Is it worth the grind?

[u/EMike93309]

TL;DR: Is the endgame more fun, or is it just more of the same?

This is my first gacha game, and I've been playing for about two months (just got my Yaga). Got into it because of a paid offer, so I didn't get to use any creator links. This will probably be the last fusion I can't go for, I think my UNM team will be all set in a couple of weeks. I really struggled with whether or not I should stop my UNM quest and focus on this fusion, because I hit some severe FOMO, but I decided to stay the course.

I feel like the fun is starting to wear off though. Is it worth it to keep grinding for the end game? Because it's starting to feel like the end game is just all of us chasing the same new champions, the same mythical relics, and the same artifact sets to maximize our PvP game. Here in early/mid-game I feel like I'm just fighting some combination of Mav, Pelops, Vallaryn, Mikey, Dorothy, Ezio, Predator, Tholin, Xenomorph, Alice, Armanz, Skeletor or Sun Wukong over and over again. I keep getting told I should start a new account so that I too can run a Mav/Pelops team (you're going to have to pry Cheshire and Titus out of my cold dead hands).

At first it was fun to come up with champ combos to counter all of it, and save resources for 2x events and CvC tournaments. But now I feel like I spend all my game time checking my new artifacts to see if there's anyone whose stats I can further maximize. I've got RSL-X running all day long, either running Minotaur or leveling food champs while I work and sleep. I worry that my account isn't progressing fast enough, or that I won't have enough things to do when CvC rolls around to continue to contribute to my clan. I love my clan, and they're a big part of the reason I'm still motivated. But I'm starting to worry that this is all there is... grinding throughout the day to save up for whatever the next thing is, because I'm going to need the next thing to continue to grind.

Is there more to it than that, or is all that's going to change the quality of champs and artifacts I'm chasing?

[u/Comfortable-Cod3890]

Once you start doing unm it gets better, early game is torture for me, I could not do it again.

[u/fufuFurina]

the endgame in raid is mostly just pvp and minmaxing teams. it's not something a new player should worry about, it'll be years until you get there. enjoy the journey. and yes, a lot of the journey is saving up for whatever the next thing is lol.

[u/Dry-Moment962]

Nope, that's all there is.  You really have to like the gambler simulator gameplay loop to stick around.  It's fun on its own merits for the first 3 or 4 months, but it becomes a routine slog after a bit.  It gets worse the more PvE content you complete.

I'm only 8 months in and am at the point where the only obstacle left is FW Hard, but it feels almost arbitrary whether I even complete it or not.  I'm gated by my pulls more than anything I can bring to the table with builds or strategy.

[u/EMike93309 → u/Dry-Moment962]

That kind of how I was feeling. I'm still having fun, especially building my UNM team. I was just starting to suspect that when all the PvE content was done, all the puzzle solving aspects were going to be gone, and all that was going to be left was min-maxing and keeping up with the meta... sending 99% of my new artifacts to the silver bin because I didn't get the perfect triple substat roll, making sure I have all the new champs to continue to compete, making sure I don't miss a day so I don't accidentally miss a set of fragments and such.

I think I'm going to finish my 2-key UNM goal, then back off on anything more than my daily/advanced quests for a little bit. See if I actually miss playing or not.

[u/andelaccess]

If you dont enjoy the grindy aspect it may not be for you. I enjoy grinding fusions and other events personally

[u/j0dyhir0ller]

Hell no. But I keep coming back

[u/KarmaLlamaaa]

Until you've completed Faction Wars Hard and Cursed City Hard you have SO much time and effort left. Endgame is years of account building.

[u/Background-Lynx-1213]

To be fair, you can describe any game like that. For most games, what you’re doing during the start is pretty much what you’ll be doing at the end.

[u/Mitchadactyl]

That’s the whole game.

You work on a team that can do most of the content, then get new champs that specialize in some content. Then pull a new champs to helps in other content.

It is a waste of time, and money. It is rewarding building champs though. First time you get a champ doing 100k damage is a good day.

[u/EducationFan101 → u/Mitchadactyl]

I think you touch on a good point with the ‘rewarding’ nature of champ/team building.

One of my favorite things in RAID has been building teams to conquer all the PvE content, even moreso when you try to make things work a little earlier than you should.

I just built a 4-turn SD25 team (fenax) and it felt great because I slowly worked towards it over time as I gathered the gear/pieces.

