Suggestion: Break the game, SE

[Anapingofness]

Now back on the topic: They could absolutely rebuild this game, and draw new customers with expansions, graphics updates, and better play scaled towards more casual gamers. That obviously can't happen on a shoestring budget with like 3 coders. Drawing new players requires advertising and marketing... and having something new to advertise and market.

Haha they actually need to try advertising first! I saw one advertisement via Steam for FFXI. Other than that last time I heard about FFXI was about the Pandemonium Warden bit.

But you know what? I am 100% behind that suggestion. They should stop putting money into polishing that turd (read: FFXIV) and really polish this game. Make it shine like we know it can. Hell, Blizzard pretty much re-released WoW with Cataclysm, why can't SE do the same? Granted they'd have to actually put some effort into the damn thing and listen to the players but it can be done.

[Zinato]

To go with what Frank said, they could rebuild the and it could very easily create top tier gear, each stronger then the last. Does this change how hard enemies will be? no, because enemies following will also be stronger. The big issue i've seen post abyssea is the need to zerg everything.

The game has a single method of defeating the enemy and thats stand at its side and smack it around. What would make the game more challenging (Real challenge not artifical) is enemies that can select random players and spawn damaging spheres that slowly engulf the arena. Arena's like Diabolos' that change as the fight progresses. Enemies that use moves that are reletively harmless unless two or more people hit it during its ready phase at which point it does large AoE dmg. Enemies that change colors to symbolize a weakness for a window of time. (and i'm talking 0 from other sources) more fights like this and less like VW, along with scaling enemies could make all the difference. 99 may be the literal cap but gear and monsters could let the game go far beyond that leaving room for many things to come. That is if they cared.

[Shipp]

I'm not terribly smart, Shipp, and I really don't know anything about making video games, but it just seems to me that you keep saying 'The game is fine the way it is.' That's okay, really.

I'm not saying 'Godmode us'. I'm not saying 'Have only aby, and no VW.' I'm not saying 'Chocobo raising should have the best rewards in the game because i likes me some colorful chicken'.

What I said was, aby was fun because it broke the game. I'm not the only one who's noted how aby broke the game -- how it undid all the barriers that they told us were in place. It gave better gear than old endgame. It gave us a stupid amount of stats. It even gave us a godmode button in form of the primeval brew.

How long did zilart remain as THE Expansion for endgame? Toau came, WoTG came, and we got sidegrades. We got content that was half-baked and unfinished, that didn't give good enough of a reward for the effort put in.

Aby came along, broke all that, and it was fun. Were there complaints? Sure. A lot of them. But overall, it gave a breath of fresh air to the game. It wasn't perfect. It was, however, new.

What I am championing is the cause of the new. I'm tired of the balancing act -- tweak this, tweak that, sidegrade here, miniscule update there. Look at the root of the most of the complaints here and you'll find that a lot of people are saying exactly that.

Yeah, breaking the game means making players a lot more powerful, but it also means opening up new venues to test us. Tweaking means leaving a lot of unused, dead content. I don't know that breaking the game would attract hordes of new players. However, tweaking and balancing won't -- and its bound to frustrate a lot more.

Hey, I'm glad that you think everything is okay. I'm glad that you're accepting of status quo. You're allowed to have that opinion.

I think SE isn't trying very hard to do their best -- and since we are paying customers, we are certainly allowed to tell them why we feel that way.

Here's what I believe:

This game has a ton of content that could be made enjoyable by better rewards/easier accessibility/newness.

This game has enough uniqueness and individuality to be a viable MMO even today.

Am I wrong? Frequently, but I don't think it's about this.

You bring up some good points, but I don't care for your somewhat snide remarks about me accepting the status quo. I'm not 100% happy with XI, nor have I ever been. I like Aby over the old-school style grind. However, I also don't see the problem with having that type of grind for players to do if they wish.

Actually it's the complete opposite. Epic mode is readily available to anyone who cares for a challenge. The fact of the matter is that none of these people who say they want a challenge are willing to sacrifice gear for some challenge. You are free to go low man VWNMs with no temps, and nothing but pups and bsts in your group, but nobody does that because they really don't give a crap about the challenge. They want the gear. Truth is that if SE added a whole bunch of NMS and content that gave no gear, but added all sorts of stupid visual effects to your character, nobody would do it unless it was super easy. As a matter of fact, I bet if you look through one of the wikis, you can actually find that there are a shit load of Tough NMs, and quests that no one cares about because they only want loot.

