Discussion on the concept of "grinding"
By
AkuTenshiiZero,
Posted on: 2009-05-28 08:09 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
Repetition, as with everything in life, is unavoidable and in many cases, desired. Games are no exception, and anyone should expect some measure of redundancy from them.
However, there are various degrees of repetition. Pushing 1-2 keys for hours and hours does get really old for me quite fast. Having a pool of 10-15 keys that must be pressed according to varying factors, with different degrees of success and efficiency, now that's completely different.
In this sense, "grinding" is not a choice. I grind words every day (translator), I grind my cooking, I grind my commuting. Likewise, I grind my games, but I do so following the standard I wrote about above.
If it pleases the mind, grinding is a healthy activity like any other. Grinding for obsession/compulsion is a different story. So, I think that everyone must draw their own line. I cannot play most Korean MMOs because I find them too shallow and with few options/strategies/rewards for the time I spent on them (with a few notable exceptions). Games like CoX, Warhammer LotRO, and Age of Conan are much more involved, provide story (should you wish one), and reward your approach to things, each in its own way.
I only think something is a grind if I don't enjoy doing it.
I've not found playing the game to be grinding except when I used to hunt certain badges. Since I don't do that any more, I don't experience any grind but since that is based on my feelings of what I am doing it is pretty clear others might do the exact same thing as me and find it a grind and what I would consider a grind another player would not.
total kick to the gut
This is like having Ra's Al Ghul show up at your birthday party.
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Warhammer LotRO
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I would so play this game.
Three Rings for the elven kings under the sky,
Seven for the dwarf lords in their halls of stone,
Nine for mortal men, doomed to die,
Blood for the Blood God on his skull throne...
Having Vengeance and Fallout slotted for recharge means never having to say you're sorry.
The problem is Everquest took the original model (which was not UO or Merdian, it was text-based MuX games) which was social-centric and added the concept of "raids" which only really occurred at max level and required a ton of people to accomplish. This created the concept of "grinding" in the bad sense.
Originally you had to keep killing the same thing over and over again due to lack of areas and diversity in things to kill. The end game was generally much worse whereby there was only one or two things you could potentially kill to continue to advance. At some point you'd end up at max level and you could only really:
1. Sit around chatting
2. Help people advance
3. Take on a staff position/build if the system allowed it
Sitting around chatting can obviously occur at any level so hitting max is pointless.
It's difficult to help other people advance except by powerlevel tactics in modern MMOs due to level restrictions on xp gain in groups.
Modern MMOs are also a business, so there's no chance of getting staff tools just because you hit max level so that's out as well.
So now we're left with this raid concept, or PvP, both of which require or make max level desirable for. You always want the best stuff and all of your powers/skills/spells to tackle PvP. (even level halted twinks like battlegrounds in WoW have hit "max" level for their bracket)
That concept for end game engenders and attitude that you need to be max level to truly be enjoying the game, thus invalidating all other level brackets of play and turning it into a "grind".
Grinding has always existed in MMORPGs. It's just more recently that it's seen as a bad area to be in.
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Repetition, as with everything in life, is unavoidable and in many cases, desired. Games are no exception, and anyone should expect some measure of redundancy from them.
However, there are various degrees of repetition. Pushing 1-2 keys for hours and hours does get really old for me quite fast. Having a pool of 10-15 keys that must be pressed according to varying factors, with different degrees of success and efficiency, now that's completely different.
In this sense, "grinding" is not a choice. I grind words every day (translator), I grind my cooking, I grind my commuting. Likewise, I grind my games, but I do so following the standard I wrote about above.
If it pleases the mind, grinding is a healthy activity like any other. Grinding for obsession/compulsion is a different story. So, I think that everyone must draw their own line. I cannot play most Korean MMOs because I find them too shallow and with few options/strategies/rewards for the time I spent on them (with a few notable exceptions). Games like CoX, Warhammer LotRO, and Age of Conan are much more involved, provide story (should you wish one), and reward your approach to things, each in its own way.
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I agree with this statement, with a few minor additions.
