Currently, players are capped at obtaining 300 Allagan Tomestones of Mythology per week. The rationale behind capping any kind of end-game currency is to ensure a smooth transition of players into end-game and provide some delay such that players have a continuing reason to play for many weeks. No doubt, in the future, there will be new similar currencies introduced, so addressing the following issue earlier rather than later would be preferable.
This deficit is inherently bad because it fragments players who would otherwise be playing together. It makes it impossible for players to catch up and join their friends, especially if they make new friends who are further in. It also makes it impossible for advanced players to establish friendships with newer players and bring them up to speed. As cooperation and collaboration are cornerstones of a PvE-centric game like FFXIV, the core game philosophy should be designed around supporting these goals.
Problem: Although the rationale itself is sound, the current implementation of a weekly limit creates a permanent deficit between players. A player who begins collecting tomestomes a week later or a player who is unable to play for a week will never make up that lost week's worth of stones. This creates a gear-gap that, so long as new gear being acquired, can never close.
Solution: Rather than a weekly limit, tomestones should have a lifetime limit that increases weekly. For example, on week 1 everyone can only obtain 300 tomestones of mythology. On week 2, everyone can now obtain 600 total, including the ones acquired in week 1. This allows players to catch up when they begin collecting at a later date or miss a collection period.
The result is the same controlled progress gate: The developers retain control over the rate at which the lifetime cap increases so they can ensure players do not obtain too much gear ahead of schedule. This can then be achieved without fragmenting players into those that have obtained the cap each period and those that have not.
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10-20-2013, 02:05 PMTelsiaSuggestion: replace weekly caps with weekly increases to lifetime caps.
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10-20-2013, 04:09 PMLuda
you don't need af2 for any content in the game yet. so no rush, don't worry if your friends are ahead of you.
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10-20-2013, 06:09 PMRyiosEvery tried being a WAR (like the OP) in BCB? AF2 is practically required, at least chest and helm. That or a Really Really Good healer.Quote:
Originally Posted by Luda
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10-21-2013, 12:17 AMJamesruglia
This deficit is inherently bad because it fragments players who would otherwise be playing together. It makes it impossible for players to catch up and join their friends, especially if they make new friends who are further in. It also makes it impossible for advanced players to establish friendships with newer players and bring them up to speed.
The very opposite is in fact what these kind of caps are good for; my friends play more than I do, so stuff like this has helped us be able to continue playing together, instead of letting them shoot farther and farther ahead of me. -
10-21-2013, 01:04 AMTelsia
I think people fail to see that, for those people that have gathered the maximum number of currency tokens each week since they were available, my proposal changes nothing. In the case of myth tomes in particular, they will continue to be able to gather no more than 300 more tokens each week. The proposed change is designed to eliminate the gap between those who have gathered all possible tokens and those who have not, allowing everyone, no matter when they join the game (especially players that join in the future) to put in the same amount of effort to be in the same state of progression.
This is a short-sighted reply, foremost because it fails to address every player other than me (and it makes a presupposition that I am behind my friends when it could also be the case that my friends are behind me), but more importantly because it limits its scope to one set of items (af2) purchased with one set of tokens (myth) in one time frame of content (currently).Quote:
Originally Posted by Luda
The problem I identify is more wide-spread: what happens when there is new content that does require af2 and new players buy the game? What happens when a new set of currency tokens are introduced while players are not playing and then return to the game several months later?
This is true if and only if you and your friends and anyone else whom you may befriend in the future all acquire tokens at the same rate. I can only infer that you and your friends have all obtained the same amount of myth tomes each week for the same number of weeks. So long as you and your friends continue to all gather the same number each week, then the current weekly system seems fine.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jamesruglia
But what happens when you introduce a new friend to the game and they only start gathering myth tomes at some point in the future? There will be a permanent deficit between the number of tomes you and your friends have gathered in your lifetime and the possible number of tomes the new friend can ever gather. -
10-21-2013, 01:29 AMRoaranI'm a WAR in BC, and it's not required in the slightest. Being bad certainly requires you to compensate with better gear though.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ryios
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10-21-2013, 04:21 AMRyiosYou might be, but you probably have healers talking crap about you behind your back going "Wish we had a paladin, it's harder to heal this guy". Where as my healers go "He's a war, but he's in AF2 so this isn't as bad as it could be". Besides my PLD is leveled and I can switch, I put the effort in to level both for switch scenarios. So I hardly believe that I am "Bad" as you say just because I think a war should get some AF2 before going into BCB.Quote:
Originally Posted by Roaran
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10-21-2013, 04:27 AMEstellios
You need it in Coil because that is balanced to be done with level 80 gear which isn't in-game yet.
