Suggestion to change the Atma Collectng System (2 different methods)
Now while I cant say this will be or ever will be implemented, making suggestions sounds more productive than just complaining how bad it is.
1st Suggestion: Make an Atma Locator
Just like how the suggestion applies, ifs a "Key" Item bought with Allagan Tomes of Mythology. "Gauges the essence of an Atma in the immediate area. Wears off after collecting the atma in the area." What would this do? You buy an Atma locator, then go to one of the twelve areas, You use the Key item, and it would say the following depending on your probablity of getting the atma.
0% "The presence of the atma has dissapeared"
1% - 5% "There are slight reactions of atma in the area"
6% -20% "The presence of atma is festering."
21% - 50% "The presecse of atma is strong"
51% + "An arma is located in the area."
Now, for this suggestion to work, the atma drop rate would need to chance so that its actual drop rate fluctruates every, lets say. 4 hours or so. An Atma locator can be used as many times until the user finds an atma, but after finding one, the locator dissapears so you would need to buy a new one for your next atma. As for the exchange rate, I would say between 600 myths to 1200 myths is doable, seeing as you need 1500 for the Books.
OR
2nd Suggestion. An "Actual" Atma Fate. Awakening of the "Zodiac name". (Ie "Awakening of the Ram")
Now this kind of suggestion would work out better if it was implemented.. In all the areas where an Atma is supposed to drop, a new kind of Fate would appear in every area, depending on either one of 2 possibiilities. An appearance timer like Odin and Behemoths but more frequent or on the number of FATEs cleared in an area. Now, how would this work. Any FATE, like right now, would have the chance of becoming this new type of FATE, and what kind of FATE would it be? I would say an Open Boss Fight, cept with a few twists.
1. The Boss that appears in this FATE would have a certain buff called "Thirst of Mist". "Overwhelmed by the presence of Thainivian Mist, attacks and damages foes with Relic Weapon Zenith. Attacks caused by Non Relic Weapon Zeniths are negated (aka Vulnerability Up, immune to aggro, debuffs, etc). Cannot damage Non relic weapon zenith wielders.
Summary, basically means the boss would ONLY go for lv50 people with their zeniths. This saves the low levels from being nuked from an open world boss that can definitely one shot them. Also helps that if a player tries to control the fight in another way, such as debuffing the boss or aggroing it w/o a zenith it doesnt work either. Basically a battle for Zenith users only.
2. Thainivian Imbalance: "Relic Weapon Zenith users can only be healed by other Zeniths. Potency of Cures and buffs from non relic zenith users are drastically reduced"
Summary, basically means that if a non Zenith user tries to support another player whos fighting in the FATE,, it means their skills will pretty much be made useless. Cures will heal for a miserable 10 HP, Stoneskin and Galvanize wont guve a def debuff, Eye for an Eye wont active, and so on, IF you're not using a relic zenith.
Lastly, this could be the real kicker to prevent people from abusing the fight. You need to stay in the fight and get gold Rating. The fight is difficult, like a battle with Odin to say the least, which means if you die and respawn on an aetheryte, your "contribution" resets, even if ifs on a group, the total contribution would be reduced by a set amount. Also, if there is no more relic zenith users in the FATE, it will disappear and you would need for it to spawn again, which means back to clearing low level FATEs with Zenith, OR change to another job and level it by FATEs, but the advantage of having a Zenith is that you're meeting the requirement for the boss to stay in the FATE while other Zenith users arrive.
Lastly, whats stopping people from farming their atmas early? Easy. Just like how in order to make the atmas drop, you need to have the quest "Up In Arms" active, the same can be said for this suggestion.
This 2nd suggestion however, is intensive, seeing as it needs to design 12 different bosses for each FATE, they cant all be the same.
What can be done about those however, is that the current models of certain monsters be used and "altered" depending on the nature of the Atma.
In case people didnt know, each Zodiac (Atma) has an Element in a chart of the 12 Zodiacs. Example being Water-Bearer (Aquarius) being Wind and Lion (Leo) being Fire. It could be a right direction to say to use these elements in mind.
If you have another idea, bring it up.