In praise of grinding
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Just got Jose Bautista so I'm feeling pretty well done, nothing to grind for, nothing to do.
We will see what Friday brings but i've quit better games than this years version of the Show.
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Who gets to decide how many hours a week is a grind?
I certainly don't want the guys with 669 hours or 576 hours of DD play time to dictate what the level of grind should be for everyone else. Even though I am retired I am not putting in a consistent 100 hours a month on the game.
The last time I decided the grind was just too much was '18 and I quit playing in May of that year. I would think that is the situation that SDS is trying to avoid. Too much of a grind will drive away far more players than too short of a grind. Because lets face it, some of the guys who can only afford to put in 5 to 10 hours a week are also probably the ones most likely to buy stubs to get the really expensive cards that they want.
I assume SDS has a good idea, or should, of how many hours the average person plays DD each week or month. I am sure they have data on which programs get completed the most vs those that get completed the least. They probably have a good idea of player retention as the months go by. In the end I think they would rather have 100 players put in 10 hours a week than 50 players who put in 20 hours a week.
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I have played A LOT and i have still not yet unlocked Scott Rolen, let alone Ted or Bautista. I didn't finish the live series until early July. Making the grind more difficult will run off A LOT of people who don't have 12 hours a week to put into this game. Some players just want to get a card in a couple hours on a Friday night and use him for a couple games that weekend in Ranked.
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@x-814-x-MAFIA-x_PSN said in In praise of grinding:
What do you mean the wheel rewards suck?
I just got a Premier Choice pack and I selected the New Threads 2.0 pack.
Not only did I get 3 97 OVR Diamonds; I got 3 97 OVR Tyler Rogers!
Where else can you get outstanding rewards like those 3 cards!
Prior to them implementing the wheel, you got jack squat for earning extra XP after the end of the path.
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I enjoy the grind, I have everything completed. And just waiting for new content to drop to keep me busy but when servers don't work I get upset. Makes me not want to bother.
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There is a balance to be had.
There really should be a way to address the people that can only play 5 hours a week as well as those that want to play 3x that amount.
I think in some ways DQ was intended to be a solution. They intended it to be this content that varied each time, but every run feels the exact same on every board except the showdown only one. But the big problem is the RNG and all or nothing aspects of it make it unappealing for a lot of grinders: grinders typically want steady progress for their work
Thats also why TA fell flat. Progress is far and far between, and grinders have already exhausted all the meaningful rewards. And if you grind early and get the voucher ahead of the drop your reward is...less things to do when the card drops.
The old way of doing TA was actually a great way of doing grinds. Giving people choices to drop out of a grind at any point once they got the cards they wanted. The 23-24 style collections worked the same way too: choice pack of three cards and usually you only really wanted 1 or 2 anyway. Easy exit point from the grind, you could safely skip the programs you didnt want to do at that point.
And now we have the new (old) collection style, which doesn't feel like a grind but a shopping list. You don't earn the cards, you buy them (with stubs). Its just not a satisfying loop.
The game needs big grinds that not everyone will do. They don't need to be extravagant in design, something as simple as a weekly version of the USA Map that is easy to churn out that most people wont touch. Just make any cards behind good grinds sellable
And do not make grinds time sensitive, that is some of the worst game design and the resign why stuff such as 200 hits online is terrible. Its the daily xp cap issue- let people play when they want to play, not when you tell them to play. Time sensitive content is the #1 cause of burnout in any game. People should be free to take a month off without missing out on anything
Continue to make use of those gold cards and other cosmetics to let people that did something special standout, while not locking others out. This works with difficulty as well, nothing should need people to be "good at the game", thats also bad game design and doesnt reflect that a large portion of gamers, particularly older ones (the main customer base for a baseball game) play to relax. Its why modes like RTTS and franchise are popular. Difficulty can be used as a time saver, and sometimes people will try difficult content if its there. EXtreme moments seem popular for example, but they are always optional. DQ has difficulty increasing the odds. The difficulty based goals in miniseasons are good too, its just a few extra things. The Show imo handles this well
Another good solution is what they did with Bautista, Wagner and Mr. D. Allen. Want to put a big grind that requires a mini season, a USA Map (BRING THIS BACK AND USE IT MULTIPLE TIMES), a DQ run, a showdown, and ranked/event/BR play? YES. Do this!. But if that grind is for a 99 then early in toss a 95 for the people like Dolenz that just want to have fun with their favorite players.
