Raise the Minimum Requirement for entering Abyssea to Lv70 or 75

[Leonlionheart]

We'd all have more time to hone our skill if Akujima had his way. Just imagine him in glowing red armor leading drills in Valkurm dunes and sending people to Mordion Gaul if they bring a powerlevel with them.

this actually made me lol pretty good.

[Panthera]

You were not using objects for your verbs, so therefore you omitted the applicable definitions.

Leeching deprives those who actually earned their level out of their prestige. It misleads people that you've been playing your job for 90 levels, when all you've done at best is just open chests, and at worst, just stood around doing nothing. Leeching evades the leveling up process of particpating in battle in a way specific to the main job being leveled. More generally, cheating is dishonest. Did you really, honestly earn level 90? No, you just leeched. Leeching is cheating by defintions,

No, I used them with objects when I originally explained applied cheating to leeching, except for usage two, but the operative word for #2 and #4 are the same anyway with or without objects.

#5 is the most used definition in terms of discussing the game, and nearly impossible to separate from the use of the word, and I don't believe that you are arguing that keying or leeching violates rules or regulations.

I disagree. The meanings are more or less independant for the purpose of usage. A bear and to bear have different, independant meanings for the purpose of usage.

I do not believe that #1, #2, #3, and #4 are as widely applicable as you are using them. Leeches are not claiming anything about how they leveled when they join a party, just that they have the job at X level. ---At this point in the game, there is no way to know how a stranger gained his levels other than asking, so it is inappropriate to make assumptions one way or the other. Without this assumption, there is no deception based on the manner of leveling.--

(My -'s (didn't want to shout for that long, but it needed disinction, and it's already in italics!).)

Here I think we're getting to the real crux of why you feel my position is invalid.

It depends on what you mean my "appropriate."

Are we talking about a "safe" assumption or a "reasonable" assumption? Assumptions are inherently never safe, because they take for granted that something may be or not be, when the opposite is actually the case. It's not reasonable to expect an assumption to be safe. If there's a 99% probability that you'll be fine, and a 1% probability that you will be harmed, the assumption is no "safe."

Is it reasonable to assume that they RMT'd their account? Is it reasonable to assume that people went afk and did nothing? No. I've never AFB'd, I know people who've never AFB'd, I don't think it's reasonable to expect that they did.

When someone is 90, we give them the "benefit of the doubt" that they didn't cheat. It is going out on a limb, I'll give you that. In other words, they are innocent until proven guilty--is that unreasonable or inappropriate? The US system of justice doesn't think so. If you did, you'd also have to explain why people should have to prove their innocence when charged with a crime.

There is an implication that people who join for active DD and mage spots have the appropriate level of combat and magic skills, and that they know what they're doing. If they have the appropriate skills and knowledge, there is no deception or fraud.

If that's the case, someone could RMT a fully leveled and skilled character. They still "have" a 90 account. But the person playing cheated by purchasing the RMT'd account in the first place, and present it as their own achievement in skills and knowledge, even if they did somehow know what they were doing, which I find doubtful. In other words, they cheated our giving them the benefit of the doubt. Even if they did admit they RMT'd their account, they still evaded the leveling process. You keep assuming that not saying anything or admitting it either way, means they're not cheating, when that isn't the case.

If they choose to not skill and gimp themselves, then sure, you can say they're cheating the party out of a DD spot, but it is because the player made bad choices, not how they gained their levels. If they only made Qufim sync xp parties, they'd still have terribly low skills.

Here's where it gets tricky. We all know that you should be able to skill up on an IT monster, even if your level exceeds the skill cap of the mob; you're still fighting something strong than you are at that level. How we've clamored for this. We should be able to expect this.

By your example, you can claim that leeches are cheating your sense of accomplishment, but saying that we are cheating is not applicable to those definitions. However, people who leech are saying that getting lv 90 is not an accomplishment for them, so they're not cheating their sense of accomplishment.

I don't think we're on the same page here.

What they're cheating is the prestige and stature of my accomplishment, not the actual accomplishment itself. In other words, they cheat the perceived value of the accomplishment, which still has a value in and of itself. Just because they don't care about getting to 90 and don't see it as an accomplishment, doesn't mean that their cheating doesn't damage the perceived value of my accomplishment. This assumes that others value the persistence that "legitimately" leveling to achieve the the accomplishment entails, in other words, people like-minded to myself, and they're out there. I've manually fished up a Lu Shang's. A friend of mine was in disbelief, he couldn't believe I did it. He didn't say that doing that doesn't have value, he just didn't think it was humanly possible! His disbelief, his perception of the impossible, has much value to me.

In the bodybuilding example, if the winner used steroids and openly admits it since it was not against the rules, there is no cheating in regards to rules violations, nor is there fraud or deception in that they are not claiming to be steroid free. If a participant chooses not to use steroids, he is just putting himself at a disadvantage.

