Revamp the way we gain experience points

[Malthar]

I don't know about you, but I do kinda miss grinding jobs up to 75, playing my job, and learning how to play. It was repetitive and infuriating at times, but it reinforced the use of the job and n00bs, though they still existed, were hard to create. You had to really work at being a n00b.

Now all one has to do is level to 30 then pay a fell cleaver 300k gill to power level them to 99. As a result, our game is flooded with n00bs power leveled mostly by RMT's and the basic xp system is meaningless.

But I have an idea. Change the way xp is attained by relating it to the effort you contribute to the fight, such as how much damage you've done, how much hp you healed your party, and how many buffs/debuffs you put on/take off. This would force everyone to engage in the fight. Hmmm... This sounds familiar... Campaign! Implement the same xp mechanism in campaign for regular xp. This would force n00bs to go play their jobs if they want decent xp.

Like this post if you agree so the devs will take notice.

[Malthar]

And Arcon, you can't comment! Just kidding feel free to connect this to my job as a bst as you wish. :-D

[Dreamin]

Why do people still thinks PL makes bad players?? IMO, a bad players will always be bad players regardless of how they get their levels???

And xp grinding the old pre-abyssea days doesn't make ppl 'learn' their job. I know plenty of bad players who were bad even from back then. The good players will be good whether they grind to 99 or they leech to 99. They understands that to be good, it's a combinations of spending the time to skillup/cap the various skills, gearing properly (appropriately), and KNOWING what each job entails and how to use them in commbinations in different situations.

You know why we have Noobs. We have Noobs because they're lazy and they dont/wont listen to what 'successful' players tells them. They won't do their researches and dont ask questions. THAT is why you have a bunch of NOOBS running all over the place across all servers. There are NOOBS from both Abyssea leech as well as outside XP grind all over the place if you just look.

[Rustic]

Why do people still thinks PL makes bad players?? IMO, a bad players will always be bad players regardless of how they get their levels???

PL doesn't just make bad players, it makes it easy for them to be bad. Being a bad player should punish you from 1 to 99, and being bad enough was enough to get bad player -out- of playing FFXI when it was actually an effort to get to the top.


And xp grinding the old pre-abyssea days doesn't make ppl 'learn' their job. I know plenty of bad players who were bad even from back then. The good players will be good whether they grind to 99 or they leech to 99. They understands that to be good, it's a combinations of spending the time to skillup/cap the various skills, gearing properly (appropriately), and KNOWING what each job entails and how to use them in commbinations in different situations.

So do I. Then again, I also knew a helluva lot fewer of them that made it to the top because the process of leveling up let them build up a horrid, well-deserved reputation of suck- and people stopped inviting them to exp. It meant bad players had a slower path to the endgame, and that meant some of them simply dropped out of gameplay.

Now you have a legion of mouthbreathers happy to ding 99 and screw around.

The level-up process was a noob filter. Now it's gone, and the noobs are running around at the top, manuring up the place. I've got no problems for making it easier to level your 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 22nd job after you cap the first one- which IMHO is what Abyssea's exp-o-rama was really addressing, and did it poorly by giving too much.

Cap Abyssea entry to 70-75 or so where a player can actually fight and give some gameplay back to the earlier levels.

[Demon6324236]

The level-up process was a noob filter. Now it's gone, and the noobs are running around at the top, manuring up the place.Bad players are easy to spot if you look past their levels... For instance, I saw a level 92 DRG in a worm party wearing the augmented Dom Ops gear, this was a bad player, no gear swaps at all, wearing this gear. If they were a good player they would have been using Perle, yes, Perle, because at 92 if you did not have the seals for the job Perle is a great set with Haste and at least some stats for TPing, where as the gear he had on had nothing. AF3+2 is not to hard to get, but bad players full time full AF3+2, easy to spot yet again, a WAR TPing and WSing in full AF3+2 is a bad player, easily spotted. You will not often come across well geared bad players, only a few of them can get good gear and actually copy the gear of others well enough to look like they know the job, and if they get that far then fail, you can easily add them to the small list of bad players with good gear, and no longer invite them.

The ability to filter out the bad from the good still exists, it just takes slightly more work on your part.

[Rustic]

Bad players are easy to spot if you look past their levels...

Then let's make it so they no longer get to those levels in the first place.

Put more soloing test barriers in the way of content and don't have an "easy button" like Maat WHM fight to get around them.

Bad players in bad gear don't get in, good players pass those tests and progress.

[Demon6324236]

Then let's make it so they no longer get to those levels in the first place.

Put more soloing test barriers in the way of content and don't have an "easy button" like Maat WHM fight to get around them.

Bad players in bad gear don't get in, good players pass those tests and progress.So rather than take an extra minute to examine the gear of someone you invite, you would rather just make everyone go back to the old slow way of leveling. I can tell you now, I only have 4 jobs left to level, PUP, SMN, RNG, and DRG. If I had to level them the old way, these jobs would never be touched, I liked the old way of xp when it was here, since then I have stopped liking it, not because its easy, but because I want to play the job at the end, not where it starts. There are many more interesting and tricky parts to a job at the end of the leveling experience than at the beginning, and I play for those parts at the end. Going back to old xp is not something I ever want to do, I would much rather just have to take an extra few minutes to check the gear of people I have never seen or heard of before.

