I love people who equate a boring grind with difficulty. Watching paint dry while you wait to apply the second coat would be a boring grind, but I don't think anyone would claim it is difficult. There is nothing difficult about running the same content over and over and over and over and over until you can do it with your eyes closed. IA is a grind, plain and simple, and not even an entertaining grind. I would rather watch the paint dry.

Vonnegut2506 wrote: »

I love people who equate a boring grind with difficulty. Watching paint dry while you wait to apply the second coat would be a boring grind, but I don't think anyone would claim it is difficult. There is nothing difficult about running the same content over and over and over and over and over until you can do it with your eyes closed. IA is a grind, plain and simple, and not even an entertaining grind. I would rather watch the paint dry.

Some cannot understand that time is a valuable resource. They also probably never played an MMO before WoW came out. MMO = grind is not a true statement. There were MMOs where you don't grind if you didn't want to that had players interact.

I played one where we could expand the world and create our own events using the scripting language that it had. That was way back in 2000. Then WoW and other games like it came out with a heavy pay-to-play model and instituted this grind-fest nonsense, cementing it because developers could then sell us back our time and pretend that wasn't and isn't what they were doing with things like experience potions / scrolls / whatever and limited storage.

That anyone would think a boring grind is a hallmark of an MMO simply shows either their age or experience with MMOs in general. An MMO is an MMO because you play in a world with others, not grind. It's weird that has to be explained so often to modern gamers, but I guess they are used to playing games with the same 1-dimensional loop as this one: only damage matters, grind for more damage, get nerfed, pay for the opportunity with money or a large amount of time to grind for more damage, rinse-repeat.

Though, it's strange. I've been playing this game for a LONG time and I could have sworn that the game loop didn't feel that way before 2020 even in this game. Sure it took over 300 runs to get a staff in Vaults of Madness that became useless less than a year when it was finally obtained, but the thing is you literally did not have to do it.

But maybe that's because before the introduction of mythics and other nonsense in the game, the gap between power wasn't as large as it is now. The game now forces you to grind or you won't compete, thanks to things like mythics, certain sets, and monster sets.

And at the same time these sets, mythics, and other nonsense got included, ZOS changed combat on so many levels that it's ridiculous. All the powercreep nerfs to accomodate things like Oakensoul, Sloads (remember that?), scribing, etc. have made builds exist in hyperbolic states where they are either extremely powerful or they are not. And those builds can only exist with specific sets or the power between them grows from a crack into a gulf depending on how experienced the user is at the build.

This same problem exists in PvP and people think that nerfing things will change it. It won't. What would is for ZOS to overhaul the combat system. At the very least they need to bring power back into the stats they cut and destroyed to accomodate mythics like Oakensoul.

Shifting balance from individual stats to a set-based system was a terrible idea and mistake in the game that begins to necessitate the need for a grind in the first place. And this happened over the time period that mythics were introduced, starting with Greymoor, which many link to the game "not being as fun anymore" and balance being terrible (esp. in PvP) among other controversial decisions that have followed it.

Yet, some think that it's a good thing. Because they want to enjoy their power they obtain with a long grind and pretend it's skill or something valuable. To be able to stand over others in any way is important to them, even to the point they need to resort to low quality bait to attempt to get opponents silenced on the forum.

Much like the guy with the Cadillac and flashing lights on his rim, it's better to simply ignore those kind of people and let them keep believing that it matters. They don't know that no one looks in admiration of them, and everyone's whispers aren't a good thing. The ultimate payoff is that you know they've wasted their time to farm gear that can be nerfed at any time for any reason and you haven't.

We've seen the cycle with mythics especailly. Who even talks about Sload's anymore? Remember that? These class sets will fall the same way too soon enough. We've already saw the Nightblade one that was "working" with Shadow Dancer too well get a massive cut.

Luneca wrote: »

I played one where we could expand the world and create our own events using the scripting language that it had. That was way back in 2000. Then WoW and other games like it came out with a heavy pay-to-play model and instituted this grind-fest nonsense, cementing it because developers could then sell us back our time and pretend that wasn't and isn't what they were doing with things like experience potions / scrolls / whatever and limited storage.

