Does it make sense to have mobs die so quickly?

As a mage, i can barely target and do my basic attack, let alone cast a nuke on them, before they're already dead... A party of people hitting them with their basic attacks is enough to kill most leve/behest monsters within 10 and 15 seconds; many times it's much, much less. (If you add network latency for European--or Eastern NA players, like me--you have a guaranteed recipe for player frustration. My brother, playing from South America, could rarely hit a monster in behest at all. He has stopped playing the game) The feeling at the end of a run is rarely more than that of having been through the rushed drill of a fight; far from the epic feeling we all crave.

Even without lag, I'm sure, the weak monsters produce something far from the sense of challenge and exhilaration the game promises. I thought the game was going to have intricate patterns of AI behavior, and environmental puzzles at the core of all battles. In reality I had to cope with a mediocre version of my expectations. Could we at least have monsters that put up a decent fight?

Is this something that will be changed in the future?

The mobs are not balanced for solo vs. party play.

It makes sense but it is not good for the game.

Nope, which is why they're changing it.

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Originally Posted by Elexia

Nope, which is why they're changing it.

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Are they? I've gone through the 10 letters, the blueprint and the recent Q&A after reading your post, and I can't find one mention of battle-time being expanded and difficulty increased.

There are these two quotes in the Q&A, however:

Quote:

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Q: Avoid haste from becoming the primary factor of the game when auto-attack is implemented.
A: Rest assured that we will handle this situation delicately.

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And

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Q: Levequests and behests are currently boring due to the monsters not having enough HP. It seems like all we’re doing is running from one place to another.
A: Once the algorithms for battles have been revised, we will look into additional factors such as monsters that appear during guild leves, the amount of their HP, group settings, etc.

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I do not find the answers reassuring enough. The main motivation for my OP was the pervasive feeling that SE still, to this day, tries to please two very divergent constituencies. They seem convinced that reducing the difficulty of the game, and making it feel like other generic MMOs will increase its attractiveness; at the same time they seem to be taking for granted their faithful legacy-player population that craves a far more challenging game.

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Originally Posted by Rutelor

Are they? I've gone through the 10 letters and the recent Q&A after reading your post, and I can't find one mention of battle-time being expanded and difficulty increased.

There are these two quotes in the Q&A, however:



And



I do not find the answers reassuring enough. The main motivation for my OP was the pervasive feeling that SE still, to this day, tries to please two very divergent constituencies. They seem convinced that reducing the difficulty of the game, and making it feel like other generic MMOs will increase its attractiveness; at the same time they seem to be taking for granted their faithful legacy-player population that craves a far more challenging game.

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Have you noticed that with 80% of the responses in the Q&A, questions were answered with a "don't worry we got this" or restating the initial question.

I personally am sick and tired of all these, "don't worry were looking into it" posts. As a community of a struggling game we don't just need a arbitrary "plan" with statements of content we all know the game needs, updating a lore page periodically on new content is not enough either... We need detailed previews maybe even some video previews something to make us all go "yeah things are looking up" not "God i hope these are not more empty promises".

But hey these are my thoughts not yours, if you still have high hopes for the game by all means spread the love.

Didn't they mention they are looking into lowering the cast times?

You have to image if those mob were taking a lot of time to kill with 8 people, then solo would take way too long. Need to have someway to balance them.

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Originally Posted by Alise

You have to image if those mob were taking a lot of time to kill with 8 people, then solo would take way too long. Need to have someway to balance them.

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no what we have to realize as a group based game(a game where se gives bonuses for grouping) then the mobs should be at least reasonably tough to defeat as a group.

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Originally Posted by Rutelor

Are they? I've gone through the 10 letters and the recent Q&A after reading your post, and I can't find one mention of battle-time being expanded and difficulty increased.