I don't actually mind a grind, as long as there is a social experience going on at the same time and it's not entirely about getting to a certain point, but just something to do with people I enjoy talking to, or new people I'm getting to know. I've played KGGs (Korean Grindfest Games) with some of my best friends and thoroughly enjoyed it. I don't exactly mind 'farming' (as it relates to CoH) as long as I have someone to chat with, but I much prefer something with an actual progression that makes me feel like I'm getting somewhere even if I'm not.
It's the social aspect of the game that I like the most. Everything, to me, is secondary compared to the social aspect. While I would like to hit my 'gold' level (around 30), I prefer to do so at my own pace if solo (usually bursts of 2-3 levels a day depending on activity), and I really don't care at all if I'm hanging out with people I know. Without a social aspect, or someone to discourse about the subject at all, I tend to not have as much interest in what I'm actually doing.
It's all about context, for me. The grind is a means to an end, but not the end itself. If I'm left with just the grind, I tend to find other things that I can focus myself on to not really notice the grind at all. As far as that goes, I'd have to say CoH/V is probably the least grindy game I've come across (as there's a plethora of things to do and enough variation that the grind itself isn't as noticeable), whereas games like Maple Story are where the high bar starts, and EVE Online is where it ends (The only benefit to EVE is that you can grind skills while not logged in - and thank freakin' goodness).
I'd like to start out by saying that the "use it to level it up" idea is hardly unique to anything, though I can't say if Ultima Online was or was not the one to start it. And, as you remarked, this is perhaps the MOST grind-prone mechanic ever the grace the face of a game. Why? After all, you want to use, say, swords, so you fight with a sword and raise your skill. Ain't anything simpler and more fluent than that, right? Well, suppose I got bored with swords or, as often happens, got an axe drop that was just AWESOME! Now I'd need to shift to fighting with an axe, but OOPS! My skill with an axe is so bad I can't even EQUIP it, much less be proficient with it. So I have to buy a crappy axe and go beat up small furry animals with it until I can equip the big one, then go beat up stuff with the big one until I become proficient with it, then keep on grinding at stuff until I at least break even to where my skill plus the axe makes me STRONGER than I was with the sword. Which was the point, right? So I've wasted how much time doing chores before I could get back to playing the game? I'd put it somewhere between "tons" and "way too bloody much."
Revenant was like that, once upon a time, and it made me dread switching weapons. Dungeon Siege was like that, and had the added bonus of bows needing strength and strength coming from swords and axes, so my archers had to "grind" strength not doing what they were supposed to be doing. Much as I like it otherwise, Advent Rising's weapon skills and powers, though they became available at scripted points in the game, were upgraded by using them. Cue thirty minutes of me firing Aion Blasts into a wall and setting down a little house of shield barriers to bring stuff up to level. Having to start from scratch and nothing as soon as you decide to switch weapons or skills, though it may be "realistic," is a really, really crappy way to play a game, because you end up going sideways and trodding in place instead of moving forward.
As far as what constitutes "grind," for me the definition is simple: anything I do not want to do but have to, in order to proceed through the game. Hey, this is a really cool quest line, I wonder if... What? I need to gain ten more levels? Go kill stuff in the forest, you say? Well, up yours, Mr. NPC! I'ma find myself a better game! Gah! 9Dragons was SO BAD like that. It started out almost impressive, with what felt like an overarching storyline carrying me forward, until I stopped getting quests. Then it became: Grind brown bears for one more level to get you next quest. Quest done. Now grind brown bears for one MORE level to get your next quest. Quest done. Now grind brown bears for one more level to tear your hair out.
In City of Heroes, nothing feels like a bigger grind than having to do chores like store runs, delivery missions, "go talk to Wincott" missions and so forth. One of my "favourite" times is when I hit, say, level 37. Then I might as well quit my team, go figure out what I need to take to level up, run around and sell my various stuff, replace my whole set of enhancements and only THEN go back to the game. And that's outright benign compared to what other MMOs tend to make me do. I mean, it's a chore, but at worst it'll take me half an hour out of a whole day. Most other games take up over half their playtime with these grinds.
