Proposal: Earning a Novus Unlocks Zodiac Quest Dungeon Drops

Obviously this is not an issue if you have previously earned at least one nexus weapon. However, I think we can all agree that it is not as easy (by easy I mean quick) to earn a nexus weapon as it once was. Number of reasons why I am making this proposal:

1) In a month or so - players will be slowing down the entire group if they are intentionally using their item level 110 novus and not their item level 130 tomestone weapon (an item level 110 weapon won't even be viable for expansion content)
2) Trial burn nexus parties are now rare to find (used to be commonplace)
3) Trial burn parties are boring as all heck

Essentially I feel that a player should be able to earn light while also attempting to earn their Zodiac dungeon drops. I think this is fair due to the fact that nexus trial burn parties are very hard to find and an item level 110 weapon is not going to be viable in expansion content. Early nexus adopters had the benefit of being able to cap tomestones / weekly content (utilizing an item level 110 weapon) without any questions being asked. Players still on the nexus stage at expansion time won't be able to use their novus for reaching weekly expansion content cap and thus will be required to spend an enormous amount of additional time earning their nexus.

I agree, but I think this should start once you reach Animus.
Misc change: Double (maybe triple!) all light rewards from completing dungeons and Crystal Tower. Let's encourage doing things other than Trial Burn parties :\. Especially if this is to help out the low levels.

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Originally Posted by Verlyn

I agree, but I think this should start once you reach Animus.
Misc change: Double (maybe triple!) all light rewards from completing dungeons and Crystal Tower. Let's encourage doing things other than Trial Burn parties :\. Especially if this is to help out the low levels.

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Not a bad idea either. I mean - even if a low level dungeon roulette gave you 50 light - that's still 40 days of low level dungeons to move up 5 item levels. I don't see the benefit of the design where a bright trial gives you as much light as majority of the dungeon runs. Makes no sense at all.

The expansion isn't coming in a month.

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Originally Posted by karaageteba

The expansion isn't coming in a month.

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When I referred to a month - I meant by that time you're going to have a lot of people with item level 120 tomestone weapons (possibly item level 130). Because those are so easy to earn - an item level 110 weapon would be viewed as slowing down the party. Obviously this will be way worse come expansion time.

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Originally Posted by karaageteba

The expansion isn't coming in a month.

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The fried chicken person is right. It's not due for at least FOUR months.

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Originally Posted by kyuven

The fried chicken person is right. It's not due for at least FOUR months.

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if you look at my post - i never said it was coming out in a month. I said in a month you'll be gimped if you're not using your "tomestone" weapon. I mention that it won't even be viable for expansion content in parenthesis.

1) We vastly out gear the content so not a big deal anyway.
2) They are common. I just hit this stage last week and parties are up every single window.
3) Grinding is never fun. If this is a problem then you're doing the wrong quest.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

Essentially I feel that a player should be able to earn light while also attempting to earn their Zodiac dungeon drops.

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This literally defeats the point of it having stages you must work through.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

I think this is fair due to the fact that nexus trial burn parties are very hard to find and an item level 110 weapon is not going to be viable in expansion content.

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No, it's not fair. You're on the most recent steps and you're asking for shortcuts. You don't deserve them just because you think farming parties are boring or hard to find. This is literally the grind you signed up for.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

Early nexus adopters had the benefit of being able to cap tomestones / weekly content (utilizing an item level 110 weapon) without any questions being asked. Players still on the nexus stage at expansion time won't be able to use their novus for reaching weekly expansion content cap and thus will be required to spend an enormous amount of additional time earning their nexus.

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Current adopters already succeed just fine at capping each weak from working on this weapon. I'm currently on the light phase myself and I capped just last week solely by doing light farm parties and one roulette where even with my 110 I was the highest DPS. The only class that may have problems with a 110 are tanks who are fighting for hate against people with much higher weapons.

As someone currently on this stage and actively working on it I completely disagree with your reasoning and the idea. It's unnecessary

Tiggy -

1) You can earn alexandrite while working on your atma - so i guess the point has already literally been defeated
2) It now takes longer to earn than before. That's typically when a developer makes an adjustment
3) I'm not talking about today. Item level 110 is perfectly fine today. I'm talking about in a month or so when everyone has an item level 130 and more so during an expansion. You won't be capping your weekly expansion content (when everyone probably has an item level 150 weapon) with your novus.

