Playing With Henchmen - Is It Possible?

I realize "teamwork" is the goal here, but nobody I know plays this game and nobody will group with me inside cities. So I am stuck with henchmen, who are apparently the dumbest NPCs on the face of the Earth. I'm a level 20 Necromancer going through "The Scar", trying to get to my next Ascension mission.

Along the way, there are large groups of level 22 Hydra as well as Centaur who run in groups of nine thousand. Is it even possible to solo as a Necromancer (and by solo, I mean with henchmen)? Is this point in the game even supposed to be hard, or are Necromancers just gimped beyond hell in PvE?

Or...should I just be trying to play this part in the game with players and not henchmen? I'm seriously getting pissed off here.

Tyria Normal Mode is definitely doable with only henchmen from beginning to end, just make sure that you have a proper build, learn to aggro (block henchmen far back with the green flag, and lure mobs little by little with a flatbow) and to ping targets, beware of patrols, escape when necessary, and in general pay big attention.

As far as the build is concerned, i assume that you own only prophecies, and that you are stuck in the desert, so that you haven't reached southern shiverpeaks yet. If this is the case, it probably would be useful to play as a minion master (minions soak up a lot of damage, which instead would be taken by henchies): animate bone horror/minions, blood of the master, dark bond (blood magic), barbs (curses), mark of pain (curses), insidious parasite (curses), enfeebling blood (curses)/weaken armor (curses), and a hard res if you are monk secondary.

I'm not sure what you mean by this. >,<

Southern Shiverpeaks doesn't sound familiar, no. I bought the Trilogy off Steam, however.

That's the reason I made a Necro in the first place. I loved the idea of having a little army backing me. The problem with this is, it seems like you have to fully rely on your retarded-as-hell henchmen / heroes to do all the fighting for you until you manage to get your army going.

But, I am still interested in this Death/Blood/Curses (or I guess just Death and Curses) build you're suggesting. I've always heard it as a Death Magic / Soul Reaping / Healing Prayers deal. I'm not looking for something to play the game for me, but I would like something that's self-sufficient and can get through the storyline well enough.

By green flag, swahnee is referring to the commands located under the minimap/radar. They allow you to force your henchmento stay in one spot so they don't pull too many enemies at once.

What elite skill are you using? It shouldn't take you too long to build an army of minions. Ultimately just focus on drawing out whatever enemies you can. You should be able to pull a few hydra away from the large group at a time.

Yes, it's possible. Difficulty increases once you reach the Crystal Desert, as you have discovered. Try pulling mobs to you by picking up a longbow or flatbow, and flag your party at double aggro range from a group. Shoot one of them, run back as soon as your arrow leaves the bow, swap back to your normal weapon, and start calling targets. You'll probably want to release the flag on the way back so the enemies don't all target you.

I don't think I have any elite skills available at this point in the game. Feel free to correct me on that. But I must say that my undead minions absolutely destroy when combined with Mark of Pain ... I'm loving it.


Ah, I get what you're saying. Thanks, I'll try that out!

You find the first elite skills in the desert missions. Order of the Vampire is the first one.

Since you're using henchmen only, I suggest that you include both monks in your party. Alesia is notoriously bad, but Lena is probably one of the better functioning henchies in GW.

Something else you can do to help yourself out is to take your character to Nightfall via a quest in LA and go through the first little bit of that to pick up a few Heroes to help you out. It doesn't take long to pick them up - just a few quests. Then you can set them up the way you want and if you do it right, they'll do a much better job than regular henchmen.

noooooooo. Don't go to Nightfall and make it (too) easy on yourself. Do Prophecies, then Factions and the Nightfall. And then buy Eye of the North. "Guild Wars, the way it was supposed to be played..."

I totally agree, did it also this way and was the most fun I had in the game. Better would be is to join some guild and play through the desert with another person.
I envy you, very nice gaming hours in store. Wish I could go back

Firstly, in guild wars mob spawns do not change depending on how big your party is. That means when you enter an area, regardless of whether it's just you, or you and 7 henchies, the same enemies appear.

