User:Quizzical/Hard Mode

The basic tenet of hard mode most of the time is that defense wins. In easy mode, you can sometimes blast mobs away before they have a chance to do much damage to you, but in hard mode, that is often impractical. You're going to take quite a few hits, so you'd better be able to survive them.

Mobs are often smart enough to pick out the most fragile target and try to kill that target. As such, it is critical that everyone in your group be reasonably durable. You don't have to do insane amounts of damage yourself, but you do have to keep yourself alive. Everyone should bring some defensive skill, to buy time for the healers when you're taking a lot of damage. Someone who takes an "I only do offense" approach isn't carrying his weight in the group, even if he does do considerable damage.

Defensive gear is also important. In most cases, additional armor will keep you alive better than more hit points. Insignias that grant armor are usually superior to those that grant hit points, though this varies by class somewhat. Either one is usually superior to radiant insignias, as those do nothing to keep you alive. If you die, it doesn't matter how much energy you had when you died. Weapon mods that give armor also tend to be the best for their slots. Increasing your damage might seem nice, but not if it gets you killed.

More important are the runes you equip. Attribute runes should nearly always be of the minor variety. A bit of extra damage from a superior rune can turn into a huge drawback once you're dead and do no damage at all. Some people think they can use a superior rune and make up for it with a vigor rune and fortitude weapon mods, but such an approach still leaves the character far weaker than if he had those mods with a minor rune instead of a superior rune. Obviously, superior runes with no health malus (vigor and absorption) are preferable to minor runes of those types.

Everyone should also bring a rez. The eighth most important non-rez skill that you might want to bring will virtually never make much of a difference. Having a rez yourself when much of the group is dead or has already used theirs will occasionally be the difference between a wipe and finishing a mission. A group needs a couple reusable rez skills to save signets when the rezzing can be done out of combat, but a group also needs rez signets (or Sunspear Rebirth Signet for players) to get players up and functional while in combat. Reusable rez skills take longer to cast than signets and bring a player back with less HP and energy. A couple rez signets can save a tough battle and prevent additional deaths or a complete wipe that may occur if the party has to finish a battle shorthanded.

It is good for players characters with attribute points in the attributes of reusable rez skills to carry such skills and characters without any attribute points in the relevant attributes to carry a signet. It should be obvious why this approach is better than to reverse who carries the reuseable rez skills.

Rebirth, however, is not a good rez skill. I'm rather mystified on why it is so popular. It brings a player back with little health, no energy, and all skills disabled for a while--hardly useful for the battle you're in at the time. And to make matters worse, it completely drains the energy of the player using the skill. A protection monk may reasonably carry rebirth in some cases, but no one else should.

A general guideline is to bring at least 1 1/2 healers for four player missions, 2 healers for six player missions, and 2 1/2 healers for eight player missions. A healing or protection monk or a restoration ritualist count as a healer, while a motivation paragon counts as half a healer.

Do a mission in easy mode before attempting it in hard mode, as this will familiarize you with the basic layout of the mission. Be aware, however, that while tactics that work in hard mode generally work in easy mode with a lot of room for error, the reverse of that is untrue. Sometimes this can be because an escort NPC who was stronger than the mobs wasn't in much danger in easy mode, but suddenly seems quite fragile in hard mode against the stronger mobs. Sometimes it is the additional skills that some mobs get in hard mode. Sometimes mobs moving faster makes it harder to pull them properly, or throws off your timing in pulling.

Before trying a mission in hard mode, check out what additional skills mobs get. Sometimes they're nothing special, but other times, they'll require adjusting your tactics to counter the additional skills that some mobs get.

If you have multiple players with heroes, you can bring all players and heroes and no henchmen. If alone, you'll have to bring some henchmen in addition to the heroes unless in a four character mission at the start of a campaign. Pick the henchmen first, by those that have a build that fills a needed role, and then fill in heroes around them. A number of the henchmen have junk builds and should be avoided.

Don't get stuck in a few rigid builds thinking that this is what you have to use to win. Often you can mostly use one of a few base builds with which you're comfortable, but have to tweak one or two skills to bring something vital to the mission at hand. Don't rely heavily on enchantments, hexes, or conditions against mobs that can readily remove them.

Be aware of whether you need to bring enchantment removal, hex removal, condition removal, stance ending skills, or interrupts. Not all enchantments that you could remove are equal, of course. Removing Channeling probably won't make much difference in a battle, while removing Shield of Regeneration can be vital if you want to quickly kill a mob. Heroes and henchmen tend not to be very discriminating in which enchantments they remove, so if you're relying on them to remove key enchantments, you'll probably have to bring enough enchantment removal for them to remove nearly all of the enchantments that mobs have--which may be impractical for a hero. Players can do far better, either by selectively removing the critical enchantment when it is applied, or by bringing heavy duty enchantment removal such as Assault Enchantments.

Heroes tend to be better about removing hexes and conditions, if only because it is more practical to simply clear everything. Mesmers tend to be the best at removing hexes, partially a group doesn't suffer much if a mesmer lays off on casting various spells to focus on removing hexes, while a monk may have to stop healing to do that, which can get people killed. When you really need a lot of hex removal, Expel Hexes will get the job done. Several classes can remove conditions, but ritualists and paragons tend to be the best at it, with Mend Body and Soul and Cautery Signet, respectively.

Mesmers are the kings of interrupts, of course, but warriors and rangers can help out substantially by interrupting whatever they happen to see now and then. AI has better reflexes than players, and it can be difficult for players to interrupt anything with a base cast time of 1 second or less in hard mode except by dumb luck. AI isn't always terribly intelligent in choosing what to interrupt, but give a hero several interrupts and he'll probably interrupt the key skills you're after, in addition to random other stuff that doesn't matter.

When assigning attribute points, a general rule is that it's better to be good at something than mediocre at a lot of things. It is only infrequently useful to put attribute points in more than three different attributes. A single character doesn't need to interrupt and remove hexes and end stances; it works just fine to let different characters take different roles, so that they all get done well.

Sometimes in easy mode you can just charge ahead recklessly and win because you're far stronger than the mobs you're facing. That only infrequently works in hard mode. You have to be much more careful and pull carefully.

Some players avoid pickup groups because a lot of the people out there with whom you could potentially group are idiots. Still, it's pretty predictable which pickup groups are going to work, before entering the mission. Ask to see builds and max HP before entering the mission, and look for defensive skills, rez skills, and a sensible allocation of attribute points for the skills used. Do check to see if everyone has their attribute quests done. The common attribute point allocations are 12/12, 12/12/3, 12/11/6, 12/10/8, 12/9/9, 11/11/8, and 11/10/10, all of which require having both attribute quests done. If someone can't get their attribute points up to something like this, not having their attribute quests done is not only bad for its own sake, but also for what it tells you about the lack of preparation by the person with whom you could group.

The important thing to look for in max HP is evidence of superior rune usage. Anything over 500 HP is good, and above 530 HP, more isn't necessarily better, if it means that a player is using survivor insignias or fortitude weapon mods instead of something that gives armor. Less than 480 HP could be a problem, and far less than this (e.g., 300) is a strong sign that the person in your group is likely to get you wiped.