A weary player sees hope in the new update

[Edgecrusher]

Why must people be so presumptuous? This is the second time I've replied to someone who has automatically classified me as *reads quote* someone who has no job, and has an aversion to sunlight. Once more, facts: I have a job too, wow! I also go to college, full time! Takes quite a bit of time, that. Takes a bit of sunlight, too. During weekends, I do yard work for others to make some additional money whenever I can. And yet, I can still find time for this. Don't presume things about situations you know nothing about.

Now then, I'm going to create a situation based upon your take of this: now, correct me if I got your view wrong, please, but from what I've read, you're saying that your rewards should not be 'hindered' because you play less, and that, likewise, those who play more should not have their rewards 'enhanced' due to it. Alright, let's roll with that, and turn this situation upside down, shall we? Instead of in game rewards, let us talk of real life rewards. I pose a situation: so you're at your work, and you put 100% into your work, as you have said. However, you have a coworker that works just as hard as you do, and just as diligently, but not as many hours. With me so far? So, the paycheck comes. According to your view, his paycheck should be identical to yours. If it's not, then it contradicts your argument. I mean hey, he worked just as hard and put just as much effort into it, so why shouldn't he, just because he didn't work as many hours as you did?

This is what my entire post was about. You'll see it many times in there. Balance. Equal Exchange. You put more time into one thing, then expect something else to suffer as a consequence of it. That's basic facts. If I chose to pour my time into this game instead of studying, guess what? My grades would suffer as a consequence. That's a fact. I'm not trying to go for some "hardcore gamers get all benefits", I'm trying to keep equality. Simple, pure, logic.

I wasn't actually making any of that to be directed towards you so if it came off that way i do apologize, but my real issue is that you can find a way to equally divide time between both, not have either suffer as a result and get the same reward..but have it say take longer and that would be fine...but you make it sound as if casual playing is a disease that should be purged from XIV entirely and good on them they want to make things take rediculous ammounts of time that way anyone who doesn't want to put in the time...even in portions will never see the end of the rainbow.

Just as you called me presumptuous for assuming "this guy is unemployed and doesn't go to school"...it's just as presumptuous imo that anyone would assume that if i cannot be on for however many hours a week, that i don't want/don't deserve the same from they game i'm paying for the same as you. You work, got school and do things on weekends...and you still found the time to meld the new equipment...which by your standards, takes alot of time...so in essence you're the exact example of what i mean.

You put the effort forward, and you deserve to be rewarded for the time and effort you put in...not in a sense of "everyone gets a trophy" like they do to eliminate any type of actual competition..but in the same vein of "I trained my ass off, it took time...and now look at what i did." But by your own rational..you'd ostracize yourself for not having the oodles of time that a supposed "hardcore" player has as opposed to a "casual". I'm all for equal exchange, but even in that you can find a balance so no one is left out.

[Hyrist]

Make the game accessible to casuals but add content that us hardcores can experience if we want to.

And hardcores need to learn that their reward for that sort of obsessive gameplay should not be one that allows them to hold their playstyles over other people's heads.

That's the sort of thing they're asking for, and it's flat out wrong.

Hardcore players are schizoid sometimes.

First they'll complain that 'casuals' are going through the game too fast and that the rewards are too easy.
But when they're forced to deal with RNG for rewards to challenging game-play, they equally upset.

What needs to be struck is this medium in which Hardcore players realize that, hey, because they're hardcore, they're going to get things faster on a consistent reward system, and then THEY'RE Going to be the one's complaining about how fast they're blowing through content. (And then suddenly it's not 'hard enough'.) Eventually they're just going to have to acknowledge that they're more skilled than the bell of the curve and instead of requesting to lengthening the time it takes to get rewards for those who have less time - to instead ask for enjoyable, repayable content that is rewarding in and of itself (Or has consumable rewards.)

Because that request is what SE is going to (and is already in the process of) respond to.

Challenging fights with consumables? Summon-able Primals that you have to reclaim after use.
Re-playable content based on just the content for enjoyment? PvP.

You do know that time=challenge. If you can't find the time for something, it's a challenge to go do it.

