Effort to reward ratio for job point categories

[Ramzi]

Dev team,
Please consider looking into some of the modifications we are currently seeing in the job points system. I bring to your attention THF. You have a category for steal cooldown time. Steal is a 5 min ability = 300 seconds. Your JP category reduces this by 2 seconds. 2/300 is nothing. It's insignificant. Even if you grinded many many many hours your total reduction is 20 seconds assuming each level is 2 seconds.

To put things in perspective, increasing this category once only makes your steal ability recharge .066% faster. Dumping all 10 levels of JP into it gives you 6% faster recharge on your steal ability- which could be argued is pretty damn useless as it is.

My point is, with the amount of effort it takes to get just one single JP (not to mention the effort to increase categories beyond that with the scaling system) the rewards are a complete joke. No one will even bother. I got a JP on my thf while farming in Marjami, and I didn't even know what to apply it to. They all suck so bad, so I put it in SA effect, so 1% more DEX is taken into consideration. Wow, so what will that do for my SA damage? 1-2 more?

Please please have another look at this system because it's flawed beyond belief. Blue Mage has the only category worth investing in.

[Aeron]

I completely agree with the OP. I know you guys have said that you aren't going to use the job point system to balance out jobs, but why not? All of the jp values need to be increase significantly. Imo the job point system is a perfect opportunity to make much needed balancing adjustments so what if it requires work on the part of the player to fix something that you guys should have fixed in the first place. At this point any system that allows the player more control over the functionality of a job is welcome in my eyes. That being said I know there are some that view job points as something that should not be required to play a certain job. Not having job points a requirement to perform in PUGs in a very valid view point because it puts at the moment a very grindy objective on the shoulders of casual players to be able to perform at a normal level in content. Being as someone that only really focuses on one job that being pld my point of view on the matter is a little biased ill admit, but really ever since they came out with these merit fights every end game even that's worth anything has become a grind.

sorry wall of text
tldr: I agree with op. fix the job point system because the effort to reward ratio sucks.

[Afania]

I completely agree with the OP. I know you guys have said that you aren't going to use the job point system to balance out jobs, but why not? All of the jp values need to be increase significantly. Imo the job point system is a perfect opportunity to make much needed balancing adjustments so what if it requires work on the part of the player to fix something that you guys should have fixed in the first place. At this point any system that allows the player more control over the functionality of a job is welcome in my eyes. That being said I know there are some that view job points as something that should not be required to play a certain job. Not having job points a requirement to perform in PUGs in a very valid view point because it puts at the moment a very grindy objective on the shoulders of casual players to be able to perform at a normal level in content. Being as someone that only really focuses on one job that being pld my point of view on the matter is a little biased ill admit, but really ever since they came out with these merit fights every end game even that's worth anything has become a grind.

sorry wall of text
tldr: I agree with op. fix the job point system because the effort to reward ratio sucks.

The reward:effort issue is the game content balance issue.

If the job point system is fixed to worth 100hr of grind, then the entire game content would need rebalance as well, thus forcing everyone to grind JP to cap.

[Aeron]

The reward:effort issue is the game content balance issue.

If the job point system is fixed to worth 100hr of grind, then the entire game content would need rebalance as well, thus forcing everyone to grind JP to cap.

I get what your saying and I agree with it on one hand while on the other hand to me at least it would be justifiable in the sense that if the rewards actually did end up balancing the jobs they would be worth it to me at least. I know other players wouldn't see it this way. I'd like to see some middle ground on this issue because right now job points being a mechanic that ppl that have everything else done for a job can do to get the little extras is a very short sighted concept and can be vastly expanded upon.

I do however get what you're saying where they would end up being if not a quasi requirement a full fledged one for ppl to play a particular job. Though merits are kind of along the same lines where some are good and some are just horrible and when making a party at least in my experience you never see ppl shout for x job with x merits you know what I mean? So this idea that job points would be implemented to restrict players to join shouts is a little paranoid, though it would really depend on how much the job points in question effected the performance of said job.

[Selindrile]

Blu has 2 categories (1 until they patch Learning Chance into Macc) worth investing into, the only one that actually feels rewarding effort/reward wise is Point Bonus. And guess what, as much as I'm loving the Blu love lately, I still never get to go Blu to any endgame other than Bee and Shark. Technically Bst has the best Job Points IMO, but nobody's seen a Bst play this game in years.

There are a few other Job Points on a few jobs that actually feel at least kinda worthwhile, like the Macc ones, some of the Accuracy ones, etc..... but there are plenty of absolute duds, and plenty of jobs that get absolutely nothing that feels worthy of putting a point into: Thf, Pld, etc.

[Ulth]

What I have been doing to determine good job point abilities and bad ones is instead of thinking about how long it would take to max them out, instead think about how I would feel if I did have them maxed out. If I am remembering correctly they plan on raising the caps to 30, so that's what I base my judgement off of.

Some of them are actually pretty good for thf, like the sneak attack and trick attack ones. 30% of my dex is like +90 extra base damage for weaponskills stacked with sneak attack. That is hardly something to sneeze at. Other ones like the Larceny extension isn't half bad. 75 seconds of one hundred fists sounds great to me.

Mug needs some work, I think if the bonus from the relic head actually increased the amount drained that would be all you needed. Steal at 30 would be a 4 minute cool down and that's pretty much nothing. Would be better if it was 3-4 seconds off per point.

Then there is the worst. +3 magic evasion per point when using perfect dodge. Sure at 30 points that +90 magic evasion, but it's for 45 seconds once an hour. Basically the added effect of the hour ability is about the same as remembering to wear some pants. It would need to be like +3 magic evasion, +3 status resistance, and +3 magic def to warrant using it to protect from magic, so the only use is to still use it to avoid attacks.

[Afania]

Blu has 2 categories (1 until they patch Learning Chance into Macc) worth investing into, the only one that actually feels rewarding effort/reward wise is Point Bonus. And guess what, as much as I'm loving the Blu love lately, I still never get to go Blu to any endgame other than Bee and Shark. Technically Bst has the best Job Points IMO, but nobody's seen a Bst play this game in years.

There are a few other Job Points on a few jobs that actually feel at least kinda worthwhile, like the Macc ones, some of the Accuracy ones, etc..... but there are plenty of absolute duds, and plenty of jobs that get absolutely nothing that feels worthy of putting a point into: Thf, Pld, etc.



What I have been doing to determine good job point abilities and bad ones is instead of thinking about how long it would take to max them out, instead think about how I would feel if I did have them maxed out. If I am remembering correctly they plan on raising the caps to 30, so that's what I base my judgement off of.

Some of them are actually pretty good for thf, like the sneak attack and trick attack ones. 30% of my dex is like +90 extra base damage for weaponskills stacked with sneak attack. That is hardly something to sneeze at. Other ones like the Larceny extension isn't half bad. 75 seconds of one hundred fists sounds great to me.

Mug needs some work, I think if the bonus from the relic head actually increased the amount drained that would be all you needed. Steal at 30 would be a 4 minute cool down and that's pretty much nothing. Would be better if it was 3-4 seconds off per point.

Then there is the worst. +3 magic evasion per point when using perfect dodge. Sure at 30 points that +90 magic evasion, but it's for 45 seconds once an hour. Basically the added effect of the hour ability is about the same as remembering to wear some pants. It would need to be like +3 magic evasion, +3 status resistance, and +3 magic def to warrant using it to protect from magic, so the only use is to still use it to avoid attacks.

Job point is certainly not as useless as ppl made it sound like. Ppl complained about long grind for little increase, but that's due to the fact that ppl are used to finishing 1 119 gear in 1hr of work. I mean, only BLU has 2 useful job point, seriously? I can name a lot more JP category that's BETTER than BLU's(IMO).

The reward/effort ratio isn't worse than 75 era, at that time +1% haste from hands cost millions and millions.

[Grekumah]

We plan on making it easier to earn job points in future version updates. You’ll be able to earn job points via the newest addition to battle content, Incursion, which is scheduled to be released in the next version update. However, as for the request regarding thief’s steal category, we do not have any plans to adjust it at the moment.

Also keep in mind what we have mentioned in the past that currently the maximum amount of points you can place into a category is 10; however, in the future we are planning to make it so you can place up to 30 points, which will enhance jobs even further.

[detlef]

Also keep in mind what we have mentioned in the past that currently the maximum amount of points you can place into a category is 10; however, in the future we are planning to make it so you can place up to 30 points, which will enhance jobs even further.Are the upgrades going to keep increasing in cost to the point where the final upgrade costs 30 job points? That would be bananas.

[Xsilver]

Probably, which is why we can hold 200. Also "Merit Point"-style mentality parties are not really sticking when it comes to job points. They probably thought people would be excited to go back to a 'grind' in a 6person party, like pre-abyssea days to gain Merits/Job Points again. The thing is you'll party for hours and get maybe 4-5 job points which can upgrade one ability by like 1%, at least merit points gave more potent bonuses. Job points are a lot more subtle and take much, much longer to gain, a little too long. CP should be doubled all around as the CP gained during the 2x CP Campaigns feels much more appropriate, can gain 10-15 Job Points in a few hours and it feels so rewarding compared to maybe 1 job point per hour(especially when upgrades in the future, when the cap is raised, will start to cost 20-30 job points to upgrade to the next level...)

[Ulth]

Job point is certainly not as useless as ppl made it sound like. Ppl complained about long grind for little increase, but that's due to the fact that ppl are used to finishing 1 119 gear in 1hr of work. I mean, only BLU has 2 useful job point, seriously? I can name a lot more JP category that's BETTER than BLU's(IMO).

The reward/effort ratio isn't worse than 75 era, at that time +1% haste from hands cost millions and millions.

I agree with the reward/effort ratio. Getting job points is about as hard as getting merit points were when they first came out. People need to just stop the abyssea merit farming, and fight content that is relevant for their level. I already have 6/10 in sneak attack, 5/10 in trick attack, 4/10 in larceny, and 1/10 in mug. What were people expecting to cap out job abilities the month is came out?

What I disagree with is that blu does not have great job point categories. The best one of course is the increase in spell points. The cap was 60, but it will be 90 when the cap on job points increases. That is godly, a 50% increase. Increases in base damage of spells, percentage increases in skillchain damage, conserve MP when chain casting the most powerful blu spells, how are any of these not great? The only bad one was learning chance, but that is being replaced with a passive accuracy bonus, and accuracy is very important in end game.


We plan on making it easier to earn job points in future version updates. You’ll be able to earn job points via the newest addition to battle content, Incursion, which is scheduled to be released in the next version update. However, as for the request regarding thief’s steal category, we do not have any plans to adjust it at the moment.

Also keep in mind what we have mentioned in the past that currently the maximum amount of points you can place into a category is 10; however, in the future we are planning to make it so you can place up to 30 points, which will enhance jobs even further. I guess I can live with steal not having much of a cool down reduction. Most of what I saw in the job points for thf was an attempt to make its job abilities useful for fights.

If you bothered to merit out aura steal, it gave you a dispel on a 5 minute timer, which was not very useful, even with the double dispel from the bonnet. Lowering it to 4 minutes seemed like a step in the right direction but a 3 minute timer seemed to be the magic number that would make it useful.

