What missions do you autocomplete?

[ZorkNemesis]

I'm curious about what missions people consider worth using your once-every-three-days auto win on.  While it's sort of intended to be saved for missions that bug out and can't be cleared I know a lot of us, myself included, use them periodically to skip specific missions that just suck (it does point out difficulty as a valid reason to skip).  It might also be a good way to see if there are specific missions that might be worth looking at for future revisions maybe?

 

The handful of missions I almost always autocomplete:

• Defeat Atta and Guards (Tashalk the Mystic) - A really long slog through a massive Troll cave.  This mission just feels like it overstays its welcome.  At least Frostfire's lair has ice physics (never thought i'd say that) and is more straightforward, I always take a wrong turn looking for Atta.
• Stop 30 Fir Bolg from entering the portal (Skipper LeGrange) - Who doesn't skip this?  It's a kill-all in disguise across a giant outdoor map and it's super boring guarding the portal solo.
• Get the News Out (Dark Watcher) - Something about this mission, Amanda's never easy to find, the generators are made of paper, Silver Mantis is there for some reason, ugh.
• Defeat the Malta Group's Invasion (Daedalus) - Another kill-all not advertised as such.  The main Cimeroran city map it takes place on is too damn big.  Plus it's Malta.
• Defeat Romulus' Forces (Sister Airlia) - Pretty much the same exact mission as Daedalus' but with Cimerorans instead of Malta.  Either way both missions are a giant slog, the map is too large for a kill-all, and if you fall and can't fly (or knock enemies off the bridges) getting back up is a pain.

 

How about the rest of you?  What missions are "must-skips" in your book?  I know a lot of people skip that kill-all in Black Scorpion's arc for speed, and Buck Salinger's last mission since it's a 15-minute nap time.

[nihilii]

All of your must-skip are must-play for me!

 

I skip either missions in Black Scorpion like you mentioned, or random missions in incarnate arcs without rhyme or reason (gets me closer to the end of arc reward).

[Tachstar]

Missions in a blue cave with that <bleepity bleep!> cake room.

[KC4800]

A mission with too many Spectral Daemon Lords or Tsoo Sorcerers that doesn't drop enough yellows, run back to door, autocomplete.

[Techwright]

The starter Incarnate mission where Lady Gray sends you, with warning to get a team, to fight the Honoree.   I'd really prefer not to skip it, but I've yet to have a character at that level capable of soloing it, and I've never been able to recruit a team for just a single mission.    It's frustrating, but I need to move forward, so I auto-complete it.   I'd probably have better luck recruiting a team if there were, say, 3 missions at team-strength level back-to-back.

[Blackbird71]

Hunt missions.  "Kill X in Zone Y."  Running all over a map trying to find enough clusters of 2 or 3 of the right enemy type is not my idea of fun.

 

 

3 hours ago, ZorkNemesis said:

 

The handful of missions I almost always autocomplete:

• Stop 30 Fir Bolg from entering the portal (Skipper LeGrange) - Who doesn't skip this?  It's a kill-all in disguise across a giant outdoor map and it's super boring guarding the portal solo.

 

You know you don't have to hang out at the portal the whole time, right?  Kill one incoming group, then you've got some time to range out and kill a couple more groups, and get back to catch the next incoming group on the path in.

 

[Hew]

Skip second to last mish in scorp, kill malta in st martial. Thats about it.

[SaintD]

4 hours ago, ZorkNemesis said:

 

• Stop 30 Fir Bolg from entering the portal (Skipper LeGrange) - Who doesn't skip this?  It's a kill-all in disguise across a giant outdoor map and it's super boring guarding the portal solo.

Literally the only 'absolutely must skip' mission for me. Utterly dismal trash, no excuse for making this mission as it is.

[Doomguide2005]

     None universally really, it depends on AT as much as anything.  On some it occasionally catches my "any AT can do this" eye and my latest Empath will bang their head against the wall for a bit trying to kill the Honoree and as someone recently put it Vanguard "Capt what's his name" with the crazy portal swarming Rikti ... and get it out of my system before hitting auto complete.  Or solo the Stop 30 Fir bolg with my scrapper, bit difficult to near impossible or with my Earth/Storm, lololol difficult NOT (and that really depends on the notoriety a lot for either one).

