Grinding - why not?

CodexMMO

Everywhere I read, the consensus is that you should not grind in ESO. Are we supposed to only run quests? Why is ESO different from other MMO's when it comes to grinding?

Theosis

They don't want us solo questing types to ever reach max level without pulling out our facial hair and sacrificing goats.

AshySamurai

CodexMMO wrote: »

Everywhere I read, the consensus is that you should not grind in ESO. Are we supposed to only run quests? Why is ESO different from other MMO's when it comes to grinding?

Because it's not fun for a lot of people here and in game. And yes, ZOS said before release that they want main progress only through exploration and questing.

CodexMMO

AshySamurai wrote: »

Because it's not fun for a lot of people here and in game. And yes, ZOS said before release that they want main progress only through exploration and questing.

Ok, cool. So if you want to run around killing mudcrabs all day, you can. But it won't gimp your character, right? It is just boring compared to the quests.

firstdecan

There's a vocal subset of the community that believes the only way to have fun in this game is to read every branch of every dialogue tree. If you don't agree with them, they whine until ZOS capitulates and ruins your fun. Then they wonder why fewer people are playing the game and ZOS can't be profitable with a subscription based model.

Essentially, the reason grinding is unacceptable everywhere you read is because the people who were interested in playing a game instead of reading an animated choose your own adventure novel were driven away by people who think a game should be a mindless click fest of dialogue trees.

Seraphyel

CodexMMO wrote: »

Everywhere I read, the consensus is that you should not grind in ESO. Are we supposed to only run quests? Why is ESO different from other MMO's when it comes to grinding?

ESOs endgame is totally relying on grinding - that's the issue.

The whole game is a big grind and not even a good one tbh.

Shadesofkin

firstdecan wrote: »

There's a vocal subset of the community that believes the only way to have fun in this game is to read every branch of every dialogue tree. If you don't agree with them, they whine until ZOS capitulates and ruins your fun. Then they wonder why fewer people are playing the game and ZOS can't be profitable with a subscription based model.

Essentially, the reason grinding is unacceptable everywhere you read is because the people who were interested in playing a game instead of reading an animated choose your own adventure novel were driven away by people who think a game should be a mindless click fest of dialogue trees.

This might be a tad unfair to many questers. I love questing, I don't care if you can grind.

That being said, I do agree that the grinding spots are nerfed too much, they should be in line with quests not above or under. Whether or not that was caused by those who believe questing should be the only way to truly earn a level, it needs to be changed back.

Bloodfang

firstdecan wrote: »

There's a vocal subset of the community that believes the only way to have fun in this game is to read every branch of every dialogue tree. If you don't agree with them, they whine until ZOS capitulates and ruins your fun. Then they wonder why fewer people are playing the game and ZOS can't be profitable with a subscription based model.

Essentially, the reason grinding is unacceptable everywhere you read is because the people who were interested in playing a game instead of reading an animated choose your own adventure novel were driven away by people who think a game should be a mindless click fest of dialogue trees.

You must be very fun at the parties.

On topic: Dialogues are the very soul of any game, MMOs are especially lacking in that. Luckily ESO did a great job and they feel more like a story. And no I wouldn't call it a "vocal subset of the community", rather a big majority of the community and in general gamers as well. ESO got very criticized at the launch, yet the story and quests were very praised. You could say they've put the bar high for other MMOs in this aspect.

I have to wonder though, why are you not playing Diablo or Path of Exile if all you want is grinding? Heck why are you not playing WoW where you don't even have to grind that much, you can easily hit level 100 in a day?

I'm sorry if you can't appreciate the masterpiece in these quests. However please don't call it a "mindless click fest of dialogue trees", because that is nowhere close to ESO, that is probably the best description for WoW. If you want to grind you still can. It should never be faster than questing anyway, so that's your choice and a problem. Deal with it.

Note: The reason why grinding in ESO doesn't work that well, is because it takes hell of a lot of time compared to other MMOs. The levelling process is so time consuming, and is about to get much longer with the Champion System. While Horizontal Progression can be a grind too, it doesn't make sense for must people to even try it. Simply because you must be really out of your mind to even try it -> Insanity level over 9000.

dharbert

I have no problem at all with those who enjoy questing and play ESO for the lore. However, grinding is superior to questing in every possible way. Less travel, less time taken, predictable XP gain, faster leveling, more gold, and better loot.

