Is this the end of group play? - NM4 solo too easy

With most of the players already playing solo most of the time before this patch. 

How many games will we find for NM4 going forward? 

What do you guys think?

[[82743,users]] Yea now it's probably a decent trade off for solo play. You might even succeed with 4 builders now. Maybe.

Here is me doing betsy few hours ago, wanted to wait till it was at least online to post this. 360p so far:P

Yup. The cry babies want the game's hardest difficulty to be easy. Easier loots, easier NM4 gameplay. Soon, there will be no more reason to even play the game since everything is so easy.

Well, if you're not sitting behind decent squire walls (due to hearty being bugged to *** and hard to find) NM4 will still be a collosal pain in the ass. 

I know, because my walls are still ***, because if I'm not sitting on my DPS, I'm unable to complete maps. 

And I've played countless maps, and have yet to see a monk weapon drop as well. 

Yes, NM4 should be easy if you've farmed non stop and have basically nothing left to farm for. I'm not understanding the gripe.


To reiterate- in any game, where there's any sort of gear, as you progress, things at high level will get easier. Look at any game that has any sort of gear grind. MMO's do it, RPG's do it, this game does it. etc. 

You think people would raid at the high end level, if getting gear didn't make the content substantially easier over time? Not at all. Same thing applies to this.

I've been playing solo NM3 for like two weeks now, in a boring grind to 'optimize' my gear (crossing my fingers on a 1% difference in passives strength). Before the patch, I couldn't solo a sinlge wave of NM4. Now, I can solo the first two waves of NM4 gates and mooch as much gear as I can before dying. This is pretty much how it should be; you master one difficulty, and slowly creep into the next. 

The concept of solo vs group play shouldn't translate to "you must group, there is no solo play unless you leech off groups first". It should be very simple. 

Solo advantages

- Noone to argue about builds/split mana with.
- No having to sync up schedules with other people. 
                                
Solo disadvantages 

- Noone to help you out with your weaknesses.
- Lower iPwr loot.
- Much more difficult combat phase on larger maps since only one lane gets repaired at a time.
- Must farm much longer, as you need a well rounded build by yourself.

Group advantages - 

- Higher iPwr loot
- Easier combat phase due to repairing/DPS
- People around to cover your weaknesses
- More maps are possible/easier to NM4
- Can be more entertaining (especially with irl friends)

Group disadvantages

- Having to sync up schedules
- Having to share mana/ideas
- Dealing with afkers, leechers, etc

To me, there are more advantages playing in a group, and more disadvantages to playing solo. To add "cannot play NM4 unless you leech first" to the solo disadvantage list would be ridiculous, and it was ridiculous before this patch. You're probably geared for group NM4 play, and have been playing NM4 for a while before this patch, which is why solo is easy for you. If that's the case, continue to group up and you should see a difficulty increase compared to solo.

All valid points above and beyond. I disagree on some. But those points were not really the topic for this post.

As I asked was if, yes this current version of NM4 is easy to solo for NM4 players.

So will that lead to less and less players wanting to group up?

Will we see less players queuing up for group play? 

I don't mind solo being doable. But when it's on par and even easier and more readily available. As it is for players at end game. Will it result in more players just sticking to solo?

I'm not trying to make you'r solo games easier.. It was doable, now it's doable for everyone. So will it lead to less group play was my main concern.. 

Will I start soloing rather than play with people on my friends list? No. 

Will I solo instead of queuing up for random games? Maybe. 

Just wanted to ask a valid concern for a game that labels itself as a coop game. 

Ya, it's a pretty valid concern.  It was always a valid concern with the way matchmaking is done though (blind matchmaking, I mean).  Now it's just going to get stressed more.  

But this would always occur if they wanted to balance solo and group play, right?  

Solo play to gear up monk/squire is still basically hell though.  So there's that

They'll eventually switch over to a matchmaking system with join/create lobbies though.  I'm pretty sure of that

While I haven't played for a bit & have no idea how much this patch really effected solo play I feel that people won't just stick to solo / premade groups simply because sometimes you want to play but members in your group are busy & you don't feel like soloing.

Personally I either do premade or public. I rarely do solo, usually I only do solo when I'm trying to break into a new difficulty or testing something. The social aspect of public games is what will attract people to it but currently people mooching/leeching is a issue but I'll put up with that for the more social aspect of public games.

After seeing the changes live, even 4 player feels gimped. Did they forget that 4 player scales to 3 players in most content?  Did a few gates incursions right away after opening the game thanks to random queue pulling that nonsense up and it was clearly a freakin joke.  Feels back to how it was before the difficulty increase.  I'm not thrilled at all.  Also don't like the fact that solo now catters to crybabies who only soloed and just whined about how they couldn't solo properly on the forums.  Solo is a challenge.  It's not meant to be done without breaking a sweat or using 4 builders.  Nor is it worth crying over if you fail to meet the challenge.  Once again, cattering to crybabies has made the game idlefriendly which feels blatantly wrong.

From my understanding Solo was still preferred over group play thanks to the crappy match making in this game, where you had no way to stop people leeching into your game.

