[dev1087] Job Adjustments: White Mage

[Purrs]

Are you people serious about making everything so difficult to obtain? It's magic. Magic was never this difficult to obtain until the post-Abyssea team started making Final Fantasy XI: The Time Sink Edition. Even pre-Abyssea magic wasn't that hard to get. The base function of a job--magic for magic casters--shouldn't be something we need to sell our souls to obtain.

At first I thought the player's statement about Araise being detrimental to white mages was silly. Then I read your response to that.

I don't think Araise will be all that beneficial. Exp is easy to obtain, so people can keep popping Reraise I scrolls and earring charges. I see the weakness duration benefit but I'm not sure how beneficial that will be if everyone is dying five times over in three minutes. Plus, without being AOE, Araise would just take too much time and MP to be practical. If you're trying to cut weakness duration on your only tank, chances are everyone else is going to be too dead to care anyways. And of course Araise will have little value in Abyssea where we have Atma of the Apocalypse anyways. You can argue that it could free up an Atma slot, but Apoc has it's other advantages and is always active. No need for recasts from a white mage who could very well be dead too.

[Economizer]

Well I'd hope this scroll is useful beyond just being a status symbol. I don't mind the people who want a status symbol, I honestly just want another small way to push my advantage over White Mages who just level it to fill the slot or have the job as third or fifth priority. It isn't any one thing (like this scroll) that makes a White Mage better at their job then another once both are playing competently, but rather a large number of small things adding up, like having the right sub, having the right gear for the situation, having a good barspell set, having all your skills leveled (even melee skills), and so on.

It will already have limited usefulness because a good group will have a strategy that doesn't revolve around dying repeatedly. The only place where this scroll will make a major difference is in large party wipe situations due to the extra timer and lowman.

Honestly, if you are worried about this scroll making or breaking your inclusion from a group, it won't unless you don't have all the other small things set up. Now the question is, will this be worth the effort? Until we know how SE plans to include this in the game and what the official MP, casting time, and recasting time stats are, we don't know. If it is a quest as long as Sleepga II, it will probably be worth the effort. If it is a drop from Voidwatch or Walk of Echoes it will be less then one million gil in six months. If it is a super rare drop from some event it might be expensive and hard to get. Honestly I'm secretly hoping it is a quested WHM-only fight that gives a R/E scroll for clearing it that involves clubbing down some blunt weak monster... it could either be a solo fight or a party fight but the jobs selection would be restricted for a Final Fantasy I tribute.

And if it is a BCNM fight that requires 60 or so of an item and has the same drop rate as a Kraken Club and nothing else of value drops from the same fight SE hates us and I will not be happy because this quote,

However, the development team would like to grant players more opportunities to obtain it.

was not what happened with the freaking Kraken Club.

[Economizer]

Are you people serious about making everything so difficult to obtain? It's magic. Magic was never this difficult to obtain until the post-Abyssea team started making Final Fantasy XI: The Time Sink Edition.

Raise III, Utsusemi: Ichi/Ni, Phalanx, Sleepga II, Mage's Ballad I, Army's Paeon V, select Recall/Teleport scrolls, Warp II, Retrace. All of these spells are over 500k to buy from the AH (although only 2-3 of these are over 1M). I don't know if this means they're hard to obtain by everyone's standards but by mine anything over 500k is something I will try to avoid buying due to militant frugality (plus obtaining something for yourself rather then paying for it has a special something to it). I only buy big ticket items if I've failed to get it myself and it is worth the price. And honestly, I don't expect Arise to be over 1M unless it is worth the price or incredibly rare.

[Fredjan]

Status symbols are worthless if they aren't useful. I really hope they don't nerf this to appease the "we want it to be easy to get because it is a scroll" crowd. I'm pretty sure they're dead set on making it harder to get compared to other scrolls and that's not bad, but it won't be good if the spell sucks as a result. Either make it worth the effort to get it or don't bother.

Yeah, I agree. It needs to be worthwhile.

A status symbol? Do you really care that much about what a bunch of game/anime/computer/sci-fi nerds from across the globe (like me) think of you that you'd put yourself through potentially years of crap just to have something to show off to them? Are your friends going to think more of you if you have it or less of you if you don't?

