What's the point of flying an Eagle if you can't dent the overpowered AI anymore with your peashooter?
Grinding isn't the player's fault
- Thread starter WeavingBird1917
- Start date
What's the point of flying an Eagle if you can't dent the overpowered AI anymore with your peashooter?
What else do you do? To give you an idea of my 'threshold of boring', I once went to the center of the galaxy for fun, which is over 26K Ly away, but I first took a detour to Colonia. I didn't feel that it was boring, as it was my first time doing it. Just honk and next galaxy as I couldn't afford the detailed surface scanner, and I used the money to buy the best warp drive, took 4-5 days. But to add to my point, it did take a while of doing mundane tasks such as trading and bounty hunting to get up to that point. I hated mining, and got bored of trading, so I went to bounty hunting, but that gotten a bit repetitive after a while. Since it was the first time on such a long trip, it was actually pretty fun for me. But if I still think there could be more activities to do, maybe a better economy system or stock market system, as things did get a bit boring after a while. The Professor Palin missions were actually great, but now they took it away. The Palin cargo racks could hardly hold anything, so I opted just to use normal cargo holds and rush back just in time before my ship blew up from the corrosive cargo.
Hmmm, yes, the only choice if you want access to much of Elite's content, particularly being competitive at anything (and I'm not just talking about pvp).
I guess I'd call what I do edge of bubble exploration. I fly around on the outskirts of civilization in search of systems that offer ideal conditions for large ship mission running. I usually search for them in a medium or small ship, and work up local rep in the same ship before bringing a cutter out.
I then bounce between missions, mostly cargo delivery, bounty hunting and CZ's, with a bulk of my time spent running delivery missions. By the time I have everything in the systems working to my advantage and I'm getting settled into a new home, I usually head off in search of a new place.
I also spend a fair amount of time fitting ships & engineering, which I really enjoy.
I've noticed that when players talk about the game getting boring, they usually get accused for 'grinding' the game. I myself haven't made any threads or comments about Elite Dangerous getting boring, but I disagree that the player should be blamed for grinding the game. And to state my view clearly, I do agree that the game gets a little boring after 100 hours, which is about over half a week worth of time. I mean, I was checking out 'games to play while watching something' on Reddit, and one of the most recommended games is Elite Dangerous, and looking at the 'helpful' Steam reviews, a lot of people seem to be talking about the game getting boring. So I don't think that most people who find the game boring do so because they've simply tried grinding it.
A lot of people do rightly state that it is a space sim, and there is 'a lot of space', however I also think that it would be more enjoyable if flying required more skills. For example, I play flight sim, truck sim, where you basically just drive or fly around, but before you know it, I look at the Steam and find out I've played over 100 hours on them. Or I think a better example is Factorio or Rimworld (Factorio did use to feel a little grindy towards the end). You play for a bit and before you know it you've clocked over 200 hours in each game. All of these games, except flight sim have a structure which requires you to obtain better and better items and equipment, which is what most people attribute grinding in ED with. The contrast for me, is that ED gets boring much quicker, because it requires less skill and attention, and also because things start repeating. Since everything is mostly the same, and travelling doesn't take much technical skill, it gets boring quite quick, whereas in the other games, you don't even think about grinding.
My point is, if players feel the need to grind, they shouldn't be blamed. It just means that the gameplay isn't interesting enough or has nothing new to it to keep their attention, and as a result players only feel excitement when working up to that next ship or item. But if they hate the game instantly, then it probably isn't for them
I think a game is used correctly if it's fun. How that is accomplished is not really important (though I consider fun by annoying others as unsocial and infantile behavior). If a player likes to grind like no tomorrow and likes that, that's fine I guess.
Some people just like to say the game is all about grinding (and they don't like it and complain about it), which definitely is wrong. There are conditions under which you really have to grind, which mostly comes down to wanting something fast which is supposed to take time.
I am playing for about 3 years now and never grinded anything and also was never annoyed or bored playing Elite.
Games typically fall into two categories
- Tight, single player, clear completion criteria, story driven games
- Wider, multiplayer, open ended, experience games
Frontier are definitely trying to make Elite the latter.
Frontier have added lots of diverse content to allow people to do 'things' once they have established themselves in game.
- Combat vs NPCs ships
- Combat vs Other players (both CPC and in-game)
- Combat vs Thargoids (of different types)
- Space exploration
- Mining
- Thargoid sites
- Guardian Ruins
- Engineers
- SRV driving
- Multi-crew
- Wing missions
- Trading
- Passenger ferrying (A-B)
- Passenger sightseeing (loop journeys)
- Skimmer missions
- BGS
- Player Minor Factions
- PowerPlay
- Community goals
In addition, other players have also created Player content such as:
- Expeditions
- SRV racing
- BuckyBall racing
- Canyon running
- Fuel Ratting
- (Rock Ratting)
I am sure that there are other things that you can do in game that I haven't listed above but my point is, if you find something boring, go and do something else, there is plenty to do.
- Tight, single player, clear completion criteria, story driven games
- Wider, multiplayer, open ended, experience games
Frontier are definitely trying to make Elite the latter.
Frontier have added lots of diverse content to allow people to do 'things' once they have established themselves in game.
