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At the moment I am an 8 Mo/R.  I have several healing and protection spells, a decent marksmanship (4, using a Mark-4 bow), and a pet.  I wear the best armor I can make.

And yet if I leave town to go to a quest contact, I'm a dead man.  All of the contacts are located beyond spawn locations that rape me.  Level 4 mobs (I'm level 8, remember) come out of the ground in waves so fast that I have to scramble just to port back to Ascalon before I get killed.  And  past them are Grawls that heal each other until I have to run. 

I could get a party, but no one ever responds to a lfg call in /local, even as a Monk.  I can get NPCs, but they whack my XP and loot gain down to a crawl.

Any ideas?

I'm in the same spot.  It is hard to get around not taking the henchmen.  Mobs may only be lvl 4 but if 3 or 4 show up with a healer forget it, you can't get enough damage in solo to outpace the heals.

edited due to trying to write down a coherent thought prior to  coffee.

The game has a single lull that I found around level 8 when you Haven't made it to Piken Square and gotten your level 6 mobs. And the run to Piken Square is a motherfucking Gauntlet of the highest order. At level 15 I probably still couldn't make it there with the level 3 Henchmen you're provided with in Ascalon.

Last night Poptart, Strazos, Tazelbain and I tried getting to the Temple of the Gods (don't ask why, I mean, cool screenshots to be had but the place offered nothing to us). It took about 30 tries and we had to sneak/run past all the mobs in the motherfucking black curtain. It was Just Like The Breach when I was level 8. Everything between those 2 areas is amazingly well laid out.

So uhmm...basically....

I think the computers went "bleep bloop bleep bleep bleep" and they had to remake the areas really fast but they weren't as good because it was hard and like....yea....

Also, we didn't know there was nothing there for us until we actually managed to get there. The only thing to do there is the uber high-end content.

Just saying...

EDIT: To be on topic....Just take the henchman, and spare yourself the masochistic torture of trying to solo. It doesn't happen.

Also, from the sound of it, you're splitting yourself between at least 4 different attributes (Protection, Healing, Marksmanship, Beast Mastery), which may be spreading yourself a bit thin. There are many different directions you could take with this character, but I would suggest you pick One direction/build, and commit to it. 4 different Attributes Can work, but only with certain skills (ie: most are pointless if you don't have the attribute pumped up to at least 8 when you lvl 20). Having upgrade runes that increase your attributes makes this a Lot more feasible.

As schild mentioned, there are a couple of spots in the game that are extremely frustrating using henchmen, but in the big picture it's only a few: Piken Square/The Breach being one of them. With my particular builds (monk/mesmer, mesmer/monk), I found it best to drop the tank, and take the archer/healer/mage--that kept the tank from always running in and aggroing/generating additional mobs.

The other thing is to just be patient--some of the mob groupings wander, and if you sit tight and time the wanderers, many times you can get a much smaller pull.

To expand on the agro concept, take a look at your minimap/radar. See that translucent sphere surrounding you in the middle? That's the agro range; Almost 100% of the time, if you can keep the red dots from touching the border of that sphere, you will not agro.

I only say "almost" because sometimes there are hidden spawn triggers. See "The Dark Curtain" for a demonstration of this mechanic.

Build-wise, is it typical to focus on only one attribute per profession? 

Speaking as a Ranger Monk whom utilized practically ONLY henchmen her entire leveling from 1-20, I can honestly say I never had a lull anywhere in the game. I always had a group, always had places to go mission from mission and all around just had fun.

And always know the chicken way out exists. You can run away from pretty much everything in this game and it will ultimately stop following you.

Again, it really depends upon the skills you are using.

The Divine Healer template uses only 2 as I remember, but the Protection Healer build uses 3 (possibly).

I typically use 3 attributes. Some builds even use 4 attributes, but YMMV.

The BWE's were extremely useful in helping to figure out stuff like this. You had all the skills in the game unlocked for you, so it was very easy to experiment.

The best you can do now is take a few long, hard looks at the skills lists.

Typically, I find that casters can get away with using only 2 attributes, depending upon build. Non-magical, or melee types typically spread themselves between 3 or 4 attributes (main attack, defense, and 1 or 2 support attributes).

So, you were 'socializing' with the henchman AND the quest givers...this is all making more sense now!  :-D

As a mesmer/monk, I've sailed through most of the quests, and even the missions (cooperative) with only a few tough points, but at level 15 working some of the quests from Lion's gate, Kryta, I've having a damned hard time---6-8 mobs at a time is tearing me apart with only one AE spell and not a whole lot in the way of direct damage.

The tank mobs just rape my healer, and then go tearing apart everyone else without me being able to do much in the way of controlling them. It's probably user error, but it's to the point of sitting for 15 minutes waiting to hopefully catch that one pathing scenario where I can split off a couple of mobs from the pack--and dodging the wandering patrols of 4-6 mobs at the same time.

I don't like you humans. Why would I, a superior being socialize with the lesser, more inferior guild wars community?

Because you are enarmored with us? Duh.

You love me though, right?  Because I'm such a noobler!   8-)