Nice to see Trendy finally threw the solo players a bone.

Solo was easier in DD1 than Group play as well. So this was an obvious thing that was going to happen eventually.

I agree though the game should be alot harder, but solo is always going to be easier.

Also understand not everyone wants to group up. I like to group up with friends, but sometimes I just want to solo and not have to worry about other players.

Comparing builders, being told where to build and what to build. Just because it works for them. Some players just host games so you can stroke their e-peen. Oh look at my stats, aren't I the bestest?

I'm more impressed with people who have low stats, but have strategy to there builds and can still clear end game content just the same.

DONT YOU BE MOCKING MY E-PEEN STROKING

@roboticaust quote:

DONT YOU BE MOCKING MY E-PEEN STROKING

If I don't who will?

@PandynatorDD quote:

So will that lead to less and less players wanting to group up?

Well there's no incentive to group currently. Grouping should be more difficult and drop higher iPwr gear, sure, but then what? Currently, DD2 just doesn't have enough content. There's not many maps, onslaught is lols, incursions ok, and that's about it... If they had more maps, bosses, game-modes, and higher-level gear to farm, I'm sure people would love to group up for it.

Philosophically speaking, some people will just always want to solo. There is nothing to be done about this, except making the game unjustly difficult for solo players to "incentivize" (force) them to consider grouping. And quite frankly, who cares? If people are playing the game, buying the skins, etc., why does it matter that they're doing it solo?

My opinion is that this game should cater to both, just like DD1, with a ramp in difficulty and iPwr in group play. There should also be more unique content, like larger maps with bosses that reallllyyyy kinda scream group play. Perhaps they could create game modes like PvP or group high-score-chasing or something to give groups a wider variety of options.

Gratz Pandy on that =). Nice to see some videos now with diversity in builds abit, with that people might get inspired to try different types of builds too.

Also i don't think that it will lead to way less group play games. People who play with a group do it for having fun together and enjoying a good talk. That's what multiplaying is about mostly. These who want to go solo having it easier now, which is fine for all i care. At last maybe some leeching will be reduced that way and some high stuck up people will be solo too.

MP all the way, can't miss out all the nice chats i have there.

@Aheadatime quote:

@PandynatorDD quote:

So will that lead to less and less players wanting to group up?

Well there's no incentive to group currently. Grouping should be more difficult and drop higher iPwr gear, sure, but then what? Currently, DD2 just doesn't have enough content. There's not many maps, onslaught is lols, incursions ok, and that's about it... If they had more maps, bosses, game-modes, and higher-level gear to farm, I'm sure people would love to group up for it.

Philosophically speaking, some people will just always want to solo. There is nothing to be done about this, except making the game unjustly difficult for solo players to "incentivize" (force) them to consider grouping. And quite frankly, who cares? If people are playing the game, buying the skins, etc., why does it matter that they're doing it solo?

My opinion is that this game should cater to both, just like DD1, with a ramp in difficulty and iPwr in group play. There should also be more unique content, like larger maps with bosses that reallllyyyy kinda scream group play. Perhaps they could create game modes like PvP or group high-score-chasing or something to give groups a wider variety of options.

No incentive to group? I must be reading this statement wrong....

In an ideal situation people would not be penalised at all for the number of players they go into a match with. Solo play is far less interesting and less mobs leads to less loot.

On the other hand, solo play should be easier than group play as there is only one person to try and control everthing! NM4 was exclusively for full 4-player parties before, even groups of 3 competent players would wait around hoping that the random that joins wasn't a leecher. For someone breaking into NM4 they were pretty much required to be one of those "leechers" for a couple of games.

If anyone wants the challenge of soloing a nm4 map on full difficulty they still can, just announce in the tavern that you need 3 leechers.

For the majority of players though, this is an amazing change (not saying it's perfect or that it doesn't need tweeking). NM4 should be playable solo.

I think there are two separate sections posting here, those that have achieved the highest tier of gear for all their heroes and those that haven't. People with 370K walls and those < 300, 3.1k traps and those with less, 50% frosty with high snowstorm and huge range and those with less.

If you have all your gear at max level with max passives all the content is easy.

Even before this patch you could do NM4 Inc with two DPS players, you could pretty much AFK wave 5 as the traps and frosties would nuke everything even if you had to deploy your dragolich.

@Fozzie quote:

I think there are two separate sections posting here, those that have achieved the highest tier of gear for all their heroes and those that haven't. People with 370K walls and those < 300, 3.1k traps and those with less, 50% frosty with high snowstorm and huge range and those with less.

If you have all your gear at max level with max passives all the content is easy.

Even before this patch you could do NM4 Inc with two DPS players, you could pretty much AFK wave 5 as the traps and frosties would nuke everything even if you had to deploy your dragolich.

As I was reading all these posts, this was exactly going though my mind.  Of course it is going to seem easier if you already had gear to do NM4.

At the same time I think this post is the best example of why they needed to do what they did.

