Anybody think Item Levels should only increase once per year?

As opposed to every 6 months?

In my opinion (many will disagree) 6 months is too fast for an item-level upgrade. In just one year - we have seen Black Mages go from having high 3,000s HP to low 6,000s HP. The frequent item-level raises can have a huge impact on balance / growth of our characters. Worst of all - it transforms older content into super easy mode without enough new content that serves as a challenge.

If it were up to me - this is how it would work:

Start of a cycle: You get new raids and a higher item level (same as now)

3 months later you have a catch-up patch with something like CT (same as now)

3 months later you get harder raids but item level does not increase (instead you get new situational upgrades to gear and weapons with small percentage attributes such as haste, double-attack, resistance to X element, etc). The raids would be tuned to allow players to take advantage of the situational attributes. Older content won't be transformed into super easy mode without the raises to item-level and challenges are kept alive just a little longer to allow players who want to beat them the "true" way to get it done before it is handed to them.

3 months later you get another catch-up patch

3 months later you get new raids and a higher item-level.

It might cause people to play less often knowing there's no rush to reach the top or stop completely once they reach the cap at a reasonable pace.

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Originally Posted by MilesSaintboroguh

It might cause people to play less often knowing there's no rush to reach the top or stop completely once they reach the cap at a reasonable pace.

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I agree that's a concern. But I think those people who reach to the top are compelled to get BIS. That's why I think small attribute jumps (rather than full-on item level jumps) would be enough to keep players busy. This way it doesn't kill the previous content immediately.

It's tricky. I just feel that FFXIV upgrades item levels faster than other MMOs (maybe not Destiny if you can call that an MMO).

The problem is people blow through content so fast that you need some sort of means to simultaneously keep the hardcore players coming back while ensuring the less-than-hardcore players aren't completely intimidated by the power disparity.
This system is one of the most common systems in MMOs for a reason. You have to pace your content and can't spend 6 months on "catch-up patches" while you hemorrhage subscribers that run out of anything meaningful to do.
Remember, FCOB got beat within a week for the first time and has been beaten on pretty much every server at this point several times over. If they only added something for those players to do once a year, they'd have no motivation to return to the game.
On the other side of the coin, frequent iLevel "lifts" like replacing the various gear currencies lets lower tier players have a shot at content they wouldn't normally be able to do previously.
Remember that "harder raids" doesn't really mean much if you have no tangible rewards to motivate players. SSCOB is harder than SCOB, yet many groups don't bother with it because it just wasn't worth the effort for them.
A faster development cycle keeps subs and ensures that the power disparity between two given players is never insurmountable.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

It's tricky. I just feel that FFXIV upgrades item levels faster than other MMOs (maybe not Destiny if you can call that an MMO).

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Not really, it's actually pretty standard operating procedure across MANY MMOs. Hell, that-game-that-shall-not-be-named, DCUO, SWTOR, and TERA all do it. The only reason many don't is because they either increase it MORE often, don't have the budget to introduce major content as often, or don't even have an equivalent iLevel system.

I like it as it is right now really.

Quick story progression and at the same time, anyone can jump in and out whenever without falling too far behind in this MMO. Its the end of the year and I've been quite busy for the last 3 months but I know I can jump right back in and quickly catch up.

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Originally Posted by Xystic

Quick story progression and at the same time, anyone can jump in and out whenever without falling too far behind in this MMO.

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Unless you're a new player, then you're kind of getting the short end of the stick since the developers decided to axe old Tomestones for... I'm not sure why actually... To give new dungeons drops?

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Originally Posted by Nalien

Unless you're a new player, then you're kind of getting the short end of the stick since the developers decided to axe old Tomestones for... I'm not sure why actually... To give new dungeons drops?

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they axed them as a means to not confuse new players as to what is valuable and what isn't as well as to streamline progression for new players. Since you gain Soldiery at basically the same rate as the old stones, your gear will upgrade at a decent clip. It actually makes life a bit EASIER for new players since they don't have to struggle on old content due to gear limitations, which lets them catch up with the majority of the playerbase faster.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

I agree that's a concern. But I think those people who reach to the top are compelled to get BIS. That's why I think small attribute jumps (rather than full-on item level jumps) would be enough to keep players busy. This way it doesn't kill the previous content immediately.

It's tricky. I just feel that FFXIV upgrades item levels faster than other MMOs (maybe not Destiny if you can call that an MMO).

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Hmm
So first month highest weapon with ilevel 140 (as an example) with non-upgadeable stats not at the cap, after 6 months same ilevel but with stats at the cap and after again 6 months new weapon with higher ilevel but again with stats not at the cap?

