The Skyscale Quest Line Is WAY Too Grindy, And Insulting [Merged]

[Oghier.7419]

It wasn't that bad.

 

I finished my Skyscale last week, after about two weeks of fairly concentrated effort.  There were times the repetitive steps seemed overdone, as Anet often goes overboard with the timesinks and busywork.  There were also some quite clever quest steps, stuff I actually enjoyed.  And, as with many things in GW2, most of the time was spent traversing the open world.  If you enjoy that for its own sake -- and I do -- the skyscale quest isn't that bad 🙂

 

Finally, it helps that the community is so willing to aid you.  There was at least one jumping puzzle step that I would never have completed on my own.  A friendly mesmer on a skyscale happened by and helped me with that bit.  That sort of thing happens a lot here.  It's pretty great 🙂

[azorean.1850]

because its not grindy at all. i think ppl forgot what grindy is or dod they even know what grindy rly is. and is also insulting to everyone that did the collection and didn cane to a forum to QQ about it

[Squishy.6139]

This quest just made me ragequit the game, after the 2 hour wait and going to the Sunspear place to find out i waited to be rewarded with.. Collecting more items. 

I just couldn't anymore, i got genuinely upset. This is not Gameplay. This is not fun. If this is the dev teams idea of content I'd rather just quit the game, FFXIV respects my time a lot more.

Edit: had a bit of time to settle my temper tantrum, should've just stepped away when i got bored and continued later. We live and learn i guess. I'll still say It's not fun content, but I'll do it in tiny steps to get that skyscale.

I'll leave the original post because i do genuinely think it is a bad thing to put something so desirable and highly quality of life behind content this poor and repetitive.

Edit 2: I have now gotten my skyscale, and still stand by everything i said. I grinded it out with the help of CommonTate guide videos because i knew it would make my time in Guild Wars 2 so much better having a skyscale.. But my lord. This is some of the most insulting terrible quest design i have ever seen in 20 years of playing MMORPGs.

Edited January 17, 2023 by Squishy.6139
I'm immature.

[Bladestrom.6425]

4 minutes ago, Squishy.6139 said:

This quest just made me ragequit the game, after the 2 hour wait and going to the Sunspear place to find out i waited to be rewarded with.. Collecting more items. 

I just couldn't anymore, i got genuinely upset. This is not Gameplay. This is not fun. If this is the dev teams idea of content I'd rather just quit the game, FFXIV respects my time a lot more.

If you actually finished this, please ask yourself if you had fun doing it.. I can't imagine anyone that did, was it really worth doing? really?

Necroing a dead thread because you 'rage quited' for an optional questline, interesting.

[Inculpatus cedo.9234]

Enjoyed the 'quest', have advocated for more such quests. 

Be aware, I completed it in 3 weeks way back when; I started with no map currencies at all and this was long, long before 'Return to....'.

[yoni.7015]

17 minutes ago, Squishy.6139 said:

If you actually finished this, please ask yourself if you had fun doing it..

I had fun doing it. The collection is really not a big deal. But if you don’t like it, just don’t do it. Very simple. Skyscale is completely optional. 

[Bladestrom.6425]

Just now, yoni.7015 said:

I had fun doing it. The collection is really not a big deal. But if you don’t like it, just don’t do it. Very simple. Skyscale is completely optional. 

 

Same here, i liked the questline and i wanted the reward, so decided to do it.  Others may not.  What's odd is starting the questline then generating drama about your own decision to start. If you don't like it just stop and do what you do enjoy - that's the core driving principle between all GW2 content.

[Heibi.4251]

I enjoyed the skyscale quest - except for the original time gates they had. I did it when the time gates were REAL and not the "scaled" back ones. And the reward at the end was well worth my effort. I mean the skyscale is basically a Legendary Mount.

Edited January 14, 2023 by Heibi.4251

[Squishy.6139]

19 minutes ago, vesica tempestas.1563 said:

 

Same here, i liked the questline and i wanted the reward, so decided to do it.  Others may not.  What's odd is starting the questline then generating drama about your own decision to start. If you don't like it just stop and do what you do enjoy - that's the core driving principle between all GW2 content.

Drama? I call it feedback.

A game making you feel this way ( Mind you I've been playing MMOs a long long time ) is not good design.

