Hunts were a terrible/irresponsible idea

[hyperhelios]

Pretty sure I saw Japanese forum people complaining that the S rank monsters have too little HP so I imagine they are having the same issues (but maybe with less raging like on our NA servers)

My favorite irony of this situation is that sharing in XI was definitely NOT encouraged. I'm gonna take a wild guess and say that more people from XI play on legacy servers than others where we were taught that battling gilsellers and raging at other linkshells over claims was just another Tuesday. Not surprised people are back to their old selves hating anyone not in their groups like on the old BG forums. We just happened to complete the circle now, I guess.

[Kallera]

It's not the people on the Naul mark bill that are killing him. That's the issue. The rewards from hunting are too good at the moment with no "casual" alternative.

So we are kill stealing the spawns that other people put up?

[L-D-Omlette]

so you're saying SE is too incompetent to think for themselves? Devs should be able to interpret what players say they want and what they actually want.

it's as if you expect all players to be highly trained and experienced game designers.

The Devs should know most of us hate FATEs and most of us only tolerant Odin/Behemoth or ignore them completely.

As a developer, when someone tells me what they want, I often have to show them that they are wrong in order for them to understand. This means I have to create what they asked for and modify it after the fact. I expect players to be like any other user, oblivious of what development actually entails and not fully understanding what it is they are asking for in a new system.

I'd also like to see your numbers on "most of us." Gauging the forums is not an adequate measure. Odds are that the devs also look at the number of players participating in FATEs to determine if we like them or not. Since this number is likely high because (brace yourself) lots of players do FATEs, even before the relic upgrade was in place, it is not unreasonable for them to think that we enjoy them. After all, if we hated it, we wouldn't do it...

I should also note that I believe that overall the SYSTEM is fine, the only thing (IMO) that needs altered is some of the variables. This doesn't mean that I am against other modifications if it is deemed necessary, just that I don't yet see evidence that it IS necessary.

[Arrak]

So we are kill stealing the spawns that other people put up?

uh... You don't put up the spawns unless you spawned an S. They just spawn on set timers... And you get seals regardless of whether or not you're on a bill. So no one's kill stealing, they're just seals farming. Doing the bill is rather pointless when you get the same number of seals from finding an A in the world and killing it. Like I said, the rewards are the issue.

[Kallera]

As a developer, when someone tells me what they want, I often have to show them that they are wrong in order for them to understand. This means I have to create what they asked for and modify it after the fact. I expect players to be like any other user, oblivious of what development actually entails and not fully understanding what it is they are asking for in a new system.

Often fates are done because they are needed, not because they are fun. There is a reason the majority of them end up barren. They often feel the same, especially if you have a chocobo. Once you have that , any half awake player is capable of face rolling the same 5 objectives with different mob sprites.

The choice for a leveling DPS is either fates, limited amount of leves, or waiting till hell freezes in the df. Are these Fun choices? Not exactly, but FATE are at least the safe and exp getting option.

[AzakaTonnerre]

As a developer, when someone tells me what they want, I often have to show them that they are wrong in order for them to understand. This means I have to create what they asked for and modify it after the fact. I expect players to be like any other user, oblivious of what development actually entails and not fully understanding what it is they are asking for in a new system.

What you said make zero sense for this situation because this is the final project on rollout, not a mockup of one.

As a project manager I understand the need to give what the client tells you they want. However, this is done in a demo environment.

In this case the are giving it directly to a paying client, and that can be a disaster. I am sorry, but if I gave the client what they wanted all the time as a finished product (I.E. @ launch to paying customers), I would be out of a job in short order. There is a big difference between a development team showing a client what they want as a way to get them to understand it shortfalls and introducing it to millions of paying customers and hoping they don't unsubscribe in anger before you can alter it to they way it should have been in the first place.

If you are unable to demo it and are giving it directly to the client (in a case like this where the client is asking for something but may not completely understand the ramifications) it is generally advisable to alter the request to make it best meet clients expectations, not to teach them a lesson that what they are asking for is wrong.

Note I said generally because if the client is another company (unlike this scenario) you really should discuss the situation rather than blindly introduce it to the public without the client's approval.

