There's always a few people around. Like 70 - 80% of the DEs scale down to soloability. If you send a message out in zone chat when a larger DE is up, you can usually get a few to come rock it.

Late at night and early morning tend to be more difficult times to find people. This is also coming from someone on Jade Quarry which is a pretty darn populated server.

A good chunk of the events are soloable in this game. However there are a few events that will be displayed as "group" events such as slaying champion mobs, or the climax of a long DE chain. However if these events fail such as the final DE in the chain then the failure event chain kicks in. 

All in all, I think there is very little you will miss out if you can't complete some events. Sure it may suck you can't complete the final chain, but I've never had issues with people rallying for the larger chains. 

in rush hours you'll be able to find like 5-6 people in these areas (also depends where + server, so it's not accurate).

question is: why bother to do DE there? I rushed through dead stuff non-stop and found areas full of people as DE there are rewarding.

Leveling up solo is possible but since DE is not that fun doing solo, a lot of people are either WvW / crafting their way to 80.

This makes the problem worse but that's what is happening.

If you are on the 2 most populated server, it isn't bad.

Any other server and yeah, it is a wasteland.

ANet are aware though and half of their 2013 blog post was all about getting players back into the world.

Originally posted by Quizzical
Are most of the dynamic events doable solo if you happen to be the only one there?  Do there tend to be a few people there doing whichever events are active, but just not nearly as many as launch?  Or are you faced with having to skip most of the content if you don't go form your own group manually?

On Borlis Pass, where I play, everything you said happens. One time I was in Timberline Falls and when I was starting out I was doing the DEs and Hearts alone. I arrived at a NPC hub and found 3-4 other players. We did some DEs along the way. The next day I logged on there's nobody else in sight, but there's activity in map chat. Eventually a LFG for some Group Event was called out by someone. There's a Champion wandering in my area, but no one else is around so I skipped it and headed towards the LFG guy's location. The next day as I was heading back to complete the Heart I left unfinished yesterday I ran into the same Champ again, but this time two others happen to be there.

Definitely there will be playthroughs where you'll feel alone and had to skip content. DEs are soloable up to the point in the chain where it says [Group Event].

I'm on Ring of Fire which is probably a bit less populated (considering how deep in ladder we are in WvW). I'm kinda altaholic, so I spend much more time in low-mid zones than in high ones. Still I never had serious problems of doing pretty much anything. As other guys said, most DEs are soloable and more often than not, while you do DE, someone walks around and joins the battle.

For group DEs, problem is, people are so used to skipping them that they just run along see noone there and keep going on. Sometimes someone rally people in chat, sometimes if you just stand around a while, someone comes along, see you standing around and join you and in a while there is 4 of you finishing that group event.

As for long chains, that's pretty guaranteed to finish. It usually has this "snowball" effect. More people will come with each event and even if the last bit is really hard there is already enough people to make it work.

To wrap it up, I think it went in opposite direction from how it was on release. There are no longer big zergs running along the map destroying everything. It's more of a solo adventurers running into each other and eventually ending up working for the same goal.

I was in a lower level norn zone tonight, and started a transport guard DE. Before 1 minute had passed we were a party of 3, by the end of the quest, which is pretty short, there were 5 of us.  I find that people naturally start to follow along with me and my wife so it's often enough that we'll be completing a map with people hanging around the entire time.

I find that I prefer the number of people now to the huge mass of players that would smash through every event in no time. I like the feeling of actually representing within a fight.

Mid level zones were a ghost town last I played..

I felt like I was missing out on content when I couldnt solo a lot of the DE's,so I lost interest and stopped playing.

Originally posted by Quizzical
Are most of the dynamic events doable solo if you happen to be the only one there?  Do there tend to be a few people there doing whichever events are active, but just not nearly as many as launch?  Or are you faced with having to skip most of the content if you don't go form your own group manually?

No most of them are not soloable, (slightly more when your a lvl 80 fully geared kicked down).

In the higher level zones you can find players doing the most rewarding DE's, most of the time, its dependent on the time of day really. The lower zones are pretty much dead, you will occasionally team up with players to do a DE, but generally its not going to happen, which means yeah you have to skip content really, or you could just stand around hoping players will turn up.

Hopefully they will incentivise players back to other zones.

Its pretty bad.

I switched servers couple of times , but no avail.

Let me illustrate this for you.

First month of the game. If you were killed in open world, you would wait no more than minute and someone would come and resurect you.

