Elemental Trials - Fire/Light

[RAIST]

Don't limit this to Fire/Light, there are a few trials that are a pain (phys down great axe with wyverns in earth weather comes to mind) I can't get past this solo, I keep dying soloing the only wyverns with earth weather (Gustav Tunnel) I really think the solution could be a buff to MMM, a low me to set up an MMM for earth weather and the wyverns, solo that would be 12 wyverns in 24hrs (60 to 72 points) out of 200 points, it is by no means over a omg wtf too power buff, it'd just make the life of the people who end up soloing easier... Also bare in mind, I can get over 400 points doing colibri under wind in one wind day if the weather is up there, THAT IS UNBALANCED (but don't change it)

I recall doing the bow trial on flans at 75 on rng.... i had to solo on birds to get my lv back and i teamed up with a couple people on other trials team up... after 3 months... that was a long time >.>

This is an example of the problem...people are focusing too much on the weather bonus and burning up time sitting around waiting for weather, when they could just knock them out on the days.

The problem is not so much the way weather works, but more the way people are trying to complete them--in some cases, just making it drag out longer than it needs to (or putting themselves at greater risk trying to get the weather).

Look at my recent any mobs and Arcana killer lists in light day/weather. I can kill at least 25 EP targets with avatars on a single lightsday. I just noticed it was January in the calendar, so I hit the OP warp to check the forecast, and bam it was there--so I did my 50 Any Monster kill points in weather. I could have just as easily done it across two lightsdays if I wasn't able to snake 50 kills in uly range or something--but light was up, I had my key, so ran upstairs and knocked them out. Wasn't able to get the full 50 arcana kill points for next trial during the next light cycle--stupid bat aggro's slowed things down, so I hit arcana in gruaberg to finish them when the day came around later--and got a SAM Body seal and some skillups as well (win-win).

I had to do Wyverns too...250 of them for an ice staff. I did them in Riverne--level 60-ish targets. Fast kills. Granted, they are a bit spread out, but you run them on a loop and by the time you get back to the start, they are repopping. NO WEATHER KILLS. That's 250 kills, one at a time, on ice day--only took a few days to do it...SOLO--and this was before all the level caps were lifted--might have been 80 at the time, forget exactly. Still, was an easy trial, just took some time. Typhoons in Gustav are higher level (80-ish) and have half as many repopswith a longer repop timer if I remember right. It would still take a fair amount of time in Riverne, but you would be killing easy mobs with no fear of death like you are dealing with currently in Gustav (might even find it goes faster in the long run, if you are having to stop so much). Alternatively...again... you could have gone into abyssea with a group--only a handful of pops there, but I think they are also on a faster timer than Gustav.

As for Flans....again, if it's a team up situation, you may have been better of to go to highlands aby and just rip them up there on the day. No waiting for the summer months to get fire weather and timing it with a group--just get your group and say "meet at maw for firesday" and go on a killing spree as many times as you need. Even if it's only one game day per day that you get to work on it, it will only take a few days--versus waiting maybe a week to catch the weather cycles. That's not just speculation--I've seen it in action: 4 days of doing Glen crabs one darksday cycle each day for a 250 crabs via pet kill in dark day/weather for a friend who could only get on for a few hours each night. Did it via abyssea targets--pretty much killing on the day was the way to do it as it was Dark element. Could have done it faster in kuftal, but we wanted the skill ups, chance for seals, as well as the LP and cruor yields (more win-win for us).

Doing the Flans on the day in aby is likely far better than trying to camp the weather in Halvung also--they are fairly close together and on a fast repop, and really easy kills with aby buffs. You have 3 known windows EVERY day where you can plan to team up and knock them out. Even in just a small group, they are a piece of cake if you have someone to nuke or a pet job to eat them up. Heck, even soloing them on WAR/DNC is pretty easy at level 90.

It would seem the problem may be less with the system and more with the players.

[Keyln]

This is an example of the problem...people are focusing too much on the weather bonus and burning up time sitting around waiting for weather, when they could just knock them out on the days.

