Out with the new in with what makes engaging environments

FFXIV's environments are stunning, the world (as of now) is fairly vast, redundant, but large. It's a shame that we as users don't get to experience it. I don't feel that this issue comes up because of there being nothing to do in it. More that, all of what we're expected to do is too accessible. Now, i've traveled around Erozea for fun. I do it quite often, and i can say that I've ran in to dangerous territory, had good times with friends and created some very good memories. This game can offer these experiences. The real problem is, you have to seek them out, out of the way of your daily leveling (guildleve's)

I would like to address:

Teleportation Travel to anywhere you please, and any given moment.

This feature, although handy. Destroys the sense of an open world. And with it, defeats the purpose of having one. This makes FFXIV into the defacto of hack & slash action rpg. With this element, there is no world, just lobbies and community.

With the implementation of teleportation we gain:

• The ability to travel where we want (after already had been there)
• Being able to meet people hastily.
• Returning to town with ease, to pick up guildleve's during a party session.

Without teleportation we will lose these things. A very important measure for players who log on for an hour, do their leves and log off.

And i'm sure many feel that, "Well, do you realize how long it would take to run to BW?"
A costly price. We would require transportation methods, such as Chocobo.

With it we lose:

The opportunity to explore, enjoy the scenery and chat with players as we head to quest or whatever. These are the times where players can talk about battle strategies, or just get to know each other after parting up. These opportunities I feel are very important when playing MMO's, the excitement of getting ready to do whatever you're planning. Preparation for adventure!

I feel that many players are losing sight of Erozea. Complaining that it's too small, or rather empty.

I've spoke with players about this in game. Some have agreed to this issue and desire it's deletion. Others are cynical and suggest, "If you got a problem, don't use it."
This however is not an option for users who desire this play style.

If a group were to teleport, I couldn't say "Sorry, guys. I enjoy the walk :)"

This would frustrate a lot of people.

Secondly, once transportation is implemented such as Chocobo, boats and airships, we won't use them after the first few times. It's simple. They're slower. We like to be efficient. It's a gamers nature.

I'm not a radical. I dont feel that the concept of teleporting be removed completely, but at least make it a little more difficult for us to travel.

• Limit the amount of accessible locations through teleporting
• Make it come at a price. (100 anima for everyone is too much)

One thing about FFXIV is that nothing comes at a cost. Everything is easy, painless and simple. This entail becomes boring in time. MMO's are everlasting becuase of the people you play with, the adventure it comes with, exploration, content and difficulty that frustrates you day in and day out. All for one thing. Reward!

It's time for a little FFXIV S&M everyone. If you want to experience a world that consumes your time and poses a challenge, get on your subligar and demand difficulty reform. I know many other aspects fall under making this change. But teleportation is a key overlooked factor.

I do hope that the devs recognize this as a series flaw in the games design. As content pours in to the game with new areas to explore, it will seem like very little if we can teleport to and fro.

*I would appreciate if we stay on topic, I understand that devs are fixing the battle system first because it's the most important thing at this time.*

I thought so too initially. It might seem like a spoil-sport for new comers but you'll get used to it.
Actually there are a lot of nooks and crannies you can't reach via teleport.

Perhaps they can get rid of the "you get the teleport after hitching a ride from friends" part.

In general, keeping travel to any destination under a tolerable amount of time is good design.

teleport is extremly extremly limited if you are not very casual.

Play this game for 20+ hrs a week, and those anima needed for teleport will be gone.

you get 6 anima per RL day:

Now check out this:

Battle Leves 2 camp locations : 10 anima in region, 16 anima outside region
Crafting Leves: 4-8 anima usally if you stay in region, 6-12 anima outside region
Gathering Leves: Gona cost you 4 anima to get there and 2 to get back at least.
Grind party: you will be in uldah, and most party camps are not in Thanalan, so looking at at least 10anima round trip

If you actully play the game and do alot you are looking at something like this a week (Staying in Uldah's Zones):
Leve days x5 x2camps = 50anima (2 camps and back to uldah)
Crafting Leves x5 1 camp = 30 Anima (1 camp and back to uldah)
Grind Partys x2 1 camp = 20 Anima

There is 100 Anima with just about 25hrs of gameplay.

Add in NM camping which is multiple regions, Faction Leves which are multiple regions, and any activity more then just those above like Gathering or Grindparty on non-off leve days. And a crafter who does all the leves with multiple camps. Quest that you are doing, storyline stuff. You are looking at around 160-180anima a week to teleport everywhere.


So if you are not extremly casual 100anima a week used/42 a week gained, See the issue there.

Crap if you are hardcore you would need 4 times the maximum anima alloted a week to get around.

You cannot warp everywhere unless you only play the game like 10-15hrs a week. which is what teleporting is for, saving the casual people with very limited playtime from having to walk everywhere.

All of those calculations imply that you yourself do all the teleporting, therefor it's a bit exaggerated. But I see your point.
Where it be just right, too much or too little. This system itself will pose as a better alternative to transportation.

On the note of Anima usage, I play a fair amount, and I can say that between my LS and I, never are we in a spot to where we cannot warp somewhere.

Engaging environments require engaging design. You talk about exploration and secrets but everyone knows there isn't all that much to explore in the game. If people had a reason to go outside of their levequest areas other than for harvesting, then maybe it would feel like players were going somewhere with a purpose.

