What MMO Do you think has the best Grind/Most rewarding Grind

tomy111 · January 2018

What MMO has the best/fun grind/Most rewarding Grind

http://www.strawpoll.me/14924222

LacedOpium · January 2018

Give its popularity, I would say BDO. Its pretty much its core game play after reaching level 50 or so. It has no end game by which to efficiently level other than grinding rotations ad nauseam.

AFAIC, however, ... Grind + fun = oxymoron.

cameltosis · January 2018

As LacedOpium said, a grind cannot be fun, otherwise it isn't a grind.

That said, in the spirit of your question, the "grind" that I most enjoyed was SWG (pre-cu). The primary reasons why it was enjoyable:

Choice - it wasn't some linear themepark garbage, I could "grind" when and where I wanted. I could pick virtually any planet and find stuff to grind. I could grind solo, small group or in a raid. I could just explore and kill everything, go to specific spots, like squill caves and grind there, or grind missions so that I earned money as well as XP. I was given tons of choice for leveling up, allowing me to pick what was most enjoyable for me on any given day.
Macros - perhaps counter-intuitive, but for something to be a grind, it has to be repetitive. Macros really helped ease the repetitiveness. SWGs combat was pretty shallow, so being able to create a macro and leave it running was a nice convenience factor, allowing me to spend more time enjoying the environment or chatting to my group or guild.
Social - I used to spend the majority of my time in a group, whether it was actively grinding missions with people out of Coronet or Anchorhead, or joining a solo-group so that I could get better missions on Dath. Combined with macros, as well as non-combat roles, it made the grind extremely social for me.
The world - sure, SWG's graphics were pretty shit, but there were still some beautiful locations and vistas, as well as interesting monsters to kill. I loved being in the SW universe. I had a particular love of Rancors, so spent an inordinate amount of time on Dathomir grinding rancor missions.

viznew · January 2018

haven and hearth has quite the grind and i love it should be on your list, and its only getting better as they keep updating

i love when a giant project comes to a end and you see the beauitfull things you crafted or built (ima builder)

here is a recent stream of a tour of the greatest city in the greatest kingdome by the greatest king lol

ChicagoCub · January 2018

By its very definition if its a "grind" its not fun and by extension if its fun its not a grind.

WellzyC · January 2018

I love any MMO that has group grinding.

DAoC for example. You "could" solo in that game, but the exp was painfully slow. Group grinding camps was the best way to level and I LOVED IT.

The conversations, the comradery. Group based exp is the bees knees.

Xthos · January 2018

I would say for me, probably EQ1. I see WoW and BDO were high up there, which are more recent/bigger, but I only played WoW beta, and didn't play BDO, so no idea about them. EQ1 you had a lot of rare drops/spawns to camp, and you also had alternate advancement experience, so you would knock both out at the same time. The AAs could be pretty powerful, once you got some advancement lines done.

I don't know about a grind not being fun, I dislike daily grind type stuff, but I did have fun grinding some stuff in EQ1 (mostly the dungeon stuff with big pulls and a group). Grinding solo/duo (with my wife, to help her, she plays support classes, like Chanter/Cleric) in a zone did get a little tiring sometimes, but I usually had fun in a good group (had a rotation of 6-8 very good people) grinding dungeons.

GeezerGamer · January 2018

DMKano said:

If you are really feeling the grind - none, as you are not having fun at that point.

However grinding mobs as "mass slaughter of mobs" - heres my list, is quite fun (for me):

- EQ1 swarming has no equal (this is literally pulling almost an enitire zone of mobs and killing them all - at 150+ mobs the lag is unreal and players can crash out of the zone). Since most games have leashing mobs EQ1 remains unique in this way.

- BDO - when properly geared for an area (you know this if you are 1-2 shotting mobs, and 3 shotting the larger health ones) it is extremely fun for me. It is sad to see so many players fight in the wrong areas (undergreared) where you see them fight a couple of mobs for like half a minute - move to a lower AP area as you are just wasting your time

- ARPGs - this is why I love the genre - blowing up wave after wave of bad guys... love it.

