Guild Wars 2

I have been going back and playing through the earlier parts of the living story with some alts and I noticed that there is definitely a punishment mechanism for solo play. When I play these instances solo all of the enemies ignore the NPC’s and just attack me, certain skills are delayed by a half second or so especially healing skills, quality of loot scales down dramatically, and overall NPC’s aggro EVERYTHING on the map and run them to me and then forget how to fight or just stand back fighting trash when I am trying to advance through an area quickly. This doesn’t happen when I am in a group (except for NPC’s fighting every single trash mob), only in the story instances that I try to solo.

What really just pushed me over the edge is that I was trying to complete the recon demolitionist achievement and when there were only 3 corpses left (all 3 mined btw) Canach became an epic hero and singlehandedly killed every single mob that I tried to pull into the waiting mine. Not only did he kill EVERYTHING in the last part of the instance by himself, he didn’t lose a drop of health while all the other NPC’s were melted by the Mordrem. He tanked all the mobile mobs at the top of the hill and of course, I didn’t get the achievement.

I don’t mind having to work harder when playing solo I kind of expect that and I do understand that this is an MMO and group play is encouraged, but when there are mechanics in the game that prevent me from using skills, advancing through a story, or earning achievements because I am playing solo it’s a bit frustrating and the Devs should be called out on it. Just my 2 cents.

I’d like to echo this sentiment.

I know the feels. Since the beta weekends, this has bothered me. I actually voiced this exact thought in a few of their feedback prompts during the beta. I have to say that so far i have leveled at least one of every profession to max and the mesmer is the one where it really kills me. You lose a ton of immersion and excitement while playing through these stories on a mesmer. Much more so than the other classes.

@Gord: Canach (as well as Caithe) is invulnerable in that LS instance. If you’re having trouble with the mobs, you can literally just run away and leave them to kill all the enemies (if very slowly) for you.

The living story instances are meant to be done solo. If you do it in a group, you’re simply trivializing it and cheating any achievements. You’re not being punished for soloing it, you’re just accustomed to playing the game on easy mode compared to its now normal mode.

The way solo players are actually punished is caused by the personal loot system and scaling, which results in an inverse risk vs reward system. If you zerg regular content for example, it upscales, resulting in more rewards and a reduction in difficulty. With the opposite however, the personal loot system guarantees that you are never compensated. Silverwastes is on the right track by removing all loot from event mobs and instead tying it to the events. There, a small group can actually be far more efficient when compared to the zerg.

I didn’t notice such a thing. Did those achievements a couple of days ago and everything went smoothly. The mine thing is very easy. During the last part my party got wasted by the sheer amount of mordrem, but I survived and I still get the achievement. Maybe the ‘survival’ of the party didn’t matter at this point.

There are certain storylines that can be difficult here and there depending on your playstyle or your class.

I’ve always found the Vigil story for defending the Fort in Kessex Hills from the undead quite tedious and challenging, but I just played through it on my necromancer and I effortlessly exploded those undead like nobody’s business.

Profession does have a lot to do with it. I do better on Warriors, Guardians, Rangers than I do on Necros and Engies (probably because I’m not as proficient with them).

Gord.8654:

I have been going back and playing through the earlier parts of the living story with some alts and I noticed that there is definitely a punishment mechanism for solo play. When I play these instances solo all of the enemies ignore the NPC’s and just attack me, certain skills are delayed by a half second or so especially healing skills, quality of loot scales down dramatically, and overall NPC’s aggro EVERYTHING on the map and run them to me and then forget how to fight or just stand back fighting trash when I am trying to advance through an area quickly. This doesn’t happen when I am in a group (except for NPC’s fighting every single trash mob), only in the story instances that I try to solo.

The mobs ignore the NPCs in the new instances because the npcs are invulnerable. Either let the npc tank for a while, or pull fewer mobs.

Also, I believe you need to learn how story instances work:
There is no extra delay on skills when you play solo… that’s nonsense.
There is absolutely NO loot in story instances, running solo or in a group….

