I feel it’s finally time to voice my thoughts regarding this aspect of the game, as for every step forward ANet takes, they seem to take 1 or 2 backwards somewhere else.
-Background
First off, some brief background. I’ve been playing since the 3-day head start, picked up this game because it did away with many of the issues I had with other MMO’s I had played in the past. I got hooked, I was a day one player, and so I made the decision to invest myself in the game I had become loyal to and become an Achievement hunter.
A brief look at other topics suggests that many other Achievement hunters (Referred to as AH’s for rest of post) are also growing frustrated, and so I will begin outlining some issues.
-Daily
I will start with a small issue first, and one that affects everyone and not just AH’s, and that is in regards to the new Daily system. I will say the concept is great and sound, but you have done away with choice with very specific requirements for the achievements. What happened to “Play how you want?”, why do I have to go to a very specific zone for PvE events now rather than just a region? Why do I have to play a specific class in PvP? The concept is great, the implementation was a step backwards however…
I do however have to say thank you for lumping the AP reward for completing the daily, and although already daily capped for quite some time now I do know what it was like to grind out all the daily achievements.
-Grindy Achievements
Grinding is not fun, and the recent trend of including some extremely grindy achievements that are in addition only limited for a very limited time is worrying! Let’s take the current example of Wintersday, which includes four of these!
-Bell choir, 3 AP/30 songs for 20 AP total, 210 songs required
-Toypocalypse, 3 AP/30 rounds for 15 AP total, 150 rounds required
-Wonderland, 3 AP/15 completions for 15 AP total, 75 completions required
-Snowball, 3 AP/30 rounds for 15 AP total, 150 rounds required
That is a massive amount of repetition for achievements that are only available for a limited time! It’s the Holiday season, people are busy, spending time with family, friends, people still need to work… it’s a lot of time to dedicate to getting the AP that will be gone forever, and I don’t think it’s worth the time any more.
On top of that I did all of this grinding last year! Why do I have to do it again?
Lunatic Inquisition had the same problem too, same grindy achievement that was reset. I actually couldn’t bring myself to repeat that grind, and that was 50 AP I sacrificed in doing so, AP I will never see!
Temporary time-sink based achievements need to stop, or if you insist on keeping them make it so they roll over year to year without resetting! At least that way people would have the opportunity to pick up on previously available AP.
There are other aspects of the system and recent changes I have discontent with as well, but this post is running long as is and I feel the above two areas are more deserving of the attention for now.
Summary, grindy time limited achievements aren’t fun, straying from ‘Play how you want’ is a mistake.