, it’s ok, but when I post my opinion it’s piling on?
Fair enough.
It’s sad because if you had problem with ascended gear you could have asked and I’m sure plenty of people (me included) would have happy to help you.
Thaddeauz [xQCx]- QC GUILD
- pre HoT the possible chests from difficulties 31-40 and 41-50 would end up with a higher total chance of getting a chest for that day (while taking substantially longer than fractals now)
Don’t you really mean similar amount of time? The data is from daily chests which require 3 fractals so marginally faster… And given the mistlock instabilities are a limited set of, what I understand to be, the least fun of the lot from pre-HoT, looks like the overall effort turns out to be the same.. but that’s just an opinion from a newb like myself. I’m too green to understand anything about this very complex game….
Pre HoT fastest fractal set:
- Swamp (first fractal could be chosen) -> Ascalon -> Grawl -> Molten Boss Duo
Estimated time for completion with a very decent group (talking organised, not puged) about 35 minutes. Estimated time with a decent pug about 45 – 50 minutes.
Pre HoT longest fractal set:
- Swamp -> Cliffside -> Dredge -> Mai Trin
Estimated time for completion with a very decent group (talking organised, not puged) about 45 – 50 minutes. Estimated time with a decent pug about 60 – 90 minutes (with close to 2 hours with a terrible pug).
Fractal set post HoT:
- Swamp -> Swamp -> Swamp
- Swamp -> Swamp -> Molten Boss
- Swamp -> Swamp -> Jade Maw
Estimated time for completion with a very decent group (talking organised, not puged) about 15 – 25 minutes. Estimated time with a decent pug about 25- 35 minutes.
The amount of fractals required post HoT is less (3 instead of 4), the fractals you get to do is freely choseable post HoT (not so pre HoT), difficult fractals can be completely omited post HoT (not so pre). The powercreep from elite specialisations makes things even easier.
I said fractals post HoT take less time, I meant it.
Now please stop embarrassing yourself infront of people who have played this content for over 3 years. I’m not even going to comment on the entire LFG thing. I’ll let others educate you on how viable certain classes and item stats where pre HoT.
(edited by Cyninja.2954)
…stuff and things and stuff…
Now please stop embarrassing yourself infront of people who have played this content for over 3 years. I’m not even going to comment on the entire LFG thing. I’ll let others educate you on how viable certain classes and item stats where pre HoT.
Good good, I don’t actually need any powercreeper posts about the LFG thing, seems pretty obvious to me. And yes, I am truely embarassed, mostly because you say so, you do seem to know what you are talking about, so I am just gonna run with it.
Oh and by the way, did you notice that I used the exact same time estimates that you did for calculating the approximate completion times for 3 over lvl 50 fractals. Uncanny is it not?
(edited by Tspatula.9086)
The idea that the ascended drop rate is the same as before HoT seems crazy to me. That or there is a bug that only effects some people. I don’t have a nice spreadsheet like above (started one after seeing that) but for myself, I used to get 1-2 chests per week doing a daily 49/50. (single fractal) Since the Patch, I’ve gotten maybe 2 (1 was from a recommended daily 19). Speaking with others they have had similar experiences. Though I have heard that some people are getting good/similar drops. Many others are getting garbage. That and doing higher level fractals (>=90) doesn’t seem to improve your chances by much if at all. Definitely not worth the increase in time. I’m curious how the spreadsheet was generated. I’m assuming it is across multiple people based on the numbers. I will say that for the first week post patch the numbers seemed decent but since then it has been barren. Either way, keeping detailed track of the chests now so that it is more precise. Maybe my RNG is in a lull.
Regarding the armor sets. I’m glad I’m not a new player having to craft from scratch.
After the Fractured update, I ran scale 30/40/50 fractals daily. In 6 months of fractal running, I didn’t get a single ascended box or fractal weapon. I started running fractals again 3 weeks ago. I’ve received 4 ascended boxes so far.
Those armadillos would be a lot cooler if they looked more like real armadillos. mmm armadillos
-BnooMaGoo.5690
-BnooMaGoo.5690
After the Fractured update, I ran scale 30/40/50 fractals daily. In 6 months of fractal running, I didn’t get a single ascended box or fractal weapon. I started running fractals again 3 weeks ago. I’ve received 4 ascended boxes so far.
This is the real problem with very small population data sets like the King data, which is basically less than 1000 chests. To be really representitive it needs to be something like 10,000 or more, all from the same account ideally.
A guildie of mine has been running the champ daily and all the other dailies pretty regularly since the patch, let’s just say that’s 4 runs a week for 5 weeks, so roughly 20 (as a lowball estimate) of each chest. He has gotten 1 armor chest and 1 weapon both from the veteran chest, nothing from the champ chest.
