Can we get an actual intuitive and modern glam system please?

[Zsplash]

Please explain your insight into the challenges that the FFXIV team faces that have cause them to ignore a 20 minute fix that would not only alleviate one of the biggest problems that the glamouring userbase faces but allow them more profits in the way of purchased glamours (many avoid purchased items because of limited space) .


If you, random, likely coding and database experienced, person can figure this out from the outside, why would nobody in this multi-million dollar company have pointed this out?

That's like asking why a multimillion dollar company released ffxiv 1.0, an obviously badly designed game with multiple issues. They just don't have the experience or edge in the field that others do as a japanese company with no experience in modern mmorpgs. 2.0+ has roughly been them trying to catch up to the modern MMORPG market from the start.

Their server infrastructure is obviously still incredibly flawed, limitations of not being able to whisper in dungeons, crossworld interactions in general i.e. social lists requiring you to press a button to see if someone is online on another world, limits on what you can do in just about everything involved, the fact that datacenters exist and divide worlds within the same region (NA), etc.

They obviously also care little for reworking content/gameplay/current systems and it's a miracle whenever they do.

[Krotoan]

That's like asking why a multimillion dollar company released ffxiv 1.0, an obviously badly designed game with multiple issues. They just don't have the experience or edge in the field that others do as a japanese company with no experience in modern mmorpgs. 2.0+ has roughly been them trying to catch up to the modern MMORPG market from the start.

Their server infrastructure is obviously still incredibly flawed, limitations of not being able to whisper in dungeons, crossworld interactions in general i.e. social lists requiring you to press a button to see if someone is online on another world, limits on what you can do in just about everything involved, the fact that datacenters exist and divide worlds within the same region (NA), etc.

They obviously also care little for reworking content/gameplay/current systems and it's a miracle whenever they do.

The road they took to 1.0 was pretty obviously many poor decisions of shortcuts , outsourcing and slapping together something they thought would grab them some cash. Sure. But, that team was scrapped and the team they've brought in for 2.0+ has been innovative, hardworking, and responsive. Often listening to user input carefully and trying to give the community what they want: A glamour system at all, Marketboards (remember the weird retainer halls?). They've made weird decisions to be sure, often linked to cultural differences and biases, but I rarely see them make actual stupid or ignorant decisions and stick to them.
Someday I hope to see an explanation of exactly WHY the inventory problem is such a huge one, as many have pointed out several times the inventory for glamour SHOULD be super simple: Data point for model, texture, paint, effects (if any). 3-4 tags of text that should be tiny data right? I have a hard time imagining the excuse behind it is simply: "oh.. we didn't know". or "we don't want that" Occasionally we get glimpses into how wierd the system is as was explained in this thread about why the inventory layout was changed: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...w-design/page7 , actual coding insight. It was neat and helped understand the why behind what originally looked like a "wtf would you do that" change. Personally I think the reaction to that post was appalling, but people seem to think that that is how we need to react to have change enabled.. didn't seem to help though.

I don't think it's a matter of not caring for reworking , but not being allowed to because of limited resources or budget. I think that to get things working the way we think they do or to get to where we want it to they'd have to do a core system rework (which I am entirely for) but I think the cost to do so (paused development on many things {can't make new stuff for an old system}, and/or cost of labor/hardware needed) is a sticking point for the highers up.

Regardless of the why, it's extremely hard to imagine an ignored supposed 20 minute fix (I hope this is hyperbole) being the reason for 6 years of glamour problems. Unless you're part of the team, have worked on the game or have a personal link into the process, I can't see making a definitive statement like that.

[Aladire]

You guys do realize that with something like a video game, what might be something that can be coded within an hour will take many times more than that to test thoroughly. You have to test accessing that menu during so many things.

What if a person opens the menu at the start of a trial?
What about the start of the dungeon?
What about in the middle of the fight?
What about standing in town?
What about standing in town while looking at the MB?
What about standing in town while looking at the MB and with the preview window open?
What about.... etc?

Then you also have to deal with performance issues too. If everyone was forced to be on PS4, then they could get a lot more new features added. But, you have the PC players involved. That makes things more than 10x more complicated because now the systems can be built different. AMDs and Intels do not run the same. Heck, we even faced problems recently that certain high end GPUs with certain monitors were crashing the game with new FPS limits...

You do realize that you have so much to test and then you need to figure out the priority. If say 99% of players will want a new glamour system instead of a new raid and new races and new items, then they would do it. It is just that the value out of revamping the glamour system vs the cost and time is not worth it.

Someone might come up with a quick new design that meets what everyone has been asking, but it is so far down in the backlog that it might never get worked on.

So, the best you can do is keep suggesting and getting people to back it up. If there is enough talk for it, they might bump up the priority and get to it at some point.

[Enthy]

It would encourage me to level other jobs if I could glamour whatever gear I want to my main job (SCH)

People might say "but then you could look like a tank as a healer, oh no!" We already have bikini tanks, that argument is invalid.

I'm sick of healer gear always being a white robe potato sack. "Play another job then!" I've tried WAR, BRD, DRG, SMN and I'm just not interested in those jobs but I love all their cool gear :/ Healers just get shafted in this game I guess.

