Level Grinding, What do you think? Options

[rewells]

I'm thinking of writing a post on games that require level grinding v.s. games that don't. When playing rpgs, do you like having to just fight a bunch of battles to continue? I never grind unless I have to because I think it's fun to try to beat the game at the lowest possible level - it makes it more challenging. But I don't mind level grinding if the game is fun. I really like rpgs with difficulty levels (like *cough* Persona 4), but it's kind of hard to adjust the math to change the character's growth curves and enemy hp and such in RM.

[Lato]

I'm thinking of writing a post on games that require level grinding v.s. games that don't. When playing rpgs, do you like having to just fight a bunch of battles to continue? I never grind unless I have to because I think it's fun to try to beat the game at the lowest possible level - it makes it more challenging. But I don't mind level grinding if the game is fun. I really like rpgs with difficulty levels (like *cough* Persona 4), but it's kind of hard to adjust the math to change the character's growth curves and enemy hp and such in RM.

I HATE RPGs where you can choose the difficulties! The whole point is to play the ROLE not get to choose different ones on different settings. Now as for battle grinding I think its a necessary evil, you only get better by having more experience in combat, everyone knows this, now as for the right balance of this that hard to say, some ppl overdue it some dont.

[nohmaan]

I believe that the reason level grinding really became a thing in video games is because it was the easiest way to extend game play time. A 8 hr story + 12 hrs of leveling = 20hrs game play.

That being said, I dislike grinding and refuse to do it, opting instead to find a strategy to win the combat under leveled. And the honest truth is, with a RPG maker game, you shouldn't be shooting for that high of a play time.

The best way (I think) to allow grinding for benefit while also having the game permit players to win at lower levels is an exponential growth curve (in the opposite direction). Formulas are really important for that.

Example, level 9 to level 10 your character may gain 4 STR, but at level 45 to 46 the gain is reduced to 1 STR. So the more you grind, the more you relieve the difficulty, but only by a slight amount. Sq Rts are good to add in to formulas for that measure.

Example, Damage Formula = (ATK**0.5) * (ATK/2)

Your damage will increase with each new level, but the increased amount is less with each new level. So from an attack of 10 to 25 the change is +47 damage, and from atk 275 to 300 its +318 damage. While that's still more, you can see how the number of increase is reduced significantly-- and you can allow grinding while maintaining a desired difficultly level.

[Kaust]

It comes down to other aspects of gameplay; if theres a sweet battle system I dont mind playing it longer. On one save of Resonance of Fate I lvled all my characters to 300 in the arena before the game was even finished, just because I enjoyed the battle system (and the arena had special items ).
The type of game also makes a difference; there are plenty of games out there considered rpgs that are just dungeon crawlers with a story tagged on. Basically in these types of games you often reach a point where getting stronger is the only goal left. You could beat PSO before level 20 but the max was 200. Also MMORPGS have a similar principle to this.

[zacheatscrackers]

I'm with Kaust on this one; if the gameplay's addictive enough, I have nothing against grinding (The World Ends With You being, in my opinion, a great example; VERY addictive battle system, and after-battle rankings give me an incentive to keep battling to see how well I can do against various enemies whilst leveling up).

For me it's the inverse, of course, if the gameplay's really really repetitive.

[Magical_RuNE_Kni...]

When playing rpgs, do you like having to just fight a bunch of battles to continue? I never grind unless I have to because I think it's fun to try to beat the game at the lowest possible level - it makes it more challenging. But I don't mind level grinding if the game is fun.

lol, I'm the complete opposite. I like getting as powerful as I can and wipe stuff out. o-o (I sound evil XD)

I think a lot of people might not enjoy grinding because it feels boring/ pointless... Maybe it works for games like Pokemon or Gotcha Force because you got to 'catch em all', the fights are simple but creative/feel non-restrictive, and they're in 1st person perspective? A.k.a, u relate better-- people don't generally like losing power or running away, and the more it relates to u, the stronger the emotional attachment? 'o'
... (this is what studying psychology and anthropology does to u.")

[phxDansuke]

That was actually interesting... there should be someone writing an article "The bond between psychology and role-playing games"

Well, getting back to the topic, It's really interesting how it's kinda controversial. I was hoping that for my project, I would have a difficutly setting: Easy (not grinding at all), Normal (a little grinding, time to beat a few sidequests), Hard (beating EVERY sidequest there is to avoid being underpowered), and Expert (same as Hard, but when a character reaches 0 HP, he/she dies permanently).

That also limits how much sidequests you can put in a game, because if there are a lot of sidequests, and you beat them all, you could be unfairly overpowered by the end of the game, making the game much easier, and kinda boring. I guess we need to find a fine balance between Replayability, Gameplay, and Game Balance (boss health, weapons, etc.) to have grinding only at parts when it won't be annoying to most.