Everyone I know who used to run fractals feels like the drops are still significantly lower than prior to HoT, again impressions based on very low sample sizes so basically irrelevant…
However, the initial rewards settings were dramatically worse than before, so bad that even Anet had to do something about it. Of course, Anet says that it was never intended to be worse, but look at the game-wide gold and reward nerfing and massive gold sinks that came with HoT, I find it hard to believe they nerfed fractal rewards “by accident” and I also don’t believe they returned things to the pre-HoT levels, regardless of the King data. Anet wants gold removed from all aspects of the game. Look at the HoT maps, the main rewards are now account bound map currencies… not gold.
People will pull more than one precursor in round of throwing things into the mystic toilet, others will do the exact same thing many times over and get nothing. RNG makes low number sample sets very biased to “luck” or “unluck”
The idea that the ascended drop rate is the same as before HoT seems crazy to me. That or there is a bug that only effects some people. I don’t have a nice spreadsheet like above (started one after seeing that) but for myself, I used to get 1-2 chests per week doing a daily 49/50. (single fractal) Since the Patch, I’ve gotten maybe 2 (1 was from a recommended daily 19). Speaking with others they have had similar experiences. Though I have heard that some people are getting good/similar drops. Many others are getting garbage. That and doing higher level fractals (>=90) doesn’t seem to improve your chances by much if at all. Definitely not worth the increase in time. I’m curious how the spreadsheet was generated. I’m assuming it is across multiple people based on the numbers. I will say that for the first week post patch the numbers seemed decent but since then it has been barren. Either way, keeping detailed track of the chests now so that it is more precise. Maybe my RNG is in a lull.
Regarding the armor sets. I’m glad I’m not a new player having to craft from scratch.
After the Fractured update, I ran scale 30/40/50 fractals daily. In 6 months of fractal running, I didn’t get a single ascended box or fractal weapon. I started running fractals again 3 weeks ago. I’ve received 4 ascended boxes so far.
Fractured killed drop rates. It took Anet months but eventually they changed it. It was still not right after that change and they changed it again to up it. I think there was another one or two times where it got messed up and was changed again. But since fractured the drop rate has changed like 4-5 times now because they have constantly messed it up and it took a lot of data collection to prove it before they would look into it.
This is the real problem with very small population data sets like the King data, which is basically less than 1000 chests. To be really representitive it needs to be something like 10,000 or more, all from the same account ideally.
771 chest is pretty good if you ask me. Sure it’s not perfect, 2-3k would be ideal if you ask me. But at the same time it’s the best source of data by far. And asking for 10 000 chest from one account is just stupid. That’s 27 years of fractal dude.
In two months there were able to get 771 chest result. So it probably gonna take another 3-6 months to get 2-3k chests. But even then, I don’t think the % will change that much tbh.
Thaddeauz [xQCx]- QC GUILD
This is the real problem with very small population data sets like the King data, which is basically less than 1000 chests. To be really representitive it needs to be something like 10,000 or more, all from the same account ideally.
771 chest is pretty good if you ask me. Sure it’s not perfect, 2-3k would be ideal if you ask me. But at the same time it’s the best source of data by far. And asking for 10 000 chest from one account is just stupid. That’s 27 years of fractal dude.
In two months there were able to get 771 chest result. So it probably gonna take another 3-6 months to get 2-3k chests. But even then, I don’t think the % will change that much tbh.
Well, I am pretty sure that 771 means the the error bars on that % droprate are quite larger probably +/- 5% or more and how do you explain my guildie who is essentially zero for 20, according to Kings numbers he should have 2 ascended armors or weapons from the champ chest? The problem with considering % chance with RNG is that you can flip a coin and have it land heads 20 times in a row, yet the next flip is still only 50% that it will land tails. Each roll on the RNG table is independent, they are not additive so even with a sample size of 771 the results can be very difficult to translate into a practical drop rate…
It the same thing with precursors. They drop for some, and others of us, myself included, never… well never so far.
how do you explain my guildie who is essentially zero for 20, according to Kings numbers he should have 2 ascended armors or weapons from the champ chest?
What you just complained that 771 isn’t a big enough sample size to draw conclusion, but then you talk about your friend with 20 as a sample size.
Anyway, there is two things here.
1) Does the kings numbers are precise enough. With 771 chest i believe it is, but otherwise we can wait 3-6 more months to have even more precision on the numbers. I doudt that the percentage of 12% could vary form 6% to 17% tbh. 771 chests is a decent sample size. Not the best, but decent enough to think that at worst the percentage will only vary of maybe 1%, not much more.