Want to be fair? make the gear readily available to anyone who is willing to put in a moderate effort like abyssea. Then create a bunch of afterglow style epic long quests and SUPER hard mode NMS that award no gear, but give people shit like glows, and flames, and shiny stuff. Watch 99.999% of the people who said they needed more challenge ignore the hard stuff that doesn't drop gear just like they do now.

Or better yet make the event so that you can adjust the difficulty, but the drops stay the same. See how many people try to do it on hard mode.

That is the thing though. More challenging events -should- reward better gear. I'm not saying that there's a problem with that. I'm saying that there are a lot of people complaining (same thing happened in WoW prior to WoTLK and Cata) that they want the best gear, but they shouldn't have to put in the effort to obtaining it. If you want that those great rewards, then put in the effort and do them. If you just want Aby-style events since they're easy and quick, then be happy with Empy+2. This isn't directed to you specifically, just in general.

To explain what I'm talking about, going to bring up WoW here. People complained and complained that they couldn't do raids. So Blizzard nerfs raids. Now everyone has the same gear. The people who wanted a challenge now have the gear, yet they don't have the challenge. Blizzard made heroic mode raids with basically the +1 version of gear from the normal raid counterpart. Then those same people who complained about not being able to raid in the first place because they were too challenging complained because now they don't get to have the top-tier gear like people who put in more effort. Then heroics were nerfed and Blizzard introduced hard-modes within the heroic raids so players had the choice of getting better gear by fighting harder version of the gear, which is basically a +2 version of the normal raid (in XI's terms). The people who originally whined about not being to raid now complain that they want hard-mode raid gear. It was never about them getting in to raiding, it was about them wanting the same gear as the hardcore players without actually putting in the time that those hardcore players do.

I see the same thing happening here. VW would be basically the equivalent of Heroic raids in WoW. Aby would be like the normal version. If people want that great gear, then they should put in the effort for it. Or, they can be happy with upgrading their empy stuff and still be far more powerful than they were prior to upgrading it.

"hey, nobody is forcing you to do it."

Yeah, that ought to sell some subscriptions.

Yes, because I certainly saw that huge influx of sub numbers rising when Aby was released.

The statement is right. Nobody is forcing you to do it. You want the rewards from it without doing it, and you want them obtained through easier means.

[FrankReynolds]

The statement is right. Nobody is forcing you to do it. You want the rewards from it without doing it, and you want them obtained through easier means.

Just because they offer you an option to get something one way doesn't mean you have to do it that way. For example: you are free to try and get to floor 100 in Nyzul isle with just 3 people.

However, I do not have the option to bring 12 people do I? Seems to me that you don't really want more challenging events. You want events that are too hard for most of the paying customers. You want to have some gear that no one else can get. It has nothing to do with the challenge. Its all about a false sense of superiority.

I have no problems getting endgame content completed. However, the average gamer spends maybe a couple hours a day playing games tops, and most of the time not consecutively. Making events that require massive time sinks, and large numbers of players who have already completed large time sinks, as the only method of completion, effectively blacks out a large portion of potential customers. Every impossible to obtain item eventually becomes the standard. They did a lot to adjust the curve so that new players could catch up for a while, but now they are screwing that all back up. They should have stuck with that.

There is always a harder way to do things. The challenge seekers never opt for that though. They always seek the easiest way to do it, and then complain that it's too easy.

If this was a standard RPG, these people would be playing on easy mode, and sad when they finished the game the first day.

[Mahoro]

Just because they offer you an option to get something one way doesn't mean you have to do it that way. For example: you are free to try and get to floor 100 in Nyzul isle with just 3 people.

However, I do not have the option to bring 12 people do I? Seems to me that you don't really want more challenging events. You want events that are too hard for most of the paying customers. You want to have some gear that no one else can get. It has nothing to do with the challenge. Its all about a false sense of superiority.

I have no problems getting endgame content completed. However, the average gamer spends maybe a couple hours a day playing games tops, and most of the time not consecutively. Making events that require massive time sinks, and large numbers of players who have already completed large time sinks, as the only method of completion, effectively blacks out a large portion of potential customers. Every impossible to obtain item eventually becomes the standard.

How is the average gamer blacked out from Nyzul when the event only takes 30 minutes? For that matter, how are they blacked out from any event you call a time sink when no current endgame event takes more than 2hrs?

