Guild Wars 2

Devata.6589:

Vayne.8563:

Devata.6589:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Bernie.8674:

How are you getting 5g in two hours? I might get that on guild mission nights, by doing dungeons, or by engaging in concerted farming, but I’ve never gotten anywhere near that by playing casually the way you claim. I must be playing wrong. I’m stagnant somewhere between 20 and 25 gold right now.

World Boss Grand Tour. Log on, find which boss is up next, and do the circuit for an hour. Sell the Ecto from salvaging the rares, sell Silk if I really want to make the money, and sell all the blues and greens.

Drop into Silverwastes if it’s before 1am PST and generally will find an active map. Do events, and sell proceeds much like with the Grand Tour. This one moves faster and can be more lucrative.

Harvest any trees I see there, and then take a moment to go to Pagga’s Waypoint and find the motherlode of Cypress to the west – sell Foxfire Clusters.

I think the lowest I hit was 3.8 g on a night where I forged rares instead of salvaging and selling Ecto.

You gave a pretty accurate view of how many people play this game… Actively grinding gold. You just proved the reason for the existence of this thread.

It’s only a little strange that you do post in in an attempt to show how there is no need to grind, or you would not consider it grind.

Except we don’t know how most people play this game, that’s an assumption and not necessarily one that I would agree with.

I think most people are so casual, they wouldn’t know how to go about grinding gold if they wanted to. I think most people log in, do a few things, maybe a few dailies, maybe hang out with their guild…they kill some stuff, they log off.

I don’t think most people are farmers.

I said many, not most. I think many because while the game had very different type of players at the beginning many (we know that as a fact) did leave. So why? Well maybe because they didn’t like to grind for everything they wanted to earn in the game? So some of those who left will be indeed the ones that login do a few things while taking with the guild and log out again (the casuals you talk about, while the reason they are still here imho is the social interaction), the WvW people and then of course those who are fine with, or even like, the grind. That is a big group because we all can see them (EotM, champ trains, SL) so yeah.. many.

“I think most people are so casual, they wouldn’t know how to go about grinding gold if they wanted to.” It’s not like you need skill or can’t be a ‘casual’ to grind.. Ask and people will tell you to run with the zerg in location x, y or z. At that moment it’s just brainlessly running along and spamming some buttons. No problem for a ‘casual’ to do so, the question is however if he will like it and stay doing it.

I think it’s very interesting to think about this. Seriously.

So people who didn’t want to farm gold (which I don’t consider grinding myself by the way I consider it farming), left the game because it’s too hard to make gold or they have to farm more than they want to.

The question, of course, becomes, how many of those people exist, compared to people who stay who like to farm? How many people, like me, don’t care about farming but stay anyway?

See it really is a numbers game, but we don’t really have the numbers, and that’s where all these theories get stalled.

I’m not convinced that the numbers of people who leave this game due to too much “grind” is greater than the numbers of people who would have left if they had nothing to “grind” for.

And that really is what the debate is about.

Killthehealersffs.8940:

Devata.6589:

Obtena.7952:

Devata.6589:

What is your problem Obtena?

It’s pretty simple; people can’t accuse Anet for making a grindy game based on whatever definition suits that purpose. That’s just self-serving justification and to expect Anet to even consider changing something in the game based on a subset of players personal pre-dispositions is nonsense; the game can’t be everything to everyone. Anet did not design the game around some random players arbitrary definition of what grindy means. People can’t seem to frame their ‘discussion’ around Anet’s clarification. I help with that.

People find the game grindy, many people do. So they tell it on the forum and even explain what they consider grind. What else can they do?

And in all honestly I also think you are downplaying the hole thing when you say “Anet did not design the game around some random players arbitrary definition of what grindy means.”. Many people find the game grindy, names as ‘grind wars’ don’t come out of nowhere. We all also know many people grind or do you want to act as if champ-trains never existed, or those grinding in EotM? We all know there is a lot of grinding going on and all that grind might not be the grind Anet tries to prevent with there ‘no-grind philosophy’ but ‘some random players arbitrary definition of what grindy means.’ it’s just downplaying of what is really going on. Like if this is some totally unknown definition of grind a few people talk about. That is just nonsense.

Are you freaking serious ?
Champ Trains and Eotm Trains where/are the MOST REWARDING things !!
That why ppl did them
It was like a super farming spots , if you calculate the time spent vs the rewards …..
Who dont want to maximize their rewards for less time ? like some ppl that want everything by playing less ?

Edit: I will leave you alone to run the thread as you wish . As a 10 years healer i have build up some endurance vs all kind of ’’Dps’ers’’ and how to copy-cat their personality to use it against them , and every person is precious with their immagination they can offer in the future (just like 1 random person that created the DOTA maps that we have today) .

But your decision about ‘’ the x-pack will sold less copies’’ it might true , just because most ppl wanted to try a game without healers and try something new or various others reasons (they are called badwagon that try various MMos) .
But i have an Intuition that you will use the less box sales to justifie your personality and try to ‘’controlll the old gg’’ i the future .
But i will be here again to have discusion about that :P

“Champ Trains and Eotm Trains where/are the MOST REWARDING things !!” Yeah that is why people are grinding it.. Thats the subject here remember.

“if you calculate the time spent vs the rewards …..
Who dont want to maximize their rewards for less time ?” They do not want to grind.. again the subject.

Somehow I think you kinda mist the point people are talking about here.

The box sales is a nice comparison against GW1 expansion sales that did on average manage to generate 100% of the income of the original game sales. (all those excuses you come up with here could apply to GW1 as well)

What I said was that if GW2 would have an expansion every year and every expansion would have done the same they would have earned more money then they did now, however I also said I do not expect the HoT expansion to sell so much because damage has been done. So based on the HoT expansion sales they might not have earned more. That’s all I am saying.

Vayne.8563:

Devata.6589:

Vayne.8563:

Devata.6589:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Bernie.8674:

How are you getting 5g in two hours? I might get that on guild mission nights, by doing dungeons, or by engaging in concerted farming, but I’ve never gotten anywhere near that by playing casually the way you claim. I must be playing wrong. I’m stagnant somewhere between 20 and 25 gold right now.

World Boss Grand Tour. Log on, find which boss is up next, and do the circuit for an hour. Sell the Ecto from salvaging the rares, sell Silk if I really want to make the money, and sell all the blues and greens.

Drop into Silverwastes if it’s before 1am PST and generally will find an active map. Do events, and sell proceeds much like with the Grand Tour. This one moves faster and can be more lucrative.

Harvest any trees I see there, and then take a moment to go to Pagga’s Waypoint and find the motherlode of Cypress to the west – sell Foxfire Clusters.

I think the lowest I hit was 3.8 g on a night where I forged rares instead of salvaging and selling Ecto.

You gave a pretty accurate view of how many people play this game… Actively grinding gold. You just proved the reason for the existence of this thread.

It’s only a little strange that you do post in in an attempt to show how there is no need to grind, or you would not consider it grind.

Except we don’t know how most people play this game, that’s an assumption and not necessarily one that I would agree with.

I think most people are so casual, they wouldn’t know how to go about grinding gold if they wanted to. I think most people log in, do a few things, maybe a few dailies, maybe hang out with their guild…they kill some stuff, they log off.

I don’t think most people are farmers.

I said many, not most. I think many because while the game had very different type of players at the beginning many (we know that as a fact) did leave. So why? Well maybe because they didn’t like to grind for everything they wanted to earn in the game? So some of those who left will be indeed the ones that login do a few things while taking with the guild and log out again (the casuals you talk about, while the reason they are still here imho is the social interaction), the WvW people and then of course those who are fine with, or even like, the grind. That is a big group because we all can see them (EotM, champ trains, SL) so yeah.. many.

“I think most people are so casual, they wouldn’t know how to go about grinding gold if they wanted to.” It’s not like you need skill or can’t be a ‘casual’ to grind.. Ask and people will tell you to run with the zerg in location x, y or z. At that moment it’s just brainlessly running along and spamming some buttons. No problem for a ‘casual’ to do so, the question is however if he will like it and stay doing it.

I think it’s very interesting to think about this. Seriously.

So people who didn’t want to farm gold (which I don’t consider grinding myself by the way I consider it farming), left the game because it’s too hard to make gold or they have to farm more than they want to.

The question, of course, becomes, how many of those people exist, compared to people who stay who like to farm? How many people, like me, don’t care about farming but stay anyway?

See it really is a numbers game, but we don’t really have the numbers, and that’s where all these theories get stalled.

I’m not convinced that the numbers of people who leave this game due to too much “grind” is greater than the numbers of people who would have left if they had nothing to “grind” for.

And that really is what the debate is about.

Again, if you allow for a direct approach to get an item then that does not mean the grind option is gone as long as the items is not account-bound. So it did not have to be an ‘or’, it could have been an ‘and’.

Nobody here is asking to remove the ability to grind, people are asking to make it not the only viable option for most things in GW2. That’s a huge difference.

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

With no grind, they mean no mandatory grind.

Exactly! No games have grind, you can just choose to not play them. Not mandatory at all.

Devata.6589:

Obtena.7952:

Devata.6589:

What is your problem Obtena?

It’s pretty simple; people can’t accuse Anet for making a grindy game based on whatever definition suits that purpose. That’s just self-serving justification and to expect Anet to even consider changing something in the game based on a subset of players personal pre-dispositions is nonsense; the game can’t be everything to everyone. Anet did not design the game around some random players arbitrary definition of what grindy means. People can’t seem to frame their ‘discussion’ around Anet’s clarification. I help with that.

People find the game grindy, many people do. So they tell it on the forum and even explain what they consider grind. What else can they do?

And in all honestly I also think you are downplaying the hole thing when you say “Anet did not design the game around some random players arbitrary definition of what grindy means.”. Many people find the game grindy, names as ‘grind wars’ don’t come out of nowhere. We all also know many people grind or do you want to act as if champ-trains never existed, or those grinding in EotM? We all know there is a lot of grinding going on and all that grind might not be the grind Anet tries to prevent with there ‘no-grind philosophy’ but ‘some random players arbitrary definition of what grindy means.’ it’s just downplaying of what is really going on. Like if this is some totally unknown definition of grind a few people talk about. That is just nonsense.