2) In the end of the day it’s still just probability. Even if the droprate is 12%, you could still get no chest in 1000 daily in a row. It’s just that the chance of that happening is pretty low.
Thaddeauz [xQCx]- QC GUILD
After the Fractured update, I ran scale 30/40/50 fractals daily. In 6 months of fractal running, I didn’t get a single ascended box or fractal weapon. I started running fractals again 3 weeks ago. I’ve received 4 ascended boxes so far.
This is the real problem with very small population data sets like the King data, which is basically less than 1000 chests. To be really representitive it needs to be something like 10,000 or more, all from the same account ideally.
A guildie of mine has been running the champ daily and all the other dailies pretty regularly since the patch, let’s just say that’s 4 runs a week for 5 weeks, so roughly 20 (as a lowball estimate) of each chest. He has gotten 1 armor chest and 1 weapon both from the veteran chest, nothing from the champ chest.
Everyone I know who used to run fractals feels like the drops are still significantly lower than prior to HoT, again impressions based on very low sample sizes so basically irrelevant…
However, the initial rewards settings were dramatically worse than before, so bad that even Anet had to do something about it. Of course, Anet says that it was never intended to be worse, but look at the game-wide gold and reward nerfing and massive gold sinks that came with HoT, I find it hard to believe they nerfed fractal rewards “by accident” and I also don’t believe they returned things to the pre-HoT levels, regardless of the King data. Anet wants gold removed from all aspects of the game. Look at the HoT maps, the main rewards are now account bound map currencies… not gold.
People will pull more than one precursor in round of throwing things into the mystic toilet, others will do the exact same thing many times over and get nothing. RNG makes low number sample sets very biased to “luck” or “unluck”
This is the real problem with very small population data sets like the King data, which is basically less than 1000 chests. To be really representitive it needs to be something like 10,000 or more, all from the same account ideally.
771 chest is pretty good if you ask me. Sure it’s not perfect, 2-3k would be ideal if you ask me. But at the same time it’s the best source of data by far. And asking for 10 000 chest from one account is just stupid. That’s 27 years of fractal dude.
In two months there were able to get 771 chest result. So it probably gonna take another 3-6 months to get 2-3k chests. But even then, I don’t think the % will change that much tbh.
Well, I am pretty sure that 771 means the the error bars on that % droprate are quite larger probably +/- 5% or more and how do you explain my guildie who is essentially zero for 20, according to Kings numbers he should have 2 ascended armors or weapons from the champ chest? The problem with considering % chance with RNG is that you can flip a coin and have it land heads 20 times in a row, yet the next flip is still only 50% that it will land tails. Each roll on the RNG table is independent, they are not additive so even with a sample size of 771 the results can be very difficult to translate into a practical drop rate…
It the same thing with precursors. They drop for some, and others of us, myself included, never… well never so far.
So your friend got insanely lucky on his veteran chests (aproximately 2% to get either armor or weapon), and very unlucky on his champion chest (where he should have had 2 items from his aproximately 20 runs).
Now I’m not going to say this is impossible since for someone this will happen. Maybe someone will even go without any drops. This would be super rare though.
Also, with how these drop numbers corelate, is there even a sligth possibility your friend mixed up the chests or wasn’t paying attention? It’s just since we are already in speculation land and “someone told me xyz happened” that does seem like a more plausible cause.
how do you explain my guildie who is essentially zero for 20, according to Kings numbers he should have 2 ascended armors or weapons from the champ chest?
What you just complained that 771 isn’t a big enough sample size to draw conclusion, but then you talk about your friend with 20 as a sample size.
Anyway, there is two things here.
1) Does the kings numbers are precise enough. With 771 chest i believe it is, but otherwise we can wait 3-6 more months to have even more precision on the numbers. I doudt that the percentage of 12% could vary form 6% to 17% tbh. 771 chests is a decent sample size. Not the best, but decent enough to think that at worst the percentage will only vary of maybe 1%, not much more.
2) In the end of the day it’s still just probability. Even if the droprate is 12%, you could still get no chest in 1000 daily in a row. It’s just that the chance of that happening is pretty low.
Look, I am not a statistician, but I DO KNOW that any number like % droprate has error bars, and that 12% number has error bars much larger than 1%. The ONLY thing one can definitively say about that data is champ chest have a better chance of dropping ascended armor and weapons, the 12% part is essentially meaningless at that sample size. I don’t have a problem with that and you are very happy with it, good on ya. Equipping ascended is absurdly expensive and has always been counter to the original idea that grinding in this game was only for cosmetics….
