Question 18 of XVII Q&A Live Letter

[Souljacker]

So just selfish? For your own personal benefit. Like I mentioned, you can still do every other content in the game with them. Coil is locked for a reason, and a good one.

No, it no longer has a good reason to be locked. Hunts destroyed what little reason SE may have once had to keep coil locked.

I agree that mercs in this game are disproportionate. There are a LOT of mercs, way more than I ever saw in XI, ever. Way more than I ever saw in WoW, ever. Every time I open PF there are 3-4 ads for mercs, a guy in my FC still runs with his merc team (he joined them for a while then came back to us for reasons unknown), half the duties I join there are people talking about either mercing or buying a merc'd run, it's rampant. If SE does not want this method of gameplay they need to crack down on it at the source, not artificially lock out content like coil. That does nothing to curb the mercenary activity.

[ispano]

No, it no longer has a good reason to be locked. Hunts destroyed what little reason SE may have once had to keep coil locked.

I agree that mercs in this game are disproportionate. There are a LOT of mercs, way more than I ever saw in XI, ever. Way more than I ever saw in WoW, ever. Every time I open PF there are 3-4 ads for mercs, a guy in my FC still runs with his merc team (he joined them for a while then came back to us for reasons unknown), half the duties I join there are people talking about either mercing or buying a merc'd run, it's rampant. If SE does not want this method of gameplay they need to crack down on it at the source, not artificially lock out content like coil. That does nothing to curb the mercenary activity.

It's not the mercing itself. It's the fact that people are getting carried. This is the main issue, even if you don't agree.

Yoshida: Do you mean as a helper?
In that instance, my worry is the breaking down of the hierachy when players who are unable to clear content overly rely on those who can and begin getting powerful items. Though I also understand that this concern is purely from a management and development point of view. This is a hard question to answer and is why we've decided to nerf contents incrementally.

[Souljacker]

It's not the mercing itself. It's the fact that people are getting carried. This is the main issue, even if you don't agree.

What is the difference between a FC carrying a less skilled member and someone buying a run from a non-friend group? Either way, carries happen. One just has currency changing hands, so either that's the only issue or there is no issue at all. It can't be that someone is getting carried - what would SE care about that? I can see them caring about the economic impact of the amount of gil changing hands, but then again, this economy is so broken I don't see why they would even bother at this point.

[SendohJin]

What is the difference between a FC carrying a less skilled member and someone buying a run from a non-friend group? Either way, carries happen.

quantity, incentive, general perception, jealousy, RMT.

- an FC only has to carry so many members, a seller group will carry as many as there is willing to pay.
- FC members get bored of doing it after while when the only reason to is to be nice.
- FC carries don't have to be advertised via the open chat channels or the Party Finder for everyone to see.
- FC carries will only annoy other FC members who for some reason don't get carried, Sells will annoy everyone who won't/can't pay
- FC carries don't tempt players to partake in RMT

[Shougun]

It's not the mercing itself. It's the fact that people are getting carried. This is the main issue, even if you don't agree.

Time to make Matt (maat) fights for level or dungeon entrance. lol

I dont think they should develop socially restricting systems to stop playing or helping other players, if they want people to follow a specified path then just do that with skill checks here and there -- not social. They've started to do path progression control with ilevel requirements to enter dungeons, can't enter without having a certain combination of previous stages. Just make the ilevel more strict, can't enter without at least 8/10 of the previous tier ilevel.. that'd certainly put people through more of the content and more opportunity to learn at a good pace (the token system would need to be modified in respect to the highest dungeon you've "mastered" so you can't buy farther than you can play, but otherwise I think that'd help this issue a bit).

Besides the system doesn't stop carrying anyways (indirectly it may have an effect on being helped, but directly it just slows people because of all the social hoola hoops - this group is not just "scrubs").

[Kikosho]

It's a shame that most of this thread is just people shouting about the "horrors" of rampant merc runs should the lockout be removed, ignoring how it screws the general population and FCs. Should just use that energy to think of a way to have the lockout removed, allow FCs to help their own members while simultaneously make run selling more difficult (it's never going away, ever.)

Time to make Matt fights for level or dungeon entrance. lol

While this may have been in jest, this is a decent start. If players have to perform a sort of solo trial to attune themselves to the highest tier content to at least display that they aren't braindead and are proficient at their job & are able to perform some mechanics, it'd limit the ability to sell runs to everyone with deep pockets. Will this hurt FCs as well? Of course, but at least the ball is in the player's court.

[skaterger]

It's a shame that most of this thread is just people shouting about the "horrors" of rampant merc runs should the lockout be removed, ignoring how it screws the general population and FCs. Should just use that energy to think of a way to have the lockout removed, allow FCs to help their own members while simultaneously make run selling more difficult (it's never going away, ever.)

