AF gear - handed to you for dinging 45/50

[Xerich]

Because of the outdated use of "Tiered progression"

Nice try-

What else could there be?

Horizontal progression?

Gross.

[Nayto]

Actually AF2 is the new iconic set in 2.0 since it has better look and better stats than both Darklight and AF1.

Ah true forgot about that. Then again these guys want the first AF to be 'meaningful' still.... which it isn't.

[CyrilLucifer]

What else could there be?

Horizontal progression?

Gross.

Funny, "gross" is pretty much my opinion about pure vertical progression.

[WiseWolfHolo]

Ah true forgot about that. Then again these guys want the first AF to be 'meaningful' still.... which it isn't.

it never was meaningful, any double meld in 1.0 easily beat it. The only meaning it has left is looking decent.

[Raeletta]

Although I'm not at that level yet, I'm kind of glad it's sort of handed to us. Getting stable gear has been fairly difficult for me and having a good base for endgame will help a lot. Plus, having reached 50... I'll want to look like what I am!

When vanity slots arrive, I'll probably use the base gear despite whichever true endgame I'm using, I do love to look good :P

Still, I understand people who think it's too easy this way. I just hope others are right in that it really is pretty basic and essentially "good enough" to start with. Even more useful since having to keep up multiple gear sets for several classes can be very difficult.

[Vanguard319]

I'm guessing you haven't played PLD, you have to do quite a bit of fighting during it's series of job quests. Bard also had some extended fights near the end, and one of the AF pieces required you to travel deep into Sylph territory. Every single job quest I have done so far have had some combat at some point. the final piece tends to be an extended battle that you have to use everything you learned to win.

Still, AF has never been endgame gear, and it shouldn't be as difficult or time-consuming to acquire as endgame gear.

[Quadboy]

I'm guessing that the reason why the quests are easy is because the AF armor has been already out for quite some time. The quests themselves were not that easy (well, you needed a party for certain quests, which could be comparable to XI). Considering that this AF is now easy to get, and that Darklight gear is fairly easy to get (for those 1.0 players), I'm really not surprised.

Perhaps the quests are easy to get 1.0 character's reaquainted. At least there is AF2 now...

Also, one other thing to consider: although level 50 is cap in this game, is this going to be the cap forever? Though no one knows when the cap is going to increase (or to what level), I think it's safe to say that with higher caps come higher level gear, and obtaining that higher level gear might be the challenge everyone is looking for. Not to make excuses or to draw conclusions, but it is food for thought.

[Xerich]

Funny, "gross" is pretty much my opinion about pure vertical progression.

There's room for "side-grades" - I never said it had to be pure progression.

Anyway, this is off topic.

ON TOPIC:

AF gear is end game starter gear. It's the gear you see when you create your character. It makes sense that it would be easily attainable (gamewise) - to give the player a feeling of accomplishment, and welcoming, to the end game. Does anyone even RP anymore? It takes a minimum amount of effort to realize that a lot of time has passed in the game world since your character first arrived on that carriage. For you, the player, it might have been a week, or maybe even 3 or 4 days. However, for your character, it has been months of blood, sweat and tears.

Therefore, artifact gear. Duh! (logic)

[Happysour]

We can all agree this game is a bit more casual and more fun in a way.

But I do feel kind of bad that everything which was harder to do/get is now easy.

Remember the annoying pain it was to get the your chocobo?

Remember how annoying the class advance quests were?

Albeit there is more worth in something that's harder to get... but I think we just need harder end-game dungeons and the sort. Not the "if you get this better armor set you can do the next dungeon easily to get that armor set, then move onto the next one fairly easily"

In all honesty I want end game gear/dungeons to be hard as balls that way less people have it as quickly and it's more of a feat.

[SenKoyo]

Oh man, how could they do this?

They gave us mediocre gear as a "gift" for hitting level cap and completing our class quests and becoming true carriers of the job title. I'm going to go cry myself to sleep now, clutching a printed out screenshot of my BRD AF2 from FFXI (that game was SUPER POPULAR and if they stray from it they have totally messed up!!!) while I dream of a day when the game is tailored to my specific taste and playstyle.