Reward-driven mentality

Everything people do is about reward. Usually that reward has to do with what goals you're trying to achieve. In bowling the reward is how many pins you knock down (or beer, which is its own reward), in CoH it can be having a purpled out level 50 or an incarnate.

In both activities, how much time you're willing to spend at activities that most find boring increases your reward. For example, no pro bowler became competitive simply by bowling with his buddies. He spent hours and hours bowling alone (and some people actually enjoy it). In CoH, those willing to farm or market can get the best rewards (some of them actually enjoy it as well).

The reward for playing catch with your son is spending time with him. If he spends the entire time on his phone with his buddies while you're tossing the ball around you're going to end the game quick. Same with the reward for spending time with friends, if they ignore you you're likely to leave.

All activities are reward driven, it just depends on what rewards you're looking for.

Okay, so, what I'm getting out of the responses to my post is:

-I'm saying that everyone who doesn't play like me is wrong.

Not at all. I'm just wondering why people spend so much time doing something the don't enjoy in order to get a reward out of it, when that time could be spent doing something perhaps less rewarding, but more enjoyable.

When people use terms like "work" and "effort" to describe something meant for entertainment, it makes me scratch my head. I can't think of any time in my life I have ever "worked" at watching a movie, or put "effort" into a TV show.

But playing online video games is different. For an apparently overwhelming number of people it seems to be not only normal, but expected that you should put a lot of effort into the game in order to advance, or keep up with other players.

That's fine, as long as you're having fun doing it. But when it gets to the point that the rewards are more important than whether you're having fun or not, maybe it's time to do something else for a while.

I casually mentioned once that since I had never done a particular TF, that I would like to take my time with it. I was actually told: "It's not about having fun, it's about getting our merits as fast as we can." I was leading the TF, and was given no choice about the pace of it, even though I stated when I was recruiting for it that I was not interested in speed running it.

I guess what confuses me is that people actually seem to have the mentality of "Who cares if it's fun? We're getting STUFF!"

And I was misunderstood in my last post, by a couple people. When I said "In my opinion, if rewards are the sole reason you play the game, you're doing it wrong" it was interpreted wrong. If rewards are what make it fun for you, okay, I don't rally understand it, but it's your definition of fun, not mine.

But, if you DON'T find it fun, and are doing it JUST for the rewards, then you've missed the point of doing it. Unless getting the next shiny IS the point of the game, in which case I guess my approach of doing what I find fun regardless of the rewards involved makes ME weird.

QR

I'm guessing that it goes something like this: Most "traditional" video games are played offline - and predate the MMO.... and I remember that I and many of my friends would go out and get a game and we'd play it until we beat it, then it'd get put away and gather dust on some shelf and only ever very occasionally get taken out and played in the future, if one was a bit bored and/or felt nostalgic.

An MMO relies on the continuing subscription and although they generally exist in a persistent world most people can play most of the content within a matter of months, especially if they subscribe soon after launch. Then it's only the regular updates and the rewards that give anything to play for.

There's always a goal, even if it's just getting to 50, and whilst on your initial journey there's much exploration to be done, and there are other things but mostly they give rewards too... Badges are a prime example.

I've done almost everything there is to do in the game in the almost-five years I've been playing - but I've been lucky in one sense that I've been able to play a lot, and I REALLY love the game. For me, the fun is being the superhero but the rewards do give you something to aim for.

It's maybe wrong to say it's a reward-driven mentality - it's probably more of a goal-driven mentality. We want to get to 50. We want to IO our toon out properly, the Purple it, then Incarnate is the next stage. Then the goals override the "fun" (I'd actually argue that getting the bits you need to achieve your next goal is a lot of fun) - and there's a lot to do in this game still if you don't mind repeating content.

For me, the FUN is in the goal achievement and moving on to the next thing. There are other little projects that are also goals: Doing a series of specific arcs, Badges, the Trio of Doom thing I've had a lot of fun with and stuff like that.

