Book burning ruined 5-man groups

[Kwate]

While I'm glad to see less job exclusion, I must say I dislike alliance EXP overall because it is horribly uncoordinated and chaotic, and lends itself far too well to gimps and leechers. Sure, arguably 6-man EXP did as well, but at least there they were easier to spot.

That is part of the fun, I can't tell you how many times I fell asleep in a 6 man party or bored out of my mind, this also alleviates if 1 or 2 people leave it doesn't kill the party if no rep is available.

[Tsukino_Kaji]

They didn't ruin anything. You don't need parties. I hadn't been in an XP pt for 2 years until abyssea. Books = good.

[Covenant]

The "grind" is still a grind... Just a faster way. Most people have no intention of leveln multiple jobs, but for those of us who do, we appreciate a faster system eve if unintentional. I did a few job the old way, and a few job the new ways and appreciate both styles. The fast way is gonna cost you some serious skill up'n...which is a grind. Even with the skill bonus from pages still wasting time whacking weak mobs to decent and even matches.

[geekgirl101]

What they need to do, remove the books and take it back to parties. But allow level sync players to gain skills while they fight. So if your buddy that is level 50 decides he'll help and join your party at level 30, the mobs he fights, should increase his overall weapon skill as if he was level 50. This would increase the people who want to level sync and join parties.

If I level sync, I fight for 5 levels and get out of the party so I can then go level my weapons. This becomes harder as DRK soloing is not exactly suppose to happen.

I certainly agree on the need for being able to skill up while synced. Since almost every party I'm in is level synced my skills are always gimped as a result.

As for an idea to deal with the alliancing and leeching situation I'd say put back the level limit on Abyssea maws and change non-Abyssea books so you can only pick up pages that within your level limit range (1-xx) and don't gain progress in an alliance. Personally I wouldn't miss alliance book burning, people might actually learn how to play their jobs and appreciate being a party member and not just someone tagging along taking everything for granted.

[Kwate]

Why? people will find another way to get fast exp. Leveling up slower isn't going to help people become better players, it just slows the exp process. If you feel that strongly, feel free to start your own conventional party.

Abyss and burns are popular because it speeds up the exp process and eliminate alot of BS prejudices against various jobs, why should it take a DRK or MNK 3-4 times as long to level up as a SAM, both are good in their role? Also it keeps the exp flowing while if 1-2 people have to leave, or if your tank or mage has to go afk, it can keep going almost uninterrupted. I think SE did the right thing, it gives alot more flexibility in the leveling up process and takes alot of unnecessary politics out of the equation.

[geekgirl101]

Give a person everything they want just to swing their epeen about how fast it took them to get to 90, and what you get is a seriously lazy, selfish, gimped and unskilled person wasting a good spot in an endgame situation.

[Ravenmore]

Easier to meet people when you spend every second running from mob to mob in crawlers nest, zero time to rest for mp, if you stop and type a sentence you're already too far away from the party to get the kill count. - Side note: The LS I'm in that is probably the most helpful, fun, and rewarding LS I've ever been in was found on a exp party about 3 months ago.

6 years ago, you were booted out of a party if you didn't know how to do Skill chains.. People aren't learning their weapons, they aren't skilling their weapons, they don't even know how to play their characters. Was in a party the other day, and the WHM didn't even have Protectra II because they didn't need it skilling with books.

With my Scythe, I can name every skill chain it goes with to maximize damage done. Can most new players even name one? No because they never even seen them happen. You use to have to macro TP Ready for use, now people look at you like you're and idiot and don't have a clue why you're announcing you're ready to use your weapon skill.


EDIT:
What they need to do, remove the books and take it back to parties. But allow level sync players to gain skills while they fight. So if your buddy that is level 50 decides he'll help and join your party at level 30, the mobs he fights, should increase his overall weapon skill as if he was level 50. This would increase the people who want to level sync and join parties.

If I level sync, I fight for 5 levels and get out of the party so I can then go level my weapons. This becomes harder as DRK soloing is not exactly suppose to happen.

You know why SC+MB was a bad idea, because the players were to dumb to do the math. If it takes you 5 mins to kill one mob for 400 XP and you could kill 3 mobs in that same time for 150 xp Which one is getting more exp.

If you tried that in old 6 man parties you would get kicked. Now if you do it who cares it only hurting you not the rest of the group. Take away the books, people will go back to Qufim TP burning Ts and VTs.

Skilling up takes time but mages can by pass it mostly with /sch and HQ staffs for everything in abyssea. Melees can afk skill up or preskill/premerit Weapons.

[Ravenmore]

Give a person everything they want just to swing their epeen about how fast it took them to get to 90, and what you get is a seriously lazy, selfish, gimped and unskilled person wasting a good spot in an endgame situation.

Nothing has changed since 75 retarded players made it to endgame just as easy as now. In the old days it was called leveling brd auto-invite to endgame, exp anything they wanted since it freed someone else to play a job they enjoyed.

[Octaviane]

Nothing has changed since 75 retarded players made it to endgame just as easy as now. In the old days it was called leveling brd auto-invite to endgame, exp anything they wanted since it freed someone else to play a job they enjoyed.

75 = skilled, usually well-geared (worked for it too) players, 90 = Abyssea leech 30 -90 in less than a day, no skills, but oh my, I have great gear, an Empyrean Weapon or 10 and it only took me a day to get.

I saw a WAR85/DNC42 yesterday taking the ferry from Mhaura to WG. He was sporting a Rune Chopper ( a nice GA pre 75), no Grip, Perle everything, Warrior's Belt (not even +1), Puissance rings, a low level Boomerang in ranged and a Spike earring. Don't remember the other. He did have a Chiv Chain. Yes, he Abyssea burned, and no I am not critcising his gear because it was obvious he had Abyssea burned.

What was he doing on the ferry? The same that I was as a level 30 THF (mule). Going to WG to get a Runic Portal in order to become a Merc, get Mog Locker and WG warp from the 3 nations and Jeuno. He chose Halvung, I chose Azouph. Point? Didn't we all have this done pre level 50 before? Now, the thing is to get to 90 then go back and skill-up and do all those things that should have, could have been done sooner. All the fun, and I will admit tedium at times, has been taken out of the game. Much as I have enjoyed Abyssea, it bores me to death to spend hours there doing the same crap over and over again. At least with the old style levelling parties, we had fun, we spoke to one another, made friends and had a good old time and we didn't have to spend endless hours at it. Sure, in old style endgame there was a lot of greed, elitism, whining and bitching, but the same applies now in the new endgame.

Everything is different, but all remains the same when you take a good look at it over the years.

I play for fun these days on a mule. I am enjoying the heck out of it despite the tedium. That's what this game means to me anyway.

[Defiledsickness]

the only difference is now you CAN level quick. you still get normal party invites faster then when i started playing about 4years ago before level syncing. the only things we've lost is EXP in old OLD areas like the bibiki bay, having to pay for a PL (100k/hour shouts in the dunes used to be as bad as RMT tells were last year), we lost Whitegate pretty much completely, and we did kinda lose whm's and plds thanks to abyssea.

but book burns are a godsend. i mean you talk about people not knowing how to skillchain, do you really want to 6man party with those people? because having a dnc tank and a dnc main heal, that's not fun imo. and if you care about gimps, dont worry! they can still get decent gear, but they'll never be decent unless they put in actual work. idc about who gets what, i only get satisfaction from killing something hard thanks to my dedication and skill.

if you're really mad it must be because you're too lazy to setup a party (which most of us are). because there are a ton of people with their flag up waiting for any invite (and back in the day you still had to teach people about SC's, it took me forever to even understand the concept. not sure why lol).