What really just pushed me over the edge is that I was trying to complete the recon demolitionist achievement and when there were only 3 corpses left (all 3 mined btw) Canach became an epic hero and singlehandedly killed every single mob that I tried to pull into the waiting mine. Not only did he kill EVERYTHING in the last part of the instance by himself, he didn’t lose a drop of health while all the other NPC’s were melted by the Mordrem. He tanked all the mobile mobs at the top of the hill and of course, I didn’t get the achievement.

For Recon Demolitionist you have to MINE the corpses, no need for them to explode to get it. You can get all achievements for that instance in one Run….

So Canach aggroing everything is irrelevant to you getting the achievement. You probably missed one corpse somewhere, hardly the game (or the difficulty) to blame here.

I don’t mind having to work harder when playing solo I kind of expect that and I do understand that this is an MMO and group play is encouraged, but when there are mechanics in the game that prevent me from using skills, advancing through a story, or earning achievements because I am playing solo it’s a bit frustrating and the Devs should be called out on it. Just my 2 cents.

As I said above, there is no mechanic that prevents you from using skills, advancing through the story or earning achievements when you are solo…. I don’t know what you are talking about

I play 80% solo, and I’ve yet to feel punished for it.

Some people are exaggerating.

Certainly, the Ranger with his soloplay and strong Longbow skills does trivialize the game a bit. At least I could do the mordrem thresher achievement (with the wolves who kill Marjory’s minions) comparatively easily. Especially skill 4 is a bliss, nice knockback. Yeah I know I don’t use that skill in group play, most hated one in the game, isn’kitten-)

Gord.8654:

I have been going back and playing through the earlier parts of the living story with some alts and I noticed that there is definitely a punishment mechanism for solo play. When I play these instances solo all of the enemies ignore the NPC’s and just attack me, certain skills are delayed by a half second or so especially healing skills, quality of loot scales down dramatically, and overall NPC’s aggro EVERYTHING on the map and run them to me and then forget how to fight or just stand back fighting trash when I am trying to advance through an area quickly. This doesn’t happen when I am in a group (except for NPC’s fighting every single trash mob), only in the story instances that I try to solo.

What really just pushed me over the edge is that I was trying to complete the recon demolitionist achievement and when there were only 3 corpses left (all 3 mined btw) Canach became an epic hero and singlehandedly killed every single mob that I tried to pull into the waiting mine. Not only did he kill EVERYTHING in the last part of the instance by himself, he didn’t lose a drop of health while all the other NPC’s were melted by the Mordrem. He tanked all the mobile mobs at the top of the hill and of course, I didn’t get the achievement.

I don’t mind having to work harder when playing solo I kind of expect that and I do understand that this is an MMO and group play is encouraged, but when there are mechanics in the game that prevent me from using skills, advancing through a story, or earning achievements because I am playing solo it’s a bit frustrating and the Devs should be called out on it. Just my 2 cents.

The living story instances are totally soloable, the bosses and the enemies downscale a lot. Ele, engineer, thief, ranger, and guardian I have solo the living story on.

For my main class I don’t feel punished at all playing solo with the exception of a few tedious storyline instances. Some of the achievements for Living Story are certainly smoother with a couple allies.

I only have trouble in solo play with classes I’m unfamiliar with. Playing a thief main I have certain tendencies when I fight and sometimes I end up exploding myself when I play other classes like I play a thief.

The game has tons of opportunity for solo play, but it also has opportunities created specifically for group play.

You can’t have everything solo. That’s called a single-player RPG. Sooner or later you’re gonna have to /wave at another human being and ask for help with something.

