Guild Wars 2

EDIT: (3/9/14)
Here are some things this thread is NOT:
-A commentary on the effectiveness of the CDI.
-A catch-all of grievances against ANET.
-A demand (not even a polite one) that ANET compensate people who lost fractal levels.
-A debate about if reaching 50+ in fractals before the reset was an exploit, because it is against terms of use to openly accuse (rather than report) other players of cheating.

What it is:
-A discussion of a topic that was deemed off-topic in another thread (linked below).
-A notice to the community of how the events described below happened.
-A plea to Chris to carefully consider if this decision sets a good precedent.

Please think carefully before you hit “submit” on your response to this thread, and make sure it’s really relevant. If you’d like to discuss something else, please start your own topic. Thank you for your courtesy.

/EDIT

So…. this happened.

Chris Whiteside.6102:

Romo.3709:

Also, Chris.
I’ve been trying to avoid the question for a while now, trying my hardest to contribute to this CDI as much as the time lets me, while trying to push this question to the back of my mind. It never seem to be a good time to ask it, but then again I don’t think it’ll ever be a good time to. But you once said that you will give your opinion on fractal reset after you gave it some thoughts. I was wondering if you got anything for us. Will we ever be compensated for levels we lost and those over multiple toons? Just stating if it’s not even a viable thing for discussion anymore would suffice.

I am pretty sure Izzy responded to this question a few months ago. I will check with him.

Chris

Estriella Faerie.4029:

Chris Whiteside.6102:

I am pretty sure Izzy responded to this question a few months ago. I will check with him.

Chris

After his response, the subject was still talked a lot. And you then told us you would think about how we felt and get back to us.

Source (response from Romo to Izzy): https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/CDI-Character-Progression-Vertical/page/3#post3369056

Your response to Romo after this: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/CDI-Character-Progression-Vertical/page/3#post3369091

This post and Chris Whiteside’s follow-up (here ) is also of particular interest in this discussion.

Since it’s considered off-topic in the Fractal Evolution CDI, I thought I’d start its own topic.

I’m done with the CDI until he says something. I don’t appreciate how he said he would be responding on this subject and now he’s bowing out.

I’ve been hopeful and positive up until now.

My first and only proposal was about developer communication. It was ignored. Not a single response from a community member or dev.

I thought it was really impressive that he was going to take the time to think about the issue and respond, and it’s really disheartening that he has instead been thinking, “Izzy took care of it.”

I’m sorry you didn’t get responses to your proposal/idea. It’s hard to be heard in those threads sometimes, due to their size and depth.

Guhracie.3419:

I thought it was really impressive that he was going to take the time to think about the issue and respond, and it’s really disheartening that he has instead been thinking, “Izzy took care of it.”

I’m sorry you didn’t get responses to your proposal/idea. It’s hard to be heard in those threads sometimes, due to their size and depth.

To your first point, yes I agree.

To your second… Mine was on the first page. I had it prepared before starting. Got it in asap. Was very silly.

The problem about the communication on fractals has been there for a while.

When they announced the reset on Fractured, many threads were created to talk about this issue. In 3 weeks, over 2500 posts were made (and quite a few threads deleted), without any answers from the dev. This was quite a mistake for communication, because as time went, players became more and more kittened at the absence of reaction from Anet, considering that our feedback wasn’t listened to at all. That’s part of the reason some of those posts back them were quite vindicative and not constructive, even though some of them were more constructive, talking about why this reset was or wasn’t needed, and which kind of compensation players could agree with.

Around a month after fractured, we got an answer from Izzy about it, saying “It’s wasn’t our goal to devalue peoples time and effort and when reworking stuff sometimes these types of tradeoffs happen.” This message was badly received by many, and after those reactions, Chris told us he would “spend some time thinking about how [we] feel and get back to [us]”.

It’s been more than 2 months since then. So I hope we can finally get an answer, other than “suck it up”, like Izzy’s post seemed to imply. Many of us lost levels we took weeks, if not months to get to. Not getting anything in exchange for this reset of our progression feels like being told by Anet that we wasted our time playing this content.

Here’s a link to some posts where I tried to sum up a few links about the subject:
This one links to the 2 bigs threads made during Fractured (around 1850 posts on those 2 threads): https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/CDI-Character-Progression-Vertical/first#post3368282

A post where I tried to describe how it happened in our view:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/CDI-Character-Progression-Vertical/page/38#post3391562

Lastly, one post on a proposal which was made by Nike:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/CDI-Character-Progression-Vertical/page/38#post3392129

Surely we will get a satisfactory , well thought-out, non copypaste response and all sides will agree and not be completely ignored.

I’ve been watching this from the outside and it is very concerning. While I don’t run fractals at all, the way they handled this situation doesn’t bode well for the rest of the game.

