Manning National Zoo can't pass in 18 minutes! Very frequent bugs on monorails!

@sonderstreet

I would like to see someone do this mission in 18 minutes. I think if all you did was run through this mission without any enemies, it would probably take about that time. LOL.

@virtual-chris

@n3mb0t

Will watch it later, and weep at how my best time is like 45 minutes.

Here's another old 16:40 speedrun (He used Lady Death mostly for the movement speed buff after a kill)

Just because it can be done, doesn't mean this league activity is properly balanced. 18 minutes is way too low considering:

• The cutscene at the end eats significant time. (Yes, I know that the game does give back some time to cover things like this, but it isn't enough in this case)
• The size of this mission/stronghold, in terms of number of engagements, is bigger than District Union, and yet as a league activity DU has a target time up in the 20's.
• Players that can only get an "8" on this, get "10's" comfortably on all other league timed missions.

It shouldn't be this way, and one shouldn't have to build out specifically for this. The top (legit) slots on the leaderboard should be what speed fanatics with speed optimized builds should shoot for.

If you want to complete this mission within the time frame then simply join a group. If not the first time you'll probably do it with another. I ran the mission many times and only few of these runs were below 10. Just make sure you keep moving and knowing where they spawn also help a lot, so one or two players can wait for them to show up and keep the AI pinned down at one spot. In many cases you don't need 4 players to kill all the enemies so one can go ahead to open doors or speed up spawns.

@tcarlisle2012 I've gotten sub 18 in a duo, but solo is rough due to the relay pit. What always frustrated me, is DUA is 25 minutes and I can do it <10, but Manning is 18 and a real challenge to pass. Those should be swapped.

@imagine_brata

Thats incredibly impressive. How is he cutting down heavies like they are unarmored reds? Is that the Lady Death and his constant moving thats buffing his damage? If so, that seems like the ideal run and gun setup.

@imagine_brata So it was a year ago! A lot of things have been changed and fixed!

So it was a year ago! A lot of things have been changed and fixed!

It's from November – and since then the game basically got no updates or balancing changes. Especially his gear and the mission itself have not been subject to changes since then. Completing the zoo under 18 minutes is definitely hard, but is not impossible.

But as @tcarlisle2012 mentioned earlier, this mission is not balanced in comparison to how overwhelmingly easy most of the other missions are. So that simply doesn't fit.

Personally, I like when speedruns actually are a challenge and that some or even most agents cannot finish them with the best possible time with the very first run. And I also liked the league speedruns better when they consisted of three challenging and one heroic missions.

It's all waaaaay too easy now – that's why people think after having completed three hard missions with a 10/10 they were good at speedruns. Although you really don't need to be good at speedruns at all for this. And then they of course start complaining about and actually challenging challenging mission.

A lot of things were fixed! And with each update, there are more and more bugs! Even take the same monorail, where there is a constant bug and there is no way to complete the mission! Back in May, it was normal!

I managed to do it solo in a bit under 18 by running a close range build and just being mindful of the spawns, if anyone wants to try duos these days we could try, it should be easier duo since we can cover more ground.

I am content with my 20 minutes.

@sonderstreet plenty of people (including me) have been able to complete it this week.

However, there might be a bug if you reset the mission before completing it and after taking the monorail, then try to play it again straight away:

https://discussions.ubisoft.com/topic/103816/we-are-not-able-to-complete-the-mission-of-the-national-zoo-in-pairs/10?lang=en-US

It's all waaaaay too easy now – that's why people think after having completed three hard missions with a 10/10 they were good at speedruns. Although you really don't need to be good at speedruns at all for this. And then they of course start complaining about and actually challenging challenging mission.

Pretty much this. Speed runs should be challenging, and most are not in this game. This one actually makes you need to use strategies/tactics where others do not. Your build must be solid, and if you're running with teammates it helps to know all the spawn points/triggers. Having someone ready to enter/start the next engagement in the next room as soon as you're done in the current one is pretty much a must.

@txdieselkid

I agree with the challenging aspect, strategies/tactics and running a solid build.
But I don't like the spawn points memorizing part. The moment I know that, that mission has nothing left for me...

I’m impressed.

In my case. I’d only played this mission once prior. In doing it again last week, with my Glass Cannon build, it took 45 minutes the first try and 40 min the next attempt. LOL. Part of that was because I had to relearn what to do. My TTK is pretty good but obviously I’m not very efficient at all.

Other speed run missions I can get 8-10 stars… I got 1-2 on this one. So I agree the others are probably too easy. But this one is particularly long.