Make S ranks immune to damage after spawning. You did it for Ixion.

[LeeraSorlan]

All it takes is everyone participating in the hunt to be in agreement that if someone pulls early to let them die to the hunt and then kill it when they're dead and so they miss out instead. They will probably rethink their actions if they that happens a couple of times.

"all it takes" is something quite difficult to do. you are basically asking 100+ players to not attack something.
That will very rarely work. when one person aggros it, nearly everyone wil be thinking "oh shit, if that guy attacked it, everyone else will to" and he will attack it because he doesnt want to lose credit. when 100+ people think that, 100+ people will attack it at once.
thats just how it works.

[QT_Melon]

Speak with all Hunt LS leader in your server and kick him and any of his friends/FC members from all of them. Real consequences do wonders instead of empty insults. Harsh? Sure, but is the only way to really fix your problem for now.

Yeah...that doesn't really work.

[Niwashi]

The alternative is that lvl 50 doesn't get a hit on the boss because a group of endgame players charged in and melted it. You can't have open world content be both lvl 50 and endgame at the same time (except fates I guess), and currently, that's what it is.

Then maybe hunts need the same solution to that problem that FATEs use. Back when the hunt system was new and 50 was endgame level, they didn't need a level sync for them, but by now, maybe they do. Level Sync the level 50 and 60 hunts like they would FATEs. (With both those levels having had a wide range of Item Levels, it would still leave players over-powered for them, but not to the extent that a well-geared level 70 player is against a level 50 hunt mark.)

[Mandudez]

Hunts are meant to be competitive. They always have been been. There's no such thing as early pulling because of that. And that's why the devs never punish anyone for doing it.

In a round about way you could technically report people for posting hunt locations on linlshells and waiting for loads of people to turn up. Because there the ones exploiting the system and not doing hunts the way they are meant to be done....

Best thing they could do with hunts is lock them out so only the party / alliance that has attacked the mark can fight it. Anyone else gets invalid target. Kinda like if you try to kill someone else's level mobs it won't let you engage them.

This would actually promote the fact it's meant to be competitive as well as help keep things challenging. Rather than that a brainless throw enough bodies at it till it's dead.

If hunts were truly meant to be competitive then not a single person would stand a chance at getting the tiger mount. And yet there it is.

[Raqrie_Tohka]

Well, let's use our imaginations for a sec. If a hunt knew that more players will arrive soon, and give it a "good fight", if the hunt crowd of players surrounding it would just wait for a bit, and it really really longs a nice good fight, then it won't even properly engage you until both you and it, the hunt, come to some sort of mutual consensus of rules of engagement. So if programmable, yes, a "smart" hunt that adjusts its difficulty depending on the number of ppl attacking it, being eligible to drop some hunt-specific rare rewards and items (like minions, materials, etc.) if it is happy that it got to have a nice big fight with many players (thus enticing players to wait for more people to do the kill together), and adding extra abilities and "savage mode hunt" to make it more "fun" while more people are fighting it.

The hunt would fight less "passionately" and be weaker if a small party of people tried to fight it at very early or late server hours where there's not that many people awake for a hunt, but in compensation it will respawn sooner so more people will have a chance to go at it again, and also because the hunt "didn't get a good fight" and comes back sooner looking for more fight (and fun). The hunt will also have some sort of "cross-realm a.i." listening in on other hunts, so if a chain-hunt is happening, the hunt will adjust its "expectations" depending on how many people, how fast, and how popular the other hunts in other regions got killed ... and make a mental note of how to prepare. So if you show up at its door and promptly start pounding it it will of course be happy you came, but will not be too pleased that you started "too promptly", and will likely carelessly swap you aside, or "hunker down"/"kite and cc us around" and simply refuse to properly take damage and fight, until the main groups can arrive. Of course if the main group takes too much time to arrive, more than the average time the other hunts had to wait, or whatever is "reasonable", then this hunt will likely realize this is about as many people as it'll get for this fight and "agree" to fight as is, or at a lower "threshold" of the dynamic difficulty. And if it hears whispers in the wind of many people still coming and some early puller starting at it, it'll get really really angry, and promptly chew up that early puller and spit'em out at the feet of the not-very-amused hunt crowd either, as an example to all you early pullers who would "cheat" a hunt out of a good fight, and players of their hunt! XD

[Akura22]

well I agree with Niwashi about the fate for all the S ranks like odin and Ixion fate that need everyone effort even if u pulled without a proper heal u die like a bug. Square-enix team need to balance it through fate system that will enable new and returned players to participate its also give time to people to zone to that area without fearing that they cant get accredit for it

[Canadane]

They're open world content.
There's no such thing as early pulling.
They are not designed for the entire server to come kill.
If you want to kill them, go out and hunt for them.
Any callouts from others through means of hunt linkshells and the like are a courtesy at best. Hey I do it too, I call them out and wait for people to show up, but I'll never be mad if I missed one because I was too late.

[Vivi_Bushido]

And effectively lock it to newer players who, until now, could start their hunting careers at 50. This would still do nothing about the actual problem, mind, especially with power creep. It'll only be punishing lower level players.

I mean... Boost Potions do exist for a reason now... Just saying.

[Brittbratt247]

Going through this right now in my server. I understand they are the ones that spawned it, and I get that they have the right to that mark my only "beef" is there is zero communication with them and others and there are others that are trying to get that "S-Rank" achievement. If there are people that dare go and start attacking the S-Rank they get upset and will say stop calling "dead- hunts" when they were the ones that pulled it themselves. While there are other moments when someone else (Not the four people that consistently do it) will spawn an S-Rank and as soon as the four people get in, instant pull no waiting just for 2 minutes. I do feel that at least a two minute timer when the S-Ranks spawns is great. They also go to a hunt tracker website and will report bad times for when the S-Ranks are spawned. It has caused a lot of conflict and even a undeserved ban of a player that was trying to help others get the S-Rank.

[Canadane]

Since SE cant make up their minds on if hunts should be competitive or cooperative

They have. It's both.
It's designed for a team, not for a server.

Edit: Oh this is an old topic. Man...