There are many definitions of challenge. Anything that requires a modicum of effort can be listed as a challenge.

Example: "It's a challenge for me to get out of bed in the morning." (Well, today it was because I was sick, but you get the idea.)

The point the Casuals are trying to explain to the hard headed hardcores is that Challenges should be in the gameplay itself, not in the progression pacing.

IE - Garuda (Once the exploit is fixed) is a hard fight. That fight, is the direct sort of challenge players want to experience, both Casuals and Hardcores. But the progress isn't tedious because you get guarenteed drops. Lucky or not, 20 wins gets you a weapon. That takes the tedium out of it without taking out the challenge.

Granted, this sort of thing is a lot harder to apply to Crafting. But a crafter who works consistently on their one chosen craft should not get penalized for not taking every craft up.

In the end, the hardcore players are asking for the wrong things, as usual. Working on Crafts shouldn't be additionally tedious - it should just have greater depth to it for the players who want to explore to do so. (This fixes itself overall when auction comes out.)

Progressing through the story should not be about hard fights that REQUIRE you to get a party for. It should be about going through the story and revisiting those fights at harder challenges for the fun of it (and perhaps unique but optional rewards)

You guys can't have it both ways by forcing timesinks on the casuals and having steady progress for yourselves. Somewhere it will turn around and bite you in the rear like with the old Primal drop system. Instead, focus on the reasons why you're asking for what you're asking for, and find true solutions instead of nosediving into nostalgia-ville with those rose tinted goggles of yours.

[Malakhim]

And hardcores need to learn that their reward for that sort of obsessive gameplay should not be one that allows them to hold their playstyles over other people's heads.

That's the sort of thing they're asking for, and it's flat out wrong.

Hardcore players are schizoid sometimes.

First they'll complain that 'casuals' are going through the game too fast and that the rewards are too easy.
But when they're forced to deal with RNG for rewards to challenging game-play, they equally upset.

What needs to be struck is this medium in which Hardcore players realize that, hey, because they're hardcore, they're going to get things faster on a consistent reward system, and then THEY'RE Going to be the one's complaining about how fast they're blowing through content. (And then suddenly it's not 'hard enough'.) Eventually they're just going to have to acknowledge that they're more skilled than the bell of the curve and instead of requesting to lengthening the time it takes to get rewards for those who have less time - to instead ask for enjoyable, repayable content that is rewarding in and of itself (Or has consumable rewards.)

Because that request is what SE is going to (and is already in the process of) respond to.

Challenging fights with consumables? Summon-able Primals that you have to reclaim after use.
Re-playable content based on just the content for enjoyment? PvP.



There are many definitions of challenge. Anything that requires a modicum of effort can be listed as a challenge.

Example: "It's a challenge for me to get out of bed in the morning." (Well, today it was because I was sick, but you get the idea.)

The point the Casuals are trying to explain to the hard headed hardcores is that Challenges should be in the gameplay itself, not in the progression pacing.

IE - Garuda (Once the exploit is fixed) is a hard fight. That fight, is the direct sort of challenge players want to experience, both Casuals and Hardcores. But the progress isn't tedious because you get guarenteed drops. Lucky or not, 20 wins gets you a weapon. That takes the tedium out of it without taking out the challenge.

Granted, this sort of thing is a lot harder to apply to Crafting. But a crafter who works consistently on their one chosen craft should not get penalized for not taking every craft up.

In the end, the hardcore players are asking for the wrong things, as usual. Working on Crafts shouldn't be additionally tedious - it should just have greater depth to it for the players who want to explore to do so. (This fixes itself overall when auction comes out.)

Progressing through the story should not be about hard fights that REQUIRE you to get a party for. It should be about going through the story and revisiting those fights at harder challenges for the fun of it (and perhaps unique but optional rewards)

You guys can't have it both ways by forcing timesinks on the casuals and having steady progress for yourselves. Somewhere it will turn around and bite you in the rear like with the old Primal drop system. Instead, focus on the reasons why you're asking for what you're asking for, and find true solutions instead of nosediving into nostalgia-ville with those rose tinted goggles of yours.

I want to give you like 3 cookies.