The only nonsense is again … you coming up with your own, not relevant to how Anet designs the game, definition of grind.

Devata.6589:

“Champ Trains and Eotm Trains where/are the MOST REWARDING things !!” Yeah that is why people are grinding it.. Thats the subject here remember.

“if you calculate the time spent vs the rewards …..
Who dont want to maximize their rewards for less time ?” They do not want to grind.. again the subject.

Somehow I think you kinda mist the point people are talking about here.

The box sales is a nice comparison against GW1 expansion sales that did on average manage to generate 100% of the income of the original game sales. (all those excuses you come up with here could apply to GW1 as well)

What I said was that if GW2 would have an expansion every year and every expansion would have done the same they would have earned more money then they did now, however I also said I do not expect the HoT expansion to sell so much because damage has been done. So based on the HoT expansion sales they might not have earned more. That’s all I am saying.

OFC ppl want to MAXIMIZE THEIR REWARDS with MINIMUN TIME , like yourself that are are proclaimed as a Collector but you dont have to grind all these collections , becuase you dont have a lot of time to waste .
But wait a sec , you didnt say that they should bring more things ingame vs the cash shop ? But you still didnt say say that you have less time to grind/waste in the game ?

What kind of person are you ?
Casual ?
Collector ?

AND THOSE PPL that choosed to follow the Trains , they did it on their decision to to maximize their rewards .
Because like yourself they think of it like a ‘’frendly Farming’’ with a minimun time to play the game = like yourself that said TAHT YOU DONT HAVE A LOT OF TiME OR DONT WANT WASTE A LOT OF TIME INTO PLAY THE GAME .

And again you dont know the cost of the Living Story and if combine it with the money needed to create the next expanion . And if the x-pack alone can cover it all that . That i am too saying

Devata.6589:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Bernie.8674:

How are you getting 5g in two hours? I might get that on guild mission nights, by doing dungeons, or by engaging in concerted farming, but I’ve never gotten anywhere near that by playing casually the way you claim. I must be playing wrong. I’m stagnant somewhere between 20 and 25 gold right now.

World Boss Grand Tour. Log on, find which boss is up next, and do the circuit for an hour. Sell the Ecto from salvaging the rares, sell Silk if I really want to make the money, and sell all the blues and greens.

Drop into Silverwastes if it’s before 1am PST and generally will find an active map. Do events, and sell proceeds much like with the Grand Tour. This one moves faster and can be more lucrative.

Harvest any trees I see there, and then take a moment to go to Pagga’s Waypoint and find the motherlode of Cypress to the west – sell Foxfire Clusters.

I think the lowest I hit was 3.8 g on a night where I forged rares instead of salvaging and selling Ecto.

You gave a pretty accurate view of how many people play this game… Actively grinding gold. You just proved the reason for the existence of this thread.

It’s only a little strange that you do post in in an attempt to show how there is no need to grind, or you would not consider it grind.

Yeah but I don’t do that every night. I don’t want to keep repeating myself here. I have plenty of other options of stuff to do. Heck, two nights ago I never even logged in. Four nights ago I spent the whole time in WvW just messing around.

And it’s not about the darn gold. It’s about things to do. I happen to make gold doing it, which was what my point was about people claiming you had to sacrifice doing what you want to make gold. You don’t have to, and you don’t have to do dungeons or get super lucky instead of being super poor.

‘two nights ago I never even logged in.’

Tobias, for you to speak like that might be a shocking twist in your routine says a lot.

There are often several days in a row I don’t log in. And when I do, I don’t go for a two hour farm fest ever.

Can you please try to sympathize with how mountainous a task ascended gear is for somebody who plays GW2 in the cracks between other rl things and other hobbies, and who doesn’t enjoy ‘farming’ at all?

Lheimroo.2947:

‘two nights ago I never even logged in.’

Tobias, for you to speak like that might be a shocking twist in your routine says a lot.

You’re not getting me. Everyone seems to assume I play every day, and commented on the routine like it was something I never varied from. That goes to show telepathy is BS, or you all need remedial courses in it.

I play often, of course. This is really the only game holding my interest currently. Of course, three months ago I was instead playing Etrian Odyssey Untold like it was the only game in the world. During Wintersday I barely was here because I was spending most of my free time on another project.

I posted how many hours I have. Just under two thousand hours since the pre-release early weekend. Realize that includes pretty hefty play time in the first three months and several months of basically “log in, spend an hour getting Daily, log out”. There are people who have played considerably more than me who also have said they don’t feel they’re forced to grind.

Which is my point – I do my routine because I find it entertaining. Not because I have to, not because I need gold or loot or anything. If it’s not entertaining I go do something else. Gasp, quelle horreur!

There are often several days in a row I don’t log in. And when I do, I don’t go for a two hour farm fest ever.

Hey, what do you know, neither do I. According to you it’s grind not farm. Fancy that.

Can you please try to sympathize with how mountainous a task ascended gear is for somebody who plays GW2 in the cracks between other rl things and other hobbies, and who doesn’t enjoy ‘farming’ at all?

Sure I can. And just there you have proven you aren’t paying attention to anything I said before I posted my “routine” for how to make 2-10g in a night without resorting to dungeons or TP play.

I have a full time job, where I have literally been pulling overtime for two weeks. I have three other hobbies which I attend to, one of which is laughably worse than GW2 in terms of RNG. I have family work which requires my attention most of my days off so I don’t have infinite time to spend online. I’m trying to madly get my D&D group back together so we can finish a campaign three years and counting (on hiatus for eight months due to RL really hammering us all in turn).

I do not have full Ascended gear, nor am I particularly chasing it with pressing need. But I’ve agreed, not less than four times, it’s got a hefty set of requirements. I’ve also pointed out, ever since its inception, it’s not particularly necessary save for Fractal running. It’s the Obsidian Armor grind of GW2 – only like much comparison between the two games, it’s bigger and more imposing on the appearance side of things.

God this thread is just going in circles, brick walls talking to brick walls, no one looking outside to see if the game was catered to them, it could make it bad for others, etc etc. It can all be summed up so easily.

Player 1: this is my definition of Grind, this game fits it, this game is grindy.
Player 2: this is my definition of grind, yours is wrong, mine says the game isn’t.
Player 1: no mine!
Player 2: Mine!
Player 1 and 2: MIIIIINNNNNNNEEEE!
Anet: Hey guys! This is our definition!
Player 1: your definition is wrong! Mine is right! I can prove it cause many people said so!
Player 2: no, they matched my definition, so I’m right. You can’t prove many people!
Player 1: yes I can!
Player 2: how?
Player 1: because people say it in message boards and map chat and guild chat! That’s many!
Player 2: out of how many total players?
Player 1: that doesn’t matter! Its many!
Player 3: hey guys, you’re both wrong! My definition is this, so the game is grindy!
Player 1: see!? He agrees with me though his definition is wrong. Mine is correct!
Player 2: you’re both wrong, and I’m right.
Player 1: no mine!
Player 2: mine!
Player 3: mine!
Player 2: now let’s right long winded posts about our definitions, compare the game to other games with other different or same versions of grind to prove our points, not budge on any issue, attack each other for how the other plays, and continue on with the majority of the thread dominated by the same few people going around in circles.

Heck, this all reminds me when bill Clinton was on trial.

Serophous.9085:

God this thread is just going in circles, brick walls talking to brick walls, no one looking outside to see if the game was catered to them, it could make it bad for others, etc etc. It can all be summed up so easily.

Player 1: this is my definition of Grind, this game fits it, this game is grindy.
Player 2: this is my definition of grind, yours is wrong, mine says the game isn’t.
Player 1: no mine!
Player 2: Mine!
Player 1 and 2: MIIIIINNNNNNNEEEE!
Anet: Hey guys! This is our definition!
Player 1: your definition is wrong! Mine is right! I can prove it cause many people said so!
Player 2: no, they matched my definition, so I’m right. You can’t prove many people!
Player 1: yes I can!
Player 2: how?
Player 1: because people say it in message boards and map chat and guild chat! That’s many!
Player 2: out of how many total players?
Player 1: that doesn’t matter! Its many!
Player 3: hey guys, you’re both wrong! My definition is this, so the game is grindy!
Player 1: see!? He agrees with me though his definition is wrong. Mine is correct!
Player 2: you’re both wrong, and I’m right.
Player 1: no mine!
Player 2: mine!
Player 3: mine!
Player 2: now let’s right long winded posts about our definitions, compare the game to other games with other different or same versions of grind to prove our points, not budge on any issue, attack each other for how the other plays, and continue on with the majority of the thread dominated by the same few people going around in circles.

Pretty much. I got better things to grind than forum PvP.

I leave this in your capable hands, people. And I swear, if one of you causes a revamp as bad as Traits, I will find a way to channel Liam Neeson . . .

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

I leave this in your capable hands, people. And I swear, if one of you causes a revamp as bad as Traits, I will find a way to channel Liam Neeson . . .

Obtena.7952:

Devata.6589:

Obtena.7952:

Devata.6589:

What is your problem Obtena?

It’s pretty simple; people can’t accuse Anet for making a grindy game based on whatever definition suits that purpose. That’s just self-serving justification and to expect Anet to even consider changing something in the game based on a subset of players personal pre-dispositions is nonsense; the game can’t be everything to everyone. Anet did not design the game around some random players arbitrary definition of what grindy means. People can’t seem to frame their ‘discussion’ around Anet’s clarification. I help with that.

People find the game grindy, many people do. So they tell it on the forum and even explain what they consider grind. What else can they do?

And in all honestly I also think you are downplaying the hole thing when you say “Anet did not design the game around some random players arbitrary definition of what grindy means.”. Many people find the game grindy, names as ‘grind wars’ don’t come out of nowhere. We all also know many people grind or do you want to act as if champ-trains never existed, or those grinding in EotM? We all know there is a lot of grinding going on and all that grind might not be the grind Anet tries to prevent with there ‘no-grind philosophy’ but ‘some random players arbitrary definition of what grindy means.’ it’s just downplaying of what is really going on. Like if this is some totally unknown definition of grind a few people talk about. That is just nonsense.

