Forums » General Pantheon Discussion

Solo players in trouble

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    • 319 posts
    May 5, 2017 7:50 AM PDT

     After watching the last 3 streams it seems that solo players will have a mountain to climb if they are to get anywhere. I know the faq states that solo will be hard but I did notice that inside the tower, dungeon and outside all the mobs were:

    A  almost always accompanied by adds.

    b  extremely tough to kill. You had a party of 6 on single mobs and Joppa was healing his butt off to keep the tank alive.

    C Kilsin and the mage I believe were both one-shot killed. tough mobs?

    If they are going to "fix" this in alpha or beta I hope they make it a little more soloable. I know some games make the mobs so easy that you can breeze through adds without even working. EQ 1 was not that way and I found it to be more of a balance when soloing. If you took on a mob that was same level as yourself it was more of an even fight.

    I know Pantheon is being developed as a social game and they want people to get together and help each other. Same as EQ 1 was. But from what I saw solo players will have a real tough go of It.

    Please give me self resses . LOL

     

    • 2130 posts
    May 5, 2017 7:57 AM PDT

    They've already stated there will be soloable content. However, like EQ, I wouldn't expect to be able to just walk into Crushbone within my first 15 minutes of gameplay.

    Some classes will also inevitably solo better than others, most likely those with CC and/or self healing.

    I agree that one shot kills are a little over the top on group content, but I doubt they've put a lot of time into balancing things just yet. I have confidence that they'll find that balance once they're focusing on that more so than actually building the world.

    • 3852 posts
    May 5, 2017 7:57 AM PDT

    As someone who has been very vocal from the day I pledged about the need to have significant solo content even in a group-focused game like Pantheon I share the OP's attitude but am not at all concerned by the streams.

    It would have been surprising had the streams not shown group content for this game. Keep in mind that dungeons are traditionally for groups only and solo players spend most of their time in outdoor zones.

    So keep the faith and keep pushing for VR to have balance, not just group content, but I don't think the streams should concern us.

    • 10 posts
    May 5, 2017 8:11 AM PDT

    I'm guessing solo players would be forced more into areas that are less camp style like this.  More forest area like we saw at the start of the day 1 of 2 streams.

    My experience from EQOA for solo was usually lower level mobs, that weren't grouped very close. It was much harder and slower than being with a group but could still easily be done.

    Also was much easier for a necromancer with his pet. (Then people figured out AFK pet leveling) *Cough* *whistles innocently*

     

    • 441 posts
    May 5, 2017 8:16 AM PDT

    Most of the streams were in areas ment for a team. In the last stream you see people doing a duo on trash mobs where the main team was fighting. My guess they were higher level. Pantheon will end up like EQ1, where solo content is slower, will have way less rewards and the risk of soloing will be much higher then a team. Not all classes will solo well and if a solo career is what you wish to play. You will have to wait and see what classes will solo best. 


    Also the main way to solo in EQ1 was kiting and fear kiting. Mobs in this game will not all react the same. When kitted some mobs may just play along while others will run for help. Others will root you or may kite you as well. The goal is a varied mob reaction so tactics will need to change, thus making soloing much harder. Not impossible but not the standard. 
     



    • 3852 posts
    May 5, 2017 9:03 AM PDT

    >Also the main way to solo in EQ1 was kiting and fear kiting. Mobs in this game will not all react the same. When kitted some mobs may just play along while others will run for help. Others will root you or may kite you as well. The goal is a varied mob reaction so tactics will need to change, thus making soloing much harder. Not impossible but not the standard. <

    I very very much hope that Pantheon will NOT take this approach. I think it would be devastatingly bad for the game. At the risk of oversimplifying, this approach would be having 100% of the game for groups or raids but allowing certain classes to do just a little solo by killing some of the group-intended mobs.

    When I see the 20-60-20 figure (20% solo 60% group 20% raid) I assume and hope this means that 20% of the content will be designed for solo players to be able to handle. Mostly unlinked mobs or mobs that a player can fight two at a time rather than linked mobs that a few classes can laboriously unlink. Granted some classes will be better than others but mobs that any class can fight not just classes with the right crowd control or feign death. If I need to kite or feign death to do anything solo other than crafting or harvesting I will not be a happy camper, and I am reasonably sure VR does not want the game this unfriendly to those that prefer to operate solo at least some of the time.


