Omg, I almost never expected someone to finally bring this up..
Grinding.. I cannot think of a more important activity, to be honest.. Without grinding there is almost no way to get your swords sharp enough.. And seriously, while most modern-day proponents say that wheel grinders are the best tool for the job, I really prefer a good ol' whetstone and some elbow-grease..
..because we're gamers, damn it!! - William Massachusetts (Log Horizon)
To me grind is just synonymous with repetitive activities. I like that if it contributes to progression. If it doesn't then I find it tedious. Grinding mobs, mats, and progressing skills and professions can be fun grinds. Good mob grinding can be relaxing and cathartic.
Agree but to add for me the grind has to deliver an acceptable amount of progression, especially if there is a fixed goal to reach in order to move to the next stage of the game. (endgame)
As I cut my teeth on DAOC it was my benchmark, so L2s grind was intolerable while WOWs was a welcome relief. (esp after following L2)
Then I found EVE where there was no skill progression grind due to always on training, nor was there an endgame, it was a steady state existence.
My grind became earning ISK and I cycled through multiple mechanisms to earn it with ever increasing efficiency.
Strangely enough mining, an activity I avoided for many years as too boring proved to be very profitable and the larger I increased my operations and skills the more I enjoyed it.
So yeah, for me a profitable, progressive grind is most rewarding and I loath most modern MMOs as they generally invalidate my progression to date with each new expansion.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
I found grinding levels fun in WOW back then when it still worked with ice mages, like on the fields around Andorhal in the western plaguelands. 25+ mobs pulled and killed -and a click party to loot that sparkling pile afterwards.
It depends on the game. If a game has World PvP, then I absolutely love grinding.
I remember grinding in my EQ2 days. I would spend hours and hours trying to find the best grinding spots / exploits. I would do anything to get that spell / gear advantage over other players. You really have to have a goal during the grind. Mine was to better outfit myself for PvP.
Some games offer a story-mode grind. I personally hate this, as I generally have to concentrate on crap that I care nothing about. I just wanted to put in my work, get my gear, and stand out via PvP. When I can "mob grind", I can listen to the Audio Bible, documentaries, music, etc.
The one thing that would really bring some fun to grinding is a Diablo 2-style loot system, where stats can be randomized etc.
OP thinks grind means repetitive...so if you had sex over and over you consider it a grind?
Repetitive means just that,repetition it does not have to relate to grind although it most certainly could.Grind is a term meaning you consider the actions painful,bothersome,always thinking "when is this going to end".Well if you are having FUN doing something,i doubt you would call it a grind.
So there is the difference,if it is fun,then that is all there is to it,your having fun,if it is not then it feels like a grind. OFTEN people relate grind to level numbers.Well to that i say,if you are playing for the level numbers,you are one shallow gamer.So it would then imo be either the combat or the questing that is bothering you,this is why i want CHOICE in my mmorpg's.
If we get enough of both questing and non questing,then we should be able to find a quality game we find fun.However as of right now we have been force fed a thousand copy cat linear questing games all with hand holding.so NO CHOICE.
If we are not given any choice in a mmorpg design,then yes we will often see a lot of complaints about grind because there is a lot of doing something you do not want to do but with no choice,we are stuck with a thousand Wow clones.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Playing Darkfall right now.. typical grind consists of killing monsters where crafting mats are needed until almost overencumbered then returning... takes about 30 min at a time and enjoy it immensely because of how the combat feels. I normally try to visit new places as often as I can which really benefits scroll making and enchanting items... the funnest types of crafting. I'm really loving the new system in that AFK skill gain is nonexistent. Visiting a dungeon to turn in collected keys from grinding is always fun and they always have quests. Im pretty excited for May 5th launch!
I didn't typically like grinding in most MMORPGs.... but some of the quest chains were fun. Finding a game where actual grinding is fun is pretty rare. Feels like a boring semi AFK activity in some games.. dungeon crawling in EQ wasn't bad because of the danger factor but when I died it was usually from boredom.
NEWS FLASH!"A bank was robbed the other day and a man opened fire on the customers being held hostage. One customer zig-zag sprinted until he found cover. When questioned later he explained that he was a hardcore gamer and knew just what to do!" Download my music for free! I release several albums per month as part of project "Thee Untitled" . .. some video game music remixes and cover songs done with instruments in there as well! http://theeuntitled.bandcamp.com/Check out my roleplaying blog, collection of fictional short stories, and fantasy series... updated on a blog for now until I am finished!https://childrenfromtheheavensbelow.blogspot.com/Watch me game on occasion or make music... https://www.twitch.tv/spoontheeuntitled and subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUvqULn678VrF3OasgnbsyA
Dark Fall, Grind was okay when I played it, and its even more fun when you get into a guild and go do PVP, its games like "Black Desert" that bore me I am not sure why but for example when I grind on Cat Fish after about an hour I will actually fall asleep on my Keyboard, and things like Relic Shards which get boring scrolls that expire and take up space only lasting for a week where your forced to run them within a certain time or they expire bores me a lot.
Now there are two other games I found fun but the companies ruined them "Vindictus" and "Blade & Soul, but I won't play B&S Currently because of Game Guard, but the combat excluding the bots and cheaters is generally fun especially with the Combos, and Vindictus is fun too but its too Pay 2 Enioy for character customization, all instanced, and Nexon wont listen or improve it over the years so that is off the list, but excluding this if this were not a problem the game would be great.
What OP said wasn't grind but called "monster (mob) hunting" type of gameplay .
That depends, spawn camping is still a grind but when you move around in a hunting party it isn't. Basically, camping the same spot killing the same mobs is as much grind as you can get.