I learned a long time ago that if I started thinking about how cool the game would be after a level or two, it was time to step back and admit I was getting burned out. As a general rule of thumb, when that time comes, NOTHING will make the game better. All I'll end up doing by trying to stick it through is hurt myself even more. Because when I've put in all the effort and all the work and found out that, no, they didn't make the game better at all, then I get angry and I blame the game, and I don't feel like playing it any more. The fact of the matter is, however, that it's my own fault in sticking to a game (or, more often, a character) I'm quite clearly tired of. To a great extent, that's why so many people blow up over such minor things - they've been burned out on the game for months, maybe even years, still engaging in the one thing that may yet give them hope for better times. So when it gets changed or they realise it won't make anything better, they get angry. And it's understandable. It's also perfectly preventable.
I've seen all the grind people claim to be here. For me, however, it has never been about how much I HAVE to grind, but rather how much what I'm working towards is WORTH working for. In a game I play for fun, the answer is often "Not a whole lot!"
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.
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the basic problem is efficiency.
if you try to be efficient you eliminate the other elements - basically the variety - from the game. The fastest way to gain XP is to fight endlessly without travel, reading story, etc.
If you run around exploring, talking, doing missions, etc in CoX - it is not a grind. You happen to gain xp and such while you are playing. But it is not efficient.
Devs cannot stop players from turning a game into a grind. They can just give the players options.
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I only think something is a grind if I don't enjoy doing it.
I've not found playing the game to be grinding except when I used to hunt certain badges. Since I don't do that any more, I don't experience any grind but since that is based on my feelings of what I am doing it is pretty clear others might do the exact same thing as me and find it a grind and what I would consider a grind another player would not.
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That's more in line with how I feel. I decided a while back that except for the very low levels (1 through 6 or so), no one level is inherently better or worse than any other. That is, teaming and fighting and playing is pretty much consistent throughout the entire game (at least, for me), so I rarely feel the need to "grind". And when I do feel that I'm grinding, I reevaluate the desired result and question whether the ends justifies the means. Is the reward worth not having fun?
I want my supergroup to have the healing badge so it can get a few final components for our base. To do that, I have to heal. A lot. I found myself playing my dark defender (the toon with the best heals, I don't have an empath) more than I wanted to. So I reexamined my goal. I envisioned having those things for my base and if it was worthwhile to get them quickly, or would it be better to just let it happen naturally? I decided that having those items would be nice, but are unnecessary to having fun. Getting a reward quickly is fun, but it's also satisfying to finally receive a reward that took time. Realizing these things, I play my DD only when my mood hits me, and I don't feel like I'm grinding anymore. (though now that I'm getting close, the urge to grind it through is increasing in strength 
).
My blaster has purples, but I only have about half of the ones I'm looking for. I could get on him and grind through and get those recipes, but I decided the cost would be too high. To force myself to play him excessively would remove an element of fun, and after getting the recipes for him, I'd still have the carrot-on-a-stick of wanting recipes for my other characters. So I decided to play him when I feel like it, and let it all happen naturally. After all, it's not like I don't have fun with him, he's my favorite character and always has been. Even without purples and even when he was level 10.
Arc ID#30821, A Clean Break
The only problem with defeating the Tsoo is that an hour later, you want to defeat them again!
"Life is just better boosted!" -- LadyMage
"I'm a big believer in Personal Force Field on a blaster. ... It's your happy place." -- Fulmens
every MMO is about grinding.
the trick to if its fun or not is sugar coating.
if the grind is sugar coated just right, you dont really notice you are grinding.
the secret to a good MMO is making your grind with just the right amount of sugar coating.
when i first started COX the game was just so much fun and so neat to play i had a sweet time playing and never really noticed the grind at all.
but now that ive played COX for many years ive gotten used to the sugar flavor and the im very aware of the repetitive grind of this game.
i can only play COX in small doses these days, like an hour or two a day and I am constantly switching which characters I play to try to keep variety. Ill do one mission with one character, then switch to another character and do a different level/zone mission.
the problem with COH is that its all about your super powers and nothing really else. and you only get super powers through grinding levels.
there is the grind to 20 until you get stamina and your travel powers set up. i hate this grind, not having stamina is horrible.
then there is the 20-32 grind until you get your lvl 32 power. (this grind takes so long you can prob divide up into two grinds by the time you get to lvl 32 its like OMG finally)
then there is the 32-38 grind when you get your highest secondary power. the level 30's are some of the longest grinds in the game.
then there very very long grind to lvl 50.
so i find the grind is more apparent because I always have some set goal/level that I want to reach that keeps my mind on the XP bar all the time like watching a pot waiting for the water to boil.