     


    This post was edited by dorotea at May 5, 2017 9:04 AM PDT
    • 1303 posts
    May 5, 2017 9:13 AM PDT

    The devs have stated repeatedly that there will be solo content. Can we take them at their word? 

    That being said, I really like the idea that mob disposition might thwart soloers from succeeding. It is as it should be. But it doesnt mean that every mob have dispositions or utliilze skill sets that would prevent soloers from killng them. 

    And the comments about the one shot kills on the last stream.... That was a group fighting even cons, approaching the final rooms of a boss. I'm perfectly fine with design that says that if you're living at or potentially slightly higher than your comfort zone you can expect to get hardcore smacked around. There's nothing at all preventing that group from coming back in 5 levels and having much less trouble with that content. 

     

    • 780 posts
    May 5, 2017 10:21 AM PDT

    Feyshtey said:

    The devs have stated repeatedly that there will be solo content. Can we take them at their word? 

    That being said, I really like the idea that mob disposition might thwart soloers from succeeding. It is as it should be. But it doesnt mean that every mob have dispositions or utliilze skill sets that would prevent soloers from killng them. 

    And the comments about the one shot kills on the last stream.... That was a group fighting even cons, approaching the final rooms of a boss. I'm perfectly fine with design that says that if you're living at or potentially slightly higher than your comfort zone you can expect to get hardcore smacked around. There's nothing at all preventing that group from coming back in 5 levels and having much less trouble with that content. 

     

     

    Yeah...I don't think you should be expecting to solo (for experience) much in dungeons, and dungeons are what they were showing.  I'm sure there are a few classes that will be able to solo white and yellow chickens and scorpions carefully out in South Saol there.

    • 1584 posts
    May 5, 2017 10:29 AM PDT

    Isaya said:

     After watching the last 3 streams it seems that solo players will have a mountain to climb if they are to get anywhere. I know the faq states that solo will be hard but I did notice that inside the tower, dungeon and outside all the mobs were:

    A  almost always accompanied by adds.

    b  extremely tough to kill. You had a party of 6 on single mobs and Joppa was healing his butt off to keep the tank alive.

    C Kilsin and the mage I believe were both one-shot killed. tough mobs?

    If they are going to "fix" this in alpha or beta I hope they make it a little more soloable. I know some games make the mobs so easy that you can breeze through adds without even working. EQ 1 was not that way and I found it to be more of a balance when soloing. If you took on a mob that was same level as yourself it was more of an even fight.

    I know Pantheon is being developed as a social game and they want people to get together and help each other. Same as EQ 1 was. But from what I saw solo players will have a real tough go of It.

    Please give me self resses . LOL

     

    Well, they did say it was going to be 90% group content so i think what we were seeing was mobs that were meant to be killed by grps by having larger hp pools and hitting harder to prevent from soloing maybe, im sure their will be areas you could solo and the hp pool/hits will be less with a penalty towards exp so you cant level up as fast as someone grping.


    This post was edited by Cealtric at May 5, 2017 10:30 AM PDT
    • 3016 posts
    May 5, 2017 10:37 AM PDT

    The Devs have stated there will be solo content,  The Tower of the Reckless Magician isn't meant to be a soloer's paradise,  it has tough content meant for groups to take on.    I have a hunch that if you want to solo or to box, you are going to have a learning curve when encountering Pantheon mobs,  who won't be standing around static waiting to be killed, who will have AI that makes them run and call for help, or other such personalities.     You will have to pay attention to your intended target, and your surroundings in this game to succeed.       I keep saying this will be a thinking gamer's game.    Pretty sure that will be the case.    Can't wait to see what emergent gameplay comes from Pantheon's gamers as they solve how to play this game successfully ...should be quite interesting. :)

     

    Cana

     

     

    • 1584 posts
    May 5, 2017 10:37 AM PDT

    dorotea said:

    >Also the main way to solo in EQ1 was kiting and fear kiting. Mobs in this game will not all react the same. When kitted some mobs may just play along while others will run for help. Others will root you or may kite you as well. The goal is a varied mob reaction so tactics will need to change, thus making soloing much harder. Not impossible but not the standard. <

    I very very much hope that Pantheon will NOT take this approach. I think it would be devastatingly bad for the game. At the risk of oversimplifying, this approach would be having 100% of the game for groups or raids but allowing certain classes to do just a little solo by killing some of the group-intended mobs.