To be honest, prior to HoT upping the baseline requirements to include ascended for anyone interested in the end game content, I found the entire fractal agony system rather inane. Do fractals to get more AR to do more fractals, to get AR, to do more fractals, to get AR. AR is just a secondary magic find only useful in fractals… useful mostly for ascended grinding, which I never found important. Now, as I have stated, Anet has changed the baseline, so I now grind fractals and AR….
Look, I am not a statistician, but I DO KNOW that any number like % droprate has error bars, and that 12% number has error bars much larger than 1%. The ONLY thing one can definitively say about that data is champ chest have a better chance of dropping ascended armor and weapons, the 12% part is essentially meaningless at that sample size.
A sample of 771 with a confidence level of 95% with give you a confidence interval of +/- 3.5%.
So basically, 95% of the time, you gonna have between 15.5% and 8.5% droprate in fractal 51+.
If you want your confidence interval to drop to 2% we will need a sample of 2 400 chests.
And if you want your confidence interval to drop to 1% we will need a sample of 9 600 chests.
So I was a bit too confident in Kings numbers and you are a little bit too sceptical about it.
Thaddeauz [xQCx]- QC GUILD
To be honest, prior to HoT upping the baseline requirements to include ascended for anyone interested in the end game content, I found the entire fractal agony system rather inane. Do fractals to get more AR to do more fractals, to get AR, to do more fractals, to get AR. AR is just a secondary magic find only useful in fractals… useful mostly for ascended grinding, which I never found important. Now, as I have stated, Anet has changed the baseline, so I now grind fractals and AR….
Pre-Hot Max required AR: 70
Maximum AR from Off/Def Slots: 70
Number of Infused (+x) Slots: 3
First Scale with AR reqs: 10
Recommended AR: 10
Post-HoT Max required AR: 150
Maximum AR from Off/Def Slots: 98
Number of Infused (+x) Slots: 5
First Scale with AR reqs: 20
Recommended AR: 8
Sure, the AR requirements went up, but it’s much easier and cheaper to get AR. your base equipment can take +7’s instead of +5 versatile infusions while the +x Agony infusions tanked in price due to how much more readily accessible the item item is rewarded now. You also have 5 Infused slots vs the original 3 which make a big difference when the pricing model for the infusions scale exponentially.
Yeah, ok, I got the OP now. He is complaining about everything around fractals. So here is my advice:
Stop playing them!
At first you are complaining about the asc droprate, then about all rewards together calling them nerfed while it is the opposite around in terms of gold. You gain much more out of fractals since ever. The amount of gold is almost ridiculous and just capped by the 3 dailies or everybody would run fractals to farm gold and silver wastes would be empty.
And in the end you are whining about AR which is posT-HoT not a real problem and can be achieved easier than ever before.
I really really recommend you to let fractals go. You should be happy because fractals are so much more casual-friendly nowadays and there are several veterans that are not content with this issue. Fractals are the new dungeons.
Took me 3 runs of the dungeon to get the bug.
(edited by Vinceman.4572)
Yeah, ok, I got the OP now. He is complaining about everything around fractals. So here is my advice:
Stop playing them!
At first you are complaining about the asc droprate, then about all rewards together calling them nerfed while it is the opposite around in terms of gold. You gain much more out of fractals since ever. The amount of gold is almost ridiculous and just capped by the 3 dailies or everybody would run fractals to farm gold and silver wastes would be empty.
And in the end you are whining about AR which is posT-HoT not a real problem and can be achieved easier than ever before.
I really really recommend you to let fractals go. You should be happy because fractals are so much more casual-friendly nowadays and there are several veterans that are not content with this issue. Fractals are the new dungeons.
No, you have pretty much everything wrong. I may not be expressing myself perfectly so here in a nutshell:
Ascended armor is now for all intents and purposes going to be required for raids which is the only real endgame content we have (until WvW gets really fixed which I am not hopeful about). Yes, you can have one or two people in your party with exotics, and at least one elite group have done exotic only runs to prove it can be done, but even they don’t recommend it. And for the record, until such time as new fractals are added to the game, I personally don’t consider them endgame content, they are loot farming.
The cost of making ascended armor whether before or after the patch means that for a very large percentage of the playerbase, only one ascended set is going to be practically attainable in a reasonable timeframe. This means that no matter what, most players are locked into a specific armor class and specific armor stats. Many of us have at least 2 sets of exotic armor per toon with different runes and stats to allow for some situational build diversity. Reduced build diversity is not good for anyone.
The new raid changed ascended from an option, to a requirement as stated by the main raid dev, Ruby. The only real change made to acquiring ascended was increasing some mat requirements for certain types, and reducing the silk cost by 1/3. So, an increase in cost overall.
