WHAT Grind?

What exactly is your definition of a "grind"?

Let's break this down a second. Some people (me) need a clear definition of this confusing, and oft-incorrectly used word "Grind".

MMORPGS (No, for the last time I am NOT comparing GW to MMORPGS here...) define grind as "Repeatedly killing the same monster or group of monsters for a static reward, often XP or a certain item or type of item".

I'm not sure If I've heard of the word "Grind" in another context. I'm pretty sure I have spent enough time with FPSs and RTSs to notice something like that creeping into the vocabulary.

So what other definition is there? I certainly can't see the above MMORPG definition applying to the particular statement quoted above. After all, when was the last time someone had to repeatedly kill a monster in the hopes of getting an elite skill?

Ok, seriously though, you people need to define grind. I have no idea how anyone is missing runes. Personal experience has netted me about 30 runes, at least 2 from each class, and about 20-30 or so various weapon parts. I have 4 elite skills and I'm at 45 hours into the game. This is not meant as a "look at me, I'm so good", but as a serious question of "I have all this, and did not have to grind for any of it. It was straight playing the game. What's wrong with you?". I'm pretty sure there's a good explanation for the "grind" question and the lack of drops question, but I've yet to hear either side of this argument come close to reaching that explanation.

100 hours!! OMG!! You do realize that in most MMORPG's to even stand a chance at pvp it would take 3 or 4 times that long. Why do you need "All" the runes in the first place? Can you stack them?

It just strikes me funny that people are calling this game a grind.. too funny.

hehehe I played DAOC 3 months before I could PvP in that game, way back befor the battlegrounds..

doh I told myself I wouldn't post again.. bad stur! bad!

This thread, like so many before it, has veered quite close to the "throw up my hands and be done with it" line. If it wasn't sure to crop up again elsewhere, I probably would, as many of you put it, break out the hammer. But I'm going to allow this to continue for now with a stringent warning. As I've said before and I'm sure I'll no doubt have to repeat yet again - you can be passionate without being personal. Discuss the facts and not the poster. And above all keep it civil and on-topic.

Pfft! 100 hours not PvP ready and you're complaining about that being any sort of task at all? Did anyone here participate in the RYL betas? You had to play for MONTHS on one character every single day trying to find parties and better armor and spending millions on one piece of armor that would many times fail at that level. If you think a week of preparing a character is bad, try preparing characters for 6 months straight and still not being able to even deal damage against the higher lvls in PvP, that my friend is ridiculous.

Guild Wars is heaven compared to other games.

I have to kill most of the mobs in this game 3 times over. I'd say that's grind.



On another note, saying GW doesn't have grind just because other games has more grind is a silly argument. Does GW have less grind than other games? Yes. Is GW grindless? No.

Comparisons are done in a casual, informal kind of way.

I don't think anyone is necessarily arguing there Guild Wars has NO GRIND WHATSOEVER. Rather that, because of how little grind Guild Wars has, especially when compared to other games, complaining about it seems ridiculous.

You have to keep in mind that not all of Guildwars' players have a background in MMORPGs. There is actually a very big base that has backgrounds from FPS/Single player RPGs, RTS-games, etc.
Now, the MMORPG fans might think this game has very little grind, but everyone that has another background is used to no grinding at all. They knew there would be some grind in guildwars, but I think a lot of them were surprised by how much it really required with the last minute changes before retail.

Let us try this one more time. And believe me, there's not going to be another chance and I'm going to do a lot more than just lock the thread the next time someone tries to derail it. You must be able to at least see someone else's viewpoint before you can talk reasonably abou this. If you cannot respect the validity of someone else's arguments, if you cannot believe they have any grounding whatesoever, then do not post here because you'll regret it.

That is a very true fact. I can't tell you how many times I've seen someone ask "what does LFG meen"?

LFG = looking for group

As someone with no backround in MMORGs (and a heavy background in tabletop and computer RPGs), I have to say that I'm not seeing any 'grind.'

Sure, I have to go out and fight monsters to level, but I enjoy fighting monsters. I'm just playing the game.

Maybe the problem is alot of people are viewing the PvE as "work"? I think if one approaches PvE that way, they are guaranteeing that they won't enjoy it.

I don't have any elite skills unlocked, and I was able to enjoy, and win more than I lost, at a few PvP games recently.

It might be nice to have an 'unlock everything' button... and it's also nice to reward people who suceed at both PvP and PvE. I don't think either solution is inherently better than the other.

Well, im a die hard RPG fan. I honestly dont see any grind here, but thats just my view, i can understand where RTS and FPS fans are coming. But at the end of the day this IS and RPG, maybe not MMORPG, but an RPG none the less. Characters become better with time spent on them, now i rarely play PvP but i see little reason for it to be fruitless. People who only play PvP should be able to have same unlocks as a PvE playing, but make it take about the same amount of play time. Everything should be unlockable on both sides of the game, seperatly or combined together. As it is now you are FORCED to play PvE and alot of people hate it.. as a PvE player im not forced to ever play PvP, so why should they make PvP players be forced to play PvE? Its an RPG character development is a given, but they should offer some more choices about how to go about that.. this game was released with a broad range of customers in mind, and it caters to very few... anyways enough of my rant, flame away or not ive spoken my mind on the subject.

