Guild Wars 2

At level 1, my character did 40 damage.

At level 2, my character still does 40 damage, despite having higher power.
At level 7, my character still does 40 damage, despite having higher power.

When I was downleveled from level 7 to level 6, my damage dropped to 38, which is
below the damage I did at level 1 without being downleveled.

When I was downleveled from level 7 to level 2, my damage dropped to something like
6 points per swing. Where as at first I did 40 damage at level 1. You can’t kill stuff when
you only do 6 damage per swing.

So there seems to be two bugs:

1) Damage does not increase when leveling up, despite having higher power each level.
2) When you get downleveled, the damage drops to way below to what it should be at
that level, way, way waaay below. Doing 6 damage per swing while downleveled to level
2 is not fun.

This is a really annoying bug! :p

I want to play the game, but I just keep doing less damage the higher I level. I can’t kill
stuff when I am only doing a few points of damage per swing.

I nearly died in Brisban Wildlands doing map completion on my level 80 in full exotics after the patch. Before and after were night and day. Blew my mind as I don’t have difficulty in Orr. But the brittle bones and shattered lockpicks more than made up for it. Yes, thank you Anet. Beautiful work. You actually destroyed an element, scaling, that I gave you credit for nailing.

It’s severe enough you probably won’t have to wait long for a fix on this one

I wouldn’t sweat it too much.

Ya, I got downleveled, and where as my lvl1 character did 40 damage per swing, my
downleveled lvl2 character did something like 6 damage per swing.

But like I said, it’s not just downleveling, the power you get from leveling up, also does
not affect your skill damage. So at lvl15 I still do the same damage I did at lvl1, if I use
the same gear.

The scaling as it was, was entirely perfect, it did not need a change, and this double bug
wouldn’t have happened.

Jeffrey Vaughn.1793:

What level creatures were you fighting?

When I got downleveled from level 7 to level 6, fighting creatures that were level 6, my
damage dropped to below what it was at lvl1.

I did 40 damage at lvl1, then at lvl7 with the same gear, I still did 40 damage, the power
increase had no effect on my skill damage. Then I got downleveled to lvl6, and my skill
damage dropped to 38, which is 2 points below what it was at lvl1 without downlevel.

Bug1: Your skill damage does not increase as you level up and your power increases, on
the same gear. So the power from gear increases your damage, but the power from the
increased level, does not increase your damage.

Bug2. Your skill damage gets dropped to below what it was with no gear at lvl1, if you
get downleveled. So downleveled to lvl2 from lvl7, fighting lvl1 creatures, I did something
like 5 or 6 damage per swing. Where as my lvl1, non-downleveled character did 40 damage.

I ran around Queensdale to finish off my daily. I’m level 80 in full exotics. No problems. I’m no longer one shotting things, now they take 2-3 fireballs before going up in smoke which is an improvement. At least now I’m not afraid to ruin the experience for leveling characters anymore. And yes, I go back often for the daily, easiest source of mob diversity.

At level80 it may be “okay”, but at lower levels, the bugs are pretty severe. My skill
damage is not increasing with my power as I level up, only power from gear affects
my skill damage, and the downscaling at this level causes my damage to drop from
40 points to something like 6 points. Where as my initial lvl1 character did way more
than that.

People were way too powerful in lower zones. And way too weak when uplevelled in WvW.

They’re trying to fix the problem when 80s go back and oneshot everything before players that are on level can get any hits in. Like at the Maw, if you’re on level it’s tough to get credit for the events when all the 80s tear it all up.

emikochan.8504:

People were way too powerful in lower zones. And way too weak when uplevelled in WvW.

That’s not the issue, it’s the bugs at lower levels that are the problem.

- Skill damage not increasing when you gain power from leveling up.
- Skill damage dropping from ~40 points to ~5-6 points when downleveled from lvl7 to lvl2.

I don’t know how the bugs affect mid-level character values.

But even at lvl80, the scaling is way too severe, and lvl5 zones are now actually harder
than Orr in some cases.

What’s most debilitating for new characters at the moment, is that while the creatures
get more powerful as they have higher levels, your skill damage just stays the same, and
does not increase as you level and get more power from those levels.

At lvl7 my swing still does the same damge as it did at lvl1, even though I have much
more power, power gained from the levels. Power gained from gear still effects damage,
just not power gained from levels.

This means you’re just much, much weaker until you reach lvl80, and have to get the
best possible gear in order to be able to beat equal level monsters, since the power you
gained from levels, has no effect on your skill damage.

At lvl1 I did 40 damage, I had 52 power.

Then I went to the mists, and my power changed to 2200. Now I did 93 damage.

