PvE leaderboards = trials grind
PvP leaderboards = ap grind in cyrodiil
Achievements = grind
Gear farm = one of the worst grind in this game
Mat farm = grind

If you remove grind away there is nothing left in this game

IrishGirlGamer wrote: »

UrQuan wrote: »

dday3six wrote: »

Many shooters have added a grind of some sort, even if just for titles, emblems, and side upgrades. Having a goal which is ultimately what a grind functions as, has been proven to be psychologically motivating.

The bold part is definitely true. Personally I don't find the goals artificially set by most grinds to be ones that I'm interested in or that motivate me, but I understand their purpose and how they have that effect for others. And for that matter, some grinds actually do motivate me, it's just uncommon. Most of my goals in video games are silly ones that I set for myself rather than ones set by a grind in the game.

I will admit I'm a closet sandbox game fan. When I get tired of pathed-RPGs (and I call ESO a pathed-RPG), I enjoy playing pure sandbox strategy games when you pick your objectives and work towards them. I find a well-made sandbox game fascinating, where I can pick my own goals and drive the game the direction I want.

That said, I can tolerate grinding IF there is some semblance of a goal. Otherwise, it bores me quickly. I do have friends, though, who swear it helps them relax.

Heh, one of my all-time favorite goals that I set for myself in a sandbox game is the goal that I always set for myself when I start a new game of Sid Meier's Pirates! My primary objective is always to turn every single city on the map English. This often requires successfully plundering each city multiple times, and usually requires multiple battles on the high seas as the other nations send heavily armed pirate hunters after me. Frequently I'll even have to install an English governor in the same city several times over, as invasion forces from other countries will capture the city while I'm elsewhere working on capturing a different city.

I enjoy PvPing when there are small scale fights to be had AND there is no lag... sadly, the only way to get that is usually on Haderus but that campaign has been dead dead since 1T was released.... even I have spent little time there and why is that? Because I am grinding PvE to get gear FOR PvP... makes sense...

It's Not A Grind, It's An Iterative Gameplay Experience™

People fail to realize that everything in every video game is a 'grind' to someone. One person may love picking nodes another may find that to be a grind, others may love questing but some may see questing as a grind and still some may see combat as a grind while others may find combat those most fun aspect of the game.

So yeah, its all button pushing and mouse clicking, all that matters is what's fun too you!

Majic wrote: »

Take away the grind, and what's left?

Good summary of the situation for most players, alas.

Grinding kills it for me. I tend to cycle out and back when there is actual new content.

It's hard to believe that 31 years now since this form of entertainment was introduced we still have grind mechanics

UrQuan wrote: »

IrishGirlGamer wrote: »

UrQuan wrote: »

dday3six wrote: »

Many shooters have added a grind of some sort, even if just for titles, emblems, and side upgrades. Having a goal which is ultimately what a grind functions as, has been proven to be psychologically motivating.

The bold part is definitely true. Personally I don't find the goals artificially set by most grinds to be ones that I'm interested in or that motivate me, but I understand their purpose and how they have that effect for others. And for that matter, some grinds actually do motivate me, it's just uncommon. Most of my goals in video games are silly ones that I set for myself rather than ones set by a grind in the game.

I will admit I'm a closet sandbox game fan. When I get tired of pathed-RPGs (and I call ESO a pathed-RPG), I enjoy playing pure sandbox strategy games when you pick your objectives and work towards them. I find a well-made sandbox game fascinating, where I can pick my own goals and drive the game the direction I want.

That said, I can tolerate grinding IF there is some semblance of a goal. Otherwise, it bores me quickly. I do have friends, though, who swear it helps them relax.

Heh, one of my all-time favorite goals that I set for myself in a sandbox game is the goal that I always set for myself when I start a new game of Sid Meier's Pirates! My primary objective is always to turn every single city on the map English. This often requires successfully plundering each city multiple times, and usually requires multiple battles on the high seas as the other nations send heavily armed pirate hunters after me. Frequently I'll even have to install an English governor in the same city several times over, as invasion forces from other countries will capture the city while I'm elsewhere working on capturing a different city.

I have to admit I've only played Pirates! once. I remember I got it late, played for a bit, then Fallout New Vegas dropped and I moved on. I need to download it from my Steam account and do another run through.

