Dark Devices - Exploitation

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Camate

Hello,

Since there seems to be a lot of questions and concerns as to whether this is an exploit, I wanted to clarify that the way this FATE functions as well as others similar to it are working as intended and it is not an exploit.

---

Thank you.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Calypsx

I kind of want the seals and the exp so i'll possibly end the fate as quickly as possible if I ever see it pop up. I don't generally play in fate parties and I'm not trying to be mean I just don't want to sit around while people farm and kill monsters. I just want to get my reward and move on.

---

2-3 fates are always going on during the entire DD chain. You can run off and do those, get your seals while not screwing over everyone who wants to level.

Quote:

---

Then "almost the entire community" has a serious entitlement problem. I can't wait for people who have such little interest in anything other than speeding to 50 as quickly as possible to get bored and quit. The game will be much better off for their absence.

---

Better for you.

It's laughable to see anyone claim that if a portion of the player-base quit, the game would become objectively better.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Nimhtaru

Then "almost the entire community" has a serious entitlement problem. I can't wait for people who have such little interest in anything other than speeding to 50 as quickly as possible to get bored and quit. The game will be much better off for their absence.

---

Actually if you're the minority complaining about how others do things in ways you don't approve of, that would make you the entitled one.

Hello. We have a player on our server (Ultros) who has DD on a timer. They (and their buddies) are level 50 players with relic weapons and AF+2 gear, and they seem to come back to North Thanalan right before it spawns each time and proclaim in /shout they will end DD in 30 seconds if either they aren't invited to a party or someone pays them 20k gil. Now that we know DD is working as intended, can players like this be banned simply for the fact that they are doing this to grief others into accepting their proposals?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CrimsonJenn

I graciously bow my head, I was wrong my misconceived notion from the live letter on their stance about it lead to me saying something that wasn't true. I'm not afraid to admit when I have been proven wrong.

---

Yes, you were wrong. You fought with me in multiple threads attempting to shame people using labels such as "exploiter." However, it's great that you're admitting that you were wrong. It would be nice to apologize to those you called names, but realizing your error is a great step.

Kinda figured as much after an entire month of people using said Fate to finish off leveling. Square seems to be down on exploiters and the moment they feel the need to strip an exploit(speedrunning AK/WP) they will do without a second thought on it, meanwhile hundreds of gold spammers spam daily and those seem to be alright when compared to fixing AK/WP.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Molly_Millions

1. Community complains about not being able to level secondary classes easily.
2. Community finds a way, but complains it's an exploit.
3. Rep says it's not an exploit.
4. Community complains

WTF?

---

I think it's continuing down a bad path. I'm totally down with being able to level secondary classes efficiently, but that's already much too dependant upon zerging FATEs. To imply that this technique is within the design parameters for the game skews it even more heavily towards particular tactics in particular types of FATE. If this kind of XP/hour can be expected, I'm fine with (and indeed, happy about) that, but I'd like to see equivalent rewards from dungeons (which are far more involved than spamming AoE) and levequests (which are limited in real time), both of which are practically never utilised for second classes because FATEs outclass them to such a great extent - few people are going to deliberately choose much less efficient options than others which are available. All of the above should be viable alternatives when levelling, and so I'd like to see viability spread more broadly rather than concentrated into an already overcrowded area.

I was never trying to shame anyone, I even said on every possible occasion that people are welcome to use it as they see fit. I never once called someone a name nor should I have to apologize for having a differing opinion on the usage of a fate. And i never fought with you in any thread, I spent the majority of the time here trying to discourage the very thing. In fact I'm not even sure other than maybe one other thread that i even posted in with you present and I never made any direct notion towards you at all.

The act of exploiting is not the same as cheating, we as human beings exploit on a daily basis - It is the strategic advantageous usage of something to expedite or ease progress towards a goal, whether it be taking advantage of a steam sale in order to get a bunch of games for cheap or just using a shortcut in mario cart. If anything it could be taken as a compliment to the players who discovered and utilize this potential of the fate. While many are fond of the traditional approach to leveling including myself, It is to be admired in a sense as to just how many people have gotten behind the aspect.