If quests gave more gold, or if they gave rewards that aren't utterly useless, maybe more players would quest.

RainfeatherUK

firstdecan wrote: »

Essentially, the reason grinding is unacceptable everywhere you read is because the people who were interested in playing a game instead of reading an animated choose your own adventure novel were driven away by people who think a game should be a mindless click fest of dialogue trees.

Can only agree, since many more traditional mmo gamers that I knew in the beginning left for that very reason and were terribly vocal about it.

Many of us career mmo players actually got used to the grind over the years. Flip on the music, or voice comms and just unwind without having to focus on dialogue cutting in, or shifting location too much. Granted, not everyones thing. Yet there are that group of us out there that find that fun from time to time, a break from other things.

Making space for different player types can only ever be a good thing.

Sotha_Sil

Grinding does not even get you any kind of achievement in this game...

Loot grind :
In PVP you don't get any sets, hopefully skills ? (lol)) and in PVE you get what? new sets that look like nothing but Elder Scrolls...

CP grind :
Now you can grind quest and mobs for more champion points to do... ehhh.. nothing ? (grind those sets that are not worth grinding eeehhh(?)).

To sum it up : grind needs to have a purpose strong enough. And ESO doesn't have it at the moment.

UrQuan

dharbert wrote: »

I have no problem at all with those who enjoy questing and play ESO for the lore. However, grinding is superior to questing in every possible way.

Except for fun. Grinding is the most boring, least fun activity I can think of in any game. Questing, on the other hand, is much more interesting and fun.

To me, anyway. I fully understand that others feel differently than me about that, and that's perfectly fine.

Rather than re-state all of this, I'm going to quote myself from another thread:

UrQuan wrote: »

Personally I have exactly zero interest in grinding, but I've said it before and I'll say it again:

There should be a handful of designated grind spots for the players who prefer to do their progression through grinding rather than questing. There would be no quests in these areas, just groups of mobs. This way people questing wouldn't have to put up with people grinding in the middle of their quests, and people who like to grind would be able to do it. Also, the XP in previously nerfed grind spots (like public dungeons) could be raised back up again (maybe not all the way to full pre-nerf values), because the grinders would still have their designated grind spots where they could earn a little more XP.

I like that doing quests is a very good way of earning XP and progressing in ESO. That fits with the way I want to play the game. That doesn't mean that it should be the only viable way of earning XP and progressing in the game, however. I firmly believe that each of the following categories should be viable ways to earn XP:

1. Questing (this what I mostly enjoy)
2. Grinding (I hate doing this)
3. PVP (I don't really enjoy this either)
4. Dungeons/Trials (I like this too, but not as much as questing)

Make all of those options decent ways to earn XP (they don't all have to be exactly equal - it's OK for an hour spent doing one of them to earn somewhat more XP than an hour spent doing another, but they should be in the same ballpark), and people will be happier. You might even get more people deciding to try out activities that they wouldn't usually do (but I still won't grind).

TL;DR: Questing should be a viable way of earning XP, so should grinding, so should PVP, and so should raiding. Those are not all equally important to me personally, but that doesn't matter.

AshySamurai

Sotha_Sil wrote: »

Grinding does not even get you any kind of achievement in this game...

Loot grind :
In PVP you don't get any sets, hopefully skills ? (lol)) and in PVE you get what? new sets that look like nothing but Elder Scrolls...

CP grind :
Now you can grind quest and mobs for more champion points to do... ehhh.. nothing ? (grind those sets that are not worth grinding eeehhh(?)).

To sum it up : grind needs to have a purpose strong enough. And ESO doesn't have it at the moment.

Monster hunter title (and related to this title achievement and dye). Also collecting all collectibles. We have few reasons to grind.

Psychobunni

firstdecan wrote: »

There's a vocal subset of the community that believes the only way to have fun in this game is to read every branch of every dialogue tree. If you don't agree with them, they whine until ZOS capitulates and ruins your fun. Then they wonder why fewer people are playing the game and ZOS can't be profitable with a subscription based model.

