Jeuno Quest Bulliten Board

This was posted in another thread, but I'd Like to respond to it here.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Karbuncle

You say a player can put put a request for help at a cost (i.e gil? or an item) and hope players chose it?
How would you make a request?
How would rewards be handled?
What types of Rewards are there? Exp?
Could you leave messages on these boards if you're say, in a different time zone but still want to help?
How would it handle Different languages (i.E would it translate it? or would there be JP/EN requests separately/Together?)
What Items do you mean when you say "Sign up using items"? Do the players who help get this item? is it lost?
How long would the request stay on the board? would you get a refund if no one took it? Could you cancel it?

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I need to point out that there are numbers and items in here I use for examples. The exact numbers / items used to achieve ballance would require data that only Square has access to.

The easiest way to do this would be to tie it to the auction house. That is where you would make / view / cancel requests. The amount of requests you can make is limited by the points. Here is an example:

TaruX just started the game. He gets 5 points for joining the game. He is now 18+ and needs help getting his support job. So he flags the quest and heads back to Windurst to post his request. He uses 3 points to post his request for help because he needs all 3 items. MithraY needs help with G1, but she does not have any points. So she helps TaruX get his items and is then rewarded with 3 points. That 3 points will only get her 1 of the 3 items she needs. So she needs to work up 6 more points.

The amount of points you use / get are based on the quest difficulty. Due to the number of people who already have so much done, there would need to be some kind of daily point reward to get enough points in to the system to make it work. Asside from point rewards, there would also be gil and item rewards. Mostly for Missions, the gil reward would be based off an amount the poster contributes. Another example:

TaruX needs to fight the Shadow Lord so he can get in to Dynamis (I know this one is a little out of date but please bear with me) he puts up 20k + points for the post. MithraY whops his ass on RDM and is rewarded with 100k + points or perhaps signs up with someone else and they each get 50k and split the points.

When dealing with these new multimember situations, the people who sign up for help with stuff they need are also charged points, but only a percent of the total. Everyone is required to have full points when they sign up, but the points will be returned apaun completion. I.E. if everyone needs the Shadowllord fight, all points are returned. Or if just TaruX and MithraY needed it, they would each pay full points and have half returned apaun completion.

Item rewards are more for things that drop items everyone is after:

TaruX needs his Brown Belt. So does everyone else on his server who FCed MNK. Everyone who signs up to help him with the Dodo would get Dodo skins of their own.

Allowing people to choose their reward would expand willingness to help. But I would need access to more data to figure out how to balance it. Speaking of balance, the next example is items:

TaruX wants a Genbu Seals for synergy. The amount of points he is charged is based on offseting the drop percentage for his shield. Instead of full points, he offers his pop items to the board. Because the seal is a %100 drop and he has pop items, he is not charged very much for this transaction. MithraY wants the Shield. She is chatged a hefty amount of points to make the shield drop %100. She can offset that by offering her own pop items.

You're already rolling the dice by using pop items on a random PT so don't give me the "it's not far" elitist QQ about making drop rates %100. But ultimatly the exact balance of the item / point / gil offset would be based on numbers that are not known to me. Items could also be used along with gil and points to help conrol the number of posts on the buliten board. For example before you post that you need help with G1 you must trade in 4 zinc cause the AH has been running low. The tier of materials or amount would be based on the difficulty of the mission / quest, but what you trade in would be based on the demands of the market. Those items would then be sold by the board on the AH for the going rate. But these are just some of the many examples of ways you could tweak the system so it balances out the whole game.

Finally we come to the language issue. This would not be a message board, but system using the existing data files to show information in the client's native language. I.E. TaruX is English and MithraY is JP, they would each see the board's data in their own language.

That's as much deatil as I can afford the time to put in for a casual request. If Square is really intrested, they know where to find me.

I really like the idea of having some way of determining who needs/wants to get certain missions and quests done from most major game areas. However, I think the system you are describing, while certainly well thought out, would never be picked up due to it requiring a lot of effort to implement. You say the system is best implemented through the auction houses (presumably because you can access them from all major locations), but this would require changing the way players interact with the auction house, there would have to be some new system for selecting whether you wanted the Board or the AH. You could just add NPCs or objects near the AHs to remedy this but now you're taking up more system resources by adding more models to the area. You're also talking about adding a "Points" system to the Board (I'm assuming this is to both prevent spam and make sure people actually get help), but the issue is how people check this. Is it through a new NPC or is it a menu item? I also don't really see an issue of people not helping, forcing people to group up artificially might have further repercussions (I don't know if this would really be an issue, it's just something to consider, the social consequences of creating this system are not for me to talk about). These points also require storing more information for each player. I also think that the board itself might require the creation of new data (you've stated above that it could just access existing data, maybe you are more well versed in the technical aspects of the game than I am). A Board "Post" must now exist somewhere containing information (or in the least the location of information) such as who is requesting, how many people have already signed up, what each reward would be (points, gil, item), the cost, what the quest or mission is, and probably a text description written by the poster. Finally the whole reward system you describe seems to me like it would throw off the balance of the game (maybe I've misunderstood you). It seems like you're suggesting that if I requested a party for to kill an xNM for x item like minded players could also receive said item, even though only one dropped, as a reward for helping (again maybe I'm misunderstanding). That would then devalue items or require them to be re-balanced perhaps ruining their beneficial nature. It also seems like it might be fairly complicated to figure out for instance if a request of that nature had been completed. To sum all that up for you: I really like the idea, but I think it would be difficult to implement at a technical level and have a lot of unforeseen repercussions.

