More Waste

[HyoMinPark]

The previous eureka gear was i355 and better (w/ melds) than 'most' other pieces until delta and if it wasn't better it was plenty good enough until delta

Your timeline is a bit incorrect.

Anemos was not released until the 4.2x series, in which Deltascape was already over and the current baseline for the tier was i350 (crafted gear). The Anemos gear was i350 with 5 guaranteed meld slots; the weapon i355 with 5 guaranteed meld slots. Gear was on par with the i350 crafted and Sigmascape normal mode gear, and the weapons were on par with Byakko Ex - both of which were released in Patch 4.2.

I was progging V8S with the i350 Anemos body piece because it was better for BRD than the i370 Mendacity body, offered better substats and 5 VI Crit melds spots (which put it ahead of the i350 pentamelded crafted piece), and BiS was the Diamond Coat of Aiming. I was not clearing Deltascape (4.0~4.2) or progging UCoB (4.1) in any piece of Anemos gear; it was all Genji/Augmented Creation gear — because the cap was i340 at that time, and you couldn’t obtain any i350/i355 gear.

So, technically, Anemos gear was better than the Deltascape gear, which was only i340 and now obsolete because it was a new tier. Some of the i345 +2 pieces are actually in BiS sets for the Unending Coil of Bahamut.

This is actually their attempt to keep crafting relevant and yes it is sad and very minimal.

It really isn't.

Tank accessories have involved crafting accessories since Deltascape because you can pentameld them, and the Savage accessories do not offer enough in terms of stats to offset the gains from pentamelds (mainly with regards to STR because the STR value is lower on the Savage accessories for both Deltascape and Sigmascape—Alphascape is a bit better but I believe that there are still a few tanking accessories that are i380 crafted).

Other jobs have used pentamelded accessories since Sigmascape as well because of being able to pentameld substats - BRD used an i350 bracelet with nothing but critical hit in it because the Savage bracelet and Mendacity bracelet offered 0 Crit, and that substat is more important to a BRD than any other. We sacrifice main stat and weapon damage if there's enough Crit involved.

The crafted accessories being BiS is not intended by the developers. They tried to improve the i340 Savage over both i320 crafted and the old i270 accessories by slapping STR on them (because, at the start of 4.0, accessories were now locked to role and fending did not have STR on them). Worked enough for people to not actually prog Deltascape in i270, but the i320 crafted were still better because you could pentameld them.

[XiXiQ]

Because what are you going to login to use that gear on, what challenge is there if you've already done the previous stuff?

Thats' the exact point I was making. It's a self-sustaining mousewheel, and we end up never allowed to gear all classes because of the deliberate bottlenecks. relaxing/removing the caps on the gear, then giving you something to actually do once you have it. and seriously, if the only reason you play is just to get the best gear then un-sub, I'm struggling to see why the game should be catering to that sub-group. It holds everyone back who'd prefer to be doing more rather than being capped in 2 days.



something like the 380 gear does not need capping at all frankly, it's not the best gear, it never will be, and it has a lifespan of about a month. It's the exact thing they should be opening to those with multiple characters to gear while they limit the highest gear.

[RyoXander]

I feel like item levels are kind of pointless, to an extent. In my opinion, the time to introduce item levels to a game is after the developers feel that the final player level cap has been reached. In most cases that's 99 or 100 and then build upon that with item levels.

Implementing the ilvl system beforehand just creates a ton of waste. It's obviously too late now but meh, it is what it is.

[azura84]

I know presenting your case honestly and accurately is hard, but you could try more.

- People wanting horizontal progression in XIV (aka people who want a XI-2) are a minority. Most people just want vertical with a couple of months added to its longevity
- Unless the new secondary stats contribute equally to output more DPS, the best one will be selected and all other ones will be ignored. Diversity doesn't matter, when it's the difference between a clear or enrage
- What people comparing XIV with XI usually and conveniently forget to mention, is that you needed to farm and carry around 3-4 different sets of gear, suitable for different battles, and change it around using macros. Pretty sure that's what the playerbase wants: gear micromanagement /s
- Putting all this in effect would require an complete overhaul of the battle system, bringing with it several days/weeks of maintenance that won't be refunded, because they weren't caused by any SE problem and are covered by the ToS. So say hi to more cries of "Why so much maintenance/I want a refund"

then you missed the argument entirely from top to bottom, I very explicitly say I just want them to slow the progression, not end it. I never once say i want them to make this XI and the only reason i mentioned horizontal progression was to demonstrate the difference between linear and horizontal. My entire argument is they need to make the gear last longer in general, either by giving the pieces a value in quests by requiring previous gen pieces to level up new gen pieces or making them good enough to last some time longer than they do. you're wrong if you think "most people just want vertical", and if they do they clearly dont want it THIS steep.

[Lumis_Arvalo]

I know you can obtain the Scaevan Magitek weapons via Savage Alphascape but it's now finally week 7 in which you can get them with Genesis and you're already releasing new content that will dwarf the weapon (Eureka).

Nevermind the fact that no one knows what the process for obtaining the new Pyros weapon will be beyond "Do Anemos and Do Pagos", there's a high chance that the Pyros weapon is going to be i385 at it's max upgrade during this leg of Eureka, as Anemos was i355 when the ilevel of those tomestone weapons was i360, and I HIGHLY doubt they will increase the power level to i400 (the same as the upgraded Tomestone weapons) out of the gate of 4.45 when there's at least one more leg of Eureka coming down the pipeline. There would be nowhere else to take the weapons except maybe i405 during 4.5, and we know how much SE loves the little intermittent upgrades between relic weapons.