Heck a lot of timers seem too slow now with how fast paced most fights are. Another thing I think about while in a fight is if an ability is worth the lull in my attacks for the time it takes to use it.

I do have a suggestion for despoil too if you want to pass it along. Since it also has no use it should drain tp with putting job points in it.

[Zarchery]

Also keep in mind what we have mentioned in the past that currently the maximum amount of points you can place into a category is 10; however, in the future we are planning to make it so you can place up to 30 points, which will enhance jobs even further.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! *sob*

I say this because I have been grinding like nuts to hit 10/10 on Chakra. I can't fathom how long it would take to get all the way to 30.

[Xsilver]

Some jobs get better Job Point categories than others. Samurai will be getting STR+30 from Hasso(in addition to Hasso's base +STR) when fully upgraded. +Attack on Jumps for DRG, when calculated and Math'd out comes out to like less than 0.5 DPS or less since Jumps already get a large attack bonus (and its only once per every min or so, compared to +Att on a stance JA like berserk which is active for several minutes)

[Metaking]

@ ulth its an increase to physical spells additional effects macc, aka stun on sudden lunge or plague on delta strike kinda thing, which is still really nice, not a bonus to the spell base physical acc
@Grekumah so when are we going to get some details on this new event btw.

and yea 30 on some castigators seems op(sam haso), and 30 in others necessary for them to be great(sch regen bonus,which this one will be so hot at 30/30 >.>).

[Zarchery]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! *sob*

I say this because I have been grinding like nuts to hit 10/10 on Chakra. I can't fathom how long it would take to get all the way to 30.

Actually, I can fathom it and ran the calculations. I estimate about 615 hours if the pattern of each upgrade costing 1 more point than the last continues. It'd be 410 more job points and I can pull in about 18,000 capacity points per hour.

[Raydeus]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! *sob*

I say this because I have been grinding like nuts to hit 10/10 on Chakra. I can't fathom how long it would take to get all the way to 30.

Then again you are not supposed to be grinding Job points, but to acquire them as you play the game as a long term goal...

...which makes the fact that you are only able to obtain CP from selected mobs/content seem like something went very wrong somewhere in development of this feature.


Like I've said before, anything that gives XP should give you CP. Even if you start by only getting 1 CP from killing an Incredibly Weak mob points will still add up as you play the game. But if you are restricted to only obtaining them from certain content you will be forced to grind them instead. Which makes the original intent look like a pile of stinky bullshit.

[dragmagi]

CP really should go like merits did once xp- merits cap off exess should goto CP. That will make grind less painful

[Mitruya]

We plan on making it easier to earn job points in future version updates. You’ll be able to earn job points via the newest addition to battle content, Incursion, which is scheduled to be released in the next version update. However, as for the request regarding thief’s steal category, we do not have any plans to adjust it at the moment.

Also keep in mind what we have mentioned in the past that currently the maximum amount of points you can place into a category is 10; however, in the future we are planning to make it so you can place up to 30 points, which will enhance jobs even further.

JPs can't be shared across jobs. So if our favorite job choices are unwanted for events, we can't take advantage of events to boost the gain. As mentioned in another thread, JPs shouldn't be used to fix unpopular jobs so that they will be wanted. It creates the same damn circular problem like needing to already have the drops that you're trying to get in the first place ...
And no one parties for this stuff on my server that I'm aware of.

[Akivatoo]

JPs can't be shared across jobs. So if our favorite job choices are unwanted for events, we can't take advantage of events to boost the gain.
PUP detected !
BTW job point took longtime to get but i still think megaboss need to give more job point (10K capacity point or more for each for each kill) can be a good way to give job point for no DD job (DD job exclude BLU PUP RUN DNC DRG BST).
tht can be an alternative way of low level monster grind.

[Zhronne]

I agree with the reward/effort ratio. Getting job points is about as hard as getting merit points were when they first came out.
Yes and no.
The CP/hr is actually better than the LP/hr we used to have at level 75, if you get a good party of course, if you solo it's about the same.
But you can't stop here, there are other factors to include which are very relevant.

Job Points are much more expensive than Merit points and are going to be even more expensive once they uncap beyond 10. Furthermore, do not forget that while the CP/hr and LP/hr rates are similar, you need 30k CP for a JP whereas you need 10k LP for a MP.
Merits offered bigger increases/changes in your job than JP do (aside from a couple of exceptions), hence making the Effort/Reward and the Gratification much less frustrating
You could get Merits on different jobs, making it easy to farm them for undesired jobs (I love the fact that you need to get JPs on that specific job, but we all have to admit that the MP system was more practical, in this sense)
Times have changed, we're in 2014


Once you consider the CP/hr in light of point 1), you're going to see how JPs are actually slower than MPs were.
What is particularly relevant and cannot be ignored, from my point of view, is point 4).
We cannot judge things with the eyes of 2006 players.
Times have changed, the game has changed, players have changed. What was a completely acceptable standard in 2006 probably is not in 2014.


I would have loved for them to bring back old style merit PTs, but their attempt isn't working so far.
All is promoting atm is leeching and botting.
JPs system in 2014 FFXI feels completely out of place, a remnant of the past despite being a new feature, a fish out of water in a game such as what FFXI has become.
They really need to find a better compromise, and the idea of having to spend 11>12>13>14>...>30 JPs for a single minimal upgrade is really... intense.
With the current solo rate of 20k CP/hr it would take ~45 hours just for the last upgrade.
652 hours to go 1>30 in a single category.
That's like 27 days of UNINTERRUPTED exping (which is unrealistical unless you're botting).
More realistically, 2hours a day of Exping (average: since there are days you won't exp because no login or doing other activities) would take ~163 days of exping.
That's for a SINGLE category.
In a SINGLE job.
Even if they were to double the amount of CP/kill you get, which would be an insane bonus and I doubt they're gonna do it since all they're talking of is "Incursion" giving CP, it would still be 81 days of 2hrs/day exp


If you think rates are fine and there's nothing wrong with the effort/reward ratio of the current system in 2014 FFXI then I don't know what else to tell you.

[Archades]

lol maybe add items that grant a Job Point upon use, then make only available from certain events, like WKRs, but rare enough that most could rather exp for em faster but not enough that it would keep ppl away

[Afania]

What I disagree with is that blu does not have great job point categories. The best one of course is the increase in spell points. The cap was 60, but it will be 90 when the cap on job points increases. That is godly, a 50% increase. Increases in base damage of spells, percentage increases in skillchain damage, conserve MP when chain casting the most powerful blu spells, how are any of these not great?

I didn't say BLU has bad job point, I only said BLU isn't the only job with good job point, and IMO some job get better job points. That's just personal opinion sort of thing.



The CP/hr is actually better than the LP/hr we used to have at level 75, if you get a good party of course, if you solo it's about the same.


This info is incorrect, a good pt at 75 era farm about 15k~30k/hr. I can farm 15k CP solo in 15 min if I pop capacity ring, which is slightly faster than merit point. I've heard some AoE jobs like BLM or BLU sub COR can farm even more CP/hr.



With the current solo rate of 20k CP/hr it would take

Current solo rate for none DD job like BRD*.....Fixed for you.

The issue of CP/hr isn't the current solo rate, since BLU BLM COR can farm CP a lot faster than 20k/hr. Even without CP ring I can finish 20k solo in 30 min. The issue of CP/hr is the fact that you can't use CP on other jobs.

If you can use CP on other jobs, you can just play BLM BLU COR and farm CP solo, then use on other jobs like BRD WHM etc. With current system you can't aim for efficient method if you want efficient CP farm, that's the real issue.




If you think rates are fine and there's nothing wrong with the effort/reward ratio of the current system in 2014 FFXI then I don't know what else to tell you.

Considering the amount of ppl I know in this game already done with CP, I'd say the rates are fine. But the mechanic still needs a little fix.

[Sasaraixx]

You ignored all of Zhronne's other points. It takes more CP's for one JP when compared with LP's and it requires more JP for each category. When the cap is lifted, it is going to require a staggering amount of JPs.

And again, if your response is that because 3 jobs out of 22 are capable of getting CPs at a decent rate, then you are only proving the counter argument. Being able to gain capacity points on any job and using them as you wish would allow for flexibility, but it is not a solution when you are advocating that people use one of 3 jobs in order to do so.

Also, just because you and some of your friends have deciding to spend most of your time grinding job points does not mean that the system is fine.

I have bigger concerns with job points because increasingly it seems that balance issues are being addressed through job point categories and this goes against the initially stated purpose of this content. I also don't see how the team envisioned job points as something to be completed while doing other content when very little content gives you capacity points and the few that do give you very little.

I'm going to have to steal a line from Zhronne's post and say that if you think the current reward/effort ratio is fine, I don't know what else to tell you.

[Ramzi]

Thank you Zhronne for putting exactly what I was feeling into better words.

Thanks Grekumah for the response. It's much appreciated. My concern is centered around the staggering amount of time you would need to invest for just a small increase in performance. This has always been my beef with the JP system, and while some have bit the bullet and gone out and grinded for hours and hours (lots of BLU's I know) I just can't bring myself to do it. I have limited time, and I feel the cost to earn JP is too high- I'd rather do something FUN with my time in the game, not bring me back to 2006 as others have said. Times have changed, and this type of activity is no longer the norm.

Having said that, I realize that this is not an activity that's being forced on us (although you can argue that for BLU, it really is- any chance you get to do an endgame event, you will be expected to be 70/70 blu points) but if it's not going to benefit 75%+ of the population, why implement it at all? Just for the hardcore people who do nothing but play this all day?

I think we can start by A) allowing JP to be transferred to other jobs, and B) giving at least SOME JP for everything that gives exp. And why not include Abyssea? That's where most people exp, so why not include it. The rate of CP doesn't have to be proportionate to the rate of exp/limit, but some would be nice. If worms or raptors are checking EP or DC, give us say 30-50 CP per kill.

Lots of ways this can be tweaked so you feel a sense of reward without dedicating your life to it.

[Afania]

You ignored all of Zhronne's other points. It takes more CP's for one JP when compared with LP's and it requires more JP for each category. When the cap is lifted, it is going to require a staggering amount of JPs.

And again, if your response is that because 3 jobs out of 22 are capable of getting CPs at a decent rate, then you are only proving the counter argument. Being able to gain capacity points on any job and using them as you wish would allow for flexibility, but it is not a solution when you are advocating that people use one of 3 jobs in order to do so.

Try to grind merit point on BLM at 75 era, see if you can still argue that you grind merit point faster than CP grind now.

Also, just because you and some of your friends have deciding to spend most of your time grinding job points does not mean that the system is fine.

I have bigger concerns with job points because increasingly it seems that balance issues are being addressed through job point categories and this goes against the initially stated purpose of this content. I also don't see how the team envisioned job points as something to be completed while doing other content when very little content gives you capacity points and the few that do give you very little.

I'm going to have to steal a line from Zhronne's post and say that if you think the current reward/effort ratio is fine, I don't know what else to tell you.


Technically there will always be certain job that can grind CP faster than another, like how piercing DD grind merit point faster than BLM in lv 75 era. Try to grind merit point on BLM in 75 era, it's probably going to be slower than CP grind now, especially if you do dyna on BLM and lose EXP lol.