No, of course they aren't cheating in the sense that they're "breaking the rules."

Would they openly admit they used steroids? Doesn't sound like an accomplishment to me. If they don't openly admit it, it is a lie of ommission, and deceptive. If they do admit they were taking steroids, they are admitting to cheating by avoidance of the purpose of the competition. I really don't think the point of a body building competition is just having a good physique, it's getting one. For example, the purpose of a race isn't just being at the finish line, it's getting there. The fact that steroids are against the rules means that having a good physique isn't the end-all and be-all of the competition.

And personally, I don't like cheating by any definition. The more definitions it meets, the worse the cheating.

They are not cheating because they are not frauduelent or deceptive: Again, no claim was made by the person otherwise. In fact, it was agreed when the keymaster was invited (or changed jobs) that that was his role in the party would be. There is no violation of rules, or deception to the party as to what that character's role in the xp party is.

This evades the definition of cheating as a form of evasion, which means it cheats the definition of the word. The most common usage is "to cheat death," but that usage is not exclusive.

And as for experience points scrolls, it depends on if you completed the quest on one job and then changed to another. If you changed jobs, by the same definition, experience points scrolls evade the leveling up process gone through by gaining experience points by defeating monsters in a way specific to or supported by the job/support job combination played, directly or indirectly while that monster was defeated. Getting experience points from ENMs, MMM, exp chests, or Dominion Ops are examples of gaining exp indirectly, but could not have been gained without participating in the battle directly. If you changed jobs, short version this time, then you did not gain exp on your job when the monster was defeated.

Levels are about combat ability, measured in increments by skill and combat levels, by stats such as STR and VIT. If you study karate, you get better at it by practicing it, not by cooking, or driving, or something that isn't karate. It only makes sense then that in order to gain combat levels, one must participate in combat, and not something else. The only way to get better at the Fencing job is to fence, and the only way to get better at the Boxing job is to box. There might be some overlap, but it's not one in place of the other.

One should not get experience points for sending tells. That's just bad game design that supports evasion. Standing around in and of itself does not give exp, it's not supposed to. You don't get exp for riding chocobos, but you can get chocobo digging skill, and not something else, which makes sense. You don't get experience points for riding the airship.

Also, notice that FOV/GOV do not allow changing jobs. One should not expect to gain easily exp on mnk/dnc and then use it on White Mage or Bard. The In other words, exp scrolls don't fight back at you via the monster on a different job, when doing so is a different leveling experience. Getting EXP on Dancer is easy by design, on bard it's difficult by design; one does not mean you've had the experience of the other.

By having a 90, you've lead me to the reasonable assumption that you've been playing it, when you have not. You've just been, for example, taggin the ??? in Sacrarium once a week. In principle, it's no different than chest leeching. It's not as bad as do-nothing leeching, but it's still cheating.

...and if not, its about the same participation as a subbed cure II.

Leeching, by which I mean keymastering, does not have the same participation as a subbed Cure II. One is related to fighting monsters. The other is keying chests.

Anyways, those are not FFXI. Have you ever seen low level characters trying to open chests while fighting murex? They really should have 2 hp atmas and atma of the apocalypse, because they die a lot in pickup groups. Stilll, most mobs used for xp do not have aoe like that.

This means they don't belong there. A level 1 has no business in a fight with even a lowly lesser colibri, let alone a Sand Sweeper. SE doesn't allow it the latter. Why they allow it with a level 30 doesn't make sense. Does a feather weight belong in the ring with Mike Tyson? Even if it were allowed for official matches, that's just plain nuts.

Also, if a mimic happens to pop in the middle of the group, then the chest will try to kill the keymaster.

This means that Mimics fight back, and normal chests do not. No one goes through the leveling process on mimics, they only happen to. If they do, it's coincidence. Not that you're saying this as such, but it's deceptive to say,"People exp on mimics." It's deceptive because it takes advantage of our assumptions about our understanding of the leveling process. It's fair to say,"I happen to get some exp on mimics while I was farming in Pso-Xja." In a more general way, it's not honest thing to say, in other words.

I think joining as a DD and then afking the whole time is a jerk move and worthy of a kick. It is deceptive, but is not a violation of the rules. Therefore, it is cheating the party out of a DD slot, but it is not cheating at FFXI.

Close. They are not breaking the rules of FFXI, but they are cheating at FFXI.

If you let the group know that you need to afk for 30 minutes, they are fine with it, and you come back, that's ok. If the person payed for a leech spot, then it is a business transaction of gil for easy xp, and there is no fraud or deception, and there is no cheating using any of the definitions.

Not completely true. It evades the leveling process in earnest.

Related, what is your opinion of people who key their subjobs from 37 to 49, and then never touch them again?