    When I see the 20-60-20 figure (20% solo 60% group 20% raid) I assume and hope this means that 20% of the content will be designed for solo players to be able to handle. Mostly unlinked mobs or mobs that a player can fight two at a time rather than linked mobs that a few classes can laboriously unlink. Granted some classes will be better than others but mobs that any class can fight not just classes with the right crowd control or feign death. If I need to kite or feign death to do anything solo other than crafting or harvesting I will not be a happy camper, and I am reasonably sure VR does not want the game this unfriendly to those that prefer to operate solo at least some of the time.


     

    But its not 20-60-20 its 90% group and 10 raiding/soloing i think, yes their will be solo areas im sure they will make certain areas easier to kill or you simply have to be higher lvl than a group to progress forward and making sure your not hitting a mob that alarms others and such this is possible, yes they are maybe making you play smarter and be more aware of your surrounding but that isn't all bad.

    • 279 posts
    May 5, 2017 10:59 AM PDT

    If it's at all like EQ class choice will invariably affect soloability.

    In Original EQ soloers even could if skilled, level faster than a group if they were willing to bet the farm and enter high risk scenarios (Chanter/Necro/Druid charming was abit... strong).

    I would guess that particular aspect will depend alot on ingenuity and emergent gameplay and be a accidental. Though I hope it's not Faster overall XP rate.

    When I watched the stream and saw the Gurkha mobs stomp face my initial thought was "found something to charm", not "O no I'll never be able to solo"

    Now will every class be able to solo? I would guess not, but that doesn't mean there will be no soloing.

     

     

    • 53 posts
    May 5, 2017 11:02 AM PDT

    Viable group content that is not sitting around in a lobby/queue waiting for random people for a dungeon run is what took a lot of the fun out of MMOs for a lot of us from the EQ era. I WANT to need a group to go kill stuff, I want to split groups of MOBs and need a healer and group support roles in my group when I tank. I think taking these games and making them so solo friendly has turned them into fancy single player games with a chat window and I cant wait to get a group together and go explore like in the old days.

     

    Will some classes be able to solo better? Yes. There will be solo content but for one, I cant wait to get a group, set up a camp and grind some enemies with friends! :)

    • 38 posts
    May 5, 2017 11:14 AM PDT

    I think it's way too early to try to get a feel for the balance of power between players and mobs.  There will be much, much tuning between now and even Alpha.  By launch it'll be a very different game from what we're seeing now.  We've only glimpsed the foundation of what this world will be.  But even the foundation is pretty damn exciting! 

    • 801 posts
    May 5, 2017 11:19 AM PDT

    CanadinaXegony said:

    The Devs have stated there will be solo content,  The Tower of the Reckless Magician isn't meant to be a soloer's paradise,  it has tough content meant for groups to take on.    I have a hunch that if you want to solo or to box, you are going to have a learning curve when encountering Pantheon mobs,  who won't be standing around static waiting to be killed, who will have AI that makes them run and call for help, or other such personalities.     You will have to pay attention to your intended target, and your surroundings in this game to succeed.       I keep saying this will be a thinking gamer's game.    Pretty sure that will be the case.    Can't wait to see what emergent gameplay comes from Pantheon's gamers as they solve how to play this game successfully ...should be quite interesting. :)

     

    Cana

     

     

     

    HI C

    Yes it appears much harder those latest streams we had. Pulling 3+ mobs and FD like we are used to, might be tough.

