Suggestion: Break the game, SE

[Duelle]

Yes, let's turn XI into the game that has now lost more subs in one year than XI and XIV even have combined.

Erm, if you're gonna mention WoW, at least get the facts right. The majority of the subcriptioin dip was because Cataclysm made dungeons and raid content much harder at the entry level than they were back in Wrath of the Lich King. This in effect meant tanks and healers became super picky over who they wanted to run with, which made pugging really difficult. Combine that with the fact that PvP was an utter mess for 2/3 of the expansion and there's your answer. It wasn't until gearing and content as a whole was made more accessible that people started coming back (AKA 3.3 between the Hour of Twilight dungeons, Fall of deathwing AND raid finder).

In short, when the expansion launched they went back to a design model where people were basically bashing their head against a wall in trying to kill things in dungeons and it pissed a lot of people off. It diluted the tank and healer pool because you had less people wanting to take up those roles due to how much more difficult content was, and PvP was a mess because of several class changes for most of the expansion. You can tell it was bad when Blizzard chose to cut an entire tier of content just to wrap up Cataclysm as soon as possible and move on to whatever is next.

[Zeratoangel]

Erm, if you're gonna mention WoW, at least get the facts right. The majority of the subcriptioin dip was because Cataclysm made dungeons and raid content much harder at the entry level than they were back in Wrath of the Lich King. This in effect meant tanks and healers became super picky over who they wanted to run with, which made pugging really difficult. Combine that with the fact that PvP was an utter mess for 2/3 of the expansion and there's your answer. It wasn't until gearing and content as a whole was made more accessible that people started coming back (AKA 3.3 between the Hour of Twilight dungeons, Fall of deathwing AND raid finder).

In short, when the expansion launched they went back to a design model where people were basically bashing their head against a wall in trying to kill things in dungeons and it pissed a lot of people off. It diluted the tank and healer pool because you had less people wanting to take up those roles due to how much more difficult content was, and PvP was a mess because of several class changes for most of the expansion. You can tell it was bad when Blizzard chose to cut an entire tier of content just to wrap up Cataclysm as soon as possible and move on to whatever is next.

You beat me to it, it seems lmao. You were just a bit gentler than I was :3

[Psxpert2011]

There's a lot of poo-flinging that goes on around here. However, there's also a ton of great suggestions that often go unanswered.

I'll grant that, over the years, most people change tastes. There's no going back, and no amount of rose-colored nostalgia is going to recreate an experience. I'm not asking to go back to the days of 2k/hr dunes parties.

I'm saying that the game needs to be broken.

FFXI has gone threadbare. Yeah, people play for friends -- but it's getting to be a lonely journey as the populace inevitably shrinks.

Yes, One idea I have is: Every full moon, let everyone receive +50 on every stats, 20% movement speed and 20% haste to their normal actions! That's because the freaks come out and aggro! The MPK patch is lifted and Goblin Smithy has a taste for Whms! :P

I have more creative juices than that:
Let's go crazy! When the moon is RED, it's PVP night everywhere, where there's no musical tracks, primarily the ballista zones... Forget that- make it every zone!

SE, your recent additions and updates keep proving to your players that you don't know where the game's true potential lies.

Yeah, people, in general, will always whine. Aby broke the game, and it was fun. A blm could go oneshot a mob. A monk could go /war and solo VTs without stopping. Just about any job, no matter how well or poorly geared, could go in and get something done. It was fun.

To put it simply: exciting announcement right now is not a spiky red body piece with a tiny bit of str/dex and crit hit+. Multiply those stats by ten, and it'd be exciting.

Exciting won't be a raise spell that reduces my weakness time by 2 minutes, that will be 'extremely difficult to obtain'. Exciting would be making raise instacast, giving whms full-life.

Flying chocobos would be exciting. Adding the ability to call your personal chocobo in every outdoor area in the game, past/northlands included, would be exciting.

