I miss the old Anima system

Good evening.

I found this Topic I wrote last year, but forgot to post it.
I remember when in the old forums of 1.0 there were many discussions about abolishing Anima, the “energy” needed to Teleport from Aetheryte to Aetheryte.
I also remember that Yoshida said it will not be abolished.

I was one of the adventurers who really liked the Anima system: it didn't cost anything, you just had to use it occasionally and not simply spam it (in that case, of course the 100 points of Anima were going down fast).
Personally speaking, I never went below the 70 Anima points.

In A Realm Reborn those requests to abolish Anima were heard and now we get to Teleport using gil... And I've to say I really miss the old system.
Also considering now, due to the timed gathering nodes (and now Hunts, too), teleporting happens more frequently, and it comes at a great gil cost in the long run.

And even the previous lore explanation about Anima was far better than the current one “Leave a fee behind to repay the great cost needed to rebuild the Aetheryte camps after the Calamity”. ...Eh...? Surely I'm not the one paying to rebuild Revenant's Toll, since that's my Free Destination!

The Anima system was good, it didn't cost anything, and required only the patience to have the points replenish. In A Realm Reborn there could have been other ways to replenish Anima points, but instead we got to spend gil to travel from camp to camp, thanks to those complaining that Anima was a bad system.

I just wanted to say that I really miss the old system and would love to have it back, although, aware of the gil sink (is that how it's called?) direction we're going, I know that's hardly ever going to happen.
I miss you, Anima! Maybe I'll see you again... as a primal.

Thanks for reading.

I agree, it make everything so easy and the world so small and mount useless when you can Teleport freely with gils. Back then in 1.0, we have to actually plant ahead and preserved our teleport and not waste it all. It also make traveling fun and the world bigger.

I was always out of anima; I could probably buy a large housing plot with the gil I've spent teleporting alone in ARR. I teleport too much.

But, when I was out of anima it was either run (which honestly, I quite enjoyed) or just don't go. When I run out of gil (which happens) I can very quickly and easily get enough to get where I'm going.. No hamlet required.

Though the world is just so tiny now if we still had the anima system it wouldn't be any thing to run.. But at least I have the option.

I miss Tanaka

Whenever a change is suggested to a fast travel system, I have to ask the following question:

Does it make the game more fun?

The point of traveling is quite simply to get from Point A to Point B. I'm at Point A, my destination is at B. I need to get to B somehow. Right now that is accomplished by Aetheryte Crystals and Gil costs. Take that away and we have to run from zone to zone. Make it a manageable resource cost, and sometimes I can teleport, and sometimes run zone to zone. Those are facts, that's how it would be, as the OP has suggested.

Now.. I have to ask this. Is running Zone to Zone fun? If the answer is no, then DO NOT Implement! We're here to play a game, not be bored.

Lets be honest with ourselves. Lets not make the game look bigger by making it boring. Sorry, if the world looks small, that's because it IS small. The fix isn't to make it artificially bigger by limiting travel. The fix is simply to make it BIGGER.

Now.. I am one of those old school players who actually dislikes fast travel. I like for travel to be lengthy, meaningful, and challenging. I used to play Everquest in my earlier days of MMOing. Take it from me, the Karanas were huge. The Karanas are still HUGE by today's standards. Even with mounts or movement buffs it still takes the better part of 30-35 (20 if Bard) minutes to traverse them (and assuming fast load times, take 2-5 minutes off if using SSD or RAM drive). You don't see that in new games.

You know why? Because unless there is meaningful content inbetween, what's the point? Getting across the Karanas in the above example is down through fast travel. Even EQ utilizes fast travel. Because lets be honest, traveling 30-45 minutes to a destination is boring. You think a DPS queue in the duty finder is bad? Try 45 minutes of getting to where you want to be, THEN looking for a group. For a DPS player with 3 hours to play on a given night. Half of it is traveling and getting into a group. Then you got an hour of fighting and then the last half hour is trekking back to a city if you don't wish to relog into a dangerous area the next day.