There are these two quotes in the Q&A, however:



And



I do not find the answers reassuring enough. The main motivation for my OP was the pervasive feeling that SE still, to this day, tries to please two very divergent constituencies. They seem convinced that reducing the difficulty of the game, and making it feel like other generic MMOs will increase its attractiveness; at the same time they seem to be taking for granted their faithful legacy-player population that craves a far more challenging game.

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Thats because the answers were not in the Q&A. They were in the Battle reform letter. Go and read that and you will get your answers. What they did talk about was not being able to defeat a mob with basic attacks. So to me that means battle and or Mobs aregetting the Change.

Is the enemy is too weak, you are too strong
Search stronger enemys.

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Originally Posted by Felis

Is the enemy is too weak, you are too strong
Search stronger enemys.

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you show me a mob that is strong enough for a party of 8 to have a decent fight that does not 1 shot your party in the world. they either die in a few seconds or deal 2k+ damage per attack. there is no middle ground.

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Originally Posted by darkstarpoet1

you show me a mob that is strong enough for a party of 8 to have a decent fight that does not 1 shot your party in the world. they either die in a few seconds or deal 2k+ damage per attack. there is no middle ground.

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I do agree with this. but the Elf parties at 30-35 are actually pretty good. Everything else like you said is pretty much to easy or to hard. Like those Imp's AOE's

It doesn't make any sense. Part of the problem is that you are not rewarded for killing things that are more than 10 levels higher than you. The SP is capped after a level differential of 10.

I explain more here: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...-How-to-Fix-it

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Originally Posted by darkstarpoet1

you show me a mob that is strong enough for a party of 8 to have a decent fight that does not 1 shot your party in the world. they either die in a few seconds or deal 2k+ damage per attack. there is no middle ground.

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There's lots of high level stuff you can kill. I'll show you.

Here's my party killing a rank 92 Goblin Headman:

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...ockup-Included


Here's my party killing a rank 77 Creeping Ivy:

http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com...entry?e=171597

When yopu got 8 people beating on a mob, yes it does make sense

you want to see what a 8 man balanced mob is like, go fight faction NMs or the higher ranked NMs in the field

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Originally Posted by darkstarpoet1

no what we have to realize as a group based game(a game where se gives bonuses for grouping) then the mobs should be at least reasonably tough to defeat as a group.

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Exactly this.

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Originally Posted by Rentahamster

It doesn't make any sense. Part of the problem is that you are not rewarded for killing things that are more than 10 levels higher than you. The SP is capped after a level differential of 10

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And you probably can't be, or there'll be trouble too. Not only would it make partying outstrip solo sp per hour and render the game solo-hostile, but people would take it too far. This system is a reaction, not a new thing. It was designed with FFXI's mistakes in mind. In years 1-4 people overcamped levels, resulting in abuse of dLV-ignoring abilities and over-emphasizing jobs that favor a pseudo boss fight-- rangers tanks and mages. Yeah, THAT discussion again.

There's really no good solution except..and people are going to balk at this...separate but equal.
One line of content for soloers, designed for them. Another line for partiers, designed for them.
Then set the SP rate difference between the two. Partying is 40% better? 60% 75%. All you'd have to do is see what the partiers are wailing at, then tweak the soloers' content to match that rate.

Unlike white and black people there are REAL differences between soloers and partiers that we just need to acknowledge and give up trying to behave like they're the same.

As far as the mob's HP goes, yeah. If you touch it, the JP soloing base goes right in the trash can. Not gonna happen without a novel solution.

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Originally Posted by Dragon

Exactly this.

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no not that

people dont understand what a grouping bonus even is

YOU DO NOT GET MORE SP FOR GROUPING

the "bonus" as it is, is only to offset the penalty you get for having more people in your group to begin with


If a mob gives 100 sp solo, it does not give more for being grouped, it gives less
with no bonus itl give 50 sp
with the bonus it may give 80 instead


the entire people of the reduced sp is in fact due to the mob getting easier to kill

so a solo kill can be 300 sp, a 8 man kill can be 100 sp, the 100 sp reflects the mob being easier to kill in a group
hence why the mobs dont need to be made tougher in order to "reflect" the misinterperted bonus

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Originally Posted by darkstarpoet1

no what we have to realize as a group based game(a game where se gives bonuses for grouping) then the mobs should be at least reasonably tough to defeat as a group.

