A mysterious thing called Burn Out

Decided to write this post as a number of us heard some guy talking in Raidcall during Club Gaiscioch about getting burn out of the game.

To start things off:

burn out

phrasal verb of burn

adjective: burnt-out

1. cease to function as a result of excessive heat or friction.
2. ruin one's health or become completely exhausted through overwork.

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So in essence, burning out means we will need to take a break from the game, which is actually supposedly the thing that ought to be fun and that we are using to take a break from whatever that we are actually doing – taking a break from the thing that is supposed to help us take a break. Hmm..

In my twelve years of gaming experience, I’ve played through a number of MMO, ranging from original EQ, Ragnarok Online, ROSE, WoW, Swtor, Rift, GW, GW2, and a number of other titles that some I couldn’t even recall their name. I can say that the levelling and questing ranges. From gruelling grinding (losing experience and possibly gear every time you die, corpse runs, hell levels every 5 levels), to easy (can’t even recall the levelling experience). From boring quests (Click, click, click, collect item, click, click, quest done), to interesting quests (listening to almost everything the npc has to say). What I can say is, ESO is not that bad, in fact, it is one of the better MMOs out there in the market now.  

Questing

The questing system in ESO is interesting enough, even until now, at VR3, reaching 4 soon, I could not recall any repeated quest. Every quest in this game is unique with a proper story line behind it. I could not stress enough on the option of being able to use persuasion and intimidation which is unlocked by the mage and fighter guild respectively – It adds so much interesting options that I sometimes wonder what could/would have happened if I do not use it. The questing in the game sometimes forces us to make interesting decisions that directly interact on how certain NPCs interact with us. PS: I didn’t know my character is Chaotic evil until he intimidated and robbed a merchant girl off her goods outside of Deshaan.

The World

Tamriel is a rich and vibrant (sometimes very dark) place. There are plenty of places to explore, there are chests everywhere waiting for adventurers to lock pick them, the bags, crates, boxes are usually filled with something, and the plants sometimes give you extra baits for fishing. It is a rich world out there, and the developers were bold to remove the mini-map, something that is in almost 99% of the MMOs out there. This in my opinion increases immersion significantly and most of us are forced to look at the screen, the scenery, the fork at the road, landmarks occasionally, to find our way. It got rid of “mini-map staring” and attempts to let us appreciate the “world” out there more.

So Tide, after this wall of text, what are you trying to tell me??

Burning out is a choice. Leveling from VR1 onwards can be gruelling, but if rushing is not how you usually play a game, don’t rush yourself and try to hit VR10 so you can kick some banana (AD) and smurf (DC) butt. Because it will be a never ending thread-mill. VR is going to keep increasing in further patches, and this cycle will only continue, pushing for level cap after level cap. Might as well try to enjoy the process instead of doing mindless grinding?

Slow down your pace, do some crafting, pick some flowers, catch some butter flies, ride around looking at the sceneries, run into a farmer’s house and loot everything, get a treasure map (I’m sure a number of you have these in your banks rotting, telling yourself some day you will just finish them up one shot) try finding the chest locations without using dulfy or google – you’ll probably be shouting “YES FINALLY!” when you found it yourself, try out different skill lines, try out different weapon types, head to cyrodiil and do some quests (for some chill when running solo and knowing that some banana or smurf might jump at you anytime!), find some skyshards that is out of the way, collect some lorebooks, go Fishing (I’ve not tried this yet), go gather some crafting materials, check out our GSCH market place and see if there’s anyone in the family you can help up, check out the emotes in-game, do some /pushups followed by having some /apple, try out some dungeons (post in the calendar if you have a fixed schedule), participate in the many GSCH events that is scheduled (no matter if you could only come for 15mins, just come), the list goes on, the list goes on.

I can’t stress enough that I’m not telling you how to play this game, but rather I’m sharing an alternative route if you feel that you’re going to burn out in this game.

Just my personal 2 cent note to the family. J

Cheers. 

