The point behind such a "grinding" grind?

[Ty Tanium]

Afternoon,
After an online session with my brother yesterday afternoon we started pondering the actual point behind such a grind gap between T6 and T7/8 ships.

In a recent post the following observation was made by Ace42;

["For all the factually incorrect criticisms people have of +/-2mm, or P2Win, etc, etc - I'm amazed that people seem to miss the one example of a pretty deliberate attempt to institute exactly those things.

I mean, yeah the P2Win is disguised behind the "it's pay to progress" conventional credit grind; plus everyone who is in a position to be disgusted by the change also being in a position to just get the ships and play them (myself included in that demographic) thanks to benefitting from rampant inflation."]

Okay, we all know that this game, like hundreds of other MMORTS/RPG games, is designed to make money... they're designed to get you to a point where, in sheer frustration, you claw the credit card out. Problem is that I would suggest the majority of those playing don't have that luxury so why make the later tier vessels so difficult to get by playing?

Wouldn't that start to drive people away from the game in frustration rather than have them continue enjoying the game WITH the P2Play option always available if they're able?

I think that a review of the "Grind gaps" between higher tier ships needs to be done.
imho, as always.
Cheers,
T.

[~T~D~]

Originally posted by Commander-S.R.:

I wouldn't recommend grinding past tier 8 anyway since the ships get ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ after t8 also thats when all the paper ships pop in at the most grind to t9 but I would still say t8 is the most acceptable level and the matches are also alot more fun then the tier 10 matches that consist mostly of long distance sniping and island hugging also from t8 and up the ships get very expensive to fully kit out with all upgrade modules etc etc it seems that t9-t10 was invented exclusively for making more money to WG

Anyway that's just my take after 3k hours in the game

Thats true and seem it same for all, wish WG added more fun for lower tiers tho.

[Blue]

Originally posted by Ace42:

Originally posted by cartridge.png:

Define 3 days.

What sort of matches?
500bxp potato matches in random that include losses?
1,600bxp 20-minute matches in Ops where all secondary objectives are secured?
1,200bxp matches that can take under 10mins in asym?

Matches or gametime will be infinitely more helpful for the same reasons you specified. If you don't have the chance to play every day for 12 hours per day you will not progress as fast.

[arjensmit79]

Why bother talking about XP anyway ? A few ship XP boosters and a day of play is all you need to unlock a line.

Its all about the credits to actually buy and equip the ships.

[Drunem]

Originally posted by ~T~D~:

Originally posted by Drunem:

and what is the difference? are the ships cheaper after 4k hours? or perhaps not? i told you it took 2 months for the complete german lines t5 to t11. what do you think how much hours i had after two months? you just tell nonsence!

U have 4200 hours and clearly not new, so yeah it's way different.

again, just for you:

a ship cost for example 240k xp points. it DOESNT MATTER how many hours you have played! 1 hour, 10 hours, 100, 1000, 10000... this ship will ALWAYS costs 240k xp points!

what do you think how many bonuses i`ve got in the first two months? i had 44 ships after two months! again: ALL germans techtrees from t5 to t11.

so, if you cant manage this, YOU make something wrong and not the game, me or someone else. just YOU!!!

[carelessjet2]

Originally posted by cartridge.png:

Originally posted by Ace42:

What sort of matches?
500bxp potato matches in random that include losses?
1,600bxp 20-minute matches in Ops where all secondary objectives are secured?
1,200bxp matches that can take under 10mins in asym?

Matches or gametime will be infinitely more helpful for the same reasons you specified. If you don't have the chance to play every day for 12 hours per day you will not progress as fast.

one dose not need to look hard to find me talking about how high level player can not relate to the new.

this is not one of them, there is a dockyard for a free prm ship.
assuming they did not play long enough for the free T10, they still got a free T8.

one can use there free T8 they just got to get the free prm T5 to grind missions and credits.

i have not done the math to see if that T6 BB can be got for free but there are free box's.
new players should worry about what they can complete and not stress over what they can't.

OH, i'm only a 48%er yet i was able to get 5 t10's this month from event...........so "3 days" dose not really sound like a stretch

[Ace42]

Originally posted by cartridge.png:

f you don't have the chance to play every day for 12 hours per day you will not progress as fast.

It should be utterly uncontroversial that people who *are not spending their time playing the game* aren't progressing with the grind. Or getting the full value out of the premium time that game has freely given them.

Sorry, but "I only played one match per day, and I've not managed to unlock a Tier 10 within three days!!!" isn't a credible criticism of the grind.
"Three matches total seems about right to get a Tier 10" isn't reasonable, however much ~T~D~ might think that's appropriate.

Getting out rewards at a rate proportional to the effort you put into optimally grinding is both right and proper.

Nepgear helped bring some useful numbers to the discussion - about a dozen matches to go from Kita to Haragumo with Prem time and blue boosters (both of which were free in the Dockyard alone, let alone all the other freebies the game gives you); with the earlier ships in the line taking even fewer-per-tier to get past.

