Why is grinding okay now?

It's just A-Net's logic I think

Grinding and farming is good in A-Net's point of view, as long as you're NOT rewarded for it.

They nerfed monster farming in the ground. You can still do it, but the time-effort balance is gone.

And now, with the Kurzick/Luxon faction, the time-effort balance is gone again. A-Net indeed doesn't hate farming, they just hate to reward players that do it for rewards.

I think this is the only way to keep people playing. If they rewarded us enough, A-Net is afraid people would have nothing to accomplish, and quit.

Just live with it, and enjoy the little fun you have, before it gets nerfed even more.

More content, more often would help. Failing that, grind really is all there is to do in one form or another. It might be title aquisition, farming, bringing more characters through the game. Its all grind so pick your poison.

The reward to time ratio in the game has sunk dramatically. Ironically, while on the one had it can be argued that it keeps people in the game and playing, it drove at least as many people away. I really enjoyed playing HM missions for the Guardian titles. The reward for me was simply in the doing. More and more this sort of outlook is what is needed in the game else you fall into complaining about grind and nerfs endlessly.

As reetkeever said, find the things you enjoy to do in the game as I dont see this dynamic changing for the better either.

Quite right.

What people are complaining about, however, is the new Kurzick/Luxon PvE only skills tied to the allegience track.

Playing through all the missions, quests, not running, etc, will net the average character ~17k faction earned, or roughly 1/6th of the way to the very first rank. Compare with what you said about SS, where simply playing through the game in anything but 'run to next mission' will get you to at least R7.

So, the 'casual' player (of which most of the PvE base is, they just seldom post here), a char getting through the chapter can get all the SS skills they want, and use them at 70% of the 'max' power. After completing Factions, they are still only 1/6th of the way to even being able to look at the similar skills.

The idea I've sported on a different board is that they need to take all the new levels they added, and put them at the bottom, not interspersed. That way, a normal player can get to a decent rank without too much trouble, and thus make the skills available and usable, and leave the higher ranks for those passionate about FF.

Dayum. That's a good sentence.

Over a few months of casual AB and FA I bagged 250k Kurzick faction for the first rank of the Friend title, and now that the ranks have been doubled I'm actually rank 2. Just at this rank, the skills work perfectly well.

Unlike the Sunspear and Lightbringer ranks, all of your characters can help each other because the title is account-wide. I earned my faction over 6-7 characters or so

Lol, these skills might, paradoxially enough, turn out to be the nail in the coffin of PuG's.

Some are bit on the uber side, there is for instance a skill that effectively gives a non-stop 33% IAS and +20AL, another adds +2 to some attributes.

the sunspear title is ok, u can get it to a decent level with just a few quests, and story progression.

lightbringer title is basicaly a farming title, as the average quest reward is 10 lightbringer points, or none. thats pretty pitiful as u could just kill a few margonites and get that

kurz/luxon, add a really low first rank (10,000 to 25,000) that u can display, so u can use the skills (at a reduced rate), and let those without the title atleast view the skills.

What's with this attitude that you have to "work" for your skills? It's a game. I don't work in real life to have fun, I do it because I have to. If the game was like a job I sure as hell wouldn't play it.

Should skills just be handed to me without me doing anything? No. But they should be obtainable by doing things as part of completing the campaign. I can get all the sunspear and lightbringer skills (and regular skills) by just playing through the storyline. And I'm willing to do some extra work to make these skills effective. I have 10 characters, of these, 8 have r10 sunspear and the other two are very close to it. And I have one r6 lightbringer, seven r5 lightbringer, and two r4. Generally I feel that vanquishing lightbringer is more than good enough considering I don't do anything in DoA.

The problem with the kurzick/luxon titles is that you don't even obtain the first level by going through the campaign. I don't want to grind just to have the priveledge of buying skills that I may not like once I try them, or may end up getting nerfed after I get them. Yes, it's account wide, but it's still a grind to just access skills, and for people like me with two accounts, that's an unacceptable amount of grind to just have access to the skills with all my characters.

