Non-VR group getting scaled up to VR16 dungeon

Ghamorra · February 2016

My wife and I (both lvl 14 non veteran rank) sought out a group to do the Undaunted Grotto dungeon for our new characters. We partied up with two other players who were also non veteran rank; levels 14 and 18. We get in and a message pops up saying the dungeon was scaled to the party leader which happened to be me. All the enemies were VR16 and our gear was buffed, albeit poorly, to meeting the estimated scale of our enemies. We fought hard and made it to the final boss but were no match.

After about 2 hours we gave up, well our healer did and we were nothing without him, he was damn good. I checked the group setting multiple times and it was not set to seek a VR dungeon, in fact I wasn't allowed to. I verified the players multiple times to make sure they weren't VR and I certainly wasn't. I tried a few more groups and more of the same. Logged out and back in, no different. So I just assumed this must be some new way the dungeons worked.

After a couple of quests I leveled so more an got some good gear drops. I decided to try again. This time though as I was walking past the wayshrine near Grotto I was asked to join a group and I did, so I didn't use the finder tool. To my surprise the dungeon was scaled far more favorably. All enemies were ordinary rank 16. We blazed through the dungeon in 15 minutes tops.

So is there something I'm missing about dungeon scaling or was this just another bug?

Slappah · February 2016

Group finder scales it to v16

If you enter manually not using the group finder it scales to the group leader

NovaShadow · February 2016

Ghamorra wrote: »

My wife and I (both lvl 14 non veteran rank) sought out a group to do the Undaunted Grotto dungeon for our new characters. We partied up with two other players who were also non veteran rank; levels 14 and 18. We get in and a message pops up saying the dungeon was scaled to the party leader which happened to be me. All the enemies were VR16 and our gear was buffed, albeit poorly, to meeting the estimated scale of our enemies. We fought hard and made it to the final boss but were no match.

After about 2 hours we gave up, well our healer did and we were nothing without him, he was damn good. I checked the group setting multiple times and it was not set to seek a VR dungeon, in fact I wasn't allowed to. I verified the players multiple times to make sure they weren't VR and I certainly wasn't. I tried a few more groups and more of the same. Logged out and back in, no different. So I just assumed this must be some new way the dungeons worked.

After a couple of quests I leveled so more an got some good gear drops. I decided to try again. This time though as I was walking past the wayshrine near Grotto I was asked to join a group and I did, so I didn't use the finder tool. To my surprise the dungeon was scaled far more favorably. All enemies were ordinary rank 16. We blazed through the dungeon in 15 minutes tops.

So is there something I'm missing about dungeon scaling or was this just another bug?

This bit is why it was v16. The moment you use the group finder tool it'll scale everyone to v15. Don't go through the finder if you're too low lvl and don't want a tough time.

Refuse2GrowUp · February 2016

If you use the group finder, it will always scale to VR15/16. Note tho that this does not mean the dungeon is on Veteran mode, as Vet mode has different mobs, harder bosses, and more advanced mechanics.

If you want to do the dungeon at your level, do not use the group finder. Simply ask a few players to group us and run it...it will then scale to the group leader. Alternatively, you can always use the group finder to find others to run with, and provided they are in your alliance, ask if you can drop them a friend request and if they would mind running non-scaled. Then simply disband the group and invite them back from your friends list...presto group scaled to your level.

Ghamorra · February 2016

Thanks for the info. Why is it done this way? It clearly doesn't scale properly.

Refuse2GrowUp · February 2016

Scaling is effective, but of course you are still limited by the skills and passives you have unlocked. Also, scaling takes into account your gear level and quality. To really get the best effects from scaling, you should have gear at, or close to, your level and it should be at least blue. If your gear is drastically under your level or white quality, you will scale poorly and suffer diminished results.

The glass isn't quite half empty on this one. For all intents and purposes, scaling will help you do dungeons (or at least give you a better shot) rather than simply trying to run it under leveled. Before they introduced the scaling group finder, if you were under leveled you simply did not do a particular dungeon (or you got carried by much more powerful mates). Now you can start trying them all almost right away.

Maybe not a perfect system, but it is certainly better than it was.

Slappah · February 2016

Ghamorra wrote: »

Thanks for the info. Why is it done this way? It clearly doesn't scale properly.

Well, for one, it helps queue times because instead of being locked out of a dungeon until you get to that level, or being over leveled for a dungeon and not getting anything out of it, suddenly now everyone can queue for everything, increasing the pool the queue can take from and allowing you to experience and gain gear and xp from any dungeon at any point in your leveling cycle.

Lenikus · February 2016

The scaling works perfectly.
The problem low levels feel is that they lack the proper skills / passives / build set to do a delve. Some people feel it's the scaling's fault only because the problem (lack of points) is easier to notice with bigger numbers (aka, a vr16 scale)

CirithValaria · February 2016

I do this every time I take my lower level guild members into a normal dungeon:
..I invite 1 to my group (usually DD) -> activate the grouping tool (some less popular dungeon like Volenfell) -> then instantly cancel the search. This makes all group members scaled, since "the tool is used to form a group" (even if it didn't actually invite anyone)
This way myself vr16 and guildies lvl10-> can all enjoy the same dungeon and get rewarded
On thing I would love to have is an option to scale it up without such a trickiness.

Scaling is perfect and makes lower level players quite powerful if they no what they are doing.
If they are set out right (attribute point distribution), got decent skills unlocked and maybe even have crafted sets (made by me lol), they can potentially be more powerful than avarage vr16 player - seen this many times.

The fact that they will allow cross alliance grouping just makes it even more easy to run dungeons inside the guild - I love it!

As a side note:
Doing pugs via tool (mostly T1 dungeons) gets u often hooked up with:
lvl 10-18 heavy armor 2 handed DD, who is totally confused..
or
lvl 10-18 heavy armor 2 handed "tank", who has no idea about taunting and simply swings his/her mighty axe/sword/maul..
This is ok since most of the normal dungeons forgive and won't require perfect group. They are good places to teach new comers and correct their expectations about how things are and work.
I still get it that people blame tool and scaling about this, but I always say: "if u simply cant handle the scaled up version, I doubt you would have handled the normal version".