The Grind
Posted 07-28-2008 at 12:31 PM by Thireas
Wired.com posted this article by Clive Thompson. It's about why MMO players, specifically World of Warcraft players, grind levels. It mentions experience in specific, but I think it could be extended to Honor, Arena Points, Reputation, BG Marks, etc.
Thompson's main point is that grinding is a direct time-to-reward relationship: The more time you put in, the more reward you will receive. Fact. He further points out that nothing (or at least, very few things) in real life work(s) that way. And, I'm inclined to agree, to a certain point.
It is very satisfying to know that killing a few more mobs will get me that next level, or doing this next AV will get me enough Honor for my new helm. The ratio of time put in to reward gained is very high.
Compare this to real life. Lets say you have a job with regular pay (hourly or salary). You put in some time, you get paid. That seems like a pretty direct relationship. It's just that the ratio depends on the ratio of how much you're getting paid to the cost of your desired lifestyle. In WoW, I guess that relates to how far you want to progress in the game. If you want to raid end-game content, you're going to have to put more time in. If you want to hit 70 and be done with it, then the needed time is much less.
So, thus far it seems pretty equal in terms of time-to-reward ratio. The deciding factor is effort. Effort in real life is variable. Effort in WoW (for the most part, and in terms of grinding), is constant - and pretty minimal. In the real world, "the daily grind" usually means you're at your job, working as hard as is necessary to make a living. If you work hard enough (put in enough effort), then you might get promoted. But this will take a long time, and a lot of effort.
It's not a "might" in WoW. If you put in a little bit of effort, and a little bit of time, you'll succeed. The effort is nothing difficult - like working in a factory, or managing a team, or building complex database driven websites - it's just pushing some buttons, really.
So... it's a confusing subject, to be sure, but what do you guys think? Is it the ease of WoW vs. Real Life, is it the ratio of the aforementioned factors?
Or is it (as also mentioned in the article), that grinding is in some way comforting? It's mindless. It's something that you don't really have to think about. I know I enjoy grinding sometimes, when I've had a stressful day. I know my girlfriend does too. Do you?
Postscript:
Thompson's main point is that grinding is a direct time-to-reward relationship: The more time you put in, the more reward you will receive. Fact. He further points out that nothing (or at least, very few things) in real life work(s) that way. And, I'm inclined to agree, to a certain point.
It is very satisfying to know that killing a few more mobs will get me that next level, or doing this next AV will get me enough Honor for my new helm. The ratio of time put in to reward gained is very high.
Compare this to real life. Lets say you have a job with regular pay (hourly or salary). You put in some time, you get paid. That seems like a pretty direct relationship. It's just that the ratio depends on the ratio of how much you're getting paid to the cost of your desired lifestyle. In WoW, I guess that relates to how far you want to progress in the game. If you want to raid end-game content, you're going to have to put more time in. If you want to hit 70 and be done with it, then the needed time is much less.
So, thus far it seems pretty equal in terms of time-to-reward ratio. The deciding factor is effort. Effort in real life is variable. Effort in WoW (for the most part, and in terms of grinding), is constant - and pretty minimal. In the real world, "the daily grind" usually means you're at your job, working as hard as is necessary to make a living. If you work hard enough (put in enough effort), then you might get promoted. But this will take a long time, and a lot of effort.
It's not a "might" in WoW. If you put in a little bit of effort, and a little bit of time, you'll succeed. The effort is nothing difficult - like working in a factory, or managing a team, or building complex database driven websites - it's just pushing some buttons, really.
So... it's a confusing subject, to be sure, but what do you guys think? Is it the ease of WoW vs. Real Life, is it the ratio of the aforementioned factors?
Or is it (as also mentioned in the article), that grinding is in some way comforting? It's mindless. It's something that you don't really have to think about. I know I enjoy grinding sometimes, when I've had a stressful day. I know my girlfriend does too. Do you?
Postscript:
I can't believe I've applied math to real life accomplishment. I guess I'm a giant nerd, but I guess I wouldn't be posting here, or playing WoW if I wasn't. At least there weren't any formulae.In other news...
There has been discussion on going into Mags, as well as going back into Gruul's. I'm excited
Total Comments 1
Comments
 | Mags is a lot of fun, once you get the pulls down its nice to do Gruul and Mag together, or even as a warm up before another raid. I think my guild has learned thru practice to down Mag in like 15-20 minutes tops, there are only 3-4 trash pulls, then the boss |
Posted 07-28-2008 at 01:21 PM by Tatt  |
Recent Blog Entries by Thireas
- Alas, Poor Macros... (01-02-2009)
- On CSS Polymorphism (not about WoW at all) (11-07-2008)
- ZA Cleared! ... twice (10-31-2008)
- Grats to the Mageroyal Syndicate (10-24-2008)
- "Rotation" (10-19-2008)