As things have been standing so far, you're actually progressing 20 ilevels per 6 months. The intial poetics gear is i120, for the time being, only fcob can provide you with the means of rising it to 130 (we're talking strictly tomes gear); when World of Darkness aka Final Tower gets here, they'll probably add the carbon items to hunts and the gear will jump another 10 ilvls with people zerg rushing hunts for them.

I disagree because it would discourage people who play a lot from continuing to play once they get to their optimal gear setup. This game doesn't really support horizontal progression right now because there is only a handful of primary/secondary stats so there is always a clear best in slot if you know your role. In my opinion there isn't enough new content every 3 months to keep people coming on strictly for fun and most of the people I know aren't going to play for just vanity.

In order to support horizontal progression I think they would need to add some special stats, larger content updates and possibly gear swapping. Regardless of which direction they go, some people will never be happy.

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Originally Posted by kyuven

Since you gain Soldiery at basically the same rate as the old stones, your gear will upgrade at a decent clip.

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Except new players cannot gain Soldiery at the same rate because they're stuck doing the older dungeons only due to their iLevel. Even if some of the dungeons will allow you in with a low iLevel, unless you're a DPS (and even then) you're not going to have an easy enough time to farm them regularly. That's partly the playerbases fault for being unwelcoming jerks, but I can't help but blame SE a bit... Did they even test Pharos Sirius as a party of full i48s?

10 Soldiery from Amdapor Keep is a snails pace, rather than remove Philosophy they could simply have increased the number dropped, then a new player does a couple runs of an easy dungeon and gets i70, instead of having to slog through countless runs with the aim of jumping them from i50 to i100...

There really is nothing confusing about the old tomestones; "Each tomestone is for a different iLevel, you'll want to start out getting Philosophy" is not a complex concept... Raising the number of Philosophy dropped, or lowering the cost of Darklight would have been much easier on new players than going "This is Pharos Sirius, you'll only get 15 Soldiery for this and people will probably kick you when you can't even tank the first boss". Pushing new players right in at the deep end just feels cruel, crueler when SE is removing easier grinds for the purpose of doing so...

While I do like what people are calling horizontal progression, what I think is missing is "Alternative Advancement."

When you are max level you can grind xp or special dungeons to gain more power (1 level 50 worth of XP would maybe let you buy +1% permanent boost to hit points, up to a 5% total boost).

THAT would keep HCs logging in.

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Originally Posted by paindax

As things have been standing so far, you're actually progressing 20 ilevels per 6 months. The intial poetics gear is i120, for the time being, only fcob can provide you with the means of rising it to 130 (we're talking strictly tomes gear); when World of Darkness aka Final Tower gets here, they'll probably add the carbon items to hunts and the gear will jump another 10 ilvls with people zerg rushing hunts for them.

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Hell no to the hunts. Square nerfed the hunts (eventually) to stop people from gaining ilvl too fast after that fiasco. They wouldn't be that stupid (as many people believe) to make the same mistake twice.

In order to make gear relevant for a year, you would either have to make it rare or time intensive to get, or you would lose people after a few weeks when there's no worthwhile reward for another year. We might see something like this with the expansion, but the current state wouldn't keep people playing without the increases.

I hope we get enough content in 3.0 to spread around unique gear that will last until 4.0, instead of just a new coil with a different name.

We don't need less ilvl increases, we need a smoother ilvl curve. Each item level tier completely blows the last out of the water, making it a jilted progression with tons of useless chaff.

Not sure one year but new gear comes out to quickly in my opinion.

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Originally Posted by MilesSaintboroguh

Hell no to the hunts. Square nerfed the hunts (eventually) to stop people from gaining ilvl too fast after that fiasco. They wouldn't be that stupid (as many people believe) to make the same mistake twice.

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While I don't disagree with your viewpoint towards the 2.3 hunt fiasco...I can't help but believe you are being extremely hopeful.

I fully expect them to inflate tomes in hunts (more solidery, A ranks giving poetics and more poetics in S ranks) and add the upgrades to poetic gear into the allied seal loot pool with the 2.5 patch. There will only be one more patch after that (2.55) before Heavensward and SE is going to want as many people as possible at the ilevel cap for when that releases. I suspect this time around they will put the carbon items (both of them) into World of Darkness from the get-go as added incentive to do them, but yeah I would just get ready for the disappointment again if I were you. :(


On topic: OP the best you can hope for is that SE changes the way they tackle progression with the expansion. There have already been comm. rep posts in the past saying the developers "have no plans" for horizontal progression, for reasons that were very well defined by Kyuven.

That being said, I would love to see some horizontal progression. I just don't think we will get it in the form that you are hoping for. Many of the playerbase enjoys that instant jump in power every 3-6 months. And ultimately, the type of progression you want is usually gated by horrifically long grinds that isn't very widely accepted (on the forums anyway). Atma threads went on for months....