Nightfall... the game that practically plays itself.

This morning I left my hench/hero party in some god forsaken spot in Elonia (it was crawling with djinn, those firey lion resmers and big dinosaur necro things) while I went to take a pee...

Well what do you know... upon returning to my comp (and feeling much refreshed) I find that my hench/heroes are just mopping up from their second mob kill. (I know this because Olias had 10 minions and there were 6 drops for my char on the ground.)

Sadly... the game is now more akin to a chore... the chore being marching my henchies from one spot on the map to another. Maybe for a challenge I'll make Olias a N/R with a pet and a bow and Jin into a R/N (non-touch) with all blood skills like Vamp Gaze and Dark Pact... meh... they'd probably still beat out most PuGs.

BTW... Jin makes a sweet CG ranger. Just don't give her any other stances and fill the rest of the bar with interrupts.

Everyone knows that NPC's have godly reflexes. I was running this sick Rit Spike that I normally hold with, when, low and behold, we come up against a team with Dunkoro, who, low and behold, has infuse. Guess the rest...

lol, they say it gets much harder, my guildy said he and his heros/henches just ran from mobs in the finall areas, i'll bet you could mop up outside droks with heros/henches wile afk as well

this is true for most of the game.. but when I reached the final area of nightfall (won't spoil ) things got interesting Hero's didn't kill groups, even when setup was good ^^ I needed to work for my kills, and that is, of course, a good thing

WARNING! the post beneath this one contains spoilers which could spoil some interesting events late game

Edit for spoil warning

mrcake, you are a spoiler :O (i'll edit it my post above you to warn people ^^)

I doubt you can leave henchies/heroes alone in realm of torment, you can get your hat handed to you fast. The demons seem to multiply or summon new ones of themeselves too. Unless I was hallucinating or something.

Maybe I didn't have an excellent team build but I fought my way to Gate of Madness with hero/hench and if I didn't run some intelligent interference things went downhill fast.

Again, Arenanet can't win. People complain that henchmen sucked and were inadequate for the harder parts of the games, so they buff the AI and add Heroes. Now complaints that they make the game too easy and the game is now a chore...

On the digglings mission (i think that's the name), where you kill harpengers, you can flag them at the top of the stairs and they will kill the incoming mobs indefinitely while you run off to collect lights.

Honestly, I was afraid that this might happen. It's a difficult balance issue - the more you replace people with AI, the more apt the game is to playing itself for you.

might been the ennmys were wandering and went into agro of ur heros and or hench so they reacted and attacked

BOOOM! Right on the nail.

3 monk henchies with Spellbreaker = GG for casters!

I give my hero monks power drain because i no they can use it, i even add leech signet against those lion mesmers resser things

Well the boards are full of apologists too. It's amazing how they sprout up... like mushrooms on a rotting log.

So count me in the opposite camp. My critique is valid in the context it was given. Elonia is vast and for most of the game (save the last part) the monsters are no match for the hero/hench team. If I wanted Dungeon Siege II... I guess I'd be playing it right now and not GW.

I want to try this out.. henchies way using iway skills!

Loki has a point though. Just look at the giant threads complaining about the A.I. being too hard or being too stupid or blah blah blah. There's no pleasing people.

Now, while I agree that if you setup your heroes decently, they can practically play themselves in SOME areas. But if you really are so annoyed by it, then don't use heroes. Simple as that. Use the "dumber" henchies. Or even better/worse yet, use PUGS. Now THAT'S the best challenge yet.

Look at my location under my avatar...

I'd use PuGs if I could find them. The problem is the game is full of people with "8" over their heads. The other problem I have is that the level of PuG play has degenerated (which I didn't think was possible).

Heroes are so good that a lot of people overextend themselves in a PuG group now. They think a human monk can keep up with them like a hero monk could. Remember in Prophecies... learning occurred over the course of the game? You learned that you couldn't Leeroy every mob. The game rewarded patience and careful play while it punished stupidity. Nightfall doesn't seem to do that... at least not through what I've seen.

