Ishgard Restoration phase 3 feedback thread

[Gourdian]

Didn't participate in this round, but did rank before.

I do support everyone being given maybe a buff once a day for an hour or two that enables crafting of recipes that give rank score. I'd like expert to be a system outside of just the rankings though. I think people are hesitant to admit this because of how long crafting has just been "hit macro buttons", but it does take some level of skill akin to playing puzzle games or anything about trying to control your luck, & that's fun.

Expert itself: A skill level uptune from P2 would've been nice, but P3 kind of put it into the more rng & time > skill ranges. Some suggested unlimited caps, but given the competition is also an endurance race, I feel like the current crafts are genuinely so punishing that bots gain an advantage by simply not having to deal with the mental impact of it & not having human error. People will just find it less fun and more tiring to constantly lose out to a pass/fail binary (and to lose by even trying puzzle through a shitty craft because of the time inefficiency) rather than "how far can I take this craft with my poor luck". I support absurd caps only if the competition wasn't a 10-day, no limit ordeal. I'm sure it's not too bad with some refining, but when I asked others about their methods, it was still a lot of "know when to cut your losses", which, previous point.

Sandbagging: I don't personally have an issue with the base concept, & I lost 1st to letting my guard down to sandbagging before, even as I expected it. & Even without exact scores, you can still gain info from the daily leaderboard by watching people's rates/comparing their ingame activity vs. just taking the number at face value. However, it is true enough that people with more retainers- a paid feature- have a strategic advantage here, & in the end, I support a timer on turning stuff in for that reason alone.

Botting: Another highly discouraging thing. They've shown no acknowledgement or concern about it. Maybe they think the ranking system isn't worth the time, but it does cut into the fun for a lot of people. Was wrong about this bit.

Is it fun? Expert crafting is a really interesting system, and fun. It's given crafting so much experimenting within the short time of its relevancy. Friendly competition is fun. But for people playing on an online game, who don't see each other face to face, who can barely be certain that someone isn't just a bot, a lot of the sportsmanship that makes competing fun just isn't there; coupled with how punishing and draining the whole ranking system is...?? iunno man. P2 was fun because it was new, people were excited, everyone had to come up with new ideas, and rivals approached each other and motivated each other. That isn't a universal experience though, and the system doesn't support or promote that sort of thing in any way. There's way too much suspicion and fatigue for most people. I just don't think this system is sustainable as "fun" content as time goes on.