There are problems on the horizon. It isn't bad as of today. It's going to get bad. Thus - these changes should be planned.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

Not a bad idea either. I mean - even if a low level dungeon roulette gave you 50 light - that's still 40 days of low level dungeons to move up 5 item levels. I don't see the benefit of the design where a bright trial gives you as much light as majority of the dungeon runs. Makes no sense at all.

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50 light for a low level dungeon? You have to be kidding me when the most you can earn now is 16 from ST in bonus. Go earn your relic and don't expect a handout. Some of you nerf advocates are really pushing it.

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Originally Posted by LaylaTsarra

50 light for a low level dungeon? You have to be kidding me when the most you can earn now is 16 from ST in bonus. Go earn your relic and don't expect a handout. Some of you nerf advocates are really pushing it.

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Not asking for that in the slightest. Not at all. However - if you really stop to think about it - you do 75 expert dungeon runs for a Novus. An expert dungeon goes by wayyyyy faster than a low level dungeon roulette. Novus gets you 10 item levels / nexus gives you 5. That is how I would have designed it originally (as 40 days of low level dungeon roulettes would seem more than fair for 5 item levels).

HOWEVER - because SE did not design it that way - and countless people have done the grind - I would never ask for such a nerf (would not be fair to those who did do all of the work).

But one more reply. How much time do you think you would spend doing 40 low level dungeon roulettes in comparison to the trial grinds? With the duty finder wait times and the new players in the low level dungeons - you might even be faster off with the trial burns. haha - so hold your horses.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

1) You can earn alexandrite while working on your atma - so i guess the point has already literally been defeated

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There is no reason you would be doing this without having your weapon already and making progress with your daily quests at the same time. It's extremely unrealistic to think this actually makes a difference since anyone doing so before unlocking the correct weapon is doing themselves a disservice by reducing options to obtain Alexandrite. It doesn't defeat the point. It's just silly and inefficient and only a player making some misguided point would have any reason to do this.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

2) It now takes longer to earn than before. That's typically when a developer makes an adjustment

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It takes longer to earn Soldiery(Myth whichever the case may have been) than it did before that is true, but you're barely talking about soldiery.(The cost of Alex maps was nerfed anyway and that would have been a more legit concern) Is this really about the paltry amount of soldiery you need in the current final phase? You can start that quest with enough soldiery for 1.25 of the items soldiery is necessary for. This is already a massive head start. Otherwise there is zero soldiery requirement in the light phase making me think this is even more of a moot point.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

3) I'm not talking about today. Item level 110 is perfectly fine today. I'm talking about in a month or so when everyone has an item level 130 and more so during an expansion. You won't be capping your weekly expansion content (when everyone probably has an item level 150 weapon) with your novus.

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First off using the expansion is an excuse and a straw man. As far as we know this weapon will be 100% outdated and a new relic weapon quest line begin. You aren't going to win me over with what-ifs that may not even be relevant. It's a weak reason that is still 4-5 months from being a concern. Secondly, I reiterate. The only person that will have an issues are tanks. DPS will already be considerably outgeared for the dungeons. Being a little out geared or extra outgeared won't make that much of a difference and people will clear dungeons just fine. Only tanks deserve this concern and this solution is hardly adequate and solving that specific problem.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

There are problems on the horizon. It isn't bad as of today. It's going to get bad. Thus - these changes should be planned.

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You're assuming they already don't have a plan. They've already suggested a new relic weapon questline would begin in the expansion leading me to believe you either A) didn't know they've talked about it or B) you're just using this as an excuse to make things easier.
They've already nerfed the first three phases of the weapon. Of course the further phases will be nerfed in due time. However, asking for the nerf to come in the form of making it easier to complete steps you don't have access too is simply too much and comes across as asking for nothing more than a hand out. You're solution is a poor fit for the problem you propose and is likely premature in its demand.