[yialee]

i am touch by your story and will give you a thumb up. True Story here for ppl who havent max everything yet. Really i feel bad for alot player who max DOL DOH DOW and DOM and just trolling ppl in town. I sure not everyone want max all those job but max job they DOW and DOM and bore. The game do not have enought content to move this fast on exp so SE should have hold that back but atm it too late. They shoulda wait til version 2.0 came out and give out exp like this so new player can catch up but not before that b/c i too have lost alot player from ffxi quiting the game til version 2.0 or playing other mmo game and hope to return or might not. Some have return to ffxi and some have move on to other. Thank you for this long story you have share it does make me faceslap myself why am i still logging on everyday to sit in town and hear ppl shout for no reason when i can be doing something esl. peace

[Alastor]

I've enjoyed reading the clever posts from people who are arguing both sides. It's like watching Atheists and Theists go at it. Both sides are entirely convinced that they are right.

I think both sides have valid points.

Time is not equivalent to skill. To suggest something so radically black and white is to discount your argument completely. Skill takes time to acquire, but not the same amount of time for each individual. There exists no equation for the rate of skill gain against time. It's impossible to measure.

No one is arguing that some content needs to be a challenge to get. Relic, Mythic, Empyrean weapons from FFXI were a good example of things that take dedication to get, but are not game breaking. I also do not see anyone pushing the idea of being "given things easily."

What concerns me, like so many other players, is how something that so greatly affects the game, such as crafting (do we even need to go into the economic effects?) is being roped off into its own category by those who seem to have a great deal of extra time. This sort of an advantage is game breaking. I won't disagree that there should always be room for those who DO have the time and energy to excel. This can be accomplished by high-end synths that take time to prepare and create. The same is accomplished on the other side of the spectrum by players who spend the time to farm Relic and Mythic weapons. However, there should still be room for those who are more restrained by their amount of play time to reach their goals, too.

It must be incredibly frustrating to have a great deal of time to play the game. I will remind you, however: you choose the pace at which you get through the game's content. If you feel like you're being "restricted" because the game is trying to open its doors to casual players, then perhaps you need to find another activity to take up that time.

To quote one of my favorite college professors:
"It's not about the time you put in. It's about what you put into the time."

[Gramul]

Like I said. There's enough room for both types of content.

[Rokien]

And hardcores need to learn that their reward for that sort of obsessive gameplay should not be one that allows them to hold their playstyles over other people's heads.

That's the sort of thing they're asking for, and it's flat out wrong.

Hardcore players are schizoid sometimes.

First they'll complain that 'casuals' are going through the game too fast and that the rewards are too easy.
But when they're forced to deal with RNG for rewards to challenging game-play, they equally upset.

What needs to be struck is this medium in which Hardcore players realize that, hey, because they're hardcore, they're going to get things faster on a consistent reward system, and then THEY'RE Going to be the one's complaining about how fast they're blowing through content. (And then suddenly it's not 'hard enough'.) Eventually they're just going to have to acknowledge that they're more skilled than the bell of the curve and instead of requesting to lengthening the time it takes to get rewards for those who have less time - to instead ask for enjoyable, repayable content that is rewarding in and of itself (Or has consumable rewards.)

Because that request is what SE is going to (and is already in the process of) respond to.

Challenging fights with consumables? Summon-able Primals that you have to reclaim after use.
Re-playable content based on just the content for enjoyment? PvP.



There are many definitions of challenge. Anything that requires a modicum of effort can be listed as a challenge.

Example: "It's a challenge for me to get out of bed in the morning." (Well, today it was because I was sick, but you get the idea.)

The point the Casuals are trying to explain to the hard headed hardcores is that Challenges should be in the gameplay itself, not in the progression pacing.

IE - Garuda (Once the exploit is fixed) is a hard fight. That fight, is the direct sort of challenge players want to experience, both Casuals and Hardcores. But the progress isn't tedious because you get guarenteed drops. Lucky or not, 20 wins gets you a weapon. That takes the tedium out of it without taking out the challenge.

Granted, this sort of thing is a lot harder to apply to Crafting. But a crafter who works consistently on their one chosen craft should not get penalized for not taking every craft up.

