Guild Wars 2

Nevets Crimsonwing.5271:

It’s like… “I want a Liadri mini but don’t want to beat Liadri.”

Or… “I want the fractal backpiece but don’t want to do fractals.”

Or… “I want COF armor but don’t want to do COF.”

Or… “I want this tentacle back piece but don’t want to do all the scavenger hunt tasks required to get it.”

The last two actually happened, you know (PvP CoF reward tracks, and Zephyrite vendor). Point 2 has also partially happened (not with the fractal capacitor, but books and quivers were given an alternate version that didn’t require mist essence). Just saying.

Of course, if we do decide to go that way, then all other items with limited acquisition options (balthasar backpiece, both sets of announced new pvp armor, etc) should also get similar treatment.

Anet never changed it, in fact, WvW players defended some of these.
Now it’s the other way around, well if they changed it they’d have a lot to answer for and there’d be a pretty big uproar (2 years asking for a change ignored).
PvE & Spvp players had to suck it up if they wanted any of those, now WvW players will have to suck it up.

Again, I’m a 100% PvE player here. 100%. I just hate Fractals more than WvW, so if badges are an alternative, then I’d be fine with that. something else could be even better.

I don’t think they’ll seriously change this particular ingredient, they don’t tend to change things, but hopefully they will put more thought into the next thing like this, and stop trying to bribe players into running Fractals before they fix them by making them shorter. If people want to do Fractals, let them, but if people don’t, leave them alone.

Astralporing.1957:

Nevets Crimsonwing.5271:

It’s like… “I want a Liadri mini but don’t want to beat Liadri.”

Or… “I want the fractal backpiece but don’t want to do fractals.”

Or… “I want COF armor but don’t want to do COF.”

Or… “I want this tentacle back piece but don’t want to do all the scavenger hunt tasks required to get it.”

The last two actually happened, you know (PvP CoF reward tracks, and Zephyrite vendor). Point 2 has also partially happened (not with the fractal capacitor, but books and quivers were given an alternate version that didn’t require mist essence). Just saying.

Of course, if we do decide to go that way, then all other items with limited acquisition options (balthasar backpiece, both sets of announced new pvp armor, etc) should also get similar treatment.

Lets not forget EoTM was added which is just a karma train, that would allow you to get to rank 5 in one evening. since you gain more wxp from that area than from wvw itself. One evening doing something you dislike via 5 evenings? Thats a weeks gameplay for some, doing something they dislike/find annoying/loathe.

I totally understand if i need/want a dungeon armor then I would have to do a dungeon, luckily for me I dont want one, I also do not need a legendary so again I do not have to do a dungeon, I’ve already got ascended trinket/back piece/weapons without ever going to fractals, we are talking about a skin from LS if you want to get an infused one then I understand why the “Mist” stone is needed from fractals, but I prefer the other Mist War being that waged everyday.

I am not going to spend my time “preparing to have fun” by organising dungeon runs, and I certainly will not spend time “preparing to not have fun” by organising dungeon runs that I do not enjoy.

As to fractals being “harder content”, what the heck is hard about corner pulls and FGS stacking?

Why do you think people run past 80% of the content in dungeons or use stuff like FGS stacking? Do you think they do it because they enjoy the gameplay?

Bazzoong.7145:

I am not going to spend my time “preparing to have fun” by organising dungeon runs, and I certainly will not spend time “preparing to not have fun” by organising dungeon runs that I do not enjoy.

As to fractals being “harder content”, what the heck is hard about corner pulls and FGS stacking?

Why do you think people run past 80% of the content in dungeons or use stuff like FGS stacking? Do you think they do it because they enjoy the gameplay?

Good to know you have no idea how it works. Fractals make not a lot of use of corner stacking and pugs do it even less.
Go ahead, try to stack a high level mossman with pugs. You will get REKT.
Try to stack anything outside of AC without using any active defensive, you will get REKT.
FGS is arguably broken, it’s no exploit but Fiery Rush is way too strong. But that’s another topic.
As for stacking, stacking occurs when everyone is close to each other, this can also happen on open field and is done because combo fields, boons etc. have a very limited range.

Anyway, if you don’t want to do that I have to tell you that you’re out of luck and won’t be getting Mawdrey. Sorry!

Missy.7356:

Lets not forget EoTM was added which is just a karma train, that would allow you to get to rank 5 in one evening. since you gain more wxp from that area than from wvw itself. One evening doing something you dislike via 5 evenings? Thats a weeks gameplay for some, doing something they dislike/find annoying/loathe.

Except you need to be rank 14 to get the gift of battle so….maybe its more analogous then you think? And the fractals only take 5 evening because of the time-gated daily chest. Its only an hour or so an evening vs a full evening of karma training.

FGS is arguably broken, it’s no exploit but Fiery Rush is way too strong. But that’s another topic.

FSG, as it’s used, is definitely an exploit, just one that too many people use to ban them all, and that is not easy to fix without breaking the intended use for it. They clearly intend you to run up to an enemy and do the one lunging attack, maybe tagging 1-2 hits on other enemies along the way, not to corner trap enemies and deliver dozens of stacked flame spike hits to them. It’s kind of ridiculous for someone to be delusional enough to believe that this is the intended use of the ability.