     

    • 409 posts
    May 5, 2017 11:24 AM PDT

    /rantmode on

    If this game turns into one of those solo orientated mmo's.... No offence to you guys but I'm done. I'll quit MMORPGS. This is my personal last hope for a group orientated mmo. If VR doesn't do it.. then I guess that's it. I'd do it myself! but unfortunately I'm no artist. +Keep in mind that we've/I've seen alot of "single player" orientated mmorpgs in the last 8 years or so and I'm absolutely sick these kind of posts. "There must be solo content to succeed."

    I'm super defensive when I see posts like this and get very annoyed by them. Gamer "convience" is the biggest bane of my MMORPG life.. Needless to say I find it ironnic that people want to solo in a "online" group game... when there are other games out there that cater a HELL of alot more then a MMORPG. Please for the love of god can we please get a traditional group orientated game! why is all of this always so differcult? I'm like 1mm away from just walking away from this BS mmorpg era and tbh PC gaming as a whole. It's absolute madness.

    • 279 posts
    May 5, 2017 11:28 AM PDT

    Nimryl said:

    /rantmode on

    If this game turns into one of those solo orientated mmo's.... No offence to you guys but I'm done. I'll quit MMORPGS. This is my personal last hope for a group orientated mmo. If VR doesn't do it.. then I guess that's it. I'd do it myself! but unfortunately I'm no artist. +Keep in mind that we've/I've seen alot of "single player" orientated mmorpgs in the last 8 years or so and I'm absolutely sick these kind of posts. "There must be solo content to succeed."

    I'm super defensive when I see posts like this and get very annoyed by them. Gamer "convience" is the biggest bane of my MMORPG life.. Needless to say I find it ironnic that people want to solo in a "online" group game... when there are other games out there that cater a HELL of alot more then a MMORPG. Please for the love of god can we please get a traditional group orientated game! why is all of this always so differcult? I'm like 1mm away from just walking away from this BS mmorpg era and tbh PC gaming as a whole. It's absolute madness.

    There isn't a like button so +1.

    This dude gets it.

    • 1468 posts
    May 5, 2017 11:48 AM PDT

    People always talk about going back to the way EQ was back in 1999. There was an absolute ton of solo content in that game if you were a class that could solo so I don't see what the anger is when it comes to having 20% solo content in the game for people who want to solo when they can't get a group or don't want a group. No one has said that this game will lose its group based game play at all they have just said that there should be a little bit of solo content for some classes.

    From what I have read there is likely to be even less solo content in Pantheon than there was in EQ.

    • 53 posts
    May 5, 2017 12:19 PM PDT

    Cromulent said:

    People always talk about going back to the way EQ was back in 1999. There was an absolute ton of solo content in that game if you were a class that could solo so I don't see what the anger is when it comes to having 20% solo content in the game for people who want to solo when they can't get a group or don't want a group. No one has said that this game will lose its group based game play at all they have just said that there should be a little bit of solo content for some classes.

    From what I have read there is likely to be even less solo content in Pantheon than there was in EQ.

     

     

    Agreed. My only point is that MMOs started going downhill once they became in essence single player games with a lobby (Duty Finder/Dungeon Finder/Raid Finder). Solo content is important to have as an option, but a lot of modern MMOs have removed the need to use your guild or friends list to do group content with. FFXIV is a great example. People just idle away in Idylshire standing around waiting for Duty Finder to pop..to then speed run a dungeon with a group of random strangers that do not speak to one another and never see each other again. I feel like once they took out the companionship of real friends and guilds, MMOs have been on a steady decline.

    • 409 posts
    May 5, 2017 12:21 PM PDT

    Cromulent said:

    People always talk about going back to the way EQ was back in 1999. There was an absolute ton of solo content in that game if you were a class that could solo so I don't see what the anger is when it comes to having 20% solo content in the game for people who want to solo when they can't get a group or don't want a group. No one has said that this game will lose its group based game play at all they have just said that there should be a little bit of solo content for some classes.

    From what I have read there is likely to be even less solo content in Pantheon than there was in EQ.



