Lies About Solo Play

Lie #1,2,3: You can solo in GW. You only need a party to complete certain quests. You can complete the game without a human party.

FALSE! You have to party up with some PC or NPC to even leave certain town areas. NPCs not only share in an equal portion of everything gained (except a few drops the server decides you want, and that isn't always quest items) but can be frustratingly over zealous when attacking enemies. Even though some could say the same for PC members at least PC members are usually over the level of the creatures being fought. Also, some of the later quest NPCs are nearly impossible to use to complete the mission due to their lack of ability to attack targets by priority or together.

I think you can solo but it is a lot harder. There was a post not to long ago with someone beating the last mission with henchies. Some missions might be impossible(the arena one perhaps?) but those are the "certain quests," no?

Try press Ctrl+Space to get them to focus.

It's not a lie... I've completed every mission with NPC henchmen. It's not as easy, and it's not meant to be, but it's not a lie.

- Kymber

Link to claims, please?

-Virt

First off, I think the drops and shared money in a Henchman group is perfectly fine. It prevents a single person from farming monsters for quick cash and promotes playing in groups more.

Anywho... on topic of your solo lies.

Bad luck I think. Where every mission/quest group I've done with people and failed horribly more than once, I can just grab an all Henchman group and successfully complete it in one try. They've gotten me thru the Ascension missions and the final mission (Some of the hardest ones) for example.

Granted, real people are better than NPCs "IF" they know how to work together and do their job. From experience although, that isn't many when as stated, an all henchman group can do better than most. Don't have to worry about stragglers, people who want to rush, afks, you just go at your pace. They target what you target (95% of the time). So the NPCs may have their little bugs and quirks, but I have more trust in them than a pickup group.

Me (Zenny Stormcaller) and 7 Henchmen at the final boss.

You can solo. I've traversed areas with just henchies.

With 7 other hencies, I nearly cleaned out Perdition Rock just to find the boss that carried the elite elemental attunement skill. The whole area is surrounded by level 20+ monsters.

I didn't die once. One henchman died only twice. All you need to do is learn how the henchmen work, and how to use them well with their abilities.

Sorry but I have gone the whole game with nothing but henchmen. I find them more able then the bad parties that just tend to float around.

@original poster: no, you cannot solo in Guild Wars. not even with henchmen, because their AI is really really bad.

unfortunately many over-eager fans of Guild Wars like to propagate the untrue idea that you can solo in Guild Wars, and freely post such misinformation all over the Internet

i feel bad that you were lied to in this regard

as for henchmen getting an equal share of all drops: henchmen are barely worth 10 gold a piece. them getting an equal share of all the useful items - considering how utterly useless their service is - is completely ludicrous

Its true, you cant play without a party. And I consider henchmen a party, so you cant solo. I think its possible to complete the game with henchmen, though its very hard. Since the game is designed for party play, it never will be possible to complete it all alone. But to make the promisses in advertising true, it would be fair if henchmen are made *MUCH* stronger. Playing with a henchmen party should not be harder than playing with real players.

Henchmen don't quit in the middle of mission. Henchmen don't yell obscenity at each other to vent their frustration. Henchmen can die over and over and are still glad to work with you. The only things that prevent you to finish the game with henchmen are the henchmen flying bug, their poor pathfinding AI and your not being a monk to rez them multiple times. If you can overcome those, GW is playable with henchmen. I'll take Alesia over any human monk who is level 12 or below, anytime. That's my 2 cents.

The only non-bug problem with henchmen is that they don't have a "hold position!" command like quest NPCs.

But other than that, henchmen are pretty damn good. You can beat every mission with henchies, even the ascension quests and the lich king.

And I should add one more thing: henchmen always carry a rez signet. Not every human player does. That often decides success or failure of a mission.

I'm just gonna say HAHA, you suck... no just joking.. but on a serious side... henchman will attack whatever YOU attack, so if they suck, it's your fault... and the ONLY missions they cant beat (with me as any character from monk-ele-warrior) is two of the ascending missions (Not dunes, its easy), and the mursaat missions... the last mission of the game is even beatable by henchman!! Maybe it's not them, it's you? Although i must agree, the healer henchman does tend to think it can run up front and tank alot...

Oh yea... and solo'n is only refered to as farming here buddy, ... do you expect enemies to drop the same amount of items for you when you have a larger party? heh...

