Delve Deeper into Seekers of Adoulin!

[Yinnyth]

Not a problem of it being casual now or hardcore. Its about getting in to even try and find where you stand.

Oh, so you want it to be more like NNI where everyone gets a chance to try every RL day, but if you're not up to snuff, then you'll never hit floor 100.

[Calintzpso]

Oh, so you want it to be more like NNI where everyone gets a chance to try every RL day, but if you're not up to snuff, then you'll never hit floor 100.

Short answer, Yes.

A game that promotes Skillful play and cooperation with others is a game that is truly challenging and rewarding.

Not a game of Mindless Luck and Grind. And I'm not talking about luck w/ rewards.

[Luvbunny]

Yes agree, everyone who is playing this game, regardless skill levels or gears should be able to try it without any restriction or gathering stupid items just to progress. Similar how the Neo events and Meeble, and pretty much some Abyssea events. We all get a chance to try and get better and practice, and bettering our selves and our gears. Right now you can't even try unless you are rich, extremely lucky, or a combination of both. I rather deal with the stupid limited tags than these new SoA events that require you "farm" or just buy those parts.

And lets not kid ourselves and keep believing these lies, those SoA are designed to halt progress, until they feel that sufficient payments have been made and 6-12 months have passed, then they will come back and adjust it. So you can either take it as it is, or take a long break again, or just pay to play when you deemed the content is worth paying.

[Yinnyth]

Short answer, Yes.

A game that promotes Skillful play and cooperation with others is a game that is truly challenging and rewarding.

Not a game of Mindless Luck and Grind. And I'm not talking about luck w/ rewards.

What's your long answer then, because it really sounds like what you want then is mission final battles. Something you only need to do once as long as you win, then you never have to do it again. While I would probably enjoy the rush at first, that rush would wear off quickly when I realize my character no longer has any room to grow no matter how much grinding I'm willing to do.

[Luvbunny]

Not sure about growth on your character(s). The game is basically now all about doing more BCNMs for gears. And grinding more for gears, especially when you factor those random numbers that will come with the augmenting system they are proposing. Which translate to more grinding for the said events to get better augments so you can get incremental boost in your damage to enable you to do more of these so called events for more gears. On and on it goes, grind for gears to infinity and beyond.

They also make sure that you can't do these events so easily. It's no longer about 24 hours real life limitation, or 3 days limitation - all these new contents are atrocious beyond belief - they are designed to halt your progress. If they want us to be better players, then let us try the new contents ASAP, over and over, so we can better ourselves and come up with a strategy to beat it, and WIN, over and over. People get better by practice, they don't get better by whacking the roots over and over - or doing run around quests. Stop putting BS hoops that everyone has to jump through just to try it.

[Demon6324236]

I like how Delve sounds except the requirements to enter, thats bad, also not happy about needing larger parties, while it is nice to have some events like that, I personally hate them, much rather small groups for events where I can be more familiar with the people I am going with and we can work well together.

[FrankReynolds]

Here's a basic analogy for what's going on:

Instead of giving that genius in the front of the class an A+ and letting him skip a grade occasionally, SE is making everyone do the work that is challenging to him and then forcing them to stay back a grade to make it up next year when they inevitably fail.

[Luvbunny]

I like how Delve sounds except the requirements to enter, thats bad, also not happy about needing larger parties, while it is nice to have some events like that, I personally hate them, much rather small groups for events where I can be more familiar with the people I am going with and we can work well together.

Yup sounds good on paper, poorly executed - nothing new here. What is baffling - they managed to did good content after Abyssea, adopted the slow and steady progression idea, your own reward system (and the atrocious RNG rewards), good variety of tasks on Meeble. Yet they fail to innovate when it comes to SoA?? We should all be able to try new contents ASAP without having to "work" to collect the various scraps. Players should only be getting better for trying the battle over and over and finding out which strategy works best to annihilate enemies and consume contents (and rewards). We should not be dealing with various stale tactics to hinder our progress and prevent us from actually trying the battle contents....

