Solution to "blinking"

[Glamdring]

the really sad part of all this is you don't actually need the gear changes to be that effective. I've done it and chosen not to do it (other than my brd instruments and status bolts, and swapping pet food for jugs). I usually make changes which don't effect the ability to target me (the exception is swapping in my terra's Staff for elegy and back to Apollo's for everything else). The gain from armor switches is really negligible. I am VERY effective in my parties, never blow the hate control (although my pet does, ASA, MKT, and ACP gear have it boosted through the roof), consistent damage throughout and always fulfill my role in the party build. Seriously, I can pull hate off tanks with my bard in base gear... and I don't even have the ability endgame to do damage with my casting. I get a good base set, do my changes with the accessory pieces (when I even bother) and just get the job done anyway.

[Windblade]

I haven't partied much since <stpt> came out. I wasn't even aware of it until I read this thread, so I'll give it a try. I just hope I can still use <stpt> with the F1-F6 keys. I've been using F1-F6 and <t> macros.

And if you want a solution to blinking, how about this: Set up all gear changes so there's a 30-second wait before the gear change actually takes effect. That's the solution. Just put a stop to gear swaps. Gear-swapping is silly, anyway, from a game-world realism point of view. I know that infuriates those of you who perhaps cannot accomplish anything without six changes of clothes in your inventory, but it's incredibly unrealistic in battle: "Oh, wait I have to change my shirt and boots before I use this special ability." Do you think that in a real-life battle against a monster, the monster would wait for you to change clothes before using weapon skills or abilities? While you're standing in front of a vanity mirror admiring your change of rings, earrings and gloves, the monster would have his mouth around your head, ready to take a chomp.

So yeah. I like the idea of a 30-second wait for gear changes to take effect. If I have to wait 30 seconds to use a water tank or a warp cudgel, why not implement the same wait for STR+5 and DEX+7? Seems like basic stat boosts are more important than when you can use a water tank.

[Sarick]

So yeah. I like the idea of a 30-second wait for gear changes to take effect. If I have to wait 30 seconds to use a water tank or a warp cudgel, why not implement the same wait for STR+5 and DEX+7? Seems like basic stat boosts are more important than when you can use a water tank.

Elemental stave's beg to differ. Why would you want to punish players who utilize the benefits of multiple pieces of gear. I play RDM, swapping a staff is not only logical its critical to the jobs effectiveness most of the time. I see that when I cure a 15-40% cure light affinity bonus really is useful. It can also be just as harmful if I need to cast sleep or another darkness based ability.

As I stated before the blinking is caused by visible armor swapping. It has nothing to do with the stats being altered. If the visible swaps can be set to filtered on the client then problem is SOLVED. I cannot stress this enough, if the gear swaps visible updating can be filtered the issue is fixed.

I think that the the development team is over thinking the issue. They think we want visible gear swapping and no blinking. If the client is forced to update the visible gear appearance the game engine can't fix the blinking because the core process unloads and reloads the visible data. This is what the developers say can't be fixed. They might change their point of view if someone actually tells them "What if you allow the players to disable the visible gear updating while in combat or in general on the client end" they might see a solution does really exist. It's unfortunate that this concept is beyond translation or downright ignored.

It's sad, People don't think outside the box where creative geniuses excel. It's like the issue where the zones are limited in the core engine. Has anyone thought of splitting the world up into multiple clients that use the same engine? It's not that hard to unload the client and load another one for another part of the world and expand it. Things aren't as impossible if you have creative minds finding solutions.

Stop assuming in all these limitations are legitimate, Storage etc have all been proven to have work a around if solutions are found outside the box. The 30 second limitation you proposed will hurt the game design and punish players when less destructive solutions are available.

[Laciante]

like Glamdring said, most equip swapping isn't necessary, and the blinking was originally implemented for the purpose of punishing gear swapping. It's understandable to forget this when we are expected to gear swap, and have macros that subvert it, but I think it's still relevant: If you want to play at the peak of perfection, use everything at your disposal (gear swaps and macro'd spellcasts)

[Rya]

Note: This is probably the first time I've posted without reading the whole thread... but my vision is blurring. Sowwies

I saw a lot of: "I can't target to cast on people."

But what about: "I can't target to locate people." ?

Someone did mention distance for AoE SCH buffs, but there are a number of things that require you to be aware of distance from targets, and especially with 18+ people, you might not know exactly where PT#2's BRD is or whatever. Perhaps the quickest way to size up someone's distance is to target them (such as via PT list) and lock-on.

Yes, you can "target" him with <stpt>/<stal>, or by typing:
/ma Paralyna Bardvark" (awesome name btw)
...but you still don't know if he's in range.
-- Or what direction to run in, if you get SE's patented Red Text of Almost!