Whether there's a job restriction or not, certain job will always pull ahead, at least not having the restriction gives ppl one more option to grind CP faster, and also make it easier to make 6 man pt for it.

I'm not too worried about grinding 30 JP per upgrade when you reach 30 cap, cuz it's just the matter of time before SE make it faster to grind. I'm pretty sure JP being time consuming to grind at this point because it's a way for SE to slow the "upper tier" player down so they won't finish everything too fast. As more and more ppl reaching JP cap, they'd balance the content based on the fact that most ppl has full JP and make it faster to grind so new/returning player can catch up.

That's what they did with merit points and most of the game content and RME, it seems like it's their direction to maintain sub.

FYI, ppl finish most or all of the JP not because they "spend most of their time", but because they have nothing else to spend time on. Most of the time when I log on I go farm JP because I have nothing else to do anyways, and I only play around 6hr~8hr a week, even then I still feel like no content last long enough except JP farm. Last new content skirmish only last less than 1hr for me, like delve2/higher tier BCs. Delve2/higher tier BC is fun sure, but unless you're selling items it's pointless to do it more than once unless your stuff doesn't drop.

[Afania]

I'm going to have to steal a line from Zhronne's post and say that if you think the current reward/effort ratio is fine, I don't know what else to tell you.



Oh and btw, for those of you argue that's been saying "this is 2014 not 2006, thus the CP gain rate isn't fine", can you list one reason to support that the "2014 game pace" being better?

Currently it takes 20 min to obtain 100k plasm, which is 2hr of grind to obtain 1 R15 delve2 gears. If you make gil via other ways, it's possible to obtain R15 in less than 2hr.

Most BC D/VD has 1/2 or 1/3 of item drop rate for specific items, unless you're going with ppl lotting on the same stuff, it takes around 2hr of work to get the drop as well.

Which 2014 MMO give you best gears in game with 2hr of work?

60k CP solo= 2 JP/hr, which equals to 28hr of work for 10/10 per category. Since MMO is supposed to be played for hundreds and hundreds of hr, 28hr of work is MMO industry standard, 2hr of work isn't.

My argument is that 2hr to get the top gear is NOT fine in any sub based MMO, you can't argue that 28hr is too slow just because you've been comparing with 2hr of delve2.

My point stands, 28hr of work is just fine, this is based on numbers, and the fact that research shows that avg MMO player plays 14hr+ a week. If avg MMO player plays 5 min a day, 28hr of work may really seem too long, but currently it's not.

Out of most of the recent MMO I've played, FFXI's game pace is actually one of the fastest unless you go grind RME.

I'm sorry if you feel you don't know what to tell me because you don't care about numbers, only how you feel. I just feel every every player should have the opportunity to finish the category in 28hrs by job change, instead of having to spend double amount of time to grind them because they can't get JP on other jobs.

[Olor]

Oh and btw, for those of you argue that's been saying "this is 2014 not 2006, thus the CP gain rate isn't fine", can you list one reason to support that the "2014 game pace" is better?

Currently it takes 20 min to obtain 100k plasm, which is 2hr of grind to obtain 1 R15 delve2 gears.

For who? I've had KI for tojil for months and still don't have enough plasm to get my 119 sword. Just cause a very small group of people can do things that way doesn't mean the whole game should be built around them. Job points on a horrible grind only make the gaps between the players that have no problem getting plasm and delve 119 gear and normal casual players bigger. That in turn further fragments the playerbase. Its a bad strategy. Frankly - I'd rather the no-lifers be bored than the game return to "horrific-grind fantasy"

I used to be able to log in for a couple hours a few times a week and feel like I was making progress on my character. Now everything just feels slow and grindy and boring.

[Ramzi]

Afania what are you killing that you are getting 60k cp/hour. If it was truly that fast, I would do it, but it's not. Maybe I'm not killing high enough level mobs, but maybe you could share some advice on getting that kind of return on your time rather than just telling us you do it so the system works.

[Olor]

Afania what are you killing that you are getting 60k cp/hour. If it was truly that fast, I would do it, but it's not. Maybe I'm not killing high enough level mobs, but maybe you could share some advice on getting that kind of return on your time rather than just telling us you do it so the system works.

I'd second that. It took me hours to get a single point, with the ring on. I tried charming stuff in the gates and using it to kill other stuff but it was still way slower than just killing easier stuff in kahmir (and way more boring too).

[Ramzi]

I'd second that. It took me hours to get a single point, with the ring on. I tried charming stuff in the gates and using it to kill other stuff but it was still way slower than just killing easier stuff in kahmir (and way more boring too).

I can see how it would be slow with BST. The kill speed is just way too slow unless the mobs are way below your level. I think the optimum kill method is AOE cleaving with BLU, BLM, maybe RDM, WAR with Fell Cleave....

But that doesn't help people who want CP for jobs without these AOE abilities. Even with a fairly powered up BLU, I don't see anything even close to 60k/hour though. Again, maybe I'm killing the wrong mobs but then what are the right mobs?

[Olor]

On the bright side the unmasked grind is really undermining my desire to play because it feels much more like a naked waste of my one precious limited life... I guess?

[Sasaraixx]

Afania, how about you stop ignoring valid arguments and changing them into something the original poster didn't mean at all.

1. You comparing an entire class of jobs to one job and then changing the argument to "some jobs will always gain x faster" completely ignored my point. I said 4 jobs out of 22 can earn cp solo at a decent rate and some how that is the same to you as 5 jobs (ignoring other viable merit options btw) got merit points faster than BLM. Seriously?

2. Did you really just respond with "people don't spend most of their time grinding job points. They have nothing else to do SO THEY SPEND MOST OF THEIR TIME GRINDING JOB POINTS?" I just can't . . .

3 /sigh You're not worried about future category expansions because you're confident they will make it easier to grind JP. . . In other words, if they don't change the current system it will be a ridiculous undertaking! You literally just proved our point while disagreeing with us.

4. I don't care how long it takes you to do anything outside of JP's. This thread isn't about any other content. It's about the amount of effort for the reward of these points being out of whack. How long it takes you to farm plasm for vastly more beneficial rewards is entirely irrelevant.

5. You're still ignoring the fact that your merit party LP comparisons are askew because you're not taking into consideration the fact it takes more CP per job point and more job points per category.

6. Your 60k/hr "numbers" are bollocks because they literally apply to almost none of the jobs in this game. I'm not even going to get into if they are accurate or not because it doesn't matter. Your argument is still flawed because even if they are "the system is fine if you can switch to BLM or BLU to get your CP" is NOT reasonable.

7. And finally even if your numbers above were accurate or applicable to the majority, which they're not, you think 28 hours of continuous game play is a warranted investment for a lot of these categories. As I said in my last post, I don't know what else to say to you.

[Zhronne]

This info is incorrect, a good pt at 75 era farm about 15k~30k/hr. I can farm 15k CP solo in 15 min if I pop capacity ring, which is slightly faster than merit point. I've heard some AoE jobs like BLM or BLU sub COR can farm even more CP/hr.
15k wouldn't really have been much of a "good" party in the ToAU era, but yeah, numbers were around those, I was trying to give approximate number, not mathematically exact ones.
I don't want to bicker with you Afania, but I'm afraid you're forgetting some important factors when comparing CP/hr to LP/hr.
You can't compare 1:1 for several reasons, among which:

It's 30kCP for 1 Job Points, vs 10kLP for 1 Merit Points (3:1)
Aside from a couple of Merit Categories, Job Points are much more expensive with the additional upgrades
Psychological factor now, not practical but still very important nonetheless. Aside a couple of notable exceptions, JPs atm are much less relevant than MPs. With the result that you work more for something that gives you less. It has a huge important in the gratification and how the subjective effort:reward ratio feels for every different player, do not underestimate it please, just because it's not a "number".


Furthermore, I think you are not considering the big picture atm.
Yes, maybe 20k cp/hr is a bit low, I could have said 25k maybe or even something more if we start talking about much better optimization, but I've been very generous with the amount of hours a day, since I doubt anybody who still plays manages to play that much every day and if they do, they probably want to do other stuff too and not just CP/CP/CP/CP/CP all the time.
Either way, I was just trying to give approximate ideas, and correct me if I'm wrong but I still think I've hit the spot.
Might have not been bull's eye maybe, but it was around that.

Yes, you are right. Some jobs have it easier with CP solo farming, not denying that.
Some exceptionally skilled players like Byrth manage to get like what, 100k CP/hr on their BLM?
It's true, it's not a lie.
But then again, would you consider that "average"? Because that's what I was trying to do, create an approximate average.
I may have been a bit below with 20k cp/hr, but I don't really think I was *that far* honestly.



Considering the amount of ppl I know in this game already done with CP
What is this line supposed to mean?
Please count the number of people who are "done with JPs" (definition of "being done"?) then let's compare that number to the total amount of players and let's see how relevant of a % that number represents.
I mean, what's the point?

Also, I'm afraid you're not considering the fact that
1) They're going to add more JP categories in the future (altough of course it will eventually slow down)
2) They are going to uncap the 10 limits first to 20 and then to 30. Getting 11>20 will require 155 Job Points. That's approximately three times the amount it takes for 1-10. 21-30 will require 255 points, for a total of 465 job points.
That's around 8,5 times the amount of points required for 1-10.
Now imagine this not for 6 categories, but for 24 categories (max cap of the system)
Imagine these 24 categories for multiple jobs.
Are you starting to see the whole picture now?
How can you define this *reasonable*?

I'm not saying they should make CP as stupid as XP/LP is today (god please no!), but then again it's pretty clear we need a better compromise than the current one.




Oh and btw, for those of you argue that's been saying "this is 2014 not 2006, thus the CP gain rate isn't fine", can you list one reason to support that the "2014 game pace" being better?
I'm not sure what you're trying to prove with this line.
You're a very smart person, surely you don't need people to remind how the game is much faster/easier/accessible than it was in 2006? Wether we like this or miss the old times is another story, but surely you can see it without anybody having to make a list of silly examples about how much times have changed?
The MMO standards have changed, what people want changed, what people are willing to accept changed, how much time people are willing to invest changed.
The effort:reward ratio to obtain some gratification changed too, not without the rightful concern of many of us who really miss the old times.
But then again, what can you do about it?
Times change, things go foward, nothing stays the same forever.

The current JP system would have been perfectly fine by 2006's standards, even later.
It's like a fish out of water with the current (retarded, imho) pace/rates of the game nowadays.
I'm sure you realize this, and if you do, then you shouldn't be surprised many players are unhappy about the JP system rates.
Wether you agree or not, you should be able to understand the other people's point of view.

[Zhronne]

One last thing. They need to find a better coherence in their plan for JPs.
Is it content "for hardcore players" or is it, like they always promoted it, content "for everyone"?
They always talked about how you would have been able to gain JPs solo, how it would have been the "natural consequence of doing something else" but atm this is very far from the truth.
Even after they patched Skirmish and Delve to give CP
RoEs can give CP, like what, 100 CP for 4 Reives? When you can get 150CP from killing a single target?