As i have said before i do not seek the FATE - Dark Devices's destruction or the particular aspect of the fate destroyed but i would like to see it be a bit more interesting than standing around aoeing perhaps scaling monsters awarding increased kill experience based on the time remaining, maybe even inspiration taken from it to create new and interesting fate designs like threshold grinding fates or a survival guildhest awarding greater rewards for the farther rounds completed.

On a final note, I will admit i started this thread having only seen and thought of the negative impact this FATE and the grinding aspect can have on the game - However due to several individuals constructive feedback and opinions, my view has shifted to some extent seeing not only the possible problems but also the potential of what the FATE system could be.

Exploit or not, this & fates in general are the bane of crafters in my opinion. Gear that would be bought normally is now skipped because people simply wont get enough use out of it due to the fact that they are power leveling. I hope they nerf FATE exp and buff other forms to balance out player skill, seal gain (is a joke, seriously.) and item worth compared to leveling speed.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Tuskai

And yet why do I see Paladins consistently opening pulls with Provoke instead of Shield Lob, level 40 white quality spears in Garuda Hard Mode even though its the biggest damage race boss in the game and watching an entire party wipe because a Paladin missed a stun on Ifrit's eruption and the rest of the party just didn't feel like dodging the second and third explosions even though they're incredibly slow?

---

Because provoke has almost double the range of shield lob and sometimes you cant get close enough to use it without face pulling.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by marcmy

Hello. We have a player on our server (Ultros) who has DD on a timer. They (and their buddies) are level 50 players with relic weapons and AF+2 gear, and they seem to come back to North Thanalan right before it spawns each time and proclaim in /shout they will end DD in 30 seconds if either they aren't invited to a party or someone pays them 20k gil. Now that we know DD is working as intended, can players like this be banned simply for the fact that they are doing this to grief others into accepting their proposals?

---

Wow what jerks. Blackmailing players because they are 50. I think that sucks in the worse way, I think maybe they should put it on random spawner so they do not know what time?...have no idea how this can be fixed seems there are not enough GM's in the game to even check this out while it is happening.

What baffles me is why someone would QQ about getting fast XP or levels in the first place?
How is "your" problem if someone levels fast? It doesn't affect your gameplay in any way.
Concentrate on your own gameplay and leave others to do what they will.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kraun

What baffles me is why someone would QQ about getting fast XP or levels in the first place?
How is "your" problem if someone levels fast? It doesn't affect your gameplay in any way.
Concentrate on your own gameplay and leave others to do what they will.

---

Do you even MMO?

Anyone with this mindset should be restricted to single player games.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kraun

What baffles me is why someone would QQ about getting fast XP or levels in the first place?
How is "your" problem if someone levels fast? It doesn't affect your gameplay in any way.
Concentrate on your own gameplay and leave others to do what they will.

---

that a perfect example of what happend in the community of the mmo, in general, this last few years... people want all fast! they don't want to spend time to learn how to play them class or anything else, they simply want to be to the top... they will use any means possible and will don't care of what the other do... nor they will care of the mmorpg they are playing into.

more important @Camate, the complain about dark device can be said for any fate of this type. is not logical, nor normal, to allows a gain of exp that violent for 10-13 minutes. worst people come there from level 40 even lower now...

Anyone who deliberately ends DD early just to get seals, in my personal opinion, is very selfish. Of course, there's alot more to it than that, the struggle of the individual vs community is an ongoing battle throughout the course of history, and it's important to stand up for individual rights.

In this situation though (few seals for individual vs 100-200k less exp multiplied by the number of people present who want primarily experience)... well... whatever, as long as you get yours, right?

another point about the trouble that can make a point.
level 51 ask 562.000 exp, meaning that with this in 1 hours you can get your 51....
let's say you get 200.000 exp from this +the three reward from the series around 50-60k exp.
the FATE repop after 45 minute in this time you get enough exp from the other fate for do at least 100.000 exp... meaning you can get your level 51 in 1 hours... i think is not normal. you can't say this work as intended with this sort of exp gained soo fast.

nothing can beat this ratio exp/time.... impossible!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by silentwindfr

nothing can beat this ratio exp/time.... impossible!

---

200k is an unusually high amount of XP, realistically most people won't get that, and it's dependent on so many factors, the most important one being player cooperation (grouping up to maximise claim and letting it run it's course rather than ending it early).

