SE enough of the treadmill, please make the game more interesting!

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

Nothing, but I also know that a bunch of procs, secondary stats and weird bonuses doesn't necessarily make good itemization. They makes itemization complex and can unnecessarily obfuscate things.

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I agree that additional stats and procs can unnecessarily complicate things, however that doesn't necessarily mean they will either. In fact, there is no real way to know until we see those numbers; not that we ever will. Which means it is all theorcrafting.

I am actually all for adding procs to weapons. I would love to see procs that further enhance the job's flavor. Maybe a proc for a WHM could be your heals have a % chance to refund some of the mana cost. One for a BLM could be your DD spells have a chance at launching an additional one or your firestarter procs have a chance to place a dot on the target for the damage it did. There are certainly a lot of possible options.

Also, since you brought up the idea of set bonuses, this is something that I would like to see in the game. This was one of the things that I liked about gear in WoW. There was an additional reason to want to get the rest of the set of gear beyond the stats that were on it or the look of the gear.

They have already said they are looking at unique and specific stats for armor come 3.0... leave the poor horse alone.

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Reddit: Yesterday you went over how you reworked the 1.0 stat system for ARR and you cut out a lot of stats in terms of game balance to make balance easier. Now that the team has had a little more experience and you have more data is there any plans on bringing back unique stats such as 'enhances skills' and things like that on gear?

Yoshida: There is a chance we'll be doing that in the future. The reason being now that we have that simple base rather than a complex base, if you have a simple base then adding things on top of that is easy because that base is solid. It doesn't effect that base that much and you're not breaking balance by adding new things on top of that. Things we've heard a lot are that players want set bonuses for their gears and that would be one thing we would definitely think of doing. Or another type of armor where if you're wearing a certain piece armor your Spirits Within cool down timer cools down faster. Things like that. Definitely thinking of adding things like that and we know players want them. But when deciding whether to put something like that in or not it's about balance and whether this will break that balance or not. So we're very careful about adding parameters like that.

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http://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/commen...naoki_yoshida/

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Originally Posted by Ryel

This is incorrect actually, what FFXI offered (which was far from perfect mind you) was variety in content.

Because gear progression was horizontal and equipment could be swapped in for various abilities etc during battle, content was relevant for much longer than it is here. You could arguably be doing Dynamis, CoP Dynamis, Limbus, Salvage, Einherjar, Nyzul Isle, Sky, Sea, HNMs, ZNMs, Campaign, and various small NMs for years because something there would still be usable (this was at 75 cap btw), and yes much of this content was added over YEARS of expansions (While ARR is only a little over a year old, FFXIV is going on 4+ years now)

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Sorry, but.. 1.0 XIV doesn't even remotely count. they had to rebuild everything. The current game has been out for 1 year. There have been no expansions yet. Pretty much every system has been redone and recoded from UI to GCD to skills, AI, graphics in general (landscape to character models), seemless world to instances, fates, DF, etc, etc and etc.

All XI had from US launch was grind and more party grind. I should know I played it for about 7 years from US release. Each expansion broken with promises of getting better with all anyone could do was simply grind away the hours. Which, I actually had no issues with :) I happily ground away hours days weeks and years. In fact the reason I quit was for people problems, not the game itself. Though, them closing my server and moving me to one that was not the same as my wife was in fact the death knell for me.

None of what you mentioned you could do in XI was there at US launch. None of it.. ell except for some NM's. You forgot the events, though. The events were really the only break with the grinding and even they could be a grind lol

At the same point now that ARR is as to 1 year from XI US release, XIV is hands down the better game with more to do. at year 1 XI we still hadn't even reached end game yet. Mostly because at that point there still wasn't an end game because for the most part US players had not reached it yet. They were still leveling up their characters due to the slower party grind system not unlike the old EQ days.

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Originally Posted by Rhas

Sorry, but.. 1.0 XIV doesn't even remotely count. they had to rebuild everything. The current game has been out for 1 year. There have been no expansions yet. Pretty much every system has been redone and recoded from UI to GCD to skills, AI, graphics in general (landscape to character models), seemless world to instances, fates, DF, etc, etc and etc.