The problem is not so much the way weather works, but more the way people are trying to complete them--in some cases, just making it drag out longer than it needs to (or putting themselves at greater risk trying to get the weather).

Look at my recent any mobs and Arcana killer lists in light day/weather. I can kill at least 25 EP targets with avatars on a single lightsday. I just noticed it was January in the calendar, so I hit the OP warp to check the forecast, and bam it was there--so I did my 50 Any Monster kill points in weather. I could have just as easily done it across two lightsdays if I wasn't able to snake 50 kills in uly range or something--but light was up, I had my key, so ran upstairs and knocked them out. Wasn't able to get the full 50 arcana kill points for next trial during the next light cycle--stupid bat aggro's slowed things down, so I hit arcana in gruaberg to finish them when the day came around later--and got a SAM Body seal and some skillups as well (win-win).

I had to do Wyverns too...250 of them for an ice staff. I did them in Riverne--level 60-ish targets. Fast kills. Granted, they are a bit spread out, but you run them on a loop and by the time you get back to the start, they are repopping. NO WEATHER KILLS. That's 250 kills, one at a time, on ice day--only took a few days to do it...SOLO--and this was before all the level caps were lifted--might have been 80 at the time, forget exactly. Still, was an easy trial, just took some time. Typhoons in Gustav are higher level (80-ish) and have half as many repopswith a longer repop timer if I remember right. It would still take a fair amount of time in Riverne, but you would be killing easy mobs with no fear of death like you are dealing with currently in Gustav (might even find it goes faster in the long run, if you are having to stop so much). Alternatively...again... you could have gone into abyssea with a group--only a handful of pops there, but I think they are also on a faster timer than Gustav.

As for Flans....again, if it's a team up situation, you may have been better of to go to highlands aby and just rip them up there on the day. No waiting for the summer months to get fire weather and timing it with a group--just get your group and say "meet at maw for firesday" and go on a killing spree as many times as you need. Even if it's only one game day per day that you get to work on it, it will only take a few days--versus waiting maybe a week to catch the weather cycles. That's not just speculation--I've seen it in action: 4 days of doing Glen crabs one darksday cycle each day for a 250 crabs via pet kill in dark day/weather for a friend who could only get on for a few hours each night. Did it via abyssea targets--pretty much killing on the day was the way to do it as it was Dark element. Could have done it faster in kuftal, but we wanted the skill ups, chance for seals, as well as the LP and cruor yields (more win-win for us).

Doing the Flans on the day in aby is likely far better than trying to camp the weather in Halvung also--they are fairly close together and on a fast repop, and really easy kills with aby buffs. You have 3 known windows EVERY day where you can plan to team up and knock them out. Even in just a small group, they are a piece of cake if you have someone to nuke or a pet job to eat them up. Heck, even soloing them on WAR/DNC is pretty easy at level 90.

It would seem the problem may be less with the system and more with the players.

I think you're missing the point. The point isn't that the trials, in and of themselves, are hard, but that some are a bit more difficult than others. Weather is a good point here. Wouldn't you agree that require blizzard weather/ice day are easier than those that require light weather/light day? That those that require wind weather/wind day are generally easier than those that require fire weather/fire day?

This is the whole point of this post. Are the trials impossible? Of course not, and no one's making that assertion. There is a bit of an imbalance, though, in that there are certain trials that are a bit more difficult, and require more effort. It is this imbalance that some of us feel that Square should be addressing.

[Raksha]

Would you rather SE revert the change so that weather kills count as 1 again? That way it's more fair? Then you can't bitch about people suggesting you do the trials on firesday instead of fire weather.

No.

This is an example of the problem...people are focusing too much on the weather bonus and burning up time sitting around waiting for weather, when they could just knock them out on the days.

Three weeks.
Every day.
After work.
Still not finished.

The reason SE made weather count for 5 kills is because everyone realized how ridiculous it is to kill 200+ mobs in a single game day. (or given your example of 25 kills/day EIGHT FREAKING GAME DAYS on a job like SMN which has a good bit of soloing capability)

If you think STR weapons are soooo much better than the other weapons that they should take 5 times longer then say so.