New 4.X open field monsters will be a shorter fight.

[Vexander]

All the more reason not to give unlimited flight that purposely makes irrelevant all the topographical and mob assets you spent time developing.

Take this sentiment to the World of Warcraft forums where it can die where it belongs. SE provides Flight the right way. It's fun, its rewarding without being punishing, and it gives players the full ground experience of a zone. Flight needs to stay.

[Khalithar]

All the more reason not to give unlimited flight that purposely makes irrelevant all the topographical and mob assets you spent time developing.

They already opened the flying can of worms, it's not going away any time soon.

But as far my view on flying:

Adding flying was the single best decision they added to the game just as it was the single best thing they added to WoW. Being able to just fly over all the inconvenient terrain and inconsequential trash mobs isn't a negative, it's a plus, a massive plus, a huge overwhelmingly absolutely awesome positive change that should stay right where it is. The way Blizzard is backtracking on flying and limiting it is actually one of the most horrible design decisions they ever made in my opinion. If anything, I'd rather be able to fly from the get go or barring that, at the very least have it automatically unlocked once we have a single job at whatever the new level cap is. There is a reason why people cheered when he said there would be flying and were booing when he announced requiring aether currents, I was booing it myself at home, just not as loudly.

Now you can certainly argue about how it makes enemies and terrain inconsequential, the solution to that isn't to ground us, it's to actually make us want to be on the ground more. Being able to just fly straight to an objective and skip all that nonsense is why I love flying so much. Being able to just get my exp so I can reach the required level for whatever main story quest as fast as possible is what my playstyle is, flying suits it just fine.

[Altanas]

One thing I don't understand is if the open world mobs are supposed to be "hassle free", then why not just revert them to all be wildlife. Basically herds of mobs roaming across plains rather than static spawns of clusters. Then you can hunt and poach them if you want or just avoid and carry on without aggro. Then let the mobs have 1.0 behaviour where different species will prey on another.

[Zojha]

Flight needs to stay.

I agree. The mobs and zones should just go instead.

It's a lot of resources we could put into instances. You could turn raids into actual locations instead of 4 boss rooms. 4 dungeons per patch instead of 2. Maybe even a 2nd 24 man raid. We can keep the main cities and housing areas as social hubs - it would be a bit like Fantasy Star online. Far more efficient resource usage IMO.

[Atoli]

I agree. The mobs and zones should just go instead.

It's a lot of resources we could put into instances. You could turn raids into actual locations instead of 4 boss rooms. 4 dungeons per patch instead of 2. Maybe even a 2nd 24 man raid. We can keep the main cities and housing areas as social hubs - it would be a bit like Fantasy Star online. Far more efficient resource usage IMO.

Ew no. Mabinogi Heroes was like that and it doesn't even remotely feel like an actual game world, just like a single city with a handful of dungeons in a menu.

[Khalithar]

just like a single city with a handful of dungeons in a menu.

Like the people who sit in Idyllshire and queue for dungeons all day? >_>

[Rennies]

No need to have HP sponges on the overworld, I'm happy with this.

[Ghastly]

There's a point where is too easy...
Yoshida, didn't Sophia teach us anything?

You can't make things too easy...balance

[Gunspec]

Have ANY of you actively tried to farm materials for crafting from enemy drops in 3.0? They tripled the amount of skin you need to make a single leather piece, and yet enemies take way longer to kill. Grinding enemies for crafting materials is a horrible waste of time,and the only reason they didn't already nerf it is that it is far more efficient to send your retainer to gather 10 skins per hour while you do more effective tasks.

Deepeye tears, skin, blood, scales... I just use retainers to farm it all. I've tried actively farming it, and its a waste. You don't even get reasonable xp from the stupid overbloated enemeis. I haven't actively fought non-fate, non-daily hunt monsters since 2.0. This change might actually get ME to engage in fighting normal mobs again. And that's good.

[Roth_Trailfinder]

Have ANY of you actively tried to farm materials for crafting from enemy drops in 3.0? They tripled the amount of skin you need to make a single leather piece, and yet enemies take way longer to kill. Grinding enemies for crafting materials is a horrible waste of time,and the only reason they didn't already nerf it is that it is far more efficient to send your retainer to gather 10 skins per hour while you do more effective tasks.

Deepeye tears, skin, blood, scales... I just use retainers to farm it all.

I thought that was the intent : to drive people who actively gathered their own materials for their own crafting to go ahead and rent the additional six retainers, so those retainers could go on ventures to gather the stuff rather than wasting the WoL's time getting them personally.