All XI had from US launch was grind and more party grind. I should know I played it for about 7 years from US release. Each expansion broken with promises of getting better with all anyone could do was simply grind away the hours. Which, I actually had no issues with :) I happily ground away hours days weeks and years. In fact the reason I quit was for people problems, not the game itself. Though, them closing my server and moving me to one that was not the same as my wife was in fact the death knell for me.

None of what you mentioned you could do in XI was there at US launch. None of it.. ell except for some NM's. You forgot the events, though. The events were really the only break with the grinding and even they could be a grind lol

At the same point now that ARR is as to 1 year from XI US release, XIV is hands down the better game with more to do. at year 1 XI we still hadn't even reached end game yet. Mostly because at that point there still wasn't an end game because for the most part US players had not reached it yet. They were still leveling up their characters due to the slower party grind system not unlike the old EQ days.

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I believe in the very post you quoted i specifically mentioned that the variety of content i listed was added over a period of YEARS of expansions, actually yup just looked again it's even there in all caps.

And no sorry even if the game has been mostly reworked, quite a lot of the content we have is still stuff that was leftover or already in development from 1.0 (See: Most primals, reworked dungeons, jobs/classes etc) Those playing around 1.23 essentially tested many of the systems that got refined in the transition to 2.0 (Like positional combos and the basis of the battle system)

Nobody is asking for this game to match what other MMO's have had (and I'll say it again) YEARS to accomplish, However what they are saying is that they hope the trend changes in the future from the repetitive grind for Allagan Tomestones of Tradology each patch, tired and arbitrary lockouts, a completely vertical progression system devoid of stat choices (Choices we had in 1.0 mind you), and dungeons that are for most players already outdated (gear wise) the moment they are released.

Bring back unique stat choices, bring back relevant crafted gear that allows us to truly customize it with Materia and don't make it slightly better than the gear from the previous patch, bring back content like Skirmish, or something crafters / gatherers can get involved in like Hamlet, even chocobo caravans are MIA, just don't feed us the same thing every other patch and call it new.

Many that have posted in this thread already realize this stuff will take time, but we'd rather voice our opinions now so they know this going forward as opposed to saying nothing and them not knowing it's an issue.

Amen to this!

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Originally Posted by Ryel

Bring back unique stat choices, bring back relevant crafted gear that allows us to truly customize it with Materia and don't make it slightly better than the gear from the previous patch, bring back content like Skirmish, or something crafters / gatherers can get involved in like Hamlet, even chocobo caravans are MIA, just don't feed us the same thing every other patch and call it new.

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Problem is many things people are asking for are general ideas and stuff, but do not get the implications and realities of those additions. Unique stats can cause balance problems, relevant customizable left-side* crafted gear risks making dungeon rewards non-relevant, Skirmish is just another type of dungeon/trail, 2.35 introduced the Ixali Beast Tribe Quests for Crafters and Gatherers, Chocobo Caravans are pretty much escort Fates, and both The Hunt and Frontlines were added in 2.3.

*Pentamelded i90 accessories are considered superior to tomestone/coil accessories by many hardcore players.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

Problem is many things people are asking for are general ideas and stuff, but do not get the implications and realities of those additions. Unique stats can cause balance problems, relevant customizable left-side* crafted gear risks making dungeon rewards non-relevant, Skirmish is just another type of dungeon/trail, 2.35 introduced the Ixali Beast Tribe Quests for Crafters and Gatherers, Chocobo Caravans are pretty much escort Fates, and both The Hunt and Frontlines were added in 2.3.

*Pentamelded i09 accessories are considered superior to tomestone/coil accessories by many hardcore players.

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Dungeon rewards are already non-relevant for everyone except those who have just recently started playing the game.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

Problem is many things people are asking for are general ideas and stuff, but do not get the implications and realities of those additions. Unique stats can cause balance problems, relevant customizable left-side* crafted gear risks making dungeon rewards non-relevant, Skirmish is just another type of dungeon/trail, 2.35 introduced the Ixali Beast Tribe Quests for Crafters and Gatherers, Chocobo Caravans are pretty much escort Fates, and both The Hunt and Frontlines were added in 2.3.