Take into account how many good players do not want to level slowly for all of their jobs, or even take more than a few days. I have little time as it is, let alone the time it would take to go out and level an entirely new job up over the course of a week or 2 so that I can play it, and maybe not even like it.

The only real 'idiot filter' you need, is your eyes, I can spot a bad player as soon as I check them, sometimes it is less clear than others, but often it makes itself apparent. Full timing +2, using the wrong gear when you have access to the right gear, missing basic gear that all players should have simply because they do not think its worth it. Want examples? I know of a THF who has full Thaumas, but TPs in Oce/Toci's, I know another with full Thaumas who did not even have Brutal, Suppa, or Rajas, and another who has a Mandau who TPs in +2 Hands rather than Bregos, used to not have a Brutal, and uses Phasmida instead of Twilight even on mobs where the EVA/Acc is not needed. These are examples of players who have good gear putting it to shame because they use the wrong gear or are missing key important gear. Easy to spot with a 1 time use of /check.

[Rustic]

So rather than take an extra minute to examine the gear of someone you invite, you would rather just make everyone go back to the old slow way of leveling.

Wait a second. What on earth does having Maat-style fights set up to be 1v1 tests of a player have to do with reverting to oldschool exping?

I want players to have to test themselves and themselves alone against an opponent in FFXI. Succeed and you can continue along in content. Fail, and you keep trying until you succeed or give up. Along the toughness level of the RDM Maat fight- you make a mistake, you get punished. Two is likely enough to cause a loss, and three is fatal. Nobody else gets to tow you through it. No items that weaken the opponent ala rarab tails. No "easy mode" based on what job you bring. No party to carry you through the fight. Bring whatever medicines and such along you think will help, but that's it.

At that point, we don't even need gear checks. Competent players at their jobs will exceed those barriers, incompetent ones will not and never get into the endgame events in question to begin with.



Take into account how many good players do not want to level slowly for all of their jobs, or even take more than a few days. I have little time as it is, let alone the time it would take to go out and level an entirely new job up over the course of a week or 2 so that I can play it, and maybe not even like it.

As I've said before, I think giving an exp bonus for any job you've capped (heck, even a lesser one for jobs you've taken 50+) that stacks would be awesome. Put it on a ring ala the Emperor/Empress bands as an enhancement you can opt to cast on yourself when you desire, and there you go.

[Demon6324236]

Wait a second. What on earth does having Maat-style fights set up to be 1v1 tests of a player have to do with reverting to oldschool exping?
Then let's make it so they no longer get to those levels in the first place.That is not proposing Maat-style fights, thats suggesting slower xp, which is why I made that entire comment about going back to slow xp. Checking someone's gear to see how good or bad they are at a certain job or overall is not that hard, and gives you the same, or better, results. I personally like how things are now, I have an easy time telling who is doing good and who is not, at the same time, I am not in any way potentially being negatively effected by the game attempting to correct the skill level of players who make it to a certain level by the time they reach said level.

So far as Maat-style fights, I think every job should have a second fight similar to Maat where you get a piece of gear that is powerful for the job, powerful enough it is not easily replaced. If you wanted to really check the skill of a player in that case you could simply ask them to show the gear to you, so that you know they have it, and passed the test. I am talking about a piece of gear for each job like a Mythic, which would boost abilities, traits, or some type of stats that would directly impact the job in a powerful way that is nearly impossible to replace, and useful enough to bother going after. Some of these would be easier to make than others, but in reality we have items somewhat like this to begin with already.

Black Belt and Evoker's Ring are 2 items like this, where they are exceptionally powerful and are made for only a single job. If gear like this were made but it came from a level 99 version of the Maat fight but without any handicaps or any other party members it would add special gear that would show a certain level of skill as well as benefiting all players who can obtain it, not simply showing an artificial level of skill. Also the fact it is job specific means it would not have an easy job to do it with where you get all of the benefits, such as the WHM Maat fight, where you can breeze through it, and all jobs benefit from the victory.

I would like to think that idea would solve your problems, and give players something unique they could use as well, something that would benefit the entire community of people able to obtain the items, rather than just give you the ability to better discern bad players from good players.

[FrankReynolds]

As I've said before, I think giving an exp bonus for any job you've capped (heck, even a lesser one for jobs you've taken 50+) that stacks would be awesome. Put it on a ring ala the Emperor/Empress bands as an enhancement you can opt to cast on yourself when you desire, and there you go.

That will have it's own set of issues. If you pop your ring and no one else does, you will level faster than everyone and ruin their exp. Even if they all decide they want to exp. fast like you, You will also out grow camps super fast making it so that instead of spending time fighting, you will spend most of your time traveling to different camps (which has nothing to do with gaining exp. or learning your job). There are already a lot of people who have most of their jobs leveled beyond a certain point, which means that you will probably have to level synch. Which means that people won't be learning anything about their abilities as they level up because they will be capped to a lower level and unable to access them.


I could go on for days, but I think you get the point. Low level experience points parties are pretty much a thing of the past. The only way that form of leveling will ever be relevant again is if SE somehow creates a huge influx of new players coming into the game that are attracted to the game because of this newly introduced feature that allows them to level at a rate that is 10 times slower than the one that all the current players got to use. Who knows though. Maybe pigs can fly.