When the game was launched people were spending hours each day walking so that they wouldn't use up all of their anima. It was immensely boring because there is no purpose to anything in Eorzea; that's what led to today's system.

I for one agree that the anima we konw today is a little over the top. Heres a few options to make it more realistic:

1. Any new add on areas will not use anima as well as the fact that when in them anima is null.
2. Lower anima to something like 20 anima with the current regen rate we currently have.
3. Seriously restrict anima teleportation designations to the lower end camps maybe up to the 30s.
4. Make it so that you can only teleport to areas in a certain range so that teleporting across the world is not possible.
5. get rid of it (I'm down for this option)


There is no adventure in teleporting everywhere and like the OP said, you cannot deny your teams teleport cause you would rather walk... :/

Anima is a lazy way to make it easy to get around hard mobs in travel. Or simply walk to get to their destination to add that one more complexity to the game. Good things take time.. no need to rush everything! (except for the quality of this trash game) :p

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Morticous

I for one agree that the anima we konw today is a little over the top. Heres a few options to make it more realistic:

1. Any new add on areas will not use anima as well as the fact that when in them anima is null.
2. Lower anima to something like 20 anima with the current regen rate we currently have.
3. Seriously restrict anima teleportation designations to the lower end camps maybe up to the 30s.
4. Make it so that you can only teleport to areas in a certain range so that teleporting across the world is not possible.
5. get rid of it (I'm down for this option)


There is no adventure in teleporting everywhere and like the OP said, you cannot deny your teams teleport cause you would rather walk... :/

Anima is a lazy way to make it easy to get around hard mobs in travel. Or simply walk to get to their destination to add that one more complexity to the game. Good things take time.. no need to rush everything! (except for the quality of this trash game) :p

---

I think this would be an excellent idea for SE to at least consider if nothing else.

Agree to get rid of anima or take points down tremendously.

It's not something that will be done until more travel options are released, but it needs to be done.

Most of the people that dont want the removal of anima is just due to the fact they are so used to it imo. Removing anima would prolly set alot of ppl to flame, but the fires would die down after a month or two.

I prefer to run every where I go and save my anima to use when doing activities with other players. Rarely do I go under 80 anima

And I certainly play 20+hours/week

I think that instead of, or perhaps in addition to, the reduction or abolition of anima, the reduction in the number of teleportation destinations would help a lot.

FFXI had about 6 teleportation destinations in its prime: Dem, Holla, Mea, Altep, Yhoat, and Vazhl. All of these except Vazhl had a chocobo renter right there, allowing you to teleport to one of a few central hubs then rent a chocobo to get to where you were going quickly and safely.

The benefits of this system: Reduced travel time without eliminating it. Left a little bit of a timesink there without causing frustration to players. Allowed players to learn the lay of the land better, making them more at home in and attached to the world. Created landmarks which every player could instantly recognize: the Crags.

Now, there were also Outpost warps for every region in the game, but those required decidedly more work to gain access to.

My suggestion for XIV:

Create some reason for the Aetherial nodes and the aetherytes in each camp to experience a large loss of energy, preventing a strong enough connection to players to teleport directly there. Add massive growths of crystals in each region, only one or two in each, which become the hubs for teleportation. This way we can keep the camps with their aetheryte crystals as sources of Guardian's aspect, HP/MP recovery, etc, while having a reason that they can't be teleported to any more. Allow us to rent chocobos from these crystal hubs and voila, I think most people will enjoy the world a little more.

I think with the deaspected crystals popping up all over the place, this would be an excellent way to introduce this change fluidly.

I honestly think that the anima system is too much. It definitely takes out the thrill of traveling somewhere. I consider myself a casual player for FFXIV, and being able to teleport so freely really bothers me. I do have a couple ideas to help with it, though, if the current system is kept. Firstly, though, before I can list my ideas, there is another area that needs to be looked at: the economy.

The economy in-game is just absolutely horrible. Players can easily make millions (I expect very easily if r50) by doing leves alone. Now, I don't mind receiving money from some quests, but large amounts from every quest I do? Even though the gil-system in FFXI may have pissed me off a lot, I continued to farm items and defeat NMs (in the very old days of FFXI) to make a few coins, and I could wear my equipment proudly when I saved up the money to buy it because it showed off my hard work. (Now you don't have to work so hard in FFXI it seems to me, Haubergeon, once at 10-20mil, is now down to 10k!)

Okay, once that's taken care of, here are my ideas for the teleportation system (and you'll see why the economy has an effect on this):
-Reduce the amount of places you can teleport to. With as big as the zones are now, I say knock at all aetherial gates and maybe 2-5 aetherytes. Areas close to the cities shouldn't have them, stretching from say Ul'dah to Camp Horizon and Camp Drybone.
-I liked the idea of making it impossible to warp long distances, like from city to city. But don't abolish it completely. Maybe set up an NPC that you have to pay gil (thus taking money out of the economy and making the gil worth more) to teleport from city to city, until some transportation like an airship is implemented, and charge a similar price for airship.
-Don't allow anima to regenerate on its own. Pay an NPC at like an inn or the Adventurer's guild to replenish your anima. Depending on how the economy is, and say anima is reduced to 20 or 50, pay between 10-30k to fully recharge your anima.

In short, the economy should decide how you travel if anything. If you're rich, travel in style with teleporting. If you're broke, grab a chocobo for 200 gil and giddy-up. :)