Has anyone done Thunderhead mission with hench?

I've come sooooo close with henchmen, but always get killed by the Mursaat elementalist boss. Has anyone done this one with hench?

One thing that GW says is that you can play through the game by yourself, and up until now I've done 90% of the missions with hench, so I'm wondering if the the Thunderhead mission is an exception.

Also, at the risk of starting a long discussion thread, I'm not sure you can do the whole game with hench. Missions like Elona's didn't seem possible with hench, so maybe another question would be has anyone done the whole game with hench?

Thanks,

Jack

There has to be someone who has done this with henchman.

Please search the forums, there is a huge post about Thunderhead, and there is most likely one about henchman only games.

it IS possible our Guild Leader has done it.

though he did say that Thunderhead keep is possibly the exception.

The trouble is Henchmen dont appear to get their armour infused, giving a huge disadvantage when fighting mursaat.

One trick is to find other baddies on the map that WILL fight other baddies.. then you basically have to lure them to the baddies you want to fight.

but sometimes even the same races will fight each other.. I've seen many stone summit kill each other, its almost like that are part of different factions.

well its definatly the case with thirsty river.

The Snowman

Hey, arnansnow.

I did search the forum and did read the threads on Thunderhead, but didn't see anything on anyone completing this with hench. It's possible my search skills just aren't that good. If so, I humbly apologize for adding extraneous message traffic to a message board.

I DiD it with henchies. And quite easily

Is that true? That requires a fix in the next update.

I thought that they just fixed that in a recent patch?
Nope guess it is just in Marhan's

There is also this

Bloodstone Fenn bonus is impossible with henchmen. You can't stop them from attacking the jungle guardians.

Bonuses are different from missions, though. Attuning Henge portals would be hard with henchies I would think.

I am curious whether anyone has completed 100% of the Primary Quest missions with Henchies.

I know I'll be trying it with my second character. Now that I know what the good skills are and what not it will be a lot easier. Even with my first character there were only a few quests that I opted for a human party.

I think the answer to the question, "Can all the missions be completed with henchmen?" is probably, "It depends on what character you play." I play as a Monk and was able to complete every mission and a good majority of the bonus missions with henchmen-only parties. Thunderhead Keep took me a few tries while I was trying to pinpoint the bonus, but once I worked it out I actually had my henchmen party out of the keep and up in the northern area of the map where the Mursaat were spawning in. We just sat there and wailed on them every time they showed up until we got the message to go talk to the NPC and end the quest. But, again, I was playing as a Monk, so with Lina and Alesia's help I was able to keep up the whole group. Spells like Protective Spirit and Aegis helped a lot, in my experience. If you're stuck relying on Lina and Alesia for all your party's healing needs... then Dwayna help you keeping an all-human team alive, let alone an all-henchie team. No offense, girls.

Tetris is right about Bloodstone Fen: that is the first mission in the game where the bonus can't be done with henchmen. For the record, here is my list of bonus missions that are impossible/very tough to complete with henchmen:

Bloodstone Fen
Aurora Glade
Dunes of Despair - Might be possible, but would be extremely difficult
Elona Reach - Not impossible, but with henchmen you likely won't have time to complete bonus AND main mission in one go
Thirsty River - Might be possible; make sure you have some anti-caster skills to deal with the two healers you have to take out at the end
The Dragon's Lair - Not impossible (believe it or not), just damned hard! I actually did this as a Prot. Monk/Diversion Mesmer with Fat Stephan, Little Thom, Alesia & Lina. It takes quite a while, but since the henchies are more reliable than humans I'd put more stock in your chances with henchmen than with a PuG.
Ring of Fire

Me, it's hard though, you need to think about lots of think. The first part of the mission easy, but when you need to defend the city, the shit begins.

Stand in the middle of the city and walk around from exit to exit, when you see a group of enemies, walk to the catapults and blast them. When they come in, just fight them. When you're done go to the middle again and walk around from exit to exit like before. That's the only way if you ask me. Off course if you're a Ranger you could trap both the exits, and there are probably many other ways to make it, but this is how I did it with my Monk.. Hopefully this helps.

EDIT: Do NOT try the bonus with henchman. Why? Because you can't, so don't try.

Actually it's just time consuming, unless you have a running speed increasing skill.
You need to atune the left & right portals without stopping or engaging in fights until both of them belong to you, so that you can attune the middle portal.
It will take a few minutes, but it's definately doable with henchies only.