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Exactly. Yes!

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Originally Posted by Peregrine

And you probably can't be, or there'll be trouble too. Not only would it make partying outstrip solo sp per hour and render the game solo-hostile, but people would take it too far. This system is a reaction, not a new thing. It was designed with FFXI's mistakes in mind. In years 1-4 people overcamped levels, resulting in abuse of dLV-ignoring abilities and over-emphasizing jobs that favor a pseudo boss fight-- rangers tanks and mages. Yeah, THAT discussion again.

There's really no good solution except..and people are going to balk at this...separate but equal.
One line of content for soloers, designed for them. Another line for partiers, designed for them.
Then set the SP rate difference between the two. Partying is 40% better? 60% 75%. All you'd have to do is see what the partiers are wailing at, then tweak the soloers' content to match that rate.

Unlike white and black people there are REAL differences between soloers and partiers that we just need to acknowledge and give up trying to behave like they're the same.

As far as the mob's HP goes, yeah. If you touch it, the JP soloing base goes right in the trash can. Not gonna happen without a novel solution.

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Do we really have to reawaken Jim Crow in order to speak about a 2-path solution in an MMO??

This coming from someone in agreement with the 2-avenue option. Just label it more kindly, otherwise it will turn people off. And rightly so.

R

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Originally Posted by TheVedis

When yopu got 8 people beating on a mob, yes it does make sense

you want to see what a 8 man balanced mob is like, go fight faction NMs or the higher ranked NMs in the field

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My linkshell and I do, all the time! Yesterday we had a great run, repeatedly beating the Great Buffalo. That is beyond the point of this question. We cannot rank up by fighting those. What about the everyday, simple experience of ranking up with a party? I really don't want to feel like SE is giving away the points, I want to feel I earned them.

In any event, even as a solo player the Guildleve mobs are too easy, and so is Behest, BTW.

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Originally Posted by Rutelor

My linkshell and I do, all the time! Yesterday we had a great run, repeatedly beating the Great Buffalo. That is beyond the point of this question. We cannot rank up by fighting those. What about the everyday, simple experience of ranking up with a party? I really don't want to feel like SE is giving away the points, I want to feel I earned them.

In any event, even as a solo player the Guildleve mobs are too easy, and so is Behest, BTW.

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well if you wanna feel like you are earning it fight higher level mobs

but a rank 40 mob, is a rank 40 mob regardless, it gives 300 sp to a rank 30 player(just a made up number but lets go with it as an example)
when 2 people fight it, it gives 150 sp to each of them, 250 with the bonus

the mob is now easier, and instead of 300 sp, you get 250 for it...thats fair
every person you add to the group makes it easier, and the sp goes down

by the time you have 8 people you are getting 100 sp each, total, counting the bonus
that solo kill was 300 sp

the reduction in sp now reflects how much easier the mob is to kill with 8 people as opposed to 1

however if you go and fight something thats say....rank 60 with you 8 people, youll have more of a challenge and i think thats what people need to consider

mobs will never scale to the group fighting them, the group needs to scale to the mobs they want to fight instead

Quote:

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Originally Posted by TheVedis

well if you wanna feel like you are earning it fight higher level mobs

but a rank 40 mob, is a rank 40 mob regardless, it gives 300 sp to a rank 30 player(just a made up number but lets go with it as an example)
when 2 people fight it, it gives 150 sp to each of them, 250 with the bonus

the mob is now easier, and instead of 300 sp, you get 250 for it...thats fair
every person you add to the group makes it easier, and the sp goes down

by the time you have 8 people you are getting 100 sp each, total, counting the bonus
that solo kill was 300 sp

the reduction in sp now reflects how much easier the mob is to kill with 8 people as opposed to 1

however if you go and fight something thats say....rank 60 with you 8 people, youll have more of a challenge and i think thats what people need to consider

mobs will never scale to the group fighting them, the group needs to scale to the mobs they want to fight instead

