Guild Wars 2

On odd levels (Fractals lvl 1, 3, 5, 7, etc.) you have 3 “scenarios” that you go through. On even levels (Fractals lvl 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, etc.) you have 4 “scenarios”. That 4th one is Always the “Solid Ocean”, commonly called the Jade Maw, or Maw.

Each of the first 3 scenarios rewards you with a chest on completion. At lvl 8, you get 6 from each chest. (so 18 total there)

At level 8, the Maw provides you with 20 relics. And I believe the chest there also awards you another 20.

Importantly, you should have your Personal Reward Level up to 8 to receive these full benefits.

You can also get yourself up to lvl 10 and do 2 fractal runs a day, a lvl 8 and lvl 10. Fractal Daily chests that you receive from the Maw are done in tiers (1-9 is a tier, 10-19 is a tier, 20-29, etc.)

So at lvl 8, with a PRL (Personal Reward Level) of 8 or higher, you’ll get 58ish relics. (18 + 20 + 20)

Source:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Fractal_Relic

One last spot of advice, as well. You know how people who walk into wvw with a PvE build are called free loot bags? The reverse is also true. Make sure you look through some guardian Dungeon builds to try to maximize your contribution to your team.

And while I understand you might not have the gear to fully spec out(after all, you’re doing this dungeon to get gear anyways), you can at least do the traits, and possibly shore up some of your gear with inexpensive rares or something.

If you’re stuck in combat while defeated, and you’re sure it’s you and not anyone else, then that’s definitely a bug to report.

Similarly, Swirling Winds should definitely destroy projectiles. If you notice it consistently not destroying them, I’d say report that bug too.

As far as the harpies going invulnerable, I always reiterate, work on keeping your entire group in melee range, chain up projectile defenses. You will very rarely see an invulnerability if you do this.

Best of luck on getting those other bugs reported.

Gudradain.3892:

And your point is? 230 is just a number. It can be anything you want it to be between 0 and 695.

Talk about the concept!

Would it helps to make the score of all server in a match up closer?

Perhaps 694 might be a good number, then?

Harper.4173:

I wonder – do people still do it? And if yes – Why?

He’s incredibly fun to fight! It’s really nice to see a random group of people from different guilds across the server actually coordinate to take down a decently interesting fight.

o_o; That sounds rough… he’s a super fun fight. We do him pretty regularly on SBI, usually right around daily reset time. (Not sure if they do that on weekdays, I can only catch him on weekends due to work.)

Seveleniumus.5973:

For warrior.
Don’t take any signet traits, ever…
Swap signet of fury for shake it off or another banner. Ideally you want to either go full on shout build with healing shouts and runes of the soldier or full on banner build.
You don’t want to go full ptv build for any dungeon, fractals 28/38/48+ included, because you won’t do any damage and still won’t be as tanky as guardian. I personally like to go for ptv on my armor and then berserker or something similar for my accessories and weapon.

I don’t play guardian a lot, but I know one guy, who does all dungeons and fractals 48+ almost every day for over a year now and he said to me, that investing into healing or vitality for guardian is absolutely worthless, so you can take that for whatever it’s worth to you.

As for the easiest, guardian will probably be your choice, seconded with the warrior, other three are usually not that useful, unless you’re really good at the class. Simply from experience (over 500 fractals), when you have a team, consisting of rangers/engineers/necros in 38+ it usually doesn’t go very well, it’s ok to have one or two, but don’t be surprised, that when run will start getting off the rails people will start pointing fingers at you.

The signet cooldown trait is acceptable to use. Having a 48sec SoR is worthwhile. Just swap out the trait if you’re using warbanner instead.

Skip the shout healing build. Skip the full banner build. Unfortunately, these two end up being crutches that will eventually hold you back from progressing in the higher levels of fotm. The reason is because mobs will do so much more damage per hit that they’ll outstrip passive defenses like heal and regen. You will end up having to rely on more active defenses such as dodging and blocking, and using your heals as a supplement to your defense.

You can use banners even if you have no traits for it. You should have space on your utility bar for at least one banner. My personal utility bar is usually (SiO, FGJ, Banner), or (Endure Pain, FGJ, Banner), or (Banner, FGJ, Banner).

I’m by no means a pro like some of the people here in the dungeon subforum, but there’s always room to grow and improve if you challenge yourself to.

