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New Aquatic Fractal


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Molten Furnace, Aquatic; two fractals sharing a similarity in how mind numbingly boring they were. I've had days where I struggled to stay awake in Molten Furnace, so when I saw those changes I liked them. In fact, any change made to increase the difficulty of a fractal these days is something I'm positively receptive towards - I still disagree with having made Twilight Oasis easier with albeit limited phase checkpoints. What was done to Aquatic however wasn't in my opinion an improvement. Mechanically, it seems like a monstrosity from the Siren's Reef department of 'throw-everything-at-you-and-see-who-breaks' design. For the record, I like Siren's Reef and I look quite heavily down upon people who use the exploit, if it still even works. Aquatic wasn't boring because it had a boss that wasn't fun nor a pretext to said fight which barely required consciousness. That's the way of every single fractal when you've done it enough times after all, and I'm still entertained doing any others as dailies. It's boring because it's guilty of being underwater content, an aspect of the game I'm certain a majority of people at minimum don't care about/actively dislike. Personally, when I see water past wading-depth in GW2 I avoid it like a fresh outbreak of Bubonic Plague in 1348. I somehow doubt that sentiment is less than uncommon in varying degrees of severity.

It doesn't matter what you do to mechanically alter the Jellyfish, or what additions you put in front of it. They don't improve the fractal as a piece of content, all it does is elongate something which you already didn't want to spend time on and frustrate through the new boss phases. Every issue Aquatic had was merely a symptom of it being underwater content, not a flaw in any individual component of the fractal itself. Replacing the Jellyfish with a three-phased fight which stacks radial condi damage on you you can do nothing to avoid (there is a difference between 'avoid' and 'mitigate') doesn't resolve the core problem of underwater content, making the boss ruthlessly punish melee to the point of uselessness isn't an improvement and removing all CC bars from sight doesn't fix anything. This just feels like change for the sake of change and I hope it isn't a wide brush that's going to start tarring all the other fractals. Aquatic doesn't suddenly require more skill and it hasn't been made harder as a fractal - it's still the same boring, slot-stealing fractal it always was, just longer than ever.

I know the change won't be magically reversed and my opinion will doubtlessly never be taken into account by anyone of relevance, but the sheer lack of necessity in this change was a frustration I had to be annoyed somewhere about. It didn't even have remotely bad instabilities today, when it finally rolls any mixture of frailty/we bleed fire/boon overload/sugar rush it's going to become downright painful on top of needlessly drawn out.

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@Angelweave.1856 said:Found the solution multiple boon strip and sustain... cause dps sits around 10k dps... so the fight takes a while

You can brute force it without any real issue if you have a competent druid. Again, my issue has nothing to do with whether the fractal has been made more difficult or not, I personally don't think it has been whatsoever. It's just forcing you to suffer playing the worst aspect of the game for longer which annoys me.

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My fractal group had a tough time with it today for some reason. Right after the change, we breezed through it with no problem.

I'm sure it doesn't help that no one seems to have a build set up for underwater combat; I had triple the DPS of the second highest person.

Not necessarily bad changes, but the final boss is fairly punishing now, especially with the phase Condi Spam. Group couldn't cleanse fast enough.

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@"Saracen.2691"

I'm just concerned about the direction that fractal development is going with each change. Water or not, unavoidable and cheap damage is never fun.

Even CM Arkk you could probably do without ever getting hit. It's hectic, sure, but at least it's fair. Then in a later release, Deepstone boss's barrier phase you cant avoid taking damage. It's not too punishing, but what if your health is already low? And shades sometimes do "mysterious damage" attacks that I to this day can't see coming. Then Siren's Reef final boss has the green and orange zones that just keep appearing right on you. There should be a way for you to not get them on you ever if you knew how. Now aquatic has a phase with a room-wide DOT from an elite mob you have to try to burst down with undergeared water weapons. ...Yep. I'm seeing a growing trend that feels most disagreeable.

On a minor note, ever since that player pull/push mechanic has been introduced (tornados, wind beams, that one champion awakened), designers have been going nuts with them. Aquatic boss has it now too. Very annoying for melee, where you're doomed to a lot of damage usually unless you're on a class with teleports.