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@Teak2112_MLBTS i agree with everything you said except for the last paragraph. I would prefer that they add a repeatable PXP mission to every program (like they do for Extreme Program) so I don’t have to play any mode that I don’t care for. Make it 5000 PXP, that’s fine. Let me play “my way” and a long grind to finish is fine.
SDS does this for most programs. Just wish they did it for all. For example, to finish Jackie Robinson program , I have to complete a Showdown or do Moments in Negro League Baseball mode. I’d prefer to do neither and would rather grind PXP to finish.
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@capardo_XBL said in In praise of grinding:
@Teak2112_MLBTS i agree with everything you said except for the last paragraph. I would prefer that they add a repeatable PXP mission to every program (like they do for Extreme Program) so I don’t have to play any mode that I don’t care for. Make it 5000 PXP, that’s fine. Let me play “my way” and a long grind to finish is fine.
SDS does this for most programs. Just wish they did it for all. For example, to finish Jackie Robinson program , I have to complete a Showdown or do Moments in Negro League Baseball mode. I’d prefer to do neither and would rather grind PXP to finish.
I'm just saying I think its ok to have a card an inning for example that you earn by engaging in all of the content, but have a lesser version for people who don't want to do all of that but still want to use the player. Nobody wants their favorite player locked behind a mode they don't enjoy playing.
As for general programs, I agree.
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@x-814-x-MAFIA-x_PSN I think I’ve got diamond twice all year and both times the cards were at or near quicksell, so even when you get lucky, the rewards suck. There’s no incentive to spin the wheel, so people stop playing to save xp for the next inning, so they can get the boss packs day 1. That’s a bad model IMO. They need to make the wheel spins more rewarding.
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@Dolenz_PSN There needs to be balance for all types of players. I thought we had that with Team Affinity this year, but they ruined it with the color storm. I think a good model is making TA a grind while keeping the other programs easier that way both types of players are incentivized to play. They could also make the specific player programs more of a grind with updates throughout the year.
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@AppleLemon560_MLBTS said in In praise of grinding:
If you put in a grind that takes two hours, that's like just giving everyone a free card. Another basically free card means less reward for the player who does all the programs, all the collections, all the content, etc.
…..The whole point of a grind is to put up a wall that makes a reward valuable -
I will never understand why some people care about what cards other people have and how much they do or don’t have to work in order to get them. I hate annoying internet-y lingo like “gatekeeping,” but it applies here.
We only get so much time on this earth. I don’t see why anyone would fritter away their precious moments by getting their wang in a pretzel because other people have virtual toys on a video game that’s only relevant for one year. There are plenty of real, serious, unavoidable reasons to get your wang in a pretzel. If anything, there are far too many pretzel-wanging problems, to be honest. But I’ll never pretzel my wang over a video game (or — even more absurd — getting pretzel wanged over somebody else’s video game!)
Let’s all just take a step back and de-pretzel our wangs.
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I feel like they should put a repeatable mission for the Sosa program
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@sbchamps17_NSW I’ll add Jackie Robinson and Spring Breakout programs ( no way to finish that Collection without playing Showdown TWICE)
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@capardo_XBL I somehow managed to complete the showdowns but hated every minute of it
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@sbchamps17_NSW
I had to do it 3 times. I did it once when the game first released and then twice later. Not fun at all. I also failed once so that didn’t help -
I would definitely rather not having to do the showdown multiple times just to get cards
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@sbchamps17_NSW i keep hoping that either SDS creates a repeatable mission OR they make those Showdown cards sellable.
I can work with either option. No can do Showdowns. I barely finish the starter one. And then consistently fail all others. It’s an extremely hard and frustrating mode.
