State of the Game prior to Liveletter

[Shougun]

I don't know about the Island Sanctuary... :/
With how much work they seem to have done so that the Island Sanctuaries don't effect the game outside of the islands themselves (not using the same seeds as housing gardens, a special inventory for material, selling handicrafts for at-island currency vs gil), it makes me feel like its going to be the kind of content that people usually just do for the cosmetics then abandon. >x>

Hopefully they will allow it to impact the game in ways that don't become major issues. Like in WoW you made straight currency, and it was a lot lol. I do hope they check out the neat concepts their competition did well, and poorly, because the island being exclusively onto itself would be a little sad but we don't want it to ruin the economy either lol.

[Renathras]

Yes, you tried that argument last time here and were given the following responses:

Your "potentially" is just that - a potentially - and the reason you tried to give for it being skewed doesn't quite stack up. Again, if the very author of that survey is happy to use the Steam figures as a proxy for the live sub figures (because no other exists save for SE's own internal metrics), and has alluded to their own concerns about player retention (by the way, the LB figures don't really make the case for stellar retention if you look at them at a granular level, where he analyses the changes by type of character, e.g. new, continuing, returning etc.), I'm curious what this specific bias in the Steam figures is that makes them unsuitable as a sample?

I literally just addressed this:

The problem is the Steam figures were pointed out as potentially not representing the larger game trend - something no one contested (instead just insisting they were valid and that no one should question them) - and that the overall Lucky Bancho numbers indicate EW has had the greatest growth of any expansion in FFXIV's history and that the post-expansion bump drop is on par with past expansions on a percent basis.

Not one piece of what you quoted is an argument for why the Steam numbers should be seen to represent the overall numbers - just stating that they do with no proof (as I said in that thread, the onus is on those pushing the Steam numbers as representative of the whole to prove it, not the other way around - you don't take a study to a scientific journal and demand they publish it unless THEY can disprove it) - and I wasn't the only one explaining this to you folks trying to use the Steam numbers. And to a one, none of you actually offered proof of your claim. You just demanded WE disprove it, which isn't the way this works. The onus is on those wanting to use a number/metric to prove it's valid, not those telling them it may not be to disprove it. And no one in that thread could prove that they were.

And that "very author's" own numbers still indicate EW had the greatest growth of any expansion to date, had a similar drop off as past expansions did in percent terms (~20%) into the X.1 patch, and that EW's total playerbase is still higher than ShB's and before, meaning the game is still seeing continual and meaningful growth.

What are you trying to argue here?

Because you haven't argued that the Steam numbers are accurate - you've SAID they are, which isn't the same as PROVING that they are; and again, the onus is on you to do so - and your quotes that are supposed to be a rebuttal to me aren't a rebuttal to me. Her tirade was based on me and others saying that people weren't using Steam to play FFXIV for much of its history, and was a "well akshually" response that has no merit since it didn't contest the point. The point wasn't if people could buy and play FFXIV on Steam, the point was that the vast majority of the players didn't, and the Steam bounce up and then down may not then map well to the non-Steam PC playerbase OR the console player base. And she stuck on that "B-b-but STEAM WAS ALWAYS AVAILABLE!!!" argument instead, because that's all she had and she couldn't actually substantiate the Steam numbers being representative when challenged.

No one has been able to yet.

And people explained the specific bias in the Steam figures that made them unsuitable as a sample. You read Shurrikahn's posts so you could quote them to me here, did you really not read any of the replies to them? Because this was already all hashed out in that thread.

.

As for the post-Liveletter content:

Looks like they're catering to the hardcore player base even more. Yay.

And no open world/field/exploration content? Really?

And no, Island Pokemon Housing-lite Crossing Farmville ain't it.

At least I'm already up to date on Hildi...

Meh, this is kind of depressing of a LL, but I'll live. Maybe the non-Savage dungeons will have a decent story for the ONE version that I'll actually do one time for the story. <mirthless laugh> Oh who am I kidding? I'll need to chain run it 30 times for the Relic anyway...

But hey, if it makes other people happy...guess I'll be happy for them.