For those who don’t care about fractals at all, this should still be a concern. I do not want Anet getting the idea in their head that it’s ok to just go and completely change things around with no regard for time and effort on the players part. If we let them get away with this, what will they do next? Reset map completion?

Lilith Ajit.6173:

Guhracie.3419:

I thought it was really impressive that he was going to take the time to think about the issue and respond, and it’s really disheartening that he has instead been thinking, “Izzy took care of it.”

I’m sorry you didn’t get responses to your proposal/idea. It’s hard to be heard in those threads sometimes, due to their size and depth.

To your first point, yes I agree.

To your second… Mine was on the first page. I had it prepared before starting. Got it in asap. Was very silly.

Well, you did get community feedback in the form of upvotes, I see. At least there’s that.

Guhracie.3419:

Lilith Ajit.6173:

Guhracie.3419:

I thought it was really impressive that he was going to take the time to think about the issue and respond, and it’s really disheartening that he has instead been thinking, “Izzy took care of it.”

I’m sorry you didn’t get responses to your proposal/idea. It’s hard to be heard in those threads sometimes, due to their size and depth.

To your first point, yes I agree.

To your second… Mine was on the first page. I had it prepared before starting. Got it in asap. Was very silly.

Well, you did get community feedback in the form of upvotes, I see. At least there’s that.

That’s true. Still I’m feeling really upset and like chris, the one person I thought was on our side lied to our face.

I think it’s time this issue gets put to rest either way.

Theres nothing they say which will please people. So they kind of just have to avoid it. I dont like it, but I understand why they are doing it. You guys should probably just let it go and work on improving fractals for the future so this kind of fiasco doesnt need to happen again.

And if you think about it. Theres no reasonable compensation they can give and its so late after the reset now they probably dont even have the data to be able to compensate those players anymore. Its basically pointless to ask for compensation at this point. The best you can do is make anet understand that this kind of reset cant happen again especially without months warning and compensation for those affected.

spoj.9672:

So they kind of just have to avoid it.

I don’t think ignoring an issue is the right way to solve it.
All it achieves is kittening the players. Many were kittened so much by the fact Anet completely ignored the issue that they stopped playing the game. The fractured patch, which should have been directed at the fractal players, instead punished the ones who were playing this content the most.

Nike.2631:

Those players should be your ambassadors of fractaline awesome to the rest of the player base, not the most legitimately bitter voices.

I completely agree with this.
If Anet had talked to us during the week before the patch, to explain the reason of the reset (and not tried to sell it as something needed for a leaderboard that no one was asking for, and that wasn’t even implemented), and to listen to our feelings about getting the progress we worked so hard for getting wiped out, there wouldn’t be a situation now. But as the people who were the most angry about this just stopped playing the game, Anet probably doesn’t care as there’s not much bad feedback on the forums now.

Every other part of the game where some kind of reset happened (sPvP or WvW with rank, for ex) got some compensation for it. There wasn’t any for fractals, and the issue wasn’t even talked about, it was totally ignored.

It’s a fact that Fractals were ignored by Anet since the beginning.
When players arrived at the level 80, they were surprised to see they couldn’t open 81, as the fractals were promoted as an endless dungeon. The question was asked on the forums, but no one ever replied to it.
I can’t count the number of threads that were opened talking about the fractals issues (bugs, dredge, etc.), and there was never an answer on them either.
When Fractured was announced, no reply was made to any comments about it. Many features were announced but were never made. Let’s take a look at what was promised and what happened:
- No more Cliffside + Dredge: it still happens. In fact, if you get Cliffside, you have more chances to get Dredge next than if you had Uncategorized as second map, for ex.
- Fractal skins instead of weapons: it was a hit in the face to tell people the skins they had dropped before would not be affected by this change. Why not put an npc who would enable us to exchange our old weapons to skins, like they did for the gathering items ?
- Fractal skin box: another thing that was well received by the players when it was announced, but when players find out it’s not in game yet and ask about it, they say it was always intended to have them at levels 51+. Then why talk about it if you’re not putting them in the game for months ? All it did was create false hope. Of course you get a backlash after this.

I’m not one of the people effected but I do think you should get decent compensation, and that it was a bad precedent to set.
Player progress should never be taken away unless it was due to cheating.

Either way non-PR answers would be nice, an equal conversation with the developers rather than prepared statements.

You do realize CDI threads are pointless?
They’ll still do what they want to do.
I’m willing to bet that most of the people are unsatisfied with Living Story, but do you think Arena Net cares? No. Just add more gem store items.

So… I’m glad you are all letting it go. I’m jealous of your ability to brush it off. I hope you all can move forward and have fun with your future guild wars endeavours.

But after being lied to, blatantly, I just can’t. I’ve been working really hard these past couple months, defending our dungeons, our community, being Loud for the attention the dungeons and fractals deserve, and it has brought us to this point.

