#2

I got diamond rating in every mission on every difficulty with Deande while playing solo. Some characters may take a little more effort, but the PvE part is doable with everyone.

I personally find Attikus one of the strongest characters for story, but I know some people disagree with that.

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#3

Caldarius is god mode in solo pve on any story mission or OPS mission. Flashbang is an AoE stun against most AI and his gun is accurate enough to consistently land crits. He can double jump while shooting so you can maintain full mobility while still attacking. When playing solo all cooldowns are halved so if you pick up a cooldown bonus you can keep waves of enemies stun locked. Just remember to take the flash barrage helix at level 4 (it changes the skill to fire 3 flashbang grenades at reduced damage, letting you hit more enemies and keep the blind status active longer).

All the melee struggle in the early part of the game but most carry very well in later game. If you are struggling with any of them, let me know and I can give you advice on how to play them for pve.

For defense missions territorial characters like Kleese or Ernest can solo with relative ease. If Miko gets to level 10 he’s one of the better characters because of his vicious strain helix and his level 5 pervasive poison, set his ult down on spawn point or the defense point and watch everything die.

Characters that are just in general good for any mission would be ISIC, Oscar Mike, Whiskey Foxtrot, Caldarius, Marquis, and Alani off the top of my head.

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#4

There are some missions I will probably never play again, even in co-op. For example: Saboteur.

Here’s all the missions. And my rating, 0 through 5, for whether or not I think it can be enjoyed in solo. 5 is best. 0 is I’ll never play it solo.

Prologue - rating 4 (can you choose any character for this yet?)
Description: Your battle begins here!

The Algorithm - rating 5.
Description: Help the Peacekeepers with icy moons, crazy robots, and universe-bending math!

The Void’s Edge - rating 2 (if I recall, you do have to defend a wolf sentry, still playable)
Description: Stop a Varelsi incursion by plugging up a portal anomaly on Bliss! Extra Wolf Sentry included!

The Renegade - rating 1 (defendables)
Description: Recruit a legendary warrior by helping him get a much-needed recharge!

The Archive - rating 2 (defendables)
Description: Tree-hugging fun for lovers of literacy in the burning jungles of Ekkunar!

The Sentinel - rating 5 - I think this is one of the few missions without instant lose conditions
Description: What universe would be complete without at least two super-weapons? Stop this one on Ekkunar before BAD THINGS HAPPEN.

The Experiment - rating 0 - defend something the entire level, it never gets health back.
Description: Who says dwarves aren’t smart? Help Boldur research “all the things” at Amenine Observatory on Ekkunar.

The Saboteur - rating 0 - ultra hard easy to lose defendable at the end
Description: Team up with a special away-team guest on Tempestas you help Rendain further refine his tastes.

The Heliophage - rating 3 - this has instant lose conditions, but no defendables at least. but I don’t think it works that well solo.
Description: Fight for the Universe as you confront Rendain on Tempest.

All the OPs missions - rating 5 - I think. I think all the OPs missions are fine in solo.

I need to replay all the missions to review how I feel about them in solo.

#5

Saboteur isn’t really that difficult. The trick is to use the buildables.

In general for any defense mission: Thumper turrets and flash traps make your life a lot easier (one exception is the final defense point in Saboteur, build one shock turret directly in front of the point and thumpers in the other locations). They were a lot more difficult at release when the defense points were made out of paper, but they were made a lot easier in a patch later.

I kinda liked the difficulty at release. It was mean, but it felt great to finally finish a mission you could actually fail when you didn’t pay attention.

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#6

The Algorithm and The Sentinel are just classic raids. Wish there were more of them.

I personally played through the entire storyline (and all the ops) solo, as organizing a time to get a co-op team was a bit difficult. Thorn used to be absolutely unstoppable, Ernest is pretty damn amazing for defense missions, Whisky works better on some missions but not others.

Defense missions in general aren’t great fun. Saboteur is generally pretty cool, but the Renegade sucks.

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#7

Solo Best Pick IMO :

Caldarius

  • if you want to speed run

Alani

  • for best chances to success in mission + she can be fast

Thorn

  • Fun mobility and Massive DMG

Pendles

  • For the lols

Honestly , I always choose characters with mobility in any mission but for the most part, most of them are shooters rather than melee type.
Melee type characters are not that good in Hardcore mode because there’s always a chance they’ll get massive from melee attack, also some bosses are too dangerous from close range.

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#8

The last defense point on Renegade is an absolute chore, especially solo, because of the multiple choke points you have to keep track of.

I personally find Experiment a little easier solo because you don’t have to worry about someone avoiding the first defense point to run all over the map looking for loot boxes while you have to fight off their share of mobs in addition to everyone else’s.

That said, defense missions aren’t too bad solo as long as you’re willing to use a gear loadout that lets you maintain a full suite of defense turrets and traps.

