Why vertical progression is poorly implemented

[Lilith_Merquise]

You were never required to do the atma grind. You could have just done primals for weapons or gotten your 110 through raids.

Exactly! There are other and honestly better alternatives to relics, go do Savage Alex or Thordan EX. But if that content isn't for you and your a casual who only does roulettes, dungeon, and leveling grinding. Why is this system a bad thing? You literally can accumulate the atmas on any class, which you're going to do anyway by grinding that over doing more End Game Content?

There isn't even content in this game that makes that weapon even necessary, the fact that a stage 2 completed relic (just fates and dungeon grind, can be done in less then 3 days tbh) gets you an i200 weapon which is your eso weapon but with better stats and not costing Eso? Like how is that a negative. You don't even have to get the weapon because there isn't challenging content enough to require it outside of Alex Savage and Thordan EX, which you're not doing anyway if you are concerned about Relic weapons lol...

[Dzian]

I would just like to point out something about multiple gear sets for a job. With how many don't even attempt to follow a BiS formula in the game currently, do you think they will get multiple sets for multiple occasions, especially when there is so many jobs in the game? RIP inventory space.

It doesn't make sense for this game. It just makes people not want to take on more jobs than one, which kind of defeats the purpose of the armory system. This was even a thing in FFXI. It wasn't simply a ton of grind that made having multiple jobs hard, it was inventory space that held a lot back.

I think part of why people don't follow a BiS formulae is because as soon as they get BiS it's replaced. so whats the point?

[Ibi]

I'm not saying you should spend a year on content and get nothing for it, but a little RNG to make people want to group together and do things rather then burning through content in a day and then having nothing to do is a real shame.

What the maximum amount of time that someone should be able to spend on a particular piece of content and get nothing for it?

A week? Two weeks? A month? Six months?

The problem with relying on RNG as your only method of reward is that no matter how long you think the acceptable time frame is, the very nature of RNG ensures that you're always going to end up with someone exceeding that threshold.

No one's suggesting that every time someone enters a piece of content they should walk away with one of the available rewards. The intent is that if someone persists with that piece of content for long enough (with long enough admittedly going to be a judgement that varies from person to person), you're guaranteed to at least have something to show for your efforts.

Saying that "Atma Grinds" were bad for the game couldn't be further from the truth IMO, it put people in an unpopulated places, and honestly made people discover things that thy wouldn't otherwise know about the zones because nobody did them.

Relevant to the discussion of RNG (and I know it's not necessarily relevant to the point Lilith was making, but it's a good example), what's the benefit to the game as a whole to have those people whose luck is incredibly good coming in, getting all their drops in three FATEs, and moving on?

If the only answer is "To balance out the people who still don't have them after three hundred FATEs", that suggests that it's not a particularly good design.

[Lilith_Merquise]

@milessaintboroguh
Got confused because both require "Atma" an figured nobody would be discussing useless 2.x content when current 3.x content makes it irrelevant... And stating a gripe about something that by all accounts is improved in 3.x just seems like a non-starter for debate. If you're expecting intense stuff from fates, keep in mind people have to do it for leveling, if you want challenging fights, do EX primals or Savage Alex, looking for challenge in fates is just preparing yourself for disappointment. Personally I want to see more out of Diadem bing that it is an innovative system FOR THIS GAME, but also new systems especially ones that harken back to 11 times Salvage, Assaults, and Nyzul Isle. That would make my life in this game.

@Ibi then you plug away? Whats wrong with spending time on content when there is nothing else to do? What are people in such a rush for? The content you get isn't even required to do anything in the game anyway. So why does it matter if it takes you a week or a month? At least you have something to do that you want. And if that isn't appealing to you, then you will tend more towards games that are action and achivement based rather then MMOs that are Time Applied = Reward Appreciation. You appreciate more what you put more time in.

[Velhart]

I think part of why people don't follow a BiS formulae is because as soon as they get BiS it's replaced. so whats the point?

You honestly believe that people will follow a BiS formula for -certain situations-? The average player is not going to get multiple sets for one job to take on one specific task. Not even a lot of FFXI players did this. Again, it doesn't influence people to take on multiple jobs if they feel the need to constantly work on one job. Its a formula that doesn't work with this game and I don't recall people liking it in FFXI much either. Mages having to carry a HQ staff for each element, constantly switching between with macros. Its only needlessly complex. This game despite my complaints does accomplish making the system simple with a lot of depth. A horizontal system with multiple sets just makes it complex without much depth added, which makes it unappealing to the average customer.

[Starbirth]

Exactly! There are other and honestly better alternatives to relics, go do Savage Alex or Thordan EX.

The problem is these alternatives are less accessible than their 2.0 counterparts.

[Belhi]

The problem is these alternatives are less accessible than their 2.0 counterparts.

This is something they addressed though in the last live letter. Midas Savage will have its difficulty tuned down and its rewards tuned up.

[Dhex]

This is something they addressed though in the last live letter. Midas Savage will have its difficulty tuned down and its rewards tuned up.

This doesn't make their raiding structure any less tired or rigid than it has been since 2.0

Alexander Midas will be another set of instanced circular-arena fights exactly like BCoB, SCoB, FCoB, & Alexander Gordias were.

You will deal with another set of four scripted fights just like you did in your Darklight gear when the game relaunched.

Please look forward to it.

[Belhi]

This doesn't make their raiding structure any less tired or rigid than it has been since 2.0

Alexander Midas will be another set of instanced circular-arena fights exactly like BCoB, SCoB, FCoB, & Alexander Gordias were.

You will deal with another set of four scripted fights just like you did in your Darklight gear when the game relaunched.

Please look forward to it.

My comment was primarily addressing the accessibility of Endgame weapons outside the anima options, not the pros or cons of the raid structure itself.

I think the fight arenas could be more interesting but I don't have a fundamental problem with the model. I personally used to find it really annoying back in WoW, having to clear half a dozen bosses every weak that I had already downed so many times I could practically sleep through it and still clear just to get to the boss my group was trying to progress on.

I suspect turn 5 made them cagey about the nature of arenas since the strat for avoiding divebombs was probably not intended and makes the mechanic a lot easier to clear.

[Andrea]

@Ibi then you plug away? Whats wrong with spending time on content when there is nothing else to do? What are people in such a rush for? The content you get isn't even required to do anything in the game anyway. So why does it matter if it takes you a week or a month? At least you have something to do that you want. And if that isn't appealing to you, then you will tend more towards games that are action and achivement based rather then MMOs that are Time Applied = Reward Appreciation. You appreciate more what you put more time in.

The problem comes when people could literally finish the atma stage in an hour when it first came out and some poor person could be still on it and not seen one drop after a month.

That is not good game design. Its ok to make something that takes a while, but RNG is not good.