Thing is, the LS missions are built in a way – mechanics and story-wise as well – that focus on you and you only. There is supposed to be one Boss, you, the owner of the instance. If you bring someone along to your instance, they will invariably become a meaningless sidekick, unable to interact with even non-essential objects such as the books in Hidden Arcana. You can’t realistically play LS missions as a group. LS is meant to be solo.
The real problem here revolves very much around class and mob AI. Mobs do completely ignore the immortal npc-s and gang up on the player, regardless of whether their class is able to play the role of tank. This, for example in a mission like Tracking the Aspect Masters, results in guaranteed deaths if you’re an ele or similar class not meant to tank 234 mobs at once. Sticking to this example, you 1) can’t pull slowly here, almost every mob aggroes immediately in the first fight 2) the veteran thrasher alone will kill you as soon as you run out of healing and evasion skills. The average ele simply cannot outheal/outlast the constant barrage of homing vines this thing spews at them relentlessly (mind you my ele is not even full dps, she is dps/balanced for more survivability, but it’s to no avail here). The thrasher will only turn on Canach and Rox if you simply choose to just stay away and let them bring it down themselves. Which I’m sure some people are okay with or even find funny, but if I can’t participate in fights because it’s better to let the npcs do it alone, then why am I there? Then I’m not needed and let the entire thing be just a string of cutscenes.

The immortality of story npcs is actually the #1 indicator that there’s a problem. Why do they have to be immortal? Back in the Personal Story, Trahearne and everyone else could die. They could be revived, sure, but if you let them die, the fights got harder to manage. Here I’m pretty darn sure they had to have been made immortal so that some insanely difficult mob (not boss!) fights wouldn’t reset constantly because of everyone dying. Tell you what, this is not necessary. It’s not necessary to have the same mob difficulty in an instance meant for solo as outside in the Silverwastes, which is a group-heavy map. Or, have insanely difficult mobs, but give them a brain. If the player’s a tank-capable class, everything should indeed aggro on them by default. It would be up to the player to keep mobs off the npcs, who would play a dps role. If you let them die, you won’t have enough dps to kill the mobs in time before they eventually overwhelm you. If you’re a support/dps class, most mobs would focus on more tank-capable npcs, and your job would be to dps while also keeping the npcs alive. Again if you let them die, the mobs will come for you and eat you up.

This system worked back in GW1, why doesn’t it work here?

(As yet another alternative, bring Mercenary Heroes to GW2 for mission instances. You have no idea how much I’d love to bring at least one of my other chars along to kick mordrem kitten with.)

Edit: to the OP: there’s indeed no such thing as a deliberate skill delay, sometimes skill buttons can be a bit unresponsive, but any delay you experience is almost certainly the product of server lag.

SlayerGT.6805:

The immortality of story npcs is actually the #1 indicator that there’s a problem. Why do they have to be immortal? Back in the Personal Story, Trahearne and everyone else could die.

Trahearne has been a bit sturdier when I first played the personal story, I think. In the end that sturdy that people from my server claimed he’s immortal. That brought me to watch him (die and make screenshots of it – well and laugh at him) – he doesn’t know that red circles are bad for him – no npc knows that and maybe that’s the reason newer npcs are immortal. But: I don’t really like personal or living stories, so I’ve already forgotten whether or not there’s a lot of red circles in LS2

Well, I noticed a differrence in the recent LS too. The monsters seem to obviously focus me (even though I don’t attack and only summon illusions on my mesmer), which is weird and certainly not normal AI behaviour. Dunno if this is intended, just sharing my observation.

Edit: “Observation” fits better than “experience”

No offense…. but if you can’t complete these missions solo, it is not the game’s fault it is yours.

Tao.5096:

I play 80% solo, and I’ve yet to feel punished for it.

Some people are exaggerating.

Exactly my thoughts.

Everything the OP is mentioning, is just a side-effect from how the game works. Indeed, these annoying tidbits are more apparent when you’re playing solo. But “punishing solo play” implies that ArenaNet does this intentionally, which is obviously not the case.

I’ve done the latest episode or chapter or whatever with four characters (which is unusual for me): ele, mesmer, guardian, and ranger. The ele got roflstomped pretty much all the way through, but oddly enough only ran into the lurcher (you rrrraaang?) once in the maze — so I was surprised on the repeats that the darn thing kept coming back. The mesmer got roflstomped by all the bosses; not unexpected. The guardian got roflstomped a few times, which was somewhat surprising as he’s usually quite sturdy. The ranger, on the other hand, only got roflstomped at the very end, and only twice, by the kitten bees. Couldn’t outrun ‘em, ran out of dodges. “No, not the bees. Aahh.” Note: she got downed several times, yes, but got back up again and was only ’dead’ twice.