Is it right for your damage to change from 40 to just 93, when your power changed
from 52 to 2200?

The power gained from levels, doesn’t affect your skill damage anymore, just minutely.
Something in the calculations must have gone wrong, and now the calculations only
work if you are lvl80 with full exotic gear. Even then the scaling is still too extreme, but
that is not the issue here.

This means anyone that is not lvl80 with exotic gear, is far, far weaker now even if
you’re not downleveled, and at lower levels, the downscaling is so extreme that you
don’t do any damage at all anymore. As your damage drops to below that of a lvl1
starter character.

I wish they would stop fixing what’s not broken.

If they don’t recognize the problems at lower levels, and just say it works the way it
should but downleveling is just more severe now, then I have to quit playing, as I do not
want to be this weak until I reach lvl 80.

Scaling was perfect the way it was. There’s no reason for a lvl80 exotic character to be
weaker than a lvl1 starter character in lvl5 zones.

it was broken horribly. The only challange you could find at lv80 was in lv80 zones. What happened to “the whole game is endgame”? All content should be viable in a system where backscaling is possible. I don’t want to kitten low level mobs in this game. I want to play with my friends without oneshooting the enemies while my friend hasn’t the slightest chance to tap the mob.

The scaling at lvl80 isn’t the problem, that’s not what the bug is about. :/

- The bug is that power gained from leveling, does not affect skill damage at lower levels.
- The bug is that when downleveled at lower levels, you only do 5-6 points of damage, &
that is eight times less damage than a lvl1 starter character with lvl0 gear.

This means the higher you level, the weaker you get. As a lvl1 starter character, you do
more damage in lvl2 zones than a lvl50 character with greens does in the same zone. It is
a double problem: power from leveling doesn’t affect skill damage, and downleveling
makes you multitudes weaker than a lvl1 starter character.

This certainly needs more attention. I thought I was just experiencing a weird bug when my damage dropped from 350-500 damage to 200-300 (on crits). Same gear, even HIGHER stats now, but lower damage.

This, tested against the same mobs before and after patch. (around the Maw- pretty much any enemy, same goes for any zone, it’s all over)

Am I missing something here or is this here to stay? Because it’s awful.

It seems that:

1) The power you gain from leveling, doesn’t affect your skill damage anymore, only
power gained from gear. As you level, monsters get stronger, you get weaker, until they
become near undefeatable, this is WITHOUT being downleveled.

Again, this is a problem that occurs that has nothing to do with being downleveled.

2) The downleveling at lower levels makes you do less damage than a lvl1 starter. As
a starter you may do 30-40 dmg per swing, when downleveled you do like 6 damage
per swing. Only at lvl80 with full exotics it gets somewhat pulled straight again.

I hope this is clear now, I don’t know how else to explain it.

this is what I experienced yesterday:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/downscaling-not-working/first#post1315721

I did 6 damage per swing last time I played, in a starter zone, downleveled to lvl2. My
lvl1 starter character did 40 damage per swing in that same area against that same
monster.

Right now, the game stops being fun the moment you get higher than lvl3, because
after that you just get progressively weaker and weaker. At lvl40 you’ll be spending way
more time killing something than you did at lvl10, and it’s impossible to play in any
downleveled zones until you become lvl80 in full exotics, at which point those leveled
zones are still tougher than Orr.

I really hope they just reverse the whole scaling part of the patch. It was perfect how it
was. Even if the bugs would get fixed, it still totally destroys any sense of power gain. A
lvl1 zone should not be equally hard as Orr.

What is the point of having progressive stats now at all?

It’s weird how these games always come up with totally unnecessary ways to destroy
themselves. It happens in practically every promising MMORPG. Some change is put in
that no one asked for, to totally wreck gameplay.

1st, you have to remember that when you level up, your enemies are leveling up too. Their armor and toughness increases, so even though your power might increase and you think you should do more damage, your opponents damage mitigation also increases. This may explain why you’re not seeing the damage increases you expect, especially if you’re not upgrading your gear.

2nd, I don’t know how the level scaling works, but it seems to me that your level, your stats, and your gear would have to be adjusted to approximate equivalence with the level you are being decreased to. There may not be a cap on this, ie: if you’re being down-leveled to level 5, your gear might not bottom out at level 5 stats. Instead, whatever gear you are actually wearing might have its stats adjusted according to how on-level equipment would be adjusted. For example, lets assume that gear effectiveness increases linearly (it doesn’t, but it makes it easier to talk about). You are level 25 and have level 25 gear. You get down-leveled to lvl 5. Your gear would need to decrease in effectiveness by 80% to be equivalent to lvl 5 gear. Now, if you’re wearing lvl 5 gear at lvl 25, and are down-leveled to lvl 5, your gear might actually be adjusted by 80% regardless of its own level, thus it would be closer in effectiveness to level 1 gear. This type of situation might explain the effects that you are seeing, when you say that you are doing substantially less damage with the same gear against the same mob when down-leveled than when you were truly at that level.