    Nahh no one did. I was just sayin' IF. As I said.. super defensive. 50%+ solo content and I'd probably quit. Just get tired of hearing whines about "lack of solo content" when they've been generally catered for for the last 8 years (pretty much) and our gameplay/style has been put on the "side lines".


    This post was edited by Nimryl at May 5, 2017 12:26 PM PDT
    • 1584 posts
    May 5, 2017 12:28 PM PDT

    Sunmistress said:

    If it's at all like EQ class choice will invariably affect soloability.

    In Original EQ soloers even could if skilled, level faster than a group if they were willing to bet the farm and enter high risk scenarios (Chanter/Necro/Druid charming was abit... strong).

    I would guess that particular aspect will depend alot on ingenuity and emergent gameplay and be a accidental. Though I hope it's not Faster overall XP rate.

    When I watched the stream and saw the Gurkha mobs stomp face my initial thought was "found something to charm", not "O no I'll never be able to solo"

    Now will every class be able to solo? I would guess not, but that doesn't mean there will be no soloing.

     

     

    they could make him uncharmable, plus charming something that can one shot you isnt smart becuase once he loses charm your dead

    • 3237 posts
    May 5, 2017 12:29 PM PDT
    I have no issue with solo content. To be honest, I would like to see portions of the Rites of Passage system include some very challenging objectives that can only be completed while solo. Beyond that, players should be able to harvest while solo. There should be some places in the world where that is viable. The majority of the game will be catered toward group content and eventually we will see powerful duos or trios able to tough through it.

    There are a lot of passionate people following this game who place a very high value on the various tenets that have been established and communicated very clearly to us. VR has emphasized many many times that grouping will make up the core of the game. Woot! I can't wait to get inside and see what all the big fuss is about. It will be epic ... and something I will be able to enjoy with many, many friends.
    • 38 posts
    May 5, 2017 12:54 PM PDT

    Cromulent said:

    People always talk about going back to the way EQ was back in 1999. There was an absolute ton of solo content in that game if you were a class that could solo so I don't see what the anger is when it comes to having 20% solo content in the game for people who want to solo when they can't get a group or don't want a group. No one has said that this game will lose its group based game play at all they have just said that there should be a little bit of solo content for some classes.

    From what I have read there is likely to be even less solo content in Pantheon than there was in EQ.

    This.  EQ had a lot of soloable content if you played the right class.  I was a Halfling druid back then.  I'd join a guild group in a heartbeat but honestly I spent most of my time duoing with my wife's magician or quad-kiting solo.  The mentioned 20-60-20% split is more than enough to accomodate both play styles imo.  

    • 142 posts
    May 5, 2017 12:58 PM PDT

    Sunmistress said:

    Nimryl said:

    /rantmode on

    If this game turns into one of those solo orientated mmo's.... No offence to you guys but I'm done. I'll quit MMORPGS. This is my personal last hope for a group orientated mmo. If VR doesn't do it.. then I guess that's it. I'd do it myself! but unfortunately I'm no artist. +Keep in mind that we've/I've seen alot of "single player" orientated mmorpgs in the last 8 years or so and I'm absolutely sick these kind of posts. "There must be solo content to succeed."

    I'm super defensive when I see posts like this and get very annoyed by them. Gamer "convience" is the biggest bane of my MMORPG life.. Needless to say I find it ironnic that people want to solo in a "online" group game... when there are other games out there that cater a HELL of alot more then a MMORPG. Please for the love of god can we please get a traditional group orientated game! why is all of this always so differcult? I'm like 1mm away from just walking away from this BS mmorpg era and tbh PC gaming as a whole. It's absolute madness.

    There isn't a like button so +1.

    This dude gets it.

    +1

    Well said my friend.

    • 483 posts
    May 5, 2017 1:04 PM PDT

    What I think VR will implement that's solo content, harversting and crafting to a degree, some quests, and maybe the rites of passage as one ADseven stated above.

    But I don't believe they'll create much content specifically for solo players, instead there will be a toon of content that's for groups, some of it easier some harder, but with the right class, level and gear players will be able to solo (mostly outdoor zones, and dungeons entrances). A side from that I don't see VR creating much solo content.