So I've been playing through Borderlands 2 solo and have been enjoying the hell out of it. At this point, I've put about 19 hours into my Commando and a couple hours into a secondary, and am basically tearing through every thing that I see like a hot knife through butter.

At this point I am Level 18, spec'd towards the Turret barrier (which I don't really use) and have been primarily using shotguns, which may be part of the problem. The shotgun that I have has been my main weapon for a few levels now, a Hyperion Corrosive Shotgun that does 74x14 (just over 1000) damage, with a 8% chance to corrode for 50 damage per second. As I said, this thing tears through everything I've seen, and makes even Hyperion Robots look like an absolute joke.

That specific weapon aside, there is also the fact that the Missions I have am receiving are always 3+ levels below my current. For example, I just received a side mission from Lilith, and despite being at Level 18 the mission that she gave me is Level 13, which immediately makes it's difficulty Trivial. Is this a normal thing for everyone else? The enemies I see aren't quite as low, but are still low enough to not be much of a challenge, usually ranging between 2 and 4 levels below me even if they are the first I have received in an area.

It feels really off to me, having things be this easy so far. I'm honestly hoping that I come across some random difficulty spike at some point just to make things more interesting. Hell, at this point I think I'm going to stop using that shotgun just to help out with that problem. Has anyone else been having this issue?

@Rabid619: Well firstly, I've heard the second playthrough ramps up the difficulty a lot, and unless I misunderstood you you're still on your first? Secondly, I think you're misjudging the average player, who by no means will do sidequests or explore (and thus being higher level for stuff).

That said; I'm around the same area/level as you, and yes I often feel overpowered with my Siren playing solo. Every now and then I run into a badass that can quickly take care of me if I'm careless, but I'm also looking forward to playing more co-op (with increased challenge there, even on first playthrough), and also looking forward to my solo second playthrough.

Like the first game, it's pretty easy to over-level if you do too many side quests in the first playthrough.  Still, even on PT1, I found the game to be significantly harder than the first, especially towards the end. I've just started True Vault Hunter mode with my Commando and it doesn't take long until you start getting your ass handed to you at every encounter. Solo seems like it'll be mighty frustrating on this mode.

@Rabid619: Yeah I'm finding things fairly easy so far. Although I had a surprisingly tough time with

just because there were those Buzzards dive-bombing me while I was trying to take care of a few Goliaths and other lower-level dudes. It was refreshing actually to have the challenge. Feeling overpowered was a problem with the first game, too, esp going solo.

@Cincaid: Yeah I am on my first playthrough at this time, just recently got into the Frozen Tundra. I have played through every sidequest that I am come across at this point, which is honestly something that I didn't even think of. People not leaving those sidequests seems... crazy. Crazy and non obsessive.

I'm honestly craving my second playthrough at this point after hearing about how much more difficult it is. The dynamic difficulty that Gearbox put into Borderlands is interesting, and a bit flawed in this way. Much as I have hated Oblivion at times for scaling the enemies to my level, it kind of worked in a way of constantly keeping you on your toes. I like what they are doing with the BL system, but it is flawed. Even though it would be difficult, I'd rather them just give you missions that are at the level that you take them out. So take a mission at Level 18, get a Level 18 mission.

I'm hoping that something will come along and kick my ass soon, however. The most recent enemy I had trouble with were the Badass Mutated Varkids in one of the side missions. They ended up taking me down a couple times until I approached the fight with better tactics.

It can feel pretty easy depending on the drops you've found but it does ramp up near the end. The last 4 or so story missions can be pretty tough if you're solo and haven't found a fantastic corrosive weapon.

The leveling goes by so fast, and they give you too many sidequests so that if you're doing them all you're going to outpace the enemy levels. Just skip those side-missions and do the main plot stuff until you unlock the harder areas. That said, the game is still pretty easy until you get to True Vault Hunter mode.

No, but I'm also bad at Borderlands.

Wait til you try True Vault Hunter mode solo. I beat the normal mode completely on my own but I've been struggling to play TVH solo.

I haven't found it too hard yet except for Heroes Pass, fucking (super?) Badass Loaders and (super?) Badass Constructors were harder than the last boss for me. I (Zer0) kept dying over and over again right when i would almost get the second wind......pissed me last night. Also when i was at the same spot with the Commando it was easy but i did the same amount of side-quest.

The only thing I can recommend is skipping side quests. I'm only level 6 or so in Borderlands 2 so I'm not sure if the main quests scale to your level, but I did a ton of side missions during the middle of that game. So when I finally picked the main quest back up, I would waltz through enemy strongholds without my shields every hitting critical. I enjoyed how absurdly powerful I was, but if that's not your thing then just skip some side missions until things even out a bit.