Now when I was a low level back in those days. There used to be a meaning behind the travel. It was challenging. Even low level areas had high level mobs that had to be avoided. But the problem there was it wasn't a challenge forever. And we don't want to introduce arbitrary challenges either.

Now if there was stuff to do along the way. If the journey was the destination, then we might have something. But the world that requires that sort of interactivity and content is not Eorzea. For someone like me, who has 6 DoH/DoM classes to 50, I have literally no quest content left. Its been completed. Why should someone like me, have to sit on my Chocobo for more than 5-10 minutes between Point A and Point B? How would that time be spent having fun for me? I don't need Grand Company Seals, so the FATEs along the way aren't an option.

Yeah I get it, the Anima would regenerate. But what if its been used up? I just have to be bored for 5-10 minutes before the fun parts? Remember, traveling on foot in this game involves holding down W for a couple of minutes, occasionally right clicking and holding and/or hitting A or D once in a while. There's no challenge, there's no excitement, there's no fun in it.

Taking in the sights are great when I first did the story quests and the side quests. I got to see all of Eorzea when I did that content. I don't need to see it again, and again, and again. Not without new challenges and content to experience. Heck I've even done the exploring thing already, so its not like I don't like looking around and taking in the sights and appreciating the beauty of the game, I've done it already. Again I don't need to keep doing it for the sake of making the world larger.

I just need to get to Point B. That's my goal. That's where the content is that I either haven't done yet, or I am working on progressing through. Fast Travel as it works now, helps me get there. Taking that away or limiting it means I have to wait for the fun. I don't want to wait for the fun. I want to be having fun. I'm not an impatient person either. I'm just here to play a game. I want to spend my time playing. Not traveling for the sake of traveling.

I think this system would make hunts more interesting. Everyone and their mother would be popping in at a moments notice one the hunt is announced in LS or in shout. Also, running places at times CAN be the fun of it all. Might see something that you have never seen before. Go places that are outside of where the story line take you and just allow you to explore.

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Originally Posted by Kaethra

Remember, traveling on foot in this game involves holding down W for a couple of minutes, occasionally right clicking and holding and/or hitting A or D once in a while. There's no challenge, there's no excitement, there's no fun in it.

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Well, speaking for me, when I travel by foot, I'm fully relaxing in my armchain using the left analog stick of my gamepad to move and the right one to turn the camera around. That, of course, because I'm an explorer and I never grow tired of watching the beauty of the Eorzean landscapes. I liked it even more in the old Eorzea, since there was actually music in the background, while now music happens sporadically.
I agree that now there's no challenge in travels, the dangers and thrill of the old Eorzea, sneaking past level 70+ monsters, are long gone.

Yet, even without music and danger, I still like to travel by foot, and sometimes just walk. But with the gathering nodes, it's not always possible to do so, and same goes for Hunts. Adventurers these days have become impatient, while with the old Anima system you had to be parsimonious.
There could have been new ways to replenish those points rather than just waste gil and forget about that lore explanation... but I understand times from the old Eorzea have changed.

i was never around for 1.0 but this anima system you speak of sounds alot better then spending like 400+gil to get to that far away zone

Anima was essentially like leve allowances in that it would regenerate slowly over time. I recall everyone in early 1.0 despised it because the regeration rate was very poor. I guess if there were some improvements on that front then it could work, or maybe you could replenish some of your stock by participating in guildhests/dungeons/dailies. It would be very difficult to just reinstate the old Anima system as people are so used to just being able to teleport everywhere.

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Originally Posted by corticarte

i was never around for 1.0 but this anima system you speak of sounds alot better then spending like 400+gil to get to that far away zone

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Until you realized you had a limited amount and it regenerated incredibly slow so that meant sooner or later you were going to spend an exorbitant amount of time traveling on foot; either doing it to save on anima or doing it because you ran out and have no other choice.

I like to travel and explore when I decide to set aside time for it, but any system that forces you to take the scenic route whenever you go outside just because is a terrible one.

