HNMs and the future of FFXI

[Habu]

Glavoid wasn't hard at 80?
Bhukis at 85?
Apademak/Pantokrator/Rani at 90?

I think you're glossing over the fact that some of the Abyssea NMs were tough at their respective caps in order to tow the line that Abyssea had no challenges but I'll put that aside and throw out that even at their caps these NMs were tougher/more complex than the entire gamut of previous HNMs that dominated the game.

"Easily repeated content?"

That sounds alot like Kings or are you going to argue that these old worldspawns were more complex battles? The only difference between KB/Aspid/Nid and the Abyssean mobs is that you could pop them in a shorter timespan with the illusion of competition dispelled.

I say illusion because once the initial MPKing stopped and bots became entrenched pathetic efforts to claim something were futile unless you too joined the ranks and bot or got a lucky claim due to incompetence or wipes.

No they were not hard at their respective levels as long as you had competent people playing with you. All I'm hearing is bots bots bots bots bots bots. This is a video people cheat in video games all the time, if you don't like it you can do one of two things 1. accept it and play around it 2. qqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqq

[Sparthos]

No they were not hard at their respective levels as long as you had competent people playing with you. All I'm hearing is bots bots bots bots bots bots. This is a video people cheat in video games all the time, if you don't like it you can do one of two things 1. accept it and play around it 2. qqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqq

Ah yes, the old 'competent' argument precision deployed in a blanket fashion. Nevermind Glavoid shit all over anything the old Kings or even newer mobs like Lambton Worm could muster, they were all snoozefests in the great blanketland of Abyssea where nothing was ever hard, ever.

There is a reason you're hearing 'bots bots bots bots bots' and when you figure that out perhaps you'll arrive at the conclusion as to why no one wants to return to the shitholes of '06 FFXI.

Play around it? How amusing. If world pops don't have the best gear available then no one does it (see: Scylla, Hydra, Vrtra, Jorm) and if it does have the best gear then people cheat the hell out of it and establish monopolies at the expense of the base. Your 'qqqqqqqq' statement simply reveals that behind all the skill taut that you simply desire to dominate endgame through tools and delusions of their being fair play.

[Habu]

Show me one time in this thread where anyone said HNMs were hard? I'll be waiting. I'm sure on your journey looking through posts you'll find multiple ones where I said "HNM's WEREN'T HARD".

[Zerich]

Abyssea ect takes work? last i checked i can auto attack kill anything in the game lately.
Challenge please

If you had a sufficient intelligence quota paired with the reading comprehension skills of a college student, you'd be able to create a script to play this game more efficiently than you could ever dream.
But the question remains, why haven't you done it yet?

[SNK]

Oh and yes, I too once took part in the 'fun' of the three-ring circus that was the almighty world spawns and I'll always look back upon it and say 'wow, this was a crock of shit'.

I was also a part of this since 2005 and I'm only sad it took 3 years to get a Ridill and 5 years to finally get an Ebody. While the camping was easy I am glad this system is dead and buried.

[Spiritreaver]

Apologies, weekend went pear-shaped after my last post in this thread, just getting back to it.

There's a huge difference between:

• Intentionally gimping yourself to make easy content that anyone can complete harder.

and

• Already hard content that only the best players can complete.

True i suppose. But there is still the choice to set the difficulty higher for that challenge some ppl say they want.

But then my definition of challenge my be a bit different than that of some. CoP(as much as i loathed it) had challenging fights @75 cap before it was opened up. The only challenge i remember from the HNM scene back in the day was the unstructured PvP-lite antics shells played on one another back then.

The actual fights against the HNMs were complete breezes after the first time in most cases. Outside of a very small few, there were no already hard HNMs back then, not really.

Ok I just tried this with the pops that I had on me. I 4 man'd Glavoid, Ecc Eve, Bria, Itzapop and the Iron Giant in Altepa. It was a little harder I'll give you that but I don't cherish the thought of intentionally gimping myself to make stuff harder. Next you'll tell me do fight them naked or without a weapon.

Read the whole reply, but bolded the bit that just reinforces my point.

Not picking at you Habu, but outside of the competition between shells back in the day, there was no super challenge in the HNM scene. Name a mob and someone can pull up a strat for it and someone else can go out and slay it. No muss, no fuss-this has not changed one bit since say '06 or thereabouts.

What has changed is that for the most part the need for the big shells are gone. Not going into root causes of that, you should know them. And with no big shells stamping about, competition isn't what it used to be.

I'm gonna posit something now: Maybe it is not challenge that you want, maybe its competition?

And that's fine by me. Like i've said elsewhere though, just own your feelings dude.

And yet at the end of the day world spawns are still garbage no matter how much nostalgia attempts to coat the harsh reality of an archaic system in a delicious vanilla coating. Many who disagree either had a vested interest in monopolizing these monsters (herpaderp kings are easy when you're using bots), has been taken over by their inner masochist (too much exposure to Tanaka) or simply cannot see the reality of how negatively such a system impacted FFXI.

You want something that caters to not only casuals but the hardcore? I have 3 solutions that make world spawns seem the maniacal ravings of a lunatic madman more concerned with keeping people on the hamster wheel in utter frustration rather than creating a game that people are supposed to enjoy.

1. Hakutaku/Alastor Antlion/Shen style spawns.
Remember the humble Hakutaku? How you had to travel around the world and get drops to create a trigger for him? This would work wonderfully for new HNMs and not only encourage people to play (by farming items) but also drum up a market for those who simply wanted to buy the pop items and spawn some mobs.