I also dont think he was saying that he wants events that are too hard for the paying customers. He expressly said that if people want the better gear, they just need to put in the effort. Your attempt to portray that as some sort of ad hominem attack that he secretly wants a false sense of superiority is not supported by what he said.

[Aquilla]

You know, frank up there nailed it, but I'm not here to laugh at the 'I want sword of supershiny and nobody else can have it' people.

Here's the problem: the game has a severe myopia when it comes to reward. You want 18+ endgame? Fine! There's the Legion -- it's tailor-made for all the HNM-fighting, 18-man goodness you can get.
Your rewards are: a sidegrade. A haste+4%, str+8 and assorted stats sidegrade.

That, quite frankly, should upset the hard-mode crowd more than me. It makes me go 'meh' since I'm not in the market for end-game of that sort, but for you hard-mode people out there, it's even more meh. That's not an endgame reward, that's a joke. That's the type of shit that you should be able to get through a quest, or somesuch.

What if Legion dropped rings that gave stat+50? body pieces that were haste+25%, etc? If you are going to have this be endgame, then have it be endgame with oomph. Have it be gear that, when I get it, I can put on and see a difference.

However, you also need to have actual content for the rest of the crowd -- and that's exactly the problem. There is no content other than endgame content. There is nothing except NM-killing and loot-chasing.

Imagine starting out in this game now -- and imagine doing it coming from other MMOs. Quests are confusing, and give no rewards. The game doesn't explain to you how to participate in the variety of content -- no explanations for BCNM, VNM, ANNM, ENM, and all other dead content taking up space. No PvP, no crafting/gathering worth doing, no non-battle content such as pankration/chocobo raising/MMM.

All of this stuff is in the game, but shitty. It gives no rewards, takes too long to do, and is too hard to get into. Why can't all of this stuff be meaningful?

The game needs a serious revamp, for both the end-game and the actual playing of the game. It needs to be fun to play. That does require breaking the game. Why? because the elitist crowd who truly cared about the nerfing of the heroics are a tiny percentage of gamers. Most people want to have fun when they are playing a game, not have the item x. that nobody has. If that wasn't true, then WoW would've tanked the moment their first expansion made the former expansion obsolete.

[Shipp]

You know, frank up there nailed it, but I'm not here to laugh at the 'I want sword of supershiny and nobody else can have it' people.

No, he actually didn't, and I'll explain how.

I don't do VW. I do Aby. In another thread about inventory issues, Frank specifically said he needs 78+ pieces of equipment for gear swaps, and I said that's not necessary for any job except maybe BLU. His response was basically that "I" might not see it as necessary, but he does. He has no problem with people like me who don't carry around 80+ pieces of gear for just one job at a time, but he feels he needs to.

You tell me who has the superiority complex sweetheart. Mahoro nailed my point perfectly. If you want better rewards than the +2 gear from aby, then you need to put in the effort. People didn't baaaahhhhh about wanting Riddil without fighting Faf back in the day, because it makes logical sense that you get better rewards from harder events. Also, nothing today comes close to endgame back in the "glory" days, so I have a hard time imagining someone has a hard time getting into endgame things.

Here's the problem: the game has a severe myopia when it comes to reward. You want 18+ endgame? Fine! There's the Legion -- it's tailor-made for all the HNM-fighting, 18-man goodness you can get.
Your rewards are: a sidegrade. A haste+4%, str+8 and assorted stats sidegrade.

And you know what, it's optional. You obviously don't like the rewards, so you don't have to do VW. That is not a hard choice. Leave the more challenging/time-consuming events to those people who want to do them. I agree that the game could use more Aby style events. I'm not arguing against that. I'm arguing against you people who claim that it's going to bring a ton of brand new players in and that more challenging/time-consuming content will kill the game.

That, quite frankly, should upset the hard-mode crowd more than me. It makes me go 'meh' since I'm not in the market for end-game of that sort, but for you hard-mode people out there, it's even more meh. That's not an endgame reward, that's a joke. That's the type of shit that you should be able to get through a quest, or somesuch.

Some people actually LIKE to do those types of events, regardless of the rewards. You know, some of us do play the game for fun instead of sitting in Jeuno e-peening around.

What if Legion dropped rings that gave stat+50? body pieces that were haste+25%, etc? If you are going to have this be endgame, then have it be endgame with oomph. Have it be gear that, when I get it, I can put on and see a difference.

