Interim Report – Sorry to keep you all waiting!

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Originally Posted by Mirage

Except:
The world isn't black and white, fights don't have to be either 2 minutes or two hours.
Do game mechanics really favor shorter battles? Why? Because we are building every single strategy around 2-hour super buffs?

I'll agree that we haven't headed in that direction for years, but at the same time, during these years, a lot of the game has been broken, limiting the number of options and possible strategies.

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No, nobody mentioned anything about using 2 hours. I say the game mechanics favor shorter battles because of AoE-more-HP-than-most-people-have TP moves, job recasts of several minutes+, or difficulty of melee to TP on mobs once their initial damage reduction buffs wear. Those don't have to include 2 hours. In fact most zergs are moving away from 2 hour use largely because you can't spam 2hr fights back to back without an army of COR, and because 2 hours have not increased enough in potency from our rise in level cap at 75 to remain useful or relevant any more. There are normal 5 min JAs that are more powerful than a number of 2 hours.

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Originally Posted by FrankReynolds

I say quit beating a dead horse because it has been debated a million times on a million forums (numbers exaggerated to illustrate a point) and the debate always ends with this argument followed by some memes and insults:

All the old methods of leveling etc. are still available. People are not using them because they would rather be doing something else. You don't need to petition the development staff to fix that. You need to put that energy into finding other people who feel the same as you. Did you find any? Good. No need to adjust the game then. Couldn't find any? I guess no one else feels like you then. No need to adjust the game.

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It's not that simple as u think.
There are plenty of people who think like eyeballed or prrsha for example.
Most just have given up the debate because its very unlikely that the game will still improve in the future, some still try to discuss tough and i fully apreciate it. (: Most are also looking forward to ffxiv, hoping it doesnt end as the same rubbish ffxi has turned into.
And people partied a lot back in the days, what do u say to that?
Do you really think they did it because they didnt enjoy the lv progress?
The reason noone does these days is simple.
It's senseless to try it. Reasons:
Everything these days works around Abyssea and Gov burns, means most people go there because its faster and there in neither motivation nor are people left for the old way. That is the the first and most important point. So even if u are one of these old player who want to give it a chance, forming a 6 man party because of the actual meta is almost impossible. People would still party without abysea and have fun and i think it would have been better for the meta of the game and future changes.
Most people who enjoyed FFXI because of the old way have already given up because they coudnt any longer enjoy it.
Maybe, the took up some jobs in abyssea bc it was the only way to do it and bc everyone was doint it but after that they got bored quick, like me, and left the game for good.

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Originally Posted by Ceinwyn

It's not that simple as u think.
There are plenty of people who think like eyeballed or prrsha for example.

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If that is the case, why don't these people team up and EXP the old way? SE did not remove the old camps. You can still team up with five like-minded players and get shitty EXP, same as in the old day. The only thing that's stopping you is if you can't find five other people like that. And that means there aren't many people left who like to EXP that way. So no, you are wrong, there are not "plenty of people" who think like Eyeballd or Prrsha. There are some. That's it.

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Originally Posted by Ceinwyn

And people partied a lot back in the days, what do u say to that?
Do you really think they did it because they didnt enjoy the lv progress?

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They did it because there was no other way. I never enjoyed it, but I still did it, not because I was a masochist, but because I wanted to join my LS mates at all the cool events they did at 75. I wanted to get the crappy part over with to start enjoying the game.

Just forget it Ceinwyn. He's using the obvious preferences of XI's current playerbase as his only reference for confirmation. It's a very convenient defense, albeit thin - like the active population found in the game these days.

Obviosuly, makes no sense anyway since he just ignores what i write anyway.
I told him why noone forms 6 man partys these days, why does he even ask then?
And i think we have different view points of "fun".
Endgame events are ok, some do enjoy this most but a game has to offer more than this
and i prefer slower exp, what u call "shitty exp" over a broken realm.

Heres the thing, hes right. You want to level slow, you prefer that, you rather the old xp, thats cool, heres the problem, you complain no one else wants to join you in 'old school' parties. If you cant find 5 others on your server who like that idea, shouldn't you take the hint that not to many people are into it? Why force the majority to return to something they do not like, for the minority to get what they do like, it makes no sense, unless you are simply going to say something similar to 'but I liked it that way ;;' in which case, get over yourself, there are alot of other people around, accept that you are 1 of few who like that way, see if you can find others, and if you cant, then accept it, and either move on, or try to adapt.

Seriously though, if old-style xp is so unpopular that you can't get a party together to do it then how is forcing everyone to do it a good idea?

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

Just forget it Ceinwyn. He's using the obvious preferences of XI's current playerbase as his only reference for confirmation.

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It's the only reference I need, because the current playerbase is the current playerbase. Why should SE cater to the old playerbase that is gone? In what universe does that make sense?

I know this is all subjective. I know I hate old EXP and I know some people like it. But if the majority of players dislikes it, it's all the reason and motivation SE will ever need to try and replace it with something else.

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Originally Posted by Ceinwyn

Obviosuly, makes no sense anyway since he just ignores what i write anyway.

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No, I didn't. I told you why what you said was completely senseless. I gave you a counterpoint.

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Originally Posted by Ceinwyn

I told him why noone forms 6 man partys these days, why does he even ask then?

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I didn't ask. It was a rhetorical question, I answered it myself right after that.

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Originally Posted by Demon6324236

Heres the thing, hes right. You want to level slow, you prefer that, you rather the old xp, thats cool, heres the problem, you complain no one else wants to join you in 'old school' parties. If you cant find 5 others on your server who like that idea, shouldn't you take the hint that not to many people are into it? Why force the majority to return to something they do not like, for the minority to get what they do like, it makes no sense, unless you are simply going to say something similar to 'but I liked it that way ;;' in which case, get over yourself, there are alot of other people around, accept that you are 1 of few who like that way, see if you can find others, and if you cant, then accept it, and either move on, or try to adapt.