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A select few pieces of left side are already considered BiS by some, nevermind the right side stuff. And dungeon gear is already irrelevant. The highest thing dropped in a dungeon is i90 gear that's nearly a year and a half old at this point. Now, dungeons also give tomes, which lead to i120/130 gear, but that's not really dungeon gear. Then you have ST gear, which is at this point only really worth it for alts. Dungeon gear is only really relevant for, like, third or fourth classes. And they keep adding in new gear that's 40 ilvl below the current max, which may as well be irrelevant gear.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

Problem is many things people are asking for are general ideas and stuff, but do not get the implications and realities of those additions. Unique stats can cause balance problems, relevant customizable left-side* crafted gear risks making dungeon rewards non-relevant, Skirmish is just another type of dungeon/trail, 2.35 introduced the Ixali Beast Tribe Quests for Crafters and Gatherers, Chocobo Caravans are pretty much escort Fates, and both The Hunt and Frontlines were added in 2.3.

*Pentamelded i09 accessories are considered superior to tomestone/coil accessories by many hardcore players.

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Dungeon gear is obsolete for most players the second it's released, due to often being 20-30 ilvls under current tomestone / ST gear, however they very well could keep it relevant by allowing it to be converted into Materia, i mean they could even take it a step further and make dungeon drops convert into unique Materia with stats that crafted gear doesn't convert into which would make it more desirable to collect.

This wouldn't screw over dungeons OR crafted gear and would allow for a better balance of both.

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Originally Posted by Prototype909

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Originally Posted by Viridiana

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Originally Posted by Ryel

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By dungeon gear I was referring to the fixed stat gear acquired from dungeons, raids, and purchased with currency such at Tomestones/Wolfmarks.

Consider the stats of a HQ pentamelded i110 crafted piece now compare it to the stats of the 3 other i110 pieces available for that slot. The HQ pentamelded crafted piece is obviously superior considering it has 2 capped Secondaries and a third at 2/3 cap. If i130 crafted gear had been introduced in 2.4 there would be very little mechanical reason to go after the Augmented Ironworks or Dreadwyrm gear.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

Consider the stats of a HQ pentamelded i110 crafted piece now compare it to the stats of the 3 other i110 pieces available for that slot. The HQ pentamelded crafted piece is obviously superior considering it has 2 capped Secondaries and a third at 2/3 cap. If i130 crafted gear had been introduced in 2.4 there would be very little mechanical reason to go after the Augmented Ironworks or Dreadwyrm gear.

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I always thought they could just implement crafted gear 10 ilvls lower than the max (i.e. a crafted set at ilvl 120 for 2.4) that only has the main stats and VIT (and acc for healers) on it with no secondary stats. Instead let the secondaries be melded on, kinda like how Novus works. That way, the Tomestone gear will still eclipse the crafted gear when it is made, but the crafted gear has the potential to rival ilvl130 gear depending on what materia is melded on given player opinion.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

By dungeon gear I was referring to the fixed stat gear acquired from dungeons, raids, and purchased with currency such at Tomestones/Wolfmarks.

Consider the stats of a HQ pentamelded i110 crafted piece now compare it to the stats of the 3 other i110 pieces available for that slot. The HQ pentamelded crafted piece is obviously superior considering it has 2 capped Secondaries and a third at 2/3 cap. If i130 crafted gear had been introduced in 2.4 there would be very little mechanical reason to go after the Augmented Ironworks or Dreadwyrm gear.

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The problem that this game has had for a long, long time is that Yoshi likes to introduce new level 50 gear drops that are weaker than what's already in the game, which leaves players who've been even remotely keeping up with no real reason to do the content that drops the new stuff. HQ crafted gear has always been something of a subversion with him, where melded gear is frequently more powerful than end-game dungeon/trial/raid gear for certain classes. The only reason you don't see more people using crafted gear at endgame is because it's expensive as all hell. Well, that, and it's a bit counter intuitive that it should be stronger.

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Originally Posted by Namasu

Hmm it's been long said that Yoshi wants to reboot FFXIV with 2.x being a simple foundation to support more complex ideas that could be implemented in the future. Yea I get that it's been over a year and the treadmilling is getting a bit stale but it's been confirmed that they plan to factor in user feedback to add unique gear stats/abilities (during the fanfest). Yoshi is just playing a very safe first year for FFXIV relaunch and don't want to break the balance when he and his team can't afford to.