I can't agree wit this more. Originally I'd been rushing through my first character to see how fast I could hit the v10 and got to about v3 and really started to slow down and it felt more like a job then something I was enjoying. Then came around graduation so now I'm rolling and alt playing with my s/o. And of course that is a much slower pace since it's her first MMO and I feel like I'm seeing the game from a whole new perspective now because we are stopping to check out everything and moving a bit slower so I can teach her the different mechanics and lo and behold at a slower pace it's like I'm seeing a whole new game. I'm not necessarily saying that I'm giving up the fast race to cap for good but it's very refreshing to see a new view of the game and brings a lot of the fun back into the equation. 

TL;DR It's like two whole different views on the same game depending on how you play it!

I think it's ok to accept that you don't like the game and just leave the game if it's not your cup of tea. Nobody here will force you to pay 15u$s a month to just rant about how much you dislike the ESO experience.

*nods* I agree with you kitty, funny thing is I feel that sometimes people who rant about it are the ones who care about the game most, haha.

That's why its always interesting to see posts about people complaining about the game especially during maintenance time - because they really wanna play the game but unable to and end up going to the facebook comments/forums. 

hmmm... it's all about the journey... is that why I used to enjoy those 21 minute boat rides that left Freeport every 15 minutes? ;)

I was there when the individual began his, for lack of a better phrase, Rant.  I can understand someone feeling frustrated with the game, it is not without it's faults, but I thought the individual took his frustration a bit too far.  The language, and I don't mean foreign language, was completely unacceptable. It demonstrated a complete lack of respect for his fellow guild members.

This is a game folks, there is absolutely no reason to "burn out" or vent your frustrations in voice chat or in chat in general. If you are not enjoying the game, stop playing! Not rocket science. 

If you find yourself reaching a high level of frustration, take a walk along the beach. Go to the gym, spend time with your family (I'm sure some may have forgotten what you look like not glued to the monitor), simply do something else until you feel like you need to give it another go. 

If you are so fed up with the game you never want to play it again that's ok!  Walk away from the game knowing you did so with honor and respect for your fellow guild members.  A written or verbal rant shows little respect for your fellow guild members. You don't have to explain why you are leaving, we understand life has many twists and turns that are personal and do not need explanation. I have seen many who have left and I was certainly sad to see them go, but real life and your own health should take priority over a game.

That is the mark of a true member of our guild, respect!

Why does my journey have to include being a speed bump to Night Mistress and friends soooo many times. it totally bummed me out. 

Not quitting. just . . . le sigh

Please take the rant for what it was, we were spilt up into multiple chat applications and clearly he was having a conversation with someone else and we weren't the intended audience.

Mistakes and errors happens and if he knows what happened, then he has been public shamed enough,  we don't have to continue it.

I couldn’t agree more with Tide. I think I was one of the loudest bellyachers – not in GSCH Raidcall – but in voice with a circle of friends and on the ESO forums. Once I realized that all the ranting on the forums wouldn’t change the things I disliked and adapted my gaming style, I became a much happier gamer. There still are many things I wish were different – but they aren’t and probably won’t change. I knew that there was a strong pull on me to continue to log on and I needed to adapt.

For me that meant letting go of the desire to craft everything and to limit myself to just 3 crafts; as well as to not stockpile everything. I have a few “mules” for extras – but knew that I was being made miserable by having to manage an unwieldy inventory.

And as Tide recommended, I stop to smell the roses now. I try to immerse myself in the unfolding stories of the quest. Occasionally I break from questing to do treasure map or lore book searches – I walk on parts of the map that quests haven’t led me to. I find that I can manage just fine with the loot drops and my crafted white items (glyphed) and so don’t need to grind for mats. I don’t even repair that much.

I sometimes get nervous when I know I am about to embark on a guild or quest hub mob boss because of their difficulty; but when I successfully complete the quest, I’m very proud. I feel the game is making me a better player when it keeps me challenged. I’m learning even more about gaming. On my first Ebonhart alt I died a few times before I could conquer the end boss. Now, on my second EP toon, I am managing them at level and with no deaths. So I am progressing. But it does take an attitude adjustment. Some will respond with anger and get very frustrated when they die a few times; for me . . . it’s a rallying call. (It does put a ding in your ego. LOL) My first tough boss was the Level 8 Mage Guild Gutsplitter (before nerfed) and I think I died about 8 or 10 times. But I got up and went right back until I got him down. Gak! Stayed up until midnight on a work night too.

And as also suggested, now and then I work on some low level toons in the other factions which gives me new scenery; quests and a break from the intensity of the higher levels.

