Suggestions about end game content

So, SE introduced Allagan and AF2 before Crystal Tower, now some people have overgeared and have nothing else to do. With each new dungeon, higher item levels are introduced. Character level is, basically, entry barrier to your skills, nothing more.

I do think that SE is going the wrong direction. They simply can't introduce even better gears without giving them headaches in trying to balance them out.

Suggestions:

1. Stop the item level at Allagan
   Right now we have i90. That is already very high, considering that our maximum level is 50. With each item level, the stats get higher, but it means they need to think of balance when creating new content, taking into account the available items and their stats.
   
   I do believe that needs to stop. By not introducing any higher gear stat-wise, future contents do not need to take into account difference in gear stats. This means that the challenge will remain constant as players can no longer overgear any new content.
   This is because stats is meaningless: making new content and introducing higher level gear to match it will reduce the challenge of older content while players will simply gather the gear needed for the new content and the challenge level will stay flat again, nothing new, only length-padding.
   
   By reducing the number of variables dev needs to take into account, dev can spend their time expanding on game mechanics instead of calculating and balancing out stuff. Devs can simply use old data to determine the amount of damage people will take/dish/heal
   
   
2. Go for looks instead of stats
   People will always go for the better when it's available to maximize their chances. With AF2 being the best before Allagan, people flock to it, then comes Allagan, and people flock to it. The difficulty of Bahamut gives them time, but someday people will gain the gear and Allagan will be the norm.
   
   Instead of giving us better gear stat wise, simply give us more options in the looks department. Stats are objective, but looks are subjective, so variations will be guaranteed. Once people have Heavy Allagan Armor, there is no point in getting Armor of Light but the looks(!).
   
   Look at high level White Mages: you'll only catch them in 5 attires: Darklight, Cleric, Vanya, Royal or Allagan. Out of those 5, only one can be dyed. It's getting boring, because the looks of each set is exactly the same, not because they don't have anything else to wear (Battlemage comes to mind), but because they can't wear anything else. Their sets have the best stats they can currently afford, to tackle the next challenge.
   
   Instead of stats, go for the looks. Introduce gears with the exact same stats but with different looks, allow people to mix and match. Augment those with dyes. It'll make the world that much more colorful. Especially in Mor Dhona.
   
   This is not counter-intuitive to vanity slots. Vanity slots allow you to dish out new gears with different looks at lower levels so low level players can get them too.
   
   
3. Do not give out high-end armors directly
   The current system, where armor drops and that's it, entirely removes the point of crafters. There is no reason to exclude them from all the fun.
   
   Perhaps you don't want to have crafters create the thing entirely like the current system. That's fine. You can simply have the crafters create the ingredients, exactly like the current way of getting relic.
   
   Suppose that we take Armor of Light as an example. Maybe the armor doesn't directly drop from Crystal Tower, it simply drops a piece of Shining Metal. Have a goldsmith dust it off with rare oil, armorer shape it to something recognizable, and bring the item to an NPC which will combine all the needed ingredients into one piece of armor.

So your idea is to make all gear irrelevant and to simply be vanity(vanity being introduced in 2.2 btw) and at the same time prevent all progression. By that I mean making it so that if you don't care about your character looking pretty, beating any dungeon once is the only time you'd ever need to, just to say you did. Effectively meaning you need to either make something so difficult no one will ever beat it or make so many dungeons every patch that it's absurd.


For one thing adding that many dungeons would be far more intensive(models for bosses, new areas, new models for gear(for every race), new mechanics and new lore) than doing a little bit of math. Going the other way and making something super difficult means that only 1% of the player base will ever be able to get it making it impossible for most who now have no reason to play.

Also having crafters make all the things would make this even worse as all the mats and items they made would need to be trade-able otherwise everyone would need every craft needed for the 1 class they actually want to play. If this was all trade-able it means you'd never even need to enter a dungeon to get your vanity only gear. You'd only need the gil to buy it, turning the game into a gil grind for nothing but vanity. Or you could run the easiest dungeon for horrible looking gear that's just as effective, then beat every dungeon once and never play again.

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Originally Posted by Archulak

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We can meld request, why do you assume they couldn't also add a craft request for said theoretical gear? Materials stay in the holder's inventory, untradable, but can be crafted by someone other than them.

Also, power creep is an insidious problem in MMOs, and focusing on constantly adding new gear with higher numbers quickly makes old content irrelevant, at which point the game has to start enticing its constantly ebb-and-flow population to return to the game by giving them bigger numbers AND handing them previously high calibre equipment for free, or damn near it, just to make the newer, actually valued content available to newer players who will have no appreciation for anything from previous updates as they'll never have any reason to experience them the way they were intended to be played.

