i'm trying to figure out the difference between soloing a level and doing it w/ 4 players. seems like
money and heat stays the same
minerals solo player gets 1/4 as much (although not exactly because the solo can choose the large mineral)
materials solo player gets 4x as much
enemy hp - is it linear? i.e. 4 player enemies have exactly 4 times as much hp as solo enemies? in other games enemy hp scaled up faster (e.g. diablo 2, in an 8 person party the enemies had 10x the hp)
Since a good deal of profits come from material sales not soloing is always going to earn you less money
They need to add more incentive to group, right now grouping is only for the fun of grouping, soloing is more profitable.
material drops being for each player the way hearts currently work would solve it.
'free rezes' are not an argument since mob AI is easier to predict/manipulate while solo, meaning its harder to get yourself killed in the first place.
Its one of my largest complaints with the game really, i feel like im being punished every time i want to group.
You are right Vab BUT you must also consider that soloing requires much more time to complete any level...
about mats, I don't think they'll ever drop them for everybody in the party; it would be nice however if there were increasing drop rates (at least for higher level mats) along with the number of players.
I wouldn't say that, since most people use swords and knock enemies all over the place, disrupt mob AI requiring you to dodge around more, and make it harder to herd things to aoe with bombs.
The magic number for a speed run is 2. If you want maximum material profit, solo. Minerals are shared among the whole group so it doesn't matter who gets the big one.
Mobs have roughly 2-2.5x as much HP with 4 players compared to 1.
differences:
- enemy health increases with party size.
There are advantages and disadvantages of solo vs party. For those I refer you to these threads:
Pros and cons of going solo
Is it better to solo or party in this game?
I don't think enemy hp is doubled for two players, usually it adds around one more strike (4 instead of 3) for me to kill something in t3 if i have a partner.
Also a team of four taking turns can open 4 energy gates for the same price as a solo player opening one.