Additionally, I would not say that "dwarfs" them if the WD is even 1 point higher, as WD is basically the primary determination of what weapons are better than others in 99% of cases.

I never once say i want them to make this XI

Good, because people need to stop trying to jam FFXI ideas into this game. This is not FFXI, and people demanding it be more like FFXI need to stop playing this and go play FFXI. I agree more horizontal progression would be nice but the core character power treadmill of this game doesn't need to change (tomestone gear, raid gear, etc.), it just needs to be added to.

[azura84]

Thats' the exact point I was making. It's a self-sustaining mousewheel, and we end up never allowed to gear all classes because of the deliberate bottlenecks. relaxing/removing the caps on the gear, then giving you something to actually do once you have it. and seriously, if the only reason you play is just to get the best gear then un-sub, I'm struggling to see why the game should be catering to that sub-group. It holds everyone back who'd prefer to be doing more rather than being capped in 2 days. something like the 380 gear does not need capping at all frankly, it's not the best gear, it never will be, and it has a lifespan of about a month. It's the exact thing they should be opening to those with multiple characters to gear while they limit the highest gear.

I really dont want to make this about slinging crap around. I dont know what you're arguing if i'm stating your exact point, is the point i made WHY you play or is it why you want change because i was stating it's why I want change and your argument seems to be why it should remain the same. Second, the current system is designed around BiS, I happen to like getting BiS but it is in no way the only reason I play the game either. If it was it's still not a reason to try and make someone un-sub, there are plenty of people who enjoy being best, that's why SE makes ladders for PotD, HoH and PvP, and why there are whole groups committed being first at completion. Just because you and I dont prefer that type of gameplay doesn't mean they should be criticized and told to un-sub. I'm not saying the game should cater to a sub group, but the way gear is progressed right now there is zero longevity to any accomplishment. All I'm asking is they straighten out the drastic difficulty spike so there is more ways and places to obtain gear and apply more quests that support gear progression or find another way to make it seem like putting that 405 weapon on the ground after the first dungeon of 5.0 doesn't feel like a complete waste.

[Lumis_Arvalo]

All I'm asking is they straighten out the drastic difficulty spike so there is more ways and places to obtain gear and apply more quests that support gear progression or find another way to make it seem like putting that 405 weapon on the ground after the first dungeon of 5.0 doesn't feel like a complete waste.

Honestly, I agree with adding in more methods of gearing as one of the primary selling points of this game is that you can be everything on one character, except you really can't because of how the gear gating works.

But if you're expecting them to change the power creep between expansions so that your raid weapon from a year ago is still good, that's a hard no from me. Catch-up mechanics exist for a reason; to allow new players to get into the game easier, as that is where all the money is nowadays, like it or not. Players are not going to want to play this game if they have to play through 5 years of back content to gear themselves up enough to do the current stuff, and forcing players to wade through that is a dumb idea, which is precisely why those power level resets exist at certain points.

[Ilan]

Meeeeeh we don't have an alternative to savage weapons!
Meeeeeh we the wannabe relic came to late!
And now:

Meeeeh we have too many options to obtain a propper weapon!!!!

Sorry but its just mindblowing how people always have to complain about everything even if they don't even have to get everything to play the game properly....

[azura84]

Catch-up mechanics exist for a reason

I get that, and I agree, for any new player coming into XIV it's much easier to get caught up and to play with friends earlier than it ever was in XI, but there are still many ways to balance this as well. I know people hate XI players for referencing it so much but in my case it really can't be helped, it's just what I know more about than any other mmo. XI did quests that took what you made from previous generations of equipment and applied some amount of progress into the next, exactly as how the relic from ARR was brought into HW, they gave you a quicker start into the quest for it. This type of quest system could be done more universally, with tomes gear, they already kind-of did it with the crafting gear by letting you swap from the 350 pieces to 360. Allow us to have some return on the effort we made, something that makes the effort of obtaining these pieces (that we got for their stats) and not just make it an overqualified piece of glamour or miniscule bits of GC seals. That's another way they could afford them value is apply new uses for GC seals, it's well past time they overhauled the GC's to be more meaningful anyways. The difference being that you don't make it exactly like XI where you have to grind through every stage to get the gear, you just offer some amount of return on your invested time beyond the minor advantages the stats provide in the next patch.

Also, they sort of already do expect players to play through 5 years of content by making a single unbreaking main story quest line instead of branching it at all, forcing people who want to play with friends to grind hard for a few months before they can play with their friends or pay a premium to skip over content they should be able to enjoy at pace.

[azura84]

And now:
Meeeeh we have too many options to obtain a propper weapon!!!!
Sorry but its just mindblowing how people always have to complain about everything even if they don't even have to get everything to play the game properly....

To me it's more mindblowing how people blow everything out of proportion, when my argument is pretty specific and not a problem with everything, my problem is with the stagnating design of the games use of equipment. I have my own beliefs where this stems from and reasons it can be changed, but my argument about this is more about the fact they could be doing more to make the equipment last a little longer, or provide some means for the premium pieces of gear we earned to amount to more than just a miniscule and meaningless bit of Grand Company Seals. Also my argument doesn't at all mention how there is "too many options" now.