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It is entirely possible that though there are those with the preference to play classic, because they too could not readily find others of like-mind, were forced to do one of two things: Conform or pack it in. I've played almost 100% solo since I returned to the game, (though I don't even log in much anymore), and I have met more than just a few returning players that expressed the desire to play the game as it used to be. You know where I find them the next day/week/month? That's right, in GM/CN/Abyssea or offline - if you catch my drift. Of course, you can say, "Hey, they found that book-burns were a faster/better way to get EXP and never looked back!", and you can also say, "Hey, they discovered that 110% of their efforts to build a 6/6 party each and every day yielded 3-4 members at most and just gave up."

Speaking from experience, this is what I do every time I log in, and I too have given up. Even when I could get 6/6, it was a crap shoot whether your tank actually had the first clue what tanking was, your Thief had any clue what "pulling" or "SATA" meant, etcetera. In the handful of occasions where things did go to plan and people were willing to learn, things went beautifully - and that's not an exaggeration. Versus IT++, fights did not last longer than 45 seconds, EXP from 450-650 per kill and never once complained "this is too slow" or "My LS needs me gotta go!"

You ask us what right do we have in asking others who are enjoying themselves to change for us? My response is: What right did you or anyone have in taking the game away from us in the first place?

This raises an interesting point.

Not even being of high enough level to challenge Maat yet, I wonder if Mr. Matsui has ever pondered the problems inherent in low-levels, or whether he even feels there's a problem at all.

The majority opinion seems to be that level progression was once too slow. Others feel as if lower levels were such a trial because there was no content.

I think that the source of the problem goes deeper than either school of thought: if all the cool gear, traits, spells, and abilities weren't waiting for your at levels 50+, would you still be in a rush? And there were low-level events available, in the form of Garrison, Expeditionary force... and those silly escort quests you simply could not get through without several other, preferably high level players.

What made these events unattractive is (aside from reward selection), the players get their butts handed to them. As an example, Garrison was like a proto-Campaign: waves of mobs, except no Protectras, Refreshes, or sick Weapon Skills in the players. Why bother with low level events when all the high-level evens came with the cool powers attached?



This, I think, is the source of what makes the lower levels (let's say, 45 and lower, maybe even 65 and lower), so unattractive: there's just nothing there. No strong armor, weapons, spells, abilities, or traits. What would you do if you could play with Refresh (even at 2 MP/tic), as early as level 5? What if the armors and weapons with +5/+6 this or that were available at level 10? What if you got Traits like Occult Accumen, Fast Cast, or Double Attack straight out the gate? I think if we had more of what makes the higher levels enjoyable, at the lower levels, people would have never developed the hasty attitude to progress.

Of course, its all just speculation at this point. I feel this is probably the one standard the developers can never hope to back to (without an FFXI 2.0): the current progression rate has been taken so well by the players that any retroactive changes would go ignored by now, and might not even serve to support the minority that prefers slower, "classic" parties. As it is, the development team is simply not known for going back and retroactively changing the levels of spells, traits and abilities, especially not on the scale I'm thinking about.

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Originally Posted by Arcon

It's the only reference I need, because the current playerbase is the current playerbase. Why should SE cater to the old playerbase that is gone? In what universe does that make sense?

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Because nobody complained about rate of progression in the first place, man! Not once in all my years of playing this game, which happened to be the years it was most successful (interestingly enough) did I hear this complaint. People either accepted it for what it was, as a necessary evil or otherwise, or were enjoying themselves.

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

Speaking from experience, this is what I do every time I log in, and I too have given up. Even when I could get 6/6, it was a crap shoot whether your tank actually had the first clue what tanking was, your Thief had any clue what "pulling" or "SATA" meant, etcetera.

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This seems to be describing my experience with pick-up experience parties in FFXI circa 2005, so you might be doing a better job recapturing the past than you think.

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Originally Posted by Byrth

Seriously though, if old-style xp is so unpopular that you can't get a party together to do it then how is forcing everyone to do it a good idea?

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Because it would be better for the durability of the game.
The game is going to hell atm.
Speedlvling created a ton of problems.
Useless areas, useless crafts and everyone is maxing out too quickly.
Lack of intresting content which is also limited to 99 only.
A lv cap on abyssea and a return to the the old lv style woudnt help much anymore but it would be a start, the game would need a lot of love which it probably wont get and therefore i think its pretty doomed.
And dont get me worng i wouldnt do a usual exp partys these days either, where is the reason pls?

And Demon
this game worked pretty well for 6~?years without abyssea and people enjoyed it and dont tell me they didnt, "grinding" was the main part of the game back then and people woudnt have done it if they didnt enjoy it and i'm pretty sure less people play it these days so I woudn't call me one of a few.

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Originally Posted by SpankWustler

This seems to be describing my experience with pick-up experience parties in FFXI circa 2005, so you might be doing a better job recapturing the past than you think.

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I did my best to try and guard my groups from the total noob effect. For what it was worth, I started with the high-ranks and worked my way down when inviting people. You would always get the occasional BLM that only cast Shock/Bind/Warp no matter what you did. But now, there's just no hope.

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

Speaking from experience, this is what I do every time I log in, and I too have given up. Even when I could get 6/6, it was a crap shoot whether your tank actually had the first clue what tanking was, your Thief had any clue what "pulling" or "SATA" meant, etcetera.

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You do realize that this is precisely what old EXP was? A bunch of noobs not knowing how to play properly, frustration of not finding good members, or members at all, bad or restrictive party setups. And you were just lucky they didn't leave because of LS activities, nothing more, because that's also something that happened all the time during old EXP parties. And that wasn't old EXP's fault, because it still happens, only now the remaining party members are not penalized as much for it.

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

You ask us what right do we have in asking others who are enjoying themselves to change for us? My response is: What right did you or anyone have in taking the game away from us in the first place?

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SE had the right, because it's their game, not yours.