They're been too scared and conservative about CP. You can't gain it in the majority of areas/mobs outside of Adoulin.
Majority of Adoulin or current content doesn't give CP.
Alluvion Skirmish normal mobs do not give CP.
Reives don't give CP.
Assignments don't give CP.
You're basically left with very small amounts from Skirmish/Delve, ridiculous (to the point of being close to trolling) amounts from a very limited number of RoE trials, and... killing stuff.
With the latter representing like 95% of the realistic source.

How is that a balanced "variety of CP sources" in their mind is quite beyond me, frankly.
So yes, we need adjustments in the rates but also in the variety of sources.

[Olor]

I wish they would just put CP on anything that gives exp. Then I could derp around on my BST doing something more than grinding very boring mobs. Like I could (example) go camp an old NM or something - I wouldn't be getting a lot of CP but I'd at least be gaining it while doing something else. Or I could farm dyna on my BST instead of my THF - accepting lower currency for the advantage of getting CP on the job I want it on rather than a different job.

Just mindlessly grinding worthless mobs is very boring. Even rieves are less soul-crushingly boring.

[Afania]

Frankly - I'd rather the no-lifers be bored than the game return to "horrific-grind fantasy"


This argument is completely based on "build the game based on what I need" instead of "build the game based on everyone's need".

MMO isn't supposed to let you finish everything so everyone can keep playing. Even if "no-lifers" are the minority, they're still not suppose to "finish" the game and get bored.

Casual can't finish the game doesn't matter....they're not suppose to, so does no-lifers. So why are you arguing a worse game design that's less profitable(let no-lifers quit so Casual can finish the game) instead of better, more profitable one(nobody quit because no one can finish anything)

[Afania]

Afania what are you killing that you are getting 60k cp/hour. If it was truly that fast, I would do it, but it's not. Maybe I'm not killing high enough level mobs, but maybe you could share some advice on getting that kind of return on your time rather than just telling us you do it so the system works.

Doh gates, there's a camp(forget the pos) that I can chain kill mobs there, each mob gives 600 CP with rings+roll, after chain 20 it's around 900 CP.

It's rather "finish 15k in 15~20 min" instead of grind for 1hr and get 60k. After ring wear I just log off and do something else and come back with a ring.

As for AoE spot, I haven't try. I only read it from a JP blog about their 30 min merit point challenge, most ppl ended up merit point chain 80+ after 30 min and more CP than I can do after 30 min.

[Selindrile]

This argument is completely based on "build the game based on what I need" instead of "build the game based on everyone's need".

By your own logic you're in the wrong, the masses want JP to flow more freely, game design should cater to the majority of players, not the minority. Let the corner cases grind for their afterglow if they're desperate for a grind, this content is no more engaging than that, let everyone else grind less and do more interesting content more.

[Demonjustin]

I honestly don't understand why Mythics and Job Points in general should be basically off limits to "casual" players when there are long term meaningless goals in the game such as afterglows that people can go after if they so desire.

[Zhronne]

So why are you arguing a worse game design that's less profitable(let no-lifers quit so Casual can finish the game) instead of better, more profitable one(nobody quit because no one can finish anything)
That scenario being "better" is your, respectable, but subjective point of view. It's not an undeniable, absolute truth.
Aside from that, I'm afraid you're underestimating the amount of time necessary to really "finish" capping JPs on more than one job (and with finish I intend FINISH, not "getting one category to 10 and ignoring the rest 'cause you don't like/want it").
Please stop watching only at the current JP system, but imagine the system in its evolution over time, the cap to 24 different categories and the cap at 30/30 in each of them (465 JPs to cap a single category).

Even no-lifers who bot 24 hours a day with 100k cp/hr would have SERIOUS ISSUES in really capping multiple jobs. And we're talking about a negligible, hardly influencing minority of players in the grand scheme of things.




each mob gives 600 CP with rings+roll, after chain 20 it's around 900 CP.
If you include rolls that's not really solo, unless you go there on COR.
And which ring are we talking about? The 100% bonus one that is a one-time only ring and has only 12 charges?
Or the 5k Sparks one with 50% bonus?
Assuming it's the latter and assuming you're talking about numbers outside of the doubleCP campaigns, you're telling me you get 400cp per kill without chains. Correct?
How many seconds does it take for you to kill one of these targets, accounting for the engage, disengage and player movement time aspects?

[Tidis]

I do remember a room in Dho Gates that was full of non-aggressive Twitheryms and Acuexs that I tried to use as a CP camp during the double campaign but I got bored and didn't particularly grind exp effectively, dunno if that's the area Afania is referring to.

[Demonjustin]

I personally used to do Pugils and Crabs. Can get there from Foret #4 Dho entrance and following the left wall once inside, one reive in the way but it's cake.

[Zarchery]

I think the comparison to TOAU era merit parties is somewhat apt, except that it leaves out what I think is the single biggest failure of the job points system: the individual pools per job. I can get 18,000 an hour solo... on Monk... which kinda works because Monk is the job I want job points for. But if I want them on something like BLM I'm pretty screwed. I've gotten some really amazing rates in Woh Gates.... when I have a Bard. I do have Bard levelled and would gladly bring it to the party.... except I have no need for Bard job points.

I think I'm still going to endeavor to get Chakra to level 10 since I'm pretty close, but if it goes to 30... forget it. 415 extra job points under the current system is absurd.

[Malithar]

If you include rolls that's not really solo, unless you go there on COR.
And which ring are we talking about? The 100% bonus one that is a one-time only ring and has only 12 charges?
Or the 5k Sparks one with 50% bonus?
Assuming it's the latter and assuming you're talking about numbers outside of the doubleCP campaigns, you're telling me you get 400cp per kill without chains. Correct?
How many seconds does it take for you to kill one of these targets, accounting for the engage, disengage and player movement time aspects?

He's on Cor, as has been said. I do the same at prolly the same camp, 3x Umbrils near the Marjami zone line. Umbrils take 2x fire and stone damage, I'd imagine he's just meleeing them with trusts and killing with Wildfire/Fire Shot. His numbers are accurate with the +50% ring with no campaign, though I don't do it on Cor so no idea on what the roll adds. Repops are fast enough that you can get into the low teens CP chains until you lose the chain.

[Rhonda]

I honestly don't understand why Mythics and Job Points in general should be basically off limits to "casual" players when there are long term meaningless goals in the game such as afterglows that people can go after if they so desire.JP can be acquired quite easily in high-level events like Outer Ra'Kaznar Skirmish, which is still quite popular, and Delve. I know a few people who are 6/10 in two or three categories just from playing events and doing JP PTs exclusively during Double Capacity events. I also have seen people with one or more fully-capped categories but I know they've done JP PTs specifically to get to where they are.

As for Mythics, while weapons that can be used forever are kinda silly for an MMO (imo), they're meant to be the best weapons in the game - supposedly with stats commensurate with the onerous requirements. There are plenty of viable alternatives and all content can be completed without Mythic.


For who? I've had KI for tojil for months and still don't have enough plasm to get my 119 sword. Just cause a very small group of people can do things that way doesn't mean the whole game should be built around them. Job points on a horrible grind only make the gaps between the players that have no problem getting plasm and delve 119 gear and normal casual players bigger. That in turn further fragments the playerbase. Its a bad strategy. Frankly - I'd rather the no-lifers be bored than the game return to "horrific-grind fantasy"

I used to be able to log in for a couple hours a few times a week and feel like I was making progress on my character. Now everything just feels slow and grindy and boring.Afania's numbers really are the best-case scenarop but Delve1, the more friendly Delve, gives about 70k Plasm with a maximum duration of 45 minutes. That's 5 successful runs for the Sword, totalling 3hr 45m. Even if you tried to fail your way into the Sword, it would take 20 runs. That's 15hrs at maximum but most wipes happen at around the 30 minute mark which shaves off quite a bit of time.

Anahera Saber, Claidheamh Soluis, and even Iztassu +2 should also be enough to get Bura, if you've really got your heart set on it, for whatever reason.


I wish they would just put CP on anything that gives exp. Then I could derp around on my BST doing something more than grinding very boring mobs. Like I could (example) go camp an old NM or something - I wouldn't be getting a lot of CP but I'd at least be gaining it while doing something else. Or I could farm dyna on my BST instead of my THF - accepting lower currency for the advantage of getting CP on the job I want it on rather than a different job.Higher level Dynamis monsters already give about 75 CAP per kill. Outside of Abyssea, anything Lv.96 and above gives some amount of CAP.

As a response to no one in particular, because I'm too lazy to find a quote:
A change to allow JP to be shared across jobs would be a disincentive to playing jobs for fun. I've seen plenty of people do Delve as WAR, BLU, THF, RUN, and DRK and many of them claim to do it for the JP. Also, the job-exclusivity of JP allows people who are have been playing their job for a while to distinguish themselves from people who just finished Aby-Leeching the job to 99 and capping merits. Previously, there was almost no benefit to dedicating time to a job. EXP/Merits can be leeched. Gear can be acquired from quests or events (Delve) that don't require you to be on the job, etc. In my opinion, this is a good thing.

[Afania]

Afania, how about you stop ignoring valid arguments and changing them into something the original poster didn't mean at all.


I didn't change anything, I only pointed out the data discrepancy of the original poster. If you want to present an argument, you can't use data that's biased nor invalid, or else your entire argument is invalid.

I'll respond the rest about data discrepancy with OP's reply below.



15k wouldn't really have been much of a "good" party in the ToAU era, but yeah, numbers were around those, I was trying to give approximate number, not mathematically exact ones.
I don't want to bicker with you Afania, but I'm afraid you're forgetting some important factors when comparing CP/hr to LP/hr.


First of all, let's say a good ToAU pt gives 30k merit point/hr, and your solo rate is 20k/hr. So I guess that you aren't soloing on efficient jobs(which is not your fault due to the JP mechanic btw)

You're comparing an optimal ToAU pt setup with subpar setup for CP solo.

Mind you, in order to have a good 75 ToAU pt, you DO need DD x3 COR BRD RDM, and your DD need decent gear as well, AND an empty camp. If you go with setup like BLM x4 or BLU, I highly doubt you can pull off 30k/hr.

If you want to compare the rate/hr with an optimal ToAU pt, then you should also compare it with optimal CP solo job. You can't just use the data from an optimal setup and another data from subpar CP solo job and present your point.

Further more, about the "majority of ppl can't pull of 60k/hr solo argument":



6. Your 60k/hr "numbers" are bollocks because they literally apply to almost none of the jobs in this game. I'm not even going to get into if they are accurate or not because it doesn't matter. Your argument is still flawed because even if they are "the system is fine if you can switch to BLM or BLU to get your CP" is NOT reasonable.

7. And finally even if your numbers above were accurate or applicable to the majority, which they're not, you think 28 hours of continuous game play is a warranted investment for a lot of these categories. As I said in my last post, I don't know what else to say to you.

You're right, the avg merit point/hr is probably a lot higher than avg CP solo/hr. That's because the fact that only a few job can solo CP well and the fact that good method to solo CP aren't well known lower the CP/hr avg.

Most ppl grind merit point at 75 era only use piercing DD x3 COR BRD RDM, with a very strict gear check......no tiger pants no merit pt for you.

