The game is more dead than it was pre-3.1

[Teryaani]

Who didn't see that one coming?? I'm sure there are a few people who love playing an RTS mini-game in an MMO...I am not one of those people and apparently neither are most FF14 players. Had it been Pokemon style like pet battles in WoW, I might have actually tried it for fun...maybe.

I'm guessing that it would have had a higher adoption rate than LoV did.

What players said: "We want pet battles like World of Warcraft has"
What SE heard: "Players want pet battles to work like Warcraft"

Minion battles, aka Pokemon in FFXIV.

Including the hunting portion. Done similarly to gathering in FFXIV where we get our own nodes because otherwise it'll get salty.

So, let's brainstorm: Fun content.
Content that has replayability beyond any possibly offered rewards, because it offers the intrinsic reward of enjoyment.

Any ideas?

Some sandbox would be nice. Diadem wasn't a terrible idea, just not all that well implemented. Rather than a time limit, have it be a zone that gives us some sandbox experience. Throw in some platforming puzzles that occasionally pop up for us to solve and a mix of fates.

[Colorful]

Including the hunting portion. Done similarly to gathering in FFXIV where we get our own nodes because otherwise it'll get salty.

Not sure I'd want it similar to FFXIV crafting as that's boring as boring can be, but rather just critters you find similar to WoW. Unless you mean only you can see the mob, or rather everyone has their own critter on their screen, in which case that would be nice.

[Teryaani]

Not sure I'd want it similar to FFXIV crafting as that's boring as boring can be, but rather just critters you find similar to WoW. Unless you mean only you can see the mob, or rather everyone has their own critter on their screen, in which case that would be nice.

The latter. Where we each have our own pool of critters to try and capture. I know why WoW did what it did - their game's core mechanic is players competing with players for resources, but it looks like we're in agreement that that would be less fun for a lot of us.

[RiceisNice]

The latter. Where we each have our own pool of critters to try and capture. I know why WoW did what it did - their game's core mechanic is players competing with players for resources, but it looks like we're in agreement that that would be less fun for a lot of us.

I haven't been savvy with WoW's changes to pet battle, but IIRc, there's an immesurable amount of critters out in the open world for you to challenge (or straight up right click and kill, or heroic leap), you can't possibly run out of them even if someone was going on a critter killing spree for shiggles

[Teryaani]

I haven't been savvy with WoW's changes to pet battle, but IIRc, there's an immesurable amount of critters out in the open world for you to challenge, you can't possibly run out of them even if someone was going on a critter killing spree for shiggles

Last time I was on (Timeless Isle) it was reasonably dense with critters and the respawn rate was pretty good. Grief happened, but it wasn't the norm - unlike their gathering where it was the norm. I have a natural desire to reduce the potential for players to wreck someone else's day though.

Given the load that tracking individual ones may cause, SE couldn't make it that dense, but certainly 4-5 on the mini map at a time doesn't sound implausible. Have a skill akin to triangulate that makes them show up.

[RiceisNice]

unlike their gathering where it was the norm. I have a natural desire to reduce the potential for players to wreck someone else's day though.

It prevents the player-run economy from being flooded though; said resource items are in constant demand across the realms, especially in a game where you're limited in what professions you can take (versus FFXIV that allows you to take all).

Of course, it doesn't stop them from having other means of procuring said materials; it's a very, very large world and they don't necessarily have ores/herbs that fill 7-8 different inventory slots per expansion cycle. MoP (and I believe WoD) also have other means of obtaining said resources that don't require gathering.

FFXIV's shards/crystals run in a similar sense where it's a constant demand, but everyone can gather it, there's no limit to how much it can be gathered in one given time, and the market gets flooded by it.

The broken foundation of the game is really starting to catch up to them.

This entire process of releasing content then releasing content with better rewards for "catch-up" purposes is the core of the problem.

I would not say it's the case, at l;east not the primary one as of now. Even motivation to do A3s has been at an all time low before 3.1 came out. It'sj ust way overtuned to expect a typical static to clear, let alone have the patience to slam their heads in it for the past few months.

The other side of things is their homogenized game design means they are pretty much out of new mechanics options. The fights are just getting to be downright boring because they all have to be designed with a 2 tank, 2 healer, 6 DPS composition in mind. And beyond the mechanics are all dead simple and similar simply because they refuse to give jobs defining abilities that could be designed around because of this silly fear that you might have to bring a BLM to one encounter and a SMN to another.

This is exactly what they want to avoid though. You saw what happened with Paladin for Savage in general, it's a piss poor choice compared to a DRK who is essentially better in every aspect. Homogenizing the utility of a job isn't a problem, and realistically fights should not be tuned to cater a specific party composition outside of the norm (it should be perfectly capable of being cleared with 2 tanks, 2 healers, 4 dps and not have outrageous outliers for taking one job over another)

The biggest defining feature of FF14, the Armoury System, is completely pointless because of the silly lockouts and limitations of consuming most of the game content on a single job. No repeatable quests to help other jobs level up, stupid alternative path gear that is always weaker than the best stuff making it difficult to raid with secondary jobs until the restrictions are lifted and making all of that pointless again because a new set of better, locked content is available.

Until they make job exclusive acessories (RIP ring armory), this is going to be the case to prevent players from gearing faster than others. And even then, the armory system is a farshot better from other MMOs that require you to create an entirely new character to play a different job. I honestly think it's fine as is; players shouldn't feel the pressuring need from the game to gear up all of their jobs. And even then, that's what the catch up patches are for, for players whom have geared up their mains already through eso and raids.