[shinyjiggly]

Just as a note, not all sidequests need to give out fancy stuffs and exp. like candy or necessarily have their own mini-dungeon area.
I've never really been that good at designing a very good exp/stat progression thing so often my games wind up having either easy fights or wind up being nigh impossible unless you happen to be the least bit lucky.
That being said, I'm okay with a very small amount of grinding, as long as it doesn't take 52 hours to do so. Long grinding sessions tend to sever personal connections to the current plot.
(Example: You're supposed to hurry and get to this place but you're too busy training in the nearby forest. Meanwhile, nobody even tries to inform you of all the time that you are wasting or of any of the consequences of doing so, though usually there aren't even any.) This would be one of the main reasons that most of my pokemon games lay dormant, stuck training for the Elite 4.

[amerk]

I'm sort of in a mixed bag. I don't mind minimal amounts of grind, but don't usually care for lengthy amounts.

My solution:

Give the player the option to grind or not, and adjust the battles accordingly. For example, Person A decides to play a game but does not like to grind randomly. He won't run from any battles, of course, but the only things he wants to fight are what he meets in the course of his travels. Person B however loves to run around and fight for about an hour before he even attempts to finish the area he's on. He wants to ensure he can take the boss on without any trouble.

How do you accomodate both people? By basing your monster stats off Person A.

Person A enters a dungeon and casually begins making his way to the opposite end. In the course of his explorations (hitting dead ends, collecting treasures, getting to the other side), he winds up going from Level 1 at the start to Level 5 by the time he reaches the boss an approximate 20 minutes later.

Person B enters the same dungeon and begins to walk randomly around fighting monsters, going back and forth, collecting money, leaving the dungeon to visit a town and restore or purchase new gear, goes back into the dungeon, etc., and by the time he reaches the same boss an hour later he is around Level 7 or 8.

You have too choices here. You can choose to tailor the upcoming boss fight for the Level 8 character, but you risk upsetting both players into quitting. Why? Because Player A doesn't feel he needs to grind to defeat said boss, and Player B feels as if all that extra grind to give him a higher advantage went to waste.

Or you can tailor the boss to around Level 5 or 6. This would make the boss a bit of a challenge to the Level 5 character, but winnable with the correct strategy; and it would make the boss relatively easy to blow through for the Level 7/8 character. The downside is you lose some of the forced challenge for a person who opts to grind, but at least you have a chance of retaining both players.

[rewells]

Thanks for all the feedback!

@Kaust: Thanks for mentioning Resonance of Fate. I looked at some youtube videos and the battle system looks interesting.

@Nohmaan: Yeah I agree that level grinding originated to make games longer, which is also why old NES games are generally ungodly hard by today's standards. They didn't have the technology to make epic 40+ hour adventures, so the longevity comes in requiring the player to keep practicing. Doesn't the growth curves built into RPG Maker follow the structure you propose? It'd be great if you or someone else could write a tutorial on how to adjust growth curves!

@shinyjiggly: Omg like in FFVII at the end of the game when you're told that you have seven days until the meteor hits and...you can continue playing the game as long as you want. Yeah, that's annoying, but how do you get around things like that without screwing the player? Implementing an actual timer could theoretically put the player in a position where they don't have enough time to get strong enough to accomplish the mission. Persona 4 is the only game I've seen do a good job with this problem because time is measured in days, but the player controls when days end (you have a set amount of activities you can do in a day, one of which is level grinding, and you can do that as long as you want in a day).

@amerk: I think that's how most RPGs work. I'm usually a type A. When designing my last project I set the growth curve of my characters to the highest (it's only a three-six hour game) and edited the pre-set enemies based on trial and error while I playtested to figure out what their stats should be. Do you (or anyone else) know of or can you come up with any mathematical models for balancing player/enemy stats? Levels are kind of a broad guide and I found myself constantly adjusting HP, STR, DEF, EXP dropped, etc. of all my enemies and it was a pain in the ass. It'd have been easier if I knew some general rules for say, if I have 2 party members at level 5 then the enemies should have between Y-Z HP, if that makes sense.

[amerk]

Well, I do have my Class and Magic Guide:

http://www.rpgrevolution.com/forums/index....showtopic=56673

which can also be applied to monster classes as well. Also, there' s a link there to ZeroManArmy's Level Balance which also discusses a lot about balancing stats between monster and player. Beyond those, I don't really think there's much you can do without trial and error.

[Badgerthrottle]

Personally, if it doesn't take very long, I will grind for longer.

Example: If I gain a level in 5 minutes, then I'd like to get another. Another level in 6 minutes, then another in 7, another in 8. I'm more willing to grind if it pays off quickly. It doesn't have to be a great pay-out, but the feeling of making progress so quickly makes me want to keep going.

[amerk]

Personally, if it doesn't take very long, I will grind for longer.

