Thread: Duo skirmishes...

Did they do anything at all besides sticking a *duo* button just above the small fellowship button and linking that button to the small fellowship skirmish?... I ask because the duo's are ridiculously hard, and I did a duo and a small fellow (with one other player) of the same quest and there was no difference at all....

I guess it would have saved on programming and QA.

I'm yet to try it but it certainly smacks of taking the small fellowship skirmishes and just re-branding them 'Duo Skirmishes' from what I've read from other players. Then adding it to the Book update as a new feature. Cheeky!

Originally Posted by jmariner

Did they do anything at all besides sticking a *duo* button just above the small fellowship button and linking that button to the small fellowship skirmish?... I ask because the duo's are ridiculously hard, and I did a duo and a small fellow (with one other player) of the same quest and there was no difference at all....

According to a podcast with developers, they did try to find a middle ground between solo and small fellowships, although they ended up having to try a compromise solution because the skirmish difficulty doesn't scale so neatly as to make it easy to add a duo option. The exact nature of the compromise eludes me but scroll back on the podcast listings on this site and you should find the one with developers who announced the duo feature.

In short, though, small fellowships are not exactly identical to duos, despite your perception.

Also, when they first came out, some of duo skirmishes were harder than intended (based on dev's post), so they may have been as hard as a small fellow skirmish because of that. I am not sure if that issue has been fixed or not.

There are two differences between duo and small fellowship:

First, the opponents have a debuff that reduces their morale and damage (it's similar to the Tier 2 buff except in the opposite direction). Second, subsequent waves never come until the first wave has been defeated (so you can take your sweet time killing off a wave). This is all that was feasible in the time between the decision to create a duo mode and the time Book 1 was released.

If you are comparing lieutenants and number of mobs, the two would look identical.

I'm not sure what the list of known issues means by some mobs being too difficult, but the most likely is that there are some opponents for whom the defuff is only a minor inconvenience.

I remember reading that there were a couple of skirmishes that didn't scale properly for duos for some reason, though I don't recall which ones they were off hand. But the few duos I did worked wonderfully- and were most certainly not the same as the small fellowships, which we found near impossible as a duo.

While there may be differences between Duo and Small Fellowship skirmishes, it's still far easier for two people to split up and both do a solo skirmish than it is to stay together and do a duo skirmish. The risk vs reward for the duo skirmish just doesn't support a push to get people into a fellowship.

I know the wife and I tried a couple of the new dou's and well I could not tell any difference betten them and trying a small fellowship. I don't remeber exactly what ones we tried it was 3 of them.

After getting our teeth kicked in she totaly gave up, and has only logged in once since then to run volume 1 solo to get her white horse.

Originally Posted by ericlewis

I know the wife and I tried a couple of the new dou's and well I could not tell any difference betten them and trying a small fellowship. I don't remeber exactly what ones we tried it was 3 of them.

After getting our teeth kicked in she totaly gave up, and has only logged in once since then to run volume 1 solo to get her white horse.

I'm trying to remember- Theivery and Mischeif I think might have been one that was having issues. I know we did Defense of the Prancing Pony and didn't have problems. Tuckborough manhandled us good, but we did manage to finish it.

I do want to ask that age old question- did you do them on level? And were your soldiers leveled up? If your soldiers are weak and not developed that could easily be your problem right there. We're also finding that doing them 2 ro 3 levels below is kind of a sweet spot- the encounters offer a good challenge, but the rest doesn't overwhelm and kill us repeatedly there.

Yeah, the end bosses in Thievery and mischief are silly hard.

All the fights themselves are fairly good, until that one.

2 elite masters with about 34-35K morale is an asskicking waiting to happen for 2 people.

Yeah this was already discussed in the skirmish forums.. The couple I have done can be difficult, but have not done one yet that is that difficult, probably have been lucky in that regard.

I've done a number of these and they are NOT difficult at all. They're akin to the faceroll that is tier 1 solo skirmishes.

If you're getting dominated in duo skirmishes I reccomend assessing the following: gear, soldier, playstyle. You should NOT be losing consistently.

Re: T&M. I don't think it's unreasonable to fight 2 EM's at the end. They're really not that hard. Mez one and tank the other or tank 'em both if there isn't a mezzer. Herbalists can keep you alive just fine.

The duo skirmishes are an epic fail in regard to difficulty and reward compared to difficulty. I can walk through a solo skirmish, on level, without a soldier, (mostly unbuffed) in about 15 minutes. So can my duo partner. For duo's we have to work to a total sweat and still die several times (always totally buffed), and it takes at least twice as long, and longer. What a disappointment these farces must be for a lot of players who were so excited about them! (Like me)....


