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Getting into Fractal CMs


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Hey. Most of my time im doing fracs alone, so the LFG-System is an nice friend to have.^^Ive always wanted to get into CMs ,but i can only find groups that have an requirement of KPs. I mean ,even "CM training" groups have Kp-Requirements of 5 or so.

Doesnt matter if im doing well in terms of -whatever an group would need- only KPs are important.How should i be able to get into CMs & earning KPs, while needing KPs to even get into CMs?

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@"Virdo.1540" said:Hey. Most of my time im doing fracs alone, so the LFG-System is an nice friend to have.^^Ive always wanted to get into CMs ,but i can only find groups that have an requirement of KPs. I mean ,even "CM training" groups have Kp-Requirements of 5 or so.

Doesnt matter if im doing well in terms of -whatever an group would need- only KPs are important.How should i be able to get into CMs & earning KPs, while needing KPs to even get into CMs?

In this case it helps to put your own lfg. Possibly without or just with classrequirements

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Honest answer:Getting into fractal CMs can be more difficult than raiding. Mostly because a huge amount of players are fine with normal T4 and the effort to get CMs down until they are a breeze is rather high.

I myself had an old fractal buddy 1.5 years ago. We basically started as druid+chrono combo and made our own LFGs. Then eventually we got people from our guild to join and ran a static group, all learning in the process. This repeated again for switching to Firebrigade, but was a lot easier since the basic mechanics of the fractal were already know.

In short:Your best bet is probably trying to get into a guild and forming a team there. If you absolutely have to PUG this, try to get at least 1 other person to coop with, then play the support comp and only look for 2 dps and a bs.

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The way I got into CMs was to create an LFG called "CM100 Learning". I had to wait for about 25 minutes to get the group to fill and we all had to agree in chat that we were going to be learning mainly through failure so its going to be a couple of hours. In CM100, we had to repeat Skorvald about 3 times and I can't even remember how many times we did Artsariiv. Like 10 or something. We repeated Arkk a bunch of times but due to exhaustion we ended up called it without getting the kill.

That said, learning through failure is seriously underrated. We let ourselves get hit by attacks to see what would happen. Oh this one literally flings you off the arena. Oh this laser is a one shot. Oh this shockwave is a knockdown. Oh this breakbar is a defiance dps check. If you don't have enough cc, everyone dies. Oh those red puddles hurt like hell.

By the end of it I was super confident that I knew everything on Skorvald and Arsariiv. Arkk I was fine with until the platforms start disappearing and then the paaanic set it, so I needed a bit more practice with positioning in tight spaces. I did beat CM100 in my second learning pug but it took a couple more groups to get really confident with it. I also had to create or join CM learning pugs for 99 too.

Once you have bashed your head against 99 and 100 for a bit and gotten your first KP, you can join groups that only require "some KP" and those are decent enough - to be honest, theres no real difference between them and 50kp pugs. You can often join 50kp pugs with a lot less KP as long as you are up front about it. I used to ask "hey, is 25kp enough? If not, its cool and I'll leave". But I don't recall any situation where I was refused. However, be sure you know your mechanics because it will become a problem if you don't. If you drilled a learning group where you failed every possible way a dozen times until nothing is scary or surprising anymore, then you'll be fine.

I encountered a couple of people in low KP groups that were just legends - one that springs to mind was a person with fractal god title in my second learning group. Thanks to that guy, I got my first KP. He was clearly the most experienced player in the group by a country mile and explained a whole bunch of things we were doing wrong and was patient enough to repeatedly fail with us until we got the timing and the positioning down.

If you get a really disastrous non learning pug that is failing defiance checks or group mechanics like Skorvald solar blooms because nobody is kicking the ball to the edge of the arena, people generally just leave without saying anything. I haven't really seen anyone rage on people in low KP groups so I don't think you need to worry about that.

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Its just a matter of trying. Unlike raids u can find training groups alot easier in fractal CMs. Bringing a experienced player is alot helpful. Honestly i was in 4 training groups before i get my first KPs. We always were failing at arkk in 30% or so wen the platforms disappeared. After a while u get used to them and CMs become a very easy content. Just ask guildies or ppl in chat and lfg ur own group or join some KP groups and tell them u know mechs. I did the same. It helped me alotGood luck

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Find friends or guildies to do normal t4s regularly. Once you get it down, you can encourage the group to try CMs and learn that way.

The reason why KP is a thing is that people don't want random people who don't know how to do fractals at all coming in. But you can bypass it by forming your own groups that already know what you can do. With a common goal, you can get those KP, or simply avoid pugging altogether and not need KP to begin with.

Alternatively, if you have a good t4 group that's bored, you can always present the option of taking a shot at CMs. Some will take you up on the offer, though this high variance.

You could get some friends to start a CM 99 ONLY group. In general, no experienced CM'ers are going to join that since they will want everything, and thus this will probably get newer people on your end. As long as it doesn't look like you are wanting to get carried, there should be chance. This is a crapshoot though. This won't earn you any KP, but it will help you make some extra friends if you do learn 99 since it'll get you a bit of leverage and also you can earn more relics and crap. It'll also increase your own confidence since 99 is not necessarily always easier than 100. (Arkk is the only hard part about 100 anyways)

Finally, I would also recommend improving your dps rotation on a golem for a little bit. Having good dps is always nice, but a lot of CM bosses are effectively DPS checks-- you can avoid most of the deadliest mechanics if you can dps fast enough to phase bosses.