Minor upgrades/sidegrades/downgrades aren't exciting. They aren't upsetting. They're completely apathy-inducing. Break the game, SE. I realize that players of games don't make the best developers, but the players overall seem to be saying that they do not want any more piddly half-steps in a meandering way.

You've got a decent bit of nostalgia left. Unfortunately, that currency is wearing thin. One by one, your players will leave, unless you shake the game up, unless you make it alive again.

that is all.

I don't think the DEV team are really enjoying their job along side FFxi anymore... I think they lost their fire. There's probably people there who never played/ enjoyed any FF game or played it just enough and said "meh"...



I'm probably sure if they work with potential fans that grew up with the game, a lot more sense will come out in future updates.

[Shipp]

Erm, if you're gonna mention WoW, at least get the facts right. The majority of the subcriptioin dip was because Cataclysm made dungeons and raid content much harder at the entry level than they were back in Wrath of the Lich King. This in effect meant tanks and healers became super picky over who they wanted to run with, which made pugging really difficult. Combine that with the fact that PvP was an utter mess for 2/3 of the expansion and there's your answer. It wasn't until gearing and content as a whole was made more accessible that people started coming back (AKA 3.3 between the Hour of Twilight dungeons, Fall of deathwing AND raid finder).

In short, when the expansion launched they went back to a design model where people were basically bashing their head against a wall in trying to kill things in dungeons and it pissed a lot of people off. It diluted the tank and healer pool because you had less people wanting to take up those roles due to how much more difficult content was, and PvP was a mess because of several class changes for most of the expansion. You can tell it was bad when Blizzard chose to cut an entire tier of content just to wrap up Cataclysm as soon as possible and move on to whatever is next.

Oh wait, which quarter was it that WoW started gaining subs back? Oh right, it hasn't. PvP has always been a mess in WoW, that's nothing new. In Vanilla people complained about Rogues. In BC people complained about Locks. In WoTLK, it was DKs and Pallies. In Cata, it has been mages.

Dungeons have been easy long prior to 3.3 HoT dungeons. Even the Zul dungeons were faceroll easy by last summer. Instances weren't more difficult, you just couldn't AoE everything down without CC from the beginning of the expansion. WoTLK was the exact same way when it was launched, but people sat in ICC gear for nearly a year before new content, so they got used to just AoE gunning instances.

It also needs to make the content to match. Low drop rates are not challenge, and never have been. Faffy was never a challenge to kill - in fact, it was a joke, doable with six people who knew which end of the pointy weapon went into the mob.

Let me guess, you started in ToAU?

I was more annoyed at the person I quoted suggesting that tuning things down and making stuff accessible drives people away, when both this game and WoW have proven the exact opposite.

I didn't say tweaking drop rates or making things more accessible turns people away. I said "breaking the game" as Aquilla wants to say, which is just a nice way of saying, "Let me godmode," turns people away from MMOs. I have no problem with drop rates being increased. None. Never been against that. What I am against is wanting Abyssea type buffs all the time, outside of Abyssea, while you're just strolling along the dunes.

[Zinato]

I said "breaking the game" as Aquilla wants to say, which is just a nice way of saying, "Let me godmode," turns people away from MMOs. I have no problem with drop rates being increased. None. Never been against that. What I am against is wanting Abyssea type buffs all the time, outside of Abyssea, while you're just strolling along the dunes.

I think I'm seeing two different conversations in this thread. I chose this quote because it sorta addresses both. I'm all for "breaking the game" but to be exact more like "breaking the game mold". The idea that I would like to see is new styles of combat, things that would prevent zerging, battles that are scripted, new types of events rather then gather 18 people beat up boss monster. (or in dynamis/limbus case pray you don't get links and wipe while proceeding to said boss monster.)