- Combat vs NPCs ships
- Combat vs Other players (both CPC and in-game)
- Combat vs Thargoids (of different types)
- Space exploration
- Mining
- Thargoid sites
- Guardian Ruins
- Engineers
- SRV driving
- Multi-crew
- Wing missions
- Trading
- Passenger ferrying (A-B)
- Passenger sightseeing (loop journeys)
- Skimmer missions
- BGS
- Player Minor Factions
- PowerPlay
- Community goals
In addition, other players have also created Player content such as:
- Expeditions
- SRV racing
- BuckyBall racing
- Canyon running
- Fuel Ratting
- (Rock Ratting)
I am sure that there are other things that you can do in game that I haven't listed above but my point is, if you find something boring, go and do something else, there is plenty to do.
Interesting, might try that. I usually stick and get my rep up with systems within the core of the bubble. I tried searching for very far systems once months ago, but found they had little to no missions, perhaps bad luck.
Achilles7
Banned
Remember to meet in a public place...Hampstead Heath is a popular choice.
Sounds like you found your perfect game
. There is a higher than normal number of people who complain about ED getting boring though, when compared to more mundane games (in theory) such as Euro Truck Simulator 2 for example, although I think most of its appeal is due to the relaxation it offers (I'm not joking, it's rated like 10/10 on Steam). I'm sure there are many who complain that the game is boring after grinding like no tomorrow, but from friends I've played ED with, those who play the game to perfection usually don't complain about it (eg: players who spend forever getting the best items, and making everything as efficient as possible).
I'm slinging poo. Not too sure who at though, but it's going everywhere.
I can't agree, none of my ships are fully engineered except maybe my speed build courier but that's stripped down for weight so not much effort.
Most are a mix of G3/4/5 with some stuff I never touch. Combat ships need thrusters, distrubuter, weps and shields. Explorer ships need a good FSD. That's about it really.
NPC's even elite wing assassinations in solo are no real threat, unless I decide to stay after it goes wrong.
The problem is - to acquire 'skills' you have to repeat (grind, in some peoples vernacular) a task until you become good at it (as in real life) - some things just take time, instant gratification just makes peoples boredom threshold even shorter (if that's possible).
Like several other commentators, I have progressed / ranked up / whatever, but not deliberately, more by just doing what I enjoy, and that happening to be a consequence of playing.
If I find myself for example becoming bored of passenger missions, I go mining for a while, or exploring into the deep.
At times, I'm as guilty as the next man of thinking there isn't a lot to do in ED, where there are actually a whole load of options - it's just easy to forget that they are there.
Edit: - I see your point re:travelling - but not sure what skills you could introduce into going from a -> b - they've tried, by adding mustn't be scanned etc.
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I agree, the game is at complete fault here:
- gameplay gets stale... so things get boring pretty fast.
- the amount of repetition is HUGE! Anything is hundreds of times repetition. RNG makes things even worse.
- actions take time. Traveling takes a LONG time and it is like 90% of the game but at the same time you are just sitting - this is a serious gameplay flaw. Gathering materials take a LONG time. Finding anything takes a LONG time, etc.
- game gives you goals, but makes it hard to do other things while you are trying to do some goal. Example, gather materials for engineer A, involves flying really far and have no other gameplay options (you take your taxi ship to do this, so can’t explore/fight/mine/etc).
- no other options of accomplishing the goals, you need material X, but can’t buy it can’t trade it, etc. You are stuck searching and mining for it.
The only option for players is to just find the fastest way to do anything and just grind it out. Otherswise it would take you months/years to get anything the game.
- gameplay gets stale... so things get boring pretty fast.
- the amount of repetition is HUGE! Anything is hundreds of times repetition. RNG makes things even worse.
- actions take time. Traveling takes a LONG time and it is like 90% of the game but at the same time you are just sitting - this is a serious gameplay flaw. Gathering materials take a LONG time. Finding anything takes a LONG time, etc.
- game gives you goals, but makes it hard to do other things while you are trying to do some goal. Example, gather materials for engineer A, involves flying really far and have no other gameplay options (you take your taxi ship to do this, so can’t explore/fight/mine/etc).
- no other options of accomplishing the goals, you need material X, but can’t buy it can’t trade it, etc. You are stuck searching and mining for it.
The only option for players is to just find the fastest way to do anything and just grind it out. Otherswise it would take you months/years to get anything the game.
There are no goals in the game - just options, you don't have to do any of them in order to play the game.
It's more sandbox, than arrow pointing left saying go this way, and in order to do so, you must do a,b, and c
Gameplay gets stale so fast that there are players whom have sunk 1000's of hours into it...
The point being that just because the game offers you the option to go from sidey to Annie in 24 hours it doesn't mean you have to.
Travelling is part of the game, but you don't have to pick the mission that takes you 1000's of light years from the star, you can pick one where the desired station is right next to it.
You don't even have to find the engineering materials you want, take the ones you have but don't want and exchange them for the ones you do.
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Fake argument. You can set your own goals. Else there'd be nothing to do.
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Make grinding Open-only.
Apparently that fixes ALL problems.
Apparently that fixes ALL problems.
