The current formula of gear progression NEED CHANGE

[Gemina]

My biggest gripe with vertical progression is that the currency that is used to buy previous BiS gear can't be used for anything unless you want the gear for glamour. I understand that new tokens are released, and the previous cannot and should not be able to be used to get new gear, but at least allow to get some cracked clusters or something with them. Ah well, it's just nickels and dimes at that point I suppose. But I hate throwing away nickels and dimes! ;p

[Seddrinth]

I dunno, ever since raiders started selling clears I havent really seen the raid weapons as that prestigious. Personally, now that this is a thing, I think SE should just make the relics match, since either way, you can get the best weapon without doing any work at all

Might as well just do away with savage and ultimate raids and just hand people bis gear when they buy the expansion. We pretty much do that already with all the welfare 400 pieces given out.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Might as well just do away with savage and ultimate raids and just hand people bis gear when they buy the expansion. We pretty much do that already with all the welfare 400 pieces given out.

Except ultimate isnt for gear, its a test of skill. I never really did savage for the gear either. Just for the enjoyment of it.

Unfortunately that test of skill is being bypassed by people RMTing clears.

[Ilan]

I actually think eureka weapons are too powerful for what people do to get them. They should be i395 at best.

They are relics. Relics always have been the same ilvl as the raid weapon torwards the end of an expansion.

[Reynhart]

The fire resistance stuff is talking about a system that does not exist in XIV outside of Eureka (you have the magia board for that effect).

Yes, the effect was removed in the transition from ARR because it was considered too complicated...come on, when did MMO players became Goldfish ?

Accuracy used to be a stat that was then removed as a player request so healers could do damage without sacrificing good gear to hit accuracy caps.

The problem is that the stat had no depth. If everyting needs the same accuracy, it's not a strategic choice to have it, it's mandatory for everything. If different trials have different "stat builds", you'd have to decide if you want to be optimized for each of them, thus, gathering more armor sets, or keep a more rounded itemization to simply be viable.

However, if you had a 'sturdy boss' fight that needed crits, you'd probably see more demands for critical-stat gear, but you'd probably find more people forcing compositions that force critical hits to appear the most amount of times: WAR, AST, SCH, DRG, BRD and maybe MNK.

How is that different from a PLD-WAR-BRD-MCH-DRG-BLM-AST-SCH setup ? Except that this setup is the best for everything.

It's also the mechanics in a fight.

Mechanics are irelevant for itemization. They only matter for player skills, a thing that definitely could stay in the game even if you had horizontal progression.

These horizontal gear progressions being mentioned worked in other games because the game was built to have that progression in them to begin with.

Problem is, if you want to keep people subbed, you need to give them a good incentive to keep playing. If they already know that the hard-earned gear will be matched by easy gear 3-months later and obsolete 3-months after that, they have no reason to try your difficult content. And since everything else can be cleared in mere days after each patch launch...

After that you also have games like Dungeons & Dragons Online, where items have lots of various effect either for facing mobs, dungeon crawling, or simply interacting with NPCs. The game could have this sort of things for better world building, or allow for a more strategic approach to combat...

[loreleidiangelo]

When I read the thread title I was thinking "Finally! Somebody admits that our gearing system is incredibly bland and could use some more variety - even if not a drastically huge shake-up, at least something neat like gear sets or more interesting secondary stats" and then I open the topic and it's complaining about relic weapons not being stronger than they are when I already think they're too strong for basically afk-able content rewards. :/

[AxlStream]

Horizontal progression is an illusion of choice. Take GW2 for example that has run about 5 years on it now. Once you get the best grade of the stats set you need for your build. You are done. There's nothing else. You'll never get any stronger and you can't use any other stats as they are suboptimal. Even the additional effects of your sigils and rune are very limited for what you want to do. There will always be an "optimal" way to play a role.

[JunseiKei]

Yes, the effect was removed in the transition from ARR because it was considered too complicated...come on, when did MMO players became Goldfish ?

It wasn't removed for complication. It was removed for forcing players to have to gain certain gear.

The problem is that the stat had no depth. If everyting needs the same accuracy, it's not a strategic choice to have it, it's mandatory for everything. If different trials have different "stat builds", you'd have to decide if you want to be optimized for each of them, thus, gathering more armor sets, or keep a more rounded itemization to simply be viable.

The accuracy requirements were based on where you attacked on a boss and what the fight was. Front had the highest requirement, then flank with rear having the least. I'm not sure what "depth" you were expecting from a stat that was there solely to check to see if you can hit something.

How is that different from a PLD-WAR-BRD-MCH-DRG-BLM-AST-SCH setup ? Except that this setup is the best for everything.

Critical strikes are an RNG stat that has a chance to proc with the more critical you have. A PLD does not give you a raid-wide (or any kind) of buff that boosts critical, as with BLM, SMN, SAM, MCH, NIN. MNK's saving grace is it has a guaranteed critical strike for bringing it; the same situation applies to WAR thanks to Inner Release. For a fight that forces you to deal more damage because it requires critical strikes to effectively deal damage, and not simply a build preference, there's not really an opinion on what the composition you need. You saw something similar with T7 - you needed someone to grab the Renaulds from a distance (immediately requires a ranged/caster) and a job that could stick the mob in place (BRD's shadowbind or SMN's miasma) were needed. You could possibly pull this off with a SCH or BLM, but it was leaps and bounds easier to complete with a BRD or SMN. It's just effective. Unless you make these "sturdy" bosses take more damage from criticals not nearly as effectively as the buffing going on with the party composition, in which case, begs the question of why was a sturdy boss made to begin with? The only forsee-able reason behind it would be the only reason left that I can think of: to punish players for playing certain classes or having a certain raid composition. Which, still, feeds into SE explicitly stating they will not force players to bring certain classes into these fights.

