Originally posted by spookycalkins

Earlier this year I gave up MMOs. Not because I grew tired of the games I was playing, but rather because I felt a need to ALWAYS be playing. The daily grind of being level-capped in WoW plus the wonderment of a new world with Rift was stealing too many hours. So I ended it. 

But then I found TSW. I did my 3-day trial and fell in love (not the weaird kind, sicko). Now I have purchased the game and have really been enjoying my time in this alternate reality where clandestine organizations and mythical monsters abound. I really feel like I've found the one to stick with. I don't feel compelled to be on for the duration of my waking hours, and as much as I love the questing in Kingsmouth area I don't get into this chain reaction of "one more thing" that lasts several hours. It's super fun for sure, but I feel okay about stepping away. 

Glad you're enjoyng the ride -- I'm the same way with TSW; no need to rush.  The game feels perfect for taking small bits at a time.  Maybe because there are no levels to worry about?  Or just the limit on the number of missions?  I think it's because the story and puzzles are good enough that you just want to slow down and just pay attention a bit more; the way the quests are tiered, you're really spending time getting through the mini-story, so just doing a few at a time works well.

Originally posted by ragz45

Originally posted by Ortwig
Might try The Secret World -- modern day setting with horror/conspiracy as well as investigation and sabotage quests.  Very nice questing.

Amazingly done quests & enviroment, boring as hell combat.  If combat is your thing though, you may want to look into a more combat savy game like GW2, AoW, or Tera.

Matter of subjective opinion on TSW combat.  Many like it quite a bit.

Originally posted by Karnavon
Would be nice to see the game, If anyone would be so kind as to send me a key to lordofinsanity@inbox.lv. Thanks :)

Just sent one Karnavon.

Originally posted by Giausbaltar

i played beta but found it unpolished and got a bit rage quity(that a word??) 

anyhow you know why im here  :)

I am looking for a buddy key to seee if it like it now. always been into this kinda thing but for some reason the beta put me off, not sure what it was now, heh

Email address is Scorpiusuk@hotmail.co.uk

Thanks folks

Now thats odd, i know for a fact i posted more than once on here, ha well

 

Just sent you one Giaus.

Originally posted by Khorrax
 If anyone has another key, I would really appreciate it. My email adress is khorrax@gmail.com. Big thanks in advance.

Just sent you one khorrax.

Originally posted by Iselin

LFG systems could be improved by requiring a personality profile to be completed first.

• You could put all the people whose gameplay is just one of the 5 things they're doing simultaneously together and let them fill their boots with frequent AFKs
• Put all the rage quitters together and don't let them leave until they learn to get along
• Put all the loot Ninjas together and give them a special crappy loot table made just for them
• Put all the people who think they know how to play the other guy's class better together and give them the ability to swap classes.

Just some ideas...

^ Epic.  Thanks for that.  lol

Originally posted by Disarmonia

Originally posted by Ortwig

The solution is to keep impatient, antisocial speedrunners as far away as possible from the casual, friendly social people in the game.  It's really simple: these groups don't like each other and don't want to play with each other.  What do people in real life do?  Go play with people of similar interests; the "community" is formed of people who gravitate toward their own tribe.

Simple solution on the group selector for style preference:

• Expert
• Speed
• Casual/social
• Beginner
• Experimental/Practice
• RP

I really do find this topic fascinating and I like your response, except the very broad dualistic view of casual people being friendly, and then the rest, crazy unfriendly antisocial degenerate people without the understanding that what happens to another person directly affects self, and if said "friendly' group was actually friendly maybe some empathy would help bridge the gap.  Afterall, there must be something in common if both people chose the same game and same server...

Oh, and if my response was a little terse it was due to this statement:

You look at me as the problem with MMOs. I find that amusing. It is people like you that are the real problem and have been since the begining of the genre. You don't act in a MMORPG as you would in the real world. You abuse the people around you because you can. You have a total lack of respect for this community ideal that you seem to hold in such high regard. All I do is ignore people. People like you take advantage of them. LOL...and I'm the problem.

The speedrunners look at social gamers as inconsiderate and wasting their time, while the social gamers look at the speedrunners as impatient and antisocial.  It's tough to foster any kind of empathy when no communication is taking place, hence my distaste for autogrouping tools: they foster lack of communication and lack of empathy.  But if they are to exist, at least give people the option to the experience they prefer.  But, no, they are still no substitute for actual talking (which the speedrunners don't want to do.)

