Do the live letters from the producer really help us as much as we'd like them to?

[Eloah]

Okay so, I read the preliminary patch notes for 3.1, and for the most part they aren't bad, but I noticed a few things that appeared to be missing, that I know a lot of people have been asking about. Now I could be jumping the gun, and they could show up in the real patch notes, but from my experience 9/10 the preliminaries match the official notes to a T. Now the issue is these issues should come up during the live letters, but they never seem too, and us players are left wondering, when will we hear any news regarding them.

The missing information I am refering to is as follows.

Egi Glamour System - we were told before 3.0 was ever mentioned that Summoner was gonna get new summoms in the expansion. Well once information about 3.0 started hitting we learned otherwise. The idea changed, people were upset but embraced the changes and acknowledged the new glamour system. Well we haven't hear anything about that system since a little after 3.0 launched. Now based on everything SE has said, the Egis should be made already, they just need to impliment the system and the animations. During the live letter it would of been nice to find out an estimate of when we'd be getting this since it's one of the top things people wanted to know about.

GC Ranks - our ranks have been stuck at second lieutenant since the start of 2.0, and people have been asking when will we get a higher rank, way back in 2.0 as well. So why can't we get an idea or an estimate, so we know to maybe back off a little. A little thing such as saying, "we are looking to increase the rank around patch 3.3". Can it really hit in 3.35 or 3.4 maybe, but something so we know that by the time that patch launches we can increase our rank, at least by 1 level.

More Inventory - possibly the highest demand there is, but we never get an official answer. We either have to buy extra retainers or deal with our cramped inventory space. Granted we get answers to this but only in the form of "no", which shouldn't be. You can't add items on top of items and not expect people to complain about the inventory space issues. This is 2015 almost 16 there should be a method of increase the space to some degree without implying that we have to pay for it. Maybe charge us in game currency, make it so we can have a personal chest if we own a house, or another armoire in the inn room that can hold crafting mats, something.

Class/Job Abilities - this one might be a little controversial but I'm including it. In every major patch we expect certain jobs to be adjusted, which is fine. Nerf or buffs, we expect them and acknowledge that they are probably coming. But when an overwhelming amount of people indicate that an ability is down right "broken" and it isn't adjusted, it is annoying in the biggest way possible. And while not the ability I am refering to, look at how the original Tri-Disaster was handled, it was horrible and everyone said so and asked SE to change it. Well they finally did, in 3.0. We shouldn't have to wait until another expansion for certain moves to be adjusted. Moves like Royal Road, Shuffle, Wanderer's Minuet, Wanderer's Paean, Dissipation, etc need some acknowledgement regarding possible changes. (I mention those moves because those are the ones I am aware of because I play those jobs, I am sure there are others, I think Warrior has a few too, lol)

The point I am trying to make with this post is, that the reason for the live letters is to keep us, the players, in the loop. But sometimes it feels like the biggest issues we have are pushed aside for some things we didn't even ask for. And while some of these new features or items might be nice, sometimes I feel like these things are only brought up to distract us so that we stop asking the same questions. But since we get no answer, or a pity vague answer, it only makes us madder. Most of us are reasonable people and don't expect these things in game like tomorrow, but it would be nice if we had an idea around the time we should expect it. Similar to when Heavensward lauched. We were told near the end of spring, like end of May begining of June. Well we officially got the end of June, so it was okay. We need stuff like that SE. But regardless we do thank you for your hardwork.

TL;DR - during the live letters do the producers just show us newer, slightly interesting things, so that we'd go, " Ooo... shiney" and forget the really important questions that we aren't getting answered?

So what are everyone's thoughts on this topic?

[l---------------l]

My thought about your thread is that you went directly to the grain, and I like it.

Because it's also the same opinion I have about the letters of the producer, I see it only like a "shiney way" to introduce incoming stuff, but, it's never something to keep us tuned to what we really want to see. Basically, it's just a teaser.

I want more inventory since ages ago... I want to use a carbuncle since the very moment almost two years ago it turned into a damn garuda-egi most of the time... But... Nope... And, damn... We are the warrior of light, the uber champion and.. and... The second liutenant of a GC.... (insert here a lots of "wtf-lol-really?" comments.)

And I also have to add that, most of useful information we always take come from some thread of general discussion where people is nice enough to show interviews that Yoshida-san does. But, those interviews are never officially linked to forum and we lose some information than most of times is more valuable than the letter of the producer.

[StriderShinryu]

I think the letters generally do what they are intended to do, which is try to let the players in a little on the development of the game and to potentially get them excited about things that are to come. I've never really expected them to answer the tough questions about the state of the game or to directly respond to pointed questions. Not that those things don't have a place, but I've never felt the Live Letters was that place as they are more of a promotional tool.

Also, I think it's important to remember that not getting the answers you want is not the same as not getting answers.

[Jeykama]

I think you're fixating too much.

Egi Glamours - Blatantly unfair for one job out of 12 to get a customization subsystem. Maybe 2 out of 12 if you want to throw scholars a bone. Devs mentioned that reason in nicer words when SMNs didn't get new egis in 2.x, maybe it still applies. My hope is that if they do announce it, it will be alongside ability customizations for all the jobs.
GC ranks - We've been disconnected from GCs for a long time. Maybe in a future story patch or more likely attached to PvP. Not important and will come when it comes.
Inventory - I have all crafters and gatherers at 60 with all the 2* crafter sets even. If I wasn't a packrat with glamour my inventory is tight but still pretty much fine. Dunno how other people collect and keep so much stuff. I don't.
Ability adjustments - they've adjusted abilities every patch? not sure how unaware you are of AST getting a million buffs, PLD shield swipe going off GCD, Minuet/Gauss getting a damage buff, etc. It may not be the adjustment YOU want but it's there. Dissipation is pretty stronk and they stealth-buffed W.Paeon to remove pacification and mentioned they were aware there didn't seem to be much utility for it atm.