[Leach]

Take THF for example. In the old days people who played THF would learn just the basic SATA from party members explaining to them how to do it. Now new THF at 99 who have never played the game before have no real idea how SA and TA are to work as well as the other JA that benefit THF in end game.

[Demon6324236]

But instead they learn how to use them in a real endgame scenario. THFs in xp parties were able to use SATA to keep hate on a tank, in endgame enmity is so broken that SATA does not have that use, instead its used to make your WSs do more damage. There is a massive functional difference in now things work in xp parties vs endgame. PLD is another job you can use for instance, in xp parties, you were to keep hate on a mob and tank it. In endgame you are to supertank adds, never even hitting the mob, and in most cases you completely ignore the entire function of enmity as a whole. DDs in xp parties had to hold back at times so they did not take hate and wipe the party, in endgame its an all out zerg of throwing down the most damage possible in the least amount of time.

There are not many things people learned doing xp parties that was actually helpful in endgame today. Exp parties and endgame today are 2 very separate things, and are practically entirely different games as a whole when it comes to playing a job. There are a number of examples ranging from RDM being better than WHM at low levels, only to be passed up by a ton in the end, or how MP is a problem at lower levels, while at high levels mages have so much refresh they can hit upward of 10MP/Tick.

[Rustic]

That is not proposing Maat-style fights, thats suggesting slower xp, which is why I made that entire comment about going back to slow xp. Checking someone's gear to see how good or bad they are at a certain job or overall is not that hard, and gives you the same, or better, results. I personally like how things are now, I have an easy time telling who is doing good and who is not, at the same time, I am not in any way potentially being negatively effected by the game attempting to correct the skill level of players who make it to a certain level by the time they reach said level.

If you hit a level cap and you can't get past it, that's not slowing the rate of exp. That's saying "You can't beat this, you go no further.". For that matter, it can apply to L99's as well. Pass this test on your own and you can play in the sandbox with all the other L99's, fail your skill check and you're stuck till you do.

Gate content based on personal skill rather than encounters other players can carry you through and you filter bad players from the system. WoW actually has cases where if you can't show up with sufficiently high item levels in gear, you can't get in on certain content. I'd rather have skill check instead of gear check.


So far as Maat-style fights, I think every job should have a second fight similar to Maat where you get a piece of gear that is powerful for the job, powerful enough it is not easily replaced. If you wanted to really check the skill of a player in that case you could simply ask them to show the gear to you, so that you know they have it, and passed the test. I am talking about a piece of gear for each job like a Mythic, which would boost abilities, traits, or some type of stats that would directly impact the job in a powerful way that is nearly impossible to replace, and useful enough to bother going after. Some of these would be easier to make than others, but in reality we have items somewhat like this to begin with already.

Ala Suppa and other unique bits. I wouldn't mind seeing additional rewards for success at beating a "gate fight".


Black Belt and Evoker's Ring are 2 items like this, where they are exceptionally powerful and are made for only a single job. If gear like this were made but it came from a level 99 version of the Maat fight but without any handicaps or any other party members it would add special gear that would show a certain level of skill as well as benefiting all players who can obtain it, not simply showing an artificial level of skill. Also the fact it is job specific means it would not have an easy job to do it with where you get all of the benefits, such as the WHM Maat fight, where you can breeze through it, and all jobs benefit from the victory.

That's one of the reasons I mentioned not setting these "gates" up with an "easymode job", which Maat does have. Having a piece of trophy gear to go with the victory doesn't hurt either, as it'd let you prove that the player is competent on multiple jobs, not just the one they originally passed the gate in question with.

[Rustic]

That will have it's own set of issues. If you pop your ring and no one else does, you will level faster than everyone and ruin their exp.

Level sync called, they want to know when you've used their service lately.


Even if they all decide they want to exp. fast like you, You will also out grow camps super fast making it so that instead of spending time fighting, you will spend most of your time traveling to different camps (which has nothing to do with gaining exp. or learning your job). There are already a lot of people who have most of their jobs leveled beyond a certain point, which means that you will probably have to level synch. Which means that people won't be learning anything about their abilities as they level up because they will be capped to a lower level and unable to access them.

We can't de-level everyone who took the exp-o-tron ride, but we CAN make the trip more educational for the ones that come after it- if S-E ever actually capped Abyssea rather than having people be able to la-la-leech mode on L80 mobs with their L30 useless piece of monster snack.


I could go on for days, but I think you get the point. Low level experience points parties are pretty much a thing of the past. The only way that form of leveling will ever be relevant again is if SE somehow creates a huge influx of new players coming into the game that are attracted to the game because of this newly introduced feature that allows them to level at a rate that is 10 times slower than the one that all the current players got to use. Who knows though. Maybe pigs can fly.

Wouldn't be the first time the rate of advancement has been turned back. Or have you been making a mint off those chocobo blinkers lately?

[Demon6324236]

If you hit a level cap and you can't get past it, that's not slowing the rate of exp. That's saying "You can't beat this, you go no further.". For that matter, it can apply to L99's as well. Pass this test on your own and you can play in the sandbox with all the other L99's, fail your skill check and you're stuck till you do.

Gate content based on personal skill rather than encounters other players can carry you through and you filter bad players from the system. WoW actually has cases where if you can't show up with sufficiently high item levels in gear, you can't get in on certain content. I'd rather have skill check instead of gear check.Sorry, when I originally read your post this line...