I'll adjust my opinion a bit on this as I've thought about it more.

I suppose the afterglow r/m/e weapons are meant to be "status symbols" - heck, they aren't even worth the trouble to get, most people will get the level 99 stage 1 forms and call it a day, if even that.

Arise shouldn't be THAT difficult to obtain, but I do like a challenge in questing magic. SE's view on magic has definitely changed post-abyssea to what it was to an extent pre-abyssea, thinking every higher level spell should have some sort of difficulty with obtaining ("Spells are set so that only the people who really want the spells will get it" etcetra). Goes without saying they want the highest level magic to be harder to get, I just hope they don't overdo it.

We saw this with Abyssea - nowadays every spell takes practically no effort to get 76-90, and they're really cheap on the AH. For those in a rush back then, most/if not all of the spells were available from a NPC. Nowadays, it's been Voidwatch, KC/HKCNMs, or Walk of Echoes to get 90+ magic spells.

Say Black Mage spells for example: I know higher level Black Mages without Warp II... that's just sheer laziness (quest wasn't even hard tbh). Sleepga II is a rough quest, that I understand.

[saevel]

Raise III, Utsusemi: Ichi/Ni, Phalanx, Sleepga II, Mage's Ballad I, Army's Paeon V, select Recall/Teleport scrolls, Warp II, Retrace. All of these spells are over 500k to buy from the AH (although only 2-3 of these are over 1M). I don't know if this means they're hard to obtain by everyone's standards but by mine anything over 500k is something I will try to avoid buying due to militant frugality (plus obtaining something for yourself rather then paying for it has a special something to it). I only buy big ticket items if I've failed to get it myself and it is worth the price. And honestly, I don't expect Arise to be over 1M unless it is worth the price or incredibly rare.

Except .... most of those are quest-able or easily obtainable through a BC fight. Their only expensive because the quest ones are one time obtain only and people don't like to both with level capped BC fights anymore. I Paid zero for my Utsusemi scroll, which is far less then 500K.

Making this a quest spell would be fine, even if it's a long involved quest that has multiple "wait till JP midnight / conquest tally", eventually the aspiring WHM will obtain it. Making it a 0.01% drop off a Fight that you'll only do once per week is beyond ridiculous. I only mention that last part because SE said various things wouldn't require "The very best" gear to obtain and would be obtaining by "the majority of players" and we saw how that turned out. Imagine if they actually wanted to make something obtainable to "only a select few" and "extremely difficult". I'm looking at rank 1 mogbanaza type rare when they say that (as in only a few per server).

[Kalilla]

I can describe this argument in one word: GARBAGE.

This obsession with rarity--in a video game, mind you--for the sake of status has always been ridiculous in my view. Why S-E (or, more specifically, team Tanaka) continues to cater to clowns who get off on looking down on people who aren't as "hardcore" as they are is beyond my understading at this point.

If there are a series of exploration quests needed, well and good. Requiring a series of HNM drops or making it a sub-1% drop from one is a bridge too far. But I doubt this point will sink into the heads of those who see themselves as a 10th-degree Black Belt in FFXI and disciples of Matser Tanaka.

I'm a helpful and kind person, so I'm not going to trash your post. I will however give you my reason as to why I want rare scrolls, regardless if you think my opinion is garbage or not.

I am not apart of team Tanaka, nor do I agree with the way the game has been going. That is my opinion, and I'm allowed to have one. I for one believe that people around the world enjoy collecting rare items because they enjoy doing it more than actually owning it. It might be an investment, it might be for fun, regardless of the reasons behind doing so, they enjoy doing it.

Just because this is a virtual world does not make people immune to this desire.

Let's say you have two options when you create a character:

1. The game asks you if you want all your jobs at level 99 and a bunch of nice gear to start your character off, while you recieve a random relic/mythic/empy once a month just for paying the subscription cost.
2. You deny the above, and play from scratch working your way up to gearing your character and each job class you wish to be.

#1, I believe most players now wish this happened. If anything takes longer than a few hours to do they get furious, no matter what it is.

#2, I do not believe most players today would choose this, even though it would be my choice today. I absolutely hate leveling, but I don't believe I should have access to a job if I don't work at it. I don't want things handed to me, period.