Example: If I gain a level in 5 minutes, then I'd like to get another. Another level in 6 minutes, then another in 7, another in 8. I'm more willing to grind if it pays off quickly. It doesn't have to be a great pay-out, but the feeling of making progress so quickly makes me want to keep going.

It really depends on my mood, but I've played some game where level grinding is such a chore and takes like an 1 hour just to gain 3 levels, but you need 5 in order to have a chance against the upcoming boss, and for those games I usually get bored real quick.

I'm with you, if grinding isn't so time consuming, I don't mind it, and I actually enjoy it to some degree, maybe not every few minutes but at least 5 or 6 levels within the first hour. Usually I like to do my grinding at the beginning and middle, with extra bonus grinds occurring by completing side quests and optional boss enemies. That leaves me enough space in between the beginning middle and end where grinding isn't necessary and I can enjoy the story.

Generally, a game that allows level grinding should count on a person gaining about 5 to 6 levels within the first hour of combat, and about 2 levels or so for every additional hour, with some exceptions.

[Severity]

I don't like grinding personally as I play the game for it's storyline and not for trying to level up quickly to make things easier for me. Unless I need to grind so that I can kill a boss or something, I would stay away from grinding.

[Severity]

Oops double post is it allowed? If its not I'm so sorry!

This post has been edited by Severity: Jul 3 2012, 03:00 AM

[Puck]

Considering I grew up on games like Pokemon, Dragon Warrior Monsters, Dragon Quest and various other RPGS that required grinding I can admit I enjoy it. It's not a real problem for me and I don't see why it is for anyone. If game time and difficult consist of grinding then so be it. If you don't like grinding you can always attempt various strategies that you can try and attempt to take the game on at a lower level. It's a concept that's in every game just in a different light. "Beat up bad guys for points." Only these points are more than bragging rights on the high score board of that Ms. Pac Man machine down at the arcade.
What good is a game that doesn't require grinding and fighting? I don't want a game that's walking through dungeons, slapping enemies that are frail and few and only dialog. It needs to be rich in difficulty and challenge. A little grinding if not required leveling is never bad. I always feel cheated and gypped when I beat a game and I only had to be level 45 or even lower and the game allows leveling to 100.

[Oceans Dream]

There is no strategy to grinding, that is why. It is just pointless wastes of time. It can be fun if you are actually working towards something but otherwise it is rewarding a behavior that doesn't increase your knowledge of the game, your use of strategy, merely that numbers go up so that you don't have to do anything else but attack or spam strongest spell. If the only way you can beat a boss is to be at level x, then the game is at fault. Running around in circles around a save point for hours should not be anyones idea of fun.

In Final Fantasy 5 for example, since the story wasn't really its main focus, but had a great class system, grinding was rewarding there, even if I still felt it was too tedious. Making goals for players to reach and be rewarded from is at least one way to minimize the pain of grinding.

They can accommodate grinders by putting optional bosses and optional dungeons, but that is not something that should be required for a main game. Obviously someone who never fought anything wouldn't be able to beat the game, but the idea is that someone should be able to win on natural levels, using their intellect and strategy and knowledge of the equipment and skills, not because they fought 2000 enemies in an area near town so they can go to the inn then go back out and continue for hours.

You can do something like beating certain optional bosses raises the difficulty of the last boss or something just so people don't whine that the last boss was too easy after they've done all that but it's not something I pay much mind to personally.

This post has been edited by Oceans Dream: Jul 3 2012, 08:57 AM

[Ndoelicious]

Yeah, level grinding gives me the creeps, like really, it's an unfair fight with many vs ONE boss and then we overpowered that boss...ugh~
But still, choosing level difficulties is god at some point, but also has it flaws. Like Kingdom Hearts 2 : a total fail. A proud mode? Damn beating the game is just as easy as hell, the only nuisance is Sephie..and pople even chllenging themself by defeating Sephie on level 50 below I managed level 60 though~

Still, it depends on the game. When the game is on a 'serious' theme, like FF series or Star Ocean and many SE published, level grinding is not an option. There's no such 'real' levelling spot, since the game was made to keep the villain-overpowering at bay. But on some games like from Nippon Icchi, which is not really that serious(80% of the map is actually for sidequesst, and of course, hidden-epic-char), level grinding is like a must. THat's why we love the NIS series like DIsgaea. Though some of the extra maps -like from Atelier/Mana Khemia will be unlockable by the endgame.

[Puck]

I agree. If it's only for the fact you NEED to be that level to get past something. It sucks a bit. But if it's for something else, say... A rare item drop, skill points or class oriented things as Ocean mentioned then it's good. I remember spending forever grinding on The Dark Spire to learn passive skills just to unlock a new class. It's fun and rewards the player if implemented correctly.

[Ndoelicious]

Hahaha, well, it always better to spend time on online-games than solo RPG since it's more rewarding
But yeah...if it's rewarding enough, why not?
There's always a Youtube to brag~ xD