Then let's make it so they no longer get to those levels in the first place.
Was read incorrectly, I thought it said...

Then let's make it so they take longer to get to those levels in the first place.
Which was a massive failure on my part. I apologize.

In either case, I am not sure I can say I would want people to have to go through Maat with each job either, some jobs, for instance RDM, would become such a pain for people to do that it would kill off the job even more. Also many Maat fights are easy, or really show no real skill at the job even if you win. For instance, THF can use steal to win, but steal has nothing to do with playing THF, WHM survives for 5 minutes, but thats not something WHM normally has to do, they keep others alive, not themselves. WAR, SAM, DRK, they are all basic zerg fights, go in, beat the old man down as fast as you can, and maybe bring a few items along to keep you up.

My point is that SE would have to get much more creative on what a person would have to do to prove themselves, because the Maat fights in general are very poor, fights that are hard have little to do with the job, and more to do with trying to out match Maat using certain tricks. The things you learn from fighting Maat or you use to fight him very often have no real application by the time you hit endgame anyways, same as how experience point parties are with endgame, the relation just is not the same. Its a solo fight, and thats what your asking for, but the endgame content is party, or even alliance content. I do not disagree that something like this would be nice, but in reality they would have to be much more interesting in how they would do the fight for each job, otherwise it will end up like Maat, where its often not even related to how you really play a job.

[Arcon]

I don't know about you, but I do kinda miss grinding jobs up to 75, playing my job, and learning how to play. It was repetitive and infuriating at times, but it reinforced the use of the job and n00bs, though they still existed, were hard to create.

If you need to whack ten thousand crabs to learn how to play the game, you're not the sharpest tool in the shed. Then you'll still need to do hundreds of endgame fights to actually be worth a damn in any events.


And Arcon, you can't comment! Just kidding feel free to connect this to my job as a bst as you wish. :-D

I actually find it a bit contradictory that a BST wants old EXP back, because for a BST that usually means sit in a corner and don't get invited at all, so you have to start claim wars over other EXP parties.

[Rustic]

Sorry, when I originally read your post this line...

Was read incorrectly, I thought it said...

Which was a massive failure on my part. I apologize.

No worries.


In either case, I am not sure I can say I would want people to have to go through Maat with each job either, some jobs, for instance RDM, would become such a pain for people to do that it would kill off the job even more. Also many Maat fights are easy, or really show no real skill at the job even if you win. For instance, THF can use steal to win, but steal has nothing to do with playing THF, WHM survives for 5 minutes, but thats not something WHM normally has to do, they keep others alive, not themselves. WAR, SAM, DRK, they are all basic zerg fights, go in, beat the old man down as fast as you can, and maybe bring a few items along to keep you up.

My point is that SE would have to get much more creative on what a person would have to do to prove themselves, because the Maat fights in general are very poor, fights that are hard have little to do with the job, and more to do with trying to out match Maat using certain tricks. The things you learn from fighting Maat or you use to fight him very often have no real application by the time you hit endgame anyways, same as how experience point parties are with endgame, the relation just is not the same. Its a solo fight, and thats what your asking for, but the endgame content is party, or even alliance content. I do not disagree that something like this would be nice, but in reality they would have to be much more interesting in how they would do the fight for each job, otherwise it will end up like Maat, where its often not even related to how you really play a job.

That's also what I've noted- in some cases, Maat is easymode. There's a reason why they tell people the quick road to 99 is WHM, and being able to heal your way through Maat is one of them. Now imagine one where your WHM is facing some kind of undead horror that they have to use Afflatus effects on, that can end up immune to Cure/Holy effects and it has to be broken by WSing the target, etc. etc...all on WHM with no SJ. That is, it's a fight designed to make the person use the whole job and it's spells/JA's to win.

Could you imagine a Geomancer trial where it was a giant game board, and pieces on your side would win or lose based on strategic buff placements, all the while having to defend yourself from occasional "pawns" trying to capture the enemy "king"? There's room for a ton of creative in there.

The point is to challenge the person alone- not so much as a "training session" for later content, but simply to prove that the person, alone can beat something challenging without being carried by his fellows. None of them should have "shortcuts" that rely on pure luck (like THF stealing from Maat). Personal skill should be tested to give the player access to content with X job- and if you REALLY wanted to be harsh about it, you only allow that person access with jobs they finished their trial on.

[Miiyo]

Took me close to a year to level my whm prior to abyssea. I was never going to level another job because the process was horrendous. You say you miss grinding but you left out the waiting and shouting for FIVE people to join you to do this grinding. It's okay that you're an M, but don't blame abyssea for your problems in finding likeminded M's to go do exactly what you miss. Grinding. It's still there. Go grind to your heart's content!!

When i was level one, i cast my cure spell. I understood that it gave me health. I didn't need tons of parties to figure that out. There are very few things in this game you shouldn't be able to figure out from just reading the description. Comprehension and "skill" in this game do not come by the amount of time it takes to level up. MOST of you whining over gimp players estimate yourselves in the first place. Alot of people whine as well on my server, about under-skilled players yet my own ls is the only NA ls able to successfully do legion.

But... why does another player's gimpness or lack of, really matter? If the server was the opposite of what you said, full of l33t assholes, everyone would be done with the game in half a year.

