Rate of Leveling and the New Player Experience

[Demonjustin]

THe reason for that is that it's easier to look at a persons gear to determine their skill rather than how they play. For example I play RDM as a DD job and few let me do it even though I've shown in many occasions that I can use RDM and still DD just as well as others can in some instances. Going by a player's real skill is much harder and so it's hardly done. 117 gear was likely an attempt to get us to invite non-119 players but the mindset just doesn't allow for it, the attempt really only resulted in killing more of the Bayld and Plasm gear while making it insanely easy to get gear that allowed players to beat content like SKCNMs rather than having a true later/stepping stone system like they originally wanted. In the end nothing short of handing out 119 weapons would've had a chance of solving the problem and doing that would've simply ended up shifting the expected gear to an even higher level in some way, be it RME or Xhits, something would've been chosen besides weapons most likely and things wouldn't have changed. Either way, that's my best guess on why SE made RoE gear so high in the first place, and as much as I wish it worked it sadly just made things in the game more meaningless.

[Castanica]

FFXI playerbase logic:

Player A :The game is dead, where are all the players?! This is so sad, we NEED MORE PLAYERS or server merges, something! Help Square, my server is dead! So many players keep leaving!
New player : Hi, could I join your group? My gear is the best I'm able to get right now, should be more than adequate for this fight and I've read up on the strat.
Player A : No sorry your gear sucks cause I want a fast kill, also not enough experience.
New player :Well I tried FFXI, nobody lets you progress so time to move to another game I guess.

Player A :SQUARE the servers are getting worse! I can never get players to join my groups and I have to keep using my alts. DO SOMETHING THE GAME IS DYING.

New player 2:Hi, sorry to bother you but could you please help me with my limit break, it's just a short way across from you and should take no more than 5 minutes. I only ask since you don't seem to be busy right now and have been standing there for 10 minutes :/
Player A :No sorry I can't be bothered, also get gud you should be able to solo those.

Player A :Square DO SOMETHING WE NEED MORE PLAYERS, THEY KEEP LEAVING! FIX YOUR GAME!

New player 3: Hi Square, I love the game. Been playing a month now and I have some suggestions for making the game better so that I and many others will stick with it. Right now it's just not fun but the fixes are pretty easy I think. Just removal of some tedious gates and things will be so much better for me and all the other new players and returnees.
Player a :Get lost scrub, what do you know? That leveling/job unlock/missions should be longer, harder and MORE boring because I did it you have to as well.
New player 3:But this is content you will never do anyway since all your jobs are capped, so why do you care about my experience on leveling content? When you did it FFXI was a group based game, that's not the reality of it now and it's just not fun to do these things in empty zones.
Player a :Meh if you can't even do that, you're worthless as a player ANYWAY cause you won't put up with the grind at endgame, we don't need you in our game. Leave.
Player a :Hey guys I'm leveling in alt, can I bring it to leech in aby?

Player a :I wish FFXI had a good community again like it used to, what happened?!....god this gimp keeps asking to join, someone log an alt on to fill the spot.

[Olor]

true stuff

Yeah pretty much, nailed it.

117 gear was likely an attempt to get us to invite non-119 players but the mindset just doesn't allow for it, the attempt really only resulted in killing more of the Bayld and Plasm gear while making it insanely easy to get gear that allowed players to beat content like SKCNMs rather than having a true later/stepping stone system like they originally wanted.

They messed it up originally when they added skirmish and delve at the same time and allowed outside delve bosses to be held indefinitely, then went back and changed that.

Honestly they royally messed up ilevel progression... so much of the gear is so new and so useless. Like ALL the early plasm stuff is pretty much garbage now. I don't really understand why they don't do something to allow it to be upgraded to 119. And they might as well delete the NQ bayld gear - who is going to buy it? It just clutters up the menu and you have to scroll and scroll and scroll and scroll to get to anything worth buying.