Originally posted by Disarmonia

Originally posted by Ortwig

The solution is to keep impatient, antisocial speedrunners as far away as possible from the casual, friendly social people in the game.  It's really simple: these groups don't like each other and don't want to play with each other.  What do people in real life do?  Go play with people of similar interests; the "community" is formed of people who gravitate toward their own tribe.

Simple solution on the group selector for style preference:

• Expert
• Speed
• Casual/social
• Beginner
• Experimental/Practice
• RP

Congregation leads to segregration which leads to isolation and alienation.  It's practical and does help remedy the situation for a short period of time.  Being anti-social doesn't mean one isn't capable of speaking, it just someone who goes against what the "norm" has been socialised to accept as proper behavior to not disturb the tribe as a whole, so the comfort level and complacency is kept in check. 

I really do find this topic fascinating and I like your response, except the very broad dualistic view of casual people being friendly, and then the rest, crazy unfriendly antisocial degenerate people without the understanding that what happens to another person directly affects self, and if said "friendly' group was actually friendly maybe some empathy would help bridge the gap.  Afterall, there must be something in common if both people chose the same game and same server...

A lot of the hype of social disorders been portrayed in the media and the awareness about it these days show lack of empathy with those who carry sorrow with them because, the societal game that people have choosen is.. tiresome.

Whatever, can I quote Bill Hicks?  Yes I can.  I'm sure have already heard this before, yet I always find it refreshing.

"The world is like a ride at an amusement park, and when you choose to go on it, you think it's real, because that's how powerful our minds are. And the ride goes up and down and round and round and it has thrills and chills and it's very brightly colored and it's very loud. And it's fun, for a while.

Some people have been on the ride for a long time, and they begin to question: 'Is this real? Or is this just a ride?' And other people have remembered, and they come back to us and they say 'Hey! Don't worry, don't be afraid -- ever -- because... this is just a ride.' And we kill those people.

'Shut him up! We have a lot invested in this ride! Shut him up! Look at my furrows of worry; look at my big bank account, and my family. This has to be real.' It's just a ride. But we always kill those good guys who try and tell us that -- ever notice that? -- and we let the demons run amok. But it doesn't matter, because... it's just a ride, and we can change it any time we want. It's only a choice. No effort. No worry. No job. No savings and money. Just a choice, right now, between fear and love. The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your door, buy bigger guns, close yourself off. The eyes of love, instead, see all of us as one.

Here's what we can do to change the world, right now, into a better ride. Take all that money we spend on weapons and defense each year and, instead, spend it feeding, clothing and educating the poor of the world, which it would do many times over -- not one human being excluded -- and we can explore space together, both inner and outer, forever. In peace." ~ Bill Hicks

So make the selections checkboxes rather than radio buttons.  ;)  

I see what you are saying and I agree,  And maybe at some point a person who is "casual" wants to do a speedrun because they are limited for time.  And someone who has been speedrunning wants to slow down and smell the roses.  There's always room to change your mode.

Originally posted by Alberel

The only 'solution' to grind is to offer more variety in gameplay. The problem? Everyone wants to rush to 'endgame' and thus ignores any alternatives and does nothing but the single fastest way to the top (which inevitably becomes repetitive). The problem isn't just the game itself but the attitude a lot of players have to games. I see countless people call games grindy despite there being a huge variety of things on offer; in reality they just choose to only do one thing (and this is usually either endlessly questing or endlessly killing mobs).

IMO the true solution to the grind problem is to actually remove the incentive to rush to the top so fast, giving players reasons to play around with the game's other features. This would mean either removing the level concept entirely (although then something else would become the grind) or make the path to the top so long that rushing it just isn't realistic.

Those oldschool 'grindy' MMOs? They didn't actually feel all that grindy... the path to the top took so long that most players stopped caring about getting there and simply played for fun. My linkshell (guild) in FFXI used to do all sorts of crazy stuff besides levelling, in fact we spent most of our time helping each other with missions or job-related quests. We all eventually hit the cap (75 at the time) and we felt amazing for doing it because it had seemed like such a distant goal. None of us felt we had 'grinded' to get there.

tldr; 'Grind' isn't just repetitive gameplay, it's often players ignoring the other features of a game in the interest of rushing to the cap.

^  Think I am with you 100% on this one.

Originally posted by GreenHell

Originally posted by CalmOceans

Originally posted by GreenHell

On what game?