[Bladestrom.6425]

51 minutes ago, Squishy.6139 said:

Drama? I call it feedback.

A game making you feel this way ( Mind you I've been playing MMOs a long long time ) is not good design.

 

' im rage quiting' is not feedback.  you started an entirely optional questline, that many others have enjoyed and you didn't enjoy it or even research it before you started..so you quit the ENTIRE game instead of that single questline?, drama much. Maybe just don't do the questline and do the content you assumedly do enjoy in GW2 instead?  btw the game didn't make you feel this way, you chose that questline, you made yourself feel that way.

What is good design?  a long term objective with a desirable goal that doesn't affect balancing and is optional and some people enjoy.

Edited January 14, 2023 by vesica tempestas.1563

[Ashen.2907]

1 hour ago, Squishy.6139 said:

Drama? I call it feedback.

A game making you feel this way ( Mind you I've been playing MMOs a long long time ) is not good design.

And yet other people feel a different way about it.

It is not physically possible to create content that every player will love, so developers create a variety of content to hopefully hit the sweet spot for as many players as possible.

Remember that pretty much every piece of content that you have loved in your, "long long time," playing MMOs was hated by someone else. Should every one of those pieces of content have been removed from those games you enjoyed?

Edited January 14, 2023 by Ashen.2907

[Sobx.1758]

2 hours ago, vesica tempestas.1563 said:

Necroing a dead thread because you 'rage quited' for an optional questline, interesting.

True. On the bright side, he seem to have realised what that post was, judging by the edit of his initial post.

1 hour ago, Inculpatus cedo.9234 said:

Enjoyed the 'quest', have advocated for more such quests. 

Same!

1 hour ago, Inculpatus cedo.9234 said:

I started with no map currencies at all and this was long, long before 'Return to....'.

...and same. Still took my time before even starting it, as didn't feel the need to rush it. Not sure why some people do, but the "I need it now!" attitude seems to be the main issue for the players complaining about it.

[dognosh.6327]

I did it 3 times(twice with friends who were doing it)

 

You want grindy ?

Lion's Memory. May the gods help you if you miss any ach in a story line and have to do it again, and again...

[ArchonWing.9480]

On 10/10/2022 at 7:27 AM, Machineuzi.5604 said:

I feel like some of the frequent responders here would have gotten the Skyscale if they devoted the same commitment/time to obtain it as they have in commenting here

Well, if only their in-game skills are better than the posting ones.

But in all fairness, there would be something else to complain about.

Edited January 14, 2023 by ArchonWing.9480

[WillowWisp.6497]

I'm sorry but... what? No one is laughing in your face. The wiki is literally there to help you where you need to go and what to do despite the 3 day and 8 hour wait because you know what you could do while waiting for 2 hours after every achievement? Enjoy exploring Tyria, do races, craft something, do Fractals, pvp, wvw or look into killing world bosses. It's unhealthy to checklist and you should broaden your horizons a little more than just focusing on getting that Skyscale.

[Vayne.8563]

I feel like the skyscale quest isn't as good as it could have been, it's a bit overtuned.

Running around the same zone three times in a row to get scales, deliver medicine and get eggs is busy work. It's not the end of the world, it's just a lot of time in that zone going to the same areas multiple times.  If we had 10 of each thing to find, it would have been faster and accomplished the same thing.  It's just longer to make it longer.

The currency bit I didn't have a problem with personally because I play those zones, and now that Seasons of the Dragons is an achievement it shouldn't be an issue at all, plus people also farm Eternal Ice.

The last part flying around in each zone is a bit over the top considering it's easy and again, just busywork. Ten zones would have been enough.

 

Not a huge deal either way for me, but I can see how it would annoy people.  I have the skyscale on 10 accounts, so I've done this quest 10 times.  A bit annoying but not nearly as bad as some people make it out to be.

 

[Bladestrom.6425]

respect to @Squishy.6139, he necro'd the thread but has since modified his comments which are more measured now and acknowledged he was a bit heated at the time (we have all been there)  /thread can die again 🙂

Edited January 15, 2023 by vesica tempestas.1563

[Obtena.7952]

Just another person that thinks an MMO can be changed to accommodate them. 

