Will there be camps in the new expansion?

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Originally Posted by FrankReynolds

As long as they didn't do it in a silly spot where there are only a few mobs. Ulli and despot camps used to be super lame when a party of six could clear the area, and there were 3 full alliances fighting over pops.

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Don't see a problem with multi spawns at once like in Abyssea, and super fast repops, or even instant repops, so long as they don't link. I am sure it could be tweaked to have either phased areas, multiple zones, or multiple smaller areas where groups can all go at it.

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Originally Posted by vienne

Thats not what i meant. HNM is there, i'd rather see it improved to todays standards then not see it at all.

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That exists now. Abyssea, VW, and WoE. There's plenty of powerful enemies for you to fight there. They just removed the ridiculous spawn conditions. I would include Legion, but until it's fixed it doesn't really deserve a mention.

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Its good to see people come up with ideas to improve it instead of just bashing the whole idea. Ideas to make it more accesible for everyone.

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My ideas involve enemies I can fight at my leisure and in cooperation with other players. I don't know if that's at all compatible with what you're asking for. I'm not going to sit here and try to put lipstick on a pig. Sorry.

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Would you prefer new content which will be called unbalanced 10 days after its been released?

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Yes, I'd rather take my chances with something new than what I already KNOW from experience to be terrible content.

people that usually want camped HNMs back (with world spawn for 24 hours +) are usually the people that dont want to put work into their gear, but would rather let a "program" do their work, so they can go sit afk every 30 min or 1 hour.

I am fine with puttign timed HNMs that drosp absolutly NOTHING, everything else is just garbage. Oh wait we allready have HNMs that you can go kill that drop nothign worthwile! Go camp them. This Topic is totaly and utter garbage, noone wants HNMs back and the people that do: so paragraph above! That is the only reason they want it. (and to turn FFXI again into a drama bitchfest noone wants either)

Of course there is also the people that made profit from those said "Programs" that want HNMs back...

I've been done posting in these threads for a while due to the tantrum-throwing brigade, but this made me laugh:

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Originally Posted by Camiie

EQ1? Ultima Online? Asheron's Call? Something old, archaic and not up to modern MMO standards?

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"Modern MMO standards", you mean like all the recent major MMO's that end up free to play within 6 months because they're crap, casual and void of content which lasts whilst overflowing with instant gratification? Yeah! Let's go with that!

I'm actually quite content with Legion at the moment. Hope more chambers are added.

I don't know, myself I always thought the reason alot of games fail is because they are made to try knocking WoW off its throne, when the goal should be to make a successful game in its own right. So far as I can tell FFXI has done that well, its a good game, it has been played for years, it isn't meant to kill WoW or be bigger, but its meant to be successful, and it somewhat is.

An example of this is TOR, it does not feel like a game that was in the making as long as it was, and it has alot of players lost already, its going F2P soon. If I remember right there was all this talk of it being a WoW killer, and it would be a great huge MMO, and now its only been out a short time in a MMOs lifespan and yet, dying already. I think the reason for things like this is the companies lose focus on making a game that everyone wants to play and will be successful, and instead they try to topple the giant that is WoW.

If you work in an office, and your goal is to 1-up someone in a big high paying spot in the place, you can very easily do a bad job. Instead you could just be working hard, focusing on yourself rather than trying to better someone else, and its much easier to succeed.

Just because people slate games as "something made to challenge WoW" - it doesn't mean its what the developers intended. In addition to this - what's wrong with trying to match the best in the market? The truth is that WoW does it well - and in cases of most new MMO's, it does it better too.

FFXI got where it was because it was out before WoW, and is incredibly different to WoW - but now people are asking it to be made like WoW, something you think causes games to fail... makes no sense to me, but to each his own.

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Originally Posted by Dazusu

"Modern MMO standards", you mean like all the recent major MMO's that end up free to play within 6 months because they're crap, casual and void of content which lasts whilst overflowing with instant gratification? Yeah! Let's go with that!

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You're conveniently ignoring the ones that are highly or even moderately successful, both paid and F2P.

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I'm actually quite content with Legion at the moment. Hope more chambers are added.

