servers way more empty now? Still doing the linear gear climb?

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Originally Posted by leorez

played it, dont wanna play another WoW clone. If they had kept the core of what 1.23 ended on the old 14, it would have been amazing and i would have never looked back, but instead they threw it all out to "meet the standard" which they even said they got by talking to blizz devs, so its no surprise its like EVERYTHING else out there.

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pssst ffxi is a eq clone, se flat out admits that
and ffxiv is not a wow clone, its just not ffxi/eq based

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Originally Posted by Afania

All MMO is about your accomplishment, you've done this, I've done that. Ebody or legendary weapons are the same as achievement system, it's 1 important aspect of the game, don't need to look at it in such negative way.

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I wish I could agree with you on that, but when you're rubbing it in someone's face (I'm looking at a certain someone I bet is lurking this forum) to the point I rejected the notion of ever going DRK, yeah there's a reason to be negative due to past experiences....

Skirmish +1 weps with +1 stone augments basically match starting Delve weapons most often, so they should be good enough.

Linear gear climb is honestly the worst thing SE could have added, due to the simple fact that they cannot keep up with the demands of new content to keep people interested. We're probably the closest to the game outright dying than we ever have been before.

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Originally Posted by Mostfowl

pssst ffxi is a eq clone, se flat out admits that
and ffxiv is not a wow clone, its just not ffxi/eq based

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FFXIV is a wow clone period, it's just a clone that doesn't have every good aspect from wow, still a clone.

There are more wow clone on the market than EQ clone, we don't need anymore, don't need FFXI to become one.

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Originally Posted by Afania

FFXIV is a wow clone period, it's just a clone that doesn't have every good aspect from wow, still a clone.

There are more wow clone on the market than EQ clone, we don't need anymore, don't need FFXI to become one.

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and i have played EQ before, though there are some parts that are very much the same, there is a good chunk that is different (and i know they said they used it as their base) but 14 is a flat out copy in almost every way, not just WoW but of all the WoW like games and their slight changes from that (like fates basically being rifts/gw2 events but crappier)

And like the person i quoted said, there are TONS of WoW clones and most have failed or barely hang on over all these years, FFXI was one of a few EQ clones and they did it when the game was still early in its life (and early in the genre in general).

Dont be shocked when in 6months to a year tons of the 14 servers are merged or they bite the bullet and go F2P (they are copying all the other "standards" so im sure they would be up for one more?

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Originally Posted by leorez

The biggest problem with the vertical slice as it is with a game this old is how few people will be doing the lower stuff. If a newer player wants to jump into SoA endgame now...well for the most part they are screwed. Its not a giant spread out community anymore, almost everyone left is at the newest endgame so if you get left behind, you might as well stop playing, next to no one does the lower end stuff because there is no need.

That in general is what i hate about the gear climb, it makes content worthless after a short time and since no one needs it, no one is gonna come help you catch up (unless you have a bunch of friends to help, but not everyone does).

2 of my friends that cam back, they are nowhere near that stuff, ones starting fresh because he hasnt played for ages, the other stopped at ToAU...i have no idea how me and a couple LS mates are gonna handle bringing them up to speed.

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you must be a new player, or you would never have made this statement

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Originally Posted by Damane

it was top tier for 7 years or more... really shit like that should never be the case with ANY item. (not to mention thats why kings also remained a shit fest for 7 years). hence why I side this horizontal gear scaling isnt good either.

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So what is wrong with gear that stays good forever as long as the content is geared side progressive as well? Did the game ever have to leave the 75 cap in the dust? of course it didn't all they had to do was add more content and their player base would still be in the 4k range on multiple servers, they didn't start having to do server merges until after they announced the level cap to 80. Think about it, your gear was good for multiples of years, you had sweet shit, were building even nicer stuff, then all of a sudden boom level cap up 5, and bamb everything you worked so hard on was worthless. Now fast forward just a few very short years and you go from not just that level cap to 99 and even worse through 4 sets of gear progression in 8 months. population then 4k, population now 700, you do the math

know the difference between ffxi and wow these days? you can only do a raid in wow once a week, you can do skirmish and delve as much as you want provided you have the ki to do it

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Originally Posted by predatory

you must be a new player, or you would never have made this statement

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Im not at all, besides the fact that there is next to no one on, people are doing shouts for mega bosses and skirmish 2...and thats about it. DO you think they would let in a guy who only has bayld gear at their best? (because its what you can get done on your own or with a small group) Unlikely, they will want people who have the weapons and gear from the plasm stuff or higher (which you can not do on your own...and no one does it anymore)

