Reasons Why FFXI is Declining

[nyheen]

There have been some improvements, notably level synch which allowed you keep xping when your tank dc'd or whatever. And able to lowman / solo your relic armors / weapons in Dyna. Relic+2 was also cool. Aby was fun and had cool mobs, but the allowing people to xp in groups with a 69-lvl gap between players was a disaster, and inevitably led to what we have now ; WAR99s would have never used a weapon more than a few times in the lvl 1-30 range, and used forbidden keys instead for 30-99. Or a blm killing 20 dolls at a time while everyone else just jogs to the Dom ops guy and back again for hours.
Its true there have been improvements and some disastrous errors / failures in the last 4 years. The importance of forums is you can discuss which of the developer decisions were good and which were terrible.
Nowadays you don't need to be polite in xp parties, or make new friends in xp parties, those things were what made FFxi a success to begin with, you had to play your job well and be a nice person in parties or you wouldn't get invited again. Nowadays you can log in and lvl 30-99 without saying a single word to anyone, and the only person who talks to you in 69 levels is a randomly-generated RMT /tell every so often. I made friends in FFxi xp parties in 2004, we became friends in real life and are still best friends. We connected because we were spending hours xping or meriting, really slowly, and playing at our best game-skills, noting that the other person was doing really good at their job, we admired them and became friends. That doesnt exist anymore, you can go Aby dolls and go afk or key or just play your job terribly, makes no difference, nobody is going to notice you or connect with you anyway. Remember how when you got a pt invite in the old game, it was your chance to shine, for a few hours you could play your job at your highest ability, make new friends, and you would get invited again because you were proficient and friendly. That stuff is just history now.

this is what most people seems to forget about. now it just a lost thing in the past but iam still happy i got the chance to do all of them things

[FrankReynolds]

You can talk to people in abyssea parties too. The conversation is often better. I see people joking and having fun now instead of bitching about who didn't cure or how much the last paladin sucked. I see people asking questions about limit break quests and getting responses from 5-10 people instead of being yelled at to pull faster. I see people talking about politics instead of bitching about the other party out pulling us.

Try talking to the guy who is keying or gimping it up on pup instead of judging him. You are the reason he doesn't talk and doesn't care. Honestly. People probably didn't admire your skill or talk to you because they thought you were great. They talked to you because you were stuck in the middle of nowhere together. Take off your old school 2004 linkshell next time you exp. and talk to the other people. Don't be that guy who sits on his blue tooth talking on the phone everywhere he goes and ignoring people right in front of him out in public because he thinks he is better than them. That guy is a douche.

[FrankReynolds]

I'm not judging keyers. I feel SORRY for them. They are not playing a videogame. They are not fighting mobs, or being a healer, or a puller. They are clicking a key-trade-macro on endless boxes for days on end. And missing out on battle, party dynamics, travelling to new zones as you level up, fighting mobs in cool areas like aydeewa and MZ trolls camp, with trolls that look cool, or CM imps which also are cool.
The keyperson is just watching the same 15 boring dolls getting oneshotted by delve meatsocks, over and over, while running to a dom ops npc and selecting the same page over and over, and opening the same boxes over and over, for SIXTY NINE LEVELS. I pity them. They are missing out on the whole game. I pity you too coz you know all this but just want to start ****.

I don't want to start *&(^&*. I want people to stop perpetuating this BS stereotype that people who level jobs in abyssea are missing out on something.

The people who already had jobs leveled didn't miss out on any of that. In fact, a large portion of them were quite sick of it.

New people were going to completely miss out on all those things you named anyways because most older players already had a few jobs leveled and had no interest in going back to level more. The pool of people with whom new people could party with was almost nonexistent.

If they wanted people to experience fighting different stuff in different zones, all they had to do was make a quest that required it. Personally, I think Trial of the magians would be a good name. what do you think?

Everything else is covered by end game events.

I vastly prefer being able to choose from a pool of bards, whms, wars, monks etc. who may or may not suck at the job to just standing around waiting for the 3 on the server to log in.