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I'm sure you are. It's still an incredible waste to create content that the vast majority of players aren't meant to be able to clear.

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Originally Posted by Demon6324236

I don't know, myself I always thought the reason alot of games fail is because they are made to try knocking WoW off its throne, when the goal should be to make a successful game in its own right.

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A lot of games try to be like WoW, but end up not getting the "feel" right. Many of them are done on the cheap so it's no wonder they end up with clunky game play, poor graphics, or just don't flow properly.

Another problem is the sheer glut of MMOs out there. Even the ones that are well designed are going to have trouble gaining a foothold in the sort of market MMOs create. Most people, due to time and money constraints are going to only be playing one or maybe two MMOs at any given time. Not only that, but there's a very strong attachment factor with MMOs. It's hard to pull people away from something they've poured a lot of time and effort into and built friendships within.

Name a recent MMO that's highly successful. Please, do it.

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Originally Posted by Dazusu

Name a recent MMO that's highly successful. Please, do it.

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First, I said "modern" not recent. There's a not so subtle difference there. There's only one highly successful MMO in the western world and we all know what it is. It's not recent, but it's far more modern than FFXI will ever be.

Fine, other than WoW, name a "modern MMO" that's successful. Equally as challenging, I think.

Point I make is, this games success depends on its originality, pushing to have it become as close to WoW as possible will result in it ending up like other games that tried/were assumed to have tried the same thing.

I don't post this in favour of HNM, just to be clear on that front.. but this whole "let's make everything easy as piss" dealio isn't helping. And no, "tough" does not equal "inaccessible", "tough" doesn't have to be "exclusive", as Legion shows. It's thoroughly accessible. No camping required.

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Originally Posted by Dazusu

I don't post this in favour of HNM, just to be clear on that front.. but this whole "let's make everything easy as piss" dealio isn't helping.

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Show me where someone is asking for "easy as piss." People just don't want their time wasted by stupid spawn conditions.

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And no, "tough" does not equal "inaccessible", "tough" doesn't have to be "exclusive", as Legion shows. It's thoroughly accessible. No camping required.

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It's pretty much everything the HNM crowd are asking for except the stupid spawn timers and competition over claims. It's obvious that they WANT the inaccessibility and exclusiveness more than anything.

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Originally Posted by Dazusu

I don't post this in favour of HNM, just to be clear on that front.. but this whole "let's make everything easy as piss" dealio isn't helping. And no, "tough" does not equal "inaccessible", "tough" doesn't have to be "exclusive", as Legion shows. It's thoroughly accessible. No camping required.

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What exactly has been "easy as piss" outiside the pile of horse glue that was Abyssea? Most of the major critics of Abyssea will concede that things got too easy but that the overall concept and satisfaction from players was and still is unmatched by any content squeezed out since Heroes finished up.

Legion is a terrible example because it has been a critical failure at drawing the endgame base to do it. Reliance on Embrava, Stuns and Perfect Defense show that "tough" for the sake of tough is a great way to drive off most of your base as individuals want to see loot comparable to their efforts. The "hardmode" that we've seen for most of the revamp period has amounted to using the same strategy everywhere if you want to win - you zerg.

If by Legion you meant the ability to have endgame content readily accessible via a teleport to a random place with HNMs then I agree that such a concept is superior to the old camping method but honestly SE has a laundrylist of ways to introduce challenge monsters without returning to things spawning every 21-24 and it'd just be lazy to do so otherwise.

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Originally Posted by Dazusu

Fine, other than WoW, name a "modern MMO" that's successful.

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EVE online.

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Originally Posted by Trisscar

EVE online.

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Incidentally, radically different to WoW - and has end-game that makes King Camps looks like Hello Kitty Island. Thanks for helping me make my point.

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Originally Posted by Dazusu

Just because people slate games as "something made to challenge WoW" - it doesn't mean its what the developers intended. In addition to this - what's wrong with trying to match the best in the market? The truth is that WoW does it well - and in cases of most new MMO's, it does it better too.