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Originally Posted by predatory

So what is wrong with gear that stays good forever as long as the content is geared side progressive as well? Did the game ever have to leave the 75 cap in the dust? of course it didn't all they had to do was add more content and their player base would still be in the 4k range on multiple servers, they didn't start having to do server merges until after they announced the level cap to 80. Think about it, your gear was good for multiples of years, you had sweet shit, were building even nicer stuff, then all of a sudden boom level cap up 5, and bamb everything you worked so hard on was worthless. Now fast forward just a few very short years and you go from not just that level cap to 99 and even worse through 4 sets of gear progression in 8 months. population then 4k, population now 700, you do the math

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yeah no... the lvl cap raise wasnt bad and I also dont think that vertical gear progression is bad. It is just pushed out too fast atm (every 1-2 months) instead of going every 8-10 months while filling the rest with sidegrades.

The game was on a big decline pre lvl cap raise and abyssea, if they wouldnt have done anything back then, we would have had the same situation like now. The only difference between now and then is that FFXIV is another FF MMO competetor and that people have literally nothing to do atm.

besides we went from lvl 75 to lvl 90 in 9 months+ vs. ilvl 99 to ilvl 120 in 2 months, that is a big difference.

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Originally Posted by leorez

Im not at all, besides the fact that there is next to no one on, people are doing shouts for mega bosses and skirmish 2...and thats about it. DO you think they would let in a guy who only has bayld gear at their best? (because its what you can get done on your own or with a small group) Unlikely, they will want people who have the weapons and gear from the plasm stuff or higher (which you can not do on your own...and no one does it anymore)

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Sorry I should have said that differently, what I meant to say was back at the 75 cap you had to have all kinds of prerequisite things done or you weren't getting into a decent endgame shell, (which of course left you out in the cold). You had to have sea and sky, all dynamis clears, you had to have completed the quest Shadows of the departed etc. or you couldn't join in their little reindeer games, the difference is now you have to have delve gear to actually get into delve, back then you just had to have access. I started a second char when they came out with WoTG, got it to 75 on brd and sam, and abandoned it because I couldn't get it the necessary clears to get into an endgame shell, simply because everyone had their clears and no one was helping or joining groups. I shouted for hours on end trying to get shit done, and then said meh, enough. So the times may have changed, but getting into stuff you wanna do for your char was as difficult then as now

Good morning,

We understand that some of you would prefer having more equipment choices made available through various content. Moving forward, a variety of new equipment will be implemented and this will give you more options to choose from laterally. We'll be introducing new content where this equipment can be obtained, and we'll also be adding them to existing content as well.

We know you're all interested in the artifact armor revamps as well, so we'd like to let you know the latest development is that we plan to set their item levels to be the same as geomancer and rune fencer AF.

Arigatogozaimasu <><><><> <(^^)> HAI !!!!

What about that server merge?

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

Good morning,

We understand that some of you would prefer having more equipment choices made available through various content. Moving forward, a variety of new equipment will be implemented and this will give you more options to choose from laterally. We'll be introducing new content where this equipment can be obtained, and we'll also be adding them to existing content as well.

We know you're all interested in the artifact armor revamps as well, so we'd like to let you know the latest development is that we plan to set their item levels to be the same as geomancer and rune fencer AF.

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Sweet, that'll make my Iuitl a swap set for rng rather than something I feel obliged to wear. Hopefully there'll be some ilevels added to our relics and empy +2 sets as well?

Oh btw you probably destroyed the game for everyone who thinks gear shouldn't last forever :D

edited to add big grin

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

We understand that some of you would prefer having more equipment choices made available through various content.

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Yes, people do want this - and oddly enough, it was something that was (not perfectly, I will admit) available before all this item level and vertical progression nonsense. People want things to go back to the way they were before.

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Originally Posted by Okipuit

... item levels ...

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Please, please, PLEASE, just stop. New AF is something that people have been asking for and looking forward to for years, but as things stand you're ruining it before it's even been released. I cannot emphasise enough how wrong of a direction this is.

I hope "adding to existing content" means they revisit the trial of the magian stuff again. I would love to be able to keep improving my weapons as an alternative aldouin stuff.

