Why are player complaining about grinding?
- Thread starter lemny
- Start date
I hope they learned the lesson. It's not in their interest to release something that needs permanent rebalancing and revision like they did with engineers.
Also, this is a story even, they only get one shot. You cannot wait for a year to start engaging in the feature (like i did with engineers), because the story progresses.
StiTch is completely right though.
Bad grind in ED is essentially a place-holder time sink for the sake of being a time sink.
If it was possible to raid a base and in and among the fun you acquired plenty of materials for crafting stuff then you wont feel like you're literally doing one thing, for the sake of one goal that may or may not succeed, faced with the prospect of then being back again, to the same place, picking up the same stuff for a re-run of that goal that may or may not succeed; slave to the randomness of sucking at dice- dice rolling that achieves nothing other than a good chance the player is ushered into returning to the same place again, for yet another chance at rolling the dice. If that's not a grind-cycle I don't know what is.
At some point, one has to question if RNG really is the best placeholder mechanic for this. Upon the realisation that I have made the re run countless times and no better off for it, i tend to think not.
I'd rather be having fun, with my upgraded engine exploring cats paw or orion nebula... not stuck at Farseer rolling dice.
To the OP and ultimate question:
Why are player complaining about grinding?
Wouldn't be complaining about grinding, if it wasn't a grind
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I certainly feel like I've found a way. I usually call it, "Play in parallel, not serially." I'm constantly on the look out for ways to accomplish multiple goals at the same time, and I personally feel it works well for me.
i dont mind some work to get rep or whatever to get a permit. but i grew up before home computers and i grew as a gamer with games that were offline only and took days of play to complete. the reason players complain now is, elite is an old style game, with an open mode. players are used to Call of Duty style pathetic play in 6 hours and never play it again single player campaign then going to mp mode and just shooting everything. and then in a week or month or so spending money on the next game. they want to blast through everything until complete and elite isnt like that. they dont know how to handle it. they have no patience the younglings.In some new 2.4 threads player are fearing they have to grind for the new modules which are coming to fight the Thargoids.
I can't understand, why grinding is branded as such a bad thing by so many players out there.
In an huge sandbox like ED, you can't generate one unique experience after another and fill hundreds if not thousands of hours with it.
If you want to be able to get the an A-rated, fully engineered Anaconda without grinding, then you would be there in 10 to 20 hours... and then what?
Grinding is the only thing to keep player occupied for long periods of time.
The same goes for the RNG at the engineers. At the first glance, I also thought that could be annoying... but since FD removed the commodities and tripled the loot, I am totally fine with it.
And if they didn't used RNG and let you simply buy the best outcomes for enough mats/money, we all had much less to do and would be bored even faster.
Many times I was going after some mats simply to try few rolls on my already top notch engineered modules because of the chance for a bonus. And it was fun, most of the times... and it was "something to do".
Sure, there are many things in ED that could be improved within these grind mechanics to make them even more fun, but the base of the game play should be always a grind with a kind of asymptotic progression where you can achieve reasonable results in not too much time but the top notch things should take a long time to keep things interesting.
just sayin...
EDIT: How about some optional "special" rolls for 3,5 or even 10 times the amount of materials or some additional very rare mats, which results are between the actual stats and the best possible outcome on an already modded Module. This should guarantee a progression and a reward feeling and would be a bit more fun and less frustrating near the top results.
That wasn't about players, but rather in response to the post about thinking playing "for real" is something you do after upgrades rather than something you do while you wait for upgrades. For some of us that doesn't come naturally, be it engineering or rank. Credits can be thrown in of you're concerned about pacing, but everything seems to make some headway there.
I never made it to tier 5 anything, but that's mostly a side point about how the process, IMHO, brings out the worst in the otherwise well built fundamentals the game has. I refused to engage in that and as a result have peaked. That's not the biggest issue when viewing ED in isolation, but it becomes an issue for anyone not already addicted to this game to the exclusion of other games. This game became WAY lower than others in fun per time spent when chasing improvements and everything else was more of the same. Why would the average player stick with that in the face of other options for their gaming time? It's something I genuinely don't get.
I did relog extensively for about a month. I'm primarily a combat pilot, but where content seemed readily available I couldn't leverage it for rank, and where I could leverage it for rank, work seemed sparse. The 17 Draconis happened. Most fun I'd ever had in game despite crashes because the mission system can't handle the at the time 20 stack limit. Hitting CZs and fighting until the missions were finished or my defenses gave out and actually seeing tangible progress was amazing. But it was patched out, and now I'm back on the hiatus I was on prior to discovering that. And that was for rank.
Engineering is right out for me as it makes every act of gameplay IMHO worse. The RNG aspect sucks so much fun out of otherwise better activities. Combat is better without stopping to salvage wrecks. Missions are better without the disappointment of not having what you need, same for USS. Farming land bases or wake farts for data was something that was always out of the way since it was never a normal occurrence. Farming wasn't needed for roll 100, it was needed for access in some cases and G3 roll #1 for me.
I've never HAD 20 rolls worth of materials on me at one point in time. There was always something missing (at least from what I was looking at) and on the few rolls I did it was one at a time. You generalizations about mass rolling don't apply to me, but I still feel like the system is highly unentertaining. I mean honestly, this game has me enjoying No Man's Sky right now by comparison.
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Blackcompany
Banned
In some new 2.4 threads player are fearing they have to grind for the new modules which are coming to fight the Thargoids.
I can't understand, why grinding is branded as such a bad thing by so many players out there.
In an huge sandbox like ED, you can't generate one unique experience after another and fill hundreds if not thousands of hours with it.
If you want to be able to get the an A-rated, fully engineered Anaconda without grinding, then you would be there in 10 to 20 hours... and then what?
