Item level / vertical progression query

[Afania]

I do play FFXIV honestly I think its a great game but I already capped out almost everything there is to do in it. It's just a difference of opinion I know people who quit FFXI because of side grades and there was no gear progression. I am very happy with the way FFXI is now, I don't see anyone in my LS complaining about it. They even updating relics/empyreans/mythic because people complained about it. Also I can distinctly remember lots of people complaining about how there were too many side grades in the game. Most of the people who didn't like upgrades quit when the level cap was raised I thought because abyssea was direct upgrades to gear.

SoA is really no different then Abyssea just the power level gap is bigger this time around. I think they wanted to raise the level cap again but they couldn't due to PS2 limitations.

Also 10 min WP is only beatable by a very small fraction I mean less then .1% of the population and takes a very specific set up, pld, whm, brd, blm. 2 dps classes that are very good at aoe. I done it countless times and have darklight for every class, but the majority of the playerbase does not have the ability to do this. This is only accomplished by taking those 4 jobs geared with at least some ilvl 90 gear.

If you don't want to help people get on the same tier as you, then your obviously not a good friend/ls member. When abyssea came out I helped a lot of friends get caught up with seals and +2s.

Lots of people are fine with the upgardes they just don't sit here and complain about it on the forums.

Don't worry, if you want more vertical progression MMORPG I can find 10 more titles for you, do you want western style or anime style?

And leave FFXI alone ty I want to get my ass kicked by lv 90 rabbits, I don't want to kill Tojil +5 NM in 5 min after 6 months

And you do realize it's just the matter of time for 50% of population to do sub 10 min WP run right? Because of vertical gear progression. Players don't have more than a few pieces of IL90 because of mythology cap and coil lock out, wait for 2 months everyone and their mother, brother, grandpa and grandma can beat it in 10 min.

You stated that "you're happy with the way FFXI is now", you do know that majority of the players who QQ here are done with the game too, due to nothing else to work on. So how can you be happy with a game ppl have nothing to do?

I only log on 2~3 days a week to play FFXIV now, since I can finish coil 1~4+ mythology cap in 2~3 night(hardcore can finish it in 1 day, inb4 go do T5). It's really hard for me to say "I'm happy with current XIV now", when I paid $10 a month and only get to play 2~3 night a week. This applies to XI. And it's all because of vertical gear progression.

Lol at "you must be bad LS member/friend if you don't do lower tier", you don't understand human nature I guess. I'm talking about human nature, even if you're awesome and want to help, doesn't mean everyone else gonna help.

More importantly, there are no sense of accomplishment in both games because gears are ass easy to obtain and doesn't last long. SoA is no different from Abyssea, and I'm never a big fan of Abyssea. Sadly SoA is even worse than Abyssea, at least Abyssea still has gear variety, unlike SoA gears are like same stat for every piece, just 1 better than another.

There are ppl who will like 75 XI, and some ppl like WoW model/vertical gear progression. But you can't assume everyone has same opinion as you and vertical gear progression is zomg the best solution to every MMO title. People complained about sidegrade, is like husband complained about their wife lol. They stick with their wife for too long and only see the bad part about it, and everyone else's wife are perfect. Vertical gear progression has it's issues, some ppl either don't see it or willing to accept it.

But there's no reason for XI to change to vertical gear progression, the entire game mechanics are based on gear swap and situational gears, it simply won't work very unless there's a remake.

Stop trying to change FFXI into wow, it's going to kill the game. If you like WoW model, build a new game or find a new game to play. Do you go to Diablo 3 forum and ask the dev change the game into WoW? No. So why are you asking FFXI to follow WoW model?

[Afania]

vertical gear progression is fine, it just shouldnt be done this quickly. haveing vertical gear progression every 9-10 months is good while you fill the inbetween months with outstanding horizontal gear progression.

Current SoA issue is more than vertical gear progression. SoA XI also has way less gear variety, that's almost as bad as FFXIV. XI used to be fun, because of situational gears that you have to collect and use it on right time, and players who's dedicated to 1 job really stand out. Abyssea/SoA FFXI isn't like that, so the game isn't as satisfying to play when your job is same as everyone else's.

[Afania]

But to might point, a game is meant to challenge you. If the devs challenge is to get the newest gear to make you feel stronger, then eat it up. Otherwise, you might want to look somewhere else. Cuz essentially, vertically or laterally, you'll be doing the same thing anyways, right? Unless you just want the gear to look pretty... go play IMVU haha.