[Random dude.5089]

On 5/2/2022 at 3:20 AM, Akisohida.8963 said:

So I need to find 21 scales, blanketing the island. Ok.

Now I need to do 30 events, to  get medicine. ....Sure.

Now I need to give it to 14 Skyscales. Oh joy; moving around the island that frequently teleports me back to camp...Again...

Oh, now the quest tells me those 3 steps, which took literal hours. Possibly DAYS if you don't have 12 hours a day to spend playing, were literally worthless to the plot. Way to actually laugh at my spent time, game. Way to laugh at me for playing you.

And now I need to go back around the island, for a FOURTH TIME, to get 21 eggs that I could not collect earlier.

 

Leaving aside the 30 Events; that's 55 different things I have to collect or interact with on multiple loops around the island. I'm not even seeing new sights or interacting with new things. I'm flying to basically the same places as the first two times. But I could not pick up the eggs early because the game said so.

 

And according to the wiki; even after I do all this; I have time-gated quests that total to 3 days & 8 hours? Why? Why?!

Why is this mount buried behind the worst grind I have run into yet? And an arbitrary 3-and-a-half-day time gate? Why? Because the mount can hover? Because it can fly slightly  upwards?

 

I know I have a habit of saying stupid things or overreacting, but this entire collection quest just feels...insulting. It insults my time with way too much to do with 0 variation. It insults me by, IN UNIVERSE saying those hours I spent were worthless. Ha-ha. Silly player. You did not make a difference. 

The medicine did not show him they were aging faster. No; the asura literally says 'What you did was useless. Oops.' Insert shrug. Cue laugh track.

It insults me by making me waste literal hours that mean nothing to the plot, only to then make me waste literal hours waiting for the plot to move forwards. For...no reason.

 

The mount is not super powerful. I can't fly anywhere. I can't break the game. I don't get some godly attack. It does not raise my stats. I can't even fly that high compared to the gryphon.

So why is the grind absurdly long, absurdly insulting, and absurdly time-gated behind THREE DAYS of waiting?

 

 

I don't expect the devs to reduce it; If they were; they would have already. But this is...Argh. I know a few people who would get to the "Oops. You wasted your time" attempt at a 'joke' and stop playing, because they don't like when games literally laugh at the player after making them jump through hours worth of hoops. And I can understand why they'd drop the game.

It's not funny; its sadistic. It's the developers, or writers, basically slapping the player in the mouth and then laughing at their frustration. "Look what we made you do. Your spent time did not even matter in-universe. Hope you don't mind us having a laugh at your expense!"

 

 

Let me try to explain my frustration another way:
Imagine a game let you customize a hero. It's not you, it's your mentor. You get to equip him and your character. You decide his training, his skills, his gear. You spend 3 days levelling him and you up. You get to the battle with his arch-nemesis. The game is building towards you and him, fighting together, to redeem him!

And then the game kills him in a cinematic for comedic effect. No epic fight. No last words. Just knocks him off a cliff with a silly *Smack* sound and a Goofy 'Wah-ha-ha-hoooy!' yell. None of your gear, or levelling, or skill allocation or ANY of your 3 days of hard work mattered; He was going to die for a joke, and nothing would change that. You wasted 3 days for a joke.

And worse, the villain breaks the fourth wall to look at the player and say 'Boy! Hope someone did not spend 3+ days working hard to fight me! Because this was always going to happen! Hahaha!'

 

THAT is what the 'Lol, the medicine was never going to work.' so-called 'joke' felt like. I felt disrespected for using this product. I felt like the writers, or devs, or whoever, were laughing at me. This was a meta joke at my expense. 'You wasted all that time circling the island 3 times and fighting 30 battles. Lol! We Asura are silly!'

 

And, as far as I am aware; I still have to spend 3 days and 8 hours working towards this mount. Not counting however long it takes me to collect the 21 eggs.

This bloody quest is too grindy, too time-gated, and too insulting of the customer's time.