Ultima Online was the first commercial breakout MMORPG, the creator coined the phrase. It was a grind. RPGs generally are, or did you never run against a wall for hours in TES3 to level Athletics, or jump everywhere you went to level Acrobatics?

ESO has taken many steps over the years to reduce the grind. It's nothing like the grind in WoW (the most commercially successful MMORPG in history), even compared to modern WoW it is a lot less.

Effort = Reward

The question then becomes: Is the reward worth the effort?!

Edit: Typos

konrad.reibinger wrote: »

HA build + youtube in Picture in Picture mode saves my sanity, when I farm IA.

But I feel your pain. The same green locations (okay sometimes pink and red) with the same monotonous music for several hours can drive anyone mad.

Wait, there's music there? I never and probably still can't even notice it. I think my mind has fallen to infinite darkness already.

olsborg wrote: »

I dont mind the IA grind too much, its easy and chill enough to run arc 1-4 and just reset and rince repeat for a couple rounds.

Yeah, I did arcs 1 and 2 daily for a month, and got all the set pieces for my class quite easily. It's a bit of a grind, and arc 1 is boring, but it's a bit like your standard daily chores, I dunno, watering the garden or ironing or whatever. Boring but relaxing.

It would feel a lot more worthwhile if we could get an almost guaranteed antiquity lead at the end of arc 1, instead of having to rely on marauders or the side portals (the goblin never drops anything for me).

Where does it state that IA sets will be meta in U50? <asked in a weary tone that really hopes there are alternative as IA is possibly the worst thing ever in this game as it is just a dull dull dull tedious dull grind that recycles stuff from the game for yet another damn currency>



I’d rather play ToT for gear than IA.

Frayton wrote: »

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

The push to make everything purchasable and tradable is killing the game, almost nothing out feels earned. Majority of the motifs available are just rng from dungeons and purchasable from a guild store etc. Aside from trial trifecta stuff, and the ic motifs there is very little you have to get in the game where you look at someone else and say dang he's him, he earned that.

This isnt even a particularly hard thing to do, as you can gain a piece of your class gear just by doing the first full level of IA, rinse and repeat. If anything the game needs more stuff you have to earn, like with the NM monster sets. More not less, we have enough convenience as is, and none of it is necessary to have for any piece of content regardless.

Boring grind is killing the game. It's not that IA is difficult. It's that it is extremely boring to the point where I just logoff, and I'm not the only one who feels this way.

I have never met another player in the game in all my guilds and Discord servers who's excited over IA. It's the exact opposite. Whenever IA is mentioned, there's always complaints and groans.

If there are actually people who enjoy IA, then good for them. I'm willing to trade them stuff I got from the ESO content I enjoy for their time doing what they enjoy. It's a win win situation, and we both continue playing ESO. This is the suggestion I have for ZOS when I ask for tradable IA gear.

This is the problem with these forums. Y'all enjoy this echochamber and assume because of the reception here, or your casual guilds, that it is the wider opinion of the community. I enjoy IA, your opinion is subjective.

This is an MMO, most of the community doesn't visit the forums as forums are outdated. They're useful and I prefer it to reddit, but I grew up using them. Most people have not.

Too many here state their opinion as objective truth. Truth is the content y'all describe as grindy or challenging in the case of NM, and yea sometimes IA also for the dragons or a certain boss otherwise I've seen recently etc, others are clearing very easily and very quickly. Like this comment here:

CatoUnchained wrote: »

BardokRedSnow wrote: »

From what I see in this thread and the forums in general is, people want instant gratification for every last piece of content there is. This is an mmo, antithetical to the type of game you are playing.

Your interpretation is flawed. If we have to spend literally hundreds of hours on a certain segment of content the content should at least be new, not recycled. This isn't like a PvE main expecting to get PvP rewards while never playing PvP.

Ridiculous, absolute hyperbole. I have spent a lot of time in IA for fun, and getting my dk sets, getting the IA buffs for future runs in case more gear was released there etc. I have all the content there aside from the weekly new stuff thrown in of course, and even the sets from other classes just by accident of playing, as well as the motifs. There's no way I've spent even 100 hours in there much less hundreds.

Your mileage may vary and thats the whole point. The idea that IA is boring and too grindy is not universal, many solo players love it, and just like I said for NM which is group content specific, it has a place, especially in an MMO which is designed around the concept of grinding content for gear.