I can’t invest as much energy as I have in something that is going to be swept under the rug. I invested everything I had in this. But now there is no point. There was no reason to anxiously await this CDI as I have done. The glimmer of hope has extinguished. I’m done.

No worries, my fashion style still remains.

Lilith Ajit.6173:

So… I’m glad you are all letting it go. I’m jealous of your ability to brush it off. I hope you all can move forward and have fun with your future guild wars endeavours.

But after being lied to, blatantly, I just can’t. I’ve been working really hard these past couple months, defending our dungeons, our community, being Loud for the attention the dungeons and fractals deserve, and it has brought us to this point.

I can’t invest as much energy as I have in something that is going to be swept under the rug. I invested everything I had in this. But now there is no point. There was no reason to anxiously await this CDI as I have done. The glimmer of hope has extinguished. I’m done.

You are not the only one.
Usually this sentence has a positive touch to it, but in this case it does not.

Many of us, being passionate about what this game could have been, have tried to speak up. We brought our concerns forward, always respectfully, we tried to start discussion with Anet. But we were met by a concrete wall.

They didn’t post up any response to the all the moans about the reset since they are not in the business of arguing with players on forums. That’s all that would have happened. A big argument on the forums between players and developers that would inevitably get deleted again.

Assuming there is no recompense for the reset, do people really want a big argument between devs and players? Would that make anyone happier? Don’t say “but I want a reset” because a big forum argument is not going to create a reset.

Hah, I never cared about these CDIs from the start. At the risk of being callous, I’m glad I saved myself some heartache.

Stooperdale.3560:

They didn’t post up any response to the all the moans about the reset since they are not in the business of arguing with players on forums. That’s all that would have happened. A big argument on the forums between players and developers that would inevitably get deleted again.

Assuming there is no recompense for the reset, do people really want a big argument between devs and players? Would that make anyone happier? Don’t say “but I want a reset” because a big forum argument is not going to create a reset.

It isn’t even about that anymore, it’s that he said he would give us his thoughts, then lied and acted like he was never going to, when proven wrong, he deletes any post on the subject and says they are off topic. Swept under the rug is the big cat problem here.

Lilith Ajit.6173:

So… I’m glad you are all letting it go. I’m jealous of your ability to brush it off. I hope you all can move forward and have fun with your future guild wars endeavours.

But after being lied to, blatantly, I just can’t. I’ve been working really hard these past couple months, defending our dungeons, our community, being Loud for the attention the dungeons and fractals deserve, and it has brought us to this point.

I can’t invest as much energy as I have in something that is going to be swept under the rug. I invested everything I had in this. But now there is no point. There was no reason to anxiously await this CDI as I have done. The glimmer of hope has extinguished. I’m done.

Im not really saying let it go. But we wont get anything, I can be 100% sure of that. So just keep it as a constant reminder to the devs that this kind of thing cant happen in the future. Essentially, never forget!

And as Stooperdale said. Its not a good idea for the devs to provoke more arguements and controversial topics. So they kind of have to sweep it under the rug whether we or they like it or not. Its the safest option for them and thats the way many business’s deal with these things.

The whole system was more or less abused to get to higher levels anyway.

People want to be rewarded for that? You have made it, you got the loot (even though loot in this game fails) and the memories. Good enough I say.

Lilith Ajit.6173:

Stooperdale.3560:

They didn’t post up any response to the all the moans about the reset since they are not in the business of arguing with players on forums. That’s all that would have happened. A big argument on the forums between players and developers that would inevitably get deleted again.

Assuming there is no recompense for the reset, do people really want a big argument between devs and players? Would that make anyone happier? Don’t say “but I want a reset” because a big forum argument is not going to create a reset.

It isn’t even about that anymore, it’s that he said he would give us his thoughts, then lied and acted like he was never going to, when proven wrong, he deletes any post on the subject and says they are off topic. Swept under the rug is the big cat problem here.

yea the primary issue is that anet isnt really saying anything. They should have before, and still should make it clear what type of loss of progress players can expect as the game evolves, and what type of things they might do should they have to reset progress. And if its just a take it on the chin type thing, let people know that too.
when you ask a store if they accept returns, and they dont they just tell you, not gonna happen.

Kaiyanwan.8521:

The whole system was more or less abused to get to higher levels anyway.

People want to be rewarded for that? You have made it, you got the loot (even though loot in this game fails) and the memories. Good enough I say.

It was not abused. I got to level 80 without using a single glitch/exploit, ever!

Kaiyanwan.8521:

The whole system was more or less abused to get to higher levels anyway.

People want to be rewarded for that? You have made it, you got the loot (even though loot in this game fails) and the memories. Good enough I say.

This argument is not only stale and ignorant it is not relevant to conversation at hand. This isn’t about “we want compensation!” It’s about “devs need to know and admit that there is never ever ever a good reason to take away their players progress without compensation.”