Edited May 8, 2021 by Doomguide2005
Clarity

[Doomguide2005]

One I haven't seen mentioned yet involving Malta.  I don't recall much about, haven't run it since before Sunset, but after you click a glowie you're hit by several ambushes which can pile up on you/the team particularly on +4/×8.  I liked running it as it really pushed my build hard, but can see it as very auto complete worthy.

[Hew]

1 hour ago, Doomguide2005 said:

One I haven't seen mentioned yet involving Malta.  I don't recall much about, haven't run it since before Sunset, but after you click a glowie you're hit by several ambushes which can pile up on you/the team particularly on +4/×8.  I liked running it as it really pushed my build hard, but can see it as very auto complete worthy.

What, you dont like multiple stacks of sappers and enginererthingys droping guns and nonsense? What EVER could be wrong with having your toggles drop as the main aggro target cause you got flatlined and got no blue?

[Heraclea]

The only mission I make sure I have a skip avail;able for is the bombs and hostages in the Rogue Isles from Levantera.  Jusr about every character does at least this arc, and gets rid of that one.   Once you finish that arc you're done with Vanguard.  

 

The missions that annoy me most are the ones that involve finding things on large outdoor maps.  Crimson and Unai Kamen are usuallly to blame.

[Yomo Kimyata]

Destroy the Legacy Chain's Army by Vincent Ross.

[Coyotedancer]

The only mission I auto every time is the "Defeat All the Wandering Clockworks in that Huge Ass Factory Where They Manufacture Pure Annoyance". 

 

I don't think anyone can be blamed for saying *NOPE!* to that one...

[MTeague]

I only use autocompletes if I'm absolutely certain an enemy has fallen through the world. Even then, I'll methodically explore the entire map, looking for mobs hidden in various corners.  I've found Family mobs in warehouses waaaaaay up in the rafters at the absolute cieling. No idea how they got there, but I was able to finish the mission legitly, no autocomplete needed.  I've zoomed in the map a lot and zipped around looking for hints and "ooooh yea, I can see the edge of a corrider there I missed in that far section of oranabega", and finished that way.

 

I do not use autocompletes just because it's a big map with lots of enemies and I just want to speed through a mission. 

I get that lots of players do that. I commonly see it advised for Black Scorpion's defeat-all in particular. That's fine for them. Not how I handle it. 

[Hexquisite]

Only when it's impossible to complete the mission. Like the final one in the Eagle Eye arc, that sometimes glitches, fails to give you the power required to beat BAB, and thus becomes unfinishable.

 

Anything else, if I can't beat it myself, and don't feel like getting a team together, I add a failure to that character's story. Which is good for them and their growth. Shows them not everyone can win every time, and I believe makes them more well-rounded.

 

...or, fills them with a burning need for vengeance, and obsession with ending that particular threat once and for all, and suddenly I'm ONLY taking missions involving the same enemies, in a long, self-destructive spiral that can only end badly for everyone.

 

It's about 50/50.

[Doomguide2005]

1 hour ago, Hew said:

What, you dont like multiple stacks of sappers and enginererthingys droping guns and nonsense? What EVER could be wrong with having your toggles drop as the main aggro target cause you got flatlined and got no blue?

     Oh I said I can see it being skipped, personally I've solo'd it several times on my scrapper at +4/×8 because it's actually makes it rough i.e. interesting.😜   But that scrapper is a Claws/SR and you can't sap what you can't hit ... especially if it kills you first or knocks you on your butt or pops blue and hits the otherwise rarely used Conserve Power or ... but it keeps me on my toes.  Now my other characters yeah not typically going to try and solo it, though if/when the Ill/Traps gets built maybe at least once.

[arcane]

My two most common ones:

 

- 3rd mission in Black Scorpion arc, the kill all.

- First Unai Kemen mission (Banished Pantheon) so I can immediately get an easy farmable non-AE mission to play around in (Council Empire).

[Spaghetti Betty]

That one mission in Shauna Stockwell's arc where you're disguised as a Skull.

 

Protect Stonehenge.

 

Character-by-character context. The 2nd Tina Macintyre mission where you have to defeat all praetorian clockwork? Yeah, my Psi Melee skipped that one.

 

Also, skipping the Atta mission? Come on, man. You bump your difficulty up by +1 and you'll level up at least twice before reaching Atta. Also lots of interesting geometry to kite with.