Clearly, the thing to do here is nerf rangers.

I’ve only played these instances solo, so I don’t really have any basis for comparison but I haven’t found them particularly difficult.

I definitely haven’t noticed any delay on skills. That sounds more like you were getting lag.

I’m afraid it’s your class/build that’s giving you a hard time, OP.

When LS2 first started I tried running through it with my thief and warrior, both of which had an incredibly difficult time because several mechanics crippled their builds: the thief relies heavily on on-kill effects to keep her health and vigor up, which none of the story mobs trigger, and the warrior was melee-oriented, which meant he either spent his time chasing bosses that wouldn’t stop moving or running away from bosses that dropped PBAoEs like it was going out of fashion.

After switching to a zerk ranger I’ve been able to do every chapter and get every achievement (except Dancer in the Dark, did party up for that) solo and with relative ease. I suspect this will be true for any high DPS ranged build as well, so give that a try even if you don’t have a ranger.

I’ve ran my Ele, Mesmer, Ranger and Thief through LS with minimal problems. Got all the achievements solo too. I just had to plan accordingly to each characters playstyle. The skill delay sounds like lag to me. I don’t really feel “punished” for playing solo. Just my take on the subject. o/

So far I’ve run the most recent chapter on a Necro, a Ranger and a guard. No real problem with any of it.

An MMO is supposed to reward cooperative play… but that doesn’t mean that solo players are punished. Its just not easy to solo.

As someone else already said, you don’t have to explode the mines to get the achievement; all you have to do is set the charge. I even did both of the mine achievements in the same instance (didn’t set them on the way up, and then set them after the helicopter showed up).

And, with the exception of the Dancer in the Dark achievement for the most recent LS, I have had absolutely no trouble doing any of the chapters or achievements solo. So, I can’t say my experience has been the same as yours.

I do most story mode content solo…

Not feeling any burdens. Not sure if this thread is more or less hyperbole or just a matter of not enough time in game / familiarity with the games mechanics.

Edit: for reference when i say most, the only times i don’t is when assisting guild mates who like the OP find it difficult. I have 1 of every class at 80 and i’ve played through every piece of the content with them. Certain classes do have an easier time, but that doesn’t mean Anet is out to get yours.

I feel that group play is punished more, at least outside of things designed for groups like dungeons.

I find it an absolute chore to go map completing with other people when everyone has to hit a mob to count for credit, even if you’re in a party. Since I build all my characters for max direct damage, that generally means I have to not do anything until the other(s) hit it, which depending on where we are and how over-levelled we are, may mean it dies before even I could hit it.

Takes extra time just because we have to wait for spawns for kill hearts because not everyone got credit.

Tachenon.5270:

The ranger, on the other hand, only got roflstomped at the very end, and only twice, by the kitten bees. Couldn’t outrun ‘em, ran out of dodges. “No, not the bees. Aahh.” Note: she got downed several times, yes, but got back up again and was only ’dead’ twice.

Clearly, the thing to do here is nerf rangers.

Play ranger, only get half the aggro #ranger4live
But really, afaik the one with the most dmg and/or toughness gets the aggro. Which is obviously the player. Non-immortal NPCs die like flies and hit like one, too.

It’s not that they actively punish you. It’s that they don’t reward you for solo play, and NPCs are just poorly designed with achievements in mind.

Would be amazing if NPCs in instances acted more like pets; if you could tell them to attack, tell them to stay passive, etc.

Sometimes they are a worse enemy than the mobs.

The personal stories aren’t going to be fixed without it costing you a second time sadly. If they can’t monetize it they won’t fix it it’s too far into the lifetime of the title for them to actually put these things on the schedule. Just thought you should know.

