AA Fight instances

[saevel]

Three total fights is absolutely horrible right now. I'm inside the zone and there are 72 people wanting to fight various NM's with only a few getting to actually participate in the content. Can the developers please expand the zone to double or even triple the original battlefield limit as this is currently unacceptable.

[detlef]

It's not really comforting when Matsui essentially says that their solution for congestion is to make the drops less desirable.

[Mavelle]

Don’t think that will happen. They will need to edit the current zone, and doing that with old zones is almost always a no go in MMORPG’s.

[Demonjustin]

The best solution would be to just separate the fights, rather than all 6 fights relying on the same instances so that if 3 groups are doing entirely different fights it will prevent anyone from doing any, they need to make it so that there can be up to 3 of each.

[Zarchery]

The least they could do is add some sort of reservation system to prevent line cutters.

[larrymc]

It takes about 30 minutes to farm 30 merits. I'm fine with this.
The AA fights take around 20 minutes. I'm fine with this.

It takes 1 to 2 hours to *enter* the AA fights, spamming the enter key every second, watching all of the Japanese group walk in the zone and enter before us.

Getting that annoying menu that says "yes you may be in" - selecting your difficulty, then getting the "You may not enter the battlefield at this time" access denied message at the last second and booted back out to spam enter for another 20 minutes. This, I am not fine with.

[MarkovChain]

Yeah it's stupid, they should put each bc in a dfferent area than the others. The next BCs are going to happen in different areas so good news I suppose?

[Demonjustin]

I really don't know why they thought 6 fights sharing 3 instances would be a good idea, I mean, I would think they could change that for the new ones even if not for the old, but eh.

[Sapphires]

most of the congestion comes from this being farmstatus for most people, reforge mats and pluton cases/boxes bring in good gil, and you can sell divine might drops for like 25mil a piece.
The flaw is partially that there is few other good options to make alot of gil easily so everyone is milking this while they can.

[Camate]

Greetings,

Below are two comments from Akihiko Matsui about the wait times for Ark Angel battlefields.



Matsui here.

I apologize for the battlefield congestion causing inconveniences.

The battlefields that were added in the December version update utilize the areas that were prepared for the missions of the past. Currently it is becoming difficult for players to access the content during times of congestion when the recent content is being challenged all at once by different parties.

We had looked into using this opportunity to change the system specifications; however, we decided to push this back as it requires a large amount of development and instead prioritized delivering new and fun content.

Currently, the development team is hard at work creating new battlefields to implement in the January version update. The content level and rewards are roughly the same as the Ark Angel battles, so these additions will expand the choices for end-game content.

We'll also be adding new skirmishes amongst other things in the February version update.




Matsui here.

I apologize about the continued congestion for the recently added battlefields.

As I mentioned previously, it’s difficult to change the specifications for La'Loff Amphitheater, but we feel that congestion should be alleviated by increasing the attractiveness of other battlefields.

Specifically, in the January version update, we are currently looking into making it so certain items from the high-tier mission battlefields can also be obtained from seal battlefields.

In addition to the above, we are also planning to add new battlefields, and though it pains me to say this, we would appreciate it greatly if you could just wait a bit longer.

[larrymc]

Greetings,

Below are two comments from Akihiko Matsui about the wait times for Ark Angel battlefields.

In Summary - Wait until the content is no longer in high demand .. that will solve the congestion problem. I don't like the answer, but at least we got an answer.

I do have another question since revamped Skirmish was mentioned - not sure if I should start a new thread for this or not ... Will the upgrade path to Skirmish 119 gear "erase" the augments on our existing skirmish gear?

[Alhanelem]

In Summary - Wait until the content is no longer in high demand .. that will solve the congestion problem. I don't like the answer, but at least we got an answer.

I do have another question since revamped Skirmish was mentioned - not sure if I should start a new thread for this or not ... Will the upgrade path to Skirmish 119 gear "erase" the augments on our existing skirmish gear?
I think a better way to look at it is: "It's too difficult to modify the area to support more groups, so we will add more battlefields that have the things people want most from the AA fights, so that people can still get these items if that area is full."

Either way means we have to wait some time for it to be addressed- there isn't going to be an immediate solution.

[bungiefanNA]

More like "we want to add more battles to spread out the congestion, while we work out how to add more instances to the currently congested battlefields" which is a faster fix for now. Having something new to do, and with some unique and some of the same rewards, will spread out the groups doing these battles.

[Sephiran]

This game obviously merits some server-side love. SE, can we please get new higher-end servers for this game? That way you wouldn't have to worry about adding new spells. It would also help the congestion issues immensely.

[Trumpy]

I hope there is more than 3 fight instances for the next two new battles.

Maybe i am just dumb or something but it seems like to me they could just add a "duplicate" zone or something maybe with more fight instances if it was needed and just change the entrance to send you there when the first three are full? Maybe i just dont understand how these things work or why its soo difficult. I kinda figured they would have worked on the making it instanced better before they released this stuff.

[Dragoy]

I would like to think that things could be worse.

They could have put a three-day block on re-entry for example. =]

Not that I'm bothered by it in any way personally; I lack access to Adōulin and the equipment it provides, and thus I don't feel like I should like to be gallivanting too close to the high-level angels.

I do hope the new battlefields will clear things up a bit for those who are being 'hit' by this. I also hope that it will reduce the prices on certain materials (5 million gilzors for a log, really?).


Trumpy,

As far as I understand, it will be the limit that always has been for those areas, just like it is for the existing ones. It will be like that until/if they manage to re-structure the system.

Or at least that's how it seems to me.

[MDenham]

Part of the problem (okay, really, most of the problem) is how instances are implemented in FFXI: every instance of a given battlefield is in the same zone, rather than a more straightforward "we create an actual new copy of the zone for each group in the battlefield". While this means that they therefore have a more predictable server load (in that they don't have to worry about abnormal "spikes" in usage of one of the zone servers), it also means that things are quite a bit less flexible.

This is partly due to virtualization being a somewhat unproven technology in 2002 - a full rewrite of the server code to take advantage of virtualization and allow more efficient usage of the existing servers would be nice and would probably allow them to implement true instancing of zones, but it's a lot of work for, at this point, not very much payoff.

It's one of those unfortunate side effects of playing a game that's over a decade old, but maybe they'll end up fixing it. (I'm not holding my breath because implementing this is a sign that the devs have run out of other things to do. :-D)

[MarkovChain]

So basically, we need to stack SKC and then BAM! Free plutons boxes (without even farming) into VD SKC10/20 ? Now I need to build my points again.


Suggestion for the dev : limit the entry to the bcnms to 3 persons minimum. Some jobs can solo up to normal...

[Demonjustin]

I disagree with the idea of having minimum player requirements added to the battlefields, I do not think they are ever a proper solution to congestion issues.

[Hvinire]

Greetings,

I’d like to give a follow-up on the congestion of La'Loff Ampitheater.

As previously mentioned, we will be continuing to release other attractive content in addition to these new battlefields, which will aid in the reduction of congestion. To give you an example, we will be adding new skirmishes and also making adjustments to Delve to make it easier to access with fewer members.

The development team is currently in the midst of looking into other improvement measures as there is still congestion as well as items that can only be obtained from the ark angel battles.

