Risk Factor. Can I have it?

[Malachite]

Again I ask, why do we NEED a harsh death penalty to be good players? Can't we just play well so that we don't suck? Can't we not want to die simply so we don't die? Especially in the instanced content, if all players die you lose essentially. Isn't that enough? Why must we lose our hard earned XP? What does that accomplish really?

It adds a horrible timesink, getting back the XP you already earned once. Then you have people afraid to take any chances or use anything other than the easiest party build because they are afraid to die. Then class stacking becomes even more of an issue because no one wants to branch out and try something different. As if we needed another reason for people to stack Archers, lets add lower risk of death and loss of XP to the list.

I'm just curious as to why we must be harshly penalized for death. I just don't see why we must have a reason to not suck at the game.

For me, it really doesn't have anything to do with having a reason to not suck at the game. It has more to do with how engaged I feel. In the early days of XI, I found that putting together a competent exp group, and pushing that particular group's abilities to the limit was immensely engaging. By engaged, I mean involved and as an extension of that, focused (something that XIV's combat system just doesn't require). The combination of XI's inherently closely matched fights (someone gave an example earlier of an even matched fight against a mandragora being a challenge) and the relatively harsh death penalty are just two of the many factors that lead to engaging play, but they were particularly important ones.

Death in XI was anathema and exp parties were as much about not dying as they were about gaining exp. This lead to dynamic groups and engaging play. Because staying alive was such a key factor to gaining exp, small changes in party makeup made a large difference. Your tank is slightly under geared or slightly underleveled? The group's strategy (a combination of trying to maximize exp gain, while staying alive at all costs) changes accordingly. Crappy healer? The group's strategy changes accordingly. Unusually effective group that comes together cohesively? The group's strategy changes accordingly.

One of the most exciting things about all of this was that groups didn't always change for the better. Maybe your RDM just couldn't keep his debuffs on the mobs you're fighting, and the tank ends up taking a beating because of it. So, their NIN tank can't keep his shadows up because the mob isn't being kept slowed/paralyzed and the group disbands. This wasn't necessarily a bad thing.

Any time you bring a group of people together, it is not a given that said group will be able to work well together. This is a fact of life. Because of this, groups that do work well are just that much sweeter. I play these kinds of games for a variety of reasons but the level of engagement experienced has a lot to do with how long I stay. In MMOs it is usually provided through the combat system. This is my main beef with XIV. You can toss virtually anyone together in an exp group, barely pay attention to what is happening and still do well. Walk away from the keyboard for a few minutes and die, so what? You don't lose anything and the party still goes on without you at practically the same pace as it did when you were there.

MMOs are a time sink by their very nature. So what if it takes me 100 hours or 500 hours to reach level cap. Furthermore, so what if I can't maximize exp gained in every single situation? I wouldn't want to do so even if I could. Where's the fun in that? There's fun, but also humanity in diversity. And what I described above leads to diversity. FFXI's partying system, whether the developers planned for it or not, was dynamic and diverse.

I went a bit further with this post than I intended, but oh well. I hope it made sense.

[Darkillumina]

I agree with this thread and I posted something similar in a giant post I made last night. Most probably skimped over it because the post was long. An excerpt is below.

Battle System

While I realize this is getting revamped in 2.0 there are some criticisms I would like to make.

The first problem is that I really feel no sense of urgency or danger in battle. In FFXI, fighting 'Incredibly Tough' monsters was extremely dangerous. A link at the wrong time could wipe your group, a blown skill-chain could extend the battle to deadly lengths. Here, whenever I am grouped with 7 other adventurers it feels like we are a tank rolling over straw huts. In FFXI preparation was everything and character death was a very real possibility no matter what level you were; in FFXIV you just wander around wherever you go like a maelstrom of death and destruction.

The second problem I have is with the revamped skill system. Quite frankly it feels like I am playing WoW, DCUO or any other MMO based off the Warcraft model. I assign a ability, press 1, 2, 3 ect and watch my character utilize a various skill. When I am grouped up it feels even worse. It seems as if everyone is spamming attacks with impunity Again, I think this game can learn something from early FFXI going forward.
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I liked the punishment system of FFXI. It forced players to actually be half decent and pay attention. You couldn't half-ass it or your team would suffer. It also pushed people to equip themselves competently so they weren't a hindrance. If you were a terrible party member in FFXI word got out and it was hard for you to get groups. If you were decent you got picked up. I don't know why everybody expects instant gratification. FFXI made you work for something and as someone else said having a single 75 was an achievement.

I am far from a hardcore MMO player, even during FFXI. I played sporadically but still enjoyed the system. It seems to me that those complaining were those who either couldn't hack it, didn't want to put the effort in to not be gimp and didn't want to group up. Heaven forbid a game actually make you work for your reward in this day and age. FFXI had such longevity between 2004 and 2007 due to the difficulty curve. It kept you coming back because there was always something or someone pushing you to be better. It wasn't a simple gear grind like most mmo's are nowadays. I would even argue that the lack of difficulty is why we see so many MMO's drop off a cliff relatively quickly after launch.

