NWO: Storm King has no Thunder

Now that I've finally completed the Sea of Moving Ice single player story line, I can give a more rounded review of this whole campaign, which boils down to one word really: GRIND. The locations are pretty, sailing in the final zone is fun, the foes are ok, the story is passable despite suddenly getting a whole bunch of new NPCs. I also quite like the increased number of patrolling enemies, it's like they saw what I did in my map Arroway Manor and copied it - yay!

It seems evil giants also like swimming.

You get powerful relic weapons at the end of this arc, with the only catch being you have to "restore" them to make them usable, via weeks/months of relic digging, heroic encounter hunting and sea fishing which in my book is still the biggest waste of time ever. Yes, the "new" fishing is more interactive but seriously loses the "fun" appeal after the first time you are forced to do it. Yes, I said forced. Despite Cryptic saying it's was an optional activity it is mandatory! Optional means there shouldn't people shouldn't be force to even do the tutorial, much less have it as a daily quest.

You want those weapons though? Look forward to hours of "fishing fun" or spending at auction house. Yep, Cryptic just showing more "Pay to Win" here. That is all on top of the grind to get the boons btw, which is a different set grinding months. This design is so disheartening and irritatingly money grabbing.

What I'm most interested in is to see how inclusive the next module is going to be. Is everything going to be scaled on the assumption that most folks would have "unlocked" these grindables, leaving everyone else "stuck behind a gear wall"? Will they make it easy content that the elite will complain about? Or are they going to give an easier alternative for the under geared to enjoy new difficult content making the current grind moot?

So I have a choice: do the ridiculous grind or find something more rewarding. I'm definitely leaning towards the latter.