Guild Wars 2

So here I am coming back to the game after a break of about 1 year and a half. My highest leveled character was level 40sh when I stopped playing.

I come back to check out what the game has in store and I notice that the same thing that was bothering me last year (which I forgot about in the meantime, but became increasingly frustrating when I started playing again) is still an issue in the game.

Basically, here it is: when you are solo-ing and there are no other players around in miles (low level areas are basically ghost towns from what I gather) why on earth are monsters respawning so quickly behind you?

Here I was trying to infiltrate centaur camp number #n, I pull carefully, try not to aggro multiple mobs, in order to get to the usual vista/skill challenge/chest at the end. BUT those kitten things respawn right behind me. There’s no sense of accomplishing anything, of clearing up something, of making any impact, if those centaurs respawn 1 minute after I kill them.

Not to mention the utter frustration where all my careful planning of taking that camp is destroyed by that veteran mob respawning just as I dodge back from an attack, then killing me and wasting 10 minutes of my solo experience.

I am dissapointed Arena Net, to see that this is still in the same state as I left it 1 year ago.

Again, this is when I am completely solo in the area, no other player in miles. I can’t believe it is that hard to adjust respawn rates in function of how many players are around. WoW did it 5 years ago and progressing through monster camps in that game was way-way less frustrating.

One could of course assume that basically attacking an enemy base would be considered a group activity, don’t you think?

I am even rather sure that the events for said camps are clearly marked as Group Events, and as such, are not supposed to be done on your own.

Not everything in the game is supposed to be solo. It is a MMO after all.

join a guild…. a friendly one, they’ll map with you. It’s a mulitplayer game, after all.

Is a shame you can’t handle the difficulty of the game, specially when most of the people playing says is too easy.

Kranyum.5490:

So here I am coming back to the game after a break of about 1 year and a half. My highest leveled character was level 40sh when I stopped playing.

I come back to check out what the game has in store and I notice that the same thing that was bothering me last year (which I forgot about in the meantime, but became increasingly frustrating when I started playing again) is still an issue in the game.

Basically, here it is: when you are solo-ing, there are no other players around in miles (low level areas are basically ghost towns from what I gather) why on earth are monsters respawning so quickly behind you?

Here I was trying to infiltrate centaur camp number #n, I pull carefully, try not to aggro multiple mobs, in order to get to the usual vista/skill challenge/chest at the end. BUT those kitten things respawn right behind me. There’s no sense of accomplishing anything, of clearing up something, of making any impact, if those centaurs respawn 1 minute after I kill them.

Not to mention the utter frustration where all my careful planning of taking that camp is destroyed by that veteran mob respawning just as I dodge back from an attack, then killing me and wasting 10 minutes of my solo experience.

I am dissapointed Arena Net, to see that this is still in the same state as I left it 1 year ago.

Again, this is when I am completely solo in the area, no other player in miles. I can’t believe it is that hard to adjust respawn rates in function of how many players are around. WoW did it 5 years ago and progressing through monster camps in that game was way-way less frustrating.

You need more DPS to kill faster. Check your equipment and traits to see how you’re set up. Pick a focus on Condition or Physical damage, and gear yourself to get the maximum benefits. The fact that mobs are respawning isn’t so much a problem of the rate of respawn, but rather the rate of killing them off.

I don’t need any help, clearing camps is easy usually. You don’t need a party to clear normal and veteran centaurs. I usually pull 4-5 at a time and AoE them down.

The respawn rate however is madly annoying, especially when you have to clear that double-veteran pack at the end and when you are DPS-ing them you end up aggroing the pack you just killed 1 minute ago.

Respawn rate is kittened because not only it’s like you’ve made no progress whatsoever and you being there made no difference at all but also makes solo play pretty annoying.

I’d rather have tougher mobs overall but that the camp stays cleared until I leave it.

And let’s be honest, leveling zones are empty at the moment, the party aspect of this MMO is pretty much dead in the lowbie areas.

Make respawns slower, or don’t do any respawning at all but in hidden areas so it looks like their heading towards your way.

this is a bit of silly game actually this is what i always did; run straight, ignore every mob, and explore your thing, and next

Fowidner.6930:

this is a bit of silly game actually this is what i always did; run straight, ignore every mob, and explore your thing, and next

yes but what if the n-th mob knocks you down and you now have 6-7 centaurs mauling you. Also archers are pretty annoying if you do that.

your right this is a huge problem and anet needs to fix it if they want their game to survive

the cooldowns on tougher monsters (champions mostly) needs to be raised, this goes for peices of artillery too (i hate u catapults!)