[Yinnyth]

What should the grind be then? They tried completely accessible battles with low drop rates for the grind (voidwatch) and people complained that drop rates are too low. They tried completely accessible dungeon crawls which were extraordinarily difficult but had very high drop rates (NNI), and people complained that it was too "luck based" because with their average of 10 floor-ups per run, they had a 0% chance of reaching floor 100. They tried completely accessible boss rushes which were extraordinarily difficult (legion) and people complained that it's too much of a gear check.

It sounds to me like people don't want to grind entry items for events because that takes time. They don't want to grind difficult events because practice and learning from mistakes takes time. They don't want to grind really easy kills with really low drop rates because that takes time. They don't want an event which requires them to get better equipment to do because that takes time.

If no grind is an acceptable grind, then you don't actually want to play the game, you just want to win it and be done with it.

[Calintzpso]

It's known as the perfect imbalance in the game development field, something SE stretches and constantly lets run wild unchecked, and they let it get pulled that way by elitist pricks. If you don't believe this, look at the job to job comparison among the "elitists". Let me link you to a good webisode I watch that will make some hidden faults more apparent. http://www.penny-arcade.com/patv/epi...fect-imbalance

SE falls towards the haphazard comment near the start of that video. If you need a prime example. RDM.

Voidwatch is mostly flopping due to core job mechanical issues and episodic chapter restrictions, which is SE's constant way of bottle necking. If people could freely traverse and start any tier of Voidwatch battle with a group of members of their choice, the system would be better off. Now don't get me wrong, We can do this, sorta...only if you have someone with the right level abyssite to summon the battle, oh and warps to gather to the spot in a timely visit. I still lack all of Jeuno wins due to taking a break when Voidwatch came out, Coming back no one wants to do those piss poor fights. Linkshells of yesteryear are now 6-10 active people at most. I haven't seen a shout for the fights I need in over 6 weeks, and the last group I tried to make was a group of 7-8 people who decided they had to go afk after 30 mins of gathering to go have comas/push grandma down the stairs/or their pool caught fire. So when I do Jeuno, I have to walk some out of to some out of way places vs others warping, and I only can hold 4 voidstones on me, so when a group does x6 they aren't happy when I have to quick restock which I wish was easier.

For the Neo things, that falls under a personal problem for the people you run the event with. The system is good in place, it could be a bit more forgiving with those lamp floors and I'm sure I'm not the only one who agrees. But the only issue with NNI that I can see is the individuals involved who run it like its a all or nothing system. In working out in RL we would call that a Gut Check. Gut checks are great, but you can't depend on them as a sure system. I recall NNI allows you to set your goal without overshooting the level aimed for now. I also recall you are given a currency like Key Item for hitting the goal/killing a boss # times, of which can be turned in for armor at a NPC. Personal Pacing is the only issue people really have. Floor 100 is great and all since everyone gets a Key Item for a armor of their choice plus the boss drops an extra. But you could settle for floor 80 instead and just work at it longer while still getting progress. To gun for floor 100 it becomes a personal gamble. How much you're willing to gamble on the system determines your progress in general. People make a poor goal choices in NNI and when they aren't rewarded, they blame the system. As is, NNI is the most balanced of the 3 you mentioned. To succeed in NNI you need to work cooperatively with the abilities of your group and set your goals based on that. If you can't do that, you aren't a team player. Patience and cooperation will help skill your group, so that someday either in a long time, or short time, you can gun for a higher goal or be able to muster the ability to do a gut check on a more often schedule.

Legion falls under a very basic system, and I don't feel I have the right to comment to much on it as I haven't done it AT ALL since it's release. From what I can observe, Its a boss rush of the 90s video games meets dynamis treasure pools. Appears to me it just needs a minimum 3 tanks and 3 good healers to hold the initial spawns, and since the next wave doesn't spawn until the first wave is killed. This is a pace based event. If your group can't keep a good pace, they the group needs to work on that to further themselves. But it doesn't keep the group from at least trying which was the entire basis of my comments.