Solo at High Levels is Not Fun

[Raspberry]

With a squad, being one-shot killed can be a little amusing as the victim is revived by his teammates. But when you're solo, it's not funny because of the limited number of self-revives/respawns. Are there plenty of frames that can improve survivability? Yes. Are there plenty that simply can't? Absolutely.

As much as I'd love to bring Nova, she won't last long because Null Star is difficult to use for damage resist even with Narrow Minded (because your protection LOVES to leave you and seek any target that comes too close). As much as I'd love to bring Mirage, her Eclipse is unreliable AND buggy. As much as I'd love to bring Volt, he can only carry 1 shield when on the move that protects only his front, which makes him terrible for non-endless missions.

Although solo at high levels is very possible with some frames, it is also damn near impossible to avoid dying a few times with other frames. Or, I can bring a whip with Primed Reach and a +range riven to really boost survivability on any frame by killing enemies before they see me, but that removes the fun factor, doesn't it?

I understand, though, that this game should be balanced around full squads, else buffing solo play in any normal way would also trivialize the same high level content when playing in a squad. But, I feel like there is a solution out there that can increase loadout variety for high level solo play without compromising difficulty for high level squad play. The problem is, though, Damage 2.5 is coming soon, and without us clearly knowing what it exactly it will do yet (especially from our negative feedback of it in December), we probably can't come up with an immediate solution that won't be outdated quickly.

Edited January 17, 2018 by Raspberri

[Drasiel]

As someone who plays mostly solo due to health reasons it sounds a lot like you are simply playing too aggressively. You also haven't clarified what you are referring to as high level. End of the starchart missions? Sortie Missions? Highest level Cetus bounties? Obviously you don't mean raids as you can't do those solo (I cry errytime)

[Raspberry]

1 minute ago, Drasiel said:

As someone who plays mostly solo due to health reasons it sounds a lot like you are simply playing too aggressively. You also haven't clarified what you are referring to as high level. End of the starchart missions? Sortie Missions? Highest level Cetus bounties? Obviously you don't mean raids as you can't do those solo (I cry errytime)

Depending on faction, could be as low as end of star chart, but I usually mean anything Sortie or Kuva Flood and above. I hardly fail any mission, but I usually end up dying and respawning at least twice before completing the mission. And it's never an "I got overwhelmed by too many enemies" moment, it's "oh, one or two enemies got lucky and one-shotted me with a shotgun or launcher type weapon". I can heal as much health as I want regardless of loadout, so healing isn't my issue. I just need reliable damage resist, and not many frames in solo can provide that reliably.

[A-Midnight-Shanking]

Personally? I'd just remove damage scaling by level and instead relegate it to the mission's tier (with a cutoff at a given point). The higher you go the 'damage increase' should be a result of the increased damage sponginess of the enemy allowing more shots to be output. At this point it means that One-Hit-Knockouts are non-existent (unless you forfeit all resistance bonuses), and it's a battle of attrition.

[Drasiel]

2 minutes ago, Raspberri said:

Depending on faction, could be as low as end of star chart, but I usually mean anything Sortie or Kuva Flood and above. I hardly fail any mission, but I usually end up dying and respawning at least twice before completing the mission. And it's never an "I got overwhelmed by too many enemies" moment, it's "oh, one or two enemies got lucky and one-shotted me with a shotgun or launcher type weapon". I can heal as much health as I want regardless of loadout, so healing isn't my issue. I just need reliable damage resist, and not many frames in solo can provide that reliably.

That's true but a lot of frames have other abilities that mitigate damage or nullify opponents. Kuva flood normally takes a revive for me as well but I suspect that has a lot more to do with enemies being able to spawn right on top of you and that the focus of that mission type isn't the enemies but snagging the kuva clouds instead of what frame is picked. 

I'd be curious to see what frames you deem incapable of high level solo. (there are a handful that struggle but I've found most perform adequately)

[Raspberry]

5 minutes ago, Drasiel said:

I'd be curious to see what frames you deem incapable of high level solo. (there are a handful that struggle but I've found most perform adequately)

I don't think any frame is incapable of high level solo, at least if it's not endless. But a lot of frames struggle to avoid dying at all, and that's what my discussion here is about. Quote: 

44 minutes ago, Raspberri said:

it is also damn near impossible to avoid dying a few times with other frames.

