Daily Slavery?

eoloe

I've just read in the last days several people explaining they quit various games (Lost Ark/ Destiny) because of its dailies.

Months ago, I dropped Genshin when I realized that I was logging in just for the dailies, getting the gems, possibly making a roll. I was not really doing any content anymore. I became a daily slave. So, I quit.

I understand that devs need content to keep players engaged. Anyway if they don't, players will complain! But how could they make the dailies more interesting or replacing them?

 

Asm0deus

Indeed when I play mmos when I start logging in just to do dailies and start having to motivate myself to actually log in it's like a big red sign saying...time to move on bud.

Dattelis

I think the problem is that more and more developers are floating towards this design because its just 'convenient' from a game design perspective. They (or publishers) probably looked at past data and saw that people were doing dailies plus dailies are accessible content to all, so they just folded a lot of progression systems into dailies as a result. The problem was that they didn't realize that people eventually stopped doing dailies in the past when they got what they wanted from them or to whatever point they were doing them to (Tol Balard dailies in WoW came to my mind for the dragon mount). This creates another problem because tying progression to dailies means dailies never end and kind of forces the player to do them if they want to advance. If you're main source of advancement is doing the same thing over and over every day or feel left behind if you skip a day, then more than likely you'll want to quit for something else. One good thing about FFXIV I guess is that you kind of only have 3 ways of advancing player power and two are usually weekly capped (raids/tomestones being the weekly thing and I guess buying crafted gear being the 3rd).

OldKingLog

Dattelis said:

I think the problem is that more and more developers are floating towards this design because its just 'convenient' from a game design perspective. They (or publishers) probably looked at past data and saw that people were doing dailies plus dailies are accessible content to all, so they just folded a lot of progression systems into dailies as a result. The problem was that they didn't realize that people eventually stopped doing dailies in the past when they got what they wanted from them or to whatever point they were doing them to (Tol Balard dailies in WoW came to my mind for the dragon mount). This creates another problem because tying progression to dailies means dailies never end and kind of forces the player to do them if they want to advance. If you're main source of advancement is doing the same thing over and over every day or feel left behind if you skip a day, then more than likely you'll want to quit for something else. One good thing about FFXIV I guess is that you kind of only have 3 ways of advancing player power and two are usually weekly capped (raids/tomestones being the weekly thing and I guess buying crafted gear being the 3rd).

In the developers defense I'd say the reason they are gravitating more towards this kind of content is due to the player base's behavior. Why waste tons of development time and resources to create great blocks of content when the players will most likely blaze right through them anyway. Give them a simple playground with a few activities and daily rewards and more often than not the players will make their own fun. In other words why go to the effort of building Disneyland when a small park with a slide, a swing set, a merry go round and a tether ball pole will suffice?

Tiller

This is what I do in Lost Ark now, actually most of the MMOs I play unless new content is added. There is nothing else exciting to do once you have done it all.

Dattelis

OldKingLog said:

Dattelis said:

I think the problem is that more and more developers are floating towards this design because its just 'convenient' from a game design perspective. They (or publishers) probably looked at past data and saw that people were doing dailies plus dailies are accessible content to all, so they just folded a lot of progression systems into dailies as a result. The problem was that they didn't realize that people eventually stopped doing dailies in the past when they got what they wanted from them or to whatever point they were doing them to (Tol Balard dailies in WoW came to my mind for the dragon mount). This creates another problem because tying progression to dailies means dailies never end and kind of forces the player to do them if they want to advance. If you're main source of advancement is doing the same thing over and over every day or feel left behind if you skip a day, then more than likely you'll want to quit for something else. One good thing about FFXIV I guess is that you kind of only have 3 ways of advancing player power and two are usually weekly capped (raids/tomestones being the weekly thing and I guess buying crafted gear being the 3rd).

In the developers defense I'd say the reason they are gravitating more towards this kind of content is due to the player base's behavior. Why waste tons of development time and resources to create great blocks of content when the players will most likely blaze right through them anyway. Give them a simple playground with a few activities and daily rewards and more often than not the players will make their own fun. In other words why go to the effort of building Disneyland when a small park with a slide, a swing set, a merry go round and a tether ball pole will suffice?

That is unfortunately the day-and-age we live in now, where optimization is more important than 'fun.' I do think that should be left for the player and not the developer though since not everyone plays games the same way even though we generally may think so. Using your own example with Disneyland, there's still a reason that is probably the most visited in the world (then again I dont have proof of that).

Iselin

Some dailies have a very valid place in MMOs by limiting some things that would otherwise unbalance the game or its economy if you could do them an unlimited number of times per day.