For armor. I’d say if you’re petrified of going full zerk at first, start with a heavy dose of knights along with zerk. Slowly swap out your knights pieces for zerk. I’d say anything ascended you should have zerk, so trinkets all zerk, then have exotic knights. If you craft an ascended weapon, make it a Zojja’s (zerk weapon gets the most awesome name attached to it). Knight’s armor to start with ruby orbs, then exchange pieces one at a time to zerk. Once you’ve got full zerk, and you’re starting to feel good about it, look into investing in scholar runes.

Best of luck!

cranked.3812:

Ethics.4519:

DigitalKirin.9714:

So I just had an epiphany.

Stacking in melee on monsters to negate their ranged attacks is the same as kiting to negate melee attacks from monsters.

Therefore, calling stacking on monsters like the spider queen in AC an exploit is essentially saying that anyone who kites or stays out of melee range of monsters an exploit.

Did that ephinany hit when you read my and another couple posts talking about the exact same thing?

People don’t even bother to read a half sentence in the LFG tool, why on earth would you expect them to read through 10 posts before replying to a thread?

Funny enough, this. But I do read LFG posts. >.>

So I just had an epiphany.

Stacking in melee on monsters to negate their ranged attacks is the same as kiting to negate melee attacks from monsters.

Therefore, calling stacking on monsters like the spider queen in AC an exploit is essentially saying that anyone who kites or stays out of melee range of monsters an exploit.

Sadly, a good majority of the 5 signet warriors are usually due to ignorance, and a kind word on explaining the benefits to them in a nonderisive language would probably help them out.

My view of where 5 signet warriors generally come from (with absolutely no backing of proof, only anecdotal observations):

- New player asks someone (possibly even in the GD subforum), “What’s a good class for a new player to use?”
- People usually respond with Warrior and Guardian.
- New player plays warrior and the first 10 point trait that really catches their eye is Deep Strike, because +40 precision sounds incredibly powerful at lvl 11-20, plus they don’t need to worry about pressing more than 5 buttons.
- New player starts playing dungeons and comes across someone who either a) doesn’t tell them the benefits of banners/FGJ or b) the topic is brought up and makes the new player defensive/confrontational, so they continue using 5 signets to “show how good it is”.

You do not have to have story mode unlocked so long as one person has explorable mode unlocked and opens the dungeon.

revan.4295:

Ok. Well I don’t know how they got a different toon inside of Countess Anise’s armor. And the url doesn’t work because of the way I copied it; it’s simple enough to paste it in the url bar, though. Thanks anyway.

Alas, the html file you posted currently resides on your computer’s hard drive. (What tips me off is that it says C:\… meaning it’s on your C drive.) Perhaps you could mention the website that you were looking at that you copied this file from?

Romo.3709:

Nothing wrong with that. I have a toon that is not a part of that 99%, but that’s beside the point.

Hmmm. Would that mean that your one toon is therefore capable of meleeing everything in high lvl fractals?

Something to this effect? http://youtu.be/Mq0iVBDQXB8

(I’m not in this video – credit to DEKeyz2Chaos, Obal, and I’m not sure who else was in that video since I don’t know them personally, haha)

You can crit champions. You can’t crit structures. Only power affects your damage on structures.

Getting a Zojja’s weapon chest is like gold. Getting just about any other weapon chest is like getting a gold.

Dungeon level confusion is one definite culprit. I’ve had someone join a fractal and say that their character is level 33 and so they’re high enough to do a 28 fractal. The problem is that dungeons like AC story have a recommended level 30, and so people mistakenly translate that to fractal level restrictions as well.

Sword/focus mainly, swapping to burst/pull/blind with greatsword. Staff you can swap in for might before a fight, and can be used for the few times you might need to kite lots of things (in the dredge cage if you use a kite tactic).

I’ll swap out greatsword for scepter (making it scepter/focus) whenever I need range.

Warrior has some fantastic team buffs like FGJ as well as Unique ones like banners that can up the group’s damage potential. However, if you wanna carry a group, the Guardian provides Aegis, Protection, Reflect, Stability, Blinds and more that I’m sure I missed.

Guardian. Don’t be afraid to get to know all your utilities. Use reflection where you should. Have sword, focus, gswd, scepter, then the other weapons if you want – hammer, shield, staff. I personally like radiance and hitting F1 a lot. >.>

It may be a good idea to swap out your turrets to something else (grenade kit or bomb kit mebbe) during big, AoE heavy events.

Azure Prower.8701:

Young Somalia.1706:

Azure Prower.8701:

Young Somalia.1706:

Azure Prower.8701:

It would be better if only the owner of the banner was the one that could pick it up.

That would be garbage.