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Warhammer LotRO
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I would so play this game.
Three Rings for the elven kings under the sky,
Seven for the dwarf lords in their halls of stone,
Nine for mortal men, doomed to die,
Blood for the Blood God on his skull throne...
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","
There, a comma just for you.
Additionally, I agree with what some people wrote above, describing how repetition becomes a grind if you do it because of some carrot, and not for the experience itself.
Again, that's sadly quite prevalent in our life. However, we do have some choices. Some people go for the equation:
100 Efficiency -> 10 Entertainment
While they could be doing
70 Efficiency -> 50 Fun
It's just a matter of a certain mental state, in which you don't focus on the "now" as much as the modern society locks us into. And herein lies the culprit, I think: the way we are bred, today, for instant gratification, shallow expectations and little questioning about the whys and hows.
I think that's the thing. People who play as you and I apparently do just have fun playing and the gains are (usually) a byproduct of that playing so we avoid any sense of grinding.
But I also don't want to assume what others do that I would find grindy they also find grindy. They might see it differently and be having fun. I'd gag running the same map over and over and over like they did/do (Dreck, Wolves, Family farm) but they must get some enjoyment out of it otherwise I cannot imagine why they keep doing it.
total kick to the gut
This is like having Ra's Al Ghul show up at your birthday party.
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I only think something is a grind if I don't enjoy doing it.
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yes.
there are any number of mindlessly repetitive things in the game that I quite enjoy.
The Nethergoat Archive: all my memories, all my characters, all my thoughts on CoH...eventually.
My City Was Gone
To me, grinding is repetitively doing something that isn't fun in order to obtain a goal.
In the early days, I ran out of mission content at level 38 with my character Yukihime. That left a big gap before I could get any more missions. Anything I could do to get past that gap would be a nasty grind for me. Mind you, I had already done some grinding via farming and teaming just to get to 38. Eventually Warburg was added, and I had the opportunity to do missions there, but I don't like to go into PvP zones. When the first double XP weekend hit, I decided to go ahead and tear through Warburg missions until I hit 40 with Yukihime.
Fortunately, I don't have to do that kind of grinding any more. The game content these days allows me to go from 1 to 50 without experiencing anything that seems like a grind to me.
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every MMO is about grinding.
the trick to if its fun or not is sugar coating.
if the grind is sugar coated just right, you dont really notice you are grinding.
the secret to a good MMO is making your grind with just the right amount of sugar coating.
when i first started COX the game was just so much fun and so neat to play i had a sweet time playing and never really noticed the grind at all.
but now that ive played COX for many years ive gotten used to the sugar flavor and the im very aware of the repetitive grind of this game.
i can only play COX in small doses these days, like an hour or two a day and I am constantly switching which characters I play to try to keep variety. Ill do one mission with one character, then switch to another character and do a different level/zone mission.
the problem with COH is that its all about your super powers and nothing really else. and you only get super powers through grinding levels.
there is the grind to 20 until you get stamina and your travel powers set up. i hate this grind, not having stamina is horrible.
then there is the 20-32 grind until you get your lvl 32 power. (this grind takes so long you can prob divide up into two grinds by the time you get to lvl 32 its like OMG finally)
then there is the 32-38 grind when you get your highest secondary power. the level 30's are some of the longest grinds in the game.
then there very very long grind to lvl 50.
so i find the grind is more apparent because I always have some set goal/level that I want to reach that keeps my mind on the XP bar all the time like watching a pot waiting for the water to boil.
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This is an interesting post, and it brings up something that I was thinking about. From your post, the entire game feels like a grind, and you admit that you've become accustomed to the taste of sugar. From everything you've posted, it sounds like you're finally tired of the game and burned out as you see the entire game as a grind.
Why do you play it that way then? I'm really interested in someone actually sitting back, asking themselves "why am I still playing?", and honestly answer that question.