Ohoni.6057:

FGS is arguably broken, it’s no exploit but Fiery Rush is way too strong. But that’s another topic.

FSG, as it’s used, is definitely an exploit, just one that too many people use to ban them all, and that is not easy to fix without breaking the intended use for it. They clearly intend you to run up to an enemy and do the one lunging attack, maybe tagging 1-2 hits on other enemies along the way, not to corner trap enemies and deliver dozens of stacked flame spike hits to them. It’s kind of ridiculous for someone to be delusional enough to believe that this is the intended use of the ability.

Nope it isn’t. There even is a tooltip for the duration of the mini fire walls and how much damage they do. It also only works when used against walls or against enemies with a huge hitbox/if you’re immobilized and works better when chilled/crippled.
They even added that tooltip after it was known Fiery Rush can work like this iirc.

NovaanVerdiano.6174:

Go ahead, try to stack a high level mossman with pugs. You will get REKT.

Why should they care, they only have to do level 1 five times, 5 different days. It might even be faster than getting 1k badges.

To anyone complaining about fractals and pugs, you have a thread full of people like you. Why not try to band up together and do the kitten thing ?

RedStar.4218:

NovaanVerdiano.6174:

Go ahead, try to stack a high level mossman with pugs. You will get REKT.

Why should they care, they only have to do level 1 five times, 5 different days. It might even be faster than getting 1k badges.

To anyone complaining about fractals and pugs, you have a thread full of people like you. Why not try to band up together and do the kitten thing ?

I just wanted to make clear that it isn’t just stacknododgezerker11111fieryrushploitmeta

I said that I believe 5 or so times, but they don’t want to apparently. Complaining is much better it seems.

rfdarko.4639:

Missy.7356:

Lets not forget EoTM was added which is just a karma train, that would allow you to get to rank 5 in one evening. since you gain more wxp from that area than from wvw itself. One evening doing something you dislike via 5 evenings? Thats a weeks gameplay for some, doing something they dislike/find annoying/loathe.

Except you need to be rank 14 to get the gift of battle so….maybe its more analogous then you think? And the fractals only take 5 evening because of the time-gated daily chest. Its only an hour or so an evening vs a full evening of karma training.

Would take me longer since Id have to get to lvl 10 first :p

NovaanVerdiano -Didnt you all complain about no reward in fractals? You wanted drops? That still didnt get everyone else to like them.. even with more rewards.

Missy.7356:

Would take me longer since Id have to get to lvl 10 first :p

Maybe I got lost somewhere, but you are talking about fractals and pristine relics, right ?

Because it’s been awhile that now, even level 1 fractals award you 1 pristine relic per day.

Missy.7356:

rfdarko.4639:

Missy.7356:

Lets not forget EoTM was added which is just a karma train, that would allow you to get to rank 5 in one evening. since you gain more wxp from that area than from wvw itself. One evening doing something you dislike via 5 evenings? Thats a weeks gameplay for some, doing something they dislike/find annoying/loathe.

Except you need to be rank 14 to get the gift of battle so….maybe its more analogous then you think? And the fractals only take 5 evening because of the time-gated daily chest. Its only an hour or so an evening vs a full evening of karma training.

Would take me longer since Id have to get to lvl 10 first :p

NovaanVerdiano -Didnt you all complain about no reward in fractals? You wanted drops? That still didnt get everyone else to like them.. even with more rewards.

Well, I complain about ME getting no rewards, because I’m one of the unluckiest persons in gw2. :P I see friends/pugs getting good drops left and right, although I do believe the droprate is a bit too low. Also, Fractured completely destroyed droprates and even though they said they modified the droprates, it doesn’t really feel like it IMO. But then again, I’m unlucky. So don’t take me as comparison for that.

However, it doesn’t matter since the backpack needs pristine relics, which are a guaranteed daily reward which drop starting at level 1 by now, so you don’t have to get up to lv10 first.

There even is a tooltip for the duration of the mini fire walls and how much damage they do.

Of course there is, but you’re still not meant to stack all that damage up against a single target, it’s intended to be spread over the full length of the charge and only a few of those ticks hitting each enemy. Keep using it until they decide to do something about it, but don’t pretend it’s working as intended.

To anyone complaining about fractals and pugs, you have a thread full of people like you. Why not try to band up together and do the kitten thing ?

The problem isn’t that it’s too hard, or too hard to find a group to do them. The problem is that it’s TOO ANNOYING, Fractals take too long to run start to finish and if they do implode part way through then all that effort is wasted. So long as this is the case I resent any attempt on ANet’s part of shoehorn me into them.

For them to get me to willingly set foot inside a fractal, they’d need to figure out a way to let me play ONE Fractal at a time. Obviously you wouldn’t get the full series reward for only doing one, but you should be able to do three fractals and a boss over four days if you like, and end up with the same reward for that as someone who does four fractals on one day (though of course he would get more rewards over time since he would then be able to repeat that each day).

I said that I believe 5 or so times, but they don’t want to apparently. Complaining is much better it seems.

If we don’t make it clear what we don’t want from the game, then how can we expect it to change?

After 3 pages of this thread with no response from Anet I’m feeling safe to assume there’s zero chance of being able to buy Mists stones for anything earned in WvW.

The Pve’ers had their own lengthy thread about having to do WvW for map completion and they never got any results either so i think we’re beating a dead horse on this.

