Originally Posted by
OldGeezer
Just because you can choose to play every class doesn't mean you get to end-game raid every class simultaneously. That's not how it works. SE gives you the choice to choose-so choose...and live with the choice. So you can't have your cake at eat it too. It's not a design flaw. If you want to do CT os a WHM you can, if you want to run coil the same week as a BRD you can. You just can't powergear them at the same time in both. You have the easy option to gear up every role in Darklight gear, and then you have to choose.
Except, if we had each of our jobs on a different character we would be able to end-game raid every class simultaneously (after having also spent the time on each needed to gather their cross-class abilities), as in every MMO that doesn't encourage (again, cross-class skills) stacking classes into a single character without locking that character, rather than its classes (which in any other MMO would be each separate characters), out.
That said, I still don't have that large an issue with CT's lockouts. But its design is certainly contradictory to its given intentions.
Originally Posted by
OldGeezer
Trust me as a BRD I wish I had more options to put in my rotation and I love invigorate as a cross-class skill. I use it all the itme. But I don't use the melee stuff because I'm ranged. There is s a limit to what you can do with these cross-class abilities and that doesn't even consider balance between the classes. Just think if Monks could use the straight shot and put a perpetual +10% crit chance ontop of their skill and strength enhancements in their rotations. People would scream injustice because they'd be too OP. Balance is always a ticky subject and SE could definitely improve in this area but developing special abilites for one class that wouldn't be exploited by another is a tricky subject.
In Bard's case, just changing out how Straight Shot works to a more fluid 'Grouping of Shots', etc, mechanic would probably help with your rotation a lot. (Critical hit) rating nominalizations might also help thereafter to add use to more than what is presently just HS, rebuffs, and Straighter Shot procs.
[Rating is gathered by, say, non-crits, while crits consume rating--essentially, the longer you go without a critical strike, the higher chance you have of getting one; that chance (rating) is not consumed by auto-crits, a bit less rating is consumed by minor hits, and a bit more by larger hits (to the same average), but a secondary stat or hidden mechanic can also thereby improve the critical chance proportionate to potential damage increase (potency), while another can even increase the level of nominalization, usable in basically auto-critting within a certain rotational string.]
It would still be nice to have more than just 1-3 direct damage abilities though, depending on how you personally define them, (just one primary use, at any rate), and for our cross-class skills to be worth something again; I miss their burst on any class, tbh. If Skill Speed would effect Blunt Arrow, Repelling Shot, and (most importantly) at least slightly effect Invigorate, that would probably help a lot too. (Likewise with Invigorate on other classes.)
Originally Posted by
OldGeezer
Because they don't want to screw the players even more. People are ok interacting with a system with fixed costs and prices. They aren't with a system that fluctuates. Gatherers jack crafters, who in turn jack customers. The prices are way out of sync with SE price menu. Thanks to the beast quests I can buy velveteen cloth for 169 gil, but the cheapest diremite web it costs to make it was 220 gil/ea on the auction house-and you need 2! If gear progression was dependent on crafters you'd have the chaos we had at the beginning where people are charging 1 million gil for 2-star gear when the average person making it to level 50 has 250k via the main storyline. How does one raid legitimately under such conditions. The answer is that most will not be able to. If crafters charged reasonable prices for items you could build a progression system around them, but the simple fact is they don't. They jack the customer and making player-crafting the vehicle for game progression would be a disaster.
However, that does not mean crafting does not have a place in this game. It's market is a secondary market, alt-gear and housing supplies. Lots of people are still grinding alts and since you can't FATE grind to 50 in your birthday suit anymore people will need gear on the way to 50. Lots of people claim that housing supplies are worthless today because FC already have crafters in guild to make their items. That is true, but when the individual housing opens up in a few months, the sky will be the limit because all of those people who "skipped" crafting are going to need their wares unless they want their new house to be 1 empty room.
+
And are completely superficial. Whether i have a pink, jet-black, or orange Artemis bow, you still have an Artemis bow. HQ crafted gear has the same primary stats as green dungeon gear and you have materia slots and dye to customize it. So if you really want it that badly you can get it, it's just that you'd have to make it yourself or pay someone gil for it. It just doesn't drop in a dungeon. That's the real grievance here. It's not as easy or cheap as a 30-minute dungeon grind. Could they revamp gear sets and put a dye slot and remove the pre-assigned materia contribution? Maybe, maybe it will come in a forthcoming patch. The option to customize stats and color exist and you can use it on gear at any level sub ilevel 80.. All it takes is a a little effort.
^ This, for the most part. Though really, it's not the level of importance crafting has in the game that bugs me (I think it's just fine, given what it supplies--though that isn't really much...), so much as that it could be a lot more interestingly integrated into the game. It's similar to how our cross-class abilities fall short. There's no interplay between a sword you've made for yourself and using it, and it's not like you could actually personalize a craft anyways. As a crafter, dungeon drops and their designs while adventuring should be playing into your own ideas (or more concretely, abilities, recipes, etc.) as you come across them and, say, 'analyze' them. Instead, crafting is consistently just sitting at a portadesk and cutting or hammering balls of light. You don't get to know your crafting processes nor the resultant product any better through the materials, and there are never choices within a certain level and class. Rather than part of the game, it feels more like a mini-game that shares an online marketplace with this one.
Originally Posted by
OldGeezer
And this is where we differ. I was totally disenchanted with the 4 minutes of running it took to go from Grindaria to Brentbranch or the 15 minute run to Quarry mill. Sure it was big, but it shouldn't be big just for big's sake. Also, let's be honest here, the graphics for these extended areas sucked. SE chose to go condensed and pretty and I'm glad they did. Sure the monsters aren't that challenging, but then again 1.0 wasn't that challenging either. Some people think open worlds give some tangible benefit to the MMOs experience. Personally, I think it's just an excuse for crappy coding.
I have to agree with you in many respects here, but I do think there is a definite beauty in large landscapes when they are done well. I'd agree that most of the early Shroud was disenchanting, though I did enjoy it, probably for the simple fact that it had Turning Leaf, Treespeak, and Sorrel Havens. But I'd likely enjoy each of those even more as their separate zones, and preferably without being filled to the brim with camps, NPCs, and various doodads. But to me there is a beauty in a smooth but transitive flow of terrain, rather than the sharp and sudden contrast between zones (we could say the same for the border between Drybone and Tranquil before). If smallish zones can still pull that off, then great. But I'd sooner take a zone that's a bit scare of manmade features and takes more than 4 minutes to ride across than one that's built a town, keep, or hamlet half a mile from the one before.
Additionally, a lot of the problems the Shroud had before hasn't improved. A few zones are still awkwardly closed off or labyrinthine. A good deal of the areas here feels like a walk to a vista on some peninsula.
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