Ok...let me level with you here SE...

[Avina]

They don’t want to dangle a carrot in front of everyone saying, “you can make these weapons even more powerful!” and then make it so only small fraction of players achieve this.

On the other hand, as some of you have already mentioned, the second stage of these weapon enhancements is left for those players who wish to go above and beyond—the “completionists” so to speak. This is why there will be no difference in weapon skill damage or other stats and only an AoE benefit as well as a special effect will be given for completing this upgrade.

Yes, I can understand how this is for the completionists and whatnot, but the developer team seems completely out of touch with the reality of the situation. I want to ask the developers, deep down inside, would they themselves shoot to complete these trials? Would you...

Be willing to spend the time and effort necessary to gather the pops?
Manipulate a linkshell of friends for years for your benefit?
Stand tall and proud because you went "above and beyond" for minor AoE bonus buffs and a glowy animation?

People enjoy playing this game. People already went through the enormous amount of work required to simply get the original weapon. And now, they are faced with this trial. I, personally, will likely never get a relic or mythic weapon, but this just strikes me as terrible game design and a terrible goal to put in the game.

FFXI warns when the game turns on to not sacrifice your life for this game. Setting such a task only disregards that message. I thought SE would have learned by now, after FFXIV, that completely ignoring the complaints your player population poses to you was not the way to go to keep your player population interested. The developer team is wrong, in this case. The 'completionists' would be just as happy if the 2nd trial wasn't there, period. This is not a feature that anyone is clamoring for or would otherwise be hurt if it was never implemented.

It already is dangling a carrot, a carrot that is going to be able to seen by other relic holders as a form of the weapon that they couldn't get.

[Kriegsgott]

SE didn made the lvl 99 Relic/Mythic/Emp weapon upgrade hard only the Step 2 Trial for Glowing which so say the most people none want it but a lot people ar still crying /sigh

if you dont like the hard work for a "useless glow effect because it dosn benefit the player" just dont do it

[Alerith]

SE didn made the lvl 99 Relic/Mythic/Emp weapon upgrade hard only the Step 2 Trial for Glowing which so say the most people none want it but a lot people ar still crying /sigh

if you dont like the hard work for a "useless glow effect because it dosn benefit the player" just dont do it

Thank you for not only taking the time to read my thread, but the posts of others within the thread.

/sarcasm

Is reading comprehension really such a horrible concept in schools these days?

The conversation is really starting to boil down to the main concern: The path of SE's thinking.

Sure, we who don't care about being all sparkly glowy could just let the issue pass. But the Dev team is going to get it into their mind that it's acceptable to make these horrid trials and to make gear even more of a pain to obtain than voidwatch already makes it. (Picture THAT one.)

No. I won't be doing the sparkly glowy trial. But I'm still concerned about it.

[Washburn]

People are "crying" because its rediculous. Making a relic in the first place is one hell of a task. I didnt have to do the trials to make it better than that level 75, but i did because i feel like, if i did all the work, the weapon should be completed. You don't start somethin like TOAU, blow through the missions with your summoner then not get alexander and odin. You don't do the moogle expansions and not trade the key for your gear piece. People who busted butt all these years should be rewarded with something decent.

Yeah yeah, i know you 85-90 emp holders feel like everyone else is bitching over nothing, but its the whole feeling of feeling like all that work you did was either not good enough, or that its never gonna end.

Yeah, glowy effect, whatever. Its no real benefit. I just feel like it could have either been something worth the work, or that it was reasonably obtainable. It feels like a paintjob for your car costing $50,000. Its unreasonable, and its insulting to think that anyone would even take it seriously enough to consider putting in the work.

Pardon the analogies, but damn.

[Insaniac]

The conversation is really starting to boil down to the main concern: The path of SE's thinking.

Sure, we who don't care about being all sparkly glowy could just let the issue pass. But the Dev team is going to get it into their mind that it's acceptable to make these horrid trials and to make gear even more of a pain to obtain than voidwatch already makes it. (Picture THAT one.)

No. I won't be doing the sparkly glowy trial. But I'm still concerned about it.

Refer to my post from the last page.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/th...l=1#post265131

The precedent is that horrible things that most people don't want to do will be optional and have very little effect on the power of your character. This is a good precedent not a bad one.

[Insaniac]

Yeah, glowy effect, whatever. Its no real benefit. I just feel like it could have either been something worth the work, or that it was reasonably obtainable. It feels like a paintjob for your car costing $50,000. Its unreasonable, and its insulting to think that anyone would even take it seriously enough to consider putting in the work.

Why in the world some people continue to ask for a better reward for an impossible trial is lost on me. With the current set doing stage 1 gives you your weapon at 99.9% power and leaves the extra .1% on a trial that almost no one will ever do. Why would you ask for them to shift more of that power on to the stage 2 trial? You want your weapon at 90% of full power and the extra 10% on a trial that you have pretty much no chance of ever completing? Why ask for this?

[Alerith]

Refer to my post from the last page.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/th...l=1#post265131

The precedent is that horrible things that most people don't want to do will be optional and have very little effect on the power of your character. This is a good precedent not a bad one.

If we were certain that's how it would stay, I would agree with you completely. But as it stands, it could be unique to R/M/E weapons.

In the future, they could say "Oh, well everyone was willing to deal with this trial. Let's add more."

If things went the way you stated, that would be perfectly fine. However, I'm concerned they wouldn't limit it to trivial things that people wouldn't mind being optional. Look at your dagger for example. Right now, afterglow is trivial and it's not going to affect your damage or performance whether you upgrade it or not.

What if, instead, the afterglow was something incredible and made your damage better, your delay lower, etc. etc.

Now there's a problem and it's a problem that could become real in the future if SE decides it's ok to go about doing trials this way.

[Insaniac]

That's just a general worry about SE competence though. They could decide any number of things but if we are talking about precedence this sets the one I posted above. From Camate's post it seems like they are fully aware of how insane the trial is and for that reason they have made it optional. They also can't infer that we are all fine with an insane trial if only 1-2 people per server do it. I can't blame you at all for expecting SE to make stupid choices but I don't think this points to the possibility of them making terrible grinds for substantial upgrades. In fact it's the exact oppossite.

[Washburn]

Why in the world some people continue to ask for a better reward for an impossible trial is lost on me.

Read this over and over until it clicks.

[detlef]

It's an impossible trial. And it's essentially entirely cosmetic. I will finish my weapons to 99 and then I will stop. The world will keep on turning.