You probably are someone who wants something handed to them, and you are allowed to feel that way. I do not, and I play this game to spend time with my friends and tackle on the challenges in this game (with the 6 hours a week I have to play). I do not show off, I don't have a town set, I don't look down on others just because their gear does not compare to what I own. I have had only one role model in this game that I looked up to and try to make my WHM like theirs. I have only been WHM in this game since day one and I am fine with this.

I am satisfied with where my WHM is today, but that doesn't mean I don't want a challenge. I could go after Yagrush but honestly I'd rather spend that time helping my friends than using it all for myself. I have no desire to have some fancy gear set that no one else has just to look cool, I just want to work for the armor I want. I stopped leveling my WHM just so I could have a Nobles Tunic, and I stopped leveling for a very long time. I had to save up 13,450,000 gil way back in the day, and loved that body. I worked for it and earned it, I didn't get it just to show it off to others so I could look down on them. I did it because I wanted to make my job better, and it took me more than a month to do so with my limited play time. I kept that body for years, and sold it back for 300k so I could buy an Aristocrats for 1.8 mil. I have no regrets for putting that work into it, and if I could of done it over again I would of because I had fun doing it.

There are people who just want to have some challenge in this game, I personally do not think time sinks are challenges. I think SE doesn't know how to make this game more challenging, so all they know how to do is make crazy long time sinks. Just look at the Part 2 of relic trials, just ridiculous. I read somewhere that it would take you 2.5 - 12.5 times the amount of the maximum gil cap just to buy enough to finish the trial. SE, just wtf?

I appreciate the counter argument, but I think your mind isn't in the right place. People are going to want to have challenges in video games to obtain rare items because they enjoy the journey there. There are going to be people who want to get them to show them off and look down on you, but they are probably 16 years old anyways, and if not then they sure are acting like it.

[Economizer]

Let's say you have two options when you create a character:

1. The game asks you if you want all your jobs at level 99 and a bunch of nice gear to start your character off, while you recieve a random relic/mythic/empy once a month just for paying the subscription cost.

Except it is a 96.99% drop Claustrum, 3% Farsha, and .01% drop of something else every month.

Anyways, I seriously think people shouldn't worry too much about it being hard to get. It might be a challenge but I seriously doubt they'll pull something that is stupid like tying it to a .01% drop rate on a fight you can only do once per real life day or marrying it to a relic or mythic weapon. One thing I could see them making it one of the rewards for say, doing the Cait Sith BCNM whenever they get around to adding that - it would be hard to get because I'm assuming we'll need to have finished all of the WotG missions. Until we have acquisition information I don't think we should be too harsh aside from the standard opinions we give on this stuff.

[Scribble]

They should've just made it an ability with a cooldown rather than it's own separate spell.

[Zigfreid]

I'd vote they drop Araise (Arise) and replace it with the spell the Galka WHM general in campaign can cast.

Removes weakness from target. I'd agree on extreme difficulty to obtain on this one ;p

In all honesty though, I do have to wonder what their idea of "extremely difficult to obtain" would be. I can't imagine it being quest based. Luxury spells are all well and good in my opinion, I like having something to work toward that sets me apart from the ones who play a job as a last resort, but damn it make it something that has some bang to it.
Here's where it gets tricky though, what kind of "luxury" spell gives that wow effect without making it almost mandatory.

[Daniel_Hatcher]

I'd vote they drop Araise (Arise) and replace it with the spell the Galka WHM general in campaign can cast.

Removes weakness from target. I'd agree on extreme difficulty to obtain on this one ;p

In all honesty though, I do have to wonder what their idea of "extremely difficult to obtain" would be. I can't imagine it being quest based. Luxury spells are all well and good in my opinion, I like having something to work toward that sets me apart from the ones who play a job as a last resort, but damn it make it something that has some bang to it.
Here's where it gets tricky though, what kind of "luxury" spell gives that wow effect without making it almost mandatory.

I'd agree on non-existent on that one. Though I would add a ~30 minute JA to do it.

I'd put money on something to do with Legion, maybe you need to kill a set amount to pop a big boss that it'd drop from.

If they ever added spells to Mythic's they should be OP, or not at all.