Hardcore, easy mode and the XI veteran

[Misha]

Good post... Always hear 11 and hard in the same sentence... yet it's just one huge timesink and incredibly shallow/slow (Still a good mmo, just incredibly flawed!). The only thing hard about it was staying awake while waiting for a nm to pop or during a hour or longer fight lmao. 11 was an incredibly easy mmo that was only hard to those who don't know the meaning of difficult or think that timesinks = immersion/difficulty!

[Jennestia]

Good post... Always hear 11 and hard in the same sentence... yet it's just one huge timesink and incredibly shallow/slow (Still a good mmo, just incredibly flawed!). The only thing hard about it was staying awake while waiting for a nm to pop or during a hour or longer fight lmao. 11 was an incredibly easy mmo that was only hard to those who don't know the meaning of difficult or think that timesinks = immersion/difficulty!

Then again we are talking about how MMO gamers these days thinks that having everything handed to you on a silver platter = good MMO, plus anything that takes more than 10 minutes to do nowadays is considered a timesink to the new generation of MMO gamers.

The only timesink in FFXI was Salvage, everything else was player's just being lazy. No other event had such a bad drop rate that you can literally do it for a year just for a CHANCE to get a bad drop rate. No one like Salvage setup. Anyone that does clearly didn't go after Ares gear.

Dynamis for example? Relic armor has such a ridiculously high drop rate I always walk out with at least 10 pieces of even highly sought after gear (Hi, Duelist Chapeau every Dynamis-Xarc run.)

"We're talking about old dynamis!"

If we can't say XI's bad condition on its 2002 launch is why XIV's sucked as "Thats a 10 year old game, this is a 2010 game", you're not allowed to talk about 2004's Dynamis, nor anything SE has long since adjusted that in all of these "XI is bad!" topics people love to forget as they know it kills their arguments.

Btw, for those that don't know~

In FFXIV these are considered time sinks:

Guildleves
Leveling
Collecting Marks
Collecting Seals
Anima restoration
Collecting Aetherytes and Nodes
Crafting
Materia given information

..oh look at that, XIV is also a time sink. This is why people need to lay off of the word timesink and it's liberal usage, because if anything, XIV is more of a timesink than XI ever was.

I never had to collect a type of currency to unlock a job trait in FFXI. See? MMOs are designed to waste your time, that's their purpose or they would never last multiple years.

[Veltaine]

very well said, i ended up reading the entire thing (had to stop crafting for this one)

the problem with XI was that if you werent there for the hours you put in, you werent getting jack, and if you were like me who started the game a few years late, you got bummed. why? cuz no one wanted to do anything anymore, they just wanted end gear, end content, and everything else was squash.. i hope this game lets us take advantage of everything placed,

and when the community flourishes well still have reasons to go back and rerun the older areas.

thank you OP for the great editorial /thumbsup

[Exni]

Good post... Always hear 11 and hard in the same sentence... yet it's just one huge timesink and incredibly shallow/slow (Still a good mmo, just incredibly flawed!). The only thing hard about it was staying awake while waiting for a nm to pop or during a hour or longer fight lmao. 11 was an incredibly easy mmo that was only hard to those who don't know the meaning of difficult or think that timesinks = immersion/difficulty!

XI was far from just being "one huge timesink". Actually.. I guess that is how YOU, the OP, and some others who agreed with the OP 'played' XI. You all choose to run with groups who did things in a very casual manner. Perhaps they were your friends or whatever, but that was your choice. I was in a few different LS's over the years and never felt once I was participating in an event that was a 'timesink'.

Like Jenn said Salvage was just about the only real event that was actually designed to be a timesink in XI. For that reason, from the very beginning I chose not to run Salvage for gear, and would just occasionally go only when my LS needed me. Other possible timesink's in XI could include Relic and Mythic weapons, another thing that alot of people just decided from the start they weren't going to try for. There was nothing wrong with them being in game, and there were plenty of other great viable weapons out there.. but if you wanted it, you could work for it. The fact that so many of the 'gamers' in this thread are claiming that most events were a timesink is a complete JOKE.

Jenn already described how Dynamis truely was.. despite everyone's crying in this thread. I had so much Dyna gear, and within a few months I already had every piece needed for my 5 jobs.. after that I just started collecting the gear noone else wanted. It wasn't even a timesink after I got all my gear because Dyna regulary funded all my jobs because I sold the currency after each run.