Essentially, the reason grinding is unacceptable everywhere you read is because the people who were interested in playing a game instead of reading an animated choose your own adventure novel were driven away by people who think a game should be a mindless click fest of dialogue trees.

I wish I could give you 100 agrees. I've never seen as much whining as I have in ESO from players as to how other people should be playing the game.

RainfeatherUK

Psychobunni wrote: »

I wish I could give you 100 agrees. I've never seen as much whining as I have in ESO from players as to how other people should be playing the game.

Haha we all know how it works by now. Nobody knows what suits you best - better than someone from half way across the world thats never met/spoken to you before in their life. Good times!

Jeremy

CodexMMO wrote: »

Everywhere I read, the consensus is that you should not grind in ESO. Are we supposed to only run quests? Why is ESO different from other MMO's when it comes to grinding?

ESO isn't like LOTRO Shadows of Angmar where you had to quest to gain experience if that's what you are worried about.

You can easily gain experience on this game by questing or grinding (which I'm guessing means killing enemies?). Hell - you can even open treasure chests for experience. So far on this game I've had a hard time finding ways not to gain experience.
-
But I highly recommend you do this game's quests. This is coming from someone who usually hates questing on MMORPGs also. Because they are interesting, well-acted and written as well as fun to do. They aren't the mindless drudgery in other MMORPGs.

technohic

People grinding ruins other people immersion. Or also known as, while they are immersing themselves, they are mad that you are outpacing their progress.

RainfeatherUK

technohic wrote: »

People grinding ruins other people immersion. Or also known as, while they are immersing themselves, they are mad that you are outpacing their progress.

Lol makes it sound like we need quarantining in non-immersion zones. Stay behind the fenced area's grinders, dont want your infectious mob farming ways reaching the eyes of the innocent unexposed masses! eek.

Nestor

I used to be able to go into a Public Dungeon and find lots of players in there, and it was easy to tag along with someone else or find another solo to group with. Now, with the Nerf to PD Mob Exp, Public Dungeons are pretty empty other than mobs.

UrQuan

Nestor wrote: »

I used to be able to go into a Public Dungeon and find lots of players in there, and it was easy to tag along with someone else or find another solo to group with. Now, with the Nerf to PD Mob Exp, Public Dungeons are pretty empty other than mobs.

Agreed. I can understand where there was a nerf to the mob XP in public dungeons. The grinding going on in them was sometimes enough to actually make it difficult for someone who was questing to complete the dungeon. I remember at one point I was trying to kill bats in Crow's Wood to do the quest where you offer the bat corpses up to the crows, but I couldn't kill any bats because there were a bunch of people grinding and just slaughtering them all before I could get a hit in. The XP nerf for them seems to have gone too far, though, as far as I'm concerned.

AlnilamE

Shadesofkin wrote: »

firstdecan wrote: »

There's a vocal subset of the community that believes the only way to have fun in this game is to read every branch of every dialogue tree. If you don't agree with them, they whine until ZOS capitulates and ruins your fun. Then they wonder why fewer people are playing the game and ZOS can't be profitable with a subscription based model.

Essentially, the reason grinding is unacceptable everywhere you read is because the people who were interested in playing a game instead of reading an animated choose your own adventure novel were driven away by people who think a game should be a mindless click fest of dialogue trees.

This might be a tad unfair to many questers. I love questing, I don't care if you can grind.

That being said, I do agree that the grinding spots are nerfed too much, they should be in line with quests not above or under. Whether or not that was caused by those who believe questing should be the only way to truly earn a level, it needs to be changed back.

Pretty much. The thing about grinding is that it gave far superior XP and therefore faster leveling. So people felt they had to grind to get to max level.

As long as the rate is roughly 1 hour of questing = 1 hour of grinding = 1 hour of PvP, I have no problem with people who want to grind if that's their thing.

As someone said, putting on the music or chatting on TS while running around killing things is pretty relaxing sometimes.

But if people complain that actual questers are "stealing their XP" by actually doing the quests in that area, then I really have no sympathy.

UrQuan

AlnilamE wrote: »

But if people complain that actual questers are "stealing their XP" by actually doing the quests in that area, then I really have no sympathy.

