This game has been ruined...

[Sarick]

Want to bring back the memories of the past take a look at this. Abbysea and GoV didn't ruin things check this Link. It falls on the developers and upper management to keep everyone happy. Sometimes they screw up in ways that make people quit.

[Rustic]

Want to bring back the memories of the past take a look at this. Abbysea and GoV didn't ruin things check this Link. It falls on the developers and upper management to keep everyone happy. Sometimes they screw up in ways that make people quit.

That has zero to do with long-term play issues or the 10-98 game, everything to do with poor customer service decisions.

[Duelle]

I don't know who you knew, and I definitely won't disagree with this for a particular reason. When you read the 'optimal strategy' for any Assault, for example, there's usually this specific set of jobs that people consider 'the way to win' and a pickup group will try to get those, but this is part of human nature within the game, not necessarily the game.

I'll disagree, as player tendencies are determined entirely by game design and decisions made by the developers. The intentions may not have been there, but that's what ends up happening.

[Sarick]

That has zero to do with long-term play issues or the 10-98 game, everything to do with poor customer service decisions.

It has everything to do with it. SE is a single company with many branches. Someone is the boss of everything. Horrid mistakes where made in the past. If you recall it was the development staff who created RMT-powner (SP).

The whole point is "This isn't the first rodeo" (train wreck..) I posted that link as a reminder.

[Randnum]

I'll disagree, as player tendencies are determined entirely by game design and decisions made by the developers. The intentions may not have been there, but that's what ends up happening.

My point is that there will always be 'tendencies'. They can at best minimize them. I'm not sure what you are really saying?

What game design can you make where an interesting event can be overcome by 6 WHM just as efficiently as with 6 WAR? or even something more sane like 'without a dedicated tank'?

NIN is a simple example. What happened to NIN was not part of game design in any SANE way, it was completely a player thing. You give a class good evasion and moderate damage, and it isn't useful in large parties. Then someone realizes how to make that evasion optimized in usage and suddenly it is.

Just a basic question so I know where you are coming from... assuming NIN didn't have Utsu or that it was unreliable, what exactly would it be 'for'? The developers know, because they gave it the abilities, but the players don't accept that. If you change it, it's not NIN anymore and then people who would have liked it don't.

What did your DRK need, in your opinion, that would have made you able to assault? Is your answer 'more assaults that DRK are good in?'

This is actually the precise problem with endgame, it's just a matter of what job concept gets excluded.

[Duelle]

What game design can you make where an interesting event can be overcome by 6 WHM just as efficiently as with 6 WAR? or even something more sane like 'without a dedicated tank'?

Now you're mentioning extremes. I wouldn't call for content that can be cleared by 6 of one job. I'm more in favor content where tank, DPS and heals can pull through at roughly the same pace and with similar results regardless of who is in each spot. While I realize that's something we'll never see in this game (too many jobs are designed around niches over possible roles), it is one of the few styles of gameplay that make sense to me.

NIN is a simple example. What happened to NIN was not part of game design in any SANE way, it was completely a player thing. You give a class good evasion and moderate damage, and it isn't useful in large parties. Then someone realizes how to make that evasion optimized in usage and suddenly it is.

Just a basic question so I know where you are coming from... assuming NIN didn't have Utsu or that it was unreliable, what exactly would it be 'for'? The developers know, because they gave it the abilities, but the players don't accept that. If you change it, it's not NIN anymore and then people who would have liked it don't.

Depends on the aim of the developers. I don't care much for "uniqueness" and niches as I tend to focus on roles, so I'd opt for saying "DPS", especially if we're keeping job concept in mind.

Nerf evasion (or add DR past a certain point), add large hate shed properties to Utsusemi to make it an aggro dump while increasing the cooldown, focus on melee + throwing. The devs dropped the ball because they refused to meddle with methods for acquiring shuriken, aside from the "technical limitations" that prevented throwing weapon skills. Provided the latter is even true, I would have opted for instead giving NIN job abilites that focus on throwing and consume shuriken (stuff like Sange should come baseline to a NIN, not be merited into). Redesign enfeeble jutsu to be potent with very short durations and long cooldowns; a conceptual extension to spells like Flash and Stun that is more of an opportunity-creator during fights without outight replacing enfeebling magic.

What did your DRK need, in your opinion, that would have made you able to assault? Is your answer 'more assaults that DRK are good in?'

This is actually the precise problem with endgame, it's just a matter of what job concept gets excluded.

Hence my original point of the devs not properly balancing the jobs. Sure, it is not the sole cause of the problem (two parts to the issue, job design and content design), but it is a large culprit.