I feel sad if you think it's all the same lol. For me getting SoA gear in XI or Allagan/philosophy/mythology gears feel the same, all just "oh, ok, let's wait until next IL tier come out and toss it".

There are several gears in XI I was like "OMGOMGOMG YEAHHHH FINALLY" when I got it, because it's best in slot and unlikely to be replaced, on top of taking very long time to get.

They are just not the same. I was doing the same thing, kill stuff and get loot, but the satisfaction isn't the same.

[Mostfowl]

I feel sad if you think it's all the same lol. For me getting SoA gear in XI or Allagan/philosophy/mythology gears feel the same, all just "oh, ok, let's wait until next IL tier come out and toss it".

There are several gears in XI I was like "OMGOMGOMG YEAHHHH FINALLY" when I got it, because it's best in slot and unlikely to be replaced, on top of taking very long time to get.

They are just not the same. I was doing the same thing, kill stuff and get loot, but the satisfaction isn't the same.

Agreed.

Remember how amazing great it was to get rdm hat or thf hands in dyna, salvage gears or odin/omega drops, black belt or maats cap? You could walk around and be proud to wear them because you earned it. Even some nm drops were an accomplishment and would be cause for celebration. Now they are practically handing things out. We may as well form a line and get it from a moogle dispensary. It made the game fun struggling for gear and the struggle for gear wasn't bad because you knew once you got it that you would be using it for years to come. Now it really feels pointless to work for any piece of gear because you know in a month or 2 you just are going to toss it for something better anyway. So you go for the 5 minute drop then afk in your shiny new piece until the next update when you toss it for something better.

Regardless you are working for gear but I would much rather be challenged and work for a piece that I am going to use for a long time instead of doing only soso challenging content for a piece that Im going to drop next update

[Zephrose]

I feel sad if you think it's all the same lol. For me getting SoA gear in XI or Allagan/philosophy/mythology gears feel the same, all just "oh, ok, let's wait until next IL tier come out and toss it".

There are several gears in XI I was like "OMGOMGOMG YEAHHHH FINALLY" when I got it, because it's best in slot and unlikely to be replaced, on top of taking very long time to get.

They are just not the same. I was doing the same thing, kill stuff and get loot, but the satisfaction isn't the same.

You just said it, you're doing the same thing now as you were then.(In Bold) Granted, it's just easier to do now. And like I said, it wasn't quick at first. They just released a bad expansion. I mean, it could be a great expansion, but I think it's backwards or just lack luster at best. In the end, they aren't releasing enough content fast enough for the players to stay active OR content HARD/DIFFICULT enough(like the old days) to keep the players engaged.

The old days everyone talks about are grindmills and torture. Albeit, I enjoyed Salvage alot and hated the drop system, I'm glad I can walk into it now with a couple of friends and just leisurely work on gear that doesn't matter anymore. But I would hate to see this game revert back to the days of 4hour party look ups, 3-48hr NM camps, and the pulling teeth farms. If you want that "OMG" gear, you still have RME's to work towards.

A good way to think of it, from then to now, is in terms of Scaled content. The amount of content versus the difficulty versus the player base. Was this not the same for Abyssea? VW? WKR? Delve? Everything in between?

Honestly, I'm getting sick of these topics with "I dont like this or that". I know we're hear to voice our opinion so the devs can take note, but in the end, it's not our game. If you don't like it, and you really want to show them you mean it, quit... Ranting and raving is only going to disappoint you and leave you wondering why you wasted so much time complaining about something so trivial when you could have just been doing something you liked elsewhere.

[Demon6324236]

Your tired of threads on a Forum saying we don't like things about the game, when the only thing we are allowed to post here is feedback, all of which is sure to be negative for the most part. They have no social area really from what I have ever seen, this is just where we come to post feedback, if you want to talk to the community there is FFXIAH.com and BG Forums, this is the place for SE to see our feedback, and since most people happy with the game have little to say, the complaining people stand out a lot more here. If people just quit without saying what their issues are, everyone would leave and nothing would change, people have to say whats wrong for something to be done so they enjoy the game and continue to play it, its a better game that way...

[Zumi]

Current SoA issue is more than vertical gear progression. SoA XI also has way less gear variety, that's almost as bad as FFXIV. XI used to be fun, because of situational gears that you have to collect and use it on right time, and players who's dedicated to 1 job really stand out. Abyssea/SoA FFXI isn't like that, so the game isn't as satisfying to play when your job is same as everyone else's.