Ok
1. Not true, an a good player is a good player even with a item level 110 weapon, I kick axx with a item level 90 weapon. Everyone is OVERGEARED for everything. We wouldnt know what the new stuff will bring untill its here. Finish your weapon already.
2.You can light farm alone. I did for 2 now a 3rd nexus weapon. You dont need anyone to do this quest. Just a Q.
3.Yes, light farm partys are boring.....dont do em. I do everything and anything other then light farming partys. Open yourself up more

Oh yes...you can do both. I do DFS on light farming on Scholar while trying for zodiak items on SMN and SCH. You can stack zodiak items.

ps:Thank you Layla.

Tiggy -

Anybody earning soldiery / mythology to earn books was doing hunts (thus earning alexandrite in the process). This isn't much different than what I'm proposing here. Really - there is no difference at all if you think about it.

It takes longer because there used to be countless burn parties in a party finder to simply jump into. There aren't that many people trying to earn a nexus these days. There really isn't.

All i'm saying is - we need some sort of adjustment. I made a proposal. How much light would a player actually get trying to earn their zodiac drops? I think most people are averaging like 70-100 dungeon runs to get all 16? This isn't like some massive advantage given to players who are behind. In fact - I don't think it makes up for the fact that a player can't simply find one of countless trial burn parties to join. I see one maybe once per week.

Bottom line - even with my proposal - I still think nexus will take longer than if a player had access to all of the trial burn parties that once were available.

I came back to FFXIV last week and upgraded my Zenith to Atma just yesterday. It took me three nights of FATE grinding, so about 7 hours or so, with 3 hours of it just sitting in the same spot waiting for the same FATE because I found a nice online novel to read and didn't want to bother running after FATE spawns that night.

So the Atma step was nerfed severely, so much so that I'd say it was outright generous, compared to the horror stories I found while I was researching it.

I believe the problem mentioned in the op will be taken care of one way or the other when the time comes. The devs have shown that they have no qualms helping the latecomers move along.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

Tiggy -

Anybody earning soldiery / mythology to earn books was doing hunts (thus earning alexandrite in the process).

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False, when that stage came out it was Brayflox speed runs to the second boss or bust. It was THE fastest way to farm books. Hunts didn't even exist yet. By the time hunts DID exist they were introduced at the same time Alexandrites were introduced. Meaning that was always the intention for this particular stage. And for reasons I pointed out above it's silly to think someone would farm all 75 from hunts before they ever reach this stage. That would be an extreme niche scenario and I haven't heard of a single person doing it for their initial weapon.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

This isn't much different than what I'm proposing here. Really - there is no difference at all if you think about it.

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It is because your original statement is incorrect.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

It takes longer because there used to be countless burn parties in a party finder to simply jump into. There aren't that many people trying to earn a nexus these days. There really isn't.

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Yes, there is. I've had light burn parties every day for the last couple of days. Since Friday. I see new ones up every new window when I check to see what the lights are. Once again you're just wrong and making blanket statements. Maybe on your server it is bad, but don't assume its the same everywhere. It's not.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

All i'm saying is - we need some sort of adjustment. I made a proposal. How much light would a player actually get trying to earn their zodiac drops? I think most people are averaging like 70-100 dungeon runs to get all 16? This isn't like some massive advantage given to players who are behind. In fact - I don't think it makes up for the fact that a player can't simply find one of countless trial burn parties to join. I see one maybe once per week.

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A) As already pointed out Square has nerfed the first three phases already. Do you really think them so ignorant of the situation to stop the nerfs there? Of course more are coming and probably will solve the problem better than this as they will be a more robust solution.
B) YOU SHOULD NOT be allowed to half farm the next step before unlocking. Period. This is a very poor solution on that grounds alone. This quest is intended to be a grind. They WILL NOT nerf the newest phase because of the reasons you suggested.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

Bottom line - even with my proposal - I still think nexus will take longer than if a player had access to all of the trial burn parties that once were available.

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There may be less sure, but hardly so few to be impossible or to require this nerf so soon. I see parties every two hours like clockwork. How about this. Make one yourself. I started farming Friday and last night I went to bed at 29% completion. At this rate I'll have it done next week. You're concerns about how long it takes fall on deaf ears when I'm moving so swiftly.

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Originally Posted by Zfz

I believe the problem mentioned in the op will be taken care of one way or the other when the time comes. The devs have shown that they have no qualms helping the latecomers move along.

