I think upgrade prices are too...

[WaffleT2]

Scaredgirl your not really being much better then Lynxion now just taking personal shots at him because he didn't agree with you but i do understand you taking his comments personally since most of your argument has been 'this is my opinion and you must agree!'

It's just not polite to go on forums then call others stupid and nuts because they have different opinions then your own, unless your intent was to cause a reaction like this cause its true that nothing gets people all offended and wanting to argue back then having their own views personally insulted, rather then constructively criticised.

Also saying that people hate it doesn't really mean that it fails the serve a function, it just means that there is too much of it. The gaming comunity is currently flooded with grinding in such a way that they only realise they are grinding when then are resenting it. The time before they are resenting it, when its just a progression towards a goal is lost and forgotten the second you start getting irritated with it.

Scaredgirl you admit that your views are based on your own gaming experience so please accept that others have their own experience and that you are tainted by personal opinion just like the rest of the world so final judgments like 'nobody likes this' and 'everyone hates that' are a bit premature.

[CB!]

Absolute card balance should be the ultimate goal. Knowingly making overpowered cards serves no purpose no matter how you try to spin it.

That's irrelevant and off-topic. This thread has nothing to do with card power, only the cost of upgraded cards and grinding.

lol....boy, you're asking for it, aren't you?

[Genomax]

It's really not too much grinding. I can get about 4-6 upgrades an hour if I really try. I agree with other posters that the price should be based on the card.

So if you want to try a new upgraded 30 card deck with new cards, you need to grind for 5-6 hours non-stop? You don't think that is too much?

This card collecting and rare hunting is a big part of CCG's like MtG, but the difference is that they are in it for the MONEY. Elements however is a FREE game so there shouldn't be any grinding. This whole grinding crap was invented in MMO's because developers couldn't design enough content and they had to force players to grind. Somehow this mentality of "it's ok to grind" has been adopted by the gaming community.

If I had my way, there would be no money, no rare cards, or no grinding. We could have a system where you would "unlock" cards, and once you've unlocked one of them, you can use as many as you like in your deck.

This game should be about building different decks, not grinding money to buy cards.

I absolutely agree with this statement. Some grinding would be necessary, to give players something to work towards other than making decks, but the current grinding is just ridiculous. I suggest the upgrade cost either drop a bit, or the grinding be made more interesting, perhaps with some sort of challenge system which gives you more gold for fulfilling certain criteria.

After all, this isn't a real TCG, where the developers make it difficult to acquire certain cards because they need consumers to keep buying packs in the hopes of getting the cards. It's a non-profit game, so the developer has nothing to lose from reducing the grind a bit. It'd probably encourage more players to continue playing the game and spend more time creating their own innovative decks.

[jmizzle7]

Just trying to keep things on point.

[jmizzle7]

It's a non-profit game, so the developer has nothing to lose from reducing the grind a bit.

Well, it's not entirely a non-profit game. Zanzarino does want to make money off of Elements, or he wouldn't have made it. He should maximize the replay value of this game so he not only attracts new players, but keeps active players.

[jmizzle7]

Absolute card balance should be the ultimate goal. Knowingly making overpowered cards serves no purpose no matter how you try to spin it.

That's irrelevant and off-topic. This thread has nothing to do with card power, only the cost of upgraded cards and grinding.

[Scaredgirl]

Zanzarino does want to make money off of Elements, or he wouldn't have made it.

People only do things they can make money with? What about hobbies and such?

I don't know what ultimate goal Zanz has but it doesn't look like he is counting on becoming rich doing Elements. He probably already has a job and he's just doing this on the side. Donation money probably all goes to keeping the servers up.

What Genomax was saying is that Zanz isn't selling any super-elite cards or anything like that. Some CCG's do that because they have a different business model and they make more money that way.

Absolute card balance should be the ultimate goal. Knowingly making overpowered cards serves no purpose no matter how you try to spin it.

[CB!]

Is it possible to have a CCG without some level of grind?  I agree with zakal's take on grinding.  If 'boring' is part of the definition of grinding, then it is entirely possible that some people don't mind grinding for money in Elements.  What's 'boring' to you can be enjoyable to someone else.  The fact that we still have some of the veteran players with the lack of content proves this point.  If you want to play the game without grinding, play the trainer.

Of topic:

This

I see these "omg delete this topic!", "this is off-topic!" and "Waah! Scaredgirl said this.. waah waah!" as a type a psychological defense mechanism. When a person has nothing more intelligent to say. That's generally something like wanting to somehow to stop the other guy from posting (like locking the thread or banning the person) or personal attacks. I've seen plenty of these two strategies here. The reason for this is that many online gamers have a really bad self-esteem. They get dominated in real life and when they come here, they feel like they can anonymously have their revenge. Their egos are very fragile and "losing" an argument is never an option to them.

And this

Yep. This thread is a disgrace and sadly tells a lot about our community.

It started of as a useless thread, evolved into OP talking about his hurt feelings, and eventually turned into drama when kids couldn't handle feedback.

Forget locking, delete this crap.

[CB!]

Just trying to keep things on point.

But, more on topic, what does everyone think would be the best way to balance ypgrades? And who actually likes the across the board same proces for every upgrade that we have right now?

I like EH's idea on them costing 10-15 what the unupgraded card costs.  I also think I like the idea of a card being able to be upgraded more than once.

[CB!]

The fact that we still have some of the veteran players with the lack of content proves this point.

Lol, your logic is truly amazing. So if "some" of the players stay, Elements is a huge success and nothing should be changed? You have any idea how many players have quit this game in the last month? Some of those players might have stayed if trying a deck with upgraded cards didn't involve grinding for 10 hours.

I never stated that Elements was a huge success and that nothing should be changed.  If you go back and read what I DID say, I was making the point that 'boring' grinding to you can be 'fun' for another player.  Of course Elements has room for improvement, as does just about every other game out there.  But that doesn't change the fact that people like cisco have played the game for as long as they have.  And this isn't about trying a new deck without 10 hours of grinding because the trainer (and better yet, Chriskang's trainer) will let you do that.

Btw.. any chance of you stopping this crying about me and what I have said? Stay on topic, dumbass.

Yeah, that's about the response I expected.  It's funny, when somebody tells you to stay on topic, you tell them to quit being the forum police and claim that sometimes discussions go off topic.  But if I take a post that you made and contrast it with another post you made, you resort to name calling and tell me to stay on topic.

[Celidion]

I though it should have been archived the second SG ruined it with her bullsh*t logic and flaming, but that's just me.

[Demongod]

For the record: Right now, I'm running two God-killing decks.  One is the mono fire splash light that wins by CHARGING MAH LAZORZ and throwing 6 fire lances to the face, and the other is a rainbow.

That stated: it is starting to get boring.  That's what happened with Kongai.  I unlocked everything, and now new content is being added.

As for games without grind:

Any game not based off of loot or levels.

This is actually the vast majority of them.

Shmups, RTSs, the best JRPGs (read: Final Fantasies on story playthroughs), any Megaman or Legend of Zelda games, and so on.

The games that do have grind:

Diablo series
WoW
Any micro-transaction MMO (which is free to play until you're addicted at which point you start paying money to make the grind go faster or some s***...you shouldn't walk, but RUN from these)