At the very least, the boss could use the Archdiviner treatment and get his health bar gutted so the length of the fight doesn't have to be so drawn out.

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@KidRoleplay.3615 said:At the very least, the boss could use the Archdiviner treatment and get his health bar gutted so the length of the fight doesn't have to be so drawn out.

Again I think that's mostly a symptom of people coming unprepared in level 5 common underwater gear and no proper build, as well as the Fractal appearing with NPNG (as well as Vengeance) for the first time where some less organized/non meta groups might have been struggling with removing the protection from the boss.

Additionally it also had Afflicted, which can be one of the most dangerous Instabilities when lacking add pull/cleave, which was probably the case underwater for most people, which may have been most of the counter pressure felt.

Once people bust out their 60k burst 30k DPS underwater builds, instead of the no effort 10-15k generally seen until now, this Fractal will melt from phase to phase in seconds without any nerf.

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  1. Underwater content is a nice break from land-based content. Simply stating "underwater sucks" is not an argument.
  2. Make sure your breather and underwater weapon are actually viable.

Those two things aside, yes, the new underwater fractal sucks, just as the Molten rework sucks, and just as Deepstone/Siren suck. I'm actually amazed that they added player push/pull mechanics to underwater content. More and more evidence that ANet's game designers don't actually play their own game (and may not play any videogame at a serious level?).

Hopefully the drop in fractal participation will make them actually put in effort + thought.

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@Asum.4960 said:

@KidRoleplay.3615 said:At the very least, the boss could use the Archdiviner treatment and get his health bar gutted so the length of the fight doesn't have to be so drawn out.

Again I think that's mostly a symptom of people coming unprepared in level 5 common underwater gear and no proper build, as well as the Fractal appearing with NPNG (as well as Vengeance) for the first time where some less organized/non meta groups might have been struggling with removing the protection from the boss.

Additionally it also had Afflicted, which can be one of the most dangerous Instabilities when lacking add pull/cleave, which was probably the case underwater for most people, which may have been most of the counter pressure felt.

Once people bust out their 60k burst 30k DPS underwater builds, instead of the no effort 10-15k generally seen until now, this Fractal will melt from phase to phase in seconds without any nerf.

So whats the point of pushing fractal to be harder actually, if u can melt everything with dps? Wouldn't that be easy mode again?Point is cheap artificial difficulty vs smart one like ark cm.this underwater right now feels very cheap.You shouldn't need CM comp to beat regular T4.

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Again, the argument is that the difficulty currently lies in damage received that is entirely out of the player's control and cheap unavoidable mechanics which are very simplistic, dull and boring, at times outright frustrating. Take that along with the fact that this is underwater combat we're talking about, which arguably most people don't find entertaining (at least from my experience), and you have just made your already dreadful experience even worse.Also, all of the regular T4 fractals are doable without any food, pots, or special builds - they simply need you to know what to do. Why should this one be an exception?

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@Athef.6879 said:Also, all of the regular T4 fractals are doable without any food, pots, or special builds - they simply need you to know what to do. Why should this one be an exception?

I don't think it's exceptional. I think it's exactly like we've seen with any new or updated fractal with new mechanics: people keep being surprised that their old tactics no longer are effective. To be fair, the old Aquatic didn't actually require tactics and today's instabilities introduced elements with which PUGs struggle even in terrestrial combat.

Nevertheless: the same global techniques work:

  • Overwhelming DPS allows teams to ignore most mechanics because phases end before it matters.
  • Use of counters (e.g. boonstrips and condi removal) allow teams to function effectively despite the mechanics.
  • Excellent support matters (e.g. heals, prots, blinds).

I notice that some players tend to stay at range (to avoid flurries from the little jellies), putting them out of range of heals and boons. Some keep trying to DPS rather than swap to utilities that help them (or team) survive. And people generally aren't as quick to respond to the new mechanics: slow to swap from big jelly to the elites, refusing to kill the veteran adds that now spawn, etc.


