A Message to Our English-speaking Community

[Akihiko_Matsui]

Matsui here.

First off, I want to say thank you very much for the positive comments made in the "Mr. Matsui" thread! I'm sorry that I haven't been able to respond directly to it.

Though we have the English reps running the ship around here, all of the discussions that take place on the English forum gets shared with both me and the other developers, and we take all of your comments into consideration when implementing new content and making adjustments.

Reading all of your posts, we get the feeling that there are a lot of you who are enjoying the various challenges and this is very encouraging for us on the development team to read.

We will continue to implement content that poses a good challenge, as well as content that can be enjoyed by a wide range of players.

Please continue to submit your feedback and hold even more discussions about the game.
Thank you very much.

[OmnysValefor]

With respect, your response embodies something voiced a lot around here. Something you yourself addressed when you replied here (translated) (http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/36018-possible-oversight-with-the-new-ilvl-system?p=461098&viewfull=1#post461098), via Camate.

Something we eagerly desire on many issues is a reply. Silence on many topics doesn't tell us whether you're considering changes or just ignoring them.

We ask you about things like:

Red mage specific spells
Enmity adjustments
Wildskeeper popularity vs the increasing difficulty

(This is not to ask for the difficulty to increase, but that as the skill of those attending decreases, along with the desire/capability to come on useful jobs, the difficulty increases greatly.)

and several other things that I imagine Camate has made you aware of.

After all that, the topic that gets addressed is the topic praising you for a job well done which, I'm sorry, is not the consensus around here.

An example would be this thread (http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/36696-Gratification-to-Matsui), which started out similarly, and then people--including myself--left feedback.

[Anjou]

Not only that, but what about Campaign? Literally every week the map stays at numbers that point to Fiat Lux never getting accessed again.

http://img687.imageshack.us/img687/8080/56en.jpg

Seriously can something be done to not see things like this anymore? At least with Besieged and whatnot there were always people in need of imperial standing for things like teleporting through runic portals, but with campaign battle, there's nothing else to it...the people who want to try to get to Fiat Lux won't ever get to do it.

[Duelle]

Something we eagerly desire on many issues is a reply. Silence on many topics doesn't tell us whether you're considering changes or just ignoring them.

We ask you about things like:

Red mage melee and specific spells
Enmity adjustmentsFixed.....

[Karbuncle]

I have to admit, You guys are seriously making me embarrassed to breath the same air as you. I do my fair share of complaining, I know i do, but a lot of complaints i see around here, hell I've made them myself sometimes half-serious that pretty much the only feedback is taken from JP posts and we just get the translations of their answers.

But, The fact is This man, who I'll believe, Is coming in to say he listens to all languages. Just because he or the dev team don't respond to every single little complain doesn't mean they're not doing their job. Plenty of adjustments have been made off the feedback here, and just cause its not what you want or it didnt effect you doesn't mean It didn't happen.

Oh, and segue into this reminder to some of you, just because you think its important doesn't mean anyone else wants. I can imagine that Thief's Knife adjustments and SMN not sucking should be the center of the world but it doesn't make it true, neither does pretending anyone cares about RDM or Campaign.

Stuffs coming on a priority basis and 10 people bickering back and forth on the 2 Campaign topics a month doesn't mean its an epidemic at the heart of dropping subscriptions. Personally I wouldn't object to a Adjustment to Campaign but I don't think its in catastrophic need of priority, and for the twist? I've created some of those Campaign threads myself and supported all/most of them. Mind blowing right?

chill out. for serious.

Sternness aside. Thank you Mr Matsui for taking the time to make this post, It means a lot to many of us, and even though the haters gunna hate, i assure you most of us understand your message and appreciate acknowledging our sometimes petty complaints.

Edit: And for examples of them listening to even small complaints. Two recent examples. RDM being added to more daggers, and THF to more Marksmanship weapons. Despoil Pools for new mobs was also added due to suggestions (or coincidentally).

[Fusionx]

Current feelings about XI vs XIV aside- Matsui is doing his job much better than his predecessor. Never mind the fact that he's also been juggling XIV's battle system while also being the Producer of FFXI. The game is seeing radical changes at this time and I think the way Matsui is keeping in contact with the playerbase is great.

You know how many posts Tanaka made on the forums? You could count them on one hand. ONE hand.

[Umichi]

Thank you for replying! I hope in the future things get easier and I hope you keep bringing content and making adjustments when you see neccesary .

I was going to post something negatively about Diefact, but then I took a Stone VI to the knee.

[Hayward]

It's good to know that Mr. Matsui does read the forums. At the very least it shows we can commend these issues to the developers' minds, if nothing else. With XIV unofficially starting tomorrow for those who bought in early, this should free up some staff to shore up XI's more pressing issues.

[Demon6324236]

Now, as for my real opinion on everything said here... I still like Matsui's direction with a few things, and hate others. Upgrading gear in the way he did, totally disagree in every possible way, changes he made to some events, Delve's reward system, these are good things. But in the end, my largest issue is still not addressed, he tends to focus on things which not a lot of people seem to have an issue with, while at the same time, ignoring, or at least not addressing, much larger and wide spread issues. Also, he seems to ignore, or again, not address, many past issues, though some of this is coming up now, UI, Cait Sigh & Atomos, but many other things like RDM specific spells, DRK Fast Cast, and other things which were on the board before he even came in. If he could implement all past things that were talked about, or at least tell us flat out they will not happen, it would at least be addressing them in some manner. Someone like myself who enjoyed Meeble Burrows may still be waiting for the update to add KIs to reduce the wait time, to implement the Rolandberry zone, and so on. But, for now, still no word on that content, at all, since when it was first talked about.



I hope you read this Matsui, I really do. Please, work on some older things. I know Adoulin is new, and fresh, but please, go back, make old content matter, add on what was previously announced, make it worth doing. Adoulin has a lot to offer right now, but you keep stepping on your own toes, you make an event like Skirmish, but you outclass everything in it with gear from Delve, and a few months later, you outclass everything in Delve with more gear from Skirmish, even the gear that is 6 levels higher gets beaten by gear from Skirmish! If you keep adding content in this way, it will seriously make players like myself stop playing, I used to love working to get gear that would last some time, that would stay good, but now it feels like every update my gear is no longer the best, I restart working on something completely different.

Let me give you an example, last month, Bokwus Gloves were the best Enfeebling Magic Accuracy hands in the entire game for RDM. The only way for them to be, would be to get them to rank 15 on augments. I spent a lot of Plasm, took my time to get them up. Now, you introduced some new hands, Hagondes Cuffs, naturally, these are already better than my Bokwus Gloves, even at rank 15, the Cuffs win without augments at all. This kind of thing makes me quite angry, I worked hard on those Gloves, I put a lot of time and effort into them. In the end, my effort was belittled by the fact they were so quickly outdated, beaten by something easier to get, and much, much better in the end.

There are old pieces of content like Meeble Burrows which people enjoyed, but as it stands, it seems like if you even implemented it now that its rewards would be either much to weak to matter, or so strong they would make everything else look bad. I would love for you to work on some of this old content, and old ideas you said you would implement, but at the same time, they need to be done well. Since the expansion has come out, you have done well, but you have made fatal flaws at the same time. You should not make better gear every single update for every single thing practically. Some things need to be long term pieces of gear that work well for a long time, and have some stability in their place at the top. As your going now, your item level system does not even work properly. You created the new Skirmish gear to be on the same level as that of the Delve gear. At the same time, many of the augments are so powerful that it makes Delve gear look like its 10~20 levels behind! We have things like a Magic Attack Bonus head piece with 40 Magic Attack Bonus on it, Delve had a head with, at most, 13, the same kind of thing can be seen through all of the mage pieces of gear, I would assume melee as well, though I have not paid attention to them really.