HNMs.. clearly if you were in some ragtag group trying to compete against established HNM shells, yes you would probably feel as though it's just a timesink. Again, you chose to run with a casual group and compete against hardcore players. IF you had decided to run with an organized experienced shell, you would know that they keep ToD's.. for every HNM they are currently farming. For example.. I login and the LS message says "Tiamat:ToD; Bahamut:ToD; Faf/Nidd:ToD; Sandworm:ToD; KS99 after last HNM window!" (the ToD is obviously replaced by the actual ToD). So I can then plan my whole day... Say I logged in and already missed Tia's window.. OK Baha's first window is at 2p.. So I go do w/e I want, then at 2p I gear up BLM and head over to Baha's first window... No pop.. so I go and solo on BLM, or craft, or merit with LS member, or w/e until the next window at 2:30p (I can't recall atm if Baha was on hour or halfhour windows but you get the idea..).. No pop.. Continue what I was doing before until the next window at 3p.. POP! I effectively spent MAYBE ~3 mins idling waiting to see if it was going to pop. If we don't get the claim, so what!? I'm definitly not going to go cry TIMESINK THAT WAS SUCH A WASTE OF MY TIME!!!.. I, or someone else from the LS, will get the ToD and try again tomorrow. Within a week or two with at least a decent LS, you'd be able to gear a good number of your members with that HNM gear. OMG TIMESINK!

[Eekiki]

Blargh

You didn't talk about how you paid for your XI subscription.

Not all of us get an allowance from our parents. We have to have jobs that force us to be away from the game a number of hours most days.

[odette]

"Because that's what XI's "hardcore" boiled down to; a bunch of adults acting like spoiled children waiving their toys in other people's faces thinking they were hardcore because they didn't leave their computer for 36 hours whilst camping an HNM.

No skill, no true effort. Just time."

i'm agree with it, remember many players in 2001 we was young and have time for waste in games, the times changes many people have now family and work, less time for waste

i think the real goal of ffxiv is become more accesible for all people that ffxi years ago

but hardcore player thinks that have more priority becaue they spend more time that normal people...

[Jennestia]

i think the real goal of ffxiv is become more accesible for all people that ffxi years ago.

Which is why they make us grind for class marks to buy job traits, yes? Both games are accessible, even to the point XI is on Steam and gotten quite a bit of new players, plus a newbie question introduced years ago made XI quite a bit more accessible.

but hardcore player thinks that have more priority becaue they spend more time that normal people...

You have this mixed up -- It's casual players that think they should have priority because they can't play the game for extended periods of time, so the game has to cater to their lifestyle.

[Eekiki]

"Because that's what XI's "hardcore" boiled down to; a bunch of adults acting like spoiled children waiving their toys in other people's faces thinking they were hardcore because they didn't leave their computer for 36 hours whilst camping an HNM.

No skill, no true effort. Just time."

i'm agree with it, remember many players in 2001 we was young and have time for waste in games, the times changes many people have now family and work, less time for waste

i think the real goal of ffxiv is become more accesible for all people that ffxi years ago

but hardcore player thinks that have more priority becaue they spend more time that normal people...

Which is why they make us grind for class marks to buy job traits, yes? Both games are accessible, even to the point XI is on Steam and gotten quite a bit of new players, plus a newbie question introduced years ago made XI quite a bit more accessible.



You have this mixed up -- It's casual players that think they should have priority because they can't play the game for extended periods of time, so the game has to cater to their lifestyle.

Both of you are right.

Both of you are wrong.

This topic has been beaten to death, ground into sausage, eaten, digested, excreted, and beaten to death again several times over. The answer is always balance.

[Krausus]

You have this mixed up -- It's casual players that think they should have priority because they can't play the game for extended periods of time, so the game has to cater to their lifestyle.

I think you are both wrong, I thing both casual and hardcore want equal attention

[Sephrick]

It seems the OP played FFXI for seven years despite finding no challenge in it. *I'm sorry to hear that.

I started XI in college with a few RL friends. We'd sit in each others dorm rooms and play together in person. That's what hooked me in for the first few years.

After college, we used XI as a way to keep in touch and reminisce. Over the years, those friends dropped out of the game until I was the sole survivor. I went on to a prominent endgame shell called Empire on Ramuh. This was the sort of shell that had people camping HNMs around the clock and had such a large roster that at times we fought multiple HNMs at once, even during events.

Only reason I joined was because I wanted to see some of that endgame gear on my character before I called it quits.

It could have been a MUD for all I care, to me it was about the social aspect. I made a lot of friends in Empire, but the rigors of that style of endgame wore me down. I hit a point where I was just too bored to log in anymore. I slowly logged in less and less, by the end I was using XI only as a chat room with pretty graphics.*

Then again we are talking about how MMO gamers *these days thinks *that having everything handed to you on a silver platter = good MMO, plus anything that takes more than 10 minutes to do nowadays is considered a timesink to the new generation of MMO gamers.