You want to be social and bring the social aspect back like partying had? Stop complaining about how people suck now because they leveled in abyssea and play with them. It's exactly the same as back in the old days, only now instead of learning stuff at level 50 they are learning it at 99. They aren't learning jobs any faster or slower. They are just learning at a different point in the game.

The old model only worked when new people were joining. They aren't joining anymore.

[Vold]

Eorzea welcomes you all.

You know it's funny that anyone says this. I have to admit, ever since FFXIV's release I have been playing it pretty much full time, only logging into FFXI to bazaar until my connection resets and boots me offline because my internet for the past two years has been a living hell. I'm not done in FFXI, not by a long shot, but the group I was doing things with have suddenly disappeared so I decided to take a break myself.

The funny thing here is, despite all of FFXIV's shine, it's fresh change of pace(to me, I hear it's practically a wow clone on gameplay but I can't speak to that)and interesting main storyline with total fake but babes nonetheless babes everywhere you look, even after nearly just one month of playing I find myself.. it's hard to describe. I'm not really bored, it's more like... tired of the style. I'm tired of spamming the same exact things for millions of experience points that takes all of 2 to 5 minutes to complete. And I know it will only get worse at "end game" when I am spamming the same things over and over to farm points/tokens/tomes/whatever they are called to purchase my ultimate gear or whatever it is. It's basically delve, is what it is on the boredom factor and people are doing everything they can to make it less of a chore.

My point is, when I'm in FFXIV everyday, chasing after my goals, I'm not thinking about FFXIV or even said total hot virtual babes that don't exist but are only appealing because they could never exist in the real world, I'm thinking about what I want to do in FFXI. It's sad, really. That even now I want to play FFXI, but it's hard to do when SE obviously does not want to continue to develop FFXI. They put a group of poor souls behind it that probably don't want to work on it either, but for the sake of a paycheck they will. I know it's a terrible pain in the ass to work on one project for just 5 years. Oh God forbid someone has to work on a MMO for 10 years. But come on, guys. Welcome to life. Welcome to reality. I've been working my same job for 15 years. I, like most people, will work our entire lives in the same line of work. Probably the same exact job. And game devs whine(not speaking to SE specifically and I don't actually ever recall them openly whining ever) that they work on the same game for just a few years, I need a change, whine whine whine.

I guess I'm just asking for them to throw an entire fresh crew onto FFXI if they have to to get things done, even if they're all newbies. I would prefer someone my age designing my games, not a grandpa. I want someone who understands my generation. That's not my grandpa. Though I give credit to Tanaka for designing FFXI, but he was obviously out of touch with the generation of gamers playing his games. And even now with someone who is not my grandpa producing FFXI, it just seems like said producer Akihiko Matsui is never going to catch a fair break because he inherited a game that was already on life support after many decisions that did not sway in it's favor. I think he's done a lot of good already, but it's hard for him to shine when his crew is maybe 20 people strong. It's hard to tell because SE never dares tell us after they admitted the force behind FFXIV. He has earned a couple black marks already but whatever. That's a fact of life for game dev producers.

So yeah. I find it funny that in a matter of months I believe FFXIV is going to see a major exodus of players, not because it's a bad game, but because 1)it's more of the same for many people, and 2)because people grow bored because there's no real challenge, danger(aggroing mobs turn back and run to their spawn point after alittle while of chasing you) or competition for anything. Everything is handed to them on a silver platter while leveling up which takes a drastic turn at lv50. It's heavily designed to be a casual solo game that does everything to not piss you off and quit but while doing so it is boring you into quiting. I think that will impact it heavily in the coming months, and soon instead of welcome to eorzea comments, it's going to be 'goodbye eorzea, perhaps FFXVII Online won't be so fricking easy and boring.'