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Exactly this.

Where has SE ever suggested that the current zodiac weapons won't further upgrade after the expansion is released? I'm sure there will be a brand new set of relics - but where did they say the current ones wouldn't also continue on?

When the weapons got the legendary Final Fantasy names (Excalibur, Apocalypse, etc.) I'm pretty sure that was the sign that they are here to stay. Are the hardcore grinders going to earn the final version of Excalibur at 2.51 and have a mere month or two to enjoy it before the expansion outdates it? I mean in three years when we are all level 75 or something - are we to look back and laugh at the puny level 50 Excalibur sword? Assumptions these might be - but I don't think SE would have granted the relics the legendary names if they weren't here to stay.

Doesn't make sense to me.

Wait...110 weapons are not enough for i90 and less leveled dungeons and HM trials?

The only place i110 weapons could be a hindrance is Final Coil; everywhere else it overgears or was the level the place was tuned to (Ramuh, Shiva, Turn 9 and Savage Second Coil). St was geared for i90-i100, Turns 6-8 too.

WoD, Odin and maybe the mystery trial will probably need a minimum of 110,but that won't really be undergeared there either.

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Originally Posted by LaylaTsarra

50 light for a low level dungeon? You have to be kidding me when the most you can earn now is 16 from ST in bonus. Go earn your relic and don't expect a handout. Some of you nerf advocates are really pushing it.

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I wouldn't be surprised if they increase quantity of light given per run in 2.5.

Tiggy - do you not admit that if trial light burn parties are absent on a server(s) then that's a problem? Can you imagine how much longer it would take you to earn a nexus without a light burn party? I think you're assuming that all servers are like yours.

I tend to think i'm on a hardcore server. I think most people on my server are long past the nexus stage which creates a problem that I feel needs to be rectified.

You are correct. Hunts did come out around the time of Novus. Hunts helped players who weren't finished with Animus. So how would my proposal be any different? It would help players who are still on Nexus. The only difference is that I think adding hunts was more generous than what I propose and there really wasn't a reason to help out people earning their Animus (things had not gotten harder). With nexus - at least on my server - I truly believe things have gotten harder (takes much much longer to obtain).

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Originally Posted by PArcher

Wait...110 weapons are not enough for i90 and less leveled dungeons and HM trials?

The only place i110 weapons could be a hindrance is Final Coil; everywhere else it overgears or was the level the place was tuned to (Ramuh, Shiva, Turn 9 and Savage Second Coil). St was geared for i90-i100, Turns 6-8 too.

WoD, Odin and maybe the mystery trial will probably need a minimum of 110,but that won't really be undergeared there either.

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They are fine now - i'm referring to down the road content. No change needed now - but soon.

Its a tough life now that most ppl r sitting at the last stage of relic lol
The light parties r so scarce now due to ppl not wanting to go thru the light farming again.
So ppl that have yet to catch up are kinda gonna have to work harder due to the lack of options they have compared to when it was the hot thing.
Technically at novus-> nexus stage
Relic difficulty is dictated by your server's community.
Im all for buffa and nerfs! This isn't 2014 anymore :p so no point in clinging onto the difficulty of a step that has been out for a while.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

Tiggy - do you not admit that if trial light burn parties are absent on a server(s) then that's a problem?

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Then make one. Fill it as much as you can with classes that help you queue fast, and just do it. It's not that hard. The one time I didn't see a party up I created one. It was full in 5 minutes. Oh woe is me who didn't see a party on party finder. *fakes fainting*

The phase will be nerfed soon enough when square feels it is time. There is precedent for this already in three previous phases. I don't understand why you think nothing is going to happen when Square has clearly been on the ball in terms of nerfing the older phases.

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Originally Posted by Yumi_umi

Im all for buffa and nerfs! This isn't 2014 anymore :p so no point in clinging onto the difficulty of a step that has been out for a while.

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That's a poor reason to nerf the most recent Zodiac phase by making it farm-able on the previous stage. It may not be 2014 anymore but that doesn't change the reality that the current phase isn't that old at all. It's barely over 1 month old since it was added in the second week of December. It should not be nerfed yet.