Since you don't get invite on jobs like BLU, forcing everyone to job change to a better job, the avg merit pt/hr was increased. Further more, at 75 good camp locations are already well known after years, while good cp solo spot/method are still unknown by the majority cuz CP is new.

On the other hand, if you want decent CP solo rate, you'd need specific job, if you want to grind CP for jobs without AOE nor cor roll bonus, you'd have no choice but deal with it. Without the option to increase CP gain rate via job change, CP gain/hr is inevitably lowered.



But then again, would you consider that "average"? Because that's what I was trying to do, create an approximate average.
I may have been a bit below with 20k cp/hr, but I don't really think I was *that far* honestly.


The point is that, if I'm going to present a data to support my argument, I'd have to filter out the subjective/biased factor. Or else the argument is invalid because your argument is based on subjective/biased factor.

When you present the data, you can't optimal v.s suboptimal setup, nor ignore other factor affecting the avg gain rate.

Sasaraixx said "You can't argue that the CP rate is fine cuz only a few jobs can do it", so OP can use a merit setup only a few jobs can do, but I can't? Double standard.

So sorry, Sasaraixx, OP's data and his argument about the point gain rate is still not as valid as you said. Now let's move on to his next argument, reward/effort ratio.




It's 30kCP for 1 Job Points, vs 10kLP for 1 Merit Points (3:1)
Aside from a couple of Merit Categories, Job Points are much more expensive with the additional upgrades
Psychological factor now, not practical but still very important nonetheless. Aside a couple of notable exceptions, JPs atm are much less relevant than MPs. With the result that you work more for something that gives you less. It has a huge important in the gratification and how the subjective effort:reward ratio feels for every different player, do not underestimate it please, just because it's not a "number".



I didn't deny the fact that JP category is less potent than merit point. But even you agreed that reward/effort ratio is purely subjective.

For example, IMO building an Amano is a complete waste of time, because Tsuru is better and faster to obtain.

However, plenty of players still insist to build an Amano, and they feel the reward is worth it.

Personally, I don't think 28hr of grind for something like 10STR is bad reward:effort ratio. This is obviously MY opinion, if you think it's not worth it, I respect your opinion as well.

However, if you want to use your subjective opinion to advocate certain design is bad, then it won't be as convincing. Thus we still need numbers and math to support argument about reward effort ratio.

Or else we can all pop on the forum, complaining the reward:effort ratio is bad becasue R15 takes 2hr to obtain, just because "I only play 5min a week".

If you want to argue certain design is bad, you can't have your argument based on your personal experience, rather you should use your personal experience to supplement it.



3 /sigh You're not worried about future category expansions because you're confident they will make it easier to grind JP. . . In other words, if they don't change the current system it will be a ridiculous undertaking! You literally just proved our point while disagreeing with us.


Not sure what's wrong with that? My conclusion of "current rate is fine" is based on the data of 28hr to cap 1 category, and the fact that research shows avg MMO player plays 2hr a day. I don't have any data from the future, so no comment on the JP gain rate when it's 30 point per category. Maybe when the JP category increase to 30 the avg solo rate would be 100k/hr instead.

I don't jump into conclusion based on the data I don't have, all my opinion about the game design are purely based on the current data available, while filtering out any biased elements like my points above. I'm not sure why is this proving your point while disagreeing with you, seems like you just want to argue for the sake of wanting to argue.



2. Did you really just respond with "people don't spend most of their time grinding job points. They have nothing else to do SO THEY SPEND MOST OF THEIR TIME GRINDING JOB POINTS?" I just can't . . .


Not sure what you mean by that, I don't think it's relevant to the argument anyways. It seems like you're not interested in arguing the point, only want to argue for the sake of wanting to argue. Despite OP data is biased, even his points are a lot more valid than yours.



The current JP system would have been perfectly fine by 2006's standards, even later.
It's like a fish out of water with the current (retarded, imho) pace/rates of the game nowadays.
I'm sure you realize this, and if you do, then you shouldn't be surprised many players are unhappy about the JP system rates.
Wether you agree or not, you should be able to understand the other people's point of view.

IMO, I think ppl are unhappy about JP rate/hr because the mechanic stops ppl from hitting the most efficient rate/hr and overestimated the actual time required to complete it. Considering the amount of ppl spend more time on building an Amano for 0 increase even in 2014, I don't think THAT many ppl would hate less than 28hr of grind for 10 STR.

[Rhonda]

I think the comparison to TOAU era merit parties is somewhat apt, except that it leaves out what I think is the single biggest failure of the job points system: the individual pools per job. I can get 18,000 an hour solo... on Monk... which kinda works because Monk is the job I want job points for. But if I want them on something like BLM I'm pretty screwed. I've gotten some really amazing rates in Woh Gates.... when I have a Bard. I do have Bard levelled and would gladly bring it to the party.... except I have no need for Bard job points.Naturally some jobs can solo better than others but you'll find MNK, BRD, and a variety of other jobs that are interested in getting JP. Shout for more people. Even if you only end up with a trio, you'd still be able to raise the JP per hour rate, especially if you manage to grab some type of Support job. The failure is less one of the JP system and more one related to comparing Solo JP/hr to Group EXP/hr. Good EXP PTs, ones with actual people and not Trusts, had strong DDs as well healers and support that aren't flaky.


I think I'm still going to endeavor to get Chakra to level 10 since I'm pretty close, but if it goes to 30... forget it. 415 extra job points under the current system is absurd.The system currently works well within the 10 Point per category limit. They've said they were going to raise the cap to 30 but they've also said they were going to make JP easier to acquire in the future.

[Afania]

I honestly don't understand why Mythics and Job Points in general should be basically off limits to "casual" players when there are long term meaningless goals in the game such as afterglows that people can go after if they so desire.



By your own logic you're in the wrong, the masses want JP to flow more freely, game design should cater to the majority of players, not the minority. Let the corner cases grind for their afterglow if they're desperate for a grind, this content is no more engaging than that, let everyone else grind less and do more interesting content more.

I'm not against more JP from current game content, but I'm against Olor's POV that the game should build entirely build based on his/her pace of playing the game.

I also don't understand WHY you guys insist that current playerbase is either extremely casual or extremely hardcore, to a point that it's delve2 weapon or afterglow but nothing else.

There are extremely casual players, there are semi casual players, there are semi hardcore players and there are very hardcore players. This isn't one way or another, to a point that every goal either has to be extremely casual or extremely hardcore.

I play around 6~8hr a week, all my LS(with 20+ ppl), my friends on FL, some players I often play with(that's around 40 ppl btw, quite a bit in 2014 when each server has less than 300 active player on NA time), has similar amount of play time and they can get items with similar pace as me.

So if we want to get a delve R15, it'd take us 2hr of gameplay. I play 6~8hr a week, so I can get 3~4 R15 per week.. I got all other BC item at similar pace as well.

If every mythic/capped JP are as easily done as R15, I'd already finish all of them by now. Because 2hr of work to get something done just isn't long enough to support 6~8hr of game play a week to worth $12 a month sub.

If I build a mythic or grind JP, I can finish them in about 3~5 months, which is just right to worth $12 a sub.

If I go build an afterglow, based on the fact that afterglow is 7x more expensive than RME, it'd take me 21 months~ 35 months to finish them.

IMO, 2hr of work to finish something is too fast and I wouldn't pay sub for it, 21 months~35 months to finish something is too slow so I still wouldn't pay sub for it, 3~5 months is just fine and worth $12 a month.

So, what makes you think that only players that's more casual or more hardcore than me(and ALL of my friends/lsmate) deserve a goal with a reasonable length?

I didn't ask casuals to be filtered out, there are content for them, they're not wasting $12 a month having no reasonable content to play with.

I don't ask requests based on what I need as well. I love 3~5 months goals, but I don't ask SE to change every delve R15 into 3~5 months of work, I also didn't ask the SE to nerf afterglow into 3~5 months of work either.

So, what gives you guys and Olor the right to ask the dev to change EVERY content/goals based on what he/she needs?

Oh and btw, about Olor being the "majority", all I can say is lol. He/she said he/she has BRD leveled and often play BRD, with so many /shout looking for a BRD every server, still can't farm enough plasm for a sword after 6 months?

Olor is certainly not the majority, get real. It seems that Olor either didn't bother to join pt for them, or often not on. Most of the BRD can farm enough plasm in 6 month if they try. In fact the time Olor spends reading this forum, he/she can already get one.

You can't pop on a forum, claiming "I'm the majority, only my opinion counts!" while not really playing the game nor care about making progress in game, and proceed to dismiss other's opinion because they actually spend time to play the game.

Dictatorship much? Cater to the majority shouldn't be the same as eliminate everyone else that's not the majority, especially in Olor's case, He/she is a player that reads the forum more than playing the game. What makes you think Olor's opinion represents everything?

[Afania]

I did a quick google search about MMO user data and found an article on Gamasutra.com, it says avg MMO player plays 22hr a week, with 50% of them working full-time.

So unless you're playing 22hr a week, you don't represent the majority, nor have the right to pop on a forum and tell everyone else to fuck off, sorry!

[Afania]

That scenario being "better" is your, respectable, but subjective point of view. It's not an undeniable, absolute truth.


I don't agree, for sure there are "better" design directions when it comes to game design, which is based on MMO user data research, and it's certainly not all being subjective.

MMO is a product to make money, so the most important factor is to keep as many customer as possible. Olor's argument was pretty much "I'm casual, only my opinion counts because I can't obtain a tojil weapon after 6 months, if you're more hardcore than me, screw you! Go fuck off and play another game".

So, a MMO designed just for Olor is better MMO than a game that's designed for more ppl than Olor? Doesn't sound convincing. If Olor's opinion is legit, that means me and my entire network of connections would have to quit.

Some things in the universe are just not as subjective as you claim. If everything is as subjective as you claim, we wouldn't need game designers.




Aside from that, I'm afraid you're underestimating the amount of time necessary to really "finish" capping JPs on more than one job (and with finish I intend FINISH, not "getting one category to 10 and ignoring the rest 'cause you don't like/want it").
Please stop watching only at the current JP system, but imagine the system in its evolution over time, the cap to 24 different categories and the cap at 30/30 in each of them (465 JPs to cap a single category).

Even no-lifers who bot 24 hours a day with 100k cp/hr would have SERIOUS ISSUES in really capping multiple jobs. And we're talking about a negligible, hardly influencing minority of players in the grand scheme of things.


I already gave my opinion about the JP system after cap increase.....I don't comment on anything that I have no data for, and I'm pretty sure by that time the most efficient JP gain rate/hr would increase as well. I only made comment about current rate/hr.




If you include rolls that's not really solo, unless you go there on COR.
And which ring are we talking about? The 100% bonus one that is a one-time only ring and has only 12 charges?
Or the 5k Sparks one with 50% bonus?
Assuming it's the latter and assuming you're talking about numbers outside of the doubleCP campaigns, you're telling me you get 400cp per kill without chains. Correct?
How many seconds does it take for you to kill one of these targets, accounting for the engage, disengage and player movement time aspects?

Actually any job can get COR roll by /COR, just that COR main has more potent rolls. I'm not sure whether SAM/COR or DD/COR can reach same lv of efficiency without better rolls. I do use WHM+ BRDx2 trusts for march + haste, but that's still solo!