"You got to dig it to dig it, you dig?"
Thelonious Monk

I play for fun - running aroud in spandex and a cape and punching bad guys

Although getting badges is also fun

Bowling is fun if you have folks to do it with and you are good at it.

Since neither applies to me, I say mehhhh to bowling.

To the OP, what exactly did you think would happen when inventions/loot was introduced?

If the game were nothing more than staying at the same level and just flying around and just beating up the same level mobs over and over again, I think myself and many others would have quit a long time ago.

Incidentally it's also why I love superhero comics. Heroes (and characters in literature and entertainment in general) evolve over time and overcome higher, tougher, and more complex obstacles over time (be it archenemies or insane plots or personal relationships.) If a comic came out that never showed any growth for it's characters (superhero comic or not) I sure as hell WOULD NOT be reading it.

So no, getting rewards IS INDEED fun. FARMING is ALSO indeed fun. Some people like getting the next shiney.

Playing the same story over and over again gets OLD. FAST. (looks at the old decrypt COH content). The ONLY thing that changes is the chance at completely random rewards that make one say "ooooooh how nice". It's the only thing that devs have built that doesn't get used by the players faster than the devs can make it.

You may have played that tf or mission for the 113232324544354th time, but I guarantee you that if a mob or enemy during it drops a shard, purple or other loot, you WILL pause and AT LEAST say "hmmm cool."

There's what you want to do in the game, and there's what you need to do to achieve that.

I hate playing under level 32. I really do. The first 21 levels are a slog with TOs and DOs and few slots in general, and even once you get to SOs and decently-powered IOs you still don't have all your powers. I understand that you need those levels to learn the basics of the character, and Praetoria has certainly made it less painful, but I still don't like it. But I know how badass so many sets can be in the upper levels and I dearly want to play many set combinations at level 50. To get there, I need to slog through the lower levels.

In a similar vein, people who were (and maybe still are) focused on merits have an eventual goal in mind. They have a specific build they want to have fun with, but to get there they have to earn their merits first, and they want to do that as quickly as possible to get it over with.

I will do many things I do not enjoy to have things I do enjoy. Certain actions in video games are one of those things.

If after a hour of farming the game asked me with a dialogue box "Since you obviously intend to do this for quite some time, how about we just give you X reward?", I'd click yes and move on to what I really wanted to do in the first place.

The enjoyment may be in the journey, but some of the sights on that journey suck.

I want the rewards because they help make my character more awesome, and I'm an engineer: http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php...&id=1797#comic

@SpaceNut - My 50s, AE arcs and current projects at ParagonWiki

There is one other thing (I hope I'm not repeating, not enough time to read every post).

I play with friends. I play a number of AT's, though usually not healer types. The game puts your characters into sometimes "dangerous" situations - it's generally easy, but occasionally you'll get an added mob aggro'd, or someone will get ovewhelmed, or split party...
And that's when you have to 'think on your feet' and work a bit harder to stay alive... and to keep your friends 'alive'. It's very gratifying to be able to pull someone's bacon out of the fire, after a tough fight. Or to notice a mob skulking up and drop that Rain of Arrows before they can hit the Lone Emp in the back. Or watch all the mean nasty mobs flopping around on their backs, making your tank able to pop that rarely needed BreakFree/Blue/Green.

So there is that, a reason to want the 'leet stufz' that makes you able to do the slightly 'heroic' stuff that helps keep your friends alive.

For me, that's one of the things that the Expensive Stuff makes more fun. (terrible sentence, but you get the idea.)

Well, getting those little drops are part of the fun.

The real question should be, when did people start thinking they had to have them in 30 seconds or less to enjoy the game?

Do I IO out my characters? Yuppers!

Do I complain about not being able to have those IOs as soon as I hit whatever level I want to slot them? Nope!

I figure the ones complaining that much, are the ones most likely to leave the game when they got it all anyways.