[Heraclea]

2 hours ago, Spaghetti Betty said:

Also, skipping the Atta mission? Come on, man. You bump your difficulty up by +1 and you'll level up at least twice before reaching Atta. Also lots of interesting geometry to kite with.

 

Aye, the Atta mission is great fun for melees, almost every room has a place to corner yourself and make them all come to you.  Good practice, especially on an under 20 character. 

 

It may help that I used the Atta map in AE and always know where the boss room is. 

 

Edited May 8, 2021 by Heraclea

[GastlyGibus]

There's only a small handful of missions that I label as "must skip." Most of the time, I only auto-complete missions when they are bugged, like having a mob get stuck in the wall. My list is as follows:

Stop 30 Fir Bolg entering door - Skipper LeGrange

Everyone skips this one, and for good reason. It's one of the most boring missions in the game. I usually don't mind tedium with fighting a bunch of bad guys, but the time between each wave spawn is so damn long and you end up sitting in this mission for close to twenty minutes.

Stop takeover of Salamanca - Buck Salinger

Another one everybody skips for the same reason as the last. You literally stand there for fifteen minutes, waiting for spawns to come, and there's no way to speed up the clock. I don't usually mind tedium in this game, but when I'm forced to stand in one spot and wait patiently for infrequent spawns to show up, I get rather annoyed.

 

Kidnap Workmen - Marshal Brass

I hate this map. I dislike outdoor maps in general, but I hate this one in particular, because enemies can spawn everywhere, not just on the ground. On the ground, on the rooftops, on the boxes, behind the boxes, outside the walls, on the walkways... and you have to try and find three hostages and then lead them back in order to finish. Trying to find these hostages is a nightmare, because as mentioned before, they can spawn literally anywhere, and you have to scour all three dimensions of this map in order to do it.

 

Get Wormy out of warehouse - Lorenz Ansaldo

I consider this mission bugged, because Wormy has a unique walking animation that causes him to stop walking and pause every few steps, and he will not start walking again until a couple of seconds pass. Also you're being ambushed by Longbow the entire time. So, you've got a hostage who has to stop to take a breather every few feet, he follows you very slowly, if you get too far he stops and waits for you to go get him again, and you're being harassed by enemies the entire time. Fuck you, Wormy, I'm leaving you to get arrested by Longbow.

 

There's probably a few more like that, but those are the only ones I can think of off the top of my head. I'll probably post more when I am reminded of them. 😛

 

Edited May 8, 2021 by GastlyGibus

[Hedgefund]

I'm going to join the hate for "stop 30 fir bolg".  Set diff to +4, autocomplete, get sweet +4 mission complete xp, then that even sweeter +4 croatoa arc completion bonus.

 

I also autocomplete the Honoree/Holtz mission.  Not because I hate that mission but it's a speed bump to opening alpha which I want asap.

 

The kill all for Black Scorp really isn't bad at all.  I guess if you're antsy to unlock a patron (like I am with Ramiel) then I guess I can see it.  It's a small map and solo I don't know if it even takes 10 minutes to clear (obviously depending on powersets and slotting)

 

I just happen to be doing Croa part 2 now.  Yes Skipper, I'm sure.

 

 

Edited May 9, 2021 by Hedgefund

[Supertanker]

4 hours ago, Coyotedancer said:

The only mission I auto every time is the "Defeat All the Wandering Clockworks in that Huge Ass Factory Where They Manufacture Pure Annoyance". 

This one, it's the worst.

[InvaderStych]

All of Unai Kemen's hunts.  50 of X in PI? Nope.

[MTeague]

I have to echo @nihilii.  Several of the missions people are listing as must-skip are ones I really enjoy and make sure to do on every character. 

 

I love the Stop 30 Fir Bolg one, and the Stop Takeover of Salamanca. I'm sure some of that is nostaglia from live days where those missions ruined my day. Crushing them now is just a "HA! I Win!".  Honoree I look at as a rite of passage. If I can't defeat that misson, my character doesn't deserve incarnate slots.  No matter if they unlocked or not, I do not fill them until the Mender Ramiel arc is done.  Is Honoree / Trapdoor easier for certain characters, oh yea, no question. But there's *very* few problems in the game that can't be overcome by Inpsirations and Set Bonues, and temp powers that I've earned in missions along the way.