I guess there are a lot of threads complaining and I've reluctantly joined in the chorus.

Honestly, I do have my concerns about the direction the game is going. I personally feel like the 'multiplayer' in this game only applies to the part where you find yourself in an outpost/town and see that there are actually other people playing Guild Wars. Even if you say Guild Wars isn't an MMO and say it's a cooperative online role playing game there still feels like something is missing to me. What am I cooperating with? The AI? I feel some of the magic has been rubbed away.

I understand what you're saying. The magic of playing an MMO is that you get to play with/against other people. However part of GW's problem is the horrible community. People say that's just how gaming communities are, but I've been around and I have to say that the GW community is THE worst.

So what's my point? Because the community is so crappy and because heroes allow people to "solo" I'm not surprised that PUGS are pretty scarce now. If the community were a lot more mature, I'd go with PUGs over Heroes anyway. But if I have to put up with a bunch of snotnosed kids not listening or ordering me around, I'd go with heroes or guildies any day.

You know, I honestly wouldn't even want to bother with PuG's anymore these days for missions or whatever, unless it's guildies or something. I was in a mission area earlier today, and some random person was advertising for a group, and then included "No Dervishes" at the end. Somebody asked why, and the person spouted off some crap about how they die too much and bla bla bla. At first, I might have taken them up on a group or something, but I was playing a Derv, oh well, guess my heroes/henchies don't care.

Plus, I'm really interested in both the new professions, so I'm not gonna let some random moron, who deleted their derv because it didn't have 100 al armor and couldn't tank, spoil my fun in this game. Really getting annoyed with the crowd that declares certain professions useless because they suck at playing them, and ruining everyone else's chance in a PuG while playing that profession. But that's beside the point really.

Guess what I'm trying to say also, is that for people that have good experience in playing all the professions, their heroes will greatly benefit from that as well, so I see nothing wrong with that. If you don't have any experience playing a certain profession, some of them might not be of any use to you, and it's back to PuGs maybe. Who knows.

it is abit spooky how quiet places are now...

Maybe if the PUG mentality and the community didn't behave and structure and focus the way it did, game-life would be a lot more tolerable. But by the time I got to Cavalon in Factions, I had to quit for 4 months to retain my sanity. Now I'm back and loving the minimal player involvement. When i want to play with people, I do. And I play with good people. Not even guildies, but just people you meet in town and think are nice or something. That kind of ability to choose is i think HELPING the game in turn. Maybe you got lucky w/ your PUG's, but I've had people all map back and refuse to accept me because I was a muslim (yes, someone called me a muslim. i'm an agnostic jew XD), had people flame me out for hundreds of private messages long because I was a smiter monk in kryta (what's better?) and various other things. It's tasteless, crude, and incredibally annoying. The kind of things that get said would have people arrested for disturbing the peace and harrasement in real life. It's pathetic.

I guess the community has reaped what it has sown. People are correct when they characterize it as full of snot-nosed kiddies and foul-mouthed teens. There definitely is some of that.

On the other hand I've also seen that there are some great people out there who will be selfless and helpful.

While heroes help you avoid the bad elements in the community, the also lock you out from the good ones. Good people who would look for a PuG are now gone... playing with their hero party.

Maybe heroes will make guild play more relevant, but I fail to see how. If everyone is off in their own hero-fueled adventure, how are you going to meet potential guildmates?

No, I remember all the idiots getting run to Droknar's and then screwing up the last missions for me repeatedly and often. I do not miss it.

This is, by design in a instanced world, probably the largest hurdle to overcome. It is not so much the option to use henchmen as it is the natural division of players through multiple instances of the same content. The option to use AI for team members does not help this situation much, but then again when the only real tool for party forming is spamming in local chat like a trader there is a larger issue at hand.

Currently, i should be looking for a different guild to join myself. However, when faced with the fact that my "best" option in this regard lies within searching the internet outside of the game and trying to create some kind of resume, i feel like im in conflict rather than trying to enjoy myself.