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That's not entirely how it works.

http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com...entry?e=183441

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...-How-to-Fix-it

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rentahamster

That's not entirely how it works.

http://lodestone.finalfantasyxiv.com...entry?e=183441

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...-How-to-Fix-it

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so your saying, when i duo a mob im getting more sp then solo?
that is how it works

the more people who join a group the lower the sp gets, period
i may not have posted exact scaling numbers, but its still pretty much a fact

granted when it comes to issues like power leveling, the sp differences can go up instead of down(say if you go from a rank 1 and a 50 together, to 2 1s and a 50, the 1s will in fact get more sp per kill at that point)
but overall the sp does go down

Quote:

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Originally Posted by TheVedis

so your saying, when i duo a mob im getting more sp then solo?
that is how it works

the more people who join a group the lower the sp gets, period
i may not have posted exact scaling numbers, but its still pretty much a fact

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Actually, as long as both party members are -10/+5 ranks of each other, they get the same SP as solo.

It only starts to get lower per person in a trio or higher.

It slowly decreases the more people you add, but the numbers don't decrease as drastically as how you said they do.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rentahamster

Actually, as long as both party members are -10/+5 ranks of each other, they get the same SP as solo.

It only starts to get lower per person in a trio or higher.

It slowly decreases the more people you add, but the numbers don't decrease as drastically as how you said they do.

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i know they dont decrease that drasticaly, i said that in my original post about it
i said it was just an example and that the numbers were not real, but an example of how it does in fact go down per person

Quote:

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Originally Posted by TheVedis

i know they dont decrease that drasticaly, i said that in my original post about it
i said it was just an example and that the numbers were not real, but an example of how it does in fact go down per person

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Then you should have used the actual numbers and formulas if you knew them, instead of making up numbers that help you to prove a point.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rentahamster

Then you should have used the actual numbers and formulas if you knew them, instead of making up numbers that help you to prove a point.

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i stated that the numbers were not actual, that shoulda been enough

i was debunking the fact some people are under the understanding that you get more sp per kill if you have more people in the group

Quote:

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Originally Posted by TheVedis

i stated that the numbers were not actual, that shoulda been enough

i was debunking the fact some people are under the understanding that you get more sp per kill if you have more people in the group

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Err, you responded to darkstarpoet, and he didn't say that you "get more sp per kill if you have more people in the group"

Quote:

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Originally Posted by darkstarpoet1

no what we have to realize as a group based game(a game where se gives bonuses for grouping) then the mobs should be at least reasonably tough to defeat as a group.

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He just mentioned "bonuses". As in, Light Party and Full Party bonus. I'm pretty sure most people realize that they get less SP per mob the more members are in the party.

Even if darkstar wasn't talking about the party buff bonuses, he was probably talking about this result of partying: While SP/mob does decrease in a party, the kill time/mob also decreases as well. That means that in a party you get more SP overall in terms of: SP/time

i.e. you get less SP/mob, but you kill em a lot faster in a party, so the "bonus" you get is a faster rate of SP gain in a party overall.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rentahamster

Err, you responded to darkstarpoet, and he didn't say that you "get more sp per kill if you have more people in the group"



He just mentioned "bonuses". As in, Light Party and Full Party bonus. I'm pretty sure most people realize that they get less SP per mob the more members are in the party.

Even if darkstar wasn't talking about the party buff bonuses, he was probably talking about this result of partying: While SP/mob does decrease in a party, the kill time/mob also decreases as well. That means that in a party you get more SP overall in terms of: SP/time

i.e. you get less SP/mob, but you kill em a lot faster in a party, so the "bonus" you get is a faster rate of SP gain in a party overall.

