Going to throw in an opinion I’m pretty sure not many others will share, but want it to be out there since a few may - I absolutely love the mindless grind of resource collecting and mining. Not all the time - I will do different things in Boundless depending on my mood - but the combination of exploration and brainless collecting to me is one of the most completely relaxing things there is. I put on some music and sort of go into the “zone” like when playing Tetris or the like.
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lol, I have these moments when mining - don’t even want to use fast brews because it breaks the mantric quality of heavy hammer swinging
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I’ve not really found anything that is grindy about the game. I really like and enjoy a challenge and I also like that some things are a marathon and not a sprint. I’m in no rush to get to any perceived end game. It’s why I’ve hardly been out to any of the exos.
I started a large scale build on release and it’s still absolutely nowhere near finished, but that is absolutely ok with me. I’m in for the long haul.
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It’s true that the grind if very subjective.
To me, the grind is also what I would call a chore, which I feel isn’t a “fun activity” :
• Having to go on hunts to be able to power my portals is a grind.
• Having to leave my build to gather many stacks of ressources is a grind.
• Having to level-up to get skill points is a grind.
• Having to craft a long chain of components to forge boons on tools for fools is a grind (eh, imma use that on a shop sign).
• Having to gather coins/cubits to buy things is a grind.
All I’m interested in is building. In the end, I don’t mind some of the grind, it legitimizes the build I’m doing more than if there was a creative mode where I could just give myself all the blocks I want (like on testing server). I’d get bored of that building with 0 grind.
I think there should be a balance between building and grinding. And right now, I’d tend to say the grinding part is getting heavier and heavier as time passes, and it’s getting less and less tolerable for me.
The farming update will make the grind way worse than it currently is, and I’m confident in saying that it’s a fact, no matter how they balance the numbers of this update.
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FUELING 3x5 PORTALS EVERY 4 DAYS IS THE WORST GRIND EVER PLEASE LET US PUT 2 STACKS IN FFS
Sorry for yelling
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Coming from heavylie modded MC, everything i cannot automate is grind to some extend.
Not beeing able to set a quarry to mine stuff whilest i process the allready quarried stuff is grinding for me.
Having to manually remove fluid because the concept of higher Technologie is missing is a grind to me.
But in the end, as stated many times, it is subjective. I fully understand why certain mechanics are in the game even some of them baffle me at times from a Player PoV. But bills need to be Paid i guess 
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Grind can be good or bad, just depends on the reward you get from it. I prefer to grind for permanent rewards personally. For example grinding for a weapon/mount/cosmetic in WoW was FUN. Because eventually you knew you would get it and have it forever.
In Boundless my least favorite grind is hunting, especially because the main reason im hunting (oort) is used for portals. Some people enjoy hunting though, while I enjoy mining. I could arrange to trade but setting said trade up is also a grind in itself.
So my issue isn’t necessarily the grinding, its the difficulty of using the economy to negate the grinds that we hate.
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Sometimes I am hesitant to embrace the opportunity to practice the lost art of patience by performing some monotonous activity (mowing grass to make flour, for example). In such a case I find some other activity – I always have lots of alternatives.
Grind is in the mind.
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Something that I think most people forget is that there’s meant to be a progression in all materials…foods, brews, gear, and building materials are all supposed to be better or made better with time. People interpret this as being faster, even though you’re making something better. This is not the case. Higher-tier anything is supposed to take more time and more material because it’s better…that makes sense to me, at least
Edit: spelling
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For me most time consuming recurring activity would be related portals remembering to fuel those and participating meteorite hunts. If I have coins to use I good part of it to get oort that I wouldn’t need to do go look for it 
That is good reason for me to take part of economy and my way to keep some time for stuff I like to do.
Trying to think why meteorite hunting is grind to me is because it has become boring to me, and how mob mechanics are working there: scaled damage and hp, group aggros, no weak points and so on kind of related to this part of hostage67.
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I view grind in games, like many folks here, as “stuff I have to do before I can get to stuff I wanna do”. In games like minecraft, some of the grinding effort is offset by certain things being able to be automated; which is good if you’re just one person. However, Boundless is meant to be a community game, so I can see how automation is less desirable than economy. At this point, if I need anything in Boundless, I just learn how to go about getting it. If I decide I don’t like getting it, my first question becomes “man this is lame… how much do I have to pay someone to do this for me?” I’m also starting to realize that the best question to ask other people in this game is “What do you hate getting and how much would you pay for it?” I think a better way to facilitate this interaction is probably the best thing for alleviating the “grind” in Boundless.
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The grind for me would be to deal with levels. There’s a lot of things locked behind levels. Crafting recipes, survivability. There’s so many things I’d like to do, but having to level up multiple different characters to do it is quite tedious.
Also, certain things that seem to be “mid game” are actually “end game” and that can be frustrating too.
Also, going around to refill portals can be tedious too.
