Bring back the OG CoP style content

[Schultz]

The game isn't a challenge anymore. My fondest memories of the game was Friday nights sitting around with a group of RL friends doing CoP missions. The rest of the week was dedicated to doing pre-req missions/cut scenes. I have some memories interwoven with the great storyline that define the magnificence of this game.

I can still remember dumping out on the O/U fight with 1 gil Mistmelts in our Bazaar. Oh how we RR'd instantly and took them out as fast as we could. It would have been amusing to watch.

So yeah bring back difficulty to the game. If you're worried about casuals that are unable to do high end content, make it so that you can opt into HQ fights for better rewards, or atleast a chance of a better reward and make the fights repeatable until you move onto the next mission.

Some of us want to be challenged, and in my history of playing FF games, I've always opted for a challenge. Fighting Ultimecia with a Lv37 Squall (and the others under that) by spamming Holy Wars, Doom Train and Eden for 3 hours only to finish the game at 2AM and sit in awe as the credits roll. That is what a FF game is all about, the difficult, the pain, the relief when you finally do it. If I wanted to be spoonfed rewards, I'd play WoW.

[Teakwood]

Go through Abyssea getting kills on all the zonebosses in low-man parties without using any Brew. Not allowed to use Brew on Shinryu, either. Good luck shouting in Jeuno for people to help you!

On a more serious note, I get where you're coming from. I do however think that everyone has a rosy-tinted nostalgic memory of CoP. For every "oh the good old days" story someone can tell there are at least five or six stories of even just finding a competent /party/ for a CoP mission, let alone doing the fight, very much akin to putting a sensitive body part in the frame of a door and then slamming the door hard. I -am- looking forward to 90-99 content, and I'm hoping it'll be rewarding enough that people will do it despite the difficulty, and I'm hoping it's a bit tougher.

Right now, though, I'm playing the game with a few newbie friends I've finally got playing the game, and I really enjoy being able to low-man the old content, and blitz them through an excellent storyline to keep their interest in the game, rather than tell them "well, wait a few months and hit max level and maybe we'll be able to beat this if we can sit in Jeuno for nine hours shouting until we get a party for this".

[Draylo]

I agree but I generally don't want to engage in these debates anymore. I find there are too many casuals that want a game just like Hello Kitty online. CoP missions were one of the fondest memories I've had in this game. There was always a sense of accomplishment when you got things done in XI. That feeling is gone and seems more like mainstream MMO's where you get things really fast :/

[Kyrial]

Right now, though, I'm playing the game with a few newbie friends I've finally got playing the game, and I really enjoy being able to low-man the old content, and blitz them through an excellent storyline to keep their interest in the game, rather than tell them "well, wait a few months and hit max level and maybe we'll be able to beat this if we can sit in Jeuno for nine hours shouting until we get a party for this".

This. CoP was a great story, but I *HATED* the difficulty. I just wanted to watch the story. Missions are without question my favorite part of the game. A little challenge is fine, but trying to get CoP done was like trying to pull teeth... with your bare hands. Admittedly, a hefty portion of the challenge was actually getting people to do it with you, and then getting lucky enough that they didn't suck. Thankfully, after CoP I had a job at 75 (and more jobs as time went on), and was able to do the missions after that as they came out, with the large groups of others doing the same. Even so, there were still times that didn't work, and it is usually still hard to find groups to do missions with, even when they are easy (easy enough for a group, but not for solo obviously). Challenge just makes it all the more challenging to find groups, as well.

Though, personally, I've never been much of a fan of challenge. The most challenge I want is "okay, we lost this time, but we've totally got it next time". Not "Damn, we've lost ten times to this, and we're still no closer than we were on our first attempt, because the only way to win is to be lucky." (I'm looking at you, pre-nerf Snoll Tzar. >_>) I suppose it's just a matter of perspective. Some win a fight easily, and think "damn, that was too easy." I win a fight my first try, and I think "Hell yes, we're awesome." :P

[Dracoth]

1/51 on U/O, over 2.5 mil in gil spent on meds both on myself and on those who were "helping" me do the fight, and I still remember the feeling of "Oh my hell, we finally beat it!" I then spent the next year pretending that my friends didn't need the fight. The LS I joined after I got Sea helped them plenty, but I still shudder at the horror that was U/O.