- Rift invasions in Rift - entire zones overtaken by mobs - I wish more games did this. Beating back the invasion is so satisfying

- Defiance Arkfalls - again I wish more games did this type of content with mass invasion of bad guys - gets very chaotic but man its just so fun blowing up the Volge horde

I am agreeing with the Rift statement. In fact reading up on the recent Rift announcement, That very scenario is what I was reminiscing about. I loved those zone invasions.

GeezerGamer · January 2018

I still say, Anarchy Online had the best character progression. Ever.

Kyleran · January 2018

For me it the "why" or purpose of grinding and most important what do I accomplish from grinding.

The activity itself does not need to be fun, in fact if it can be done more or less mindlessly like mining in EVE while I watch Netflix, all the better.

What it must provide is a steady progression to a goal I'm seeking.

L2 got it wrong in my book, progresson slowed down far too much for my tastes which was blocking from effective castle sieging, playing with my "friends" was not enough of a benefit to climb what I estimated to be a 1.5 year slog. (Then the first expansion came out, oh my.)

I love EVE, because there is no skill grinding, continuous progression well suits me.

ISK is what we grind, and it's just so damn useful. From funding a mining fleet, to PVP ships to blow other players up, to building your own empire, all ISK I've ever earned (along with 1/2 a billion accumulated skill points) are as equally valuable today as when I first joined in 2007.

Well, except for that damned Rorquel training, maybe I need to rejoin and start flying one in PVP.

baphamet · January 2018

EQ1 for me.

Loke666 · January 2018

Hmmm, I think Lineage as it was when the western version got released had the best grind.

There are many other games that had good grind including Guildwars (1) which had rather little grind but compensating that by having high difficulty and interesting ggroup mechanics (before it got nerfed) and for that matter old Meridian 59.

EQ had a tad too much grind for my taste, it was a good game but could have cut down grinding a bit anyways.

SedrynTyros said:

There seems to be a consensus here that a "grind" has to mean it's not fun, but I've never seen it that way and I'm not sure why that's how the term is being used now. All of the original MMOs had massive grinds. Seriously .... of them. Are we now going to tell ourselves that those MMOs weren't fun because they were grindy? I loved Dark Age of Camelot but leveling was a massive grind.

I've never thought of grinding as being inherently unfun. Grinding to me implies having to do the same or similar tasks over and over again to achieve specific goals. It can be tedious to some, but believe it or not some people appreciate and even enjoy monotonous tasks.

Well, grinding is repeating content over and over which can be very boring depending on the content. It also doesn't help if the content is very hard, or worse, very easy.

Sometimes grinding can be fun but far to often you do the same daily quest over and over which suck. Also is grinding far less annoying in PvP since you get a little variation there.

Clearly is that there is good and bad grinding.

cameltosis · January 2018

SedrynTyros said:

There seems to be a consensus here that a "grind" has to mean it's not fun, but I've never seen it that way and I'm not sure why that's how the term is being used now. All of the original MMOs had massive grinds. Seriously .... of them. Are we now going to tell ourselves that those MMOs weren't fun because they were grindy? I loved Dark Age of Camelot but leveling was a massive grind.

I've never thought of grinding as being inherently unfun. Grinding to me implies having to do the same or similar tasks over and over again to achieve specific goals. It can be tedious to some, but believe it or not some people appreciate and even enjoy monotonous tasks.

Grind has always been a negative term. If you look in the dictionary, it is defined as "hard dull work".

Even in the MMO world, I've never heard anyone use grind in a positive way. There has definitely been a trend towards calling anything repetitive a grind, regardless of whether the player enjoyed it or not, and thats an incorrect usage of the term. But even as I look through this thread and read the reasons for people enjoying various "grinds", they tend to not actually enjoy the grind itself, it's just other things they were able to do at the same time, such as watch netflix, or earning money, or socialising. The activity that is being repeated still isn't referred to positively.

Sinsai · January 2018

WellzyC said:

I love any MMO that has group grinding.

DAoC for example. You "could" solo in that game, but the exp was painfully slow. Group grinding camps was the best way to level and I LOVED IT.