We’ve been receiving a lot of requests and feedback mentioning that the best way to deal with this congestion is to just add more instances. However, to actually do this it would be roughly the same amount of work and testing as adding a whole new type of content or could even require more time. Likewise, the same goes for having ark angels spawn in other battlefields. The reason being that if something is added to existing battlefields there is a possibility that bugs will arise in the existing elements, and it would take time to test for this.

Based on the above, we would like to see the conditions after the February version update and then make a decision about adding instances. I apologize that we are not able to fix this issue right away, and we appreciate your understanding.

[larrymc]

Greetings,

I’d like to give a follow-up on the congestion of La'Loff Ampitheater.

As previously mentioned, we will be continuing to release other attractive content in addition to these new battlefields, which will aid in the reduction of congestion. To give you an example, we will be adding new skirmishes and also making adjustments to Delve to make it easier to access with fewer members.

The development team is currently in the midst of looking into other improvement measures as there is still congestion as well as items that can only be obtained from the ark angel battles.

We’ve been receiving a lot of requests and feedback mentioning that the best way to deal with this congestion is to just add more instances. However, to actually do this it would be roughly the same amount of work and testing as adding a whole new type of content or could even require more time. Likewise, the same goes for having ark angels spawn in other battlefields. The reason being that if something is added to existing battlefields there is a possibility that bugs will arise in the existing elements, and it would take time to test for this.

Based on the above, we would like to see the conditions after the February version update and then make a decision about adding instances. I apologize that we are not able to fix this issue right away, and we appreciate your understanding.

One suggestion that could potentially reduce congestion for AA/DM II battlefields is to remove the requirement of completing all 5 AA battlefields before getting access to DM II. Getting an alliance worth of people with DM II access can be challenging, and forcing each person to get 5 wins in a smaller group just puts more pressure and congestion on the 3 instances. If the bar to access to DM II is lowered, then perhaps more larger groups will try this, and instead of 1-6 people using an instance, ~18 people will do so more often, potentially cutting congestion by one third. One of the good things about delve is that there are no artificial prerequisites other than the leader having the appropriate key item.

[MarkovChain]

Add pluton cases or even boxes to individual drop pool on D and VD SKC20 battles, simple fix. You'll get read of half of the people farming AA for gil because it's going to be easier to spam in those bcs than in La'loff. Either way, if you increase the number of instances, more people will farm for gil, and pluton/crafting-mats price will crash anyway. So adding pluton case at least to individual pool is going to fix all of your problems.

I have other solution that are going to make people mad though ; limit difficult/ VD battles to once a day OR limit easy/ very easy to once a day, both work, but you don't make the same people angry.

Finally you can increase the requirement for D or VD battles. Make it so that each Difficult AA requires a normal clear, and each VD requires a D clear just like accessing tough battles for the first time requires a previous kill on normal. This way you'll considerably limit the people that spam it for gil.

[Sfchakan]

Okay, Square, let me explain this to you: this is content you made that isn't broken, incredibly boring, and has been desired for longer than a month. This is content we like. You don't have to replace it, you just have to make it to where we can actually play in those battlefields.

We realize it's almost or about as much work as adding new content and, guess what, that's okay! Make AAs/DM accessible to more people at once. This is what your playerbase wants!

I know on my server, the NA player response to the two new BCs seems to be "meh." Many people are still enjoying the "old" AA fights. Please do something so that more people can do it at the same time. Making additional battlefields hasn't seemed to do much to help with the congestion on Odin.

Also, I would just like to note that JP players have an unfair advantage when it comes to entering these congested battlefields. More than a dozen times, my static has had to sit at the entrance spamming Enter for over 30 minutes while we watch JP soloers and groups waltz right up and enter before us. Most times, our group and those players are given indication that they're inside, only for us to be booted out while they get to walk right in. This really stinks for NA (and I'm sure EU) players.

[MarkovChain]

Jp more chance ? I don't think so ... usually 70 people in zone. All jps. Sucks to be NA I suppose but it's propbably not as bad as JP. The bcs are nearly empty during EU though except weekends since JP don't sleep.

[Demonjustin]

JP players could theoretically have a higher chance at getting in with faster load times couldn't they? Not more instances, but, this could be something... idk.

[tumz]

Technically, Since the serves are hosted in Japan, we NA players have 100-200 latency on a fast connection. The same fast connection in Japan can see latency times of 10-100 which is roughly a fraction of a second. May not sound like much, but when spamming enter it can make a difference.

[Sabishii]

Okay, Square, let me explain this to you: this is content you made that isn't broken, incredibly boring, and has been desired for longer than a month. This is content we like..

Can I make an argument that the AA battles are in fact incredibly broken, because the only classes people want for DD are ranged classes that don't end in the word mage. For a setup, people only want PLD RNG RNG WHM BRD COR, or something to that effect. That's the STANDARD battlefield set up for AA battles, and I never see shouts for the other 2 fights that aren't ark angels, the two zilart brother fights. These NMs each have highly damaging AoEs that the only way to safely get near them for melees is to sub /NIN because all the aoes are absorbable by shadows. For one thing, I thought modern content had moved away from requiring a /NIN sub. And second thing, melee cannot survive against the ark angels for very long. PLD cannot keep hate off melee damage dealers, and the second a melee grabs hate, he's going down unless he can juggle shadows long enough for the tank to reacquire hate. I've done the AA HM, MR, EV, and GK with various levels of success (I did EV when it came out unsuccessfully, getting totally destroyed with a shout group not knowing what we were getting into, ran out of time on GK, while MR and HM I've been able to down as a melee). These fights make me feel like a BAD PLAYER, because the strength of their aoes can kill me despite having decent gear, 119 weapons, ninja shadows, etc. Most groups will NOT invite a melee, leaving 90% of the jobs in the game out. Sometimes a THF gets invited, depending on who is setting up the group, because treasure hunter does affect AA drops to my knowledge. All of this AA fighting I've done was done on NORMAL difficulty. I cannot imagine doing this content as a melee on difficult or very difficult. Maybe someone who actually was able to complete this content and upgrade AF1/AF2 gear for all their jobs would confirm or refute my claims. I'm just surprised I don't see anyone complaining about this kind of thing in this thread. Everyone's complaining about not being able to get in.

TL;DR version: rangers, corsairs are the only favored DD jobs for AA fights. Consider changing these fights so other jobs can actually complete this content. Not even BLM are wanted because of the AA's magic resistance, or just because no one wants BLMs for anything any more (and this is coming from someone who plays BLU and SAM mostly).

[Sapphires]

TL;DR version: rangers, corsairs are the only favored DD jobs for AA fights. Consider changing these fights so other jobs can actually complete this content. Not even BLM are wanted because of the AA's magic resistance, or just because no one wants BLMs for anything any more (and this is coming from someone who plays BLU and SAM mostly).
SE isn't responsible for the narrowminded metagame mentality of the playerbase.

lots of different setups work well for harder modes, NIN NIN THF + support works for AA's, and the JP playerbase is far more open minded and receptive to unorthodox setups.
I exclusively do AA/DM as dancer, I have done these fights alongside jobs like drk and drg because they were top notch skillful players with good gearsets.
If you arent a favored job you just have to try harder and make your own groups, find an ls and a group of friends to do these with that does something other than cookie cutter setups.

The main problem is that party builders are taking the easy way out because they don't want to do the hard work of finding out who competently plays jobs and they fall back on 'idiot proof' setups.
SE really can't do anything to address to address the metagame or 'image issues' without creating a nerf on a job or potentially overpowering a job in the hands of a more skillful player.

