Who ever got six-person parties in the first place?

[Inches]

Nostalgia always wears rose-colored glasses.

I keep reading people posting about colibri parties, and campaign and such. I'm not sure if they remember FFXI had been around for a long time before that.

Looking for a party could be a *hellish* experience. Unless you were a whm (until that time when rdms started replacing whms) or a brd...or a Rng (pre nerf), or a blm (pre-zergs). Let me introduce you to my friends, the DRKs. Stories of woe and pain are told about Dark Knights haunting the streets of Jeuno, not being able to make their living as adventurers.

Typical party forming dialogue in the day: "hey, i got a friend that wants to come, he's a drk" response: "ew, nope" .

As a whm turned smn back in the day, I *had* to build my own parties, and could totally see the difference between playing a wanted job vs an "unpopular" one. But even then, making parties wasn't a walk in the park and many times, there simply wasn't a way to do it. Did I manage, yes I did. Eventually I reached my goals, but I will *always* remember how hellish it was to get anything done.

I guess if you have all the time in the world to play, it doesn't really matter because, eventually, you *would've* gotten into a party (unless, again, you were a DRK). But someone that works, studies, or both, that wants to lay back and enjoy a friendly grind with 5 other folk, and only had 1 or 2 hours a night to play; or maybe they could only play 2 times a week or less. Yeah, i bet it was hellish for those people.

Back in the day, I did have all the time in the world, so I was lucky because there was always a time I could join or make my group. But the difficulty in partying back then was a very real thing.

Right now, I have a really hectic schedule, and the only reason i *could* come back was because Abyssea and the new system allows me to enjoy the game at my pace, and it does not occupy 155% of my time. I also think, because I play the game since release, I can appreciate these changes and the wonders of being able to do what we are able to do nowadays.

I loved the old final fantasy xi (headaches included..never could stop thinking about the game) and I love the new final fantasy xi. Consider me a happy panda.

[Economizer]

As a whm turned smn back in the day, I *had* to build my own parties, and could totally see the difference between playing a wanted job vs an "unpopular" one. But even then, making parties wasn't a walk in the park and many times, there simply wasn't a way to do it. Did I manage, yes I did. Eventually I reached my goals, but I will *always* remember how hellish it was to get anything done.

Yeah, White Mage has had its ups and downs as a job...

Currently, sure, you can find an experience points party very easily as a White Mage, but that's true of any healer - I haven't seen a Red Mage or Scholar get denied from an experience points party if there was an open healer spot.

On the other hand, even to this day, soloing anything that other classes can solo - and not just BST, but DD jobs and even magic nuking jobs, is a complete and utter pain most of the time. I might be able to pull some things off with White Mage that most other people couldn't, but I feel the limitations compared to the jobs SE is favoring for certain events.

Maybe it is stubborn to expect to be able to pull off what most others can do on other jobs if my gear keeps getting better, but it sucks to hit those occasional limitations when nobody is around to help and you know you could pull off whatever you need done if only you had job x leveled. I suppose I've leveled / been leveling other jobs but if it can be done with extreme blunt force trauma involving two one-handed weapons in a familiar 6-7 hit pattern of pain, I try to make it happen.

[Cream_Soda]

I thought the older pt'ing was a lot more fun than the 18 man abyssea pt, but I like the Abyssea exp much better. The only way I'd go back to the 6 man pt system is if it could match/exceed the exp of an Abyssea pt.

There is more to XI than leveling

[Alhanelem]

The same goes for any War, Sam, Brd, or Rdm that sucked too, really. People call it princessing, I call it wanting to get the hell away from those godforsaken pink birds as quickly as possible.

I understand your sentiment, but those less awesome players may not have loved grinding merits any more than you did. One could ask "Why do you deserve to get done faster at these other people's expense?"

I keep reading people posting about colibri parties, and campaign and such. I'm not sure if they remember FFXI had been around for a long time before that.

Yes, it was, and it was the dark ages.

[Cream_Soda]

I understand your sentiment, but those less awesome players may not have loved grinding merits any more than you did. One could ask "Why do you deserve to get done faster at these other people's expense?"

One may ask "what makes you feel you're so special that others will want to willingly lower their exp/hr to compensate for you"

For me, the question to that answer is if you are my friend, I don't mind what job you come on.

For random people, that answer is sorry, not happening

[Aarahs]

I think I usually only had to wait an hour on average on dragoon. Though I remember several times I got invites without my flag up. Merit parties gave 20k/hr on birds.

On summoner I had to turn down invites when they wanted me to be main healer with no assistance. I only tried it once and I couldn't keep up. Still not very bad though.

[Greatguardian]

I understand your sentiment, but those less awesome players may not have loved grinding merits any more than you did. One could ask "Why do you deserve to get done faster at these other people's expense?"

Yes, it was, and it was the dark ages.

What Cream said.

I could give a shit less about how anyone else gets their merits. I just know I was getting mine out of the way in 25k/hr or higher parties. If someone couldn't keep up in a merit party on any of their jobs, they can slog through campaign.

[Flionheart]

I was a Princess BRD unless someone was my friend. You want minuets? I'm sorry my e-peen is the exp/hr, not how much your Penta's can spike.

[Xantavia]

I found that the less xp/hour I got, the more fun I actually had (sometime). When people are talking, it made the time go much faster. I was in no rush to get to the cap, so I didn't really care how long it took. The parties that were "kill, kill, kill" left me feeling wiped and not wanting to xp for a few days afterward. I guess it was all about what you wanted from the game. Somebody who wants the best gear is going to have a different definition of what is fun than the guy who is interested is exploring the zones to see what is out there.

And I never had a problem getting invites to parties. Sure, there were days when I didn't party, but I didn't stand around WG just waiting. I'd find some ep to kill (before the upped xp for them), go do map quests, or just explore corners of the zones to see what was there.

[Zarchery]

I did a 5-man party at level 95, RNG MNK WHM BRD THF, fighting IT tigers in Kuftal Tunnel, a few weeks ago. We were farming Rarab Tail items and Seasoning Stones. Somehow, even though the mobs were IT, we killed them in a fraction of the time it took to kill IT mobs in the old days.