Yes, lets make the game boring and easy.

Kiba.9701:

Is a shame you can’t handle the difficulty of the game, specially when most of the people playing says is too easy.

Yep, clearly a l2p issue… /S

I don’t think I even had a problem with any PvE monster. I used to solo any champion event I found when I first started even if it gave complete kitten for rewards.

OP is right,

this has been an issue since day 1 and has never been addressed. Don’t mock him for playing the game the way it was meant to be played.

Mobs respawn ridiculously fast in this game and have done so ever since launch. I’ve been frustrated by this on multiple occasions at it’s a big reason why I hate leveling in this game.

If you enter a cave, barely 20 yards deep, you can be your kitten you’ll have to fight your way out again because mobs respawn after 30-60 seconds. It’s a joke. Even with full Berserker gear you’ll have a hard time not dodging into respawning mobs.

This also goes against the whole core combat concept of active dodging and movement. When movement is so dangerous because of constant adds then you’re better of standing in a corner and auto-attacking.

This is something that could be fixed so easily. I mean a respawn timer is surly a simple line of code somewhere that just needs its variable updated.

Because the current respawn rate is broken.

Another confirmation that OP is correct. +1

glaphen.5230:

I don’t think I even had a problem with any PvE monster. I used to solo any champion event I found when I first started even if it gave complete kitten for rewards.

Indeed. Not usually one to say this but, it does seem to be an l2p issue. Open world PvE is probably the most forgiving thing this game has to offer.

Ok, just as a curiosity. Those that claim that open world PVE is easy, what profession do you usually play while roaming?

All of them Although I no longer have a Mesmer or Ranger.

The events are scaled. Respawn can be a pain but as was written above you seem to be doing too low damage at lvl 40. I have solo’d this game on multiple characters, 7 proffs are at 80 my engi is lvl 61 now, if you have trouble with carefully soloing a group event don’t solo it. Call out in chat. There was someone who did map complete with I believe lvl 60 being their final level posting here, you do not need to complete events to get vistas or poi’s, you don’t even need to get into combat to finish the vast majority of hearts.

Kranyum.5490:

Basically, here it is: when you are solo-ing, there are no other players around in miles.

Anet please fix this, insert some players for his paradox, hes solo-ing yet he complains there are no players around. This is why server crash every time, the results give devided by 0.

Yargesh.4965:

The events are scaled. Respawn can be a pain but as was written above you seem to be doing too low damage at lvl 40. I have solo’d this game on multiple characters, 7 proffs are at 80 my engi is lvl 61 now, if you have trouble with carefully soloing a group event don’t solo it. Call out in chat. There was someone who did map complete with I believe lvl 60 being their final level posting here, you do not need to complete events to get vistas or poi’s, you don’t even need to get into combat to finish the vast majority of hearts.

I haven’t played this game all that much, so I dont understand what low-damage really is. I am only level 45 now and I usually buy gear from the Karma vendors.

I play elementalist and usually pull 4-5 melees at a time and AoE them down with my staff in less than 10 seconds (usually by going Bleed from Earth + the two AoE Fire + the Arcane AoE blast). Is that low?

Problem is, when you encounter a Veteran mob, it can take maybe 20-30 seconds to kill it and as you get it low ther other stuff you killed respawns back again.

I have played a lot of WoW and other MMOs, I know that in those games, respawn rates were nowhere near this fast.

Also Guild Wars was supposed to be about the “impact” the player does on the environment: what impact is there if mobs can’t even stay dead while I am there. The immersion is simply destroyed by this.

i suspect you are poking mobs with a spoon
try something sharper

mobs indeed respawn very fast. but if they didn’t, player walking minute away from you, would be rather bored

ability to solo content, comes from practice and experience

here is a bigger picture:
there are people soloing legendary bosses, champions, and groups of elite veterans… meanwhile you are struggling with group of normal mobs and a veteran

so what the problem really is?

• monsters too stronk
• you are too weak (as not experienced enough)

:)

Kranyum.5490:

Yargesh.4965:

The events are scaled. Respawn can be a pain but as was written above you seem to be doing too low damage at lvl 40. I have solo’d this game on multiple characters, 7 proffs are at 80 my engi is lvl 61 now, if you have trouble with carefully soloing a group event don’t solo it. Call out in chat. There was someone who did map complete with I believe lvl 60 being their final level posting here, you do not need to complete events to get vistas or poi’s, you don’t even need to get into combat to finish the vast majority of hearts.