But that only works if you do in fact play the game for other reasons and the dailies help with those other reasons.

If I were logging in just for dailies I'd quit.

Lithuanian

If one plays game just to do dailies (killing same Orcs/Jedi to get 1 grind token and exchange 5000 grind tokens to 1 shiny token, to exchange 5000 shiny tokens to Grumpy Cat emote...) - then it's probably time to change mmo or make a pause.

Lotro has an example of unbalanced dailies: Wildwood. You go, pick dailies, grind reputation (which cannot be advances otherwise). Next day you go, pick dailies, grind reputation. And cycle continues untill you are top level reputation with locals. Is it wise or encouraging or fun? Nope. Should it be changed to something better? Of course.

Another example: Lotro Enedwaith. You are doomed to do dailies many times, for all quests and deeds are not enough to get you to top reputation with two local factions.

Dailies can be as source of local tokens. Imagine, some faction has tons of things to barter for Shiny tokens. Quests, deeds gives you some limited amount. If you want more - feel free to do dailies. Or, they could introduce you to lore. Imagine some planet and local Historian can remind you how Empire liberated this planet from Rebel scum. Each day you replay some episode and so for, say, 6 months. Not obligatory, just for the sake of fun with rewards being xp + some cool title (like "True Lord of the Sith").

Scot

This dovetails into all issues about rewards and what gameplay you have to do to get them. Just like having more than one way to get PvP rewards can cause huge issues, dailies can distort the game too. They need to be for rewards you cannot get any other way, with additionally some reasonable xp and coin but not too much. If they are just for a new mount or outfit skin (account bound) you can't go wrong, when they result anything that gives you a PvE or PvP boost/items etc they immediate distort the game.

Adamantine

Dailies suck.

Big time.

A game is not a job.

cheyane

When Everquest had come out and was relatively popular I was playing a wizard and every solo spot had some druid or other wizard quadkiting and it was a taboo to try to muscle in on them as there were strict rules and people owned mobs. No kidding mobs were booked and taken and fights would ensue with threats if you did not obey the camping gods.

So, dungeons then, well I get into a queue and wait for up to 2 hours if I'm lucky for some other guy to get bored or his mother calls him away to actually play the game. Every square inch of a dungeon had some group's name written on it and you seldom find anything open because groups passed off camps to other friends or guild members.

What I would have given to have some other way to progress. 

Now we do have that way in the form of dailies but like everything in life and games it has gone in the direction of another extreme.

I don't want this any more. Which is why I now favour games that have other mechanics like crafting and trading with wagons and ships or other activities besides just getting experience to level and do end game raids. I don't enjoy PvP because I suck at PvP so it is not enjoyable to get curb stomped on a daily basis so I avoid games like that.

However I do enjoy games that allow players to progress in other areas and not just levelling up. If a game has many activities that involved farming, husbandry or different types of building in the world that can involve helping your faction by making things for them or simply indulging in commerce and other forms of enjoyment that the developer has actually spent time and effort in the systems is my new way of having fun. It is not about soloing but actually playing the game in other ways. I enjoyed this in both Archeage and Black Desert.

Dailies are not it though. That is the lowest effort in creating content for a game and it shows. I quit games over dailies I will not be dragged into that cycle of utter soul crushing boredom.

Theocritus

and alot of the daily stuff is our, the gamers, fault...We are the ones that complain about leveling being too slow.  They are just giving what the players want, but the problem is the players are NEVER happy.

Dibdabs

"Dailies" and "End Game" are just glorified hamster wheels the Devs put in their games to keep the rubes happy.  It's tissue-thin game content wherein some players happily grind to get better gear to grind for better gear... over and over again, ad infinitum.  Somehow, they're too unperceptive to see it, poor things.

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user298

eoloe said:

I've just read in the last days several people explaining they quit various games (Lost Ark/ Destiny) because of its dailies.

Months ago, I dropped Genshin when I realized that I was logging in just for the dailies, getting the gems, possibly making a roll. I was not really doing any content anymore. I became a daily slave. So, I quit.

I understand that devs need content to keep players engaged. Anyway if they don't, players will complain! But how could they make the dailies more interesting or replacing them?

