Level 50 Dungeon Level Syncs

[Aerowaffle]

You can do this now. Get that dusty ilvl50-55 AF out of storage, make a quick visit to the MB to buy some i49 accessories and weapons, slap all that old gear on, Make a PF party to find other players that ACTUALLY want to engage in such activities (if you can). Bam, just solved an invalid argument for enforcing ilevel sync, while saving the devs from having to write a single line of code.

It's already in the game, you have to get up and do it, as inefficient as it sounds. Players can enjoy that feeling without imposing it on players that would rather enjoy the rewards they've obtained from the latest content.

My work here is done.

Doesn't really solve the problem for new players that don't want to go through such hoops just to experience the dungeon without being thrown into the back seat of the speedrun car.

[KaedrianLiang]

Doesn't really solve the problem for new players that don't want to go through such hoops just to experience the dungeon without being thrown into the back seat of the speedrun car.

Oh but it does. they can use the PF to find exactly what is stated.

Ill lay it out for you.

New Player, wishes to experience that feeling when going through older dungeons.

New player, opens PF, creates a party with the following description. "Running dungeons for the first time, first time bonus included, please only join if you are willing to bend yourself backwards to fullfil my urge for "that feeling" by equipping gear in the range of ilvl 50-110."

Wait for the party to fill.

Only hoop here is making a PF party.

Bam problem solved without imposing restrictions on players that would rather enjoy the fruits of their labor obtained from playing the latest content.



TL DR why would you rather have OTHERS jumping through hoops to fulfill YOUR desire for that feeling Theres a Winner and a Loser in this scenarior. When you can jump through hoops yourself where everyone is a winner in this situation.

[Skeith-Adeline]

Doesn't really solve the problem for new players that don't want to go through such hoops just to experience the dungeon without being thrown into the back seat of the speedrun car.

Rude or not, they're too late. After 3 dungeons, they'll find out that the dungeons are all the same car with a different paint job on them. Trash Mobs > Boss > Trash mobs > Boss > Trash mobs > Boss. The trash isn't interesting; there isn't anything to appreciate with trash. It's pull a pool, burn them, and repeat a few times before the bosses.

Why not have a dynamic ilvl sync system. Since the trash in the dungeons are so tirelessly repeated, implement the ilvl sync when engaging the mini-bosses and boss of the dungeons. Keep the tedious parts less tedious and let the newer players appreciate the bosses.

Again, however, once you run the dungeon once, the only other reason you'll run it again is for a quest or farm. That gets tiresome and you can't fault players.

EDIT: Also, about the current ilvl sync, why? Why 110? That won't help anything... only preventing lower laughable speedruns from becoming even more laughable.

[aisustrong]

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EDIT: Also, about the current ilvl sync, why? Why 110? That won't help anything... only preventing lower laughable speedruns from becoming even more laughable.

well there's one good thing about the sync, helps close the gap when the tank is way out geared by the dps (like i95- tank and i117+ dps)

[kyuven]

Why not have a dynamic ilvl sync system. Since the trash in the dungeons are so tirelessly repeated, implement the ilvl sync when engaging the mini-bosses and boss of the dungeons. Keep the tedious parts less tedious and let the newer players appreciate the bosses.

Whenever people use the word "dynamic" to describe a feature they want, I hear the groans of a thousand testers.

[Aerowaffle]

Oh but it does. they can use the PF to find exactly what is stated.

Ill lay it out for you.

New Player, wishes to experience that feeling when going through older dungeons.

New player, opens PF, creates a party with the following description. "Running dungeons for the first time, first time bonus included, please only join if you are willing to bend yourself backwards to fullfil my urge for "that feeling" by equipping gear in the range of ilvl 50-110."

Wait for the party to fill.

Only hoop here is making a PF party.

Bam problem solved without imposing restrictions on players that would rather enjoy the fruits of their labor obtained from playing the latest content.



TL DR why would you rather have OTHERS jumping through hoops to fulfill YOUR desire for that feeling Theres a Winner and a Loser in this scenarior. When you can jump through hoops yourself where everyone is a winner in this situation.

The exact same argument could be used if the situation were reversed and duty-finder enforced a strict iLvl.

"Oh you want to quick speed-run through a dungeon? Well you can already do that, just use party-finder and go to the dungeon manually."

Telling people to use party-finder just so they can experience the dungeon properly is essentially giving them the middle finger and telling them to manually find people. Using the party finder to get a group of players to run entry lvl50 content at reasonable iLvl is just asking to wait at least 10x as long for people (assuming you ever get a group). People must actually search for the group in the party finder, and the quests even say, "Use the Duty Finder and finish [dungeon name]".

When the dungeon is so laughably under-leveled compared to the gear of the group, the point of the dungeon is lost. You get a reward for absolutely no challenge. And that's what you're fighting for, you're fighting to keep your method of farming rewards while practically sleeping at the keyboard. You sound like you would fight for the option to just have a "Wait 20 min for your reward" option instead of doing the duty roulette.