None of this should be confused for me actually enjoying the new version of Aquatic. Longer fight, less interesting. It feels to me like the entire purpose was to extend the duration to make it comparable to other fractals, not to make it more fun. I'd be curious what the devs have to say, as I'm sure the changes were planned some months ago.

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@"Asum.4960" said:It feels like an actual Fractal now and once people adjust and come prepared with a somewhat decent underwater build to swap to, it's really not bad.

I keep hearing that every time there's a change to a fractal. And in the end what happens is always one of two things:if the difficulty remains the same, but the fractal just requires slightly different changes to the strategy, players do adjust, and eventually everything works exactly as before. No meaningful change happens.If the new version actually requires more effort/commitments, players do not adjust. Some of them just start skipping on that fractal from now on (and i don;t mean people dropping to a lower fractal tier - most of them actually just don't bother to do the fractal at all anymore). Average skill level of players doing it rises, but only because the least skilled ones are removed from the equation. Not because players got more skilled, because the improvement curve of each individual player remains unchanged - they keep improving at exactly the same rate they improved when the older version was present.

So, the end result is just a reduced population of players doing the content. But hey, at least it "feels like an actual fractal now".

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@Asum.4960 said:It feels like an actual Fractal now and once people adjust and come prepared with a somewhat decent underwater build to swap to, it's really not bad.

@Astralporing.1957 said:I keep hearing that every time there's a change to a fractal. And in the end what happens is always one of two things:if ...players do adjust, ... eventually everything works exactly as before.If ...players
do not
adjust.. Some of them just start skipping on that fractal from now on

As phrased, that's a truism. If there aren't meaningful changes, then there's no need for players to adapt. If there are substantive differences, then those who aren't willing to update their tactics (whether due to skill or impatience or burnout)... will skip. That's human nature, not something specific to GW2.

The question is: to which group should ANet aim its changes? To those who want more challenges? Or to those that don't? For Fractals and Raids, I think it should be the latter. For open world PvE, it's probably fine to focus on the first group. (And it's more complicated for PvP and WvW.)


@Astralporing.1957 said:So, the end result is just a reduced population of players doing the content. But hey, at least it "feels like an actual fractal now".

It's a seven-year old game; participation is reduced in all game modes. The question is whether fractal participation is decreasing at a faster rate ... and I don't think we, as players, have any data with which to make an informed opinion. With raids, we can compare Living World to Raid achievements (begin LS episode vs first raid boss in the wing, end LS episode vs last raid boss)... and for that, there's little difference on GW2 efficiency: about 15% of accounts are completing raids vs LS, regardless of the timing. Most fractals (especially revamped ones) don't have achievements, so we don't even have a proxy for measuring participation, just anecdotes.


Again: I'm not a fan of the changes to Aquatic. I don't think it's "too hard;" I just think it's even duller now than it was before.

It reminds me of Waiting for Godot, where one character argues that being bored is good, because it feels like time passes more slowly, which means a longer (perceived) lifetime. As if 60 minutes of perceived boredom is a better life than 30 minutes of actual excitement.

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@Astralporing.1957 said:

@"Asum.4960" said:It feels like an actual Fractal now and once people adjust and come prepared with a somewhat decent underwater build to swap to, it's really not bad.

I keep hearing that every time there's a change to a fractal. And in the end what happens is always one of two things:if the difficulty remains the same, but the fractal just requires slightly different changes to the strategy, players do adjust, and eventually everything works exactly as before. No meaningful change happens.If the new version actually requires more effort/commitments, players
do not
adjust. Some of them just start skipping on that fractal from now on (and i don;t mean people dropping to a lower fractal tier - most of them actually just don't bother to do the fractal at all anymore). Average skill level of players doing it rises, but only because the least skilled ones are removed from the equation.
Not
because players got more skilled, because the improvement curve of each individual player remains unchanged - they keep improving at exactly the same rate they improved when the older version was present.

So, the end result is just a reduced population of players doing the content. But hey, at least it "feels like an actual fractal now".

What alternative do you propose? Every fractal is swim/walk to a boss and then use random skills you didn't even bother to read what they do and comfortably beat the encounter on the highest difficulty available?

Then we maybe have population, for a time, but just like story and open world no actual enjoyable and engaging content to play with.