But if it helps you get a handle on things: I'm not some sort of mutant wearing a diaper, and on a drip-feed of nutrients and stimulants allowing me to cram a months' worth of grind into just 3 days. If anything, burn-out and boredom meant I was taking it particularly lazily (as I think I stressed earlier) - I think the last few times around I did a Haragumo reset, they were in 1-2 days.

I can't remember the exact amount of match-time I spent this time around, nor was I counting the number of matches - I was just getting on grinding out that week's Dockyard (some of which couldn't be conducted in DDs, and thus some of which was not contributing to the line's shipXP, but would've contributed to credits admittedly) and then playing a handful of asym / Ops matches when it took my fancy.

I don't have some magic hyperbolic time-chamber that lets me grind out "years" worth of matches in the space of just three days; nor do I have access to secret special resources that aren't easily available to the rest of the playerbase.
I *do* typically top score, and even if someone competent pips me to the top score, I'm generally scoring well and consistently: Specifically in both Asym and Ops for the purposes of this grind and discussion.

I stressed the factors that went into making this grind exceptionally easy (free premium time, free blue boosters, asym being an active gamemode, misc xmas giveaway rewards quite aside from those that were tied to having a large pre-established port); but also how new F2P players can leverage them to the same extent.

Naturally, anyone with even the slightest head-start on the grind (better than T5 ships, a free premium ship from the previous dockyard's giveaway or free xmas crates, credit drops in free santa lootboxes, a free T8/10 from the giveaway, whatever) should find that the requirements for closing out Haragumo are even less stringent than the extreme case I put to ~T~D~ by way of illustration.

Originally posted by arjensmit79:

Its all about the credits to actually buy and equip the ships.

Ship singular, to be clear. The thread's mostly about getting a T11 (although the tangent we're on atm is expressly about a T10 for various sensible reasons). There's arguments for being patient and keeping intermediate ships in a line, but for sake of grinding in the shortest possible amount of time - neither keeping nor equipping the ships is necessary.

In the case of the Haragumo line - I was resetting it anyway. I didn't need to research unnecessary modules, nor buy them; nor did I need to equip them. They were all getting liquidated after the grind anyway.

If you're just gonna bash out an entire line in a few days in PvE, you don't really need to waste credits on ships you're barely going to be sitting in for too long.

[Blue]

I don't see why this is so touchy?

Can't you just tell me in assumed hours/matches.

Knowing "it took me X weeks" doesn't answer anything.

[Banzai]

Originally posted by cartridge.png:

Define 3 days.

Maybe talk in matches?

3 days to me is at most about 25 matches.

Originally posted by cartridge.png:

I don't see why this is so touchy?

Can't you just tell me in assumed hours/matches.

Knowing "it took me X weeks" doesn't answer anything.

He did:

Originally posted by Ace42:

Nepgear helped bring some useful numbers to the discussion - about a dozen matches to go from Kita to Haragumo with Prem time and blue boosters (both of which were free in the Dockyard alone, let alone all the other freebies the game gives you); with the earlier ships in the line taking even fewer-per-tier to get past.

And tbh I dont see why this is in any way complicated. If you average 5k ship xp per battle for example (including boosters/prem or whatever) then its pretty easy to work out how long it will take to get 100k xp.

[Ace42]

Originally posted by cartridge.png:

Can't you just tell me in assumed hours/matches.

I wasn't keeping count, and I don't like giving out inaccurate information. Nepgear's already, rightly, had to pull me up on being imprecise.

However if you want me to make a guess, I was typically getting ~20k shipXP per match (sometimes pushing 30, sometimes maybe down to 17k or so, maybe to occasional unlucky match that was a washout).

So we'll say
12 matches for Kita > Gumo
8 for Aki > Kita
6 for Shira > Aki
4 for Hatsu > Shira
3 for Mina > Hatsu (no Ops, and Mina's default torps aren't really suited to Asym).

And below T5 can just discount altogether because you're in what the OP called "getting to T5 in a heart beat" territory; and the FXP you get from stuff like Dockyard is enough to skip straight to T5 anyway.

So 33 matches, plus whatever it takes someone to get to T5.
So about 11 hours worth of grinding in 20 minute ops (just under 4 hours a day for three days);
about 5 or 6 hours worth of grinding in Asym (2-3 hours per day).

Somewhere between the two if you're mix-and-matching, if you get particularly unlucky with teammates in Ops might be a bit higher - if you're particularly lucky getting bad teammates in asym, far far quicker.

Credits is a bit of a different picture - as I said, I was doing Dockyard missions alongside the grind, but I was down to zero credits during this period (grabbed Kunming that cleared me out; was kitting out several Xmas premiums, etc) and didn't stall on them, so not exactly unworkable either.
Sometimes various lines get discounted for credits, so there can be a bit of horse-trading between whether you get the value out of grinding a cut-price line vs grinding when various freebies are active or not - which further complicates the credit picture.

If, unlike me, a player managed to get the benefit of the +200% FWOTD bonuses from last week, that would've trimmed out an extra half-a-dozen matches btw - assuming they weren't wasted on a washout.