Rude or not, they're too late

Alienating new players for the sake of people that are grinding at end-game is a great way to kill the game. MMOs need new players to continue functioning.

[Kosmos992k]

Doesn't really solve the problem for new players that don't want to go through such hoops just to experience the dungeon without being thrown into the back seat of the speedrun car.

The folks who oppose restoring balance through level sync do not see this as a problem, and never will. It doesn't matter that ignoring the mechanics in the dungeon and boss fights is not running the dungeon as intended. It doesn't matter what you, I or anyone else (especially new players) think. Seemingly all that matters to that group of people is speed grinding the content into the dirt because it's more convenient for them to do so. I don't for a moment believe the statements that amount to little more than wounded pride, complaining about their new shiny gear being made irrelevant by ilvl sync. That's not the issue, the issue is the time taken. It seems to come down to a matter of convenience and speed for those players vs game balance and playing as intended for everyone else, along with a major dose of helping newer, low level players learn and enjoy the game.

In my opinion, we're looking at a straight conflict between the vested self interest of a group of high level players at end-game who want to grind everything out as quickly as possible, and the more altruistic interests of players who want to play the content as it was intended to be played, and help other players learn and enjoy the game. It reminds me of the differences between hunters who hunt in a large mob and melt S rank marks in seconds vs those who hunt in just a full party of 8, and take down S rank marks as intended. The hunt mob wants the seals as quickly as possible and doesn't give a damn about the actual hunt, as long as they get credit and receive their reward. It's all about speed and the rewards.

I feel like that is actually the greatest conflict in this and most other MMORPGs. The conflict between players who must have everything as fast as possible, and will grind things out as quickly as they can as if it is a race to the finish; and players who want to play the game, and literally take the longer term view of the game, and so do not rush to cap everything in days. This conflict of philosophy is something I just don't think will go away any time soon, and especially on this forum, the representation of the different philosophies seems heavily biased towards the speed run mentality.

In other discussions people have talked about end-game/progression oriented players vs social oriented players, sometimes it devolves to hardcore vs casual and other lebels and name calling, which misses the point IMHO.

Overgearing content in the absence of a balancing ilvl sync effectivelty breaks the game. That's a fundamental issue, and one group has no problem with that, but others do.

[Ashkendor]

In my opinion, we're looking at a straight conflict between the vested self interest of a group of high level players at end-game who want to grind everything out as quickly as possible, and the more altruistic interests of players who want to play the content as it was intended to be played, and help other players learn and enjoy the game.

I love how you portray the people that disagree with you as having nothing but a vested self interest, and the people that agree with you as being altruistic. Just because someone doesn't agree with you doesn't automatically mean that they should be demonized. Personally, I'm against a stricter level sync on these dungeons, but it's not purely out of self interest. What I worry about most is people abandoning the runs when they see there's a new person. I worry about people simply queueing in premades, leaving the queues for the dungeons all but abandoned for the newer players. Because I worry about these things, I presented to you the fact that the veterans that are running the old content for Animus and Zodiac are being shoved back into that content multiple times now.

Look at it this way. We are now doing (as an example) Amdapor Keep for the third time for our Zodiac weapons, and this time we have to farm the hell out of it unless we get lucky in the first couple of runs. If your idea were to be implemented, not only would we have a stricter level sync, we'd potentially be in there with someone that we would also have to teach the mechanics to. While some people may be willing to give a detailed run-down of the mechanics of every single boss fight in any given dungeon, many would either just bail and eat the half hour penalty (which is shorter than some of those dungeons when you're at a lower item level than we are now) or avoid the problem entirely by putting up party finders exclusively for Zodiac drop farming rather than queueing in duty finder.

Neither of these is good for new players because it makes them wait even longer in the queue for the dungeons. Even if they don't get to run the content as it was intended, at least they get to get through the content for progression. A soldiery bonus only does so much. There's far faster ways to get soldiery than to slog through a level synced dungeon with someone that doesn't know anything about the content.

So yeah. Please don't try to make the argument that we're only looking out for our own self interest.

[Kosmos992k]

I love how you portray the people that disagree with you as having nothing but a vested self interest, and the people that agree with you as being altruistic.

What did you not understand in the phrase "In my opinion"? In my opinion, there is a vested self interest among players who want to grind out things as quickly as possible in keeping level 50 dungeons as easy and mechanic free as possible to facilitate speed runs and quick farming. How is that an unreasonable conclusion? In my opinion, people who wish for a stronger level sync to maintain the mechanics of the dungeons, at the possible expense of some speed, are doing so to maintain the relevance of the content and game balance which primarily benefits new and low level players which I think passes the test of altruism. So, yeah, I think I'm good with what I wrote, thanks.