A small hunting party moving through a zone looking for bosses and rare mobs can be rather fun unless you make the exact same run over and over.
Grind can't be fun since it is boring repetitive content, like daily quests. If you are having fun you havn't started the actual grind yet.
MMOs do need some grind if they are to last longer then a few weeks, no matter how massive content you have some of it will be run many times and stop being fun. There are tricks that makes things easier on the players and breaks the monotony but the games need to encourage the players to explore as much of the game as possible.
Players tend to be lazy and run the same content over and over only to quit after a while since the game get boring and that is not good at all, there will never be enough content in a themepark MMO so the devs need players to enjoy as much of it as possible. So doing content over and over should be less rewarding, also because the risk Vs reward rate gets wrong otherwise, something you already done for a long while get less risky as you master it.
Comments
Grinding.. I cannot think of a more important activity, to be honest.. Without grinding there is almost no way to get your swords sharp enough.. And seriously, while most modern-day proponents say that wheel grinders are the best tool for the job, I really prefer a good ol' whetstone and some elbow-grease..
..because we're gamers, damn it!! - William Massachusetts (Log Horizon)
As I cut my teeth on DAOC it was my benchmark, so L2s grind was intolerable while WOWs was a welcome relief. (esp after following L2)
Then I found EVE where there was no skill progression grind due to always on training, nor was there an endgame, it was a steady state existence.
My grind became earning ISK and I cycled through multiple mechanisms to earn it with ever increasing efficiency.
Strangely enough mining, an activity I avoided for many years as too boring proved to be very profitable and the larger I increased my operations and skills the more I enjoyed it.
So yeah, for me a profitable, progressive grind is most rewarding and I loath most modern MMOs as they generally invalidate my progression to date with each new expansion.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
25+ mobs pulled and killed -and a click party to loot that sparkling pile afterwards.
I remember grinding in my EQ2 days. I would spend hours and hours trying to find the best grinding spots / exploits. I would do anything to get that spell / gear advantage over other players. You really have to have a goal during the grind. Mine was to better outfit myself for PvP.
Some games offer a story-mode grind. I personally hate this, as I generally have to concentrate on crap that I care nothing about. I just wanted to put in my work, get my gear, and stand out via PvP. When I can "mob grind", I can listen to the Audio Bible, documentaries, music, etc.
The one thing that would really bring some fun to grinding is a Diablo 2-style loot system, where stats can be randomized etc.
EQ1, EQ2, SWG, SWTOR, GW, GW2 CoH, CoV, FFXI, WoW, CO, War,TSW and a slew of free trials and beta tests
Repetitive means just that,repetition it does not have to relate to grind although it most certainly could.Grind is a term meaning you consider the actions painful,bothersome,always thinking "when is this going to end".Well if you are having FUN doing something,i doubt you would call it a grind.
So there is the difference,if it is fun,then that is all there is to it,your having fun,if it is not then it feels like a grind.
OFTEN people relate grind to level numbers.Well to that i say,if you are playing for the level numbers,you are one shallow gamer.So it would then imo be either the combat or the questing that is bothering you,this is why i want CHOICE in my mmorpg's.
If we get enough of both questing and non questing,then we should be able to find a quality game we find fun.However as of right now we have been force fed a thousand copy cat linear questing games all with hand holding.so NO CHOICE.
If we are not given any choice in a mmorpg design,then yes we will often see a lot of complaints about grind because there is a lot of doing something you do not want to do but with no choice,we are stuck with a thousand Wow clones.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
I didn't typically like grinding in most MMORPGs.... but some of the quest chains were fun. Finding a game where actual grinding is fun is pretty rare. Feels like a boring semi AFK activity in some games.. dungeon crawling in EQ wasn't bad because of the danger factor but when I died it was usually from boredom.
NEWS FLASH! "A bank was robbed the other day and a man opened fire on the customers being held hostage. One customer zig-zag sprinted until he found cover. When questioned later he explained that he was a hardcore gamer and knew just what to do!" Download my music for free! I release several albums per month as part of project "Thee Untitled" . .. some video game music remixes and cover songs done with instruments in there as well! http://theeuntitled.bandcamp.com/ Check out my roleplaying blog, collection of fictional short stories, and fantasy series... updated on a blog for now until I am finished! https://childrenfromtheheavensbelow.blogspot.com/ Watch me game on occasion or make music... https://www.twitch.tv/spoontheeuntitled and subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUvqULn678VrF3OasgnbsyA
Now there are two other games I found fun but the companies ruined them "Vindictus" and "Blade & Soul, but I won't play B&S Currently because of Game Guard, but the combat excluding the bots and cheaters is generally fun especially with the Combos, and Vindictus is fun too but its too Pay 2 Enioy for character customization, all instanced, and Nexon wont listen or improve it over the years so that is off the list, but excluding this if this were not a problem the game would be great.
A small hunting party moving through a zone looking for bosses and rare mobs can be rather fun unless you make the exact same run over and over.
Grind can't be fun since it is boring repetitive content, like daily quests. If you are having fun you havn't started the actual grind yet.
MMOs do need some grind if they are to last longer then a few weeks, no matter how massive content you have some of it will be run many times and stop being fun. There are tricks that makes things easier on the players and breaks the monotony but the games need to encourage the players to explore as much of the game as possible.
Players tend to be lazy and run the same content over and over only to quit after a while since the game get boring and that is not good at all, there will never be enough content in a themepark MMO so the devs need players to enjoy as much of it as possible. So doing content over and over should be less rewarding, also because the risk Vs reward rate gets wrong otherwise, something you already done for a long while get less risky as you master it.