Thoughts on Relic Armor upgrade

[Ziyyigo-Tipyigo]

Though I personally prefer the look of the relic armor for my job of choice over artifact, I just don't see myself bothering with whatever process you'll be putting in place to raise it to 119.

Basically, looking back at what you've done with the artifact armor it seems we'll be heavily encouraged to first upgrade our relic armor to the +1 and/or +2 versions first. But with regards to the +1 version I'll be damned if I spend Dynamis currency on anything but a relic weapon. And my personal experience with the "Forgotten" items necessary to upgrade to +2 is that they are too annoyingly rare a drop, to the point where I am still well shy of 30 of any one type of them (let alone 50) after all this time since their introduction.

Really, I'm not sure relic armor +2 was ever comparable to the effort-to-reward ratio of empyrean armor +2.

So while it's nice that you're introducing some sort of path to upgrade relic armor to make it a viable choice today, my experiences with what "relic armor upgrades" have meant in the past keep me from believing that whatever you have planned this time around will be something I'll want to do.

[Twille]

I'm curious as to why they're only upgrading 3 pieces of Relic to 119 rather than all 5

[Renaissance2K]

To artificially extend interest in the content.

[Ravenmore]

Though I personally prefer the look of the relic armor for my job of choice over artifact, I just don't see myself bothering with whatever process you'll be putting in place to raise it to 119.

Basically, looking back at what you've done with the artifact armor it seems we'll be heavily encouraged to first upgrade our relic armor to the +1 and/or +2 versions first. But with regards to the +1 version I'll be damned if I spend Dynamis currency on anything but a relic weapon. And my personal experience with the "Forgotten" items necessary to upgrade to +2 is that they are too annoyingly rare a drop, to the point where I am still well shy of 30 of any one type of them (let alone 50) after all this time since their introduction.

Really, I'm not sure relic armor +2 was ever comparable to the effort-to-reward ratio of empyrean armor +2.

So while it's nice that you're introducing some sort of path to upgrade relic armor to make it a viable choice today, my experiences with what "relic armor upgrades" have meant in the past keep me from believing that whatever you have planned this time around will be something I'll want to do.

Currency is fairly cheap and the only forgotten items that are expensive are head and body which most likely be the 2 slots they leave out. Also the forgotten items are only rare off EPs go to the DC(or what used to be DC) and they drop pretty good. Only thing I'm wondering is if augmented relic gear will keep the augments by just adding them to the reforged or will we have to restart with the base item.

[Demonjustin]

Basically, looking back at what you've done with the artifact armor it seems we'll be heavily encouraged to first upgrade our relic armor to the +1 and/or +2 versions first. But with regards to the +1 version I'll be damned if I spend Dynamis currency on anything but a relic weapon. And my personal experience with the "Forgotten" items necessary to upgrade to +2 is that they are too annoyingly rare a drop, to the point where I am still well shy of 30 of any one type of them (let alone 50) after all this time since their introduction.If you haven't gotten your forgottens you apparently have never spent any amount of money on them and hardly ever do Dynamis, I have never done a Dynamis run since its re-release and not walked out with less than 4, more often than not I walked out with around 7, which puts me at 4~8 runs apiece. They are by no means hard to get, skipping +1 is cheaper than doing it anyways, and on your server looking at the prices for things (http://www.ffxiah.com/search/item?q=Forgotten) everything except head would cost you between 250~500k at most, assuming you have none already and farm no more, head you could farm Thoughts for if you went to Dynamis. As for getting the money, if you lack any as is you can easily go do any of the Limited Time Objectives for Records and sell the Plutons from them, your server seems to average 100~110k right now, so that can help with money as well as currency from farming if you wish to sell it, which only gets you closer.


I'm curious as to why they're only upgrading 3 pieces of Relic to 119 rather than all 5Depending on how they go about the upgrades its possible they simply do not think they will have time to implement the content for which they wish to add the drops for the other 2 pieces.

[FaeQueenCory]

I'm curious as to why they're only upgrading 3 pieces of Relic to 119 rather than all 5
This update is REALLY large....
I mean, new enemies, new missions, new quests, new area, new skirmish, new gear, new CSs.... that's a LOT of data to be sent... so the 3/5 thing is probably just due to limits set on how big updates are allowed...........
Probably.

Though on topic I have 4 feelings about the relic upgrades:

1) YäY! more iLv for my TH-THF and SMN!

