Alright. Let's talk Airship explorations.

[Mug]

I like how the content is modeled, and large FC oriented content is something this game has badly wanted for. But I am quite disappointed they did not follow through with their plans to make airships player-controlled, with intricate, player-filled roles such as helmsman, engineer, as part of the ship's normal operation...

I agree. Ever since 1.0, they've have all these awesome plans for the game, and everything that seems even remotely out of the box gets scrapped or heavily toned down. Like how MCH-guns were supposed to have interchangable parts, and the original idea for FC-crafting (the picture of the two lalafells making a cake comes to mind). Everything has become painfully formulaic. Hopefully Airship explorations will mix it up a bit =)

[Volsung]

I agree. Ever since 1.0, they've have all these awesome plans for the game, and everything that seems even remotely out of the box gets scrapped or heavily toned down. Like how MCH-guns were supposed to have interchangable parts, and the original idea for FC-crafting (the picture of the two lalafells making a cake comes to mind). Everything has become painfully formulaic. Hopefully Airship explorations will mix it up a bit =)

couldn't have said it better myself. Hoping to see not just stuff that's "out there" but stuff thats different
from what we currently have, in a good way, and has some maybe long term goals, group goals or
something different than straight higher numbers gear.

[Reaperking386]

This airship feature is literally what the wow peeps wanted when they got the crappy shipyard feature. so funny.

[Gardes]

I love the whole concept of it, it looks very good on paper. SE has a tendency to underwhelm when it comes to these things, but I'm cautiously optimistic. I wish the actual airship was incorporated more, though. Imagine how fun it would be to have actual aerial combat on board your airship. Would be all kinds of awesome.

I was gonna point out stuff that already underwhelms me but Yeldir has already pointed most of it out. But what really gets to me is people's eagerness to ignore these things or do get bothered about it but then be distracted with SE's superficial offerings like glamours, selfie cameras (don't bother replying to me about how important those things are to you please) and then forget everything else and then continue to praise SE. It's crazy.

I'm already doubting the longevity of this content and the status it will have as a content type. I have a feeling that once 3.2 level cap increase, they will do nothing to exploration and let it stagnate and then at 3.3 just throw in a small amount of rewards to get people to flock there again without actually updating the content of the content. Like hunts. Call me pessimistic but I can't really be anything else when SE is so predictable (already called ships being just cut scenes as soon as it was announced before HW releases).

[Eul]

Is it gonna be a problem if only 3 people in my FC do this? Or should I ask help form other FC?

[Airget]

I was gonna point out stuff that already underwhelms me but Yeldir has already pointed most of it out. But what really gets to me is people's eagerness to ignore these things or do get bothered about it but then be distracted with SE's superficial offerings like glamours, selfie cameras (don't bother replying to me about how important those things are to you please) and then forget everything else and then continue to praise SE. It's crazy.

I'm already doubting the longevity of this content and the status it will have as a content type. I have a feeling that once 3.2 level cap increase, they will do nothing to exploration and let it stagnate and then at 3.3 just throw in a small amount of rewards to get people to flock there again without actually updating the content of the content. Like hunts. Call me pessimistic but I can't really be anything else when SE is so predictable (already called ships being just cut scenes as soon as it was announced before HW releases).

Honestly, if red scrip mats can come from this content it will last for quite a while. There are a lot of pieces of crafted items that are blocked because of the weekly craft feature I could honestly see Crafters using island exploration as a method to obtain the mats needed for crafting rather than using their scrips to obtain said mats.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...=1#post3389394

Depending on the cost of trading in the items I feel like people may prefer this method of obtaining red scrip mats compared to the current method. Even if that's not the case then the other fact remains that because of island exploration items that were once precious and harder to obtain now have a means of obtaining that aren't restricted to weekly tomes.

[Dualgunner]

I have a feeling that once 3.2 level cap increase,

Wait, 3.2 is bringing a level cap increase? o-O

[Akuryu]

Wait, 3.2 is bringing a level cap increase? o-O

He meant item level cap, and yes it will. 230 is my guess.

Honestly the success or failure of this content depends on the amount of variety, and the challenge.

Variety: if the island and monster layout stays the same each time you enter, people will learn the "best" places to go for optimal farming. This will ruin the exploration aspect and make these just as formulaic as all other content in the game. They need to be randomly generated, or at least have many different layouts. I haven't heard confirmation one way or the other on this.

Challenge: Not looking for Savage level here, but this game needs mid-core content and I'm hoping this is it. Monsters need to be hard enough that pulling more than 2 or 3 of them is a real problem. There needs to be stuff out there that can wipe a full alliance. If this is the same as dungeon content (ie, gather up a giant pile of mobs and aoe the crap out of them until dead. rinse, repeat), it will get very boring, very fast.

[Ultimatecalibur]

He meant item level cap, and yes it will. 230 is my guess.

I'm betting 240. i220 A5-8(NM), i230 Tomestone, i240 A5-8(SV)

3.3 will likely add a new set of Airship Explorations that drop gear between i200 and i240.

[Dererk]

I was really looking forward to this. But problems with my last FC that I will not go too far into literally caused it to break down.

I'm in a newly formed FC now while I'm happy FC that have airships get more out of this because we severely lack reasons to do stuff as a FC. It still sucks that we can't get the most out of it because we have no house.

Also I'm afraid people are going to be selling full alliance runs for the high rank stuff. Or if you do join another FC for this they will want you to give up most of the stuff you've obtained on the islands.