Having stuffs on the level of leaping boots and emp pin from FFXI that was more relevant and ridiculously camped more than other gears 60 levels later is just not what Yoshi and us as players should shoot for. However, now that lvl1-50, story mode, and a lot of endgame progression is established, they have more room to work in unique items/gear set effect come expansion.

The expansion will also feature more dangerous zones that so many old school MMO-ers were clamoring for (confirmed in interview). I won't say that we shouldn't be impatient and not critique the quality of the current gameplay but just know that a lot of good ideas that most of us want in game have been heard and will most likely be implemented by expansion. Oh and let's not forget that 2.45/2.5 will feature a lot more social friendly side-games with the introduction of the gold saucer. So let's at least look forward to it a little longer?

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they also said they would be making this game for casual gamers, with endgame content for hardcore players, they also said they will be adding in FC alliance, so you can team up with another fc so small fcs wouldnt be required to merge. yoshi also said housing would be affordable. there are many other things they said will happen.
still havent see some of these things and until it happens, i dont think we should pressume anything SE staff says is true until its implemented

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Originally Posted by warren-ragnarok

they also said they would be making this game for casual gamers, with endgame content for hardcore players, they also said they will be adding in FC alliance, so you can team up with another fc so small fcs wouldnt be required to merge. yoshi also said housing would be affordable. there are many other things they said will happen.
still havent see some of these things and until it happens, i dont think we should pressume anything SE staff says is true until its implemented

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I don't know how you go about seeing ANYTHING positive in life with this kind of outlook...It's always just black, no white, no grey with the type of person you are.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

By dungeon gear I was referring to the fixed stat gear acquired from dungeons, raids, and purchased with currency such at Tomestones/Wolfmarks.

Consider the stats of a HQ pentamelded i110 crafted piece now compare it to the stats of the 3 other i110 pieces available for that slot. The HQ pentamelded crafted piece is obviously superior considering it has 2 capped Secondaries and a third at 2/3 cap. If i130 crafted gear had been introduced in 2.4 there would be very little mechanical reason to go after the Augmented Ironworks or Dreadwyrm gear.

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And this is an issue in itself, It shouldn't be the case that the gear with the highest stats / ilvl in the game comes from quite literally ONE location each patch cycle. I have already said earlier in this thread that we need a variety of content to offer up that sort of gear, not just one type of content at a time, whether it be multiple types of raids or even a raid that works in tandem with crafting, a system like this one would work quite well.

This isn't a solution that needs to be one or the other, there are tons of ways to make various methods of high level gear acquisition desirable without sticking the best of the bunch in one raid for 6 months and calling it at that.

SE should replace the Class System with an Ability Sphere Grid where players can gain ability points which they can spend on a Job specialization or a combination of different abilities in areas such as Melee, Ranger, Caster, Pet, Healing and Tank.

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Originally Posted by warren-ragnarok

they also said they would be making this game for casual gamers, with endgame content for hardcore players, they also said they will be adding in FC alliance, so you can team up with another fc so small fcs wouldnt be required to merge. yoshi also said housing would be affordable. there are many other things they said will happen.
still havent see some of these things and until it happens, i dont think we should pressume anything SE staff says is true until its implemented

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Roaming primals as well.

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Originally Posted by Akiza

SE should replace the Class System with an Ability Sphere Grid where players can gain ability points which they can spend on a Job specialization or a combination of different abilities in areas such as Melee, Ranger, Caster, Pet, Healing and Tank.

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I'm sorry, but a Sphere Grid would be the WORST decision this team could ever make. I despise it in every game that has it. I would rather the skill system from FFT:WotL, that would suit this game much better!

Fine, so what do you want to grind? Levels? Gear?

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Originally Posted by Ryel

And this is an issue in itself, It shouldn't be the case that the gear with the highest stats / ilvl in the game comes from quite literally ONE location each patch cycle. I have already said earlier in this thread that we need a variety of content to offer up that sort of gear, not just one type of content at a time, whether it be multiple types of raids or even a raid that works in tandem with crafting, a system like this one would work quite well.

This isn't a solution that needs to be one or the other, there are tons of ways to make various methods of high level gear acquisition desirable without sticking the best of the bunch in one raid for 6 months and calling it at that.