I have completed every single mission/quest in the entire game with only henchmen. Navaros is either a complete newbie at the game, has no clue how to press CTRL-SPACE to get the henchmen all on one target, has no clue how to pull and/or observe mob patrol patterns, or just plain sucks at this game.

Tons of people have played through the entire game with henchmen only. For the most part, it's much easier than the usual parade of retards that make up pickup groups.



*** SPOILER ALERT ***

Becca Bellows and 7 henchmen win the game!





Edit: Yes, the missions with lots of Mursaat casters are rough, and really only possible if you have the Monk class/secondary to do the necessary charge/pull/kill/die/res technique to get past them.

i honestly cant count the number of times i have had to rez my little healer hench multiple times on a mission but the one time it really counted was when i died and she ran back to rez me and we went on to finish the mission

So far all the times I've tried quests with human parties, it's not been pleasant. Some of them go and grab items in the middle of a heated battle. Some of them are overly demanding and expect the entire party to bend over backwards to support them on fools errands, such as attacking hordes of Charr with no tactics in mind just to get experience points. Usually killing the rest of the party in the process. Some of them are obnoxious, some of them have no concept of team work, some of them are down-right rude, some of them disappear half-way through a quest. Some of them whinge and whine about how bad the drops they're getting are, and won't shut up until you drop a few half-decent items to shut them up or just leave. Some of them join up to do a specific quest, only to realise they've already done it and run off without so much as a word. And one time there was a party member who refused to get involved in combat for fear of dying...

Henchmen? They don't speak. They don't whinge and whine. They get pick-ups instantly, so they don't run off to grab them when you need them to be fighting. They respond to attacks with super-human reaction times, especially useful for a healer. They follow you around no matter what (unless they get stuck behind a sign or something). They might not take orders, but they don't run off and abandon their team. Sometimes they start fights and run into impossible situations, but you know it's not out of greed or spite, and it's fairly easy to get them to retreat afterwards. Most importantly to me, they aren't obnoxious, ignorant or offensive, which makes them wholly more desirable.

Their AI might not be the best I've ever seen, but sometimes 'Artificial Intelligence' is better than so-called 'real intelligence'.

Don't get me wrong, there are some truly decent and skilled players on GW. Especially, I find, in pre-searing Ascalon. I've helped a few people on quests with the character I keep there, and so far I've only run into one or two bad apples. This gives me some hope for the future at least. I just can't seem to find them when I need help. But the Henchmen are always there, come rain or shine. Loyal till the end... always waiting for me to take them on an adventure somewhere, probably to their dooms but that's how I like it.

none of the above is true.

in fact, henchmen will actually run ahead of you as you are standing still and go attack whatever the heck is there against your will as you are trying to observe mob patrol patterns. this happened to me a few days ago. classic example of henchmen total mental deficiency

another one: i was on the hill just north of Coppermines...the henchmen went charging ahead of me into two mobs meeting a patrol point. i did not tell them to attack that mob, and i did not lead them into it. obviously they all got owned really bad

then i cast Rebirth on Little Thom. he resurrected by me, with me standing still. with him only having 50HP or something like that. as soon as he was resurrected, he immediately went charging back into the mob that killed him. i was not even moving. i did not tell him to do that. he by his incredibly defective AI, did that all on his own. he was dead again in less then 5 seconds after being resurrected.

this of course is typical of what henchmen always do - run to the stupidest place imaginable all on their own and get killed because of it

would you care to give us your opinion as to how other people succeed with henchmen and you cant?

sure

1. nukers. nukers have an easier time with henchmen because nukers can kill stuff much faster than a warrior class can. plus nukers do not have to get as close, hence the henchmen are not as close to the mobs

2. liars. many people who love Guild Wars will pretend it's perfect no matter what, and make stuff up for the sake of trying to entice new people to buy the game

Let's not flame people who don't know how to use henchmen well. It took me a bit of practice to learn how to manage them too. The most important key is to lure the enemies, click on the enemy you intend to draw AND RIGHT AWAY slowly back up by hitting 's' key, and in meantime KEEP CLICKING on your character's name bar, the two fighters charging ahead WILL come right back toward you and retreat, if you do that right. It takes some practice. They'll quickly retreat while you backing up slowly, drawing baddies further away from others. Now, henchmen are great in luring enemy groups, better than some human players because they'll back up as far as you wish. If someone has better methods of using them, I'm all ears. By the way, my character is a W/Mo, so it certainly is doable for a warrior.