Personally, I like new things and Live Letters are good for that.

[Colorful]

Egi Glamour System

It's quite clear why they don't want to state an estimate, the playerbase will take that estimate as "it will release in this very patch" and the developers know that. Setbacks happened and unexpected issues arrived? Prepare your booty for 10,000 forum posts to be made about it in the span of days, because they didn't meet this "estimate". I'll have to assume that other things took priority, because they are more important and actually factor into gameplay. For example, chocobo and mount out at the same time, Mudra changes and the whole heap of QoL that have arrived in this patch.

GC Ranks

They said they are working on making it more than worthless ranks, the ability to recruit an entire platoon of soldiers, make it fun to rank up, etc. I'm honestly not quite sure why people want more ranks if it brings absolutely nothing to the table. It will be ready when it's ready, why do you want it to be nothing more than useless ranks?

More Inventory

Definitely an issue, but not something they can discuss on the Live Letter. It's a problem with the budget and from a forum post I've read, Yoshida was quite aggressive to the president on the anniversary stream regarding this. They can either disappoint us by saying "It's not going to happen", or stay silent about it so there is no shitstorm on the forums.

Class/Job Abilities

It's like they're deaf to the complains of every player out there regarding this, do they not browse the forums for each role and get an idea of what people want? I definitely agree here, but this is something that doesn't need to be in the Live Letter imho, just something that should be addressed.

I think you're expecting something entirely different for something which is meant to be a showcase of new content, that's all it is really. We've known this for a long, long time when they blatantly ignored 90% of the important questions in the Q&A thread. For what it's worth, the Live Letter is a great thing for the game, and I think it has its place. It tells me what I want to know about the new content, little snippets here in there. If you go on expecting anything else, you're going in with the wrong mentality.

[RiceisNice]

SE definitely has a habit of not meeting expectations, overselling in previews, or both. The greatest offenders I can come up with the top of my head (imo) is the summoner egi (DWT is a nice alternative, but honestly this is something that you'd should really follow up on considering it's intergral to the job) and MCH's overall design in comparison to BRD (which is one of my biggest peeves, and similarly falls into the same category as SMN with intial presentation scrapping, except it doesn't have the benefit of having a nice alternative in it's place).

GC ranks and anything else GC related has all been forgotten so far, with the exception of frontlines (which at this point can't even be considered more than a glance with reference to your GCs). There's litereally no involvement with your GCs in any 3.0 content except for frontlines.

[Gunspec]

A letter from the producer that airs a few days before a patch is obviously going to stick to telling us what is in the patch. If they aren't talking about the things you want to hear, its probably because it isn't in the patch.

Sure, there are plenty of things they could talk about concerning the direction of the game, and they do that occasionally. But I'm sure just about everyone on these forums could hit word limit cap listing everything they've SAID they were adding to the game that has since been forgotten about.

When you throw Yoshi-P's quotes about personal housing in his face before each live letter, you can't blame him for keeping his mouth shut about things that aren't already set in code.

[SendohJin]

Egi - a lot of work for a small population with almost no gain, they'll get to it when they get to it, they haven't gotten to it so there's nothing to say.

GC Ranks - they want to add content to go along with ranking up, they haven't done that content yet as new 3.1 is all about airship stuff.

Inventory - it's obvious they want people to buy extra retainers, saying it out loud is bad PR. they have no reason to hurt themselves.

Class/Job Abilities - people want lots of things, they don't go into details until they know what they are going to do. and lots of changes have balance issues, these changes are not about giving people what they want/ask for.

[Eloah]

snip

I am aware that not getting the answers I want and not getting answers at all are 2 different things. The only issue I brought up, that has been answered was the inventory issue, the other have had no response, to my knowledge, since 3.0 launched.

snip

In regards to the egi glamours, it is completely fair, because while it may be one job it is accesible to everyone. How would you apply a system like that to the other jobs anyway, barring scholar. And as for SMN not getting new egis that was an entirely different reason than the one you are implying. As for the GC rank, people are just curious nothing more. And with the abilities I think you may of missed my point. I am not talking about the changes that have occured, I am refering to the ones people are still asking for since they too are QoL changes.

In regards to the moves I mentioned.

Royal Road - people are annoyed they can't use it when they would like, it automatically is used with the next card. While not major, people would like it addressed.
Shuffle - this move is broken, period. The whole point of the move is to switch the card you got because you don't need it. But if you get the same card 80% of the time, what is the point. There have been many suggestions for changing this move for the better.
Wanderer's Paean - This move is good in theory but bad in execution, and serves no real purpose. Simply changing it to an AoE would make it so much better, but there is more that can be done to it too.
Wanderer's Minuet - the buffs to this move have been great, the issue that still exists is the clunckiness it still has; similar to mudra lag. Remember, unlike Machinist, Bard had this skill tacked on, where as Machinist was designed with it from the start. That is the issue that this move still has.
Dissipation - this move is okay, highly situational, but okay, yhe real issue is once the move is gone and how you get back into your normal groove. People have stated that maybe you automatically switch to the other fairy to encourage swappin, allow for an mp free summon or an mp fueled instant summon. The Fairy is part of your resources and once she is gone you "have" to get her back, but the price to get her back outweights the slight increase you had for 30 seconds.

[Canadane]

GC Ranks - our ranks have been stuck at second lieutenant since the start of 2.0

Longer than that... I walked into 2.0 as a Second Storm Lt.