I’m primarily a PvE and dungeon person so will join with GSCH events when they are scheduled. (Wish there were more!  I'm bad about picking up event threads in guild chat.  LOL) A big part of my gaming enjoyment comes from interacting with people.

Do I want more inventory space given to me? Ability to craft everything and with less restrictions? A central hub for buying and selling? Yes! But that isn’t the game they envisioned. It’s a big departure from what I am used to; but it’s the cards have been dealt us – and I want to stay in the game.

Please note that the intention of this thread wasn't to shame or pin-point anyone at all. The intention of this post is to share with everyone in the family on how burn outs can be prevented by playing the game from another view-point. 

No one is here to force anyone to stay in the game, and there is no right way or wrong way to play a game - just play the way you want it, how you want it.

The only reason I typed this wall of text is to share my view-point to people who are finding the leveling process grueling that there are alternative routes to travel from point A to point B, and things aren't as bad as it seems.

That's a pretty good sized wall of text.  I am very impressed, especially with the time taken to format it.  It's one thing to do a wall of text post, it's far more impressive when you do it with style.  lol.

I think we've hashed this over before but the problem isn't so much that people feel the need to rant.  Sometimes it's pretty therapeutic to vent your frustrations in a speech.  The problem is the venue of choice for the rant is not always appropriate.  If you're negatively impacting the fun of others, then you should probably take it elsewhere. 

That being said, sometimes you start off in a room with yourself and a few close friends and the suddenly half the guild is in there with you.  I know back in the Rift days, people would constantly jump into the channel I was in to talk to me or just listen to my long winded soliloquies.  Some just wanted to listen to us during raids, which often resulted in them losing several hours of their life that they wished they had back.

On the topic of playstyles, I think the people who came to this game for the PvP are especially frustrated about the extended PvE stuff needed for them to get to max VR level.  It's a delicate balancing act in all games of this nature.  If you make things drag out for too long then the PvPers will start to complain and if you make the leveling too easy then the PvE people will complain.  Maybe when they tweak the amount of xp you can gain in AvA, the people who don't enjoy questing or dungeons or PvE type things will have an easier alternative to level and the frustrations will be less.

I do agree that if you really don't enjoy this game, then you should just go find another game.  We are spoiled with choices these days when it comes to MMO's.

Wait.... "take a walk on the beech"... /looks outside   Ohhhh Dang, I don't have a beech!

But....  I could be one of those people who suffer burnout if I would let it get that far.  I have a lot of time (retired) and love to play games.   I have played ESO a lot - a whole lot.  And still haven't even reached the VR levels on any of my numerous characters.   I go off and play GW2 a couple of times a week - I play on the X-box with the grand kids - I spend time with family and friends to break up my ESO time.

But I can truly see if someone has reached VR levels - however they did it - then gets rolled by someone or group of someones who did a massive grind to get to VR10 just so they could be dominant in RvR then frustration could very well set in.  This is when you really need to take a step back and start "playing" again - don't make it a job to level.

Is getting rolled by the VR10's fun - well, maybe not yet I don't hate it.  It is a learning experience especially if you watch their tactics and while some may say all they do is go Vamp and Sorc on your butt - that isn't really all they do.  They move as a coordinated squad.  They follow their leader - do circling techniques, set offensive siege even in the field - have players assigned to specific tasks - such as finding stealthers, curing conditions (not just healing) and tend to focus, and focus quickly, on any one opponent that is causing the most grief to them and then move down the line.  They also put several players (they seldom if ever travel alone) in the back lines to pick off stragglers or those with less health or armor and then go stealth and hang by the corpse waiting for someone to come rez them - to pick them off also.  Don't mistake their dominance as being a one trick pony - they aren't. 

And then we were fed another bit of info on Tues by an astonishing source - them (the comment was they want us to be better - they enjoy the competition - yes, we talked to them)- they have a dedicated player guesting on every campaign.  If need be they can then travel to that player once he enters the campaign regardless of their home or most recent guest campaign chosen so they can have a fight - they like to fight.  They also pulled out on purpose after Fog explained what we were doing.  We may not like them on the field of battle - but they aren't bad people.  If this is a /bug or working as intended I don't know.  But it isn't an exploit - imho -  if any of us can do it - it isn't unfair - it is just good strategy.  They have excellent strategy - we need to accept that and get better ourselves - and we will.  You have to accept that also - we will get better.