I was talking about 5k spark ring, without rings it's around 400 CP per kill without chains, correct.

I didn't count the seconds, it kinda vary based on how good the pulls and how good the buff was. Most of the time the target die in 2 WS or 2 WS+ 1~2 QD.

The player movement doesn't matter that much since the camp I use has enough mob for me to do CP chain 20+, not alot of running around.

If you're seriously into detail I can probably make a vid >.>

[Sasaraixx]

Afania, I am finished responding to your posts. It seems like I'm "arguing for the sake of arguing" to you because you are unable to comprehend even the most basic of concepts.

The entire point of the solo CP argument is that it ONLY APPLIES TO 3 JOBS. That is in no way similar to the optimal merit parties that were a lot more inclusive. There were at least 3 times as many jobs that could gain LP at a decent rate during that time period.

You also still can't seem to understand that 30k/hr merit parties are still much better than 60k/hr solo capacity points because the latter requires THREE TIMES THE POINTS and more upgrades. And that is on top of the point I just made above about merit parties being vastly more inclusive than JP soloing. Your 60k/he "data" applies to literally less than 15% of jobs.

I cannot take you seriously anymore. "Only a few jobs can solo CP well." That's the entire point!! "People have nothing else to do so they grind job points." Job points are a ridiculous grind!! And you don't see how you are proving our point?

And on top of all that, you accuse other posters of wanting changes that only reflect their play style. Yet you are the one who seems fine with making people spend most of their game time grinding these points in order to cap them and forcing them to play literally only a few jobs in order to solo them. Who is inflicting whose play style on others?

Don't bother responding. I won't read it. I've reached the point where I don't think I can be civil in any further exchanges. Trying to have a rational debate with you is almost impossible.

Continue on your marry way spending most of your time grinding job points and switching to BLU or BLM so that you can solo them. The rest of us will continue asking for changes that place this content in line with the originally announced intention and don't require such an outrageous time sink.

[Afania]

I comprehend everything you said, it's just not the point I was trying to make since I already agree that it shouldn't be limit to AoE jobs, duh. If anything I was arguing that every job needs to reach 25~28hr per 1 category. Not sure why you think I'm disagreeing with that.

[Zhronne]

You're comparing an optimal ToAU pt setup with subpar setup for CP solo.
Hmm no, I'm comparing an average/good ToAU pt to what is either the average/optimal solo setup for many jobs.
A MNK posted a while ago in these pages saying he gets 18k on MNK, which is certainly not a BRD (speaking of which, I get way more than that on my BRD but then again I'm a Mythic BRD so I don't really count like "average" either :p) .
I get 17k on my RUN.
The world outside is full of people who get numbers like these if not even lower.
Yes, some jobs (3? 4?) have it better. What about everybody else?
What about all those players without mules or RME gear?
Sorry to return your argument backwards and I don't want to sound like an ass, but if someone is biased here it seems you are, too much used to your decent rates on your jobs that you fail to see the whole world outside, and it's a much slower world trust me.


Now, getting back in-topic, we could argue comparing a PT setup (ToAU) with Solo setup (solo CP farming).
It's a valid point, but then again game changed. You hardly farmed XP solo unless you were a BST or something else. Back then FFXI was a highly group-focused game.
Now it's getting solo-content more and more, so it's hard to compare.
The fact that almost nobody wants to make CP Pts in gates zones doesn't help either (people lost the habit =/)
And then after 2+ hours of shouting you finally get a tell, you ask if they have ~900 acc unbuffed and they reply that at best they can get to 750 lol, and you're back to square zero.

CP pts in Woh Gates are not super exclusive in terms of the jobs they require, but they're not particularly flexible either, not at all.



Most ppl grind merit point at 75 era only use piercing DD x3 COR BRD RDM, with a very strict gear check......no tiger pants no merit pt for you.
I guess every server is a different world then, because I don't really remember those strict gear checks.
Majority of people weren't even using stuff like Windower Script macros, let alone stuff like Spellcast or Gearswap back then.
RMEs weren't a "requirement" (because hardly anybody had one) and people were usually getting invites based on reputation or... lack of alternatives I guess.
I mean, I remember getting XP invites on birds on PUP. Yes, PUP, omg I'm not even kidding lol (after the "Daze" ws patch!)
But either way, I think we're sliding very off topic now.


you'd have no choice but deal with it.
Why does the only alternative be this?
Why can't it be "we expose the issue and SE does something about this system to make it more even for all jobs"
Why can't it be this way? Why is the only available option "dealing with it"?



data here, data there, blahblah
Sorry for the cut, but it's a recurrent topic of your post.
Afania... this is a forum post among players of a videogame.
It's not an university essay about statistics.
What, did you expect people to post semi-parametric Statistical inference?
I don't see why you're behaving like I tried to act allmighty and give this impression.
I have estimations, averages, general stuff with some numbers provided.
The 20k/hr number wasn't based on the fact that some people can easily do 60k/hr solo, that I can do 90k/hr with a good pt or that Byrth can do 100k/hr solo with his BLM.
It was mostly based on my experience on a plethora of other jobs (yes, they exist) and other players which get actually lower than that.
Yes, 20k was maybe a bit lower, I probably should have used something like 25k/hr, but then again I don't see how you could call such a small difference "highly biased".
It's just a small difference which is perfectly legit from my point of view within the range of exreme approximation I was trying to achieve.



I didn't deny the fact that JP category is less potent than merit point. But even you agreed that reward/effort ratio is purely subjective.
No I said something different.
I said there is an important subjective aspect in that, I didn't say it's "purely subjective".
You have to see it on a large scale.
If 10 people say it's fine and 990 say it's not, who do you think it's going to get more attention/relevance?



However, if you want to use your subjective opinion
Afania, again, how can you call it subjective?
I invited it two times already and make it three to judge the system not only in its current form (unbalanced but bearable) but in its future forms.
Stop imagining 6 categories requiring 55 points each to cap.
Start imagining 24 categories each requiring 465 points to cap.
How can you call *this* scenario reven remotely "subjective"? Unless you're a masochist of course, I wouldn't argue against that then.

I'm not advocating anything, just like I'm certainly not asking them to make JPs as irrelevantly pointless as XP/MP are today (please: no!).
But at the same time it's pretty clear this system, atm, is not balanced in several, multiple aspects that have been sufficiently enough exposed during this thread.
The fact that some people can infact "escape" this thing thanks to playing on one of the few lucky jobs or thanks to the fact they can afk and leech CP surely doesn't make the system less "unbalanced"?

Please, do not treat me like I'm an envyous kid who has zero JPs and wants to cap before tomorrow because I'm totally not that kind of guy (as a matter of fact, despite me playing only a few days a week I already have more than 170 farmed JPs).
I'm not talking out of personal interest or personal bias.
I'm talking from as much as an objective point of view as I can do.
I'm not on either side of the extremes, not on the side of who wants JPs=MPs, not on the side of who wants JPs to stay like they are now.
I consider both stances to be exagerations.
The system needs some work, but they don't have to completely destroy it or turn it into something it was never meant to be.
It was meant to be something for long term goals, leave it that way! They just need to tune the effort:reward ratio a bit better and increase the number of sources from which you can reasonably gain CP. Nothing more, nothing less.

[Olor]

As a response to no one in particular, because I'm too lazy to find a quote:
A change to allow JP to be shared across jobs would be a disincentive to playing jobs for fun. I've seen plenty of people do Delve as WAR, BLU, THF, RUN, and DRK and many of them claim to do it for the JP. Also, the job-exclusivity of JP allows people who are have been playing their job for a while to distinguish themselves from people who just finished Aby-Leeching the job to 99 and capping merits. Previously, there was almost no benefit to dedicating time to a job. EXP/Merits can be leeched. Gear can be acquired from quests or events (Delve) that don't require you to be on the job, etc. In my opinion, this is a good thing.

I agree with this completely.



The system needs some work, but they don't have to completely destroy it or turn it into something it was never meant to be.
It was meant to be something for long term goals, leave it that way! They just need to tune the effort:reward ratio a bit better and increase the number of sources from which you can reasonably gain CP. Nothing more, nothing less.


I also agree with this - with the caveat that job points need to be a bonus, not a job fix. It's simply not reasonable to say "oh well pets can't hit the broad side of a giant monster even with acc food - lets fix it with job points" - people should be able to play their job in current content with zero job points - the points should be a bonus not basic.

[Afania]

Hmm no, I'm comparing an average/good ToAU pt to what is either the average/optimal solo setup for many jobs.
A MNK posted a while ago in these pages saying he gets 18k on MNK, which is certainly not a BRD (speaking of which, I get way more than that on my BRD but then again I'm a Mythic BRD so I don't really count like "average" either :p) .
I get 17k on my RUN.
The world outside is full of people who get numbers like these if not even lower.
Yes, some jobs (3? 4?) have it better. What about everybody else?


Just curious, did you really farm CP on BRD or are you joking? Lol >.> I was just guessing and using it as an example >.>

I didn't argue that none AoE jobs could have a harder time to farm point, that's the reason why I suggested SE to remove the job restriction so every job can grind point faster by job change.

Sure, I can make alternative suggestion that EVERY job can farm CP faster solo, but then the job that's already farming fast would ended up farming even faster.

I feel 20hr~30hr of gameplay to cap 1 category is "just right" due to how short endgame current content is. By the data you provided, other jobs would need 3 times more effort to farm equal amount of job point. If every job including BRD and WHM can cap 1 category in 20~30hr of grind, then BLM would ended up finishing 1 category in 6~10hrs.

Personally, I think it'd be a little too fast unless SE can create content faster or create content with longer life span. For past 4 months all we got was higher BC and new skirmish, which doesn't last nearly as long. So we'd see a wave of players finishing 1 JP category after 6hr of grind and complain about nothing to do in game again.

If SE can create content that lasts longer, I wouldn't object 6~10hr of grind for 1 category.



I guess every server is a different world then, because I don't really remember those strict gear checks.
Majority of people weren't even using stuff like Windower Script macros, let alone stuff like Spellcast or Gearswap back then.
RMEs weren't a "requirement" (because hardly anybody had one) and people were usually getting invites based on reputation or... lack of alternatives I guess.


Of course RME weren't a requirement, E didn't exist back then, there are less than 10 mythic owner per server.

If you try to get a pt on PLD SCH etc, it's hard.



Why does the only alternative be this?
Why can't it be "we expose the issue and SE does something about this system to make it more even for all jobs"
Why can't it be this way? Why is the only available option "dealing with it"?


I don't mind if CP gain rate is even for all jobs, but I don't see a way to make it even for all jobs. Some jobs will always grind CP faster regardless. They can create a content that gives 60k/cp per hour, but the content itself will probably exclusive like every other content.

It's more about an ideal impossible to accomplish, rather than against the ideal.



Sorry for the cut, but it's a recurrent topic of your post.
Afania... this is a forum post among players of a videogame.
It's not an university essay about statistics.
What, did you expect people to post semi-parametric Statistical inference?
I don't see why you're behaving like I tried to act allmighty and give this impression.
I have estimations, averages, general stuff with some numbers provided.
The 20k/hr number wasn't based on the fact that some people can easily do 60k/hr solo, that I can do 90k/hr with a good pt or that Byrth can do 100k/hr solo with his BLM.
It was mostly based on my experience on a plethora of other jobs (yes, they exist) and other players which get actually lower than that.
Yes, 20k was maybe a bit lower, I probably should have used something like 25k/hr, but then again I don't see how you could call such a small difference "highly biased".
It's just a small difference which is perfectly legit from my point of view within the range of exreme approximation I was trying to achieve.


