Guild Wars 2

I understand the need for challenging players and I really do like the fact that higher level players can’t just come through a lower level zone and steam roll everything in sight, but I don’t understand how things are scaled….
If I am using gear for 50+, I naturally assumed that it would make some sort of impact, but even in lower level areas I can find my self in trouble regardless, does the game take into account any gear stats?
At this point I have started carrying gear which is appropriate level for the zone I am going to be running around in since it doesn’t seem to make much of a difference with my damage or defense plus It seems to have lowered my repair costs.
Thank you Anet for such a great game, all your hard work and dedication to the fans and gamers alike. Can’t wait to see what you have in store for us in the future.

I believe the stats for down scaling actually matter to a cap. After that anything over that cap is lost to the wind but generally since it’d be a pain to calculate the cap… it would be difficult to carry all the gear for specific down scaling.

Truth is, things are still supposed to be difficult even if you outlevel the content.. I like the idea that I could go to the plains of ashford and get my butt handed to me if I mess around and don’t take things seriously.

A stat cap makes sense, but I can’t help but feel that there is some balancing issues.
For example if I am in the Azura starting area and lowered to lets say level 3, I have little issue with 3-4 enemies, but if I move to another party of the zone where I am now level 10, all of a sudden 3-4 enemies becomes a lot more dangerous. Maybe its just me but maybe the stat cap needs a bit of tweeking.

Junel.5479:

A stat cap makes sense, but I can’t help but feel that there is some balancing issues.
For example if I am in the Azura starting area and lowered to lets say level 3, I have little issue with 3-4 enemies, but if I move to another party of the zone where I am now level 10, all of a sudden 3-4 enemies becomes a lot more dangerous. Maybe its just me but maybe the stat cap needs a bit of tweeking.

Well it makes sense in that they want people to ease into the difficulty of the game. So a lv 3 mob would pose no threat as opposed to a lv10.

If anything, we’re far too powerful when our level is scaled down.

Even stripped naked, I do not have the stats of (example) a true level 5 character when my level is scaled down to 5 from a higher level (say, 20). In my test my stats were closer to the stats of a true level 9 character, even though I was being scaled down to level 5.

Obviously that’s going to make me overpowered for the area I’m in. It makes fighting a reasonable amount of opponents a whole lot less entertaining because the encounter is not nearly challenging enough. It also makes higher level characters who are scaled down unwanted in events because they’re two-shotting mobs and throwing off the balance of the encounter for everyone.

If you get attacked by several mobs at once, you’re probably going to die because your smaller health pool just can’t compensate for the amount of damage coming in. But that has less to do with being scaled down and more to do with just playing unwisely. You should never be taking on a swarm of opponents at once.

I really wish they would revisit the entire scaling down system and tone down the power levels of higher level characters who are being scaled. This single feature is one of the biggest draws to the game for me, and it’s just not working as well as it should be.

I noticed the same thing. Even though I’m scaled down, I’m still powerful. I’m not sure of the stats of the gear and weapons I’m carrying still carries the same level of stats. The only reason I’m dying was because of the lower health pool and because someone was mob training. But that’s rare, since I love to manage mobs attacking me :p

Oh, the advantage of traits too comes into play here. Still in effect even if you get scaled down to say level 3.
In any case, I always end up helping players that I run across the path of where I’m headed, since I know I’m stronger than them even though I was scaled down. It seems only the base stats (Precision, etc.) gets scaled down.