The only nonsense is again … you coming up with your own, not relevant to how Anet designs the game, definition of grind.

First of all, it’s not Anet’s definition of grind you seem to be talking about here. You are talking about Anet’s no grind philosophy. Thats something completely different. Read Colins post again.
“There are certainly optional activities in the game players can embark on that I think we’d openly accept fall into the category of our definition of more “grindy”. Earning certain unique skins, and in particular some titles absolutely qualify as things we’d put on this list. Legendary weapons have components to them that fall into this category.”

So that general meaning of the word grind you seem to discard as if it’s just the definition of a few people is at least also the definition of Colin. It just does not fit into there no grind philosophy.

Secondly.. The only think that would be irrelevant would be Anet’s definition as this is about how players feel about it. The fact they find it grindy. That is what people are talking about here. For that it does not matter how Anet would define it for them-selfs. People find it grindy so they give them feedback including what they find grindy. Clear and simple. Anet’s definition completely irrelevant.

If we would follow your logic you could close the hole forum because people might dislike something but heey Anet designed it as they wanted and consider it fun so if you do not consider that fun you should not talk about it because your definition of fun is irrelevant as it does not fit’s Anet’s vision.

Killthehealersffs.8940:

Devata.6589:

“Champ Trains and Eotm Trains where/are the MOST REWARDING things !!” Yeah that is why people are grinding it.. Thats the subject here remember.

“if you calculate the time spent vs the rewards …..
Who dont want to maximize their rewards for less time ?” They do not want to grind.. again the subject.

Somehow I think you kinda mist the point people are talking about here.

The box sales is a nice comparison against GW1 expansion sales that did on average manage to generate 100% of the income of the original game sales. (all those excuses you come up with here could apply to GW1 as well)

What I said was that if GW2 would have an expansion every year and every expansion would have done the same they would have earned more money then they did now, however I also said I do not expect the HoT expansion to sell so much because damage has been done. So based on the HoT expansion sales they might not have earned more. That’s all I am saying.

OFC ppl want to MAXIMIZE THEIR REWARDS with MINIMUN TIME , like yourself that are are proclaimed as a Collector but you dont have to grind all these collections , becuase you dont have a lot of time to waste .
But wait a sec , you didnt say that they should bring more things ingame vs the cash shop ? But you still didnt say say that you have a time to grind/wast a lot of time in the game ?

What kind of person are you ?
Casual ?
Collector ?

AND THOSE PPL that choosed to follow the Trains , they did it on their decision to to maximize their rewards .
Because like yourself they think of it like a ‘’frendly Farming’’ with a minimun time to play the game = like yourself that said TAHT YOU DONT HAVE A LOT OF TiME OR DONT WANT WASTE A LOT OF TIME INTO PLAY THE GAME .

And again you dont know the cost of the Living Story and if combine it with the money needed to create the next expanion . And if the x-pack alone can cover it all that . That i am too saying

I am not sure what your point it, all I can conclude is that you seem to have no idea what people are talking about here or you are just trolling?

Yeah all you say about people maximizing there reward with the minimum time is true. but what they are doing is grinding for gold is it not? And what do we talk about here? The game being so grindy. You only confirm that, so I guess thats for agreeing with me?

What type of player I am? I don’t know.. how do you define collector or casual?
I care more for cosmetic stuff. Fun crafts (Not the ones you have in GW2 but you have some MMO’s where some crafts are all about making toy like things), collecting mini’s, mounts, skins or as ranger special ranger pets. That is the stuff I usually like to do in an MMO. I see a mini I like so I find out what I need to do for it to get it and got myself a new goal. Now in GW2 that 9 out of the 10 times is ‘grind gold’ what I dislike as I am not a grinder. For leader-boards or PvP I don’t care much (maybe guild leader board would be nice?_, for those things I play FPS games. I also could not care less about BiS gear, for me BiS gear is the gear that looks the best. Oow and in GW2 I also like JP’s and WvW and the guild stuff (In HoT that hopefully also includes guild-halls when implemented properly). So you decide for yourself what type of player I am.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Devata.6589:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Bernie.8674:

How are you getting 5g in two hours? I might get that on guild mission nights, by doing dungeons, or by engaging in concerted farming, but I’ve never gotten anywhere near that by playing casually the way you claim. I must be playing wrong. I’m stagnant somewhere between 20 and 25 gold right now.

World Boss Grand Tour. Log on, find which boss is up next, and do the circuit for an hour. Sell the Ecto from salvaging the rares, sell Silk if I really want to make the money, and sell all the blues and greens.

Drop into Silverwastes if it’s before 1am PST and generally will find an active map. Do events, and sell proceeds much like with the Grand Tour. This one moves faster and can be more lucrative.

Harvest any trees I see there, and then take a moment to go to Pagga’s Waypoint and find the motherlode of Cypress to the west – sell Foxfire Clusters.

I think the lowest I hit was 3.8 g on a night where I forged rares instead of salvaging and selling Ecto.

You gave a pretty accurate view of how many people play this game… Actively grinding gold. You just proved the reason for the existence of this thread.

It’s only a little strange that you do post in in an attempt to show how there is no need to grind, or you would not consider it grind.

Yeah but I don’t do that every night. I don’t want to keep repeating myself here. I have plenty of other options of stuff to do. Heck, two nights ago I never even logged in. Four nights ago I spent the whole time in WvW just messing around.

And it’s not about the darn gold. It’s about things to do. I happen to make gold doing it, which was what my point was about people claiming you had to sacrifice doing what you want to make gold. You don’t have to, and you don’t have to do dungeons or get super lucky instead of being super poor.

I did not say you did that every night. So no need to repeat that. The thing is that many people do that because they want something and the only way they can get it is by making gold and to get that gold they exactly do what you describe there. For them it’s not about ‘things to do’ it’s about making gold. Then it does become grinding. It’s very nice that you happen to like those things other might not.

Hunting down an item, you know the thing I like to do is not really an option other then grinding gold. So I kinda stopped caring about that, but that also means a huge part of the end-game is none-existing in GW2.

When a person that is called Devata , thinks that doing over and over again the same raid for a cosmetic gear is a ‘’Friendly Farm’’ and when the company sais that doing over and over that Raid is called a ’’grind’’ , then Deavata must revalue her definitions of Grind and Farm and stop defines what is truly Grind or Farm to others .

When she cant understand that in the ’’Trains’’ You get GOLD+ EXOTIC GEAR + MATS based on your lvl + Luck ?
PPl always try to exploit the system , to maximize their rewards vs the time spent

When she cant understand that doing various things in the games , theres a chance to be rewarded with the same rewards … i dont know what to say

I can go too circles over circles if you wish till we close this thread .
Theres a new thread about Achentant , and i hope you dont hyjack it that too :P
(atleast not with 160 posts) :
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Ascended-gear-grind-is-OTT-ridiculous

Edit: cya tommorow

Devata.6589:

I did not say you did that every night. So no need to repeat that. The thing is that many people do that because they want something and the only way they can get it is by making gold and to get that gold they exactly do what you describe there. For them it’s not about ‘things to do’ it’s about making gold. Then it does become grinding. It’s very nice that you happen to like those things other might not.

Hunting down an item, you know the thing I like to do is not really an option other then grinding gold. So I kinda stopped caring about that, but that also means a huge part of the end-game is none-existing in GW2.

Yeah, but you’re not listening . . . you’re focused on the “I make gold” part, or “I do this for Crests” or whatever.

I don’t. I don’t do it for the gold because I want the gold, or need the gold, or have a goal in mind. I do it because it’s something to do. Why, oh why, do you think I compare this all to GW1’s title grind? I didn’t start that until I ran out of other things to do either.

Seriously, we’re speaking past each other here. You’re obsessed with trying to pin grind on the post I made and the subsequent ones talking about it. (And you’re not alone.) It’s not grind so much as “meh, don’t have anything better to do” and still wanting to play the game rather than find some other game.

And, notably, I have found other games. I actually came up with a Settlers of Catan variant I play with my friends which basically doubles the board and adds in all the neat expansion ideas we liked while leaving some out due to clunk factor. I have a D&D group on hiatus where I’m trying to restructure the game so we can have a “refresher session” where everyone re-learns how to play 4e when we can meet again. I have a 3DS where I’ve got Bravely Default, Etrian Odyssey Untold, and Pokemon.

. . . I choose to play GW2 in the midst of all this, and it’s because I find it relaxing, interesting, and fun.

Go fish somewhere else. I’m not grinding or farming because I want something and need to meet some internal quota to reach it. I am playing the darn game as I see fit and enjoying myself. Especially when the WvW nights have some actual play going on instead of “let’s take their stuff while they sleep”.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

I have a D&D group on hiatus where I’m trying to restructure the game so we can have a “refresher session” where everyone re-learns how to play 4e when we can meet again.

No wonder your group went on an eight month hiatus.

I kid….

mostly.

Serophous.9085:

God this thread is just going in circles, brick walls talking to brick walls, no one looking outside to see if the game was catered to them, it could make it bad for others, etc etc. It can all be summed up so easily.

Player 1: this is my definition of Grind, this game fits it, this game is grindy.
Player 2: this is my definition of grind, yours is wrong, mine says the game isn’t.
Player 1: no mine!
Player 2: Mine!
Player 1 and 2: MIIIIINNNNNNNEEEE!
Anet: Hey guys! This is our definition!
Player 1: your definition is wrong! Mine is right! I can prove it cause many people said so!
Player 2: no, they matched my definition, so I’m right. You can’t prove many people!
Player 1: yes I can!
Player 2: how?
Player 1: because people say it in message boards and map chat and guild chat! That’s many!
Player 2: out of how many total players?
Player 1: that doesn’t matter! Its many!
Player 3: hey guys, you’re both wrong! My definition is this, so the game is grindy!
Player 1: see!? He agrees with me though his definition is wrong. Mine is correct!
Player 2: you’re both wrong, and I’m right.
Player 1: no mine!
Player 2: mine!
Player 3: mine!
Player 2: now let’s right long winded posts about our definitions, compare the game to other games with other different or same versions of grind to prove our points, not budge on any issue, attack each other for how the other plays, and continue on with the majority of the thread dominated by the same few people going around in circles.