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

Because nobody complained about rate of progression in the first place, man! Not once in all my years of playing this game, which happened to be the years it was most successful (interestingly enough) did I hear this complaint. People either accepted it for what it was, as a necessary evil or otherwise, or were enjoying themselves.

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All of this is a lie. Either that or you played an entirely different game from me. Not only did I hear people complain about how slow and boring leveling was, people actually refused to level certain jobs, even if they actually wanted to play them, because it was too much of a pain to level them up.

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Originally Posted by Ceinwyn

The game is going to hell atm.

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You're aware that people have been spouting this garbage line since 2005?

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Originally Posted by Ceinwyn

this game worked pretty well for 6~?years without abyssea and people enjoyed it and dont tell me they didnt, "grinding" was the main part of the game back then and people woudnt have done it if they didnt enjoy it [..]

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All of this is completely wrong. The game did not "work well" for six years, the playerbase has been declining for most of the six years before Abyssea as well. And no, EXPing was not the main part of the game, that was never true. You're completely delusional if you believe that. And yes, people do level despite hating it. Take me for example. I hated every moment of it, and I still went through it, because my goal was a different one, I wanted to play the jobs at 75. Leveling was a necessary evil I had to take upon me to be able to do that.

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Originally Posted by Arcon

You do realize that this is precisely what old EXP was?

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Nope. Not near the degree as what you'll find today. Not even close.

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SE had the right, because it's their game, not yours.

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That's right, and by this rationale, it's not your game to contest that we are trying to take something away from you.

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All of this is a lie. Either that or you played an entirely different game from me. Not only did I hear people complain about how slow and boring leveling was, people actually refused to level certain jobs, even if they actually wanted to play them, because it was too much of a pain to level them up.

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How funny that people who might have complained stuck with a game they didn't like. I wager that what complaints you did hear were those who moaned about never getting invites on unpopular jobs more than anything to start with. That is what I've heard. What I have to say about that is I took at least MNK and THF to 75, typically having no trouble at all getting a group because I took the initiative to make something happen for myself. "I waited DAYS for an invite on my DRG!!!" Keyword: Waited; Well there's your problem there, skipper!

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

How funny that people who might have complained stuck with a game they didn't like. I wager that what complaints you did hear were those who moaned about never getting invites on unpopular jobs more than anything to start with. That is what I've heard. What I have to say about that is I took at least MNK and THF to 75, typically having no trouble at all getting a group because I took the initiative to make something happen for myself. "I waited DAYS for an invite on my DRG!!!" Keyword: Waited; Well there's your problem there, skipper!

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I found leveling White Mage in pick-up groups miserable for the 50-75 stretch because of how misinformed and esoterically equipped 90% of the melee were, even relative to the limited knowledge available at that time. There were a lot of people who were so dense that, even to me on my first job going to 75 for the first time, it was obvious they were retarding progress. As the healer, all I could do to make them flail around less horribly was cast Haste and Dia II. It was infuriating.

I stuck it out because end-game looked interesting for support jobs, even if watching a handful of mental invalids fail to efficiently kill various species of crabs killed something deep inside of me.

That was my subjective experience. Your subjective experience is that you enjoyed leveling up by killing more crabs than the bearded boat bros on The Deadliest Catch.

You are trying to make your experience into something objective. That is not the case.

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

Nope. Not near the degree as what you'll find today. Not even close.

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Yes, very much so. I'm right, you're wrong. Your word against mine.

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

That's right, and by this rationale, it's not your game to contest that we are trying to take something away from you.

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And I'm not contesting it. I already acknowledged that all of this comes down to a matter of opinion, and sadly you're entitled to your own. What I'm explaining to you is why your idea would be hurtful to a majority of the playerbase, and that SE knows that and that that's why it will never happen. Do you think they didn't foresee what was going to happen? Why do you think they did it in the first place?

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

How funny that people who might have complained stuck with a game they didn't like.

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I loved the game, I just hated EXP. Remember, I actually did everything else the game has to offer, something you repeatedly seem to forget even exists. EXP is so minor compared to everything else that exists that this entire debate is pretty pointless.

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

"I waited DAYS for an invite on my DRG!!!" Keyword: Waited; Well there's your problem there, skipper!

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That didn't help at all, skipper. The problem you're not getting is that there were periods of days of no invites in your level range appeared. I've been there and I tried building parties and even that failed sometimes. It wasn't until Level Sync was introduced that it was remedied somewhat (aside from the fact that higher levels still didn't wanna do much with lower levels). And if a PUP invited people to a party, they wouldn't even bother to respond unless they already had five other people. You're completely delusional if you think it was always that easy. THF and MNK were both desired in parties, and still there were periods during which people just weren't around, or not a decent number of people, so 8 people were lfp but only six could party, so two had to sit out, and of course it would always hit the same jobs over and over again. The old EXP system was so horribly flawed in a myriad of ways that I can't possibly understand why anyone would want it back.

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Originally Posted by SpankWustler

I found leveling White Mage in pick-up groups miserable for the 50-75 stretch because of how misinformed and esoterically equipped 90% of the melee were, even relative to the limited knowledge available at that time. There were a lot of people who were so dense that, even to me on my first job going to 75 for the first time, it was obvious they were retarding progress. As the healer, all I could do to make them flail around less horribly was cast Haste and Dia II. It was infuriating.

I stuck it out because end-game looked interesting for support jobs, even if watching a handful of mental invalids fail to efficiently kill various species of crabs killed something deep inside of me.

That was my subjective experience. Your subjective experience is that you enjoyed leveling up by killing more crabs than the bearded boat bros on The Deadliest Catch.

You are trying to make your experience into something objective. That is not the case.

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I think you answered your own question here; Obviously this was early on in the game's history and people were simply noobs on the whole. I mean, fair enough all you had to do was stack MND/MP, (if even that to be effective), where if you had a problem sticking Dia something was terribly wrong, and if you couldn't stick Haste, you might give MNK a try instead.