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you would be surprised how many people i talk to in game actualy think you get more sp per mob, not a faster rate....

Quote:

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Originally Posted by TheVedis

you would be surprised how many people i talk to in game actualy think you get more sp per mob, not a faster rate....

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Yeah, I know there are a lot of dumbasses out there, but we need to try not to immediately call out people on stuff when they never actually said anything factually incorrect in the first place.

We should hold the level of discourse here to a higher standard, otherwise it's no better than the crap you see on the WoW boards.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rentahamster

Yeah, I know there are a lot of dumbasses out there, but we need to try not to immediately call out people on stuff when they never actually said anything factually incorrect in the first place.

We should hold the level of discourse here to a higher standard, otherwise it's no better than the crap you see on the WoW boards.

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im not calling anyone out
im just saying, its better to defeat the misconceptions rather then let people think otherwise

i was just stating that people may be misinterpereting it(which a ton of people are) and i stated the facts on how it really works


but back on topic


mobs dont need to scale to party size
partys need to find stuff that scales to THEM. go fight higher monsters if you think its too easy

The system is designed so that optimally, there are 4 members in a party. That is in-line with their statements that they want the norm to be 4, and the megaboss fights to be 8. In fact, adding any more members above 4 on the field really does kill your sp per hour. It's not a marginal decrease, it's a 15-25% decrease in SP per hour.

This is unfortunate, because 4 meleers at ants that can heal themselves is much better SP per hour than 4 meleers and a healer.

It's not a marginal sp reduction. 30 sp difference per mob is a big difference in sp per hour when the mobs are dropping a base of 175.

Once again, though: The original issue, in my starting post, had to do with battle time and challenge, not a system of reward. Of course, the two collide, but I was just advocating for more expansive, intricate battles. I am aware of the complications of balancing solo-vs-group reward, and that's a big issue that I hope the development team is aware of, and dealing with resolutely.

I just wanted to open a thread on something that, usually, is mentioned only tangentially. In contrast with the issue I brought up, I have read and heard plenty of concern about how to balance reward in the game.

Ok in all honesty, the dlevel scaling handles groups pretty well, mobs that are higher level have a base damage increase and reduction, just them being higher level means they will do more damage and take less, making them better for parties, up to a point, that point is where they can murder a tank easily. The problem is in fact, that we are limited to things 10 levels higher. Before the SP nerf people got all kinds of exp on different monsters, if we had 15 people at level 33 we killed piestes, if we had 6, we killed efts, if i was duoing/trioing we killed monkeys.

I think dpoet implied that anything that would take longer to kill, would kill you, totally untrue. groups can usually handle things up to 24 levels higher, depending on mob type. This is when roles really start to come into play. This is when you really see the advanatges of a person who builds thier charachter to tank, and a healer who does 2x as much per cure, and has a real mp pool. Thats when defense matters and the fact that you do 10-20% more damage than another class might matter. While the dlevel irrelevant skills grow in power, its not so much that they ruin everything (until you start fighting special species, or things like 30 levels higher) the fact is most of the dlevel skills are dots, and totally useless on stuff 10 levels lower, they were meant to be used on things 10-20 levels higher.

they just need to curve the sp gains properly so you dont completely destroy soloing.

two paths is an interesting possiblity, but not the only way, and they should remove sp cap regardless, or at least extend it to 20 levels

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Rutelor

Once again, though: The original issue, in my starting post, had to do with battle time and challenge, not a system of reward. Of course, the two collide, but I was just advocating for more expansive, intricate battles. I am aware of the complications of balancing solo-vs-group reward, and that's a big issue that I hope the development team is aware of, and dealing with resolutely.

I just wanted to open a thread on something that, usually, is mentioned only tangentially. In contrast with the issue I brought up, I have read and heard plenty of concern about how to balance reward in the game.