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First, I think several design decisions were made to get the game out the door as cheaply as possible. Implement simpler systems that are known to work, laying a stable foundation for adding complexity later on.

I tend to think using gear as an end is a crutch, so I love the idea of multiple sources of gear. Imagine a system where players can craft gear, farm it from dungeons, or gain it from treasure maps. I also love the idea of interesting customizations, like set bonuses, body armor providing primary stats and accessories providing secondary. It all sounds great!

Until you do it.

First, as has been mentioned, changing itemization is hard. +Crit and +Haste on rings is a good example. You someone have to normalize it so that a player with +10 Crit and a player with +10 haste can do roughly the same damage in a given period of time, the caveat being the +crit player does bigger hits, whereas the +haste player will do more hits. Why?

Because FFXIV is not a game, it's a graphical spreadsheet. The vast majority of players, from hardcore to casual, are achievers. There's a reason WoW got rid of the skill point system and simplified itemization. It's easier to balance, but the truth is the vast majority of players will simply wait until the numbers are run, the optimal setup is determined, and then just use that. WoW, being the 800 lb elephant, has a enchantments and gems, right? But look at J Random Warlock. He's probably destruction and gemmed/enchanted for haste. That's until he gets the gear for the haste breakpoint and then switches over to crit. It's not just the raiders, though, it's everyone. Spell crafting in DAoC was the ultimate form of "build your own gear" and yet, everyone just had the same setup. Even now, people are running a few templates.

Multiple sources of gear are great, but people are lazy and will just go for the easiest path to the highest ilvl. Why farm a random dungeon repeatedly if you can just buy the gear? Wasted content.

While FFXIV is probably the best story driven MMO currently, the focus is on achievers, because that's where you get the most subscriptions from.

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Originally Posted by Ryel

And this is an issue in itself, It shouldn't be the case that the gear with the highest stats / ilvl in the game comes from quite literally ONE location each patch cycle. I have already said earlier in this thread that we need a variety of content to offer up that sort of gear, not just one type of content at a time, whether it be multiple types of raids or even a raid that works in tandem with crafting, a system like this one would work quite well.

This isn't a solution that needs to be one or the other, there are tons of ways to make various methods of high level gear acquisition desirable without sticking the best of the bunch in one raid for 6 months and calling it at that.

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2.0 tried to do this, but the fact that Myth gear was i90 caused people to ignore BCoB, the endgame raid, after fully gearing up in Myth ~8 weeks after hitting 50. This is why from 2.2 on they started doing a +20 ilevels for hardcore players every 6 months/+10 ilevel for midcore and casual players every 3 months upgrade rotation. 2.3 had a slight fumble in the midcore range with the gear upgrades gained from Hunts being gained to fast and players fully upgrading in 1 or 2 weeks instead of the roughly 8 weeks intended. Sources of gear that are to easy/fast negatively effect the play ability of harder/slower sources of similar gear. Crafted gear is pretty much the easiest/fastest way you can get gear.

Also the Abjuration system already exists and has been used since 2.2 in the form of Sands and Oils of Time and now Carboncoat and Carbontwine.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

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No. raiders ignored BCoB because raiders don't give a shit about glamour pieces. If the allagan gear did more than take myth gear stats and stir them around a bit them players probably would have been more excited to do it. Adding a 10 level power difference doesn't fix anything but makes it much worse (the entire point of this thread).

Oils and Carbon are nothing like Abjurations. Abjurations drew from open world bosses, exploration, other players, and crafting. It also involved destroying goods but to a lesser degree. Weathered gear is bought with player bound tokens earned in the same instances were you get the player bound item to upgrade them.

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Originally Posted by MageBlack

I'm sorry, but a Sphere Grid would be the WORST decision this team could ever make. I despise it in every game that has it. I would rather the skill system from FFT:WotL, that would suit this game much better!

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Aren't you the same person saying grinding for gear would be fun as well. Grinding for gear with different stats isn't any better.

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Originally Posted by Catsby

No. raiders ignored BCoB because raiders don't give a shit about glamour pieces. If the allagan gear did more than take myth gear stats and stir them around a bit them players probably would have been more excited to do it.

