Making Ballista uncapped 75-cap

[Alhanelem]

Not everyone has all the perfect gear for that particular cap anymore, yes, but thats just incentive to play more to get it.

Ballista is a for-fun event. While it has a cult following (of which I am a part), there is really no incentive to regrind gear you already got in the past and upgraded, just to not be naked for it. This is why PvP in MMOs these days tends to normalize stats/skills, so that you don't have to do any of that and can just jump in and enjoy it. While I personally find it fine to have gear for PvP, I've never been able to convince someone with a passing curiosity to play when they discover they're going to need to get gear for it (not to mention the unlock quest, which itself made people lose interest when I tried to ask them to join me).

There's no incentive to grind gear for Ballista because there's no reward other than temporary titles and maybe taking a little gil from your friends. The reward is (supposed to be) a good time, people won't grind gear just for a good time, and that's been one of FFXI PvP's problems from the get-go. As I said before:

I don't think I could convince anyone to farm 75 gear over again to perform optimally in side content like this.

This is why I, and the people I enjoy it with, are happier with unrestricted PvP as they don't need to do anything special to prepare for it other than take gear swaps out of their macros (which itself is enough of a deterrent for some).

Ballista's biggest problem has always been barriers to entry. So while I support getting rid of the options no one will ever use, I don't support level 75 being the default unless they do something about how overly limited the gear scale-down features are (where the only thing that scales is basic stats and everything else is disabled). And that's probably more work than they would ever possibly consider putting into this.

Few people, even among those that want 75 Ballista to be the default, likely are prepared for it, and there is little incentive to do so. Uncapped official matches should remain uncapped, while 75 and 99 without job points/master level should replace the other level restrictions. Everyone gets what they want this way, as not even the people who like ballista ever play at level 30 or 50.