If groups have to bring a melee they do stuff like go for 'oat monks only' even though most of these i've played alongside are absolutely terrible and die, dont have hybrid sets, etc, but they got a free pass due to high base hp and mantra to buffer less skillful play.

[Zarchery]

Sapphires I've been meaning to post something much like what you said for days now. Just never got around to it.

I've done the various AA fights on every difficulty level, from Very Easy to Very Difficult. The fights vary in difficulty (I find that HM and EV are harder than TT and MR, and GK is right in the middle). I've done them with all sorts of setups. I've done stuff with cookie cutter setups that failed and unconventional setups that succeeded. I think that the VE - VD tiered difficulty level is a great thing. Lower difficulties allow more leeway in party setups and more room for error. So you're probably right, most jobs aren't going to make the cut in a Difficult or Very Difficult Ark Angel fight. So do a lower difficulty.

Here's the thing about organizing an event: it's stressful. Some people might disagree with me on that, but I think we can all agree, at least, that being the leader is more stressful than being a passive member. When someone takes on the responsibility of being leader, it's his right to decide which party setup he wants. If you don't like it, start your own and bring whatever job you want to the table. Or level one of these popular jobs and be a member. But you want to have your cake and eat it too; the stress free role of not leading the party along with the capacity to play it however you want. Sorry buddy, it just doesn't work that way.

[Camate]

Greetings,

We understand that congestion is still an issue for certain battlefields, and the development team is planning to implement countermeasures to disperse the congestion.

First, the team is currently looking into making adjustments so that certain Rem’s Tales (not random) can be obtained via high-tier missions battlefields other than La'Loff Amphitheater, and they are looking to do this in the June version update.

Additionally, we’re looking into reducing the merit point cost to obtain Phantom gems for battlefields other than La’Loff Amphitheater.

With these adjustments, we feel that there will be a greater variety of choices for battlefields when you wish to obtain Rem’s Tales. There are also other countermeasures being looked into, and we’ll be sure to post follow-up information once there is more progress.

[Zarchery]

I haven't really seen as much congestion in these lately. However, if you are adding these over to the new mission battlefields, it'd be best if you made each non-Ark Angel fight drop only one type of Rem's chapter. So like....

Stellar Fulcrum only drops Chapter 6.
Celestial Nexus only drops Chapter 7.
Tenzen only drops Chapter 8.
Ouryu only drops Chapter 9.
Some still unimplemented BCNM drops Chapter 10.

Alternative, implement 2 new AMAN Vouchers. When turned in to the sparks trading NPCs, these vouchers entitles you to either 1 or 2 copies of any Rem's Tale chapter you want. Make that drop from the new BCNMs.

[Kombys]

Dear SE just increase drop rate on plans, 4 on normal 6 on D and 8 on VD, the reason why ppl do more AA then others is drops are useful and dont need to deal with bullshit

[Calatilla]

This doesn't really tackle the issue though, most people aren't doing the AA fights purely for Rem Tales, they're doing them for Gear drops. And you have only 3 instances for 6 different fights, do you see the problem here?

[Demonjustin]

This doesn't really tackle the issue though, most people aren't doing the AA fights purely for Rem Tales, they're doing them for Gear drops. And you have only 3 instances for 6 different fights, do you see the problem here?Yes, that's a big part of the issue, but you can't say if people could get Rem Tales from the other fights reliably that it wouldn't be helped. I've been trying to get the Body from Ouryu, the Feet from Tenzen, and the Legs from Stellar Fulcrum for some time now, I've gotten none of these 3 pieces. The one piece from the non-AA fights I have gotten was the Vanir Feet, those were only gotten because people do the Vanir fight for the Fast Cast/Stun body piece. People do these for gear undoubtedly but they do them for tales too. If you're after gear, you might do 1 of 9 fights, depending which fight drops it, but if you want chapters, you're only looking at 5 fights which might drop what you want, that is unless you want to take a shot in the dark.

[Calatilla]

Yes, that's a big part of the issue, but you can't say if people could get Rem Tales from the other fights reliably that it wouldn't be helped. I've been trying to get the Body from Ouryu, the Feet from Tenzen, and the Legs from Stellar Fulcrum for some time now, I've gotten none of these 3 pieces. The one piece from the non-AA fights I have gotten was the Vanir Feet, those were only gotten because people do the Vanir fight for the Fast Cast/Stun body piece. People do these for gear undoubtedly but they do them for tales too. If you're after gear, you might do 1 of 9 fights, depending which fight drops it, but if you want chapters, you're only looking at 5 fights which might drop what you want, that is unless you want to take a shot in the dark.

The dev post makes it sound like SE think that by putting Rem tales that drop from AA fights into other non AA fights it`ll somehow alleviate the congestion caused by only having 3 instances for 6 fights. It will go some way to helping sure, but the big issue i'm concerned with is why there are only 3 battle instances. Nyzul Isle has more instances as far as I know and thats 1 zone, compared to the 6 for AA+DM

When you are gathering for a DM+II run and you get met with "you cannot enter at this time" for an hour, it gets annoying very fast. There should be 1 instance for each fight, 6 fights = 6 instances.

[Demonjustin]

The dev post makes it sound like SE think that by putting Rem tales that drop from AA fights into other non AA fights it`ll somehow alleviate the congestion caused by only having 3 instances for 6 fights. It will go some way to helping sure, but the big issue i'm concerned with is why there are only 3 battle instances. Nyzul Isle has more instances as far as I know and thats 1 zone, compared to the 6 for AA+DM

When you are gathering for a DM+II run and you get met with "you cannot enter at this time" for an hour, it gets annoying very fast. There should be 1 instance for each fight, 6 fights = 6 instances.And you have my full agreeance on that, I'm just saying that giving the other fights specific chapters will help too. The fact that the other ones have it random not only attribute additional congestion but also make the other fights much less desired. There's a reason why in the time it's been out I've done no Ouryu, 3 Tenzen, and 2 Stellar Fulcrum, 2 of those have been out less than a month but the third has been out for a fairly decent amount of time. The reason I've done them so little is because there are so few shouts for it on Phoenix, hardly anyone wants to do them, and unless gear incentive exists it won't be done because Chapters are simply too random.

I agree the amount of instances is the largest problem, I'm just saying content wise and congestion wise that changing the chapters would help both ways, especially if they're unable to untie the AA fights themselves due to the way it was created originally all those years ago(since it seems they're tied together).

[Olor]

yeah they really muffed up by putting lacklustre gear in Ouryu fight especially. I see people shout for Tenzen (assuming for the ilevel SAM bow) but NOT 1 shout for Ouryu. If it dropped some tales and maybe 1 piece of gear which wasn't mediocre people would do it.

I mean, I'd totally like that gear but my LSmates who are better geared don't see it as an upgrade so they don't want to do it.

[Bayohne]

This doesn't really tackle the issue though, most people aren't doing the AA fights purely for Rem Tales, they're doing them for Gear drops. And you have only 3 instances for 6 different fights, do you see the problem here?
As the drops that you can receive from the Ark Angel battlefields are closely tied to that boss it would be a bit strange to suddenly have them dropping from other locations. That is why we have chosen to begin by first adjusting Rem's Tales and continue to monitor the changes. Also, as Camate mentioned, we'll be lowering the cost of Phantom gems for other high-level battlefields to 10 merit points in the June version update.