I can just bring a Rhino that can solo every non-stealthy, non-endless mission better than almost any other non-stealthy frame, ya know? Edit/clarification: meaning, why would I artifically "handicap" myself by choosing any non-stealthy squishy frame?

Edited January 17, 2018 by Raspberri

[Drasiel]

Just now, Raspberri said:

I don't think any frame is incapable of high level solo, at least if it's not endless. But a lot of frames struggle to avoid dying at all, and that's what my discussion here is about. Quote: 

I can just bring a Rhino that can solo every non-stealthy, non-endless mission better than almost any other non-stealthy frame, ya know?

Okay so my definition of incapable includes struggling with the content. So what frames are struggling?

[Raspberry]

1 minute ago, Drasiel said:

Okay so my definition of incapable includes struggling with the content. So what frames are struggling?

Didn't I bring up a few examples in my original post? Here are more: Titania's grounded form is pretty god-awful, must always use her 4 (and recast her 4 if her Razorflies die off), Atlas' invincible punch has gaps of vulnerability between casts, making him susceptible to unlucky one-shot deaths from nearby enemies that aren't killed yet, Ember's abilities are very weak at high levels (although her 4's augment helps, but that makes her "require" an augment, doesn't it?), Zephyr's vulnerability to any explosive/AoE is no debate, Limbo is pretty much unusable against Corpus when there's a lot of nullifier/scrambus/comba presence.

[Shaw1996]

I wish Null star don’t seek targets because with the mechanic Null star have now, it makes the ability pointless. If it worked like Mesa’s shattershield, Then her 1 would be more useful. The only place where i could get one shot in is MOT and Sorties but in Sorties, it depends what frame i use.

Edited January 18, 2018 by Shaw1996

[Raspberry]

1 hour ago, Shaw1996 said:

I wish Null star don’t seek targets because with the mechanic Null star have now, it makes the ability pointless. If it worked like Mesa’s shattershield, Then her 1 would be more useful. The only place where i could get one shot in is MOT and Sorties but in Sorties, it depends what frame i use.

Null Star really needs to be redone. When you don't want half of an ability to work as intended because you only want its other half's effects, the ability is literally conflicting with itself. Its augment only hotfixes the issue, and it's really not enough. On TOP of that, reducing Null Star's range to conserve the damage resist directly sabotages Wormhole's range and Molecular Prime's blast radius (thankfully not the expansion radius, though).

[Drasiel]

2 hours ago, Shaw1996 said:

I wish Null star don’t seek targets because with the mechanic Null star have now, it makes the ability pointless. If it worked like Mesa’s shattershield, Then her 1 would be more useful. The only place where i could get one shot in is MOT and Sorties but in Sorties, it depends what frame i use.

 

32 minutes ago, Raspberri said:

Null Star really needs to be redone. When you don't want half of an ability to work as intended because you only want its other half's effects, the ability is literally conflicting with itself. Its augment only hotfixes the issue, and it's really not enough. On TOP of that, reducing Null Star's range to conserve the damage resist directly sabotages Wormhole's range and Molecular Prime's blast radius (thankfully not the expansion radius, though).

Nullstar has provided damage resistance for a long time, it was just never included in the description.

 

 

4 hours ago, Raspberri said:

Didn't I bring up a few examples in my original post? Here are more: Titania's grounded form is pretty god-awful, must always use her 4 (and recast her 4 if her Razorflies die off), Atlas' invincible punch has gaps of vulnerability between casts, making him susceptible to unlucky one-shot deaths from nearby enemies that aren't killed yet, Ember's abilities are very weak at high levels (although her 4's augment helps, but that makes her "require" an augment, doesn't it?), Zephyr's vulnerability to any explosive/AoE is no debate, Limbo is pretty much unusable against Corpus when there's a lot of nullifier/scrambus/comba presence.

Okay so

• Nova
• Mirage
• Volt
• Titania
• Atlas1
• Ember
• Zephyr
• Limbo

I'm not discounting your opinion as invalid, but I will be stating my opinion on those frames as far as high end play goes.