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@ArchonWing.9480 said:Finally, I would also recommend improving your dps rotation on a golem for a little bit. Having good dps is always nice, but a lot of CM bosses are effectively DPS checks-- you can avoid most of the deadliest mechanics if you can dps fast enough to phase bosses.

That may become an problem too^^ Its not like im not good in doing rotations. Even managing to top snowcrows benchmarks (same build) by quite a bit ,even though with bad rng .But the problem may be that im maining herald and i dont really like other^^ And dps herald..... its still garbage. Even more than 2018. Rotation wouldnt help a lot there ^^

I can play most other useful classes in raids, but fracs are kinda an way different scenario. Besides outdated minstrel-chrono, there isnt much left with enough agony.

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@"Virdo.1540" said:But the problem may be that im maining herald and i dont really like other^^ And dps herald..... its still garbage. Even more than 2018. Rotation wouldnt help a lot there ^^

I can play most other useful classes in raids, but fracs are kinda an way different scenario. Besides outdated minstrel-chrono, there isnt much left with enough agony.If you drop Herald you can play Alacrity Renegade.

It's probably the easiest build to get a group with as well.

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DPS Herald is fine for pug CMs. The boon stacking is nice and gives your support players more margin for error. The dps is not so bad that its going to be the reason your groups don't clear 99 and 100. That is always due to failing group mechanics and to a lesser extent, too many people failing individual mechanics.

The only problem you are likely to encounter is people asking you to switch to Support Renegade (Alacrigade or Alac as it is commonly referred to). Or they join your party thinking you are a Support and when it turns out you are on DPS Herald, they might get freaky or feel like their time is being wasted. Most pugs end up waiting the longest for a Support Renegade and there is a good reason for this: they are typically responsible for solo mechanics (like Arkk anomalies and Artsariiv ball). They are responsible a significant amount of defiance bar damage in CMs where everyone dies if you don't break bars fast enough. If No Pain, No Gain is an instability, you have to go Mallyx and boon rip. You are also responsible for providing supplemental stability, to save your entire party from death by CC.

It is a meta hard carry role and has the most individual responsibility imo. I consider it to have the highest skill floor of any meta role and is probably the hardest one to learn - certainly if you don't play it well, you will be responsible for the most party wipes. That said, there is no harm having a pocket meta support. If you are comfortable with mechanics on a Support Renegade, you will have a straight up easier time on every other class. It will also enable you to play Herald since you alway have the option to switch to Support Renegade if your party just won't let it go. However, if you go the learning pug route, its going to be a bit overwhelming at first but what it will do is drill very solid fundamentals into you. Its much easier to learn CM99/100 on heal firebrand but I sometimes find the aegis and passive healing encourages sloppy play because you can simply get away with making more mistakes.

Overall, I don't think CMs are fundamentally all that different from T4s. Its mostly the same mechanics you have seen in T4 but theres just more of them happening at the same time, you are under greater time pressure and failure tends to punish the whole group instead of just the individual.

When making the transition from T4 to CM, I think the hardest part is realizing all those times you didn't bother to learn mechanics in T4 is coming to back to bite you. For example, in T4 100 pugs, it is common to see people getting feared by Arkk. The common excuse is: its only T4/recs. So you never learn to recognise the eye symbol above Arkk's head as a threat and never learn to turn away/about face. In T4 it is rare that getting feared will result in you getting killed.

In CM100 there are more disappearing platforms, more skull bombs and concentric rings to cc you. All of this is stuff you have seen before but its all happening at the same time. So not learning the fear mechanic is going to end badly for you. You will get cc'ed with the bomb, your nova launch is on cooldown and don't have enough time to reach the dome. Or you can be standing in the dome with the bomb and you get feared out of it just as its exploding. Or you get feared into a hole in the floor, or feared into a concentric circle and stunned on a platform that is about to disappear. And if you nova launch to stunbreak out of the fear, now you don't have it for the shockwave/red puddle and you'll die to that instead.

So to end with some positive words of encouragement - CMs are not as hard as you initially think they are. You are not going to do many mechanics you haven't already seen a million times in T4 already you just need to respect them and stay calm. You can do it!

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You could look at the lfg a bit more often, if possible.

I have been lucky enough to soon find trainings with no kill proof requirements. The guy that taught them to me, later asked to join him again. Now I’m also doing Fractal CMs with guild mates.You could also try to ask people if they know a Guild or a person who teach CMs.

You could ask in game, maybe in map chat, if someone is willing to take you into CMs. There are many people willing and happy to help.

LFG requirements are also not “set into stone”, you could study the encounter as well as you can, then try to join a training group with few killl proofs requirement and gently ask if you can stay.

Lastly, when you know mechanics and you know you can make a good job, you could consider to fake kill proofs. There are a few ways to do that.

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First of all, I suggest you to have a simple understanding on normal scale 100 and 99

I have two options for you :)

1.- Open up a CMs party yourself, ask for 25 or 50 ess, and look for the usual (hb, alacrigade).2.- Fake your ESS by generating a code and join low ess groups, just do fine and you'll get away with it.

CMs are hard, good thing is that there are a lot of experienced players, but when 2 or 3 people are unexp on CMs it can take way too long and give you lots of frustration, specially on the overwhelming Arkk battle, so make sure you at least have decent understanding of the normal T4 fracs.

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