As I said, I hope you read this, this game is about to take a large hit when FFXIV hits I think, and unless you can keep people here, it will only get worse. If enough of my friends leave for FFXIV, I probably will as well, and I will be but another domino in the chain, my leaving will cause others to leave, who cause others. If this game pulls people back, or if you can do things to keep them here, that will not happen, but everything is in your hands. I know it must be hard to do your job, I can not expect it to be easy, but I can expect you to listen, understand, and do everything you can to do it well. You have done well so far, but there are things lacking, some errors have been made, and unless you fix the issues we have with the largest, most wide spread problems, you could very well see this game come to an end, or at very least, see the amount of people playing this game dwindle to the point it becomes nothing more than a ghost of its former self. I wish you best of luck Matsui, I really hope this game stays alive, that you can use the feedback we give to truly make it a better game, but as it stands now, unless some large changes are made to create a balance between what FFXI was, and what you have transformed it into, I fear that despite your efforts, this game is going to crumble around us all.

[Zarchery]

This is what I get from this particular thread...

Matsui: "Thanks for your kind words. I'm glad you're enjoying the game!"
Several different players: "I'm not enjoying the game! You're ignoring my personal preference so you are a failure!"

[OmnysValefor]

They're not ignoring "personal" preferences. They're ignoring so many topics. Look at the recent threads and out sparse the SE replies are, especially when you weed out silly topics like "Thank you for the Login thingy".

Red mages have been pleading for some unique utility to the class for a long time. Refresh II is nice, but if you gotta choose between Bard and Red Mage, the answer is clear. If you have to choose between Geomancer and Red Mage, the answer is clear, unless Gravity II is just fundamental to the win for all those Tojil kites! (Nobody kites Tojil, and I doubt you could grav him anyway.)

Enmity adjustments? They know enmity is broken, they just don't care. Yeah, I'm a PLD main, so especially care about enmity, but ya know what? I'm not the only one. A lot of people just don't even get on PLD. There are, I think, 5 Aegises and 3 Ochains in my ls, and I'm the only one with the nerve to use PLD most the time, the others are so disheartened. PLD isn't the only Tank. Runefencer, which has existed entirely within a state of uselessness (as a tank), is something a lot of people really want to break out. Let's not forget ninja. I have never, not once, seen a ninja in delve. I've never seen one in Skirmish either.

No, when they ignored my thread for something to be done about beasty shanks, that was ignoring a largely personal request, but sorry, friends tried to help me obtain a defending ring standing in a line in a video game. I suggested 3 different ways they could modify it, two very easy, and SE never replied.

Sorry, I've got four great friends in this game, and I'm losing all four to FFXI's prettier sister tomorrow, because they've become so disheartened with FFXI and hope that XIV will bring them what XI hasn't in a while... adventure, and stuff for their small group to do. And even if endgame is alliance-level only, it will, because there's such a long leveling process ahead of them. Maybe they'll come back, but they're not leaving because FFXIV "looks really fun", they're leaving because FFXI isn't.

There's 3 things to do in this game atm, Skirmish, Kill Tojil, or try to kill Tojil. Oh wait, I forgot, I have to go stand in a line in a video game.

(Also, yeah, there's Dakuwaqa and Mugwinga, forgive me for being a little snarky.)

[Delvish]

Mr. Matsui,

Thank you for taking the time to directly respond to us. Even if it was something you had the english reps translate for you, as long as it is under your name, it makes us feel less neglected. FFXI and FFXIV comparisons aside, one thing I really appreciate Mr. Yoshida doing is simply posting in the EN and EU forums from time to time. Not your first language I understand (I'm scared to death of trying to speak in a foreign language!), but even the smallest of "Thanks for being a part of the FFXI family all these 11 years!" means a lot to us when coming from your personal wyvern. Keep it up, Mr. Matsui!

[OmnysValefor]

He quote replied to this


It seems like you are working with the people who are favorably accepting the whole concept of content levels and item levels, while you ignore the majority of feedback which are filled with criticism and concern.

acknowledging that is is frequently enough the case. He called it his inadequacy, but he acknowledged it.

To begin to rectify that, he comes to the english forums and the one thread that he acknowledges is a thread thanking him for a job well done. That's just continuing with the same thing.

[Renaissance2K]

Don't say "We just want you to reply" when what you really mean is "We just want you to agree with us."

[Demon6324236]

Don't say "We just want you to reply" when what you really mean is "We just want you to agree with us."No. If you give someone a logical reason as to why something can not be done, its one thing, if you simply say nothing to them at all, its completely different. SE often says nothing at all to us, we want something, not nothing. Its not like they told us some smart answer as to why they couldn't do something, they told us nothing at all on most topics.

[Anjou]

More like "We just want you to fix things that have been issues for over a year now" things that would literally take only like...10 minutes to implement. Adding Fast Cast to Dark Knight? No problemo, add the value for the job ability and tag it to Dark Knight at a certain lvl for it to be obtained. Cait Sith/Atomos? make a few AI with HP/MP, abilties and ofc their summoning/desummoning animations, and then add the cavernous maw/cait sith dats to wrap that up. Seriously it is not that much of a 'twisting your arm' thing, as most people are preaching on about (Like Karbuncle but I agree some of it does get out of hand, I only asked what the status was with campaign) it's just a simple 'hey this shouldn't take too long when you said a few years ago we were gonna be given this stuff' if they never put those on the road map, this wouldn't even be talked about. It's the fact we were -promised- the new summons (Which I'll be honest SMN NEEDS SOMETHING FRESH AND NEW) and they apparently just rolled it all up and tossed it away for that cute little sachet that makes your avatars a little stronger. Yeah stronger is nice, but we're still using the same old same old, and Odin/Alex don't get to come out and play that often anymore...

[OmnysValefor]

Don't say "We just want you to reply" when what you really mean is "We just want you to agree with us."

On some things, I can't fathom a reason why they don't agree, like why they can't remove the rare tag from beastly shanks, blue pondweeds, and honey wines. (It makes sense that the higher tier is rare.). It made sense at one time but why can't I try to obtain something while having fun rather than try to obtain something instead of having fun.

On other things, like tanks being able to tank, I do wish they'd agree, but there are reasons against tanking. The one thing I can't understand is why they'd add a tank at a point in time where tanking isn't part of the game.

I can see reasons against tanking, like if they wanted to say it makes things more stale, except again, why add a tank if that's their feeling?

[Anjou]

Most of the time they observe how the community handles the new jobs, it determines their future in terms of af stats. If paladins use sentinel a lot, their af could cater to sentinel a little (As shown by Valor Leggings)

[Renaissance2K]

No. If you give someone a logical reason as to why something can not be done, its one thing, if you simply say nothing to them at all, its completely different. SE often says nothing at all to us, we want something, not nothing. Its not like they told us some smart answer as to why they couldn't do something, they told us nothing at all on most topics.
There are enough people here that equate "illogical" to "doesn't agree with me."

They've replied to tons of common issues. Recently, they've discussed inventory size increases (and mentioned how it would increase zoning time), they've discussed why we can't solo Assault and Salvage events (they don't have the resources for that amount of instanced load), they just posted a novella's worth of information on the new PC-exclusive, mouse-based UI that people have been clamoring for since 2007, they produced a timeline for RME improvements and confirmed that Empyrean weaponskills will be unlockable, and so on and so forth. They even posted on some random stuff that only saw one thread.

Just because your one or two pet issues (Campaign, Cait Sith, adding Margarita recipes) isn't currently the hot topic of discussion, it doesn't mean the community is being ignored.

I mean, the fact that THIS VERY THREAD EXISTS proves that isn't true. "We're sorry, everyone. We see all your posts, but the language barrier is delaying our interaction somewhat. Please be patient." And the responses? "RAWR WHERES MY CAIT SITH CAMPAIGN THAT DROPS MY ILVL 199 EXCALIBUR? YOU LIE!"

MMO community representatives have tough jobs. Their job is the PR equivalent of walking through a field of Chigoes.

[Kincard]

If you care that much about politeness you'll appreciate that Matsui posts anything at all, but personally I find most of Matsui's (or to be more fair, the devs, since I'm sure Matsui is just the main spokesman of the dev team anyway) posts are either empty promises or non-answers so it's really not much different than no posts at all.

[OmnysValefor]

Some people look at this thread and seem to react like "Oh, he replied, so they're paying attention.".

The fact is, his reply merely says "We're paying attention and thank you for thanking me.". I don't mean to call the man, or the company, a liar, but we have months, and years of evidence that the NA concerns are back-burner vs two posts that say they do read our posts.