FFXI got where it was because it was out before WoW, and is incredibly different to WoW - but now people are asking it to be made like WoW, something you think causes games to fail... makes no sense to me, but to each his own.

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Basically if a game is trying to be better than WoW, or in some way looks at WoW & tries to do something similar then they are going to fail. They are most likely going to be creating content similar to WoW, but they can never capture a true experience that something else has already produced, like with movies, the original normally stands to be the best.

If games ignore all other MMOs except for what generally makes a good one, they can have a good game. Basically so long as they find what is fun for players, and what people want, they can work to create that environment within their game while maintaining a diversity to create a feel that is different, but can still give people the same kind of fun.

From what I hear The Old Republic for instance plays as a bad Star Wars version of WoW, I think if it does it is likely that Bioware looked at WoW, and tried to get to close to the same gameplay as WoW while trying to do better, it is what would ultimately cause it to fail as well. While other games like FFXI can ignore that and create their own content that brings people enjoyment and so long as it is different than what other games bring than it can still work very well, because it becomes unique, not a bad copy.

I could be completely wrong, but I wanted to further explain for you since you didn't understand. To me it looks like companies lose original thought alot and end up going into another games area and end up with a game that is very similar but not as good in the eyes of players. Examples are all through out gaming, Call of Duty has so many games but if you look around alot of shooters try the same thing, alot fail because it is deemed to be a bad Call of Duty copy, alot of Si-fi shooters get the same between them & Halo, more open shooters get the same with Battlefield. They are the big names in the genre and so when a game similar comes out, it is compared and dropped fast.

WoW is no doubt the biggest name in MMOs, so it seems to me the same happens here, we have MMOs that once they assume the same kind of content WoW does, they are deemed a copy, and thrown into the trash bin. Thats why most MMOs end up with that base kind of content however, because they look at WoW as the giant it is, and try to make success off it something similar, which doesn't work, it would be like if Star Wars had another movie with alot of the same idea, a big Empire, a Rebellion fighting said Empire, however, the Death Star is a cube, and the X-wings are Ts now. The movie would be looked at with a O.o from alot of people, and write it off as bad, for trying to do what someone already did, and pleased so many more people with its originality.



In either case to be a little more on topic. I do not think FFXI is trying to be a more "modern" MMO or anything of the sort. FFXI is simply opening up the content to a more casual audience, while trying to put out content that is just as accessible however much harder, that way it should appeal to the more "hardcore" players as well. The problem is that SE has lost touch with the word balance that they throw around so much. In this hard content there is either an enormous amount of RNG or mobs that hit much to hard for standard play. This is not necessarily what players want however, and thats why it is flawed. FFXI has become much more about accessibility for content and as such things have become faster, but the problem is that the faster things get, the faster we finish, and so the faster we end up without things to do, which leads to more complaining about things being to easy.

So it sum it up, FFXI isn't trying to be more "modern" or to copy other games, its trying to be more open, while it also struggles to recover some balance lost due to certain abilities and content that were given.

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Originally Posted by Dazusu

Incidentally, radically different to WoW - and has end-game that makes King Camps looks like Hello Kitty Island. Thanks for helping me make my point.

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Hold it right there, champ. Before you get ahead of yourself, you should learn from someone who's actually played EVE (namely, me). Everything in EVE is open season PvP, even when your'e docked 'safely' in the space stations.

So while you're trying to take down Sleeper Battleships in W-Space (not quite end-game, but you try doing that first day) you have to be on the look out for gankers, who are free to attack you and your targets.

So EVE doesn't have that exclusitivity you are looking for to support your argument.

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Originally Posted by Dazusu

Incidentally, radically different to WoW - and has end-game that makes King Camps looks like Hello Kitty Island. Thanks for helping me make my point.

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Get the hell out. The toughest thing about kings camps was getting and keeping claim while fucktards tried to mess with you. Nothing was hard about the mobs post-2004. Hell, the wyrm and turtle ksnm mobs were harder than king camp mobs.

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Originally Posted by Dazusu

Point I make is, this games success depends on its originality, pushing to have it become as close to WoW as possible will result in it ending up like other games that tried/were assumed to have tried the same thing.