2) >:[ Morrigan and I disapprove of this special treatment RUN and GEO are getting over the other jobs.... A diddly little quest (more likely a questline)? I would have had no problem with the 109 relic update requiring +2/+2A relic pieces had the relics for RUN and GEO dropped randomly in dynamis areas... I mean, it was a given that they'd be at least 109... but with RUN and GEO's ease at getting 5/5 (not)relic pieces... ANY version of the relic pieces better be 109-able.
It's gonna be some pretty big BS for RUN and GEO's not-empy sets coming out of the box in "109 +2 form" with no effort in making them.

3) RUN and GEO's not-relic better not be on slip 06....

4) I hope the bring back a bunch of the lost stats from the +2 to the relics. If only for diversity... since it seems we're returning to the 75 era where you have the luxury(?) of choosing between AF1+1 and AF2+1 for each slot... and them both being "equal".
(Only now it will be RF1+1 RF2+1 and RF3+1! and they'll all be 119!)

And, Ziyyigo-Tipyigo, it really depends on the job.
For instance, SMN's AF2+2 hands FAR exceed the usefulness of AF3+2 hands... by like a bajillion.
And then you have the TH on Thief's relic hands... so it's really a by-slot evaluation rather than a whole set comparison.

[Olor]

I'd really like for them to slightly increase the drop rate of forgotten items. I spent 1.5 hours in dyna-beau last night, killed mobs like no one's business - WITH TH2 from thf sub and got only 3 items. That really really really sucks.

[Demonjustin]

Did you kill the old EP mobs or the DC mobs?

[Olor]

Did you kill the old EP mobs or the DC mobs?

I can't tell, everything checks incredibly easy and I never farmed it before. I don't think it should matter. It was like a 1-2% drop rate with TH2 - that's garbage.

[Glamdring]

MORE TIME-SINK PLEASE!!!!

when have I heard that before? oh, right, never!

[Demonjustin]

EP mobs have always had a fairly low drop rate compared to the DCs, if you can tell me the zone you farmed and the area in the zone in which you farmed theres a good chance I can tell you if it was EP or DC mobs, but so far as drop rates go, EPs have like a 2~5% drop rate and DCs are more like 5~10%, just doing Arch Dynamis Lord over the last month and a half and picking up loose hopes falling into my inventory from NMs & DC monsters I have gotten over 150 of them stocked up, if I went out of my way to farm them, it would likely be much higher, since we have around 10 people most nights and yet only kill around 150 mobs capable of dropping any hopes.

[Olor]

I was on the Orcs by the lake on the way to the boss pop area in Beau

[Demonjustin]

Ok those are EP. In Beau the DC mobs are generally the ones higher up from the starting area, if you went up the very first ramp on the way to TE1, those and everything further upward are all DCs so far as I know, they are also all Hydra mobs. One of the easiest ways to remember what mobs are DC and what ones aren't, the 10 minute TEs are all spread out in the areas with EP mobs, the 1 20 minute TE is placed in an area with DC mobs, so if you know where the 20 minute can pop, you should know where DC mobs are for the most part.

Also as a note I would do Chains areas like Valk or Bub rather than original Dynamis areas like Beau or the cities, but thats more a matter of preference I suppose since I always hated the original zones.

[Olor]

Only Tav has thoughts other than beau... and I don't have access. Hydra mobs really really really suck.... ugh. Thanks though, that helps. I usually just don't get the 20 min TE because I am not proccing and don't actually want to spend that much time on a 2 per cent drop.

[Demonjustin]

Yeah if you are going specifically for thoughts it can be a pain, even if you did Tav your mob selection wouldn't improve much in that case since the monsters there I think are Demons, Clusters which blow up, and Leeches. Either way, I get where you're coming from, but I do hope with this new info you can more easily get your drops, so long as you use the Sparks gear from RoE you should be good to go do DC mobs anytime.

[Ziyyigo-Tipyigo]

500 log-in points for a single "Forgotten" item? While listing an entire frayed pouch of Walk of Echoes coins or enough seals to jump up from nothing to Empyrean +1 in a single purchase for the same price? Sounds like the annoyingly low drop rate is "working as intended."

Yeah... still not feeling it.

[Zeargi]

500 log-in points for a single "Forgotten" item? While listing an entire frayed pouch of Walk of Echoes coins or enough seals to jump up from nothing to Empyrean +1 in a single purchase for the same price? Sounds like the annoyingly low drop rate is "working as intended."

Yeah... still not feeling it.

But did you also notice that they removed the +2 items for Emp. Which is a likely sign of that the Empyrean equipment isn't short behind this string of ilvl+