[Demon6324236]

There are enough people here that equate "illogical" to "doesn't agree with me."These are what I call idiots, and I see few of them on that subject I can think of off the top of my head.


They've replied to tons of common issues. Recently, they've discussed inventory size increases (and mentioned how it would increase zoning time), they've discussed why we can't solo Assault and Salvage events (they don't have the resources for that amount of instanced load), they just posted a novella's worth of information on the new PC-exclusive, mouse-based UI that people have been clamoring for since 2007, they produced a timeline for RME improvements and confirmed that Empyrean weaponskills will be unlockable, and so on and so forth. They even posted on some random stuff that only saw one thread.Ok, out of the list of things you said, here are the reasons they are not, logical answers.

1. Not a single person I know of has actually complained about the longer load time, at all, not a single person. To use that as an excuse as to why it can not be done when no one has voiced a problem with it, is yes, illogical.

2. They do not have the resources for the instanced load, in other words, congestion, they can not create more instances for the events, so to allow people to enter solo would mean some people would have to wait outside to enter since they can not increase the instance limit. This is illogical because I seem to be unable to enter Skirmish right now, as I type this post, because there are so many people doing it, to say you can not do something due to congestion and at the same time, allow congestion on a brand new event, is illogical.

3. The UI update was announced a while back, it was first previewed at Vanafest at the same time SoA was announced I think. I think its nice they told us about it and we can finally play with it on the test server, but its long overdue, and honestly, looks ugly in my opinion to the point I cant imagine using it. This was not a reply to something the community talked about recently either, so its not something I would even talk about being a logical answer or not, because its not an answer in the first place in my opinion.

4. They talked more about RMEs without giving any details at all, still not impressive. If they want to make the players happy on the RME topic, we need details, to know how strong they will be, what will be needed, what is expected of us, if they will match up, and so on. Being able to unlock the WS is awesome, I love it, they didn't tell us if only people who made the Emp can do it, if only people who made the Coin weapons can do it, or both. Illogical to inform the players your doing something without telling them anything more than they already knew really. They gave us a vague date, nothing else was really new.


Just because your one or two pet issues (Campaign, Cait Sith, adding Margarita recipes) isn't currently the hot topic of discussion, it doesn't mean the community is being ignored.WK Reives? Content being outdated left and right? This stuff is a hot topic, still not addressed properly, often not replied to by them.


I mean, the fact that THIS VERY THREAD EXISTS proves that isn't true. "We're sorry, everyone. We see all your posts, but the language barrier is delaying our interaction somewhat. Please be patient." And the responses? "RAWR WHERES MY CAIT SITH CAMPAIGN THAT DROPS MY ILVL 199 EXCALIBUR? YOU LIE!"Yeah, that's exactly what everyone said.


MMO community representatives have tough jobs. Their job is the PR equivalent of walking through a field of Chigoes.Never said it was easy.

[FaeQueenCory]

Most of the time they observe how the community handles the new jobs, it determines their future in terms of af stats. If paladins use sentinel a lot, their af could cater to sentinel a little (As shown by Valor Leggings)
Exactly. I think no where is this better exemplified than in SMN.
AF1 basically tells you how they intended the job to be played originally... Looking at SMN's.... it's pretty obvious that they intended for SMN to summon>BP>release>repeat.
But when they actually looked at how people played it... No one did that crazy thing.
So the Relic set offers more bonuses that cater to how a smn actually plays the job.

[FaeQueenCory]

I LOVE the new Skirmish in Yorcia.
It feels like.... Garrison to me. And that's not a bad thing. I really enjoy the use of the waves of enemies here... and the way skirmish works just in general is, in my opinion, Adoulin's biggest success.
(It's fun, it's challenging enough, it doesn't take 7hrs, it's fun, and the rewards are good.)
Keep up the good work Matsui and Dev Team.

[Riggs]

I missed posting on the post in question but I would like to comment on it here, while I was very critical early on I do feel like the dev's have listened to many of our comments and have tried to take them on board in the last 2 updates, while there are still problems as pointed out and probably some personal grievances about favourite jobs if the current course of action continues I believe this game will continue to thrive.

[OmnysValefor]

Thrive?

Sometimes it's really important to choose the correct word and not be sarcastic or facetious. I'm not saying you are but I think thrive is very far away from what this game is doing.

The next week (starting tomorrow, specifically) may do some real damage to XI in the short term, and depending on the direction each game takes, may do lasting heavy damage.

This is why I'm concerned with letting things be, just giving them time, and being "appreciative of posts like these" which are empty. All I see is a game in decline. I feel hesitant to be too easy on them because in a lot of areas, they need to stop precisely what they are doing.

[Falseliberty]

Current feelings about XI vs XIV aside- Matsui is doing his job much better than his predecessor. Never mind the fact that he's also been juggling XIV's battle system while also being the Producer of FFXI. The game is seeing radical changes at this time and I think the way Matsui is keeping in contact with the playerbase is great.

You know how many posts Tanaka made on the forums? You could count them on one hand. ONE hand.

Hold the phone, you mean to tell me the guy who is in charge of 11 is ALSO working on 14?, I never knew this, and it explains a lot, and the massive irony of people people hating on him to go play something hes working on? I don't even... mindblown.gif

Man if anything I don't wanna communicate with devs anymore, I wanna yell at his bosses for not giving him enuf tools and support to get anything done.
Upper management BS

[Demon6324236]

Hold the phone, you mean to tell me the guy who is in charge of 11 is ALSO working on 14?, I never knew this, and it explains a lot, and the massive irony of people people hating on him to go play something hes working on? I don't even... mindblown.gifHe works on the battle system so far as I know, large difference between working on combat and working on the entire game as its overseer.

[OmnysValefor]

I hope you read this Matsui, I really do. Please, work on some older things. I know Adoulin is new, and fresh, but please, go back, make old content matter, add on what was previously announced, make it worth doing. Adoulin has a lot to offer right now, but you keep stepping on your own toes, you make an event like Skirmish, but you outclass everything in it with gear from Delve, and a few months later, you outclass everything in Delve with more gear from Skirmish, even the gear that is 6 levels higher gets beaten by gear from Skirmish! If you keep adding content in this way, it will seriously make players like myself stop playing, I used to love working to get gear that would last some time, that would stay good, but now it feels like every update my gear is no longer the best, I restart working on something completely different.

Let me give you an example, last month, Bokwus Gloves were the best Enfeebling Magic Accuracy hands in the entire game for RDM. The only way for them to be, would be to get them to rank 15 on augments. I spent a lot of Plasm, took my time to get them up. Now, you introduced some new hands, Hagondes Cuffs, naturally, these are already better than my Bokwus Gloves, even at rank 15, the Cuffs win without augments at all. This kind of thing makes me quite angry, I worked hard on those Gloves, I put a lot of time and effort into them. In the end, my effort was belittled by the fact they were so quickly outdated, beaten by something easier to get, and much, much better in the end.

Dang Demon, I somehow missed this post til just now but it is expresses things exceptionally well. I'd like to add one point. I've done some easy skirmishes to accomodate casual/returning friends (t1), and those dropped several times. *I* have a pair which I really didn't *want*. (Oh, they're fantastic, I just don't ever play those jobs.)

So yeah, gear that is free-dropping, or hitting the ground, in the easiest of new content, is better than the previous best-in-slot. I can also imagine that your probably feel like you would have been better off "selling" that plasm.

[Demon6324236]

Dang Demon, I somehow missed this post til just now but it is expresses things exceptionally well. I'd like to add one point. I've done some easy skirmishes to accomodate casual/returning friends (t1), and those dropped several times. *I* have a pair which I really didn't *want*. (Oh, they're fantastic, I just don't ever play those jobs.)