As well, I feel you're also attempting to objectify your experience in an even more acute sense with regard to a single job for a span of 15 levels. I'm referring to all jobs from levels 1-75 (99?).

PS: Your sig is the best I've seen in a long time. :)

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Originally Posted by Arcon

And I'm not contesting it. I already acknowledged that all of this comes down to a matter of opinion, and sadly you're entitled to your own. What I'm explaining to you is why your idea would be hurtful to a majority of the playerbase, and that SE knows that and that that's why it will never happen. Do you think they didn't foresee what was going to happen? Why do you think they did it in the first place?

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Honestly my contempt comes not from XI in its current state anymore. I couldn't care less and am not even sure why my account is still active. The flames are fueled by the apparent new trend in all MMO's that mirror what has happened to this game. And what's happening to 99% of new MMO's? Aw screw it, let's be honest: Nobody's made a great MMO in a decade or more. Care to figure out why?, I do; Hell, I fucking love playing the genre, and I know what I loved most about playing them. Now name me some of the major changes that FFXI has undergone in the past few years and we'll see if we can deduce why the active playerbase continues to bleed out.

My contention is, "Easy come, easy go".

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And I'm not contesting it. I already acknowledged that all of this comes down to a matter of opinion, and sadly you're entitled to your own. What I'm explaining to you is why your idea would be hurtful to a majority of the playerbase, and that SE knows that and that that's why it will never happen. Do you think they didn't foresee what was going to happen? Why do you think they did it in the first place?

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And who cares if it hurts the playerbase, right? I mean, you would have been on the indifferent side of this argument 5 years ago it seems. Again, what playerbase is there really left to offend?

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I loved the game, I just hated EXP. Remember, I actually did everything else the game has to offer, something you repeatedly seem to forget even exists. EXP is so minor compared to everything else that exists that this entire debate is pretty pointless.

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I didn't forget about the rest of the game. The rest of the game is not the issue here.

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That didn't help at all, skipper. The problem you're not getting is that there were periods of days of no invites in your level range appeared. I've been there and I tried building parties and even that failed sometimes. It wasn't until Level Sync was introduced that it was remedied somewhat (aside from the fact that higher levels still didn't wanna do much with lower levels). And if a PUP invited people to a party, they wouldn't even bother to respond unless they already had five other people. You're completely delusional if you think it was always that easy. THF and MNK were both desired in parties, and still there were periods during which people just weren't around, or not a decent number of people, so 8 people were lfp but only six could party, so two had to sit out, and of course it would always hit the same jobs over and over again. The old EXP system was so horribly flawed in a myriad of ways that I can't possibly understand why anyone would want it back.

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I never (read: almost never) took an invite from another leader for EXP and roughly 85% of the time I could start a group any old time I felt like it. And not some trash I threw together just so I could say we got mobilized, if anything. Level Sync just put the icing on the cake for a leader trying to form a group. I'll say it till I'm blue in the face: If you couldn't get an invite it wasn't because you weren't on RDM or BRD - it was because you were too damn lazy to do anything but sit back and complain that the game didn't fix your problems for you.

This debate is so pointless so I'll keep it short!
I forecast this:
SE is bored of this game, this is clear!
The uptades and the team put on the game are/is and will stay at a rock-bottom level to keep it barely alive!
New Expansion will be downloadable and offer minimal content, oh and it's relase will be delayed to 2014!
They shit on the economy of the world and encourage speed-lvling because it's easy mode
and probably most do like EASY-MODE!
They know the game will suffer and that they can't keep up with the content since everyone is 99 in a day
but they just don't care because it doesn't matter at all.
People will move on to FFXIV anyway, old players will go there anyway and new ones also if they are done with maxing all their jobs, thx to speedlvling yeah! and have finished or are bored of the poor endgame content what is all the game has left now, we're genius!!!
So let's hope ffxiv will be any good my fellow players because i don't belive in this game anymore.
I really recommend everyone to move on to something else and leave the actual poor playerbase alone and let em enjoy their left time we had ours i guess (: ,
with the release of FFXIV: A realm reborn. This game will take another serious drop on poulation and because of that mister, accompanied by other factors, I'm pretty sure it will go to hell.

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Originally Posted by Ceinwyn

This debate is so pointless so I'll keep it short!

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It's not pointless though. Do you love playing MMO's? When was the last time you picked one up that you didn't touch another video game for years, period? That was me and FFXI in 2005; For 4.5 years I did not play a single game outside of it. It was exactly what I loved and the game was a success and I refuse to believe the only reason it was a success is because secretly there was a majority of players that despised backbone of its content. Bullshit, I say.

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

As well, I feel you're also attempting to objectify your experience in an even more acute sense with regard to a single job for a span of 15 levels. I'm referring to all jobs from levels 1-75.

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I tried not to, but my feelings probably bled through a bit because my experiences are from the opposite end of the spectrum. I just wanted to provide an example that lots of people had lots of different experiences.

There were some people who did little other than level back when leveling had a much slower pace, and enjoyed it. Others leveled jobs as quickly as possible, hanging out with Shiva in Korroloka Tunnel rather than leveling normally when possible; they wanted to use a certain job for end-game, to fill a niche within their linkshells, or just to equip the armor they had accrued for that job via free-lot. I mostly met the latter kind of player, given that I was the latter kind of player, but I have no idea which group made up the majority at the time.

I don't think anybody else has any idea which group made up the majority, either. I also doubt the player base could be divided neatly into groups. It's so hard to collect data on the mental state of large groups of people that there are statistical tactics for using normally problematic sample sizes to get representative results in the social sciences.

Basically, I have no faith in my ability or anyone's ability to have knowledge of what's good or bad for FFXI players as a whole. If somebody tried to make the point that almost all players hated leveling more than my racist uncle hates brown people, I would find that dubious as well.

It's cool that some people liked leveling at the slower pace. I'm glad somebody really liked it to balance out how much I hated it. I just find any implication of a "silent majority" to be very, very, very suspect and one or both sides always make that implication when this topic comes up.