"Fly Me To The Moon and let me PLAY among the STARs~...

You are all I long for, the one I worship and ADORE~...

In other words, HOLD my hand...

In other words, please be true~ ..."

~SINATRA

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Originally Posted by Malthar

What about that server merge?

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No, if you're unhappy where you are nothing's stopping you moving, I'm happy where I am thanks.

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Originally Posted by Kraggy

No, if you're unhappy where you are nothing's stopping you moving, I'm happy where I am thanks.

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I don't want to leave my friends on Phoenix, I don't want to be on a server with few people on every day, tell me, how does one solve this? Only way I know of is merging.

Umm this game's always been vertical, all MMO's are. At level 75 you were not using a Bee Spatha. At level 90 you were not using a level 75 weapon. Level 90~99 things leveled out a bit as Tanaka tried to reverse the gear progression from Abyssea but there was still progression from voidwatch, magian and legion. Now we are level 119 (effective) and are using level 103~119 gear.

The only issue is that SE released level 119 gear too fast, they did 20 levels of gear progression in a matter of months. They should of been much slower about it, 103 then 105, 107, 110, 113, 115, 117 and eventually 119 sometime next year. I wouldn't expect a level 119 person to wield a level 99 weapon for the same reason I wouldn't expect a level 99 person to wield a level 75 weapon.

Except for many years 75 was the cap, through RotZ, CoP, ToAU, and WotG, a long period of horizontal progression, then they released Abyssea, we went to level 99, and during that time it was vertical for a short time, with only Abyssea/VW/WoE for gear till 99 really, then it went back to horizontal. Really, if you look at the history of the game, the game has been horizontal far more often than it has ever been vertical.

Saying that we didn't use underleveled gear doesn't say much, once you leveled to 75 the gear was horizontal for a long time, same with 99, as I said, short bursts of vertical, but when we hit 99 we had a large selection of gear to pick from, some better than others, yes, but not so much better that only it matters. At the point the game is getting to now, 1 weapon is vastly better than everything else with no real comparison between the two in damage, for instance, Oats and Rigors have an extremely large gap, far larger than, say, Relic H2H & Brawny. That kind of imbalance is new, and bad for the game.

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Originally Posted by saevel

Umm this game's always been vertical, all MMO's are. At level 75 you were not using a Bee Spatha. At level 90 you were not using a level 75 weapon. Level 90~99 things leveled out a bit as Tanaka tried to reverse the gear progression from Abyssea but there was still progression from voidwatch, magian and legion. Now we are level 119 (effective) and are using level 103~119 gear.

The only issue is that SE released level 119 gear too fast, they did 20 levels of gear progression in a matter of months. They should of been much slower about it, 103 then 105, 107, 110, 113, 115, 117 and eventually 119 sometime next year. I wouldn't expect a level 119 person to wield a level 99 weapon for the same reason I wouldn't expect a level 99 person to wield a level 75 weapon.

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like demon said below me, it spent more time horizontal content wise than ever vertical, now even at 99 cap they are continuing the stupid vertical climb with this dumb ilevel crap. Not only is it keeping going instead of going back to how it was at 75 cap where it goes back to horizontal, its doing the fastest vertical its ever done, within a month or 2 when everything you got was suddenly crap, especially with weapons.

People dont want this vertical climb anymore and want it to go back to how 75 cap was. Lots of endgame to be viable and not just turn it into this climb to do a single event. Ilevel was basically garbage they pulled over from FFXIV and if we wanted to do that junk, we could play XIV and not this.

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Originally Posted by leorez

like demon said below me, it spent more time horizontal content wise than ever vertical, now even at 99 cap they are continuing the stupid vertical climb with this dumb ilevel crap. Not only is it keeping going instead of going back to how it was at 75 cap where it goes back to horizontal, its doing the fastest vertical its ever done, within a month or 2 when everything you got was suddenly crap, especially with weapons.

People dont want this vertical climb anymore and want it to go back to how 75 cap was. Lots of endgame to be viable and not just turn it into this climb to do a single event. Ilevel was basically garbage they pulled over from FFXIV and if we wanted to do that junk, we could play XIV and not this.

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IMO if they want to keep this ilevel crap, fine, just side grade every other part of the game, so it all becomes relevant again

Funny, just a year or so ago people were super tired of "side grades". You can't please anyone lmao.