So yeah, gear that is free-dropping, or hitting the ground, in the easiest of new content, is better than the previous best-in-slot. I can also imagine that your probably feel like you would have been better off "selling" that plasm.Of course, the gil I would have gotten could have been put to pay for my GF's Atinian Staff, +2 rocks for Skirmish gear, upgrading my Soothsayer, or I could have simply kept the money for a later date when I would have needed it. Instead, I used it on something which was seemingly amazing at the time, but now, it seems as though no matter how high or low a level, no matter how good it is, it can be beaten by anything in any update. This update showed that we have level 113 gear which beats level 119 gear easily, it beyond blows it away, its so much better that it looks like it should be level 135, maybe even level 140! This kind of thing is very disheartening to players like myself, every long term goal seems like its only going to be met with disappointment by the end of the month, any progress made flushed down the drain, leaving only annoyance and anger in its wake. I like some of the new gear, make no mistake, but the fact all of my old gear now feels as though it was a waste of time, that is a problem to me.


Note: While it started as a reply to you, it was also meant as something for them to read on the subject as well, as I am sure you already know my view on things, and in many ways likely share it.

[Riggs]

Thrive?

Sometimes it's really important to choose the correct word and not be sarcastic or facetious. I'm not saying you are but I think thrive is very far away from what this game is doing.

The next week (starting tomorrow, specifically) may do some real damage to XI in the short term, and depending on the direction each game takes, may do lasting heavy damage.

This is why I'm concerned with letting things be, just giving them time, and being "appreciative of posts like these" which are empty. All I see is a game in decline. I feel hesitant to be too easy on them because in a lot of areas, they need to stop precisely what they are doing.

I typed out a long response to this but then decided to delete it as i guess it was too much based on my play style and likes. So all i will say is perhaps thrive was the wrong word but i was trying to be positive for once and based on the history of this game did anyone really expect an expansion to be released and be more than 20% complete?

[detlef]

I LOVE the new Skirmish in Yorcia.Do you love the random augments, and how ilvl 113 gear destroys some ilvl 119 gear?

With that said, I'd say Yorcia Skirmish is more good than bad, but still seems to suffer from the randomness that the player base has been quite vocally against for some time.

[Falseliberty]

I really think the dev is doing a fine job.. it's more the company he works for..
lightning returns?
tomb raider selling 4M copy's is not enough?
hitman and sleeping dogs didn't sell enuf for them?

try reading this garbage
http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/DarrellGallagher/20130822/198839/How_do_you_tackle_industry_change.php

If anything 14 I think is SE's shining star atm, god knows they cant get anything else right atm, and treat they IP'S like dirt and the costumer base even worse.

[OmnysValefor]

There are a few things to like right now

Monstrosity, but admittedly, the novelty wears off. They had a huge opportunity with monstrosity to collect on the nostalgia of visiting the old camps (they did that part) but allow us to do it as groups. All of us old players have an appreciation for grouping, at least for grouping with people we like. Still, Monstrosity was a lot more fun than I thought it would be.

New Skirmish, low-man, fairly unique, AND relevant. The only issues I have with skirmish is how slow the beginning is, even in the upper tiers, and that SE took all our feedback on the uselessness of old skirmish gear and went CLEAR to the other side of the spectrum.

Gear is also way too easy to get. It drops like rain. You could skirmish for a full day and, possibly needing to use wings, come out with every piece of gear from the zone and that's while everyone else is interested too. In a few weeks when it's used as a tool to PL a friend, it will go a lot faster.

Item Levels: SE also doesn't understand the strong-point of item levels, aside from all the negative feedback they've gotten. It's a great frame of reference so that you don't end up with...exactly waht they did. Lower "ilvl" gear outperforming higher, more expensive, and much harder to obtain gear. Not just that, but it's not like we've had the gear forever.. All of it less than 4 months, and for most people, much less than that.

The whole time we're saying "Please, we play the game because we place value in our gear, as XI has always done.", we are getting slammed every update with gear that just smacks everything pervious in the face, while still being very expensive, until you rush to the auction house after the update hoping to sell yours for some decent price, before everyone else (unless it's EX, as it typically is).

[Nebo]

Matsui here.

First off, I want to say thank you very much for the positive comments made in the "Mr. Matsui" thread! I'm sorry that I haven't been able to respond directly to it.

Though we have the English reps running the ship around here, all of the discussions that take place on the English forum gets shared with both me and the other developers, and we take all of your comments into consideration when implementing new content and making adjustments.

Reading all of your posts, we get the feeling that there are a lot of you who are enjoying the various challenges and this is very encouraging for us on the development team to read.

We will continue to implement content that poses a good challenge, as well as content that can be enjoyed by a wide range of players.

Please continue to submit your feedback and hold even more discussions about the game.
Thank you very much.

First off, thank you for writing a post specifically targeted to English speaking players. I'm sure many people are dying to see more posts from you directed at us and responses to our feedback...

...that post was not it.

Trying to convince us that you read our forums by responding to a thread that is at least five pages back in the history does not make much sense to me.

Saying that you get the feeling that a lot of us are enjoying the various challenges....makes me truly believe that this is a lie and you don't read the threads here.

There's isn't much on the NA forums with that kind of talk lol.

Saying that you read our forums is nice....but I can see this post annoying people because it's just a non-post post - Lots of words...not saying much of anything.

If you want to convince us you take our feedback seriously, you're going need to respond to specific things that aren't patting you on the back.

[Umichi]

And you people wonder why they don't bother posting more material in threads? most of you are either ungrateful, or selfish... And the only thing your worried about seeing is responses to game content, or the mechanics behind game content... they don't want to talk mechanics as every time somethings not broken what do most reps tell you to do? go to your community based sites for info. They don't want to talk to you about how YOU think the game should be run. What they do want is feedback for the job your play, and questions about their game that doesn't force them to pull the "I can't really talk about that because it's a nono topic for us to even discuss" card..

No one was patting them on the back.. If I wasn't clear enough I stated in my initial post on that thread that I appreciate the work he's doing and I know how much pressure he and his team are under and to keep up the good work.


then you get your emo responses like "Yeah he does an ok job, but he still sucks at this" or "Wheres mai cait sith" or "Haste II?" or "I disagree he sucks he needs to do a better job"

then he comes onto the site and posts something for english speakers thanking us for our patience and tells us that they do look through our forums and hopes he can do a better job and everyone goes apeshit on him... no wonder why he stays to posting in threads that are about gaming lore of future updates.

All I can hope for is that Mr. Matsui isn't disheartend by all the ragging he gets from the playerbase he loves so much. I also hope he doesn't treat this game like a job because yes it is a job but working on a game with a group is about the fun and the experience of shaping your own world. Not someone elses.

Fin

[OmnysValefor]

Some people here have ragged on him, and a few of those posts have been deleted, and more probably will be.


No one was patting them on the back.. If I wasn't clear enough I stated in my initial post on that thread that I appreciate the work he's doing and I know how much pressure he and his team are under and to keep up the good work.

"Keep up the good work", is patting them on the back and you're in the minority for thinking they're doing good work. Yes, some of the changes hold promise, but many of the more important changes (the up-ending of the gearing paradigm > monstrosity) are going in wrong directions.

Some people speak respectfully to developers, some people speak more bluntly, or speak to other players, and most of the time, neither gets a reply.

You don't have to agree, the forums speak for themselves.

Also, if you're doing this job, criticism is part of it. It is a game and a great number of elements they're adding are adding frustration, rather than fun. Now brb while I go spend this Stone +2 for an augment not guaranteed to be better, in any fashion, than what a nq stone gives me. I've got no choice to spend or sell the stones, I don't have the inventory space to sit on them.

That's another thing, there are longstanding things like inventory which they can at least help us with while they work on something more permanent.

How can they help us?

Make meds stackable to 99.
Give us a storage slip for non-augmented relic +2.
Create an NPC to hold Abyssea +2 items.
Expand the storage slip for voidwach gear to include, well, most voidwatch gear. Why can't I store Toci's Harness and Porthos Byrnie? So what, I'm not a fan of dropping gear. Past events (neo-Limbus) have proven me right in that feeling.
Chatoyant gorget (or an overall Light Gorget and Dark Gorget, since those specific items already exist, call them Benevolence Gorget and Malevolence Gorget), and the same for Obis.

[Kincard]

I think it's impolite to yell at the busboy or the chef but if I think the soup tastes awful I don't think I'm doing something wrong by saying it, especially when the restaurant hands me a "give us your feedback" slip.

[Umichi]

Some people here have ragged on him, and a few of those posts have been deleted, and more probably will be.