Ohoni.6057:

The problem isn’t that it’s too hard, or too hard to find a group to do them. The problem is that it’s TOO ANNOYING, Fractals take too long to run start to finish and if they do implode part way through then all that effort is wasted. So long as this is the case I resent any attempt on ANet’s part of shoehorn me into them.

You just don’t want to do it because you don’t want to do it, that’s it.

It kittening level 1. You aren’t force to do level 50 or even 20. It’s level 1. It can easily take you less than one hour to complete a run.

I’ve had my fair share of fractal runs, the only time I’ve seen a party implode is when we encountered a bug.

You don’t even want to try to do it. You just want to sit on the forum and try to force Anet to give you another “grindier” option (which no one gives a kitten about because it’s so easy to crumble under badges of honor).

Ohoni.6057:

There even is a tooltip for the duration of the mini fire walls and how much damage they do.

Of course there is, but you’re still not meant to stack all that damage up against a single target, it’s intended to be spread over the full length of the charge and only a few of those ticks hitting each enemy. Keep using it until they decide to do something about it, but don’t pretend it’s working as intended.

To anyone complaining about fractals and pugs, you have a thread full of people like you. Why not try to band up together and do the kitten thing ?

The problem isn’t that it’s too hard, or too hard to find a group to do them. The problem is that it’s TOO ANNOYING, Fractals take too long to run start to finish and if they do implode part way through then all that effort is wasted. So long as this is the case I resent any attempt on ANet’s part of shoehorn me into them.

For them to get me to willingly set foot inside a fractal, they’d need to figure out a way to let me play ONE Fractal at a time. Obviously you wouldn’t get the full series reward for only doing one, but you should be able to do three fractals and a boss over four days if you like, and end up with the same reward for that as someone who does four fractals on one day (though of course he would get more rewards over time since he would then be able to repeat that each day).

I said that I believe 5 or so times, but they don’t want to apparently. Complaining is much better it seems.

If we don’t make it clear what we don’t want from the game, then how can we expect it to change?

It does. That doesn’t make it less broken. I’d love to see a change for this too.

Also, really, low level fractals don’t take long. I had runs with extremely bad pugs on 11 which were done in 30-45min, so you can do it on difficulty scale 1 in the same time. If you form a group with 4 people with the same mindset the fractal-run won’t “implode” suddenly as you call it as everyone wants to get through and everyone knows that the whole team is not as experienced with fractals.

Sure, you made your point. That’s what you should do if you dislike something; it is pretty much clear though that ANet won’t change it and if it’s only because of the enormous uproar that would follow. So you have to live with it how it is.

Missy.7356:

Would take me longer since Id have to get to lvl 10 first :p

Nope, as novaan said, they drop at level one now. Scale 1 fractals can basically be bumbled through on upleveled characters in less then an hour.

I hadn’t done fractals for months so I was a bit nervous. But it was fine! The group was mostly other semi-experienced people, and we rolled 4/4 on ones I actually like doing. Yeah, I quit doing them because they take so long and I don’t like the randomness. It was quite pleasant being forced back in though in the end.

Lalocat.6793:

I hadn’t done fractals for months so I was a bit nervous. But it was fine! The group was mostly other semi-experienced people, and we rolled 4/4 on ones I actually like doing. Yeah, I quit doing them because they take so long and I don’t like the randomness. It was quite pleasant being forced back in though in the end.

Glad to hear at least someone is open about it and actually enjoyed it in the end!

You just don’t want to do it because you don’t want to do it, that’s it.

Yes, that’s what I’ve been saying.

It kittening level 1. You aren’t force to do level 50 or even 20. It’s level 1. It can easily take you less than one hour to complete a run.

Nobody ever said it was level 50 or level 20, level 1 is annoying enough (and I’m likely going to run it at around level 10 since that’s the highest tier I hit and offers slightly better loot potential). And yes, it can take less than an hour to complete a run, but an hour is too long, even a half hour is too long, and less than an hour is for a team that knows what they’re doing. If you end up on a bad team it can take longer, or fail to complete entirely, so minimum clear times aren’t really relevant to the discussion.

You don’t even want to try to do it. You just want to sit on the forum and try to force Anet to give you another “grindier” option (which no one gives a kitten about because it’s so easy to crumble under badges of honor).

I’m going to get around to clearing this one, and like I said, I really don’t think it’s likely they’ll actually change anything about this requirement since they’re too lazy to fix things they already consider “done,” I just want to raise awareness so that they don’t add MORE requirements like this in future content. I don’t want to see any NEW achievements or rewards based on running fractals until such time as they make them faster to run. I don’t want, three to six months down the road, to see another LW update or reward drop that requires going into the Fractals to complete it. It’s too late for this patch, but it’s not too late for the patches yet to come.

Sure, you made your point. That’s what you should do if you dislike something; it is pretty much clear though that ANet won’t change it and if it’s only because of the enormous uproar that would follow. So you have to live with it how it is.

Obviously. What alternative could there possibly be?

