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Powerleveling versus Smartleveling The Benefits of Investment Powerleveling

Goals are essential, both in life and in RuneScape; they are what motivate us to work towards something that is important to us. For example, as I compose this topic, it’s a Sunday afternoon and I’d much rather be playing RuneScape than writing about it. J I have a goal to get this general overview of skills written, though, and that compels me to push on. For many RuneScape players, in-games goal are a similar vehicle for encouraging them to stick to particular training targets.

Not all goals are created equal, however: I draw a distinction between what I consider natural goals, and those that I feel are more artificial. This isn’t an effort on my part to be judgmental—I realize that everyone is different in terms of their objectives within the game. It is simply my belief that natural goals do a much better job than artificial ones at positive motivation, while the latter type is much more prone to encouraging frustration and burnout.

Any time a player is trying to reach a level in a skill in order to accomplish something specific within the game, I call that working towards a natural goal. There are hundreds, even thousands of such goals that players set for themselves each day, depending on what they consider fun or important. Natural goals can range from reaching particular skill abilities, to enabling access to minigames, using special equipment, reaching moneymaking targets and much more.

Here are a few examples of natural goals:

• Getting level 25 Herblore to do the Heroes Quest.
  
  
• Training to level 70 Attack to be able to wield a whip.
  
  
• Raising your Firemaking skill up to level 80 so you can burn magic pyre logs at the Shades of Mort’ton minigame.
  
  
• Training Slayer up to level 60 to be able to fight aberrant spectres, so you can use their excellent herb seed and herb drops to train Herblore.
  
  
• Training Fishing from your current level of 76 up to 81 so you can catch manta rays on the fishing trawler.
  
  
• Working towards level 94 Magic to cast Ice Barrage in PvP activities.
  
  
• Leveling Hunter up to 65 to be able to catch magpie implings in the Impetuous Impulses minigame.
  
  
• Raising Strength or Agility up to level 60 to be able to get into the God Wars Dungeon.
  
  
• Getting Herblore up to 85 to be able to make all potions in the game (Figure 136).
  

  Figure 136: That’s a Wrap!

  In hitting level 85 Herblore, I am now able to make every potion (and variation) in the game.

  
  

These are all rather different in nature, and most involve different skills. But what they have in common is that each goal is a natural consequence of trying to unlock content in the game. And that makes them, in turn, naturally motivating, with a clear target and a specific reward for achieving it.

In contrast to natural ones, artificial goals are those that players invent for themselves, often without any specific underlying in-game reason. These are goals that players want to reach not in order to unlock game content, but just to have the levels themselves. Here are some examples:

• Deciding to get at least level 80 in every skill.
  
  
• Trying to attain a total skill level of 1900.
  
  
• Attempting to be the first to get 99 in a new skill.
  
  
• Getting a higher level in a skill than a friend has.
  
  
• Powerleveling up to level 99 Cooking to get a skillcape.
  
  
• Maxing out a skill (getting 200 million XP).

Now, again, I am not saying that there is anything wrong with striving towards goals of this sort. But in my experience, these sorts of artificial, “man made” goals far more often lead to problems than natural goals do.

First of all, since natural goals are based on achieving in-game capabilities, and most in-game features require levels below 80, they are more realistic. In contrast, many artificial goals are far more difficult to reach, and involve a lot of grinding—don’t underestimate just how much more difficult it is to get 99 in a skill than it is to get 90. This can lead to players becoming frustrated or falling victim to leveling burnout.

Second, most artificial goals don’t have any tangible reward to them, just a sense of accomplishment. While this is fine for some players, others feel rather let down when they get to their goal and find that it really hasn’t change much about them or how they play. This is also true when it comes to skillcapes, even though that could be considered a tangible reward. Some players get these thinking that other players will “respect” them for it, and then find that it simply isn’t the case.

Finally, I have on many occasions run into players who were trying for an artificial goal, such as getting all of their skills above a particular level. Yet this goal, rather than motivating them positively, weighs them down like an albatross around the neck. I can remember one person in particular, who kept lamenting that he had to train some skills he hated to achieve his objective. Eventually I just asked him why he was doing this if he wasn’t enjoying it—and he really didn’t have an answer.

Remember that it’s a game, and it’s meant to be fun. If you’re enjoying working towards a skillcape, great! But if your goal is turning the game into a chore, then the goal needs to go!

Powerleveling versus Smartleveling The Benefits of Investment Powerleveling