So, now if you can't tab/arrow/xyz through the list (esp. due to blinking), then you would need to type:
/ta Bardvark
...but that seems time-consuming doesn't it?


Still, <stpt> & <stal> were the best thing ever when they came out, and I pretty much barfed my delicious tasty beverage all over my computer screen when I read the update notes, due to excitement. Needless to say, I use them both religiously, all day every day, on every job, for every ability, constantly, forever. They're the bestest! Thanks SE!

Sidenote: If you try to lock-on right when someone blinks your cursor away, you ANNOYINGLY heal! (takes forever)

[Venrymel]

A point that I think exists and I'm confused nobody brought up:

Sometimes people are battling a foe with more than 17 other people at their side. Party leaders can do things to assist the targetting issue, but Targeting someone outside the alliance (which is the three parties as one) without the potential nuisance of a "blink" requires typing out their name. Typing, like any skill, is something some people are really good at and others aren't. It's that simple. You don't become a horrible person for not having a particular skill. You're just flawed like everyone else. Nobody's perfect, but as the Japanese say: がんばって＾＾。

I don't understand the problem people have expressed with <stpt> and <stal> not solving the issue. When I learned about these, I duplicated my books (SMN, WHM, SCH, RDM, BLM—I'm a mage if you haven't already guessed) so that one set had <stpc> and the other <stpt> and <..al>. The <stpc> sets haven't been updated in a while, because I have very infrequently found myself needing to target an adventurer who is not currently in my alliance (again, which includes all three parties). I have not been very involved in endgame activities, but I usually wind up using the menu list of spells or typing out someone's name with a spell (Dynamis) when they're altogether not accessible by <stal> (not to be confused with creating a macro which contains specific player names).

Point: For any spell/ability that works only on my party OR only on myself, I use <stpt>. For everything else, I use <stal>, due to the afformentioned seldom occuring necessity of targeting someone outside my alliance (in other words: any one who is not one of the 18 people in it).

I do sometimes have problems with my spells activating (as if I had used a dead macro), but as this also happens with summoning an avatar, I don't think it's the same problem. It might have to do with the order of my macros lines, I'll need to look into it. It seems to only happen when there are a lot of people and things are really hectic and my fingers are flying across my keyboard, so I really have no better idea what the problem might be. Me? Computer? Bandwidth?　かも知れない。

I wouldn't use "bad", I'd just say "less experienced". To compare life to ingame: EXP drops off at "too weak". Logically, to continue gaining EXP, you need to move on. Similarly, in life, only so many things can be learned from any one thing, but variables make quantifying that quite difficult. Nevertheless, improvement is best had through further experience, not through mulling over the same issue ad infinitum.

Insulting other players over knowledge they don't have is just plain rude. People get irritated, it happens.

Even adding a menu option to filter away blinking adds code to the game. It's possible developers don't deem blinking as important an issue, since the secondary party/alliance tags already exist and seem to negate the problem and the PS2 is nearing max capacity.

I wonder if it's possible, instead, to add an arrow to the field that is tied to the <stal> type tags. I also wonder if it's possible to alter player names' colors to differentiate between the players of extra-party alliance members; different colors for each party, so they can be located as easily as the person's (自分の) party.

This would help with WHM and SCH effects that can perform AoE on allies.

Perhaps the <stal> tags can be made to induce the same lighting effect that manually targeting anything causes.

[axlzero]

idk how it is on other servers but just about everyone cheats on alexander useing windower and plugins. I tried lvling whm to 42 and i complained about it myself other players told me to just install windower and use blinkmenot app i wouldnt so i just went whm/nin i had club capped from pld and soloed to 42 on whm. Lolz belive it or not a whm/nin with combat gear capped combat skills and good hammers solos very well in one party i even tanked as whm

[darkvision]

using <stal> <stpt> etc is not hard to understand, people are just too damn lazy to change thier macro's i know tis a pain in the ass to go through everything but in the end of the day you can become more efficient. yes mages get bitched at for "i cant target [insertnamehere] to cast on them", this is not an excuse these days, every DD/Mage/support want to be as efficent on thier job they are playing. this will require alot of blinking but they are more effincent and performing to ther best on thier job as they can.

if your in a situation like vyhakeyo mentioned being tank PT mage having to cure a whole alliance + more as the tank PT mage then you need to sort that out with who ever made up the allience. if i am mage then i focus priority as my PT > my Ally > all else, every PT should have some sort of healer imo, so that come down to poor planning.

any good mage wont use the excuse that "i could not target you to cast [spellname] spell" because they prob dont have that problem with people dieing coz they utilise the functions available. none the ls member in the shell i am in have that problem. they tel people new to mage to use <stal> or <stpt>

i remember about 1 month ago i was doing CC and 1 RDM said i had to blink less. me being on NIN with top gear and utilise it properly, i blink for almost everything, i think, the main thing that i was getting moaned at was coz i changed to enity gear for provoke/yonin/warcry/berserk then having to change to utsusemi set which is haste/eva gear then having TP to Blade Hi. all i said was "learn to <stal> <stpt> etc" at the time the RDM didnt understand. after that fight i had a reliable WHM change place with him and after that run i explained to him how stal stpt etc works and the benefits.