Not saying cosmetic-only gear is the way to go, but neither is allowing the constant in-game arms race to run un-checked. One of the reasons I was glad 2.1 didn't introduce a new top tier for gear.

@archulak:
1. Wait, did you just describe the current phenomena where nobody cares of how they look and wants BiS?

Yes, my idea is to make gears irrelevant. If you only care about beating the game, what is the point of different looking gear? Simply give out AF when you get your job and keep it that way, because all new gears will look exactly the same when worn, like the days of 2D RPGs.

When was the last time gears are relevant? When new difficulty is introduced. One that simply needs moar health to tank with, moar damage to race with, and moar power to heal with. Once you have your character decked out in Allagan, what makes you want to do Crystal Tower? No point, right? After all, you just want to finish all dungeons exactly once and finish the game.

There is simply no such thing as "progression". It's simply a matter of padding the game length. Instead of dealing with numbers that make you grind, I'd rather have multiple dungeons that require pretty much the same level of gear but with unique mechanics. This means everyone will have the same chance, by virtue of all of them having similar stats. Playing catch up stops at Bahamut, then it's time to play for mechanics and not grind for stats

2. Ironically, I did not ask for new models for bosses. New dungeons do not have to come with new models (such as Caduceus, simply uses the same model with that snake from Halatali). What I did ask is new models for new gear for each race. Did they not have to do the same whenever they actually introduce a new armor?

Have you seen the models of Allagan, Crystal Tower, AK/WP, Darklight and Af2 armors? They actually look different from each other! Nophica save me! Oh my god, they actually make new areas for new dungeons! Am I mad now? Or did they simply do what they already have to do when they make new dungeon or new armor?

3. I never once said it has to be trade-able. Simply allow you to ask an appropriately leveled crafters to do it for you, the item never being transferred to the crafter. Hey, did I just describe a system SE currently has known as "Request Meld"?

4. There will always be that one mechanic that is easier than the rest. If your actual objective is to just beat a dungeon once and never play again, no amount of difference in gear stats will keep you around, because the only way to keep you playing would be to introduce new dungeons, ironically taking more time to implement than simply introducing new models.

Nah, I want my ilvl 120 gear.

< Will sell character body for more lootz.

I have not done CT, Ultima or King Moogle cause you know...no lootz. My FC have cleared everything in 2.1 but there are players just like me in my FC and outside my FC in all servers whom share similar interest, Raid & lootz.

つ ◕_◕ ༽つ Give ilvl120.

I think you are playing the wrong game, the other one is called the sims online (please check it)

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Originally Posted by Raestloz

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1. I want to play the game to make my char feel more powerful. If it's all vanity there is literally no reason for any like minded person to play past getting 1 set of gear.

2. I think you misunderstood my point. If the only difference in difficulty is mechanics then every dungeon added will be beaten in a week(see extremes).
So in order for people to be entertained for any length of time you'd need to make far more dungeons than are currently being planed for, and making things harder through gear is far less time consuming than making all those assets. Also if that large amount of dungeons were all using similar boss models the game would become very bland. Really it's not about making the models, which they do all the time but having to make 3 times as many assets which would take far longer than what they're doing atm.

3. No you described a system that could be called "request craft" which is a totally different thing that could very well be added in the future and would be pretty good.

4. I never said that I like to do dungeons only once, that would only be the case under the system you suggest. I like seeing my char progress by getting stronger, if i could leave the game for a year come back jump right into the newest thing and beat it in a week that just means there would have been no reason for me to play for that year. Especially if i didn't like any of the new vanity pieces that had come out in-between. Also if I played for said year and went back to one of the starter dungeons and it was just as hard as when i first started, couldn't complete it any faster or do anything better,I would feel that I'd just wasted a year of my life on nothing. But at least I'd look cool, oh wait I could anyway cause vanity is being added in 2.2

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Originally Posted by epryn

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Also as a side note it's very likely that when a new top tier is added there will be a new set of tomes added and hopefully a lift on the myth restriction making i90 just as easily obtained as darklight and you'd be making the game pretty much the same as the beginning of 2.0 as far as new player grinding but giving all the people who put in time before the increase an edge as far as completing new content.

I don't think any successful mmorpg's have ever done what OP has recommended.

But it has been done though many times!!! In offline game rpgs....

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Originally Posted by Raestloz

I do think that SE is going the wrong direction. They simply can't introduce even better gears without giving them headaches in trying to balance them out.

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I think this will not be a problem.
Considering the average item level indicator has slots for four digits, I think they intend of going on "Item level 1200" that gives us "+130" int and so on... which would be the same as our "item level 90" that gives us "+13 int", so besides higher number, it'll be exactly the same. Sadly...

Nope. I disagree. I don't like this idea.