Who actually wants to pick up a banner?

I do because apparently people like you don’t. What’s the point of a 90-second buff that only lasts 15 seconds because ANYONE refuses to move it?

Stop being useless

That should be the responsibility of the banner owner.

I agree with Young Somalia.

First, what if a warrior puts down 2+ banners? If you’re traveling somewhere, you can’t pick up both of them.

Second, when I’m on my mesmer, I really like banners because they have a swiftness buff as well as a charge.

There would probably be way more game balance issues with eliminating the ability to pick up a warrior’s banner than the very slight inconvenience of training yourself to hit a new key combo to aoe loot. It would be like saying “I hate having to stop at crosswalks, they make my drive slower and more inconvenient! We should just abolish all of them.”

Allow me to attempt a translation:

I refused to use battle standard at Giganticus Lupicus. My reason is simple, I wouldn’t get the boons from it because I’d be waiting to use it on a pug that got downed. Plus, there’s the danger of someone kiting Lupicus away from my banner and thusly losing the benefits of having the banner down. Instead, I’d rather use my Signet or Rage and have the boons on me right away. I even had a pug just leave before the fight because of my refusal to switch SoR to BS.

“Let me see that character sheet…”

AntiGw.9367:

You are wrong on everything you said.

This is false. Reasons why:

DigitalKirin.9714:

Status quo right now is that some people skip and some people don’t.

This is a true statement. If this was false, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.

DigitalKirin.9714:

Status quo is also that ANet recognizes that skipping occurs and has indeed build some instances with the intent of having some parts skipped.

This is also a true statement.
ANet recognizes skipping occurs.

Anet has indeed built some instances with the intent of having some parts skipped.

You’ll notice that my two statements do not conflict with a true statement you have made here:

AntiGw.9367:

The “status quo” is that the entire game has been constantly rebalanced since launch to address exploits and cheesy mechanics. Bugs have been and are being fixed, exploits have been and are being closed, farming spots have been and are being shut down to encourage better designed activities.

And you know what? I’m completely okay with whatever ANet has deemed an exploit and has closed. Most of them I actually have no idea about. I’m also completely for better designed activities.

However, your argument fails here on this part:

AntiGw.9367:

Current dungeons are not designed for skipping, except for a select few spots. That means you are not supposed to skip them.

You believe that there is only a singular intent.

In Hrouda’s post, which I linked, he clearly states “I could make enemies never drop their aggro on players and force them to fight every single mob, but I don’t see that as a viable solution right now.”

He concedes that there is a solution to force people to not skip any encounter. He then says that having this singular solution is not viable. Literally, mobs leashing is in the game because it is NOT a viable solution to straightjacket players into one path.

AntiGw.9367:

The devs can’t fix skipping right now due to a number of reasons, and you are twisting that fact to mean that skipping all fights is a part of the game.

This sentence could easily be said in the opposite: The devs can’t change skipping right now due to a number of reasons, and you are twisting the fact to mean that all monsters have to be fought.

Both of these statements are of equal value.

As an aside, though, I do believe the devs want to produce dungeons in a way that will make both the pragmatist as well as the romanticist happy.

AntiGw.9367:

That claim goes agains everything that has been happening in GW2 in the last… forever, because the devs have always been improving and removing badly designed exploits like that.

Except that the claim that is made doesn’t go against what the devs have been removing.

e.g. The bridge in CoF p1. Completing this event, along with killing the turrets/shamans just behind it does not change the state of the dungeon at all (doesn’t open/close doors). Completion of the acolytes event does change the state of the dungeon(opens a door to the boulder hall). There is no precedent where ANet has stated that you Must fight the mobs on the bridge. Nor is there any precedent for anyone having been banned for “exploiting” by skipping a non-state changing fight.

There have been, however, cases where people have skipped dungeon state changing fights. There IS precedent for ANet restructuring dungeons through rescripting and use of walls to close off exploits of this type. For example, CM.

See, the failure in your logic is this:
You observe ANet removing a skipping exploit in the game. Therefore, you incorrectly interpret, all skipping is an exploit. ANet looks at encounters in a case-by-case situation. You’re using a wide brush to paint scenarios with.

AntiGw.9367:

getting a full reward for no effort

I’d like to point out that this is a tangental issue. Throwing this into the debate we are having doesn’t really affect it, but I’d like say that there are plenty of people who will counter your opinion (that skipping takes no effort). I’m sure you could start another debate with someone else about it rather than try to cloud our debate with it.
—————-
Lastly, I highly recommend you form your own parties and make sure to put “not skipping” in it. I believe you will be happier if you sidestep the issue and take responsibility for your own peace of mind. I do not say this in any negative way. I honestly believe that playing with like-minded people will increase your enjoyment of the game and reduce occurrences of topics like this on the forum.