the person then changed all his macros and i done another run ( cant remember what) and he had no problem with me blinking, he even thanked me for helping him out, and he become a better mage for it.

while blinking is a pain for people that are not used to the functions available or dont know they exist, some times its best just dealing with how they play at that time then after explaining how it would make them more efficient and not have that problem in the future. some people are not willing to learn and that is thier fault.

the solution to blinking is to teach others about the functions they dont understand or do not know about. if they are not willing to learn then stop. The use of <stal> <stpt> etc is the solution.

also sent people to http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Wh...ge_Macro_Guide which tells you all about <stal> <stpt> etc. also you might want to rethink your mage priorities too if you are in an alliance that is having to do the work of 3-4 mages of your own back.

i can manage to play 2 characters at the same time, NIN and WHM with the use of the <stal> <stpt> functions and keeping 1-2 PTs alive, mainly coz i can dictate the flow of a fight. if your curing outside of PT/ally then try work out who to focus on and have a seperate macro set for that so you can easily change names on your cure macro's. i personally have been able to keep 3 MNK/DRK (back at lvl75 Dynamis Lord Zerg) at full HP.

you can solve alot of problems through the use of proper comunication, sadly alot of people lack these skills

tl;dr version? read the bold parts

[Duelle]

using <stal> <stpt> etc is not hard to understand, people are just too damn lazy to change thier macro's i know tis a pain in the ass to go through everything but in the end of the day you can become more efficient. yes mages get bitched at for "i cant target [insertnamehere] to cast on them", this is not an excuse these days, every DD/Mage/support want to be as efficent on thier job they are playing. this will require alot of blinking but they are more effincent and performing to ther best on thier job as they can.

if your in a situation like vyhakeyo mentioned being tank PT mage having to cure a whole alliance + more as the tank PT mage then you need to sort that out with who ever made up the allience. if i am mage then i focus priority as my PT > my Ally > all else, every PT should have some sort of healer imo, so that come down to poor planning.

any good mage wont use the excuse that "i could not target you to cast [spellname] spell" because they prob dont have that problem with people dieing coz they utilise the functions available. none the ls member in the shell i am in have that problem. they tel people new to mage to use <stal> or <stpt>

i remember about 1 month ago i was doing CC and 1 RDM said i had to blink less. me being on NIN with top gear and utilise it properly, i blink for almost everything, i think, the main thing that i was getting moaned at was coz i changed to enity gear for provoke/yonin/warcry/berserk then having to change to utsusemi set which is haste/eva gear then having TP to Blade Hi. all i said was "learn to <stal> <stpt> etc" at the time the RDM didnt understand. after that fight i had a reliable WHM change place with him and after that run i explained to him how stal stpt etc works and the benefits.

the person then changed all his macros and i done another run ( cant remember what) and he had no problem with me blinking, he even thanked me for helping him out, and he become a better mage for it.

while blinking is a pain for people that are not used to the functions available or dont know they exist, some times its best just dealing with how they play at that time then after explaining how it would make them more efficient and not have that problem in the future. some people are not willing to learn and that is thier fault.

the solution to blinking is to teach others about the functions they dont understand or do not know about. if they are not willing to learn then stop. The use of <stal> <stpt> etc is the solution.

also sent people to http://wiki.ffxiclopedia.org/wiki/Wh...ge_Macro_Guide which tells you all about <stal> <stpt> etc. also you might want to rethink your mage priorities too if you are in an alliance that is having to do the work of 3-4 mages of your own back.

i can manage to play 2 characters at the same time, NIN and WHM with the use of the <stal> <stpt> functions and keeping 1-2 PTs alive, mainly coz i can dictate the flow of a fight. if your curing outside of PT/ally then try work out who to focus on and have a seperate macro set for that so you can easily change names on your cure macro's. i personally have been able to keep 3 MNK/DRK (back at lvl75 Dynamis Lord Zerg) at full HP.

you can solve alot of problems through the use of proper comunication, sadly alot of people lack these skills

tl;dr version? read the bold parts

In other words, accept the design flaw and like it?

[darkvision]

what i am trying to say is use the functions that are avilalbe to you and stop trying to take they easy way out. maybe SE designed you to have blinking on purpose? maybe its a deliberate game mechanic?

and my point was that alot of good mages dont moan about the blinking and all the crap ones do, blinking has been part of the game since i started, some people worked with the the functions available others dont. anyone i know and my self included do not have this problem since we use <stal> <stpt> just learn to use them and update your macro's already