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Before i became wealthy enough not to have to grind i did grind. Alot. And it wasnt fun because the time i did spend playing the game i wasnt doing what i wanted to do. I was getting materials to do what I wanted to do. And whenever you get to that point the game becomes less fun. In the case of Boundless tho, it wasnt the worst thing because Boundless is an awesome game and i just always wanted to play it. But ive been playing since the day PS4 released and i can no longer grind because i have other things to do and keep up like a mall. So i just buy whatever i need whenever i need it and it is nice. Although i hate forging, i have a forge shop and make just enough and that is my source of coinage. Find a way that works for you so that you can have constant coinage and you wont have to grind 
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The Negative Grind in Boundless:
-Leveling. Once you hit 50 it doesn’t matter. However, reaching 50 was NOT fun from level 17 to 46.
-The Power Coil grind. It was not fun being stuck in the “Iron Age” from level 17 to 46 because I couldn’t make or buy coils.
-The “Wax” grind. Does every recipe ‘really’ need all those irrelevant ingredients… for sake of adding grind…?
-The Alts grind. If you want to do it all, you’re gonna have to map out which skills to put on which alts… and level said alts.
-The Economy grind. The economy was literally and objectively broken for a significant portion of my Boundless playtime. Maybe it’s fixed now… or at least better.
The Nerf grind. Whatever they happen to nerf along the way to make things take longer or become less effective.
Other than that I mostly enjoyed everything else.
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Wait… I have to agree with DK on the Oort shards in the portals… we need the ability to fuel them for longer. That is a needless grind…
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I would call that “second job” set up, rather than grind; you don’t need more shards because there is less slots, you just need to log in more often solely for the purpose of re-fueling the portals;
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It felt grindy to me to have to get on during hunting groups to get Oort shards when I might want to do either things. As a result I just let my portals expire.
It felt grindy to find stuff to sell so I could afford aoe hammers to get building materials. Now I just play a few days at most during the week and use my footfall to get building blocks once every week.
I was a slow builder already and now this makes it even slower but this way I don’t have to do things I didn’t enjoy as much. It also gives me time to do other things in life…like chug water.
Edit: spelling error, fixed jug, correctly displays chug
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To me the grind is the needless time to do certain tasks. Making pies the amount of time to me is a grind. Yes, normally I can do other things, but at times that is a grind as I may not Want to do those things and having to do them is frustrating, time consuming and takes the enjoyment out of it.
This isn’t whining, it is just a fact, I seem to not have the ability to make lots of coins and most of the time I don’t care, I have what I need. Right now I’m trying to learn how to forge because if I had to buy the tools I would be really hurting for coins and I kinda like forging.
It the lack of ability to get the mats needed and making tools that I have no idea of they will come out good or be lousy and not be what I need on a level 6 planet to get the exotic yams I have to make whatever I need. Same with bitter beans.
For those who have jobs, families and commitments, I can imagine how difficult it is for them to be able to do the work, “grind” to gather what is needed and then the long wait for it to be finished. Who wants to go and gather milk glands, make milk, then make purified milk then fortified milk then fortified butter to make a pie with and still need to gather the berries to make syrup, leaves to make sackcloth, grass seeds to make flour, take the syrup and make sugar, and the other ingredients to make a pie.
I’m going to have to sit down and see if what I am gaining from the trading for what I need for forging would come out with my buying them from the sales of the forging mats. Some aren’t selling yet have been told they are high in demand.
Right now I am tired and feeling depressed so that is affecting my desire to play and my perception of what is grinding.
My son, who is disabled and is a gamer because he has no life, says the game is too grindy, to many steps and there is not enough content and won’t play until more is added unless I need his help. Which I think I am going to go in seeing if we can do some meteorite hunts and not have to jump from a platform. We may have to go on our own.
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I didn’t really find this game grindy at all. Maybe trying to get diamonds with a single hit titanium/gold hammer was tedious, but that’s only because I didn’t want to spend 1/4 of all my money on 1 hammer that I knew I’d be able to craft at some point… So then I leaned to forge and mining became a joke. Food crafting is mildly complex but not grindy. Which is the way it should be and is in every mmo. I also come from games like ffxi where you spend your week out farming mobs with a full group to gain ONE level… or allods where I had to wait a real life month for my airship to be built… growing a toon to be the biggest baddest mammajamma around takes time.
I feel the younger gamers want too much instant gratification and mmo’s are not the game for that. The more time you put in the better you get. This game should take the average gamer 6+ months to get to be awesome/happy with their toon. I like to think I hit this game fairly hardcore (not as much as some of you real hardcore folk), as I do most games and it took me about 4 months before I started fully understanding how things worked and started feeling comfortable/happy with my toons. And when that happens you are fairly well “done” so to speak.
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Grind typically has a negative connotation within the gaming sphere.
Additionally, but not always, it can be repetitive tasks (npc quest of go kill x number of mobs) for the sake of a reward of an item drop chance or xp. Looter shooters are prime examples of grindy games.
The only things in boundless that I do which I find grindy are getting sap and bark. Requires mindlessly coping down trees for sometimes hours on end to get a decent stock built up.
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