Players working together to maximise XP gain sounds pretty normal to me.

Even if it was the case that you could get 200k each and every time, does 3 hours instead of 1 to gain a level really make a difference?

even if it's an unusually high amount, it's still possible to get it and is a trouble to get 1/3 of a level (1/2 for some level) from 12-13 minute of gaming is not normal at this level.
how you want to balance the exp at this range of level if it's possible to simply crush the ratio exp/time from any other content.

and the more important, it's in the 40-50 level that your class change the most.

I have not taken part in this FATE, as I normally don't FATE grind at all. If I see one on the way to a quest/hunting log mob I will do it, but that's pretty much it.

As a result my friends who have all done this FATE have multiple classes at 50. Doesn't bother me at all.

That's the thing about MMO's, you can pretty much do what you want in an open world enviroment. Don't like it? Don't do it. There's no reason to tell the rest of the players that they are wrong for doing it.

personally i don't say people mustn't do it, i point a flaw in the game mechanic, that quite different.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kraun

What baffles me is why someone would QQ about getting fast XP or levels in the first place?
How is "your" problem if someone levels fast? It doesn't affect your gameplay in any way.
Concentrate on your own gameplay and leave others to do what they will.

---

My issue is FATEs trivialize a lot of other content in the game. Such as Grand Companies, Levequests, Dungeons, Guildhests, Crafting, Supply & Demand, Player Skill, Player Attitude, and most of all, game quality.

Level how you want? Sure. At the cost of the above? No.

"I deliberately troll dd zergs and now I'm on the forum crying because they blist and rage at me"

Oh lawdy. We have a common enemy, folks. It isn't the people that want to level faster, and it isn't the people that want higher quality to level people.

Our common enemy vis a vis is SE. want folds in them dungeons learning how to be pro lee7 supahskillet bo billet a wabba jacka flim glam, soloing coil in their sleep?

The answer is to make that sort out content the most rewarding thing to do. Dungeons should be the xp farms, the lot farms and the gil farms. Sadly, they're not the best xp sources right now, and it can be really hit or miss finding groups.

Say 'find an fc' all you like. Most fc's aren't farming the dungeons you level in, or need for the story. They're not going to start farming sastasha and coppermine etc either.

Why? There's nothing in those they want or need when their time needs to be spent farming hm primals and tomestones. Will you sometimes get help in kindlier fc's? Sure. Will some people sacrifice their time doing something worthless to their own advancement to help you with yours?

Sometimes yes. Most days? No. Finding an fc does amazingly little to ameliorate the actual problem.

What would fix it? More quests. Dungeons offering rewards comsnsurate with your actual level and significantly better xp than fates. GC seals on completion.

There. I fixed the problem, and I didn't troll scores of my fellow players repeatedly because I needed to make a moral statement either.

If its such a huge exploitation then Square will fix it since they seem to be fixing exploitation issues. with the sheer amount of people that have been coming to this fate, I think the exp people are expecting is quite impossible now. Don't blame fates for lack of skill in a player, you blame the player. someone can easily learn how to play in a simple video and fates teach you if you already don't know, to not stand in the red crap.. How you level and how you play at end game are 2 different things. Plus no one cares how you got to 50, its all about your gear and if you know the fight plain and simple. "oh hey i got to 50 without doing DD!" do you hear the crickets?

@mixplate: that the trouble SE just decide it work as intended (cf: camate).
i still try to understand this decision. even if they double the exp from dungeon it will be impossible to beat this ratio time/exp. more important, exept the gears (what you don't get everytime) you often loose gil in dungeon.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Chrysania

What would fix it? More quests. Dungeons offering rewards comsnsurate with your actual level and significantly better xp than fates. GC seals on completion.

There. I fixed the problem, and I didn't troll scores of my fellow players repeatedly because I needed to make a moral statement either.

---

XP rate always felt fairly similar to me in level appropriate dungeons, with a decent group. I'd still rather do FATEs than dungeons to level... why?

- Can leave when you want, like if a run for a dungeon you want comes up in FC.
- Don't have to be on full top form, something you can do when tired or lacking focus.
- Can solo if you feel like it.
- Fairly consistent XP.. dungeons will always be highly variable depending on others in the group, whether they have done it before, whether they are geared correctly etc.