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#9

Everyone is viable.
Just depends on the challenge you would like to overcome. Marquis is easier than El Dragon most of the time, though he does make it easier to grab the bonus points. (If you survive)

I don’t think anyone really complained the axe throwers on 8-1 of Mario Bros we’re too hard.

We embraced it, don’t die. I just wish there were leaderboards to compete against.

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#10

I think all of the defense missions have enough shards that you can run whatever you want (might not be able to activate all of them very fast though). A healing drone also might save you from having to rebuild turrets and traps all the time, if you have some troubles keeping them alive (I usually buy one at the last section of experiment).

I find legendaries unnecessary in PvE, so I usually don’t have too much problems with shards, but I’m quite confident that even a triple legendary loadout without shard gen would be doable.

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#11

Yeah, solo-ing, you’re probably fine there.

If I’m public queuing (a little sideways from the topic, I know) I’d still use a loadout with shard gen so I don’t have to worry about sharing shards with new players who collect them and don’t know how to use them.

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#12

Pre-nerf Gallilea was the choice, easy to get full corruption plus the shield and sword lasers…now…

Building health with Kelvin is pretty fun, though it can be rough going early…Really, your only tough missions are likely be the defense missions and Heliophage. If you are in team for Heliophage and having trouble, take a Pendles for the stealth revives… For the defense missions, take a Kleese…Oscar Mike is a great all around choice and particularly good for Experiment (airstrike ignores Artem’s shields)…

Basically for solo, you want someone with range and/or a useful gimmick like a shield or invisibility. Of course we’ve all solo’d with melee, just responding to the OP and giving what I feel is the best general advice.

Some levels are much easier with a little strategy too, for Void’s Edge, have enough shards ready to build a shield on the sentry immediately after he spawns right before the first door opens. Also have enough to build a shield for the final area with him right after he jumps down… That mission (especially on advanced) is twice as easy doing that (though you really do want a ranged attacker for that boss fight). For Sabotuer, knowing how many Thumper turrets to build in each area and adjusting your load out based on that (playing in a big group, time to bring those greens and purples)… same with Experiment though shards are plentiful there so you can take 3 legendaries…

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#13

Everything is doable, and I’ve done everything multiple times. But never the less, there are caveats worth mentioning.

  • Missions
    • Algorithm - Definitely the one they put the most time and love into
    • Void’s Edge - Back when more of the characters felt powerful, I used to love mowing down the hoards of Varelsi and stun locking Warlord Nix.
    • Renegade - The OG Battleborn hoard mode, and again the final area was very fun when more of the characters felt impactful (to my standards)
    • Archive - Meh. Not good or bad, and it didn’t help that it’s horrible for gear, as there’s only one boss
    • Sentinel - My personal favorite, although it was 10x more fun with how the guardians used to be.
    • Experiment - I enjoy it. Though I can see how it can be frustrating if you are new or have bad teammates. I love how you have access to the entire map from second 1 (If you have someone with good verticality like Attikus, Benny, etc…)
    • Saboteur - Least favorite. Lingering memories of how extremely easy it was to fail on release, and the fact any Jennerit map screws over my PC, (and a few more things) make it hard to like it
    • Heliophage - Enjoyable once you know what to do, but it’s not my style and “hard CC out-the-wazoo” Rendain really kills the enjoyment of this mission for some characters
  • OPS
    • Attikus - 2nd. For any game that is so focused around PvP balance, a boss that does 2-3k damage a pop attacks is not fun, even if she has “tells” you can learn. Not to mention the Brute grenades everywhere. I can’t imagine this mission on 3 player difficulty with average players.
    • Toby - 5th. Lots of lame reused assets, easily failed challenges, annoying traps, a horrible final arena, and a pitiful boss makes this OPS trash IMO.
    • Oscar Mike - 3rd. It’s only purpose is easy gear, but I’m pretty sure they reduced the drop rates of the chest.
    • Montana - 4th. Love the aesthetics, but the final boss and the entire map before the library is a big F U to all melee heroes. Along with the Varelsi Dancers or whatever that have the release day Attikus Ults that chunk off 1/3 of your health per knock up. Horrible shard and level economy as well.
    • Phoebe - 1st. Lots of shards, plays nice, pretty, and has an optional never ending horde mode. The final boss and bad leveling are it’s only blemishes.
  • Strong starter characters
    • Oscar Mike, Thorn, etc…
    • Any ranged character that isn’t primarily a caster or support.
      • Characters that don’t fit this can work, and so can the melee ones, but these guidelines will help get your feet wet.
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#15

So. Let me rephrase this. I’ve played enough to have a strong opinion on the defend this or lose missions. Nobody here will ever convince me that they were a good idea or fun. IMO anyhow. So, if the mission has a thing you must defend, odds are high that I hate that level. There is maybe one level that has a defendable that I actually tolerate. (I recall being able to heal the thing in question and I think I rarely lost the mission).