Heck, this all reminds me when bill Clinton was on trial.

Yes and no. Sure some things keep coming back like that the definition however I also see some progress and think it’s also an interesting thread for dev’s to see how different people feel about it.

Anyway the progress I see is that while at the beginning there was still a group that strongly stated there was no grind, that group is still defending Anet but now saying stuff like. The grind is in fact a good thing to keep people playing, and but it’s pretty easy grind so you can earn money fast. So in general more people seem to agree there is grind. The question how bad it is is still there but then again, that is of course also a personal thing.

Ashen.2907:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

I have a D&D group on hiatus where I’m trying to restructure the game so we can have a “refresher session” where everyone re-learns how to play 4e when we can meet again.

No wonder your group went on an eight month hiatus.

I kid….

mostly.

Well, it started with a move – helping one player move and he lost his materials. I have copies of everything but he was really attached to those dice. So he opted to wait until he could find “another set I like”. Another player herniated his back at work, another lost his job and had to go searching, and I hit a period at my job where I was pretty much going closing shift the first day and opening shift the next.

Yeah, RL hit us all pretty freaking hard.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Ashen.2907:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

I have a D&D group on hiatus where I’m trying to restructure the game so we can have a “refresher session” where everyone re-learns how to play 4e when we can meet again.

No wonder your group went on an eight month hiatus.

I kid….

mostly.

Well, it started with a move – helping one player move and he lost his materials. I have copies of everything but he was really attached to those dice. So he opted to wait until he could find “another set I like”. Another player herniated his back at work, another lost his job and had to go searching, and I hit a period at my job where I was pretty much going closing shift the first day and opening shift the next.

Yeah, RL hit us all pretty freaking hard.

Oddly enough RL impacts on the ability of my longstanding (since 1990) DnD group’s ability to meet Friday evenings is how I got into GW (and online gaming in general).

One of the members of the group bought GW1 for all of us so that we might be able to do something RPG related together when RL prevented us from making the trip to play DnD.

But my previous post was meant to be a lighthearted DnD snob jab at the bolded portion of the quote…“4E.” Oh ick.

Ashen.2907:

But my previous post was meant to be a lighthearted DnD snob jab at the bolded portion of the quote…“4E.” Oh ick.

I know. Hence the smiley at the end.

Honestly, since most at the table had only heard of D&D and not played, and the two who hadn’t had gone through every previous edition with at least a four-session game to each? We determined the 4e was a good bet as it was current (meaning easy/cheap to get the rules legally) and if we ran into a sticky rules question it was more likely we could find someone to help.

There is literally very little I can’t do in 4e which I could do in 3.5/3rd. And there was a lot of things I can do in the three successive editions than I could do in 2nd. So, meh. I’m hesitant to buy 5th yet if only because I can’t do that to my players – I already retooled this off 3.5 before I started it, doing it mid-campaign seems . . .

. . . well, like introducing NPE

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Ashen.2907:

But my previous post was meant to be a lighthearted DnD snob jab at the bolded portion of the quote…“4E.” Oh ick.

I know. Hence the smiley at the end.

Honestly, since most at the table had only heard of D&D and not played, and the two who hadn’t had gone through every previous edition with at least a four-session game to each? We determined the 4e was a good bet as it was current (meaning easy/cheap to get the rules legally) and if we ran into a sticky rules question it was more likely we could find someone to help.

There is literally very little I can’t do in 4e which I could do in 3.5/3rd. And there was a lot of things I can do in the three successive editions than I could do in 2nd. So, meh. I’m hesitant to buy 5th yet if only because I can’t do that to my players – I already retooled this off 3.5 before I started it, doing it mid-campaign seems . . .

. . . well, like introducing NPE

My last off topic post (I hope)

I have decided to steal some really good ideas from 5e but stick with other versions of the game. One of the best ideas I have ever seen in a PnP RPG is the advantage system. Rather than leafing through hundreds of pages looking for yet one more +2 bonus to stack with all of the other bonuses you just look at the situation and decided whether or not one side has an advantage over the other and apply a single modifier. 5e still isn’t as crunchy a system as I prefer, but it is decent and has some nice ideas.

I personally do not find the game all that grindy, its the RNG tied to the grind that is the killer. You can essentially play this game forever and not progress what so ever, especially when it comes to legendary’s, if you have bad RNG like myself and many others the road to a legendary can feel like an endless hopeless grind as there’s nothing one can do to progress towards that goal besides farming gold in hopes the in game economy doesn’t price you out of the items you need. Ascended weapons and armors are a bit more forgiving but again requires another boring time gated gold grind if you have bad RNG. I personally find the bad RNG in this game to be the main cause of why this game can feel so grindy at times for its vanity items not so much the grind itself. Its only saving grace is its all voluntary not mandatory. I have all 8 classes with minimum of 3 builds for each, it would take me 100 lifetimes to get them all geared in legendary’s and ascended if I was lucky enough.

What this game desperately needs are items that are earned purely through skill based activities, this game sorely lacks that.

Devata.6589:

Anyway the progress I see is that while at the beginning there was still a group that strongly stated there was no grind, that group is still defending Anet but now saying stuff like. The grind is in fact a good thing to keep people playing, and but it’s pretty easy grind so you can earn money fast. So in general more people seem to agree there is grind. The question how bad it is is still there but then again, that id of course also a personal thing.

To summarize, technically, there is very little grinding in line with the A’net definition, but there is lots and lots and lots of farming. And farming can be a good thing…

Unless, you are just endlessly farming gold on the most profitable activities, or farming for hundreds of hours to get an only moderately rare skin, or something similar, in which case farming can feel exactly like grinding, even if it technically isn’t according to the official game definition.

Insert pages of arguments about when/why/how farming turns into grinding by another name.

Wonder what has come out of this thread…

(Stopped reading after page ~7, I think.)

Killthehealersffs.8940:

When a person that is called Devata , thinks that doing over and over again the same raid for a cosmetic gear is a ‘’Friendly Farm’’ and when the company sais that doing over and over that Raid is called a ’’grind’’ , then Deavata must revalue her definitions of Grind and Farm and stop defines what is truly Grind or Farm to others .

When she cant understand that in the ’’Trains’’ You get GOLD+ EXOTIC GEAR + MATS based on your lvl + Luck ?
PPl always try to exploit the system , to maximize their rewards vs the time spent

When she cant understand that doing various things in the games , theres a chance to be rewarded with the same rewards … i dont know what to say

I can go too circles over circles if you wish till we close this thread .
Theres a new thread about Achentant , and i hope you dont hyjack it that too :P
(atleast not with 160 posts) :
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Ascended-gear-grind-is-OTT-ridiculous

Edit: cya tommorow

Oow so now I said I wanted to have people do raids over and over again to get rewards. Thats funny, you seem to keep coming up with things I said, that I did not say.

The thing I said that came closes to it was that ONE of the MANY direct ways to earn items (next to things like complete content x get rewarded for it, or do a quest and get rewarded for it) was the rng part that I said you could have an item for example in a dungeon (but also in a JP or something) with a doable rng. As in it’s not doing it over and over and over but there is more a reasonable limit to it because you have a more easy going (doable) rng.

Even more important, that would be exactly the type of items that would likely not be account bound! Some items not being account bound is also what I talked about because they allow to still let people like grind gold and buy it. So still not sure whats your problem. You are afraid if they would implement what I say you would have to do raids over and over again? Well don’t be, you can just carry on what you are doing. Maybe you sometimes have to do a JP or a dungeon once but thats about it.

I have no interest in that other thread as thats specifically talks about ascended stuff. The part I don’t care that much about.

Closing a thread where don’t agree with the conversation. So like censoring everything you do not like. Yeah thats a great idea.. especially if the facts aren’t on your side.

But seriously I wonder if you really don’t get it maybe misinterpreting things and thats how you keep coming up with things I said, that I did not say or that you are indeed just trolling.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Devata.6589:

I did not say you did that every night. So no need to repeat that. The thing is that many people do that because they want something and the only way they can get it is by making gold and to get that gold they exactly do what you describe there. For them it’s not about ‘things to do’ it’s about making gold. Then it does become grinding. It’s very nice that you happen to like those things other might not.

Hunting down an item, you know the thing I like to do is not really an option other then grinding gold. So I kinda stopped caring about that, but that also means a huge part of the end-game is none-existing in GW2.

Yeah, but you’re not listening . . . you’re focused on the “I make gold” part, or “I do this for Crests” or whatever.

I don’t. I don’t do it for the gold because I want the gold, or need the gold, or have a goal in mind. I do it because it’s something to do. Why, oh why, do you think I compare this all to GW1’s title grind? I didn’t start that until I ran out of other things to do either.

Seriously, we’re speaking past each other here. You’re obsessed with trying to pin grind on the post I made and the subsequent ones talking about it. (And you’re not alone.) It’s not grind so much as “meh, don’t have anything better to do” and still wanting to play the game rather than find some other game.

And, notably, I have found other games. I actually came up with a Settlers of Catan variant I play with my friends which basically doubles the board and adds in all the neat expansion ideas we liked while leaving some out due to clunk factor. I have a D&D group on hiatus where I’m trying to restructure the game so we can have a “refresher session” where everyone re-learns how to play 4e when we can meet again. I have a 3DS where I’ve got Bravely Default, Etrian Odyssey Untold, and Pokemon.

. . . I choose to play GW2 in the midst of all this, and it’s because I find it relaxing, interesting, and fun.

Go fish somewhere else. I’m not grinding or farming because I want something and need to meet some internal quota to reach it. I am playing the darn game as I see fit and enjoying myself. Especially when the WvW nights have some actual play going on instead of “let’s take their stuff while they sleep”.