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Originally Posted by corticarte

i was never around for 1.0 but this anima system you speak of sounds alot better then spending like 400+gil to get to that far away zone

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Yeah.... then when no Anima ppl's just dont go anywhere far , or Pay 20+k for tele , yeah... i still remember this s..t no thanks . I better pay 400+ everytime when i want tele.

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Originally Posted by corticarte

i was never around for 1.0 but this anima system you speak of sounds alot better then spending like 400+gil to get to that far away zone

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It was a mixed bag. For those that were thrifty it was a good system (I only ever dropped below 50 when jobs were first released and I was porting all over the place to complete the quests). For those that wouldn't run the distance of (to give an example from V2) Swiftperch to Aleport there was never quite enough anima.

I do wish they would have kept that.

I do use as few teleports as I can even now. I have my warp set to ul'dah, so if I need to go anywhere in thanalan I just warp and then use my chocobo from there. If I need lano or shroud, I teleport to mists or lavender beds and go from there. Unless hunting, then I teleport if someone hasn't already done it. Or if I'm late for a timed node.

But still, I wish they would have kept that.

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Originally Posted by Onizuka

And even the previous lore explanation about Anima was far better than the current one “Leave a fee behind to repay the great cost needed to rebuild the Aetheryte camps after the Calamity”. ...Eh...? Surely I'm not the one paying to rebuild Revenant's Toll, since that's my Free Destination!

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You pay Rowena to rebuild Revenant's Toll.

After all old Atherytes got destroyed, a company from Ul'dah rebuilded them. But the new Aetherytes were not cheap. And the company want the money back from the cities. And the cities get the money from those who use the Aetherytes.

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Originally Posted by Kaethra

Remember, traveling on foot in this game involves holding down W for a couple of minutes, occasionally right clicking and holding and/or hitting A or D once in a while. There's no challenge, there's no excitement, there's no fun in it.

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You know you can just hold down the auto run key or the third mouse button right? Those that leveled up DOH by teleporting to coerthas and turning in levequests at whitebrim should know what I'm talking about:)

No thanks. If you want to run from zone to zone, be my guest. Don't force other people to abide by your play style just because you lack the self control to not use the system you dislike.

Everyone who's using the "But anima ran out then I had to WALK everywhere!" argument, remember that by 1.23 we had hamlets, which if nothing else were a way of very rapidly increasing our anima stocks. As a fisher, I could hand in a stack of young indigo herring and get nearly my entire 100 anima points back. Seeing as how you could catch a maximum of 10 young indigo herring in a single cast, this isn't as bad as it seems.

In fact I still have 58 stacks of the things on my retainer.

The crafters and fighters also had ways of replenishing anima. Personally I supplied my LS with all the herring they needed.

People have been used to teleporting everywhere instantly that they forgot there are Chocobo Porters that speed up travel time significantly, as well as the airship and ferry.

No thanks, the system right now is great and provides options fkr everyone.
Choco porters are cheap and quick, I use them all the time. If anything they should improve on that and add more locations, la noscea is terrible to travel through!

Seriously though, if you want to walk from zone to zone, do it. Nobody is stopping you. Why do you feel as though everyone should be forced to abide by that when you have the option of doing so without impacting other players? If it's so great, why don't you do it now instead of using teleports?

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Originally Posted by Amused

Seriously though, if you want to walk from zone to zone, do it. Nobody is stopping you. Why do you feel as though everyone should be forced to abide by that when you have the option of doing so without impacting other players? If it's so great, why don't you do it now instead of using teleports?

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Cause like everything in an MMO, it's not down to just "one person". Giving instant access to locations broke a few things like hunts.

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Originally Posted by Magis

Cause like everything in an MMO, it's not down to just "one person". Giving instant access to locations broke a few things like hunts.

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Hunts were going to be broken anyway. It's no different than NMs in FFXI. There will always be people who are devoted and dedicated to making sure they're where they need to be when NMs pop.