However, with that said, I did want to let you all know that we are considering having the Divinator and Seraphicaller available from additional locations in the future. When details have been confirmed, we'll be sure to let you know!

[Demonjustin]

yeah they really muffed up by putting lacklustre gear in Ouryu fight especially. I see people shout for Tenzen (assuming for the ilevel SAM bow) but NOT 1 shout for Ouryu. If it dropped some tales and maybe 1 piece of gear which wasn't mediocre people would do it.

I mean, I'd totally like that gear but my LSmates who are better geared don't see it as an upgrade so they don't want to do it.The one piece from Ouryu that's good is the body piece. That body is the best Enfeebling body in the game for all jobs including RDM and even beats our RF1+1 Tabard in every stat except INT/MND by 4 points, but the MAcc/Skill more than make up for that. It's also a great melee mage body. The issue is that Enfeebling Magic and melee maging are both crap. It's the one good upgrade I see in that fight and it's not nearly enough to motivate people to do it, I'd have to solo the fight to obtain the drops and I'm not going to submit myself to 100+ fights spending 2000+ merits for that body, no.


As the drops that you can receive from the Ark Angel battlefields are closely tied to that boss it would be a bit strange to suddenly have them dropping from other locations. That is why we have chosen to begin by first adjusting Rem's Tales and continue to monitor the changes. Also, as Camate mentioned, we'll be lowering the cost of Phantom gems for other high-level battlefields to 10 merit points in the June version update.

However, with that said, I did want to let you all know that we are considering having the Divinator and Seraphicaller available from additional locations in the future. When details have been confirmed, we'll be sure to let you know!Are there any plans to make the other Merit Point fights more desirable?

Right now they rely on nothing but gear as incentives while Ark Angels have both pages and gear as incentives. AAs also have Divine Might where you can get a ton of drops in little time with a good group, something none of the other instances have no matter what they look to obtain. I expect an 'Apocalypse Nigh' battlefield in the future which may help address the Celestial Nexus and Stellar Fulcrum instances being so deserted for gear in the same way Divine Might does, but the fact that Tenzen and Ouryu have no sort of joint battles means that their gear is likely to be nearly unobtainable for most of us.

[Puck]

As the drops that you can receive from the Ark Angel battlefields are closely tied to that boss it would be a bit strange to suddenly have them dropping from other locations.Ok then, why not make forced pop versions of the Ark Angels elsewhere in Tu'Lia (not in instanced battlefields), which have a chance to drop the AA gear but not any chapters? That way, the people going for just the gear can pop as many AAs as they want and not jam up the few instanced zones. Add a feature like that in addition to chapters dropping in other battlefields, and that should alleviate the congestion.

Forced pops worked pretty nicely in Abyssea. Dunno why everything these days has to be in instances, nobody likes having to wait.

[Camiie]

Why can't the individual Ark Angels be added to the other Zilart battlefields? Qu'bia Arena, Chamber of Oracles, Celestial Nexus, and Stellar Fulcrum. Empyreal Paradox too while you're at it. It's a COP zone, but sea is creation of the Zilart race. Just leave out the cut scene since it wouldn't make sense to show the inside of La'Loff.

[Calatilla]

As the drops that you can receive from the Ark Angel battlefields are closely tied to that boss it would be a bit strange to suddenly have them dropping from other locations.

I wasn't asking for the gear to be duplicated in other battlefields, I was asking why there are only 3 battle instances for 6 separate fights. In its current form it is impossible to do all 5 AA fights and DM at the same time, because there aren't enough instances. Having Rem Tales available elsewhere will help those people who only do AA for them, but they are a minority.

[Camiie]

I wasn't asking for the gear to be duplicated in other battlefields, I was asking why there are only 3 battle instances for 6 separate fights.

Poor planning and foresight. A lack of or a misappropriation of hardware/software/financial resources. A pitiful grasp of human nature. For whatever reason when they first developed the game they thought 3 instances would be all that would ever be needed and left no means to add more. You could sum it up as "Game Engine and Server Limitations," and that's likely what their response will be. WoW was so revolutionary, in part, because it dealt with that issue head on with dynamic instancing. Blizzard learned from Sony and SE's mistakes and EQ and FFXI's limitations. SE didn't do nearly as well advancing from the EQ model.

[Olor]

The one piece from Ouryu that's good is the body piece. That body is the best Enfeebling body in the game for all jobs including RDM and even beats our RF1+1 Tabard in every stat except INT/MND by 4 points, but the MAcc/Skill more than make up for that. It's also a great melee mage body. The issue is that Enfeebling Magic and melee maging are both crap. It's the one good upgrade I see in that fight and it's not nearly enough to motivate people to do it, I'd have to solo the fight to obtain the drops and I'm not going to submit myself to 100+ fights spending 2000+ merits for that body, no.


Thanks for confirming that! I thought it looked good for RDM enfeebling but LS folks thought the RF was better. Glad that my instincts were on. I told them it was best enfeebling body they still didn't want to do it :( and given you have to spend the merits for the fight it kind of sucks for doing a shout as you can't do something like "your orb your drop" - bad enough fighting RNG for items without having to fight your party for them too when they drop.

[Olor]

As the drops that you can receive from the Ark Angel battlefields are closely tied to that boss it would be a bit strange to suddenly have them dropping from other locations. That is why we have chosen to begin by first adjusting Rem's Tales and continue to monitor the changes. Also, as Camate mentioned, we'll be lowering the cost of Phantom gems for other high-level battlefields to 10 merit points in the June version update.


That's fine, can you add more DESIRABLE gear to other fights? It doesn't have to be the same but it should be of similar utility/power.

[Demonjustin]

Thanks for confirming that! I thought it looked good for RDM enfeebling but LS folks thought the RF was better. Glad that my instincts were on. I told them it was best enfeebling body they still didn't want to do it :( and given you have to spend the merits for the fight it kind of sucks for doing a shout as you can't do something like "your orb your drop" - bad enough fighting RNG for items without having to fight your party for them too when they drop.http://wiki.bluegartr.com/images/d/d5/Atrophy_Tabard_%2B1_description.png
http://wiki.bluegartr.com/images/a/a3/27868_description.png

Just a quick gear comparison, ignoring all stats that are the same.

Atrophy has 4 more MND/INT, 10 more MAB.
Ischemia has 1 more DEF, 25 more Acc, 5 more MAcc, 1 more Skill.

Since the 5MAcc alone makes up for the MND/INT difference in accuracy, the only benefit Atrophy really has in Enfeebling is the fact that MND/INT attribute to your potency of your Enfeebles. That benefit however is completely usurped by the Empyrean body due to it's attribute that specifically enhances potency outside of the MND/INT formula.

Just to break down the reasons for you if you want to relay the message.



Back to the topic at hand. I sadly don't think desirable gear alone will be enough really, we need more stable chapter drops so that you can reliably farm them from other fights. Though in reality the fact these fights are more difficult than Ark Angels is also part of what blocks them. When you think about it Ark Angels are all straight forward, they just fight like those jobs and have some SP abilities, no hate resets(Fulcrum), only 1 form(Nexus), no un-killable adds casting at you(Tenzen), and no ability to fly mid-battle(Ouryu), all of which also makes people avoid these fights.

[Calatilla]

Thanks for confirming that! I thought it looked good for RDM enfeebling but LS folks thought the RF was better. Glad that my instincts were on. I told them it was best enfeebling body they still didn't want to do it :( and given you have to spend the merits for the fight it kind of sucks for doing a shout as you can't do something like "your orb your drop" - bad enough fighting RNG for items without having to fight your party for them too when they drop.