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

PS: Your sig is the best I've seen in a long time. :)

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Thanks! I saw the image and it's dimensions seemed perfect for a signature.

I would post a link to the maker's Tumbler but there's some NSFW stuff there. Typing "Paul Robertson" into Google and checking out his Tumblr should do the trick, though. Again, there is some NSFW stuff there.

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

It's not pointless though. Do you love playing MMO's? When was the last time you picked one up that you didn't touch another video game for years, period? That was me and FFXI in 2005; For 4.5 years I did not play a single game outside of it. It was exactly what I loved and the game was a success and I refuse to believe the only reason it was a success is because there was a majority of players that despised backbone of its content. Bullshit, I say.

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I can understand u bc it was the same for me but things are like they are.
I don't belive either that it was a succes bc of people who didnt like it at all but lots of people don't even check the forum and i can't blame em for it.

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Originally Posted by SpankWustler

I don't think anybody else has any idea which group made up the majority, either. I also doubt the player base could be divided neatly into groups. It's so hard to collect data on the mental state of large groups of people that there are statistical tactics for using normally problematic sample sizes to get representative results in the social sciences.

Basically, I have no faith in my ability or anyone's ability to have knowledge of what's good or bad for FFXI players as a whole. If somebody tried to make the point that almost all players hated leveling more than my racist uncle hates brown people, I would find that dubious as well.

It's cool that some people liked leveling at the slower pace. I'm glad somebody really liked it to balance out how much I hated it. I just find any implication of a "silent majority" to be very, very, very suspect and one or both sides always make that implication when this topic comes up.

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You could say it's because the game's old, outdated graphics, what-have-you and that's the reason the game is 'dying'; But on the other hand, you could say that (Your sig is really distracting! haha) it's just as likely that the game changed in a few major ways (Abyssea/99 cap) that OG players weren't keen on and those facts are equally responsible in the decline of player numbers and re-subscribers.

It's a given to say that the game had aged by the time WoTG released, but it had aged gracefully. So much that when FFXIV released, many, many players migrated over expecting more great things from SE. Unfortunately we all know how that went, and you had (and still do) their players wanting to recapture the gameplay they had known for years only to realize that it was nowhere to be found.

The majority of the current player base (which is a very low number compared to old ones) that favor speedleveling are who stay with the game. The people who don't like what the game has become, have tried it for a few months, then left without a word. The simple fact is because the game is tailored that way, then those people who like speedleveling stay, have access to the forums and as such a vested intrest in the game. Those people are the "vocal" minority (due to their ability to post here).

What if SE was to take a poll to all of those players who LEFT due to the current state of the game. I am sure you'll agree that number FAR outweights the current numbers of the playerbase. Heck the people in my LS above are a prime example of that. A good 80% of them quit the game due to the changes. Will they ever return to be able to post here? Doubtful. What you have here is the great silent MAJORITY.

In order to see the numbers SE saw way back in the golden days of 2005-2006 they should at least consider their thoughts (Maybe a mass e-mail poll to ex-players would do the trick) to get an unbias poll.

Arcon has stated that levels don't matter anymore, and they should be removed. As crazy as that sounds, I'd have to agree with him if SE treats the road to level 99 as something that is an unwanted after-effect of the game. If this is the case, make every player level 99. You might as well make the test server, the "player server", so they can have access to every spell, set of gear etc. What you have now in FFXI is not a level progression ladder, but a set of ability/gear progressions... but you know what... it's the same thing. Both are time sinks and what is worse... some forms of obtaining gear is entirely luck based. At least with levels, you are guaranteed to get them. SE has just about removed the risk of leveling down (since exp is so plentiful).

So yeah same progression and time sink... different names.

Edit: clean up

I've been thinking of deleting my character and washing my hands of MMO's, but I read on the XIV forums that a group of them started again at Phoenix. Are you part of that group? Entertaining the idea of hopping over.

You know what I haven't had in awhile? Big League Chew.

How did this derail from a dev update post to a full on horse corpse abuse session?

Prrsha/Eyeballed:

The reason the Devs don't allow feedback from nonpaying current customers is because they have this funny mentality that the game should be shaped by the current playerbase, which is usually to the detriment of the game.

I'll say that personally there were aspects of the exp grind that I loved. And as much as I agree with (and have argued siding with) people that say exp parties don't teach a player how to do anything meaningful but exp; there are a small handful of jobs that I think really did benefit from it. I know I was a much more adaptive, reflexive and resourceful WHM from having grinded exp the old school way with complete idiots and with limited resources.

Mostly though, it was repetitive and it sucked. The party seek function sucks; level sync came out way too late in the game's lifecycle and was poorly implemented, ushering in terrible parties that were terribly geared due to syncing mechanics, as well as exploitive options such as SMNburn.

The reason it was repetitive and sucked, and which is really the core of the problem, lies truthfully in the unimaginative way SE plotted mob spawns (mostly 1 type of mob in an area), battle mechanics that penalized lower level players by virtue of lack of stats, gear and spells/abilities (and the fact that accuracy SUCKS at low levels no matter what you do), a homogenous leveling experience from 1-30 because most jobs didn't obtain their job defining abilities and traits until the 30s, and the fact that despite the myriad of fauna available to hunt in Vanadiel, most players focused on about 5 of them throughout the course of leveling, due to terrain, surrounding mobs and party friendliness. The ecosystem wasn't sufficiently balanced to healthily support leveling on any type of mob you desired, and still isn't.

Even in 2005, we would always comment that leveling in the 50s was like watching paint dry. Those Bibiki Bay parties that could go up to 6k/hr (which was a holy grail to us back then, even though usually we were at the 3.5-4k/hr mark) were constantly interrupted by gobby bombs that could 1 shot people, dhalmel links, and nooby players.