Ohoni.6057:

I’m going to get around to clearing this one, and like I said, I really don’t think it’s likely they’ll actually change anything about this requirement since they’re too lazy to fix things they already consider “done,” I just want to raise awareness so that they don’t add MORE requirements like this in future content. I don’t want to see any NEW achievements or rewards based on running fractals until such time as they make them faster to run. I don’t want, three to six months down the road, to see another LW update or reward drop that requires going into the Fractals to complete it. It’s too late for this patch, but it’s not too late for the patches yet to come.

They’ve had similar mechanics in the game since launch, and added several more with several LS releases. All of those have been argued against on this very forum with a vehemence that puts this puny thread to shame. ANet knows the objections, there can’t be any doubt about that. And still they just did it again. They’ll probably do it again before long. Obviously, this is how they want things to be.

Ohoni.6057:

I’m going to get around to clearing this one, and like I said, I really don’t think it’s likely they’ll actually change anything about this requirement since they’re too lazy to fix things they already consider “done,” I just want to raise awareness so that they don’t add MORE requirements like this in future content. I don’t want to see any NEW achievements or rewards based on running fractals until such time as they make them faster to run. I don’t want, three to six months down the road, to see another LW update or reward drop that requires going into the Fractals to complete it. It’s too late for this patch, but it’s not too late for the patches yet to come.

So you don’t want something that makes you play a different aspect of the game. You’d rather get mindless grinding. Because 5 pristine relics isn’t grinding.

And really, unlike WvW which is somewhere between PvE and PvP (but leaning way more on the PvP side), fractals are part of PvE.

Would you have been happier if you were asked to complete arah p4 5 times ?

They’ve had similar mechanics in the game since launch, and added several more with several LS releases.

Yeah, but they change things all the time too. They only added Edge of the Mists less than a year ago, and are just now getting around to fixing Commander tags. Just because they haven’t fixed something yet doesn’t mean they’ve completely given up on it.

So you don’t want something that makes you play a different aspect of the game. You’d rather get mindless grinding. Because 5 pristine relics isn’t grinding.

I don’t mind playing different aspects of the game, so long as it’s not Fractals, because I’ve played Fractals and I don’t like them at all in their current form. Don’t try to broaden the argument from there, you’re just making pointless assumptions at that point.

And really, unlike WvW which is somewhere between PvE and PvP (but leaning way more on the PvP side), fractals are part of PvE.

Maybe, but so what difference does that make? They are a part of PvE that is way too time consuming and unrewarding. If you enjoy Fractals, great, nobody is trying to take anything away from you, but if you don’t enjoy Fractals then you shouldn’t have to do them. That’s one of the great thing about 99% of this game, that you can do whatever you enjoy and still be rewarded for it. It’s the 1% where they shoehorn you into Fractals that are the problem.

Would you have been happier if you were asked to complete arah p4 5 times ?

Probably not. I haven’t done Arah explorable but that doesn’t seem like my cup of tea either. I’ve done some other dungeons that weren’t so bad. I think the important thing is options, forcing the player to do any one thing is a bit much, there should be multiple paths.

Ohoni.6057:

Maybe, but so what difference does that make? They are a part of PvE that is way too time consuming and unrewarding. If you enjoy Fractals, great, nobody is trying to take anything away from you, but if you don’t enjoy Fractals then you shouldn’t have to do them. That’s one of the great thing about 99% of this game, that you can do whatever you enjoy and still be rewarded for it. It’s the 1% where they shoehorn you into Fractals that are the problem.

Would you have been happier if you were asked to complete arah p4 5 times ?

Probably not. I haven’t done Arah explorable but that doesn’t seem like my cup of tea either. I’ve done some other dungeons that weren’t so bad. I think the important thing is options, forcing the player to do any one thing is a bit much, there should be multiple paths.

And it would seem that you don’t like specific dungeons.

Here’s the thing about multiple paths to the same thing : they have to be somewhat equal, else one of them is never going to be used.
And that’s why we got the Mystic forge and RNG nearly wherever you look at. And now the one time Anet makes everyone play different aspect of PvE, some people are saying “nope, we don’t want to play. We prefer to grind away 1k badges (which we already got thanks to the huge karma farm EotM is)”.

Here’s the thing about multiple paths to the same thing : they have to be somewhat equal, else one of them is never going to be used.

Here’s my thinking, if people don’t want to do content unless you bribe them into it, then it’s probably not good content and you shouldn’t bribe them into it in the first place. Make multiple paths, if that lead to some of the paths not being used, then the solution is not to force people to do that unused path, it’s to make that unused path better so that people will want to do it.

Anet makes everyone play different aspect of PvE, some people are saying “nope, we don’t want to play. We prefer to grind away 1k badges (which we already got thanks to the huge karma farm EotM is)”.

I play plenty, I don’t don’t play Fractals, and don’t want to. Stop drying to belittle the opinions of those that don’t want to do fractals, by trying to make them out to be lesser players than those that do.

But you said it yourself that you wouldn’t be happier with arah p4. So certain dungeons are out too.

You want an equivalent, but there’s not a WvW or PvP equivalent to doing a fractal (which once more isn’t even a big deal to start with). It’s sort of like the new armor exclusive to PvP tournaments : there’s no PvE equivalent to a PvP tournament.

But you said it yourself that you wouldn’t be happier with arah p4. So certain dungeons are out too.

