I've been experimenting with various characters to see if I can beat the various Heroic 4s around the world, partly just to see if there's anything interesting in the story and partly because I'm bored. I've come to the conclusion that some heroic 4s are absolutely impossible to solo at even level or even while they still give XP. You can be clever about stuff that requires you hitting switches or killing just a large number of mobs, but there's always some Heroic 4 that features like a guy with boss immunity and 3 elite friends that you cannot possibly solo unless you're 10 levels higher than the enemy.

Now people will say they're Heroic 4s, they're not meant to be soloed, and that's fine, but people pretty much never group up in this game to do anything. Besides, when you do beat them, the reward is usually something uninteresting like a random orange item with blue/green mix of parts, or 3 commendations. You won't get anything that makes you feel powerful even compared to just doing crew skills, and crew skills are weak right now. You get something like 2X worth of XP, except leveling is trivial in this game. Basically Heroic 4s only make sense if you know at least one other guys who likes to kill hordes of elites that are actually sort of challenging instead of just level up to 50 through normal quests and/or PvP. I mean, it's not like being able to duo a Heroic 4 teaches you any meaningful skill in the end game (well it actually does but if you can learn from that you're already set).

The Heroic 2s, on the other hand, are actually pretty well thought out. You can usually solo them if you really know what you're doing or you can grab some help, and it's not even clear if the Heroic 4s give better loot than the Heroic 2s.

There should be at most one Heroic 4 per planet, and Heroic 4s should give twice the reward compared to a Heroic 2 so that there might actually be a reason to try to find some other people to do them.

Heroic 4

Obviously you can't solo them at level.

I disagree, I think there should be MORE heroic 4's and especially heroic 4s that unlock certain areas or something. Doing that would increase the desire to group up a lot.

I remember once on correlia I saw an operative solo that prison break heroic 4, this was before the nerf. I was along for the ride but it was funny to watch.

I am not against Heroic 4s, but I am against them being EVERYONE in one planet and outnumbering Heroic 2s.

I believe there should be ONE Heroic 2 in each main area of a planet.

In contrast, there should be ONE Heroic 4 on the planet that sort of coincides with the main planet's storyline in a deeper way that the other planet quest/Heroic 2s do not. In essence, I am saying that they should be more like mini flashpoints with much dialog options and cinematics instead of an open area of enemies to kill, collect and item, and go back to turn it in.

The problem with Heroic 4s and why nobody does them is because there are TOO MANY of them on one planet to the point where people like myself just skips them to keep the pace of my planet/class story level.

If there were just one big Heroic 4 on each planet, you'll have more people willing to do them because it would be easier to find a group considering that many other people are probably looking for people to join with. And the 1 Heroic 4 on every planet should have more depth to it in terms of cinematics and dialog like some flashpoints [Think Black Talon or The Esseles].

ALSO,

People do Heroic 2s in groups because it is easier to group. Two tanks can group together and one can bring a DPS companion and the other can bring a healing companion. However, for a Heroic 4, you have to spam chat to find 2 DPS, 1 Healer and 1 Tank. And it is always hard to find that 1 healer. So imagine trying to do this 4-5 times on one planet!

Atleast with Heroic 2s you don't have to worry about finding a complete group, just join with someone and use your companions to fill the missing roles [i.e. tank or healer].

So yeah, for future content [expansions] I think Bioware should just have 1 Heroic 4 on the planet and the rest being Heroic 2s.

This is just a for instance, but I think the Hoth Bonus Missions have 3-4 Heroic 4 missions in them. Which I would wager are completed with a frequency bordering on never.

To me this is purely wasted content. People seldom in my experience do bonus missions and seldom do heroic 4 missions.

I know that after my first character, I stopped even trying to do any heroic mission. I mentioned it during the beta, but there aren't and won't be enough people on a planet after the initial rush do do heroics any more. The initial rush is over, and the population of planets is sparse enough that filling a heroic 4 group is nigh-impossible.

I concur that heroic 4 missions need to go. I would also prefer to see all heroic missions go. Grouping to level was discovered to be ineffective in EverQuest. Most games since then have realized that having group quests for leveling do not work. Group quests in general do not work, in my opinion. Questing is what I would consider solo content.

A mission finder/flashpoint finder might alleviate some of this, but I think that due to the scarcity of leveling people the mission finder portion won't help heroic 4 missions as much. As noted, the population to complete them doesn't seem to be there any more.