And basically, I’m trying to figure out which levels I should play solo as I revisit this game. I personally got soured on this game a while ago despite everything I love about it. So I’m trying to avoid that. The past couple days I’ve played two OPS and the Sentinel. Next I’ll likely play the Algorithm and then some OPs again.

The only thing that would change my mind about the other missions is if they wiped you back to a checkpoint if the defendable got destroyed.

As for characters, I mostly feel the same. Some levels and some characters are probably fine as melee only in solo. But in general I’d rather have at least some range because you need it way too often.

I don’t buy this “it doesn’t matter, just go play any character on any level, even if with the hard settings on”. That might work for some of you, but not for me.

Today I played as Caldarius again. Pretty decent solo. Tomorrow, I’ll likely revisit Montana.

I’m revisiting this game because I kinda felt like it recently, I told myself I would at some point, I didn’t feel like playing much else, and I’m paranoid they’ll shut down the servers. I feel like we’d get a decent headsup notice, but who knows. It could be 30 days notice and I might not be looking during that time. Or I might be too busy to do anything about it. This game has too much character (ha ha) and I’d like to feel like I’ve played more of it, before it fully goes.

#16

While this isn’t a helpful response, virtually any character works on any given level if you understand the fundementals of the character your playing and the structure of the missions.

There are only a few characters I’d never want to pick up in PvE whatsoever, primaily Ambra & Kid Ultra due to their poorly suited primary attacks which has low damage and can’t crit which is detrimental in PvE. Galilea is another no-go and possibly Beatrix.

My main suggestion is to virtually always run health regen. It makes things a lot easier and you don’t have to rely on health drops or worry about going in without a healer.

My personal list of the best characters for the missions;

The Algorithm

Marquis, Montana, Oscar Mike & Whiskey Foxtrot.

The Void’s Edge

Caldarius, Oscar Mike, Orendi, Phoebe & Thorn.

The Renegade

Kleese & Miko.

The Archive

Attikus, Caldarius, Marquis & Thorn.

The Sentinel

(Benedict), ISIC, Mellka, Thorn & Whiskey Foxtrot.

The Experiment

Attikus, El Dragòn, Kelvin & Phoebe.

The Saboteur

Attikus, ISIC, Kleese, Phoebe & Toby.

The Heliophage

Alani, ISIC, Marquis, Montana, Oscar Mike, Toby & Whiskey Foxtrot.

—

Attikus and the Thrall Rebellion

Caldarius, Deande, Oscar Mike & Toby.

Toby’s Friendship Raid

(Benedict) & Mellka.

Oscar Mike vs. the Battle School

Caldarius.

Montana and the Demon Bear

ISIC, Marquis & Thorn.

Phoebe and the Heart of Ekkunar

Alani, Marquis, Oscar Mike, Thorn & Whiskey Foxtrot.

As said though, those are what I would deem to be top picks, and there are a lot more good choices for the different missions.

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#17

Well, the simple answer is to play those you enjoy.

As far as the defence missions goes, the Wolf sentry in The Void’s Edge has an upgrade which heals all allies around him and himself (i.e the defence objective) for a set amount of time which doesn’t have a limit more than your fundsz

Similarly, the Chronicle in The Archive will slowly regenerate health over time when you’re collecting data minions.

My personal favourite missions would be The Algorithm & The Void’s Edge. The only negative in the Algorithm is the poor levelling comparatively to other missions while there’s nothing I don’t like about the Void’s Edge.

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#18

Just wanted to say that Gally is a beast on everything. Giver Blue LLC Regen, Purple Flawed(-negative shield delay) damage redux plus health regen and SEoA and shes good to go.

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#19

I’ve played her solo in Ops on PS4 a lot lately (needed to level her up enough for mutations). She actually worked much better than I remembered, but I went for a more offensive build than when I last tried on PC (i.e., take all damage options you can have for solar wind and try to always have it on cooldown). There are a few occasions when you get oneshot on her and can’t really do anything, but she isn’t the only character who suffers from 3k damage attacks.

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#20

I played an OP solo with Galilea recently. I did enjoy it. I felt tanky. Although I did end up feeling like her damage output was slow on the boss. So what you said might explain that.

I’ll check out voids edge again. And I’ve been meaning to try Kleese in PvE.

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#21

Tried Kleese, solo, in the mike OP. I love that OP because it’s quick. But the downside is not enough leveling. I wish the leveling was scaled based on the amount of XP available on the map plus or minus a special sauce factor that would ensure that you have time to enjoy level 10, or that for long maps you’ll be level 10 almost guaranteed 30 minutes in.

Also, I think all the OPs missions are fine unless you are a stickler for 100%ing all OPS points each time. I play them casually.

Kleese is fun. I’d only played him PvP before. I bulit him a bit dumb/risky and he ended up in a bit of trouble but I recovered.

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#22

Well if you become a stickler, you’re guaranteed to be level 9 or 10 every time before the end boss.

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