I actually have seen that exact complaint from some grinders. That's part of the reason why I think each zone should have 1-2 designated grind spots with no quests in the area. That way there would be places people can go to grind without stepping on the toes of those who want to quest, and at the same time those who are doing quests won't step on the toes of those who want to grind.

Xendyn

[/quote] I actually have seen that exact complaint from some grinders. That's part of the reason why I think each zone should have 1-2 designated grind spots with no quests in the area. That way there would be places people can go to grind without stepping on the toes of those who want to quest, and at the same time those who are doing quests won't step on the toes of those who want to grind.[/quote]

I like that idea!

I agree that ESO has some great quest writing and voice acting and I enjoyed doing every one of them the first time thru (pre vet nerf).
Second time was ok and I took some different quest options when available to keep it more interesting.
Third time not so much lol. That character did Cadwells only, pub dungeons and delves for the skill points and made up the rest in Craglorn (pre grind nerf...I actually miss the burial grind and Upper Crag, was a great way to meet folks)

I am not really looking forward to leveling my two Vet 1's who are waiting for 1.6 and I wish there were some alternatives to dragging them thru every corner of every Vet zone yet again.

dietlime

Theosis wrote: »

They don't want us solo questing types to ever reach max level without pulling out our facial hair and sacrificing goats.

Apparently they didn't want me to play their game. Or anyone else without hundreds of hours to spend doing solo fetch quests.

jelliedsoup

i don't like grinding as i play the game for fun.

Nestor

I don't like to grind either. But, if I am close to a skill morph, or maxing out a skill, then I will grind for 20 or 30 minutes.

Now, farming a delve for a certain set piece? Yep, can do that for hours. But, I am making money during that time.

Zabernat

AshySamurai wrote: »

Sotha_Sil wrote: »

Grinding does not even get you any kind of achievement in this game...

Loot grind :
In PVP you don't get any sets, hopefully skills ? (lol)) and in PVE you get what? new sets that look like nothing but Elder Scrolls...

CP grind :
Now you can grind quest and mobs for more champion points to do... ehhh.. nothing ? (grind those sets that are not worth grinding eeehhh(?)).

To sum it up : grind needs to have a purpose strong enough. And ESO doesn't have it at the moment.

Monster hunter title (and related to this title achievement and dye). Also collecting all collectibles. We have few reasons to grind.

True but those could be done mostly by completing quests and just fighting mobs "in quest" couldn't they? I have mostly just quested through the game and am over half-way to monster hunter

Zabernat

jelliedsoup wrote: »

i don't like grinding as i play the game for fun.

I'm right with you there, but I think grinders should still be able to earn good xp for similar play times or even a little more

CodexMMO

I wasn't saying I want to grind, I was just wondering why people say, "you don't grind in ESO." It makes sense to me now why people say that if the mob spawn farming areas were eliminated, or reduced.

This game really seems to hide a lot of information from those of use who do like to grind:

1. I don't know how much damage I am doing, how much damage I receive, and from what mob.
2. I don't really know how much EXP am I getting from each mob.
3. I don't understand the amount of decay my equipment takes from use just from fighting (without dying) either.
4. It is somewhat cumbersome to collect the loot while 'grinding' too.

UrQuan

CodexMMO wrote: »

I wasn't saying I want to grind, I was just wondering why people say, "you don't grind in ESO." It makes sense to me now why people say that if the mob spawn farming areas were eliminated, or reduced.

This game really seems to hide a lot of information from those of use who do like to grind:

1. I don't know how much damage I am doing, how much damage I receive, and from what mob.
2. I don't really know how much EXP am I getting from each mob.
3. I don't understand the amount of decay my equipment takes from use just from fighting (without dying) either.
4. It is somewhat cumbersome to collect the loot while 'grinding' too.

There are addons you can get for #1 & #2, and for #4 all you need to do is turn auto-loot on and it becomes simple to collect the loot. For #3 I'm not sure if there's an addon that tracks equipment decay, but generally your equipment decays from combat with anything that's not too low level for you to get XP from it, and in addition it decays by a significant amount (I want to say 20%, but I'm not sure on that) each time you die.

clocksstoppe

Bloodfang wrote: »

Dialogues are the very soul of any game

That's a nice opinion you got there, so keep it for yourself.