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Originally Posted by Sapphic

I wouldn't be surprised if they increase quantity of light given per run in 2.5.

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Hell the decreased the light obtained from certain instances last patch. SCOB I think went down in terms of how much light you obtain. Nexus light farming is just mindnumbing. In the new patch 130 weapon will be easily obtained, yet players who are slightly behind have to continue to switch to an inferior weapon just to get the damn light. It is an annoyance to constantly switch. I wanted to punch the wall last night after forgetting to switch my HA spear to my novus for the last boss of snowcloak.

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Originally Posted by CYoung187

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Carbontwine has not been confirmed to be added immediately in 2.5 - I imagine the carbon coat and tomestones will be available early on.

As for dungeons and light farming there needs to be a change made. Harder/longer content should not be less light than an easier content/fight. Thus I feel dungeon mini-bosses should give light as well as an increase in extreme fights/scob/last dungeon bosses. This way it will FEEL more worthwhile to use your novus in those fights. I am against being able to farm the final stage items ahead of time.

The only thing people should be able to buy ahead of time is the sacred spring water (soldiery item) because by the time you finish doing novus you have wasted a bunch of soldiery from capping 3-4 times.


(Aside I already did 2 zodiac weapons so... I know the pain!)

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

Where has SE ever suggested that the current zodiac weapons won't further upgrade after the expansion is released? I'm sure there will be a brand new set of relics - but where did they say the current ones wouldn't also continue on?

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If they add a brand new set of relics, what point would there be to continue updating the old ones? People will flock onto the new relics and the old ones will be come obsolete, merely becoming just an achievement for those who withstood the grind (see every wow legendary from every single expansion).

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Originally Posted by karaageteba

If they add a brand new set of relics, what point would there be to continue updating the old ones? People will flock onto the new relics and the old ones will be come obsolete, merely becoming just an achievement for those who withstood the grind (see every wow legendary from every single expansion).

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FFXI had relics, mythics, empyrean, etc. Each continued to upgrade (they still continue to upgrade) and offered different perks / stat benefits. Not too difficult to imagine.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

FFXI had relics, mythics, empyrean, etc. Each continued to upgrade (they still continue to upgrade) and offered different perks / stat benefits. Not too difficult to imagine.

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Ahh the classic FF11 arguement...

As we have seen via development, Yoshida and his team do things their way, and the premises set forth by FF11 have very small effect on how they operate. (Outside of "What not to do.")

For this reason one cannot simply say cause FF11 did it this way it will be the same here. Think of all the people who raid; every big patch our gear is near obsolete due to the new crafted gear, tome, and coil gear. Who is to say that relic is immune to this?

I can easily see SE making this Zodiac Weapon glamour. Who knows; they may add unique animations with these weapons (They mentioned at one point that we would possibly have unique animations at the end of the zodiac weapon quest line.)

Also, take into consideration that with 3.0 comes new players and returning players. Meaning either their will be a "hand-out zodiac" quest in 3.0 to catch people up or they will start a completely new relic quest, which would be time saving for them as opposed to having concurrent weapon quests.

I'd just make all lights the bonus as the standard instead of having random bonus hours. So running ST will always yield a newborn and ex dr will always be blinding. But yeah the Nexus step though incredibly easy to do is far too tedious with very little tangible rewards. The only thing we get is a "type of glow" that is not seen until it reaches 2000. At least with the atmas you can see which ones you have and which ones you need.

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Originally Posted by Mardel

For this reason one cannot simply say cause FF11 did it this way it will be the same here. Think of all the people who raid; every big patch our gear is near obsolete due to the new crafted gear, tome, and coil gear. Who is to say that relic is immune to this?

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It's all assumptions at this point. But answer me this:

We can agree that the earliest anybody will earn the 2.51 zodiac upgrade is March, correct? If we are to assume that this is the final upgrade of the Zodiac - that means that even the hardcore grinder will only enjoy their final form of the relic for maybe a month or two (before the expansion). Does that not seem a bit odd? Does it not seem a bit odd that the Zodiac weapons now have the legendary Final Fantasy names (Excalibur, Apocalypse, etc.). Would SE really keep Excalibur as a level 50 weapon when someday players will likely be able to hit level 100?