I'll answer it for myself, as I've reached the point several times in several games where I felt it was all a grind. I was doing it out of habit. At some point almost every day, I'd log onto the game to have fun and socialize. At one traumatic period in my life when I became widowed, I logged in because the repetitive nature of grinding occupied my mind for a few hours and let me forget my grief. Those sessions turned into habits. It was something I was used to doing. When I did decide that I wasn't actually having fun anymore, and was instead just killing time, I still logged on and grinded because I didn't know what else to fill my time with. I'm curious why other people who are exhibiting burnout and are obviously tired of the game still play. For the same reason as me? (out of habit). Or for some other reason?
Is there any intention to resolve that? Obviously, continuing to play and grind isn't going to make the game gradually more fun again, so what are your long-term plans? Play until even getting quick 50's or purples isn't fun anymore and then quit? Take a break and come back?
Like I said, I'm curious as to why someone who finally admits that they've lost enjoyment of the game and just grind through it... still play. I'm not being negative or condescending when I say this, as I've done it too, and still do it at times. I just think it makes for an interesting discussion that has the potential of changing perceptions and possibly even restoring fun again.
Arc ID#30821, A Clean Break
The only problem with defeating the Tsoo is that an hour later, you want to defeat them again!
"Life is just better boosted!" -- LadyMage
"I'm a big believer in Personal Force Field on a blaster. ... It's your happy place." -- Fulmens
Ahh, good old ultima online. i actually love the way the skill system is set up, and even befor ethe various changes that have made skill gains come much faster than in the old days, I find its easy to reach max skill level. Unfortunatly these days teh game has more grind to it than it used to thanks to the more recent (comparatively) addition of artifacts. Fortunately I play on Siege, and as much as it annoys me sometimes, there's nothing like full loot PvP to keep the prices of uber-gear in check. But I digress.
There are essentially 2 definitions of grind in my experience.
One is any repetative task you perform that gives you in-game rewards. By this definition, as someone noted earlier, ALL MMOs are grindy (and so are a lot of other RPGs for that matter). The names, and faces, and storyline souveneers may change to protect the innocent, but in every MMO from ultima to now, and certainly in city of heroes, the basic formula for doing missions and killing bad guys knows only so much diversity. Some games do a better job than this one of coming up with different sorts of tactical scenarios, and enemies with unique abilities that makes it different to fight them than the last group. Some do significantly worse, let it be noted. But play any MMO long enough I gaurantee you will reach the point where one missions starts looking a lot like every other from a tactical standpoint.
The other definition is any repetative task that you perform solely for the in-game rewards it gives you. Obviously there will always be people who do this because they want to find the tactic that maximizes their material gains over time in an absolute sense, and sometimes Im one of them. But this can be at least partiallya voided by having interesting content to go with the strictly tactical aspects of your mission. Not everyone is a roleplayer, but almost everyone has more fun when they feel as if they're actually participating in some sort of meaningful plotline as opposed to just killing yet another computer generated bad guy because thats how the game works. City of Heroes has gotten a lot better at this over the years. When it first started out, it had a lot of repetative filler missions that seemed to serve very little purpose in the story arcs they were part of other than to make you go beat up yet another warehouse full of guys before getting to the bossfight. As time's gone by, however, the design of missions has improved significantly to the point where I rarely, if ever, feel that a mission is boring and pointless, and wish I could jsut get it over when doing most of the more modern content.
On another topic, its also been suggested that CoH is more grindy than some others because it offers less reward at each power level than some RPGs, meaning that it even when you level it can feel as if you're not erally getting anywhere. This is not a bad point. You only get new powers once every 2 or 3 levels. Enhancers are great, but depending where you put them, they may not improve your performance in a way that is dramaticaly aparent - that makes you go "wow, badass!" and feel, emotionaly, as though you've gained something for your efforts over the past level even if you know intelectually that they're doing good. The gear system in this game is simialr, actually. Any individual IO set, even the ultra-rares, and the new PvP IOs I keep hearing about, only add a small benifit - one that will hardly be noticed in and of itself. Its only when you have many of them all slotted and stacking effects with each other, and look back and compare your performance ot how it was when you first hit 50, that you realize the difference they make. Hence, ti DOES often feel as if its taking you a lot longer to see a serious improvement in character performance than you could get for similar effort and similar rewards in other MMOs. The question is: what can be done about this? Not a lot. The power/enhancement setup of the game's design is quite possibly the most fundamental aspects of City of Heroes game-play. To change it would essentially require programing a completly new game. We can hope that this is something that the developers of other superhero MMOs will take into consdieration, and the developers here at Paragon Studios will remember if ti ever comes time for City of Heroes 2, but there's not much that can be done to remedy this aspect of the problem hear and now except to create more polished, interesting content, and hope it makes up for it.