I'm not just going to nitpick you though, I think this feature could ultimately be implemented in much simpler ways. For instance it seems to me that another search function could be added. The server already knows what quests I have active and what missions I am on. I think it would be a lot easier to add a mission/quest search feature. This would (at least as I imagine it) allow you to search for players in an area (or the whole server or whatever) who have the selected quest/mission active. I think really the biggest issue with this is that the game would have to either present you with a full list of missions and quests (which is clearly unreasonable) or would require the game to keep track of all the quests you have active and present you with that list (which may require creating more data or menus etc). I suppose another option would be requiring the quest name to be input as the search term (like the search name feature). I suppose it could also be pointed out that unlike your suggestion I don't really provide an incentive for people to help, but I've never had an issue with the community's willingness to help out. I think the biggest plus of doing something more of this nature is that it uses existing systems, menus, and commands.

Anyway, if I've misunderstood your post please feel free to correct me. If you have a better understanding of some of the underlying technical elements of the game, feel free to correct me on that too. Like I said at the start this is the kind of feature that I'd like to see exist.

:D

...really, people. Use search comments. The JP players utilize the mission/quest category for them far more than the NA playerbase does.

I have no idea what JP players use in thei /seacom because they refuse to auto trans. Even if it were true that they use /seacom more than us, it does not help us if no one else uses it. But I wouldn't mind if Squarre would save our /seacoms when we log and let us file one under each category. I don't think the board would be as hard to implement as Xale says, but I'll take what we can get.

I've actually gotten to get quite a few things done simply because I put it up in /seacom and bazaar. I got my DRG feet simply because I had it in /seacom--was farming chests off pucks and I got a tell out of nowhere from a THF farming funguar. Partied up and I got my feet and I stuck around for him/her (was a stranger) to finish seals off the NM.

I've also tracked down people that posted in server pages at other sites...even the job pages too. Others have looked me up because I posted for guidance on something and we linked up and got her done.

There are already several tools available for helping you out with teaming up, people just don't use them. Surprises me too after Magian's has been out so long--this is one of the most obvious reasons to use the comments. Who knows why they aren't using the tools. Maybe they didn't RTFM....maybe they haven't done any research and don't know about all the sites out there. Maybe they're just blindly following what others are doing and would rather sit on their fanny and shout for 8 hours for a party instead of...idk, get off their butt and grab a couple friends to low-man some pages or <gasp> go solo with your flag up.

You'd be surprised how many people I see come into the game and don't even know about ffxiclopedia, much less the dozen or so other places I have gotten info from over the years. One of my old LS's had a blog where we listed links to about 8 sites for tools, guides, and general info on this stuff. We also had our own request board to post things we wanted to do where others could sign on for, but only a handful of people actually used it.

The point is... just because you build it....doesn't necessarily mean they will come. Might be better served to educate the masses first.

I've tried /seacom, no one uses it. The only way you're going to get people to use somehing is if they have incentive to do so.

my incentive to use it is simply.... it works for me.

So you're the only one who uses it because you're the only one it works for. Good for you. Now we gotta fix it for the rest of us.

funny... if it worked for me, then it worked for all the other people who I partnered with because of it, including a handful of people I've added to friendlist over the years--some who were indeed JP and read my auto-trans. /seacom.

Take a look at some of the extra features, some not originally in the game that SE has added over the years (Brenner, Ballista, Garrison, Expedition Forces, Pankration, Choco Racing, Besieged, Campaign, the list goes on). Some work for some, doesn't for others. As long as people like you are not willing to use it and preach it doesn't work, then it may just continue to work for fewer and fewer--the same thing could happen to a bulletin board. People could post there and not get a response after a short time and just say f*k it. I've done Garrison and didn't like it... doesn't mean I think others shouldn't do it. Doesn't mean that it works or doesn't...just that one person had an issue with it and has elected not to use it. That one person's experience is not necessarily indicative of everyone's...otherwise people wouldn't have manequin's in their mog house. So long as it is proven that it works for at least one person, it IS fullfilling it's role, and serves a purpose. So you technically can't say it doesn't work as it has been proven to work by definition.

That's not to say a bulletin board wouldn't be useful either. I'm just saying there are methods already available that can be used to reach the same end result. People should try them out if they haven't already, which by the state of the forums here, they are not (at least on this site).

Have a feeling this could go round and round to infinity....so please, just stop.

Reminds me of Gin Rummy from the Boondocks:

Quote:

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Gin Rummy: I always say the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence.
Riley: What?
Gin Rummy: Simply because you don't have evidence that something does exist does not mean you have evidence of something that doesn't exist.
Riley: What?
Gin Rummy: What country are you from?
Riley: What?
Gin Rummy: 'What' ain't no country I ever heard of! They speak English in 'What'?
Riley: What?
Gin Rummy: English, motherfucker! Do you speak it?
Riley: Yeah.
Gin Rummy: So you understand the words I'm saying to you!
Riley: Yeah.
Gin Rummy: Well, what I'm saying is that there are known knowns and that there are known unknowns. But there are also unknown unknowns; things we don't know that we don't know.
Riley: What?
Gin Rummy: Say what again! Say what again! I dare you! I double dare you, motherfucker! Say what one more time!

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/facepalm

I'm trying to relate actual experience in the game, not just some stuff you do for Lulz that happens to work every now and then on your server. It does not work for the rest of us, now please stop distracting from the real problems at hand.