Heroic 4

 

Obviously you can't solo them at level.

Unless you're a stealther.

I'm not really talking about whether they're soloable or not. I've soloed pretty much all of them while they still yield XP unless it's one of those where you've to fight a Champion with boss immunity + friends (practically no way to do anything clever there). That's not the point. Like one of the post mentioned, Heroic 4s are just wasted content. You don't need them for XP, and you don't get any interesting loot. They're not even important to the story (that's actually why I did it in case they've a cool cutscene, which they do not) in any way. It's just this quest you pick and then immediately abandon because you know nobody's going to do it, and I see the same guys spamming "LFG for random heroic 4' all day without ever getting the people to do it.

Voss has a heroic 4 (The First Commando I think) that basically has 5 boss fights back to back and each of them drops a blue loot, and I think the final one drops a purple. They're also very tough, on par with FPs of the same level (the last guy you've to interrupt all his nukes or he pretty much one shots the tank, which is asking a lot from a pickup group). This is an example of a Heroic 4 with the right amount of risk, though even there it's hard to get people to do it. Yes some of it is because people don't want to group at all, but if you've a mini FP with the corresponding loot drop some people might at least be motivated. I did that Heroic 4 quite a few times with friends because it's actually worth the time to find people. Certainly I can't imagine why I'd ask a friend to come do a standard Heroic 4 that involves killing large number of elite packs and yield an item worse than a blue level gear of that level. When I asked for help on Heroic 4s on daily missions my reasoning was literally 'because I want to see what happens when you beat it'.

I think I have soloed every heroic 2 while the mobs are still yellow (so +2 at most) with a wide array of classes. They're actually very well thought out. It's unfair for some classes (i.e. if you can only CC droids, you might be screwed) but if the heroic 2 features a mob you can CC, then you can pretty much always do it.

Unless you're a stealther.

Or you're smart. Been soloing Heroic 4s on my Marauder while leveling.

This is just a for instance, but I think the Hoth Bonus Missions have 3-4 Heroic 4 missions in them. Which I would wager are completed with a frequency bordering on never.

I actually soloed all of those at 50, and when I beat it and look at the reward it makes me wonder why would anyone ever do these missions.

I think, you all confused what purpose [Heroic] missions really serve.

- It is not part of planet story

- It is not part of class story

- It can be skipped without decrementing to your experience

= You aren't required to do them in any way or form

+ It giving fun alternative to players completing content in group

+ It provide one of a kind orange gear as reward or planet commendations in ample quantities, so you can feast yourself at commendation vendor

+ It sometimes giving you unique loot from inside heroic NPCs, like orange bracers/belts (I look at you, Taris)

= Right alternative to solo questing or just bonus activity with right rewards for right kind of people.

At level 50 you also have few daily heroics, and all of them giving you just that - bonus. Be it purple mod or armoring, or one of a kind orange gear for your companions, or commendations in ample quantities, so you can feast yourself at commendation vendor... see the trend here now? Guess no one have problem finding group for level 50 dailies, right?

TLDR: It is bonus - you can do it and get above average rewards, or you can skip it easily.

P.S. I've completed almost all [Heroic] missions on every planet, and never I met problem finding group for them. Even while at average planet population is 15-20 on my server.

In fact I have had bigger problem finding group for Ancient Probe droid on Hoth, then for any of Hoth bonus series heroics.

Or you're smart. Been soloing Heroic 4s on my Marauder while leveling.

Marauder, aka, another class with some stealth. Nothing to do with being smart.

Marauder camouflage doesnt drop combat as far as I'm aware.

Actually lets clear something. Heroic don't have enrage timers, the timer is the tank survivability and the healers's pool. And few damn thing come close to being challenging.

You can easily do heroic 4 with a single friend so long as the tank OR the healer is a player. For H4 ideally both.

The real cake comes in H2. Respect healer/tank combo, using your companion to fill the missing role and you can solo H2 pretty much at level. H2 normally feature groups of 1 elite 2 strong, or 2 elites. The odd hard fight in them will be 2 elite one strong.

Healer class have a CC, so at worse one elite one strong. Easy to solo.

And to finish about H4: take whoever wants to come. Did one where we were 3 tanks with mako healing. Sure why not? Heck, 4 DPS with some CC can pretty much do some of them so long as not all of them are glass cannons, or that one got offheals (so unless you got 4 snipers...)