I've always been slightly annoyed with the game play in guild wars PvE. It forces you to play with a team, be it people you know, random pickups, or computer controlled players.

Coming from a diablo2 background i absolutely hate it. I don't like being forced to play with other people 100% of the time. another thing i can't stand is that you really don't have to do much till late game. even before heroes in cantha you can just bounce around with hencies and kill all, you aren't really necessary.

I really wish guild wars could to scaled difficulty and drops per player in the instance like diablo 2 did, i really liked that system. right now though there's only one style of play in PvE, Hench master, and it feels so much like the skele minion necro in diablo 2 its really kind of boring, no personalization, just watching hencies do your work for you while the game progresses as you move from point A to point B.

there is lots of group strategy in elite missions, but it should stay there. there needs to be a place for elite missions and a place for "normal" play.

However i realize this game is advertised as the game where you"never fight alone" and unfortunately is true...

ever since the farming Nerf i don't think I've even bothered with playing PvE. NF campaign looks cool and all but, i wanna take my rit and blow the s*** out of some monsters instead of seeing some kind of pathetic 80 dmg stuff from a supposedly 140 dmg spell and my henchies do the rest.

I loved exploring in the early part of all of the campains where you could solo. after that with the massive 8 player parties it gets boring fast. You do it just to get to new places, armor, and skills, you can't just run around and enjoy the scenery.

I think of one example in D2 vs guild wars( i realize they aren't the same game but indulge me as a show why guild wars PvE is sow much slower paced, and therefore boring, and D2 solo style is so much better IMHO)

take the elementalist and sorceress class in the two games, the elementalist is advertised as doing big dmg. I have to laugh, in D2 the sorceress would lay waste to all surrounding area melting monsters in flame, lighting, and exploding shards of ice( albeit cartoony) it was fun. and you had to be careful too, you could get nailed in 2 hits and die. i liked that fast paced action much More than

.. hire seven random hencies, find monster group, wait 2 minutes, while you do little or nothing,letting your "never fight alone" hencies do your work for you move to next group, makes exploring slow and painful, and the battles are just as bad...

i guess thats enough of a rant, didn't really intend for it to go that far, but really, do you guys enjoy running around and having to work with 7 other guys all the time? Don't get me wrong. i Love this gAmes PvP, it owns D2 PvP. but its PvE is a bit lacking in the excitement factor.

It just struck me that those same snotnosed kids may be thinking the same of you: "How dare this n00b order me around instead of letting me order them around!"

Irony aside, I know the feeling - I've been fairly lucky with PuGs as a rule while playing GW, but I've had the odd bad experience, and plenty of times when I've taken henchmen (or small groups of players with henchmen) and done better than with the PuG I've just abandoned (not always successful, but usually more successful than with those Leeroying idiots that seem to think that a single-digit energy call from the healer is the signal to charge)... I generally have more of a problem finding PuGs in the first place than getting bad ones, which is why I like having heroes (fed up with babysitting level 12 henchmen in Kryta and the jungle...) They mean I, as an Australian player, don't need to choose my playing times for when there will be a decent number of people around to have a chance of progressing through the storyline.

That said, I can see how making 'henching' the game could make the average PuG worse - the more players who can hench it, the more of the better players who aren't joining PuGs any more, and hence the weaker the PuGs get. On the other hand, from the perspective of someone with a fairly small guild and who normally plays during relatively quiet hours... heroes, put simply, mean that I may actually get to complete the Titan Quests one of these days.

I didnt mean to imply that I order anyone around, just saying that those snotnoses just dont listen in general. Some dont even follow the mission objectives.

I honestly think that's why so many people love Pre-Searing. You actually have a choice right from the beginning, no matter your skill level. You could go out alone and do just as well as you could teamed up with someone, and you didn't have to focus on a specific 'solo build' in order to do so. Later in the game, there simply are no areas like that.

Not saying it's a bad thing, just an observation.