Knowing "it took me X weeks" doesn't answer anything.

It answers the charge that the game's progression system unfairly prevents people from grinding out high tier ships in a timely manner; as well as undermining the idea that F2Pers are forced to crack open a wallet unless they want to spend a "year" failing to nail one single tech tree.

Using totally free, easily acquired, resources, a player can convert their free time into grind progress and be done in days - without the need to go full stalker-astronaut-cross-country-driver.

I thought I was clear drawing a distinction between "the game enforces a slow grind on you to make you pay to skip it" and "the grind will take a long time if your personal circumstances (or preferences) oblige you to draw it out over a long period of time".

The former, ~T~D~'s accusation, is unreasonable. The latter should be uncontroversial.

[Blue]

I don't have any disagreeing points on the grind. I don't personally find it that long.

Your breakdown of your DD grind is much better for me to gauge.

I can also give an accurate answer to my "early game grind" and "mid game grind" as I played the ships exclusively to get to the T10 and never again.

I know that my first ever T10 took me 147 battles in T9 ALONE. Something I do painfully remember as it was the most miserable T9 ship I've ever owned. The next was 90 and the most recent that wasn't free exp was 53.

I have never used free exp for grinding and I have still to break to reluctance on using it (currently 900k).

Your breakdown of your DD grind is much better for me to gauge.

[Ace42]

Originally posted by cartridge.png:

I have never used free exp for grinding and I have still to break to reluctance on using it (currently 900k).

Unless you're brute-forcing a quick grind in PvE like I was, you want to be using FXP to insta-research modules on whatever new ship you're in, so you're not struggling in PvP using stock ships needlessly.
There's some ships that benefit from this even in PvE (IIRC Minegumo needs upgraded torps to easily stealth torp depending on commander, etc? - whatever)

That's their best use - although obviously no point in doing that if you're not going to buy the researched module and thus get the benefit on your way through the line.

Aside from that, assuming you've gotten a T9 premium to grind credits in (usually you'll get one from coal before you feel any need to grab one using RB), it's really a matter of personal preference whether you want to use FXP to jump ahead with a tech-tree grind to get a T10 (and thus anniversary / Xmas event rewards, etc) or want to hoard them for RB resets if there's a specific RB ship or Unique Upgrade (LegMod) you want.
Of course, you'll want to keep enough FXP in your pocket for the next ship(s)' upgraded module(s).

Your breakdown of your DD grind is much better for me to gauge.

Bear in mind this was Haragumo line - so the consistency of a gunboat and safety of smoke-farming. Torpedo DDs might struggle to beat out teammates in Asym, although tend to do tolerably in most Ops IIRC.

Haragumo is preferred for FXP resets because it has low XP costs for the line - battleship lines tend to require more total XP and thus would require more matches to max out.
But ship lines like Libertad benefit disproportionately from having access to Asym, so that also kinda sorta balances out potentially too.

[Blue]

I'm still holding out on a 750k free exp ship (I know it's never coming but let me believe)

I do however, as you say, spend them on modules that are deliberately designed to hold you down. Notably torpedo and main gun ranges...

[Ace42]

Originally posted by cartridge.png:

I'm still holding out on a 750k free exp ship (I know it's never coming but let me believe)

While the grass is growing, the hungry cow starves. My understanding is that FXP ships as a concept has been totally superceded by the Research Bureau (which does effectively the same thing, but in a greedy way to combat grind acceleration and thus FXP inflation - it converts FXP into premium / special ships).

I do however, as you say, spend them on modules that are deliberately designed to hold you down. Notably torpedo and main gun ranges...

Gun ranges aren't typically that useful except on open-water gunboats. Battle impact always goes down with distance.

Stuff like the Yugumo Type F3 8km torps are far more consistent (faster, less reaction time, higher DPM - although less safe) than the 12km torps T93 mod3 torps (20km T93s are a bit of a noob trap given that their surface detection radius tends to be higher than assured hydro detection radii).

Obviously torpedo boats like having the "best" torpedos available - and some torps have *very* different characteristics to others - but because typically any torp alpha is good alpha, it's not necessarily the highest priority.
Worth noting that the unlock-order for F3s and mod.3s are reversed between Yugumo and Shima.

So yeah, it's typically nicer to have it than not have it (although DDs having short gun ranges can help with duels vs enemies DDs where you kill the enemy DD and then instantly go dark because there's no other enemy ships in your smaller gun range), but I wouldn't consider these anywhere near as important as improved hull.
Especially as some improved hulls can mean stuff like more MB guns (Z-23 is an example IIRC?).

[Blue]

Originally posted by Ace42:

Originally posted by cartridge.png:

I'm still holding out on a 750k free exp ship (I know it's never coming but let me believe)

Gun ranges aren't typically that useful except on open-water gunboats. Battle impact always goes down with distance.

I just so happen, to play almost exclusively gunboat DD now.

[Ace42]

Originally posted by cartridge.png:

I just so happen, to play almost exclusively gunboat DD now.

Then yep, gun range is essential for open-water gunboating, so that makes perfect sense.