I am largely mystified by how a group works if it has two (or more) characters of very different levels.
I know that zones with a level range will automatically scale the monsters up (or down) to your character’s level within the range. If you’re too low or high, the monsters scale as far as the zone range and that’s it. But it’s totally unclear what happens when you’re in a group of characters with significantly different levels.
Has Blizzard provided a description of what happens in the open world? How about within dungeons?
If Blizzard has not, can someone say, definitively, what happens when the level gap becomes large in the open world? How about a large gap in a dungeon party? I would appreciate definitive information (preferably with BfA references or v8 tests) about exactly how this works.
I’ve been in three different guilds, each with very different ideas about how it worked, and none of them seemed to match observable reality !!
I can’t speak to what happens in dungeons, but world mobs scale to each individual character’s level. I tested this with a friend. He logged onto a level 21 character and I logged onto a level 60 character and we both crewed up, went to the same location (in the Barrens just outside of Crossroads) and looked at the same mobs. He saw level 21 mobs and I saw level 60 mobs.
I have no source other than my own anecdotal experience, but it’s easy enough to replicate to verify.
@Truthspeaker - What happened when you fought the monster? Was one of you doing significantly more damage than the other? Did one of you get significantly more or less XP than the other? Appearance is fine - but what happened in fights?
I (as a level 37 hunter) was teamed up and in the same zone as a level 115 hunter. The zone was Feralas (35 -60). He was instantly one-shotting anything in sight. My aimed shots at best did their usual amount, which meant I needed aimed shot, plus pet, plus a few other shots to take down opponents, as usual.
I suspect that in my case, critters appeared as level 60 to his level 115, so of course he was one-shotting them.
To be honest, we didn’t fight anything. Just saw the different levels and different amounts of health on the mobs and that told us what we needed to know.
Yes, exactly. Mobs only scale to the max possible in that zone. As you said, it’s expected that a 115 hunter would one shot anything in Feralas since that zone only scales to 60. You should have seen 37 ish mobs and he would have seen level 60-61ish mobs.
This is correct even when you’re in a group with others at different levels. Mobs scale up or down based on the character level within the min and max level range of the zone.
I’m pretty sure they do. I just logged onto a lvl 40 and 75 character and checked the dungeon finder for each. Looks like the minimum level varies based on the dungeon, but the max level is whatever the max is for the zone that the dungeon is in. In classic zones, for example, the dungeons max out at level 60.
Here’s a screenshot of the dungeon finder screen (specific dungeons) for a level 40 character and a level 75 character.
I’m guessing dungeon mobs scale the same way as world mobs - within the min and max for the dungeon in question based on the level of the character. I haven’t tested this, though, but now I’m curious and want to.
Yes, like world zones, dungeons also have minimum and maximum levels, although the “maximum” is based on their expansion, while the minimum is based on the original unlock levels.
So for example - Ragefire Chasm is a “level 16” dungeon. It unlocks at character level 16 and scales up to level 60, although the chances that you’ll get it while doing random dungeons after about level 20 is very small.
What I’ve found is that the dungeon finder will typically pull people in approximately the same level ranges as the original range for the dungeon, so a Ragefire Chasm group will typically be players with levels from 16-18. You will almost never see a group with a random player more than 5 levels higher than the group average, and the only times that will happen is if a higher level player queued with a lower level friend, although that also has restrictions attached.
Players who exceed the level cap for a dungeon cannot subsequently join queue groups for it. So a level 61 player could not queue into a random group for Ragefire Chasm, and mobs inside the dungeon will not scale further than they would for a level 60 character.
The scaling works on a character level. You’ll see it in dungeons, out in the world, during events, etc. During Brewfest, for example, a level 50 might be able to queue into the Coren Direbrew event alongside a level 120. The boss will be appropriate to each of their levels. Damage is done more on a percentage basis in that case. The level 50 will see they’re doing 100 dps (for example), which is 1% of the bosses health. The level 120 will see 3000 dps, which is also 1% at their level. This way, everyone contributes equally. Of course, gear will effect the damage, so the 120 will do more overall, but the level 50 will have helped.
@Keres - What ARE the restrictions in forming groups? As a level 16 character, could I group with a level 59 character, and both of us queue up for Ragefire Chasm ? I assume that if I was grouped instead with a level 70 character, I couldn’t queue for any dungeon because there is no dungeon that allows both level 16 and level 70 characters.
@Chirona - What you are saying is that the scaling of damage effects ONLY takes into account character level. Weapon level, other equipment levels, or more precise measurements are not included when the game logic converts absolute damage values into a percentage value? I suspected WoW’s servers were getting long in the tooth, but using highly simplified math strikes me as opening the floodgates to all sorts of twinking and other departures from “fair and balanced” gameplay.
Correct. A level 16 and a 59 or even 60 level character can group up for Ragefire Chasm using the LFD queue no problem, but trying to group with a 60+ character would cause the dungeon finder to kick out an error message that one in the party is over level. You could still walk to the dungeon and enter it as a group that way with a level 70 character, but the level 16 character will get much less xp from the run since he’s with a character that’s over level for the dungeon.
Unfortunately, I don’t know enough about twinking or the actual algorithm that Blizzard uses for scaling, but I suspect you’re correct that things are far more imbalanced than they used to be before the entire world scaled the way it does now.
It doesn’t ONLY take into account character level, but you won’t see too much of a difference with a low level character since the stat squish. You might see +1 agi on a level 16 and a +4 agi on a level 59. It’s not until you get up to max level when you’re seeing +300 stats that you’ll really see gear affecting the scaling. I don’t know how the whole algorithm works, but everyone contributes.
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