"Keep up the good work", is patting them on the back and you're in the minority for thinking they're doing good work. Yes, some of the changes hold promise, but many of the more important changes (the up-ending of the gearing paradigm > monstrosity) are going in wrong directions.

Some people speak respectfully to developers, some people speak more bluntly, or speak to other players, and most of the time, neither gets a reply.

You don't have to agree, the forums speak for themselves.

Also, if you're doing this job, criticism is part of it. It is a game and a great number of elements they're adding are adding frustration, rather than fun. Now brb while I go spend this Stone +2 for an augment not guaranteed to be better, in any fashion, than what a nq stone gives me. I've got no choice to spend or sell the stones, I don't have the inventory space to sit on them.

That's another thing, there are longstanding things like inventory which they can at least help us with while they work on something more permanent.

How can they help us?

Make meds stackable to 99.
Give us a storage slip for non-augmented relic +2.
Create an NPC to hold Abyssea +2 items.
Expand the storage slip for voidwach gear to include, well, most voidwatch gear. Why can't I store Toci's Harness and Porthos Byrnie? So what, I'm not a fan of dropping gear. Past events (neo-Limbus) have proven me right in that feeling.

all of those things YOU wish to see. SE never intended everyone to be a one man army. you see you use the term good as in literally good (the positive iterance of the word) work. I used the term good work as in their work is good keep it up. there is a difference.


You don't have to be a jerk about everything especially when you are speaking to another person from another culture especially ones like japan where courtesy and respect get you farther than being rude and obnoxious.

However I'm not going to continue defiling a thread which was aimed at good intentions. I've said my part HF sitting on the black sludge of a floor you call negativity.

Edit: took out last sentence moved up into a new paragraph.

[OmnysValefor]

Instead of the things we ask for, like inventory improvements, we get Mog Gardens, which causes more inventory issues if you try to actually use it. Was Mog Garden necessary, or in any way beneficial? Twice now it's given me a pop item for some NM in Passhow {S} that drops nothing of value. I can't NPC it, so I have to actually go in and drop it.

It gave me an Amrita (the synthesis result of cursed beverages) the other day, too bad I never play mage in any mp-intensive setting.

Mog bank is cute, but simply that, only cute.

It is a common feeling around here that we have a small crew working on XI, and the community would really appreciate it if the crew stopped adding silly things.

Several jobs are pretty much rotting. Their only use in adoulin is wildskeeper reives or lol-farming, and SE remains quiet. My Ninja loved the 1h update, but it's not getting any invites as a tank because lol, or a dd because it can't ws like a war or d-o-t/ws like a mnk. I thought that skirmish would give some love back to 1hr's but it seems like 2hr's subbing rdm are the better option, especially since some of their aoe weaponskills do as much/more (sometimes one-shotting) to each mob as dual-wielders do with their best weaponskills. For example, Fell Cleave (edit: said Upheaval) does more to each than blade: jin does to one.

[OmnysValefor]

all of those things YOU wish to see. SE never intended everyone to be a one man army.

Tell me what's bad about a storage slip for non-augmented relic+2, please.

Or anything else I listed that could be done for inventory?

The only possible issue is something someone expressed about them needing to change the results of the recipes, and that's a fair argument, but there are possible ways around that. One possibility is making no change at all and just having the alchemists build stacks of 99 at a time. As long as you make all 99, it's the same gil, and more AH-space available to you.

Instead of making 20 stacks of 12 echos, you could make 2 stacks of 99 (formerly 17 of 12), and 2 stacks of 12 remedies, and 2 stacks of holy water.

Yes, *I* wish to see them, along with many other players, because *I* am aware of the issues in the game.


You see you use the term good as in literally good (the positive iterance of the word) work. I used the term good work as in their work is good keep it up. there is a difference.

I'm not seeing a difference. You're saying the work they're doing is good, and I disagree. I like a few things, and have pointed them out (Monstrosity, New Skirmish, though both have issues) but the overall direction the game is going is bad. You don't go tip a waiter who provided bad service just because the drinks were cold.


You don't have to be a jerk about everything especially when you are speaking to another person from another culture especially ones like japan where courtesy and respect get you farther than being rude and obnoxious.

I'll need you to point out for me where I was being a jerk. I've tried to be courteous and honest. I avoid sugar-coating my words simply because I understand that it will be translated and pleasantries and colloquialisms may not translate well.


However I'm not going to continue defiling a thread which was aimed at good intentions. I've said my part HF sitting on the black sludge of a floor you call negativity.

Ideally, I wouldn't have wanted to taint a thread created as a sign of good will but we have pages and pages of threads that aren't being seen by the right eyes. It is my genuine hope, a faint one, that Matsui would come back to this thread, see all the replies and find someone to translate for him.

It was my intent, and I think I achieved it, that my first reply was as nice and respectful as could be, as I want to be a positive member of the community. I'm sorry though, I'm not going to say to him what I believe are lies.

Perhaps he just isn't hearing us. Maybe, not likely, that's been the problem all along.

[Karbuncle]

I can safely say If i made a thank you thread and came back to nothing but more complaints about people whining the game sucks because their favorite jobs aren't updated or their favorite event isn't designed how they wanted, I'd probably just ignore it.

There's a time and a place for bringing up issues, Its littered all over this once decent forum... Can go to "New Posts" and almost every threads going to be another inconsequential complaint. i've contributed a few myself and stand by a few, but the point remains, If anyone wanted to be Courteous or polite they'd of kept their squabbles, qualms and bickering in any of the 1,000 already existing threads for such a thing.

I'll acknowledge my argument is kinda pointless cause its attempting to reach people who feel fully justified hating this man and will continue to find reason to do so despite how much the games improved since he's joined. Maybe not all of us agree on this point, and maybe the success isn't in Subs, but I'll maintain this is because FFXI players are among the worst in the MMO community for accepting new things (sorry!), but the game is a lot more accessible to everyone, with the only real hindrance being the communities ability to welcome less than perfection. Which is our fault not so much as its theirs, cause I can tell you with fact you can beat Tojil and etc without Perfect weapons... the LS I was in did it before they added I.lv stats like Skill+ and not a single one had Oatix... And I've seen it 8-manned.

I can speak with 100% certainty half the stuff suggested here, even stuff I've backed like SMN/THF/RDM updates or Campaign updates, Is in majority either looked down upon or laughed at as pointless by other forum communities, and people I play with online. There are some who wouldn't mind it, but very few who say they'd support putting man hours too it as a priority.

Point being, they listen to our suggestions, they just mostly suck or not everyone wants them and they're going in order of priority, and while they may seem "urgent" to you or me, they aren't, which is the bottom line.

They're doing a fine job and while a lot of us can disagree with the design direction, when it comes to minor things we have to understand we're not the center of the universe, and despite having this Official forum hub, not all suggestions here are equal in the eyes of the FFXI community and this is not the single source of their information, by their own admission they do read other forums to get a rough idea of peoples reactions and such or for leisure heck if i know, this is just their hub where they can respond.

(PS Dude above me, Like 99% of this is not directed to you or anyone specific in this thread)

[detlef]

Well I don't think it helped that that particular post was started by one of the more sycophantic posters on this forum. I'm sure everybody knew it wasn't going to go well the moment the post was made. It didn't help that he said "gratifying" instead of "gratitude."

Aside from that, once you make a post (especially one like that), you have no control over the responses. It's not like you can police or bully people into only responding positively. While we'd all love sensible, well-reasoned posts, I think that rants are also helpful because they convey much more emotion. I'm sure that we wouldn't have gotten as quick or as definitive a response to the RME issue if people hadn't flooded that thread with negative responses of all kinds.

Anyway, I have no doubt that Matsui is doing the best job he can for us. I have no doubt that he has the game's best interest in mind whenever he makes a big decision for the game's future. We'll see how well he does. As players, if we are given a forum to voice opinions and concerns, it should be used to provide critical feedback on anything and everything. As long as you don't make it personal, he and his staff should be able to handle any and every bit of feedback we give without shedding a tear.