AntiGw.9367:

I don’t need to prove anything.

False. Status quo right now is that some people skip and some people don’t. Status quo is also that ANet recognizes that skipping occurs and has indeed build some instances with the intent of having some parts skipped.

You are attempting to change the status quo. Therefore, the onus lies with you to make an argument as to why the status quo should be changed.

AntiGw.9367:

You are the one making an illogical claim

It’s only illogical to you.

so it’s your responsibility to provide proof for anything.

I have provided proof. You’d better go read.

AntiGw.9367:

You get a reward for fighting through the mobs, not for skipping to the end boss in two minutes.

This is false. You actually can skip mobs and kill the end boss and receive the end rewards. What you’re saying is what you’d like the system to be.

AntiGw.9367:

You really need to stop performing these mental gymnastics to justify your cheesing.

I’m sorry if logic seems like gymnastics to you. I guess I’m just too used to logic and gymnastic endeavors.

DigitalKirin.9714:

Of the options above, I believe you actually enjoy telling people “this is how the game should be played” and standing on your own morality, feeling like it’s the superior one.

Quod erat demonstrandum.

AntiGw.9367:

Provide what? Something that is self-evident?

Yep. I’m asking you to prove it. If it’s so self evident, then the proof should be easy. But you can’t. Because there’s no fact to support your opinion.

While some can be coerced into acting nicely, and some can be enticed into acting nicely, there will always be people there who just won’t act nicely, regardless of any external influence. Some men just want to watch the world burn…

In the end, the choice to play nicely with one another boils down to being a personal choice.

Also, the cost-to-benefit of putting people’s RL names on the internet without their consent would be terrible.

AntiGw.9367:

That’s not my opinion. Skipping is an obvious loophole.

If this statement is not your opinion and based on fact, then provide it.

Plus: I like how you’ve decided to ignore my question about forming your own parties and advertising it as “non-skipping”. What this tells me is a few possible things. Either:

1. You’re lazy. It is possibly too much effort for you to form your own party and you’d rather join a party and make yourself unhappy when they skip stuff, and be morally outraged when they do.

Or

2. You join a party already knowing that in all likelihood that they will skip at least some mobs, but possibly hoping that they don’t. If the former, then you must enjoy being morally outraged and actually like getting into fights with people. If the latter, then I’d say you are being willfully ignorant.

Of the options above, I believe you actually enjoy telling people “this is how the game should be played” and standing on your own morality, feeling like it’s the superior one.

swiftpaw.6397:

Thoughtful. good one.

I’d written a bit more, but I wasn’t in the mood to get infracted, so I edited the post. Plus, I’d actually like him to respond, since I’m somewhat curious to see what he has to say about it.

AntiGw.9367:

I don’t need to have any authority to judge anything, and I don’t need to be anybody. I have every right to judge everything in this game, like anybody else.

True, you don’t need to be anybody to cast a judgement, however, you should judge things based on evidence founded in reality. Your opinion

You are not “given” a choice to skip, it’s an unexpected loophole like any other

is not founded in anything. It’s just that: your opinion. When you make judgements based on only your opinion, you’re being prejudgemental. You’re being prejudice.

If you actually read Hrouda’s post, they actually DID consider that people would skip. It’s not a loophole, it was a careful calculation on their part about what they wanted to have optional and what they didn’t want to have optional.

Lastly, I noticed that you chose not to respond to one of my previous posts. Mind giving a thoughtful response to it?

AntiGw.9367:

I have to be somebody to judge which mobs (that are present in current dungeons) are meant to be fought?

You aren’t. That’s guan’s point. That you completely missed.

Hrouda actually talked about why he put leashing in the dungeons. ANet has to consider many player types and skill ranges when they make content. Everyone is rightly pointing out that if you make things a bit tougher for the pragmatist that goes in for efficient clears, it is multiplicatively more challenging for the unorganized Puggers.

Your points that stand on “Nobody should skip fights that are meant to be fought” fails because you don’t have the authority to decide which fights are meant to be fought.

Lafiel.9372:

No one dies because you are or are not wearing berserker gear. People die because of their own fault.

People die if they are killed…

Just curious, AntiGw, why don’t you form your own parties and just advertise “not skipping” in it? Wouldn’t that save you a lot of heartache and frustration in dealing with people who expect to skip?