Not to get off topic but it sounds like you're in the wrong LS if they won't help you improve your gear just because they don't want it themselves.

[detlef]

Look at it another way. For some people, 20 merits is a big deal. For casual players it might take all their free time one night just to prepare for the fight. It can be a lot to ask of someone, especially if they don't need/want anything.

Not to mention that doing the fight on normal to ensure the win means having to deal with likely 0-1 drops loading and only random Rem's tales. Unless Olor's enfeebling gear is perfect in every other slot, there are probably more sensible and reasonable ways for the LS to help improve her gear than to do this fight.

SE's solution to reduce the merit cost to 10 and to not randomize Rem's is a nice start, but I think the low drop rate on Normal difficulty is a huge turn off for a lot of people. They really should improve that if they want more players to attempt the fights more than once.

[Olor]

Not to get off topic but it sounds like you're in the wrong LS if they won't help you improve your gear just because they don't want it themselves.

Eh, they help me improve my gear a lot, its a good LS, just not really large and folks wanted to do AA fights because they benefit more people. It makes sense really, and as Detlef notes, its not the only way to improve my gear. Unfortunately Ouryu is only fight I can access out of Tenzen, AAs etc so that is part of the reason I want to do it. I definitely don't blame folks for putting priorities elsewhere though, especially when Ouryu is really gimmicky and the gear itself is only a minor upgrade for 1 class.

FYI though, these folks helped me break through rieves to get warps (even tractoring me over some parts) so I could do Raz skirmish and wildskeepers, helped me get my difficult win for JSE, and even some delve (non mega) boss wins. I really like my shell, but I don't expect them to move heaven and earth for me. I'd rather the fight have better gear so it benefits more people to do it.

Also they are mostly on EU time so the overlap between our playtimes is larger than I'd like, so its not always very good timing for them to do stuff. Anyway, I imagine we'll try it eventually (or I'll join/start a shout) but it would be awesome if the reward levels were more consistent across hard fights overall.

[Demonjustin]

SE's solution to reduce the merit cost to 10 and to not randomize Rem's is a nice start, but I think the low drop rate on Normal difficulty is a huge turn off for a lot of people. They really should improve that if they want more players to attempt the fights more than once.An idea I came up with to solve the lack of being able to get a desired drop would be to make a point system where we can trade in a certain amount of points for the drop we want from a NM. Much like the way chapter drops are done, we could get these points dependent on what level we do the content as well as when doing events like Divine Might it could give points for each NM involves, perhaps half or so of the norm.

1 for VE
2 for E
3 for N
4 for D
5 for VD

As for what we could buy.

3 points per chapter from the fight
5 points for a RME item
10 points for the craft item
25 points for 1 piece of armor or weapon of your choice from the fight

This would allow everyone a chance to get their drops in time regardless of luck while also giving more reason to do the content regardless of difficulty. Sure, my Battlecast Gaiters are unlikely to drop from Tenzen on Normal, but if i do it I get 3 points and make progress toward my Gaiters none the less. The same thing goes for people who can't find others for certain battles, if I really want my Legs from Stellar Fulcrum I can go out and solo it on VE 25 times, it'll suck, but I can walk away with my Legs all the same at the end of it all. This also lets people amass chapters more easily, and from the battles that give random chapters would allow players to obtain the chapter of their choice after a Normal battle.

[AppropriateName5786]

The problems with the instance fights are layered so unless all of them are tackled nothing will change. They've all been mentioned already but I thought I'd just summarize and add some of my own.

1) Difficult setting is the actual normal since gear hardly ever drops on normal setting and people want a reasonable number of chapters per fight.
2) The number of instances is way below what it should be.
3) Grinding merits before every single fight. While it's cute the first time, it can't go on forever like it does currently. The KIs should have been a 1-time purchase that is non-consumable. No one wants to gamble with 20 merit points, so you'll never see a PuG experiment with new job setups for these fights.
4) AoE, one-shotting, hate resets, and more AoE. Job balance is innately tied to horrible fight design. BRD and WHM are guaranteed slots, which means 20 jobs fight for 4 spaces, while constant AoE means that RNG or high HP DD (MNK) are disproportionately preferred.
5) The location of the fights is a huge barrier to bringing newer players or those who have not done them before. The most memorable thing about The Celestial Nexus II is probably how it takes every party 1.5 hours to gather because of a certain yellow door. Monarch Linn is also annoying, though it doesn't take as long. Let Domenic in Lower Jeuno teleport us directly to the new fights. I assure you the game will not break.

[KingShez]

Specially, since I don't have the time anymore (I'm a new Daddy) to wait for parties to be setup. Basically, when I get on shouts are to a non-existent. Waiting over an hour to setup is just not feasible. Furthermore, if I do get lucky to join one and it fails leaves me so frustrated I want to throw my controller at matsui! (Kidding of course)

1. Individual ki pop would be nice instead of the whole party needing one.
2. AA solo fighting
3. Can you lower the cost of sparks to obtain rem tales 6-10....? Maybe 10k?

Just my opinion

[Calatilla]

I don't think only needing 1 person in a party to have the KI as being a good idea personally, so you have 6 people each with a KI and it only uses 1 of them when you enter. 1 party could do 6 fights back to back. This would only increase congestion not relieve it.

[AppropriateName5786]

I don't think only needing 1 person in a party to have the KI as being a good idea personally, so you have 6 people each with a KI and it only uses 1 of them when you enter. 1 party could do 6 fights back to back. This would only increase congestion not relieve it.

The only way to understand what you're saying here is that players doing the game's content is a problem. Does that make sense to you? What kind of company makes something that its clients enjoy and then spends no time accommodating them? That's not hunger marketing; that's shooting yourself in the foot. The lack of resources to support the gameplay that the devs themselves designed is the actual problem.

What exactly is wrong with using 6 KIs to do 6 runs? Should SKNM orbs and Skirmish KIs be changed as well just to make sure everyone gets the least amount of entertainment for the largest amount of time-sink in a game? The current system serves to discourage players from doing content and, so, SE needs to stop with the excuses and do whatever it takes to increase the number of instances as well as tackle the other problems outlined in this thread (and others).

[Afania]

3) Grinding merits before every single fight. While it's cute the first time, it can't go on forever like it does currently. The KIs should have been a 1-time purchase that is non-consumable. No one wants to gamble with 20 merit points, so you'll never see a PuG experiment with new job setups for these fights.


I don't agree with this, because:

1. Instead of seeing 70 ppl in AA zone, you'd see 100+ in zone because everyone and their mother spams the BC endlessly.

2. It makes AA gears require very little to no effort to get....you can just solo VE, get drop, enter again and solo another VE, instead of trying to make a group of 6 for VD and aim for higher drop rate, it'd be much faster and easier to just enter VE and solo repeatly. That also killed the entire purpose of having VD mode.

3. Doing a content should have some sort of risk/penalty for losing. AA content is easy as hell with difficulty setting, with a much higher PUG win rate than delve 1/2, if you get zero penalty for losing, what else do you do in this game?

4. PUG doesn't experiment with different setup never has anything to do with the risk/penalty for losing in a content. Delve 1 is only 3k~20k a pop, and it's much faster to farm a pop, do you ever see ppl use RNG setup for Yorcia, or 0 MNK in Tojil, or 0 piercing DD in Ceizak?