[Demon6324236]

And you people wonder why they don't bother posting more material in threads? most of you are either ungrateful, or selfish... And the only thing your worried about seeing is responses to game content, or the mechanics behind game content... they don't want to talk mechanics as every time somethings not broken what do most reps tell you to do? go to your community based sites for info. They don't want to talk to you about how YOU think the game should be run. What they do want is feedback for the job your play, and questions about their game that doesn't force them to pull the "I can't really talk about that because it's a nono topic for us to even discuss" card.What's wrong with wanting to know about mechanics behind an event? How can you justify GMs not being allowed to explain to me what I have to do to qualify for drops in a WK Reive, and them having to tell me to go to a community site? How is it wrong for us to want to see responses on content rather than only lore, or silly comments and the like rather than real meaningful and informative responses to a post? Its funny how they say something isn't broken, go look at community sites for problems which are multiple years old, and yet, the players on any English site have no info on it. Were not perfect, community sites are not perfect, to always point us to only other players means many things can go completely unknown forever such as ToAU kings because we have no idea exactly how they work which is why sometimes they go a very long time without people getting them to pop.


No one was patting them on the back.. If I wasn't clear enough I stated in my initial post on that thread that I appreciate the work he's doing and I know how much pressure he and his team are under and to keep up the good work.If someone tells me to keep up the good work, I think I'm doing well, doing the right thing, how is making me think that not the exact same thing that patting someone on the back is meant to do?


then you get your emo responses like "Yeah he does an ok job, but he still sucks at this" or "Wheres mai cait sith" or "Haste II?" or "I disagree he sucks he needs to do a better job"We point our how he does a bad job as well? Why he should not keep up 'the good work'? I fail to understand how that's ungrateful or selfish of us.


then he comes onto the site and posts something for english speakers thanking us for our patience and tells us that they do look through our forums and hopes he can do a better job and everyone goes apeshit on him... no wonder why he stays to posting in threads that are about gaming lore of future updates.The reason we get on him about things is because that's all he posts in, if that's why he posts only in them then congratulations, you have found the loop. He does not answer many of our questions, we complain, he hates us, he does not answer many questions, repeat.

Maybe, just maybe, we are complaining in this thread because he said we are all happy about the new content, which the only content I think got universally good feedback on was Monstrosity. It would be like if at a concert the crowd was booing and there were 3 people out of a thousand which were cheering & shouting for an encore. It doesn't mean they all love you, it means if you want to do a good job, you need to make the other 997 people like it by changing some stuff up. He came in saying he's happy to see we all like the new content, and he reads our posts, these two things contradict one another and if you think about it, make his post meaningless in a way.

[OmnysValefor]

The concert is a fantastic example.

When a concert sucks, most people leave. What's left are a few people who want to stay, stay merely because friends are staying (sound familiar?), or because they paid to go.

How does that relate to XI? A lot of people have given up on XI. They left. They may have stayed for some time, because friends did, as many in my clique did, but ALL of those friends left for XIV? Why am I still here? I enjoy the total result of my effort. I enjoy the journey as much of my friends, but I'm not keen on starting a new journey because it appears, I'd rather continue on the one I'm on.

To put it better, when a concert sucks, you have three types of customers. Those that left, those that want to stay, and those that stay because of friends or some loyalty to the band. FFXI has three types of customers, aside from those who quit because it was time to move on: Those disappointed, who quit, those who want to stay, and those who stay for friends/attachment to accomplishment/faith in the brand.

FFXIV is just the better concert next door.

[Umichi]

Sycophantic.

I don't like being called names, especially ones that are false..

[Demon6324236]

I can safely say If i made a thank you thread and came back to nothing but more complaints about people whining the game sucks because their favorite jobs aren't updated or their favorite event isn't designed how they wanted, I'd probably just ignore it.So you would do the stupid thing? If everyone is yelling at you that they are angry and do not like the game for blah reason and you do nothing but ignore it you will only serve to alienate those players, and prove you did not truly listen to them in the first place has he has just claimed. Also, unless the majority of people are doing this, it would be no issue anyways, so its not as though he would be alienating some small part of the players, but rather, it seems the majority of players would be ignored, again, meaning he is doing just the opposite of what he said he is doing.


I'll acknowledge my argument is kinda pointless cause its attempting to reach people who feel fully justified hating this man and will continue to find reason to do so despite how much the games improved since he's joined. Maybe not all of us agree on this point, and maybe the success isn't in Subs, but I'll maintain this is because FFXI players are among the worst in the MMO community for accepting new things (sorry!), but the game is a lot more accessible to everyone, with the only real hindrance being the communities ability to welcome less than perfection. Which is our fault not so much as its theirs, cause I can tell you with fact you can beat Tojil and etc without Perfect weapons... the LS I was in did it before they added I.lv stats like Skill+ and not a single one had Oatix... And I've seen it 8-manned.While all of this is true, there are some things they do very poorly. The game is more accessible in one respect, while they are still as vague and unhelpful with things as ever before, leading only to community sites for information, expecting us to have nothing more than other players to get our info from. I accept some new things, I hate many others, part of why new is bad for this specific game is that those who like old, not people who are ignorant and hate it for being new, but they just flat out do not like new, could come here for old. Now, this is becoming new, so where does one go for old? The game had a unique aspect to it of being different, many people didn't like how, but it was different, so it worked for it, if you make an old game like every new game there will never be much reason to play it, if you make an old game stay old, it might continue to live on as an old game, for those who like them.


I can speak with 100% certainty half the stuff suggested here, even stuff I've backed like SMN/THF/RDM updates or Campaign updates, Is in majority either looked down upon or laughed at as pointless by other forum communities, and people I play with online. There are some who wouldn't mind it, but very few who say they'd support putting man hours too it as a priority.I'm sure, this is a close minded player base after all. I basically had to argue with a leader 2 nights ago to let me go RDM/SCH as a DD to Yorcia Skirmish, because he claimed my RDM would never out DD his DRK or MNK. After finally getting him to accept me I ended up out DDing every person in the Skirmish easily because I was 1~2 shooting nearly everything. Because of his close minded approach to my RDM, thinking as most do, RDM is worthless, magic damage sucks, WAR DRK SAM MNK are the only real DDs, blah blah blah, he almost made his run fail, because without me, they were not killing mobs as fast as they popped up. The problem is that they hardly do any of these updates anyways. If they fixed RDM's flaws, maybe people would bring one more often, maybe it would not be getting replaced by SCH once again, right now, in all content RDM has been good for in SoA, mind you that's limited to Skirmish and Delve Boss runs. But rather than do that kind of update, they make new events which only make their old events not worth doing, which is creating a cycle of wasted time.


Point being, they listen to our suggestions, they just mostly suck or not everyone wants them and they're going in order of priority, and while they may seem "urgent" to you or me, they aren't, which is the bottom line.How many people asked for Skirmish gear to smash Delve rather than be on par? How many asked for more completely random augments for an event? How many asked for hour long battles that take more than 50 people to take down? They listen to some suggestions, yes, but it seems to have almost no priority factor. How many THFs will really use marksmanship weapons? How many RDMs will really even be allowed to use daggers in parties without RDM melee being upgraded at some point? How hot were these topics even in their own forums? Yet, here they come, we will be getting them in the fall update. What about redoing merits? Making TH mean something in more events? Making THF have more of a use than simply TH? Fixing RDM melee by adding more decent gear? RDM unique spells or Haste II? These are things which were much more popular and requested many more times by the players, but they never happen, yet, Marksmanship & Daggers are on the way. How is that priority?


They're doing a fine job and while a lot of us can disagree with the design direction, when it comes to minor things we have to understand we're not the center of the universe, and despite having this Official forum hub, not all suggestions here are equal in the eyes of the FFXI community and this is not the single source of their information, by their own admission they do read other forums to get a rough idea of peoples reactions and such or for leisure heck if i know, this is just their hub where they can respond.I agree they do a good job in some things, but I think they do horrible in others. I just wish they seemed to listen to us a bit more on where we want them to take this game rather than only going where they want with most things. We are in a car and they are the driver, if they do not end up going somewhere we want though, we are going to jump out of the car and find someone else going the direction we want if at all possible.

[Mnejing]

I don't like being called names, especially ones that are false..

He's not referring to you, he's referring to someone else.