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I dont think SE need to make FFXI as WoW clone verbatim when it comes to gameplay, but they surely can appropriate the big idea of addictive, accessible and fun vision of WoW. FF has over 20 years of history with rich lores, monsters, jobs, and game mechanic to draw upon - originality is not SE weak point, they have TONS of things to draw inspirations from. I think the problem is at the company, mismanagement, and not enough funding. FFXI was different enough when it was launched, but it was also a derivative of Everquest since WoW did not even launched yet in 2003. At the very least SE was willing to evolve the game with Abyssea, let's see what will be in store with SoA, it looks promising, but then again one never know - at least not yet.

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Originally Posted by Trisscar

Hold it right there, champ. Before you get ahead of yourself, you should learn from someone who's actually played EVE (namely, me). Everything in EVE is open season PvP, even when your'e docked 'safely' in the space stations.

So while you're trying to take down Sleeper Battleships in W-Space (not quite end-game, but you try doing that first day) you have to be on the look out for gankers, who are free to attack you and your targets.

So EVE doesn't have that exclusitivity you are looking for to support your argument.

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Read my earlier posts. I'm not looking for exclusivity, nor am I defending it in "successful" games (if it even exists?). It's a bad idea to exclude (or make people feel excluded) from a section of end-game. You got no argument here from me, but similarly, everything doesn't have to give instant gratification.

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Originally Posted by Luvbunny

FF has over 20 years of history with rich lores, monsters, jobs, and game mechanic to draw upon - originality is not SE weak point, they have TONS of things to draw inspirations from. I think the problem is at the company, mismanagement, and not enough funding.

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You got it kitty.Game needs more money and a bigger team. Ultimately, the development cycle needs speeding up.

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Originally Posted by Aldersyde

Get the hell out. The toughest thing about kings camps was getting and keeping claim while fucktards tried to mess with you. Nothing was hard about the mobs post-2004. Hell, the wyrm and turtle ksnm mobs were harder than king camp mobs.

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I don't disagree, and for the majority of people who killed them daily, this was always the case. But those who didn't stilled wiped to Fafnir with 18 people.

I'm not here posting pro-HNM camps, but I am pro-Legion and other content similar.

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Originally Posted by Trisscar

Hold it right there, champ. Before you get ahead of yourself, you should learn from someone who's actually played EVE (namely, me). Everything in EVE is open season PvP, even when your'e docked 'safely' in the space stations.

So while you're trying to take down Sleeper Battleships in W-Space (not quite end-game, but you try doing that first day) you have to be on the look out for gankers, who are free to attack you and your targets.

So EVE doesn't have that exclusitivity you are looking for to support your argument.

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Lets not even begin with corporate CEO's raiding the bank accounts or assassinating each other.

EVE ... is what happens when you remove the GM's and have a standing "all is fair game" policy.

Just imagine in FFXI if one LS leader could assassinate another LS leader and force them to start over or significantly reduce their achievements.

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Originally Posted by Dazusu

Name a recent MMO that's highly successful. Please, do it.

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DDO after Turbine took over.

(Highly is relative, game went from heading to the trash bin to making immense profits and sustaining a rapid expansion with constant content updates).

http://massively.joystiq.com/2010/02...ragons-online/

1 million+ subscribers as of 2010, even more now.

Not quite pure F2P, more of a hybrid subscription model (you can chose a regular subscription or chose micro transaction system, subscription model gets all the goodies, micro transaction must use points that they either earn in-game or purchase in bundles).

DDO has become a benchmark for MMO success stories. From a failure after launch that including shutting down servers in the entire EU region to a resounding success that had servers bursting at the seams.

The game should revamp itself and refocus itself on what gave FFXI it's glory. I'm really tired of seeing mediocre players with great gear because it's easy to obtain. The game needs it's sense of competition it once had.

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Originally Posted by Aldehido

The game should revamp itself and refocus itself on what gave FFXI it's glory. I'm really tired of seeing mediocre players with great gear because it's easy to obtain. The game needs it's sense of competition it once had.

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If you want a PvP experience go play a PvP game.