And, Magian, I bow to your *godliness*... ~bow~... But I really don't need Elvis coming in here and telling me how easy it is to sing, or Bolt telling me how easy it is to run fast.

Originally Posted by Magian

I've done a number of these and they are NOT difficult at all. They're akin to the faceroll that is tier 1 solo skirmishes.

If you're getting dominated in duo skirmishes I reccomend assessing the following: gear, soldier, playstyle. You should NOT be losing consistently.

Re: T&M. I don't think it's unreasonable to fight 2 EM's at the end. They're really not that hard. Mez one and tank the other or tank 'em both if there isn't a mezzer. Herbalists can keep you alive just fine.

If you already got level 60+ level characters. Getting started on skirmishes. Having success can be very difficult with rank 1 soldiers. So much so with the duos that people will give up.

I hate skirmishing with my minstrel solo. I have to set the skirmish to -4 levels to complete them. Otherwise, it is multiple defeats. No fun.

Some skirmishes are much harder than others. I gave up on a three man with thievery and mischief. We could not beat the two bosses with our group mix. It would either reset. We would end up defeated. After screwing around for 20 minutes. We left the instance.

Originally Posted by Magian

I've done a number of these and they are NOT difficult at all. They're akin to the faceroll that is tier 1 solo skirmishes.

If you're getting dominated in duo skirmishes I reccomend assessing the following: gear, soldier, playstyle. You should NOT be losing consistently.

Knock it off. Really. Your elitist attitude is getting on my nerves. Some of the duo skirmishes are bugged. They are the small fellowship version instead. I went into a duo TRiT with a captain on my RK(On a level 37). We got our butts handed to us repeatedly. Are you going to tell me that my playstyle is wrong, that I'm a bad player, that we suck? Cause that would be so so amusing. On one of the counter assaults, we got 10 adds plus a lieutenant. And about half were elites. Is that duo sized? Sure... sure. Amusing to hear.

"It's not a problem for me, therefore it's not a problem for anyone. I can't look past the experience that is my own." /WIN

Originally Posted by revoked

Also, when they first came out, some of duo skirmishes were harder than intended (based on dev's post), so they may have been as hard as a small fellow skirmish because of that. I am not sure if that issue has been fixed or not.

Signed... + Rep for you.

Few things:

1) I know some encounters are bugged in difficulty. I've seen some of these. Things like EM (or two EM bosses) with two lieutenants is a little extreme. But I'm not talking about the extremes; and this does not happen every duo you do.

2) Notwithstanding the extreme cases, I have done enough duos to see almost every Lieutenant at least once. Unless they're bugging out and sending legions at you (they don't) they all can be handled.

3) Roov you got on my nerves a long time ago. Interesting, eh? And expressing a personal opinion is not elitism.

4) Yes starting soldiers are a little bit inept, but you make provisions for it until it gets better. We all had to deal with it - and we managed to make it through OK.

And please guys (and gals), drop the insults. They're unnecessary and only make your arguments weaker.

Originally Posted by Magian

And please guys (and gals), drop the insults. They're unnecessary and only make your arguments weaker.

Hey, skippy. Realize that telling other people they suck and that's the reason they're failing is an insult. The only person with a weak argument here is you because you seem to think that your experiences = reality. F A I L. Some of the duo skirmishes are bugged. I'd like to see you in a duo take on four encounter mobs, one having 222k morale in a duo. Or is that working as intended? You sound like Gildhur.

Originally Posted by cwswim03

Hey, skippy. Realize that telling other people they suck and that's the reason they're failing is an insult. The only person with a weak argument here is you because you seem to think that your experiences = reality. F A I L. Some of the duo skirmishes are bugged. I'd like to see you in a duo take on four encounter mobs, one having 222k morale in a duo. Or is that working as intended? You sound like Gildhur.

DING!

Duo skirmishes are currently out of balance. If anyone thinks that even the easy ones are akin to a Tier 1 solo, they must really suck at Tier 1 solo.


"You must spread reputation around before giving it to Cwswim03 again".

Originally Posted by cwswim03

Hey, skippy. Realize that telling other people they suck and that's the reason they're failing is an insult. The only person with a weak argument here is you because you seem to think that your experiences = reality. F A I L. Some of the duo skirmishes are bugged. I'd like to see you in a duo take on four encounter mobs, one having 222k morale in a duo. Or is that working as intended? You sound like Gildhur.