Do I need the skills? No. Would they make my characters more powerful? Yes. I have a hard time believing that my ele could do as much damage as an ele with perpetual elemental lord. And it's not just something that's only useful in RoT or DoA. These skills will be useful in gw:en, too.

And what if the devs think "well since we gave them these overpowered skills, we can make pve much more difficult in gw:en"? Or what if these skills were introduced so that they could properly balance pvp (eg. nerfing SF)?

Even if that doesn't happen, the point is that those who grind a lot are more powerful than those who don't, in every area of the game. Pve never used to be like this. If I wanted a game where I could grind to be better than others, I would have gone to WoW like soooo many people I know did. But I stayed because I don't want to play that kind of game. I want to play through the storyline, doing the quests and the missions, and maybe with some minimal grind, and have access to all the skills of my class. Since gw was always that way before, I don't think that's too much to ask.

And what's next? Supposedly in gw:en we are going to get a large number of new pve skills. Probably linked to titles. If these titles are anywhere near as grindy as the faction titles, I want nothing to do with it. Grinding for skins or titles to show off? That's fine. Grinding for access to skills (which in gw:en will be a large chunk of the number of new skills) is NOT ok.

See the "Optional" in effect? Can't please all people all of the time. You're one of the "other" guys.

I'm not gonna grind. I'm going to play as I normally would, and make the skills more powerful (they are already more than useful, just from regular play.)

It doesn't make sense to just call anything grind. People seem to love to complain about "grind", when they don't have to do any of it at all. Repeated PvP is grind if you don't enjoy it.

Grind? no...

For as long as I've been playing GW the whole paradigm has been "time spent doesn't give you an advantage- your skill at the game gives you an advantage." These Luxon/Kuzick skills seem to be a major reversal from that paradigm. The amount of grind required to reach even rank 1 of the required title is immense, and I cannot imagine that I would ever be able to/want to accomplish it. I really, really hope that these new skills are not indicative of the direction ANet is taking with GW2.

+ and free_fall
Thanks guys. I was all screwed up with the Factions game-skills and the 'faction-skills'. And maybe it's my beginner's ignorant-bliss... but I think it's fun to just log in and go out and kill stuff. It does make me feel better to know that GW:F is the easier of the 3 and that I started with the chummy one out of random chance.

Anyways, this game is fun. And like I said in the other thread...
"On my first mission, I went running behind trees so the Kappas wouldn't see me..." [/classic]

The problem is, a.net is trying to cater to the "grind crowd." Unfortunately, this game doesn't have nearly the amount of customization options that make such grinding worth it as do other MMORPGs.

The alternative is to find another game.

For those of us in the middle -- where we want a challenging game, but don't want to waste time on grinding -- GW is not the only game in town.

Now that ANet has changed to time > skill, the only really strong "hook" for GW is its lack of a monthly fee. And for some of us, paying a fee isn't a problem. I'd rather pay a fee, and get better service, than play a game that's no longer interested in my kind of player.

So yes, we should find fun where it exists -- and in this case, it isn't GW.

I think this is the outcome, but what's the cause? Why cater to grinders? I think the cause is money. They can't afford to make free content, so they make titles and grind paths instead. This way instead of making content, they can work on new games instead.

What I am hearing from a lot you is that you don't like it that someone who is willing to put in the work is getting rewarded when you don't want to put in the work and still want the reward. Frankly I hope none of you are over 10 years old because if that is your attitude and you have a real job it would be awful to be your boss.
"Boss, John Doe got a raise. Why didn't I get one?"
"Well Mr. Smith, John actually worked hard and all you did was play solitaire."
"That is so not fair! Either I get a raise or I quit!"
"Well, goodbye."

Well you have to remember that titles and additional skills from titles are only optional. It is really up to you if you want them or not but please keep in mind that there are alot of people who play GW1 who love getting titles and don't mind putting the extra effort in to attain these.