I love Heros >_>

*Huggles Zhed Shadowhoof*

I beat Nightfall with them, and They'll make me think twice about ever grouping with anyone in PvE again apart from friends and such that need help.

That's like this one time, that I went AFK and the rest of my team beat Elona's Reach without me.

You're right. This game does play it's self.

Maybe its just me, but I think having 3 heroes per char is way too many =/
Like....2 players for a fully customized team? I know some people prefer that...but wasn't GW supposed to be CORPG?

That was the first thing I noticed coming from Everquest was how hard it was to find a good group. Believe me, I would much, MUCH rather spend a little time before I begin a quest/mission spamming for a group or trying to round up some guildies, as opposed to being in HUGE LAGGY ZONES filled with pretty much the same nonsense you see in towns and outposts (especially the PvP servers).

Not to mention the fact you don't have to worry about certain places being camped for good drops, or corpse camping, or spawn-camping, or players intenionally pulling "trains" of mobs to the zones to kill other players, or any of the nasty "grind" type features that non-instanced zones bring to the party.

A-net might be up against a rock and a hard place, and I personally think they found a pretty good compromise. Want a PuG? Be patient and find one. Don't feel like it? Grab some heroes and hit the ground running. Kudos A-Net.

Thats the thing. Anet will NEVER win with feedback from multiple regions from around the world. However they can pick and choose problems that get the most heat from gamers.

Fortunately the constant complainers here don't speak for everyone.

One cure: Find a pve guild.

No one forces you to play with heroes. Find other people who hate npc parties and form a guild.

I have nothing against choice.

Henchmen (note not heroes) win most PvE battles until really late in all of the campaigns anyway. It's not just Nightfall!

I'm in the same "situation". I create a team of heroes and henchies and find them performing to my expectations, i.e. killing everything in front of them. I don't even direct them half the time, since they are capable of taking down targets on their own.

When I want to play with people, I do. But almost every time I do, I'm reminded how poor some people play, and find myself going back to my AI-controlled team. I just picked up Norgu as well, can't wait for the instant-interrupts for my team.

A few days ago I cleared out a mob but then got pulled away from the computer for about ten minutes. Olias and his band of minions just stood there with the rest of our party while I went and did what I had to do. Lo and behold, when I returned, Olias had still kept the minions up! I was like, "wow, dude."


Hate that? How could I hate that? I've been hoping for this kind of gameplay for a long time, and the smile hasn't left my face since I opened the NF box. (Okay, the Garden of Seborhin mission had me a little heated the other night, but that's IT! I swear!)

I've not bought Nightfall yet, and it's because of some of the reasons already posted. I can complete Thunderhead Keep with a full hench team (I was mesmer) and have seen first hand that the hench AI is much improved and this reduces the satisfaction gained from doing what most people would bi*ch about being the hardest mission in Prophecies. With Heroes, I'd consider doing the bonus as well

Coming from a hard core Baldur's Gate (preferably II) fan, I thought that the hero system was awesome. If I ever needed to a Minion Master, boot up Olias, and enjoy. And the fact that I can customize my monks to not using Healing Breeze is awesome.

However, as nearly everyone has stated, this makes PUG groups harder to come by. And while I myself was not very fond with PUGs (I tried THK 7 times with Pugs, last with hench, and BEAT it with them. What does that say?), it was a very fundemental element of Guild Wars.

All it's about is choice. I like that you can control AI, because it makes playing with real players much simplier. Before NF, I felt that Guild Wars made missions that would needed real players. The fact that you have the choice to either play with people or play alone is now my favorite GW feature.

I think PUGging has gone way way downhill in Nightfall


I brought my ranger over from tyria and joined up a Paragon at consulate docks, we got a necro and a wammo and the rest were the Para's heroes. i asked if he wanted me to pull up my hero Olias, cause hes a MM, but since Olias wasnt lvl 20...i got a "No".

We failed the mish because we glitched out (the cinema to open the gate didn't trigger), but regardless it wasnt a very fun group and i had an easier time with heroes and hench when i beat it later on.