Understanding the EXP situation [Strawpoll Added]

[rofldat]

I don’t know about other classes, but I’m Priest and with my +5 Morningstar I can 4-shot Panto and other enemies nearby just holding down Z (2-shot on the brown seed since it’s weak to it) so long as I’m hitting at least 2 enemies with each swing my progress is not that slow.

And, this is in hindsight but, I found recipe for Goat Horn from one of the further area (require 86 Panto horns to make) so I have motivation to grind it.

Lastly, I think a game that shows it will have grind early will have less…disappointment? When there’s grind late game, compare to if a game is smooth failing until end game then it’s massive grind (i.e. Destiny or other MMOs that doesn’t have many raiding content at max level)

[rexzshadow]

Do people really can’t comprehend that the issue isn’t you have to grind its that the grind is insanely unreasonable? Has any of you even hit lvl 30? coz anyone who say this grind is remotely ok have not the wall at 30 because anyone who experience that stupid grind at 27+ ish would know its not remotely enjoyable grinding experience at all. You have all 2-3 skills that drain all your sp instantly with barely any good spots to grind at.

[Methrammar]

For beta x3 x4 exp rate should be fair to test content little bit further.I had a dream of testing monk but,I guess its impossible for me to test it, after leveling/grinding for a day.
But for the release, x1.5 exp rates can be fine.You will still have to grind but maybe 1-2 lvl when you complete all the quests till 30. not like 22-30.

[Cider]

I think you have to consider other people with the EXP rates. Many people who are hyped for ToS or are interested in it have not played ragnarok online. I know for a fact only 1/6 of my friends will do whatever it takes to enjoy the game, but what about my other 5? They don’t have time for this anymore, and I barely do too. Why should the grind start so early? If the exp rate is still this low for the release, it’ll get an awful reception, and it’ll only keep in a niche of players who really want to invest time into the game to enjoy it. I still don’t understand why the grind is defended, not all people who want to play this game are people who have their whole summer off and will their life away in games the whole summer. I’m sure you won’t find it fun anymore if there isn’t a large playerbase? It’s necessary to keep all types of people playing to keep other people to stay. If a game has low population, it becomes increasingly harder to enjoy. How can people enjoy the diverse class system and combos if they have to grind barebones for a while before they can even reach that point in the game? They don’t. Probably a number as high as 70-80% will stop once they discover that they must grind a long time to even reach those points, and guess what? You have to include other interests. Why should they bother their time in ToS?- when they could use that time for anything else entertaining. They don’t. As much as it’s really cool to bring back the old ragnarok style about, just look at how the culture has changed. People have many more other games to play besides mmos even. This will just push them away. I’m just arguing that this grind has many many cons, and I’m sure it’ll be changed in the next cbts, but this is what I believe will happen if they weren’t, or were just slightly changed.

[Adelheid]

Honestly I’m not at all looking forward to the reversion of this game to a WoW style questing system where you just quest to max level like it’s a joke. But it will inevitably happen, if only on international servers.

It is honestly kind of ridiculous that we expect this from games now.

ToS simply isn’t the kind of game where you grind to max level so you can start the “true” game at the “end game”. ToS is a game designed to be fun and challenging from the start. Leveling isn’t a tutorial, it is an ingrained and deep part of the game. Breaking up the questing monotony with some blue hunting or field grinding is part of what will keep the game interesting into level 600+.

Leveling to high levels will be a huge achievement that makes players and their characters famous, like it used to on old RO.

If you feel held back by being a low level then you’re simply approaching this game incorrectly. It isn’t like other MMOs. The “real game” of ToS doesn’t start at max level. The whole game from level 1 is the “real game” unlike most other MMOs. If you’re not having fun early on, it’s not the grind’s fault, you just simply don’t like this kind of game. It won’t get better as it goes on.

Please please don’t reduce ToS to a questing tutorial to max level so you can start the ‘real’ end game. I want a game that bucks the new trends and returns to the old ones, a game where the actual PROCESS of leveling and improving and socialising is the game itself, not a game where the process is a waste of time that people want to skip over with as many distractions as possible.

And please, think a bit about what you’re expecting out of ToS. If you’re expecting to be able to hit max level and go raiding and PvPing… you’ve got the wrong game. If you’re expecting a charming social game where the pace is slow and those at the top earned their accolates. A game where you can become known for being a high level or a good PvP or that guy with the super rare weapon. Then ToS IS the game you want. Don’t try and turn it into every other modern MMO, please.

Ask yourself how long you think it should take to get to max level. I almost gaurentee you, if you’ve coming from the point of view of WoW or any other modern MMO, then ToS will take magnitudes more time than that. And that is a GOOD thing.

[peek427]

ToS simply isn’t the kind of game where you grind to max level so you can start the “true” game at the “end game”.

Nobody in the thread has said anything about wanting this.

Leveling to high levels will be a huge achievement that makes players and their characters famous, like it used to on old RO.

Alright. Since people keep bringing up RO, let me set the record straight. First off, RO’s max level was 99, and leveling up once at level 30 in VANILLA RO still didn’t take as long as it does in ToS.