Anyway. I assume this simplified scenario is not the full picture. I assume it is much more complicated and somebody may or already has teased it out through experimentation. But my primary point is that you may be seeing only a tiny part of a complicated mechanic, and jumping to the conclusion that it is broken simply because you don’t understand how it actually works.

I should note that I have a lvl 35 character with lvl 35 gear and, while running around down-leveled in Wayfarer Foothills after the patch I was seeing no massive changes in expected damage output or difficulty.

I’m not feeling any sense of accomplishment or gained power from the scaling. I don’t mind if enemies were buffed (better ai, more skills, better tuned stats), but it makes absolutely zero sense to have a more experienced fighter, with a better weapon, fight less effectively than one starting out with little to no experience mid game.

I don’t care what they do with the monsters in general, but I feel like a LOT of my hard work just disappeared into thin air now that I can’t even do as much damage as I used to. This is an adventure game, there’s hardly any skill in it anyways. I don’t even have to connect blows, parry, or construct new tactics when going to a new zone- it’s always the same. So, at least, at the very least, I would like to have what I do put into the game to show.

That much, is more than paramount.

Also, this should provide context, albeit a little outdated due to the way things are now. This is roughly how they used to be (or somewhat, it is what was advertised).
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Dynamic_level_adjustment

I’m perfectly okay with scaling in terms of keeping areas open to high level and low level characters, but I’m not cool with having a lower level, less equipped character use skills as effectively as one who is more than enough experienced, meets cap, and has greatly better equipment. That much is what I don’t agree with.

Vyral.4365:

Anyway. I assume this simplified scenario is not the full picture. I assume it is much more complicated and somebody may or already has teased it out through experimentation. But my primary point is that you may be seeing only a tiny part of a complicated mechanic, and jumping to the conclusion that it is broken simply because you don’t understand how it actually works.

Ya but it’s not just that.

You level, but the power you gain from leveling, does not affect your skill damage.
The power will appear on your stats, but it won’t affect your skill damage.

That is the bug that bugs me most right now.

Lvl1: power is 52 and skill damage is 40.
Lvl10: power is 82 and skill damage is still 40.

Only power gained from gear and skills affects your skill damage at the levels I tested.
The power you gain from leveling, has no effect on your skill damage. This is clearly a
bug.

You see?

I went and fiddled around checking this out, it’s pretty bad.

Needs a look. Right now you’re better off being a lev 20 in blues killing lev 20 mobs than a lev 30 in blues killing those same mobs. By a somewhat meaningful margin too. It’s not a huge deal for 80s in exotics clearing lowbie zones but for people leveling normally that are just some levels above the stuff they’re clearing as they play normally, it’s really wonky.

Right now, the game is unplayable for anyone that is not lvl80 in exotics. Even in zones
where you are not downleveled, you’re still much weaker since the patch, since the stats
you got from leveling, have no effect on your skill damage right now. Only stats from
gear and from boons affect your skill damage.

Wow, I hope this gets fixed soon. I’m hesitant to run a dungeon if that’s the case. My 80 necro in blues and greens had a hard enough time before this nerf. I can’t imagine being very effective now. Of course, if I were a guardian that would be a different story, but still.

Dude, calm down. The developers have read your post and are now aware of it. If there’s indeed a problem, they’ll look into it and eventually fix it. But fixing it is going to take time, and it’s not going to happen in the middle of the night. Spamming your own topic event 5 to 10 minutes isn’t going fix anything tonight. If you simply cannot play the game as it is, call it a night and go do something else.

Zsymon.8457:

Right now, the game is unplayable for anyone that is not lvl80 in exotics. Even in zones
where you are not downleveled, you’re still much weaker since the patch, since the stats
you got from leveling, have no effect on your skill damage right now. Only stats from
gear and from boons affect your skill damage.

Our characters are weaker than the ‘god-like’ ones they were before the patch? Yes, that’s the whole point. They were far, far too overpowered when going back to lower level zones.

In no way is it unplayable. At the moment I’m going through with a new character (lvl 31) and have returned to lower level zones to see how things are. They have mixture and at best, master-crafted gear (Green gear). I must say the level scaling is a HUGE improvement on what it was. I really think Anet has found a happy medium here. Whoever there did the modifications deserves to feel pretty good about themselves.

