Guys and girls I have a question that will probably be unpopular…
I am new to the game, and it took me ages to unlock empowered monoliths… When I finally got there and saw that more of the same grind was ahead I wanted to stop playing.
I just figured that I don’t like the class that I picked and would rather play something else. When I’m contemplating about making a new character, thinking of going through all the campaign and then to mindless normal monolith grind just makes me want to quit 
Do you have the same problem? If so, how do you all deal with it?
9 Likes
I probably just won’t to be honest.
Plays ARPG and doesn’t like grind??? So you want d3 and to gear you char out in a couple hours? I do think one of these should be implemented however. Either monolith progress should be shared ala POE maps or let the story be unlocked so we don’t have to go thru it but can go do the quests if wanted for rewards (skill points/gold/items) and lower level ways to level up outside story. I don’t want rushes like can be done in D3 to get your char to max in like 10 min as that’s fucking stupid and your just wasting time not doing it that way. The game already has scaled xp so no rushing.
2 Likes
I have no problem with grinding. I did it in diablo 3 endlessly. It’s the loot grind that I enjoy.
Spending hours in game without the chance to progress your gear is just soul crushing however.
Leveling yet another character for the 10th time through the same acts has never added anyone any amount of joy in any game. At least in D3 you have the options to level yourself through the events. I think that’s a great idea.
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Can you be certain about this? As in, have you asked “everyone” and they “all” said that?
I for one do occasionally like to run a new character through the story.
2 Likes
I don’t like grinding, but the bosses in Monolith are pretty interesting. The Empowered versions are more dangerous and give better loot. So all in all, it’s not a bad mode. I do agree that it takes a little too long to level though.
I started playing 0.9f at 81 hours playtime and since then I’ve leveled two characters to 100 and my playtime is at 330 or so. I was probably AFK a good 10 hours of that. So each character took about 120 hours to level. I think this is a bit excessive. Probably 40-60 hours is a good range. I know there are games where it takes even longer, but I really feel like if you’re asking me to spend more than a 40 hour work week to see the bosses at the end of the game, you’re kinda dragging it out. That’s how I value my time, personally.
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I was about to write something similar.
Having to replay a good chunk of the campaign for the passive points only and the idol slots and then unlock all the empowered monoliths over and over it makes it hard to decide to try a different type or class. I understand that respeccing is easy withing the Mastery but you can’t go back if you chose Necro and want Lich, or if you chose Bladedancer and want to try Marksman, and the only way is to play it over and chose a different mastery.
I would love to see something like Passive Points shards and Idol Shards being dropped as loot and they could be used to unlock Idol Slots or Passive Points.
Idols Slot Shards could be obtained also by salvaging idols. And Passive Slots just by playing.
So then you get to chose how you want to level up your toon but doing the campaing over and over wouldn’t be mandatory.
And Empowered Monolith should be unlocked account wide. Once you play one toon you don’t care either about the campaing or the normal monolotiths, you just run through it all to get to empowered as fast as possible so don’t see the point why it HAS TO BE replayed over and over… rather than give players the opportunity to try different builds and get engaged in content.
Also can’t imagine what will happen when seasons drop and the few toons I got now to whatever power level won’t be available for the new season and will have to replay the campaign and the monoliths again and again over and over…
Like I said,
Empowered Monoliths unlocked account wide.
Idol Slot Shards from loot or salvaging idols.
Passive Points shards from loot and maybe Monolith reward.
Or allow to use ingame gold to BUY passive points and idol slots as another way to spend the gold.
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It’s peculiar to me that some people seem to have such an issue with replaying the campaign and talk about it like it’s this jarring, unconventionally regressive feature. Every game like this that I’ve played except D3 makes you replay the campaign.
It’s also weird that if you really think about it, the complaint is like, “GRRR, I hate that I have to repeat this one kind of thing once per character, just let me skip straight to the part where I endlessly repeat a different kind of thing that’s even more repetitive!”
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I mean, technically, they don’t. I haven’t done it, but can’t you go right into Monos/Arena when you unlock teleport? Sure, if you want your passives and idols, then you need to do the corresponding quests. And even then, you only have to complete up to Lagon’s Isle to unlock all that. I don’t hear anyone complaining about having to complete the entire campaign for the (practically worthless) +1 to all stats reward.
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It is much easier to alt than you think once you have the levelling Uniques like falcon, arboreal circuit x2 etc.
That’s actually a good point. At least the story content is story content. The only thing to do at the end of the game are things you’ve already done in some other shape form or fashion. People even call it “grinding” and clearly don’t find it fun in the same way you would a new interesting game, but still want to do more of it instead of less. That’s the power of being possessed by a random loot system, I guess.