Dungeons are far less elective and have absolute time demands that are fairly substantive, yes. You and three other people WILL be doing a dungeon run for at least 30 minutes, probably 45, quite possibly 1 hour or more. You cannot take breaks, you cannot go AFK for very long, you cannot go 'dinner, brb in 15'. Fates don't require the sort of time commitment dungeons do, or the communicative coordination of multiple parties.

Ergo, dungeons would have to be substantially more rewarding than fates to pull even with them. If a dungeon takes ~1 hour to do, that isn't just any ol' hour. Its an hour in which you're committed. You can't so much as go afk to piss, or there's a good chance your tank or healer will go 'eff this' and go get another instaqueue.

If you're in an FC wherein you're fortunate enough to have people at all times wanting to do what you're wanting/needing to do, this isn't too much of a problem. So, the reward system as it is seems tuned to the perfect ideal.

If you and your perfect team can run a dungeon every 30-45 minutes, you could feasibly run 8-10 dungeons in an 8 hour play session, which would net you XXX,XXX experience, XXXX gil, etcetera, so on.

Nearly nobody has a perfect team to do things with at all times. I'd wager that a good chunk of us haven't had 8 hour play sessions since before we were adults with grown-up responsibilities, with the occasional burst during vacation times and other definitively 'not routinely' occasions.

When you do have a team, its unlikely that it will be perfect and a dungeon run might take far longer than a perfect dreamteam would've required. People go AFK. People take breaks. People get tired. Your tank from Arizona and your healer from Australia can't always be on at the same time as you in New Jersey and the other DPS in Florida. Your tank works nights IRL, your healer in Australia's unemployed and has to be awake during his day sometimes to go job hunting and your DPS in Florida's only around every 3rd day and nobody knows why.

This is commonly the reality of running group content; its been 'balanced' to make it fairly difficult for the people that play 16-18 hours a day, every day, to advance too rapidly. If you play 3 hours a night on weeknights and work weekends? You're pretty much boned. You won't get in an FC doing group content with that kind of schedule, you won't have teammates to do things with very often and you absolutely will not get much done this side of ever.


Unless you fate farm, of course. That is, presently, the only consistent means by which most people can consistently do anything with others. You run out of quests pretty fast; there goes most of the soloable content worth doing. Battleleves? Don't make me laugh; you're wasting leves you could be using to give worthwhile boosts to crafting for nearly nothing, and fates are free.

Even if you can do dungeons consistently, they just plain get sucky, tedious and boring when you've done the same one repeatedly, and while this is true of fates too, fates are not nearly so much hassle to get moving on in the first place.

If there were a lot more quests, people could rely on those more than having to do fates. Quests give pretty decent Gil, you see. Fates...frankly, don't. That'd be one good reason to run quests instead of fates, if you wanted gil and didn't want to be playing World of Craftercraft to do it.

Dungeons offering gear and token rewards of use to you no matter your level (Yes, even max level) would be good. For every dungeon, a daily XP bonus like we get the first time we do guildhests. Give guildhests a smaller-but-daily-recurring XP/Gil boost too.

Dungeons offering GC seals would be fantastic, even if just once per day as part of, oh, that as-yet imaginary daily "THANK YOU FOR KEEPING OUR DUNGEONS POPULATED" reward to get everybody running more dungeons of all levels, thus helping to ensure that more people get to do more dungeons at least a little closer to when they'd like to.

Stuff like that matters. Well, it will soon enough I suppose. It'll explain itself real soon, I expect.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CrimsonJenn

The FATE event Dark Devices is being used to effectively power level players by intentionally avoiding completing the objective and farming the endlessly spawning monsters that are not relevant to the completion of the FATE.

---

This whole argument/exploit claim is ridiculous.
You're running FATE's for exp... They are getting exp...

ALL FATES HAVE TIMERS!
So just help them, which will help you, and before the timer clicks beat boss.
Thus maximizing your exp (which is what you're trying to do isn't it?)

This particular FATE isn't really any option for "powerlevelling" on Hyperion the last few days, a particular troll FC who I won't name sit there night after night with a group of 50s ending DD phase 1 in around 10 seconds just for the lulz of seeing people get mad in shout. Most nights I only get an hour or so to play, but it doesn't bother me.