For me it is not about the reward. It is all about enjoying the game you like to play and having fun with it and I'll feel the same way when GW2 hits the stands.

fixt imo

EDIT:

LOL you may want to check the thread polling the average age groups of people in GWguru playing GW.

back to topic. Yeah I agree with most of people here that the requirements for SS skills are fine as they are attainable just by playing through the game. For the Faction PVE skills, after completing the campaign, you still have to gind sleeplessly just to get title 1. I may never be able to actually see those skills in game if their requirements are kept as they are now.

You've got it wrong, I can play solitaire for 42 days straight while being a doorman at fff. Heck, I bet I could even run bridge and play solitaire. Nobody here said they wanted maxed rank for free, that's not the point. I think everyone understands we need to work towards a reward, we just think that doing fff for a thousand hours to obtain it is a little dippy. Alliance Battles? You've got to be kidding me? Alliance Battles are PvP, and shouldn't even be a topic in working towards PvE only skills.

The problem with that argument is that GW is a game not a job. The problem I have is not that other people are getting rewarded, but simply that it takes 1000 hours to get the full reward.

Someone on GWOnline suggested that these were meant to be Lightbringer skills instead... but after ANet saw how few people were participating in AB they decided to link them with the Faction title. If you look at the Luxon icons (which ANet cleverly did not use in their update notes) you can easily see how closely they look like the Sunspear skills. The Kurzick skills resemble neither. IMO, they made the Luxon icons for the Lightbringer title and then made the Kurzick ones after they decided to link them with the Faction rank.

I realise that GW is a game and not a job, but the mind set is the same. You want something you got to put in the time. Some people didnt put in the time and want these skills, others put in the time but wanted fake gold instead of a title and they are mad and then there are others who decided they wanted the title or a town and they still have to earn more faction to get the skills, but theres is a bit stronger.
With the most recent update anyways...And also the double faction to your title when you get the skills, it is very easy to get to rank 1 to get the skills and to get them stronger.

Guild Wars is designed to be fun, not designed to be work. People complaining about what Arena.net has implemented are complaining because it doesn't make the game fun, it makes it work. Originally the only things which were accomplished by grinding were purely cosmetic. This is no longer the case. The people who are against the changes aren't against them out of laziness as in your workplace analogy. They are against them because one of Guild Wars' main selling points was a lack of a grind, which is a philosophy they seemed to have changed their mind on.

I'm not sure how I feel about the changes, perhaps the faction-skills simply aren't that big a deal. I'll think about it some more. However, your post seems to indicate a lack of understanding of the points being made in this discussion.

You sound like you came straight out of WoW. GW has never been about "putting in the time" to get your skills. You "put in your time" to get your vanity weapon skins and FoW armor skins, but never for weapons that do more damage, armor that protects better, or skills. Ever. There are a multitude of other online games that require a grind obtain anything, but this has not been one of them, until now.

When Anet pays me $95,000 a year I'll be happy. And if they promise me a 20% raise I'll max out the titles by "working hard".

And another thing. People don't get raise for working hard. They get raise for working "smart".

Unless you work at an assembly line, doing the same thing for 8 hours every day, for years, and get that miniscule 2% seniority raise, which becomes pointless once you are handicapped and forced into retirement at 33.

But the aproach that MMOs use to promote "hard work" is exactly the type of work that will not get your a raise. Unless you consider flipping burgers a career, and moving on to salads a promotion.

In real world, "exploiters" and "eBayers" are the only ones who get ahead.

I liked that quote... Sweet irony here.

There still is that philosophy. Some one can put in 5000 hours on their warrior and I can make one and spend 20 hours with him and he will be just as strong as the person's who spent 5000 hours with him.With todays update you can spend five hours fff and have rank one and have access to one of the skills. The skills are just slightly better than what you can buy at the skill trader anyways unless you get them to the very high ranks. Also, I have never played WoW but I have spent five years of my life on Diablo II. And in GW you have nothing to distinguish yourself from someone else because everyone gets max armor and max weapons from traders half way through the game. So what I have a problem with is all the people who come off as saying that one of the few ways of distinguishing yourself from others are these titles yet people seem to be saying we want the skills, dont want to do anything to get them.Unfortunately people do make careers by working in a McDonalds or Burger King or Walmart. They are crappy places to work and the people who work there do have to work hard. If you had ever worked at some place like that you would know. And there is a difference between working hard in real life and working hard in a game. To max some titles you do have to dedicate yourself and work at it. But all I see in this thread and others are people coming off as they want everything handed to them instead of trying to accomplish it. I won't comment on the salary thing as you are obviously trying to brag to people who probably will never see you in real life or in game and could careless about your career as long as you do your job to beat the mission or win your PVP match.

