It's the journey, not the destination: Really?

I'm sure many of us have heard the topic phrase, "It's the journey, not the destination." It's used most often in opposition to folks who seek levels over playing the content within those levels. The considerable consternation over Issue 20 (and Issue 19) has me wondering:

Do you subscribe to the belief that the game should be about the journey, not the destination?

I agree.

I just love to play. To beat up the bad guys in massive quantities. To kill pixels to relieve stress with colorful powers.

I love that there are things in the game that take a long time to attain. Be that massive IO builds or Incarnate powers or whatever.

I play to play. Some days I play low level new ideas, some days I play my uber built tricked out monsters.

I play to make new ideas come to life in a creative sandbox that has few rivals.

I do not play with nothing more than the goal of getting the very best of everything as quickly as possible.

To use a friends experience one day for an example, he was told on a TF, "We are not here to have fun, we are here to get xp and rewards."

Also, I don't think a game like this has to be perfect. I think there are a number in the current stable of complainers that seem to think anything a coding house produces has to be without flaw, which is simply not possible.

I simply do not understand the outlook necessary to find the faults the game does have to be so horrible as to think they matter enough to whine about as some posters do. I just don't get it. The game is fun ans entertaining.

I play for the hallibut.

I have so many alts and always making new ones and i love them all. When i20 is out i will still be making alts and loving them but also while playing through the incarnate system.

Personally i stopped looking at incarnate trials/endgame threads because its turned into a simple case of . . . .

I dont want to have to be forced to do that content [when really speaking can you think of any of the systems since CoV that DOESNT force you to do something to unlock it?].

It is still about the journey but the only difference between now and then is simple. There is now a goal in the sights. Before, the only real goal was get to 50 and then it was like oh ok now what, now you have the added goal of actually becoming incarnate.

I still have so many ideas for characters in my head that im bound to make quite a few of them, even more so now that the server list merge will happen.

I'd certainly agree it's the journey, when it comes to this game - but of course it does kind of depend on what the destination is. For some of my toons, getting to 50 is enough and some got to 50 and got deleted. For others it's experiencing all the content in the game possible. The "goal" for me is fluid at best. Often I'll simply roll a toon and see how it feels.

But I definitely have never rolled a character just to get to 50 or to purple out or some such nonsense. This game isn't about the rewards for me, it's about the social experience and the fun that comes with it

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

Stop it! I demand more doom threads >:O


'Don't stop believin'
Hold on to that feelin'
Streetlight people'

Hmmm...I think even after getting my favorite character to as far as I can get her, I'm still trying to get her were I want her! So, I don't think I've ever hit the destination to know!

She's been rerolled, gone back to past builds...with me still trying to find that one set that says "Hell yeah, I love this build!" and that's after around 30 runs to 50, 8-10 of them being the same concept put into new ATs/powersets.

I'm sure I'm just waiting for certain powersets to be ported OR certain EPIC ATs to be made.

If this game was about the destination, I'd have quit after getting one (and only one) character to 50.

If the journey was dull, I'd have stopped playing.

I like the journey. When the very first character I ever made (Maiden Canada) was about to hit 50, it was kind of bitterweet. I was looking forward to it, but I kept thinking that her journey was coming to a close. fortunately, there is still always new stuff to do with her, which now includes the Incarnate stuff. My issue is that I like to experience new stuff. While I don't mind repeating things multiple times, I prefer not to do 2 or 3 missions over and over and over to try to advance. I want MC to explore the Incarnate stuff and grow stronger, but prefer not to continually repeat the same content.

I enjoy this game as it's the most enjoyable multiplayer gaming experience I've found in any place. In that way, it's about the gameplay....but that being said, it's most fun when the group is going for a specific goal. It gives a shared purpose, a focus to our goofy horsing around and blowing stuff up.

Having a goal in the game is important, especially for people who've been around here the better part of a decade. I run with a group that's been here since beta, and I've been here since month 1. That's about seven-odd years of the same 'journey'- if there was no new destination to choose to head for, it's reeaaly darned easy to look out the window and realize you've gone nowhere new, and you're still circling the same road.