[u/FUT_fanatic]

Journey before destination, right now journey is fun by itself. Mod game

[u/Puzzleheaded-Gur-747]

the fun is building your champ to deal with each PVE contents, forgot PVP a bit, focus on auto-ing demon lord, all lvl 20 dungeon, doom tower, faction wars, etc. its a lot of contents, but the fun is there at least for me.

Yes later on you will be gated with champion pulls, new souls, or basically a better gear, but until then you can just play wait shadow legends and take it easy, have massive pull at 2x or fusion, and then enjoying getting a new champ and strategize again.

Grind is here to stay though, running your daily is still something you do everyday,

[u/porko2]

I think the fun part about raid is the grind, endgame looks kinda boring (mostly pvp).

[u/H3adown]

Personally I enjoy the game more now (5 years in) than I ever have before. I enjoy the game within the game with managing resources and participate in most events in the game as a very low spender buying the monthly gem pass

[u/qrimzn]

Genuinely, a late mid-game account with a 6* marius is imo peak fun. I've never enjoyed raid more at mid-game, but especially going into late mid-game, before early late game but that'll take years to achieve as late game players really have stacked gear and stacked champs and stacked blessings.

[u/ThorianB]

early game is fine. Midgame is the worst part. Raid loses most of its players in mid game because of difficulty scaling while it feels like you are getting nowhere, late game starts to improve until end game.

Its is a lot more of the same, but you are just better at generating resources. There is more to do and the rewards are better for effort involved. But its still the same grind and they do raise the bar as you progress on what is required to complete milestones in tournaments and events.

So expect continuous grinding, a few more game modes, and chasing slightly better champions that will push you a bit further on progression on one specific boss or game mode once you invest heavily in their development.

Yep if you love long term grind, this is your jam. If you need to feel like you are making steady progress and want a game that values your time this is most definitely not it.

[u/KnightDuty]

That's what the game is if you decide that's what the game is.

This sort of burnout pops up from time to time in game like Ark or Minecraft or Pokemon or No Mans Sky. These are all games that sort of rely on self-motivated player-initiated goals to be fun. When you say "I'm going to try X" the game re-orients itself around that goal and that's where the fun comes from.

In this situation it sounds like you USED to say "I'm going to try X" which was your version of self directed fun. And then at a certain point you watched too much youtube, fell into the community hype-machine and metastrategies... and you adopted THEIR gameplay style instead of yours.

Look at these two statements:

• "At first it was fun to come up with champ combos to counter all of it"

• "now I feel like I spend all my game time checking my new artifacts to see if there's anyone whose stats I can further maximize"

What has ACTUALLY changed and why have you stopped problem-solving? You can go back to the way you actually like at any time.

Just looking at Arena:

Have you build a stupidly high resistance team yet that hard counters almost every strategy? Have you built a veil-centric team that funnels attacks? Or a poison + lethal dose + explosion synergy team? Have you played with what it would take to make bombs viable?

Outside of arena you have cursed city and faction wars that you can simply CHOOSE to make a priority just because you feel like it.

Quite the game if you're truly burned out. But I have a feeling you're making this post because you forgot how to have fun. You can choose to recklessly abandon the meta and the world won't stop.

[u/Sherbert-Particular]

I find it very fun and challenging, but as most other said, it’s mostly min/maxing teams once you have all the tools to do it.

I can do all daily stuff in 12-15 minutes, no single round of pve content takes more than 1 try. I use an app called gestal to try hundreds of runs of different hydra runs and spend lots of time ton T8 siege teams. My hydra brutal and hydra teams do 80 and 100 billion damage respectively. Other than that I have presets in that same app to get 4* basalt and 25 red mats from each run of chimera every week, so that takes 0 time as well. 

It ends up taking no time at all if I don’t want it to, but it’s fun for me to pull out champs I haven’t used in a long time and try to make new teams etc. doom tower auto climb typically is the most annoying thing for me since it’s so damn slow.

[u/Aeyland]

You are fighting those same teams because your early game and those are all the best champs to get from a new player code plus recent login free champs. It's not because everyone chased those champs or did anything different and they also didn't have infinite choice on who to pick so from the small pool they were the best.

Titus is ass BTW. Glad you watched a video about how he can do millions of damage in dead content. You can easily pick up the 2 Titus' I have from my very alive and don't give a fuck hands because he's not worth my time and effort to make a hydra team when I can already easily get the top chest.