The conversations, the comradery. Group based exp is the bees knees.

I have to agree with the above statement.

You can, in fact, enjoy grinding by spending that grind with friends, family and guildies who you enjoy being around chatting with.

I LOVED grinding in DAOC/EQ/AC1.

Celcius · January 2018

I don't really think most MMOs are good at this, tbh. I think the best time MMOs are is when it does not feel like a grind. I think as far as raw killing monsters and having fun progressing, however, the reward goes to the not-so-mmo Path of Exile.

Panther2103 · January 2018

It depends on how you are looking at the term grind as other people have stated.

Personally if you can call just killing mobs a grind, even if you enjoy it or not then I would say FFXI, L2, or BDO have been my favorite games to mindlessly kill mobs.

In FFXI I loved going and getting a group together and just camping mobs for hours. You really felt the difference between levels as you gained levels slowly and you could tell when you leveled up with the damage you took and damage you output (or whatever your specific class did).

In L2 I enjoyed grinding in groups in the Necropolis / Catacombs because there was the slight increase in adena gained based on the seals if you wanted to put them towards selling to other players, or you could turn them in. It was also really easy to grind in as you could just click a mob and talk to other players while downing it, unless it was a more difficult area.

BDO is just pure craziness when you are grinding mobs. You are doing all kinds of skills and flying around and it's just fun feeling. Having pets pick up loot is nice too as you can just keep going and going and going. Also the fact that you can have your dropped gear go straight to auction (for lower prices than putting it up yourself) was sweet because you would get an additional boost in gold. I actually don't think I've ever had more fun just mindlessly killing mobs in any game ever by myself than in BDO.

Loke666 · January 2018

cameltosis said:

SedrynTyros said:

There seems to be a consensus here that a "grind" has to mean it's not fun, but I've never seen it that way and I'm not sure why that's how the term is being used now. All of the original MMOs had massive grinds. Seriously .... of them. Are we now going to tell ourselves that those MMOs weren't fun because they were grindy? I loved Dark Age of Camelot but leveling was a massive grind.

I've never thought of grinding as being inherently unfun. Grinding to me implies having to do the same or similar tasks over and over again to achieve specific goals. It can be tedious to some, but believe it or not some people appreciate and even enjoy monotonous tasks.

Grind has always been a negative term. If you look in the dictionary, it is defined as "hard dull work".

Even in the MMO world, I've never heard anyone use grind in a positive way. There has definitely been a trend towards calling anything repetitive a grind, regardless of whether the player enjoyed it or not, and thats an incorrect usage of the term. But even as I look through this thread and read the reasons for people enjoying various "grinds", they tend to not actually enjoy the grind itself, it's just other things they were able to do at the same time, such as watch netflix, or earning money, or socialising. The activity that is being repeated still isn't referred to positively.

To be fair do some people actually enjoy hard dull work as well. The term is indeed mostly negative but until someone invents an AI that constantly add new content you need grind if people are to spend months or years in the same game, even in full sandbox games.

And there is clearly "good" grind and "bad" grind as well. Good grind might be repetetive but it isn't terrible and add something to the game. Bad grind is so boring that only greed can keep you playing it.
Daily quests you already done many times are a good example of bad grind, or a kill 100 (or more) skeleton quests.

Good grind is more redoing a large dungeon several times to get that drop you want or finding all materials to craft an epic piece of gear.

I don't see how we could get rid of grind in a MMO the next 10 years but we could minimize the bad grind at least and make it less painful. We can also mix in more of the actual fun parts as well.

Another thing is that MMOs today have very little grind until you hit the endgame but then it gets an insane amount of it. That is probably one of the bigest reasons so many players are less and less happy with MMOs endgame today. The grind need to be portioned out better.

dougha1 · January 2018

The first Guild Wars. Pick an outpost. Then pick an adjacent explorable and go in. Wander around, carefully fighting mobs one group at a time. Kill stuff and take the loot. The landscape is not simply traversed: some areas could even be called maze-like. And the landscapes are so well done.

