Sorry, but Content deal finder again.....

[Velhart]

hehe, I ment Duneons can be half non-instanced, and half Instanced, I don't mind the setup as we have it now, but I do agree Dungeons should be Instanced though. But I do like the Open world Dungeons, so that you can see random people pop in there for whatever reason :P

I would be okay with that. I wouldn't mind if some dungeons were set up like that, but I would want NM fights to be instanced or forced popped under certain condition. I loved Sky and Sea, but I hated fighting other LS's, especially botters over mobs just to get items to pop the god NM's.

Perhaps in major end game areas, SE could meet in the middle with that.

EDIT: But I still believe smaller dungeons like Cutter's Cry and Aurum Vale should be instanced, but major end game areas should be a mix of both.

[Starlord]

I would be okay with that. I wouldn't mind if some dungeons were set up like that, but I would want NM fights to be instanced or forced popped under certain condition. I loved Sky and Sea, but I hated fighting other LS's, especially botters over mobs just to get items to pop the god NM's.

Perhaps in major end game areas, SE could meet in the middle with that.

Open-world NMs for the low level stuff, then Forced popped or Instanced NMs for the Uber and strong end-gear.. that way everyone can have the slice of the NM kill and possibly a reward from it. FFXI was a great game, but one of the things I didn't like was that I couldn't get Relic gear etc etc, because you needed to be in a Fuctional working LS to get them or else you lose out, and not only that but some NMs you could get sometimes because the other players get to them first, then you have to wait for 21+hrs to even try it again.

[Velhart]

Open-world NMs for the low level stuff, then Forced popped or Instanced NMs for the Uber and strong end-gear.. that way everyone can have the slice of the NM kill and possibly a reward from it. FFXI was a great game, but one of the things I didn't like was that I couldn't get Relic gear etc etc, because you needed to be in a Fuctional working LS to get them or else you lose out, and not only that but some NMs you could get sometimes because the other players get to them first, then you have to wait for 21+hrs to even try it again.

Got one problem with forced pops. People not in a party can still hit mobs. What is stopping people from getting their 40 LS members and take down an NM the developers design for 8 people? Possibly 16 if they implement an alliance system. The best way for NM's is to be instanced. Can even make it look like the area you were just in. Like you get the item required to pop one NM. When you go to the "???", you go through the classic "You are bound by duty." with people in your party go into an instanced version of the area you are in, kill the NM, then it takes you back from the instanced version to the normal open world area.

That is what I believe the best way to handle open world end game dungeons. I think a lot about Sky and Sea when I talk about this. It worked for those major end game dungeons because others outside the party could not claim mobs. So I think this is how it should be balanced. Of course, major fights be done in a special instanced area in the dungeon.

[Arcell]

Got one problem with forced pops. People not in a party can still hit mobs. What is stopping people from getting their 40 LS members and take down an NM the developers design for 8 people? Possibly 16 if they implement an alliance system. The best way for NM's is to be instanced. Can even make it look like the area you were just in. Like you get the item required to pop one NM. When you go to the "???", you go through the classic "You are bound by duty." with people in your party go into an instanced version of the area you are in, kill the NM, then it takes you back from the instanced version to the normal open world area.

That is what I believe the best way to handle open world end game dungeons. I think a lot about Sky and Sea when I talk about this. It worked for those major end game dungeons because others outside the party could not claim mobs. So I think this is how it should be balanced. Of course, major fights be done in a special instanced area in the dungeon.

From a balance standpoint, Velhart is 100% right. Anything in the open world can be attacked by any number of players/parties outside of those who claimed it. This means that zerging becomes the strategy of choice for most people and thus there is no difficulty. With instances, or even pseudo-instances like faction leves, balance can be achieved because the number of people allowed to participate is limited.

Also there's nothing that they've said that means the game is going to be 100% purely instanced. They've said that they want to rely heavily on instances for things like dungeons but that makes sense. It is a unique area in the game with unique objectives that lends itself to only a few people being present.

And don't act like they aren't always adding open-world content as well. The Strongholds are the biggest example of this. They are quite similar to dungeons (areas filled with monsters in which progression through is limited to a few paths and various treasures are around to be found) and are open-world. Hell they even added Shposhae as well, a completely open-world dungeon.

I think for end-game content that warrants it, we will see instances to avoid a lot of the hatred, animosity and lack of sportsmanship that comes with things like claim wars. Things like dungeons and primals, they warrant instancing. However they will still be adding open world content. Why do you think they're re-creating every single one of the overworld maps? So we can just walk around and look? No. They're going to fill those new maps with content as well. This game will never be all open world or all instanced, there will be a mix.