Grinding (defined simply as doing something unpleasant and repetitive for future reward) doesn't really have a place in CoX, because we have no end game. The closest thing we have to "high end lewt" is purples, but since they really aren't needed for any content in the game, no one really rushes to 50 so they can farm for purples (at least, I hope not).
CoX is meant to be fun from 1 to 50. We can have a debate about what life is like pre-travel powers and pre-stamina, but in general the point of the game is to experience it. If players choose to grind to 50; that's their choice, but I don't see any dev-created incentive to do so.
Agua Man lvl 48 Water/Electric Blaster
"To die hating NCSoft for shutting down City of Heroes, that was Freedom."
If CoH was a stand alone 1 player game, I would have felt the grind a long time ago. BUT, since there are other people to talk to and team with and try out new combos with and trade stuff with and build bases with etc etc etc...
I don't find any of it much of a grind.
With some other MMOs, you'd be very limited in the sheer number of alts you can create. There's always a new combo to try and they keep adding more.
As far as written story content goes.... eh. I've seen a lot of it before. But MA, when sifted through, has some fun and novel stuff to do.
I'm all for the latest wave of discussing what should be done and how to play and whatnot, but I don't play this game purely for in game reasons.
I play it mostly because the silly people I meet and team with crack me up and I have a blast with the whole team dynamic thing.
If I'm on and I even get a sniff of boredom, I go watch TV. That sure ends the grind right there.
I see alot of words, and I am tired, so I'm only gonna read about ten or so of them...
Anyways, grinding, as many have said already, is not so much repetition as it is repetition that isn't enjoyable. For example, I do Mayhem missions constantly. Is this repetitious? Yeah, it is. Is it enjoyable? You better believe it! The only reason I do it so much is because I love the thrill of beating down wave after wave of do-gooders trying to take me in. I love fighting to the last second, only to complete a side mission and get a couple extra minutes to keep doing the same thing. Repetitious, but not grinding.
There's many rewards for this. Right now I'm still working on Firebug, Outlaw, Invader, and Hero Slayer, not to mention levelling. So I have to keep doing Mayhems to get all this stuff. Repetition that I need to do, but still not grinding, because it is fun.
Compare this to WoW, where you have to kill innumerable critters to get your hands on a measly 10 items, just to complete a quest. Search. Kill. Pray. Loot. Cheer/Curse. Move to the next. Take a wild guess why I quit that game for CoX. That is my idea of grinding.
The off-beat space pirate...Capt. Stormrider (50+3 Elec/Storm Science Corruptor)
The mysterious Djinn...Emerald Dervish (50+1 DB/DA Magic Stalker)
The psychotic inventor...Dollmaster (50 Bot/FF Tech Mastermind)
Virtue Forever.
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Ahh, good old ultima online. i actually love the way the skill system is set up, and even befor ethe various changes that have made skill gains come much faster than in the old days, I find its easy to reach max skill level. Unfortunatly these days teh game has more grind to it than it used to thanks to the more recent (comparatively) addition of artifacts. Fortunately I play on Siege, and as much as it annoys me sometimes, there's nothing like full loot PvP to keep the prices of uber-gear in check. But I digress.
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Allow me to digress too....
It's nice hearing from someone who appreciated that system as much as I did. It felt natural, even if it was grindy. I was so sad when they broke the world into two instances, one with PvP and one without. As much as I hated being ganked, some of the best times I had were hunting down those PKers with other people. I remember getting killed by someone once using the paralyze/Corp Por combo. I was playing later with my more experienced character (a VERY fast katana-weilding fighter) when I came across him in the woods. We both stopped and stared at each other, and simultaneously started attacking each other. I ran for him while he started casting. What a rush it was to constantly interrupt his spells (katanas are FAST when you have 100 dex), and to see him continually try to recall. He got away, but not without a lot of sweat.