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Lol. Tons of players back then ran the coil for BiS pieces. Simply being i90 wasn't all out took it get all of your potential. I don't think you knew why people ran coil in 2.0/2.1. The raider absolutely ran coil for those pieces. That jumble of stats your downplaying was a pretty big detail to raiders. No different than it is today.

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Originally Posted by Delily

I think the issue here is that FFXIV is aiming to be a story driven MMO

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If this is the case then I think it's very weird for "story driven" content to be shut down behind the hardest difficulties that is for "good players" only. Last I checked many people still can't get through T5,is this how "story driven" content supposed to operate ? A few MMOs that I have played made it quite clear to seperate the two things at endgame,story and gear progression. FFXIV on the other hand seem to mix them altogether.

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Originally Posted by Sadonix

If this is the case then I think it's very weird for "story driven" content to be shut down behind the hardest difficulties that is for "good players" only. Last I checked many people still can't get through T5,is this how "story driven" content supposed to operate ? A few MMOs that I have played made it quite clear to seperate the two things at endgame,story and gear progression. FFXIV on the other hand seem to mix them altogether.

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Binding coil is a small part of the story that has more to do with past events than current ones. You're only missing out a small part of the story by not completing coil and once 3.0 launches that story will be accessible to all. I believe any good endgame content should have some type of compelling story otherwise the bosses just feel like loot pinatas and lack dramatic flair. It would feel kinda anticlimactic to beat the last boss and, chest full of loot drops with nothing else.

The problem with locking the highest ilvl gear behind raiding coils was all it did was ensure hard core players have shiny high level gear to lord over the casuals. What SE did from 2.2 onward was an MMORPG No. Without a variety of ways to obtain the same high level gear a divide was created between casual and hard core players. Hardcore Gamer are able to progress through Coils and get all their BIS and ilvl 110 coil gear in 6 weeks. Mid Core players get screwed over because by the time they get their BIS and ilvl 110 gear a new set of gear is out in a week and Casuals are simply left to play Coils just to see the story and unlock the next Coils.

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Originally Posted by cookiecutter

Binding coil is a small part of the story that has more to do with past events than current ones. You're only missing out a small part of the story by not completing coil and once 3.0 launches that story will be accessible to all.

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Going by that logic one can say the same about gear progression as well,you're only missing out a small part of gear arsenals by not completing coil and once 3.0 launches those gear will be accessible to all. Only that it's pretty much an outdated content by that point.In MMO where they encourage people to keep up with contents that would be quite contradictory,don't you think ? Proclaiming to be "story driven" but the circumstances try to make a large crowd wait and fall back a few months after release in order to see it ?

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Originally Posted by cookiecutter

I believe any good endgame content should have some type of compelling story otherwise the bosses just feel like loot pinatas and lack dramatic flair. It would feel kinda anticlimactic to beat the last boss and, chest full of loot drops with nothing else.

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WoW,for an example,has a heroic mode that existed for the reason of challenges and bis loots. There's nothing new story-wise and people still do it. That should prove you wrong enough.

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Originally Posted by Akiza

Hardcore Gamer are able to progress through Coils and get all their BIS and ilvl 110 coil gear in 6 weeks. Mid Core players get screwed over because by the time they get their BIS and ilvl 110 gear a new set of gear is out in a week and Casuals are simply left to play Coils just to see the story and unlock the next Coils.

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A) you are severely over estimating the rate at which raiders gear up. I've gone over three months of wins without getting a single drop. How does that fit in your six week time frame??

B) "casuals" got Syrcus Tower and unlocked sands and oils in hunts over three months before the new coil came out completely invalidating your assertion.

Your using hyperbole to attempt to justify your opinion, but you're so far off base that it can't be taken seriously. Either you aren't paying attention to patch notes or your willfully ignoring the true pace of progression. They do a very obvious patch cycle. 3 months for hardcore then 3 months for the more casual group.It's been that way from the beginning.

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Originally Posted by Sadonix

Going by that logic one can say the same about gear progression as well,you're only missing out a small part of gear arsenals by not completing coil and once 3.0 launches those gear will be accessible to all. Only that it's pretty much an outdated content by that point.In MMO where they encourage people to keep up with contents that would be quite contradictory,don't you think ? Proclaiming to be "story driven" but the circumstances try to make a large crowd wait and fall back a few months after release in order to see it ?