That's a fun grind. Admitedly, a slow grind, but just the right mix of elements to make it fun. For years.

p.s. also fun to chat on guild chat whilst grinding.

Cryomatrix · January 2018

cameltosis said:

SedrynTyros said:

Grind has always been a negative term. If you look in the dictionary, it is defined as "hard dull work".

Doesn't grinding on a dance floor with a girl, mean you are dancing in very close proximity with your legs between her legs or whatever?

Cryomatrix

Albatroes · January 2018

Currently? The most rewarding grind would've been Archeage if it had a sub only server since the stuff you work on continues to persist and isn't obsolete after 3-6 months like clock work just so that "people can catch up."

Second, I'm honestly leaning towards SWL and ESO mainly because you can upgrade the gear that you want to up to legendary status, it just takes alot of money and luck (more so on ESO's part probably) I assume.

But this is just current and what I have personal experience with. If it was all time rewarding grind games, it would definitely be FFXI followed by RO in my mind (I didn't really play EQ in my early years but would probably add both if I did).

Mikeha · January 2018

Lineage 2 because it was fun and rewarding.

Vynt · January 2018

Grind is intended to be used as repetitive not fun work, but most people use the word as repetitive and add good or bad to it now.

I tend not to use the word grind unless it really is something that I'm not having fun doing, but for some reason I need to. An example for me would be grinding out dailies in WoW, ugh.

When I played EQ1 and I was at a camp for like 8 hours, I never called it a grind because I was having fun doing it. Seeing my experience go up, and then my AA go up and gaining new skills, winning rare drops, it was fun for me, thus not a grind. I would just call it camping (or even playing, lol). Think some other terms were used too, but now, most people will just say like, was having fun grinding out those levels for the last 8 hours.

To use the word in the newer way, I found my grinds to be good when I was in a group and could see progression or drops.

Octagon7711 · January 2018

L2 was good especially when you were buffed and could one shot mobs or had a healer and dps working together.
ESO double XP event grinding dark anchors.
SWTOR double XP event.
GW2 boss train.
A few others but I enjoyed the ones listed above the most.

Theocritus · January 2018

GeezerGamer said:

I still say, Anarchy Online had the best character progression. Ever.

This was my pick....Never felt like a grind to me.

MightyUnclean · January 2018

EQ1, because you accomplished the grind while socializing with other humans. That, and the fact that each piece of gear you obtained actually meant something and might be with you for months, if not over a year.

darkhalf357x · January 2018

Grind to me is something that is a step above mindless but lower than complete attention where I can do something over and over, like someone else said, towards a progressing goal.

I only realized this recently as I started to question why I play MMORPGs, but more importantly why do I keep looking.

EQ1 - Graphics are horrible. UI is a mess. But I loved the hell out of this game and to this day really haven't found anything else that is like it. Almost as if MMORPGs devolved instead of evolved. 300 zones. Tons of monsters. Crafting. Housing. (almost) Endless progression with over 10,000 AA. The problem with EQ is age. In 2017 grinding through the late 50s to mid 80s is downright borderline torture to me. And end game looks entertaining but I dont have the resolve to make it

WOW - Questing in terms of structure is the best around. Leveling 1-60 was awesome. They lost me with the expansions. Completely jarring and unrelated content came off as if it was meant to be played at that time and wasn't part of a larger narrative. Lack of housing is stupid. You always need a personal space to display your trophies.

I could go on with the others I've tried, but for me, right now, ESO hits that mark. Its almost a spiritual successor to EQ1 in structure, and Im speaking current game one tamriel, not beta and early game. The mobs require a bit more attention than my definition but it only draws you to the combat and absolutely gorgeous world they created. Everything in this game is a grind. Crafting is a grind. Gear is a grind. Skills are a grind. Housing is a grind. But the time grinding is filled with so many nuances that bring the entire game world together.

Its that aspect that I look for because if I'm drawn to the world through gameplay, I won't mind grinding to see more of it.

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What MMO Do you think has the best Grind/Most rewarding Grind

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What MMO Do you think has the best Grind/Most rewarding Grind

Comments

Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV

"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey