Devs: You're aware how terrible Missions/Parley are, right?

[Celeras]

Something thats been on my mind lately. Content this, battle that.. but no talk about the staple of Final Fantasy: the story.

Missions in this game all the way up to 50 are godawful. Don't get me wrong, the story and cutscenes are for the most part amazing.. even if I don't like how much the arc jumps around in between missions. But the parts we actually play are a joke. Run in circles for a few minutes while an NPC laser charges and hope you don't get hit? Attempt to elude detection from a handful of inept guards while watching your NPCs pathing bug out? Come on.

And Parley.. dear GOD parley. The fact that this even exists blows my mind. Crafters/Gatherers (apparently) need a way to do these missions without combat, I get the reasoning. But you couldn't have come up with something less.. bad? Like, I don't know, making them craft/gather something for the battle they can't participate in, then give them the cutscene upon completion? The fact that its REQUIRED for some parts is downright insulting, and its existence takes away any possible challenge the actual encounters could have. Too difficult? Go the crafter route.

I'm sure most will agree with me, even if the vocal defense squad doesn't. But the point of this thread is that this part of the game hasn't even been mentioned (to my knowledge) since Yoshi took over. Are you aware of this problem, and what are you doing about it?

[Arcell]

I'd honestly like to see them stray from the "crafters and gatherers can do story missions with parley!" bit. What's going to happen at the end of the story? Convince the big bad evil boss to reconsider his ways through parley? That's certainly not heroic at all.

I think if they want to involve crafters/gatherers in the story they should create separate story missions pertaining to them that tie in with the combat ones. That way the combat classes can actually have challenging and interesting fights in the story and crafters/gatherers aren't left out entirely.

[RichardButte]

Crafters and gatherers should be able to wield their tools like weapons, as was originally intended.

[Betelgeuzah]

Crafters and gatherers should be able to craft and gather to clear the main scenario quests. Parley needs to go away, party encounters in normal battlefields need to come in.

While I am pretty certain that they have something better planned for the future scenarios, I hope they'll go back and tweak the existing quests.

[Zeref]

They did screw the pooch on this one I'll admit, intentional or not it does seem inconsiderate for crafting and farming classes, but hey, at least it makes sense, you know, Just because you choose a non-violent path in life doesn't mean your life will be sunshine and daisies.

[Rentahamster]

Parley is the worst idea in the history of gaming. Throw it in the trash and implement Triple Triad instead, please.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...ll=1#post16036

[Dreamer]

Crafters and gatherers should be able to wield their tools like weapons, as was originally intended.

I disagree. Crafters and gathers are by their very nature not front line people. There's no reason why they should be involved in combat.

[Balbanes]

I disagree. Crafters and gathers are by their very nature not front line people. There's no reason why they should be involved in combat.

I agree. People pick crafters to craft, not fight. That's why we have a choice of easily-switchable classes.

Also Parley by itself is fun. But I would like to see it in some other fashion than missions. They are just to easy as-is.

[Shai]

Of course their primary function isn't to fight, but it was clearly expressed that they would have a use in a battle originally. Perhaps they would serve some kind of support function - but regardless even NPCs in the game still comment about how formidable weavers are in combat and stuff.

I actually like Parley for some things. I honestly wish the Parley NPCs had some more practical use rather than just giving me items one by one that I could get in bulk as a Rank 1 miner. The Main Scenario doesn't require you to use Parley so don't use it. A few crafting quests have required it, but I'm a crafter being questioned on the subject of my craft. So be it.

It reminds me of the "Debates" in Romance of the Three Kingdoms series. I kinda like it as a mini-game when it has a purpose. Though I agree the reliance on it in Missions is silly. I also think the Missions in general (and Class Quests) are great! Certainly more accessible than quests and missions in XI.

It would be nice if you could scale the difficulty and invite more party members, though. That's the one thing I'd change to the story missions in the future.

[JackDaniels]

I personally thought parley was innovative and groundbreaking. Surely the one redeeming feature of FFXIV.