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How is it contradictory? The only place where you might need that small gear set is coil anyway. Everything is else is completely accessible to every type of player. If SE wanted to they could just make coil a faceroll at the beginning. They'd lose all their hardcore players but, then you wouldn't have any division of players anymore right? Maybe one day SE will do that down the line it really depends where most of their money is coming from and if they no longer want to make challenging group content.

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Originally Posted by Sadonix

WoW,for an example,has a heroic mode that existed for the reason of challenges and bis loots. There's nothing new story-wise and people still do it. That should prove you wrong enough.

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What I said was my own opinion which is why I prefaced by saying I believe. I know other people can get motivated to complete new content by shiny sets of new gear and mounts. Personally I enjoy the mix of challenge and story elements in end game raiding and the gear is just a plus for me. The whole raid finder thing was actually what turned me off completely to wow since there was no more work involved to unlock the endgame story.

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Originally Posted by Delily

Multiple sources of gear are great, but people are lazy and will just go for the easiest path to the highest ilvl. Why farm a random dungeon repeatedly if you can just buy the gear? Wasted content.

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Depends. Crafted gear should be a viable stepping stone to high level content. I saw it happen in WoW's second expansion to some moderate success, especially after the BoPs seen in burning crusade (basically the good stuff was only for those who leveled the craft and could not be traded or sold). The key thing was that crafted stuff only covered part of your gear set up (Wrath's crafted stuff basically got you covered for head, weapon, offhand if you were a tank, and feet), so you still had to run other stuff either for tokens to trade in for gear or specific drops that brought you to stat caps (I ran Halls of Lightning more times than I can count for the tank trinket, for example).

That's sort of where things have fallen apart when it comes to crafted gear. First because said gear is stupidly difficult to craft between resources and skill level required. The fact people will lean to HQ-onry also has a lot to do with it; WoW's crafting system never had to deal with that issue because you couldn't HQ gear, so you were more worried about getting a Titansteel Destroyer instead of sifting through the AH for a Titansteel Destroyer+1 that would not cost you your firstborn.

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Originally Posted by cookiecutter

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And here we go again with the thinking style of "it's black or white". Seriously why do insecure comments seem to come out whenever that coil is mentioned in this game ?

Just FYI following that train of thought of yours,the "casuals" could also very well leave after they found out there's a massive roadblock at the endgame and the best bits of game are locked behind it with only pointless crumbs here and there left outside.

Come to think of it,in fact it would be very interesting if the aforementioned "casual vs hardcore" scenario someone mentioned earlier really do take place here.

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Originally Posted by cookiecutter

The whole raid finder thing was actually what turned me off completely to wow since there was no more work involved to unlock the endgame story.

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I don't understand...so you're saying you're not fine with WoW raid finder but you're actually okay with FFXIV duty finder,the feature that basically does the same thing ? How does that even work ? Not to mention all those fetch quests ?

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Originally Posted by cookiecutter

Binding coil is a small part of the story that has more to do with past events than current ones. You're only missing out a small part of the story by not completing coil and once 3.0 launches that story will be accessible to all. I believe any good endgame content should have some type of compelling story otherwise the bosses just feel like loot pinatas and lack dramatic flair. It would feel kinda anticlimactic to beat the last boss and, chest full of loot drops with nothing else.

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Only a small piece of the story???!?

Are we playing the same game here?? IT'S THE ENTIRE STORY FFS!

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Originally Posted by Sadonix

And here we go again with the thinking style of "it's black or white". Seriously why do insecure comments seem to come out whenever that coil is mentioned in this game ?

Just FYI following that train of thought of yours,the "casuals" could also very well leave after they found out there's a massive roadblock at the endgame and the best bits of game are locked behind it with only pointless crumbs here and there left outside.

Come to think of it,in fact it would be very interesting if the aforementioned "casual vs hardcore" scenario someone mentioned earlier really do take place here.

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I have nothing to be insecure about. SE can do whatever they want since its their game. If they want to completely cater to people who don't want to put the time or skills into endgame content that's fine with me. I'll just play something else. Really they have three choices. 1. They can keep the status quo. 2. Completely nerf in game content so it can beaten by all players in a timely fashion. 3. Create two different modes of coil for the "casual" and "hardcore" at launch of patches. The problem with the third option though is that its much more work for them to make two separate forms of encounters. Not only that they'd probably have to incorporate a better gear set to give incentive for hardcore players to actually do it. The reason why savage was a flop was because all that you got from completing it was a title. Choices 1 and 2 are the easiest for them to do so we'll see what happens.

