Thread: Proper Frag farming NA vers

I'm Yezhik, and I'm here to teach you proper frag farming.
I'm sharing these guides I wrote for a guild I was in.

What is Frag farming?

Frag farming, is acquiring dimensional crystal fragments, over and over again.
You achieve this, by Running any level 9-23 Dungeon(at the current cap) on Abyss difficulty, and using
a Dimensional Key to open the silver bunny, to receive 23 frags. Which you can turn them in for Epic skill plates,
at Bailey(Carderock), or Stashy(Saint's Haven)

How do I do it?

You get Dimensional Keys from Master difficulty dungeons(pretty rare). Then you run an abyss dungeon, pop open a silver bunny, and get your fragments.
But how can one farm frags, when the keys are sparse? The mentor system.
The mentor system allows you run abyss dungeons, and every bunny will drop the random/preset
loot that should drop, with a dimensional key. But with one exception, the party's level difference between
max level, and the lowest level, has to be at at least 9.
(Note: if you don't have a key, as long as there is that 9 level gap, you get a key from a bunny, but no fragments, until the next run.)

Before people thought Frag farming required a level 15 or lower player all the time(24-9=15).Now that level cap has been raised
people still have the misconception of having a level 15 or lower player to farm VoM(Valley of Mourning)
Truth is, you can frag farm(at the moment ANY cardreock dungeon(32-9=23)(Don't do Minotaur nest, it's just too long and impractical for farming)

Which Dungeons?
Quick Legend: Total run time = Run time + wait till silver bunny + all party members getting silver bunny loot + loading time back to field + getting ready to run it again.(usually 1:30-2:00 minutes)

Valley Of Mourning(level 9+)
This dungeon is usually chosen, and is the best(opinion) dungeon for frag farming. The first level only requires you to destroy the 3 crystals, not the monsters. Has a chance of dropping Epic(orange) sparks.
Run time : 1:40-2:10 minutes tops.
Total Run time : 3:30-4:00 minutes
Tactics:
Scene one:
In the beginning your melee characters should destroy the crystal in the middle, Sorcs/archers can snipe the crystal to the right(on the hill) with their ranged spells this should be done by one person, (although an archer can hit all three crystals using magic arrow, triangle shot and frag arrow) the other ranged(Like Mystic) Can run to the middle and snipe(black hole or if a Paladin/Priest then his Relic. Elementalist don't really have 1shot crystal spells but they can use the glacial spike from the sorc tree to snipe, and fireball) the crystal on the left(the one behind the barricade). This shouldn't take you more than 20seconds(speed run).
Scene two:
Your warrior(s) should run past the mobs in the beginning to start killing the boss, and the monsters to the right(two people, warrior/archer). Your Sorc/Clerics should take care of the bats, and the kobolds. Your party should converge almost at the same time at the last creep mob, before the entrance to the next scene.
Scene three:
This is the boss scene(if you have a mystic, she should teleport->timestop->Spectrum Ray/Blackhole Credit:Astrohawke, which should end the dungeon. Elementalist can blink in, and glacial freeze, and let the team dish out dmg, or they can start with by charging fireball, or ice cold field.) Clerics probably won't have time to do much, as these are low level mobs, and can easily be killed, but if anything summon relics. Warriors almost the same applies, but just use your AOE skills, and if one creep runs away, get em right away.
Archers your job is to make sure that one stray creep is dead, of course you can use your AOE skills in the beginning too, but make sure no time is wasted trying to kill that one harpy, after everyone's skill is on CD.

Assassins' Den(9+)
At first I didn't like this dungeon, because the beginning seems slow, too much running. Then scene two you have 2 opposite creep camps that you must clear out. I tested this myself, with a full party, and we did it in 2:00 minutes first run.(There 5 purple named mobs, who have a chance or dropping the Epic(orange) sparks, more than VoM)
Quick access, after coming back from town.
Run Time : 1:50-2:20 minutes Tops
Total Run Time : 3:20-4:00 minutes Tops
Tactics:
Scene One:
Here it's not worth spending time sniping those kobolds, just run through the map and AOE every creep you find, pretty simple
Scene Two:
This is where the split happens. Depending on what team you have, you should try to take melee + ranged, be it warrior/sorc, paladin/archer, or many other combinations. Do note, that once a camp is cleared there will be a cutscene(like 3 seconds, but still) then poochums will run down the middle bridge, this will happens twice(2camps of creeps 2 waves of poochums) Remember to kill everything.
Scene Three:
This area is pretty small, so just AOE, and they will drop like flies.

Astral Coven Lab(16+)
The reason why this dungeon is chosen is because of it's drops. VoM drops very low level equipment, and frag lusters(16-). ACL Drops crude lustres,
which are still viable on the market, and level 24 equipment(blue too). Also it has a chance of dropping orange(epic) sparks. Also fast, because you only need to kill the big spiders, you can ignore, and run through everything else.
Run time : 2:00: 2:20 minutes tops
Total Run time 4:00-4:30 minutes

Recommended Teams
Always have a party of four, for the fastest run. Remember that the level difference between lowest lvl person, and the highest lvl person, must be 9.
1 Warrior
He rushes in and clears any debris, or off to the side mobs(like in VoM 1st scene, the crystal to the right, 2nd scene the mobs to the right by the chest.)
1 Mystic/Elementalist
While being completely useless and horrible in 1v1 PvP, they have range/AoE(area of effect) attacks, and a lot of damage. They help clear the dungeon a lot faster.

Archer(Optional) They can snipe the crystal(on VoM), from below....so can sorc's

The rest is Optional.