Today, i was asking on map chat, no answer. Nobody at all on whole map , on peak time. Waited around 10 minutes before i gave up.

Originally posted by mmoski

Originally posted by Quizzical
Are most of the dynamic events doable solo if you happen to be the only one there?  Do there tend to be a few people there doing whichever events are active, but just not nearly as many as launch?  Or are you faced with having to skip most of the content if you don't go form your own group manually?

No most of them are not soloable, (slightly more when your a lvl 80 fully geared kicked down).

You're doing something wrong if you can't solo most events. You should be able to solo all events of your level and most events that are a level or two higher.

Originally posted by Lobotomist

Its pretty bad.

I switched servers couple of times , but no avail.

 

Let me illustrate this for you.

First month of the game. If you were killed in open world, you would wait no more than minute and someone would come and resurect you.

Today, i was asking on map chat, no answer. Nobody at all on whole map , on peak time. Waited around 10 minutes before i gave up.

Thats doesnt mean theres nobody else in the zone, it means nobody wants to come and rez you.

I had no problems doing most of group events without asking in map once.

Originally posted by Betakodo
Champions: Not soloable.

Not until lvl 80 anyway.  A friend of mine can do it on the non-80 Champs (don't remember the profession he used though).

As for the "deserted zones" and "dead game", it's just hot air.  Sure, at times there aren't people at an event, but there are thousands of events... no one's going to be waiting for one to start.  I almost always find people to do things with even then.  If no one's around, I just whisper a guildie and we two man it if it's not something like the Champion Megalodon (which is definitely not soloable)

Originally posted by Lobotomist

Its pretty bad.

I switched servers couple of times , but no avail.

 

Let me illustrate this for you.

First month of the game. If you were killed in open world, you would wait no more than minute and someone would come and resurect you.

Today, i was asking on map chat, no answer. Nobody at all on whole map , on peak time. Waited around 10 minutes before i gave up.

You waited 10 minutes?  Geez.  Unless it's Orr where all the waypoints are contested regularly, walking back is no big deal.  If I get killed when no one's around, I don't bother waiting.

Originally posted by Quizzical
Are most of the dynamic events doable solo if you happen to be the only one there?  Do there tend to be a few people there doing whichever events are active, but just not nearly as many as launch?  Or are you faced with having to skip most of the content if you don't go form your own group manually?

Its rare that I ever solo an event. Usually between 1-10 people will pop up and help if an event starts.

Most events are soloable though, only the ones labeled 'group event' can be a bit tricky, and those tend to be the final events in the zone chains. So usually only 1-3 events per zone are not soloable. Once you hit 80, most of those 'group events' below level 60 are soloable. Higher ones too if you are a good soloer.

Also changes to the rewards system look to be implemented pretty soon, so you should see some more open world action soon.

Originally posted by Eir_S

 

/snip

As for the "deserted zones" and "dead game", it's just hot air.  Sure, at times there aren't people at an event, but there are thousands of events... no one's going to be waiting for one to start.  I almost always find people to do things with even then.  If no one's around, I just whisper a guildie and we two man it if it's not something like the Champion Megalodon (which is definitely not soloable)

Just because it doesn't happen to you doesn't mean it doesn't happen for someone else.

What server are you on? As far as I can tell, only two servers are relatively 'okay' in the mid-level zones and the others are wasteland.

My guardian that just hit 80? Crafting from 40-60, then personal story / WvW till 70.

Cause the 30-40 were just awful.

If you want proof, look at ANet and how they dedicated (and create a whole new game design) half of their '2013 plan' on getting people back into the world.

Originally posted by mmoski

Originally posted by Quizzical
Are most of the dynamic events doable solo if you happen to be the only one there?  Do there tend to be a few people there doing whichever events are active, but just not nearly as many as launch?  Or are you faced with having to skip most of the content if you don't go form your own group manually?

No most of them are not soloable, (slightly more when your a lvl 80 fully geared kicked down).

In the higher level zones you can find players doing the most rewarding DE's, most of the time, its dependent on the time of day really. The lower zones are pretty much dead, you will occasionally team up with players to do a DE, but generally its not going to happen, which means yeah you have to skip content really, or you could just stand around hoping players will turn up.

Hopefully they will incentivise players back to other zones.

Nope.  Most are soloable. 

Why?  Because I don't play on a heavily populated server.  And I have soloed most of them.  They do scale down, and yea, one player can complete them.  Especially below 80. 

Some you can "fail".  Sometimes that happens to me, but I don't die.  Usually most all are soloable and able to be completed that way.