They cheated.

You will still need to learn when to use the subjob's abilities with your main job, and adjust to the slightly different playstyle.

Yes, they should have played their jobs so they'd know how to play from first hand experience.

Does your opinion change if the person admits that its a new subjob for them that they're trying out in an xp group?

They cheated on their subjob. Not taking subjobs seriously is nothing new. I didn't like it then, moreso now.

Since the keymaster is paying 500 cruor per chest opened, he is actively participating in that aspect of the party.

He didn't fight the monster to get the 500 cruor to open the chest. If he did, it might be ok. But......I don't like the time limit in Abyssea such that opening chests can practically be a full time job for most jobs so that you can keep fighting. And Dominion Ops aren't well designed, either. I think it's silly we have to stop fighting to have a chat with an NPC, back and forth and back and forth, and someone who just takes up space and can't fight the monster shouldn't be allowed to benefit from it. Fighting for up to 30 minutes in MMM I liked; a good bit of fighting and then a short teeny tiny break. If I may be indulged in a bit of my own hyperbole, I can blink in the amount of time it takes to beat an OP, and then I'm going through riveting confirmation windows with an NPC, which probably takes up as much if not more time than fighting monsters that drop like flies because of the fact that it's 18 guys against 1 EXP monster when they have Abyssites. Killing monsters should not and doesn't really depend on proc-ing and chests and lights. It's gimicky and convoluted. Why not just have us climb ladders and do backflips and sing and do a little dance? It's just as arbitrary, and probably more entertaining. I think that if they had doubled or tripled the exp to begin with, and Abyssea wasn't just nothing more than areas we've already played, except with bells and whistles added, we wouldn't be having a discussion about people who's actions contribute nothing to the battle in ways that don't have anything to do with the battle, period.

In regards to the walking across the US example, it may be one person's goal to walk across the US, but others may just want to cross the country so they can spend some time at the beach with their friends; those people lose nothing by taking a car or plane, nor does it detract from the first person's sense of accomplishment for getting there in his own way.

Ok, if I've been unclear, let me rephrase: getting there matters as being there does. The practical value of manually fishing up a Lu Shang's is that you get a Lu Shang's, which also has it's own practical value. A Lu shang has it's own value to have, but getting there also has value, if you do it the hard way as opposed to the easy way. If i wanted to walk across the US, and then do something really cool once I got there, they both have value to me.

Now, here's the thing. It depends on if you believe in objective, inherent truth, or if it's just something we as humans make up. It is my assertion that Walking across the United States has an inherent, objective value. It's an accomplishment, whether anyone wants to think it is or not. It's the damage to the subjective, perceived truth of the value of the accomplishment that bothers me as much as anything.

[Nacht]

So if you think that people shouldn't level jobs in abyssea because they have to learn their jobs, then what about if we're leveling a job on a mule character? I already know how to play whm, I've played whm for years, but now I want a 2nd character that's a whm, and I want it quickly. Then that's ok to leech because I already know how to play the job, right?

I might have to learn a different playing style that involves controlling 2 characters, but I better get that whm to 90 as quickly as possible so I can start learning that.

[Panthera]

You are completely in error.

Let me give you an analogy. Advertisers love to say "free with purchase." Now, you have to pay for your bologne sandwich or whatever, and then they give you the cheap plastic promotion toy for a Disney live action movie. Now, obviously, the bologna sandwich was not free, because you had to pay for it. Now, you've got the bologna sandwich, and then they give you your toy. But they didn't give just give you the toy, you had to pay for the Big Mac. If you had to pay for A to get B, then B isn't free because you had to pay money to get it because you had to pay money for A. It's bologne, and I don't care for bologne.

It's deceptive because it takes for granted our assumptions about our world. I just assume people do the right thing unless I can prove otherwise. If someone shows me a Purple Heart and says,"look what I got!" when they mean got to mean "have" not got as in, got it the hard way like real heroes do, they're taking advantage of my assumptions. And that's just not honest. That's why it's cheating. They called it the Stolen Valor Act. Stealing isn't honest, either.

I just love how people evade definitions they can't argue with. They cheat the arguement. It's not an honest particpation in the discussion. It's merely a show of it, false.

In the old days, there were far fewer teleports. Now there are more.

Just getting from point A to point be can be an accomplishment or not. Getting through Promyvion back when it first came out was an accomplishment. Trying to get to Khimaira is an accomplishment, if it had undead, moreso.

They had POS hacking too, and that was never an accomplishment.

Changing the game does not change the definition of cheating. Changing the rules does not change the definition of cheating. It might or might not coincide with the definition of cheating, which it should, but it doesn not change it.