Does it matter? Are we going to play the "one game has a horrible community and the other doesn't" card? Does it really matter? The act is the same no matter what game it was. If you do this crap in WoW or in Eve it is the same. It's not about the game it is about the lack of respect that you obviously have no problem with.

It matters since I assume it's an LFD game, which is exactly why you are having issues. LFD raids often have anonymous PUG raids and people tend to go AFK and you get the dramaqueens and arguments you talk about.

It has happened to me in every game before and after a LFG tool was created. Once again I believe your logic to be flawed. Some how in your mind if you know those 60 other people its just fine to make them wait for you. No!!! No its not. I played SWG pre-cu and the crap happened then. It has always happened because people like you feel its ok to be a inconvenience to other people and you try to justify it to yourself by saying " oh they understand..they are my friends"

You look at me as the problem with MMOs. I find that amusing. It is people like you that are the real problem and have been since the begining of the genre. You don't act in a MMORPG as you would in the real world. You abuse the people around you because you can. You have a total lack of respect for this community ideal that you seem to hold in such high regard. All I do is ignore people. People like you take advantage of them. LOL...and I'm the problem.

The solution is to keep impatient, antisocial speedrunners as far away as possible from the casual, friendly social people in the game.  It's really simple: these groups don't like each other and don't want to play with each other.  What do people in real life do?  Go play with people of similar interests; the "community" is formed of people who gravitate toward their own tribe.

Simple solution on the group selector for style preference:

• Expert
• Speed
• Casual/social
• Beginner
• Experimental/Practice
• RP

Originally posted by Aroton

No, LFG didnt ruin games communities. People ruined communities.

The reality is, its all about who is playing the game. In the past, only people with LOTS of time played mmos. Now, people with very limited time play, and so the "community" suffers because they appear to be dicks about efficient use of time.

Its really that simple.

A lot could be solved if there were just a few selectable options on these tools:

• Pro-player (prefer fast, expert runs)
• Casual/social (prefer chat and leisurely pace) 
• Beginner/experimental (teaching newbies or trying new tactics)
• RP (roleplaying group)

Originally posted by Ghavrigg
A game without some sort of grind would get old and boring incredibly quick. With nothing to work towards, there's nothing to look forward to, thus no reason to continue playing.

^ See what I mean?  ;)

Originally posted by KaosProphet

Originally posted by Ortwig

Originally posted by VengeSunsoar

Originally posted by Ortwig

Originally posted by Vhaln

Originally posted by Ortwig
People say they hate grind, but when it is removed people whine about not having "enough to do."

because what they really mean, is that they hate games where there isn't much to do, except grind.

Actually what it really means is that some people like grind, but won't admit it.

Well if they like the activity, they it is no longer monotonous or unpleasant right?  Therefore it's not a grind anymore.

To some, doing something montonous or repititous is not unpleasant.  

To some, being beaten senseless with a steel rod is a turn on.  And while I am in full support of risk-aware consensual kink, I'm not about to go proselytizing it's virtues to the skeptical.

(Although in fairness, I must admit that I have and likely will do so regarding other analogs...)

Unfortunately, there are more people who like being beaten with steel rods (and won't admit it) than you think.   I'm not one of them, just sayin...

Originally posted by VengeSunsoar

Originally posted by Ortwig

Originally posted by Vhaln

Originally posted by Ortwig
People say they hate grind, but when it is removed people whine about not having "enough to do."

because what they really mean, is that they hate games where there isn't much to do, except grind.

Actually what it really means is that some people like grind, but won't admit it.

Well if they like the activity, they it is no longer monotonous or unpleasant right?  Therefore it's not a grind anymore.

To some, doing something montonous or repititous is not unpleasant.  

Originally posted by Vhaln

Originally posted by Ortwig
People say they hate grind, but when it is removed people whine about not having "enough to do."

because what they really mean, is that they hate games where there isn't much to do, except grind.

Actually what it really means is that some people like grind, but won't admit it.

Yeah, it's tough to pick one since each approach makes sense in different situations.  My standard solo tactic (Blade/Chaos) is to start off with the Quantum Brace, do a Chaotic Pull, then Art of War to Impair everyone, Reality Fracture for the AOE then Escalation for weakened state.  Lots of dodging and moving in between, with Matadaor as a good builder.  

Doesn't work so well when you need to single target someone though!  Lately playing around with Shotgun and Elementalism.  Very different/kitey feel on those...  :)