I haven’t played this game all that much, so I dont understand what low-damage really is. I am only level 45 now and I usually buy gear from the Karma vendors.

I play elementalist and usually pull 4-5 melees at a time and AoE them down with my staff in less than 10 seconds (usually by going Bleed from Earth + the two AoE Fire + the Arcane AoE blast). Is that low?

Problem is, when you encounter a Veteran mob, it can take maybe 20-30 seconds to kill it and as you get it low ther other stuff you killed respawns back again.

I have played a lot of WoW and other MMOs, I know that in those games, respawn rates were nowhere near this fast.

Also Guild Wars was supposed to be about the “impact” the player does on the environment: what impact is there if mobs can’t even stay dead while I am there. The immersion is simply destroyed by this.

I have yet to see a MMORPG game able to give a good quality ‘impact’ to the world environment. I have followed games for many years, all talk about it, not one has delivered. For me it is not a bad thing, in order for it to work you would need phasing so severe you would never ever meet someone else since even a little change in play-style would lead to a cascade of changed situations. You wind up in a personal instanced game from beginning to end and it is no longer even close to being a MMORPG.
To your combat, what you have written seems fine, I personally do not see problems with respawn. It can be a great thing if you are trying to kill off x-number of mobs. It can lead to your untimely death. Again though if you are trying to do a group event solo then you will run into situations where the mobs overwhelm you. That is kind of the point.

Dee Jay.2460:

this has been an issue since day 1 and has never been addressed. Don’t mock him for playing the game the way it was meant to be played.

Because the current respawn rate is broken.

You are making an assumption in both cases.
Based on how the game is made, it’s safer to assume you are playing it in a way not intended. The areas and mobs you are are trying to do were obviously meant for more than one person to solo through. This is an MMO afterall, it makes sense they would make the game rely on interactions with surrounding players. So these areas are actually not broken at all, but being attempted in ways not intended.
The real issue is the lack of players in those areas.

What level are you?
What zone were you in?
What event were you doing?

Very important questions that may help solve the original post.

I’ve never noticed quick respawn being an issue in this game. It’s all about knowing what you should attack and what you shouldn’t.

I’m sorry OP, but the problem isn’t the respawn rate, it’s how you view it – that is the problem.

You really need to view it from a different perspective, and then there won’t be a problem. View it as a challenge to have to learn how to deal with those situations. (For ex. learn how not to aggro enemies that have respawned, by not dodging in the direction of enemies that may be respawned behind you.)

I go into caves for a minute or less all the time, but instead of viewing it as “frustrating” that there’ll be a respawned mob waiting at the entrance when i’m done, I simply accept that fact and either kill it again or run past it. It is called “Player VERSUS Environment” for a reason.

digiowl.9620:

Kiba.9701:

Is a shame you can’t handle the difficulty of the game, specially when most of the people playing says is too easy.

Yep, clearly a l2p issue… /S

OP is correct, been playing since first beta weekend. respawn timers are broken and have been for over a year. Its too easy because the game is focused around zergs. The only difficultly is because of Anet broken systems, ie repawn timers.

The respawn rate is ridicilous in certain places. I am all for beeing on your guard and always check behind you and so on, but the idea of if you cant instakill whatever crosses you, the spawnrate is gonna get you is silly. And even if you instakill everything, more then likely you have to kill all the mobs again on your way back. Not so much dangerous as annyoing. Very annoying.
And is isnt always an event, an event quite often has a limited number of mobs you have to tear through, and you’re done. The casual camp with a poi or a skillpoint and speedspawn isnt dangerous or hard, just meh..
On a skillpoint, I had to kill a veteran who was guarding it. I killed it, and it respawned and attacked me before I had finished “communicating” with the kitten point..

There are definitely a few places that the respawn timer is off in this game…but they’re relatively few and far between. This isn’t a universal problem. It’s a problem limited to a few out of the way places.

If you won’t team up with someone (for whatever reason) then you’re stuck doing it as best you can in those few areas.

I’ve yet to find an area in this game on any profession that I can’t solo, even with this “problem”.