Keep playing, the game has peaks and valleys when it comes to difficulty as a lot of loot based games do, with some encounters that might make adult men cry. Gear matters a lot too, getting lucky with a gun drop can make the next few levels a piece of cake, then you feel the ramp up again. It also ramps up the difficulty rowards the end, and if you are feeling like a challange do the Robot Arena solo. Dukino's mom is a fun romp too.

Finally there is the second playthrough, to give an example the very first encounter with bandits right outside of Hammerlock's house got me into second wind. It's taking me about twice as long to progress through TVH mode compared to the first playthrough.

Those corrosive weapons are basically designed to rip through Hyperion boys like paper. That said, as an Assassin specced into Bloodshed my melee kills just about everything in one hit with its ~750% damage. It doesn't feel OP though because when I'm not stealthed I still find a satisfying amount of challenge.

I don't know, when you've got low level weapons and play Zer0 solo it's definitely challenging. I'm only level 23 and haven't messed around with any of the melee skills yet, but playing ranged keeps you on your feet in close-quarters combat.

Honestly, like most have said true vault hunter mode ramps up the difficulty significantly. I'm a commando as well and I went into the shielded turret tree, in the first playthrough I would deploy both turrets and basically chill inside shooting a sniper. Now the enemies in the second playthropugh one hit my turrets shields and destroy me every now and then

It seems you haven't met the earth worms and the four-legged crystal beasts yet. I went from being overpowered to being a rape victim.

@AhmadMetallic said:

It seems you haven't met the earth worms and the four-legged crystal beasts yet. I went from being overpowered to being a rape victim.

:D

I'm doing fine and honestly I think the whole aspect of over leveling and completely destroying everything in your path is a large part of RPG's that has been missing recently. I love doing a bunch of sidequests and then being 2-4 levels too high for a quest and just one shotting everything.

The power trip fantasy and cool looking gear is a large part of why I play RPG's and I hate it when it's always an uphill grind.

@Cincaid said:

@AhmadMetallic said:

It seems you haven't met the earth worms and the four-legged crystal beasts yet. I went from being overpowered to being a rape victim.

:D

This, I also feel super underpowered when doing anything solo. It's way harder to get a second wind it seems. Of course now that I've gotten rid of that shield, the one that shoots out boosters that pop out shock grenades that damage me as well as the enemy, I'm not dying as much.

I've just solo'd through the whole game and started playthrough 2 with all my badass orange loot...and died on the bullymongs. so yeah, difficulty will ramp up XD

@AhmadMetallic said:

It seems you haven't met the earth worms and the four-legged crystal beasts yet. I went from being overpowered to being a rape victim.

IF you just run up and melee the crystals on the legs of those crystal beats they go down super fast. For me anyone it took one melee attack for each of the 4 legs and they because ridiculously easy - just run a circle around them BAM profit.

Yeah I find it super easy playing solo. I pretty much just do side quests solo and do story missions in co op just so the enemies are more difficult.

@Rabid619: Oh, how the mighty shall fall. Let us know how it goes for you when you reach True Vault Hunter mode. Fucking Demongs, I hate them so fucking much, level 52 that was just a dick move from Gearbox.

@Humanity said:

@AhmadMetallic said:

It seems you haven't met the earth worms and the four-legged crystal beasts yet. I went from being overpowered to being a rape victim.

IF you just run up and melee the crystals on the legs of those crystal beats they go down super fast. For me anyone it took one melee attack for each of the 4 legs and they because ridiculously easy - just run a circle around them BAM profit.

Wow thanks for the tip. Whenever they gang up on me now I hit escape, put my face in my hands and sob.

@AhmadMetallic said:

@Humanity said:

@AhmadMetallic said:

It seems you haven't met the earth worms and the four-legged crystal beasts yet. I went from being overpowered to being a rape victim.

IF you just run up and melee the crystals on the legs of those crystal beats they go down super fast. For me anyone it took one melee attack for each of the 4 legs and they because ridiculously easy - just run a circle around them BAM profit.

Wow thanks for the tip. Whenever they gang up on me now I hit escape, put my face in my hands and sob.

Use a sniper rifle from long range. They've never proven to be a problem for me...well, after that first time I ran directly into one and died...quickly.

@AhmadMetallic said:

@Humanity said:

@AhmadMetallic said:

It seems you haven't met the earth worms and the four-legged crystal beasts yet. I went from being overpowered to being a rape victim.

IF you just run up and melee the crystals on the legs of those crystal beats they go down super fast. For me anyone it took one melee attack for each of the 4 legs and they because ridiculously easy - just run a circle around them BAM profit.

Wow thanks for the tip. Whenever they gang up on me now I hit escape, put my face in my hands and sob.