Let me explain the problem with grinding for items:

Runes: Runes make you more powerful plain and simple. If you have two evenly matched guilds playing against each other than items will be the deciding factor, not skill. Here's a smaller scale scenario: I have base items and deal 10 damage to you. You have all the same gear as me, except you deal 12 damage per hit because of your runes. We hit the same number of times at the exact same speed. Guess who's going to win?

Skills: Not as hard to get as runes but can be a pain. I've spend as much as 60 minutes not only trying to get the boss to spawn, but then trying to get him to use the damn skill.

As I've said before I've played over 100 hours since release and at least 30 hours has been farming runes, items and skills. 6 hours has been PvP and the remaining has been quests and missions. Please keep in mind that doing quests and missions is not necessarily grinding. Killing 12323904732 Hill Giants for runes is.

As for the comment about people taking a year to get good at FPS: Please explain to me how spending 30 hours grinding and farming is improving my PvP skills? It's actually doing the opposite. I would much rather spend those 30 hours doing PvP.

Why am I grinding for the best stuff? Because everyone else is. I don't want stuff for free. I just want a level playing field whether that be having all the runes, or everyone having none. When I win a PvP match I want it to be because we are better than the team we faced, not because we farmed more.

Since Rex locked two or more of these types of threads already, I'm trying to be as civil as possible! Hope no one gets offended!

But I believe it is a general consensus that PERSONAL EXPERIENCE does not count. Want an example? Let's take it to the extreme.

Man #1: I beat some noob with my hands
Man #2: You can't attack with your hands
Man #1: But he quit, because I did /dance with my monk
Man #2: Damn, must work

Obviously, this is exaggerating it. But no matter how good you are, or how inexperienced you are, you do not base things on personal experience.

On a side note: I am betting that 90% of the people who think grinding is not an issue here do not understand how 1 damn rune can make any difference. Let's do some basic Math.

You have a Superior Rune. Let's say you use it to plug Expertise to 14. Now instead of plugging in 12 attributes + 1 mask + 1 minor (and you have to GET the minor first). You say it's 75 hp off. But let's look at the benefits. Your expertise gets to stay at 10. 10 going to 12 requires like around 30 attributes in total. 30. You could easily plug more into wilderness survival, or a conjure element, or beast mastery. Those are big numbers. You lose a bit of hp, which would be countered by a superior vigor, for a huge rate of flexibility. Not to mention you also gained the dreaded 2/4 mana use.

Let's look at Superior Air. How many aeromancers can claim they've ever hit 200+ on any character that is a pre-made or stronger? Probably none. But Superior Air allows you to hit over 230 damage on a monk. 230. That's nearly half your hit points if you don't have mods. As opposed to 180 or so on the monk. I'm probably pulling numbers outta my ass, but this is probably somewhat accurate.

Let's take a look at Zealous Mod, or Element Strings/Hilts/Hafts.

You have conjure, a move that is completely dependant on elemental modifiers. This is probably the most demanding skill in the entire game, as it requires a specific item modifer to even WORK. If you wanted to make a shock sniper, where are YOU going to be? Farming! Unless you can magically rely on luck all the time, the drops are NOT frequent enough for the CASUAL gamer to unlock a specific modifier. Will a casual gamer unlock modifiers just by playing the game? Of course! What about the ones they want? Nuh uh. If your luck sucked, you could play this game for a year or two, and STILL never get a superior rune, or a perfect enchantment grip.

Zealous mod is about half the reason why warrior/monks are insanely strong I believe. The ability to spam 100 blades for only 3 mana, get 2 strokes of adrenaline, and when frenzied, have a rate of mana regeneration higher or almost as high as your 2 arrows is insane. Is it broken? Nah, there's lots of counters. But is it needed for a warrior/monk that plays competitively? Hell yeah. You don't argue when your using a Paladin template, which can't even take on a frenzied warrior/monk.

Unlike D2, items are unlockable, so unlocking matters more then trading. PVP characters get perfect items, so there's no way in hell you would care to rely on a superior air rune or something on a pve character to pvp competitively in the long run. You want them unlocked, so that when you have to change, you can. This creates a NEED.

The opposition uses comparison just like in previous threads to defend their arguement. Allow me to use their logic.

Man #1: I murder someone.
Man #2: I commited manslaughter
Man #1: I obviously now feel alot better and more confident about my trial

Comparison is useless. Scale of Reference is useless. I'm not offending anyone so far am I? Logic should tell you that comparions/scales/whatever you want to call it is only as important in the eyes of the beholder. Someone who's never played Lineage 2 before, and played Counter-Strike his whole life would call Guild Wars grind. Just because he hasn't played Lineage 2, you get to whack at him using "PSSH YOU DIDNT PLAY L2, YOU DONT KNOW HOW IT FEELS LIKE", in the same retrospect, if the CS player was mean, he could be like "Maybe because I wasn't dumb enough to buy it". But you don't see that happening right? But it somewhat does, because you provoke people by using such a silly thing to base your arguement on. The insults just come in a more subtle way.