More importantly, there were TONS of places you could grind. This is why early grind WORKED. You could explore and find all sorts of maps to kill monsters on. It was part of the adventure. Different classes could grind on different things and in different ways due to their unique abilities. The diversity of content EARLY ON IN THE GAME made it successful despite how grindy it was.

This ISN’T the case with ToS. Map progression in ToS is linear. There aren’t multiple starting towns or tons of fields to explore and kill things in. Every class grinds effectively the same way (as opposed to RO, where mages could firewall to train on higher level things, acolytes could train effectively on undead due to heal bombing, archers could outrange Greater Generals), and they grind in the same areas.

Grinding for hours, then, makes more sense LATER ON in ToS, when there is more diversity in the content of the game. Classes will get more specialized and more maps will be available, so every single person isn’t forced to do the exact same thing with zero uniquity.

Again, ToS can’t afford to have such a stupid curve so early in the game. It doesn’t have what RO had available at the start of the game. Not at all. There is nothing charming, immersive, or adventurous about everyone running around like a bunch of bots in tenet garden for 4 hours.

[Raine]

Everything this guy said!

[Adelheid]

Lets not pretend anyone is saying ToS is perfect how it is. It is beta, it will need adjustment, of course. But what people are complaining about here isn’t the grind, it’s the potential grind to max level, and it’s the lack of quests holding your hand through every level. The fact that level caps are even coming up in a thread about EXP rates shows that people are concerned about it. If people were truly only bothered by the grind at 30, then you’re telling me that people are being put off because of a single hour to level? No they’re put off by a single hour to level in the context of a modern MMO culture that says “max level is everything” and max level in ToS being 200+ levels away.

The fact is that almost every MMO player now a days has been very strongly trained by modern MMOs to feel a very strong pressure to level up as quick as possible, because in most MMOs that really is the only thing that matters; being max level. An hour grind for a level at level 30 is nothing. Even modern MMOs where max level = start of the game, have grinds much longer than that.

As an aside: looking at level 30 as level 30 out of 99 or level 30 out of 600+ is exactly the kind of max-level focused attitude I’m talking about. It’s implicitly pointing out that you’ve got so many more “to go” or it’s such a small amount of progress looking at the overall goal of max level, and thus the grind is unjustifiable. But the whole point of this kind of leveling system is that you’re not really expected to reach max level. It’s not level 30 out of anything, it’s just level 30. So that kind of argument really has no bearing on the game.

I grinded for uncountable hours on PSO when I first played it and only ever go to level 100 or so, out of 200, or was it 250? I forget. But did that make it a bad game? Did it mean I didn’t have fun because I didn’t get upto max level? Was it not fun because I had to run the exact same zones over and over and the zones never varied by class? No, it was fun because the gameplay was fun, and the gameplay was about the progress, it was about the journey; not about max level. It was fun because I played it with friends, and it was social. Just like other older style MMOs ala RO and ToS and Ultima Online, etc.

If this has absolutely nothing to do with the false pressure to get to max level, then answer me this: Would an hour grind at 30 be unjustified if the max level was 31? My answer is no.

It’s only ‘unjustified’ if you’re suffering from maxlevelitis and the max level is 600 levels away.

[Garfy]

I played RO to max level. I’m level 36 and facing over an hours worth of grind to level up once.

If we translate these numbers (36 out or 500+) into RO terms. I’m a level 7 novice and it’s going to take me about 4-6 hours of grinding to hit level 8.

Also, I’ve datamined the game. If these numbers are correct, the grind at higher levels is going to be the worst that has ever existed in a game. Infact, getting to level 300 is going to be impossible because the game will be dead long before that happens (people themselves might die of old age before that happens).
What’s even the point in adding that many levels and all that high level stuff when no ones ever going to reach it?

[Raine]

He said that games like RO as an example have lots of interesting contents to explorer early on (a lot of low level, interesting maps, different leveling places for different character types, etc) while ToS feels quite limited, there doesn’t have much to enjoy in early game, monsters often get much stronger from map to map. Heck I wandered around as a novice almost the whole first week and it was pretty enjoyable for me. The attractive points of ToS is its huge class system but at this rate I wonder when you will start seeing these classes. If things keep like that I bet there will be some classes and skills you will never see anyone uses in the game since they are useless for grinding and grinding is all that is to do now. If you ask me why not party then the answer is parties don’t really like having anyone dragging them down.

BTW, I bring up RO as an example, I don’t expect it to be RO or anything. Just in case if someone want to push words into my mouth.

[Adelheid]

36 out [of] 500+

Again, this is simply the wrong way to think about it. See my post above.

Anyway, the grind isn’t that different from vanilla RO grind at official server rates (x1) and with a class that doesn’t level too great (or only levels with zenny, and you’re poor). It is probably faster than early RO transcendant classes. It’s only modern RO that is super fast.

[Garfy]

Did you purposely ignore the rest of my post.