I'd also like to see players get larger stats from gear, buffs etc. (also, possibly progression of gear and example would be if dynamis gear made getting limbus gear easier, which in turn made nyzul easier to complete for even better gear.) Now to clarify, this doesn't require "godmode", godmode would be if players had an overwhelming advantage, to the contrary what I would prefer are stronger monsters to match. Larger more climatic battles where DMG in the 1000s is bouncing around, in reality player vs monster variables remain, however everything is on a grander scale. However, as can be guessed something of this magnitude would completely change the way we all play, as well as all previous content either outright outdated or needing overhauls to compensate. Thus, "breaking the game". That's my preference anyway.

Oh, and on the note of drop rates, yeah drop rate increase would be nice, and hopefully more content to go with it. (Rather than the current 1/300 should keep players busy while we spend a year making something new.) Sorry, its sometimes hard to tell who is posting about godmode vs not godmode and overhaul vs not overhaul.

[Zinato]

This is the flaw in Empyrean's design and the recreation of dynamis. Super weapons were never ment to be an every man item, and this holds true for nearly every MMO. However, now enough people have empyrean to make it "standard", the problem this causes is a rift between content. On the one hand those with empyrean find the content too easy since the weapons themselves are far superior to any non-super weapon counterpart. Then on the other hand, any player unable to gain an empyrean will likely find content too hard or else players will gain the idea of empyrean = faster and therefore only useful way to win. (Since zerg has been the play style for quite some time now)

The problem lies in the uncloseable gap of power in the Weaponskills along with double dmg aftermath, this on low delay weapons makes a major difference. When SE announced new Weaponskills for players that threatened to be as powerful as empyrean, those with the weapon fought back and eventually got the weaponskills weakened. (Not without reason however, they did after all create a weapon vs 100 merits) Had the weaponskills remained in power its possible empyrean would be counteracted and the situation wouldn't be what it is now. Alternatively if the aftermath or even the weaponskill itself was unlocked at 90 or more so 95 the balance would likely be restored. The fact that for larger teams empyrean is dime-a-dozen and for smaller teams its much more of a time commitment the balance will continue to shift. As more people make empyrean out of nessessity the gap grows ever larger and the means to acquire ever smaller.

Imagine for a moment, 6 months from now leveling drk, this is long after the abyssea rush and many ls' will be burnt out on creating empy after making so many others. But, you must have 90 GS to even have a chance of using the job, and whats more this may only be your second job. (This issue affects any DD regardless of how many other jobs a player has.) The common argument is just level a mage, but this not only lowers DD available for runs but from the players perspective has nearly the same result since magian staves are up to 8 or more per mage, excluding WHM. (besides, if a player is forced into a role they dislike its highly likely they wont hang around long.)

[Mahoro]

Actually ....

Earlier today I noticed not one, not two, but four different VWNM shouts that required the melee's to have Emp / Relic weapons. They were not even for Rex but for Ig, Gaunab, Uptala and drum roll please, Pil. I'm not sh!tty you, they demanded emp / relics for ... Pil.



Because the people who will be organizing these events will demand Emp / Relics and nothing else. The "average" player doesn't have an Emp, I know I've been watching. Without solid friends or a shell getting past Stage II is pretty much impossible now. Nobody even remotely cares for the +2 drops from those NMs nor the Atma's, we've completely saturated the supply with them by having to do them x50 x50 x75. 50 really was too big a number, or the NM only dropping 1~2 was too little, either way it required such a grind that people refuse to help anymore. Relics are now more realistic to obtain then Emps due to being able to do the entire thing by yourself or nearly by yourself.

So yes, "average players" aka the majority of paying customers, are being c*ck blocked from events by leaders demanding relic / emps. Basically saying "you can not participate in any new content without first making yourself several Emps / Relics". And yes it's several, because at this point in time people have different jobs. And if the event leader needs a DRK, and you leveled DRK but have an Almace or Ukon, then your told to go piss off. If the event leader is looking for "Ukon WAR Onry" and you got a Torcleaver but also have WAR leveled and fully geared, your told to piss off.

