Quote:Original post by Diodor
None of WoW then qualifies as pure grinding - even when killing nth of a kind mobs with no uncertainty about the success of that action, you can still kill them quicker, lose fewer HPs while doing it, deal higher DPS and there's also the meta-game decision of choosing to grind in the first place: maybe grinding other mobs or dungeons or battlegrounds or maybe choosing a different team could be more profitable.

This is like saying that mopping the floor isn't a chore because you could try to do it really well. Tiny additional gains, all of which you'd obtain anyway while watching TV, eating and simply grinding a little while longer, do not suddenly turn the act into a not-grind.

Quote:Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

Quote:Original post by Diodor
I'd go further and say, it's grinding if the game is bad, that is, you aren't making any interesting decisions while playing.
...
Then the obvious solution to the problem of grinding: make a good game. It doesn't help any but at least it makes it clear no single simple solution can exist.

I'd argue that a heuristic that only rewards risk and interesting decisions would eliminate the concept of grinding. Of course it's just a bastardization of your point, and stating the premise doesn't really cast light on the mechanic required.

I've always enjoyed the idea that in order to get better at a skill or ability one must first challenge themselves and then fail.

Players will always take risks and make interesting decisions if you make the game hard enough and the player actually has to overcome challenges in order to gain anything towards defeating the other ones. You have to make it hard enough that players will occasionally fail and not just succeed - exactly like most non-MMO games. And voila, you have gotten rid of the grind.

There is no need for a "heuristic" to assess what was "risky" and what was "interesting" after the fact.

This episode exemplifies awful questing:
http://www.hulu.com/watch/108636/stargate-sg-1-the-ties-that-bind#x-0,vepisode,1,0

What is the purpose of grinding/questing/ability tree, or for that matter, attributes and other stats? How does it (in your game) lend to increasing "fun factor" for the players?

Late reply to the first post:

Quote:Original post by Ashaman73
The fact is, the gamers are attracted to grinding like flies...

I'm not. I hate it.

Quote:
Are (MMO)RPGs really games any longer or are they not already some kind of virtual world or even virtual reality ? In a virtual world, is it bad to do some work to gain an advantage ? Or to "grind" some mobs while chatting with some friends ?

IMHO, most mainstream MMO's are not games. They are virtual worlds which may *contain* games, but they aren't games in themselves.

Quote:
In my opinion it is time to stop swimming against the current and turn our gamedesigns around and start utilizing "grinding".

No thank you.

Quote:What do you think ?

I think that grinding is not challenging and it's certainly not fun. It's a simple (the simplest) way to keep the thousands of players playing when you run out of unique game content.

I "grind" at my real-life work every day, for money and experience, why the heck would I like to do the same thing on my computer when I get home?

I want to be the center of the world - fight epic battles and discover new worlds. Just for an hour a day. I'd much rather do that than run around killing 150 defenseless gnomes just to get a new weapon so that I can kill them all again (but quicker).