If we change the way the xp is attained via your suggestion, if you were in a party with me or any decent+ blm, you'd not get much mp unless you go kill outside of my aga/ja range.

[FrankReynolds]

Level sync called, they want to know when you've used their service lately.

Great. Let's all level synch to 30 and never use our abilities until we are 99. That will fix the problems with people reaching 99 and not knowing their jobs.



We can't de-level everyone who took the exp-o-tron ride, but we CAN make the trip more educational for the ones that come after it- if S-E ever actually capped Abyssea rather than having people be able to la-la-leech mode on L80 mobs with their L30 useless piece of monster snack.

Face it man, there is like 5 minutes of education to be had in there and you want it to be spread out over weeks / months. It's a not a good formula.




Wouldn't be the first time the rate of advancement has been turned back. Or have you been making a mint off those chocobo blinkers lately?

When exactly did we begin discussing money making?


Take THF for example. In the old days people who played THF would learn just the basic SATA from party members explaining to them how to do it. Now new THF at 99 who have never played the game before have no real idea how SA and TA are to work as well as the other JA that benefit THF in end game.

It's been years since people actually lined up for that. Why would I want to spend months learning how to do it?

PS. If you even make it to level 31 without knowing how that works, you are a fail boat anyways. Before wiki even existed, it was almost impossible to level another job besides thief without figuring out how that worked. Gearing for it is the hard part and you won't get any gear fighting crabs.

[Demon6324236]

Blinkers were an example of things that were amazing for people while here, but if people missed it then they got screwed. In this case with xp it would be the same, those here while Abyssea allowed amazing leveling would be lucky, and after the change that nerfed it, people would be screwed.

[Caketime]

With all the talk of gear checks and item levels and WoW references in this thread I almost thought I was reading the Blizz forums. The only thing it's really missing are the random shitposts. Wait no, this is one of those. Hmm.

[Yinnyth]

Making exp parties an acceptable pasttime in FFXI again would be a very difficult task. The suggested system of campaign-like exp rewards sounds nice on paper, but craps out in practice. There has never been a good implementation of such a concept. It always winds up being most profitable to figure out which actions net the highest reward, then max out your actions per minute spamming those actions.

In the old days when I actually did WoE, we always had random ass-hats enter our linkshell runs with us (which sometimes prevented some of our members from entering). They were terrible and made the whole thing harder for our linkshell, yet they would still manage to get one of the ending reward chests to themselves.

It is extremely difficult to quantify with a number the value of an action a player takes. Creating even a slightly good ranking system would require an immensely complex set of calculations. Even assuming that it would not result in the servers getting bogged down with all the extra workload, it would be a large investment in programming time. A large investment ultimately designed to slow the exp you receive. I assure you, players would cry bloody murder for "wasting dev time on a nerf".

[Myo]

The faster every player caps their experience points/merit points/jobs, the faster the game will die. This game isn't being flooded by new players, and if all the old players start to leave because they FEEL like they have nothing to do (even if they might have stuff to do but don't want to do it), the game will start to depopulate. I'm not going to argue the fact that this game has survived 10+ years and if it deserves to live or die... But from a logical standpoint, that's what's going to eventually happen. We've already had serveral threads from people who have capped out their characters experience points and feel bored/plan on quitting, this isn't something unheard of.

[Caketime]

Quitters quit, that's just what they do. What I don't get about it though is when you have every job at 99 there's a huge amount of stuff to be done, not to mention having the option of attending every event as a different flavor of derp each day.

[Yinnyth]

The faster every player caps their experience points/merit points/jobs, the faster the game will die. This game isn't being flooded by new players, and if all the old players start to leave because they FEEL like they have nothing to do (even if they might have stuff to do but don't want to do it), the game will start to depopulate. I'm not going to argue the fact that this game has survived 10+ years and if it deserves to live or die... But from a logical standpoint, that's what's going to eventually happen. We've already had serveral threads from people who have capped out their characters experience points and feel bored/plan on quitting, this isn't something unheard of.

There was an MMO I played before FFXI called Asheron's Call. Out of the box, its level cap was enormous (126, I believe?) It was a massive grind to get to that level, and even after you got to it, you could keep racking up experience points to dump into your abilities. Around the time I started playing FFXI, they came out with an expansion for AC which increased the level cap almost tenfold. From what I understand, the game is still alive with a barebones crew and small number of players, but it is nowhere near as popular as it used to be, even though its level cap would take you years of active play to reach.

The need for exp is not the only thing that keeps players attached to a game. It certainly helps, but there are other aspects.

[Zarchery]

That sounds needlessly complicated. If you wanted to stop leeching, just make it so that you get zero experience points unless you either take some action (ANY action) on a teammate or monster.