So as you'd imagine, being completely by yourself is going to be very difficult (in fact it's just about impossible, if this is the first time you're playing through prophercies). But if you bring a full party of 8 it gets a lot easier.

Prophercies in normal mode is defintely playable with just yourself and henchies:
1. Read the pages MisterB linked to
2. Some of the later missions, especially the dessert ones, are pretty hard. I advice always reading the wiki page. Of course some people think this is 'spoilers', but trust me it'll really help. The wiki pages offer tactical advice, and give you a clue about what kind of build you'll want to use.
3. Since you're up to the dessert now, Elite skills start appearing and I think pretty soon you will have a skill trainer who can sell you all prophercies skills. You can look at Elite Skills. A good idea is to get an Elite Skill that you like ASAP, and pick other [URL="http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_core_necromancer_skills"]skillsURL] to make a build around it.

And yeah... my advice is also to do a little of night fall and eye of the north for heroes.
Heroes are like henchmen but smarter and better. You can only have up to 3 in your party, and each have to be unlocked. Good thing is, you can get a few heroes unlocked very quickly:
- Eye of the north: Just starting the campaign gives you an elementalist and monk hero
- Night fall: travel to elona, and IIRC the first welcome mission gives you access to a dervish, a warrior and two monks.

All very well to say don't go to nightfall and get heroes and if the game was still functioning as it was 4 years ago I would agree.
You cannot depend on being able to pick up parties to do the game not without lots of waiting and maybe not even then.

Prophesies was the best game in the set and it still has the best storyline but it is way outdated by what came after.
To keep your sanity and play the game within a reasonable time frame and not have to spend hours awaiting parties go get heroes.

The game is meant to be an enjoyable experience not a historic recreation of how players used to experience the game.
I experienced prophesies with some great players who kept the party going when I screwed up gave me good advice on builds and walked me through the tougher areas.
You cannot do that anymore.

All of you proposing to go to Nightfall and get heroes forget what it's like to be starting the game fresh -- the OP has no skills unlocked, is new to the game, and won't be able to give the heroes any decent builds for quite some time yet. The henchmen are much better than unequipped heroes with no elite skills and bad builds!

Also, last year all the henchmen skill bars were revamped and are now quite good. I've played through all campaigns, all missions, with only the henchmen and heroes available at the time. It's definitely doable, and after the revamp, a lot easier too.

To reply to the original post -- yes, the desert is where things get difficult and where you really need to start paying attention and learning how to play Persevere and learn to pull carefully and focus down the most dangerous targets first.

After the hydras (who can wipe your party in one volley, especially if your henchmen have bunched up and have lots of death penalty), the centaur mesmers are your highest priority. They cast Diversion and Backfire, which if they land on your healer can totally shut her down. Don't be afraid to retreat, heal up and wait a bit for energy to recover if things go belly up.

Bring Dunham, he has power block and can with a bit of luck interrupt some of the more dangerous spells. Also bring Stefan, he also has plenty of interrups and plenty of survivability. I also like to bring Claude because he has Blood Ritual, which he uses to give extra energy regen to the other casters in the party -- he's essential if you're having prolonged battles that would otherwise drain your healers.

Since I only read a portion of these posts I will say im not sure I saw this offer..hit me up in game if u need help with any campaign also not sure if you have joined a guild you are welcome to join mine. If you want people to play with that's your best bet. But most important if you need help IGN: Neith bow mistress. I have several characters that I can help with. Oh and we have a TS3 server if u like chatting

Thank you for saying that. It is so true.

Please stop telling people to go get heroes when it is their first time through the game. A low level (Nightfall) or even high level (EotN) hero with no runes and partial builds will not be better than the available henchmen. The AI is the same whether Hero or Henchman, and the Henchmen are better designed for the area.

@Ironfungus - Hang in there, it does get better. Meanwhile, you might want to check out several pages of threads in the Guild Looking For forum in Guild Connections. I'm afraid that trying to group on the spot can be very frustrating and it always has been. And if you do manage to get some real players, they tend to be worse than the AI, because they haven't bothered to get runes and insignia or put together a good build.