[OmnysValefor]

Daemon authored the thread he's talking about and it was his second (or first, but he made two) attempt at a thread merely meant to praise Matsui. It got exactly what I'm sure he wanted: direct attention from Matsui.

[Nebo]

And you people wonder why they don't bother posting more material in threads? most of you are either ungrateful...

I'm going to stop you right there.

The dev team doesn't post on the forums as a favour to us. They do it as a function of their greater marketing strategy - customer relationship management. And they don't do it for free. They do it because we pay them every month for their services. They also want us to keep paying them every month for their services.

Mr. Matsui doesn't do this out of "love" for the player base. This is his job. There are a lot of people doing him the favour of continuing to pay for the privilege of posting on these forums to express their dissatisfaction with his product, rather than just cancelling their subscription and moving on.

For any community management team, it's a challenge to sift through the tone and find the common denominator that creates dissatisfaction. But if any of them, including Mr. Matsui takes it personally and focuses on the tone, not the message and become offended...they aren't professionals.

And realistically, they have no right to be. It is very much a reality that we have been paying full price subscription fees for less and less resources/service every year.

[Umichi]

He's not referring to you, he's referring to someone else.

I retract my statement then :)

[OmnysValefor]

This thread was created like Friday night or something, so I kept tellin myself they'd be sayin somethin this week. They'd see the thoughts echoed here and make a substantive reply once the work-week started again.

Losing a little bit of hope for that, but I still hope they come through.

[Stompa]

Please extend Magian 99 weapons with new trials that take the base damage to (at minimum) the lvl of Forefront weapons. A hard magian99 can take 2-3 weeks work to build, longer if you have limited game time, and a lot of effort. A forefront weapon can be obtained in a couple of hours. And yet the base dmg of forefront daggers is like +30~ over magian99 daggers which also carry heavier delay. We understand that SoA had these easy-to-obtain heavy damage weapons as an encouragement to ppl who felt jaded with the old game, but really it makes no sense to have a weapon ppl work on for 3 weeks does almost half the damage of a weapon you can get for bayld in a few hours. Thankyou in advance.

[Spectreman]

Please extend Magian 99 weapons with new trials that take the base damage to (at minimum) the lvl of Forefront weapons. A hard magian99 can take 2-3 weeks work to build, longer if you have limited game time, and a lot of effort. A forefront weapon can be obtained in a couple of hours. And yet the base dmg of forefront daggers is like +30~ over magian99 daggers which also carry heavier delay. We understand that SoA had these easy-to-obtain heavy damage weapons as an encouragement to ppl who felt jaded with the old game, but really it makes no sense to have a weapon ppl work on for 3 weeks does almost half the damage of a weapon you can get for bayld in a few hours. Thankyou in advance.


People used to take weeks or months to get sky/eihenjar/nyzul gear that now it obsolete as well. You can't hold yourself to older items forever. We had 6 years of sidegrades, its about time gear got a huge improvement in all areas.

[Twille]

People used to take weeks or months to get sky/eihenjar/nyzul gear that now it obsolete as well. You can't hold yourself to older items forever. We had 6 years of sidegrades, its about time gear got a huge improvement in all areas.

I'm pretty happy with the new content. I can understand feeling a little angst over having REALLY hard to obtain gear become worthless overnight, but personally I'm glad to see the game move forward. Old content can't stay relevant forever.

[Stompa]

People used to take weeks or months to get sky/eihenjar/nyzul gear that now it obsolete as well. You can't hold yourself to older items forever. We had 6 years of sidegrades, its about time gear got a huge improvement in all areas.

Magian 99 weapons are lvl 99 weapons, the Forefront weapons say lvl 99<nameofjobs> on them too but for some reason have an enormous high base damage despite taking 3~ hours to get from hitting some feeble colonisation mobs. My point is that they should add this higher base dmg to magians which are also lvl 99 and take magnitudes more effort to get than a forefront.

Magians are lvl99 and date back to around 2011~ , unlike sky gear etc. which is absolutely ancient and lvl75. I have a lvl99 char and lvl 99 magian which was only released 2-3 years ago, so why is it gimped by other lvl99 weapons from colonisation-rieve that are 1000x easier to obtain.

[OmnysValefor]

As long as there are trials required to further upgrade them, more upgrades would be nice. Blu's love to Bura/Hala but I'm sure they'd love to offhand those expensive STR or DA swords that they made. Same for every job. The OA2-4 GS was supposed to be pretty darn good, and I'm sure there's a lot of them that would like to see the light of day again.

Bst's and their PDT Axes, too. Since pet levels are increased depending on the weapon, there's no scenario where bsts would want to equip those axes over something lvl 113 or so.

[Demon6324236]

That was one of my biggest issues with the item level thing, magian weapons. Specifically the utility ones, PDT Sword, Pet:PDT Axe, EVA Katana, EVA Dagger, so on, any of the weapons which people made for utility uses like PDT or EVA. All of them were thrown so far behind in damage they are worth nothing now except possibly idle pieces, some of which cant even do that. An upgrade to them would be nice, or gear to replace them in their use, though I think the first is more likely than seeing a Buramenk'ah class weapon in terms of DMG with 11% PDT on it.

[Nebo]

FFXI probably has one of the most "resistant to change" communities in the market. Which is kind of funny to me because complaints requesting change are all you see from us on the forums.

I am a complainer...but I'm a THF main...SE hates us, what can you do?

But even I think Matsui has done some pretty good things with SoA. To me, the fault lies more with their communication practices than with their work. They play a lot of things close to the chest in the (somewhat likely?) event that they can't actually make things happen within a reasonable time frame. They usually take way too long to implement the things they do talk about.

The other piece to that is that, personally, I wish that the team would find a way engage us more as a part of their decision making process, rather than coming to us after the fact. There are decision they make that seem to be made with a philosophy about the game that does not match the reality of playing the game.

But, imo, these are also the symptoms of an under-resourced team, which is not specifically Matsui's fault. SE just bet more of their chips on FFXIV and if early numbers are any indication, they were right to do so.

That sucks for those of us that are seriously, unhealthily attached to FFXI. But it's realistically a better investment for them.

It's an interesting story too if they pull it off. The first one sucked, they completely rebuild it from the ground up, and re release the game with resounding success - An unprecedented accomplishment. Something SE can be very proud of. A worthy extension of the Final Fantasy legacy.

FFXIV: ARR release has not been without incident, mind you, but it's mainly only because they were not able to accurately predict just how successful it would be at launch.

[Meyi]

Please extend Magian 99 weapons with new trials that take the base damage to (at minimum) the lvl of Forefront weapons. A hard magian99 can take 2-3 weeks work to build, longer if you have limited game time, and a lot of effort. A forefront weapon can be obtained in a couple of hours. And yet the base dmg of forefront daggers is like +30~ over magian99 daggers which also carry heavier delay. We understand that SoA had these easy-to-obtain heavy damage weapons as an encouragement to ppl who felt jaded with the old game, but really it makes no sense to have a weapon ppl work on for 3 weeks does almost half the damage of a weapon you can get for bayld in a few hours. Thankyou in advance.

This.

I worked hard on making all six of my magian staves for BLM (and all eight for SMN). Had to leave because of financial reasons for a few months, and when I came back, SoA had been released and the godly BLM staff was being paraded around. I felt slapped across the face and even two weeks after coming back it still stings. I don't mind that there is a wonderful weapon out there for people to get -- that's super awesome! But why can that weapon be so overpowering, yet when we asked for a way to combine our magian staves into one staff, that was considered "too overpowering to do"? I mean, they have magic accuracy +1, magic damage +6 -- the new staff has INT+13 Magic Accuracy+191 Magic Attack Bonus+26 and Magic Damage+205, along with some other goodies like the higher damage, skill+, MND+, and enhancing of fast cast.

I wouldn't mind working hard on a quest (in fact it'd be a lot of fun with some sort of storyline!) to take these six weapons I worked hard to make and meld them into one staff equivalent in stats to the new weapon. -sigh- I don't want to throw away my staves because I worked hard on them, and yet they're taking up so much inventory...

Other than that, I do applaud Matsui for working hard to continue communication with us and update frequently. This era has already been more satisfying than the Tanaka era had been. (I'm sorry, Tanaka...)