I think it was mentioned before but GROUP missions should not be done solo, in fact the whole idea behind Guildwars 2 was not to have questing but living events, and as such bring groups of people together continuously to fight along side each other (But still have a challenge no matter how big or small the group.). I love this, but yes as I went back to level my alt I did notice a whole lot of nobody around as I leveled (Starting areas were okay so I leveled all starting areas and was about 70 when I was done.). When you are in areas with little to no people it is frustrating because you have lots of group missions around you and no group, people may tell you just find a guild to help, but it will be hard to find a guild that continually runs around helping you mid game level your char. Another option would be to go level with them, go run world bosses and events with your guilds, your level will adjust for them and you will still be weak but its okay cause you’ll have group. But yes as you stated, if you just want to solo level 1-80 in the suggested level zones 40-70 will be boring, and you will have fast respawn areas, which will quickly humble you if you have not updated your armor to the appropriate level.

In some instances, yes the OP is correct. The spawn rates don’t seem to be standardized by any means. In some areas they spawn a bit slower, in others they spawn so quickly that it feels like you’re making no head way. I’m not talking about things labeled as an event either. Just ‘normal’ non-event spawns.

I am not advocating making the game easier. I am simply calling out that they may need to check their spawning algorithms to verify they are working as intended.

I would tend to agree with the OP as to respawn rates when alone. Wait till you get to Orr, even after the fixes. I think that this is a part of the game we have to adapt to, and it is not going to change because of the necessity mentioned above that another solo player a minute or two away needs those respawns. And I think but cannot quote that the devs do this on purpose to encourage/support team gaming in the open world.

Not dodging back into agro can be pretty much impossible in certain terrain.

No one seems to have mentioned that Elementalist is considered a pretty squishy class and one of the more difficult to play. I found being completely alone pretty difficult at certain levels on the two I took to 80. Also certain classes have level ranges that are particularly difficult. Level 40-60 was not fun, iirc.

My response, and the response of a whole lot of players that I know, is to grind an alt to 80, gear to exotic level or better, and then go back to do the stories and areas. A down-leveled character with full skills and build will be a whole lot more survivable and have a better kill rate. Not what they intended, you get a lot of useless rewards, but a rational response to the problems you are having.

I was very fortunate that I had a solid group of friends that came here in mass and helped each other level our first alts. They have all quit GW now. This issue is one of the reasons.

I was also very lucky in that Guardian was the third class I tried. For whatever reason it clicked with me and it was just about the only class I found that I could solo with at first. My first alt was also an Ele and sat unplayed at lvl 20 as a mule for over a year. My 2nd alt was a Warrior and even that sat for a long time. Embarrassing but true. I could not get the survivability I needed even on a War when I was first playing this game. Now with over 3,000 hours I can finally play just about anything. Slow learner these days I guess .

I don’t really see the problem.

Centaurs are a great enemy to farm due to Supply Bags dropping vast quantities of Cotton.

If you’re having trouble with Centaurs, God help you when you attempt Skill Points guarded by Champions in Cursed Shore.

CursedShaitan.9720:

Yes, lets make the game boring and easy.

Too late.

DiamondMeteor.8345:

I don’t really see the problem.

Centaurs are a great enemy to farm due to Supply Bags dropping vast quantities of Cotton.

If you’re having trouble with Centaurs, God help you when you attempt Skill Points guarded by Champions in Cursed Shore.

Farming them is not the issue. The issue is when you fight said champion for Skill Challenge X, dodge once and you’ve re-aggro-ed the mobs that you just killed to get to said skill challenge.

It’s not always hard (unless the packs are large), but every time it’s god kitten annoying.

- give me harder mobs
- give me mobs which drop more loot
- give me mobs which when I kill them it does make a difference
- and make them respawn less often.

I want to feel that I am playing a game and not a grind-simulator.

It’s probably L2P issue, but since you’re solo and low lvl, I’d wager, you’re against a group event. If it’s not a group event, and you still can’t beat it, just L2P better and you’ll get it soon.

As for about making an impact for events, it’s been discussed countless times, and many said [and even a dev response iirc], it was pertaining to Personal Story. I mean, let’s face it, if someone killed SB and it will take a whole year for him to respawn, what will that do to new players? So many already are annoyed with “temporary” contents that players missed, what if all bosses in this game spawn only once a month just because some players would like to have an “impact”?