Two months to enjoy a final version of a long questline would seem a bit strange. And lets be honest - most people won't be able to reach the final form before the expansion is released. If the relic weapons truly are to be final upon the release of the expansion - wouldn't it have been more likely than not that the final quest would have been released at least 6 months prior to the release of the expansion? Would seem like pretty poor planning to me.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

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The name change does give some weight to the continuity of the quest line. However, the issue lies with the introduction of new jobs. (They could retcon akin to ninja.) With new jobs being released would they get a free pass to the stage we would begin with in the expansion? We could think of the relic quest line to it's final stage as Excalibur or something as a "reward" for playing FF14 through the 2.0 era. With the next set of relic quests being the "reward" for playing through the 3.0 era.

That way the older the game gets people will be like "Oh cool what weapon skin is that? You'd be like oh that's from 2.0 and it's Excalibur!" These are just guesses I have no qualms or real faults with your opinion, I was just stating the counter argument for the sake of debate!

FINAL NOTE:
If the weapons are carried over and SE adds a new set of weapons, why do the new weapon quest line? We can already alter the stats of the old weapons; the new weapons would be somewhat pointless, outside a new skin. Yoshi-P would be setting up the new weapons to be glamour fodder by (which is what people are trying to avoid with these weapons here.) Thus sacrifice the new for the sake of the old? That itself would be a waste of development time as well! (A conundrum one might say.)

It's tricky. They've kind of dug themselves into a hole where they can't appease both sides. If they were smart, at the beginning of 2.4 there would have been a "Final" relic quest and SE would make it very clear that it was the final quest and that there would be a new relic coming for 3.0. The final quest would have rewarded an item level 130 weapon. Completing T13 would transform the 130 weapon into 135 (essentially just insuring the player gets an item level 135 without having to lot against others). For those who think the requirements are too strict - you can hang onto your item level 130 weapon and wipe the floor with Bahamut at level 60 to earn your glamour piece upon the release of the expansion (offers a good sense of closure to 2.0).

Now the problem SE is faced with is that half of all servers are pretty much working towards these relics and the quest-line isn't even over yet! There's a new quest at the end of February and the expansion could drop anytime in April / May. If all of a sudden SE announces relics are starting over with 3.0 - everyone is going to feel like they severely wasted their time (didn't have a chance to enjoy their fully finished relic or aren't close to finishing and are better off putting their time elsewhere).

If these aren't FFXI relics that last forever - than the amount of time to earn a Zodiac is wayyyyy too much. As far as I'm concerned - if they don't last forever - they aren't true MMO relic weapons. The stage after nexus should have been the conclusion (at least would have given your average player a shot of completing the questline).

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

They are fine now - i'm referring to down the road content. No change needed now - but soon.

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There won't be any more content that needs higher ilvl due to the expansion being around the corner, in which you wont be using lvl 50 gear but the new level 60 gear. Also they will not make having to get ilvl 120+ a requirement to do level 51+ levelling content.

So PArchers statement still stands.

Seeing this discussion intimidates the heck out of me considering I just managed to get my i80 bow last week...

One Random Thought: In many MMO's, the developer have either started with at launch or added weapons that were intended to be used as vanity items only (GW2 is mostly based around this, but games like SWTOR and WOW have added them as well).

In some of these games, players will go through very long, sometimes months long, quests just to get a skin for a weapon. I don't see FF14 players think in these terms yet, but it's possible that future weapon releases would be JUST glamour targets and not intended to increase the power level. There are alot of these vanity items in the game already (like the parka recipes in leatherworking and the Emporer's gear in alchemy).

I'm just starting my novus but the only thing I wish SE could change is the obligation to use the atma weapon while doing books when it's so easy to obtain a 110 weapon with memos and a couple of ST runs. Running all the dungeons books with an atma curtana when the DPS are using nexus weapons and more is pretty scary.

Whether or not they will continue this quest line or not doesn't change much about the problem the OP presented. In the end the best fix for the problem presented is to increase the rate at which we obtain lights or to decrease the amount of lights so that the 110-115 phase moves faster. That's the only change required to specifically address the problem presented. Not to nerf the final phase. The light nerf will likely come in 2.5 at some point anyway.