• Nova: for solo play you rely on nulstar at range and molecular prime for cc. Large batches of enemies are easily dealt with via antimatter drop and if you get in a real pickle use wormhole to either go straight up in the air to allow shields to restore or into the next room. Quick thinking and rage really help
• Mirage: Her greatest defense is actually her Hall of mirrors, keep it up at all times. use small bursts of her fourth ability or slight of hand for the blind.
• Volt: you are not limited to just one shield place one on the ground behind you and pick up the one in front. Use speed to get to cover, Use discharge it's amazing cc
• Titania: While very squishy, with tribute (specifically dust the most common one to get) and lantern titania has a lot of damage mitigation and cc, if you aren't using tribute while not in her 4th you need to. That said I wouldn't willingly take her to a sortie
• Atlas: Atlas doesn't have a lot going for him but he's decent in health and armour. His 4th ability provides you with a pretty tanky decoy keep it up and you won't be the sole target when you fist the world.
• Ember: Accelerant coupled with world on fire gives minor cc and weakens enemies to fire. Generally speaking ember will have to rely on her weapons more than her powers at high level which I feel has  more to do with how hard fire falls off vs armour more than just her powerset. Throw a fire based or modded weapon and watch the world melt. Fit her with corrosive and watch her fire eat everything alive.
• Zephyr: I feel zephyr's struggle with high end is more to do with how 3/4 of her powers are near useless in combat or unreliable. She only really has turbulence that shines. Maybe if she had more reliable abilities it would counteract her issue with explosives. Best I can suggest is using tornadoes when you spot a bombard or napalm. it likely won't kill them but it will prevent them from firing.
• Limbo: I don't' like playing limbo, so I've never taken him to high level play. Nullifiers shut him down pretty hard, which with how his power set impacts other players I'm happy when I don't see him on corpus mission. >.> but that's neither here nor there in regards to his capabilities.

All that said my biggest complaint about solo play is the deaths caused by shield ignoring status effects. Slash, toxin, and toxin aura. That always feels S#&$ty as a solo player when you die with near max shields.

[Raspberry]

3 hours ago, Drasiel said:

 

Nullstar has provided damage resistance for a long time, it was just never included in the description.

 

 

Okay so

• Nova
• Mirage
• Volt
• Titania
• Atlas1
• Ember
• Zephyr
• Limbo

I'm not discounting your opinion as invalid, but I will be stating my opinion on those frames as far as high end play goes.

• Nova: for solo play you rely on nulstar at range and molecular prime for cc. Large batches of enemies are easily dealt with via antimatter drop and if you get in a real pickle use wormhole to either go straight up in the air to allow shields to restore or into the next room. Quick thinking and rage really help
• Mirage: Her greatest defense is actually her Hall of mirrors, keep it up at all times. use small bursts of her fourth ability or slight of hand for the blind.
• Volt: you are not limited to just one shield place one on the ground behind you and pick up the one in front. Use speed to get to cover, Use discharge it's amazing cc
• Titania: While very squishy, with tribute (specifically dust the most common one to get) and lantern titania has a lot of damage mitigation and cc, if you aren't using tribute while not in her 4th you need to. That said I wouldn't willingly take her to a sortie
• Atlas: Atlas doesn't have a lot going for him but he's decent in health and armour. His 4th ability provides you with a pretty tanky decoy keep it up and you won't be the sole target when you fist the world.
• Ember: Accelerant coupled with world on fire gives minor cc and weakens enemies to fire. Generally speaking ember will have to rely on her weapons more than her powers at high level which I feel has  more to do with how hard fire falls off vs armour more than just her powerset. Throw a fire based or modded weapon and watch the world melt. Fit her with corrosive and watch her fire eat everything alive.
• Zephyr: I feel zephyr's struggle with high end is more to do with how 3/4 of her powers are near useless in combat or unreliable. She only really has turbulence that shines. Maybe if she had more reliable abilities it would counteract her issue with explosives. Best I can suggest is using tornadoes when you spot a bombard or napalm. it likely won't kill them but it will prevent them from firing.
• Limbo: I don't' like playing limbo, so I've never taken him to high level play. Nullifiers shut him down pretty hard, which with how his power set impacts other players I'm happy when I don't see him on corpus mission. >.> but that's neither here nor there in regards to his capabilities.

All that said my biggest complaint about solo play is the deaths caused by shield ignoring status effects. Slash, toxin, and toxin aura. That always feels S#&$ty as a solo player when you die with near max shields.

I'm not gonna pretend that your strategies don't exist because I use them, too. I'm just saying that when nullifiers cancel pretty much every ability you have, you are forced to directly deal with them, and both Corrupted (fissure or void) and Corpus have them. Ancient Disruptors reduce incoming ability damage by 90% and duration by slightly less (damage reduction stackable with Ancient Healers, too), which is also a pain to deal with. Missions are far from impossible, but these universal anti-ability measures make it far easier for us to get killed because we are interrupted. Even easier when the tileset is relatively tight (i.e. Infested Ship, Grineer Galleon, at least half of Void).