This is actually a really neat case study: Does this then mean that the little progress bar you have towards the next level reminds people how long they’re grinding? So people who find the leveling annoying are actually admitting that what they’re doing wouldn’t be fun enough on its own to keep doing it if the progress was actually linear. That’s super interesting to think about. If that’s the case, that confirms a bunch of the things I’ve been saying here over the years.
As DirePenguin alluded to, you do not need to complete the entire campaign on every alt, or even your first character. As soon as you get to the End of Time you can go straight to the Monolith. You’ll probably want to get all of your passives and Idols though, which will put you through the Heoborea Chapter. On an alt with leveling uniques this generally takes me about 2-3 hours and I’m not trying especially hard (although I do have a lot of experience, so your numbers will probably be a bit higher). The only thing you’re missing is the reward at the end of chapter 9, which is a negligible +1 to all attributes. To me, this is a very reasonable amount of time for a campaign, and for me it’s a refreshing break from the Mono grind.
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Leveling alts can be a hassle, but the process can be made very fast. Having a tab full of low level leveling uniques that you equip very early, especially alot of uniques that have movement speed, means the process can be sped up very much. I can get some classes to level 30 in only an hour and some change, then they’re usually strong enough to start doing monolith by then. It does not take very long, you don’t need to get all your idol/talent points immediately and you can go back and grab them later whenever you feel like.
As a new player, you are probably going to be slow to level alts, and this is why it seems like such a large task. It gets easier and faster with time, gear and some preparation of gear before you level another character.
Alternatively, without preparation of movement speed gear/uniques, and with little/no knowledge of what works to progress quickly through the early acts, it will take you some time. But that is part of being a new player, getting faster/better at this.
I don’t see how you’re getting bored and its soul crushing if you’re a ‘new player’, though. You should be enjoying the class and testing things/ experimenting and enjoying the journey, not trying to rush to the endgame on a class you haven’t even played before.
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I honestly think that this would only do good to the longevity of the game.
Doing the campaign again should be optional.
Running all the regular monoliths to unlock empowered monoliths should be optional too.
Obviosuly the game isn’t finished yet, but precicely because of this, now is the time to figure these things out.
3 Likes
The whole point of these games is to get loot and improve your characters.
The campaign and the normal monoliths are the tutorial that are meant to get you acquainted with the story and the game systems.
Once you know these there is nothing to gain from doing them, besides saying that you grind for the sake of grinding, the actual progress is marginal.
Asking people to go through the tutorial for all of their characters is not good game design in my oppinion.
4 Likes
No problem, there will be people that enjoy going through the tutorial/capmaign/normal monoliths for the X’th time.
Make it optional so everyone can enjoy the game.
Making it optional also creates an efficiency problem which immediately turns it into a false choice. Players will take whatever the most efficient path is and the other choice will be largely abandoned.
3 Likes
So, correct me if I am wrong here… But…
– You skip the campaign for the most part…
– You don’t want to do Monoliths…
What exactly does that leave?
– The Arena
– Dungeons
The joy in playing new alts is in the animations, character lines, and different playstyles. My buds constantly get annoyed when I cackle and chuckle because I have a primalist built around Fury Leap and while their minions and crap get bogged down I hit one button and RAAR – dead mobs everywhere. It’s hilarious.
I have a L100, 3x L85-90s, and I’m STILL building new alts just to try out new stupid theorycraft ideas, the latest being a Lightning Blast/Lightning Meteor Mage that’s just silly. (In fact, the easiest levelling builds I’ve played so far are LB Sorc and Spin2Win VK)
The ONLY point I will make about levelling a new alt is that levels 25-50 can be slow and painful depending on the build, even with twink gear because twink gear doesn’t scale well and you can’t go into your box of stupid and grab every exalt you’ve collected from levelling all your other toons. That being said, you can blow some of the hundreds of shards you’ve collected and twink out some pieces as they drop to add strictly offensive stats to slowly replace the twink gear.
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If that’s the case then at the end of the day, those same players claiming that they enjoy going through the campaign/normal monoliths were just fooling themselves.
2 Likes
I’ll correct you:
- Skip the campaign.
- Don’t want to do normal monoliths.
I will ask again, since people seem to miss the point:
There are people who hate doing campaign/normal monoliths.
There are those who enjoy doing campaign/normal monoliths.
What’s the issue with making it optional?
If you enjoy it so much, just keep on doing it.
If you’re so concerned about efficiency, then skip it.
2 Likes