Beta PvE impressions. The feel of the game is... Very much like a generic MMO.

[Alaris]

Are you trying to define rewards as gameplay now?

No, I do not.

Rewards (XP, gold, loot), that's all carrots and sticks. I make a point to not be an addict to that stuff, but I also realize that there are players who are addicted to that stuff and that's bad. More generally, I don't really appreciate the fact that there are carrots and sticks in games, GW2 is no exception. I appreciate it's not as bad in GW2 as in other MMORPGs, but that makes it less evil.

I'm also making a distinction between "grind (noun)" and "grindy (adjective)". It's part of my "getting to understand what makes games what they are" series. Grind (noun) can be seen as content, whereas grindy (adjective) is the boredom associated with the obligation to complete a given amount of content (that you might want to skip) to progress.

The problem with levelling is that it pretty much confuses content with rewards. But it also takes content and makes it so you can pick & choose which parts you want to do, and which parts you want to skip. See, if each heart was a closed room with foes and you had to kill all the foes to open the door to the next room (as is often the case in fps games), nobody would call that grindy. But because you have levelling and open areas and all that, now we're all "but I don't wanna kill stuff" which is absurd given we spend so much on combat games.

I do want to kill stuff. It's also absurd to think the endgame foes are fundamentally more interesting than midgame foes, unless that is, that the endgame is fundamentally different from midgame which it shouldn't be.

Sooooo...

Yes, there are people who get bored of content and do it anyway because they need the XP. That, I find terrible. But then there are also people who will skip content as much as they can regardless to get to endgame, and then complain the game has nothing to offer, and that's also bad. And linear games feel linear which is also bad. The point of levelling is to offer open-world, but also to pace the player, to make sure they do get to play the content.

Hearts are content. They may be somewhat cut & paste content, but it is nevertheless quests with mobs and scenery and stuff that needs to be done for some lore-based reason however ridiculous it might be. If you removed gold and XP entirely from the game, I'd still do a bunch of hearts just because they're something to do and I enjoy playing the game. I'd likewise still do jumping puzzles for fun, or sPvP for fun. The fact that some content include rewards does not make it any less content... but it does make it somewhat more obligatory.

[RD]

Honestly, even when I'm hard up for something to distract myself at work, I can't make myself read / get involved in an Alaris/rasp debate.

[CHIPS]

Yeah no, that's not what I mean. Only a complete retard would even think that anyone meant something like that.

The frustration is strong in you m'lady. How else would you fix the "I didn't change anything in the world" problem in MMOs? Permanent changes cannot be done in MMO b/c there will be new players that comes after you. The only way is to increase the monster population, so that getting back to normal monster population is an achievement in itself.

[raspberry jam]

No, I do not.

Rewards (XP, gold, loot), that's all carrots and sticks. I make a point to not be an addict to that stuff, but I also realize that there are players who are addicted to that stuff and that's bad. More generally, I don't really appreciate the fact that there are carrots and sticks in games, GW2 is no exception. I appreciate it's not as bad in GW2 as in other MMORPGs, but that makes it less evil.

I'm also making a distinction between "grind (noun)" and "grindy (adjective)". It's part of my "getting to understand what makes games what they are" series. Grind (noun) can be seen as content, whereas grindy (adjective) is the boredom associated with the obligation to complete a given amount of content (that you might want to skip) to progress.

The problem with levelling is that it pretty much confuses content with rewards. But it also takes content and makes it so you can pick & choose which parts you want to do, and which parts you want to skip. See, if each heart was a closed room with foes and you had to kill all the foes to open the door to the next room (as is often the case in fps games), nobody would call that grindy. But because you have levelling and open areas and all that, now we're all "but I don't wanna kill stuff" which is absurd given we spend so much on combat games.

I do want to kill stuff. It's also absurd to think the endgame foes are fundamentally more interesting than midgame foes, unless that is, that the endgame is fundamentally different from midgame which it shouldn't be.

Sooooo...

Yes, there are people who get bored of content and do it anyway because they need the XP. That, I find terrible. But then there are also people who will skip content as much as they can regardless to get to endgame, and then complain the game has nothing to offer, and that's also bad. And linear games feel linear which is also bad. The point of levelling is to offer open-world, but also to pace the player, to make sure they do get to play the content.