I never understood the argument of sitting around in FFXI waiting for a party either. If you did that you were doing it wrong. When I was flagged which was often as I was initially a DRK, I never sat around waiting for an invite. I was always doing something like mining or camping an NM.

[Arcell]

For me, it really doesn't have anything to do with having a reason to not suck at the game. It has more to do with how engaged I feel. In the early days of XI, I found that putting together a competent exp group, and pushing that particular group's abilities to the limit was immensely engaging. By engaged, I mean involved and as an extension of that, focused (something that XIV's combat system just doesn't require). The combination of XI's inherently closely matched fights (someone gave an example earlier of an even matched fight against a mandragora being a challenge) and the relatively harsh death penalty are just two of the many factors that lead to engaging play, but they were particularly important ones.

Death in XI was anathema and exp parties were as much about not dying as they were about gaining exp. This lead to dynamic groups and engaging play. Because staying alive was such a key factor to gaining exp, small changes in party makeup made a large difference. Your tank is slightly under geared or slightly underleveled? The group's strategy (a combination of trying to maximize exp gain, while staying alive at all costs) changes accordingly. Crappy healer? The group's strategy changes accordingly. Unusually effective group that comes together cohesively? The group's strategy changes accordingly.

One of the most exciting things about all of this was that groups didn't always change for the better. Maybe your RDM just couldn't keep his debuffs on the mobs you're fighting, and the tank ends up taking a beating because of it. So, their NIN tank can't keep his shadows up because the mob isn't being kept slowed/paralyzed and the group disbands. This wasn't necessarily a bad thing.

Any time you bring a group of people together, it is not a given that said group will be able to work well together. This is a fact of life. Because of this, groups that do work well are just that much sweeter. I play these kinds of games for a variety of reasons but the level of engagement experienced has a lot to do with how long I stay. In MMOs it is usually provided through the combat system. This is my main beef with XIV. You can toss virtually anyone together in an exp group, barely pay attention to what is happening and still do well. Walk away from the keyboard for a few minutes and die, so what? You don't lose anything and the party still goes on without you at practically the same pace as it did when you were there.

MMOs are a time sink by their very nature. So what if it takes me 100 hours or 500 hours to reach level cap. Furthermore, so what if I can't maximize exp gained in every single situation? I wouldn't want to do so even if I could. Where's the fun in that? There's fun, but also humanity in diversity. And what I described above leads to diversity. FFXI's partying system, whether the developers planned for it or not, was dynamic and diverse.

I went a bit further with this post than I intended, but oh well. I hope it made sense.

I can understand that however I don't think that a horribly masochistic death penalty is needed for that. Fights that require thought and where you can actually die, regardless of consequences, would help. I would agree that we need more of that, more challenging content. I think we could achieve a level of engaging combat by just making things not die so easily, but I just don't think the death penalty is required for it.

Also worth considering is that this game was and still is built for a more casual audience than XI. Yoshida changed the death penalty once, we used to only have the sickness. He could have changed it to something like XP loss/level down but he didn't, I think they also said that they have absolutely no plans to do such a thing.

Challenging content is something I would like to see and it's plausible for the future. XP loss/level down is not quite as likely.

[Malachite]

Yeah, I agree with that Arcell. Death penalty isn't necessarily required, it just helps. Something I didn't mention with regards to why I'd rather a more significant death penalty has to do with immersion. I simply feel more immersed in a world where death has fairly harsh consequences. But hey, that's just me.

[Catharsis]

FFXI's partying system, whether the developers planned for it or not, was dynamic and diverse.

What's so dynamic and diverse about sitting in town waiting until a RDM or a BRD and a PLD or NIN logged on and wasn't snapped up within 15 seconds by other desperate groups? There were levels when you couldn't even sub Dispel and without it, there would be no practical way of doing any form of decent experience on Robber Crab/Crawler Tedious Grindfest Mania when dealing with people with attention spans shorter than their vocabulary and bladders the size of peas (just how difficult can it be to synchronise a toilet break?).

[Khal_Drogo]

Someone's post:

FFXI's partying system, whether the developers planned for it or not, was dynamic and diverse.

Response:

What's so dynamic and diverse about sitting in town waiting until a RDM or a BRD and a PLD or NIN logged on and wasn't snapped up within 15 seconds by other desperate groups? There were levels when you couldn't even sub Dispel and without it, there would be no practical way of doing any form of decent experience on Robber Crab/Crawler Tedious Grindfest Mania when dealing with people with attention spans shorter than their vocabulary and bladders the size of peas (just how difficult can it be to synchronise a toilet break?).

Why do ppl have to be so dismissive about something just b/c ONE aspect of it's design was flawed? I think everyone realizes that there were some pretty significant issues w/ XI that completely ruined gameplay for some ppl....


That doesn't mean to scrap the thing completely and deem it "taboo." Try to have an open mind plz...Can you honestly say that NOTHING about XI's pt system was dynamic and diverse? simply b/c you had a hard time making parties and trouble killing some foolishly designed mobs?