Now, it's a total cake walk. And, there's nothing better for me than the cathartic feel of plowing Omega while on BLU at 90. I love being able to help new people get things done. We've run 14 people through CoP in my LS now over the last two months and it's been great. Some of them are people that have played for ever and never had any luck finding a good group and are amazed at how fun the story line is.

I do agree, however, that it would be fun if SE added in an option of doing it the hard way. Make it similar to DM in the sense that the fights are harder but that they also give a reward that's worth working for. Make it so that it can be repeated in a similar fashion as well and that either version will allow progress on the storyline, although the repeated fight could be done by anyone on or past that mission. This would give plenty of people a reason to participate and work with those going through as well as allowing those who just want the storyline done to get through it quickly.

[Meyi]

I hated CoP the way it was. I like it the way it is now.

And yes, I completed it the first time on my first character the old fashioned way. I didn't pay attention to the cutscenes and I was miserable. Death after death, and hours wasted doing pointless leg work.

I had a blast soloing it. It was a challenge, doing it all by my taru black mage self! If you think it's too easy now, then try to solo the Airship fight or something. -smiles-

[Septimus]

No, no, a thousand times no.

It is hard enough to get anyone to care about missions these days- my second character is two fights from a Moonshade Earring but no one is close to finishing them and no one wants to bother to redo them, and these missions aren't even hard. This was pretty much the same thing when I had to do CoP missions for him, even after they were nerfed (but before they were really nerfed and they added XP), no one wanted to bother because they remembered the nightmare of doing them the first time. Specific job set ups, enfeebling items that you had to go out and farm yourself, trudging through level-capped areas with true-sight mobs; that is artificial difficulty at its highest.

I was lucky when it came to CoP missions, I had a linkshell that had a stated goal of doing them and was full of competent people. We were in sea on day one, and boy was it disappointing. We did jailers on day one, and boy was it disappointing. Half of my linkshell quit for WoW directly because of CoP, so maybe all of this is why I don't have the rose-colored glasses that seems to accompany reminiscing about the "good-old days" of CoP. (That, and I am sure a lot of people with these very fond memories did the missions after a few nerfs.)

So yeah, missions are fine the way they are. You want difficulty, try to solo them on a level 60 job.

[Gwynplaine]

I think there's good but conflicting reasons why CoP divides people into loving or hating it so intensely. And that depends upon what is considered a "challenge". CoP certainly WAS a challenge, but for some good and some bad reasons. Here's my opinion of how the "challenge" aspect splits up into proper or improper:

A good means of creating a challenge and fun works to bring a unique angle to the gameplay that makes you think and adjust to new strategies. Examples of this could be the airship fight itself, one of the most epic battles ever in FFXI. Or even just NM's like Warbler or Bloodeye Vileberry.

A bad way of creating a hassle that amounts to an artificial challenge are things like all those obnoxious farmed items CoP required. It was difficult enough forming a proper party that could win. Then on top of that you had to hug walls or risk wasting more time (the whole process was a ticking clock before your party members "had to go"). Then get lucky rolling the dice for the crap to drop for you. Then go back etc.

And requiring gimmicky junk that wasted your time, like having to trade a farmed key to the Movolopolis door and THEN having to walk ALL the way back to get cutscenes, then return. Is not a challenge, it is a run-around time sink. Just like arbitrary game day or next day waits. They only serve to make stupid people feel like something that takes longer equals something that was more worthwhile, difficult, or had more put into it.

So I'm all for a challenge if that means fun and unique battles or puzzles. But Square can keep its masochistic, time wasting, artificial "challenge" in the form of hassling you.

[Retsujo]

I absolutely love a challenge, and love even more the reward of continuing story for completing the challenge. I don't mind running around for cutscenes (though WotG had even me complaining about some parts). Wings of the Goddess missions are a pretty good challenge towards the end even at Lv90. Though the reward wasn't anything to boast about.

I also have a feeling that we're going to be seeing a decent sized expansion soon, not just a piddley little add-on scenario or three. That's just a feeling I have, though.

[Zarchery]

No, no, a thousand times no.

I get where you're coming from, but I think the OP was suggesting the old-school mission style would be optional, and furthermore provide some new material reward. This would be pretty easy to pull off. Make it possible to inflict a level cap when you start the fight (like with Assault), and make the fight repeatable with, say, a key item. I can see it being a lot like the Bahamut fight, where you have one semi-easy quest fight which provides no reward except advancement of the story, and another which is repeatable and provides material rewards, but also the NM is stronger.