And as pointed out, they can mostly be skipped if the reward doesn't interest you. You can check what most yield on data sites like torhead.com.

As an exemple, I skip hunger of the whatever on NS, all of the NS BS ones, all of alderaan.

I do nearly all of them on tatooine and taris. Etc.

I've been experimenting with various characters to see if I can beat the various Heroic 4s around the world, partly just to see if there's anything interesting in the story and partly because I'm bored. I've come to the conclusion that some heroic 4s are absolutely impossible to solo at even level or even while they still give XP. You can be clever about stuff that requires you hitting switches or killing just a large number of mobs, but there's always some Heroic 4 that features like a guy with boss immunity and 3 elite friends that you cannot possibly solo unless you're 10 levels higher than the enemy.

 

Now people will say they're Heroic 4s, they're not meant to be soloed, and that's fine, but people pretty much never group up in this game to do anything. Besides, when you do beat them, the reward is usually something uninteresting like a random orange item with blue/green mix of parts, or 3 commendations. You won't get anything that makes you feel powerful even compared to just doing crew skills, and crew skills are weak right now. You get something like 2X worth of XP, except leveling is trivial in this game. Basically Heroic 4s only make sense if you know at least one other guys who likes to kill hordes of elites that are actually sort of challenging instead of just level up to 50 through normal quests and/or PvP. I mean, it's not like being able to duo a Heroic 4 teaches you any meaningful skill in the end game (well it actually does but if you can learn from that you're already set).

 

The Heroic 2s, on the other hand, are actually pretty well thought out. You can usually solo them if you really know what you're doing or you can grab some help, and it's not even clear if the Heroic 4s give better loot than the Heroic 2s.

 

There should be at most one Heroic 4 per planet, and Heroic 4s should give twice the reward compared to a Heroic 2 so that there might actually be a reason to try to find some other people to do them.

I'd just like to point out that the devs said "a group is 4 players but COMPANIONS count against this total". I believe it even comes up as a tip on the loading screens sometimes.

That said,

ALL Heroic 2's should be soloable with your companion AT LEVEL (depending on class this currently isn't always true).

Heroic 4's should be doable with just 2 people with their companions, this isn't true either for all of them. Although as mentioned some are able to be done solo.

Honestly some of the solo class story fights are harder than some of those H2's. And therin lies the problem, there is absolutely zero consistency throughout this game.

BTW, I was doing this as well, because I was bored, until I found out the rewards are pretty much crap. It takes alot of effort and WAY more time to do these and you basically get nothing useful out of it. Even the XP being double makes it less efficient. It takes way longer then twice the time to drop a group of elites or champ and therefore you are actually wasting time. And to get nothing to drop but a couple credits, often less than what i get from a group of 4 normal mobs... Well that just kinda sucks. And the actaul quest rewards 9/10 aren't worth the time either, not even an upgrade in most cases just more vendor trash.

You can 2-man the heroic 4s at level with 2 decent players. Get out there and make some friends!

Or skip them and do the bonus series to make up the lost xp.

4 man heroics are not useless!

It allows me to do what a mmo actually should be about, to actually GROUP with someone.

I have made my friend list thicker through doing 4 mans with randoms, but if your an unsocial git i guess the very idea of having to group up and cooperate about anything make them useless.

This is the very reason why the introduction of an x-realm LFG and maybe in the future LFR will be a bad thing.

I realize that its harder to get groups now that server populations are lower due to activity level and more level 50 toons, but they were never needed just a nice bonus before you move into next planet.

On my 37 marauder, I've swapped out doing Heroic 4s with Space Missions. If you're running yellow missions, you'll still get 2x,xxx experience per mission, plus space commendations and upgrades for your ship. Also, they take considerably less time to do than the average Heroic 4, meaning you can theoretically level faster. I've been doing this since the early 30s on my marauder, and honestly think that I'll do this for all of my toons from now on.

H4 are interesting xp wise but mainly done for the reward at the end. So space is a good filler, but won't yield the same unique gear, for exemple.

Space missions are also awesome at making you massively overlevel, same as doing WZ while leveling.

I'd just like to point out that the devs said "a group is 4 players but COMPANIONS count against this total". I believe it even comes up as a tip on the loading screens sometimes.

 

That said,

ALL Heroic 2's should be soloable with your companion AT LEVEL (depending on class this currently isn't always true).