Safe Journ!

edit:   Well, I kind of got off track from the primary concern of the thread.... but then again - frustration can hasten burnout especially if you think you aren't getting anywhere from your "grind" or play time.

So yes, ease your frustration - smell the roses - look at the vistas... (in RvR the other night I couldn't help but stop and look at the distant snow covered mountains - it was like a nice picture post card)... go play COD for awhile - not because you will enjoy it but since after playing it any gripes you might have with any other game will seem small :) (btw, I do play almost all the versions with my two grandsons and do have fun with them - but it is still ... well won't go into that here.)

If you are getting burnout from any thing - game, work, relationships - then my advice is to take an ice cold glass of ice tea and sit back so that you aren't so close to the flames.  Then move back in when you have cooled off.

I tried to play this game at a casual pace but in all honesty, it just wasn't interesting enough to do so.  In my opinion, Zenimax played it safe, which made for a boring experience.  I didn't burn out on ESO, I just saw it for what it was and decided that I did not have any desire to get back on that treadmill again.  Same treadmill, different gym.

I've kind of hit a burnout point well for me I guess it's moreso ran out of content. I am v10 and have no content left to do The veteran dungeons after so many runs of farming have become mindless and boring and no challenge at all anymore. Initially when me and VR guild starting farming these dungeons it got fun again since it felt like we were searching for these set pieces that you can't craft. That was done in a week got the best gear in the game and no reason to run them anymore.

The quests? Well they may be interesting but after questing up to v5 I don't have it in me to go through that again so I grinded through the v6-v10. Crafting well they've made crafting so easy it's disappointing I got my crafts to 50 just deconing stuff in VR zones and it was very easy, my enchanting is also 50 and well the game only allows us to make v8 splendid glyphs basically even though mobs drop white monumental glyphs. Enchanting gave me something fun to do I made millions of gold from it when I set up my glyph shop in the VR zones, but that too got very boring cause now I got over 2mil gold and thats when you begin to wonder what do I even do with gold in this game? lol

PvP well it's just not my thing here I'm always a big pvper but this game has taken the fun out of it for me, there isn't ever a point in AvA where I felt myself getting excited about going into a fight, its zerg after mindless zerg. Small scale pvp in a small group is just as unrewarding you run 20 mins to maybe fight for 5 mins before a zerg takes you out. I wish there was some sort of pvp like GW2's spvp or WoW's arenas that would actually challenge a player, where each player their build their items and skill level determine the winner, not the zerg that has the most people.

Some would say I went too hardcore and didn't take the time to enjoy the game, to them I'd say everyone enjoys the game their own way. For me what I strive for in mmo's is the chance to be the best and enjoy a community, unfortunately for eso trying to be the best means you run out of content.

As much as I find this game flawed I really enjoyed it and it was definitely worth the money for the amount of time I played on it, I just wish I had more reasons to continue subbing I hope craglorn will be it and it's kind of do or die for ZOS cause if they screw up craglorn they are going to loose a ton of subs that like me are waiting to see just how great this craglorn is.

There have been so many insightful posts... thank you for your comments and the good read. I would suggest that some of the problems and the solutions are applicable to real life. I was a mom who didn't mind having her sons play video games because I thought they taught lessons that could be used in their education, relationships and much more. The idea that there is often another way to approach a problem - never give up, was easy to identify. Teamwork was learned early. I could go on. Getting burned out is something that companies dread in their employees and, of course, employees hate as well. Smelling the roses, changing procedures, taking breaks, learning patience, all are good ways to improve your life, work, marriage, parenthood, etc. 

I just hit 37 and I still love poking my nose into all sorts of places to see what is there. It's been a very long time since any game made me want to randomly wander about just to see what I can find. This is my way of agreeing 100% with the OP; no game should be "work". I don't care if we get rolled over by VR10 - it's still fun leaving RL for a while messing about with guildies. It will all equal out in the long run so I'm one of those that will enjoy the journey.