I can still get a level on my time limited evenings, even if they are knocking 50-100k off my hourly exp (because honestly, the highest "extra" from DD I got was around 150-180k and that was being on whm49 spamming Holy in a party that was also exceptional at getting claims, and it's very very rare to get that much).

You have to be an idiot not to want to join a fate party and not get the 150k+ XP gravy train. Don't spoil it for the other 30+ people doing it.

So true once you've played through the first 50 levels of the game the first time around the rest of the jobs you wanna hit to max lvl asap to focus on end game content and be super flexible for your fc so you can play all types of roles for specific end game encounters. That is of course if you're playing this game to experience it's full content which of course is the majority of players

this thread shows that FATEs are community breaking, and in an MMO if you break the community... you break the game

Instead of doing a quicky and ending it in 30 seconds. Join a group and talk to people

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by CrimsonJenn

No, they are addressing issues based on priority of severity. And Ninja had a specific stance that improved enmity and lowered damage output not to mention merits that improved enmity of ninjitsu (also inversely had ones that reduced it), they wouldn't have these tools available if they were unintended to have the potential to tank....

---

You are astonishingly stubborn. I love a good debate, but I presented you with actual evidence that shows *the comments that developers left* in reply to the unexpected use of the job. This isn't for you to pick apart, it's for you to read and understand. You can argue that the Earth is flat, and you might make a point that you think sounds good, but once you see the photographs, you have to give it up.

I'll leave the rest of the content of that post alone, as, much like with this NIN discussion, reality has swooped in and proved you incorrect.

Two arguments here:

I just want GC seals. I just want to finish the FATE and move on. I don't care what others want.

We want to farm this FATE. We are doing it it a Dev supported manner. We would appreciate you not ending the FATE early.

Needs of the many, needs of the few.
Moogle says, "Don't be a jerk Kupo!"

I don't have a job high enough level to exploit this, thus I have never done it. I can tell you right now the people who are whining about what they call an "exploit" are the people who would gladly exploit it if they had a job to do it with.

There is nothing to stop you from completing the objectives. Stop whining you little babies. It's not an exploit that people kill mobs for 15 minutes instead of running to the next Fate to kill mobs.

Being stubborn has nothing to do with it, it's common sense if something is given enmity abilities - enmity gear - and enmity merits, its generally going to function as some form of a tank. As for "Reality swooped in" the developers blanket posted the entire FATE forum with "working as intended" basically a large enough number of players enjoy it to where they are just gonna leave it alone to avoid any conflict directed at them.

And kort, i would not recommend this but my first experience of the fate i watched someone level from 1-40 in the use of the fate. He just sat in the house in the fate group, not sure if it has been fixed yet.

And GordonLiu i don't seek to discredit your argument it is a sound point but there are better examples than ninja, try summoner with no inherit healing capabilities save for healing ruby was forced into the role of an alternative healer often ignoring its primary focus of avatar use.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kazamoto

Two arguments here: snip"

---

In their defense, it's usually more than one person who wants to end it for the seals. Not as many as the people abusing the fate, but still more than 1 (usually 3-4 people). So the 'I' term doesn't exactly work there.

Big 'WE' and little 'we' perhaps?

Although there is a lot of comments here trying to show off the size of the speaker's 'we'...

Fates are the fastest way to level. If your a dd and want to do dungeons add up another 20+mins waiting for a spot in a dungeon, or should I say instance opening. If it didn't take probably 5 times longer to level in dungeons then maybe I would do them. But seeing as I'll have to do what 60 dungeons at first for gear then another 60ish I'd rather take a break on dungeons till then.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Pathios

Fates are the fastest way to level. If your a dd and want to do dungeons add up another 20+mins waiting for a spot in a dungeon, or should I say instance opening.

---

The only reason they take even longer in the first place is because all the healers and tanks are doing fates.

The other content needs to be buffed to compensate. Newer players joining the game wont have anybody to do important story dungeons and fights with in a few months because everyone else will already have them done and see no reason to bother with them.

Fates should stay the same, but dungeons should give much more than fates seeing as they are more difficult to complete. That way if you want the most efficient way to level, you have to put effort into it, and if you just want to relax and turn your brain off while still obtaining good exp, you can do fates.