That does not mean what you do is what somebody else basically has to do to earn get a reward and what is grind for them. Because exactly what you describing is what many people do or feel they have to do if they want to get a rewards simply because grinding gold is the only way and this is one of the most effective ways to grind gold.

It might not be grind for you, you might not do it for the gold and you might even just do it for fun but that does not mean it’s the grind other people talk about.

Deadcell.9052:

I personally do not find the game all that grindy, its the RNG tied to the grind that is the killer. You can essentially play this game forever and not progress what so ever, especially when it comes to legendary’s, if you have bad RNG like myself and many others the road to a legendary can feel like an endless hopeless grind as there’s nothing one can do to progress towards that goal besides farming gold in hopes the in game economy doesn’t price you out of the items you need. Ascended weapons and armors are a bit more forgiving but again requires another boring time gated gold grind if you have bad RNG. I personally find the bad RNG in this game to be the main cause of why this game can feel so grindy at times for its vanity items not so much the grind itself. Its only saving grace is its all voluntary not mandatory. I have all 8 classes with minimum of 3 builds for each, it would take me 100 lifetimes to get them all geared in legendary’s and ascended if I was lucky enough.

What this game desperately needs are items that are earned purely through skill based activities, this game sorely lacks that.

You start with saying you don’t find it that grindy to then come with the ‘complain’ that describes the grind many people are complaining about.

“there’s nothing one can do to progress towards that goal besides farming gold in hopes the in game economy doesn’t price you out of the items you need”
Well thats the grind so many people here complain about, not only for legendaries also for toys and cosmetics in general this is the case but yeah a legendary is the extreme version of that I guess.. That and the ascended stuff.

“What this game desperately needs are items that are earned purely through skill based activities, this game sorely lacks that.”
And that’s what many of those complaining about the grind are asking for.

What you describe is exactly the grind people are complaining so much about here.

DavidH.7380:

Devata.6589:

Anyway the progress I see is that while at the beginning there was still a group that strongly stated there was no grind, that group is still defending Anet but now saying stuff like. The grind is in fact a good thing to keep people playing, and but it’s pretty easy grind so you can earn money fast. So in general more people seem to agree there is grind. The question how bad it is is still there but then again, that id of course also a personal thing.

To summarize, technically, there is very little grinding in line with the A’net definition, but there is lots and lots and lots of farming. And farming can be a good thing…

Unless, you are just endlessly farming gold on the most profitable activities, or farming for hundreds of hours to get an only moderately rare skin, or something similar, in which case farming can feel exactly like grinding, even if it technically isn’t according to the official game definition.

Insert pages of arguments about when/why/how farming turns into grinding by another name.

Let me try to make it a little more accurate.

“technically, there is very little grinding in line with the grind Anet tries to prevent with it’s No-grind-philosophy”

And yes “Unless, you are just endlessly farming gold” I would indeed consider that grinding not farming because you are grinding for a currency not for an item. But you already did see that part was open for debate.

Still this thread moved to a more general consensus of this interpretation yes so I do feel it was a thread that not just run in circles but did in fact lead somewhere and the circle parts did show how many people feel differently about different things. While I have a feeling not many devs are still following it I do think it would be an interesting and useful thread for them to have followed, even if it was to understand the different idea’s and feeling different parts of there player-base have about this subject.

A subject I think is very important for HoT if they want to this time hold some of the players they did lose before. If they lose them again many of them will be gone forever imho.

Devata.6589:

That does not mean what you do is what somebody else basically has to do to earn get a reward and what is grind for them. Because exactly what you describing is what many people do or feel they have to do if they want to get a rewards simply because grinding gold is the only way and this is one of the most effective ways to grind gold.

It might not be grind for you, you might not do it for the gold and you might even just do it for fun but that does not mean it’s the grind other people talk about.

. . . they have to do in order to get a reward? I have a hard time picturing any necessary rewards which have this pattern of “do whatever I feel like doing tonight without any structure aside from tagging along with the gang”. It’s not even really grind since there’s really not a goal in mind to be grinding for. Unless you want to claim that’s grind, in which case I really don’t know what ‘grind’ is anymore.

But, yeah, you’re not listening to me anyway. You still are playing “pin the grind on the poster”. I play how I want to play, what I want to play, and when I want (or have time) to play. I pick something and go do it not for the reward but because “I want to do that today”.

. . . you want to pin “grind” on that?

Like I said before, go fish.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Devata.6589:

That does not mean what you do is what somebody else basically has to do to earn get a reward and what is grind for them. Because exactly what you describing is what many people do or feel they have to do if they want to get a rewards simply because grinding gold is the only way and this is one of the most effective ways to grind gold.

It might not be grind for you, you might not do it for the gold and you might even just do it for fun but that does not mean it’s the grind other people talk about.

. . . they have to do in order to get a reward? I have a hard time picturing any necessary rewards which have this pattern of “do whatever I feel like doing tonight without any structure aside from tagging along with the gang”. It’s not even really grind since there’s really not a goal in mind to be grinding for. Unless you want to claim that’s grind, in which case I really don’t know what ‘grind’ is anymore.

But, yeah, you’re not listening to me anyway. You still are playing “pin the grind on the poster”. I play how I want to play, what I want to play, and when I want (or have time) to play. I pick something and go do it not for the reward but because “I want to do that today”.

. . . you want to pin “grind” on that?

Like I said before, go fish.

“I have a hard time picturing any necessary rewards which have this pattern”
Oow really, can you finally stop with all the necessary crap. NOTHING is necessary. If we where to take that seriously the whole subject of grind did not exist in any game as nothing is necessary.

You do not need to get to level 2 you can simply keep running around in level 1 in any mmo, you also do not need to go to the next zone and so it’s a choice and so even in the game where you have to grind to get to level 2 it’s not grind because it’s optional.

Just as much as I do not need to get a cool skin. It’s a choice. Some people say WoW is grindy because you ‘need’ to grind for the BiS gear what is funny as I played it for some time but never grinded for BiS gear. The whole ‘need’ is nonsense.

It’s always need if, and that if might be important for one person and not for the other. Getting a cool skin is more important for me then doing high level raids in WoW for example.

I will make a example for you step by step to show you how people run into this grind wall you don’t seem to see.

1. I see a guy with a cool looking weapon. I ask him what weapon it is and he tells me it’s the Chaos Sword.

2. I want to go on my way to ‘hunt’ for the sword. That is the way I like to play. Turns out, there is no in-game way for me to earn the thing, just buying it from the TP with gold.

3. Oke so if that part of how I like to play the game does not exist then lets not grind for it but earn it by doing the other stuff I do like to do in GW2. Guild-missions (3 gold a week), WvW (more of a defender but I do also run wit the zerg so lets say 5 gold a week), JP’s 1,5 gold a week (not like I keep doing them all over and over again, just a few for some fun)).

4. The cost for that skin is 245 gold so with 9,5 gold I would only need to ’play the way I want for 25,7 weeks. Of course there are also some more active weeks so lets be extremely generous and make it 10 weeks. (I personally would never earn that money in 10 weeks but I want to be generous here for your standpoint)

5. 3 weeks later I see another guy.. oow he has a nice mini it’s the Mini Largos (go back to step 2 and add cost for the Mini Largos).

6. Come to the conclusion that the hunting down items like I want (my way of playing the game I want) is not really available (few exceptions), getting any of these items will only be doable by earning more gold by starting to grind for it or simply ignore the items.

“I play how I want to play, what I want to play, and when I want”. That is great. All the people who complain about the grind wished they could do the same but they feel to get what they like the only option is grind.

“Like I said before, go fish.”
If that would be a craft Anet would implement where I would go on adventures to learn the secrets of fishing for specific fun items like a mini land-fish, and a cool scale armor set, and weapon-skins inspired by the see and cool toys I would love to do so.

Devata.6589:

Deadcell.9052:

I personally do not find the game all that grindy, its the RNG tied to the grind that is the killer. You can essentially play this game forever and not progress what so ever, especially when it comes to legendary’s, if you have bad RNG like myself and many others the road to a legendary can feel like an endless hopeless grind as there’s nothing one can do to progress towards that goal besides farming gold in hopes the in game economy doesn’t price you out of the items you need. Ascended weapons and armors are a bit more forgiving but again requires another boring time gated gold grind if you have bad RNG. I personally find the bad RNG in this game to be the main cause of why this game can feel so grindy at times for its vanity items not so much the grind itself. Its only saving grace is its all voluntary not mandatory. I have all 8 classes with minimum of 3 builds for each, it would take me 100 lifetimes to get them all geared in legendary’s and ascended if I was lucky enough.

What this game desperately needs are items that are earned purely through skill based activities, this game sorely lacks that.

You start with saying you don’t find it that grindy to then come with the ‘complain’ that describes the grind many people are complaining about.

“there’s nothing one can do to progress towards that goal besides farming gold in hopes the in game economy doesn’t price you out of the items you need”
Well thats the grind so many people here complain about, not only for legendaries also for toys and cosmetics in general this is the case but yeah a legendary is the extreme version of that I guess.. That and the ascended stuff.

“What this game desperately needs are items that are earned purely through skill based activities, this game sorely lacks that.”
And that’s what many of those complaining about the grind are asking for.

What you describe is exactly the grind people are complaining so much about here.

I guess I was complaining and didn’t realize it LOL, the reason I felt this game is not that grindy is because I learned a long time ago that grinding in this game is a complete waste of time, I personally found I made no strides what so ever in what I wanted to achieve and no longer do it. All those vanity items like unique skins, ascended stuff, legendary’s etc I basically look at as unattainable and no longer waste my time trying for those things, I just log in, do what I enjoy, mostly WvW and PvP and log off, completely ignoring any and all things that would be considered grindy, I guess its been so long with that mindset I no longer look at Gw2 as a grindy game.

Deadcell.9052:

I guess I was complaining and didn’t realize it LOL, the reason I felt this game is not that grindy is because I learned a long time ago that grinding in this game is a complete waste of time, I personally found I made no strides what so ever in what I wanted to achieve and no longer do it. All those vanity items like unique skins, ascended stuff, legendary’s etc I basically look at as unattainable and no longer waste my time trying for those things, I just log in, do what I enjoy, mostly WvW and PvP and log off, completely ignoring any and all things that would be considered grindy, I guess its been so long with that mindset I no longer look at Gw2 as a grindy game.