I loved that natural feel to the game. It was so exciting to be in a virtual world with all of those other people. Considering all of those other games didn't exist, it was a whole new genre. Very exciting times.
I've actually been considering starting the account back up again, though I think my old account was deleted. I couldn't reactivate it as the server said it didn't exist. I had kind of hoped my characters would still be there. I still may do that this weekend though and try making a new character. I don't know if I'll use Seige Perilous or not, it was always a very difficult server to play on, but I may do it just for a change of pace.
anyway, back to our original discussion....
Arc ID#30821, A Clean Break
The only problem with defeating the Tsoo is that an hour later, you want to defeat them again!
"Life is just better boosted!" -- LadyMage
"I'm a big believer in Personal Force Field on a blaster. ... It's your happy place." -- Fulmens
QR;
I consider the word "grinding" to be pejorative anyway.
The reality is that "grinding" and "Farming" are the same thing. They're identical activities, repetitive behaviour for extended periods of time for the purpose of accruing an in-game commodity (experience, currency, items, whatever...).
The only real difference between grinding and farming is whether or not the player himself is enjoying it. If the player enjoys what he's doing, then he'll likely call it farming. If he doesn't, then he'll likely call it grinding.
In short, grinding is farming that isn't fun, and farming is grinding that is fun, both of which are entirely dependant on the perspective of the player.
Brother of Markus
The Lord of Fire and Pain
The Legendary Living Hellfire
Fight my brute!
I grind for badges, I'll admit it. Like the Ouroboros badges I'm still working on.
But the rest of the time, I play. It's a lot more fun that way.
--NT
They all laughed at me when I said I wanted to be a comedian.
But I showed them, and nobody's laughing at me now!
If I became a red name, I would be all "and what would you mere mortals like to entertain me with today, mu hu ha ha ha!" ~Arcanaville
Indeed. "Grinding" is a point of view. I farm because I want money and items to make my characters strong as possible. This action on a repetitive loop turns into grinding. If I just run missions, it turns into grinding because of how slow the lvls are acquired. But the end is where the fun is. PVP. If one has jedi hand to eye coordination, they will still be defeated due to lack of enhancements. So grinding is a must for competitors.
one
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I grind for badges, I'll admit it. Like the Ouroboros badges I'm still working on.
But the rest of the time, I play. It's a lot more fun that way.
--NT
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I feel like a spoilt brat, man.
For years I argued for the ability to go back and do arcs that I missed on the way up the level chain. I fought and squabbled and tussled with the developers and with the other players and posters who disagreed with me.
Well, finally I got my way! I can do it now!
... and I hate it.
Don't get me wrong, I love that we can do it, but I hate doing it. I hate taking my super-ultra powerful characters down to level 15 to solo missions in 6 year old content, it's just the most unfun thing in the game.
So, yah, spoilt brat.
Brother of Markus
The Lord of Fire and Pain
The Legendary Living Hellfire
Fight my brute!
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Ahh, good old ultima online. i actually love the way the skill system is set up, and even befor ethe various changes that have made skill gains come much faster than in the old days, I find its easy to reach max skill level. Unfortunatly these days teh game has more grind to it than it used to thanks to the more recent (comparatively) addition of artifacts. Fortunately I play on Siege, and as much as it annoys me sometimes, there's nothing like full loot PvP to keep the prices of uber-gear in check. But I digress.
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Allow me to digress too....
It's nice hearing from someone who appreciated that system as much as I did. It felt natural, even if it was grindy. I was so sad when they broke the world into two instances, one with PvP and one without. As much as I hated being ganked, some of the best times I had were hunting down those PKers with other people. I remember getting killed by someone once using the paralyze/Corp Por combo. I was playing later with my more experienced character (a VERY fast katana-weilding fighter) when I came across him in the woods. We both stopped and stared at each other, and simultaneously started attacking each other. I ran for him while he started casting. What a rush it was to constantly interrupt his spells (katanas are FAST when you have 100 dex), and to see him continually try to recall. He got away, but not without a lot of sweat.