In the end, the hardcore players are asking for the wrong things, as usual. Working on Crafts shouldn't be additionally tedious - it should just have greater depth to it for the players who want to explore to do so. (This fixes itself overall when auction comes out.)

Progressing through the story should not be about hard fights that REQUIRE you to get a party for. It should be about going through the story and revisiting those fights at harder challenges for the fun of it (and perhaps unique but optional rewards)

You guys can't have it both ways by forcing timesinks on the casuals and having steady progress for yourselves. Somewhere it will turn around and bite you in the rear like with the old Primal drop system. Instead, focus on the reasons why you're asking for what you're asking for, and find true solutions instead of nosediving into nostalgia-ville with those rose tinted goggles of yours.

You know, I remember when games were games, made by gamers for gamers. Till the mass was like "OH I DO LIKE PLAYIING GAMES, BUT DON'T REALLY WANT IT TO BE THAT HARD, JUST MAKE IT SIMPLE SO I CAN FIGURE IT OUT" Now that everyone plays games, they over shadow the real gamers, so who is holding their head above others? Ya, the casuals, go do something outside, thanks!~

Ps; I'm a casual gamer that loves hardcore things, I like things that I will never get EVER, I like them there. I hate things that I can get with short amount of time, I wont buy a video game if it has only 6 hours of story. I only buy games with at least 20+ hours worth of game time(story), whether or not I finish the game, well, that's fine. Though, everytime I play I know I have something to work towards even though I won't get to the end.

[Nate_Sith]

Time is not equivalent to skill. To suggest something so radically black and white is to discount your argument completely. Skill takes time to acquire, but not the same amount of time for each individual. There exists no equation for the rate of skill gain against time. It's impossible to measure.

I think the argument of whether or not time invested = skill. It obviously doesn't, skill is basically a by-product of time invested that happens naturally in any activity, but that's not the point of why things should take a certain amount of time to complete. If you say that there is unnecessary time it takes to complete a certain activity, and you advocate shaving off some of that time, where do you draw the line? At some point you're going to come to the question of, why aren't these activities practically instantaneous? Then we wouldn't waste ANY time on them, right? In my opinion, after some point, having something take so little time to complete it then becomes meaningless and therefore a waste of my time..... Oh the irony. The fact that it might take you a month rather than a day to complete something makes it a whole lot more meaningful. I want to play a game that has achievements that are meaningful.

What concerns me, like so many other players, is how something that so greatly affects the game, such as crafting (do we even need to go into the economic effects?) is being roped off into its own category by those who seem to have a great deal of extra time. This sort of an advantage is game breaking. I won't disagree that there should always be room for those who DO have the time and energy to excel. This can be accomplished by high-end synths that take time to prepare and create. The same is accomplished on the other side of the spectrum by players who spend the time to farm Relic and Mythic weapons. However, there should still be room for those who are more restrained by their amount of play time to reach their goals, too.

I don't really understand this, crafting as it stands now doesn't really seem that lengthy at all. I've only been playing for about 3 weeks and I already have most all of my crafts near 10, with one at 17, and I don't spend very much time crafting really. If you're a casual gamer, you'll likely have more guildleves built up when you log in and well have a potentially easier time crafting. Crafting to me is purely economical, I don't see why else you would engage in it. That being said, if you want to make it easier/faster for everyone, what are these economic effects you hinted at? The value added to materials by synthesizing them becomes less, basically making crafting pay a lot less if you were to invest your time into it. So now instead of having a hard time getting to be able to craft certain items, just about everyone can craft them. Then it becomes more about fighting to sell the items, I'd prefer the former.

I don't think making crafting easier would make it more profitable to casual players, or anyone for that matter. It will simply translate to more synths for the same amount of profit you could achieve before. This fixes nothing.

[Enfarious]

...
Time is not equivalent to skill. To suggest something so radically black and white is to discount your argument completely. Skill takes time to acquire, but not the same amount of time for each individual. There exists no equation for the rate of skill gain against time. It's impossible to measure.