Kaiyanwan.8521:

The whole system was more or less abused to get to higher levels anyway.

People want to be rewarded for that? You have made it, you got the loot (even though loot in this game fails) and the memories. Good enough I say.

people lost progress to 80.
Honestly i think its more the non responses than anything. I mean i was initially on the just take it on the chin side. But anet should explain that its a take it on the chin situation.

If they were like:

going past 50 was an unintended occurence, we did a quick patch till we could figure out what to do, at some point we realized we couldnt support the consequences of the bug so we had to clean it up.
as far as those who earned up to 50, we ll give you rewards for levels at the level you were until you catch up.
Or we dont have time to do anything now, but we will compensate you later

Or, that was a big mistake not to consider it ahead of time, we wont do that in the future, but we had to do it then once we were commited

but they never said anything really one way or the other, or said what their intent is for the future.

Izzy says yeah we thought it would be a good change, but nothing about the results or intents, or what to expect in the future. We shouldnt have to assume, or figure out anets intent when it comes to these things. Its the type of thing the company should either say, yes i will accept returns, or no we dont accept returns. dont say we are considering your case and never really respond. To this day no one knows what anets stance on the issue even is.

They havent even said if 50+ was fair game or not

Kaiyanwan.8521:

Zelyhn.8069:

Kaiyanwan.8521:

The whole system was more or less abused to get to higher levels anyway.

People want to be rewarded for that? You have made it, you got the loot (even though loot in this game fails) and the memories. Good enough I say.

It was not abused. I got to level 80 without using a single glitch/exploit, ever!

I would say the same if had abused the system. It doesn’t matter what you did or not. The fact that it was abused massively justifies the decision not to give out any reward/compensation.

I do not care about compensation, really. Of course it bothers me a bit that other communities get compensated for resets while we do not, but that is not personal, it is a matter of justice. In fact I speak out only because I can not tolerate Anet being OK with treating their player-base like that. If they can be so incredibly insulting to some part of their community what is the reason to believe that they won’t act the same way for the rest of the player-base? This time it was us, but next time it may be others, and then we well see how people feel offended …

My point is that the Fractured patch showed one thing: Anet does not care.

Kaiyanwan.8521:

No, i didn’t care a bit for the fractal reset, never had a word on that topic.

Then why are you here in this thread arguing against us when you do not care about it one way or the other?

Whatever. I hate this community. Signing out. Good day.

Zelyhn.8069:

My point is that the Fractured patch showed one thing: Anet does not care.

They did, they fixed the content for you. They updated it and gave you new toys to play with.

With the reset (I’d call it a rollback because of MMO rule #2: Exploit early exploit often), they leveled the playfield for everyone. This sounds like caring to me.
They would REWARD exploiting if they gave something for everyone.

Don’t blame ANet (wow, that’s hard for me to say) blame the people who exploited the system.

Kaiyanwan.8521:

Zelyhn.8069:

My point is that the Fractured patch showed one thing: Anet does not care.

They did, they fixed the content for you. They updated it and gave you new toys to play with.

With the reset (I’d call it a rollback because of MMO rule #2: Exploit early exploit often), they leveled the playfield for everyone. This sounds like caring to me.
They would REWARD exploiting if they gave something for everyone.

Don’t blame ANet (wow, that’s hard for me to say) blame the people who exploited the system.

your entire theory is offbase for one simple reason

they reset to level 30, not to level 50.
30-50 was completely legitamate, not even questionable.

then even on your level 80 is an exploit thing,
Im sorry, according to anet it was not exploit. I was infracted for saying it was. Anet never really made it clear whether it was or was not. People directly asked them.

The problem here is, and has been a lack of communication.
If it was an exploit, why didnt they tell players
If it was unintended clean up, why have they still not said so

and non of that explains why the 100% legitamate progress from 30-50 was reset.

I can infer the reason was because placing instabilities at 50 would be way too high, but they should have made instabilities a seperate track with special rewards.

Would you have preferred it if they simply nerfed 1-50 and added 20 more levels featuring the new mechanics? They could have done that instead, making it slightly more of a grind for players to catch up. In the end, it would have been the same thing. I wouldn’t expect compensation.

Anet may have never expected or intended players to go as high as they did so soon. But they advertised fractals as endless. And the use of ingame items or quirky tricks to survive the agony from jade maw is far from exploiting. The players used these to get as far as they could before the required agony resist was released to tank it. Thats completely fair and none of them were banned for it so its pretty safe to say its not an exploit.

ANet tolerated it as long as they had no way to solve the problem itself.

If something gets tolerated it does not mean that it is not an exploit. They had the choice to close down fractals all together till they could fix it, or set a hard reset when they got a fix.

They went for the latter. I think that was fair for both sides.

