I would say the availability of dies and residues is by far the biggest issue.
If we have to choose between the two ideas, I would go for increasing die/residue supply. However, I would also welcome both of the two ideas.
Implementing these two changes you mentioned would very likely bring me back to make a few more weapons for some of the jobs that aren't at the very top of my priority list, and therefore also make me play the game more in general.
If you are worried about players completing their WoE weapons too fast, and be left with nothing more to do in WoE, you could always just add another stage to the weapons. WoEweapon lv99-2, like with the empys and stuff. Give the weapons some significant stats, but not something that would make them stronger than the real lv99 empy.
For example, the WoE great katana could get a tiny bit of store TP, the WoE greataxe could get a tiny bit of double attack, the WoE dagger could get a tiny bit of triple attack or crit rate/damage, and so on.
Last edited by Mirage; 12-20-2012 at 08:01 AM.
The coin suggestion is a no brainer to me - if they could be bought or traded, friends could work together to make several types of weapons, or you could buy them in WoE bazaars in much the same way as Dies and Residue.
My only worry would be pouches making prices on the items dropping for people farming WoE for gil (those of us lucky enough to be on at the times JP players make it possible to play WoE), but considering this also makes the price for Gimpyrean weapons higher and thus less worthy, I'd think this is probably the only solution... unless you want to buff the level 99 Gimpyrean weapons to have Aftermath (or a gimpy version that is Occ. deals 1.5x damage if double damage aftermath is too much) then people farming in WoE will have to take a backseat to the Gimpyreans.
Basically, the effort/reward ratio for Gimpyreans could also be fixed by giving the level 99 versions aftermath - they'd still be weaker then Empyreans by a sizable margin, but getting one wouldn't be a waste of time compared to making a 85 or 90 Empyrean, which are easier. But if you make Residue and Dies easier to get, this should be offset for farmers as long as coins are now bazaarable.
Currently the damage of a 99 WoE weapon sits between the lvl 90 and 95 Empys, but with much higher delay, no aftermath and no added stats., making a 90 empy slightly less damage, but overall, higher DPS.
The thing is, a 90 empy if bought completely, costs ~100k per dropped item so (50 x 100) + (50 x 100) + (75 x 100) = 17.5 mil.
Whereas the liminule residues and devious dies cost the same ~100k each, making them (100 x 100) + (100 x 100) = 20 mil.
Bumping up the supply will drop the prices, making them worth making. Currently, it's generally faster and cheaper to make a lvl 90 empy. Even the lvl 85s would actually out-do them on DPS without taking the aftermath or added stats into consideration, and that is priced around 10 mil. Half that of a 99 WoE weapon.
To be honest, I'm not sure why the path for the WoE weapons are even the same to start with as a regular empy. At one time I actually considered making a couple for the less used jobs, but even then you have already done most of the leg work into getting the better weapon and now that most of them can be easily duo/trio made it seem a bit off.
Even with this adjustment to WoE weapons, a great chunk of them are not useful because of the merit weapon skills. A STR weapon typically costs 4-5M in geodes, an OAT weapons typically costs something like 3M in mirrors/riftsand, and a WoE weapon costs 20M in die/residue to upgrade to 99.
The WoE weapons should not be adjusted in comparison to empyreans, but rather in comparison to STR and OAT weapons. The STR and OAT weapons are outdoing the WoE weapons because most (all?) of the merit WSs now outclass the Empyrean ones. Some solutions to this can be:
1. Improve Empyrean WS
2. Add the base stat increase to WoE weapons
3. Add a weakened aftermath effect to WoE weapons
4. Add stats onto the WoE weapon, such as DA on the axe or TA on the dagger, that sort of thing.
The WoE weapons are never going to be made if something cheaper and more easily obtained is going to outclass them.
Yes! a 100 times yes!
I have a two lesser weapons I wanted to make to mess around with but not devoted to fighting Bukhis 100 more times after completing my Bow!
My main has the coins for the Axe and Club I want, but my Alt is the one that would use the weapons more often to have some fun/decent damage with.
Removing the EX trait would make things so much better. I approve of both Ideas, but at the stage of barely anyone on in Walk of Echoes when I play, this would help me greatly.
Since your handing out Conquest/Allied points like its pennies now(Tablets/Waypoint quests/Campaign Caps increased). You should consider also offering a bonus reward for people continuing to do Walk of Echoes Content, like maybe the above or a good chunk of crour similar to that of Voidwatch amounts or kinetic points based on EXP gained. Some random reward that is always relevant to the constantly changes of endgame content that is coming and going. This would make it viable for anyone to still do no matter what the current endgame point system is.
Honestly, as good as the best Empyrean WSs are even those pretty much all just break even with their Merit counterparts. The ONLY exception to this is Chant du Cygne, which consistently outdoes Requiescat but the latter will still have uses in special situations regardless.
The second place would be the following:
Shijin very slightly beats Smite.
Hi is equal to slightly better than Shun, but honestly both weapon skills need a boost.
Fudo is better than Shoha only if you are ratio capped.
Every single other one is either worse (lolCloudsplitter) or serve different purposes (Ex. Last Stand VS Wildfire, Rudra's VS Exenterator, etc).
I assume your biggest concern in this case would be how it would affect the balance of Relics VS Empyreans. Of the ones I listed above where the WSs are in close direct competition for the same function (H2H, Katana, GKT), Spharai outdoes Verethragna by a slight bit (Though it's more flexible defensively and it doesn't rely on AM) and both Katana WSs need a boost anyway.
There are other strong ones like Ukonvasara but unless they go really overboard Upheaval and Resolution will still destroy Ukko's Fury when you have Mighty Strikes up.
I think the bottom line is that out of all these, pretty much the only big unbalanced change is that Masamune would get an even bigger lead over Amano if you boosted all the Empyrean WSs.
Last edited by Kincard; 12-20-2012 at 07:03 PM.
Please dump the ex on coins and thank you very much!!!!!!
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