Oh and this is yet another example of a suggestions folder suggestion that disappeared early on into the game.

For Recon Demolitionist you have to MINE the corpses, no need for them to explode to get it. You can get all achievements for that instance in one Run….

Yeah, I cleared both by doing a run without using any of the mines, then once credit dinged for that achievement I just backtracked and placed all the mines, done.

No offense…. but if you can’t complete these missions solo, it is not the game’s fault it is yours.

Elitist bullkitten …

I have 0 problem to play my character in open PvE, but I can’t play it when three elite mobs focus me and are allowed to use chain CC, even less when in restricted space where I can’t move.
No even speaking about mobs which do a short retreat to have full life again and come back to you.

I have 0 problem doing such mission with a ranger cause my pet will tank and probably with any class able to tank. So I’m supposed to play a tank in any scenario cause of this.

This is a game design fault.

PS : By the way, “signet of bloodlust” are bugged cause they won’t never stack in scenarios.

Aristide de Beaumont.8623:

PS : By the way, “signet of bloodlust” are bugged cause they won’t never stack in scenarios.

There was a thread about this. Apparently these mobs and the ones in the Vinewrath don’t give exp. That means all the ‘on kill’ sigils, traits, runes, food, etc. don’t work. Pets with Master’s Bond also don’t gain points and get stronger.

I noticed this in the Vinewrath lanes. My ranger got there with no bloodlust. After killing awhile I noticed I still didn’t have a stack. I checked my pet, no Master’s Bond.

This new system badly effects anything that depend on activation upon kill which might be why some people are having unexpected problems.

I don’t know how to respond to OP without coming of as an elitist…

Keep in mind that LS is basically the end-game. And as such it makes sense for it to be catered towards people that does have a good knowledge about the game and their class.

The achievements are also supposed to be rather hard (although most of them aren’t), with the story itself being quite easy.

. . . punish . . .

Look, punishing solo play? That was GW1, where you had to make a group with early on rock-stupid henchmen or later on some heroes you could micromanage . . . and fill the rest of the party with henchmen.

Who all leeched off your loo and gold drops.. All of them.

In contrast? GW2 is a paradise of solo play.

Tao.5096:

I play 80% solo, and I’ve yet to feel punished for it.

Some people are exaggerating.

Gotta echo this sentiment. Dunno what to tell you, OP – I don’t have these problems.

I never felt punished, yes I’ve been dying in personal story, but I’ve always succeeded at some point. Then again I haven’t experienced endgame LS.
You could assemble your skill settings to the instance…

I’ve always entertained the idea that living story achievements are meant for group play, and this was their answer to new “dungeons”.

Some achievements are really difficult solo. I don’t even bother with them anymore. I preferred the old living story achievements, since it was out in the open world. It felt more social.

Astral Projections.7320:

Aristide de Beaumont.8623:

PS : By the way, “signet of bloodlust” are bugged cause they won’t never stack in scenarios.

There was a thread about this. Apparently these mobs and the ones in the Vinewrath don’t give exp. That means all the ‘on kill’ sigils, traits, runes, food, etc. don’t work. Pets with Master’s Bond also don’t gain points and get stronger.

I noticed this in the Vinewrath lanes. My ranger got there with no bloodlust. After killing awhile I noticed I still didn’t have a stack. I checked my pet, no Master’s Bond.

This new system badly effects anything that depend on activation upon kill which might be why some people are having unexpected problems.

Its not a new system .. it is really old and you already had that for example at
Claw of Jormag event .. however its not such a big problem there as it is if you
are in those solo instances having to kill hordes and hardes of mobs, and
finally some overpowered endmobs .. and simply don’t get your stacks and
your traits don’t trigger.

I love how whenever something is hard, it’s clearly not a problem with the player; they’re just being punished for not choosing a better playstyle. Right??

Andred.1087:

I love how whenever something is hard, it’s clearly not a problem with the player; they’re just being punished for not choosing a better playstyle. Right??

So is it “better playstyle” in this case, when i just overwrite my stacking sigill with
5% more damage and 7% more critchance ?