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Originally Posted by polyhedral

Only a small piece of the story???!?

Are we playing the same game here?? IT'S THE ENTIRE STORY FFS!

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Coil isn't connected to the main storyline at all. The main storyline revolves around the Ascians and the coil is simply tying up loose ends from 1.0 involving bahamut. It's not even remotely the "entire" story. First coil barely even had any story at all.

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Originally Posted by polyhedral

Only a small piece of the story???!?

Are we playing the same game here?? IT'S THE ENTIRE STORY FFS!

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It is if you like bahamut but, it really doesn't have much do what is currently happening in the game. I can't really say much more without spoiling though.

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Originally Posted by Catsby

No. raiders ignored BCoB because raiders don't give a shit about glamour pieces. If the allagan gear did more than take myth gear stats and stir them around a bit them players probably would have been more excited to do it. Adding a 10 level power difference doesn't fix anything but makes it much worse (the entire point of this thread).

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As Tiggy mentioned, Hardcore raiders did go after BiS mixed Allagan/Myth builds, but a fair portion of the Midcore felt no need to attempt it even though they could as they were already max ilevel and only missing a ring and felt no need to attempt coil for it. Where as now those same players were willing to attempt SCoB once they cleared T5.

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Oils and Carbon are nothing like Abjurations. Abjurations drew from open world bosses, exploration, other players, and crafting. It also involved destroying goods but to a lesser degree. Weathered gear is bought with player bound tokens earned in the same instances were you get the player bound item to upgrade them.

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My mistake then. Abjurations are gear gained by trading in 2 crafted tokens made from materials gained from the FXI equivalent of Hunts. I thought the Cursed gear was already usable and not just tokens like the Ancient armor tokens we have now.

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Originally Posted by Akiza

Aren't you the same person saying grinding for gear would be fun as well. Grinding for gear with different stats isn't any better.

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I do not understand what you mean by this...

I was responding to the sphere grid system for levelling (like the one in FFX and Path of Exile) I greatly dislike this style of system, personal opinion. If there were to be a re-vamp of the skill system, I would like it if they crossed the 1.0 skill system with the Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lions skill system. This would work much better within the confines of this game.

Now, I may have misunderstood what you were talking about. Were you meaning have a sphere grid style system for your gear and have your gear level up? Sounds interesting and odd at the same time. If you have read somewhere that I said the gear grind is fun or adding extra stats makes it better, I don't think I have ever used that term. I know I have said I was ok with the current system knowing the changes they have in store and realizing this is the base framework that can, and will, be built upon. At least grinding for gear with different stats would give you a reason to grind other gear aside from looks.

This is the usual problem there is with every MMO...

People want horizontal progression, but if they made that, I'm certain people would complain about there being no reason to gear up or something along those lines...

In a themepark MMO, it usually just comes down to the amount of content the developers put out, and while the amount of content SE brings us is decent, they bring us the wrong content... A major patch every 3 months is okay(like they said it would be), but it has actually been like 4 months between them all, and every other patch makes no sense in the progression of the game. I'm not a hardcore player, and I see a use for Crystal Tower, but with how the weekly cap for tomes work, every player(however casual you are) will be able to have full gear from those tomes, so the gear isn't really that important... It all comes down to items to upgrade your gear, which is nice, but a whole 4 months wait to get something that already exists in the game? (much easier mind)

Instead of releasing crystal tower like raids every other patch, they should use that development to make the game a little more horizontal (not too much though), and offer something new and challenging for the more hardcore players, but still appeal to less hardcore players. And it should only be 3 months between patches... Then it would be fine

EDIT: In fact, if they struggle to make content for both hardcore and casual players (and they don't have resources to make more content), they could just make an extreme version or something of the content they release (not 24 man raids, oh god...), which would make it much easier for them, and they could release relevant gear for hardcore players. Could even make something new that you put on your gear to get a special attribute or something. Also, I don't want 24 man raids ever... Makes everything feel meaningless and chaotic.