When did I tell them they sucked? Oh wait, that's your own interpretation, not what I actually said. What I said is this: [based upon my experience] you should not be consistently losing duo skirmishes. If you are, I reccomend looking at xyz.

That is very different from saying something like 'lawl noobs l2play.' That would be something more akin to 'telling them they suck.'

I was constructive, comparing my own experiences to what is being presented. Bugged duo skirmishes notwithstanding (200k morale mob, 4 EMs at once) I -think- you should be able to do them.

No flames, no insults, no trolls. My opinion and helpful suggestions to beat the content.

Originally Posted by Magian

When did I tell them they sucked? Oh wait, that's your own interpretation, not what I actually said. What I said is this: [based upon my experience] you should not be consistently losing duo skirmishes. If you are, I reccomend looking at xyz.

Originally Posted by Magian

If you're getting dominated in duo skirmishes I reccomend assessing the following: gear, soldier, playstyle. You should NOT be losing consistently.

When "Z" is "Playstyle" its very similar to saying L2P. If you don't think people will interpret this as an insult, you really don't understand people very well...

Originally Posted by KainXI

When "Z" is "Playstyle" its very similar to saying L2P. If you don't think people will interpret this as an insult, you really don't understand people very well...

He's such a doof I can't believe it. Your playstyle is wrong ---> You suck and you're doing the encounter wrong. Lulululul. "I Don't insult people I just tell them they're playing wrong." WIN

Hey mav, I can solo the small fellowship skirmishes on my Champ. Does that mean I should come tell you that your playstyle is wrong for not being able to do them? No. I accept that I am not in the majority and that bugged duo skirmishes are a MAJOR problem for MOST of the people out there. Really... get a grip and read what you write first.

Originally Posted by KainXI

When "Z" is "Playstyle" its very similar to saying L2P. If you don't think people will interpret this as an insult, you really don't understand people very well...

Similiar? To some, maybe, but it's not. That's the problem with this forum sometimes. Too many read into meaning that just isn't there.

If you want, take out playstyle and insert 're-evaluate strategy.' That's -all- that was meant.

edit: Roov wins by insulting! Woo I guess?

Originally Posted by Magian

edit: Roov wins by insulting! Woo I guess?

Roov wins by pointing out that you are saying... in not just this forum but the instances and raids forums too... "My fellowship (Raid (Small fellowship (Solo))) experience is that this is not the case, hence it is not the case in all situations." That is a fallacy. You think that just because you don't encounter a problem, a problem does not exist. That is not the case. Duo skirmishes are bugged. It's an issue. Deal with it.

Originally Posted by cwswim03

Roov wins by pointing out that you are saying... in not just this forum but the instances and raids forums too... "My fellowship (Raid (Small fellowship (Solo))) experience is that this is not the case, hence it is not the case in all situations." That is a fallacy. You think that just because you don't encounter a problem, a problem does not exist. That is not the case. Duo skirmishes are bugged. It's an issue. Deal with it.

When did I refute duo skirmishes are bugged? I didn't. I said they are not bugged with consistency (ie., there are duo skirmishes that aren't bugged).

All you do is misinterpret and read into meaning that isn't there. :/

Originally Posted by RileyCraven

You sir are an a@@hole. There's everyone else in this thread saying there is a problem, then there is you saying everyone else just sucks. So now I am going to add my two cents

Duo skirmishes are a JOKE. Gear is a check, lvl 33 burg, and 33 capt in critted lvl 28 gear (most of that gear is even better than critted lvl 35 gear) Soldier choice, an archer for the cappy and protector for the burg. Now playstyle. No matter how you do T i Ts it is going to be heavily dependant on what leuts you get if you win or lose the skirmish. And even then some of the mob waves are just stupidly ret a r ded. The problem with ANY healer in this regard is that the second you do ONE heal you practically have all the aggro of 10 mobs... cuse yeah a character with 1500 health is going to tank that many mobs *eye roll* (and ps the protector is long dead by this point, cuse no amount of healing is going to allow him to tank 10 mobs, and even if he did live the healer would be just short work with all the agrro it would pick up keeping the alive) then lets assume that you get to the boss without dying (highly unlikely) you have to kill the boss while he summons not one but TWO add leuts. Again if you get skrewed by leuts you die in seconds, EVEN with mezs. I say this after having played TONS of solo versions of T i Ts and Gondomam and having died maybe once or twice on each in the whole course of 20-30 runs. You sir are full of garbage.

That's a problem with skirms at low level in general, and not just Duo.