In the old days there were far fewer camps. Now there are more. You get twice the XP for kills, plus XP rings, plus stronger signets, plus faster mob re-pops, more merits, etc. It's much easier to level now than it was before. People who level now using xp rings, double xp, signets, merits, ports, etc aren't cheating because others of us leveled jobs the old way when it was easier. They're not cheating if some people refuse to use those things. They aren't cheating if they fail to tell people how they leveled.

You're still fighting monsters in this case. With chest leeching or do nothing leeching, you are not.

And if people look at someone's jobs, they might think they are all years old or brand new. They might think they were burned or leeched or the account was bought. But they don't ask because they don't care: they just want to add you to produce.

If someone is trying to figure out how to play on NMs that I have an interest in, I care, it matters to me. If someone RMTs their account, I care, I want nothing to do with them. And given that do nothing leeching is about the same thing, I want nothing to do with them either, and I don't, I kick them. People complain about do-nothing leeches, I'm really not the only one. If I could have a Bard, Cor or Smn, for example that can handle doing their job well enough while doing chests well enough, I wouldn't call them cheating, because they're particpating in the battle. If someone shows up on pup/thf and wants to open chests because they can't do much else, that's cheating.

[Akujima]

I might have to learn a different playing style that involves controlling 2 characters, but I better get that whm to 90 as quickly as possible so I can start learning that.

Ever notice how alot of people in game say they "need" something?

I see it all the time amongst 90% of the player base. How so many people say that they "need" a certain piece of equipment. When the fact is, they don't "need" it at all. It's a desire, not a necessity. Sure, you may want a Lv90 mule quickly, but what is the "need" for it? If as quickly as possible was to LvUp outside of Abyssea, then how would you know the difference? When is there a consensus on what is "fast enough" for everyone? Technically the fastest way to get a Lv90 WHM, is to buy an account with a Lv90 WHM job. But that is fraudulent, and is against the rules.

There needs to be rules and regulations, even within the construct of video games. If sports had no rules, how would they be entertaining at all? What is the excitement of scoring a goal in hockey, if there is no goalie to defend the net? Would it even be considered "scoring" without the challenge of having to get the puck past the goalie?

[Byrth]

Ever notice how alot of people in game say they "need" something?

Sometimes I do

There needs to be rules and regulations, even within the construct of video games. If sports had no rules, how would they be entertaining at all? What is the excitement of scoring a goal in hockey, if there is no goalie to defend the net? Would it even be considered "scoring" without the challenge of having to get the puck past the goalie?

I think you have a self-incriminating post fetish. This is another of my favorites:

I wish SE would step up and have the guts to do something unorthodox for once. Every other MMO has blood tanking as the main focus. Constantly avoiding DMG or taking so few DMG, kinda lessens the importance of "Healing" type jobs.

Hurry up and try something unorthodox, guys! Make it the same as every other MMO! If you don't even read what you write before you hit the post button, you can hardly expect other people to read it. By the way, worst analogies ever.

[Akujima]

Hurry up and try something unorthodox, guys! Make it the same as every other MMO! If you don't even read what you write before you hit the post button, you can hardly expect other people to read it. By the way, worst analogies ever.

Pulling a post out of context, from a different thread, because you don't understand the topic being discussed proves nothing.

The OP in that thread was talking about raising Utsusemi Ni to Lv50 so that subjobs would not have it available to them. In this context "Unorthodox" means "Do Something Drastic" to change the game mechanics around.

[Vivik]

I wish you guys would let this thread die so I can start my "Make Abyssea level 75+ or at least level 70" thread. It's tiring waiting so long and I don't think it's fair to others who want to rehash the same topic over and over again.

[Neisan_Quetz]

Holy walls of text you are are thick and still wrong. I can't believe you even made a reference to cheating death just to show how horribly wrong you are, get over yourself, damn. You still haven't provided a single instance of cheating that is allowable because cheating isn't allowed by the ToS. Seriously, just shut up.

[Akujima]

@Panthera: Good luck trying to get any point across. It's quite obvious that it's impossible to have a mature debate with anyone here.

The fact of the matter is that people want to be deceived into believing that there is no objective truths. That absolutely everything is subjective to perception, is what they base their entire thesis on. It's the other end of the fanatical agenda, allowing them cling to whichever side that suits them best at that particular moment.

If you bring up a reason that has to do with morals, they will say things like "you're QQ'ing, because you just want people to LvUp your way!"

If you bring up a reason that has to do with logic, they will swing in the other direction saying "well we should have have the choice to play how we want"

Whatever situation arises, they will simply pick and choose whichever response best suits them.

Speaking to them about intangible things, such as emotion, feelings and accomplishments is futile. Rarely do people truly understand these things anymore, and far and few between will have the integrity to discuss these things in a mature manner.

They will continue to avoid confronting the real discussion, picking and pointing at your minor inconsistencies until it drives you mad. Like a child who repeats everything you say, just to get under your skin until you give up. That is how they win.