[Volarione]

The game changed, OK, but it changed years ago its nothing new. If you can't take a few hours looking for a party how in the back did you survive per abbyssea when you could go days without a pt invite and it took years to level? If anything I feel the should just take level cap off all quests from vanilla ffxi and let people do then at pleasure.

[Randnum]

Depends on the aim of the developers. I don't care much for "uniqueness" and niches as I tend to focus on roles, so I'd opt for saying "DPS", especially if we're keeping job concept in mind.

Nerf evasion (or add DR past a certain point), add large hate shed properties to Utsusemi to make it an aggro dump while increasing the cooldown, focus on melee + throwing. The devs dropped the ball because they refused to meddle with methods for acquiring shuriken, aside from the "technical limitations" that prevented throwing weapon skills. Provided the latter is even true, I would have opted for instead giving NIN job abilites that focus on throwing and consume shuriken (stuff like Sange should come baseline to a NIN, not be merited into). Redesign enfeeble jutsu to be potent with very short durations and long cooldowns; a conceptual extension to spells like Flash and Stun that is more of an opportunity-creator during fights without outight replacing enfeebling magic.

Hence my original point of the devs not properly balancing the jobs. Sure, it is not the sole cause of the problem (two parts to the issue, job design and content design), but it is a large culprit.

Ok, then I'll bow out of this discussion, since your concept of what fun/balance is, is fundamentally different. I play NIN because it has evasion and does the specific things it does, for the most part. I don't actually care about the DPS, and I actually prefer jutsu over melee.

The answer you gave is my point, in a sense. What you'd do is change NIN more in line with what you see as 'useful', and you'd be right, but your 'useful' is based on the content you like and the mechanics you enjoy.

Most of our older content is exactly as described. Tank, DPS and healers all manage decently no matter who is in each slot. But there's always, always, always a 'most efficient' for each slot and that's what people want. 'Similar results' are only achievable when you give the classes more or less the same abilities with different names.

So I'll agree to disagree if you will. I say that job design wasn't an issue much in the older content due to better content design, you say job design is a large culprit in the problem.

[Numquam]

I'm sorry to say but this game has become very boring and almost pointless. So many things that we had back before Abyssea are not around anymore such as a simple 6 man group when leveling up. Now all there is to do is GoV and spend tons of hours in 2 different zones until you go to Abyssea and jump up to the 90s. I have tried to level up several jobs i KNOW i would have enjoyed leveling up in a group but now i cant even experience this. A good example is leveling my Paladin, im sitting in GoV as a DD not learning how to play my class and feeling like my job is just a title and nothing more.

Ive been playing this game since release off and on and it has changed to the point that I am disappointed more than having fun and i was obsessed with this game.

Dont get me wrong Abyssea and GoV were great ideas and allow players to enjoy the later levels more but whats the point of lv10-98, nothing really. I really did enjoy both of these added features but because of them FFXI will never be the same and i will never experience that feeling i had when i started getting into this game. Unfortunately and fortunately I will be moving on the FFXIV ARR, it may be pretty different and had a bad first release but it has potential and has came a long way since it first released.

Im going to miss you Final Fantasy 11

Please, go away.

[Duelle]

Ok, then I'll bow out of this discussion, since your concept of what fun/balance is, is fundamentally different. I play NIN because it has evasion and does the specific things it does, for the most part. I don't actually care about the DPS, and I actually prefer jutsu over melee.

Fair enough. You asked a question and I chose to give an honest answer.

The answer you gave is my point, in a sense. What you'd do is change NIN more in line with what you see as 'useful', and you'd be right, but your 'useful' is based on the content you like and the mechanics you enjoy.

More like effects that I see the job having on other jobs that won't upset other things. NIN as it was introduced changed more about the game than most people realize, affecting overall survivability and encounter design while trivializing already-existing threats (mobs with high damage nukes/TP attacks that would tear a PLD to pieces while a NIN would laugh at them because of Utsusemi). My biggest gripe was how it became "required" for everything.

Most of our older content is exactly as described. Tank, DPS and healers all manage decently no matter who is in each slot. But there's always, always, always a 'most efficient' for each slot and that's what people want. 'Similar results' are only achievable when you give the classes more or less the same abilities with different names.

This is where the point of class balance got lost. If a "best" set up exists then either class balance, content balance or both are lacking. Ideally BST, PUP, WAR, SAM, and MNK would be interchangable in a DPS slot with very minimal (if any) impact on raid performance and chances on success. And this is on a mass scale, not "got into the group as <insert your favorite loljob> because I"m friends with the Alliance leader".

I'll now drop this topic and go on my merry way.