[Afania]

The only way to understand what you're saying here is that players doing the game's content is a problem. Does that make sense to you? What kind of company makes something that its clients enjoy and then spends no time accommodating them? That's not hunger marketing; that's shooting yourself in the foot. The lack of resources to support the gameplay that the devs themselves designed is the actual problem.

What exactly is wrong with using 6 KIs to do 6 runs? Should SKNM orbs and Skirmish KIs be changed as well just to make sure everyone gets the least amount of entertainment for the largest amount of time-sink in a game? The current system serves to discourage players from doing content and, so, SE needs to stop with the excuses and do whatever it takes to increase the number of instances as well as tackle the other problems outlined in this thread (and others).

What kind of comparison is that? I think AA is 10x more enjoyable than SKCNM. I seriously hate the fact that every SKCNM pt I joined need to do the BC for SIX times instead of just 1. Obviously you can choose to do only 1 orb instead of 6, but then the other 5 players would want to use their orb for their drop too.

So instead of doing 1 quick AA run and finish it in 15 min, you'd rather do 6 in a row for 90 min? If your pt is gimp and it takes 25 min to kill, it'd be 150 min for a run. Add that to the time you spend on organizing pt, you're looking at around 3hr of /shout and killing all 6 AA for everyone in the pt, more than 3hr if people go afk/wc/recharge ammo between runs as usual. I don't know you, but personally I think it's NOT enjoyable to play a video game for 3hr~4hr in one sitting AT ALL.

[Lithera]

Then you wouldn't have liked doing dynamis or sky or sea when they were end game events. Since they took 3hrs at a minimum including gathering time. Yet almost all other posts you say if not come close to saying that this game is a second job/life. That people should have to endure some form of a time sync to get something that they want. People are having to grind out merits just to get an item they want from this or that AA so why shouldn't they be able to so? Or is it not too long term goal for you?

[Afania]

Then you wouldn't have liked doing dynamis or sky or sea when they were end game events. Since they took 3hrs at a minimum including gathering time. Yet almost all other posts you say if not come close to saying that this game is a second job/life. That people should have to endure some form of a time sync to get something that they want. People are having to grind out merits just to get an item they want from this or that AA so why shouldn't they be able to so? Or is it not too long term goal for you?

Maybe you should read what I mean in previous post.

What I was asking, is to make AA gear more of a long term goal, that every member farm KI casually and do 1 run at once. Instead of a short term goal that entire pt are forced to spend 3.5hr a run so they can finish everything in a day. Basically I think current AA requirement is fine.

I fail to see the connection between "wanting items take a while to get in MMORPG" and "hate to play the game for 3hr+ in one sitting". "Long term goal" is also very different from "playing for 3.5hr in one sitting".

"Long term goal" is something you do that's gonna take a while, but satisfying after you're done. You don't necessary spend 3.5hr in one sitting doing it everyday, but you can't finish it in a day or 2 either.

Yes, I think players in MMO shouldn't get items in 1 day or a few days of playing, or else everyone gonna quit after they're done, and that's bad for MMORPG. But that has nothing to do with "playing for 3hr+ in one sitting".

It took me around 3 years to finish my Mythic. Most of the time, I play only 1.5hr or less a day. I log on, enter dyna, farmed 1hr~1.5hr and log off. Doing assault doesn't take 3hr, doing Einherjar doesn't need 3hr. Besides Dyna and a few CoP missions in 75 era, I honestly can't think of ANY event I've done in my life in FFXI that took me 3.5hr a run. Most of the time, if I spend more than 3.5hr a run in FFXI, I probably wasted too much time doing inefficient stuff and I should fix that. I also don't recall sky/sea takes more than 3.5hr, unless the LS leader being retarded.

Grind merit then do AA isn't 3.5hr a run. You can do it casually solo, maybe spend 30 min a day to grind merit, and do 1 AA run a week. I'd rather spend 30 min a day to grind merit on my own time, and do 1 AA run(which takes 25 min) a week, so everyday I only play less than 1hr, instead of playing 3.5hr a day because the party demand all 6 member to sit in the party for 3.5hr a run.

"I wanna do 6 runs at once so I can finish my gear in a day and sit in town looking pretty or quit FFXI" is probably what OP means.

[Malithar]

I honestly can't think of ANY event I've done in my life in FFXI that took me 3.5hr a run.

Someone never did a last window ground king. :P God, kings were so soul shattering at times.

[AppropriateName5786]

1. Instead of seeing 70 ppl in AA zone, you'd see 100+ in zone because everyone and their mother spams the BC endlessly.

As mentioned above, the problem is not the players, it's the lack of developer foresight and game infrastructure (i.e. number of instances).


2. It makes AA gears require very little to no effort to get....you can just solo VE, get drop, enter again and solo another VE, instead of trying to make a group of 6 for VD and aim for higher drop rate, it'd be much faster and easier to just enter VE and solo repeatly. That also killed the entire purpose of having VD mode.

Gear barely even drops in N setting, and you think soloing VE will require very little effort? Wow, this wasn't even worth responding to.

And the purpose of any D to VD content should be to challenge "elite" players, not make it so that everyone NOT doing D/VD will take ~500 merits to upgrade one set of armor for one job to 119. That's 25 fights on normal if you don't comment Rem's Tales and/or have competition for them. Do you only play one job? Did you know that there are both Relic and Artifact sets that you can upgrade? And you're saying that soloing something repeatedly (in your own words) means that the player doesn't deserve the gear he's working towards? I guess you don't deserve your Mythic either because you soloed and took 3 years to make it. Seriously, your logic never fails to leave me speechless.


3. Doing a content should have some sort of risk/penalty for losing. AA content is easy as hell with difficulty setting, with a much higher PUG win rate than delve 1/2, if you get zero penalty for losing, what else do you do in this game?

Even if you didn't have to farm merits for a KI, even if the fights had enough instances for everyone, even if you had a group of skilled players in your back pocket that you can summon at a moment's notice, even if you didn't have to explain the fight before entering, even if they all set their seacoms quickly, even if all of them could gear their jobs/get food/gather at HP within 10 mins, failing a fight will still cause you to lose 40+ minutes of your life. I don't know how lost time isn't considered a penalty for losing. Maybe SE should add $1 to your subscription every month if you wipe in a BCNM so you can feel penalized enough?


4. PUG doesn't experiment with different setup never has anything to do with the risk/penalty for losing in a content. Delve 1 is only 3k~20k a pop, and it's much faster to farm a pop, do you ever see ppl use RNG setup for Yorcia, or 0 MNK in Tojil, or 0 piercing DD in Ceizak?

Of course not, because there are close to 0 Delve shouts on my server. And yes, PuG's not experimenting with setups has everything to do with the risk and penalty of losing. Just as an example, no one let nukers into Yorcia Skirmish when it was released. That's because Yorcia Visages were hard to come by and no one wanted to risk losing. People began to care less and less when the content was understood and Yorcia KIs were everywhere, so people experimented and let nukers join. After that, no one brought anything but nukers. This is just one in a sea of examples.


So instead of doing 1 quick AA run and finish it in 15 min, you'd rather do 6 in a row for 90 min?

Because everyone is hurrying to get back to Adoulin and Jeuno to afk, right? Because the game is literally gushing with fun content for people who have been playing it for a decade that we must rush through new stuff in 15 minutes to get back to the old stuff, right? Because 1 chance at getting the drop you want is better than 6 chances right?