No one is arguing that some content needs to be a challenge to get. Relic, Mythic, Empyrean weapons from FFXI were a good example of things that take dedication to get, but are not game breaking. I also do not see anyone pushing the idea of being "given things easily."

What concerns me, like so many other players, is how something that so greatly affects the game, such as crafting (do we even need to go into the economic effects?) is being roped off into its own category by those who seem to have a great deal of extra time. This sort of an advantage is game breaking. I won't disagree that there should always be room for those who DO have the time and energy to excel. This can be accomplished by high-end synths that take time to prepare and create. The same is accomplished on the other side of the spectrum by players who spend the time to farm Relic and Mythic weapons. However, there should still be room for those who are more restrained by their amount of play time to reach their goals, too.
...
To quote one of my favorite college professors:
"It's not about the time you put in. It's about what you put into the time."

That's a great quote there.

Sorry to edit your post, but I'm going to try to avoid the super wall-o-text that this would have become.
The time vs. skill or time == skill arguments aren't black and white at all, the variance that people will find is that people who are "naturals" will get through things faster, invariably the people that don't truly grasp the mechanics of the game will require more attempts at that same content. This is your grey, an already skilled player won't get stumped by a new dungeon for 10 runs it'll only take them 3, a new unskilled player won't get it in 3 but rather 10. As that new player learns, grows, and gains skill OVER TIME they'll begin to get through content faster too, again from a number of attempts stand point not real time.

You know, I remember when games were games, made by gamers for gamers. Till the mass was like "OH I DO LIKE PLAYIING GAMES, BUT DON'T REALLY WANT IT TO BE THAT HARD, JUST MAKE IT SIMPLE SO I CAN FIGURE IT OUT" Now that everyone plays games, they over shadow the real gamers, so who is holding their head above others? Ya, the casuals, go do something outside, thanks!~

Ps; I'm a casual gamer that loves hardcore things, I like things that I will never get EVER, I like them there. I hate things that I can get with short amount of time, I wont buy a video game if it has only 6 hours of story. I only buy games with at least 20+ hours worth of game time(story), whether or not I finish the game, well, that's fine. Though, everytime I play I know I have something to work towards even though I won't get to the end.

To the first point, yes now every tom dick and harry play games but they don't delve deeply into them, they play for the surface content, this has actually been the case the only real divider being who could afford the consoles who had that disposable income and felt that a console was worth it. Now with PCs filling the consoles role to a point and nearly everyone being able to purchase one that great divide has been closed. This happens with everything over time, initially (atari colecovision) only the elite and truly dedicated, later (Sega Master System, NES) more people join in, far later (PS2, XBOX) it's mainstream and everything is geared to suit everyone initially but most games will slide into casuals dust racks and be forgotten, the hardcore will continue to play for ages, FFXI for 6+ years, 6 full relics, 5 full Nyzul weapons, etc. This game will do it too, after a couple years the novelty will wear off and the casual players will drift.

To the second. As a rule I won't buy a game that can't provide, potentially, a number of hours of enjoyable game play >= it's cost in USD, FFX $50.00 I played 200+ hours and enjoyed easily 190 of those hours, that was a sound investment. FFXI thousands of hours over the years also sound. Rift 6 hours til it's WoW cloneness drove me away, CE I purchased, not sound I flogged myself for the remaining hours to make up the price:hours. This game, otw to providing those hours, with the potentially to match XI.
MMOs are great for that because it's not just the content that make things enjoyable it's also the community. That first M says make friends and enjoy the ride.

[Hyrist]

You know, I remember when ...

Didn't I imply you to take those glasses off?

If you want a reality check, the definition of an average gamer is a 40 year old woman playing Bejeweled (Or Farmville, or Angry Birds, take your pick.) This isn't a nerd's club anymore. So before you call yourself a 'real gamer' please realize that such a concept no longer exists as you think it does - and that, in fact, is a good thing for games. It means it'll garner a wider respect as a medium.

Now, of course, that comes at the sacrifice of niche appeal to broad system games like FFXIV. But as you were just so nice to tell the casuals to go outside, the instant rebuttal that comes to my mind is that you're missing your local Magic:The Gathering tournament right about now -

They call themselves "Real Gamers" too.