PvP was never FFXI's core competency.

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Originally Posted by Aldehido

The game should revamp itself and refocus itself on what gave FFXI it's glory. I'm really tired of seeing mediocre players with great gear because it's easy to obtain. The game needs it's sense of competition it once had.

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You know who says this kind of thing most often? Its not the true hardcore elites, as one might expect me to say. It's the second-rate nobodies who think they're hot shots. I know I'm a second-rate nobody, but at least I don't think I'm something special when I'm not.

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Originally Posted by Aldehido

The game should revamp itself and refocus itself on what gave FFXI it's glory. I'm really tired of seeing mediocre players with great gear because it's easy to obtain. The game needs it's sense of competition it once had.

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Does other people wearing good gear make your gear less useful?

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Originally Posted by Takutu

Saying that everyone can't experience this is complete nonsense. Everyone has the opportunity to go to the camps, and compete. The game needs a sense of competition, and these events were one of the biggest competition driven events that also had the opportunity to yield some of the games best gear. I'm not saying all the best gear came or should come from camps, but quite a bit of it did, and should.

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No, saying waiting for something to pop for hours every few days with a crap drop rate is engaging is nonsense.

If you can not see there is still competition in everything people do in FFXI then you really are blind. I would rather fight over popping ???s in abyssea than spend a lifetime trying to out claim some dumb dragon.

I would rather do 200+ Pils all over again because at least I get more reward (cruor, gil, xp) out of not getting the drop compared to having to be in a LS and go through the list of BS associated with HNM camping. Besides, 200 Pils may actually be much faster while rewarding more than a top to bottom list of people in a LS.

It is better to have gear come from an instance like the new Ultima, and when did competition take priority over challange and strategy?

Do not pull the "trying to out claim others is challenging" card too. If that were the case we could all go compete over Gukumatz right now to suit your need for competition. If you have had to compete for him as much as others then you realize the flaw in the HNM system since his KI would never be 100% in an HNM world. Unless you enjoy it that much on being the first to provoke a monster then it is just a truly annoying event. Even then, leave the community out of it.

It is much more exciting and satisfying to go solo the last fight in Kupo d'Etat on BLU than it ever will be to have claimed Fafnir on your RDM and watch your LS kill it.

I hope everyone who's so keen on there being competition are constant participants in Ballista and Brenner. I hope they're all over the Play-As-Monster system when it's released. I hope they're racing Chocobos and tossing mobs in the Pankration ring. Something tells me none of this is or will be happening though. It's not REALLY about the competition is it? Rhetorical question. We all know it isn't.

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Originally Posted by Camiie

I hope everyone who's so keen on there being competition are constant participants in Ballista and Brenner. I hope they're all over the Play-As-Monster system when it's released. I hope they're racing Chocobos and tossing mobs in the Pankration ring. Something tells me none of this is or will be happening though. It's not REALLY about the competition is it? Rhetorical question. We all know it isn't.

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It is more about the satisfaction of taking away what someone else wants for yourself.

Lets not forget the people who start thinking they are better than everyone else because they claimed and are wearing some gear.

Or the groups that get everything they want out of x HNM and continue to claim it anyways to either sell the right to fight, the drops or even just to prevent others access to the gear.

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Originally Posted by Sp1cyryan

It is more about the satisfaction of taking away what someone else wants for yourself.

Lets not forget the people who start thinking they are better than everyone else because they claimed and are wearing some gear.

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I bought all the pink shirts at the mall so that no one else could get any. Clearly I am better than those people in white shirts.