*
I didn't say everything should be handed. Only that everyone should have a fair shot on their own schedule.

If it takes someone six months to a year to finally beat something, that's fine. Whether it's a series of quests or a single monster in a room, a true "hardcore" challenge is one that is overcome by the use of cumulative skill, not by hurdles like "JP midnight" and 72 hour open world spawns.*

That's not asking for a handout, it's asking to trim the fat and give a real challenge.

._. another thread trying to drive our community further apart. this rules.

I'm not trying to divide anyone. I'm only trying to get to the root of it and to weed through the nonesense.

As DoctorMog said, why can't we have both?

To me, Darkhold was testing those waters. A group of players can enter at 45, net some SP and pop a few chests -- casual. Or they can speed through and try to beat DS and Batraal in the 5th chest's time limit -- hardcore. Because just entering is easy, but learning the ropes and doing it well takes skill.

Granted, Darkhold wasn't enough to appease a hardcore crowd for a duration necessary to fund an MMO, but it was a start. Plus it's intended to eventually be a mid level event.*

But the time leading up to Darkhold's release is a prime example. 5 minute reentry times were "easy mode." No need for an obscure drop with a low rate from an outside source for entry was "easy mode." The fact that there were chests along the way that had a chance to give a modest reward was "easy mode." People weren't asking for challenge, they were asking for XI-style time sinks.*

The same thing is happening with chocobos. Being able to get one for 3k seals is being called "easy mode." But getting to ride a company-trained mount is just the first step in a planned mount system.*

It's a case of people focusing their energies in the wrong direction.*

SE has said "XIV will be heavily instance-based." To which people can only say "give us HNMs, raids are too easy."

But now is a chance for that hardcore crowd to influence the future of gaming -- if only they'll stop trying to beat XIV back into the hole where all other MMOs exist.*

XIV has a plan. The main focus of which was and is ease of access. SE *wants everyone everyone to have a fair shot -- or in other words, to actually be allowed to play when they log on.*

But if raids is a tainted word because of how easy they were in other games, tell them why.*

*If HNMs were the best thing in XI, why not suggest having a random chance to see one in raids as an optional boss. That way there's no griefing, or botting or any other sort of nonsense. That way casuals get to do their raid and hardcores have a raid plus an HNM.*

I'm not in the "get hardcores out of XIV" camp. I want both. Some day I may want to take a crack at that HNM in that raid, but there's nothing hardcore about doing nothing for pop after purple pop.*

And if I find it impossible for myself, it'll make me respect those who can win all the more.*

Or maybe seals are the way to go. The "Uber Sword of 1337ness" could be in a chest, the key to which a shady NPC within the Grand Company is willing to part with for the paltry sum of 100,000,000 seals.*

Then make rewards performance-based. If a talented hardcore group decimates an instanced raid, leaving nary a mob behind, then they get more seals than the casual group who barely makes it to the boss.*

That way, a hardcore player will get their item a lot sooner than a casual. And the casual group might just find themselves content with decent cheaper items sold directly by the GC.*

Just ideas, but they're both natural was for both play styles to coexist.*

Dynamis for example? Relic armor has such a ridiculously high drop rate I always walk out with at least 10 pieces of even highly sought after gear (Hi, Duelist Chapeau*very Dynamis-Xarc run.)

...


Btw, for those that don't know~

In FFXIV these are considered time sinks:

Guildleves
Leveling
Collecting Marks
Collecting Seals
Anima restoration
Collecting Aetherytes and Nodes
Crafting
Materia given information

..oh look at that, XIV is also a time sink. This is why people need to lay off of the word timesink and it's liberal usage, because if anything, XIV is more of a timesink than XI ever was.

I never had to collect a type of currency to unlock a job trait in FFXI. See? MMOs are designed to waste your time, that's their purpose or they would never last multiple years.

*
As for relics, the random number generator was in your favor. In my years I saw three rdm hats and two thf hands, but we were dropping pup and blu gear like they were flint stones.*

As for the list of "time sinks" in XIV, the difference is they all build to some ultimate goal unless you fail at it. Every player is given the opportunity to succeed or fail.*

And as for not collecting currency for skills in XI, ask a Mage or Cor what they think about that.*

No one wants easy handouts. Just a fair chance to win or lose. Some might call it a chance to actually play a game instead of watching it. Standing still for hours is not indicative of an MMO.*