This is worth recognition. Once more people break out of their stigmas established from other MMO’s, they will realize the same thing. GW2 is something much different below the surface.

Devata.6589:

“I have a hard time picturing any necessary rewards which have this pattern”
Oow really, can you finally stop with all the necessary crap. NOTHING is necessary. If we where to take that seriously the whole subject of grind did not exist in any game as nothing is necessary.

No, I’m not going to stop with it, because you are trying to tell me to. And with bad hyperbolic examples too. Find something with better teeth than “playing the game is optional too” and I’ll take your request more seriously.

Just as much as I do not need to get a cool skin. It’s a choice. Some people say WoW is grindy because you ‘need’ to grind for the BiS gear what is funny as I played it for some time but never grinded for BiS gear. The whole ‘need’ is nonsense.

Congratulations, you made my point. Now be quiet on trying to chastise me.

I will make a example for you step by step to show you how people run into this grind wall you don’t seem to see.

I know how people run into it and see it as grind. I know how it develops because I watch it outside of MMOs, and saw it years before with Magic: The Gathering. “It’s too expensive to play and requires loads of time to find the right cards.” Bullcrap. People have made decks out of nothing but commons worth less than $10 and had them shred decks people spent $200 on. I should know because I made one of those.

So, no, you don’t need to sit down and try to give me a numbered list like I need to be led to the emergency exit. Thanks.

That still doesn’t change two things: this is something you choose to do rather than you are forced to do, and it has little impact on your performance in the game. I again will point to exhibit A – Obsidian Armor, and tell you . . .

. . . you guessed it. Go. Fish.

“I play how I want to play, what I want to play, and when I want”. That is great. All the people who complain about the grind wished they could do the same but they feel to get what they like the only option is grind.

First, not my problem. I’m not their parent, I’m not their guardian, and I’m probably not their designated raider. They want to do it, fine, just don’t come to me trying to convince me it was necessary you spent $100 on those cool shoes because everyone else was wearing them. K, thx, bai.

Second, I respect their God-given right to free will. And if their free will drives them to touch the burning log while complaining about it being too hot, I’m definitely going to roll my eyes.

Third, and final. I listed what I did, which is in a relatively casual play period. I listed roughly how much I make because it was claimed gold was too hard to grind out. I replied as people proceeded to assume I did the same thing, every day (or every login) and felt the need to try to parse my words to paint me as a grinder. Gold isn’t hard to come by, so long as you are patient. The big ticket items with all the neat particle effects and the “ooh neat”? Yeah, I have yet to hear someone explain exactly why they feel 900 Gold is worth having a tree planted in your home instance you can get Elder Wood Logs (once a day) from when Pagga’s Waypoint provides me with considerable more . . . every few hours, should I feel the need to return there later.

If you want to keep championing for the downtrodden grinders, you need to step up your rhetoric because I’ve seen it all before and there’s nothing new here. In fact, you keep repeating the same thing. “It’s grind because I say it’s perceived as grind.” Lovely for you guys, I’m happy you feel that way. But you’re tilting at the wrong windmill here – your real enemy isn’t grind, it’s the RNG which makes specific items rare enough to have the price high enough you feel it’s a necessary grind.

And now, I’ve spent enough time fighting against the “no, I say you’re wrong because I said so” tide, so I’m going to go entertain myself watching Chuck and Seamus lampoon really bad video game writing/construction.

In the meantime, maybe you can come up with some better retort than “I say it is so it must be so”. I’ve at least sat down in good faith and laid out a time-frame for my play, what I can do and earn in that time, and what other options I might employ to have fun. All you’ve done is point to people who are not speaking up other than to parrot the same sentiment above: it’s grind because we say it’s grind and we have to do it because we must get the shiny.

(. . . they don’t need to make skritt playable, most people already play them it seems.)

naiasonod.9265:

• TP marketeering activities
• I can make upwards of a reliable 20g on a productive, long night of running dungeons and hitting the worldboss train
• my records indicate that the variation is typically in the range of 18-43%

there’s a distinct possibility that I’m not really all that casual at all in certain regards.

Yah think?

Again You do NOT have to get a legendary or ascended armor to play effiecently.
level 80 greens will get you through things everything else is OPTIONAL IF YOU WANT TO GRIND FOR IT !

I like the game therefor I took the time to make Twilight for example do I need twilight to complete level 80 personal story content ? be good at spvp or wvwvw with it ? No I did not NEED IT I WANTED IT therefor I took the time to make it.

Any grind you do in this game is purely OPTIONAL, You are not blocked from doing any content because your not in full exotics.

Honestly, I stopped at just rares until I had a clear shot at Temple Armor and took it like a discount sale on a good flat-panel television. Didn’t notice all that much change except in WvW.

. . . I died to zergs about 3 seconds slower.

Deadcell.9052:

I guess I was complaining and didn’t realize it LOL, the reason I felt this game is not that grindy is because I learned a long time ago that grinding in this game is a complete waste of time, I personally found I made no strides what so ever in what I wanted to achieve and no longer do it. All those vanity items like unique skins, ascended stuff, legendary’s etc I basically look at as unattainable and no longer waste my time trying for those things, I just log in, do what I enjoy, mostly WvW and PvP and log off, completely ignoring any and all things that would be considered grindy, I guess its been so long with that mindset I no longer look at Gw2 as a grindy game.

You know what, I can agree with this, you’re completely right.

The game, if you decide to achieve nothing within it, is not grindy.

But god help you if you decide to achieve anything; then it’s grindy as hell.

If Anet doesn’t have a giant red alarm going off at hearing that thought process I don’t know what would cause the giant red alarm to go off.

Lheimroo.2947:

But god help you if you decide to achieve anything; then it’s grindy as hell.

If Anet doesn’t have a giant red alarm going off at hearing that thought process I don’t know what would cause the giant red alarm to go off.

. . . really? Anything?

Jumping puzzles? Completing your Personal Story? Doing dungeons . . . once, for the title? The boss achievements? Map completion? Wardrobe, for things lower than Rare? These things are grindy?

Fighting (and beating) a champion with nothing more than you and whatever you can bring in with you, because you want to prove you can? This is grindy?

Taking Stonemist Castle in a three way battle which makes the game bog down pretty harshly, going on fifteen minutes of back and forth . . . barely hanging in there and when you can picking up people on the edge of the battle? That experience is grindy?

Getting a few of your friends together to go knock down each of the Temples in Orr on a whim because you’re all bored and want to do something? That’s grindy?

Logging on one night and chilling out in Divinty’s Reach with some total strangers just roleplaying about all sorts of minor things? This is grindy?

. . . but, by comparison, the titles in this company’s previous entry into gaming? This isn’t?

I’m at a loss here.

Lheimroo.2947:

Deadcell.9052:

I guess I was complaining and didn’t realize it LOL, the reason I felt this game is not that grindy is because I learned a long time ago that grinding in this game is a complete waste of time, I personally found I made no strides what so ever in what I wanted to achieve and no longer do it. All those vanity items like unique skins, ascended stuff, legendary’s etc I basically look at as unattainable and no longer waste my time trying for those things, I just log in, do what I enjoy, mostly WvW and PvP and log off, completely ignoring any and all things that would be considered grindy, I guess its been so long with that mindset I no longer look at Gw2 as a grindy game.

You know what, I can agree with this, you’re completely right.

The game, if you decide to achieve nothing within it, is not grindy.

But god help you if you decide to achieve anything; then it’s grindy as hell.

If Anet doesn’t have a giant red alarm going off at hearing that thought process I don’t know what would cause the giant red alarm to go off.

But isn’t that every MMO type game if you just switch that slightly to, “if you decide to achieve modestly within it” and “but got help you if you decide to try to get near the top/best of anything”? The top/best is always set to challenge the most dedicated and/or skilled and lower levels of achievement exist all the way down to just making the next level. The issue shouldn’t be about hitting or not hitting top achievements, since most people will never even come close, but about having good and fun levels of achievement and reward along the way that give everyone something fun and challenging to obtain that matches their own personal dedication, skill, and fun.

Devata.6589:

Oow really, can you finally stop with all the necessary crap. NOTHING is necessary. If we were to take that seriously the whole subject of grind did not exist in any game as nothing is necessary.

In fairness, I think there is a bit of a point in those arguments that you are dismissing a little too readily. There is “necessary to see/play all the content/story in the game” grind, and that does make a fair bit of difference in how optional it is, though not in any way that is related to your personal issues with grind.

Leveling is one of those grinds in the game. If you wish to see and play the Orr storyline, you have to level to 80 or darn close to it if you don’t want to settle for watching it on Youtube. And unless you are darn good, I suggest you obtain some decent masterwork gear, if not rare gear, as well. This is the kind of thing people are talking about when they say “it isn’t necessary” to have ascended. Everything in the game is playable in exotics, to you don’t need ascended to see/play the story/content in the same way that you need to level for example. Coming from other games that is a fairly common issue, and there are plenty of storyline endings I never saw because I didn’t grind the gear tiers far enough to be able to play them.

Devata.6589:

I will make a example for you step by step to show you how people run into this grind wall you don’t seem to see.

1. I see a guy with a cool looking weapon. I ask him what weapon it is and he tells me it’s the Chaos Sword.

2. I want to go on my way to ‘hunt’ for the sword. That is the way I like to play. Turns out, there is no in-game way for me to earn the thing, just buying it from the TP with gold.

3. Oke so if that part of how I like to play the game does not exist then lets not grind for it but earn it by doing the other stuff I do like to do in GW2. Guild-missions (3 gold a week), WvW (more of a defender but I do also run wit the zerg so lets say 5 gold a week), JP’s 1,5 gold a week (not like I keep doing them all over and over again, just a few for some fun)).