[Katoar]

dont forget most of the action roles were initially taken from whm as i remember and also whm lost adds to quite a bit if u count every expansion they removed his skills or rebranded them and gave them to all.

And let's not forget than SCH had WHM as a pet

[Axxion]

And let's not forget than SCH had WHM as a pet

[Axxion]

Looks like they're catering to the hardcore player base even more. Yay.

An.

Serious question how are they catering to the hardcore player base even more?

[Mimilu]

And let's not forget than SCH had WHM as a pet

That's a mental-image and a half. (⁄ ⁄•⁄ω⁄•⁄ ⁄) ♥

[Lauront]

*snip*

I don't have much interest in engaging your tirades, so I am going to focus on this as this was the crux of it:

I'm honestly not sure that Steam numbers do that. If you were to ask me why, I'd say that the Steam users are PROBABLY a lot of the WoW refugees whereas PS4/5 players (especially people that don't PC game) are likely a very different batch of people. Likewise, the people using the regular FFXIV launcher having bought it normally instead of through Steam are probably also a different mindset of player.

Her response:

So why would WoW players, who've never had any Steam integration, flock to Steam, while all other players of XIV (which has had Steam integration since the game's second quarter) would predominantly avoid it? And why, even, would players be more critical of XIV just because they'd played another MMO prior?

What even is the basis for this "probably"?

So yes, it could "potentially" be biased, but your just-so stories don't really do much but guess at it and don't offer much reason for a "probably" beyond your own guesses, whether you call them "logic" or something else.

You then retorted with this:

The overall point stands that the Steam numbers are probably NOT a representative sample of all FFXIV's playerbase. You can make the argument they ARE, but you'll need some evidence and a rational argument backing it up. Not just "No, YOU prove they aren't!" or "Well...there's no reason that they wouldn't be..." as I've already pointed out reasons to think that the Steam sample wouldn't be representative.

Here you are now making a positive case that these numbers are "probably not" a representative sample, with little more than guesswork. You are going beyond questioning it, you are flat out saying that this is not a representative sample.

The reason people use this as a sample is because 1) it is substantial in size and 2) they see no obvious reason as to why it would be fundamentally biased in comparison to the game's broader playerbase. I'm not sure what you are asking of us here - to enumerate every single possible bias it could have and show how it doesn't suffer from that issue? To conduct a demographic study of the wider playerbase and see how this maps over to Steam's playerbase?

At the end of the day, you don't have to accept use of this sample, and quite frankly, I don't care if you do or not. That's your choice. Likewise, unless you provide a good reason to discount it, reliance on it will continue. That's simply where things are. If you want the standard of a scientific journal, I'm afraid unless someone is motivated to put in that effort, it's not going to happen.

As for this:

The problem is the Steam figures were pointed out as potentially not representing the larger game trend - something no one contested (instead just insisting they were valid and that no one should question them) - and that the overall Lucky Bancho numbers indicate EW has had the greatest growth of any expansion in FFXIV's history and that the post-expansion bump drop is on par with past expansions on a percent basis.

The steam figures show a pronounced rise as far back as July (around the time of the WoW exodus - again, a fraction of the total increase to the game's figures resulting from this exodus), with a peak in December on release. That is a good reflection of the game's recent history. If you mean it's just following historic trends regarding LB figures specifically on the point of retention, you'd need to do more dissection than that and look at the composition of the surveys and compare - certainly regarding the Steam figures specifically, in percentile terms, it is losing figures more aggressively and faster relative to its peak than SHB did. Here the issue may well be that new players are now dissuaded from buying on Steam as a result of the recent changes with the launcher, but that is a fairly hollow comfort when the discussion is centred around retention and not whether it can draw in new blood fast enough to replace the old.

LB himself offers a reason here as to why these figures will not exactly correlate at all times:



He also commented again on this issue here, where you can see a breakdown of the figures, including those of continuing characters, which are buoyed thanks to the resumption of sales in the prior survey, but nonetheless down. Just as a note, regarding returning characters, we also have to recall that there was a free login campaign during this survey.

These are auto-translated in case anyone wants to directly translate the site.