Hearts are content. They may be somewhat cut & paste content, but it is nevertheless quests with mobs and scenery and stuff that needs to be done for some lore-based reason however ridiculous it might be. If you removed gold and XP entirely from the game, I'd still do a bunch of hearts just because they're something to do and I enjoy playing the game. I'd likewise still do jumping puzzles for fun, or sPvP for fun. The fact that some content include rewards does not make it any less content... but it does make it somewhat more obligatory.

Well, I agree. But. One interesting thing you mention is, I bolded that part. You if anyone should know what rewards do to a person's motivations. Basically, it makes the thing you are rewarded for doing feel like work, even if you like it! Both the people who do content that they are bored of and those who skip it to get to the endgame "do what they have to do" (in the latter case, they don't do what they don't have to do...)
The problem is that players perceive that there is something that they "have to do" at all! Apart from purely story oriented things, of course. And that is why it's ok in FPS games: there you kill the enemies because otherwise they'd kill you, or in some other way prevent you from doing what you want to do (kill the final bad guy or whatever).

When I suggest removing grind (levels etc.) from games, people say things like "but then there's nothing to prevent you from killing the final boss right away". Well when I play an FPS game, there's nothing to prevent me from completing the final level right away, apart from all the stuff that is in the way. Levels (as in the pure map distance I need to cross), enemies, and so on. Those should be the only obstacles. As they often were in GW1.

Of course, designing a endless-content system that doesn't look stupid is very difficult. GW2 isn't perfect, but then again, without ANet's attempt, we wouldn't be able to have this discussion.

Permanent changes cannot be done in MMO b/c there will be new players that comes after you.

And that would matter why? All that matters is that those players have something to do. It doesn't need to be the same thing as I did.

Simple:
1. Keep track of the number of "hearts" (we'll call them that even though they are not the same as GW2 hearts) that exist in a certain area.
2. Whenever a "heart" is finished, spawn a new one somewhere else.

No exploding mob populations, you do make "permanent" changes to the world, and there's an endless stream of stuff to do. What you do miss out on are the hand crafted text lines about that you need to pick apples because Farmer X needs to make an apple pie, etc. that appear if you talk to the NPC managing the heart quest, but are you seriously saying that you read those?

[RD]

And that would matter why? All that matters is that those players have something to do. It doesn't need to be the same thing as I did.

http://www.joystiq.com/2005/11/24/st...ayer-backlash/

[Alaris]

Rewards are tricky, and I for one am not happy with the general trend of rewarding play, play should be rewarding in itself. But... games that include rewards sell better, so I don't see that disappearing anytime soon. You can feel rewarded for doing something you love... but reward-based gameplay can easily go wrong as you stated.

Keep in mind that in fps's, people can get frustrated too if there's something they have to do and can't get through. It's not grind they feel, but there's still "getting stuck" and "having to repeat boring or frustrating content". The reason it's more acceptable is because it develops a skill, which means you improve as a player. Grinding does not necessarily involve an improvement on the player's side because it does not strictly require it.

[raspberry jam]

http://www.joystiq.com/2005/11/24/st...ayer-backlash/

Thanks but I don't see why that would have anything to do with what I said. I was talking about relatively small modifications in content (like do you really care if the orcs you kill are attacking a wheat farmer or a dairy farmer?), not huge revisions of the entire ruleset.

play should be rewarding in itself

This.

play should be rewarding in itself

I put it here again just to point out.

[Ringsgold]

Ignoring the ongoing discussion - I'm sure it's incredibly interesting but I just cba.
In reply to OP:

The mob spawns make it too much like a generic MMO. Areas are filled with mobs standing around in a grid-like pattern, this really kill the atmosphere in the game world. You want to create somewhat realistic scenarios - a campfire with some guards sitting/standing around it - with some tents for bigger camps. Maybe some scattered sentries standing alone or in pairs at some distance. Some enemies can be done in the easy grid-fill way but they should be an exception (generally use animals for this, it makes more sense for animals to be standing around randomly).

Age of Conan is a great example of how to do this, seems like the flaws of GW2 are showing me all the things that game did right lol.

[RabidCoqui]

My main gripe with PvE so far (and this might change quite a bit with time) is that it turns into a cluster with every event. You're just walking and then you get a notice to do something... you wonder why but what the hell... then jump into a zergfest. Can be fun at times but not so often.

Also, only somewhat related, getting ganged up on during personal story quests can be a real pain. My human mesmer got downed 3-4 times during one of the early ones.