The game is more dead than it was pre-3.1

[Teryaani]

Wow does it fine and I don't know why SE can't find the same balances wow has. I would love to play wow, but they treat their players like garbage with their cash shop.

SE needs to figure out what wow did in pleasing so many players and try to replicate some of those aspects in this game.

WoW bleeds players badly in the months that follow the release of new content just like we see here. Also, Draenor wasn't exactly a roaring success for them.

[zosia]

WoW bleeds players badly in the months that follow the release of new content just like we see here. Also, Draenor wasn't exactly a roaring success for them.

Again, I gloss over a lot for the sake of brevity. Just look at what wow did right in WotLK and MoP, SE needs to do that. Obviously wow has it problems, but one problem wow has addressed very well is keeping multiple types of players satisfied.

[Teryaani]

Again, I gloss over a lot for the sake of brevity. Just look at what wow did right in WotLK and MoP, SE needs to do that.

Totally agree. I liked the Argent tournament and Timeless Isle (sans griefing) was more enjoyable for me than Diadem was.

[Magis]

Again, I gloss over a lot for the sake of brevity. Just look at what wow did right in WotLK and MoP, SE needs to do that. Obviously wow has it problems, but one problem wow has addressed very well is keeping multiple types of players satisfied.

Totally agree. I liked the Argent tournament and Timeless Isle (sans griefing) was more enjoyable for me than Diadem was.

For what SE copied from WoW, it was the later half of WoW's life, where Blizzard made very dumb decisions. Vanilla and TBC is where WoW made all it's subscriber counts and SE could have looked at their open world environment. I hear WotLK was as good, but the subs levelled off there, and I quit before it cause I saw where the game was heading after TBC.

[Teryaani]

For what SE copied from WoW, it was the later half of WoW's life, where the company made very dumb descions. Vanilla and TBC is where WoW made all it's subscriber counts. I hear WotLK was as good, but the counts levelled off their, and I quit before it cause I saw where the game was heading after TBC.

WoW had moments of smart design even in the later years, they were surrounded by terrible decisions, but they were there. People complained about the grind that the argent tournament was, but I have fonder memories of it than I do of the beast tribe dailies which serve the same purpose (vanity awards and rep with a racial faction). Maybe it's rose colored glasses <shrug>

I would take WoW's vanity pet battle system over LoV in a heartbeat and Timeless Isle was a fun playground most of the time.

[zosia]

For what SE copied from WoW, it was the later half of WoW's life, where Blizzard made very dumb decisions. Vanilla and TBC is where WoW made all it's subscriber counts and SE could have looked at their open world environment. I hear WotLK was as good, but the subs levelled off there, and I quit before it cause I saw where the game was heading after TBC.

Well, I honestly think triple A MMO's need an lfr to survive these days. That's why we needed alex normal. Naturally, something like lfr offends raiders, so Blizz made it up to them with little perks. The best ilvl, bonus bosses, distinct heroic/mythic gear sets, titles, mounts, exclusive mats, accelerated legendary gear progression, etc etc etc.

We don't see a fraction of those rewards for raiding in this game and yet we are supposed to choke down a lfr version, the fastest vertical progression I have ever seen, and BiS weapons being completely unrelated to raiding.

Wow struck a balance with giving the casual crowd a lot more content while giving raiders more rewards too. SE has yet to find that balance and it's causing content to have very short lifespans.

[Terribad]

Surely you know why, IF nothing was capped all people would do is just that, grind untill they cap, then just unsub till next patch, people already do that but it would be far worse. That is just how this game works. FFXI survived for years because getting gear in that game took ages, and LOTS of time and paitence. but when you got gear it lasted years.

But everything doesn't have to be so gated. Majority of people aren't going to grind and then unsub because majority of people don't have time for that. Hence all the complaints about not having enough time.

[Mwynn]

But everything doesn't have to be so gated. Majority of people aren't going to grind and then unsub because majority of people don't have time for that. Hence all the complaints about not having enough time.

^ This. I rather Unsub because when my Esotoric Tomestones have been capped I have to wait.
If this wouldn't been the case, I rather spend more time on other Jobs to gear them, thus not needing to unsub or log off for some Days...

Other Content is gated pretty much ...

[Yukiko]

(..) Things like the elemental wheel, monster weak points (..) A game designer should balance the mechanic not avoid it because they have to balance it (..)

^very well said. Nothing to add here!

[Fynlar]

IF nothing was capped all people would do is just that, grind untill they cap, then just unsub till next patch, people already do that but it would be far worse. That is just how this game works. FFXI survived for years because getting gear in that game took ages, and LOTS of time and paitence. but when you got gear it lasted years.

That was the ticket. The gear lasted.

The way it is here, you struggle to gear up *one* job thanks to stupid daily/weekly limitations, and by the time you finish it's about to be all obsolete anyway.

- people complaining about GARUDA NORMAL difficulty. I'm a 'casual scrub', someone that can't even think about touching savage because I don't have skills for it, but c'mon, Garuda NORMAL?

Garuda storymode is the hardest Garuda fight currently because it cannot be overgeared (at least in the DF, which prevents you from doing it undersized)

Go in with a healer that cannot avoid Mistral Songs (and consequently gets 1-shotted by it) and you're going to have a hard time. Compare this with Garuda HM, where everyone is encouraged now to eat the Mistral Song on purpose just for the sake of getting more damage in on Garuda a few seconds faster because the damage is no longer a threat.