I don't remember saying anything on the forums a year ago, but I do remember bitching ingame about the same things I am whining about in the forums now, and it fundamentally comes down to a lack of rewarding content at endgame, and or content that has been brushed aside for new endgame content rather than being brought up to date.

There would be so much stuff to do in Vanadiel that getting all of it done would be a daunting task to even the most diehard of us, if they would just go ahead and make it all relevant again, and let's face it, the real reason everyone hates the ilevel system is it was a blatant statement "This game is nothing but a time sink, and your goals and efforts to attain them, mean nothing"

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Originally Posted by Draylo

Funny, just a year or so ago people were super tired of "side grades". You can't please anyone lmao.

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I know I use the term sidegrade a bit too liberally but I don't really mean it literally. It's mostly used to contrast against ilvl gear and wholesale replacement and obsoletion. I think most people who continue to play enjoy situationally good gear with occasional best-in-slot pieces introduced every so often.

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Originally Posted by detlef

I know I use the term sidegrade a bit too liberally but I don't really mean it literally. It's mostly used to contrast against ilvl gear and wholesale replacement and obsoletion. I think most people who continue to play enjoy situationally good gear with occasional best-in-slot pieces introduced every so often.

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There has always been some slightly better pieces introduced, the thing is, they were never such a giant leap that it made anything but that one thing pretty much irrelevant or if you didnt have it, your exceedingly weaker than the other person. I never liked salvage and it took forever to complete a single piece, so i pretty much ignored it, and honestly that was just fine because it wasnt such a step up that i was utterly useless without it.

The other obvious thing was that these slight upgrades came every so often and not every couple of months. They also normally didnt replace entire sets of stuff, they would do a piece here and there. These updates basically take (for example) a DDs TP and Haste set and completely replaces all of it at once. This was never the norm, nor should it be.

That style is how games Post WoW work it seems...and they haven't exactly fared well. Right as this game decided to pull this crap me, a bunch of my friends all got fed up and left, and when we came back its now a ghost town...i wonder why? I don't wanna play a dumb 1 game event ladder climb, nor can i see most of the FFXI players wanting that either, if they did there are choices out the bum to do that exact thing, including the overly praised FFXIV.

I'm going to go with saevel on this. They basically implemented Mount Everest when all they needed was a mild incline. All the new gear needed were slight stat boosts compared to what we already had and some unique bonuses. Old content would still be relevant and people would have had plenty of incentive to chase the new shinies.

Yea.... Sorry but I feel you guys are well still wearing rose colored glasses and are missing the obvious reason why the servers are empty. The fact is the population has BEEN low and steadly decreasing for the longest, that's why they had to merge in the 1st place, remember? By the time 14 came along the 1st time it was only around 2000~ 2500 per server, ok for getting some stuff done but considering that this is a party oriented time burner ( it still seems to me that they expect EVERYTHING to be done with a party), a lot of stuff just wasn't getting done so a lot of people simply left until it finally started being only around 1800 to 1500 when 14 came out again and when people left to play that well a mass exodus is basically the end result. People pop in shout for SoA and get nothing they figure well screw this I'M GONE. Now unlike most I like soloing my lowbie jobs while I wait and see what happens so it bothers me none that people are gone. But...well...since like I said b4 this game is a party oriented time burner it's is what made it so great is what is leading to it's own demise

I'm really waiting for someone to explain how going from level 10 gear to level 50 gear isn't "vertical progression".

Guys' there is no such thing as "horizontal progression", it's an oxymoron. You can't walk forward by walking to the side. What people really are talking about is minimum progression, aka side grades. Where you wait six months to get an item that is 2~3% better then the one you already have. Where new content might have 1~3 pieces of useful gear per job instead of replacing nearly everything. Voidwatch, Legion and Sea are prime examples of this content. Skirmish, Delve, Sky, Abyssea and Ground Kings (depending) are examples of vertical progression.

People aren't pissed that gear is being upgraded, it's always been upgraded and people actually get pissed when there is no carrot. People are pissed that the previous gear they spent years getting was obsoleted so fast that it left them behind. The people who are the most pissed are the ones who were in the ultra elite groups that claimed exclusive rights to be "winners", after all if everyone can get a trophy then trophy's are meaningless.

And that is why the veterans are probably leaving in mass exodus...well the few veterans that are left

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Originally Posted by saevel

I'm really waiting for someone to explain how going from level 10 gear to level 50 gear isn't "vertical progression".

