Just a interesting artcile about FFXI (and XIV)

[Benediction]

yea... they can... but I don't know if they will

Well, I guess that's why some of us are here because we hope that SE will do that.

[Benediction]

stuff

Well, as you said that's assuming that classes are balanced... so yeah people will gravitate to something easy or popular. Like you said, it's just human nature.

But the focus is to make them balanced to give that freedom. You can only do so much with what you are given with.

Sure I can go to parties and present myself as a SMN healer (with the system that SMN is given with), but how effective would I be compared to a RDM? I guess I could put in more effort to be almost as effective... but if I want to be a healer, I'd rather go to a job that takes less effort to be more effective.

[zaviermhigo]

You can really tell the reading comprehension of this forum sometimes. When he said "forced partying" is a bad thing, he meant, someday you sat with your flag up, YOU WERE paying for a game, that you could not actually play at the time. You start the game when the population is lower, eff u, you won't get crap done. Now its not like that, and I hate the new version of XI. But they never marketed XI or XIV outside of Japan that much, which meant new players were low, there wasn't always a base for the leveling you need. Pre level sync you had to have a static to level up, and everyone knows there's that one dick in the static who levels up sneaky without you all the time just to ruin exp.

[Xoo]

You can really tell the reading comprehension of this forum sometimes. When he said "forced partying" is a bad thing, he meant, someday you sat with your flag up, YOU WERE paying for a game, that you could not actually play at the time. You start the game when the population is lower, eff u, you won't get crap done. Now its not like that, and I hate the new version of XI. But they never marketed XI or XIV outside of Japan that much, which meant new players were low, there wasn't always a base for the leveling you need. Pre level sync you had to have a static to level up, and everyone knows there's that one dick in the static who levels up sneaky without you all the time just to ruin exp.

Thumbs down for lazy people.

HEY EVERYONE! I'M ONLINE! SHOW ME THE MONEY!!

(And lol @"Had to have a static group to level up" ... just lol.

[Mireille]

No, it's definitely a design flaw. The classes were way too unbalanced; mostly showing their bias by favouring Samurai and barely providing effective healers other than White Mage or Red Mage. For the longest time, Dragoon was at the bottom of the list of jobs to invite to groups.

I agree with you in principle, but at the same time this is a Final Fantasy title. I'll give you an example from FF X. Auron was a great DD vs hard shelled opponents, but vs. flan you used Lulu's magic spells, for fast oponents you used Tidus, and vs. flyers you used Wakka. In X if you wanted to clear the harder boss fights you used a specific party setup and some characters didn't get used except maybe once to steal or to learn a spell.

When they created the class balance in XI they were just doing what FF games have always done in my experience. Up front I will admit I haven't played them all. In XI what was frustrating was you spent months leveling and gearing 1 job just to find out you needed another job for one particular fight, or that in endgame you had to level a wanted job to get gear for an unwanted one.

As I see it class distinction must be there in a FF game, but big events should have content for all classes and jobs. It will be interesting to see Hamlet defense because this will be the first event content that is made for DoL, DoH classes in addition to DoW, DoM classes. If they pull this off it's a sign of things to come when we get real endgame content.

[ChiefCurrahee]

Originally Posted by Xoo
Beastmaster was intended to be a solo job, primarily. I'll have you know that just for fun, I made a group of RDM BRD BST BST PUP PUP once versus Greater Colibri. We had a blast. It's just the fact that, like it's been so many times now, people are lazy and rely on the cookie-cutter far too much.

honestly if one party make up is way easier... people are going to gravitate towards that and shun the other classes
Knowing that people aren't going to change... the fights could be made to encourage more varied groupings of classes

you mean kinda like how Ifrit is Gla con con thm thm thm thm thm or moogle is gla con con thm arc arc arc arc ?

Xoo you need to take a step back at look at how the player base at large operates. Player will choose the path of least resistance and stick with it in what ever they do.

Can Ifrit be defeated with a variety of set ups? Yep. is it easier? Nope. Are people open to it? mmm.... Not as much as you think. How long would you stay in an Ifrit PT if you set up was Gla Con Con Pgl Lnc Mar Arc Thm and it was taking 20+ mins to kill, or was a very hairy fight? 2/3 fiights tops?

It was the same in XI. And just so you know, I just didn;t sit aroudn in Jeuno waiting for an invite to come my way. I would actively recruit for parties. In fact the majority of my progressiion came from me forming my own parties. It was RARE that i would get an invite as a drg. And of course i'm talkign about the time before ToAU, and merit parties. I'm talkign about CoP and prior.

So you can chalk it up to players being lazy if you want, but there are things SE can do to balance the content to the classes.

for example. It's not that melee are poor performers in damage output on ifrit. It's the fact that in order for melee to be within attack range they are also in sear range and get hit often by it. then the fact that to keep up damage output combos are needed but it becomes too dangerous to perform those combos after a certain point on ifrit.

The solution: ranged attackers with high damage potential without the need of positional combos. Consequently this is the very reason why Arc is prefered over melee in moogle figth as well.

Design flaw or player laziness? I'm leaning more toward design flaw.

[Xoo]

Fairly, I don't need to take a step back and look at anything. Firstly, the game in subject was FFXI. Secondly, what the hell does attack distance (Sear) have to do with job balancing? Thirdly, yet again, what does animation lock have to do with the price of tea in China?

And, I've played through Ifrit with all sorts of jobs on wins, losses and everything in between. It doesn't bother me to lose - even if a lot.

Groups who go with the most efficient setup are weak because they take the path of least resistance. Fine for pickup groups where you don't know what to expect from its members. Or, it could mean you're the type of player that wants to blaze through everything without knowing what can be done and probably could care less.

[Xoo]

Anyhow, regarding FFXIV and everything outside of Darkhold/Ifrit/Moogle, with the exception of Gladiator and Conjurer, it really doesn't make a damn what you fill the gaps in with as every battle will consume the same minute amount of time. With this game, I think the jobs could stand a few more defining characteristics.

[Zezlar]

Oh how I miss the days of forced grouping. Now i'm forced to endure this.....torture.

[Lienn]

I agree with the article dude.