[Myo]

I only posted here because I am in this position personally. I no longer benefit from experience points in any fashion. Which is kind of depressing if I'm honest. Yeah, there are plenty of events... But once you have all the gear you can get without selling your soul to one of the only 3 linkshells on the server that even DO Legion or Neo Odin or other high end alliance content/events on a regular basis (If you even have the right jobs, gear, and merits to please them and join to begin with, which usually includes the correct emp/mythic/relic). You get bored... the game eventually just becomes an endless grind of daily dynamis, maybe some emp weapon farming, helping your friends with things you don't get anything from, or waiting around in jeuno half afk for the correct voidwatch shout. Lets face it, most people avoid starting their own voidwatch alliances, and for good reason. You need to be experienced with the monster you want or at least VW in general to make a run. Not to mention most people are just lazy/shy, and not charismatic enough to start their own shout groups.
Point is that relying on events alone for entertainment at any random time of the day, isn't really around-the-clock fun for most people. Seeking a party is easy in comparison (if equally boring at times) and leveling up new jobs and meriting certain abilities and stats feels consistantly productive.
In my opinion an MMO needs both experience point character enhancing and endgame events, to please the majority of it's fanbase.
Experience points should never be completely useless. It's a giant waste of a perfectly good game activity. The two options are slowing down the rate at which experience and/or levels are gained, or, for Square Enix to add more things to do with EXP after capping out your job. More merit catagories or higher catagory caps. A way to change EXP into something else more useful, like points to use as currency for purchasing special types of gear. Or better yet, customizing gear that's already in the game, as an alternative to the expenses of synergy.

Sorry for the long post... :D

[Ezikiel]

for future reference how many times is this thread gonna be recycled?

[Horadrim]

I don't know about you, but I do kinda miss grinding jobs up to 75, playing my job, and learning how to play. It was repetitive and infuriating at times, but it reinforced the use of the job and n00bs, though they still existed, were hard to create. You had to really work at being a n00b.

Now all one has to do is level to 30 then pay a fell cleaver 300k gill to power level them to 99. As a result, our game is flooded with n00bs power leveled mostly by RMT's and the basic xp system is meaningless.

But I have an idea. Change the way xp is attained by relating it to the effort you contribute to the fight, such as how much damage you've done, how much hp you healed your party, and how many buffs/debuffs you put on/take off. This would force everyone to engage in the fight. Hmmm... This sounds familiar... Campaign! Implement the same xp mechanism in campaign for regular xp. This would force n00bs to go play their jobs if they want decent xp.

Like this post if you agree so the devs will take notice.

No.

Shitty players are shitty players regardless of how long it takes them to level up.

[FrankReynolds]

This game isn't being flooded by new players, and if all the old players start to leave because they FEEL like they have nothing to do (even if they might have stuff to do but don't want to do it), the game will start to depopulate.

I felt like I had nothing to do back when the level cap was 75 even though I only had like 5 jobs leveled on my main. The reason? Because getting the jobs that I was less interested in up to level cap seemed like a giant boring, tedious grind. After they released abyssea, I went and leveled a bunch of jobs that I had previously ignored just because it was easy to level them. Guess what? It turns out that some of them are fun, so I started gearing and practicing playing them. Now I have tons of new job quests to do, AF sets to build and gear to chase because I actually like some of these jobs that I had previously ignored due to the effort required just to try them out.

For example, when I leveled Ninja to 45 for a subjob many years ago, I hated it. But after I leveled it in abyssea while my LS was farming chests, I started to like it. Now I play it as much as I can. If I had been stuck playing RDM, BLM, BRD, WHM, MNK and THF all this time, I would have p[robably lost it a long time ago.


TLDR; a lot of new players never got into the game because leveling took too long. Can't win em all.

[Rustic]

I felt like I had nothing to do back when the level cap was 75 even though I only had like 5 jobs leveled on my main. The reason? Because getting the jobs that I was less interested in up to level cap seemed like a giant boring, tedious grind. After they released abyssea, I went and leveled a bunch of jobs that I had previously ignored just because it was easy to level them. Guess what? It turns out that some of them are fun, so I started gearing and practicing playing them. Now I have tons of new job quests to do, AF sets to build and gear to chase because I actually like some of these jobs that I had previously ignored due to the effort required just to try them out.

For example, when I leveled Ninja to 45 for a subjob many years ago, I hated it. But after I leveled it in abyssea while my LS was farming chests, I started to like it. Now I play it as much as I can. If I had been stuck playing RDM, BLM, BRD, WHM, MNK and THF all this time, I would have p[robably lost it a long time ago.

Of course, even if this very day we said NO SOUP FOR YOU and locked Abyssea to 75+ characters...people would STILL be leveling faster than they did in the bad old days. You could sit there on your I-don't-want-you-in-my-exp-PT-forever-alone job of choice from that era now and be guaranteed a steady rate of exp gain.

I don't care what job you are. Given baseline equipment, you can kill EP mobs. If you can kill it and it gives exp, all it takes is a GoV/FoV page and you're looking at advancement at a pace that isn't grindingly agonizing. For anyone.

That's good. It's the overwhelming mass exp generation that is Abyssea that's broken, where players literally don't have to move for 69 levels straight from one place, in perfect safety while the guy with the great axe and his healer lulz their way through for you. Heck, I wouldn't be surprised if you couldn't just bot the healer and auto-level 17 people with one guy twoboxing his computer (yes, botting illegal. Someone should tell all the fishers I keep seeing that.). No threats. No worries. Just dingdingdingding hey I'm 99 now, YAY I R TEH SPECIALZ!

Abyssea's exp system wasn't a "fix" for grinding. It was the death of the exp system, period, reducing the process to something of a zero-risk proposition for 16 people at once. GoV/FoV was the fix.