Let's be honest, the game offers many side roads for the experience (Through different archetypes, powers, builds, etc.) but it's still the same place, so if you never arrive anywhere, the journey gets wearing. Reaching a destination is a "We're here!" moment, before you get back in the car and head somewhere else.

A journey is not a journey without a destination, but going somewhere is not worth it if you hate the drive. As such, the game has to make the ride fun, and give somewhere to go. These aren't mutually exclusive, the game should be, I'd argue has to be, about both. The strength in the game is that it gives many different goals, and many ways to reach them. Getting to 50? Unlocking a badge? Finding a recipe? beating a mission? Unlocking a new power? Gaining a new incarnate power up? It has lots of carrots to chase. It sets out these goals in ways that are almost all fun to get to. Want that badge? Go help your buddies blow up stuff! Want that shard? Play a fun task force! Want that recipe? Do some fun tip missions! You will find many people on these chases, and having fun as they go along. Some are more focused on the goal, others the ride- but if there's no point or the chase becomes a slog, it all falls apart.

In short, the game should be a fun journey to many destinations.

Another one here who digs the journey, but I also believe in my friend's saying, "By about level 46 or 47, yes, it IS about the destination."

Later on,
Gate

I am mixed. I have tried the journey. Liked it, but trying to level up something red side the journey bites.

The journey is fun, but sometimes it is hindering, especially when the cool stuff now is happening end game.

Again I am mixed. I like doing arcs and stuff, but sometimes I just wish I could get som,ewhere quicker.

I think that is how new player will feel coming into the incarnate age. Not all of them, but it has definately been toted as a new shiny feature, that some might get frustrated trying to get there. It sometimes feels like a rush.

I am trying to give both sides.

Some toons = Journey
Some toons = Grind

For me it is the destination ... and the origination.

Specifically, I either make characters because of a cool story concept, or because I want to see how a certain powerset combo plays when done. So I care about level 1 and level 50. I don't care much about the in-between or how I get there. I also don't really care about shards or any of that. In fact I dont even know how to do that stuff, I'm kinda ignoring the new system entirely.

But I cant really enjoy my character until they are level 50, or at least its hard. Once I have all my powers and slots, I can then relax and enjoy the character. If I want to see how a certain powerset does on certain epic / famous / old-school missions, I'd rather push to 50 asap, slot with generic IOs or SOs, and then use Ouroboros to re-visit it. Even story concept characters, I don't really enjoy until they are done, or I feel "nervous" or "unsatisfied" until they are level 50.

THEN I actually pull them out of the "done" barn and play them through missions.

YMMV.

I don't play my 50s. I'm ignoring the whole Incarnate thing because a) the story behind it sounds dumb, b) I don't feel a need to dust off my 50s just to power them up further, and c) I almost never do TFs and trials, and that's all there is for Incarnates.

So, yeah, journey. I'll just keep hopping around my alts and working them up and maybe hoping that sometime, in the distant future, we'll get new story arcs from the devs...

(Power-wise, I generally feel like most characters are "done" sometime in the 30s, and everything after that is just extra.)

agreed, i am in no hurry. like you i also have less free time than in the past(one reason i have been unable to play on any of the public beta events), so i wont be seeing the upper levels of any of the new stuff any time soon. I'm glad it will be there as it is a new thing to look forward to, but i wont be straining to go at it.

Take the Magic: The Gathering 'What Color Are You?' Quiz.

I'm going to refer to the Bartle types -- the four types of MMO players, first described by sociologist Richard Bartle.

For Achievers, it's all about the destination.

For Killers, it's all about the power, which implies the destination.

For Socializers it's the journey. If they get to the destination too quickly, there's nothing to talk about.

For Explorers, it varies. If they're exploring the game content, they enjoy the journey of going through and mastering the new challenges. But once they've mastered them, further play over the same content becomes a grind. If the explorers are exploring the game mechanic space (i.e: Character Builds) they may be more focused on the destination, because their new character creation will only be complete when they have the powers it grants.

As an explorer/achiever myself, I'm a bit worried about i20. I've already given up on ever getting a 'very rare' alpha slot, because it's too grindy for me. If the new slots in i20 are that difficult to get (and it sounds as though they may be) then I may not participate much in the new incarnate system. Which would probably lead to me no longer participating in CoX, as incarnates are the new focus of the game.

We'll see.