[Afania]

Gear barely even drops in N setting, and you think soloing VE will require very little effort? Wow, this wasn't even worth responding to.


Yes, I think soloing VE require very little effort, especially for ppl with mules. Or else you wouldn't see everyone and their mother soloing it all day long. If it require a LOT of effort, then you'd see only 1~2 ppl per server can do it. If you zone into AA instance on JP prime time, at least 1 or more pt is VE solo/duo box PT. That's how the zone ended up 70+ player on JP time.

Whether "something" requires lot of effort or very little effort, is not decided by you, but the amount of ppl that's been doing it in the past. You can tell me "Solo VE requires a lot of effort", but I'm not buying it as long as my friends/lsmate/strangers all enter VE/E and solo everything every day.



And the purpose of any D to VD content should be to challenge "elite" players,

It should be a challenge, and reward. Or else why'd you want to work harder and do D/VD? That's just all be lazy and do easy VE.





And the purpose of any D to VD content should be to challenge "elite" players, not make it so that everyone NOT doing D/VD will take ~500 merits to upgrade one set of armor for one job to 119. That's 25 fights on normal if you don't comment Rem's Tales and/or have competition for them. Do you only play one job? Did you know that there are both Relic and Artifact sets that you can upgrade? And you're saying that soloing something repeatedly (in your own words) means that the player doesn't deserve the gear he's working towards? I guess you don't deserve your Mythic either because you soloed and took 3 years to make it. Seriously, your logic never fails to leave me speechless.


I didn't say anything about soloing something repeated means that player doesn't deserve the gears he wants. I also never say anything about whether X or Y deserve a gear or not.

I only said gear shouldn't be obtained in a very short time frame in a MMORPG or else everyone gonna cap gear and quit, and there should be some sort of penalty if you fail a content, such as needing to get a new KI. You sound like you want to do 6 run at once so you can finish it in 1 go, and you don't want any penalty if you fail in a BC.

If that's the case, single player game + cheat code is more suitable for you. Because games should be enjoyable to play right? I shouldn't be punished if I fail in a video game right? I soooo want to play invincible Mario.




Even if you didn't have to farm merits for a KI, even if the fights had enough instances for everyone, even if you had a group of skilled players in your back pocket that you can summon at a moment's notice, even if you didn't have to explain the fight before entering, even if they all set their seacoms quickly, even if all of them could gear their jobs/get food/gather at HP within 10 mins, failing a fight will still cause you to lose 40+ minutes of your life. I don't know how lost time isn't considered a penalty for losing.


It's work if VE/E version doesn't exist, since you still need to spend the time to make a pt of 6, and that's penalty.

The problem is, VE/E version exist and majority of ppl with right job/mules can just go in and solo.

So that's not much of penalty anymore. My RNG friends used to solo VE/E TT all day and make gil with mat, with 100% win rate. Another friend of mine made PLD on mule just to solo VE/E all day too. They rarely fail, with free KI they'd just go in and solo the content a lot more, instead of actually spend time and play with other ppl on D/VD settings.





Someone never did a last window ground king. :P God, kings were so soul shattering at times.

I didn't camp ground king, but I did camp joytoy NM several times for myself and LS in 75. IMO it's nowhere near as soul shattering as doing 6 AA for 3.5hr. I don't need to /shout, I don't need to concentrate on killing stuff and dodging AoEs until NM pop, I only need to afk and watch youtube video until next window open lol.

[Demonjustin]

Yes, I think soloing VE require very little effort, especially for ppl with mules. Or else you wouldn't see everyone and their mother soloing it all day long. If it require a LOT of effort, then you'd see only 1~2 ppl per server can do it. If you zone into AA instance on JP prime time, at least 1 or more pt is VE solo/duo box PT. That's how the zone ended up 70+ player on JP time.

Whether "something" requires lot of effort or very little effort, is not decided by you, but the amount of ppl that's been doing it in the past. You can tell me "Solo VE requires a lot of effort", but I'm not buying it as long as my friends/lsmate/strangers all enter VE/E and solo everything every day.You can say it doesn't take a lot of effort, but by compared to doing Difficult or Very Difficult the effort is enormous, you're talking about having to farm 15 more merits every single time you wanna do it. The fact that people are doing it 'all day every day' is a result of the fact the gear drops at an insanely low drop rate on VE, probably comparably as low as VW is on it's high quality gear, which means the effort put in has to include both the constant merit refill and the fight itself. If you look at just the fight itself it's easy, that's why it's called Very Easy, but if you're talking actual effort not just easy-ness then VE is insanely more effort for near no reward rate than anything you could do in current events.


It should be a challenge, and reward. Or else why'd you want to work harder and do D/VD? That's just all be lazy and do easy VE.Doing VE is actually the less lazy of the two. Your choices are basically do it solo and get your gear eventually(probably 50~100+ fights) or make a group and get your gear in what's likely to be at most, 5~10 fights. You could argue that making a party is a lot of effort, and I'd agree, but equal to 5~10 times the effort of doing VE as well as the additional merits for each battle? No.

In all honesty you could bump each rate up to the next highest difficulty level and nothing would be broken. VE drops as good as E currently does, E as good as N, N as good as D, you get the idea. Doing that would leave VD out, but you can just make it so that VD always drops 2 pieces of gear which I believe right now isn't the case, it's not that hard to balance things and still make it not only worth doing on higher levels but worth doing on lower levels as well. With all of that said, if the argument is just over letting it only take 1 KI then I'd honestly see no issue with it provided SE fixed the AA instance issue first. If they didn't then it's just congestion waiting to happen and while I hate using that as a stupid reason for not doing good updates, it's sadly true that it would screw us over in that kinda way.

[Malithar]

If you look at just the fight itself it's easy, that's why it's called Very Easy, but if you're talking actual effort not just easy-ness then VE is insanely more effort for near no reward rate than anything you could do in current events.

To be fair, for the first few months of AAs, it was actually a very rewarding thing to do. RF mats dropped with a pretty good frequency on VE/E, and all of them except for HM (silly 6x orb crafting) were worth millions until only recently. Even now, I'd argue it's a good source of time/money if you're capped on KIs and merits.

Looking squarely at gear though, I'd agree, RNG is pretty rough on those difficulties with getting any gear, let alone the piece you're after.

[Lithera]

So I guess you never did sky/sea with people who didn't have sky warp yet, any of the maps, or have 2-3 other LSes lock you out of fighting byakko because not everyone was at the tele pad or wasn't afk. Or did a pop farm run for the next run and had people camping despot and zippy against other LSes. Before they changed the warp to Kirin's room could be a time eater since you could have tried to get to his room for 15 mins alone. Didn't do sea while it was a high traffic event, but I can see how that could take a while concerning how so many people would get lost on the inside while just doing the missions.

Woo you can solo E/VE good for you. From what I gather most people don't do the AA fights for the chapters, but for the armor that drops from them. Even if you soloed E/VE the whole day you're still trying to get lucky with winning the rng lotto. Instead of the rng and five other people. It's why some might want a leader only needs to have the KI so they can do more and have better odds at geting the one thing they want.