@OP - Every time I hear the word "grind" and GW I disagree.

When you compare "GW" grind to other MMO's, I played FFXI for 2 years... let me tell you about "grind there".. GW grinding is nothing.

GW still allows me casual play. Playing a few hours a day within a week or two to get enough points to unlock the ability to buy the lux/kuz does not seem that much to me at all. Once that's done, I think I can get 1 skill per day with an hour or two of doing faction stuff.

I personally think Fort Aspen is rather fun and earns me nice bath-faction / lux/kuz faction points quickly imho.

Once you grow up and have to work for your money, keep your house tidy and prepare your own dinner and that of your family, you'll find that you don't have all that much time left to grind countless hours in some game. Maybe you'll discover that you'd rather play games for entertainment rather then as a substitute for real life accomplishments and fulfillments.

EternalTempes, you need 100k faction, at 400 per quest you are looking at repeating a quest 250 times. That is grind. And even if you manage to repeat it ten times per hour it will take 25 hours.

Edit: ok, oh it's 50k and 125 times the same quest ... it's still grinding.

Rewards require effort. Effort=work. You put in effort to get something you want. if you want something badly enough, you put in extra effort for it.

I guess the question is: is the effort required for Factions skills worth the reward? I...don't think so at this time. You're better off getting your PvE Sunspear title maxed and use those skills. Its less effort for greater rewards

I am glad that they are doing something with the friends titles though. I started PvP in AB and it brings back a memories to think that those titles now can serve a purpose. But...the casual gamer will likely never attain them, or will not attain a high enough title to use the skills to their greatest effect. Thats kinda sad tbh. Its one thing to deny them some nice looking greens or gold weapons or fancy armor skins if they haven't the time to play for long hours. Its another to deny them builds because they don't have the skills needed to run them or can't get them maxed out enough to use them well.

Grind was always before, a cosmetic thing. This time, it will have an actual impact on performance. Its a first for GW (barring a few, tiny things like req 7 shields and stuff like that) and I honestly don't like it. It shows a change in how Anet is thinking about its customers. They are catering more to players who want grind in their game. This is a tangible reward for grinding, not a cosmetic one.

...I didn't like that in my other MMOs. Thats why i bought, played and continue to play GW. Sure, I grind a lot to build up my main character and make my heroes better. but It was always my choice to grind. What if a combo comes out with the factions skills that sets someone above my little r2-3 friend of the luxons? Will I be penalized because I played different aspects of the game instead of ABing all my time away?

In a game that is built so heavily around the skills (and skill) you bring to a team, excessive grinding for max attribute is...bad. It makes you wonder: whats next? I'm not Chicken little and i don't think the sky is going to fall on Tyria any time soon, but it does make me worry what the next title will be to get a tangible buff instead of a cosmetic one. And--unless you've maxed out all your title tracks--you might want to wonder 9and even worry a little) too.

Nope. I don't like the turn I see Anet may be taking with these friends skills after all. Its scarry that I'll have to spend all my time farming something I hate to do instead of playing what i want to play and being on equal (equipment wise) footing with any other player.

Sorry if I upset people, but thats what I think.

GGs

The biggest problem I have with the whole thing is the 'been there, done that, not doing it again' issue. I already DID grind for faction, a year ago. Every point I got went into materials, enough to buy two armors. I was bored sick of it after that, and don't intend to ever do it again.