It doesn't matter if you're making a point about university essay or video game design direction, if you want to make a point, you need to back up your reasons with numbers. I find the number you were using are quite different from my personal experience and what I've read on the internet, and you based your entire argument around it by adding them. So I just pointed that out.

You can argue that my personal experience is narrow, but I can make the same argument for your numbers as well. We all made argument based on personal experience, but it is possible that our personal experience is narrow minded and wrong info.

Thus I use the highest number I've heard and read on blogs/forums, instead of limiting it with my personal experience only. 28hr of grind to cap is my personal experience, I also shared many other's experience as well, which is higher.




No I said something different.
I said there is an important subjective aspect in that, I didn't say it's "purely subjective".
You have to see it on a large scale.
If 10 people say it's fine and 990 say it's not, who do you think it's going to get more attention/relevance?


It's human nature to complain stuff is bad, without seeing the big picture though.

Of course it's easy to complain about gear/content that takes longer than 5hr to finish because "I only play 5hr a week, I'd like to obtain 1 item per week or else I'm wasting my time".

But if you look at it from the profit POV, 5hr is too short in the realm of MMO. Once ppl play for 5hr and finish everything, they'd go to next game.

Thus I wouldn't say 990 player's opinion are always more relevant, I have to read what they say and see whether their points make sense.

I would LOVE to finish everything in 5hr and complain about this game about the pace with everyone else, but I know if I play this game for 5hr and get it done with, most ppl would quit and I'd waste half of my sub sitting in town doing nothing, thus I don't really complain about the pace of the game.



Afania, again, how can you call it subjective?


I don't think we were talking about the same thing. When you said "subjective" in my post, I was replying to Olor's post about his/her opinion of "Everyone else that's more hardcore than me should gtfo and quit"



I'm not advocating anything, just like I'm certainly not asking them to make JPs as irrelevantly pointless as XP/MP are today (please: no!).
But at the same time it's pretty clear this system, atm, is not balanced in several, multiple aspects that have been sufficiently enough exposed during this thread.
The fact that some people can infact "escape" this thing thanks to playing on one of the few lucky jobs or thanks to the fact they can afk and leech CP surely doesn't make the system less "unbalanced"?

Please, do not treat me like I'm an envyous kid who has zero JPs and wants to cap before tomorrow because I'm totally not that kind of guy (as a matter of fact, despite me playing only a few days a week I already have more than 170 farmed JPs).
I'm not talking out of personal interest or personal bias.
I'm talking from as much as an objective point of view as I can do.
I'm not on either side of the extremes, not on the side of who wants JPs=MPs, not on the side of who wants JPs to stay like they are now.
I consider both stances to be exagerations.
The system needs some work, but they don't have to completely destroy it or turn it into something it was never meant to be.
It was meant to be something for long term goals, leave it that way! They just need to tune the effort:reward ratio a bit better and increase the number of sources from which you can reasonably gain CP. Nothing more, nothing less.

I definitely agreed that the system needs some work, and I definitely agree that everyone should be able to solo 1 category to cap in 20~30hr, which is a number I feel right.

I simply disagree with 2 opinion you made, one is the fact that you calculate CP/hr based on subpar setup then compare it with pink bird merit pt in ToAU, another one is your argument about "this is 2014, the pace is faster, so JP farm should be faster too".

I forgot to reply that 2014 post of yours, so I'll reply here. 2014 pace is faster than 2006, which is fact, I didn't say it's not. But I think without afterglow/JP/mythics, current pace is TOO FAST for a MMO that it's bad for the game.

So we need some slower paced content to balance it, and I feel job point is a good content to give ppl something to work on. It's not like you're forced to do it, if you don't like it don't do it.

[Demonjustin]

I did a quick google search about MMO user data and found an article on Gamasutra.com, it says avg MMO player plays 22hr a week, with 50% of them working full-time.

So unless you're playing 22hr a week, you don't represent the majority, nor have the right to pop on a forum and tell everyone else to fuck off, sorry!My normal play time was 4~8 hours a day every day. Assuming 4 hours a day that's 28 hours a week, I meet your criteria, **** off.

[Afania]

My normal play time was 4~8 hours a day every day. Assuming 4 hours a day that's 28 hours a week, I meet your criteria, **** off.




Nope, 28hr is higher than 22hr, so you're still not the majority! You can't be the majority if you're more hardcore than the majority!

Also idk how faster mythic/JP farm is equal to a FFXI that's more fun, but w/e.

[Selindrile]

What I disagree with is that blu does not have great job point categories. The best one of course is the increase in spell points. The cap was 60, but it will be 90 when the cap on job points increases. That is godly, a 50% increase. Increases in base damage of spells, percentage increases in skillchain damage, conserve MP when chain casting the most powerful blu spells, how are any of these not great? The only bad one was learning chance, but that is being replaced with a passive accuracy bonus, and accuracy is very important in end game.

Set Points: Awesome, no doubt, debatably the best job point category, though I'd give it to pet haste if Bst could actually use their pets effectively in any real content.

Azure Lore Effect: Increase the base damage of spells during this effect by 1 per upgrade: Once per hour, your spells will end up doing maybe +100 damage accounting for multipliers at 30/30, lets say you get off 6 spells during your 1hour which is pretty optimistic, and not usually efficient to just spam spells anyway. 600 Damage an hour, for playing inefficiently, woo, even during a zerg while you'd gain some extra damage from spamming spells your still better off just TPing/WSing outside of CA, so realistically it's more like +100~150 damage for one spell once an hour.

Unbridled Wisdom: For 1 minute per hour, +Up to 90 conserve MP, which means it will proc almost every time, but you have to realize Conserve MP when procced conserves on average 28% of the spells cost, so, all mathed out, it's "Your spells refund an average of 25% of their value for 1 minute out of an hour. Again, saying you're playing sub-optimally and spamming high MP cost spells like thrashing assault, and other quick ones, lets say you get off 6 spells that cost 100MP base, you conserve 150MP, in an hour, again likely playing inefficiently during this time to get more use out of this.

Burst Affinity: Nobody uses this outside of cleaving, and everything you cleave dies in 1 BA'd spell generally anyway, even if you did fully JP it, it wouldn't push most magical spells into the realm of usability, they're mostly pretty unusable outside of cleavable content, in which case this doesn't matter.

Chain Affinity Effect: On most party content, DDs' WS spam prevents you from getting full use out of this, but, it's overall not bad, chaining for 4k or so when you do means about +1200 damage each CA (at 30/30), which IS rather nice IF you can manage to get the chains off during WS spam, in solo content, almost all mobs won't live through a chain anyway without this.

Learning Chance: An absolute joke as is, but admittedly will be pretty good when they reforge it into Macc for physical additional hit spells, but our hitrates are rather atrocious on these as is on anything higher end, will this make up for it, maybe, we'll have to see, this one has potential.

tl;dr : Blue JPs are 3x crap, 2 situational, and 1 excellent one, but yes Blu is still ahead of the curve on job points alone, admittedly most others are really terrible. But Blu still in the middle of the pack for overall job usability. They're still no Brd or Whm or Sam, or Mnk, or Rng or even Pld or Cor or Rdm in most endgame desirability, they fall in around Drk and War as sometimes acceptable jobs, depending on content, but I full well admit they need less help than some other jobs.

[Demonjustin]

Also idk how faster mythic/JP farm is equal to a FFXI that's more fun, but w/e.That would take a lot of explaining on what type of person I am which is completely off topic so talking about it here seems out of place.

[Mefuki]

Don't you think it'd be good for the game to have both short AND long term goals? If everything we short term, everyone would cap out on everything, get bored(usually) and quit. If everything were long term, everyone would feel like they were spinning their wheels not getting anywhere, get bored and quit.

[Demonjustin]

I'm not saying make all goals short term, but there's a large disparity between the short and long term goals of this game. Almost all goals that don't fall into one of the extremes are luck based, not slightly luck based, but severely. I'm talking about things like Skirmish gear or Dring, things that could take one attempt, or one thousand attempts. I believe the longest goals in the game that are made for the most diehard people should be the vanity items like Afterglow, next up should be the top tier gear like Mythics, then Relics, and so on. Job Points aren't something I'd put anywhere near that class, but as they are a background accumulating point system I think they should be faster than they are by far. The primary issue with long term is how long you want long term to take, if you leave it as it is then in my opinion it's far too long. That's not to say take out the fact it is long term nor to shorten long term goals in general to an extreme degree, simply enough so that long term and short term goals aren't such extremes and one can feel like they're making progress more easily.

I understand this is a MMO but honestly I don't understand why people want to keep goals in this game that literally take a minimum of 3~5 months to complete per weapon no matter how much you work on it or how much you've put into it already. I'm all for long term goals, but really, I think this is a bit too long term. Job Points as they are currently fit this as well. Focusing on Job Points and nothing else I think my old rate was 2 points per hour. 55 points per category currently and 6 categories total means for a single job to cap you need 330 points. That's 115 hours at my old pace. Assuming Afania's average rate of 22 hours of play time per week you're looking at around 3 hours 10 minutes a day, that means about 37 days of spending your entire play time for the average player doing nothing but Job Point farming from start to finish from the time you log in assuming you are farming at the rate I used to in Dho without competition. One month for a single job to be finished assuming you play no other jobs and do no other events. That's too long.

[Afania]

I'm not saying make all goals short term, but there's a large disparity between the short and long term goals of this game. Almost all goals that don't fall into one of the extremes are luck based, not slightly luck based, but severely. I'm talking about things like Skirmish gear or Dring, things that could take one attempt, or one thousand attempts. I believe the longest goals in the game that are made for the most diehard people should be the vanity items like Afterglow, next up should be the top tier gear like Mythics, then Relics, and so on. Job Points aren't something I'd put anywhere near that class, but as they are a background accumulating point system I think they should be faster than they are by far. The primary issue with long term is how long you want long term to take, if you leave it as it is then in my opinion it's far too long. That's not to say take out the fact it is long term nor to shorten long term goals in general to an extreme degree, simply enough so that long term and short term goals aren't such extremes and one can feel like they're making progress more easily.

I understand this is a MMO but honestly I don't understand why people want to keep goals in this game that literally take a minimum of 3~5 months to complete per weapon no matter how much you work on it or how much you've put into it already. I'm all for long term goals, but really, I think this is a bit too long term. Job Points as they are currently fit this as well. Focusing on Job Points and nothing else I think my old rate was 2 points per hour. 55 points per category currently and 6 categories total means for a single job to cap you need 330 points. That's 115 hours at my old pace. Assuming Afania's average rate of 22 hours of play time per week you're looking at around 3 hours 10 minutes a day, that means about 37 days of spending your entire play time for the average player doing nothing but Job Point farming from start to finish from the time you log in assuming you are farming at the rate I used to in Dho without competition. One month for a single job to be finished assuming you play no other jobs and do no other events. That's too long.