Simple solution…

1. Have a spouse or partner that has a stressful profession. My wife was a trauma OR RN for…hum…can’t remember exact years, but way to long…lol. Now she is an OR Manager for a rural hospital; her idea of slowing down thinking it would be less stressful…/facepalm.
2. Convince said spouse to try video games to take their mind off the sometimes grueling emotional aspects of their day to day job activities.
3. Trick them…I mean, talk them into joining you in an MMORPG by explaining to them how much fun it will be to run around in a virtual world that has absolutely nothing related to the real world, hand in hand…okay…sword or staff or bow or…in hand projecting images of individuals that made their day even more unnecessarily stressful on mobs or bosses as you decimate them together with your uber powerful alter egos. Okay…maybe mine is less alter than hers is. Never really thought I would ever see my wife find so much enjoyment beating the living poo out of some virtual in game baddie. It’s the quiet ones you have to watch out for…just saying.
4. Finally, allow them to run around aimlessly for hours at a time exploring every pixel of every graphic thingy in every area of the entire game world all the while telling them how much *cough…fun you are having. We haven’t even made it out of Stonefall yet because she is certain there are still some rocks she hasn’t turned over to look under for some nonexistent skyshard or some useless item that she can try to stuff in her already overflowing bank slots until she trades them with me thinking she is giving me a gift. Now I have to find some place to store the items she gives me because I guarantee that someday she is going to say…”hey hun, do you remember that thingamajig that I gave you back on May 3, 2014 that kind of looked like a hunk of rock but was blue in color and”…
5. Smile and bite your tongue every time you start to think of the times you had to grind solo for hours just to level so you could be more helpful during guild events as the “good old days”…remembering that this new state of “fun and relaxation” was all your fault to begin with. *Sigh…well at least I won’t get burned out…

In all seriousness, any time I find myself starting to become disinterested in a game, I just take a short break and play something else until I’m dragged back in by my wife…no that’s not it…until I’m ready to give the game I’m taking a break from another go. And I really do love playing these games with my wife even though she really does look under every rock, behind every tree, in-between every blade of grass…around every…

  Reason i  am feeling burnout after just 2 weeks is because they desgined the lvling system so poorly . you only have 1 zone to lvl in per lvl range wth were they thinking .  Every MMO  has 3 to 4 diff zones you can go to to quest explore etc per lvl range .  say lvl 5-15  you can choose between 3 or 4 diff zones to exp in for that lvl , so get bored of one head to another area etc.

  Really only 1 way to lvl that is effective  you must follow the linear hand holding path that they direct you on  from quest to quest , do not stray from the path  well you can but you won`t accomplish much and sooner or later you will need to get back on their path .

 Really poor game desgin , there should be more than one effective way inwhich to lvl /play the game   you should also be able to lvl up entirely in RVR  starting at lvl 1  same as in warhammer and for the most part  in DAOC  you know the game the lead dev  helped create before ESO .

  I haven`t played any of the other factions but games  while looks great as far s graphics go , as far as functions it is very generic and done poorly ,  RVR is great  but they nerfed the repeatable  quest basicly killing the ablity to lvl up in RVR , guess they were afraid people would skip all the pve stuff they made lol .

  For people that have played diff factions are the dung and fighters/ mage guilds quest even diff or are they the same  for each faction ?  that`s what was great about DAOC  each  faction had it`s completly different dungeons , quest, mobs, etc than the other two factions  if they have the same dungs  ie crows wood, fungrul grove , etc  as   Ebonpact has thats sad  and pretty bad really .

 And wth desgined their user interface , that is the most clunky thing i`ve ever seen  press i  for inventory and instead of showing your inventory , it stops your character opens up all the sections  you can`t look at inven and still be running like every other mmo .  try and report a player it does the same thing  ,  amusingly bad chat interface as well . guild store is almost useless  in it`s functions .

Grouping system is very bad as well they have a  LFG took that is very generic, while i would actually perfer to make groups myself , due to their clunky phasing system you maynot even get to be in the same instance in a dung,   game is mostly a single player game in regards to lvling as  only time people help out is on anchors, and world bosses lol .

 And the map really pisses me off everytime you press M  for the map you   need to scroll out which gets old , but most of the time you also need to select the zone you are in from the side bar , to actually see the whole map for where you are . 

 It`s like they had some interns working on their user interface as a summer school project for extra credit , but none of them had ever even played a MMO before  .