The devs already know Duo skirms are hard for some people. Coming in here and saying "Duo skirms are too hard" doesn't tell them where the problem is. You have to give them more info. What classes. What levels. What soldiers. Are the soldiers up to your level, or are they still at Rank 1. Which skirmish. Which part of the skirmish is the problem.

Remember that balancing Duo skirms is a hard thing to do. They have to drop the difficulty to a level that is doable for most class makeups, but at the same time, they can't drop it too much that people will be able to solo them.

My recommendation is to remove Small Fellowship LTs from the Duo LTs pool. Lots of people can already solo Duo skirms and are being able to easily advance the Small Fellowship LTs deeds without ever having to group.

Originally Posted by cwswim03

Hey, skippy. Realize that telling other people they suck and that's the reason they're failing is an insult. The only person with a weak argument here is you because you seem to think that your experiences = reality. F A I L. Some of the duo skirmishes are bugged. I'd like to see you in a duo take on four encounter mobs, one having 222k morale in a duo. Or is that working as intended? You sound like Gildhur.

You rang?

If some of the duos are bugged, you should be smart enough to not include them in your discussions of the overall difficulty of the duo setting.

If a duo skirmish has EXACTLY the same level/health/damage on the mobs, it is BUGGED and is therefore irrelevant to the discussion because that's not how it's intended to be.

What "four encounter mobs" are you talking about? And what has 222k? More details, please.

Originally Posted by Magian

Similiar? To some, maybe, but it's not. That's the problem with this forum sometimes. Too many read into meaning that just isn't there.

If you want, take out playstyle and insert 're-evaluate strategy.' That's -all- that was meant.

edit: Roov wins by insulting! Woo I guess?

Sometimes, when 8 of 10 people who read what you wrote misinterpret it (I read it as an insult, and really, my reading comprehension is typically spot-on) it might be the wiser course of action to humbly confess that you have just possibly expressed yourself poorly and X was really what you meant (you even almost did that, minus the humbly plus the added arrogance to the correction). The defensive posturing and continued insults re: reading comprehension and "reading into things what isn't there" (which is, by the way, an important part of human survival and downright instinctive) isn't actually going to defuse a situation. This advice, of course, only holds if you are truly trying to be helpful and actually want to get along with people.

Just my 2 cents, which may be worth more like 1 cent,

Pax

Originally Posted by gildhur

You rang?

If some of the duos are bugged, you should be smart enough to not include them in your discussions of the overall difficulty of the duo setting.

If a duo skirmish has EXACTLY the same level/health/damage on the mobs, it is BUGGED and is therefore irrelevant to the discussion because that's not how it's intended to be.

What "four encounter mobs" are you talking about? And what has 222k? More details, please.

I did ring. The OP stated the problem that I described exactly. The small fellow and duo skirms are exactly the same in some cases. Hence, why I said it's bugged. The developer's intention is irrelevant if the game is a certain way. I'm not discussing the non bugged ones, but the bugged ones. People should not have to stray from Trouble in Tuckborough just because it's broken. But they are being forced away because the duo is harder than it should be.

I guess you didn't see the screenshot where four encounter mobs spawned in Danneglor and one was a 222k arch nemesis.

Originally Posted by cwswim03

I did ring. The OP stated the problem that I described exactly. The small fellow and duo skirms are exactly the same in some cases. Hence, why I said it's bugged. The developer's intention is irrelevant if the game is a certain way. I'm not discussing the non bugged ones, but the bugged ones. People should not have to stray from Trouble in Tuckborough just because it's broken. But they are being forced away because the duo is harder than it should be.

I guess you didn't see the screenshot where four encounter mobs spawned in Danneglor and one was a 222k arch nemesis.

No, I didn't see that. And again, that's irrelevant to a discussion of the difficulty of duo skirmishes because it's a bug that shouldn't be in a duo skirmish. If you started a solo T1 T&M skirmish and got the bug that we got in SoM beta where four copies of the boss spawned, one elite, one EM, one nem, and one AN, would you then say that solo T1 skirmishes are too difficult?

Originally Posted by gildhur

No, I didn't see that. And again, that's irrelevant to a discussion of the difficulty of duo skirmishes because it's a bug that shouldn't be in a duo skirmish.

Yes because you usually don't read posts. It's not irrelevant to a discussion if it's what's happening consistently in duo skirmishes. If duo skirmishes are consistently harder than they should be.... that is the reality of it. Man you really are the biggest fanboi ever. Yula's quicker on the reply button than you are though.