It's not too long with the current life span of content though, unless you only want to play this game for 1 month and quit. Also if you get bored/unmotivated because you do too much job point farm, then you need to change your mentality - -

I don't force myself to finish all category 1 month after release, I just do it when I wait for ls/friends to pop. It's nice to have something to work on that isn't going to be done after a few hrs then toss it next update.

[Demonjustin]

It's not too long with the current life span of content though, unless you only want to play this game for 1 month and quit. Also if you get bored/unmotivated because you do too much job point farm, then you need to change your mentality - -



I don't force myself to finish all category 1 month after release, I just do it when I wait for ls/friends to pop. It's nice to have something to work on that isn't going to be done after a few hrs then toss it next update.Right now it's 37 days by your own numbers, for a person who you said is the average MMO player to finish this for a single job, not multiple, and this is on top of their full time job. You're basically making this a second job, something I'm sure people would love to come home and do after working for 8 hours.

Am I saying people will do this? No, it'd be stupid to do it, but if you were to do it all back to back that's the time required for such a task right now. You are someone who doesn't care to finish it all instantly and you only do it when you are waiting for things, awesome, I often did it the same. The problem is it's a system meant to happen over time in the background as you normally play and if you go out of your way to do it then it should be quite a bit faster. The problem is having it accumulate in the background isn't working at all.

Assuming you only play one job even it's still far too slow to get very far. My RDM has one category at 8 and 27 points ready to spend, nothing else has been spent thus far and it's the only job I play. In what I think was 4 months since the release of Job Points my only job I play has obtained only that, which mathed out is 63 points I believe. I've not been the most devoted person to obtaining them but I've done plenty of Skirmish and Delve since the release as well as plenty of parties both during and outside of double campaigns and I've used rings every time including my anniversary ring. All of that stacked up and that's all I have to show.

In the end it comes down to simply being too slow, no matter how you go about getting these points it's not fast enough for you to get a good deal of points as it is without absurd amounts of time spent. To this day the only person I know who has capped their points in even a single job is someone I know who wasn't even at their keyboard while they did it. So while I'm not against it taking long enough we don't all finish every category of every job in the first week after they're released, I'd like to be able to actually make some progress doing other content or be able to focus on this specifically and bang out 5~10 points a hour in a good party on a constant basis.

[Zhronne]

Just curious, did you really farm CP on BRD or are you joking? Lol >.> I was just guessing and using it as an example >.>
Stop offending my DD Bard, it's awesome, you're making me cry Q___Q
Well, I got Horn99, Daubla99 and a Carnwenhan119, I kinda love my Bard.
ddBRD is much better than people think it is. Especially for solo. You get 4songs permanently on you, it makes a huge difference when soloing.
For instance, I'm getting way more points on BRD than on my RUN. Probably more than my MNK as well lol.

Either way, getting back IT.
I don't think removing the job restrictions would be the right solution for this problem.
The easiest/fastest solution? Probably so, but the right one? I don't think so.
As I said previously in my opinion there are pros and cons in a system that has job-specific pools compared to the general cross pool of Merit Points.
Some examples:
It forces you to play that specific job. One of the thing that a lot of players whined about in the post-abyssea FFXI compared to the pre-abyssea one, is that you could leech all the way to cap and find yourself already geared, full of merits etc. There was hardly a way to show "dedication" to that certain job. JPs offer this, because you are forced to slowly grind on that job to achieve Job Points. From this perspective, I consider this a pro.
Since the system is currently unbalanced/flawed, some jobs have it easy and everything else does not. Some jobs in particular would have quite a hard time soloing JPs and good luck finding a pt. This is so bad that it makes you wish you could farm JPs on another job. It would be cool, faster and more efficient, but it would kinda completely defeat the purpose with which the system was created to begin with.




I don't mind if CP gain rate is even for all jobs, but I don't see a way to make it even for all jobs. Some jobs will always grind CP faster regardless.
I agree with this, I think it's utopistic to expect anything different.
At the same time though, I think they can surely work to close the gap.
What they need to do is offer alternative ways to efficiently ("efficient" up to a certain degree, of course) to farm CPs.
That way people who can already farm at 60k/hr or more atm will keep doing that, but other people will have different ways to farm CP and still obtain decent rates, at least 40k/hr would be decent enough with the current caps (different story once they unlock the cap of course)



I forgot to reply that 2014 post of yours, so I'll reply here. 2014 pace is faster than 2006, which is fact, I didn't say it's not. But I think without afterglow/JP/mythics, current pace is TOO FAST for a MMO that it's bad for the game.
I'm not sure about this, I kinda have mixed feelings myself.
I mean, if we're talking about my personal tastes then yes, absolutely, this game is way too fast from the "sweet spot" where I'd like it to be. Maybe not in every single aspect but in the majority of them for sure.
But too fast compared to other MMOs?
Hmmmmm... not sure about that. Which MMOs were you thinking about when you wrote that?
If I think about WoW or FFXIV for instance, they don't really seem slower than FFXI.
Altough it's hard to make a 1:1 comparison since those games play so different than FFXI.
But it seems to me that even after all the huge changes FFXI has been going through as of late, they're still more focused on speed/instant gratification than FFXI is, and that is clearly one of the (many) keys in their success among a wider range of players.


And to end the topic, I welcome slowed paced content with open arms.
But that doesn't change the fact that the overall (i.e. not for a couple of specific jobs) situation of the JP system is not quite where it should be, yet.

[Afania]

Stop offending my DD Bard, it's awesome, you're making me cry Q___Q
Well, I got Horn99, Daubla99 and a Carnwenhan119, I kinda love my Bard.
ddBRD is much better than people think it is. Especially for solo. You get 4songs permanently on you, it makes a huge difference when soloing.
For instance, I'm getting way more points on BRD than on my RUN. Probably more than my MNK as well lol.


Nah, I didn't make fun of your DD BRD, I was just surprised that I pulled out a random none DD job and it's really the job you've been using D:

4 songs could have been awesome before trusts exist, now that with BRD trusts the gap between BRD solo and another job is a lot smaller. I'd probably have less CP/hr than you if I don't have haste+march buff from trusts.

I think RUN may have to rely on fell cleave for faster CP farm, but I haven't try that personally nor know how to pull that off efficiently.



Either way, getting back IT.
I don't think removing the job restrictions would be the right solution for this problem.
The easiest/fastest solution? Probably so, but the right one? I don't think so.
As I said previously in my opinion there are pros and cons in a system that has job-specific pools compared to the general cross pool of Merit Points.
Some examples:
[list] It forces you to play that specific job. One of the thing that a lot of players whined about in the post-abyssea FFXI compared to the pre-abyssea one, is that you could leech all the way to cap and find yourself already geared, full of merits etc. There was hardly a way to show "dedication" to that certain job. JPs offer this, because you are forced to slowly grind on that job to achieve Job Points. From this perspective, I consider this a pro.


I don't agree that JP farm is the right way to force the player to play specific job. IMO it'd just make players farm JP harder on specific job due to the fact that content is often selective.

For example, if a content offers 100k/hr a run, but it's a PLD+RNG setup content, then the only job that can get 100k/hr are PLD RNG RDM BRD or COR.

Unless the content gives equal opportunity for every job, in the end every job would still ended up having a gap.




I'm not sure about this, I kinda have mixed feelings myself.
I mean, if we're talking about my personal tastes then yes, absolutely, this game is way too fast from the "sweet spot" where I'd like it to be. Maybe not in every single aspect but in the majority of them for sure.
But too fast compared to other MMOs?
Hmmmmm... not sure about that. Which MMOs were you thinking about when you wrote that?


I can't think of any MMO that allows the player to obtain the highest raid gear in 20 min~2hr of grind with ZERO cooldown time....can you? >.>

It's a lot harder to obtain the highest raid gear in FFXIV back when I still play, even if you leeched in an elite LS and beat the content 1/1, there's still a pretty big chance that you won't win lot/stuff won't drop, then you'd have to wait for 1 week to try again.

In FFXI you can farm delve2 none stop and cap everything in a very short time....it's just not right.

IMO a MMO either needs cool down time or longer grind to keep players around, personally I HATE weekly lock out in ARR with a passion, because I'm paying a monthly fee but only get to play a few hr a week. I'd like to play as much as possible if I pay for a monthly fee, that's why I support longer grind. If I'm a no-lifer with 40hr a week of playtime, I should be able to invest 40hr of my time to make progress, instead of having artificial weekly lock out telling me "no, you can only play 6hr a week because we don't let you make anymore progress after 6hr of playtime"

[Zhronne]

4 songs could have been awesome before trusts exist, now that with BRD trusts the gap between BRD solo and another job is a lot smaller.
Kinda depends on your definition of "lot". It is smaller for sure, absolutely, but you have to keep in mind that atm Trusts have no song potency. Take Marches for instance, theirs give 15.7 haste (both together), mine give 31,3 haste.
And that's not considering the small factors like choosing the "right" songs 100% of the time, being able to put 3 ballads on healer Trust (that's like what, 21mp/tic?) and never dropping.
If I feel like I'm not gonna lose attention I can keep up 5 songs for a few hours as well.



I don't agree that JP farm is the right way to force the player to play specific job.
I think it might be a matter of subtle perspectives.
I don't know how the system will evolve through time of course, but I'm pretty confident when they thought it they meant it to be something to stimulate and promote playing on different jobs, not to "force" them.

The reason why I think your proposed solution would be very simple to implement and it would "work" but it would be the "wrong" one is because at that point everybody (or the majority of people) would level those 3 jobs that have it easy for CP and farm CP on them only and then spend them on whatever job you like.
Quite a sad perspective, wouldn't it?

[FrankReynolds]

Kinda depends on your definition of "lot". It is smaller for sure, absolutely, but you have to keep in mind that atm Trusts have no song potency. Take Marches for instance, theirs give 15.7 haste (both together), mine give 31,3 haste.
And that's not considering the small factors like choosing the "right" songs 100% of the time, being able to put 3 ballads on healer Trust (that's like what, 21mp/tic?) and never dropping.
If I feel like I'm not gonna lose attention I can keep up 5 songs for a few hours as well.



I think it might be a matter of subtle perspectives.
I don't know how the system will evolve through time of course, but I'm pretty confident when they thought it they meant it to be something to stimulate and promote playing on different jobs, not to "force" them.

The reason why I think your proposed solution would be very simple to implement and it would "work" but it would be the "wrong" one is because at that point everybody (or the majority of people) would level those 3 jobs that have it easy for CP and farm CP on them only and then spend them on whatever job you like.
Quite a sad perspective, wouldn't it?

If they keep the JP system as is and raise the cap to 30 or 45, eventually I will be forced to earn cap points on jobs that suck at earning cap points just to keep those jobs up to par.

If they make JP transferable between all jobs, I'll end up playing some other job I don't want to play all the time in order to earn points just to keep my other jobs up to par.

I'd rather get it over fast on a job I don;t necessarily like than do it slowly on one I do like. Bonus points because if they make them non-job-specific, I can still opt to do them slowly on the job I choose if need be. So if I choose to go grind them out on BST instead of getting them quick on BRD, I can.