Because I have a kids running around and a wife with an aggro bubble of a Siege Wurm, I usually never ever play with human players, so yes, the game is perfectly playable as a single player (with henchman) game. What I do highly recommend is to find a helpful guild that can give you tips and look at your builds (you can send a copy of your build to the guild chat window in the attributes window under templates). Also, as mentioned a key part of this game is learning how to pull enemies and keep them from overwhelming you. As soon as an enemy enters that little circle in the middle of your radar they will attack you. Also most enemies run "patrols" where they follow certain routes. Watch the activity on the radar to get a feel for what patrol is going where. Regarding the hydras, they ARE one of the most difficult monsters you will encounter. You really need to be aware if they are casting a meteor shower on you and move away or interrupt it.

Hogwash! Do whatever is the most fun for you. The order of the campaigns doesn't mean anything.

Henchmen aren't ideal, but they will help you get the job done. You should consider looking for help in a populated outpost like Lions Arch. You will often see guilds recruiting members there. It is very easy to get help once you've joined a guild. They are usually willing to help new players through their stumbling blocks.

Because you bought the trilogy, you have access to heroes. I don't recall what is the easiest method of getting heroes to use in Prophecies. Heroes are more customizable than henchmen with respect to skills, weaponry and armor.

This is true. I wasn't thinking about how having a new account would affect the usefulness of Heroes. (haven't had one of those in a loooong time!)

True, but some of them still leave something to be desired (Alesia). That's one reason I like taking both Lena & Alesia in the desert. Lena does a good job of making up for Alesia's shortcomings.

It's usually best to have two healers in a party of 8 anyway, so it's good that their builds compliment one another.

@OP - In normal mode, all of Prophecies is doable with just Henchmen.

@ others - while it's true that a poorly equipped Hero may not be as good as the "equivalent" Henchman, one advantage to using Heroes is that there are some very useful builds you can't get with a henchman, such as the MM Necro or SoS Rit.

i`d have said get heros from nf - reason is - regardless of how badly skilled they are you actually have more control over heros than hench ( not much but its something ) and you can spread heros out where hench cant.
You will need to buy heros runes etc but if not done now you still need to do later on when you get them.
Personally - id get heros regardless if you will use them yet or not - if you do hit a really hard area least you can try with heros and better positioning and see how that goes.
No1 forces you to use heros and end of the day its the players own personal choice to how they play the game and how they enjoy it ( except when anets rules apply lol )

LOL! well we can already see how your home life is.. lol

You dont get heroes in Proph.. period. if someone has heroes in their party its because theyve been to NF or EotN. Factions doesnt have heroes either. You have to be minimum level 10 before you can migrate between campaigns to do that.

Heh actually, since somewhere around Kryta I think, I've been chilling with the M.O.X. hero. But that's probably because I bought the Trilogy. But since I've only really played a Necromancer/Monk, he doesn't have any skills outside of the standard Dervish he was given. But he is level 20, and my henchies are stuck at 17.

There is no level requirement for access to Nightfall, although the quest can be difficult with just the henchmen in LA.

That's entirely untrue. There's a lot of reasons why getting heroes ASAP makes prophercies easier for a new player. I just did this (new player just finished running through prophercies).

1. In prophercies it takes a while before henchies get to lv20. The opening guy said he was at the desert, IIRC the first mission with lv20 henchies appears just before that. For most new players, you can get nightfall and EOTN heroes far before this. Having three lv20 heroes with you when you are below level 20, and when henchies are even lower level, is very helpful. At this point the henchie builds aren't great either.

2. Just playing through the game normally, you get enough gold to give your heroes runes and decent weapons. I just did this, and the only 'lucky' drop i ever got was a single white dye early in the campaign. And there was only a few times when i felt i was out of gold. This partly fixes the heroes are weaker problem.

3. Heroes can PULL. Henchies can't do that. You can send in a henchie to pull. You can flag ALL henchies away but if you're a squishy class then that's not a good thing. You can flag ALL henchies into a mob, that lets them take the aggro... but that aggros all the mobs. If you have two mobs close together you can't just aggro the closer one. Lastly, sending in ALL henchies isn't always a good idea.