To be fair, i was responding to the point that grindy time sinks are blacking average players out. From a design perspective, no event takes over 2 hours in current FF endgame, so the argument that there are scads of casual or average players who cannot put in time or effort to do SE's events strains credulity. They might be grinds, and I myself do not appreciate artificial grinds like VW, but the intent of the programmer was never to black people out.

As to the phenomenon you are talking about, that lies SOLELY at the hands of the playerbase. Shouting for Relics or Empyreans ONRY in shit like Pil is sheer idiocy. There are various solutions for average players running up against that kind of mindset. One is to join an LS. Another is to start their OWN shout groups.

[Fupafighter]

They should make a DKP system added to LS's lol. So you can't be cheated out of your armor. Like say everyone gets 5 points for events attented and there is a minimum amount of say 100 before you can lot certain armor. This way LS leaders can't abuse people and people get rewards. Via we have to sign in for events with the LS before we start.

[Aquilla]

I won't pretend to know enough about WoW or any other game to make meaningful comparisons.

However, I will stand firm with my opening post. Yeah, SE needs to 'break' the game. It needs to make their players powerful in the world of Vana'diel, because we, as the players, have worked to be powerful.

It also needs to make the content to match. Low drop rates are not challenge, and never have been. Faffy was never a challenge to kill - in fact, it was a joke, doable with six people who knew which end of the pointy weapon went into the mob. Taking two, three years to get a drop off Faffy and his ilk didn't mean that a player worked for two, three years -- it meant that they worked for five-ten minutes, and all the other time spent killing Faffy was essentially wasted time.

I also want to champion the causes of lost content, and not just for the sake of epic lewtz. I want crafting to be meaningful. I want synergy to be meaningful. I want evoliths to go from 'you're kidding me, right? acc+3 vs. beasts only?' to 'I should toss this str+5 stone onto my Legion-begotten red jacket of mediocrity.' I want the hunt registry to have less of 'let's watch Netflix while I wait for this mob to spawn' and more of 'Here's this orb. Throw it into a burning circle, bring all your potions and lucky charms, and see if you can beat it on your own/with two of your best friends/just you and your moogle'. I want chocobo racing to involve me racing my chocobo. I want the potions to stack to 99.

Are any of these things a good idea? Maybe. I say, SE, try it and let's see. Revamp the game you have, and toss it out there to duke it out with the big guys. Maybe your reputation will go from 'That company that made the one good RPG and has been turning out soggy crackers since' to 'Hey, this is cool. Not like WoW and all the other WoW clones out there. You should try it.'

A cat can dream!

[Duelle]

I won't pretend to know enough about WoW or any other game to make meaningful comparisons.

I was more annoyed at the person I quoted suggesting that tuning things down and making stuff accessible drives people away, when both this game and WoW have proven the exact opposite.

I want evoliths to go from 'you're kidding me, right? acc+3 vs. beasts only?' to 'I should toss this str+5 stone onto my Legion-begotten red jacket of mediocrity.'

Meh, personally evoliths need to be scrapped and remade. I'd take from the one thing TOR got right and borrow elements from their gear modification system. Any piece of gear that is not rare/ex could be put through a process (probably using synergy) to have all of its stats stripped from it and instead 3 or 4 evolith slots. Elemental affinities would be removed from the slots themselves and be kept on the evoliths to signify their allignment. Then assign the evolith shapea to a type of equipment buff (say, square evo sockets being for boosts to base stats, triangle sockets being more stuff like +attack or +acc, and circle sockets being for extra effects like Enhances Refresh or Enhances Dual Wield). At least this way you have some sort of modifiable gear and give evoliths some use. Then it'd be a matter of balancing values per evolith and so on.

Oh, and they should be crafted. None of this nonsense of randomly dropping in chests.

As far as the hunt registry, I agree that it should be more along the lines of a pop item leading to you killing the target NM. I wouldn't make it an orb though. Something more along the lines of "the NM is in X zone. Y item can lure it out, which can be obtained from Z mobs in that same area" or something like that.