How exactly does the lockout screw over the general population and FCs? Let's get something clear. The only time a lockout is in effect is when someone has cleared the turn for that week. If both parties have not cleared the turn, they can still play together so long as they can find a common time. Whether a lockout is implemented or not would not change anything in that regard. So when you say that you want a lockout removed, what you are saying is that you want to put someone who has not cleared a turn with a person/people that have cleared it before. If you ever run titan ex, or coil with people that have experience, you would know that the difference between an experienced and inexperienced party is night and day. A clear party can make up for your mistakes, can cover you when you are not performing optimally or if you want to put it less audibly pleasing, carry you.

Now you might ask, what is wrong with an fc static helping other members of the fc. This is an mmorpg after all, people should help others right? Here is where I disagree. IMO, the spirit of raiding (and this also draws on my raiding in previous games) should be to go into an encounter "fresh", and watch your team grow and progress until you finally get the clear. And the spirit in which to maintain it, should the lockout be removed, is to have 1-2 experienced players to guide the other 5 or 6 other members. This would be perfectly fine. But chances of this happening are virtually non existant. The group that cleared it has probably spent hundreds of hours wiping to get to that point and don't wish to wipe again with a new team. So what will happen is that they will bring 1 new player in each time. At this point, if the new player can carry their weight in the group, it would probably still be all right but with the way coil is designed, with all the one shot mechanics and the ability to wipe your team members, they would probably not last long before they are told "Just go die there, we'll clear it for you". Add to that the 500 members fc where each member is clamouring for a carry and you can see how this can get out of hand fast. And I'm not speaking out of my behind because I've experienced this personally. We have been rotating people in our coil groups and current members have been stepping out to bring new players in to help them clear it, all this even with the lockout where we can only help one person a week. We have done it for T6 and T7 successfully with 7 man, and are trying T8 and T9 the coming weeks. And I'm sure I'm not the only person here to have experienced this.

[SendohJin]

How exactly does the lockout screw over the general population and FCs?

Here is where I disagree. IMO, the spirit of raiding (and this also draws on my raiding in previous games) should be to go into an encounter "fresh", and watch your team grow and progress until you finally get the clear.

my FC is average sized. we run 4 Coil groups, the top 2 run really consistently, the other 2 not so much, they are mostly comprised of people with more irregular job schedules and/or family obligations. at best it's only possible to run for 2-3 hours once a week and sometimes even that gets interrupted, usually because 1 person has something come up.

so the group ends up either not running for an entire week or PUGing the last spot (or 2) in which they don't really grow/progress together and end up spending more time trying to find someone that can help clear. and that doesn't at all help in progression because you end up with someone who can clear T6 but have to teach them T7 from scratch or you end up with someone who can do T6 & 7 but have no interest in sticking around for the group to learn T8. people with such tight schedules don't have time to put PF up over and over again.

without a strict lockout you can fill those vacant spots with people from the first 2 groups.

[skaterger]

my FC is average sized. we run 4 Coil groups, the top 2 run really consistently, the other 2 not so much, they are mostly comprised of people with more irregular job schedules and/or family obligations. at best it's only possible to run for 2-3 hours once a week and sometimes even that gets interrupted, usually because 1 person has something come up.

so the group ends up either not running for an entire week or PUGing the last spot (or 2) in which they don't really grow/progress together and end up spending more time trying to find someone that can help clear. and that doesn't at all help in progression because you end up with someone who can clear T6 but have to teach them T7 from scratch or you end up with someone who can do T6 & 7 but have no interest in sticking around for the group to learn T8. people with such tight schedules don't have time to put PF up over and over again.

without a strict lockout you can fill those vacant spots with people from the first 2 groups.

I'm sorry to be so direct, and I hope I don't come off as elitist (btw, totally agree with your definition of elitist up there), but people who only have 2-3 hours to raid per week should not really hope to clear coil as quickly as those that can put in more hours. O I mean if you think about it, 2-3 hours per week is really really little, its not even enough to do your daily roulette and beast tribe dailies every day in a week, and you still have ST, pvp on top of that. Raiding is as much about commitment as it is skill. If some people only have limited time, then there's lots of other stuff in the game to occupy them (which are catered for players who play less or at more irregular hours). I really don't think an entire system (which by definition is designed for more hardcore players) should suddenly be changed to cater to these players.

[Exstal]

No, it no longer has a good reason to be locked. Hunts destroyed what little reason SE may have once had to keep coil locked.

There are 2 (likely) reasons Coil is locked.

1 - Keep raiders subbed to get the last of their gear they will need to make the next Coil less painful
2 - High Allagan is reserved for players who can complete the hardest content the game has to offer
2b - Hunts doesn't allow one to get the strongest weapon, although some non-HA weapons can get close.