State of the Game: The Problem with the Current Progression System

[Jojoya]

It's a MMO. You can't have continued progression or the gap between long time players and new players creates an unbalanced experience.

XP points exist to get the player to level cap. There's no reason for there to be continued reward once there. XP also gets replaced by things like tomestones in some content once you've reached level cap so there's your equivalent of a treasure coffer.

Regarding things like teleport costs and speed increases: if you put a cap on those, then you've once again stopped progression and you've recreated the original issue you want addressed. People will start asking for more rewards to replace the ones they can no longer earn. Where does it end? Do those bonuses get taken away once level cap is raised so they can become meaningful again once the player has reached the new level cap?

Your idea for using merit points to buy unique items sounds an awful lot like the Achievement Certificate system already in place. The only current drawback to it is that it primarily offers the old veteran rewards with few new rewards being added. SE really needs to expand what rewards are being offered.

Regarding using gear to impact how jobs function, just a flat out no as far as I'm concerned. Once you start moving job function from character progression to gear progression, you've just killed the player's investment in their character because their character no longer can progress and they rapidly lose interest in the game. Go play WoW and see what a disaster that turns into.

I'd quite like to see some sort of progression at level cap.
I've leveled everything I possibly can now and I really only need to log in once a week to run Alphscape to upgrade gear I don't need.
Having some sort of incentive to log in and progressively improve my character is and should be what an MMO is all about imo.

No. An MMO is about playing with other people. It's not about endless progression.

If you feel like you've hit the limit for what you can do with your character, create an alt and start the process over again. That used to work very well for WoW because it kept characters fairly close in progression regardless of whether a player had 6 hours a week to play or 30. Then Blizzard caved into the part of the player base that wanted endless progression. People felt overwhelmed. They felt tied to a single character and every moment not spent playing that character was the character failing to progress. It went from being a game to being a never ending job.

Go play WoW if you want endless progression.

[Ilyrian]

No. An MMO is about playing with other people. It's not about endless progression.

If you feel like you've hit the limit for what you can do with your character, create an alt and start the process over again. That used to work very well for WoW because it kept characters fairly close in progression regardless of whether a player had 6 hours a week to play or 30. Then Blizzard caved into the part of the player base that wanted endless progression. People felt overwhelmed. They felt tied to a single character and every moment not spent playing that character was the character failing to progress. It went from being a game to being a never ending job.

Go play WoW if you want endless progression.

Why go to such extremes? I need something to do. There is literally nothing to do in this game once you've leveled all the jobs.
If you remove progression you're not playing an MMO - you're playing the Sims.

[Nariel]

Why go to such extremes? I need something to do. There is literally nothing to do in this game once you've leveled all the jobs.
If you remove progression you're not playing an MMO - you're playing the Sims.

Its false.

Gatherer and/or crafter, PvP, treasure map, triple triad or verminion or whatever. Gear every job, sadic raid or ultimate trial are here too.

There is plenty to do, but you don't enjoy them its quite different.

[Ilyrian]

Its false.

Gatherer and/or crafter, PvP, treasure map, triple triad or verminion or whatever. Gear every job, sadic raid or ultimate trial are here too.

There is plenty to do, but you don't enjoy them its quite different.

I've yet to see anyone who claims to like Verminion. PVP...really...reallly?!

Anyway - clearly I enjoy something that you guys don't. You carry on with your ERP or whatever it is you crazy kids get up to.

[LauraAdalena]

Alright, let's look at these proposed ideas.

1. Good idea to not do: Cite Destiny 2 as an example for anything given how divided opinions are in it (at least, that I've seen). That being said, let's actually look at what you cited before dismissing your argument entirely like a jerk.

So, are you proposing a light engram system? Because that's what your post implies given you said that's what Destiny 2 does well. Here's a fact: It doesn't. That system is constantly being fiddled with by Bungie to influence players to buy their lootbox variant. So, I'm going to give a hard disagree with this statement. Do I believe we should have a better endgame system for max level? Certainly. But this is not the example I want going into it.I also would say random rewards should be limited to side dungeons such as The Lost Canals or Aquapolis. It works fine there. If I were to amend your statement, I'd do it as such:

1. So first up, give a treasure coffer of set rewards that help progress a player further from where they are. Something that gives gear meaning past their current ilvl value even if it's merely some item it becomes later. Could be random chance drop or some coin/token they redeem later.

At least, that's my opinion.

2. The problem with suggesting FFXI items into FFXIV is that MMO design has changed greatly. I'm not against a merit point system, but I'd much rather it not be any of what you said in terms of your merit rewards... except one, but even then I'd change it in one way.

h. Use Merit points to buy unique mounts/minions/glamour gear (all tradable too)

If I earned those with merit and saw some rando who just started the game with one, I'd be really upset. Which is the opposite I feel about items that are on the MB. Items on the MB are frequently random chance drops, so having them tradable would be a really bad thing imo.