I do agree that fractals are a lot easier to manage now that you can pick and choose, many of my guildies disagree that the drop rates are the same as before, but the points made here are reasonable to suggest that drop rates are similar to before, I can accept that. And yes, the gold is not bad to very good. If you find a group to run the over 50s, which based on the in-game LFG system is very hit or miss. But that aspect of this conversation has NEVER been a point of contention or complaint by me. There are lots of ways to obtain gold in this game, many for far less effort… although perhaps at the cost of brain cells…
AR is a ridiculous system. It serves absolutely NO PURPOSE other than to allow players to rerun the same fractals but get more ascended drops. SO it’s magic find pure and simple. Explain to me why it’s bound to individual pieces of equipment? How exactly does that make sense? Well, prior to HoT AR drove the desire to attain more ascended armor, we all know we aren’t after it for the looks, right? AR has no other function, NONE. It is 100% magic find for grinding the same fractals over and over. Which is fine, but why isn’t it account wide, like magic find?
I’m not a big fan of hamster wheel game mechanics, which is why I have always prefered WvW. I’ll think about crafting a legendary if a precursor drops, I am not going grind out a thousand this and thats and dump hundreds of gold to get one. I think it’s wrong that after spending the time and or gold to craft or acquire ascended armor that it should be a limitation on how I would like to play GW2. You are fine with it, ok. You probably already have a lot of ascended gear, so this conversation is largely irrelevant for you, except you might think my idea would devalue your multiple sets of ascended armors…. it’s tough to be the 1%.
(edited by Tspatula.9086)
Yeah, ok, I got the OP now. He is complaining about everything around fractals. So here is my advice:
Stop playing them!
At first you are complaining about the asc droprate, then about all rewards together calling them nerfed while it is the opposite around in terms of gold. You gain much more out of fractals since ever. The amount of gold is almost ridiculous and just capped by the 3 dailies or everybody would run fractals to farm gold and silver wastes would be empty.
And in the end you are whining about AR which is posT-HoT not a real problem and can be achieved easier than ever before.
I really really recommend you to let fractals go. You should be happy because fractals are so much more casual-friendly nowadays and there are several veterans that are not content with this issue. Fractals are the new dungeons.No, you have pretty much everything wrong. I may not be expressing myself perfectly so here in a nutshell:
Ascended armor is now for all intents and purposes going to be required for raids which is the only real endgame content we have (until WvW gets really fixed which I am not hopeful about). Yes, you can have one or two people in your party with exotics, and at least one elite group have done exotic only runs to prove it can be done, but even they don’t recommend it. And for the record, until such time as new fractals are added to the game, I personally don’t consider them endgame content, they are loot farming.
The cost of making ascended armor whether before or after the patch means that for a very large percentage of the playerbase, only one ascended set is going to be practically attainable in a reasonable timeframe. This means that no matter what, most players are locked into a specific armor class and specific armor stats. Many of us have at least 2 sets of exotic armor per toon with different runes and stats to allow for some situational build diversity. Reduced build diversity is not good for anyone.
The new raid changed ascended from an option, to a requirement as stated by the main raid dev, Ruby. The only real change made to acquiring ascended was increasing some mat requirements for certain types, and reducing the silk cost by 1/3. So, an increase in cost overall.
I do agree that fractals are a lot easier to manage now that you can pick and choose, many of my guildies disagree that the drop rates are the same as before, but the points made here are reasonable to suggest that drop rates are similar to before, I can accept that. And yes, the gold is not bad to very good. If you find a group to run the over 50s, which based on the in-game LFG system is very hit or miss. But that aspect of this conversation has NEVER been a point of contention or complaint by me. There are lots of ways to obtain gold in this game, many for far less effort… although perhaps at the cost of brain cells…
AR is a ridiculous system. It serves absolutely NO PURPOSE other than to allow players to rerun the same fractals but get more ascended drops. SO it’s magic find pure and simple. Explain to me why it’s bound to individual pieces of equipment? How exactly does that make sense? Well, prior to HoT AR drove the desire to attain more ascended armor, we all know we aren’t after it for the looks, right? AR has no other function, NONE. It is 100% magic find for grinding the same fractals over and over. Which is fine, but why isn’t it account wide, like magic find?
I’m not a big fan of hamster wheel game mechanics, which is why I have always prefered WvW. I’ll think about crafting a legendary if a precursor drops, I am not going grind out a thousand this and thats and dump hundreds of gold to get one. I think it’s wrong that after spending the time and or gold to craft or acquire ascended armor that it should be a limitation on how I would like to play GW2. You are fine with it, ok. You probably already have a lot of ascended gear, so this conversation is largely irrelevant for you, except you might my idea would devalue your multiple sets of ascended armors…. it’s tough to be the 1%.
How is Ascended armor a requirement from raids when every boss has been beaten in exotics minus trinkets which are virtually given to everyone for logging in?
You are stating things that are just false, FoTM is the only content ascended gear is required after FoTM 10.
All of your statements are based on your biased opinion and not on any actual facts, especially since ascended items don’t provide a huge advantage over those that don’t have it. And since they haven’t released any tier higher than ascended/ legendary there is no hamster wheel like in MMOs like WoW.
once you have the gear you can transfer to other characters and even change the stats for a negligible price of gold compared to crafting the gear, seaming how you can get ascended items from every game mode through Rng and crafting, as well as purchasing it outright in raids.
And how are ascended items limiting your playstyle? You can get them in any game mode and you can craft them or buy them. And they are not required for anything other than FOTM so not having them is not hating you from any content besides high level FOTM, which you can get max AR without having any ascended Armor and only having the trinkets. Hell you can reach max AR with 3 ascended trinkets if you really wanted.
Not like its the cost worth to try for maximising the attuned and infused agony slots. Beyond +12 agony, the price quickly reaches truly ridiculous levels, thanks to the truly obscene amounts of thermocatalytic reagents needed.
If you have a full set of ascended armor + trinkets. Theres x14 slots you can fill with +7 versatile AR infusions. Coupled with the 5 bonus slots (attuned and infused ) you can add to your rings and cloak. You merely need to craft 4x 10 AR and 1x 12AR in order to reach the 150 AR cap.
Not like its the cost worth to try for maximising the attuned and infused agony slots. Beyond +12 agony, the price quickly reaches truly ridiculous levels, thanks to the truly obscene amounts of thermocatalytic reagents needed.
If you have a full set of ascended armor + trinkets. Theres x14 slots you can fill with +7 versatile AR infusions. Coupled with the 5 bonus slots (attuned and infused ) you can add to your rings and cloak. You merely need to craft 4x 10 AR and 1x 12AR in order to reach the 150 AR cap.
Or go 3×10 AR and 2×11 AR. Slightly cheaper and gets you to 150 too.
Otherwise yes, the 20-30 copper per +1 AR price has made the infusions a lot cheaper.
Ascended armor is now for all intents and purposes going to be required for raids….
No, it’s not. Multi people on the forums (let alone this thread) have already provided numerical data and personal testimony to discredit the concept of Ascended gear being required for raids.
Yes, you can have one or two people in your party with exotics, and at least one elite group have done exotic only runs to prove it can be done, but even they don’t recommend it.
Ultimately, in the perfect world with identical team execution, you’d lose 12% of your outgoing damage from the difference in gear from exotic to Ascended. Now, if the DPS checks on the bosses were tighter than they are right now I would agree that Ascended would be required. But, the boss timers are extremely generous. Gorsy is about as aggressive as it gets since there’s “soft DPS checks” in between phases. So of course Ascended gear is recommended for the free damage, but it’s still not required.
Trinkets and weapon alone account for about 10% with the remaining 2% coming from upgrading your armor. So ultimately, you’re looking at under 100g (worst case) to gear up a toon with weapons and trinkets with 0 crafting material in reserve. If you want to spend the extra several hundred gold for one set of armor for the extra 2%? I highly highly advise against that and would rather slap some weapons and trinkets on other toons.
The cost of making ascended armor whether before or after the patch means that for a very large percentage of the playerbase, only one ascended set is going to be practically attainable in a reasonable timeframe. This means that no matter what, most players are locked into a specific armor class and specific armor stats. Many of us have at least 2 sets of exotic armor per toon with different runes and stats to allow for some situational build diversity. Reduced build diversity is not good for anyone.
For one, build diversity and gear diversity are not the same thing. Secondly, gear diversity is also not needed for anyone. Again (for the third time?) you can do the entirety of fractals and raids with a single set of gear per toon. You can even share that same gear with toons of the same weight class. If you feel that you want a secondary or tertiary set of gears that’s completely on you to fund. Now, I admit to having multiple gear sets myself, but only my fractal/raid set is of Ascended quality. For WvW (when my server was active), my alternate sets were only of Exotic quality.
The new raid changed ascended from an option, to a requirement as stated by the main raid dev, Ruby. The only real change made to acquiring ascended was increasing some mat requirements for certain types, and reducing the silk cost by 1/3. So, an increase in cost overall.
I would love to see the exact statement where this was claimed regarding the gear requirement. The increase in material cost was both due to new stats but, more importantly, was driven by precursor crafting which make heavy use of ascended material.
I’m not a big fan of hamster wheel game mechanics, which is why I have always prefered WvW. I’ll think about crafting a legendary if a precursor drops, I am not going grind out a thousand this and thats and dump hundreds of gold to get one. I think it’s wrong that after spending the time and or gold to craft or acquire ascended armor that it should be a limitation on how I would like to play GW2. You are fine with it, ok. You probably already have a lot of ascended gear, so this conversation is largely irrelevant for you, except you might think my idea would devalue your multiple sets of ascended armors…. it’s tough to be the 1%.
You’re more along the lines of the 0.01%. I’ve worked with friends/players that have come back from years worth of complete hiatus from the game, and yet I can still take them along in fractals and raids with the gear they crafted/bought within the first month of the game. When they saw the AR reqs for fractals? Some saw it as a challenge and are hard at work to make their gear. Others said “meh” and stuck to the gear that they had. The hamster wheel claim? GW2 probably has one of the most generous systems I’ve seen in the game relating to gear. A. They stuck to only a single tier upgrade during its entire life of the game with no intent to raise it yet again. B. They’ve allowed for Account bound top tier gear vs making it souldbound. C. You can “retrain” your top tier gear for a mere fraction of its original price. Anyone remember when Ascended gear used to be Soulbound? Yeah, come talk to us about the expense of gearing your toons when that rule was around.
Not like its the cost worth to try for maximising the attuned and infused agony slots. Beyond +12 agony, the price quickly reaches truly ridiculous levels, thanks to the truly obscene amounts of thermocatalytic reagents needed.
If you have a full set of ascended armor + trinkets. Theres x14 slots you can fill with +7 versatile AR infusions. Coupled with the 5 bonus slots (attuned and infused ) you can add to your rings and cloak. You merely need to craft 4x 10 AR and 1x 12AR in order to reach the 150 AR cap.
Or go 3×10 AR and 2×11 AR. Slightly cheaper and gets you to 150 too.
Otherwise yes, the 20-30 copper per +1 AR price has made the infusions a lot cheaper.
Have you looked at the tp, to see how much the higher AR infusions costs? Definitely NOT cheap if you go beyond whats listed above.
Not like its the cost worth to try for maximising the attuned and infused agony slots. Beyond +12 agony, the price quickly reaches truly ridiculous levels, thanks to the truly obscene amounts of thermocatalytic reagents needed.
If you have a full set of ascended armor + trinkets. Theres x14 slots you can fill with +7 versatile AR infusions. Coupled with the 5 bonus slots (attuned and infused ) you can add to your rings and cloak. You merely need to craft 4x 10 AR and 1x 12AR in order to reach the 150 AR cap.
Or go 3×10 AR and 2×11 AR. Slightly cheaper and gets you to 150 too.
Otherwise yes, the 20-30 copper per +1 AR price has made the infusions a lot cheaper.
Have you looked at the tp, to see how much the higher AR infusions costs? Definitely NOT cheap if you go beyond whats listed above.
Made a long post, scrapped it.
TL;DR version
Post-hot, the remaining +52 AR from infusions comes to around 60 gold (3 +10, 2 +11).
Pre-Hot the +52 (3 +10, 2 +11) would cost around 110g.
*The pricing of a +1 being closer to 2s rather than 20c
The crazy part? Without the 2 new infused slots from attuned rings your +52 AR(2 +17, 1 +18) came out to 9,160-ish gold.
I’d have to say buying infusions became radically cheaper and more economical for players across the board. So it’s a lot easier for players to gear up on their AR reqs if they’re choosing to pursue top level fractals.
Not like its the cost worth to try for maximising the attuned and infused agony slots. Beyond +12 agony, the price quickly reaches truly ridiculous levels, thanks to the truly obscene amounts of thermocatalytic reagents needed.
If you have a full set of ascended armor + trinkets. Theres x14 slots you can fill with +7 versatile AR infusions. Coupled with the 5 bonus slots (attuned and infused ) you can add to your rings and cloak. You merely need to craft 4x 10 AR and 1x 12AR in order to reach the 150 AR cap.
Or go 3×10 AR and 2×11 AR. Slightly cheaper and gets you to 150 too.
Otherwise yes, the 20-30 copper per +1 AR price has made the infusions a lot cheaper.
Have you looked at the tp, to see how much the higher AR infusions costs? Definitely NOT cheap if you go beyond whats listed above.
Read, comprehend, then post.
I was refering to the fact that +1 AR infusions cost around 20-30 copper a piece, where as they were at 12-15 SILVER a piece pre HoT.
Also due to the exponential nature or how infusions work, 3×10 + 2×11 (requires a total of 7 +10 AR infusions) is cheaper than 4×10 + 1×12 (requires a total of 8 +10 AR infusions). Simple math really.
(edited by Cyninja.2954)
I would love to see the exact statement where this was claimed regarding the gear requirement. The increase in material cost was both due to new stats but, more importantly, was driven by precursor crafting which make heavy use of ascended material.
Ask and ye shall receive:
http://dulfy.net/2015/09/30/gw2-ascended-gear-will-be-needed-in-raids/
Increased crafting cost are due what you are talking about, which by the way, doesn’t matter, increased is increased. but also, leather was added to some of the recipes, adding mats adds the cost of the mats. It just simple maths.
(edited by Tspatula.9086)
Ask and ye shall receive:
http://dulfy.net/2015/09/30/gw2-ascended-gear-will-be-needed-in-raids/
Seriously? Your defense is a tweet from September when the raids were still under development? They hadn’t even had their Beta weekend at the point to have open player involvement (aside from the 2 guilds invited for testing). Also not a very convincing statement given that she uses terms “can prob be” and “should be” in regards to the requirement question. More convincing evidence would be from a dev post-deployment of the raids declaring the raids mechanically cannot be completely without top tier gear which we already have proven otherwise many many….many times.
If you need higher tier gear as a crutch to build up skill that’s one thing, but a hard do-or-die requirement is another. In regards to raids, groups are using gear as a crutch for lack of skill and/or experience (again, free damage from better gear). Once you have a couple kills under your belt you can walk in with lesser grade gear and barely notice the difference.
Ascended gear doesn’t keep you from getting teleported in the VG fight. You don’t magically gain the ability to dodge out Gorsy’s slam attack or avoid eggs with better gear. Certainly, the cannons on Sabetha don’t spontaneously explode upon sight of players with top tier armor.
As far as increased costs on ascended material? Supply and demand. If you need material, you’re at a disadvantage if you’re starting from scratch. The contrary is true as well. If you’ve saved up your materials (which you indicated you have) you can sell away your excess/unused material for better prices than what it originally cost your to craft it.
The real truth is that I have been doing some research/reading and it seemed to imply that Zerk wasn’t gonna work over fractal lvl 75
You came to the wrong conclusions, zerk sets work fine all the way to 100, the only requirements are AR.
Ask and ye shall receive:
http://dulfy.net/2015/09/30/gw2-ascended-gear-will-be-needed-in-raids/
Seriously? Your defense is a tweet from September when the raids were still under development? They hadn’t even had their Beta weekend at the point to have open player involvement (aside from the 2 guilds invited for testing). Also not a very convincing statement given that she uses terms “can prob be” and “should be” in regards to the requirement question. More convincing evidence would be from a dev post-deployment of the raids declaring the raids mechanically cannot be completely without top tier gear which we already have proven otherwise many many….many times.
If you need higher tier gear as a crutch to build up skill that’s one thing, but a hard do-or-die requirement is another. In regards to raids, groups are using gear as a crutch for lack of skill and/or experience (again, free damage from better gear). Once you have a couple kills under your belt you can walk in with lesser grade gear and barely notice the difference.
Ascended gear doesn’t keep you from getting teleported in the VG fight. You don’t magically gain the ability to dodge out Gorsy’s slam attack or avoid eggs with better gear. Certainly, the cannons on Sabetha don’t spontaneously explode upon sight of players with top tier armor.
As far as increased costs on ascended material? Supply and demand. If you need material, you’re at a disadvantage if you’re starting from scratch. The contrary is true as well. If you’ve saved up your materials (which you indicated you have) you can sell away your excess/unused material for better prices than what it originally cost your to craft it.
I am sorry but none of your arguements with regards to needing or requiring ascended armor/trinkets are generally valid, everything you are suggesting is very situational, which is absolutely fine for you, but not particularly applicable to anyone else. And as to the various attack dynamics that you say ascended doesn’t help with, again you are wrong, faster defeat means less time avoiding damaging mechanics etc… Nice try tho…
Ascended is ONLY required for high level fractals. Given the fact that getting the trinkets+back piece takes little effort, you can easily reach the agony threshold to do 1-60 fractals. At this point, going higher is only a matter of completing the 1-100 achievement, which, being an achievement that doesn’t matter for absolutely NOTHING beside you having a golden skin, should not be easy to get. Your complaint here resumes to [ascended gear is required for the 1-100 fractal achievement]. Which is in no way game-breaking nor content-gating.
I have 150 AR myself, but I dont foresee myself pushing higher than 77. The higher fractals is simply too much of a pita, not worth the effort. So most will be happy with the 109 needed for 77.
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