Mechanics are irelevant for itemization. They only matter for player skills, a thing that definitely could stay in the game even if you had horizontal progression.

You are misdirecting my rebuttal to your statement. You said there's no reason to have bosses only differ in HP values:

There's also no reason that every boss only differs by it's HP number.

I am plainly telling you that you are incorrect as the fights and the mechanics themselves make every boss different.

Problem is, if you want to keep people subbed, you need to give them a good incentive to keep playing. If they already know that the hard-earned gear will be matched by easy gear 3-months later and obsolete 3-months after that, they have no reason to try your difficult content. And since everything else can be cleared in mere days after each patch launch...

Players will always consume content faster than what can be put out unless you gate it behind high RNG or obscene grind, even if it is easy [read: you simply need to sink time into it to complete it].

After that you also have games like Dungeons & Dragons Online, where items have lots of various effect either for facing mobs, dungeon crawling, or simply interacting with NPCs. The game could have this sort of things for better world building, or allow for a more strategic approach to combat...

The point with Dungeons and Dragons is a matter of how the developers decided to design their game. I never played it; I play Dungeons and Dragon at a table with pencil and paper and actually role play it. Playing it online just never appealed to me so I can't actually speak on what their game is like or offer any counterpoint here with what little is said here. I can compare it to the books and that's simple: you can have strictly social characters, you can have murder hobos and you can even create pure artisans. That makes perfect sense to have gear for the things you said given those confines.

I can, however, compare it to Black Desert Online, which has gear for conversing with NPCs (their Amity mini-game), gear for AP (attack power), evasion, DP (defence power), DR (damage reduction), accuracy, etc. There's a reason a lot of the same armor has been "BiS" for the last 4 years for a lot of classes. There's simply always a best option for a build. Even other games, like TERA, still had this issue. Tons of armor options; there's always a BiS that you need and the rest are filler until you get it.

From what you're saying, it seems a lot of these games with horizontal progression have a lot more... systems... at play than what XIV [currently] offers. Amity and NPC interactions sound like what the NPC trust system might be (never played XI). For battle, I don't see the need to offer a ton of 'choices' that ultimately won't matter. XIV is a modernized MMO [read: streamlined] so I really don't understand the need to regress, especially when people already complain about the small[ish] amounts of RNG that already exist (like everytime a new raid tier comes out and you need that 1 drop from this one normal fight).

[Alexandre_Noireau]

Stop making it seem like there is only two alternatives. (Grind or no grind, horizontal or vertical, years or months, etc, etc.) There is no constitutional rule, let alone law in the universe, that demands MMORPGs for them to be grindy or RNG progression exclusive, that demands for them to either push content every 2 months or nothing at all for a whole year, all of those, are just design decision that can be changed. And honestly, considering the state of the genre, NEED to change.


This game has the best multi-class system, 1 character all classes. There is no reasonable explanation for gear to be irrelevant in weeks (gear treadmill) or to abuse of RNG at every corner to fake a sense of "achievement" or "goal". Which it isn't, wasting time is not a skill to be proud of...

If there is an MMORPG that could potentially beat the stigma of the genre that is leading it to it's slow painful dead that is now facing, the stigma of the meaningless grind and constant gear treadmill, that game is FFXIV. With all these classes, gearing should be a matter of days/weeks at MAX, and RNG should really be toned down, as to allow players to gear up multiple classes, gear up faster, and allow the game to open to the rest of the content it has to offer besides the weekly/daily lockouts or hyper grinding (anything that takes more than 5 hours is a grind honestly.)

Accept mediocrity like this, because "this is the way things have been". Damn, that that is inexcusable.

Yes, FFXIV needs to change it's gear AND character progression, not towards full horizontality (which is equally if not even more grindy than vertical, see GW2 case.) but towards a balance of DIAGONALITY. Push the ilvl each 8 months, make content last long, patch a bit slower (4-5 months instead of 3), give older gear good incentives to be kept and attained (like, a bonus to damage and performance that last ONCE till you clear a new content piece then it wears out). Make earned gear worth time and investment, make earning gear diverse and FUN.

Link relic weapons to guildhests, guildleves, again with the FATEs, more crafting, and diversify all stats. Expand D I A G O N A L Y. In proportionated and slower paced content patches, so content can BREATHE instead of CHOKING TO DEATH by massive surges of content that falls again into simplistics dualities of "hardcore" and "casual", as if there was no middle ground. In all honesty, gear progress at least should be 4 times faster minimun.

Tome price of a body gear piece shouldn't be more than 500, maybe it should be 300 with the weapon costing 400. And requiring 2 weekly items instead of 4.
Raids should have at least 1 guaranteed class drop based on SINGLE player entry, thus stopping the people from just grinding and grinding till they hate the content instead of liking it.

The treadmill doesn't need to stop, let alone be burnt. It just needs to slow down a notch, 2 notches maybe. Is like, giving reason for a player to invest 3 hours daily in eureka, if someone is gonna sit 3 hours doing the same tasks over and over, it should at least get half a stage or a whole weapon for that time. If he then wants to get all 18 relics, good for him, idc, and no one should care. Stop designing games around wasting people times. MMORPGs have been like that all the time, and is exactly why their populations go down and down. And before you dare say FFXIV is doing well: Yes it is, like those rich guys on the titanic that MIGHT stay afloat. That is better than the rest, no doubt. Is it a good situation? Not at all. Stop accepting mediocrity just because "is the way of the world".

There are alternatives, just gotta think a bit outside the fake dualities of "no/yes" "grind/no grind".

[Penthea]

You'd be suprised what lengths people will go for JUST glamour

Stats last for a tier. Glam is forever.