 

Developers could easily replace daily jobs (including equally boring, tedious work of "running the weekly raid to get some token for new armor piece which you can only do once a week") with many other forms of gameplay to keep most of the people wanting to log into the game. For example, give more tools for people to engage in open world PvP where there is a good incentive to permanently capture and hold some capturable territory and where there are plenty of such territories so no single group of players can capture and control all of them, with fully lootable gear and fully destructible defense structures (to make crafters always relevant). Or (for people who don't enjoy PvP) give people tools to create their own custom dungeons with custom loot and the ability to share those dungeons in game with other players. Or give players more tools to socialize with each other, like a support for full body motion trackers for your character (so players can use natural body gestures when interacting with each other instead of clicking on limited amount of in-game emotes) and built-in proximity voice chat (so players can organize their own concert events, with singing, or in-game talk shows, or in-game theater performances).

Thing is, vast majority of game developers are either too mentally deficient to understand the long term benefits of adding such form of self-sustaining player-driven gameplay in their games or are too lazy, or both. So we still have these monotonous, brainless "dailies/weeklies" as the only form of trying to keep people coming back to game (which does work well for some antisocial people who enjoy doing monotonous repetitive tasks all by themselves but doesn't really work well with majority of other people).

Mendel

Dailies are the main reason why I'm still hanging in with EQ1.  Not that there aren't horrid daily quests in EQ1 (Teek quests), it's just that they are everywhere.  EQ1 has long been known for its grind, and the only real way to progress is to do the dailies, which have far better XP than simply grinding.

However, due to the way they implemented the dailies, the EQ1 dailies came with a Hot Zone, where XP was boosted in the zone where the Teek quest sends you.  So, I can get a daily, and go grind in that zone and feel like I'm making some (marginal) bit of progress.  I occasionally finish the quest, for that extra touch of XP.

I'm not really in any hurry in a game, and I can be content with playing without feeling any need to rush to an endgame.  That mindset keeps me playing.

Kyleran

After quitting LA I realized the past month or so I had been logging into it only to do dailies which kept increasing as I got additional alts up to 1310.

So it's with great relief I'm free of them, so much so that despite returning to FO76 to play a new character I've refused to even look at the list of dailies. 

Some get completed though normal game play but I've refused to jump back on that or the "event" treadmill, screw the mothman, he can destroy Appalachia for all I care.

Also been ignoring the ritual queen fights, just very tired of treadmills, at least questing on my alt is mostly at my discretion what path I'll take for this time around to develop my character.

I haven't even bothered to worry about joining public groups for their bonuses, just doing my own thing and enjoying some random, totally unoptimized  gameplay.

olepi

I guess my approach to gaming is different than most. I have never done dailies.

I play MMO's like a virtual world. I like to live and move and have my being in the world, not try to maximize my time to achieve something. I've never done repetitive quests to gain the best armor, never run the same dungeon over and over to get the best drop.

In early games, like DAOC, Ryzom, CoH, and Vanguard, I'd do lots of grinding to level. Mostly to level my character. But this was all done with groups, and the fun part was the group. I spent months grinding to get my first mount in Vanguard, only to see a store get implemented where someone could just buy it.

Today's games seem to have major ADHD; people want to rush through it to get to the end. Speed runs over and over. Nobody talks, you can't take any time to read the story or look around, you'll be left behind. And of course, people are willing to pay money to NOT have to play the game.

Based on today's audience, I'm not sure what could replace dailies, or the endless running of the same dungeon over and over.

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Dattelis

Kyleran said:

After quitting LA I realized the past month or so I had been logging into it only to do dailies which kept increasing as I got additional alts up to 1310.

So it's with great relief I'm free of them, so much so that despite returning to FO76 to play a new character I've refused to even look at the list of dailies. 

Some get completed though normal game play but I've refused to jump back on that or the "event" treadmill, screw the mothman, he can destroy Appalachia for all I care.

Also been ignoring the ritual queen fights, just very tired of treadmills, at least questing on my alt is mostly at my discretion what path I'll take for this time around to develop my character.

I haven't even bothered to worry about joining public groups for their bonuses, just doing my own thing and enjoying some random, totally unoptimized  gameplay.

I kind of did the same thing during my last run in WoW before 9.2.5 release. I just leveled up characters because I admit that I like how leveling works in Shadowlands. Sometimes I'd do pvp or run some heroics/lfr just to get my 'fix' and then not log in for a while and just repeat until the sub lapsed. Raids and dungeons are fun in that game but unfortunately the arbitrary stuff in order to reach the 'challenge' has always been the problem with that game since around Legion. Only sad part is that I miss being limited by my skill level, not by how much mental endurance I have in order to run the same minor content everyday to reach a threshold where I'm able to do something harder (reaching rep thresholds, grinding torghast, etc). I'm sure 9.2.5 made some of the stuff less tedious but that's also been Blizzard's problem since forever: making content tedious at the start just to nerf it later.