[Afania]

You can say it doesn't take a lot of effort, but by compared to doing Difficult or Very Difficult the effort is enormous, you're talking about having to farm 15 more merits every single time you wanna do it. The fact that people are doing it 'all day every day' is a result of the fact the gear drops at an insanely low drop rate on VE, probably comparably as low as VW is on it's high quality gear, which means the effort put in has to include both the constant merit refill and the fight itself. If you look at just the fight itself it's easy, that's why it's called Very Easy, but if you're talking actual effort not just easy-ness then VE is insanely more effort for near no reward rate than anything you could do in current events.

Doing VE is actually the less lazy of the two. Your choices are basically do it solo and get your gear eventually(probably 50~100+ fights) or make a group and get your gear in what's likely to be at most, 5~10 fights. You could argue that making a party is a lot of effort, and I'd agree, but equal to 5~10 times the effort of doing VE as well as the additional merits for each battle? No.

In all honesty you could bump each rate up to the next highest difficulty level and nothing would be broken. VE drops as good as E currently does, E as good as N, N as good as D, you get the idea. Doing that would leave VD out, but you can just make it so that VD always drops 2 pieces of gear which I believe right now isn't the case, it's not that hard to balance things and still make it not only worth doing on higher levels but worth doing on lower levels as well. With all of that said, if the argument is just over letting it only take 1 KI then I'd honestly see no issue with it provided SE fixed the AA instance issue first. If they didn't then it's just congestion waiting to happen and while I hate using that as a stupid reason for not doing good updates, it's sadly true that it would screw us over in that kinda way.


You're arguing that VE requires a lot of effort, when merit point comes into play. That was exactly my point.

Yes, if merit point and KI comes into play, soloing VE is more time consuming than do VD. If you remove the merit point aspect and hand out free KI, you can just do VE, exit, repeat, exit, repeat with zero down time. If you make a pt of a few people, you can probably repeat VE even faster. I'm also going guess that killing VE with 6 ppl using any setup and finish it in 5 min, and do it for 25 times(with zero downtime and zero risk to fail) is probably faster than /shouting for ppl with right job to do a D/VD with some risk to fail.

The point is that the entire AA drop rate and difficulty mode is made on the fact that you need to farm KI and there are downtime between each runs that you can't spam it repeatedly endlessly. If you don't want to farm KI, then the SE will have to remove VE/E and readjust the drop rate too, you seriously want that? lol.

[Afania]

So I guess you never did sky/sea with people who didn't have sky warp yet, any of the maps, or have 2-3 other LSes lock you out of fighting byakko because not everyone was at the tele pad or wasn't afk. Or did a pop farm run for the next run and had people camping despot and zippy against other LSes. Before they changed the warp to Kirin's room could be a time eater since you could have tried to get to his room for 15 mins alone. Didn't do sea while it was a high traffic event, but I can see how that could take a while concerning how so many people would get lost on the inside while just doing the missions.


Maybe that wasn't the case when sea/sky was just out, but back in 2009 when I did sea/sky with a few friends, I remember it's possible do those with slightly less ppl than a full LS/alliance. Unless I remember something wrong, my friend can usually DB or lowman most of the sea NM @75 on MNK. With less ppl in ally it's less likely to have 1 person d/c or stuck/get lost and waste time.




Woo you can solo E/VE good for you. From what I gather most people don't do the AA fights for the chapters, but for the armor that drops from them. Even if you soloed E/VE the whole day you're still trying to get lucky with winning the rng lotto. Instead of the rng and five other people. It's why some might want a leader only needs to have the KI so they can do more and have better odds at geting the one thing they want.

I don't solo E/VE because I like to play with ppl. Most of the time I do VD or at least D for AA, I find VD way more enjoyable than doing anything below D. I highly doubt ppl would ever want to do VD/D again if KI doesn't cost merit, that's why I don't want them to change that.

Also "Some might want a leader only needs to have the KI so they can do more and have better odds at getting the thing they want" is doesn't make it better game design. The way they design difficulty setting is suppose to reward players trying harder difficulty. So you either try harder difficulty and get stuff faster, or try easier difficulty and it takes longer. If easier setting no longer take long, what's the point to do VD?

[Demonjustin]

You're arguing that VE requires a lot of effort, when merit point comes into play. That was exactly my point.

Yes, if merit point and KI comes into play, soloing VE is more time consuming than do VD. If you remove the merit point aspect and hand out free KI, you can just do VE, exit, repeat, exit, repeat with zero down time. If you make a pt of a few people, you can probably repeat VE even faster. I'm also going guess that killing VE with 6 ppl using any setup and finish it in 5 min, and do it for 25 times(with zero downtime and zero risk to fail) is probably faster than /shouting for ppl with right job to do a D/VD with some risk to fail.

The point is that the entire AA drop rate and difficulty mode is made on the fact that you need to farm KI and there are downtime between each runs that you can't spam it repeatedly endlessly. If you don't want to farm KI, then the SE will have to remove VE/E and readjust the drop rate too, you seriously want that? lol.I fail to see how VE/E would have to be removed when redoing the fight 100 times for a 1% drop, excluding merits, would take so much more effort than making a party for D/VD and only having to do the fight 5~10 times for a 50% drop. Oh, and as for making a larger group of up to 6 people to spam VE? Yeah, great sounding idea, except that now when my piece of gear drops after fighting it 100 times I now have to go try to outlot anyone else who wants it.

Do you really honestly think people would do dozens of fights with groups of 6 people with hardly any chance of their gear dropping rather than making a party for N~VD especially when they would have to lot against other people for their drops on the extremely slip chance it drops? I think not.

[Afania]

I fail to see how VE/E would have to be removed when redoing the fight 100 times for a 1% drop, excluding merits, would take so much more effort than making a party for D/VD and only having to do the fight 5~10 times for a 50% drop. Oh, and as for making a larger group of up to 6 people to spam VE? Yeah, great sounding idea, except that now when my piece of gear drops after fighting it 100 times I now have to go try to outlot anyone else who wants it.


Lol, there's something quite wrong in your example even if the number you use is true. Let's assume you go with PUG and spend time on /shouting.

Do VE 100 times, each time= 5 min= 8.3hr total. You lot against 6 people. Let's say if 1 run takes 2hr, after 2hr pt disband you make a new pt, you'd need to make 4 pt. Let's say if you need to /shout for 15 min each time, the total time to see a drop from VE is 9.8 hr.

Do VD 10 times, each time let's say 25 min a run= 4.1hr total, let's say if you /shout twice after 2hr and each /shout takes 1hr because RNG+PLD is harder to find. The total time to see a drop from VD is 6.1hr.

3 hr difference, which you may argue that VD is still faster, but if you factor the fact that there's quite a bit of chance that VD may fail(it's also very hard to recover if PLD d/c and shit in VD), but VE is nearly 100% win rate no matter what, the difference isn't very big.

Also, BOTH group, VE or VD needs to lot against 5 other people. I don't understand the logic behind "VE is slow because you need to lot against 5 people", since you always need to lot against other ppl in VD too.

However, in VE the chance of lotting against 6 people is smaller because you can probably bring mules and still win, but not everyone may want to bring mules in VD.

A lot of times, "effort" is more than the drop rate and the actual time it takes to do something, but also the difficulty to get right jobs and the risk to fail a run. I'm pretty sure a lot of ppl would rather bring 3 mules to VE and kill it in 5 min with 100% win rate, and do it 100 times, get 3 chances to lot on an item by lotting on mules, instead of spending 1hr to make PLD+RNG pt and take risks with PUG and lot against 5 person.