LOYALTY MODE

[Santan]

1. This post = genius.

2. I love all the people not getting it, bless their hearts.

3. Lu Shang's Fishing rod...

That stupid quest made me a fortune bazaaring my worm balls in windurst!

[Neptune]

lol

Most retarded list ever.

Excuse me sir, are you implying that a list of things carried over from a game many people have devoted themselves loyally to is RETARDED? Are you then, by extension, calling those who want to see these changes retarded? I do hope you think for a moment and apologize to all those who have put so much time and effort into requesting the changes in this list.

[Ceons]

"-At the beginning of the game you pick what class you want, the game starts you out as another class and you have to level to 30 to unlock the one you originally wanted"

Best bit in the whole sarcastic post.

Don't forget, first you have to level something to 18 to get a subjob. Level that to 15 then go back to the 18 class and level that to 30 so you can qualify for a quest to unlock the job you really want to play.

[yukikaze_yanagi]

this topic is still alive ?

[Preypacer]

I would like to also add: Sitting in one of the main cities for hours(sometimes days) hoping to get a party invite until SE add a level sync feature years later...Then having more days to spend trying to level your gimp weapon skill.

lmao Loyalty Mode...

To start... Yes, I got the joke in the OP and do agree with some of what he lists there as being less than great ideas or implementations of otherwise good ideas. I've had my share of "WTF were they thinking?" moments while playing XI over the years, to be sure. Most of them have been since WoTG came out and SE's been trying to retro-fit XI to be more "casual friendly".

However, other things on that list, though characterized as "bad things" were actually quite fine and consistent with the type of experience XI was designed to be. XI wasn't designed to be a "quick race to end-game" like newer MMOs have become. It was designed to be a long-term adventure through a massive and complex virtual world with tons of things going on.

It didn't sit well with people who were only interested in leveling as fast as possible and racing through the content when they had to, bypassing it completely when they could. But then, I think it's pretty clear those aren't the people XI was designed for.

When you're in a hurry, everything seems to "take too long". Many MMO players these days are forever in a hurry.

Yet, for those who approached it as an adventure, as a long-term hobby, not a short term race to the finish line... the game provides many great and memorable experiences. It's all in how you approach it. When you're not in a hurry and just enjoying the journey, how long something takes doesn't even occur to you.

Many of the things in that list could have been better implemented. Most of them, though, I think were just fine for that setting. A number of them come back more to how people approached them than the systems themselves.

Speaking of "how people approached them"...

Akumu, you illustrate one of the things in XI that drove me nuts... and (like many other perceived "flaws" in the game) it was the players' doing, not SE's.

For years, players leveled up in normal parties and gained xp/levels and skillups at the same time. This way, their skills were almost always up-to-date, or no more than one or two job levels behind. There was never a problem. People seldom ever had "gimped" skills. When you hit 75, you could be reasonably sure your skills were only equivalent of one or two job levels behind and would catch up in short time.

Level-Sync was introduced and people immediately adopted it as a way to level their jobs faster, without considering how having no skillups when capped could affect their performance later. People didn't care, because it meant "faster levels and xp" which, in their tunnel vision, is all many players seem to care about these days; "How can I level as fast as possible?".

The attitude was, "Meh... We can get the skillups in a party later on", which meant hours in Boyadha Tree or one of the tunnels skilling up on crabs.

This is one of the best examples of /facepalm worthy behavior I've ever seen by players in a MMO. In their obsession with "leveling up to cap in less time", they actually gave them self twice the work.

Had they stuck to parties in areas closer to their actual level, instead of leveling up to 75 while sync'd down to 22 in Qufim Island or elsewhere, they'd earn their levels and their skillups and they wouldn't have to go back and grind out skillups.

I actually asked people about this.. "You realize you're doing twice the work to get the same result you would if you just leveled up in normal parties, closer to or at your actual job level?" They'd agree it was pretty dumb, but "it's what people did", so they went along with it... complaining the whole way.

The scenario you describe was 100% the players' fault. They chose to use level sync in that way. It's not how they had to use it.

The problem with people (many of them anyway) is that they always immediately look for someone or something else to blame when they make poor decisions. Instead of stopping and thinking, "Hmm... you know, if we xp'd on mobs closer to our actual job level and didn't sync so far below it, we would get more skillups and would have a lot less, if any, catching up to do later". But of course, in their conceit, many people won't do this. So, instead we get "Stupid SE making us spend hours grinding our skillups to catch up with all the levels we got while sync'd down to 20 on our level 70 jobs..."

Same thing with the Dunes. If I had a nickel for every time I saw someone say "I can't believe SE made the Dunes the only place you can level up to 20", I'd have enough to pay a subscription for a year. If I had a nickel for every time they also refused to acknowledge that other options do exist and that the Dunes isn't the only place you can level to 20... I'd have enough for two years of subscriptions. Again, people making poor choices, then blaming someone/something else for the result.

Typical.

[Vivik]

Great post OP. The reaction from some of the posters here were even better though. FFXIV fanbois r mad.

[Neptune]

XI wasn't designed to be a "quick race to end-game" like newer MMOs have become. It was designed to be a long-term adventure through a massive and complex virtual world with tons of things going on.

When you're in a hurry, everything seems to "take too long". Many MMO players these days are forever in a hurry.

Yet, for those who approached it as an adventure, as a long-term hobby, not a short term race to the finish line... the game provides many great and memorable experiences. It's all in how you approach it. When you're not in a hurry and just enjoying the journey, how long something takes doesn't even occur to you.