Kyleran

Wargfoot said:

Kyleran said:

After quitting LA I realized the past month or so I had been logging into it only to do dailies which kept increasing as I got additional alts up to 1310.

So it's with great relief I'm free of them, so much so that despite returning to FO76 to play a new character I've refused to even look at the list of dailies. 

Some get completed though normal game play but I've refused to jump back on that or the "event" treadmill, screw the mothman, he can destroy Appalachia for all I care.

Also been ignoring the ritual queen fights, just very tired of treadmills, at least questing on my alt is mostly at my discretion what path I'll take for this time around to develop my character.

I haven't even bothered to worry about joining public groups for their bonuses, just doing my own thing and enjoying some random, totally unoptimized  gameplay.

Translation: I'm bad at games.  

Well that's a given really, but I think 10 yrs of "freedom" in EVE spoiled me from participating in more organized activities.

OldKingLog

Wargfoot said:

We've talked at length on this site about adding depth to a game, and more simulation aspects to a game, to increase longevity of a title.  

As a small example: To get a house in UO I had to earn money and find a housing location.  The finding of a housing location turned into a mini-quest where I ended up exploring a great deal of the world and checking back on houses near collapse.  It was fun and ate up a lot of time and didn't feel like a grind.

Instead of adding depth and variety to a game we get "Kill 10 wolves" repeated until our noses bleed.

I'm tired of discussing these things.

If people want daily grinds and think level appropriate gear grinds and color coded mobs is anything other than slavery then have at it.

I won't play that garbage anymore - I'll go read a book.

Yep same here. I remember when I used to be able to play MMORPGs for hours at a time. I can't do that any more. Not because I have less free time, I actually have quite a bit more these days. I can't play very long because I saw beyond their illusion of game progression and realized these games aren't worth spending hours on. My time could be far better spent elsewhere.

Ungood

Alright, I'll chime in.

In GW2, dailies are rewards for doing activities I would do anyway, so they just give me additional loot for my normal game time., Dailies that I would not normally do, I don't do.

Now I will admit, if you find yourself just logging in for the dailies, yah, you know you are on the burnout stage of playing, just like the people that log in to chat with guildies, and don't actually play anymore, they are just sitting in the social hubs, chatting away.

I mean, sure, discord has done a lot to move people way from logging into a game for social, which, no doubt has moved MMO's to find other ways to get people to log in, who are otherwise tired of the game.

But I would bet a lot of gamers will admit they have kept playing an MMO long past the point they should have stopped, for a great many reasons, it could anything from social, just to the idea that they were not ready to stop playing something they have invested so much time into already.

Personally, I think the time investment is what holds people the most, it's hard to walk away from something you have put several thousands of hours into, and gotten a lot of joy from, and in some cases filled us with a sense of accomplishment.

So, I'll just say it, It's not an easy choice to make to not log in today, which is why many of us who invest a lot of time into a single MMO, find ourselves logging in doing dailies, because we don't want to stop just yet, and were looking for an excuse, any excuse, to keep logging in just one more time, and dailies fit the bill.

Nature of the game, really.

So if you find yourself logging in just to do dailies, that means you are burned out, but not quite ready to stop playing.

And I respect this, in fact this is a throw back to Sub games, and really hits a lot of older players harder, because we were raised on sub games, and after finally admitting whatever was pissing you off about the game outweighed the good parts of the game, and finally walking away, well, when the urge to come back itched, paying that sub again, just to log back in, was one hell of a gatekeeper, and pretty much made any exit a permanent one.

So, I can get, if someone was an older gamer, or played sub based games, they would be already be conditioned to think that leaving a game was a big deal, unlike a lot of modern gamers, with the F2P games making game hopping and returning a common cultural thing, so much so, that people taking a few month break, is just common among the new generation of MMO players.

So dailies have their place, and if the game is F2P, don't be so hard on your self, if it is feeling stale, take a break, go learn to play the guitar or something else equally worthless, and come back if the itch arises, or maybe try something else, without that paywall of entry like the old sub days, nothing wrong with taking some time off here and there.

Kyleran

OldKingLog said:

Wargfoot said:

We've talked at length on this site about adding depth to a game, and more simulation aspects to a game, to increase longevity of a title.  

As a small example: To get a house in UO I had to earn money and find a housing location.  The finding of a housing location turned into a mini-quest where I ended up exploring a great deal of the world and checking back on houses near collapse.  It was fun and ate up a lot of time and didn't feel like a grind.

Instead of adding depth and variety to a game we get "Kill 10 wolves" repeated until our noses bleed.