If people don't actually want to play the game and just get loot for menial tasks that just require time as opposed to effort, then what is the point of playing? And what do you do once you got the shinies you want if the content is just mind numbing easy and unenjoyable in of itself?At least the people who still play after those Fractals are made more interesting and engaging are there to play and improve.

Aquatic was a boring farm fest you could solo while watching a show on the side or eating dinner, or both. If it didn't give rewards no one would ever think to play it. Now at least it's the only somewhat interesting piece of underwater content in the game worth having a UW build for.The issue is rather that there isn't more challenging content to motivate people to improve and make builds for, rather than there being any semi challenging endgame content at all, which really this isn't even.

In this case specifically, the Instabilities were causing more trouble than anything else and I gladly take a bet that most groups who struggled with it today didn't bring boon rip and condi cleanses for NPNG, Vengeance and Afflicted. That wasn't even the fractal being too difficult, just people refusing to bring appropriate tools.The Fractal is just not completely brain dead anymore, which is a welcome change. Of course there is room for tweaking and improvement, but it's better than what it was before.

If you are not invested enough into playing and beating the content to look for pretty obvious, easy and accessible ways to easily beat the content, you can't really complain imo.

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I just experienced the changes for the first time today and I really dislike it. It feel like I need to make a specific build and team comp to clear this fractal without frustration. It promotes a challenge for doing it as a pug group who do not have tailor made builds for the new mechanics. I feel like people will want to start with this frac now so they can kick people who do not perform

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@KidRoleplay.3615 said:On a minor note, ever since that player pull/push mechanic has been introduced (tornados, wind beams, that one champion awakened), designers have been going nuts with them. Aquatic boss has it now too. Very annoying for melee, where you're doomed to a lot of damage usually unless you're on a class with teleports.

This specifically is one of the things that annoyed me in Aquatic too. I play Scourge. My optimal DPS requires that I stay close to whatever I'm killing, which the new jellyfish only punishes you for. Actually, it feels pointless to even try anything other than just stay outside of drag range and just spam shade abilities with the measly amount of life force you get back from the fight. It doesn't help that a lot of the added mobs seemingly have those second brief CC pulses to throw at you randomly either, crippling any value stability generation might have to the wasteful. As for the rest, i.e. how chaotic other fractals are, I don't really mind. I can avoid almost anything in land-based fractals with comfortable ease after a brief first-encounter with the mechanic - the same doesn't hold true underwater. Love them or hate them, orange circles immediately tell you what you're working with and give you something to react to. Nothing underwater signals to you clearly what the range of anything is, you either get hit or you don't and you can try to guess if moving away will avoid further damage, or if it doesn't matter and you'll always get hit anyway. No animations are tied to the condi pulses or the dozen other things thrown at you randomly during the phases, at least none discernible. As far as I'm concerned adding mechanical obfuscation introduces only confusion and aggravation, not a better state of play.

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@Aaron Forestman.4758 said:Today's difficulties with it had to do with getting Afflicted as an instability. He's supposed to just pulse some light damage during the invulnerable phases, but Anet forgot to make that not trigger afflicted. Thus we get tons of unavoidable condis.

Begs the question, will it trigger Outflanked in the future, or Stick Together, or Sugar Rush?

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This Fractal needs to be fixed...

This was our.. Oh nice a lucky break once in a while fractal to save time running T4s and CMs... Now it's not even worth doing until they fix some of the unfairness while keeping in mind we are under water using skills and stuff we're not used to.

I don't particularly appreciate the torment attacks and condies during the kill the krait phases that drag the battle on even more.

Also.. what's the deal with this thing killing you instantly from the battle if you can't get those mini games right multiple times.. I have gotten all right at least four times but I still died because my hp was all gone before I could continue...

And if he eats you with low to mid health.. forget it

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@"Angelweave.1856" said:Found the solution multiple boon strip and sustain... cause dps sits around 10k dps... so the fight takes a while^this. I went with a scourge with as main target boon corrupt/ removal and condi convert/cleanse. Had a healing FB in addition and rest was prime dps. A little slow, but no struggles. Pretty butter smooth.

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