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Originally Posted by LlenCoram

Everyone who's using the "But anima ran out then I had to WALK everywhere!" argument, remember that by 1.23 we had hamlets, which if nothing else were a way of very rapidly increasing our anima stocks. As a fisher, I could hand in a stack of young indigo herring and get nearly my entire 100 anima points back. Seeing as how you could catch a maximum of 10 young indigo herring in a single cast, this isn't as bad as it seems.

In fact I still have 58 stacks of the things on my retainer.

The crafters and fighters also had ways of replenishing anima. Personally I supplied my LS with all the herring they needed.

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Which was trash. Don't bring that up.

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Originally Posted by Magis

Cause like everything in an MMO, it's not down to just "one person". Giving instant access to locations broke a few things like hunts.

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It's not down to the few zerg obsessed hunters either.

At the time I wasn't too keen on the Anima system because I kept running out, but in hindsight it is much better than just paying gil simply because it makes the world seem so small now. Though the world is actually quite a bit smaller compared to 1.0, being able to port go anywhere with such ease doesn't help, nor does the DF with instant access. Though I understand the benefits for the super casual player I think it has damaged the community in a way.

Because you can share teleports people would be more inclined to talk to other players to find out if anyone was porting to a specific location because the Anima was so precious.

I think the Anima system could be brought back but all they would need to do is introduce methods of obtaining Amina via leves or GC points etc and perhaps make some WHM Teleport spells like in XI. Tele-Dragonhead Do you need it?!

I never played 1.0, but I think the Anima system is preferable to the way it is now. Just make it regen faster, give us daily quests that can replenish it, items that replenish it, etc. With items, people who want to pay gil to teleport still can, they'd just be doing it in a more roundabout way.

People who like to run - Can just do that - Run. No one is holding you back.

Don't see the need to force it on everyone.

I love exploring but I also played 1.0 and running to Uldah from Gridania **For the 20th time** was surely not fun ( > . >

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Originally Posted by Synestr

I think this system would make hunts more interesting.

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Originally Posted by Magis

Giving instant access to locations broke a few things like hunts.

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Hah, no...

[3]<John Doe> Ghede Ti Malice - South Shroud (18,22)
<Entitled Person> wait 20 mins plz lots of ppl coming from southern thanalan
23 minutes later
<Random Person> Ghede Ti Malice - DEAD
<Im'also Entitled> wow thanks for pulling early, jerks

For S ranks it would be a 40 mins wait because X person is in Outer La Noscea and is making his way to Coerthas.

Fast travel didn't break the hunt, the community (and SE) did.

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Originally Posted by Alukah

Hah, no...

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Well, to be fair, with 8 people in a party you could go through 8 NMs and use only between 2-6 anima each (2 for a favoured destination in the same region, 4 for non-favoured in the same region, 3 and 6 respectively for those in another region). If you have 12 anima per day that would mean you could keep stable anima levels while killing 16-48 NMs. Average would probably come in at 4 anima per tele so 3 rounds of each person porting, 8 NMs per round = 24. I think that's a decent amount.

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Originally Posted by Alukah

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Yes, people being able to get to a hunt mob the second it spawn had noooooothing to do with teleports. Nope, not at all.

The horde wouldn't exist if the ability to zero in on the was that quick. People would have been more spread out.

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Originally Posted by Amused

Hunts were going to be broken anyway. It's no different than NMs in FFXI. There will always be people who are devoted and dedicated to making sure they're where they need to be when NMs pop.

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No different? Yeah, I remember the roving parties instantly traveling across Vana'diel killing NMs left and right.

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Originally Posted by Moqi

It's not down to the few zerg obsessed hunters either.

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Point was the zerging was dumb and bad, but teleports allowed that shit to be possible.

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Originally Posted by Magis

No different? Yeah, I remember the roving parties instantly traveling across Vana'diel killing NMs left and right.

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I meant that it is no different in the sense that someone will always be camping for it, in some manner.

I hated it, and glad it's gone.

The only reason FF14 1.0 and other MMOs didn't have fast travel or made it a luxury was to get people to waste more time to get to where they needed to go, hence they play longer and still keep paying for subscriptions. That's an outdated way of doing things now. I completed the main story quests, the other end game quests, and other knick knacks. Why should I still be subjected to slow travelling for stuff like dailies or going to another city to do a quick transaction?