Also they are going to alleviate or eliminate stone caps as we get higher tier gear and more tiers of stones. -
10-21-2013, 12:03 PMTelsiaWhile it's good that they're looking towards the future, I am too; I don't think weekly caps will be any better in the future than they are now, so the devs should be looking ahead and implementing lifetime caps for future stones, not merely correcting current stone caps.Quote:
Originally Posted by Estellios
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10-21-2013, 12:14 PMLisotte
I suspect that whenever they introduce a new type of tomestones they'll get rid of the cap on myth. So at that point myth will be the new philo, and everyone will cap the new type of tome every week.
This doesn't fix the problem though that if someone starts collecting tomes later than a friend then he will be permanently weaker than his friend, gear-wise. Case in point: I've been collecting myth for several weeks now, enough to start buying things. My friend is leveling slower and hasn't started collecting them yet. Whenever he hits 50, he will be far weaker than myself, even after he gets full DL. He'll never have the same amount of relic armour that I have, unless they change the current cap. -
10-21-2013, 01:00 PMDjeseritQuote:
Originally Posted by Lisotte
...and that is perfectly fine, because you have put more effort into it. -
10-21-2013, 01:04 PMAnimation
I like the idea, maybe it goes up 25 Tombs each week, that way it's not a massive jump but it's still better than nothing. As long as you cap it goes up, if you don't it stays the same.
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10-21-2013, 01:06 PMLisotteHave I? I've sunk more time into it because I've got a freer schedule than him, but he is a player plenty skilled enough for endgame content. Only him and I can't play together because he'll never be able to catch up to me gear-wise thanks to the myth cap. Not to mention I have another friend who had a legacy char at 50 when 2.0 launched (I was a drg in 1.0 but started over as a brd), so he got started on grinding myth earlier than me. So out of my pool of friends that I would want to play this game with, one is over-geared and one is under-geared (while I COULD go do coil with my over-geared friend I would be less useful than other people who started 2.0 at 50).Quote:
Originally Posted by Djeserit
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10-21-2013, 05:45 PMKelg
I want this, but it probably will never happen.
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10-21-2013, 06:01 PMAltena
Hmm Is this not a good thing?
The fact that someone who plays consistently, and is further then others, shouldn't be able to keep that progression/gap?..
Case in point, why should someone who just dings level 50 on their first job months after release, be able to have the same amount of AF2 as someone who has been playing since the start? Similarly, if someone goes on holidays for a month, why should they be able to come back and be at the same point as those that played every week for those 4 weeks?
Issue gets reversed when there is a "Lifetime" cap... You have people play every week consistently, yet they are going to be at the same point as someone who logs in for 1 day a month.. It doesn't really seem that fair to those that played / progressed their character over those 4 weeks, as opposed to someone who logs in for 1. -
10-22-2013, 03:39 AMArkista
Sure at some point they will just remove the cap for Phil/Myth as one of the new tomes come into play.
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10-22-2013, 04:26 AMBrucieBeats
they should increase the cap for every 50 job you have leveled making the next grind for your new jobs more appealing, just like increasing the exp gained after hitting one job to 50. it's a small boost but at the same time it's nicer than not having it at all.
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10-22-2013, 04:27 AMZanzhizExaverionIssue: I want to play with my friend but I'll play without him anyway.Quote:
Originally Posted by Lisotte
Solution: Slow down and play with your friend. -
10-22-2013, 06:53 AMTelsia
I think there are two themes skirting the issue but failing to effectively counter the point as presented.
"The cap will go away when a new currency arrives, so it's not an issue." This response fails to address the underlying problem inherent in a deficit-based system. Yes, the cap on Myth tomes will go away, but it is logical to assume that the same cap currently applied to myth stones will be applied to the new currency, so the problem starts all over again.