Abyssea was like having the human race become immortal and invulnerable, followed by GoV/FoV's discovery of the cure for cancer.

[FrankReynolds]

Disclaimer: The following post is not aimed at anyone in particular but if the shoe fits...


I'm not really sure what the problem is? It sounds like a case of "I don't want it, but I don't want you to have it either.". I mean if you like leveling slow, it's there. If you like leveling fast, it's there. It seems to me that some people just love making other people do things their way.

Why does it make people so sad in their pants to see joey the mouth breather on a level 99 character? Are you really going to assert your mental superiority over him while simultaneously admitting that in ten years of game play you haven't figured out how to spot the retard in your group and kick him out? I mean how are you honestly going to say that you are an intelligent seasoned player who hasn't figured out how to either A) spot a moron or B) coach an inexperienced player? If you are in charge of a bunch of idiots that you chose, then what does that make you? If you did not choose those idiots on your team, then what does that make you?

Smart people kick the idiot and don't invite him again. If you keep getting screwed by the pink BST on your NNI runs, maybe the problem is not abyssea.

If you really love old exp. parties and you think they are so fun that everyone else should be doing them then make an effort to revive them. I have seen 20-30 threads about how abyssea exp. ruins the game etc., but I have yet to see even one person create a thread / link shell / group organized around the idea of actually getting together a group of people who like that method of leveling succeed. There is a reason for that.

Wanting to slow other people's progress just to make your self feel more accomplished is a pretty pointless endeavor.

[Horadrim]

Disclaimer: The following post is not aimed at anyone in particular but if the shoe fits...


I'm not really sure what the problem is? It sounds like a case of "I don't want it, but I don't want you to have it either.". I mean if you like leveling slow, it's there. If you like leveling fast, it's there. It seems to me that some people just love making other people do things their way.

Why does it make people so sad in their pants to see joey the mouth breather on a level 99 character? Are you really going to assert your mental superiority over him while simultaneously admitting that in ten years of game play you haven't figured out how to spot the retard in your group and kick him out? I mean how are you honestly going to say that you are an intelligent seasoned player who hasn't figured out how to either A) spot a moron or B) coach an inexperienced player? If you are in charge of a bunch of idiots that you chose, then what does that make you? If you did not choose those idiots on your team, then what does that make you?

Smart people kick the idiot and don't invite him again. If you keep getting screwed by the pink BST on your NNI runs, maybe the problem is not abyssea.

If you really love old exp. parties and you think they are so fun that everyone else should be doing them then make an effort to revive them. I have seen 20-30 threads about how abyssea exp. ruins the game etc., but I have yet to see even one person create a thread / link shell / group organized around the idea of actually getting together a group of people who like that method of leveling succeed. There is a reason for that.

Wanting to slow other people's progress just to make your self feel more accomplished is a pretty pointless endeavor.

Quoted for truth.

There is absolutely no reason to lock Abyssea. You don't learn any more in Book Burns than you do in Abyssea, especially when you look at how often you find people leeching there as well.

Last I checked, I had to interview and fill out applications to join big linkshells doing endgame content -- that should be even more intense these days seeing as how established members can just abyssea up required jobs instead of finding people who already have them. The only reason you should be having trouble dealing with bad players is if you didn't do your due diligence in finding people worth doing events with. Pick ups have always sucked ass, Abyssea didn't make them any worse than they were when it was shouts for 75 climbs or CoP boss battles.

[Glamdring]

That will have it's own set of issues. If you pop your ring and no one else does, you will level faster than everyone and ruin their exp. Even if they all decide they want to exp. fast like you, You will also out grow camps super fast making it so that instead of spending time fighting, you will spend most of your time traveling to different camps (which has nothing to do with gaining exp. or learning your job). There are already a lot of people who have most of their jobs leveled beyond a certain point, which means that you will probably have to level synch. Which means that people won't be learning anything about their abilities as they level up because they will be capped to a lower level and unable to access them.


I could go on for days, but I think you get the point. Low level experience points parties are pretty much a thing of the past. The only way that form of leveling will ever be relevant again is if SE somehow creates a huge influx of new players coming into the game that are attracted to the game because of this newly introduced feature that allows them to level at a rate that is 10 times slower than the one that all the current players got to use. Who knows though. Maybe pigs can fly.

Frank nailed it. With the Outside Aby XP doubled, XP rings and in most cases an FoV page the XP gain is simply too fast to do an old school grind, at least below 30, what with having to constantly switch camps to keep skill points accumulating (which it sounds like is at least part of your concern). I understand the bitch, I'm a skill points hawk myself, which is why I stay the hell out of aby until 75 (cant connect enough to make skilling realistic before 75).

Now, you can START grinding again if you want somewhere between 30 and 40 depending on the job/party build-and it does vary, even with GoV. However, if your server is anything like mine the common GoV spots have a constant alliance spamming pages at that level, you join them or just try to do your GoV page with no prey-not gonna work-but the problem is the alliance is burning XP as fast as you were 1-30, so again skill suffers, especially with a sync.

So if you wanna old school your best bet is going to be 50-80ish on Gov pages or in an old school camp, but good luck finding the parties. It's been mentioned elsewhere on the forums numerous times, what we really need is an outlet that gives major skill-ups to off-set the gap between skill levels and job levels to get those points up in something like the rate we got the XP/merits up. So far SE's only answer has been Martial Master, a ring/earring and a few foods; oh, and to take away the outlets for rapid skill-up to ofset the gap created by rapid XP up (campaign fortifications, etc.). No answer, I know, make of it what you will...