[Welsper59]

I have no problems with it, but that is not the same as "Open World." People said they wanted open world content and now that it exists they realize that's not what they wanted. What they really want is instanced content in the open world. The two are very different. i.e. Be careful what you ask for, you might just get it.

That's not exactly what was implied with open world content. Open world content, by what most people refer to, is that there are many commonly found things to do (along with any rare-ish things to be found, if implemented). This includes high difficulty/stat generic monsters that can be a threat to level 50. We have that now, with the hunts, but it's only based on rare spawns. It's not the same. I can't just go to say... Mor Dhona with a few friends and hope to spiritbind some ilvl70 gear. I can venture out into any area and practically doze off while going from A to B without any real threat of death, short of actually falling asleep in a high 40s area, but if I realize it at some point, I can easily take out whatever threat that is on me alone.

Then there's also incentive to venture out. A lot of games tend to do this by introducing random spawn loot/treasure. Nothing major, and in most cases useless, but still something to at least look out for and maybe feel good about while you do daily quests. Wouldn't it be nice to find a treasure coffer randomly from time to time? Even if it gives you some Aetherial piece that you don't need, at least you can turn it in for some seals or bind/convert it.

New quests that require us to go out to the world are fine... but it's also not the same as open world content. Open world content serves the purpose of giving the world an accurate feel to what the story is trying to portray. It makes us familiarize with the environment and understand that there is something unique about that given area. For example, we know that Sahagin roam the shorelines of La Noscea and Kobolds hold dominion of the mountainous areas. We know that they're a threat to the area (by story concept). If the story wants you to believe that there is danger out in it, we need to see that in an obvious way. As a player though, the beastmen presence offers nothing but a snooze fest of traveling from A to B for a quest and irritation from the fact that we got hit with a Heavy debuff for 20sec by that lv41 mob. Why not include an area that we can't venture alone in without high risk of death? It doesn't have to be part of a quest or anything, nor does it have to include some sort of obvious reward (like a random spawn coffer, though that would be nice). Useless for the solo player, but useful for a group that looks to spiritbind, especially if it were to bind i70+ stuff. Heck, it'd at least make an S rank elite fight a little more interesting if one were to spawn in that area currently.

With Hunts, they're open world content, but it's nothing different than what we already had. They're singular FATE mobs that aren't tied to a FATE. S ranks are essentially Chimera in Northern Thanalan again... but a lot easier in most cases.

[Sygmaelle]

Are Sands of Time being removed from the rewards in a few more days? I must have missed that announcement.

I dont know, I dont do hunt for that

[L-D-Omlette]

The choice for a leveling DPS is either fates, limited amount of leves, or waiting till hell freezes in the df. Are these Fun choices? Not exactly, but FATE are at least the safe and exp getting option.

Using participation as a measure (I am betting on this being the case as there is no other measure to use) does not provide context, unfortunately. Fact is, players do FATEs so the devs have no indication that players do not like FATEs aside from player feedback from the forum which is not representative of the entire population.

Snip

I agree, and in an ideal world they would be doing beta's on content to get feedback, but they don't. Chances are they have playtesters, and the feedback for this content on a small scale would likely be positive. I stand by my opinion, the SYSTEM isn't broken, the variables need adjusted, that's what hot-fixes are for.

My comment there was to merely address this:

so you're saying SE is too incompetent to think for themselves? Devs should be able to interpret what players say they want and what they actually want.

it's as if you expect all players to be highly trained and experienced game designers.

in that I have ZERO expectations from players when it comes to design decisions because at the end of the day they are users and don't always know what they are asking.

Snip...

I don't disagree with any of this, and would actually be excited if this got implemented. I'm not sure what I have said in this thread that would indicate otherwise. The comment you quoted was in reference to NMs specifically.

[hyperhelios]

I look at the silver lining in all of this. Eventually with hundreds of people teleporting to every spawn with a lot getting nothing they'll eventually run out of gil. 500 people teleporting to a 600 gil location is an instant 300k loss for the server so I wonder how long it'll take...