I'm not giving up on 14 just yet, I'm just saying it's human nature to dump the game before it's first expansion even comes out. The style worked in WoW because WoW was the first. No one is ever going to duplicate WoW because at this point everyone has had enough of WoW. If they want WoW, they will stay at WoW. And with that said, FFXIV is never going to be an accepted successor to FFXI. FFXIV is all about short term, FFXI is all about long term. There's a reason FFXI is still going today and SE did not take that reason to heart whatsoever. They went for the subscribers. They gave in too much to feedback by solo players from WoW, and didn't even bother giving group players a exp bonus for grouping up and killing random monsters. The monsters are merely there to drop crafting materials and to be used for 2-5 minute quests. My warrior can SOLO MONSTERS 5 FRICKING LEVELS ABOVE HIM. I think they may regret that in the long run, and FFXI will benefit when it gets back subscribers from FFXIV.

[Xantavia]

If they wanted people to experience fighting different stuff in different zones, all they had to do was make a quest that required it. Personally, I think Trial of the magians would be a good name. what do you think?

Would be a great idea, except SE decided to kill this with their ilvl deal.

[Demon6324236]

FFXIV is never going to be an accepted successor to FFXI. FFXIV is all about short term, FFXI is all about long term. There's a reason FFXI is still going today and SE did not take that reason to heart whatsoever.

In all honesty, you speak of the FFXI of the past, now, its not that way. The last of the long term goals which existed were RMEs, they were killed, now, they exist still, but they are never going to be superb from what we know, they are planed to be on par with other weapons, which is only more reason why people will not make them. In the end, I think long term goals for FFXI are being left behind as well, FFXIV may not be a successor to old FFXI, but it probably is to the current game, and maybe that's why they changed this game in the first place, to make them more relatable. But either way, I hope they find a way to make FFXIV work out well, from what I hear its great, but I know little about it since I cant play it, and would hate to get excited over something out of my reach.

[nyheen]

Trial of the magians starts at level 75. So that would be a pretty stupid way to level up from say level 20, wouldnt it. Plus magians are soloable, and are for weapon-building for lvl 75+ people. They are not XP parties which is what I was talking about, although I've noticed you do wriggle around a lot and grasp at any straw available. Please try harder.



No, again you are grasping at straws. I wasn't talking about people sucking, I was talking about how the game has changed.

With the addition of Level-synch ( a great idea) and xping in the glamorous old areas, far easier to keep an xp party going for ages. We never had any problem inviting people with level synch, despite your false and absurd claim ;"The pool of people with whom new people could party with was almost nonexistent". Thats nonsense. The reason people dont do old areas XP anymore, is that they can key in dolls for 69 levels instead. Its the 'path of least resistance'. Its the lazy option, so people will most times take the easiest option, but miss out on the actual game in the process. That is SE's biggest FFxi mistake of all time, not the players mistake. Most people will take the easy option if it is laid out for them, even if it deprives them of 99% of the fun xp content in the process. SE should not have allowed 69-lvl gaps in Aby xp parties. We had 2-3 lvl gaps in old xp parties, which we were able to augment with level synch. That prevented AFK leeching, and no-skills 99s running around wondering what 'provoke' does.


LOL. Thats funny. Lets go farm some capes in Marjami. Or some gear with built-in obsolescence, that gets outdated next week. Pebbles anyone?


In 2009 we had all the old areas xp camps still busy, and fun, and we had campaign battles where you could fight enemy generals on hilltops with thunderstorms in the sky above and crumbling castles around you, and waves of enemy soldiers storming up the hill, and NPC Heroes talking in /chatmode as they helped you pwn the enemies. Our xp options at level 10-60, we could form a legit party and learn our jobs and skill up same time, and see interesting places in vanadiel as we did so. And have some fun memories, and make friends. Then at like 60+ we could stay in the Toau xp areas or go to campaign. Both options had atmospheric scenery, and exciting mobs.