[scaevola]

Take THF for example. In the old days people who played THF would learn just the basic SATA from party members explaining to them how to do it. Now new THF at 99 who have never played the game before have no real idea how SA and TA are to work as well as the other JA that benefit THF in end game.


Yeah actually you're right; some things are kind of hard to figure out on your own without somebody knowledgeable present to explain them to you.

Fortunately, people recognized this problem a while back and tried to address it with a pretty neat little innovation called "writing".

[RAIST]

Fortunately, people recognized this problem a while back and tried to address it with a pretty neat little innovation called "writing".

If only people would take the time to do a little research...so many posts lately about "problems" that are already covered even in the older wiki's that receive little updating these days.

[Kari]

It's too late to make any changes. Bad players will always be bad players. Gimp players may get better with time, just don't let them be convinced that it's okay to come to a T6 Voidwatch shout with AH gear, no temp items, 3 stones, etc.

If you can't look at someone and figure out that they aren't geared/skilled enough to do what you're planning, then you're probably just as bad of a player.

Making exp boring as hell again will just make SE lose money. I'm okay with having more gimps and potential good players opposed to every new player quitting because exping sucks and all of this game's content is at 99.

[saevel]

Hey guyz I got a solution

when they release SoA they should delevel EVERYONE back to 1 and make Abyssea level 99 onry. Also make it so you don't get XP on the monster unless you SC it.

That'll sure teach everyone to really hate the game, make it so only us true players can play...

[saevel]

Yeah actually you're right; some things are kind of hard to figure out on your own without somebody knowledgeable present to explain them to you.

Fortunately, people recognized this problem a while back and tried to address it with a pretty neat little innovation called "writing".

OMG seriously! You mean people can learn about something without being subjected to blind trial & error? WTF is this nonsense, why ... that's CHEATING! You should be banned for suggesting some actually research community knowledge pools!

Next you'll tell me that we're not supposed to wear costumes of our characters while we play.

[FrankReynolds]

Next you'll tell me that we're not supposed to wear costumes of our characters while we play.

No way man. If I can't dress as a galka in a mankini while I play, I'm out of here.

[Zarchery]

I've come to the point where I don't really mind leeching, except when it's done unilaterally. That is, some goober will join a party where they are fully capable of contributing, say a level 90 character in Abyssea or a level 40 character in Crawler's Nest. Then, like 30 minutes into it, they just decide to AFK without notice. That just pisses me off. At least with Abyssea keying, the lower level guy is contributing a needed service, and with Fell-Cleave leeching there is a pre-existing agreement between the people attacking and the people leeching. Here it's just some guy who joins a party under the guise of being a contributing member and then deceives you.

[Sarick]

Why do people still thinks PL makes bad players?? IMO, a bad players will always be bad players regardless of how they get their levels???

You missed the part where good players can become bad players and bad players MIGHT become good players. The part about good players becoming bad players doesn't always mean it's their fault. Take for instance someone had a minor stroke or other health conditions like old age.

I think the main reason people think PLs are bad is because it creates a lazybones play style that in the long term may make a players skill level worse. For example, when I leveled RDM it was my responsibility to do many things at once. Now days instead of playing that job I avoid it.

The responsibility of playing a job right is to much to handle for some players and this lazybones style creates an environment to support it. Sometimes it's better for them just to avoid playing the difficult jobs if they're really bad. If this seems a bit off please go back and re-read last sentence of the first paragraph.

Conclusion, In my book most I just level to level even if I don't want to utilize the job experience. By leveling the job I can at least fulfill the completion of 99 by power leveling the easy way. The only time it becomes critical is if people want me to use a job in an important event when they know I shouldn't or I attempt to fill an important position knowing I lack the experience/skill to support it.

Simplified.

Question: Does it matter if someone cheats their way to max level?

Answer: It all depends on how they plan on using it and/or if they can learn the skills needed to play it effectively.

[scaevola]

No way man. If I can't dress as a galka in a mankini while I play, I'm out of here.

IMMERSION.


You missed the part where good players can become bad players and bad players MIGHT become good players. The part about good players becoming bad players doesn't always mean it's their fault. Take for instance someone had a minor stroke or other health conditions like old age.

Well, I think the more refined way of saying it is bad players will remain bad players INDEPENDENT of how they gain their levels. The biggest reason for this is that dead weight in an XP party was still getting XP; at 99, there comes a point relatively quickly at which you can no longer progress unless you step up your game a little bit, and I think that's always been the relevant moment regardless of how slowly or quickly we were getting XP.

[Rustic]

Well, I think the more refined way of saying it is bad players will remain bad players INDEPENDENT of how they gain their levels. The biggest reason for this is that dead weight in an XP party was still getting XP; at 99, there comes a point relatively quickly at which you can no longer progress unless you step up your game a little bit, and I think that's always been the relevant moment regardless of how slowly or quickly we were getting XP.

Of course, it used to be that dead weight in an exp party brought it to a screeching halt as far as experience was concerned.

You could tell PDQ when someone fell asleep on the job in ToAU exp PTs.