@Aheadatime quote:

I've been playing solo NM3 for like two weeks now, in a boring grind to 'optimize' my gear (crossing my fingers on a 1% difference in passives strength). Before the patch, I couldn't solo a sinlge wave of NM4. Now, I can solo the first two waves of NM4 gates and mooch as much gear as I can before dying. This is pretty much how it should be; you master one difficulty, and slowly creep into the next. 

The concept of solo vs group play shouldn't translate to "you must group, there is no solo play unless you leech off groups first". It should be very simple. 

First, congratz on soloing NM4 Betsy, you obviously have good gear and are a talented player.

However, I have to disagree that "easy solo play" will stop group play.  I know I will still play with my friends.  I enjoy group play better than solo, though I solo a lot.  Not because it's "easy", it wasn't.  I soloed because I was leveling a character or pet or wanted to work on completing a "Onslaught" daily.  Or, I wanted to try my towers out without using the meta all the time.  I don't want to bother others with my screwing around and waste their time... thus I queue a private match.

And someone already pointed that out.  Once you get good gear, the game always become easier, if it didn't... what's the point of grinding for gear?

It did feel a little too easy as someone still making the nm4 transition. If it weren't for the odd kobold, and malthius' skeletons causing havoc on physical lanes, I'd drop my barricades. 

The true problem is that you simply cannot progress from NM3 to NM4.  You just can't.  I have played almost 300 hours since December.  I log in each day and fail at a couple NM4 maps, do some Harbinger (very repetitive and slow) then eventually downgrade myself into lower tier play so I can succeed.  There are several problems here that are playing into why the difficulty doesn't feel good for players.

1. The difficulty gap between NM3 and NM4 is too big; you need NM4 gear on farm to prepare yourself for the NM4 content... thus most rely on people that have already geared up when the content was easier...

2. There is no mode to play that is rewarding for people that have nearly maxed their gear.  They are doing the same content as geared NM3 incursion players.  IMO fix onslaught's broken loot system, and increase the number of epic and legendary drops in NM4 incursion to make that the "endgame" (right now there is a nearly comparable benefit to the player for completing little horn / greystone / etc. when compared to incursion... so for someone seeking efficiency, what's the point of incursion?)

So yeah, I completely understand that if you have great gear you want challenging content.  For the players that don't have nearly perfect gear, we need a means to be able to attain it.  Right now it's solely leeching or extremely slow through Harbinger (filled up 2 bags worth of legendary items last weekend from Harbinger: 2 total upgrades over all my characters in ~12 hours of farming).  The difficulty is honestly broken.  The endgame game modes don't make any sense.  The progression into the endgame is broken. There is a lot to fix here.  Let's not get caught up in black or white difficulty discussion.  The regular NM4 content needs to be easier and there needs to be a place for geared players to most efficiently use what they have attained to get more items than sometime who is just breaking into NM4.

I think there are some people that need to be carried to get gear in NM4 and that is why they are afraid of co-op getting less people. As far as the difficulty being to easy I suggest all you people put your super elite gear in your inventory and try farming nightmare gear purely solo and see if you get a challenge, then come back and tell us how easy NM4 is solo.

I was planning on coming in here to defend Trendy's decision, but after seeing where the hearted posts are, doesn't look like I have to. I'll just let the hearts speak for themselves.

wouldn't call it so much a nerf! Haven't felt that the mobs do less dmg or have less hp. The biggest difference is the amount of mobs that spawn, and that is a big nerf to the amount of gear that drop.

So if u want to be most efficient farming gear I would jump into a group and get to kill muuuch more mobs than in solo.

There might be less group play because so many People where forced to play group just to do maps and get gear. If you Are a group player u will still play group, and if u Are a solo player u can actual play solo and do things.

If they wanted to promote group play they would just make it the same way DD1 was. The more people in your party = better loot drops overall. Why bother playing with strangers who dont know what theyre doing and wipe on wave 1 when you could solo and get more of the same loot as you would with randoms? 

To a certain extent i agree with the NM scaling, what i dont agree with is Trendy's thoughts on balance. Atm they created a situation where theres no point in joining randoms. Friends will still play together but theres no point for randoms to group at a chance for even less loot than they would get playing solo.

I really just thought people like Pandy and anime say this stuff for their own epeens but now i think they actually believe it.

Casual players play like ~2 hours a day man. You cant have mega difficulty and mega grind mixed together and expect any of them to stick around.

 I realize now that you guys don't understand this since you grind dd2 all day long and its all super easy with tons of gear. But if trendy wants to keep the other 95% of players they will have to never listen to you guys again lol. You are literally bad for the game.

@Pegazul quote:

I really just thought people like Pandy and anime say this stuff for their own epeens but now i think they actually believe it.

Casual players play like ~2 hours a day man. You cant have mega difficulty and mega grind mixed together and expect any of them to stick around.

 I realize now that you guys don't understand this since you grind dd2 all day long and its all super easy with tons of gear. But if trendy wants to keep the other 95% of players they will have to never listen to you guys again lol. You are literally bad for the game.

I haven't asked for it to change at all. Just wanted to ask if it could potentially eliminate the already small NM4 matches going on. Maybe it will do the exact opposite, since it will be more accessible.

Not shouting for it to change, just a little concerned that is all.