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there will be harder battles in the futre
thats a given, and i dont think you have to worry about it

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Physic

two paths is an interesting possiblity, but not the only way, and they should remove sp cap regardless, or at least extend it to 20 levels

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If you extend it to 20 levels then you greatly exacerbate the differences between sp per hour of certain setups, unlocking the inherent imbalance in the game that's looking for any excuse to express itself fully.

SP per hour of gld mrd lnc lnc pug con: 22k
SP per hour of arc arc arc thm con thm: 45k

Thus, archers cons and thms never party with glds mrds lnc and pugs, and choose to team up for that 45k an hour.

Leaving the original 22k an hour group impossible to build.
Now you have gld mrd pug pug lnc lnc. SP per hour: 12,500.

Great. The end result, is instead of everyone getting 22k an hour, now a subset of people get 45k an hour and a subset of people get 12.5k an hour.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Peregrine

In fact, adding any more members above 4 on the field really does kill your sp per hour. It's not a marginal decrease, it's a 15-25% decrease in SP per hour.

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That's mainly because of 2 factors:

1. Most of the time, in a 4+ member party, you kill stuff faster than it can respawn.

and

2. All of the time, you are not rewarded with more SP for fighting mobs more than 10 ranks higher than you

Problems that I elaborate upon and propose fixes for in my "fix SP" thread: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...-How-to-Fix-it

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Peregrine

This is unfortunate, because 4 meleers at ants that can heal themselves is much better SP per hour than 4 meleers and a healer.

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That's because ants don't have any AOE moves, so the meleers don't have to be concerned at all with AoE healing. (but even if you do you can just use archers and the point is moot, but that's an argument for a completely different thread)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Peregrine

It's not a marginal sp reduction. 30 sp difference per mob is a big difference in sp per hour when the mobs are dropping a base of 175.

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I didn't say it was "marginal". I said it was less in reality than the numbers that Vedis gave in his example.

Besides, you probably shouldn't be grinding on stuff that only gives you 175 SP per kill. Optimal raptors give 450 SP per kill in a duo and 383 SP in a party of 4.

NOTHING gives you 383 sp in a party of 4 at rank 27 save for an easily-exhaustable quest mob set. You underestimate the inherent differences in sp that each type of mobs give at a given dlvl cap. The 35-39 ranges of mobs is a deadzone of sp per hour, because there are no options but low-sp yielding enemies. There are no raptors, efts, beastmen, eyes, peistes, fireflies, or the like. There are at best dodos, which are about the middle of the pack in terms of sp.

Ants give about 250 a kill, and are about your best bet. Ands are sub-par SP targets by design, but they have the most density by far.

Not every R35 mob gives the same amount of SP to a R27 player. In fact, the differences are huge.

I do not see an issue. People in ffxi made the community cookie cut jobs, job choices, weapon choices to kill mobs the fastest. In ffxi sometimes they killed mobs to fast for me to do much of anything. Its not the difficault imo its the players wanting to be uber effecint (sp)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Peregrine

NOTHING gives you 383 sp in a party of 4 at rank 27 save for an easily-exhaustable quest mob set. You underestimate the inherent differences in sp that each type of mobs give at a given dlvl cap. The 35-39 ranges of mobs is a deadzone of sp per hour, because there are no options but low-sp yielding enemies. There are no raptors, efts, beastmen, eyes, peistes, fireflies, or the like. There are at best dodos, which are about the middle of the pack in terms of sp.




Ants give about 250 a kill, and are about your best bet. Ands are sub-par SP targets by design, but they have the most density by far.

Not every R35 mob gives the same amount of SP to a R27 player. In fact, the differences are huge.

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this is a big problem they dont have enough different sp rates per species, that actually represent thier difficulty, but i havent tested all the choices, i did notice though at high levels, a lot of monsters that have very different difficulties give around the same sp.