4. The cost for that skin is 245 gold so with 9,5 gold I would only need to ’play the way I want for 25,7 weeks. Of course there are also some more active weeks so lets be extremely generous and make it 10 weeks. (I personally would never earn that money in 10 weeks but I want to be generous here for your standpoint)

5. 3 weeks later I see another guy.. oow he has a nice mini it’s the Mini Largos (go back to step 2 and add cost for the Mini Largos).

6. Come to the conclusion that the hunting down items like I want (my way of playing the game I want) is not really available (few exceptions), getting any of these items will only be doable by earning more gold by starting to grind for it or simply ignore the items.

“I play how I want to play, what I want to play, and when I want”. That is great. All the people who complain about the grind wished they could do the same but they feel to get what they like the only option is grind.

I’ll grant you there is a fair bit of that, but can you meet me part way too? What if there were cool minis and skins that were exactly the way you describe, but also enough minis and skins collections that were obtainable by completing content and or reasonable amounts of farming that you could keep yourself entertained hunting down those. Would that be an acceptable tradeoff?

I think it is fair for everyone to want to have stuff that is achievable at their level/skill/dedication/style, but also means having to accept that most people aren’t going to be able to get everything that exists to be obtained, or even close to it. From what you’ve said before, I think that is a reality you acknowledge as well, but that tends to get overlooked as people argue about one side or another as if they aren’t all necessary to keep as many players as possible happy and playing.

If it was clear to people that you aren’t trying to argue that grind should be eliminated, but rather that you want so see added ways to obtain stuff directly from existing content, then you might find people less inclined to instinctively oppose your ideas. I find people tend to be fairly accommodating of other play styles as long as they don’t see the requests as damaging to other’s play and rewards.

DavidH.7380:

I think it is fair for everyone to want to have stuff that is achievable at their level/skill/dedication/style, but also means having to accept that most people aren’t going to be able to get everything that exists to be obtained, or even close to it. From what you’ve said before, I think that is a reality you acknowledge as well, but that tends to get overlooked as people argue about one side or another as if they aren’t all necessary to keep as many players as possible happy and playing.

If it was clear to people that you aren’t trying to argue that grind should be eliminated, but rather that you want so see added ways to obtain stuff directly from existing content, then you might find people less inclined to instinctively oppose your ideas. I find people tend to be fairly accommodating of other play styles as long as they don’t see the requests as damaging to other’s play and rewards.

See, that’s not my problem with how this has been going on. It’s not about wanting an assurance my play won’t be damaged because of this – frankly it’s survived worse thanks to NPE. (Yes, I just said something negative about the game. Be shocked.)

My problem is with how grind has been continually redefined by each person who has taken part here – mostly so they can disagree with the one Colin provided. And yet there hasn’t been a “so grind is a subjective measurement” agreement despite all evidence that it is subjective to the person. There’s attempts to paint farming as grind, because it’s repetition. There’s attempts to paint trying to beat the RNG as grind, which is silly because it’s RNG and the simplest way to beat it is to avoid getting attached to a prize from it. There’s attempts to put “grind” on a routine I put up here which is pretty much the second most casual way to play the game short of using a pair of dice to influence what you do.

My problem is how the argument continues to ignore fine details like, oh, facts . . . in favor of whipping up an anti-grind sentiment. I find it noble to aspire to that ideal of a game with no grind, but I find it . . . a little misguided to think it is possible to actually think it plausible on a broad scale like an MMO. Even Minecraft is grindy.

At the end of all this, my problem is how it’s really just complaining about something you don’t like. Something which you don’t like and aren’t forced to partake in, but you want the results anyway. You just don’t think you should put in the work, because it’s beneath you. Because it’s a game, and it’s meant to be fun, so why don’t you let me have fun? I mean I could do all this other stuff but I want the shiny thing and it’s no fun if I don’t have it.

It’s really time to just chill out. You’re supposed to want the shiny thing, yes. You’re supposed to have to put in the time to get it or the money to circumvent it, sure. The fun part comes when you stop and look at it and realize you don’t need it to have fun, and you certainly don’t need it now to have fun. These things are valuable commodities because they are hard to get, either through effort or through RNG. And people want them. You want them to be cheaper? Stop paying extravagant prices for them.

But if you want to have fun . . . and your fun is dependent on things? Rather than people, rather than the experiences? Maybe you should think about that.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

DavidH.7380:

I think it is fair for everyone to want to have stuff that is achievable at their level/skill/dedication/style, but also means having to accept that most people aren’t going to be able to get everything that exists to be obtained, or even close to it. From what you’ve said before, I think that is a reality you acknowledge as well, but that tends to get overlooked as people argue about one side or another as if they aren’t all necessary to keep as many players as possible happy and playing.

If it was clear to people that you aren’t trying to argue that grind should be eliminated, but rather that you want so see added ways to obtain stuff directly from existing content, then you might find people less inclined to instinctively oppose your ideas. I find people tend to be fairly accommodating of other play styles as long as they don’t see the requests as damaging to other’s play and rewards.

My problem is how the argument continues to ignore fine details like, oh, facts . . . in favor of whipping up an anti-grind sentiment. I find it noble to aspire to that ideal of a game with no grind, but I find it . . . a little misguided to think it is possible to actually think it plausible on a broad scale like an MMO. Even Minecraft is grindy.

I agree, which is why I’m slowly trying to shift the conversation a bit. I don’t think it is possible to get anywhere unless we can all acknowledge that grind is fundamental at this point in game design history, we aren’t getting rid of it anytime soon, so the hope isn’t getting rid of grind but finding a way to coexist with it. Of course, fundamental to coexisting with it is accepting that we can’t have it all. Only when we can talk about having non-grindy rewards tracks that are designed for non-grinders that are good enough to be rewarding, while accepting there will still be stuff for grinders that we can’t get without doing the grinding, do we even have a chance of starting a conversation that isn’t all about arguing.

In fairness to Devata, that isn’t his only, or maybe even his primary issue. When he talks about what he really wants, it seems his biggest issue is that he finds hunting down, directly obtaining, and collecting rewards to be the main thing he enjoys. Things like ice elementals having a chance to drop an ice elemental mini, earth elementals dropping earth elemental minis, and a collection for obtaining all elemental minis. This is typically considered a farm, but with a low enough drop rate it comes dangerously close to the precise definition of grind that Colin gave, and the RNG can be frustrating, so the game typically makes stuff less directly farmable but allows it to be purchased with gold or tokens. That fixes the problem of people complaining that they’ve killed 10,000 ice elementals and never gotten a mini, but it causes a new problem for people like Devata who can’t practically farm the drop directly and for whom farming tokens or gold and buying the item negates all the fun of getting it.

Of course, getting out of the “whaaa! grind!” and “do the work or do without!” cycle would be the first step to getting anywhere, so I was trying to see if I could prod things past the grind issue and on to more of a, “yeah, there is grind, but lets talk about if there is enough other stuff you can find something to do and enjoy anyway” direction.

DavidH.7380:

In fairness to Devata, that isn’t his only, or maybe even his primary issue. When he talks about what he really wants, it seems his biggest issue is that he finds hunting down, directly obtaining, and collecting rewards to be the main thing he enjoys.

Quite. It’s why people liked the RNG in GW:EOTN dungeons way back – you knew which dungeon you did, and you did that one til you puked trying to get, say, a Froggy Stick for your mesmer. It’s why people put up with the Mini Polar Bear having an abysmal drop rate too – you knew where you had to farm.

But me? I don’t see a difference between “farm it by doing the same area and laying waste to every living creature to try to earn the drop” and “grinding it out via tokens or Karma”.

I love the idea of diversifying loot into places where it can be easier acquired if you want to put some work into it. I once suggested letting events end in vendors who might sell precious skins but for Karma and being “Account Bound on Acquire” and nonsalvageable. (Why? To prevent you from flipping Karma -> Coin like they had to nerf the heck out of early on.)

This is typically considered a farm, but with a low enough drop rate it comes dangerously close to the precise definition of grind that Colin gave, and the RNG can be frustrating, so the game typically makes stuff less directly farmable but allows it to be purchased with gold or tokens.

I personally think Karma should be the key resource for that sort of thing. It’s non transferrable, but easy enough to earn by playing . . . well, whatever you want to be doing. Seriously. Everything earns karma in some fashion, it seems, short of chests. Perfect currency to use, actually, so long as you can curtail the transition of Karma -> Coin and keep it at a reasonable level.

That fixes the problem of people complaining that they’ve killed 10,000 ice elementals and never gotten a mini, but it causes a new problem for people like Devata who can’t practically farm the drop directly and for whom farming tokens or gold and buying the item negates all the fun of getting it.

I played Monster Hunter. You know what “fun” I had trying to get some of the high-level monster parts in order to make high-level armor just to survive to fight high-er level monsters? I’m going to tell you it starts with Jack and the second part rhymes with skritt.

I like items being able to be traded off. Especially the Ascended Materials for armor, which . . . hey, could alleviate the problem of getting the resources if your guild or some members are okay donating for the heck of it. (I know way back before our alliance did in fact take up collections and do extra runs for a fellow member who really wanted to have his Paragon in Obsidian Armor. We helped pitch in, and they got it with what felt like a minimum of fuss.)

Of course, getting out of the “whaaa! grind!” and “do the work or do without!” cycle would be the first step to getting anywhere, so I was trying to see if I could prod things past the grind issue and on to more of a, “yeah, there is grind, but lets talk about if there is enough other stuff you can find something to do and enjoy anyway” direction.

Yeah, but the problem is the stuff I find fun just isn’t about the same thing as what others find fun. What I find fun is just doing stuff and not caring about whether I could be 10% more effective if I bothered grinding out Ascended, or if I should be swording on my ranger for the DPS change, or if I should just chuck it in a bin and go Guardian . . . or worrying about whether I should Forge a ton of Greatswords and hope Dawn pops out . . .

I care less about stuff and more about experiences. Even being a collector type of person who likes having some particular trinkets (my MTG collection for starters), it’s not the end of the world if I never complete it. What I care about more is rifling through the cards now and then and building another deck just to see if a theory or theme works. It’s not trying to have the most valuable card ever (I linked it earlier up thread, and I swear, that’s insane) or even winning tournaments. It’s sitting back and being able to riff on the game, or my deck, or just chatter up with friends or random people over the cards.

