Yoshi-P on Character Growth

[Alexander_Dragonfang]

what you think doesn't make it true.

When is support by reason, it does. Reasons for players to know what the truth of the server population and activity is, comes from the need to know how healthy their game is.
Reasons for SE to keep numbers secret are all driven by their need to make the game look good, they are logically much more inclined to hide or alter numbers.

It is reasonable then to think that Players censuses are much closer to the reality than anything SE will ever give us.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

When is support by reason, it does. Reasons for players to know what the truth of the server population and activity is, comes from the need to know how healthy their game is.
Reasons for SE to keep numbers secret are all driven by their need to make the game look good, they are logically much more inclined to hide or alter numbers.

It is reasonable then to think that Players censuses are much closer to the reality than anything SE will ever give us.

Except there have been many people stating they are active and haven't even cleared through 2.55 yet.

There are currently 700ish players logged into balmung under lvl 60. Not going to try to determine the number of 60 players because that would take way too long.

[Musashidon]

When is support by reason, it does. Reasons for players to know what the truth of the server population and activity is, comes from the need to know how healthy their game is.
Reasons for SE to keep numbers secret are all driven by their need to make the game look good, they are logically much more inclined to hide or alter numbers.

It is reasonable then to think that Players censuses are much closer to the reality than anything SE will ever give us.

anything is reasonable if you choose to see it that way. you just said *se has no reason to give up the real numbers and pad/alter it* that is a personal bias i have no reason to see them fake numbers they are one of the top games in the mmo market they don't need fake numbers to beat the lower games that are out there and fake numbers won't be matching wow colossal status.

[Leigaon]

I'll admit, I do like being able to come back after so much time off and play, and sort of catch up. I am sure not a lot of people have the time to do things like FFXI merit grind and luckily the time it takes to level a job is nothing compared to how it was there. Still, it looks like they're focusing on that entire aspect of builds when it could be done a bit easier while keeping the pace of the game for everyone about the same.

Take for example, IMO a well written post, about how we could add special traits to gear http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...nd-other-stats and along the way add them to other gear. Doing it with something permanent that tracks the traits you have or make the items (key items? something not filling up inventory of course) so you can do even a basic build. Going from basic boosts for classes, to something bigger for jobs through AF.

I do like how it feels as if he's saying "Look, I understand and I want to, but there's money involved." which is very true, if we got a chance to implement an idea and it failed..what would we loose? Nothing. Them on the other hand...so I understand where being careful comes from.

The game is easy to pick up and easy to put down, but when you take your time and relax..accept that even though you can do everything you do not have to, it's fun. He acknowledges that people get bored, and will come back. Those who do come back for a month or so, well that's a months worth of payment they get. Also, they can't be doing everything bad if you end up coming back. If you come back to a game you got bored on because you are bored? That's a much deeper issue that a specialist needs to attend to.

[Alexander_Dragonfang]

Except there have been many people stating they are active and haven't even cleared through 2.55 yet.

There are currently 700ish players logged into balmung under lvl 60. Not going to try to determine the number of 60 players because that would take way too long.

That is the issues with the censuses (i never stated they were perfect or accurate) the methods, limited of course in tools and information accesibility. Again, only SE knows "real" numbers. But the censuses are a good guess, they might require some refinement, maybe consider lower level achievements to account for players doing content below level 50, but that is a whole diferent topic.

SE on the other hand, what reasons has to give legit numbers to us? None. What reasons they do have to keep them to themselves or alter them? Way too many.

My point remains, anything players come up will always be more thrustworthy if their method is properly explained (which all these censuses have been doing so far) than anything SE will ever say about this topic.

anything is reasonable if you choose to see it that way. you just said *se has no reason to give up the real numbers and pad/alter it* that is a personal bias i have no reason to see them fake numbers they are one of the top games in the mmo market they don't need fake numbers to beat the lower games that are out there and fake numbers won't be matching wow colossal status.

No, not anything, for example your position.