I think their goal is to move away from gear swaps, so you can actually play with in game macros like they intended.

[Zumi]

Agreed.

Remember how amazing great it was to get rdm hat or thf hands in dyna, salvage gears or odin/omega drops, black belt or maats cap? You could walk around and be proud to wear them because you earned it. Even some nm drops were an accomplishment and would be cause for celebration. Now they are practically handing things out. We may as well form a line and get it from a moogle dispensary. It made the game fun struggling for gear and the struggle for gear wasn't bad because you knew once you got it that you would be using it for years to come. Now it really feels pointless to work for any piece of gear because you know in a month or 2 you just are going to toss it for something better anyway. So you go for the 5 minute drop then afk in your shiny new piece until the next update when you toss it for something better.

Regardless you are working for gear but I would much rather be challenged and work for a piece that I am going to use for a long time instead of doing only soso challenging content for a piece that Im going to drop next update

You are talking about grinding a long time 1% salvage drop rates repeating the same zone like 300 times for 1 drop I.E. SSR Turtle back at 75 cap. Or camping HNM vs a bunch of botting LS trying to get that Nidhogg claim for Ebody, dalmatica ect. What we have now is bascially the same thing, only its designed better so you don't have to do 300 runs for a 1% drop rate you only need to do 1 run.

There is more skill and coordination involved now with delve bosses then there ever was with salvage. With campable NMs the fight was extremely easy the hard part was getting the claim. 5NM+boss kills besides Tojil are tuned pretty well tuned and were at least somewhat challenging for first time kills. Personally I rather be doing lots of new content as it comes out to get the next higher tier gear then running something really easy 300 times like salvage 1.0 and not even get the drop.

I find it fun getting new gear and progressing your character.

[Mostfowl]

I find it fun getting new gear and progressing your character.

But getting drops from salvage and what not WAS progressing your char. And content like salvage, dyna, einherjar, etc even repeated took skill. We had a ls that ran Dyna and salvage for literally years and it was always fun. Not to mention we helped countless ppl climb nyzle isle and again it was good times. Its not like XIV's AK or WP where you can burn thru with substandard gear and pay only 20% attn. to your screen or SoA content where you only have to really do it once or if you do have to spam it, you can afk or again give only 20%.

If you like gear progression there is tons of games out there for you but what ffxi unique and fun was the "grindfests". Sure you had to do content often but it was good content. And you want to talk easy when it came to nms after claim? Really? There were many many nms that were not easy even if you got claim, some even seasoned vets still had a hard time with and could wipe easily to. And if you enjoy new content your failing to realize your content is severely limited atm. with the introduction of the new progression your basically limited to a couple events and the myriad of other systems and content in the game is now null and void. Einherjar, Limbus, Nyzul, Salvage, MMM, BCNM, Sky, Sea, ZNM, HNM, Besieged, Campaign, to name just some of the content that was available. Now what do you have? A handful at best.

Really if you look at the sheer amount of ppl who have left and the rest who are departing or on here screaming at SE to stop this madness, you my dear are in the minority on this one

[Jerbob]

It's worth pointing out that the old horizontal system certainly wasn't perfect; a lot of the loot systems were terrible and things did get grindy at times. That's just because SE don't have a clue most of the time - it's not a fundamental flaw with the horizontal system. XI is constructed from the ground up around that style of progression and it's a much better foundation to work from simply because there are lots of supporting mechanics that make it work so well.

All the effort that they put into the item level system could have been spent on improving the supporting mechanics of the game to breathe new life into the horizontal progression system. Fundamentally, inventory space and equipment swaps through macros are the backbone that allows us as players to properly access the equipment variety that comes with the "old way"; the playerbase have made so many sensible and intelligent suggestions to improve these systems and work around the intrinsic limitations in XI's engine, all of which have been ignored in favour of item levels and "streamlining" gear variety.

Ultimately it just comes down to SE needing to put a bit of creativity and effort into development instead of blindly following the crowd and subscribing to the "just enough to keep them interested" paradigm. They have (or rather, had) a playerbase who are eager to put forward their feedback and make hundreds of novel suggestions, a lot of which are unworkable but most of which provide inspiration or insight into a game that they plainly don't play themselves. But no, they completely ignore everyone in favour of hastily blundering forward with ill-conceived plans that never actually see the light of day due to crippling resource mismanagement. This is why there are so many people complaining, and it's also precisely why there needs to be people who continue complaining.