Casuals would focus on getting supplies to market, Hardcores would spread their wealth down by purchasing items from those who farmed and this would give everyone a 'chance' to spawn that NM with the shines on a level playing field.

2. Point systems.
This crap has been beaten to death already. If you create a point system where the XXX uber gear is at the top of the list you'd have many casuals quit before they ever amassed the points and all the hardcores looking to be gods among men could repeat whatever content it was that had the gear until they obtained the badass set of badassery.

Again, everyone has a fair opportunity to obtain items and the onus lay on the player to choose how far they want to take the pursuit of gear.

3. Tiered Progression
Yet another system where the lower tiers would be the realm of the casual player whereas the higher tier NMs would be difficult enough to keep most greenhorns out of action. Systems like ZNMs and Abyssea involved this type of progression where the lower tier monsters were easily accessible but as you climbed the ladder the need for more hardcore types to take control was needed if you wanted to stand a good chance of clearing content.

Yet again the player has options, the casual has the opportunity to access hardcore content if he/she chooses too all while the top tier players spin their genitals like a helicopter and dive headfirst into the pool of loot.

tl;dr - Kings were garbage and a lazy solution to true tiered content. HNM at best amounted to poor mans PVP where people talked trash, AFK'd for hours on end, bragged about not playing XI before AFKing in town with the cool guy gear all while pretending that running cheats or no-lifing took 'skill'.

Oh and yes, I too once took part in the 'fun' of the three-ring circus that was the almighty world spawns and I'll always look back upon it and say 'wow, this was a crock of shit'.

Quoted this post after i had mostly finished the above. Wish i could like it multiple times. The last line is EXACTLY how i reacted at the end of my stint in that whole scene. It was my Ralphie moment(one word-Ovaltine).

[Arcon]

I have a different theory. I think they are pissed because they used to be able to watch Sabrina the Teenage Witch marathons all day while their Bot camped NMs for them, but now they have to somewhat pay attention in abbysea / vnm / NI 2.0 to get the best gear. I think they are pissed because they have to work now. They just pull the "I like competition" and "Camping NMs is hard work" cards so that they don't sound like they are just as lazy as the casuals.

I can't speak for the others, but for me it's two things. First of all, personally, I like the exclusiveness of rare items. That's also why I went out of my way to camp very rare NMs/drops, because rarity is something that excites me. I like being rewarded for dedication. It's why I wasted 80M on KB and it's also why I still camp Noble Mold. I don't think a Rain Hat will do me much good at this point, but I still wanna have it. I like possessing rare items.

Secondly, I like competition. I know it sounds weird, especially because I hate it in other places (like Dynamis for example), but there is a reason behind it. I like feeling like I'm chasing something big and the feeling when I win against others is great. And I am fully aware that it doesn't have anything at all to do with skill but just luck. But that's always a factor. It's like hunting for a treasure against others, and someone just gets a lucky break and finds it first. That doesn't mean they're more skilled or anything, but that doesn't make the chase any less fun, it doesn't make the thrill go away. The feeling when you get a claim is really rewarding, even if it was just luck and nothing else. I'm sure you'd enjoy winning the lottery as well, even if you know there isn't any skill involved.

And I also must admit that I enjoy the occasional HNM drama, although I know that people will tear this statement apart, but whatever. I liked people raging over a flailed Fafnir, accuse others of all kinds of shit when they lost claim, or wasting everyone's Chainspell by pulling one Knight Crab out of range and holding it. In before "that says all about you as a person", like I care. It was good times and I enjoyed it.

And lastly, I don't need HNM back. I wouldn't care if they never returned, I'm happy thinking about it as something I got a kick out of in the past. That's for two reasons as well. First of all, I still like the game and do plenty of other things. I simply don't need them to enjoy this game. I never did, by the way, I didn't camp them nearly as much as others may have done, mostly due to lack of people to do it with. Secondly, as was also pointed out before, there are better systems in place. Tiered spawned HNMs will always be a better concept, and I certainly wouldn't mind that being added instead of world spawns.

Also, Hayward:
There's two entirely different arguments here. People complain about difficulty and people complain about exclusivity. Two entirely different things and completely unrelated. I don't think anyone at all thinks HNM were hard (although some fights actually were harder than most other things in the game). I'm not conflating those two terms, difficulty is entirely off-topic here. Exclusivity is an entirely desirable attribute on its own, which is what this is about to me.

[Anapingofness]

Pft, old school HNM can bite my Elvaan behind.

I don't miss it. In fact, most people don't miss it.

If you miss the so called "challenge" from old endgame then go do VW and Aby w/o buffs. If you want to go and "camp" (read: sit and do nothing for hours) land kings all over again then go and do it, nobody is stopping you. Likewise, if you want old exp party format then go and make one, but don't come to these forums and give SE bad ideas/advice. They're liable to follow it.

This game becoming more casual player friendly is one of the best things that's ever happened to it, hands down. If anything it needs to keep moving forward, not backwards. If anything SE needs to go back and either revive old content or get rid of it altogether.

[Habu]

Brb intentionally gimping myself while going to camp land kings that aren't there anymore. Do you realize how dumb of a post that was?

[Anapingofness]

Brb intentionally gimping myself while going to camp land kings that aren't there anymore. Do you realize how dumb of a post that was?

You mean to tell me you don't like sitting around doing nothing?

D=!!! omgnowai!!

Golly Gee! Habu! Here I thought this is precisely what your post was about!

/end sarcasm

Cause that's pretty much what you did in old school endgame and that's precisely why people don't want to go back to it.