I'm tired of discussing these things.

If people want daily grinds and think level appropriate gear grinds and color coded mobs is anything other than slavery then have at it.

I won't play that garbage anymore - I'll go read a book.

Yep same here. I remember when I used to be able to play MMORPGs for hours at a time. I can't do that any more. Not because I have less free time, I actually have quite a bit more these days. I can't play very long because I saw beyond their illusion of game progression and realized these games aren't worth spending hours on. My time could be far better spent elsewhere.

Stop!

Ungood

OldKingLog said:

Wargfoot said:

We've talked at length on this site about adding depth to a game, and more simulation aspects to a game, to increase longevity of a title.  

As a small example: To get a house in UO I had to earn money and find a housing location.  The finding of a housing location turned into a mini-quest where I ended up exploring a great deal of the world and checking back on houses near collapse.  It was fun and ate up a lot of time and didn't feel like a grind.

Instead of adding depth and variety to a game we get "Kill 10 wolves" repeated until our noses bleed.

I'm tired of discussing these things.

If people want daily grinds and think level appropriate gear grinds and color coded mobs is anything other than slavery then have at it.

I won't play that garbage anymore - I'll go read a book.

Yep same here. I remember when I used to be able to play MMORPGs for hours at a time. I can't do that any more. Not because I have less free time, I actually have quite a bit more these days. I can't play very long because I saw beyond their illusion of game progression and realized these games aren't worth spending hours on. My time could be far better spent elsewhere.

Actually, unless you are having fun, nothing is really worth  your free time.

You have work time, where you do your labors and chores, and the things that need to get done.

And you have free time, where you seek to do what brings you joy.

No joke, some people will bounce a ball at a wall for hours on end, with their free time, and find immense joy in that simple act.

Some people will stand around grunting as they lift heavy things, with the sole purpose of lifting a heavy thing, others desire to travel in circles either by foot, or wheeled device, who am I to judge what brings others joy, as long as they are not messing up my life.

So as long as you are having fun, that is what matters, when you cease to have fun, that is when it becomes time to do something else.

I think this is what people miss when they talk with players that enjoy the journey, they are there to have fun first, and rewards second. This in no way means they do not want the rewards, but they want to enjoy the trek as well as the destination.

AlBQuirky

"Slaves?" I think that each players chooses to log in to "their dailies."

Ungood said:

OldKingLog said:

Wargfoot said:

We've talked at length on this site about adding depth to a game, and more simulation aspects to a game, to increase longevity of a title.  

As a small example: To get a house in UO I had to earn money and find a housing location.  The finding of a housing location turned into a mini-quest where I ended up exploring a great deal of the world and checking back on houses near collapse.  It was fun and ate up a lot of time and didn't feel like a grind.

Instead of adding depth and variety to a game we get "Kill 10 wolves" repeated until our noses bleed.

I'm tired of discussing these things.

If people want daily grinds and think level appropriate gear grinds and color coded mobs is anything other than slavery then have at it.

I won't play that garbage anymore - I'll go read a book.

Yep same here. I remember when I used to be able to play MMORPGs for hours at a time. I can't do that any more. Not because I have less free time, I actually have quite a bit more these days. I can't play very long because I saw beyond their illusion of game progression and realized these games aren't worth spending hours on. My time could be far better spent elsewhere.

Actually, unless you are having fun, nothing is really worth  your free time.

You have work time, where you do your labors and chores, and the things that need to get done.

And you have free time, where you seek to do what brings you joy.

No joke, some people will bounce a ball at a wall for hours on end, with their free time, and find immense joy in that simple act.

Some people will stand around grunting as they lift heavy things, with the sole purpose of lifting a heavy thing, others desire to travel in circles either by foot, or wheeled device, who am I to judge what brings others joy, as long as they are not messing up my life.

So as long as you are having fun, that is what matters, when you cease to have fun, that is when it becomes time to do something else.

I think this is what people miss when they talk with players that enjoy the journey, they are there to have fun first, and rewards second. This in no way means they do not want the rewards, but they want to enjoy the trek as well as the destination.

Yes. Games are entertainment. If they cease to be fun, it's time look elsewhere, right?

When I  was a regular on the old "Bethesda Boards", the common thought process there was, "One doesn't BEAT a Bethesda Game. You EXPERIENCE it." Many of the old MMORPGs attracted players with a similar mindset. Not so much today. Neither is right or wrong, just different ways to play

Dailies serve a purpose. Like all games, it is up to each player to decide for themself. If Dailies provide enjoyment, play on. If not, move on