Just got done leveling....

[Zaaku]

I just got out of a party leveled MRD from 19-25.5 everything was smooth and all but the atmosphere was devoid of human interaction. We just mindlessly linked tons of Cactaurs and dragged them back in a pile so our cons and thms could aoe them, repeat that, remove talking except for one or 2 people randomly saying goodbye and ropping without a second thought.

I am happy I finally got a party after damn near a few weeks total of seeking for 5+ hours a day. I was seeking for almost 12 hours today before I got this party. I just wish leveling was more envolving instead of a aoe spam fest.

Well I'm glad to hear you made some progress! A shame about the lack of interaction though. A PT chat devoid of actively and you may as well be playing with bots I say! I have also noticed something that I just picked up in my latest PT.

I leveled on my Monk tonight (41-45 ^-^) and I had elected to take my party to the Pirate beach North of Camp Bad Knoll. Depleting the world of yet another generation of Raptors didn't sit well with me and I wanted to explore other options. (Kudos to Professor Tipton for the location ) Anyways along the way our Whm had strayed into the Toad cluster halfway between the camp and the Aether-Wright. Needless to say he was promptly tongue lashed to a bloody White and Red pulp with no hope of escape. Our Blm though he could take the lot of them on with his Lighting arsenal. Turns out frying one toad doesn't mean much where it's 14 pond brothers were around. Some how a Dragoon got caught up in the pile O' bodies before we finally marshaled the remaining survivors of the Toad's bloodthristy onslaught. Even under manned the Toad's didn't offer much of a challenge and we were able to raise the fallen and continue along our trek.


From that moment on the PT attitude just shifted. We began bantering with the unfortunate victims about their Toad hunting prowess and the bravery of taking an entire horde of Horny toads. The topic of discussion followed a dizzying array of deep and relevant topics. Such as sex and lewd jokes about sex, and all the times were wish we had had more sex. Before I knew it 4 1/2 hours had pasted and we had just FLOWN through 260k worth of EXP. I kind of had to just stop and think about it. The entire slug fest hardly seemed to be taxing at all in retrospect. Compared to my other leveling sessions. What paradox did I uncover that made EXP grinding as cathartic and speedy as a good Morning Glory?

Then it hit me

We were talking. The conversation had compressed time and made me selective memoric about any troubles we had encountered that slowed our Pirate hunt. The entire time we forced more on talking then being 100% efficient with our chains and skill usage yet I felt as if we made significantly more progress then anything I had done before... actually I take that back. I had encountered this before. Just not for a very very long time.

I recall near release when this game was almost nothing like what we call FFXIV today. Back when Con's were the nukers and a Thm could main heal an entire dungeon and retain 90% of his MP pool. One detrimental effect of faster, mobile parties was the inability to just take 4 seconds of time off the screen and chat with the other members. Everything was click this click that run here change AoE function now drain this corpse run back over here. There wasn't a moment of time for me to relax. This has obviously changed quite a bit with the inclusion of Auto-attack yet it is still, to my preference at least, far too fast. Mobs take 10-15 seconds of attention at most and to keep up with the massive number of bodies you must churn it leaves very little time to converse with the other human being you are playing this game with.

I really hope they make a return to static parties which have a seditary formation and a single puller who brings the mobs into a kill zone. Along with more focus on less mobs with more HP. I personally would like it to go back to one at a time. It allows for us players to mellow out a bit and have fun with each other without having to click the next button and switch targets every other syllable. Not to mention makes the skills you preform and damage you dish out more satisfying. Keeping hate on a single mob for 50 seconds with a string of hate inducing abilities on PLD in FFXI was much MUCH more gratifying then this run into a cluster, provoke, get 2 WS's off then change targets malarky we got going now.


Anyway long winded post short: Try strike up conversation more often and get the other members of the PT into the chatty mode. It will make the experience much better and time go by faster.

[Keith_Dragoon]

Anyway long winded post short: Try strike up conversation more often and get the other members of the PT into the chatty mode. It will make the experience much better and time go by faster.

I tried striking up conversation, I'm a old-school FFXI player so convos and partying go hand in hand for me but all my chatting fell upon deaf ears. I got one or 2 "lol" and maybe a shorthanded response from people I spoke to. All they wanted to do was storm through the cactaurs and get exp. Nobody but me cared about the social aspect of our party so in the end I stopped trying.

Congrats on another good party that even included sex talk! :P /jelly

[Mikita]

Anyway long winded post short: Try strike up conversation more often and get the other members of the PT into the chatty mode. It will make the experience much better and time go by faster.

Thanks for sharing your experiences here. They are refreshing to read. ^^

I tried striking up conversation, I'm a old-school FFXI player so convos and partying go hand in hand for me but all my chatting fell upon deaf ears. I got one or 2 "lol" and maybe a shorthanded response from people I spoke to. All they wanted to do was storm through the cactaurs and get exp. Nobody but me cared about the social aspect of our party so in the end I stopped trying.

At least you tried. Sometimes it will work -- many times it will not. Breaking the ice can be really hard, especially when you don't know just how thick the ice is... but when you do get through then it can lead to a really great experience.

...

And a general, perhaps really naive question about standing in Ul'dah for ____ hours trying to get a party...

Why do people wait that long? Why not try shouting a few times, gather whoever you can within a few minutes, and then just head out even if there are just 2 of you?

I've been taking Archer from R30 to just short of R50 over the past couple of weeks, and most of the time it's been in parties of 2 to 3 people sharing leves and behests, as well as going through mitelings, raptors, and hog areas.

The EXP is not as good as chaining all the monsters in an area then bombing them with AoE attacks, but I still gain 1 or 2 levels per night on average.

And the nice thing is that fights last longer and I actually get to do things... like learn how to use my new abilities and combos.

It's actually really fun. ^^

[Keith_Dragoon]

And a general, perhaps really naive question about standing in Ul'dah for ____ hours trying to get a party...

Why do people wait that long? Why not try shouting a few times, gather whoever you can within a few minutes, and then just head out even if there are just 2 of you?

I've been taking Archer from R30 to just short of R50 over the past couple of weeks, and most of the time it's been in parties of 2 to 3 people sharing leves and behests, as well as going through mitelings, raptors, and hog areas.

The EXP is not as good as chaining all the monsters in an area then bombing them with AoE attacks, but I still gain 1 or 2 levels per night on average.

And the nice thing is that fights last longer and I actually get to do things... like learn how to use my new abilities and combos.

It's actually really fun. ^^

I did shout for abit, I searched for people in my range and sent tells, I never got a single hit in all my time until the party I mentioned before.

On a related note to OP...

Yet another party today formed by the leader of the silent group, got Mrd 25-29. Party started off abit rocky with me joining in the middle of a camp swap and we damn near wiped from the mobs. We quickly raised, recovered and returned to their old stomping grounds thinning the giant bug colonies 1 miteling at a time. This time around the party was not a AOE storm of mages but a zerg fest of melee so I actually felt like I contributed with my shiny medal for most deaths in 1 party.

This party was abit more talkative seeing as I cracked enough jokes to break apart the glacier that sunk the Titanic. Not as social as I am used to but a welcome change. After a few hours we got a rep for one guy who came in for 30 mins then I started having connection issues. When I returned he decided to PL me to 30 from 29 before party disbanded.

I have now unlocked Warrior and have 1 less job in the sub 30 hell house.