Healix.5819:

Would you have preferred it if they simply nerfed 1-50 and added 20 more levels featuring the new mechanics? They could have done that instead, making it slightly more of a grind for players to catch up. In the end, it would have been the same thing. I wouldn’t expect compensation.

they should have just made instabilities a seperate track/mode. they havent really gained much by not doing that. I perfectly understand them not wanting to place instabilities at 50 or 80, and wanting people to go through the content, but there were other solutions, and they will continue to have the same problems as fractals continue. Even the next set of instabilities, will not be available until people hit 50, the ones after that? 70

and what about players who want to have the new instabilities without the increase in HP/DMG etc? If they dont make it increase that way, then why put difficulty scale numbers on it? They didnt come up with a better solution, they streamlined a bad one, and its still going to be a problem later.

Kaiyanwan.8521:

ANet tolerated it as long as they had no way to solve the problem itself.

If something gets tolerated it does not mean that it is not an exploit. They had the choice to close down fractals all together till they could fix it, or set a hard reset when they got a fix.

They went for the latter. I think that was fair for both sides.

you are ignoring this part, the people who were 50 who were reset to 30. 50 was completely legitamate and doable without any exploits, hacks, tricks, you could get to 50 by just fighting normally and playing smart.

They reset them down to 30 with that patch. dropping them 20 levels of earned rewards.
Forget the level 80s who may or may not have been unintended, what about the level 50s who were completely intended and encouraged who lost 20 levels?

It doesn’t matter. They have changed fractals and how they work, added stuff past 30 and added new fractals.
30 is as arbitrary as 40 or 50. They changed the difficulty curve. Level numbers have lost their meaning.
Could they have gone with 50? Sure. They have decided to apply changes though and they decided on 30. Nothing wrong with that.

It is a different scale now. They decided that it should be the same for all players, new and old. Sounds fair to me.

Kaiyanwan.8521:

Zelyhn.8069:

My point is that the Fractured patch showed one thing: Anet does not care.

They did, they fixed the content for you. They updated it and gave you new toys to play with.

With the reset (I’d call it a rollback because of MMO rule #2: Exploit early exploit often), they leveled the playfield for everyone. This sounds like caring to me.
They would REWARD exploiting if they gave something for everyone.

Don’t blame ANet (wow, that’s hard for me to say) blame the people who exploited the system.

There are bugs in fractals that have been in since launch. Really, the only thing they “fixed” was dredge, which is pretty obnoxious since they specifically said they’d make it shorter.

Fractured pretty much was the product of anet not caring at all about fractals or what fractal players wanted. I’m not sure how you can honestly say otherwise when the patch was hyped up with things that aren’t even in the game. They care so little that they couldn’t even bother implementing some of the main features of the patch to begin with!

Kaiyanwan.8521:

phys.7689:

Kaiyanwan.8521:

ANet tolerated it as long as they had no way to solve the problem itself.

If something gets tolerated it does not mean that it is not an exploit. They had the choice to close down fractals all together till they could fix it, or set a hard reset when they got a fix.

They went for the latter. I think that was fair for both sides.

you are ignoring this part, the people who were 50 who were reset to 30. 50 was completely legitamate and doable without any exploits, hacks, tricks, you could get to 50 by just fighting normally and playing smart.

They reset them down to 30 with that patch. dropping them 20 levels of earned rewards.
Forget the level 80s who may or may not have been unintended, what about the level 50s who were completely intended and encouraged who lost 20 levels?

It doesn’t matter. They have changed fractals and how they work, added stuff past 30 and added new fractals.
30 is as arbitrary as 40 or 50. They changed the difficulty curve. Level numbers have lost their meaning.
Could they have gone with 50? Sure. They have decided to apply changes though and they decided on 30. Nothing wrong with that.

It is a different scale now. They decided that it should be the same for all players, new and old. Sounds fair to me.

except level 50 was harder before than now, they leveled nothing because the people who were at the level basically deserved to be there, they didnt even create a system that made it so each player played through every instability, many people progressed without playing anything but the level 49 that there friend let them into.

So the net result was, an easier climb difficulty wise, but a big time sink and downgrade to reward for 20 runs aka 20-30 hours.

I think instabilities were good, i think the implementation was off, and is still off, and they will have problems with the linear system when it comes to adding content and evolving fractals.

To top it off they alienated the community and still have yet to say anything that you came in and said in 2 minutes.

Like i said, i was initially against it, but the way they responded/havent responded to the community or commincated intent was the initial problem, and its why it came to bite them in the butt later.

They could have said, level 50+ was unintended, and may be reset later, consider it fractal beta test.
They could have gave the level 31-50 people some title since they were getting reset, or some item skin, or even some unique color, since they are completely blameless, and really did nothing at all wrong.

Would you be cool if they reset everyone to charachter level 40, because they added some new level 40-80 zones, and they want everyone to be on an even playing field?