3. A lot of people suggest this, but SE'd have to do it themselves to make me see it as viable. I'm not against or for items that give traits, I just want to see what they are like before I say I agree with the idea or disagree. As it is with FFXIV I don't see a way of making this gear any different than what they've been doing without radically re-designing the game. And that being said, I am all for a new progression system if it's interesting. At the moment, I don't see a point in doing this when they can barely balance the jobs they have with each other at points. (I'm also kind of trying to avoid this topic because this is the one that frequently divides people in this community.)

4. Agree... and disagree. I like the idea of separate progression systems... but I'm not sure that them being that way is a good or a bad thing. I'd like to be able to work on the Elemental leveling system outside of Eureka, but at the same time I'd also like to be able to craft, gather, or even queue for other duties within Eureka, or adjust glamours. Just anything beside waiting, chaining, or sitting in a train the entire time. I just want them to either make it so you can work on it in the overworld, or do other things in Eureka.

[Kazgrel]

Why go to such extremes? I need something to do. There is literally nothing to do in this game once you've leveled all the jobs.
If you remove progression you're not playing an MMO - you're playing the Sims.

ROFL. Nothing to do once you simply level jobs up?

I’ve spent far more time this xpac with everything leveled doing things that aren’t leveling. They’re also more fun to me than leveling. Just about anything is, really.

[Darkn155]

Hi! You make some interesting points. However...,

A. Instead of increasing the cap on different currencies, I would like to have increased options for what I can spend the current currency on. This would be great for players leveling multiple jobs. Here's the possible run down for this idea:

1. Genesis = Minor materia and gear stat improvement options for ilvl 380 390. More tomes needed for the higher the grade of materia needed for augmentation.
2. Mendacity = Minor materia and gear stat improvement options for ilvl 360 - 370. More tomes needed for the higher the grade of materia needed for augmentation.
3. Creation = Minor materia gear stat improvement options for ilvl 330 - 350. More tomes needed for the higher the grade of materia needed for augmentation.
... and so on.
The materia stat improvement is for materia already melded in the gear itself in order to do it. Materia is still obtained through the current means. (Drops, Rewards, and purchases)

B. I have not really played Eureka Anemos that much, but felt it was a mindless grind to me. I did not see the rewards worth the trouble since I can get most of it through the normal content at a much faster rate. That said, I would <making air quote hand gestures> do Eureka if it had rewards like gear that I can war into raids. Who says a forbidden land can't have good enough gear for that. This can be applied along with your Wonderous Tales idea to get more people to do it.

[Tharnor]

The current system is BORING! Adding alternate leveling systems without meaningful rewards is just more trash to farm. Giving it good rewards gates players behind those that have to much free time to those that do not. It is the primary reason you do not see similar systems in modern mmo's.

The only cure to this problem is a change in the formula. Do something new and actually listen to their play base and not waste a huge chunk of the expansions resources on stupid stuff like diadem/eureka. Both of which had potential but they clearly lake the vision to do anything valuable with it. I have yet to see anyone say they like anemos/pagos. Without the relic they would never have gone.

They could have easily added hunts, beast seal spawned fights like in 11, gear progression via gathering/crafted items, etc. This would have created a whole new economy around the content they are wasting so much resources on. But hey we are getting the logo system for abilities not tied to our class. It is not like a large chunk of us has all the arch types leveled so filling roles is hardly a problem....

It seriously feels like they are happy with adding in new system after system and leave them barren. When they could easily be tied together for alternate progression.

[Jojoya]

Why go to such extremes? I need something to do. There is literally nothing to do in this game once you've leveled all the jobs.
If you remove progression you're not playing an MMO - you're playing the Sims.

You still don't understand what a MMO is if you think MMOs require neverending progression to be a MMO.

Massively Multiplayer Online - I don't see the phrase "unending progression" contained in that anywhere. I'm not sure why you do.

If you want neverending progression, go play a single player game where that's a viable format. It will never be a viable format in a MMO.

[Ilyrian]

You still don't understand what a MMO is if you think MMOs require neverending progression to be a MMO.

Massively Multiplayer Online - I don't see the phrase "unending progression" contained in that anywhere. I'm not sure why you do.

If you want neverending progression, go play a single player game where that's a viable format. It will never be a viable format in a MMO.

We clearly have a very different idea of what an MMO is. That's cool.
I didn't say I wanted 'unending progression' - but I would like something to aim for. What form that takes is why we are having this discussion.