Crusader Kings II is probably my all-time sandbox favorite. Oh, things you can do in that game. I just never get tired of killing my relatives. Unlike Seyne, I apparently do not treat my family well.

Grinding is where you repeatedly do the same thing over, and over, and over, and over again, in order to be able to get to the fun part of the game. If you want to be able to engage in combat with other players, you will have to spend a month running through quests and cheesing dungeons for experience and skill points, just to be able to not get completely slaughtered in a couple seconds.

It's just bad game design that is straight out of the 80s; repeat the same dull tedium in order to add some numbers to your damage and defense formula, so that you can progress in the story. That was acceptable back in the days when technology was too slow for real-time combat (I.E, turn-based RPGs), but those days are long gone, and ESO isn't exactly a Final Fantasy game.

As a prime example of how grind completely kills a game, take a look at Age Of Wulin/Wushu. It will take you at least a year just to stand a chance at not getting killed instantly in PvP, due to the extreme gear and level grind; doesn't matter how great you are at using a keyboard and mouse, if your damage formula hasn't been steadily increased over a few thousand kilowatt hours, you suck.

One of the posited problems is that there is no readily apparent sign of progression, should you remove the archaic leveling mechanic. That's just an issue of not looking at the rest of the game, and only focusing on the empty space where your level number used to be.

As you progress, you unlock different skills for different situations. You unlock different craftable appearances. You unlock minor stat gains, such as having 10-15% stat differences between your normie gear, and the gear you earned from slaying Oblivion daedra. You unlock different food recipes. You unlock different animations. You unlock different houses. You unlock different emotes. You unlock different horses. Etc. Etc.

There is plenty of progression to be had, and when you remove the tedious and antiquated game mechanic that is character levels, many more players are able to interact in many more parts of the game, as we've seen in PvE with One Tamriel. It just needs to be taken further, or perhaps an off-shoot added for PvP, so PvE still has the equipment grind, but PvP is a completely level playing field.

Majic wrote: »

Ch4mpTW wrote: »

Majic wrote: »

Take away the grind, and what's left?

PvP, trials, dungeons, questing, farming crafting materials, fishing, role-playing, crafting, and exploration.

Those are all forms of grinding.

I think it depends. I consider "grind" as "something I *need* to do in order to do something else I want to do".

So if you are running pledges because you want a monster set that you can wear in PvP, that's a grind.

If you are running pledges because you enjoy the group dungeons and like grouping with new players, then it's not a grind.

That's the way I look at it.

Tandor wrote: »

X3ina wrote: »

PvE leaderboards = trials grind
PvP leaderboards = ap grind in cyrodiil
Achievements = grind
Gear farm = one of the worst grind in this game
Mat farm = grind

If you remove grind away there is nothing left in this game

But why is all that a grind? How else do people expect to get top of the leaderboards, to have all the achievements, gear and mats, if not by playing the game? Crown Store? Press a button on the character creation screen? Buy a Crown crate?

The only one in that list that is an actual grind, is the gear farm. That's caused by having an RNG akin to Xenoverse; a % chance to drop a piece of gear, with a % chance of that being one you don't have. It's also made worse by there being simply broken equipment, like the proc sets; auto-cast attacks that deal extreme amounts of damage that cannot be done normally.

The solution is to make the dropped gear sets progressive; if the legs and helm dropped, you won't get those again until you have cycled through the rest of the gear slots.

Achievements aren't a grind by nature, they only become one as players decide to go out of their way to get achievements, rather than getting achievements as they play the game.

Leaderboard grind? Same gig as Achievements. If you like doing PvE, you'll be doing it often and thusly rank highly on the leaderboards. Same gig with PvP.

Material grind? You're doing something wrong. Mine and deconstruct unwanted gear rewards as you play through the game, and you'll have more than enough materials to craft sets for your character, at all the level tiers ya find yourself at.

Drdeath20 wrote: »

The combat alone has little replay value.

It's not that the combat is inherently boring, it's the fact that you can get hit for four or five attacks in a single weapon swing, that makes the combat exceedingly lame. That, and bosses that use the exact same attack pattern; 3x light attacks, aoe, heavy attack, repeat until 0 health.

Because i love eso pvp despite all it's flaws.