Here are my thoughts (take them with a massive grain of salt):
There's something to be said about competition. HNMs with 72hr repops do provide sufficient competition to players. But there's little strategy here. You know exactly when it will pop. However, setting a range on the pop timer will not help either, nor will making it a lottery spawn. What really needs to be present in a HNM that drops really good gear is the following:
Strategy. It shouldn't be a one size, zerg all monster. Some serious thinking needs to be done on the devs part to make the monster engage the players in battle. It should be legitimately hard. The gear is good, therefore, the players have to play well to get them.
Absolutely NO randomness. Nobody likes random. But drop rates exist for a reason: Limit the number of existing pieces. That makes sense, that's the competition. So drop rate should be random. (You're welcome thieves...) But access to the monster should not be random. Progress bars are great motivators. If you are constantly making progress to get to fight a monster, you get to see that. Randomness in invisible and it annoys the life out of players. Suggestion: The pop shouldn't go away if you lose to the monster, perhaps some farming needs to be redone, but failure is always an option. We can only learn from failure, so don't punish us for learning.
Good drops. Man, they have to be good. Tons of work should go into getting the monster to pop. Legitimate work. It's gotta be hard for it to be an HNM. Then, the monster needs to be tough. You have to really have great players with great gear and a great strategy (something unique). So it better drop great gear. Grand difficulty means grand drops. They don't even have to be gear drops. It could drop 0-3 items that you turn in for gear or something.
Play style adjustments. Legion is interesting in that there are two modes: 18 and 36. Each mode has its own benefits. HNMs should be accessible to single-party groups. That could mean allowing the party to pop another HNM that's less difficult and drops less items or lower-quality items, etc. Every player has his own preference. Play on that.
Interesting story. Not a requirement, but story really beefs up the entertainment-factor (this is a game after all). I really enjoy beating the tar out of Shinryu because of story. I'll do it for fun. I don't even need to proc. I enjoy that kind of stuff. I know a lot of other players do too.

I think that what I'm trying to say is this: There are a lot of systems in this game that do one thing great. I'd like to see a new system, perhaps new HNMs, that really hit the nail on the head, here. I'm predicting that's where the real end-game content will end up. To the devs: Please make it fun, rewarding, difficult and yet accessible to most players.

Think SE doesn't like making tough mobs because whenever they do, people QQ that it's too hard and only the top 1% if any, can kill them.

Examples:

1) Absolute Virtue (People killed at 75 once they learned how to lock 2hr)
2) Pandemonium Warden (Nobody ever killed at 75 until Alex was released 2yrs after PW was released, the gimmick of locking Astral Flow was never discovered)
3) Hall of Mul (Only a couple LS on each server really have manpower, relics, and skill to beat this tier and farm drops.)
4) Botolus Rex/Kalasutrax/Ig-Alima (Not many people could kill these things reliably, so they added White Procs, temp items restored with each proc and phase displacers.)

I remember when TOAU was first released and the top HNMLS on Diabolos I think it was Solstice or Ethereal or something claimed Hydra and held it for 18 hours because they couldn't kill it, and people on BG were QQing that it was unkillable etc; same with Odin v1. When Odin's chamber came out, it was at least 3 months before a NA shell beat it and it was a good 2 months before the first video on BG surfaced of a JP shell taking him down.

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Originally Posted by Ophannus

Think SE doesn't like making tough mobs because whenever they do, people QQ that it's too hard and only the top 1% if any, can kill them.

Examples:

1) Absolute Virtue (People killed at 75 once they learned how to lock 2hr)
2) Pandemonium Warden (Nobody ever killed at 75 until Alex was released 2yrs after PW was released, the gimmick of locking Astral Flow was never discovered)
3) Hall of Mul (Only a couple LS on each server really have manpower, relics, and skill to beat this tier and farm drops.)
4) Botolus Rex/Kalasutrax/Ig-Alima (Not many people could kill these things reliably, so they added White Procs, temp items restored with each proc and phase displacers.)

I remember when TOAU was first released and the top HNMLS on Diabolos I think it was Solstice or Ethereal or something claimed Hydra and held it for 18 hours because they couldn't kill it, and people on BG were QQing that it was unkillable etc; same with Odin v1. When Odin's chamber came out, it was at least 3 months before a NA shell beat it and it was a good 2 months before the first video on BG surfaced of a JP shell taking him down.

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There's a pretty big difference between Absolute Virtue and Pandemonium Warden, and literally all of the other stuff listed.

If Botolus Rex before white procs was a hurdle that you had to train a little to leap over; Pandemonium Warden at 75 would have been two hungry, armored bears released into the sports arena by your own fiance as she made out with both of your parents.