 

 

Sorry for the rant. But sometimes critical feedback is better than positive feedback, and I tried to keep my points clear and not insulting. I also just needed to vent after being laughed at by the game for spending the last 3 days of my free time starting this collection.

 it took me two weeks to complete just by playing 2/3 hours a day , the path of fire 250 currency is easy to get , just do the achiement to tier 3 and you get 250 each , also you just need like 300 gold , including the living world season , plus the skyscale food if u don't wanna wait or forgot to craft one each day , also  there is only two flying mounts , you could also go for the griffon and get it in a day or two , the mount is unique and worth the grind , way to keep you busy , the harder you grind for something , the more boring it gets , like why would you need to go hardscore on a mount that is not even necessary , i did all content without flying mounts , ofc not so efficent , but you'll get there , plus its a one time grind , i don't see why you complain , i guess you just tought how long it will be to grind and u got traumatised thinking about it.

[IAmNotMatthew.1058]

On 1/14/2023 at 5:59 PM, Squishy.6139 said:

This quest just made me ragequit the game, after the 2 hour wait and going to the Sunspear place to find out i waited to be rewarded with.. Collecting more items. 

I just couldn't anymore, i got genuinely upset. This is not Gameplay. This is not fun. If this is the dev teams idea of content I'd rather just quit the game, FFXIV respects my time a lot more.

Edit: had a bit of time to settle my temper tantrum, should've just stepped away when i got bored and continued later. We live and learn i guess. I'll still say It's not fun content, but I'll do it in tiny steps to get that skyscale.

I'll leave the original post because i do genuinely think it is a bad thing to put something so desirable and highly quality of life behind content this poor and repetitive.

Welcome to MMOs. If you don't want to grind for stuff CoD may suit you better. But considering you rage quit over the second collection I don't think anything was really holding you here. It literally takes like an hour for each part of the collections, excluding the feeding part.

[Artemis.8034]

Its pretty much the rolls Royce of mounts, I wouldnt expect it to come cheap and easy.  Actually it isnt hard to do really ,just people dont want to take the time to do it. I guess they want it like raptor a quick little story and boom a mount. That would be insulting to the mount since it is a premier mount and insulting to the mmo genre.  The instant gratification crowd are trying to change the mmo philosophy in this game and change it for the worse. If you want games like that then go play games like that and stop trying to destroy this game and make it fast and cheap.

 

Nothing good will come from that only the ruination of another great mmo. Players that dont like this kind of long term gaming need to move on, we play this game for long term  not instant gratification. Then after you have everything in a few weeks after getting the game changed,  you locusts move on to another game leaving our game that we love decimated and a shell of its self. Any game company that goes this route will only see short term gain , and long term slide into irrelevance and servers on life support. I have seen it happen over and over again 

[asket.5674]

On 5/2/2022 at 3:35 AM, Xerxez.7361 said:

Just wait until you start working on a Legendary Armor set and learn that to quickest one is time gated by 6 weeks (30 weeks+ for all 3 Sets) 😄

Haha 6 Weeks of raiding for BiS. Man i remember times before raid item tokenization + fixed rewards, times where DKP Systems were in place to distribute loot, times where excess items simply got destroyed because nobody needed them anymore and the whole raid went home empty handed. 

man i don’t remember how long i farmed my epic mount in vanilla wow. 

people forgot what a grind really is. 

Compared to the old stochastic itemization processes of mmorpgs, the deterministic  „grind“ of gw2 is a cakewalk.

kitten i am old. 

[Gehenna.3625]

1 hour ago, asket.5674 said:

Haha 6 Weeks of raiding for BiS. Man i remember times before raid item tokenization + fixed rewards, times where DKP Systems were in place to distribute loot, times where excess items simply got destroyed because nobody needed them anymore and the whole raid went home empty handed. 

man i don’t remember how long i farmed my epic mount in vanilla wow. 

people forgot what a grind really is. 

Compared to the old stochastic itemization processes of mmorpgs, the deterministic  „grind“ of gw2 is a cakewalk.

kitten i am old. 

I remember playing Aion Online and the Miragent armor set...

[Urud.4925]

47 minutes ago, Gehenna.3625 said:

I remember playing Aion Online and the Miragent armor set...

I was there... I also maxed all the crafting professions, before they completely removed then in favour of a new crafting system. So much time wasted 😕 At least GW2 doesn't invalidate "grinding" achievements. I'm fine with some grind, but I hate when it becomes useless after a new gear set/QoL improvement.

[Psybehr.2518]

I check this forum once a month to see if this awful grind is gone. I got half way through, noped out, and took my money to WoW.