I value experiences well above stuff. I’m just sort of a freak that way.

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Lheimroo.2947:

But god help you if you decide to achieve anything; then it’s grindy as hell.

If Anet doesn’t have a giant red alarm going off at hearing that thought process I don’t know what would cause the giant red alarm to go off.

. . . really? Anything?

Jumping puzzles? Completing your Personal Story? Doing dungeons . . . once, for the title? The boss achievements? Map completion? Wardrobe, for things lower than Rare? These things are grindy?

Fighting (and beating) a champion with nothing more than you and whatever you can bring in with you, because you want to prove you can? This is grindy?

Taking Stonemist Castle in a three way battle which makes the game bog down pretty harshly, going on fifteen minutes of back and forth . . . barely hanging in there and when you can picking up people on the edge of the battle? That experience is grindy?

Getting a few of your friends together to go knock down each of the Temples in Orr on a whim because you’re all bored and want to do something? That’s grindy?

Logging on one night and chilling out in Divinty’s Reach with some total strangers just roleplaying about all sorts of minor things? This is grindy?

. . . but, by comparison, the titles in this company’s previous entry into gaming? This isn’t?

I’m at a loss here.

I enjoy doing most of these things as well, a lot of this is fun challenging content and its a very rewarding on a personal level, but heres my issue and maybe this is a whole other topic but why is zerging down a risen chicken in Orr with 40+ players more rewarding than solo’ing a champion or finishing all the jumping puzzles or spending several hours fighting 2 other servers over Stonemist? Why are mindless task so much more rewarding than anything remotely challenging in this game? This is something that has baffled me since launch and ultimately led me to why I have the mindset I have and why I don’t bother trying anymore for the shiny stuff. From a personal achievement perspective my shelf would be full of tall miraculous trophies its just a bit bothersome that my characters have nothing to show for those accomplishments.

I will agree with DavidH that what is missing in this game is a middle ground.

Things are either relatively easy to get or dishearteningly hard. The problem’s compounded by most of what’s considered ‘the best/most desirable stuff to have’ being accessible least randomly by just getting gold .. and farming gold is an activity which Devata and myself find fundamentally uninspiring, and neither of us, with our playstyle, I expect, accumulate it very fast.

They could have doubled and tripled the token costs of the dungeon sets and I would seriously have been fine with it. Dungeons are an activity that I find relatively engaging; they require some switches in routine, sometimes quick reactions.. specially the harder ones. Plus the fact that I would be making measurable progress each run towards a known token cost would help.

But gold? Sure, it’s accessible everywhere.. but it’s needed for EVERYTHING. It creates this incentive to just go hard and do what it takes to get it as quick as possible, and it still ends up feeling like it’s not enough.

The champ trains existed for a reason; people feel this compulsion from the game design: get gold, get better stuff. And yet it results in the most mind-numbingly samey gameplay.. unchallenging encounters repeated ad naseum.

Not only that, but with prices fluctuating and gradually rising continually, it replicates the same feeling I had such a problem with in WoW and other gear-grind-centric games.. the feeling that if you aren’t moving forward full speed you’re falling behind.

Of course you can get gold from just playing as you want; the problem then being that you’re limited to cherry picking an occasional ‘cool thing’ every couple of months, with many items realistically beyond your grasp.. and never having the fun experience of feeling like you directly earned an item from a difficult challenge.

The Liadri mini and title.. a straight out skill challenge. There’s this one guy earlier in this thread who said that repeating her X amount of times to learn how to kill her would have felt like a grind to him; I politely disagree – learning something new and challenging would NEVER feel like a grind to me. ‘Blazing Light’ is a wicked awesome thing to have, and it was never a grind.

At least with dungeons, fractals, pvp, Liadri, at least it’s challenging or mentally stimulating. And you get an item directly through skill, with relatively little repetition.

Can you make enough gold to get ‘X’, some desirable random item, through those things? Sure. But when you’re ticking off progress at 3g/hour – less than 1% an hour, against something that costs hundreds of gold, that’s demotivating.

I’m not saying I need ascended now now now now. I’m saying that the mere prospect of trying for it is so demotivating that it sours gameplay for me.

So either I content myself that it’s out of my reach, or I begin to feel the developers have played a bit of a stupid joke on me – ’you’ll never be the best because you don’t have X gear, regardless of how asskickingly skilled you are.’

It’s a small enough difference in stats and so rough to get that nobody requires ascended to form groups around. So it not only feels like a small niggling disrespect of skill over gear, and a skinnerian masterstroke to encourage farming, it feels pointless for all of that.

I vacillate between contented rejection of ascended and flabbergasted /facepalm mode. Sorry. I know I’m a little mental about it, but it’s something I will never feel fits within Guild Wars.

Grinds? Okay, fine.

Grinds for a lot of stuff? Sure, okay.

Grinds for most cool stuff? Not good.

Grinds for a small-yet-nigglingly-present power difference? In Guild Wars? Cardinal sin, to me.

Deadcell.9052:

I enjoy doing most of these things as well, a lot of this is fun challenging content and its a very rewarding on a personal level, but heres my issue and maybe this is a whole other topic but why is zerging down a risen chicken in Orr with 40+ players more rewarding than solo’ing a champion or finishing all the jumping puzzles or spending several hours fighting 2 other servers over Stonemist? Why are mindless task so much more rewarding than anything remotely challenging in this game?

. . . do you want the honest truth? Because they can’t realistically balance loot rewards that way.

Oh, they can try. I know I can think up a vague sort of framework for how. I’m sure you and about ten others in this thread could put their minds to it and come up with something they feel is fair. But it wouldn’t work out, because every single system we’d come up with would be gamed and broken by the kind of people who like to seek a way to profit somehow for the least amount of work.

And if it can be gamed, and the reward is actually of value somehow? Oooh you got a problem there with how valuables enter the game. And that in turn makes it harder to balance rewards later when it’s out of balance already with how much is in the system.

I mean, that’s the long answer. The short answer of why farming bags in WvW is more lucrative than killing a single champion solo? Volume . . . but you already knew that one.

You’re not baffled about the reward scheme itself and how it’s doled out. You’re baffled about why you can’t get anything to show for these personal things of your own to remember. You want to have something concrete about these feats you do and want to always cherish.

. . . it’s not possible. See, that is something that is about the intangibles and the unexpected. Not everyone values these things, these experiences. And those who do, like myself . . . probably would find a reward at the end of it a carrot misplaced and wrongly used. There’s no reason to earn a medal or a Shiny Thing for doing something, there’s the simple act of doing it.

It’s like mountain climbing, or the whole wind-soaring suit with the wings on the arms and legs. Or running a marathon. People do it not because they want the rewards, but because it’s there for them to do.

Lheimroo.2947:

I will agree with DavidH that what is missing in this game is a middle ground.

Things are either relatively easy to get or dishearteningly hard. The problem’s compounded by most of what’s considered ‘the best/most desirable stuff to have’ being accessible least randomly by just getting gold .. and farming gold is an activity which Devata and myself find fundamentally uninspiring, and neither of us, with our playstyle, I expect, accumulate it very fast.

I don’t actually accumulate it very fast either, when you consider what it would cost for Dusk. Or even The Lover if I wanted a ponybow. I’m just okay with that, because almost every other skin I could buy, I can afford to. I just don’t want to.

They could have doubled and tripled the token costs of the dungeon sets and I would seriously have been fine with it.

Nah, I’m preferring where it is right now. I don’t want to get bored of a dungeon before I get my armor from it. Not to mention if I actually luck out and need the Gift for a legendary.

But gold? Sure, it’s accessible everywhere.. but it’s needed for EVERYTHING. It creates this incentive to just go hard and do what it takes to get it as quick as possible, and it still ends up feeling like it’s not enough.

. . . meh.

You could gear up in Exotics for one character for less than 50 gold, if you don’t do Temple Armor. If you do you can do it in under 10 gold, since you’re mostly buying weapons.

The champ trains existed for a reason; people feel this compulsion from the game design: get gold, get better stuff. And yet it results in the most mind-numbingly samey gameplay.. unchallenging encounters repeated ad naseum.

Ah, nope. The champs trains existed because of “Monthly Champion Slayer”, “Monthly Event”, and so forth. It was seriously the least stressful way to do it, and it just moved from wherever it was easier to wherever it was more profitable depending on what people wanted.

Honestly I think the trains in Cursed Shore and Frostgorge Sound are just out for getting the named Exotics out of the coffers/strongboxes there. Because there’s always a demand for them, especially that hammer. What’s it called, Entropy?

Not only that, but with prices fluctuating and gradually rising continually, it replicates the same feeling I had such a problem with in WoW and other gear-grind-centric games.. the feeling that if you aren’t moving forward full speed you’re falling behind.

It helps if you just set your sights on functional and put the thought of “awesome” on the back burner. No, seriously, it does help if you don’t try to set a quota for your periods of play and just realize you are . . . in fact . . . always taking a step towards it. It’s a mental exercise worth pursuing.

The Liadri mini and title.. a straight out skill challenge. —- ‘Blazing Light’ is a wicked awesome thing to have, and it was never a grind.

It was to me, I’m sorry to say. That place was not friendly to my play style and forced me outside of the nice box where I have fun playing the game. It was a chore, not fun, which is why it felt like a grind and made me really stop and go “nope, I don’t want this that bad, enjoy everyone else . . . I’m off to go deforest Orr again”.

It’s very much a “your mileage may vary” thing.

At least with dungeons, fractals, pvp, Liadri, at least it’s challenging or mentally stimulating. And you get an item directly through skill, with relatively little repetition.

Or, if you don’t get it, relatively lots of repetition. Or if you cheese it like people learned how to . . . no skill at all and just following a manual. I mean, I don’t like using walkthroughs to figure out how to beat something. I like to give it a shot first, and if I can’t do it . . .then figure it out. Otherwise, what’s the point? It’s like I’m not actually playing the game – I’m playing it for someone else.

1/2