WatchTheShow.7203:

Ranger longbow #2 (rapid fire) will kill yourself if you use it on an enemy with retaliation. Every time that arrow comes back and hits you, you get hit with vulnerability, so every attack hits progressively harder and harder until you’re dead. Fun stuff.

Retaliation != Reflection

I agree with Wolfheart in the sense that people with different thinking should avoid each other. If you’re a zerker build and you’d like to run with like kind, make sure your LFG post says so. If you’re a support build, make sure your post says something like “Anyone welcome” or “not looking to speedrun”.

If you are not starting the party and are instead joining a party, you should be willing to adjust your build/playstyle to meet what the party wants. And if you are unable to, then save everyone some heartache by saying something like, “Sorry guys, I don’t think it’s gonna work out, I’m not specced like how you guys want.” And then just leave and find a new party.

There once was a player named atse
Who ran dungeons like a maze, see
He’s a rat in a cage
Filling forums with rage
And deplored good advice from me

Nice, very impressive!

Value the journey
That’s truly legendary
Worth more than pixels

There are many roads
They may all lead to Twilight
Walk more than one path

More to GuildWars 2
Than simply running dungeons
Go do something else

Vayne.8563:

I’m proposing a solution to a perceived problem.

In your opinion, is berserker’s gear an actual problem, Vayne? Because if it’s just a perceived problem, then the solution should be to change peoples’ perception.

And sometimes they’re in EU, and you’re NA – or vice versa.

mosspit.8936:

Also wonder what your next title change will be.

Not my fault. Looks like someone got a mod to change it.

Himax.3954:

While your basic descriptions here are very astute, ultimately this is a matter more for the devs than for the players.

The ones who DESIGN the dungeons are supposed to have a grasp of the different playstyles, and more importantly what is expected of the players, to beat them.

I am most certainly a romanticist in regards to your definitions here. I can respect the skill required to slip past an enemy in order to avoid them. But if the point of a dungeon is just to get to the end as fast as possible for loot, then you’re not really PLAYING the game at all.

You can argue this case a thousand different ways, but ultimately the devs have to decide what they want dungeon runs to be, and how many different choices we can potentially make.

I highly disagree about this being a dev issue. It isn’t in the interest of the developers to straightjacket players through hard coding the game a certain way. There must be flexibility in the system to allow players to feel like they are free to make their own choices. There is a rule framework that ANet has about what is and isn’t an exploit. For example, as much as it might irk some people, skipping certain sections of trash mobs isn’t an exploit, and has been mentioned before by devs to not be exploits.
(Hrouda on skipping, Vaughn on skipping)

The developers have given us a sandbox. We as players have to take a certain amount of responsibility to avoid kicking sand in each others’ faces/privates. This might mean playing in different corners of the sandbox.

Tree.3916:

tl;dr;
I play how I want.

More accurately:

If you want to play how you want, find like-minded people, because joining groups that have a different requirement than what you are providing is just going to cause conflict.

Also, if you find yourself in the minority in a group, it’s better to leave peaceably with an explanation than to stay in a group and suffer their presence and have them suffer yours.

Super impressed, good run. I like how all your armor is damaged but not broken. o_o)-b

If you are “dead every second”, wouldn’t you feel that you “suk”?

Berry well then! o_o)-b

FrankGrimey.7032:

I have symbols, dodge roll (which on avg heals about 10% per roll, AND I can roll 3-4 in a row before no endurance. I have the F2 forgot the name. And that combined with the elite that resets F1-F3, I heal a lot. That in addition to the fact that I prioritize empowering over my own damage which is low. I also can take a hit. Often times, I can stand and take damage then others can’t.

Almost all of the support you mention here can be done just as well by a guardian focused on DPS. Aside from symbols healing, there are several DPS builds floating around in this dungeon subforum that include the vigor on crit and heal on dodge roll that you seem to value. Plus, you will always have Virtue of Resolve and Courage just by being a guardian, regardless of your spec. Same with Renewed Focus.

I honestly think you should consider giving a zerk guardian a try. I personally enjoy the Radiance tree for the ability to blind things with virtue of justice as well as renewing virtue of justice when you kill something. Plus, Right Handed Strength is a pretty fantastic trait to cap off that tree.

Thank you, colesy.

Dolan.3071:

coronaas.4362:

This is all brought along by the statement “play how you want” which is by far the most detrimental statement I have ever seen used by a playerbase

/thread

QFT