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Originally Posted by Magis

Yes, people being able to get to a hunt mob the second it spawn had noooooothing to do with teleports. Nope, not at all.

The horde wouldn't exist if the ability to zero in on the was that quick. People would have been more spread out.

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I don't know how people would be spread out when only one or two zones would be in window, people would still try to organize it and harass those who don't follow their rules. I'm surprised someone from Excalibur, the server with the worst zerg situation, cannot see this. That zerg mentality didn't come from quick travel.

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Originally Posted by MilesSaintboroguh

The only reason FF14 1.0 and other MMOs didn't have fast travel or made it a luxury was to get people to waste more time to get to where they needed to go, hence they play longer and still keep paying for subscriptions.

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The reason said games had them was because the game was built around making a believable virtual world, not shoving interfaces and game systems in your face. It plopped players into a virtual world that was believable and let them run around. If "waste more time" was the goal, then FFXI wouldn't have had the crag teleports, warp, ferries, and airships, and vanilla WoW wouldn't have had boats, airships, and gryphons. Why do dungeons even have entrances when we just pull up another non-immersive system to instantly teleport into the dungeon.

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Originally Posted by Alukah

I don't know how people would be spread out when only one or two zones would be in window, people would still try to organize it and harass those who don't follow their rules. I'm surprised someone from Excalibur, the server with the worst zerg situation, cannot see this. That zerg mentality didn't come from quick travel.

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Because there would be a greater chance that players in the zone would down the hunt, before some guy half way across the world would be able to get to it and do the same. The only reason people get pissed is because the wait time for a hunt mob is what... 30 EZ minutes at most? People would scoff at the idea players should wait 20 IRL mins for some guy on the other size of Eorzea wants to get said mob.

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Originally Posted by Magis

Because there would be a greater chance that players in the zone would down the hunt, before some guy half way across the world would be able to get to it and do the same.

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full party + everyone only teleport once (the others get a free teleport) + multiplied by other full parties + alt characters created as teleport slaves = still a horde teleporting around

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Originally Posted by skaterger

You know you can just hold down the auto run key or the third mouse button right? Those that leveled up DOH by teleporting to coerthas and turning in levequests at whitebrim should know what I'm talking about:)

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I can do that in most MMOs.

But its much quicker to press M or go to the teleport window and click the crystal and get there that way. My point was, the system we have now works. The proposed system would make the game a little bit unfun to play at the benefit of seeing sights and views I've already been to and seen. And no new content inbetween.

If they want to make the world bigger by making the zones vastly bigger. Add in content for me to do inbetween point A and B. Content that my level 50 iLvl 90+ characters can be challenged by and be rewarded for defeating and overcoming. Then by all means. I don't think the sight seers would like that very much. And SE already said they don't wish to put in -that- challenging of content.

Like others in this thread have suggested... why not an in between? If you run out of anima you're forced to spend gil to teleport. Dailies, fates, leves, gc seals, whatever could replenish a certain number of anima.

It would benefit the frugal and the teleport happy players could continue doing what they do.

It wouldn't really be the same as the system in 1.0 of course, but I would love to cut teleport costs out of my expenses by doing a few extra leves or paying some GC seals to keep up my anima supply.

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Originally Posted by Dappel

Like others in this thread have suggested... why not an in between? If you run out of anima you're forced to spend gil to teleport. Dailies, fates, leves, gc seals, whatever could replenish a certain number of anima.

It would benefit the frugal and the teleport happy players could continue doing what they do.

It wouldn't really be the same as the system in 1.0 of course, but I would love to cut teleport costs out of my expenses by doing a few extra leves or paying some GC seals to keep up my anima supply.

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This could work well actually. I'd be for this.

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Originally Posted by Dappel

Dailies, fates, leves, gc seals, whatever could replenish a certain number of anima.

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I'm pretty sure those activities will net you enough gil to teleport so I don't see the point of adding anima back into the game.