And i really did that .. however thx god i don’t do dungeons, because then it would
be “bad playstyle” maybe to use those sigills, and i have to overwrite them again.

This thread is more than a month old, I’m pretty certain that the OP already moved on. And I can understand that some players post threads because they’ve got a moment of frustration, no need to keep this story alive.

Beldin.5498:

Andred.1087:

I love how whenever something is hard, it’s clearly not a problem with the player; they’re just being punished for not choosing a better playstyle. Right??

So is it “better playstyle” in this case, when i just overwrite my stacking sigill with
5% more damage and 7% more critchance ?

And i really did that .. however thx god i don’t do dungeons, because then it would
be “bad playstyle” maybe to use those sigills, and i have to overwrite them again.

Stacking sigils aren’t used in most “meta” dungeon runs anymore

Hi OP, I’ve only done LS solo (on a glass thief), and found it a little too easy, TBH.

Maybe we could give you some advice? What class are you on, what traits, and what weapon? Is there a certain mechanic that’s giving you a hard time?

Most things in this game that seem hard don’t need a nerf — usually the player just isn’t aware of how they can counter the bosses in their class

Anyhoo, we’re here to help if you want some pointers!

Edit: lol, didn’t realize this thread was an old necro. Offer still stands though

The only thing I’ve found difficult solo in the entirety of LS2 was getting the Dancer in the Dark achievement. Granted 70% of the difficulty was getting the bugged challenge mote to spawn in the first place, but the rest of it was actually hard, especially at the 20% 6-dodge phases. Still completed it solo because I wanted to, but that took some time to do.

The rest of it can be completed on a full glass thief build, which doesn’t even have the invulns a full glass ele has, and nonexistent heals. Anything tankier should find the instances easier, if somewhat slower.

Also, zergs do complete open-world content slower than soloists do due to HP scaling, though 5 man teams tend to be the most optimal point in general. For instance it used to take me 3-4 minutes to solo Golem Mark II, but now zergs generally kill it in 7 minutes (8 min left on timer). If anything, the game punishes players for zerging. Nowadays I generally tag up and ping my location before soloing a champion, which allows me to bring its HP down to 10% alone while they run, while those who come in later still can get the chest.

Strange, the fact that the game is too solo friendly is the reason gw2 isn’t as good as it could be in my opinion. The only things that require a group of players are world bosses(lulz), dungeons, fotm and guild missions. The rest of the game can be solo’d and its painfully easy. I miss the days of gw1 with missions that required a group of people to progress further into the game. Not to mention the glory of uw/fow, but I’m getting off topic. If they made the game any more solo friendly the game will begin to die. (imo)

sanedude.9450:

Strange, the fact that the game is too solo friendly is the reason gw2 isn’t as good as it could be in my opinion. The only things that require a group of players are world bosses(lulz), dungeons, fotm and guild missions. The rest of the game can be solo’d and its painfully easy. I miss the days of gw1 with missions that required a group of people to progress further into the game. Not to mention the glory of uw/fow, but I’m getting off topic. If they made the game any more solo friendly the game will begin to die. (imo)

Only back in the days of proph only were real people required to do missions because henchmen were horribad. Nightfall just made things far more dumbed down with builds like sabway and discord spam. You can run around with 7 heroes now. You dont even need to bother with henchman unless you only have like 3 heroes. If you think gw1 wasnt solo friendly in its current form you’re wrong.

Speaking from a pve point of view.

I’m still seeing people trying to get help for the final personal story. In what way does it improve the game to have people eternally not be able to complete a PS because they designed the final PS to be so difficult you need a group because they have a serious problem with BALANCE in game design? Please enlighten us with your “nothing’s wrong everything is perfect you’re doing it wrong” philosophy because I’m sure people who play other games that are actually balanced when doing things like this to see the lore would like to know how there game is terrible because it’s actually balanced properly and how they must be simply tired of having a great time in a game that’s got 0 design flaws in PVE combat because their game devs actually care about PVE combat balance issues….We’re waiting…