[GenBroadaxe]

General rule of thumb: if there's something that you think should be an stupidly simple thing to implement in a multifaceted computer program, 99.9% of the time it's not. There may be things within the engines tools that conflict, there may be changes that would require unique coding, there may be a feature players want that the system itself was never originally designed to do so that function needs to be built from scratch. This comes from hearing the IT folks at work talk about the exact same thing.

There's a software system our company purchased for call routing at work and they had to hand build a ton of extra stuff to add on that we needed, but the software was never meant to do. They had to build on full suites of features that one might think a call system would have (like being able to access voice mail), but it just didn't have. At the end of the day, the only people who really know how big of an undertaking it would be are the SE designers who have access and full knowledge of the software the game is running on.

[Aladire]

I do wish I could put plate on my healers. There are some cool combinations that could be done with mixing the cloth gear with plate and such.

[Leloa]

I haven't used plates yet, someone tell me have they lifted the idiotic reason why we can't change class without the glamour disappearing if we arent in a big city? That is my trigger, like I have time to teleport before accepting a duty just to keep my glamour. Since they added dancer to brd/mch gear it's hard to come up with a glamour for all three of them on same single gear. This is what they need to work on.

[Kaethra]

If you, random, likely coding and database experienced, person can figure this out from the outside, why would nobody in this multi-million dollar company have pointed this out?

Its the same reason you can play a various amount of other AAA titles that are missing x feature or have one that seems 'limited'. However through the 'wonders' of modding it seems like the modders know more than the devs at times on how to code their own game. And its not incompetence. I'm not going to go so far as to say the coders are incompetent. The game works, the bugs are few, and quite frankly, everything runs smoothly even during congestion.

So what's the problem?

Lets break this down. Look at the current Glamour system. It requires you to obtain an item. It requires you to bring it back to a Glamour dresser. It requires you to have a Glamour prism. It requires the item to be fully repaired to be placed. Previously it required you to have glamour prisms that matched the crafting skill that made/repaired said item and the tier of prism based on the level.

None of what I just said is required to have a glamour system. Its extra steps, extra machine cycles, extra talking between client and server.

To have a glamour system people desire, you simply omit those extra steps. It becomes easier on the server because less steps and less 'talking' between the server and client. Also less space on the database. The only thing you need to add is another entry (which could replace the glamour dresser entry) on our character table within the server database. This would simply have true/false, on/off, yes/no entries saying whether we collected an item or not. We already have this in the dresser, it simply applies whether or not we've placed in an item or not. As for showing the glamour on the character, nothing changes there. Whatever you applied to that item simply shows as it does now.

But back to the question. Why did they make a dresser? Why all the extra steps if people like the other system better and its less load on the server?

Because either a coder or producer decided in their mind that players should change their clothes at a dresser. Clothes should be stored in a dresser. That's right. They made an arbitrary decision that makes sense in their minds to make the extra work. They believed that's how players would see it. That's how players would roleplay it. They didn't. Least I didn't.

Glamour prisms do not exist because they are needed for anything. In code, they exist simply because they wanted the players to obtain them in some form before placing an article of armor in the dresser (or applying them directly under the old system). The only code there is pretty simple:

Does player have a prism?
IF Prism >= 1
THEN Apply Glamour
Prism = Prism - 1
Else Throw back error

That's.. not needed. Prisms themselves really serve no function at all in mechanics other than the fact they are relics of a previous system and someone still thinks we ought to have 'something' in order to put something in the dresser each time. Why? I don't know why they think that. Again this is the same person who thinks we need a dresser to store clothes in. And that we need prisms I guess to store 200 articles of clothing in there. Some 'lore' craziness is going on inside his head.

So we need to send a message to this person. Let them know that storing clothes in a dresser and having to go to a dresser to take clothes out is a stupid idea. This isn't the SIMS. And ridicule him into finally getting rid of it. Its dumb, its taking too many server packets, too many machine cycles, and annoys players. I'm sure the idea sounded great in their head. But no one here likes it. Its gotta go.

[Krotoan]

Because either a coder or producer decided in their mind that players should change their clothes at a dresser. Clothes should be stored in a dresser. That's right. They made an arbitrary decision that makes sense in their minds to make the extra work. They believed that's how players would see it. That's how players would roleplay it. They didn't. Least I didn't.

Oh.. wait.. we have had this discussion. You think that the whole system is in place because someone somewhere just decided on his own "that's how it's gonna be" or "Cause that's how it works". ... I disagree that large game studios make decisions this way, however neither is provably true unless one of us works in one.

Its the same reason you can play a various amount of other AAA titles that are missing x feature or have one that seems 'limited'. However through the 'wonders' of modding it seems like the modders know more than the devs at times on how to code their own game.

Nyuuuurrm... so.. how so? I know there are databases out there you can use to preview looks on your character, this does not mean this is how it works in the game. I also know there are mods out there to replace actual gear in game, this still is only local and unattached to the actual workings of how the system is keeping track of our gear/glamour/items. The way the server talks to our system to show us what it wants isn't necessarily how it keeps track of the items and appearances on the server side. It really should be, I won't argue that, but I'm reasonably sure the server side is a crazy mess.