Actually, the only character I was able to do Thunderhead Keep with henchies with was a ranger..because of the same Mursaat boss. You need a lot of interrupts, and henchies don't seem to carry any. Savage shot is good.

Main mission definately doable with henchies. To me honest I never tried the bonus there. I just stayed in the middle of the arena and fought the groups as they came through the doors. Ranger/monk main.

Every mission up to the crystal desert I did with henchies. I completed dunes of despair EASILY with henchies. With 5 minutes left on the timer my mom made me come outside to help with lawn and when I came back I won lol, i didnt even have to play. As for dragons lair, on two characters i did it with henchies and never once did i die. 2 for 2. As for thunderhead keep, its not a problem of dying mostly, its a problem of the king dying. The king follows you until he sees some monsters in his agro circle, then he does his own thing until he dies (which is what always happens with henchies), or all the monsters are dead.

BTW, i played Thunderhead as a W/N and E/Me so I could not heal the king myself. A monk would be able to keep him alive.

Good advice, GranDeWun.

I've been taking distracting shot, but maybe I'll load up on interrupts and try to completely shut him down.

The hardest main mission to complete with henchies is Iron Mines - this is due entirely to the change where you have to fight and kill the four Jade Armors at the end now, not just Markis. As henchmen do *not* get infused from completing the infusion quest, this pretty much means instant death. You can *carefully* crack the armor's obelisks, or whatever they are, and pull 1-2 at a time, you just have to be very good at controlling the henchie AI so that your warriors don't run in and crack the rest.

Still, an extremely difficult mission to hench simply because you're supposed to be infused for the ending and your henchies simply are not. Hopefully this will be fixed in some future patch.

Don't even think about doing the sidequest on that mission with henchies.


Thunderhead can be a bit rough with henchies, but it's doable. Usually people do ok until the Mursaat boss comes, at which point they just get overwhelmed while trying to take him down. The trick to the boss is to kill off of the other Mursaat first, then chip away at the boss in between waves. Basically you need to camp at the top of the stairs, next to the king, so that all of the aggro comes to you. If you're anywhere else, some of the Mursaat are going to slip around and attack the king while you're tied up with the boss. That's a no-go. So get all the Mursaat just at the top of the stairs. Kill the guys with the boss, hack on the boss a bit, kill the next wave that comes in, hack on the boss - usually I go through around 2-3 waves before the boss goes down, but it does depend on which guy you pull.


For the desert missions, beating Dunes is mindless, and Elona you have to play carefully but it's fairly straightforward as well. Thirsty can be a bit tricky to solo with henchies - you need to find a way to take that Monk boss out of the picture while you kill the priest, and so many dumb things can go wrong (terrible pathing on the Warrior henchies, for starters, not to mention the inability to divert an off target without all your henchies switching), but it's possible with the right skills. With a two man party it's fairly straightforward.


Ring of Fire can be a bit nasty, if you don't know how to pull the towers. The trick here is to stand just inside of the tower radius but out of aggro range, wait until you get zapped, then immediately run back out of range. While this doesn't sound like it'd do much, it will make any of the Mursaat assigned to that tower - the bows, elementalists, and the like - fan out around the tower looking for the 'disturbance'. Of course that means one or two will run straight for you, allowing you to take them out from outside the tower's radius. Once you know that trick, you can work your way in the front gates of the Mursaat compound, and complete the mission and bonus that way. I've found that to be much easier than trying to convince henchies not to stand in a Meteor Shower.

The only real trick in Abaddon's Mouth is to go in the back door after you go through the first wall of the Mursaat compound. Lets you pick off more sleeping armors and flank the second boss pack. Hell's Precipice is bloody long and tedious, but there's really nothing special to that mission.

Peace,
-CxE

My real life husband and I have done all the missions so far with just the 2 of us and the rest of the group is henchies. We're stuck on Thunderhead Keep right now. Gonna have to give it another go after reading this thread soon, though. We do okay until the Jade Armors and other Mursaat come into the fort. Some of the jade armors always seem to slip past us and kill the king before we can get there.

This has been said many times, but both Bloodstone and Aurora are possible with hench. They are not impossible. Bloodstone: make sure you're alone or only bring one weak hench when doing the bonus. Aurora: focus on and defend only one portal until there are no more runners coming. Then run down and take out the bonus guy