The whole idea with level scaling is that no matter what level your character is, you can take them to any lower leveled area, and still have a similar experience to adventuring there with a character of that level.

Additional Edit: I believe and agree with what Vyral’s written about above. I believe that’s what’s happening at the moment. And personally I think there’s nothing wrong with that. The level of your character is should be seen – at least in part – as an indication as to possible places you could adventure. It should not be taken as a direct reference to how powerful your character is/should be.

Tarn.1374:

Zsymon.8457:

Right now, the game is unplayable for anyone that is not lvl80 in exotics. Even in zones
where you are not downleveled, you’re still much weaker since the patch, since the stats
you got from leveling, have no effect on your skill damage right now. Only stats from
gear and from boons affect your skill damage.

Our characters are weaker than the ‘god-like’ ones they were before the patch?

No, on lower level zones you are much weaker than normal characters were before. When they corrected for the godlike ones, they went too much the other way for anyone that wasn’t max level/stats already.

Yea… i seriously hope this wasn’t their idea of “motivating” players to get back into the world.

We’ll have to spend more time in the world because it’ll take more time to kill stuff. YAY FUN!

Hopefully this isn’t as designed and will get removed or tweaked.

Zsymon.8457:

At level 1, my character did 40 damage.

At level 2, my character still does 40 damage, despite having higher power.
At level 7, my character still does 40 damage, despite having higher power.

When I was downleveled from level 7 to level 6, my damage dropped to 38, which is
below the damage I did at level 1 without being downleveled.

Its not a bug you just accidently start play an Engineer:-P

If the situation is as Zsymon has described it, repeatedly, over and over, with little alterations or new information, then it is obviously a bug. It’s a pretty serious bug that will likely be fixed soon.

I just visited a lv3 area with a lv80 and a lv16 and there was nothing out of the ordinary. My 80 dropped the mobs with a single skill. My 16 dropped them in a few seconds.

Everything is normal, for me.

Astralporing.1957:

Tarn.1374:

Zsymon.8457:

Right now, the game is unplayable for anyone that is not lvl80 in exotics. Even in zones
where you are not downleveled, you’re still much weaker since the patch, since the stats
you got from leveling, have no effect on your skill damage right now. Only stats from
gear and from boons affect your skill damage.

Our characters are weaker than the ‘god-like’ ones they were before the patch?

No, on lower level zones you are much weaker than normal characters were before. When they corrected for the godlike ones, they went too much the other way for anyone that wasn’t max level/stats already.

That’s the thing.

I think the issue that caused them to adjust it down was the thing was properly calibrated before to downlevel your player and gear independently.

It’s just that the lower level areas are not balanced for the presence of a full set of exotics.

No matter what ANet does (short of reverting this part of the change), it will still bork people who are not fully geared, regardless of level, when leveling down.

ANet does not like to acknowledge the gear factor in this game, they prefer to treat the curve as shallow, but it’s quite clear it is not the case.

I was just on my 50 ele in 40 blues killing things at level just like normal. I noticed slightly less damage when downleveled. Nothing broken on my end.

I noticed a change in my damage also, my fully equipped 80 lvl staff necro did 125 to 130 damage per tick to mobs in cursed shore now it fell to 110 to 115 …i thought they made them that way like less mobs but harder to kill? but seeing other people see a difference now…:S

Zsymon plays a warrior, where everyone else seems to be talking about another profession.

Are we seeing a bug that disproportionately affects warriors?

This is really bad, especially at low level. Warriors are highly dependent on “kill them before they kill you” tactics.

it’s really frustrating to see so many people whining because they don’t 1-hit everything in their way. Why do people actually fight in low level zones when they can afk-kill anything that is 200 feet near them. Must be fun, bah.

Ok two things.

If you are level 1 with level 1 gear and then level to 7 with level 1 gear you will do less damage then when you did at level 1. This is due to the fact that you receive less benefit the higher in level you go. Example, 25 crit at level one may be 10%… that same 25 crit at level 7 is 6%.. those are just to show the example.

Now the 2nd part. Taking what you learned above… you are level 7 with level 1 gear and you downlevel to 6. Your stats get adjusted down by a factor. This causes the stats at level 7 to be less then what they would of been had you been level 6 because the bonus you receive did not drop…. your still level 7.

Example, 25 crit at level one may be 10%… that same 25 crit at level is 6%.. those are just to show the example. That 25 crit gets down ranked to 20 crit when you downlevel to 6 and causes your number to drop to 5% thus it makes you crit less.

That is how I understand the system works, as you level you need more and more of a stat to make it matter.

