The Rise and Fall of Romulus Augustus

Is this supposed to be solo-able? I am not asking about turning down the other NPC heroes coming with you. I understand the game warns you not to do that, and I don't. But to I need a full team? The NPC heroes just don't seem to make much difference since they are all dead by the 2nd group of Cyclopes/Minotaur anyway. I have tried coming at this a couple different ways and I don't see many valid paths to finishing this without a group. I have an no-alpha Broadsword/Will brute that breezed through most of the content up to this point but soloing hoards of bosses that frequently can't be pulled apart doesn't seem practical. Then of course there is the end fight, which I is pretty mush solo suicide.

Is the general consensus that this was supposed to be a group only mission? I thought the idea was these story arcs gave you a casual friendly approach to the inbcarnate path. This one mission does not seem to me to fit that.

My main did it solo.

Granted my main is T4 in all slots.

It's possible. Throw up barrier and judgement your way through it.

I guess my question is not so much, can it be done as should it be expected? I can solo all the other content in every other Dark Astoria story arc but this one. Is this expected? Am I missing some trick that would make this doable?

You indicated that you hadn't yet got your alpha slotted, and that might be part of the issue. I was able to solo it without help for the badge with an archery/devices blaster, but I had my tier-3 alpha and my tier-1 lore and judgments slotted (the latter two as a result of DA arcs and street sweeping in DA; the Alpha'd been slotted thanks to some TFs I'd done prior to this Issue), and they helped. (Also helping was about a dozen trip mines per group of EBs and a whole lot of purples; good thing they refilled my inspiration tray as they fell....)

It may be worth running some of the repeatables in DA, street sweeping there, or repeating the arcs prior to the Cimerora ones to build yourself up to alpha slotting; even a +1 level shift can help here. Alternatively, I don't know what difficulty settings you have, but it may be possible to turn them down to -1/x0. And load up on the purples. They can't hurt you if they can't hit you.

Edit: Incidentally, under no circumstances would I have called this EASY; I still ended up faceplanting a number of times.....

My difficulty is +0/x1/No Boss (no AV) when playing the DA story arcs. Normally I run somewhat higher than that but the DA arcs are tougher, which isn't a shock since it is incarnate content. I guess I could drop it to level -1 but I don't know that I believe that will make much of a difference.

I am not really looking at how do I defeat this one time and be done with it. I would like to be able to run this story arc weekly through the Ourobors to make progress on incarnate abilities. Since you can't use the "Complete this mission" option there (it counts as a task force) I mostly am looking at doing this story arc to completion, ideally I would have liked to do it on a weekly basis and the only hang up to doing that is this mission.

My regular group are my 11 and 8 year old kids. I don't take them into the hard stuff like this because they aren't up to it and it I just get more bad guys on me. I have been stuck at level 50 with my main waiting for causual/soloable end game content for more than a few years now. (Been playing since launch.) I thought this story arc was my ticket to do that. Right now the only strategy I have is to keep hitting those earlier misisons over and over again, which I suppose is doable if not extreemly boring. At least doing all the arcs would be more interesting.

This just feels like a broken mission to me. If these groups of bosses obeyed the "no bosses" flag I could probably sleep walk through this thing except for Romulus himself, and might npcs might even survive to be there to help with him.

Still people are doing it and having trouble with it. Maybe the difficulty is where it is supposed to be. Romulus is clearly set up to be a bad ***.

Is that Sister Solaris's arc? I soloed it on my T3 Mastermind (Bots/FF) but it weren't easy. The whole time I was thinking "This would be really hard on any other toon."

Tankers would probably be really slow, but possible to solo. Brutes and scrappers would probably be the best, although if not sturdily built they might have problems. Anything else... I can't see it with any degree of reason. Lots of trips to the hospital and lots of Insp.

I'm not sure I've seen this mission/arc. Who gives it out?

Sister Solaris as part of the Dark Astoria Incarnate story arcs. You have to travel to Cimerora to get it from her and it is her final mission excluding her personal story.

Second thought: Don't you get the options to take several Cimerorans with you to help? I think that's the "solo option." Ask for help when Sister Solaris offers it.

Yes you do, but having tried it several times none survive past a couple of the cyclopes and minotaur groups. I guess maybe if I was playing a defender I might be able to keep them alive. I have tried agro management but I really can't handle much more agro.

Normally I eat bosses for lunch but bosses in this mission come in 6-12 packs, and they all have unstoppable to boot. That is why I question "am I even supposed to be doing this?"