Yeah. Arah would probably be better than Fractals but not a whole lot. More choices would be better, they would not always be what I’m looking for. Going from Fractals to a top tier dungeon though is a minimal movement at best. Ideally the options would be a variety of very different tasks, rather than just “vanilla” and “French vanilla.”

You want an equivalent, but there’s not a WvW or PvP equivalent to doing a fractal (which once more isn’t even a big deal to start with). I

If doing a fractal “isn’t such a big deal” then why get hung up on “equivalent?” I mean, 5 pristine relics would take an average, amateur player, what, 5-8 hours to acquire, assuming that at least some of the runs would run long, and maybe some implode without reward. So why not let people buy them for 800-1000 Geodes? Or maybe any ten runs worth of dungeon tokens? Offer something that takes an equivalent amount of time, or perhaps even more time to account for being more convenient, and let people choose which they want to do.

Julius Seizure.4985:

When I saw the Pristine Fractal Relic was required for the ascended vine back piece, I was incredibly distraught. Because of this one requirement the entire thing felt unobtainable.

I too had a terrible experience early on with Fractals, and constantly found myself having to deal with rude comments about both myself and fellow players that had the audacity to try and learn the mechanics of a Fractal during a respective dungeon run. Why didn’t we just use youtube? Why did the Fractal dungeon take 90 minutes rather than 20 minutes? Why did you bring a Necromancer? Noobs.

It was toxic and off putting.

But you know what happened? After I was bummed out about this requirement I returned to the Fractals of the Mist starting area and joined a casual group using the LFG tool. I met some nice people in there, and had a fun (and rather quick) run at the dungeon culminating in 1/5th of the necessary Pristine Relics for my sought after item.

I have also run several more fractals since then and am finding myself enjoying them enough that I would do them even after I have enough Pristine Relics for the vine.

---

For all those that are frustrated about this, I think there are a few things to remember:

1- Fractals has had its difficulty and reward structure revamped since a lot of us last played.

2- The LFG tool is very handy and a lot of talented dungeon players can be met in there.

3- You might sometimes have a bad experience, but more often than not you will meet good people online.

4- Ignore snarky comments and be sure to follow the lead of experienced players. You don’t really need someone shouting commands at you and you can figure out most of the mechanics by observing others in these Fractal dungeons.

5- Almost all players are in full exotic nowadays, and most are probably in a mix of Ascended/Exotic gear. When Fractals came out, a lot of players were using green and yellow gear and this made the dungeons particularly difficult.

---

I am not opposed to having other options for purchasing a Mist Stone— in fact I think it is a great idea to have WvW be a second avenue for this. However, I also feel that players should give Fractals a shot and be sure to run with at least a few fellow guild mates for the best possible outcome.

So, I did some googling and the only info I can find on getting Pristine Fractal Relics were from 2013. My character is like Fractal Level 3 or something, if I go in and do a full run will I get a Pristine Fractal Relic at the end of it?

I just find this game is very.. how can I put it? ‘Group Content’ unfriendly, I guess?

There doesn’t seem to be any cohesion. Because there is no set trinity and everyone can pretty much do everything, it just feels like an attitude of solo-oriented play gets extended to group content.

In other games when running Dungeons I knew my role was defined by my class (Healer, Tank, DPS) in this one – not so much. Not only that, but in other games, the group talked about the mechanics of the fight and what to do.

In this game there is nothing like that and it goes from extreme silence from players, to nothing but toxic attitudes (that makes you not want to spend the next x amount of time with them)

Then you have the ‘Meta’ builds (Basically, one set way for equipment, traits, etc.) that are basically demanded, and you have yourself an unpleasant experience.

I honestly don’t foresee myself doing any Dungeons or Fractals for as long as I play this game.

I just got back from my first Fractal run in… almost a year? The last time I ran Fractals was during the early months of its release and I barely got past level 3. I have to say that I found myself enjoying it again, and that is mainly due to the friendly people I got to play with (minus one person that rage quit).

If you’re unsure that you want to try and get the Pristine Fractal Relics because you don’t want to run Fractals with a group of players that will be super toxic or demand a specific build (This was why I stayed away from the LFG Tool) then try looking for Level 1 runs.

With Level 1 runs you’ll, more often than not, run across like-minded players that are there for the same reasons you are.

I actually did the two Fractal runs I still needed today (I had three relics lying aroudn from the last Fractals patch). I had a relatively pleasant experience. The first run (at level 10) was some of the most annoying Fractals for each phase (Asura/Charr/Thermanova/Mai), and it took a little while to work the kinks out, but the group was largely supportive and explained what needed explaining. The second was a level 9 run, and went considerably more smoothly. No real personal drama in either. I was not the best in either group, but I don’t think the worst either, I stayed alive more often than some, and feel I was pulling my weight on the various tasks.

My opinion overall hasn’t change though, while the runs were reasonably entertaining and the people involved were as nice as one could expect, I still don’t like Fractals, and hope to not have to set foot in one again any time soon, not until they break them up and allow you to run individual fractals one at a time, especially at lower levels.

What’s even the point of forcing you to run them in sequence? Do they hope you’ll die enough that you’ll run out of armor and have to quit? Not likely now that most people know the basics. Even in that first run where I had zero Agony resistance, didn’t know some of the new mechanics needed, and got trapped in a wall once, I still didn’t die enough to lose a single piece of armor. The only real hassle was trying to keep my inventory cleared. Why not just let people do as many or as few Fractals as they like?