So far so good right? Am I not offending anyone? I'll edit the post if I do. Just say so. Honestly, trying to keep it civil.

If you truely want to realize why PVPers hate this, why not just look at this site? Guild Wars Guru. Look at the amazing amount of builds we got. High-Damage Tombs, Aragon t3h s3x4h, Barragebot, Shock Sniper, You name it, they got it. Do you really think that the people who built these builds actually want to get the items that they need the way it is now just to make their build? How do you test this amazing build without trying it out? A major expertise and a superior expertise is already a giant difference when it comes to barrage bot and shock sniper. It just doesn't work that way. You can always say "don't play shock sniper then", but that's exactly what is wrong. You should never be denied from a build simply because of item rarity.

Had anyone argued this 5 days ago or something, I would be much more lenient to people who say farming is ok. But since the new patch update, there is no way in hell a casual gamer is going to get the superiors he or she wants without being super lucky or spending an insane amount of time.

If anyone wants to argue about the grind factor being fine, I ask that you name a Superior rune that you do not currently have unlocked, and time yourself to find it. Currently, there is no hotspot for farming, so you have no excuse. I want to see how "easy" it is to get it. Because honestly, even though I don't like using personal experiences or what not, I don't believe that the majority of the people who argue that the grind is fine right now even has gone through what it takes to get those items. And argueing those items aren't required is bullshit. Even KOR can't be godly without their runes and item modifiers.

Now, did I offend anyone? If so tell me, so that I can change it, and let this thread continue.

Clearly what the game needs is rules for your matches. For example you could fight an anything goes match, or you could fight a no runes, no elites, no unlockables match and so on. That way everybody wins. I mean, if you just give everyone who does PvP everything that someone who does PvE can possibly ever get right at the start then where is the surprise for the PvE player?

This game was a gem because it offered a level-playing field. That doesn't exist. True, PvE is much more motivating with a reward, but I didn't come to this game to be rewarded for time i spent "playing". I wanted skill selection, strategy, teamwork, skill based wins, and above all a level-playing field.

Now I have a lvl 20 W/N that only has half of the "easier to get" skills unlocked. To be even, I need to spend, grind or gameplay or farm, I'm assuming another 40 hours or so minimum, not even including all the runes, hilts, etc.

I wanted to play even-level PvP; that's why I bought this game. Apparently now I need to "quest" through numberous and not so various tasks in order to get a PvP player that is competitive. This is not an even-level playing field - this game is not offering what I expected.

Furthermore to my concern, is that when expansions come out, are we to have to "play" another 100 or more hours to unlock all the powers from that set? Again, not what I bought the game for.


Suggestion/Solution:

Don't make an item a "rare" drop. Don't make a skill "difficult" to get. By doing so you reward time based play - the players that play more than others will have an advantage. Eliminate the advantage. Make it so that any reasonably, not so inclined PvE player can achieve a top-notch PvP.

PvE should merit it's own playing. A player should say, "Hey, let's see if we can beat the Ice Dragon of Death!" Not, "Hey, want to go try to get a team and kill the ice dragon so I can get my skill?" Is this not as rewarding a PvE experience? Yes. But if you won't play the PvE without a reward, then you shouldn't ever have to do it. I thought Guild Wars was finally offering a salvation to players who hated the "Gather 100 of 10 different items 20 times and I'll give you God Sword +1" feature of other games. Putting power increasing rewards at the end of quests, or rare item drops that can be farmed, creates a grind for some players. This grind will inevitably be avoided by some, and thus create an imbalanced PvP system.

If Guild Wars is to truly be skilled based at its core, then this type of reward-for-time-spent needs to go. I know that eventually if it doesn't, I will.

However, I also like Thraxus' suggestion. Dangerous, but at least a viable solution.

Like I said before. The way the game was set up in beta was perfect. Players that wanted to pve could go out and do what they wanted to do and the players that wanted to pvp could do the same. Allowing pvp characters to unlock there skills was something I really hoped would come into release since these characters had no influence on pve.

I am not against making players that want runes and weapon items unlockable in the pve part of the game since you can unlock all with a single character.

*sighs* This thread like so many other has devolved into the same old "You're lazy! There's no grind you're just stupid!" thread again. I'm not asking to take away the fun for the hardcore grinders. They can still grind if they want to. But it seems like they always seem to want to force their "fun" on others. I'd just like an option, an alternative to getting certain things.

It's just an opinion and a gripe of many other's but people can't seem to stand differing opinions. If you're so happy with the game why not just let people voice their opinions without bashing them and you go play the game youre so happy with and have no gripes with at all?

Uh, just speculation, but like you know from other human activities, even when people are happy with what they got, they see change as a bad thing and well you know, are hostile towards it. It's just the way it is I think with humanity as a whole, nothing personal. Look at other issues of the world today that shouldn't bother some people but do. I won't give any specifics, but people are very territorial about things they think are fine for them.