Your opinion is taken into consideration of course but when I see comments thrown around like "My guilds dont talk about X excitedly so it must be bad" and "hundreds of hours of grinding" hyperbole or not and the like I tune it out pretty much immediately, its very disingenuous. Especially for content with gear you DO NOT NEED.

Munkfist wrote: »

What I'm stuck on is the fact that people keep asking for the game to be made easier, rewards to given with little effort or time involved.

Maybe they just want their `focussed effort` more rewarded

There is nothing to change in IA to make less "tedious" right now. Do the daily quests, and then collect fortunes to buy the goodies of Ool (sp?) and then in the meantime collect the class sets (as well as the leads), for a few weeks.

IA is not only meant to collect the class sets.

If you struggle, do the first two arcs daily and that's it. Kill the sole marauder in this run, to collect his precious loot. If you cannot be patient, yes it's better to quit ESO. But don't go to WoW instead, because IA is the norm there.

Also class sets are right now very ugly design, except maybie for the necromancer. So who said these will be meta? The IA templar sets for example give a buff once in a blue moon, and the second set needs that your target(s) stay in a given spot IIRC.

I usually do IA every other day sometimes so I don't get burn out. Still working on warden, arcanist, templar and now dragonknight. Grind don't bother me so much as the silly RNG does though.

Personally I find IA to overall be extremely tedious and boring. The portals to the unknown, boss stages, and marauders are the only parts where I'm not just bored and annoyed (even they aren't really that interesting after the first couple of times), and I almost never see a marauder because I usually leave in boredom before one shows up. I've only made it past arc 2 a couple of times, not because it's difficult (I almost never die even once when I'm in IA, and when I do it's because I got bored and stopped paying attention), but because I'm just too bored and irritated by the tediousness to want to keep playing ESO at all before I even get to the 2nd Tho'at.

It wouldn't be quite as bad if you could save your progress, because then when I get too bored to keep playing ESO I could just leave and the next time I could continue without having to start at the most tedious part (arc 1) again.

Dagoth_Rac wrote: »

Instead of quitting ESO, consider:

1). Running content you do enjoy rather than content you do not enjoy. There is a lot of content in game and none of it requires IA gear to complete. You can easily ignore IA and still do plenty enough DPS to clear anything you want.

or,

2). Running IA as a duo, which is how it was designed. Trying to solo Fungal Grotto I or Wayrest I to fill your sticker book, instead of running with a group, would probably be tedious, too.

Getting groups to run dungeons is easy; can't say the same for trying to get people that want to run IA in my experience.

To be clear, though, yes, I also hate grinding IA. It takes 30 minutes to do 2 arcs but it feels like an eternity. At least I’m missing mostly gear now… though that means 1 arc or 3…

Frayton wrote: »

U50 DPS meta is going to be the IA class sets, so I've been trying to farm them, but good grief it's so mind numbingly boring that I just logout of ESO after a few cycles and play a different game.

ZOS please improve this experience.

- The cycles are too spread apart. Having an option to lump several or all of them together, so that you can get through the monotonous slog faster would be nice.

- Why in Oblivion are all the gear pieces broken up into each individual weight? This game has so much bloat with sets. It would lessen the grind and bloat if each gear slot only required 1 drop. An example would be 1 head piece covers all head weights (heavy, medium, light). The same way motif style pages work.

- Let the class gear be tradable so I can give someone who enjoys that place some gold or other items in exchange for IA gear. If this is impossible, then let us buy the gear with gold or add IA sets to the Golden Vendor to purchase with gold or fortunes to lessen the horrible boring grind.

I man, I couldn't agree more. IA was a bad idea on paper, how did it ever get time and money investment to create it? Oh wait, they didn't create anything. They just took a bunch of content they'd already created and recombined it into a single location on the map.

IA is a complete waste of time and horrible in every way imaginable. How about some actual new content instead.

SerafinaWaterstar wrote: »

Where does it state that IA sets will be meta in U50? <asked in a weary tone that really hopes there are alternative as IA is possibly the worst thing ever in this game as it is just a dull dull dull tedious dull grind that recycles stuff from the game for yet another damn currency>



I’d rather play ToT for gear than IA.

The PTS U50 notes.