I agreed with this whole point you were making here. I partially wish I had seen FFXI as a hobby when it first came out. It would have changed my perspective on the game. However, it was not sold as a hobby, it was sold as a videogame comparable to FFX.

From reading about FFXI I was mesmerized by the idea of other people in your city who you could talk to. I imagined a city full of people lounging around and just having a good time like the NPCs seem to be having in other RPGs. I imagined having conversations and going on adventures. But let me tell you about my very first hours in FFXI. The game started you in a city with no prior backstory. You're there, and you start talking to NPCs. One NPC in San'doria gives you a quest to turn in bat wings. So I go out to fulfill this quest. After a while I wind up with 200 gil. A potion vendored for about 6k. Shoes cost someone around 1k if I remember right. I wound up with enough gil to buy my shoes, but I realized for the exact same amount of time I could have literally made minimum wage somewhere and bought a pair of $60 Nike shoes with the wages. In that sense, it was a huge waste of time. There was no sense of adventure. It was just a pointless grind. It wasn't that I was in a hurry.. there was simply nothing fun about it.

I think that highlights a lot of people's overall experience with FFXI who didn't make it very far. For those who did, including myself later on, you're absolutely right that the game provides many great and memorable experiences. It really was a long-term adventure through a massive and virtual world. However, I think you'll agree with me that that is only half of the story of FFXI.

Speaking of "how people approached them"...

Akumu, you illustrate one of the things in XI that drove me nuts... and (like many other perceived "flaws" in the game) it was the players' doing, not SE's.

I completely see your point of view, but I'd like to bring something to your attention. It's useful to look at the environment when thinking about the behavior of people. Environment always factors in. And it factors in to this situation. Who designs the environment? Guess who, the dev team. Through the creation of the environment the dev team is determining the behavior of players. Like you implied the players always had a choice to resist the environment and, for instance, level in parties away from the Dunes. But that is like swimming upstream. It's hard to find 5 other fishes and convince them all to swim upstream when there's a strong current carrying you to the Dunes. You haven't yet appreciated the role of the dev team in designing the dynamic environment that created the conditions of player behavior you noticed.

I really don't think the dev team was aware that they had even created an environment to the extent that they had. I really don't think they realized that if they had changed this or changed that how different things would have turned out.

The team is more aware now. It used to be in FFXIV that you had everyone solo grinding Coblyns. The players picked the path of least resistance to grinding. The dev team stepped in and raised the HP, changing the environment and the path of least resistance. Now you have leve linking parties and raptor parties. What changed, the players or the environment?

So as you can see the blame truly does lie on the dev team and not the players for these kinds of bad experiences from FFXI. And in the case of Akumu, he played years before level sync. They added level sync, what, 6 or 7 years after launch? My skills were super gimp too once I hit 75. Did you level early on? And what job? Mine and Akumu's experience from leveling with traditional parties was gimped skills, due to game design, or more accurately, the lack thereof.

So I'm really glad you posted, because you brought to light this truly valuable discussion of the great adventure of FFXI combined with the truly ridiculous timesink. That's what a lot of us see in FFXIV, a long-term, grand adventure.

Great post OP. The reaction from some of the posters here were even better though. FFXIV fanbois r mad.

lol. thanks

Don't forget, first you have to level something to 18 to get a subjob. Level that to 15 then go back to the 18 class and level that to 30 so you can qualify for a quest to unlock the job you really want to play.

Also, lol yeah wow so true. I might have to edit that in...

[Ceons]

Yes, also add the sub job quest where you had to kill 3 different enemies to get a special rare drop from each to turn in and unlock the ability to sub a job. The run to jeuno that took an hour when you were level 20. The 6 hour quest to obtain a chocobo license. The level 25 quest where you had to get a key drop from every cities enemy territory by beating on endless mobs for hours, to get a special airship pass that went to one zone only where you exped past level 25. The airship pass that you got only after completing several missions and becoming rank 6. (or coffing out 600k which was a lot of gil at the time since no mobs dropped money...)
The first zone you went to group in was 25min walk or more and the nearby village had no homepoint so if you died and had no raise you had to wait (or run) for 25-30mins till your group was together again to exp.

Despite all of this I did play XI for years and it was my first MMO and I had some great times...

[Demacia]

Yes, also add the sub job quest. The run to jeuno that took an hour when you were level 20. The 6 hour quest to obtain a chocobo license. The level 25 quest where you had to get a key drop from every cities enemy territory by beating on endless mobs for hours. The airship pass that you got only after completing several missions and becoming rank 6. (or coffing out 600k which was a lot of gil at the time since no mobs dropped money...)
The first zone you went to group in was 25min walk or more and the nearby village had no homepoint so if you died and had no raise you had to wait (or run) for 25-30mins till your group was together again to exp.

Despite all of this I did play XI for years and it was my first MMO and I had some great times...

Actually Selbina had a homepoint and they added nomad moogles in the recent years. Walking to dunes took 15 minutes too, but the chocobo quest is complete BS. XI had a ton of flaws and was extremely unforgiving but I still loved the shit out of that game.

[Ilean]

I am calling your list retarded.

I could care less about how many no-lifers devoted themselves to it, and since you want to bring argumentum ad populum into the discussion (look it up!), I will also say that I bet there were many more people who didn't like XI than people who liked it. XIV should stay a game for people with full-time jobs, families, etc..

Good day lolsir!

Excuse me sir, are you implying that a list of things carried over from a game many people have devoted themselves loyally to is RETARDED? Are you then, by extension, calling those who want to see these changes retarded? I do hope you think for a moment and apologize to all those who have put so much time and effort into requesting the changes in this list.