Even to the mobs, I’d hate for mobs to spawn every 10min, that’s just too long to wait, just cause someone wanted to make an impact…

I have to agree with OP. It’s not a issue now that I’m 80 and can solo champions, but whilst leveling up I shared the same frustrations. However, I’m not sure how this could be fixed without creating equal frustrations for the opposing crowd that doesn’t see this as a problem. My advice would be to just avoid these kind of densely populated areas if you’re not up for a challenge, you can always come back later when you’re 80 and laugh your way through it.

kittenball.1086:

I have to agree with OP. It’s not a issue now that I’m 80 and can solo champions, but whilst leveling up I shared the same frustrations. However, I’m not sure how this could be fixed without creating equal frustrations for the opposing crowd that doesn’t see this as a problem. My advice would be to just avoid these kind of densely populated areas if you’re not up for a challenge, you can always come back later when you’re 80 and laugh your way through it.

Difficulty can be created differently than infinitely respawning mobs. It is a broken and unenjoyable mechanic. If the mobs are overall tougher but respawn much rarely, the player feels that he is challenged and when he succeeds (i.e. clear the camp) he feels that he accomplished something.

Also, for those who think that slower respawn rates would lead to problems when more than 1 player is in the area competing for mobs, keep in mind that this problem has been solved long time ago by older MMOs (such as WoW) where the respawn timer of a mob depends on the number of players in its vecinity.

That is why in the initial zerg fests of new expansions, mobs keep respawning very fast and most players can get their quests done and when the areas become empty of players, that one singular guy killing the mobs will see them respawn much much rarely.

I feel that this game could be made overall much more fun if the combat emphasis of “questing” and exploring the areas would be much more oriented towards challenging encounters than it is right now. Currently as I am leveling in empty areas, I get the empty feeling of simply having to grind to no avail other than hitting the next level mark.

I for one would like to know where these mobs with super high respawn rates are

Because I’d like to farm them.

Vol.7601:

I for one would like to know where these mobs with super high respawn rates are

Because I’d like to farm them.

Keep in mind that if you are level 80 in super strong gear and full talents your experience might be quite different of their respawn rate. But for an averagely geared class of the level of the zone the respawn rates are pretty fast.

The most annoying respawn rates for me were in Harathi Hinterlands centaur camps, one I remember to be particularly frustrating was around the skill challenge in Modniir Gorge. There’s a Veteran Centaur caster guarding a skill challenge and some centaurs on the stairs leading to said challenge. I killed the Veteran, started the challenge, one Veteran beast spawned and while I was killing the Beast, the Veteran Centaur Caster respawned again. On an unfortunate dodge, I realized that all the centaurs on the stairs had also come back…

Anyway, the average respawn timer of centaur mobs in that area is around 1 minute.

Kranyum.5490:

wasting 10 minutes of my solo experience.

It wasn’t time wasted, you just got frustrated at the high respawn rate in that particular spot. Time wasted would be spending 10min doing a jumping puzzle and then falling at the last minute and having to restart. That would be your 10min being wasted as you have nothing to show for it. In your case you have XP and loot to show for your time spent.

Not all areas have respawn timers like that. The ones that do, from my experience, tend to be areas that are designed for more people.

And like someone else said, this game’s solo PvE is widely considered to be very easy by MMO standards. It’s a shame you are having so much trouble with it.

I agree OP, respawn rates could totally be adjusted.

An easier fix is to level up to 80 and ignore the mobs like everyone else does. Run through mobs, run through dungeons, focus on your goal. Not that i agree it’s the most fun, but i’ve come to the conclusion that, in most cases, that is how GW2 is meant to be played.

The damage the mobs do is not really meaningful or intrusive at a higher level, and in dungeons all the mobs aggro resets so i just assumed it was intended that you run through and ignore the mobs.

Scrambles.2604:

I agree OP, respawn rates could totally be adjusted.

An easier fix is to level up to 80 and ignore the mobs like everyone else does. Run through mobs, run through dungeons, focus on your goal. Not that i agree it’s the most fun, but i’ve come to the conclusion that, in most cases, that is how GW2 is meant to be played.

The damage the mobs do is not really meaningful or intrusive at a higher level, and in dungeons all the mobs aggro resets so i just assumed it was intended that you run through and ignore the mobs.

this makes me sad

Agree completely to the OP. I haven’t even made it to level 20 yet and I’m considering giving up for this very reason. I get that it’s an MMORPG, but if there’s nobody around to help out I should still be able to progress in this day and age, especially if the area isn’t even advertised as a group event.

Draknar.5748:

And like someone else said, this game’s solo PvE is widely considered to be very easy by MMO standards. It’s a shame you are having so much trouble with it.

Can’t help but think anyone who says this hasn’t played very many modern MMORPGs…