[Xantavia]

FFXI playerbase logic:

New player 3: Hi Square, I love the game. Been playing a month now and I have some suggestions for making the game better so that I and many others will stick with it. Right now it's just not fun but the fixes are pretty easy I think. Just removal of some tedious gates and things will be so much better for me and all the other new players and returnees.
Player a :Get lost scrub, what do you know? That leveling/job unlock/missions should be longer, harder and MORE boring because I did it you have to as well.
New player 3:But this is content you will never do anyway since all your jobs are capped, so why do you care about my experience on leveling content? When you did it FFXI was a group based game, that's not the reality of it now and it's just not fun to do these things in empty zones.

I can agree with the first 2 points you make, but I disagree with this. What you consider to not be fun, I do. What you may see as roadblocks to progress, I see as learning about the geography of the world along with the way the game works. I hear complaints that there is nothing to do in the game until you get to endgame, but then see constant requests on this board to get rid of any challenges on the way to accessing endgame. It is different playstyles and mindsets, one group cares about the journey, the other the destination.

[Olor]

I hear complaints that there is nothing to do in the game until you get to endgame

Where are these complaints? I've never seen anyone complain there is not enough STUFF that can be done before endgame. The problem is the content isn't generally worthwhile and doesn't add to progression. Contrary to what some believe most players aren't interested in content for the sake of it - it has to be content that advances the character somehow. Otherwise it's not content, it's grind.

I honestly NEVER heard anyone say there is "nothing to do in the game" till endgame. They might have been complaining "there is nothing WORTH DOING in the game till endgame" or "There is no group oriented content before endgame" and both those would be correct. Endlessly soloing outdated missions is not what most people consider fun.

The reason why people are asking for gating to be removed is cause they play MMOs to play with other people... forcing them to spend several months soloing outdated content is not fun. Look, when all you old timers did this content it was CURRENT. It was useful. It was done with groups. Was it hard? Yeah it was a challenge and it took a long time and it was important to get it done.

Now it's just a gate that keeps new players from playing with their friends and getting their gear good enough so they can play in modern content. I don't see why people don't see why people would object to being forced to solo for a month or more just to get to the point where they can play with others.

[Malithar]

The problem is the content isn't generally worthwhile and doesn't add to progression. Contrary to what some believe most players aren't interested in content for the sake of it - it has to be content that advances the character somehow. Otherwise it's not content, it's grind.

Is that not the very point of gated content? Gotta agree with Xant, it comes off as "I don't want to do that, gimme the rewards NOWZ!" They've gone back and removed nearly all (or maybe all?) of the JP midnight and conquest tally waits. From my understanding, it's far, far easier to complete these things now. HP warps, Waypoint warps, faster travel, higher character power level making it easier to get through, etc. It's fairly easy to do, yet it's an unrewarding grind that's unnecessary, says the one's who want the rewards, without the work.

[Olor]

Is that not the very point of gated content? Gotta agree with Xant, it comes off as "I don't want to do that, gimme the rewards NOWZ!" They've gone back and removed nearly all (or maybe all?) of the JP midnight and conquest tally waits. From my understanding, it's far, far easier to complete these things now. HP warps, Waypoint warps, faster travel, higher character power level making it easier to get through, etc. It's fairly easy to do, yet it's an unrewarding grind that's unnecessary, says the one's who want the rewards, without the work.

W/E I've done most of it now on this character and a lot of it on multiple other characters I lost over the years because of SE's formerly crummy payment system... it's about wanting to play with other people not do really REALLY REALLY boring stuff alone and pay a company for the privilege of doing it. Look down on it all you want, easy to say when you're done all of it - but I personally would like to see this game continue for a long time and that will never happen if the community continues to fight for this to be a game for masochists only.

Of course people want content to be rewarding. I don't see why that's seen as some kind of moral weakness. People want to make progress on their character. Grind is okay as long as it's meaningful... expecting people to mindlessly grind just to unlock the "privilege" of accessing meaningful grind... well that's not a good way to retain subs.

Funny I don't see all these posters talking about how MUST NOT MAKE GAME FUN FOR NEW PLAYERS going out of their way to help/lead people through this content - at least they wouldn't then be stuck tabbing to a wiki, bored out of their mind, frustrated and lonely...

but nope, all the lifers here, complain that a new player might like to actually play the fun part of the game, and then don't do a thing to help said new players get through the horrible horribly boring grind of going through all the gates.

