the grind in fact is a matter of opinion based on what your willing to do to achieve an end game goal.
Fact: if you play any game for only an hour you can achieve end game eventually
Fact: money is easily achievable even when taxed for example
Mini fact: You dont have to use the trading post in order to sell gear(No tax)
Mini fact: you can lower your repair cost by crafting repair parts if you level a profession if not the repair parts of a full 580 set medium fully broken is 300 gold which you can get by doing your faction quest.
all these facts: are in fact, FACTS any game actually has 3 versions of it. The casual version(1-2hours of game play) where you just enjoy the game for what it is, you pop on you choose something you want to do if your on a high pop the choices are more then a low pop but still similar and then you log off.
medium (3-4 hours of game play) You focus on achieving concrete goals like maxing out a profession or working on your gear score, interchaning these goals in order to reach a end game goal of being closer to min/max to perform better in PvE/ PvP content (Which you can choose) also yes PVP content you will notice a performance drop if you do not do this but you will still be able to compete if you understand your class (I suggest watching the video of the naked rapier combo so you understand just how this game does in fact not need gear in order to perform. yes this is an EXTREME example but an example non the less)
High(6+ hours of game play a day) ill drop no lifers into this category even though they should get there own category, These players have more time to work on professions, grind WM, PVP, take territories and participate in wars, they will naturally have an advantage that you can eventually get to with time but because they have more time they are naturally ahead because they just have more time then you.
A Low should not be upset that in his 1 hour of game play he can not achieve what a HIGH is currently achieving but in fact he/she is pretty close to a medium and a medium should e close to a high.
Now the problem is how a LOW manages his time. IF for instance you CHOOSE to max out a profession and BUY all your 600 gear that is in fact fine. BUT if you CHOOSE to ONLY do PVP your watermark will be low because CACHE WM system is SLOWER then PVE WM system.(how so?) I am glad you asked.
While you pvp’d in that OPR for 30 minutes twice and logged. a PvE player with the current BORING SYSTEM did this: NINJA’d ALL CHEST IN Scorch/Most of MYRK Rotated through the small towns and got every small chest and 1 hour chest, ported down to REEK did all of Sirens Elite chest, More then likely abused tentacle poor mechanics of pathing and got the 2 chest at Eternals. both played for an hour but PvE player managed to push his watermark more because 50-55 in fact goes pretty fast( a week or less at an hour a day). Now if you add in a second or third hour to these LOW I don’t have time to play players you get to Form a group to farm bosses farming GUN/BRUTE or FIST/Guide) your increasing that watermark even faster. NOW you could also go attempt a dungeon but seeing as you do not have the experience and more then likely DONT have the time to MIN/MAX with Potions and gemming correctly to max out your damage so the run goes smoothly you might in faction wipe and lose a good amount of money. but eveyr boss gives 288 gold and assuming you have a clean inventory that gives you 5-6 wipes worth of repair bills based off the repair cost above. (winded)
Now then lets get down to the truth.
We all hate the grind it is long but not impossible. Many of you have chosen to do 1 aspect of the game expecting to keep up with people who utilize the full game. This game was advertised as IMERSIZE many times they said they wanted all aspects of the game to be intergraded meaning, a crafter who wants to achieve crafting with out trading post would of just by killing and not skipping monsters would of raised his WM by now if he started when the game first game out to a minimum of at least 550. Facts are many people did not want to do content because it was boring or repetitive Crafting is the same shit you gather materials you craft stuff it raises or you buy it and it raises you hit 200 and you begin your next profession. Much like PvE you grab the same chest you kill the same mobs at first glance the systems are boring. Now if you do not avoid the IMERSION that they have been pushing then in fact you do many different things. You go clear portals with your company because you need azoth/money/loot because you cleared these portals you now have material you need to Craft dungeon keys, WM, Make money, Make azoth(But portals are so HARD, well yes the end game portals are but you can do the lower ones with a small group and upgrade the shards you get naturally slowly leveling your Stonecutting in order to make KEYS for dungeons, WOAH CRAZY what a system!) or you could say sheesh i want to fight some bosses! go to dynasty because it WAS a LOWER tier AREA you should of been FARMING from 500-550 GS ANYWAYS woah look at all these chest and loot i got naturally doing the game. ZOMG I GOT A TROPHY ITS A LOADED DICE(20k) but maybe i want to keep it for my self you still made 20k). Wait I am higher then that what can i do? Oh I can always quest and get FREE keys to RUN DUNGEONS to get a taste and see if i like it or join pug groups I could run lower dungeons for money even though I am higher then the content i get to help my friends LEVEL bro i am so nice! NAH i dont have time for that, LET me be PROACTIVE and watch some CONTENT VIDEOS on how to RUN the boring chest runs for an hour. Woah Crafting mats? I NEED THOSE (OR nah ill sell it and make money) WOAH MY WM is going up from this, DOUBLE WOAH i get trophies purples and potential legendaries BECAUSE IM MAX GS wild!
Done beating a dead horse my point is you make these excuses but in fact you have done nothing in this game to actively play a game that they wanted you to enjoy the whole game. You can here thinking it was just like every other MMO I can do 1 thing and compete with the rest of the people.
NOW! LUCKY YOU! the designers said we like casuals WE WANT you to play for just a little and benefit in multiple ways. So they came out with the CACHE system. you can now do OPR, or portals or dungeons or even craft and get WM AND you can still do the old method but rightfully so they reduced it to balance out with the faction you can now GARENTEE a push in WM. Where as people who no life’d this game for instance could have farmed brute/gun and walked away after 6 hours with NO WATERMARK now they can do an hour of OPR and upgrade. SHEESH say please say thank you to the DEVs. Also do not reply to this saying ZOMG I did not read your log winded post because in fact that only shows that YOU sir are in fact the problem your lack of effort and spreading of misinformation from lack of understanding of what the game designers were actually trying to achieve is a problem.
NOW i will say they need to communicate better with each other give us a road map and continue to improve on the game but you can do your part by actually going out there and playing it. I watch as my LOW pop (AZTLAN) server has many people in town afk chatting on global about how they hate the changes/ While i run my chest routes and kill silver elites when i can to increase my low watermarks.