Fast forward to 2013 (yes, I can time travel a few weeks into the future :-) !) None of that is any different now, with the exception of mildly-but-not-nearly-enhanced-enough-exp, except that now doing the same grinds level synced with high level gear results in an even worse experience due to the poor way gear syncs.

I would say that in order for "old school" partying to be effective, FUN, and appealing, the following would have to change:

*Increase in mob density and increased population overall with lower repop timers, which disallows building custom 4 of 1 type of job melee parties, as different damage types would be needed and allows for an uninterrupted grind experience.
*Availability of more refresh options to accommodate faster chains (look at how much refresh we have in Abyssea).
*Higher base experience points (to the order of at least 50% of what is currently being awarded after numerous xp bump patches).
*Modification of basic mob strengths and behavior at < 75 levels to even out the difficulty of several mob types and to increase the number of available camps.
*Fixing the way gear syncs.
*Balancing of job abilities and stats at low levels.

Which would all said and done essentially create the same exp rate outside of Abyssea as inside (GoV notwithstanding).

So, which do you want exactly? A needless time sink by forcing everyone back to 2005 era exp under the pretense of "lurning ur job doods!", an opportunity for legit but efficient exp outside of Abyssea, or level caps and exp restrictions inside of Abyssea? I'm just confused. Is your goal to create a fun, flexible and fair mode of exp with several different paths, or is it just to hop in your Delorean and head back to 2005 when it took unnecessarily long to reach level cap for no reason? What are you trying to accomplish? There's no content at low or mid levels and even SE acknowledges that. There's no reason to want to grind.

But as has been pointed out, the option to grind is still available to you. You can't find anyone to do it because nobody wants to. You say that pro-"new way" people on the forums are a "minority" that are the "vocal majority" because all the sane people have jumped ship. The option to grind was always available and so they if there were that many of them, they coulda teamed up and formed a grind LS and called it "TeamGrindCore" or something and grinded until they were sore from all the grinding. So really, there weren't that many of them right? Cuz the option to grind was never removed from the game.

*edited for some spelling and revision of potentially inflammatory remarks*

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Originally Posted by Prrsha

Arcon has stated that levels don't matter anymore, and they should be removed. As crazy as that sounds, I'd have to agree with him if SE treats the road to level 99 as something that is an unwanted after-effect of the game.

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It's not crazy at all. I humorously made the same remark in another thread very recently.

I don't want anyone to get any ideas: I really don't care about this debate about fast leveling vs slow leveling. I'm in the neutral camp. Fast or slow, as long as I'm enabled to perform missions, quests, and events, I don't really care.

I'm honestly surprised no one caught Sunrider's post. Actually I shouldn't be since everyone was caught up in their "NO U!" argument.

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Originally Posted by Sunrider

This, I think, is the source of what makes the lower levels (let's say, 45 and lower, maybe even 65 and lower), so unattractive: there's just nothing there. No strong armor, weapons, spells, abilities, or traits. What would you do if you could play with Refresh (even at 2 MP/tic), as early as level 5? What if the armors and weapons with +5/+6 this or that were available at level 10? What if you got Traits like Occult Accumen, Fast Cast, or Double Attack straight out the gate? I think if we had more of what makes the higher levels enjoyable, at the lower levels, people would have never developed the hasty attitude to progress.

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I'll take what Sunrider said, and take it a step further: There is sort of gratifying goal in this MMO. This game is a static, uneventful world that never changes, regardless of your level. Literally everything in this game stays the same no matter what you do, and it's a shame because this world is so elaborate, yet so little is done with it.

So really, what is everyone's goal with this game? To get the next level? To get the next shiney? To get the bestest gear in the game? Who cares about any of that stuff if you can't do anything with it? And I feel that's why Matsui keeps everything at level 99. Because what's the point otherwise? Leveling up and getting new gear means absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things.

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Originally Posted by Carth

It's not crazy at all. I humorously made the same remark in another thread very recently.

I don't want anyone to get any ideas: I really don't care about this debate about fast leveling vs slow leveling. I'm in the neutral camp. Fast or slow, as long as I'm enabled to perform missions, quests, and events, I don't really care.

I'm honestly surprised no one caught Sunrider's post. Actually I shouldn't be since everyone was caught up in their "NO U!" argument.



I'll take what Sunrider said, and take it a step further: There is sort of gratifying goal in this MMO. This game is a static, uneventful world that never changes, regardless of your level. Literally everything in this game stays the same no matter what you do, and it's a shame because this world is so elaborate, yet so little is done with it.

So really, what is everyone's goal with this game? To get the next level? To get the next shiney? To get the bestest gear in the game? Who cares about any of that stuff if you can't do anything with it? And I feel that's why Matsui keeps everything at level 99. Because what's the point otherwise? Leveling up and getting new gear means absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things.

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I missed his post completely too, but I essentially wrote exactly the same thing. That low level exp anything would benefit from refresh and more defined job abilities and party roles. +1'd

XPing at a low level isn't even the same game as it is at 99. You have almost no abilities, a weak WS, no gear to swap, no spells. It's simply not fun for me. And I certainly would not be learning a single thing while XPing. Maybe a case can be made for the mid-levels, 50-60 or so. By that point you do have a lot of your job-defining abilities and spells.

For me personally, I would have quit if my first job was not BRD. I would not have been able to handle not being invited and I would not have met my girlfriend in my endgame linkshell. Maybe in 2005 I could handle it, but I have grown up quite a bit since then and I cannot spend 12 hours to get one level anymore.

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

It's not pointless though. Do you love playing MMO's? When was the last time you picked one up that you didn't touch another video game for years, period? That was me and FFXI in 2005; For 4.5 years I did not play a single game outside of it. It was exactly what I loved and the game was a success and I refuse to believe the only reason it was a success is because secretly there was a majority of players that despised backbone of its content. Bullshit, I say.

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I absolutely agree with everything you said. It's bullshit that a majority of players despised the backbone of its content. Only EXP is not that backbone. It was an experience that introduced the game to the players. For about the first 10 levels. After that it was endless repetition until 75. It was not essential, it was not crucial. If the game started at 50 back when it was released, and if they autocapped everyone to 75 when the cap was increased, it still would have been a great game and would have had everything that most people loved about it.