When's the last time you helped a new player get atma? Or ran them up the Tor?

[Demonjustin]

People complain about the journey because now days it's often a journey made alone rather than with company. No one comes to a MMO environment to be told that only after a few weeks of doing old content that everyone else has long since completed can they finally experience a part of the content the community is currently playing and thus play with others. I understand why people want to keep things as they are somewhat but the thing is that no one is forcing you to do things the way some want to, if I want to upgrade my Artifact to 109 or 119 before I finish CoP I'd still be able to, that wouldn't change, but if I don't want to I'd be allowed that flexibility.

Every player is fully capable of giving themselves personal challenges if they so choose, I personally challenged myself to solo Briareus and Sobek before I would finish my Almace, I did the same thing with the NMs I needed for my Excalibur's trials. If these are things you truly enjoy then why must you have SE enforce them upon you rather than doing these things yourselves? Personally, I see no reason to make other players conform to one specific method, but as it is right now no matter which you prefer in the end you're stuck with getting the journey even if you're more interested in the destination you'd reach at the end of it.

[Malithar]

W/E I've done most of it now on this character and a lot of it on multiple other characters I lost over the years because of SE's formerly crummy payment system... it's about wanting to play with other people not do really REALLY REALLY boring stuff alone and pay a company for the privilege of doing it. Look down on it all you want, easy to say when you're done all of it - but I personally would like to see this game continue for a long time and that will never happen if the community continues to fight for this to be a game for masochists only.

Of course people want content to be rewarding. I don't see why that's seen as some kind of moral weakness. People want to make progress on their character. Grind is okay as long as it's meaningful... expecting people to mindlessly grind just to unlock the "privilege" of accessing meaningful grind... well that's not a good way to retain subs.

So now we're back to "I've done it before, I'm a vet, make it easier so I don't have to bother"?

RotZ blocks you from doing certain VW that may or may not be popular on your server, AA, DM, Fulcrum, and Nexus fights. It could also be knocked out in literally a few hours, there's very little involved with these missions. Storyline is butt though.

CoP blocks you from Ouryu and Tenzen, both fights that are only partial way through the missions, though Tenzen is on the farther end. You'll also need access to Al'taieu for reforged armor, but that's hardly blocking you from participating in content, you just can't upgrade the armor until you've gone that far. Admittedly, it may take a few days, maybe even a week to do those depending on play time. Storyline is at least solid here.

ToAU blocks you from Lancelord and Gessho, both about mid way through the missions. The missions were never that hard, though things like BCG and the training may be annoying and time consuming, the rest of it is mostly a breeze. Storyline is also fairly decent.

WotG, you'll be blocked out from whatever fights they're presumably adding in September, and WoE is also locked out. They can take a good bit of time, though tbh, I'd imagine it's greatly shortened now without anymore JP midnight or conquest updates. Again, fairly decent storyline, if a little disjointed and hard to follow or make sense of at times.

All of these are a one time completion. Go through once, done, you've progressed your character to the point of being able to do that content. In a few words, you've grinded reasonable content to progress, the grind was meaningful, it had purpose. From the standpoint of an MMO developer, is that really asking too much of your player base? I see the argument a lot of "I just want to play with my friends!" Then how about your friends help, ya know, just like they did back in the old days that you guys seem to slam so quickly? It's far easier, far quicker, and the rewards that everyone wants (Rajax, Moonshade, access to content, etc) are all still in place. It's progressing your character, how could you not want that? I guess this is the outlook that this generation of gamers carries with it. Skip the work, get to the rewards. Even when that "work" is far from anything of the like.

[Olor]

I want to clarify, I've never suggested unlocking hard mode fights for people that have not done the fights in storyline. I want unrelated content (such as not being allowed to do any reforging till almost finishing COP) to be removed.

And no, I wasn't arguing that I was a vet, I am saying these roadblocks inhibit fun.