So what's the problem?
Lets break this down. Look at the current Glamour system. It requires you to obtain an item. It requires you to bring it back to a Glamour dresser. It requires you to have a Glamour prism. It requires the item to be fully repaired to be placed. Previously it required you to have glamour prisms that matched the crafting skill that made/repaired said item and the tier of prism based on the level.
None of what I just said is required to have a glamour system. Its extra steps, extra machine cycles, extra talking between client and server.

Agreed, this is mostly fluff now. I believe in the past this was to link crafting to glamouring in a significant way and to be a gil sink of some sort, but those concepts seem to have been abandoned. Now crafting is linked to glamour period in a simple way with a minor gil sink (prisms and removers). People are weirdly attached to their items too, desire to reclaim items even after glamouring them was a big demand. Having the system also function as extra storage of a sorts was an advantage as well, you can now store quite a bit of gear in the dresser. True it loses all those little things like materia and soulbinding, but it's still somewhere to stick stuff. Inventory in general though is a whole different argument I believe can happen elsewhere. So I'll move on to your next point...

To have a glamour system people desire, you simply omit those extra steps. It becomes easier on the server because less steps and less 'talking' between the server and client. Also less space on the database. The only thing you need to add is another entry (which could replace the glamour dresser entry) on our character table within the server database. This would simply have true/false, on/off, yes/no entries saying whether we collected an item or not. We already have this in the dresser, it simply applies whether or not we've placed in an item or not. As for showing the glamour on the character, nothing changes there. Whatever you applied to that item simply shows as it does now.

I have no idea how the character/item databases and servers talk to each other, so I won't presume to correct you. However if it was as simple as logging just an appearance , I would think deciding between storage and where it can be applied wouldn't be an issue but it is their currently cited problem. We get the slots, or we get more areas we can apply them in, something is limiting them and I would love to know what.

Posters note: part of the next quote is actually up on top, this is not verbatim. formatted for stream of thought.

But back to the question. Why did they make a dresser? Why all the extra steps if people like the other system better and its less load on the server?
Glamour prisms do not exist because they are needed for anything. In code, they exist simply because they wanted the players to obtain them in some form before placing an article of armor in the dresser (or applying them directly under the old system). The only code there is pretty simple:
That's.. not needed. Prisms themselves really serve no function at all in mechanics other than the fact they are relics of a previous system and someone still thinks we ought to have 'something' in order to put something in the dresser each time. Why? I don't know why they think that. Again this is the same person who thinks we need a dresser to store clothes in. And that we need prisms I guess to store 200 articles of clothing in there. Some 'lore' craziness is going on inside his head.

Glamour prisms exist because they were originally a catalyst gil sink for glamouring and a link to make crafting relevant to glamouring. I think I've stated my theory on that well enough but I'm glad to go into it if it seems flimsy to you. I don't think this is the result of someone arbitrarily making a decision to make these requirements but ideas put in the system to solve certain problems like integration into other aspects, isolating data bandwidth usage, and removing gil from the system that have persisted into new iterations built on the original concept. To me it smells of two possibilities:
1. A desire not to waste money/resources used on a system and to work with that system as best as possible. They found the glamour system didn't work out entirely as desired and its being repurposed as best as they can manage within system parameters and limitations.
2. A unknown limitation or restriction on reworking the item system and databases and the system we have is the best they can do without that restructuring.

We have abandoned "lore" before. It's been shown not to be set in stone especially where player demand opposes it.

So we need to send a message to this person. Let them know that storing clothes in a dresser and having to go to a dresser to take clothes out is a stupid idea. This isn't the SIMS. And ridicule him into finally getting rid of it. Its dumb, its taking too many server packets, too many machine cycles, and annoys players. I'm sure the idea sounded great in their head. But no one here likes it. Its gotta go.

I really don't think there is any one person responsible for this decision. It's definitely just my opinion but it's hard to imagine such a large company allowing someone, especially at coding level, to just.. "this is how it has to be". I cannot reconcile that concept in my head.

I can agree our system is very limited for how many pieces of gear are available, how many jobs we have and how many places and situations would be better if we could just swap to another look for a bit.
I can agree a system like GW2 would be awesome. I LOVE changing looks in that game, it's super easy and I can spend hours designing my new look for the month. I don't know if that wardrobe, all dyes unlocked, cross character, implementation works on FFXIV though.

But I would give my left thumb if I could have a discussion with the actual devs about why it cannot be done and why the system we have in place is limited like it is. My biggest wish is for them to be as transparent about it as possible so that the players and the developers can work towards a solution that is both cost effective, work efficient and above all useful for all.

[Lihtleita]

People might say "but then you could look like a tank as a healer, oh no!" We already have bikini tanks, that argument is invalid.

we also have multible instances of reskinned gear jumping from tank only to dps only and every other combo imaginable. there is no "looks like its role" unless the player goes out of their way to make it so. no excuses for this kind of glamour locking.