I have HAPPY MEMORIES from xp parties 2004-2010. I don't have ANY happy memories of dom ops. And while you are quick to point the finger at me and say its because im a horrible person so ppl in dom ops will hate me, I'm the same person I was in the xp parties those last ten years where I got friend invites, and made friends with ppl who are still friends after 10 years, and some of those Vanadiel friends became friends IRL. I havent changed, or turned into an ogre, but FFxi has.
A lot of people enjoyed travelling to the rock in W.Altepa, for beetles, with the sandstorms and the danger lol. And I loved troll parties at 74. Up on the battlements, fighting trolls! Aydeewa and MZ crawler parties, diremite parties, imp parties, torama parties in the labyrinth etc.etc. Excitement and variety, and you bonded with people because a lot of the time it was life/death battles where you survived by being a competent player.

What happy memories are you gonna tell ppl about your 69 lvls of sandsweepers? ;
"Oh, I remember that one time, I was putting a key into a lock, and a brown doll was getting oneshotted <over there>, then I ran to the Dom Ops NPC again (and he introduced himself to me again for the 1000000th time with the same 'getting to know me' speech, which I really had SO MUCH FUN spamming through his introduction-speech AGAIN) and I selected the same dolls page again (even though I wouldn't actually fight any of the dolls or cure the people who were fighting the dolls, and who dont need curing anyway coz the mobs die in 2 hits and atmas keep you on 90%+ hp the whole time.) Great times, wish you could have been there with me! Go go gaming!"

165% agree. now quick marry me! put the ring on now!!

[Arcon]

I have HAPPY MEMORIES from xp parties 2004-2010.

Your life must be awful. I'm so sorry.

[Afania]

Your life must be awful. I'm so sorry.

After spamming AoE in boring FATE in XIV for weeks I miss xp party 2004~2010 so much.

[FrankReynolds]

Would be a great idea, except SE decided to kill this with their ilvl deal.

We can both agree on that. iLevel is absolute crap.

Trial of the magians starts at level 75. So that would be a pretty stupid way to level up from say level 20, wouldnt it. Plus magians are soloable, and are for weapon-building for lvl 75+ people. They are not XP parties which is what I was talking about, although I've noticed you do wriggle around a lot and grasp at any straw available. Please try harder.

Not wriggling. You complained about people missing out on seeing different zones. TOA made/makes people try a far larger number of zones and different monsters than exp parties did, not just crab crab crab crab. And, While they are soloable, they are a lot easier if you team up. End game is almost all group stuff and again, if you aren't talking to people in exp parties, it's because you aren't talking to people in exp parties.

No, again you are grasping at straws. I wasn't talking about people sucking, I was talking about how the game has changed.

So when you said:

...playing at our best game-skills, noting that the other person was doing really good at their job, we admired them and became friends. That doesnt exist anymore...

What exactly did you mean? That everyone is just too damn good at the game to team up now? no, I know what you meant...

Especially since your reply says this:

SE should not have allowed 69-lvl gaps in Aby xp parties. We had 2-3 lvl gaps in old xp parties, which we were able to augment with level synch. That prevented AFK leeching, and no-skills 99s running around wondering what 'provoke' does.

With the addition of Level-synch ( a great idea) and xping in the glamorous old areas, far easier to keep an xp party going for ages. We never had any problem inviting people with level synch, despite your false and absurd claim ;"The pool of people with whom new people could party with was almost nonexistent". Thats nonsense.

No it isn't. Level sync wasn't fixing the problem. Most people stopped after leveling a few jobs and finding people to do it was hard unless you wanted to sync to 37 and spam birds in ronafure for 38 levels (which was even crappier than keying IMO) because at most levels, the camps / exp sucked.

The reason people dont do old areas XP anymore, is that they can key in dolls for 69 levels instead. Its the 'path of least resistance'. Its the lazy option, so people will most times take the easiest option, but miss out on the actual game in the process. That is SE's biggest FFxi mistake of all time, not the players mistake. Most people will take the easy option if it is laid out for them, even if it deprives them of 99% of the fun xp content in the process.

Is it really that hard to imagine that for most people, that was not fun at all? It really hasn't occurred to you that most people would have already had every job leveled to 99 by the time abyssea came out if they had enjoyed doing so? It was a boring tedious grind and a lot of people hated it. You may be the perfect image of positivity, sitting there happily chatting while smacking crabs and beetles for 2k exp/hr, but the other people were likely staring at their screens tired and annoyed wishing they didn't have to do this for months on end just so they could play <job> with their friends in <event>.