If we translate these numbers, I’m a level 7 novice and it’s taking me half a day to level up once. Getting to job change is going to take me 2-3 more days. I remember it taking an hour or two of casual grind to hit job change in RO as a Novice.

The amount of grind I’m facing so early on is about as high as you’d face as a lower mid level player in RO (level 60-70s). Which would be around level 300-350 in TOS.

And yes, levels do matter. I cannot do this or that or play as the class I want to without leveling up. Most of the game is hidden behind level requirements. Without reaching certain levels I cannot experience or enjoy large parts of the game.

[Adelheid]

Why would grinding be the only thing you do? That would only be true if you had maxlevelitis and felt some immersurable pressure to just keep leveling.

This is not how early MMOs with this leveling style worked. You played the game because it was fun, not because you -had- to reach max level. If you get tired of grinding, hang out with friends, socialize a bit. Help lower level people. Craft. Hunt rares. This is exactly the kind of gameplay ToS, and other games with this kind of leveling style, try to engender. A relaxing slow grind that gets you invested and absorbed in the world, it’s activities, it’s people and your friends.

If the community is anything like those in these older games, we’ll see all kinds of classes, skills and builds, because a big draw to these games is playing unique and fun characters. Original RO had battle priests and everything, despite them not really being supported.

Like I said before. No one is saying the EXP curve is perfect as is. It should and will be changed before release.

But talking about changes to the EXP system in the context of “It’s only level 30 out of 600+” and complaints about quests running out is the wrong way to criticize the EXP curve, because it simply -isn’t that kind of system-.

[Raine]

the grind isn’t that different from vanilla RO

When I played the games, people went all over the world to level as soon as they started playing, everyone has their own favorite leveling spots, creating their own adventures. Different jobs and character types have different leveling spots. People who solo have their own places, people with party have other places. Now in ToS, I see everyone at 3x bunny hope around in the chapel, not much else to do.

The point of designing a game is design it to be enjoyable, not to be hard so please don’t say meaningless stuffs like “in the old days we used to grind, kids nowadays are spoiled by spoon feeding games…”. I am pretty much a grindy palyer, I grind hours upon hours in RO just for 1% exp but even I think the current EXP rate is bad design.

[Satoru]

My wall on RO was at level 60~, more than half way to cap. I not only had way more maps to grind, cards to search and stuff, but I had more shiny skills to use and distract me.

I don’t know how people are saying players will be entertained in ToS by hitting the wall at 5~10% of the final cap with limited reasons to farms monsters and only 3~4 usefull skills until you reach Rank 4 or higher (which is at level 80).

kCBT has done it right as I said before. It’s not quest driven, but also not so-early-grindfest.

[Adelheid]

Did you purposely ignore the rest of my post.

No, but you clearly didn’t read my earlier post that I referred you to, which already completely addresses everything you’ve said in this post. Lets try not get caught up in derailing bullshit here.

[peek427]

Lets not pretend anyone is saying ToS is perfect how it is. It is beta, it will need adjustment, of course.

Hence the entire point of this thread.

But what people are complaining about here isn’t the grind, it’s the potential grind to max level, and it’s the lack of quests holding your hand through every level.

Not ONE of the posts here says anything about wanting more quests or wanting to make the game quest-oriented. Not one. Why are you making things up?

No they’re put off by a single hour to level in the context of a modern MMO culture that says “max level is everything” and max level in ToS being 200+ levels away.

Have you read anything I said? Actually, have you read anything in the entire thread? The reason max level is relevant isn’t because people want to rush to hit it. It’s the exact opposite. Max level is relevant because it represents a proportion. Roughly, level 200 means you’ve experienced almost all of the game’s content. 30/200 would tell you that level 30 means you very little content available to you. I’m not going to keep repeating myself about why the lack of content is significant to the grind.

Nobody is concerned about reaching max level. It’s pathetic that I even have to say this because you’re just not even reading the thread.

Your posts are directed an audience that doesn’t even exist in this thread, and I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you’re trolling.

[Raine]

Why would grinding be the only thing you do?

Because what else to do? Tell me.

Monsters get much stronger from place to place so not much to wander around. People want to get into the later class ranks as soon as possible because they are the main attractive contents of ToS, so no one wants to do nor has any other thing to do rather than grinding. You want to set up a camp, sit down and chit chat with your friends? Then you will have to grind to rank 5. You want to start collecting stuffs and craft items as an Alchemist? 6 ranks of grinding awaits you.

[Garfy]

You said grinding and level do not matter. You are wrong. I cannot do anything unless I am high enough level, which means I need to grind.

You tell me to go and do other stuff. Do what? I’m not high enough level to do it. I’ve got to go and grind first.

[Adelheid]

And yet this doesn’t really have any bearing on whether ToS should have:

• EXP curves that are designed with reaching max level in mind
  or
• A quest line ala modern MMOs that will guide you from level 1 to level max.

ToS can fix the problem you bring up here by making fields more like RO or by tweaking the EXP curve slightly. Like I said many times, I’m not saying don’t change the EXP. I’m saying don’t change it with comparison to max level, like MANY people here are suggesting.