If the issue is that people will skip the “hard” ones and just repeat the “easy” ones, then use the Matrix key system. Let people do whichever fractals they want, but make it so that once per day, if they do a “first tier” Fractal, they can earn a blue key, when they do a “second tier” one they get a green, and a red for the “third tier” ones. When they run a boss fight, the final chest can only be opened with a completed key. Keys would of course be based on the level tiering of the dungeons as well, so you could not complete a bunch of low level fractals then jump to a higher one for the boss chest.

Now you could do all four of these fractals in a row if you like, or you could do one per day over several days. You could even do 2-3 per day and collect up key bits, combine them all, and then run the boss several times in a row on the weekend to use them up, in any case you could never average more than 1 chest per tier per day, so if anyone wants to keep playing the way they’re playing now, they could and it would still be the most efficient way to do it, but it would give alternatives to people that don’t like to “lock in” to the full series.

Ohoni.6057:

I actually did the two Fractal runs I still needed today (I had three relics lying aroudn from the last Fractals patch). I had a relatively pleasant experience. The first run (at level 10) was some of the most annoying Fractals for each phase (Asura/Charr/Thermanova/Mai), and it took a little while to work the kinks out, but the group was largely supportive and explained what needed explaining. The second was a level 9 run, and went considerably more smoothly. No real personal drama in either. I was not the best in either group, but I don’t think the worst either, I stayed alive more often than some, and feel I was pulling my weight on the various tasks.

My opinion overall hasn’t change though, while the runs were reasonably entertaining and the people involved were as nice as one could expect, I still don’t like Fractals, and hope to not have to set foot in one again any time soon, not until they break them up and allow you to run individual fractals one at a time, especially at lower levels.

What’s even the point of forcing you to run them in sequence? Do they hope you’ll die enough that you’ll run out of armor and have to quit? Not likely now that most people know the basics. Even in that first run where I had zero Agony resistance, didn’t know some of the new mechanics needed, and got trapped in a wall once, I still didn’t die enough to lose a single piece of armor. The only real hassle was trying to keep my inventory cleared. Why not just let people do as many or as few Fractals as they like?

If the issue is that people will skip the “hard” ones and just repeat the “easy” ones, then use the Matrix key system. Let people do whichever fractals they want, but make it so that once per day, if they do a “first tier” Fractal, they can earn a blue key, when they do a “second tier” one they get a green, and a red for the “third tier” ones. When they run a boss fight, the final chest can only be opened with a completed key. Keys would of course be based on the level tiering of the dungeons as well, so you could not complete a bunch of low level fractals then jump to a higher one for the boss chest.

Now you could do all four of these fractals in a row if you like, or you could do one per day over several days. You could even do 2-3 per day and collect up key bits, combine them all, and then run the boss several times in a row on the weekend to use them up, in any case you could never average more than 1 chest per tier per day, so if anyone wants to keep playing the way they’re playing now, they could and it would still be the most efficient way to do it, but it would give alternatives to people that don’t like to “lock in” to the full series.

I’m glad that you at least gave fractals another chance and – even if in the end you still don’t like them – at least had two pleasant runs.

About the length… Low-level difficulty fractals (up to 29~) can be done in approximately half a hour or so, depending on your group (and if you get the longest fractals possible or not), so I’d say that’s just fine – you just gotta get into it. I’m fine with the length too, it’s meant to take longer and be a bit of a challenge, which we’re severely lacking in GW2. Of course this won’t be liked by anyone, but that’s normal – there’s no content liked by everyone.

About the length… Low-level difficulty fractals (up to 29~) can be done in approximately half a hour or so, depending on your group (and if you get the longest fractals possible or not), so I’d say that’s just fine – you just gotta get into it. I’m fine with the length too, it’s meant to take longer and be a bit of a challenge, which we’re severely lacking in GW2. Of course this won’t be liked by anyone, but that’s normal – there’s no content liked by everyone.

And I agree, content doesn’t have to be liked by everyone, UNLESS ANet tries to shoehorn players into it. So long as there’s nothing encouraging me to go into Fractals, Fractals can take six hours each to complete, whatever, so long as someone likes it that’s fine by me. But if ANet is putting in content that makes me want to go into Fractals, then I want the Fractals to be enjoyable to me, and that means making them shorter. It can’t be both at once, ANet needs to pick, either A. Fractals are what they are, but only people who like how they are have any reason to be there, or B. Everyone is pressured into running Fractals from time to time, so Fractals have to be made into something that most players can enjoy.

Lorewise, I agree that being able to trade 1000 Badges of Honor for a Mists Stone would be a logical alternative than trading 5 Pristine Relics. ANet obviously is trying to use Mawdrey as a hook to encourage more people to do Fractals, and I don’t begrudge them that. You can get the Pristine Relics (and Agony Resistance) you need just by running Fractals at Level 1 a few times, and it’s actually easier than most dungeons.

But I do always support having multiple routes for players to achieve something, and so I support the OP’s idea on that basis.