Ok, here's the gist: what is EXPing? A way to develop your character. And I love developing my character, it's the sole reason I play this MMORPG. I invested in Arcon and I wanna see him grow, and myself with him. I want him to progress, to learn, to get experience (not necessarily EXP) and skill (not necessarily skill levels). I love working towards obtaining a new spell, that's why I loved getting Meteor. So if I like developing my character in certain directions, why don't I like EXP?

And the answer is a lot simpler than some of you seem to think. It was boring. That is the only reason. I already said a few posts ago, if SE managed to find an interesting way to introduce EXP, it would be an entirely different story. However, the gap between 1 and 99 is immense, it's pretty much impossible to fill it with unrepetitive content. It doesn't work. And they can't make it challenging, if they do, casual people would not make it anymore. Old EXP was about the easiest thing in the entire game, and still people failed, because everyone was doing it, not just the best. Even people with little to no experience and/or brains. That means that people who were good at it were extremely bored while people who sucked at it were challenged to the point of frustrated if they made a reputation and couldn't get invites anymore (I know a few of those notorious people on Leviathan and still remember them, I'm pretty sure other servers had similar idiots).

I don't have anything against leveling up or EXP gain per se. The reason why I'm against it now is because it's impossible to implement it in a way that's fun and challenging to people with an IQ larger than their shoe size without making it inaccessible to the masses. It just doesn't work. And, as I also mentioned before, because anything EXP-related they add now will not affect a majority of the population.

These are the facts. Anything after that is up for interpretation. Like the claims that the EXP system was what turned old players off this new game, which I find completely ridiculous, but I have no way to disprove it, so I won't bother. I'm just pointing out that that's your take on it, not a fact.

Or your opinion that old people liked EXP and that was the reason why they stuck around. Not everyone was aversed to FFXI like you were. On the other hand, it's a fact that EXP was a minor part of FFXI. And I'm not talking subjectively. Sure, for you it may have been big, but objectively compared with how much content there was aside from it, it still took up a very minor part. There were missions (which is a very broad category, and some say playing through CoP was one of the defining features of their FFXI experience), quests, crafting, Dynamis, Limbus, Einherjar, sea, sky, HNMs, Assaults, Nyzul, Salvage, Campaign, xNMs (which includes a massive variety of battlefields, BCNMs, KSNMs, ENMs, SCNMs, ANNMs and ZNMs being the ones I can think of) and even Ballista and random wandering around hunting for minor NMs (like LL, Goblintrap, Argus, etc.). This game was full of content that did not relate to EXP in any way. Even back then there were quite a few people who got by without EXPing at all, which alone proves how insignificant it could be to some people.

So to sum up, some objective facts:

• EXP was a minor part of the game (see above), even more so now (above + Abyssea, Voidwatch, Meeble Burrows, Nyzul Isle Uncharted, Legion, new Einherjar/Limbus, soon new Salvage)
• EXP was repetitive content (little variety in mobs and even in camps after Level Sync was introduced)
• EXP was not challenging (easy targets were chosen, no annoying TP moves, no area effects, no screwing with enmity, no weird status effects, nothing to prepare for endgame)
• EXP was tedious (finding camps and getting there) and time consuming (could take months to get to 75)
• EXP was difficult to set up (finding working job combinations, hoping enough people were even lfp) and sometimes excluded certain jobs entirely (BLM, SMN, PUP and BST were all favorites of not getting picked)
• EXP formed bonds, some friends were made through it since you were in a party for several hours
• EXP caused drama and frustration because of stupid players, lack of combined skill resulting in wipes and/or camp competition

I understand that there's people who have no problem with these things and can, in fact, embrace them. Especially the second-to-last point seems to appeal to certain people so much that they use it as the backbone for their entire argument (all the claims that fast EXP ruined the community and linkshells stem from this point). However, most of these points were of a negative nature, and I don't see how anyone can rationally defend them.

Saying you miss them is perfectly fine. Saying you want them back also. Saying that most people liked it and that it's the reason people quit and the game is dying is wishful thinking on your part.

This debate is so pointless so I'll keep it short!
I forecast this:
SE is bored of this game, this is clear!
The uptades and the team put on the game are/is and will stay at a rock-bottom level to keep it barely alive!
New Expansion will be downloadable and offer minimal content, oh and it's relase will be delayed to 2014!
They shit on the economy of the world and encourage speed-lvling because it's easy mode
and probably most do like EASY-MODE!
They know the game will suffer and that they can't keep up with the content since everyone is 99 in a day
but they just don't care because it doesn't matter at all.
People will move on to FFXIV anyway, old players will go there anyway and new ones also if they are done with maxing all their jobs, thx to speedlvling yeah! and have finished or are bored of the poor endgame content what is all the game has left now, we're genius!!!
So let's hope ffxiv will be any good my fellow players because i don't belive in this game anymore.
I really recommend everyone to move on to something else and leave the actual poor playerbase alone and let em enjoy their left time we had ours i guess (: ,
with the release of FFXIV: A realm reborn. This game will take another serious drop on poulation and because of that mister, accompanied by other factors, I'm pretty sure it will go to hell.

I think you will find that quite a lot of FFXI players wont touch FFXIV, many will, but not enough so they will need new players in order to make up for that, don't expect FFXIV:ARR to make that big of a difference just because you are excited about it. the reason the original failed was many factors, the biggest of which it made many of the systems it ran on choke, if ARR doesn't alleviate this problem it will not replace FFXI because the simple fact is FFXI runs on older systems and many people with those older systems cannot afford to upgrade to one that will handle XIV as it was properly, we shall see if ARR fixes that, I'm not going to hold my breath though

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Originally Posted by Arcon

I absolutely agree with everything you said. It's bullshit that a majority of players despised the backbone of its content. Only EXP is not that backbone. It was an experience that introduced the game to the players. For about the first 10 levels. After that it was endless repetition until 75. It was not essential, it was not crucial. If the game started at 50 back when it was released, and if they autocapped everyone to 75 when the cap was increased, it still would have been a great game and would have had everything that most people loved about it.