4. some missions, if you are soloing, really help if you can flag heroes around. Rather than the all or nothing of henchmen flagging. IIRC there was one desert one where you can flag a healer on the NPC you're trying to protect, which helps because you have to actually run away to do something to get a bonus.

5. Lastly, we're not suggesting to replace henchies with heroes. You can only have 3 heroes. So the question is whether 7 henchies is better than 4 henchies + 3 heroes

6. How are henchie better desiged for the area? I don't see any basis for this claim. According to the wiki pages, henchies have the same skill sets depending on their level. So no matter which area you go into, the henchies have the same skill sets. They don't change depending on what kind of enemies you are fighting, etc.

And this is probably anecdotal evidence, but when I played prophercies. We played with two players, 5 heroes and a single henchie. We took a protector henchie, because both of our monk heroes only had healing builds.

And guess which was always the first thing in the party to die? The henchie. I believe it was because we couldn't flag her away. We couldn't use the flag for all henchies and heroes, because we didn't want all our heroes flagged. So the henchie just remained unflagged. I often flagged my Ogdnen or Vekk away to a safe (but still in range spot), or set Ogdnen to the passive mode so he'd only heal and not try to attack.

I could keep an eye on the protector henchie but i couldn't do either of those things.

I've been interested in getting Spiteful Spirit for a while now, but is it even possible? The only mob that looks okay to kill would be Zaln the Jaded, but it appears I need to beat Prophecies in order to unlock the area he's in.

How do you "beat" Prophecies? And is it even possible to solo the missions in Prophecies? For a Necro, the Ascension missions seemed pretty damn difficult, and I didn't even attempt to solo (except the Dunes of Despair).

After you finish the desert missions, you'll end up in a city close to the Talus Chute boss.

'Beat' generally refers to finishing the final mission of that campaign.

I'm assuming you mean a you + henchmen? That isn't solo (which means one person), it's referred to as H/H. If that's the case, it's possible to do every PvE related thing, barring BLA HM (currently), with H/H, even in HM. Areas where there are no henchmen are obviously excluded.

Hi. You are in the desert, so you've a ways to go to complete Prophecies. The soonest available capture for Spiteful Spirit will be immediately after you complete the final mission in the desert, Dragon's Lair, where you will be teleported to Droknar's Forge. There is a way to have someone run you from Beacon's Perch to this location, by-passing all the work needed to getting to it on your own.

At this point, without heroes, high level friends or a good elite, yeah, it's going to be annoying. This is a frustrating area and the missions for ascension are some of the most annoying, due to time constraints. If you have a really good build, you can still run around with henchmen, but, you need some work so I would suggest you travel to Nightfall and GWEN to get heroes. If you need any help in game, PM me on here.

Well, I got the Ascension missions out of the way. At least, the main three. I still need to do the Dragon's Lair, and I'm not sure what to expect from that.

But can I kill it while only using henchmen? It's level 28, and I'm not sure if I need to worry about any additional mobs or not.

Yes. As I said, every PvE aspect of this game, barring BLA, has been completed with H/H in HM. That mob in particular isn't all that hard anyway. Level 28 might seem intimidating, but you'll have a larger team, full skill bars, and someone with a brain.

Awesome, thanks!

What's so special about BLA?

No one has been able to do it in HM with H/H and no cons. I haven't tried it myself, but from screenshots I've seen there are an incredible amount of foes. Not to mention worthwhile skill bars and benefits associated with high levels and HM.

Battle for Lion's Arch, let alone Hard Mode, is not even in the same league here.

Talus Chute still presents challenges for those that are new. The tengu mobs are tougher than anything seen prior to this area. Avicara Wise have Ineptitude and Ardents should also be a top priority. In particularly, heading northwest toward Camp Rankor will eventually lead to a bottle neck of a lot of enemies, right where many of the nightmare bosses spawn.

One of the things that you can do to open an elite skill when you haven't gotten to the area to kill the boss and capture the skill, is to unlock the skill using Balthazar Faction which you can get either by PvP'ing or by using Zaishen Coins to buy Flames of Balthazar. Use the Balthazar faction to unlock the skill, then buy an Elite Skill Tome to open the skill on your PvE character. It's rather expensive to go about it this way, but it works.