Do you ever just think for a moment and wonder if the devs, or rather their bosses play FFXI? I'm sure most of us have had that thought at some point, with the various random overall bad/questionable decisions made for XI. I understand that this game is a business, and SE wants to keep the revenue flowing, but with a MMO I think most would agree that the developers have to think 50% gamer / 50% businessman. It seems that with SE we get one or the other always, never a great fusion. (Usually seems to always be the business side)
So with that said, I wonder what everyone's FFXI would be like if we had a chance to improve FFXI to our own standards? What would you add, at 99 to make FFXI the ideal game, a game that many of use have played for 5-8 years, and could easily play for a good few more?
Off the top of my head, I know it would have to be events for me. The story in xi is great, the lore is fantastic, but it can only push your experience so far before you're bored really. If I had my options of implementing new content in XI to keep myself and my friends interested for a long time I'de probably add to or revamp the following.
Limbus 2.0 - More of the fun that was limbus, more boss fights, more gear, more rewards in the form of coins etc so that everyone benefits. With the addition of being able to choose party settings, setting your party to 6- spawns less mobs, and a slightly dumbed down version of the boss for lowman style, and then of course alliance style, more mobs, more rewards, possibly better rewards in some cases because of a much greater risk.
Salvage - Maybe add a new area, upgrade the gear, add possible other worthwhile rewards such as high lvl crafting materials worth some nice gil to keep people interested.
Einherjar - Pretty darn good system just needs its tweaks.
WoE - I think WoE could be utulized for much more than it is right now, the WoE maps are big and lend themselves to being capable of a limbus style event. WoE is made for the general public, putting an event in the zone for a LS would be easy, and could add lots of content even though its recycled.
While were on the topic of WoE, this is just me I'm sure many people would be uninterested in this idea, but I like it!XD Basically when you've beaten all of the fluxes (they would reset every week) the doors by flux 11 open up and allow you to use a final flux to a zone that can hold say 100 or so people (maybe more), and it just has this massive mob (kinda of like the big dude in the plains area of FFXIII I forget his name). Anyway it would take somewhere of up to an hour to kill this guy at least, just an epic fight that is fun, can be mindless at times and drops very rarely, but drops some damn good gear.
HP/MP Refinements - For some reason back at 75, I had the hopeful thought that at 99 our HP/MP wouldn't slowly crawl up at about 20+ per level. I understand the game is about having support and using your HP and MP wisely, however it seems that for fights to get more intense you need more HP/MP to compete. Going into WoE with 1500 HP and getting 1 shotted by pretty much every boss mob and some normal ones for anywhere to 1800-3000 dmg, and then getting up and zombieing until you're one shotted again doesn't seem like a viable strategy. That's why pet jobs rule WoE atm because it's pretty boring to die 25x per WoE.
Lastly I'm sure many people would say noooo and boooo to this idea, but Abyssea Sky & Sea. No brews in these zones, fun fights, as well as epic fights, great gear and a place to upgrade our emps to 99 at.
I'm sure most people will just skim through this post so I'll ask this at the end to make it easier for you :P. What would you do to make the game better? Or are the devs on the right track, and already have it all figured out?