 

Heroic 4's should be doable with just 2 people with their companions, this isn't true either for all of them. Although as mentioned some are able to be done solo.

 

Honestly some of the solo class story fights are harder than some of those H2's. And therin lies the problem, there is absolutely zero consistency throughout this game.

 

BTW, I was doing this as well, because I was bored, until I found out the rewards are pretty much crap. It takes alot of effort and WAY more time to do these and you basically get nothing useful out of it. Even the XP being double makes it less efficient. It takes way longer then twice the time to drop a group of elites or champ and therefore you are actually wasting time. And to get nothing to drop but a couple credits, often less than what i get from a group of 4 normal mobs... Well that just kinda sucks. And the actaul quest rewards 9/10 aren't worth the time either, not even an upgrade in most cases just more vendor trash.

I as a tank and My brother as a healer have Done every single heroic +4 with our 2 companions as dps. So you can do them with just 2 people and 2 companions. obviously we kept up on our gear and our companions gear. and we where Assassin tank and Operative healer. So we had 2 saps and a droid cc pretty much it most the time i just aoe tanked everything and said f cc.

the quest reward xp is only half of what your earning by doing htem. The heroic content xp is per kill is higher then normal quest xp per kill. Normaly doing 1 heroic +4 and doing hte bonuses will yeild you close to a full level.

I agree with the OP.

Too many H4 missions on some planets, especially Hoth.

It's almost impossible to find people to group up with and having to find 2 or 3 people to do those quests is really hard.

Reduce Heroic4 missions to Heroic2 and maybe if you really really still want a H4 mission, just have one single big H4 mission on each planet. Make it shareable as well.

Dont make the same dumb mistake that blizz/wow made with their silly elite mob areas in azeroth. Now they are all gone as no one quests in those areas.

Good points on both sides, but the issue is that Heroic 4s are NOT getting done most of the time. It's hard enough to get groups for Heroic 2+. If you aren't on the fleet , chances are you aren't gonna find 3 people willing to group for a single planet quest.

They should tone down the difficulty or turn them into world quests. Its true. At the moment its largely wasted content.

Maybe take from "that" other game, things like Ring of Blood, Amphitheater of Anguish were a great distraction while questing, it was good to grab a group for these as the Exp was brilliant, the end rewards were very useful plus the little things like health pots and so on.

I normally wait for a few mates to catch up to an area and then I will go and run them through the H4's, I normally just skip them as while I quest I also sign up for PVP so the exp isn't worth the time it takes to find a group and do the quests, but this is just me. If people ask in General for a Healer or Tank I will go along unless I don't have the quest yet, some tried to share but it doesn't always work, yet if you go pick it up it's fine.

They need to make the Exp either a little more worth while or rewards better, give people the incentive to run these and they will do it, but remove a couple as well so people feel like they are missing out if they don't do them.

From what I have done I found because I do PVP a lot, I normally only ever complete half a planet if that, I did it on Quesh recently, I did the class quest and moved on, I was too high for the area, so moved onto Hoth I think it was for class story line.

Pretty much all Heroic 4s can be done by 2 people plus companions unless you get into some oddball one like The First Commando and your healer is merc (he cannot interrupt, so your tank gets one shot by the final boss because you don't have two interrupts). Problem is 95% of the time the guy you find isn't going to be convinced 2 is enough and will be looking for a tank and a healer, which he will pretty much never find. Looking at chat with the guys who are "LF2M for some heroic 4" I can say with certainty most people are too scared to do them with 2 so the fact that they can be done with 2 doesn't help.

All the heroic 2s can be soloed unless they feature a mob mix that you cannot CC. For example Assassins can't fight the mobs in the Heroic 2 in Belsavis because all the mobs are droids (but he can just stealth past them). I think some ACs can only CC droids and they'd get mauled by a standard 2 elite + 1 strong humanoid formation.

The point is not whether I can do them. I actually can do a lot of them especially the ones where you just have to click on something (send in companion to die, click, done), and most are quite easy with stealth. The point is that they're clearly not done by most people. Go to any planet and you'll see the same guys that's LFM for Heroic 4s all day. What's the point of the content if it's not done? You don't need it to level, it's not really that challenging, and the reward isn't even very good. I'm only doing it because I want to see if they've interesting story (and if you're curious, they do not). Other than for the sake of being a completist, there's really no reason to do it. Sure it doesn't harm me to do it, but what's the point of content if it's never done?