[Jeeqbit]

Everyone is gushing over Criterion (Savage) when literally nothing was shown on how difficult it is nor meaningful descriptors. Can't rez? O no, anyway.

Rez makes extremes easier and no rez made BA harder.

only 3 Criterion dungeons over the entire expansion? Uhh, not so cool. Not cool at all. Lackluster I'd say.

Do you expect enough new content to give you a brand new experience 365 days a year? Armies of developers would struggle to achieve that. That's how many work on a lot of AAA games. Unless you find something to do such as mount collecting or RP, the only way to get a year's worth of content is to play other games as well.

Why is Island Sanctuary which was billed as a major expansion content STILL not out? Why is it releasing with 6.25 and not 6.21 or 6.2?

New content types from the patches of an expansion are advertised in the marketing for the expansion. It's always been like this. When content was not staggered over smaller patches, it overwhelmed players and forced them to prioritize, then created a patch lull that didn't need to exist if content was staggered.

Why is all the content revamped content or boring upscaled fights I've already done when it was current (Unreals) which are now even easier by virtue of having a more extensive toolkit?

Not everyone has done them. A lot of newer players asked for the old fights to be made relevant again so they could enjoy them. You don't have to do them and you can buy the rewards off the market board instead.

And looking at the blurred out Island Sanctuary picture again. Even that looks disappointing. The vast majority of the picture is just blurred out water. Unless there's verticality to the island with valleys, climbable mountains, and caverns/caves underneath the land, it looks far smaller than I would have hoped.

The island looks massive and I think they were implying that we will slowly gain access to more of it over the expansion.

Serious question how are they catering to the hardcore player base even more?

Criterion dungeons and criterion savage.

[Axxion]

Rez makes extremes easier and no rez made BA harder.

Do you expect enough new content to give you a brand new experience 365 days a year? Armies of developers would struggle to achieve that. That's how many work on a lot of AAA games. Unless you find something to do such as mount collecting or RP, the only way to get a year's worth of content is to play other games as well.

New content types from the patches of an expansion are advertised in the marketing for the expansion. It's always been like this. When content was not staggered over smaller patches, it overwhelmed players and forced them to prioritize, then created a patch lull that didn't need to exist if content was staggered.

Not everyone has done them. A lot of newer players asked for the old fights to be made relevant again so they could enjoy them. You don't have to do them and you can buy the rewards off the market board instead.
The island looks massive and I think they were implying that we will slowly gain access to more of it over the expansion.

Criterion dungeons and criterion savage.

I dont think that even for the hardcore player base. anybody can do it.

[Payotz]

Looks like they're catering to the hardcore player base even more. Yay.

Criterion dungeons and criterion savage.

Good. It's about time there's 4-man "Hardcore content" in this game.
If you're implying it's a bad thing, it's not because there's literally a casual dungeon mode of the SAME dungeon that you can go in at anytime and go at your own pace.

It's also really funny how before the PLL, you people were all like "DONT COMPLAIN DONT COMPLAIN DONT COMPLAIN DONT COMPLAIN DONT COMPLAIN" and now that PLL is over and the info is released, all of a sudden, "COMPLAIN COMPLAIN COMPLAIN COMPLAIN COMPLAIN".

Really shows the double standard. Don't get me wrong though, feel free to provide your criticisms on things, like how there's no bozja equivalent for relics, because that is valid criticism. People would be more than happy to discuss opinions and criticism rather than being told "shut up, the game's fine!".


---

I'm pretty okay with the PLL. It's a step in the right direction content-wise, and I hope Variant/Criterion would be the baseline standard of all dungeons in the game at some point. We'll see what the execution is ofc, but I applaud the idea behind it.

Maybe someday we can also get modifiers and mutations with it but baby steps.

Islands are cool and my jam so we'll see how it executes for now.

Don't really have any opinions about Relics because that's not my content. They can do whatever they want with it as long as they don't really do something dumb, like make it better than Savage BiS on Week 3 or something that I'm required to grind it out because the new content is actually tuned around it.

That's a mental-image and a half. (⁄ ⁄•⁄ω⁄•⁄ ⁄) ♥

Oy bad! BAD! NOT IN PUBLIC!