Why I'm not going to resub

It's still harder to find people to do things than it is to do the things in the game. It would be easy to implement a signboard system where people could volunteer to help others in exchange for points that would in turn allow them to post for help. Weather it's abyssea seals, Dynamis wins, Abyssea ZB wins, Voidwatch, Missions, etc you spend all your time trying to find people to do it with and for better or worse it's over in 5 minutes. Thiat is assuming you can find people to go with to begin with. I have been in more parties that broke up because they couldn't find people than PTs that tried and failed in the past month.

People keep quiting and coming back. You obviosly have a game people want to play. Give them a reason to stay.

Being someone who recently returned after a couple years off, I agree that it is hard to find people to help with content other than Adoulin etc.

What I see now is that theres less opportunity to grab and go, people seem to stick in friendship groups or their LS. I guess best opportunity for someone like me is to form an LS with people who want to do the same content as me, which will probably be difficult.

Instead I've sort of resigned myself to enjoying the game solo, which isn't so bad. I chat and socialise with others but while they're enjoying end game content I'm working my way through Rise of the Zilart or Chains of Promathia at my own pace.

It's not great, and it isn't what the game used to be, but it isn't all bad!

I agree - this game is sorely missing tools to help connect players for specific objectives. They started to address this with the Linkshell Community site, but it fell far short of the mark and never saw any further development.

The great strength of FFXI has always been the community. The balanced-group-required nature of the game forced leaders to emerge; to organize people and events. It seems that, over time, these leaders have become harder and harder to find. Many of them have settled in with a comfortable group of friends and no longer interact with strangers. Others have moved on to other games with most of the population. It's likely that the "dumbing down" of XI has resulted in a different kind of new player - the kind less likely to step up as a leader to get things done.

All this is to say that XI's greatest strength - the community - flourished because there WAS no "signboard" system. With the community eroding, however, perhaps it's time to change direction on the player-event coordination front.

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Originally Posted by Inafking

It's still harder to find people to do things than it is to do the things in the game. It would be easy to implement a signboard system where people could volunteer to help others in exchange for points that would in turn allow them to post for help.

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The problem with this system type is that people would abuse it with second and third characters to get themselves points infinitely.

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Originally Posted by Demon6324236

The problem with this system type is that people would abuse it with second and third characters to get themselves points infinitely.

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Not a problem if points can't be traded. Dual boxing will only take you so far if you only get points for things you can duo. There is ways to adress it. The mistake would be to not implement it and not address the bigger problem of people not staying in the game.

People will tend to focus on the content that gets them the best gear, which currently is delve which outdated many pieces of gear so that is where the main focus lies.

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Originally Posted by Deifact

Being someone who recently returned after a couple years off, I agree that it is hard to find people to help with content other than Adoulin etc.

What I see now is that theres less opportunity to grab and go, people seem to stick in friendship groups or their LS. I guess best opportunity for someone like me is to form an LS with people who want to do the same content as me, which will probably be difficult.

Instead I've sort of resigned myself to enjoying the game solo, which isn't so bad. I chat and socialise with others but while they're enjoying end game content I'm working my way through Rise of the Zilart or Chains of Promathia at my own pace.

It's not great, and it isn't what the game used to be, but it isn't all bad!

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I myself have the same feelings and views

my bigger concern would be that SE wouldn't design it worth a crap, making it go the way of the /seacom system.

So much potential, but a shotty design and failed integration into the search system could once again drive players away from it out of frustration/disappointment.

The sentiment of the OP is why I made this post a few weeks ago.

Better Purposed Party-Seeking

/invite (the green flag) is dead. The search system sucks. The ability to seek for specific events, broader event types, and perhaps multiple, would do a lot of good for this game.

Right now, if you want something, it seems like you need to idle in a city and hope for a shout. You can shout yourself, but after a half hour of forming, many shouts spam for an hour looking for something like bards.

I should be able to seek for
* Voidwatch
* I should be able to seek for a chapter. Sure I'll go to bastok run because I need X.
* More specifically: A chapter and tier so that I can seek for Jeuno T3 (Heavy Metal Plate NMs) or uh.. Zilart T3 (Pouch NMs).
* Further specifically: A specific NM. I never did get those legs from Gaunab. Tried dozens of times. To quote Gone in 60 seconds, they were my Unicorn. I should be able to seek for Gaunab. I never did get that drk neck either, whose name escapes me.

* I should be able to seek for experience points, still, of course.