Grinding is the only thing to keep player occupied for long periods of time.
The same goes for the RNG at the engineers. At the first glance, I also thought that could be annoying... but since FD removed the commodities and tripled the loot, I am totally fine with it.
And if they didn't used RNG and let you simply buy the best outcomes for enough mats/money, we all had much less to do and would be bored even faster.
Many times I was going after some mats simply to try few rolls on my already top notch engineered modules because of the chance for a bonus. And it was fun, most of the times... and it was "something to do".
Sure, there are many things in ED that could be improved within these grind mechanics to make them even more fun, but the base of the game play should be always a grind with a kind of asymptotic progression where you can achieve reasonable results in not too much time but the top notch things should take a long time to keep things interesting.
just sayin...
EDIT: How about some optional "special" rolls for 3,5 or even 10 times the amount of materials or some additional very rare mats, which results are between the actual stats and the best possible outcome on an already modded Module. This should guarantee a progression and a reward feeling and would be a bit more fun and less frustrating near the top results.
If you're depending on grinding to retain players, it's because you're incapable of making a fun, compelling, dynamic gaming Experience.
When the mindset is in error and has infected the rest of the team, it will be hard to put logic back into it. That was gone a long time ago when the first bad design decisions were made for the game. Still waiting on the next Elite. It hasn't arrived yet.
"Please, sir, I want some more"- Oliver Twist
How Brit can you get?
If you had brought more lunch boxes you could've rolled more times.
Only if they had Genuine Thermous Bottles.
How Brit can you get?
"Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way...."
Ahhh how jolly true old chap!
Every year is getting shorter never seem to find the time.
Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines
Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way.
http://www.pink-floyd-lyrics.com/html/time-dark-lyrics.html
I'm sure Dave Gilmour was talking about grinding reputation... what a poet!
TBH the problem of ED grind always goes back to the RNG, the original expensive 2.1 engineer + commodity but with fixed or slider based outcome, while convuluted and time consuming, would still be preferable over the 'endless grind' feel of RNG engineers, since you have definitive progress and an end goal.
Gambling invested time and mats on outcomes that are completely unpredictable is not fun.
Nah, requiring commodities was a mistake, as there are many ships where this required cargo reconfiguration (combat ships such as Vultures or FdL often run without cargo due to their limited internals).
Other than that, I agree. It's ok to have some RNG farming mats as long as the end result is predicable.
I guess they just played a bit too much Diablo lol
Other than that, I agree. It's ok to have some RNG farming mats as long as the end result is predicable.
I guess they just played a bit too much Diablo lol
I think if you read the thread its been established that one persons grind is the other persons game.
A game is built upon either :
1. Objectives that are fun to achieve (essentially following a story, doing puzzles or stamina achievements)
2. Overcoming challenging situations/competitions (PVP and PVE)
Engineering is an extension of the "modify ship" part of the game and thus an achievement. Only thing is it interacts with the PVE and PVP part of the game in a negative way since the grade 5 mods are overwhelmingly powerful leading to players complaining about dying very swiftly at the hands of griefers with overpowered ships. Their only protection: They start doing things they don't like to achieve protection from the other overpowered Griefers (which essentially is players bored with the challenges presented by PVE). Thus is the feeling of grind introduced in order to people to keep up. This is a sign the game is unbalanced right now.
I really don't think you need to worry so much. I've played a lot in open and only met a few overly engineered ships hunting me down. One of which I suspect was a exploiter. All the exploiters have been reset in RNG for now.
Accept that there is a long way before you get the most powerful modules and enjoy the other parts of the game doing parallel gameplay as Darkfyre99 called it.
My two cents for improvements:
1. Drop the rolling of the stats in RNG its just not right for this kind of game IMHO
2. Nerf the mods to 50% of their strongest version now, or introduce bigger drawbacks for the hefty improvements. For instance you should use much more power or generate more heat with a weapon doing more damage. In the current version that won't always be the case.
3. Let the Engineers have different but preset versions of the mods. Like each engineer that modifies drives have their own recipe for example dirty drives. Each with advantages and drawbacks that makes it necessary to do a design choice when you combine modules and mods on each ship.
Oops. got a little carried away there
Yeah! I just want that 'good' roll on my FSD, and be off with it... I don't want to be stuck at an engineer in a seemingly infinite material collection grind cycle, getting the result I want..
I don't even want to be in the bubble... I want to be the other side of the galaxy finding stuff.. Only now, after the introduction of Engineers I feel i'm short changing myself if I don't have this GOOD roll. FDEV made this issue by saying these good rolls are possible.. it means I'm OCD compelled to get the 'good roll' before I'm contented enough then to disembark and proceed on my sojourn into the depths.
I'd have been more OK had engineers hadn't even been introduced, that way I wouldn't have to be obsessed in that 'roll'. But nah.. it's in game, and RNG is preventing me from breaking this barrier. It's not helpful considering it plays on my personality to need to achieve.
Agree that the RNG nature of material collection for engineers is what irks me the most , its RNG within the RNG that annoys me. For example if i need to find a specific material i must ..
1. Find a specific USS (RNG based).
2. Will the material even be present in the correct USS (RNG based).
3. Will i get a decent roll or worse than my current setup (RNG based).
I could live with number 3 if it wasnt such a pain to do parts 1 & 2.
I don't have anything against harvesting materials for upgrades, or having to buy commodities.
But mission rewards are a little unfair because not everyone does missions.
Also, when finally getting those precious mats you've been hunting for weeks on end, suddenly gets thrown away in a crap roll...
But mission rewards are a little unfair because not everyone does missions.
Also, when finally getting those precious mats you've been hunting for weeks on end, suddenly gets thrown away in a crap roll...
I had one of those in a pub once. I knew I should have gone with the pie.