Guys' there is no such thing as "horizontal progression", it's an oxymoron. You can't walk forward by walking to the side. What people really are talking about is minimum progression, aka side grades. Where you wait six months to get an item that is 2~3% better then the one you already have. Where new content might have 1~3 pieces of useful gear per job instead of replacing nearly everything. Voidwatch, Legion and Sea are prime examples of this content. Skirmish, Delve, Sky, Abyssea and Ground Kings (depending) are examples of vertical progression.

People aren't pissed that gear is being upgraded, it's always been upgraded and people actually get pissed when there is no carrot. People are pissed that the previous gear they spent years getting was obsoleted so fast that it left them behind. The people who are the most pissed are the ones who were in the ultra elite groups that claimed exclusive rights to be "winners", after all if everyone can get a trophy then trophy's are meaningless.

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though its true i can never actually be "horizontal", its a way of saying things differently. If i get a piece that is situational or get a piece that is better suited for my build (like i need more acc vs attack) would you consider those vertical? It was that not every piece was exactly better than the last, but had different uses for different set ups. I could ignore certain pieces and not be gimped and not be able to participate in things because my damage or w/e is drastically lower.

And yes the giant obvious problem is how not only quickly they replaced just about everything, but how much of a jump it was, making you so much weaker than another player it made your output not worth having. Its the design of most new age games, and in particular FFXIV where if at 50 you dont have the higher "ilevel" sh*t you dragged everyone down pretty substantially. I hated it and left the game pretty quick because of it (among plenty of other reasons).

We went to 99, so yes lots of old stuff would be replaced, we all got that, but it should have went back to how 75 cap was with lots of viable gear in tons of different events, basically re-doing the 75 endgame design. Instead they pulled this "ilevel" crap too and basically raised the levels even more (why?..who the hell knows?). Poor design by a terrible new team who havent the slightest clue how this game worked before and what kept people around, its turned into a poor mans FFXIV testing ground run by a bunch of amateurs.

The elites leaving wasn't the real problem it's the people that got shut out of content leaving that is the problem.

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Originally Posted by Ravenmore

The elites leaving wasn't the real problem it's the people that got shut out of content leaving that is the problem.

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That sounds just about why I'm leaving

I like the ilvl system way more then side grades. Because with the big upgrade it actually feels like I am getting better gear and my character does noticeably more damage.

People aren't leaving because they don't like the gear system in the game. Its more like FFXI is really old 12 years almost. The graphics are pretty dated, there is new shiny FFXIV out now with HD graphics. One of the main contributor to FFXI's population loss is new games especially FFXIV. Personally I know I been playing FFXIV more then FFXI since there hasn't been much new added in FFXI for quite some time.

SE just said that 1.5 million people were playing FFXIV, and it uses the same ilvl system as they put in FFXI so its not the gearing system that is at fault here, its the fact the game is very old now.

SE said 1.5M people were playing FFXIV, not that 1.5M people who play FFXI were playing FFXIV. Just because a lot of people are playing that game does not mean that the issue of this game is not the ilevel system. The fact is, ilevels suck as an idea for this game. This game has always had gear which lasted a long time, every update was not likely to bring gear so much better that your gear you got since last update was practically worthless by compare. On top of that, the power gap is to large, far to large, anyone without a boss weapon has a massively lower DPS, so much so that its insane by compare to the old idea of RME > All, a massive issue in the community since Abyssea till the start of SoA.

So far as just saying its a dated game, that's never stopped it before. The game has been old for quite some time, and not a single person I know of who has quit or has been talking about quitting has even once brought up its age. Everyone I know who has even talked about quitting brings up that the game is changing to much, they don't want to go get new gear every couple months and feel like they are starting from scratch. Maybe you and the people you know are different, but from what I have seen, your statements are completely wrong as to why people are leaving.

Erm... Man I don't think you have been paying attention. BEFORE they even started the the ilevel stuff and even before Abyssea people were leaving. Pay attention why don't you? The servers only had around 3000 to 2500 and steadily decreasing wait you know what? If you haven't been checking the population then this is useless to explain.

The population has been slowly going down, yes, but in the last few months the population has fallen drastically, at a much faster speed than the norm. If it were falling like normal, there would be no need to make special notice of it, but its going much faster, which is why its actually being brought up as more of an issue, the acceleration is worrisome.