The amount of entitlement in this post is disgusting. Fractals is the most neglected piece of content in GW2. There are only a few people that run them anymore. Most days it takes over 10 min to fill a party with no stipulations and I gave up trying to pug a coordinated run. This is compared to near instantaneous fills of a normal dungeon. Fractals is not rewarding and far more challenging than the commonly run dungeons. Only the insane people who fight RNG for alright skins with little particle effect and those who want a challenge/want to better themselves as players fight in the mists. Don’t blame Anet they want people to do neglected content. Blame yourself for wanting the easy route out of another thing. It is most people in this thread’s arrogance that prevents them from asking people who know the content. Instead they join a group of people that are exactly like them looking for a pristine relic. If you have anyone who has a semblance of knowledge about fractals in a party I guarantee a sub 1:30 run and that’s only with many wipes and bad RNG. If even 1 more person does fractals because of this it is completely justified. Fractals needs to be given life don’t rip this chance away because you blame the people who you will not ask for help from. People will help you if you ask. GW2 is the best community for an MMO by far. Stop insulting it and join it.
I will run anyone that whispers me in game through fractals, but be willing to listen and be open to ideas.

Ok my rant is over
tl;dr fractals are dead and you dont want them to have life

Nil.6289:

Fractals is the most neglected piece of content in GW2. There are only a few people that run them anymore.

And this should tell you what people think of fractals. A very tiny majority like them, but they are being forced on us as a requirement to complete a living world crafted item for no good reason other than Arenanet is annoyed no one is doing their crappy fractal content they spent so much time making.

The majority people who are supporting the inclusion of fractals in the recipe are those who already do fractals, already have relics saved up and put in zero additional effort to get the mist stone.

I’ve now done my 5 daily runs. All up it took me about 12 hours which is a fairly large time impost when compared to every single other part of the crafting which took a couple of hours all up to run around the world and collect everything I needed. So that single step took 6x as long as the entire rest of the crafting process.

I find it a bit rich for supporters of fractals to come here and tell everyone they should just get in there and do it, waste 10 hours to get the mist stone when I can almost guarantee that none of them had to do a single fractal to get the stone. They just used relics they already had saved up. And then dismiss the idea of WvW players using badges they have saved up.

If Arenanet wants people to do fractals then provide us with a reward that makes people want to go in there, not force people into them. Forcing people to do something they don’t want to do is the single worst way to get them interested in something and it isn’t fun.

If you want to entire people into fractals here is a better way to do it in 3 easy steps.
1) Make the daily a single fractal, not 4. Most players just don’t have a full hour and a half+ to devote to fractals, so requiring 4 for the daily immediately means only hardcore players are going to do it.
2) Make pristine relics tradable for stand relics. I.e. 20 standard relic = 1 pristine relic. You can lower the daily reward from 20 to 10 relics and keep the 5/fractal. This means people will need to do more than 1 fractal per day to get a pristine relic, but it still allows people who can only spare enough time to do 1 a day to still work towards a reward.
3) Make it quicker to increase fractal level at lower levels. E.g. 1-9, every fractal done can increase your level. 10-19, two fractals done = 1 level, 20-29, three fractals done = 1 level, 30+ as it currently is. This helps new players get into fractals.

The amount of entitlement in this post is disgusting. Fractals is the most neglected piece of content in GW2. There are only a few people that run them anymore. Most days it takes over 10 min to fill a party with no stipulations and I gave up trying to pug a coordinated run. This is compared to near instantaneous fills of a normal dungeon. Fractals is not rewarding and far more challenging than the commonly run dungeons. Only the insane people who fight RNG for alright skins with little particle effect and those who want a challenge/want to better themselves as players fight in the mists. Don’t blame Anet they want people to do neglected content.

If you’re right that nobody wants to do Fractals, then the lesson is NOT that Anet needs to shoehorn people into doing them anyways, the lesson is that ANet needs to CHANGE Fractals so that more people WANT to do them. The loot for Fractals is plenty, you can already get some pretty sweet stuff from running Fractals. They don’t need to “sweeten” Fractals with better loot, they just need to make the gameplay into something that more players will enjoy doing.

tl;dr fractals are dead and you dont want them to have life

tl;dr kitten ed skippy I don’t want them to have life, not until they earn it.

Held my nose while doing my 5 – hope to never go back. To get those 5 – had 3 good groups -2 rage quit groups – 1 hammer bug (on the third of 3 fractals of course. It was not fun at all… It even chased me off to another game for a few days before I decided to slog through it..

I would have liked to have had alternatives as well….

Lasica.5068:

Nil.6289:

Fractals is the most neglected piece of content in GW2. There are only a few people that run them anymore.

And this should tell you what people think of fractals. A very tiny majority like them, but they are being forced on us as a requirement to complete a living world crafted item for no good reason other than Arenanet is annoyed no one is doing their crappy fractal content they spent so much time making.

Fractals give the worst time vs reward. Even worse than WvW.

Coupled with the fact that for months it was plagued with game breaking bugs (which is why I stopped playing them for more than a year, because when there’s a bug, it’s going to find me).

And some players simply hate it because “it’s when Anet introduced ascended items”.

The only main difference between fractals and dungeons is that you can’t take a break between fractals and do the rest later (you can still go back to LA to repair your armor).

I doubt a lot of people like world events where you just afk the boss. Yet they do it because it’s somewhat rewarding (or a nice place to sort of afk).

The only main difference between fractals and dungeons is that you can’t take a break between fractals and do the rest later (you can still go back to LA to repair your armor).

