I see a lot of complaints about grinding and was just wondering what you would replace some of the grind with?
If you replace the grind with something repetitive players might say “Not another quest that replaces grinding”. And why is it always a “quest that replaces grinding?”. Players will burn out on it as well. So shouldn’t it be a mix of different, innovative ways of questing in order to not burn players out and keep it somewhat fresh?
So what questing mechanic would you replace grinding with or reduce the overall amount of grinding with?
EDITED: Changed title because it was misleading. It use to say “replace grinding with” but I wasn’t looking to replace all grinding just the insane amounts of grinding Blizz puts on just about everything.
grinding is cheap…they save money when we run
the hamster wheel…i’m not a game developer…
but, if i was, i would be looking for creative alternatives…
or at least ways to mask the grind in captivating storyline
or something…they appear TOO LAZY to bother.
Exactly but what ideas could we suggest to them that would make that grind more enjoyable. I’m tired of kill this many of this quests. I’m going to have to think about this because I really want to know what the better, more enjoyable way is.
Let me grind for specific pieces of gear for pvp from a vendor instead of essentially just buying scratch tickets in hopes of lotteryboxing a piece I might need (but probably dont)
When they do that RNG crap I wish it was smart RNG that checked if you had that ilvl gear in the same spot and if you did then it would roll it for one you didn’t.
It is more that I would NOT put so many things behind grinds and time gating. I first got a regular sub during MOP. I looked at crafting professions and saw that most required reputation (grinds) something I did not consider fun. So I picked Jewelcrafting because I could do that without reputation grinding. I had fun.
I was annoyed during WOD because Pathfinder was going to require a bunch of things I don’t normally do. (I don’t play the game “the way you are supposed to”). I was about to quit for good except that I had made enough gold and was able to buy a bunch of Medallions of the Legion to bump some rep that otherwise I would not have got.
The first things the devs can do is allow flight at max level for free, and let pathfinder be an account wide reward. Many people do not like grinding specifically for Pathfinder, so get rid of it. But, then people won’t have a reason to grind, and they are supposed spend all their time do rep grinds, is that it?
I agree we have too many grinds. everything seems to have a grind now-a-days and it gets boring real fast.
I’ve said this before but when flight becomes available they should allow you to buy it per toon or unlock it account wide with Pathfinder. Simple and makes both arguments happy.
for rep grinding I’d do it like they did it in WOTLK. Get the tabards at neutral and use them in 5 man dungeons to gain rep for that faction. It was a better system over all. None of this having to wait for daily resets so you can do more rep grinding. it would also make dungeons relevant again. it’s not totally eliminating the rep grind, but it is better than only being able to get so much per day.
Give people a reason to revisit old zones. Keep creating new content, but continue to flesh out the old zones as well with max level content and phasing.
Griding is apart of every mmo. For the pvpers though who just want to pvp, they should have some system in place that allows for them to get in the instanced pvp action right away instead of having to farm pve content, but whatever that system would be (like GW2s pvp system for instance) shouldn’t cross over in to pve.
I’d also like rep for killing mobs. Doesn’t have to be much maybe 5 - 10 rep each but at least it allows players to still farm.
I’ve said this exact thing in a couple other posts. If you add new content to old zones they still serve a pupose and make the otherwise dead zone become more lively again which is a win win situation imo.
Grinding is part but it shouldn’t be everything and it seems that Blizz makes it part of every new piece of content.
For PvP I would like to see vendors return and in order to get PvP gear you would have to farm/grind honor or something like you did back in the day instead of hoping for a mark to drop. I agree it should not cross over. Never PvP’d in GW2 so not sure what their system is.
Just go back to when we could craft our pre-raid BIS gear and get the occasional endgame BIS from a world drop or AH. They can even still keep dailies for people who don’t want to farm and craft. You can also split the difference. Do dailies for a few pieces and when you’re bored stiff of them you can go skin mats and make the rest.
In GW2 you get full access to your class’ talents/abilities from the start when in instanced pvp content, as well as your pick of which runes you want to use on your pvp gear (runes are basically like wow class sets, so some do big aoe dmg, some single target, some for tankiness, etc).
Pve grinding in wow could do with a lot less rng, but there will always be some sort of grind.
Edit: I’m not trying to fanboy for GW2, the game was just mentioned in a different thread so the systems are fresh in my mind lol But I do think they get it right in this regard.
I think “grinding” means something different to each person.
I personally don’t mind questing until the quest is a PITA, e.g. the turtle quests in BfA, quests that are deliberately harder than they need to be, or quests that make you fly back and forth and back and forth, etc… for no good reason.
I think experience gain should be a combination of questing and other skills gain, if nothing else it would break the monotony. We gain experience for picking herbs and mining ore but why no character experience for fishing, skinning, tailoring, etc… Also, solo dungeons I think would go a long way to break up the monotony. Yes, team play is valuable and they should keep that too but for days when you don’t want to put up with the 30 minute dungeon queue, or want to solo, it would be great to queue for a solo dungeon.
The problem I have with this expansion isn’t so much the amount of things in this game that requires grind (as I’ve always been one to grind rep and other things in the past) … it’s how many player power progression systems there are in the game that is gated behind the grind.
I mean, we’re long gone from the days where it was simply tier sets and trinkets. Now we have Azerite gear, essences, cloaks, corruption in addition to raid gear and trinkets. But each one of the BFA systems requires a tedious amount of micromanagement with each upgrade point feeling like baby steps and taking entirely way too long.
I don’t think anyone wants to “replace” grinding. The key is that every grind should be and feel rewarding and, imo, have a fixed end that is the culmination of your efforts. Endless, open grinds are poor design.
I think in the past, even in Legion itself, I generally felt like I was being rewarded for my time. WQs for rep? Cool. Raid quests for gear and appearances? Great. Sure, some of the RNG sucked, like paragon cache mounts (which should have been on the rep vendors to begin with…) but getting them wasn’t a big issue to at least try.
They time gated a lot in Legion, and in the past, but I don’t recall it ever being this…disheartening. Maybe it’s just my perception of BfA, I don’t know. In the past they were able to make grinding fun or at least tolerable, because it was while I was doing activities I’d normally be doing anyway. Or in Legion’s case, activities I normally wouldn’t like normal mode raiding.
To returning PvP vendors