Let’s be honest there is no point in fractals after you’ve gotten your ascended backpack (assuming you went this way) and ascended rings.

Hell I’d say half the people in my guild don’t know that it exists or that you can get skill points, 20 slot bags, obsidian shards from the fractal relics.

The rewards for doing levels higher than 21 (the first level available for 3 pristine relics a day) isn’t even worth doing after you get all your rings. Some drops+1 gold+some karma assuming your average pug group time of an hour? I can get more of all this in queensdale sitting at boar. Once you start going higher everything just 1 shots you anyway so you might as well just go zerk or go home.

difficult=/= 1 shot kills/stupidly high health

March 18th anet increases rank points gained in all of the gametypes, basically a scale changes. Do we expect any reset? Because it would be perfectly fair.

I am trying to figure out what the issue is here. Fractals were reset to 30 or anyone above rank 30 would be already far above the new content which would make the new leaderboards invalid. They also put a hard cap of rank 50 to prevent people from going higher than that because there is no new challenge or anything different above that. So they need to make content above rank 50.

You are wanting Anet to apologize for reverting you down to rank 30? Like really guys does it seem fair that if you played FOTM prior to the update that you had an easier time getting to rank 50 than new people trying to get to FOTM rank 50?

They also changed the rewards system for FOTM giving better rewards for higher ranks.

The only thing they did wrong is not changing old FOTM weapons into skins (ones without stats) like they currently are.

Going to floor 50 in the previous FOTM was not that hard and less of a challenge compared to the new FOTM. This is also an active MMO meaning you should expect changes to effect competitive areas.

Edit: As well I am not being a fan boy here. This could be the worst possible game in the world but the decision for what they did was not wrong but the right one. It has the most impact on the least amount of people. If they let you keep your ranks it would have negatively effected the leaderboards (that were created in that same patch) and the community as a whole. The majority of players were below lvl30 which is why the choose that number to revert to.

Suddenflame.2601:

I am trying to figure out what the issue is here. Fractals were reset to 30 or anyone above rank 30 would be already far above the new content which would make the new leaderboards invalid. They also put a hard cap of rank 50 to prevent people from going higher than that because there is no new challenge or anything different above that. So they need to make content above rank 50.

You are wanting Anet to apologize for reverting you down to rank 30? Like really guys does it seem fair that if you played FOTM prior to the update that you had an easier time getting to rank 50 than new people trying to get to FOTM rank 50?

They also changed the rewards system for FOTM giving better rewards for higher ranks.

The only thing they did wrong is not changing old FOTM weapons into skins (ones without stats) like they currently are.

Going to floor 50 in the previous FOTM was not that hard and less of a challenge compared to the new FOTM. This is also an active MMO meaning you should expect changes to effect competitive areas.

Edit: As well I am not being a fan boy here. This could be the worst possible game in the world but the decision for what they did was not wrong but the right one. It has the most impact on the least amount of people. If they let you keep your ranks it would have negatively effected the leaderboards (that were created in that same patch) and the community as a whole. The majority of players were below lvl30 which is why the choose that number to revert to.

the leaderboards are already invalid, they realized they have nothing with which to currently measure players to begin with.

As far as the above 50 debate, it is primarily caused by anet never saying whether it was intended or not. Even after pages and pages of people asking within the first few weeks of fractals

FOTM is not harder to get to 50 now, its probably slightly easier, perhaps if they used a different system and people had to actually beat all the levels to raise their difficulty, but they dont. Before they scaled it in a semi cheesy way, but is was unquestionable harder and less forgiving. They built a better system(in some ways), but it is in fact easier than before. So really, the people who were at 50 had kind of already proven themselves. the net result really came down to being, get less rewards for 20 levels.

also rewards are not really better, they are actually worse, the biggest difference is they added a low chance of some specific items.

i think you may have made a mistake, they never actually made the leaderboards, and they still havent. Also reseting progress for leaderboards is bad idea. Fractals was never presented as a competitive format, it was supposed to be a dungeon you could work your way through that would get harder and harder as you beat it more, people essentially got the difficulty AND rewards they earned downgraded, to make it into a competitive format, when they havent even figured out a good way to make it competitive yet.

go look for the fractal leaderboards, you wont find any. Most likely once they do exist, they will have little to nothing to do with what difficulty scale you get up to, because that will always be capped, and if its capped everyone will get there eventually if they try

as for resetting people to 30 because thats what people were at, is kind of a slap in the face too, because its saying we dont care about you guys because you are the minority.

Just to be clear, i am not speaking for myself here, i was basically at like 29 when this happened, but it doesnt mean that it was good decisions, or communication on those decisions

spoj.9672:

So they kind of have to sweep it under the rug whether we or they like it or not. Its the safest option for them and thats the way many business’s deal with these things.