I was able to handle it on a full t4 earth/rad controller running at +3/x1. I died a few times and had to take it pretty slowly, but it was doable. And you get to feel like you've really accomplished something afterward.

I was able to solo this arc with my level 50 tanker. She only had her tier 1 alpha slot at the time. After 3 years I am not a novice, but I still consider myself a casual player. So it defintely can be done solo, and not just by hardcore players with advanced incarnate characters.

Yes, it is TOUGH. I died once. I'm sure it helped that I was playing a very survivable AT. None of the NCP allies made it to the last fight with Romulus, but most of them made it pretty far. The NPCs benefited from the fact thaqt I could draw most of the aggro, and in truth most of them were lost the one time I died.

Like any tough fight, I relied heavilly on large inspirations to get me through, especially the last fight where i was alone. I stocked up on more when I died and had to come back. That's all I can suggest you do to get through it (plus all the other usual suggestions, such as Shivans and Nukes, which I didn't use but would have also been very helpful).

Go to -1, that is a *huge* help v. Bosses.

Bring Shivans and make sure they take the alpha strike so your helpers stay alive.

Break up the group:
1. Outrun your helpers so you can pull by yourself.
2. Aggro a boss from the spawn, and if only that boss follows, great. Lead it to the others. If more than one follows, out run them till they give up. As they walk back to their spawn point, you can now hit one of them and just that one will follow... the others are committed to return to their spawn point.

In I22 Beta I think I ran that mission once where I lost more than 2 of the helpers (Dream Doctor, Imperius and Sister Airlia).

I haven't lost more than 2 in the rest of the runs I've done on Live or in I22 Beta.

Most of my runs through that mission on Live I don't lose any of them.

This is on an unshifted (until last night) SO/HO build of a Fire/Device/Munitions blaster. Always running this at +0/x1, no Bosses (doesn't affect this mission apparently), no AV's.

I finally got my Alpha Shift last night. Just unlocked Lore and Destiny after that but haven't started slotting Destiny, Lore is T1 slotted. Interface and Judgement are both T2 slotted waiting on Rare drops or enough Empys to craft the T3.

When I started running the DA arcs I had T1 Alpha slotted and none of the others opened. I had run through the first full set of DA arcs and had done some in Ouro before Taskmaster Gabriel was introduced with just the T1 Alpha slotted. My first run through Ouro after Gabriel came in I got a T2 slotted in Alpha part way through Mu'Vorkan's arc, so I had T2 Cardiac Alpha when I got to that mission.

Range is your friend. Kite like the wind.

It's fairly easy to zip ahead into the range of your longest ranged attack, fire it off and then zip back before your "help" catches up to you, even with just flight. When you zip back past your helpers, they'll follow you back and then generally not attack anything until it gets too close.

Since you have pulled one (occasionally a small handful) of the enemy mobs they won't go rushing headlong into a large group full of AOE attacks.

EDIT: See Zombie Man's tips in the post before mine for how to break up the groups.

This is a mission that really shows up the power of level shifts. At a +3 shift, I found it a little harder than the other DA missions, but still pretty easy. Without a level shift, I doubt I would've got through the first batch of EBs. It does seem rather out of whack with the other missions, especially for content that expecting brand new Incarnates.

This is actually a very good topic. What can really make a difference on this particular mission both for good and bad are your tactics. Specifically, pulling one, two or three monsters out of the mobs that run between six and eight. This is where a melee-oriented mentality is actually a detriment, because pulling enemies out of a group isn't a usual tactic for most melee types. However, it can be a real life-saver on this mission. I'd much rather deal with three cyclopes or minotaurs then six or seven, and when you can break them into more manageable numbers your survival rate soars. Remember that this mission isn't timed, and use that to your advantage. When you get to Romulus, now, it's going to be a fight; I've not yet succeeded in pulling any of his personal mob away without bringing them all, but by the time you reach that point, you know you can beat him.

There's no doubt this is one of the toughest non-TF/SF missions in the game running it solo, but it is doable. You don't need to be purpled out; my main (an elec/energy/elec blaster) isn't, and she did fine soloing it without any NPCs. But you have to bear in mind that I've played my main since the game came out eight years ago, and I know just how to work with her; that's the biggest reason I was able to do it. Level shifts are a HUGE plus on this mission, definitely, and you have to play smart and with patience. I'd say take a few days and get your Alpha slotted with a T3 and try it again, focusing on pulling a few at a time out of the large mobs as you go. I bet your experience will be much more enjoyable at that point, and when you beat that mission, you'll have a badge you'll be proud to display.