Like I said, and you denied, you want godmode.

However, you also need to have actual content for the rest of the crowd -- and that's exactly the problem. There is no content other than endgame content. There is nothing except NM-killing and loot-chasing.

You have Aby for the time being. I don't know what you want, +50 gear just handed to you or something? Why SHOULDN'T you have to kill NMs? What is it that you want? You keep saying what you don't want to do yet you don't say what events you do want, only the rewards you want.

Imagine starting out in this game now -- and imagine doing it coming from other MMOs. Quests are confusing, and give no rewards. The game doesn't explain to you how to participate in the variety of content -- no explanations for BCNM, VNM, ANNM, ENM, and all other dead content taking up space. No PvP, no crafting/gathering worth doing, no non-battle content such as pankration/chocobo raising/MMM.

Very few new people are coming to this game. It's been that way since about WoTG release.

All of this stuff is in the game, but shitty. It gives no rewards, takes too long to do, and is too hard to get into. Why can't all of this stuff be meaningful?

Not everyone needs a reward to do something they consider fun. Perhaps you're not understanding the point of a game.

The game needs a serious revamp, for both the end-game and the actual playing of the game. It needs to be fun to play. That does require breaking the game. Why? because the elitist crowd who truly cared about the nerfing of the heroics are a tiny percentage of gamers. Most people want to have fun when they are playing a game, not have the item x. that nobody has. If that wasn't true, then WoW would've tanked the moment their first expansion made the former expansion obsolete.

You know, this is the exact same mindset of WoW players. Look how many subs dropped after Cata turned the game into easy-mode. Also, BC was a challenging expansion which most players actually did NOT raid, only the elites. I don't know where you're coming up with your info, but you're sorely mistaken and misrepresenting the facts. Blizzard has even stated that Cata's raids were easier because only a small portion of the playerbase had been raiding from Vanilla through WoTLK.

You are trying to bring a Cata-style revamp into XI, and Cata is the entire reason why I came back to XI. It's trash in terms of endgame. If you want easy events where you get the best gear, go play any other MMO, don't try to turn one of the last MMOs into that.

[Aquilla]

Wow, that was lengthy! Well, back on track:

Break the game, SE. Be brave, and bold. Do something new and innovative. That was what made FF special from the beginning!

Try something new -- because the current approach is just death by small doses. If you make the game shiny, new, and exciting -- and it still fails -- at least it would've gone out gloriously.

[Anapingofness]

Actually Shipp... people did go "baaahhh Ridill" back in the day. I would know. I was one of those people. Besides, Ridill wasn't that great either. It was an e-peen item. Not to mention that Faffy wasn't that hard anyway.

On that note...

SE!!
Break the game!
If Shipp quits I'll get another player to take his place. Hell I'll pay for two accounts. Just make the game fun!

[FrankReynolds]

No, he actually didn't, and I'll explain how.

I don't do VW. I do Aby. In another thread about inventory issues, Frank specifically said he needs 78+ pieces of equipment for gear swaps, and I said that's not necessary for any job except maybe BLU. His response was basically that "I" might not see it as necessary, but he does. He has no problem with people like me who don't carry around 80+ pieces of gear for just one job at a time, but he feels he needs to.

You tell me who has the superiority complex sweetheart. Mahoro nailed my point perfectly. If you want better rewards than the +2 gear from aby, then you need to put in the effort. People didn't baaaahhhhh about wanting Riddil without fighting Faf back in the day, because it makes logical sense that you get better rewards from harder events. Also, nothing today comes close to endgame back in the "glory" days, so I have a hard time imagining someone has a hard time getting into endgame things.

TLDR;


Yes, If you don't carry any healing set or any physical damage down set, and I do, then your physical damage down and your healing sets suck compared to mine. This is because you didn't bother to make a set at all. Not because I have epeen gear and show it off to make others feel inferior.

I carry around a bunch of stuff because it makes my character perform better, and it doesn't require any grinding to get that improvement. I mean seriously, who wants to help a guy get his awesome strength headpiece when the guy doesn't even bother to keep it on him so he can use it afterwards? DO you really not feel annoyed when the mage runs out of mp, and you look over and hes not wearing any HMP gear while he rests? This is all stuff that can be bought cheap off the AH. not king drops.

How can you act like I'm lazy for complaining about months of grinding when you can't even be bothered to buy sets off the AH?