Goodbye Battle Regimens

[Alcide]

The thing i liked about SC and MB was that you didnt just have to plan it every time, it could be totally spontaneous without even needing to have a 'prep talk' about it. I mean sure, you could set one up and sort out who does what before hand, but sometimes you could just go in to a party, someone would let out a WS and before you know it you've got an SC and an MB right there. It was just nice to see random initiative and a reward for it, without the need to plan ahead once in a while. It was also fun when you were new and pulled them off by accident, which wasnt too hard to do.

In its very first incarnation, my experience with BR on the fly wasn't great. If i tried to initiate one myself, no one would realise. If i tried to alert them to what i was doing everyone was all 'huh!? what? BR actually does something? what do i use? did it work? did i do it?' and the whole time we're being whacked away at by whatever we're fighting. This was real early on though, i dont know how much it changed along the way, after that experience i was loathe to revisit it. I think some of the DDs in my old static would play around with it but i never even noticed.

Are you serious?? o.O I remember in random exp parties I used to have a macro announcing my WS in 5 secs, saying wich WS I wanted people to use and wich SC would have come out, still I was having a hell of a time getting people to do that. Also I had to remember all of the different combinations and update my macros based on the party setup.
I never ever saw a SC coming out of nowhere.

BR is much easier, the only problem people have with it is that they don't know how it works. If I have to do BR first I ask if everyone know how it works, usually they don't, so I spend 2 minutes explaining how activating it and what different combination does. Then, since I am pretty familiar with the system I tell them that I'll open the BR whenever I see more than 2 ppl with TP and that if they see a normal attack they have to stack another normal attack, if they see a WS they have to stack a WS. This is just the basic knowledge of the system, there's much more to know when you're doing it in a well trained party fighting NM, but it's still ok for grind parties.

After explaining this usually the flow of the battle is pretty quick, there isn't any waste of time, any wasted WS or any failed attempt, it's easy to explain and easy to remember and once people see the benefit they love it.

[Orca]

Are you serious?? o.O I remember in random exp parties I used to have a macro announcing my WS in 5 secs, saying wich WS I wanted people to use and wich SC would have come out, still I was having a hell of a time getting people to do that. Also I had to remember all of the different combinations and update my macros based on the party setup.
I never ever saw a SC coming out of nowhere.

BR is much easier, the only problem people have with it is that they don't know how it works. If I have to do BR first I ask if everyone know how it works, usually they don't, so I spend 2 minutes explaining how activating it and what different combination does. Then, since I am pretty familiar with the system I tell them that I'll open the BR whenever I see more than 2 ppl with TP and that if they see a normal attack they have to stack another normal attack, if they see a WS they have to stack a WS. This is just the basic knowledge of the system, there's much more to know when you're doing it in a well trained party fighting NM, but it's still ok for grind parties.

After explaining this usually the flow of the battle is pretty quick, there isn't any waste of time, any wasted WS or any failed attempt, it's easy to explain and easy to remember and once people see the benefit they love it.

I guess we've just had different experiences. ^^ Excluding a few new players, i never came across anyone who didnt know how to SC, the only reason i saw a decline was because people just couldn't be bothered to do it and that wasnt until around the time Aht Urghan came out. Im not sure if that attitude bred a generation who didnt know how to use it, or what but when i played there were more than enough players who could close a SC without having to be commanded, i loved doing it and id close them myself or do the MB. I havent touched it in a couple of years but people i know who still play are often very surprised to see a SC or MB below the 50's now. When i first got the game there were random SCs and MBs all the way up to crawlers nest, it wasnt til after that that i noticed it got a bit more organised.

I'm not saying BR is bad or ineffective, i dont disagree with anything you said. Again, maybe we had different experiences and you were out there on day 1 BR'ing for all your worth and taking to it like a fish to water. For me? I found it an annoyance for a variety of reasons. I do like SC and MB, but im not hung up on it, im cool with BR being the system, i just liked XI's system and picked it up very quickly. I found it fun as soon as i tried it and not stressful, unlike BR which i found clunky and finnicky, (my opinion) but im totally aware that i dont have experience with it, and im more than set to have another bash once SE brings it back.