Yes, which is why they need to allow players to break up Fractals and do them in 15-minute bites if they prefer, NOT why they should give even better rewards to the people already doing Fractals. They also need to streamline some of the fractals themselves. I had to do the Thermanova reactor Fractal and it took forever, with multiple phases. They need to streamline that so that you only need to do one of those tasks and then the boss battle, perhaps randomly rotating which of those tasks you have to do each time, or on a daily rotation.

If you could just complete each fractal at a time and they slightly compressed the necessary steps then the reward/time balance would be on part with world bosses.

+1 to this, to keep up the pressure.

We should not be forced to do one specific piece of other content to get an LS reward. At least give people a choice of source for the stone – Fractal/WvW(badges)/PvP seems fair.

Well gee, what about people that don’t like WvW, don’t like fractals, and don’t like PvP. What about the people that just like to run around and do events or a dungeon here and there. I don’t think it’s fair they would have to get badges of honor, or fractcal relics, or anything in PvP in order to get items…..

The key is options. In a game with such a diverse player base, due mostly to the vast amount of both casual and hardcore content, there should be different ways to get items required for new crafting recipes. Just as you can get materials from both salvaging and gathering. Just like you can make some mats you have professions leveled for and buy the others on the auction house. Being able to buy the mists stone by other means other than the incredibly niche fractals would be great.

jazix.9541:

The key is options. In a game with such a diverse player base, due mostly to the vast amount of both casual and hardcore content, there should be different ways to get items required for new crafting recipes. Just as you can get materials from both salvaging and gathering. Just like you can make some mats you have professions leveled for and buy the others on the auction house. Being able to buy the mists stone by other means other than the incredibly niche fractals would be great.

Exactly. I’d be OK if they added Dungeon tokens too, if that helps. Basically, requiring a certain amount of graft is fine, but don’t tell people what that graft has to be……unless it is directly related to the story.

My idea too I really would like something to do with these too! I got lots of them.

Who care how fast I could do the Fractals they are boring. They are full of rage quitting yahoos. They are full of not nice elitist people and before you get too mad at me I know they also have nice people too but I seem to always get with a group of misfit dips that got nothing better than to yell at everyone who makes a mistake. So not my style and not my idea of Fun.

I know there are a lot of people who love this kind of content but for everyone of you that does there are many who just would rather not go there. And please enjoy it but do not require us to do it for items in LS. The Legendary are bad enough and if getting one of them is not enough to keep people in the dungeons and fractals nothing will. The problem is they created these areas and no one is doing them and people cannot get groups. So this is their way to force people to do the content.

The only solution is to make the mist stone available in other venues. WVW is one, PvP must have some kind of token they could use. All we want is a bit of a choice.

Well gee, what about people that don’t like WvW, don’t like fractals, and don’t like PvP. What about the people that just like to run around and do events or a dungeon here and there. I don’t think it’s fair they would have to get badges of honor, or fractcal relics, or anything in PvP in order to get items…..

That’s what achievement chests are for. I haven’t done any meaningful WvW in over a year, and even before that I barely dabbled in it, and yet I still have a thousand or so badges after having spent a ton of them on trinkets, a commander tag, and a Gift of Battle.

jazix.9541:

The key is options. In a game with such a diverse player base, due mostly to the vast amount of both casual and hardcore content, there should be different ways to get items required for new crafting recipes. Just as you can get materials from both salvaging and gathering. Just like you can make some mats you have professions leveled for and buy the others on the auction house. Being able to buy the mists stone by other means other than the incredibly niche fractals would be great.

Wait we have hardcore content?

Even if I’d be for multiple ways to get the Stone, it won’t happen. It CAN’T happen. ANet had a whole ton of kitten to explain otherwise. They never changed something like this, they never will and can’t anymore.

NovaanVerdiano.6174:

jazix.9541:

The key is options. In a game with such a diverse player base, due mostly to the vast amount of both casual and hardcore content, there should be different ways to get items required for new crafting recipes. Just as you can get materials from both salvaging and gathering. Just like you can make some mats you have professions leveled for and buy the others on the auction house. Being able to buy the mists stone by other means other than the incredibly niche fractals would be great.

Wait we have hardcore content?

Even if I’d be for multiple ways to get the Stone, it won’t happen. It CAN’T happen. ANet had a whole ton of kitten to explain otherwise. They never changed something like this, they never will and can’t anymore.

While you speak the truth (I did the 5 knowing I had no alternative), complain enough and the next “mawdrey” May have alternate paths of attainment or at least an alternate “mawdrey2” to attain that eats dust.

NovaanVerdiano.6174:

Even if I’d be for multiple ways to get the Stone, it won’t happen. It CAN’T happen. ANet had a whole ton of kitten to explain otherwise. They never changed something like this, they never will and can’t anymore.

Never changed something like this? What game are playing?

They’ve added alternative recipes to a couple of the previously Fractal-only backpieces.

They’ve added most of the S1 rewards for laurels.

Perhaps most significantly, they’ve added the Arid achievement track to PvP – which awards a fossilized insect on completion. Remember all the complaints about that item? The result has been an alternative method of acquisition. And rightly so – games are for fun, not ruining your evening, grinding rubbish you can’t stand.