I loved that natural feel to the game. It was so exciting to be in a virtual world with all of those other people. Considering all of those other games didn't exist, it was a whole new genre. Very exciting times.
I've actually been considering starting the account back up again, though I think my old account was deleted. I couldn't reactivate it as the server said it didn't exist. I had kind of hoped my characters would still be there. I still may do that this weekend though and try making a new character. I don't know if I'll use Seige Perilous or not, it was always a very difficult server to play on, but I may do it just for a change of pace.
anyway, back to our original discussion....
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Trammel was a good decision at the time, when it appealed to a lot of their base. But now the more content oriented casual players, and hardcore PvP-is-evil storyteller types ahve all moved on to other games, while the ones who stayed (and the slow trickle of new recruits that still come in) are people who are attracted to the open world, sand-box, player-driven nature of the game. So for them, the duel worlds are not so good, but at this stage it would be impractical in the extreme to remove trammel from existing servers.
This is why I play on Siege Perilous - no Trammel there! Of course, Siege still has full player looting, which I like a lot less, but them's the breaks. I will say one thign for it - nothing cuts down on godmoding douchebags, like knowing that if you can just beat them and take their stuff if you ever have to prove their true (lack of) power to them.
I seriously msut say thought aht the game is a lot less grindy. I can get a character to max skill level in well under a week now-a-days.
I thought this could make for an interesting discussion. "Grinding" has been tossed around a lot. Some see it as absolutely necessary, some avoid it through powerleveling, some don't do it at all, some may not even know what it is. People may even have different ideas as to what constitutes "grinding". I have my own concept of what constitutes grinding and have dropped games because of it, and even altered my expectations in a game to avoid it. So I thought it would make a good discussion.
My first MMORPG was the grandaddy of them all.... Ultima Online. I know, Meridian 59 was technically first, but UO was the first one to popularize the genre and tie together all of the things we expect to find in an MMORPG. Now, for those of you who haven't played it, UO has no levels. You have three stats: strength, dexterity, and intelligence. You started with a base amount of stat points you could spread out in those three stats, and the combined total of all three could never surpass something like 240 points (100 being the max in any attribute). Those three stats gave you your hitpoints and stamina and mana. What is unique is that after character creation, you no longer use stat ponits or skill points. If you want to become stronger, simply use skills that rely on strength and you'll gradually get stronger. Want to become better at a skill? Use that skill more often. Nothing prevented you from trying to cast a level 8 (the highest level) spell, but if your Magery skill was too low, it'd fail.
That started the concept of "grinding" for me. If you wanted to be a powerful tank-mage, you needed a 100 in Magery, so you had to keep successfully casting spells that were a challenge for you. You'd keep casting lightning bolt on yourself over and over and over again. If you wanted to be a GM Weaponsmith, you kept making swords or weapons over and over and over again. Very very grindy. With combat, it wasn't that bad because you would just go out and fight monsters and keep getting better, enabling you to move on to bigger monsters.
UO introduced the concept of grinding to me, EQ cemented it in place. EQ, being level-based, meant that the next "awesome" ability or spell was always the next level. Until you hit the max level, you had to grind away to get more experience. After you hit that level, surely the next level will be better, and the grind never ended.
Fast forward to CoX, and it's apparent that little has changed since EQ. Graphics are better, but all of the ingredients are there to make for a very grindy game. To be a high-level character, you need to grind away with combat and grind through levels. The grind exists as strongly as before.
Or does it?
Having played UO, EQ, AC, DAoC, JG (jumpgate), EQ2, WoW, SB, and CoX, I've found that grinding is a choice a player makes. It comes from the expectation or belief players have that some later point in the game is better than the point they're in at that moment, so grinding must be performed to get past the current position.
What's your own opinions on grinding? Is it something you do? Unavoidable? Avoidable? Good? Bad? Necessary? A state of mind?
Arc ID#30821, A Clean Break
The only problem with defeating the Tsoo is that an hour later, you want to defeat them again!
"Life is just better boosted!" -- LadyMage
"I'm a big believer in Personal Force Field on a blaster. ... It's your happy place." -- Fulmens