I would argue that they’re making customers extremly angry about it, so maybe it’s not the safest option after all. Unless you consider that you can get people so angry that they’ll leave, after which they don’t have to care about them.

Personnaly, I wouldn’t say it’s the safest option. It’s more like the most cowardly one. And telling us they would think about we felt, then 2 months later telling us that this matter was solved back then, seems to imply they just wanted us to shut up about it, thinking we would forget about it after a while. That is not a way to address an issue your community is talking about.

Kaiyanwan.8521:

They did, they fixed the content for you. They updated it and gave you new toys to play with.

Lol ? You call that fixing the content ? Are you joking ? Read my post earlier in this thread, here. More than half the thing they promised for fractured were not implemented, especially the ones most wanted by the community (less dredge, no more cliffside + dredge, fractal weapon box).

Suddenflame.2601:

Like really guys does it seem fair that if you played FOTM prior to the update that you had an easier time getting to rank 50 than new people trying to get to FOTM rank 50?

Getting to 50 now is way easier than what it used to be before Fractured, the only part more “difficult” is have more stuff than before (AR), but the skill requirement is way lower. People have now so much AR that they don’t have to focus on dodging like we did when we had only 25-30 AR.

phys.7689:

Suddenflame.2601:

I am trying to figure out what the issue is here. Fractals were reset to 30 or anyone above rank 30 would be already far above the new content which would make the new leaderboards invalid. They also put a hard cap of rank 50 to prevent people from going higher than that because there is no new challenge or anything different above that. So they need to make content above rank 50.

You are wanting Anet to apologize for reverting you down to rank 30? Like really guys does it seem fair that if you played FOTM prior to the update that you had an easier time getting to rank 50 than new people trying to get to FOTM rank 50?

They also changed the rewards system for FOTM giving better rewards for higher ranks.

The only thing they did wrong is not changing old FOTM weapons into skins (ones without stats) like they currently are.

Going to floor 50 in the previous FOTM was not that hard and less of a challenge compared to the new FOTM. This is also an active MMO meaning you should expect changes to effect competitive areas.

Edit: As well I am not being a fan boy here. This could be the worst possible game in the world but the decision for what they did was not wrong but the right one. It has the most impact on the least amount of people. If they let you keep your ranks it would have negatively effected the leaderboards (that were created in that same patch) and the community as a whole. The majority of players were below lvl30 which is why the choose that number to revert to.

the leaderboards are already invalid, they realized they have nothing with which to currently measure players to begin with.

As far as the above 50 debate, it is primarily caused by anet never saying whether it was intended or not. Even after pages and pages of people asking within the first few weeks of fractals

FOTM is not harder to get to 50 now, its probably slightly easier, perhaps if they used a different system and people had to actually beat all the levels to raise their difficulty, but they dont. Before they scaled it in a semi cheesy way, but is was unquestionable harder and less forgiving. They built a better system(in some ways), but it is in fact easier than before. So really, the people who were at 50 had kind of already proven themselves. the net result really came down to being, get less rewards for 20 levels.

also rewards are not really better, they are actually worse, the biggest difference is they added a low chance of some specific items.

i think you may have made a mistake, they never actually made the leaderboards, and they still havent. Also reseting progress for leaderboards is bad idea. Fractals was never presented as a competitive format, it was supposed to be a dungeon you could work your way through that would get harder and harder as you beat it more, people essentially got the difficulty AND rewards they earned downgraded, to make it into a competitive format, when they havent even figured out a good way to make it competitive yet.

go look for the fractal leaderboards, you wont find any. Most likely once they do exist, they will have little to nothing to do with what difficulty scale you get up to, because that will always be capped, and if its capped everyone will get there eventually if they try

as for resetting people to 30 because thats what people were at, is kind of a slap in the face too, because its saying we dont care about you guys because you are the minority.

Just to be clear, i am not speaking for myself here, i was basically at like 29 when this happened, but it doesnt mean that it was good decisions, or communication on those decisions

Easier? The levels above 30 have extra challenges placed on them to make them more difficult. They also added Ascended Armour which means people have more AR, and they also have combinable infusions. As well people who have higher FOTM rewards did not lose any reward just their ability to reenter higher ranks of FOTM.

If they allowed you to keep your rank that is above 30. It hurts the leaderboards (FOTM leaderboards are still gaining data which is why you can’t see them https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/updates/Game-Update-Notes-November-26-2013)

They also introduced new rewards for 30+ and the 50+ rewards were also shifted down so basically they did not lose enough to even be considered a issue. As well being down to 30 is not a slap of the face when 30+ has new rewards and challenges.

Estriella Faerie.4029:

Suddenflame.2601:

Like really guys does it seem fair that if you played FOTM prior to the update that you had an easier time getting to rank 50 than new people trying to get to FOTM rank 50?