SE doesn't need to fake their numbers? hiding them is enough. We all know they can't compete in numbers with WoW, no one can. WoW can lose 1 million subscription with the worse expansion in the history of MMORPGs (warlords of dreanor) and still be just fine, FFXIV loses 1 million subscriptions and overnight we have Yoshida speaking about the plans for the F2P transition. Any other MMORPG loses 1 million active players and closes its servers or resets. WoW is not a good example for anything.

What we need numbers for is not to compare to others, is to see our own development. Again, a game director that thinks is ok and seems to be developing content for players to stop playing his game and then come back, is a very bad signal, there is no way arround that, no matter how pretty you want it make to be.

I don't want yoshida saying "is ok for 1/4 of my players to go and play Legion". I want him doing content so he fights to the death against legion for every single player. I've done a better job to keep players playing this game than he has.

[Clover_Blake]

Yes, what I'm suggesting is ultimately a grind, and not everyone is into that, but... So what? If you don't want to grind, don't... If I undertake a long grind to upgrade my Balmung to Lv60 and to a current item level, by doing all the content between 2.1 and 3.4... How does that impact you? If you don't want that kind of grind, just get the current item level weapon through whatever system suits you...

Ah, I understand if that's the kind of content you personally enjoy. I believe they are trying to cater to that kind of players as well with the long weapon quests. Also, gear progression requires you to cap weekly, so that's another goal that takes at least over a month. I don't know, I understand you'd prefer upgrading the weapon of your choice (like I'd prefer a dyeing system that lets me choose several colours per piece, instead of just one), but the current system isn't bad either, is it? ;_;
I mean, I think this game has variety of content for several kinds of players. Of course people will still have personal preferences on things that could be improved, but it doesn't mean that the game doesn't offer things, or that Yoshida isn't trying. also, the game is being constantly updated too, so maybe more systems that you'll enjoy will come in the future. Just my opinion.

[Knahli]

Yes, what I'm suggesting is ultimately a grind, and not everyone is into that, but... So what? If you don't want to grind, don't... If I undertake a long grind to upgrade my Balmung to Lv60 and to a current item level, by doing all the content between 2.1 and 3.4... How does that impact you? If you don't want that kind of grind, just get the current item level weapon through whatever system suits you...

From her previous posts, I gather that she is fully supportive of grind content because she knows full well it appeals to certain kinds of people such as yourself, but what she may have been implying is that not everything can be made that way, especially mandatory progression. Considering also that many people whine about certain types of content just being grind after grind, I think she was also alluding to the idea that: "These people demand longevity, but they hate grind!" which is definitely a real mindset among at least some people.

Never mind, haha. Posted at the same time seemingly.

[Kaurie]

actually it is, you can pretend all you want the info on the census means anything but it doesn't.

until se gives us real sub numbers they are all fake numbers.

I really do not understand how you can think this, and it makes it difficult to argue. The numbers are not fake, but I could agree that they are not precise; however, their lack of precision inflates the numbers, so all we know is that they are less than reported.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

I really do not understand how you can think this, and it makes it difficult to argue. The numbers are not fake, but I could agree that they are not precise; however, their lack of precision inflates the numbers, so all we know is that they are less than reported.

It could also be greater than reported, as many active players havent cleared the most current patches.

[Musashidon]

I don't want yoshida saying "is ok for 1/4 of my players to go and play Legion". I want him doing content so he fights to the death against legion for every single player. I've done a better job to keep players playing this game than he has.

well this is where we differ while you are saying 1/4 i am say the number is lower like 1/10

but they you say but look at the numbers! what numbers? what number of players are we suppose to have at all times? 500k? 1million? 2million?
the game caters towards the players who won't burn out due to not being able to do everything super fast and likely to never unsub.

I really do not understand how you can think this, and it makes it difficult to argue. The numbers are not fake, but I could agree that they are not precise; however, their lack of precision inflates the numbers, so all we know is that they are less than reported.

what's to argue? the numbers are not subs, and the numbers are not accurate you can say oh but they are 10% wrong or 20% wrong but that shows that you don't even know if the number are true so why would i believe something you don't even know?