Gaining sunspear ranks can be done in what, 85% of all Elona maps? As a side effect of doing whatever it is you're doing. Gaining allegiance can only be done in a terribly small number of maps doing the same damn things over and over and over and over and over and over. And over. And - frigging - over.

Been there, done that, not doing it again. It got stale a year ago and it's not gotten any fresher.

Gaining allegiance has quite a few options - regular PvE zones, challange missions, Fort Aspenwood and Alliance Battles, plus you can do it over multiple toons like I said before. Gaining rank 1 is easy - you don't have to rush it, y'know... take your time and smell the roses.

I don't agree on the no lvl cap, I could go with a higher lvl cap tough.
I do agree with you on that luxon/kurzick title, it's a title for insane ppl that have no life pretty much.

A few times a week I go to the Battle Isles and beat up a few NPC's for a few k of balthazar's faction. Essentially it is, what, 5-10 minutes of work to unlock a skill for my heroes and PvP. And I get to try out some new hero builds. That is the kind of no-rush getting there slowly grind you seem to be talking about. But when I compare that to the dozens of hours of grinding for a single PvE-only skill I think I know which is the more rewarding 'grind'. Too bad about the work ANet put into these skills.

This game really doesn't require the grind. You can do just as fine without the Luxon/Kurzick skills, and sunspear skills even at rank 7ish is good enough to be used compared to other skills.

Although I am now primarily a PvP player, I always enjoy a little mindless PvE now and again (pretty yellow numbers + things going boom = yay) IMO the "friend" skills are cool, but not at all game-breaking. Normal mode does not require them and guild / alliance groups will never turn me down because I don't have "friend of x"/ SS /LB maxed out - they know I'm a good player and that IMO goes much further than any title. As for pugs, personally I wouldn't waste my time with someone who insists on a skill that requires me to have maxed some lame title from factions :P .

I do work, I do work around the house. And for some reason I can find 5 hours it takes to get to rank one. Nobody said that you had to do it all at once. Hell, you could fff for a half hour a night and have rank one and able to get the skill you want in 10 days. Personally I find AB fun and the fact that I get some nifty little title and now some skills to go along with it keep me doing AB instead of farming with my 55 trying to get a pile of virtual gold.

Except that we did pay the same as other people for guild wars. But because we don't enjoy the repetitive actions required to get those skills, we don't get them. But some of the skills look like they might make the game more enjoyable, which is the point of gaming.

So for guild wars, how does forcing players to do the same thing they hate over and over make any sense ?

A bit late, but here's a more fitting version:

"Boss, John Doe got a Christmas bonus. Why didn't I get one?"

"Well Mr. Smith, I've been keeping tabs on how you boys spend your paychecks. John donated all disposable income to Scientology, whereas you just bought some clothes."

"Haha, that's so funny... wait a minute, you're serious, aren't you?"

"Yes Mr. Smith, I'm perfectly serious."

"I see..."

"Would you like to take one of our free personality tests?"

How does doing work around the house compare to what Amy Awien was saying? I think she meant something more like working 9 hour days, commuting, plus handling all the errands and chores that occur daily (which easily stack up twice high when kids are involved.)

Back to the discussion, I think you are missing the entire point here. The problem is that instead of playing the game and having fun for X number of days you have grind and work for X number of days to achieve the lowest level of the Luxon/Kurzick skills. It doesn't particularly matter how palatable you might find the grind to be, it is still a grind.

There is no way you'll get even just 50k in 5 hours or 300 minutes. You'd have about 2 minutes per quest (400 points each). Not to mention that you'd need half a dozen other players willing to repeat the same mindnumbing tasks over and over again.

Highly unrealistic.

The problem isn't the time, but repeating the same dull task again and again and again and again. That is the definition of grinding.

Then there is the problem of getting half a dozen other players to go online and grind with you half an hour per day for the next two days. I'd think that is unrealistic.


I see, to you the game consist either of grinding for gold or grinding for faction?

But now we've come to the root, you play a different game. It's not as much that other people can't work and they'll become the doom of their employers, it's you who happens to enjoy the kind of grind that is required to obtain these titles.