* I should be able to seek for Delve.
* I should be able to seek for Delve NMs.
* I should be able to seek for specific NMs.

Such a reworking would take considerable effort, but it's a system they designed. They should adapt.

A cross-server content finder would be a godsend to many of these problems, imo. I too, have recently come back, and other than two or three friends I had that were still playing, I've had little luck tackling stuff outside Abyssea pretty much. :/

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Originally Posted by RAIST

my bigger concern would be that SE wouldn't design it worth a crap, making it go the way of the /seacom system.

So much potential, but a shotty design and failed integration into the search system could once again drive players away from it out of frustration/disappointment.

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SE has already designed a system for this, it's all in XIV. Years ago Everquest used online adventures as sort of a testing ground for game mechanics. Some of the ideas were implemented into the PC game, and others that didn't fair so well were not. Maybe SE will look at how a content finder and all that works in XIV and bring a form of it back to this game.

You must be talking about the beta or very late 1.x improvements. When I played that monstrosity, I couldn't even see people's jobs easily if they weren't close to me. (You could be too far within the same city.)

If you're talking about beta, {Take care.}.

Lots of information has been talked about during the Live Letters from the Producer and the blog posts on the official website.

You know why it's hard to do content now? Because there are so fewer players around and of those that are they have probably either done it or have no interest in it. Cross server finder isn't going to happen for various reasons.

The game needs new players, the only way that's going to happen these days is for it to change the payment system it uses. F2P will bring in a lot more players and revitalise the game, nothing else is going to do it at this point, at best under the current system server merges might help but that's about it.

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Originally Posted by Runespider

You know why it's hard to do content now? Because there are so fewer players around and of those that are they have probably either done it or have no interest in it. Cross server finder isn't going to happen for various reasons.

The game needs new players, the only way that's going to happen these days is for it to change the payment system it uses. F2P will bring in a lot more players and revitalise the game, nothing else is going to do it at this point, at best under the current system server merges might help but that's about it.

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Lol @ this logic!

F2P would serve to destroy this game, not bring in an influx of players. It's ALREADY FREE for a month. The problem with the game is balance: a lot of the starting content needs to be adjusted or revamped altogether.

If people aren't sticking around even with a free month trial, what makes you think F2P would solve the issue? No, it wouldn't, not by a long shot.

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Originally Posted by Vil

The problem with the game is balance: a lot of the jobs and content need to be adjusted or revamped altogether.

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Fixed for you. XI's problems run deeper than most seem to realize.

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If people aren't sticking around even with a free month trial, what makes you think F2P would solve the issue? No, it wouldn't, not by a long shot.

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This is true. F2P wouldn't help much with the game in its current state. People would get on, blow it off as a shitty game and move on.

The fact the developers seem to still design stuff for large groups doesn't help (which is self-defeating when the playerbase population seems to be smaller).

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Originally Posted by Duelle

Fixed for you. XI's problems run deeper than most seem to realize.

This is true. F2P wouldn't help much with the game in its current state. People would get on, blow it off as a shitty game and move on.

The fact the developers seem to still design stuff for large groups doesn't help (which is self-defeating when the playerbase population seems to be smaller).

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Lol thanks. That was more or less my aim: They need to fix a LOT of things on the foundational level if they want to XI to appeal to a broader audience. Of course, this may not be what they're looking for and thus they may not see it as cost-effective to go back and fix all the little things.

But it is a big problem. Basically, if you don't already have friends ingame to help you through stuff and explain things, you're going to be poking blindly in starter cities wondering wth you need to do. Sure there's wikis and stuff, but for brand new people, they won't know of their existence right away.

It's amazing though that we have such attachment to thsi game that we'll participate in events on jobs we don't like so we can gear the jobs we do.

The several jobs that didn't have a real place in aby--at least for long (brd, rdm, pld -- irony being that they were loved before then) and the jobs that weren't highly useful in aby, or useful at all outside of solo--blu, pup, bst still got played, just like the lolbst and lolpups were played before aby.

It's amazing to me sometimes how much attachment we develop that we still built our jobs though all that time even though noone ever wanted them. I came back after pld was of significant use in voidwatch. I'd Aegis pil sometimes but that was about it. I still built an aegis and ochain and ran around helping friends, using pld where it was sensible, although not optimal. (Chanspell safety on Pankrator).

Thieves, since the beginning of time, have known why get they invites, and it's not for dps, and it's not really about SATA as that's been subbable, yet there are plenty of mandaus and piecutters.