"It's fair for people who play more / put in more effort to be further ahead." Is it? But there's actually two responses to this.
First of all, a weekly resetting cap doesn't measure effort or pay time, but weekly regularity since launch. Someone who logs in once a week to do a few dungeons and cap out their myth tomes will be further ahead than someone who buys the game three months after launch and then plays the game 24/7. If reward should correlate to effort or play time, the reward should be based on effort or play time, not a small weekly attendance check-in.
Secondly, Why does "fairness" mean preserving an imbalance between players? The issue I present is about ensuring that players get to play together by equalizing the playing field for potential gear acquisition. My argument is, quite plainly, that all players, at all time, should have equal access to gear, in so far as that gear is distributed through token systems. If that isn't "fair" I don't know what to tell you.
Furthermore, there is something else that hasn't really been addressed: it's better for the game itself, and the game's operators, to ensure that friends can play together as much as possible. Artificial barriers like weekly caps on progression or a lack of level sync drive a wedge between players. This can discourage new players from joining the game or existing players to quit if their friends can't/won't join. In both cases, the devs lose money from subscriptions and the servers lose valuable population. If the devs can do something to maintain "fairness" (such as a lifetime cap rather than a weekly cap), encourage play and cooperation (perhaps a capped player can help an uncapped player gain tokens faster, similar to a mentoring system?), and bring players together, they help build a vibrant and long-lasting community within the game.
I realize that it seems like the myth cap is one little thing and hardly something that will drive a community apart, but this sort of narrow focus fails to carefully weigh the pros and cons of any given system or change to that system.
I urge you all to consider the following two questions:
#1) Would you, personally, be better off, worse off, or unchanged with a lifetime rather than weekly currency cap?
#2) Would the game population as a whole be better off, worse off, or unchanged with a lifetime rather than weekly currency cap?
And, I suppose, a corollary to #1: are you made better off or worse off by the population as a whole being made better off or worse off? I'd argue that everyone is made better off by everyone being made better off. So even if this change doesn't affect you much, if it makes things better for others, that's still a good reason to support the change. -
10-22-2013, 07:34 AMSchalaZealThey don't increase exp gained after hitting one job to 50.Quote:
they should increase the cap for every 50 job you have leveled making the next grind for your new jobs more appealing, just like increasing the exp gained after hitting one job to 50. it's a small boost but at the same time it's nicer than not having it at all.
They increase exp gained for any job of combat (Magic or War) that is below your highest. Lv 30 Conjurer is your highest? Any combat class lv 29 or below gets +50% exp bonus on FATEs and mobs. Always was. -
10-22-2013, 07:39 AMC-croft#1 is a loaded question. Sounds more rhetorical than anything. Who wouldn't be 'better off' with increasing the tomes as you state.Quote:
Originally Posted by Telsia
#2 I believe worse off. Essentially someone could FATE their way to 50 job after job, get carried and be fully geared simply based on the fact that they waited for awhile, instead of start grinding for tomes right away. You could also be away for awhile for whatever reason and gain this seniority for cap increase, but did nothing to earn it. You could then spam dungeons and next thing you know, you are fully geared like the guy who has been working and grinding from the very beginning. You would also most likely be carried through content with other people who have been grinding since the beginning. You shouldn't be carried and should always pull your weight. Might as well go to CM and afk for awhile. -
10-22-2013, 07:53 AMTelsiaSomeone who already has max tomes and every intention of gaining 300 more per week, every week, would not be better off with the increase that I suggest.Quote:
Originally Posted by C-croft
I don't quite grasp the logical leap from a higher tome cap later in the game to being "carried" and "doing nothing to earn" gear from the tomes. One would still have to do just as many dungeon runs to get the same number of tomes, one simply now has the opportunity to actually do them, rather than having that opportunity lost.Quote:
Originally Posted by C-croft
I'm especially amused when you say: "You could then spam dungeons and next thing you know, you are fully geared like the guy who has been working and grinding (read: spamming dungeons) from the very beginning." Yes, I think people should be able to do the same thing and end up just be like each other.