The damage I tested was about just base damage, nothing to do with crit. I explained
it so often already yet it’s still not understood. Point was, that power gained from
levels, was not affecting skill damage at the levels I tested. Your power goes up as you
level, but your skill damage just stays the same. This was not the case before the patch.

I am not talking about stat scaling or leveling crit scaling with this part of the bug. It
is just a matter of the power gained from leveling, not affecting skill damage.

When will ArenaNet learn that they should not attempt to ‘fix’ something if it was working perfectly.

Sure, a full level 80 in Exotic gear felt like a demigod in starter zones, but isn’t that because he is the experienced Hero of countless battles? The Slayer of Zhaitan and 5 million unrelated monsters that happened to cross his path?

So you want more people out in the world? Well, that’s not going to happen if you’re going to punish them for it every step of the way.

Stop randomly changing stuff because your game will become worse and worse every single time!

I hope they revert this change, it sounds terrible and makes me not want to play most of my characters.

EnemyCrusher.7324:

I hope they revert this change, it sounds terrible and makes me not want to play most of my characters.

People are exaggerating or are experiencing some type of bug.

Last night I played my level 45 mesmer with a friend who was level 20, in a 15-25 zone, and did not notice any significant decrease in power. My gear ranges from level 26-38, blues and greens.

Yeah I really hope this gets fixed soon.

Had my level 30 warrior run a bit around Queensdale and slaughter things … the scale went down in 1 or 2 hits. Had my level 80 ele in Queensdale then … with D/D fire #1 insta kills the scale.

So far I see no dramatic change as described by the OP.

HtFde.3856:

Had my level 30 warrior run a bit around Queensdale and slaughter things … the scale went down in 1 or 2 hits. Had my level 80 ele in Queensdale then … with D/D fire #1 insta kills the scale.

So far I see no dramatic change as described by the OP.

Except that the OP is mainly about a bug that has nothing to do with what you
are describing. Also, lvl1 starter characters such as guardian with a hammer can
instakill scale in Queensdale too, they’re the lowest hp monsters in the game save
critters.

Aveneo.2068:

When will ArenaNet learn that they should not attempt to ‘fix’ something if it was working perfectly.

Sure, a full level 80 in Exotic gear felt like a demigod in starter zones, but isn’t that because he is the experienced Hero of countless battles? The Slayer of Zhaitan and 5 million unrelated monsters that happened to cross his path?

So you want more people out in the world? Well, that’s not going to happen if you’re going to punish them for it every step of the way.

Stop randomly changing stuff because your game will become worse and worse every single time!

No you are wrong. This change from Anet fixed a huge problem. Why don’t you people try to understand and stop thinking about yourselves for a moment?

Higher level characters in the lower level zones were far too powerful before, it was ruining the experience of both new players and any other player with characters there of the appropriate level. It was trivializing content. One and two-shotting enemies was never the intended idea. Read above if you want to know what Anet’s vision about level scaling was, it’s already been written many times before.

Personally I’ve had a bit of a play around and I don’t think there’s a ‘bug’ that exists with this change. Sure, Anet’s changed the mechanics in which the level scaling works, but that’s not a bug, that’s just something we have to get use to. They had to change something after all because it was broken. Once again, how the system works has already be described above by various posters (e.g. by Fractal & Vyral). It makes sense.

It may not be perfect (nothing ever is) but it sure is a lot closer to that goal than it was before.

And anyways, who said your character should automatically become more powerful when they level up? People somehow have gotten it into their head that having a higher-level character automatically grants them some god-given right to be over-powered in lower-level zones. A simple read of any number of Anet’s philosophies will dispel this myth.

A character’s level is a primary indication in this game as to possible places where they should/can adventure, not some sort of predetermined right as to their level of awesomeness. If you want that, go play another game that satisfies that fantasy. Clearly – as they themselves have stated – Anet does not.

Tarn.1374:

And anyways, who said your character should automatically become more powerful when they level up? People somehow have gotten it into their head that having a higher-level character automatically grants them some god-given right to be over-powered in lower-level zones.

Who ?…well maybe most of the RPG since DnD first ed…….If you go to the end of your logic then take out the leveling system altogether (like in Zelda by example) .

Leveling is there to mimic the obvious fact that “practice makes perfect”…that a highly trained commando GI will kill somebody a lot faster and easier that me …but in a fantasy world…so yes I think it’s logical that a level 80 would be more efficient than a level 5 at killing a level 1 monster.

That said, I have to agree that this system was working well giving you a better play experience…but I still think it was already well balanced and didn’t need any of those so call “improvement”.