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Without getting too much into the semantics of relating anatomy with a game, in a game where you actually do not begin the game at cap, the mere requirement of players to (ad)venture out and gain levels one by one to support the subsequent requirements of those skills gained in the process sounds more like the backbone than anything else. That's the way I see it; You may not agree.

On the other hand, if your biggest gripe and defense is that grinding was simply too boring for your tastes, I have something else to say. There are things in life nobody really likes doing. We don't like doing them because we feel, personally, they're not necessary or shouldn't apply to us because we're special.

But also, as with many aspects of life, rarely do you get to enjoy the just rewards of anything before putting in some work. And what is work? - a pain in the ass. I'm sorry you don't like your job because the idiots around you hold the group back. I'm sorry you can't enjoy your job as much as I enjoy mine.

Yet, you seem to think that life is primarily about rewards. Let me say this: Rewards do not exist properly without the struggle. Without dinner there is no dessert. Simple logic.

As soon as they added monsters and events that could only be beat by level capped groups of characters, leveling your character became a means to an end and until they remove all level capped content, it will always be so.

You can add whatever twists you want on the debate, but the fact of the matter is that the old methods of leveling are still present. The people who enjoy them are not. Removing all the new fast methods of exping will not make all the old people come back and exp with you. They are gone. Or to be more accurate... They are still here, but they don't want to do that anymore. You can't force people to be your friend and do stuff with you.

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Originally Posted by Eyeballed

Yet, you seem to think that life is primarily about rewards. Let me say this: Rewards do not exist properly without the struggle. Without dinner there is no dessert. Simple logic.

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The current state of the game disagrees with you. Now we have dessert without dinner. So it is possible. Although it's an oddly phrased metaphor, as dinner is normally also delicious. And unlike EXP, it's also essential. EXP gave nothing relevant to FFXI except raise your level. The "journey" as you call it is a sham. It's not a hike across a mountain in the beautiful countryside, but slowly dragging through big city sewers. Sure, at the end you're relieved. But it was a voyage of pain and despair and gave you nothing but exotic diseases.

Games are precisely there to not be bound by real life restrictions. It's like saying you shouldn't be able to start up Mario Party until you read through the entire manual and have a written exam on it, because it prepares you for the game. "You must first endure torture to have fun" is not a good game mentality. I understand that some people were drawn to it, and that's good for them, but not good for everyone else. This is good for everyone else.

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Originally Posted by Arcon

The current state of the game disagrees with you. Now we have dessert without dinner. So it is possible. Although it's an oddly phrased metaphor, as dinner is normally also delicious. And unlike EXP, it's also essential. EXP gave nothing relevant to FFXI except raise your level. The "journey" as you call it is a sham. It's not a hike across a mountain in the beautiful countryside, but slowly dragging through big city sewers. Sure, at the end you're relieved. But it was a voyage of pain and despair and gave you nothing but exotic diseases.

Games are precisely there to not be bound by real life restrictions. It's like saying you shouldn't be able to start up Mario Party until you read through the entire manual and have a written exam on it, because it prepares you for the game. "You must first endure torture to have fun" is not a good game mentality. I understand that some people were drawn to it, and that's good for them, but not good for everyone else. This is good for everyone else.

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Way to take some sound wisdom out of context to loosely support your argument. Simply put, I believe, you're not willing to put in the work for your rewards and only want to eat your cake and have it too just because in a perfect world, (your world), that's the way things would work out best. Not to worry though, it looks like SE and most developers are on your side, and the overall interest in new MMO's reflects it.

And in case you're wondering, I concur: Neither developers nor yourself have any idea what you're doing to the genre.

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Originally Posted by Arcon

The current state of the game disagrees with you. Now we have dessert without dinner. So it is possible. Although it's an oddly phrased metaphor, as dinner is normally also delicious. And unlike EXP, it's also essential. EXP gave nothing relevant to FFXI except raise your level. The "journey" as you call it is a sham. It's not a hike across a mountain in the beautiful countryside, but slowly dragging through big city sewers. Sure, at the end you're relieved. But it was a voyage of pain and despair and gave you nothing but exotic diseases.

Games are precisely there to not be bound by real life restrictions. It's like saying you shouldn't be able to start up Mario Party until you read through the entire manual and have a written exam on it, because it prepares you for the game. "You must first endure torture to have fun" is not a good game mentality. I understand that some people were drawn to it, and that's good for them, but not good for everyone else. This is good for everyone else.

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The missed fact most people don't see is that the Final Fantasy franchise is NOT Mario Party, Halo or Half-life. It is Final Fantasy. It is a distinct genre of a level based progression system, where time and battles = exp and exp is seen as a reward. If you take out that equation, it is just not Final Fantasy anymore. You have a different kind of game. SE owns alot of franchises. They own the rights to many games, with play styles like the before mentioned games. If they wish to make clones of them, shouldn't they make a new titled game to appeal to those masses insteads of destroying a nitche franchise game that has been a hallmark of Square?

If you play a FF# game, expect the following: experience points, gear progression, ability progression and time sinks. All of those wrapped up in an engrossing storyline. If you want to play a game like Half-life, I am sure there are many others out there that will suit your needs. This is just an example of a company trying to pander to waaaay too many different backbone playstyles at once (instead of its nitch) and losing its core design in the process. It's like Disney trying to make petroleum instead of animated movies.

In sort they messed up a good thing. Now they are in damage control mode and asking a skewed ratio of customers what they want in the game. It's like the blind leading the blind now... and I can't blame them. Most of the people that designed FFXI and it's expansions have moved on to other companies (citing complaints of restrictions of their creative freedom in the design process).