I actually don't know why that entire post I wrote sounds like I'm drunk. Either way what I meant to say is that you can just melee attack each of the four legs on the crystal monsters and the critical damage kills them instantly. Also as mentioned by another poster, you can try a sniper although for me personally no weapon was able to destroy the crystal on their legs with a single shot while melee attacks always did the trick in one swing.

This works real easy with only two of them around but it gets a little tougher when theres more in the areas as their ranged attack hurts quite a bit.

@AhmadMetallic said:

It seems you haven't met the earth worms and the four-legged crystal beasts yet. I went from being overpowered to being a rape victim.

Excellent, I have never looked forward to being raped by worms before, but hey, first for everything. I will be disappointed if they don't look like tremors, though.

I think I'll probably start having some issues once I run into enemies that ignore Corrosive damage, too. As I said, by far my best weapon is that shotgun, but if you take that away from me I am much worse off in the borderlands.

I will say that this game, despite being a bit easy so far, is still incredibly fun. That constant promise of a step forward that comes with the loot system is so damn exciting. I really like the small ways to get loot too, like that Michael dude in Sanctuary. He actually gave me a great Electric sniper rifle that I still use now.

I haven't read the entire thread so i'm not sure what everyone is saying but i can assure you the difficulty will catch up to you soon enough. 
 
Take this from someone who has done every single side mission before advancing the story. I felt OP for a good chunk of the game where most if not all the missions i would receive would read "trivial" but after a certain story changing event in the game, shit gets real
 
I'm a level 31 siren and now most of my missions read "normal" while being 1 or 2 levels below me but even then enemies still pose a big threat if i'm not smart about how i approach the situation. 
 
That being said, a lot of the difficulty comes from the sheer amount of enemies that they throw at you as oppose to each individual enemy being overly resilient. 
 
On a side note, "the rats" (i think thats what they're called, the people you run into in "the fridge") were really resilient for some odd reason. Even when i was multiple levels stronger than them.

@hbkdx12: I actually just go to The Fridge and the rats do pose a good challenge, and they are actually at my level which is nice. Things look to be picking up.

One weird thing that is still happening is my side quests coming in far under my current level, resetting even lower if I turn the game off and come back. For example, a side mission I had received at Level 18 came in as a Level 15 mission, but I had to turn the game off and come back later. Once I came back, I noticed that the missions level had fallen to Level 13, which is what all of my other missions were resetting to, as well.

Basically it seems that all of my side missions are reverting back to whatever the level of my lowest current side mission is, which is a pain in the ass, as it leads to me getting garbage for reward loots. Currently, I'm trying to clear out all my current side missions to see if I can fix that, but the Sanctuary event just happened so one of them is on hold right now.

I've found the game, when fighting normal dudes, to not be such an issue. But the way they've designed a lot of the game, and the Badass enemies really show this, is around co-op. There are quite a few area-defense missions, and Badass enemies don't have any cooldown on their attacks (for example, Badass Constructors will shoot missiles endlessly as long as you're in range). Much of the way the game feels is co-op driven, but solo isn't hard. There are just certain situations that clearly aren't balanced for solo play.

Imlevel 35 and I'm struggling with the first side missions on the second playthrough. Don't know if it's my build or not but it's brutal.

So, I'm the only person having trouble soloing around level 10 on the first playthrough? :\ Either this game is noticeably more difficult than the first one or my FPS abilities are getting worse than they already were (me and resource-management shooters don't get along). My character feels decidedly UNDERpowered, and my guns? Not interesting or awesome, and certainly NOT badass.

I hope it's just that all of my guns are REALLY terrible, or maybe that Zero is terrible... I'm on "Hunting the Firehawk". I got 90% of the way through that long area one night and decided it was time for bed. So the next day, after realizing the hard way that the little respawn points apparently aren't SAVE points, I can't find the energy to bother with that long trek again. Not a single moment of that area was really enjoyable. I found myself repeatedly running all the way back to the vending machines to heal. Just. Ugh. So, here I am. At the beginning of Frostburn Canyon... and I'm finding I'd rather do basically anything else at this point. :(

/RantOver

The first playthrough is pretty easy solo so you don't need to do most of the sidequests since you level so fast. True Vault Hunter mode is a whole other story though. I have 30,000 shield and 40,000 health but I can still be killed just by a handful of regular dudes.

The level-scaling (yes there is scaling) and random weapons drops are sorta jacked. Some people are finding themselves just breezing through the game while others are struggling hard. I was one of the more unlucky ones, and I can assure you I wasn't doing anything wrong. Playing through it again with a different character I'm finding that I can breeze through stuff I struggled with last time while I'm finding other parts more challenging as this time I've got different scaling and weapons for different areas.

Playstyle also matters quite a lot. Because of the bigger emphasis on monster-closests in this one, anyone who uses long range weapons will have a much much easier time.