Communal outcry against sub-prime gear lockouts

[Davionx]

I don't know what kind of viable business model is to tell your customers to wait a year lol.

The things people come out with.

They are not saying that you should wait a year. They are saying that its a years worth of work ahead of them. You don't think the work is done and they are just waiting a year do you? That would be amusing

[Zohnax]

Please cite any "increasing issues" encountered by removing gear lockouts from sub-prime gear. Nice attempt at condescension though, however, next time you might want to think it through.

Content is designed around these iLvl Requirements. Sub-prime players not meeting the average iLvl minimum of content requires other players to pick up their slack. This doesn't work well in Garuda's Sister Phase and Titan's Heart Phase for instance. But I'll tell you what, it got really annoying for awhile when I saw Lv50s with just AF in Ifrit and dungeons and in Lv20-30 accessories. You talk as if players are going to get locked out of every end-game dungeon, but in reality, they are being more guided to follow a path rather than try and jump ahead and bring other people down. It was a system discussed in one of the Live Letters about completing content and obtaining the gear before progressing to the next.

To add on to your initial post, the disparity between players' playtime is a concern they are trying to carefully balance. Of course someone who plays everyday is going to progress further than someone who plays once or twice a week. Personally, I've leveled up two additional jobs since relaunch, but I made sure I had good gear, crafted or dungeon dropped, for my levels as I progressed, so all I'm getting from your post is that you're impatient and don't want to put in the work.

[Dhex]

8/8 group who have all gotten their once-a-week loot item from CT - queue CT and start getting drops - do these drops floor or auto-sort?

[Ravinous]

stuff.

I completely agree with what you are saying, and I would love for MMO's to go back to the time sink that they used to be. The problem that you end up with what I call the WoW effect.

That's what happened in WoW. Vanilla it took along time to level a character to cap. Then you had atonement quests to be able to raid that might take you a month or more if you were lucky. On top of that you had legendary quests. That could take any where from 4-6 months to complete. That all came to end when people complained that they "didn't have time to do that", and that "they pay for a game, and should be able to play it how they want to". Then the player base ended up with the steaming hot mess that game is now. Level a character from 1 to level cap in 1-2 days. Get all the epics you want handed to you via Flex raiding, Raid Finder, etc... etc... All because the player base didn't want to put the time in.

[Lurkios]

Level a character from 1 to level cap in 1-2 days. Get all the epics you want handed to you via Flex raiding, Raid Finder, etc... etc... All because the player base didn't want to put the time in.

Personally I find myself jumping back a forth a lot on that topic... When I was leveling my bard I was ecstatic to hit 50, but at the same time a bit sad that the leveling bit of the ride was over, I'd really enjoyed it. I'm feeling the same way about my scholar, 30 now and I hope it lasts a good while. But then I started on a lancer for that sweet, sweet cross-class and it took me FOREVER to just get to level 15. I found I'd rather stare at the fountain in aleport than level it I hated the class so much - it'll be 22 forever. And now I'm feeling the same way about thermatauge... At least swift cast is at level 26...

So yeah, sometimes I wish it was a bit longer... sometimes I wish they'd just hand it to me...

[Mitski]

They are not saying that you should wait a year. They are saying that its a years worth of work ahead of them. You don't think the work is done and they are just waiting a year do you? That would be amusing

There's a distinct difference between the two, but the end result for players is the same.

That being said, I appreciate all the work SE is doing with FFXIV, and I'm still looking forward to future content releases.

[Alhanelem]

Personally I find myself jumping back a forth a lot on that topic... When I was leveling my bard I was ecstatic to hit 50, but at the same time a bit sad that the leveling bit of the ride was over,

I'm never sad when the leveling 'ride' is over because the rides you get to get on after you are done leveling are all more fun than the leveling ride was.

[Luso]

So yeah, sometimes I wish it was a bit longer... sometimes I wish they'd just hand it to me...

I can understand your feelings exactly. When I look at leveling some more subjobs (so happy I'm almost done with my cross-class skills) I want to bang my head into the desk. I look forward to class quests every 5 levels. At least they give a purpose to why that class/job exists in the world.

Leveling up through the story line quests was a lot of fun. It was a decent pace, there was a purpose to almost all the quests/activities during the grind, and the player felt immersed in the world.

F.A.T.E leveling is fast. Player can get to 50 in 1-3 days of constant fates. However, fast does not equal fun. Slowed down, and engaging content is a great way to level up.

[Enfarious]

...Put in long progression quests, RNG some of the rare loot to actually be rare, add a collection game or scavenger hunt.

Keep people in the game everyday. Even if its for short 1-2 hour periods. If players log in once a week, it will be easy to replace a game they play on Monday with another game that is more entertaining.

RNG, grinds, and prerequisites are mandatory in an mmo to keep it alive for a long time. Accomplishment for getting something that took a lot of time and effort is what an mmorpg should stand for. Sure its frustrating sometimes when luck isn't in your side, but at least players will keep trying rather than log off to wait for next weeks dungeon timers.

The only thing I'll never be a fan of in here is RNG, it's great when it's in combat mechanics, or mini-games of chance, but when it's in the loot system it's a PITA. Seriously, let's put an end to the days where the 9th allagan ring of maiming has dropped to the group and hits the floor, or the 23rd Garuda's Beak gets floored.
Otherwise, I'm all for some more grindy elements, leveling being one of them, instant gratification might get you a huge player base early, but it will lose most of it after a fairly short time. What's better in the end, a player base at a constant 120k or one that surges from 10k to 1mil then falls off again after 2 weeks and stays down til the next content release? I suppose unless your managing releases every month.

I'm never sad when the leveling 'ride' is over because the rides you get to get on after you are done leveling are all more fun than the leveling ride was.

Yes and no. I love knowing a job is capped, especially when it actually took some work (you know like it used to). Post grind content is always (well almost) more fun.
I do however miss some of the /shout xp partying that used to exist, and /search xp pts from XI that would run for hours and you'd actually talk to people.

[Ravinous]

Personally I find myself jumping back a forth a lot on that topic... and more

That is completely understandable. There are aspects of the game that people sometimes just don't find enjoyable. I was that way when I played WoW all 8 years of the time I played, because I detested gathering professions. I found it so tedious, and boring. I was never one of those players that spent hours farming, or was able to play at times that allowed for the best farming when no one else was. So we all get that "I'd rather do xyz then do this" feeling at some point or another.