Originally Posted by cwswim03

If duo skirmishes are consistently bugged than they should be.... that is the reality of it.

FTFY

/bug it and do a different one

Just to relay my experiences with duo skirmishing, I've seen the whole out of balance bit a LOT. In the end, every time, we've ended up splitting up and doing the skirmish each as a single. I'm sure I'm not the best minstrel, but there was no way we could have completed them duo.

Originally Posted by gildhur

You rang?

Originally Posted by cwswim03

I did ring

Round 1, FIGHT!

Queue Mortal Kombat music.

Originally Posted by gildhur

No, I didn't see that. And again, that's irrelevant to a discussion of the difficulty of duo skirmishes because it's a bug that shouldn't be in a duo skirmish. If you started a solo T1 T&M skirmish and got the bug that we got in SoM beta where four copies of the boss spawned, one elite, one EM, one nem, and one AN, would you then say that solo T1 skirmishes are too difficult?

It's pretty much the same bug. Happened in Dannenglor with one of the encounters. And I don't think it's something that is limited to just Duos.

Originally Posted by Golledhel

It's pretty much the same bug. Happened in Dannenglor with one of the encounters. And I don't think it's something that is limited to just Duos.

It's not limited to duos. I saw it in a 3-man before V3B1.

Just adding another anecdotal data point -- two of my kinmates (level 32 LM / champion, low level herbalist / bannerguard soldiers) have also had massive trouble with duos, especially Tuckborough; they had to downlevel it by 4 to prevail, and they died so many times they basically exchanged silver for skirmish marks (the exchange rate isn't as good as ya might think :P). The other skirmish available at that level (Siege of Gondamon) was reportedly a bit better, but still extremely difficult.

When I joined them on my alt (level 32 captain, low level warrior soldier) we tore through the even-level small fellowship version of Tuckborough effortlessly -- we didn't even come close to wiping. They swore off duos for this reason, and I can't blame them.

Tangent, but I think this also underlines the problem of purely level-based scaling; power levels do NOT increase linearly with character levels, and not just because important spells/abilities are learned later on. I don't have a max level character yet, but my level 50 main became a lot more powerful after getting some initial Moria loot and the starter legendaries. I imagine another shift happens when moving into SoM content, and of course level 65s run the gamut of yellow-purple-cyan gear like everything else... and that's without moving into soldier level territory (returning players with a level 50/60 character and a newbie soldier, etc).

edit: They were aware of the bug where duo skirmishes change to small fellowship ones right before you enter them; they were extra careful when selecting the skirmish, so I'm 100% they did a duo and not a small-fellowship skirmish.


my 2 level 30 skirmish marks,

-- Z.

I have a completely different take on the Duo skirmishes:

Originally Posted by Boraxxe

So far I have attempted and completed 3 of the offensive skirmishes on Duo mode but running them solo.

Burglar/Herbalist (all skills/training 18 or higher).

In Thievery & Mischief: died at final bosses, retreated, came back and defeated them. 2nd try, completed without dieing.

In The Battle in the Tower: completed first try.

In Breaching the Necromancer's Gate: had to retreat 3 times. Note: it was not at the final boss that I had trouble, and not even a Lt. It was a priestess that kept popping out spooks that got me. Finally determined how to deal with her and finished the skirmish.

All in all, I enjoy the increased challenge supplied by the toughened up Duo level. It is challenging to run as a duo and really challenging to do it solo.

The Burg/Herb combo works well going solo. Not sure what other combos work well.

Anyone else doing these solo?
What combos are you running?

http://forums.lotro.com/showthread.php?t=321854&page=2

Originally Posted by Herellomar

According to a podcast with developers, they did try to find a middle ground between solo and small fellowships, although they ended up having to try a compromise solution because the skirmish difficulty doesn't scale so neatly as to make it easy to add a duo option. The exact nature of the compromise eludes me but scroll back on the podcast listings on this site and you should find the one with developers who announced the duo feature.

In short, though, small fellowships are not exactly identical to duos, despite your perception.

I find it hard to believe that anyone could look at duos and think they were in the same solar system as 'middle ground' between solo and small fellowship. Maybe that was the original intent, but to believe this I would have to believe they are not very competent - and I don't believe that.

They in fact appear to be aimed at the people who were duoing small fellowship with two people.

Bree finish:

solo: 1 elite

3 man: 2 elite masters (am I recalling this correctly?)

middle ground: 2 elite masters

Originally Posted by gildhur

FTFY

/bug it and do a different one

That's very helpful, although at level 30 you have so many to choose from, it's hard to pick just one.