[Fynlar]

Please don't expand lv99 magian weapons (other than RMEs obviously)

I already tossed mine :/

[OmnysValefor]

I lol'd.

You have my sympathy, though.

[OmnysValefor]

Almost two weeks later.

I think we have our answer.

[Umichi]

Almost two weeks later.

I think we have our answer.

who wants to talk to people who agree being rude is a legitimate way of approaching a conversation to get a point across..

[detlef]

It's kinda their job, and the purpose of this forum's existence.

[OmnysValefor]

I don't know, being super nice and respectful hasn't gotten a reply.

This thread was just fluff.

[Ravenmore]

who wants to talk to people who agree being rude is a legitimate way of approaching a conversation to get a point across..

Watch CSPAN, Fox news, CNN, MSNBC, congressional hearings, better yet did you see how Parliament was acting when they did the vote the other day. If that hurts their feelings to freaking bad they should grow thicker skin. Not like anyone on the dev team reads the unfiltered NA/EU post. So if you use your head a little the JPs flame the devs just as much but there is no filter between them.

[Camiie]

who wants to talk to people who agree being rude is a legitimate way of approaching a conversation to get a point across..

If they wanted rainbows and sunshine blown up their <Rear>s they got in the wrong business.

[Umichi]

Watch CSPAN, Fox news, CNN, MSNBC, congressional hearings, better yet did you see how Parliament was acting when they did the vote the other day. If that hurts their feelings to freaking bad they should grow thicker skin. Not like anyone on the dev team reads the unfiltered NA/EU post. So if you use your head a little the JPs flame the devs just as much but there is no filter between them.

yes because FFXI is politics? and camiie just because they are a buisness does not mean we can't be civil.I'm sure they don't expect rainbows and sunshine... but at least have some decency.. we are adults..

[detlef]

yes because FFXI is politics? and camiie just because they are a buisness does not mean we can't be civil.I'm sure they don't expect rainbows and sunshine... but at least have some decency.. we are adults..We pay for a service. Aside from that, what's your definition of "decency?" This thread has been very civil. If you're saying that every single post has to be worded carefully to filter out any negativity then you're in the wrong place. And I don't mean this forum, I mean the internet.

[Anjou]

yes because FFXI is politics? and camiie just because they are a buisness does not mean we can't be civil.I'm sure they don't expect rainbows and sunshine... but at least have some decency.. we are adults..

So we are to just tolerate poor customer satisfaction in a product?

[Camiie]

yes because FFXI is politics? and camiie just because they are a buisness does not mean we can't be civil.I'm sure they don't expect rainbows and sunshine... but at least have some decency.. we are adults..

For the most part we are civil, but it seems that most any criticism or request is met with belligerent White Knighting by some players and is either dismissed or completely ignored by SE. You can understand why some just say "screw it" and let loose with whatever is on their mind.

Also, this is a game where the customers have a lot of time, money, and emotion invested. Tempers will run hot at times. That's just how it goes and if they're truly professionals they are prepared for that.

[Anjou]

If we were flat out saying insulting things to the developers, then yes I can see why you would defend them. However what most people do is publicly point ingame issues that the devs (and this is my own speculation, feel free to disregard it) ignore and therefore they have sought to use this forum as a means of bringing it to a more public light. Because for the most part, what gets said on this forum is talked about ingame. Sooner or later SE'll have to step up to the plate and either commit to fixing the more pressing issues, or else they'll face the realization that they will end up losing potential profits.

[Prrsha]

Something that is not focused on and has been neglected for a VERY long time, is new player retention. For a MMO to survive and remain healthy it needs to retain a certain percentage of new players. Grasping for vets with these "log on campaigns" will not fill your coffers in the long run. It is just a temporary stop gap measure. Vets will move on to other games eventually, players RL situations will change and some will leave. Many will move on to other games like 14. This is why there needs to be look back to the drawing board to solve some glaring problems that are keeping new players from staying in 11.

#1 New tutorial. There should be some form of offline tutorial to introduce new players to an old format of a MMORPG. This would help immensely. It coulc give players a run down for every job and how each one should be played in a party format. Currently there is no such thing.

#2 Economy problems. Currently due to the huge rate of exp gain from Abby and GoV and players are leveling far faster then they need the gear for it. This renders the need for low level gear (aside from Guild Points) non-existent. It puts up a giant road block up for new players trying synthing, because they will quickly learn that none of their equipment they synth will sell. They will lose gil altogether and just quit, shrug and ask "Why is this feature even in the game?"

#3 Forming Parties. In the past that was the #1 complaint about leveling. Finding xxx job to do xxx. I am pleased however to see changes in the UI for the PC that is going to allow players to find other players that need similar quests/missions/leveling related content done. So that problem is sort of being fix. Kudos.

#4 VERY high level monsters (Level 99) one or two ZONES away from a starting city. Really? Come on guys, this is really a poor battle design. Players from Bastok should not be given a quest to clear bats from Bastok Mines only to attack the first bat they see, and it one shots them and they die (because the bat is level 99). This zone connects to the town for Pete's sake. From a RPG standpoint, if the bats wanted to, they could swarm the city and kill every last NPC if they wanted to.

Also many of these level 99 monsters are right in the way of certain quests (like the brass canteen quest) and other low level quests. New players can (and will) get confused easily when they lack a tutorial regarding "Sneak and Invisible" and don't realize why they can't complete simple starter quests. In addition access to sneak oils and prism powders are far out of the gil range of new players. Please just remove those high level monster clusters. No high level player levels off of them anymore now that newer content is around.

#5 Low level content for lower level players. Players won't feel the need to rush to level 99 if they have something worthwhile to do along the way. Look at FF14 for an example. There are plenty of quests with rewarding items and those that give exp. The rewards for the lower level quests need to be looked over again and changed to fit the changing landscape of the game. No one needs a Linen Robe anymore as a reward for a quest that takes 5-6 hours. Also in 14, you have events like FATE that low level players can take part in. FFXI desperately needs events like this. Garrison and Eco-Warrior doesn't cut it anymore, especially when you are handing out many of the worthwhile rewards from log in campaigns anyways. A Wotg Campaign battle style for lower level players could be a start. That way players would be doing something "fun" to get to level 99 instead of spamming GoV fell cleaves in Gusgen Mines or leeching in Abby from level 30-99. Back in the day, that would be considered exploiting the system, but few care anymore which leads me to my final point...

#6 Very few Vet players will care about new player content. Why? Because it doesn't pertain to them. You will see very little threads about it. Heck, most of the new players who leave 11, don't even know this forum exists (or really care). See... new players aren't as passionate about 11 as vets are. Why? They have invested nothing but a month into the game. They move on and don't give it a second glance. All of those silent joiners and leavers are tons of cash flow out of your pocket. If you want to see a richer game, a game with a larger development staff... there needs to be the player base to support it. If you ignore these people new to 11, the game will slowly die out like a starved candle. I've seen it before in far to many MMOs to count.
If you really care about 11's legacy you need to fix it's foundation. Attract new players, make them feel welcome, WHILE attending to your vet players. If you don't do all of these things, all you have left is a server full of disgruntled vets wishing this and that were added to the game... but wonder why it isn't happening, because the devs don't have enough cash to hire a larger team to address those matters.

In closing:

Please shut down exploit leveling by capping abby to 75+

Please alter the GoV and FoV books so people don't fly to 99 in a few days. If they do, there will be no use for low level gear or a reason for crafters to craft them.

Please add fun and engrossing content for players that are leveling to reach to 99 so they are not bored and allow the content they do, HELP them obtain that goal instead of give booby prizes.

Please allow such content to be done with the help of vets and new players alike, working together towards a common goal. One simple way to do this was to have events with level caps on them. CoP was brilliant in doing so because you brought both communities together to accomplish certain aspects of the storyline. It would be nice to see those level caps back again. It would also serve to make low level gear useful again (which would help the crafting economy). My only gripe with CoP was that it was very difficult to organize a run. With the new search system, I hope this would be a thing of the past. Another thought would be to have level capped campaign battles that players could join freely. Or a FATE system like in 14.

Once you do the above things, advertise the game more, and let the new players enter FF11 and fall in love with it like we did before.