Edited January 18, 2018 by Raspberri
clarity on ancients

[Drasiel]

21 hours ago, Raspberri said:

I'm not gonna pretend that your strategies don't exist because I use them, too. I'm just saying that when nullifiers cancel pretty much every ability you have, you are forced to directly deal with them, and both Corrupted (fissure or void) and Corpus have them. Ancient Disruptors reduce incoming ability damage by 90% and duration by slightly less (damage reduction stackable with Ancient Healers, too), which is also a pain to deal with. Missions are far from impossible, but these universal anti-ability measures make it far easier for us to get killed because we are interrupted. Even easier when the tileset is relatively tight (i.e. Infested Ship, Grineer Galleon, at least half of Void).

That's actually why I use predominantly status biased weapons with radiation and viral, especially against infested or corrupted. When you rad proc an enemy or even better one of the offending ancients their auras and special abilities no longer function on the enemies because they are no longer "allies" of the Ancient. As far as nullifiers, I only really find them an issue with limbo, because he has no self preservation outside of the rift. I bring a gun specifically for nullies, fast fire rate to pop a bubble or heavy and slow to take out the drone at the top of the bubble, then they are just another enemy. 

I don't find the nullifiers power nullification to be the most egregious of their sins. I think they provide an interesting counterplay without the no line of sight power shut off or energy drain of scrambus/combus and energy drain eximus respectively. What I don't like is that they are relatively fast, block bullets for both themselves and allies, and have a powerful attack on top of power nullification. They are a fairly common enemy that offers incredible support and protection to multiple other units and has mechanics one would expect to find inside of a boss fight not on a common mook. Honestly I'd really like if they gave them a much weaker attack and slowed their walking speed not just for soloers but for everyone.

[TheLexiConArtist]

I solo the majority of the time, and honestly, most of my deaths are a result of laziness and suboptimal play and I can actually identify them as such. I don't go to deal with a Bursa even though they're pretty simple to neutralise. I stand in place like an idiot and take a sniper round because I'm taking potshots at something else. Not using what's available to me.

I'd say I run about 60-70% deaths due to outright lazy play, 20-25% mechanical/gameplay errors and 5-20% unavoidable slaughter... the range of the latter depending on sortie modifiers, usually.

 

Things I consider while soloing that help me live longer during intended high level* content, in no particular order:

• Don't neglect your redirection/vitality in build. People do like to say shields are useless, but unless you're in a Toxin Sortie you get more mileage out of them than you might think. You might see full shields at that moment when Slash or Toxin procs down you, but that doesn't mean you haven't been spared a ton of health damage or had several audible 'evade now' cues that stopped you just getting plain old shot to death.
• Sentinels over pets. Redirection shields plus that quick-refresh from Guardian is a valuable double-buffer. You get the shield-break sound, Guardian procs, you know you need to start evading harder with your second-wind shield weathering the blows until you're back in control of the situation.
• Secure your healing. Hirudo. Life Strike. Get Medi-Ray on that sentinel. No healing means every Toxin hit, every tick of those shield-bypassing procs, the carryover damage before you get the Guardian restore for your shield is going to add up to you getting inevitably downed.
• Identify your panic response / exit strategy and what can interrupt you executing it. Which ability gives you the most breathing room, and quickly? What enemies might still be hitting you in spite of it (or where are the nullifiers being nullifiers)? Do you need to also move, because there's still napalm or grenades coming your way?
• Rolling mitigation when damage (including procs) is inevitable, because lots of people STILL don't know about that 75% damage resistance.
• Know your limits. Punching the living daylights out of a Sortie Phorid under a Healer aura is all fun and games but most frames won't hope to win that battle of attrition.
  • On a similar note, don't commit to distracting fights when your buffs are going to need recasting soon... _{I still do this all the time when Trini-tanking.}

Sure, the Commanders will get you down, aimbot grapples can catch you, and those Grineer wardens still toting insta-shot Vulkars will still abruptly lay you flat at times, but that's what revives (and sentinel Sacrifice/P.Regen) are there for.

 

*_{Intended high level means approximately up to level 125; Sortie 3/Kuva Flood enemies, not level 1000+ enemies hours into a high endless mission because that's not intended to be reasonable.}