Getting to 50 now is way easier than what it used to be before Fractured, the only part more “difficult” is have more stuff than before (AR), but the skill requirement is way lower. People have now so much AR that they don’t have to focus on dodging like we did when we had only 25-30 AR.

So in the end it wouldn’t have been any more difficult since Ascended armour was introduced with combinable infusions which again would have lowered the difficulty. Or did you forget about those 2 things. Even if they didn’t add combinable infusions just the mere fact that Ascended armour was introduced would have lowered the difficulty any way. By adding new things increased the skill requirement again.

Estriella Faerie.4029:

spoj.9672:

So they kind of have to sweep it under the rug whether we or they like it or not. Its the safest option for them and thats the way many business’s deal with these things.

I would argue that they’re making customers extremly angry about it, so maybe it’s not the safest option after all. Unless you consider that you can get people so angry that they’ll leave, after which they don’t have to care about them.

Personnaly, I wouldn’t say it’s the safest option. It’s more like the most cowardly one. And telling us they would think about we felt, then 2 months later telling us that this matter was solved back then, seems to imply they just wanted us to shut up about it, thinking we would forget about it after a while. That is not a way to address an issue your community is talking about.

Think of it this way. No matter what they say they wont be able to please us. So bringing up the topic and encouraging the discussion just makes things worse. I think they would rather keep the minority of us annoyed rather than trying to respond, failing to satisfy and making us even more angry and maybe bringing other customers into the arguement. It just doesnt make sense to engage with us in this situation. I know you disagree but thats just because you are letting your bias get in the way and assuming everyone else well be satisfied with a simple apology. Most people arent that reasonable, so no matter what anet do they will get flak.

You cant go wrong or make things worse by not doing anything (sort of). So its definately the safer option. But yes it is cowardly.

spoj.9672:

Estriella Faerie.4029:

spoj.9672:

So they kind of have to sweep it under the rug whether we or they like it or not. Its the safest option for them and thats the way many business’s deal with these things.

I would argue that they’re making customers extremly angry about it, so maybe it’s not the safest option after all. Unless you consider that you can get people so angry that they’ll leave, after which they don’t have to care about them.

Personnaly, I wouldn’t say it’s the safest option. It’s more like the most cowardly one. And telling us they would think about we felt, then 2 months later telling us that this matter was solved back then, seems to imply they just wanted us to shut up about it, thinking we would forget about it after a while. That is not a way to address an issue your community is talking about.

Think of it this way. No matter what they say they wont be able to please us. So bringing up the topic and encouraging the discussion just makes things worse. I think they would rather keep the minority of us annoyed rather than trying to respond, failing to satisfy and making us even more angry and maybe bringing other customers into the arguement. It just doesnt make sense to engage with us in this situation. I know you disagree but thats just because you are letting your bias get in the way and assuming everyone else well be satisfied with a simple apology. Most people arent that reasonable, so no matter what anet do they will get flak.

You cant go wrong or make things worse by not doing anything (sort of). So its definately the safer option. But yes it is cowardly.

not really, if a store tells you no returns, you know where you stand. If they thinking about it we ll get back to you, and you trust them, you are left wondering and waiting.
The biggest problem is that they didnt communicate well in the beginning, and that created the above 50 debate, months later they have to deal with the results. They then didnt communicate on the new content versus old progression debate which i guarantee you will come up in the future. The problem is instead of telling people whats up, they just arent dealing with stuff. People mostly want to know where they stand/what to expect.

I’m just mad because I didn’t want anything other than an open conversation about it. Or even just a response that says whether or not they think it will happen again. I have no reason to level fractals. I have no desire to go in and have my progress destroyed in 6 months when they think more people should go into fractals. Because the real truth is, the argument for 30 was that people couldn’t get up to 50. But really, I highly (and I mean highly) doubt that the number of people maxed out at lvl 50 fractals now is much different from those that were before. Casuals still don’t play above level 19. And so next time they decide to “increase the challenges for leaderboards that won’t ever exist because they never had any idea on how in the first place” (hence the several dev comments either saying explicitly that they’re still trying to figure out how to measure fractal awesomeness or simply asking, ‘how to do bros?’ As in the CDI).

Lilith Ajit.6173:

I have no reason to level fractals. I have no desire to go in and have my progress destroyed in 6 months when they think more people should go into fractals.

Or when they actually release the leaderboards (if they ever do). After all, one of the reasons they did a reset was so everyone was on an even field when the leaderboard was released…

Hah , you guys should come check out the Ranger CDI and you will see the meaning of “communication” take a whole new level.

That CDI has a full 40+ pages worth of ideas and suggestion from the community and not a single summary or plan from anet’s side. They are absolutely clueless on some things in this game.

At least Chris is doing SOMETHING by posting every day and giving some kind of opinion/feedback… we see that in the ranger CDI once every 3 days lol