[Teryaani]

It prevents the player-run economy from being flooded though; said resource items are in constant demand across the realms, especially in a game where you're limited in what professions you can take (versus FFXIV that allows you to take all).

Granted, but enough players aren't completists like us that the market for materials and gear is still okay. I know they regret the decision to allow us to have all classes, but it was the selling point for this game for me. I never would have picked it up otherwise. You can see that regret in the inclusion of the specialist system that they're testing the waters with. I can see that there will be more and more specialist recipes as this expansion cycle rolls on.

This entire process of releasing content then releasing content with better rewards for "catch-up" purposes is the core of the problem. Stat progression is so linear and so simplistic that they simply design half there content out of existence with new patches which is just ridiculous. Not only that but they spend so much time and effort on designing redundant "alternate" progression that basically isn't used by a chunk of the population one way or the other. Then on top of this Yoshida is starting to complain that his team doesn't have enough resources. I mean, no sh*t? You push everyone to a tiny bit of new content every few months. Then to make content relevant they have to pull terrible design decisions like putting the best gear in Diadem to actually draw people to the content. Again this core of this issue is the terrible progression plaguing the game.

You're not a fan of vertical progression I take it. I get that. The treadmill gets tiresome. I'm not a fan of the treadmill, but I'm also not a fan of horizontal progression entirely either. There is a feeling of accomplishment and advancement in upgrades. This patch was a bit...odd...in how they did it and hopefully they'll learn from it.

Yoshi is complaining, I think, because his team did a huge amount of work in salvaging a failing product and bringing a nice chunk of revenue to SE and they're not getting the team they need to keep it up. That's corporate culture and has nothing to do with the foundation of the game. His patch cycle is aggressive but it's what's needed to keep players interested, at least in the short term.

The other side of things is their homogenized game design means they are pretty much out of new mechanics options. The fights are just getting to be downright boring because they all have to be designed with a 2 tank, 2 healer, 6 DPS composition in mind. And beyond the mechanics are all dead simple and similar simply because they refuse to give jobs defining abilities that could be designed around because of this silly fear that you might have to bring a BLM to one encounter and a SMN to another.

That's not a silly fear. That's a fear that you can see played out in other MMOs.

[Nominous]

I honestly think it's fine as is; players shouldn't feel the pressuring need from the game to gear up all of their jobs. And even then, that's what the catch up patches are for, for players whom have geared up their mains already through eso and raids.

If the point of the Armory system is to provide players the freedom, which is what it seems to set out to do, then I think what they said is pretty accurate. The gearing systems in game (all mostly revolving around a weekly cap) act counter to that idea of freedom. You're locked down for about 2-3 months (Tomes/Raid Team locking your gear) before any of that freedom is really tapped in to. At that point you might as well make a new character, because you'd honestly have more freedom that way. If you have the time, it's far more beneficial to just make an alt.


Also, the other things they said ring pretty true as well. A lot of the problems with the game right now are things that only exist because of poor structure. I don't need to reiterate too much, but like half of the content they make cannibalizes itself. People know there's catch-up patches, so the motivation to do things is shot when they know they can wait, do something far easier, and get similar upgrades. Boring gear amplifies this problem. With only higher stat points on the line, a lot of the content people do is far too much of a hassle. It's too little reward for big hurdles. How much more would you want to beat A3S if it gave a chest piece that gave you cooldown reduction? Or if it gave bottoms that increased the available time on a buff, or extra stacks for a skill? Change those structural blemishes, and you have a game that people are far more motivated to play.

The other biggest problem is homogenization, even though I might not agree with where they're coming from on it. I think having balance is great, and FFXIV was one of the first MMO's to show me that you can have a fun game that IS balanced. However, too much of anything is bad, and that's where they've landed. They've designed themselves into a hole of, "Every tank needs an invincibility skill, every tank needs these damage soaks, every healer needs these effective heal potencies," etc etc. There's never going to be a unique or creative take on either of those roles, because whenever one emerges (AST) it can't exceed (kill other jobs) or fall below (kills itself) the standards the others provide. DRK is only as good as it is because they specifically created content to make it the best choice (DPS checks and magical damage). DPS are the only place creativity can thrive, and even then, I've got my own issues pertaining to how they all play the same (burn all cooldowns all the time, as soon as they're available, no exceptions).

[Bourne_Endeavor]

I think the fundamental problem with 3.1 is the five month delay. While not an entirely large patch regardless, this fact was further compounded by many twitting their thumbs in monotonous 'anticipation', only to discover the "big update" amounted to a grind fest dungeon and a mini game no one actually wanted. Frankly, I find it baffling the sheer amount of time they dedicated to Lords of Verminion, especially given the minimalist additions elsewhere.

Unfortunately, the larger issue runs completely contradictory to Yoshi's vision: game difficulty. Very little content lasts long enough to keep people hungry. They need to either find ways to tune old content, if re-running it is their intended direction, or establish an actual midcore scene. It's not exactly reassuring to hear they don't want to offer fights comparable to Thordan EX's difficulty. Imagine if all the Primals got a lvl60 overhaul, a full new arsenal and were thus vaulted to Thordan EX? It would keep people busy. Instead, the devs seem resolved to release easier content that far too many end up blowing past.

That all being said, do I think the game is dying? Not even remotely. Much as we many fancy believing otherwise, the forum represents only a small fraction of players. People seem more inclined to congregate to certain servers, or are exclusively focusing on their own groups. But I sincerely doubt the population is dwindling. I suppose that too could be argued as a problem, considering it does not promote much motivation for the devs to change their current paradigm.