SE should not have allowed 69-lvl gaps in Aby xp parties. We had 2-3 lvl gaps in old xp parties, which we were able to augment with level synch. That prevented AFK leeching, and no-skills 99s running around wondering what 'provoke' does.

What's the difference? Whether you get in a level 30 party and the guy doesn't know what provoke does, or you get in a level 99 group and the guy doesn't know what provoke does... You still got stuck with the guy who doesn't know what provoke does. You can't go back in time and keep his parents from ever meeting Marty McFly. No delorean. No Doc Brown. The guy is here and he wants to party with you.

LOL. Thats funny. Lets go farm some capes in Marjami. Or some gear with built-in obsolescence, that gets outdated next week. Pebbles anyone?

I'm sure you had a point. What is it?

In 2009 we had all the old areas xp camps still busy...

Wrong

and fun

Wrong

[/quote]and we had campaign battles where you could fight enemy generals on hilltops with thunderstorms in the sky above and crumbling castles around you, and waves of enemy soldiers storming up the hill, and NPC Heroes talking in /chatmode as they helped you pwn the enemies.[/quote]

They removed campaign from the game? Nowai! When?!?!

PS. this is solo stuff. What has it got to do with becoming awesome and making friends in a party (besides not doing that)?

Our xp options at level 10-60, we could form a legit party and learn our jobs and skill up same time, and see interesting places in vanadiel as we did so.

You see all those places later anyways. Forming a legit party is overrated. Why do you think people don't do it any more? It's because they would rather be 99 than party (for a million different reasons).

And have some fun memories, and make friends.

You choose not to do that anymore. The game and the people still exist.

Then at like 60+ we could stay in the Toau xp areas

Could?

or go to campaign. Both options had atmospheric scenery, and exciting mobs.

They still do?

What are you saying? Does everything in the game turn into wire frame animation at level 99 for you? You should try re-installing. It sounds like your game is messed up. Mine still shows the same zones / scenery.

I have HAPPY MEMORIES from xp parties 2004-2010.

The crux of your entire argument. Those are your memories. You can't make everyone else have them.

I don't have ANY happy memories of dom ops.

I do.

And while you are quick to point the finger at me and say its because im a horrible person so ppl in dom ops will hate me, I'm the same person I was in the xp parties those last ten years where I got friend invites, and made friends with ppl who are still friends after 10 years, and some of those Vanadiel friends became friends IRL. I havent changed, or turned into an ogre, but FFxi has.

No, it's you. They didn't cancel every account and get 300k+ new people to join when they released dominion ops. It was all the same folks.

A lot of people enjoyed travelling to the rock in W.Altepa, for beetles, with the sandstorms and the danger lol.

Not many apparently.

And I loved troll parties at 74. Up on the battlements, fighting trolls!

There is a joke here somewhere...

Aydeewa and MZ crawler parties, diremite parties, imp parties, torama parties in the labyrinth etc.etc. Excitement and variety, and you bonded with people because a lot of the time it was life/death battles where you survived by being a competent player.

Your memories. Not everyone else.

What happy memories are you gonna tell ppl about your 69 lvls of sandsweepers? ;
"Oh, I remember that one time, I was putting a key into a lock, and a brown doll was getting oneshotted <over there>, then I ran to the Dom Ops NPC again (and he introduced himself to me again for the 1000000th time with the same 'getting to know me' speech, which I really had SO MUCH FUN spamming through his introduction-speech AGAIN) and I selected the same dolls page again (even though I wouldn't actually fight any of the dolls or cure the people who were fighting the dolls, and who dont need curing anyway coz the mobs die in 2 hits and atmas keep you on 90%+ hp the whole time.) Great times, wish you could have been there with me! Go go gaming!"

Oh man!!! You mean all these good times I've had over the years with my LS are meaningless because we weren't in exp parties when they happened? Whew! This really changes my perspective on life and friendship. Mind Blown.