Guild Wars 2

Like the topic says, I’ve been wondering about how downscaling works. Let me just posit a simple example and maybe we’ll find out.

What happens when a lvl 50 characters runs around in a lvl 10 zone with lvl 20 gear? The thing I’m wondering about is how the scaling of gear stats is applied.

For instance, if everything is simply taken together, and your character is then downscaled from 50 to 10, you’d theoretically be left with 20% of the stats. The exact result is determined by how the scaling is applied, but the central idea remains the same.

The reason that would be undesirable is because you then also only get 20% of your lvl 20 gear (where you’d actually want 50%), essentially nerfing your character the higher lvl you are.

To clarify. If your base power stat is 500, and you have a +25 power item which is lvl 20, when taken as a single unit your total would be 0.2 * ( 500 + 25 ) = 105

The other way to do it would be to take the item level into account. You’d then get 20% of your base stat (determined by lvl and traits), and 50% from the item in question. You’d then end up with 0.2 * 500 + 0.5 * 25 = 112.5

Maybe it’s just me, but I have been noticing that once I outlvl my gear, I appear to be having a harder time in lower lvl areas, which discourages me from going into lower lvl areas since I need to be gathering crafting materials for higher lvl gear (because I craft my armor myself) This isn’t a big issue (I could just play the higher lvl zones first, and start doing the others once I have appropriate gear) but since I’m outlvling my friends this could keep us from playing together.

Has anybody tried to figure out how the calculations are done? I’ve been thinking about this a bit today and I’m planning on doing some calculations when I get home tonight to try and figure this out.

Just tried some stuff out, and a lvl 45 item with +15 power adds approx 2 power, going from lvl 54 to 14. The same applies to a lvl 33 item with +16 precision. That’s an 800% decrease, lol…

Even so, it appears to confirm that the item’s level is not influential in the level of decrease, which I think is why I’m feeling kittened in lower lvl areas with underlvl’d gear.

Ah, so no reason to hoard low level gear for farming operations or helping friends out.
Got it, thnx a bunch!

Ah, one more thing though.
Is the repair bill at least lowered with the low level gear or can I just switch to the city set or go naked outright?

Xaert.8142:

Just tried some stuff out, and a lvl 45 item with +15 power adds approx 2 power, going from lvl 54 to 14. The same applies to a lvl 33 item with +16 precision. That’s an 800% decrease, lol…

Even so, it appears to confirm that the item’s level is not influential in the level of decrease, which I think is why I’m feeling kittened in lower lvl areas with underlvl’d gear.

You can decrease the initial value by ~87%, or you can say the final value is approximately one-eigth of the initial value.

Just because you have to increase the final value by 800% to return to the initial value, doesn’t mean you can apply an 800% decrease to get back. That’s going to be a wee bit negative.

It’s a common misconception… works for me when stores have a “sales-tax free” promotion. GST tax is 15%, so they take 15% off the initial cost of the item. They really only need to take 1 – (1/1.15) = 0.1304 = 13% off… then if you add 15% back on you get back to the initial price of the item.

There’s today’s maths lesson :p

In relation to the actual topic, I suspect your gear is scaled such that it’s comparable to the same level item of the same rarity. i.e. a “masterwork” pair of gloves at level 30, when you’re in a level 10 area, will have the same stats as that “masterwork” pair would have at level 10. The fact that you don’t get rarer items at lower levels may still give you a little bit of an advantage. It’s what makes sense to me, anyway. It’s probably the same deal in reverse with WvWvW.

The scaling will NOT be linear with character level in the sense that the OP implies. Are you saying a level 2 guy is twice as powerful as level 1? It will likely be a weakly exponential formula, or a linear one with a reasonably high, arbitrary initial scaling factor that’s not some stat (like player level) that you can view.

Joriarty.4318:

In relation to the actual topic, I suspect your gear is scaled such that it’s comparable to the same level item of the same rarity. i.e. a “masterwork” pair of gloves at level 30, when you’re in a level 10 area, will have the same stats as that “masterwork” pair would have at level 10. The fact that you don’t get rarer items at lower levels may still give you a little bit of an advantage. It’s what makes sense to me, anyway. It’s probably the same deal in reverse with WvWvW.

The scaling will NOT be linear with character level in the sense that the OP implies. Are you saying a level 2 guy is twice as powerful as level 1? It will likely be a weakly exponential formula, or a linear one with a reasonably high, arbitrary initial scaling factor that’s not some stat (like player level) that you can view.

What the OP was saying is that, when he went to a low level area and get scaled down, he switches to an appropriate gear for that zone. But instead of getting the 100% stat value of a gear that drops in that zone, that gear gets downscaled too.

• Level 80 goes to Level 5 area
• Level 80’s stats scales down to Level 5 area stats
• Wearing level 80 gear, the level 80 gear’s stats lowers down to the gear for the level 5 area

Then this is what the OP was saying:

• He switches to a level 5 gear that drops in that level 5 area
  • Theoretically, the player should get 100% stat of that gear, since it is of the level of that area and it drops in that area.
  • However, that’s not the case. That level 5 gear that is appropriate and drops in that level 5 area, is also scaled down the same percentage as a level 80 gear gets slashed.

In my experience, downscaling isn’t powerful enough. My 80 Necro has about 1300 condition damage. When I go to low level zones things just melt. It isn’t remotely as challenging as I would like it to be. While I could get some lower level gear, I would say it isn’t needed. Some tweaks to the maths or some additional factors could do the same job.

I fully understand that things working for me include a full set of abilities, having better knowledge of my class and better experience with playing in general but I would like it to be harder when I go back to explore low level zones.