SE's sense of balance treats our jobs like crap, while always favoring a certain few (though it shifts a bit every few years and the princess jobs are sent to scrub the dishes).

And yet, we still play.

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Originally Posted by OmnysValefor

And yet, we still play.

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Some people care about the game. Others have a hard time letting go of the amount of time spent on that character. Personally, I get access to stuff that makes silly things like this and this possible (I didn't make the second one). We all have our reasons for playing the game. *nod*

I don't seek out machinima but I link what friends show me and "Mika x taru" is probably about the best I've seen.

Very well done.

But yes, we all have different reason, and though we're tread on many times, we keep coming back.

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Originally Posted by Runespider

You know why it's hard to do content now? Because there are so fewer players around and of those that are they have probably either done it or have no interest in it. Cross server finder isn't going to happen for various reasons.

The game needs new players, the only way that's going to happen these days is for it to change the payment system it uses. F2P will bring in a lot more players and revitalise the game, nothing else is going to do it at this point, at best under the current system server merges might help but that's about it.

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You have your own topic where people called you an idiot stop dragging your stupidity into other peoples topics. Thank you.




Honestly I don't have any problems doing old missions or quests because I made friends when I came back. Simple get some people and have fun. Most of the the old content can be soloed now anyway.

I really doubt cross server finder has potential though. It's a sizable undertaking, if even possible. For instance, wow's instances seem to be hosted on different servers than players are on. On two occasions the world I was on, Area 51, crashed while the instance I was in did not.

Given that old instances have 1-3 copies, I'd more suspect that the instances are on the server.

And then of course, Naakual happen in the game world itself and I really imagine there would be troubles with people coming cross server for that, not to mention besieged level lag and frequent dc's, system-lockups.

Another round of server merges would be a better option. Not all servers need it, but some certainly do.

Also, you think the community has degraded now. Cross server instances in many games cause so many people to feel such a lack of accountability for their conduct that they'd do things they'd never do when repercussions are likely.

I was playing WoW when they brought in Dungeon finder, and it sounded like an awesome idea. They were probably the first big mmo to do it, and people were excited, and it was fun for about a week and then people started causing other people sh*t. Ninja'ing things. Making a huge pull and then leaving group (thus jumping from the instance). Vote-kicking people so that their friends got armor etc etc.

What little integrity remains in this community would die.

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Originally Posted by OmnysValefor

I was playing WoW when they brought in Dungeon finder, and it sounded like an awesome idea. They were probably the first big mmo to do it, and people were excited, and it was fun for about a week and then people started causing other people sh*t. Ninja'ing things. Making a huge pull and then leaving group (thus jumping from the instance). Vote-kicking people so that their friends got armor etc etc.

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This is where "community policing" and responsible leadership come into play. You react to the situations as called for during dungeon runs and counteract when you can. I lotted against loot ninjas, won, then had the people that could actually use the gear /random for that gear. You deal with people leaving the instance by having them replaced. Not to mention anyone who's been around enough knows to click no on random vote-to-kick, especially if the run has been relatively smooth.

People will be dicks regardless of whether Dungeon Finder existed or not. I have no issue playing with strangers while also understanding what may possibly happen in such PuGs, and as such have benefitted greatly from DF.

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What little integrity remains in this community would die.

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Seeing that this playerbase treats its players worse than anything I've ever seen in MMOs that are not Lineage II (yes, that includes WoW and it's "bad" community), I don't think there's much integrity to speak of...

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This all being said, I don't think cross-realm partying would actually work. XI's server architecture would not be able to handle it as is, and would need a huge revampt to make it even possible.

If you played before WoW before and immediately after dungeon finder, you could see a sharp increase in people doing mean things just because they could.

There are "nice" people in all games.
There are "mean" people in all games.
There are people that are only nice because they care about their reputation.

The degradation of XI's community paralleling the incline of low-man content is proof enough of that.

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Originally Posted by Vizzer

SE has already designed a system for this, it's all in XIV. Years ago Everquest used online adventures as sort of a testing ground for game mechanics. Some of the ideas were implemented into the PC game, and others that didn't fair so well were not. Maybe SE will look at how a content finder and all that works in XIV and bring a form of it back to this game.

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I have to disagree on any type of content finder. I have experienced it in other games and it really dosent work out like some think. With content finder you are automaticly put in a Q, at that point you are randomly thrown with A: a group that knows whats going on and you actually succeed at what you are doing or B: you get into a group that dosent know jack, dosent talk and you end up failing. Content finder dosent do anything but waste players time and effort.