Critical Analysis: Relic Weapon Seal Acquisition

[Babydoll]

The relic quest was designed for organized linkshells/communities. Pick up groups will obviously have a harder/longer time.

This is what basically makes or breaks the game for me. I despise how everything needs to be in an organized, SMALL linkshell commuinity to be done. Excuse me SE, I am playing a MMO...which is a Massively Multiplier Online game. I love doing things with pick ups and meeting new people, or yanno...playing with a very diverse amount of people. Hopefully this will be fixed in ARR.

[Raikki]

This is what basically makes or breaks the game for me. I despise how everything needs to be in an organized, SMALL linkshell commuinity to be done. Excuse me SE, I am playing a MMO...which is a Massively Multiplier Online game. I love doing things with pick ups and meeting new people, or yanno...playing with a very diverse amount of people. Hopefully this will be fixed in ARR.

No. Just no. Casualifying the game to the point that barely-capable-of-beating-Ifrit-level PUGs can do everything would absolutely destroy the game. You can PUG enough in the game already without demanding to be allowed to PUG relic weapons of all things. Let those of us who care about skill keep something to play for please.

[Babydoll]

No. Just no. Casualifying the game to the point that barely-capable-of-beating-Ifrit-level PUGs can do everything would absolutely destroy the game. You can PUG enough in the game already without demanding to be allowed to PUG relic weapons of all things. Let those of us who care about skill keep something to play for please.

Yes..just yes lol.

No, not casual. That is not what I meant, I do not want content for casuals.

For example, FFXI was not casual...not by any means. I nearly played FFXI with the eat sleep and breathe it mentality 24-7 and loved it. And yeah..with that game I could hop online and join PUG's and get shit done. Not easily though, haha nooo not at all.

I have played it since 2003...and anyway, people on that game only made statics for play times, not because of the content. That game was made so that it was very hard and challenging but yet pick ups could still do it BUT they had to invest an insane amount of time and effort in it. Does this make sense? Maybe I did not choose my words properly. I in no way want a casual game, those are boring and I give up on those fast..or avoid them at all costs.

I would join PUGs to do stuff and it would take the whole day. I am not against difficult, hardcore content...that is what I have been wanting for years. But I do not want to be forced to do it with the SAME 8 people every time. That gets stale and old fast to me. I love meeting new people and making new friends. That is the whole point of a MMO no? If you want 8 man content and want to play with the same group of people day in and day out....umm that is not what I imagine when I think of a MMO....

I got 2 relics from pick up groups (yes, even the ifrit extreme part), so yes it is possible to get relics from pickup groups. Just probably not NA pickups.

Yeah this is what I want. Thank you for sharing this ^^

[Raikki]

But I do not want to be forced to do it with the SAME 8 people every time. That gets stale and old fast to me. I love meeting new people and making new friends. That is the whole point of a MMO no? If you want 8 man content and want to play with the same group of people day in and day out....umm that is not what I imagine when I think of a MMO....

You're missing the point. Wanting (and having) ample PUG content is fine. Asking for literally everything in the game to be easily PUGable is not fine. If NA PUG players were willing to play on the same level as JP PUGs, that would be different, but everyone knows how low the typical NA PUG skill level is. Even still, NA PUGs can handle almost everything in the game already.

Content in general needs to be made harder to PUG, not easier. Not because you shouldn't be able to PUG it, but because if you're going to PUG it you should at least be putting in as much effort as more serious players.

[Babydoll]

You're missing the point. Wanting (and having) ample PUG content is fine. Asking for literally everything in the game to be easily PUGable is not fine. If NA PUG players were willing to play on the same level as JP PUGs, that would be different, but everyone knows how low the typical NA PUG skill level is. Even still, NA PUGs can handle almost everything in the game already.

Content in general needs to be made harder to PUG, not easier. Not because you shouldn't be able to PUG it, but because if you're going to PUG it you should at least be putting in as much effort as more serious players.

Yeah them making it easier would not fix anything >.< I don't want everything to be easy by any means, that just makes it more boring..I just want to be able to do hard stuff like how the JP do it seems. Yeah I agree the NA pug skill level is usually pretty poor, at least in FFXIV from my experience.

I am a very serious player and always try my best...I pay attention and would like to think I know how to play my jobs and I hope everyone who joins PUGs is the same way. I am a fast learner and usually can do things correct after being explained once. However in my experience that is not the case with the NA PUG groups I've joined...people just play as if they are half asleep and not paying attention. They just want to play casual and halfass everything then after wiping get frustrated and leave.

EDIT

Maybe there's a misunderstanding here, but when I read "I want to be able to PUG everything", it comes across as "I want content to be easy enough for my PUGs to beat"

Yeah that is not what I meant at all. >.< I do not want easy content. ;~; I want to be able to do what Charazard did with the JP. Keep the difficulty...by all means!!

typical NA PUG will always consist of people who are woefully underprepared for the content and aren't willing to invest enough effort into it. People like that should not be able to clear all the content in the game. That's all I'm saying.

Yes this...this is what I was trying to say!

[Shougun]

No. Just no. Casualifying the game to the point that barely-capable-of-beating-Ifrit-level PUGs can do everything would absolutely destroy the game. You can PUG enough in the game already without demanding to be allowed to PUG relic weapons of all things. Let those of us who care about skill keep something to play for please.

Using a small group doesnt mean no skill. SE could have dynamic difficulties to ensure challange through a broader party spectrum.

Hamlet becoming more open in 2.0 is exciting for this though, I really hope they do it dynamically (within reason) otherwise it will be like the stupid fire dance. Either you got so many people you just stand around and watch or not enough and its guaranteed failure.

Assuming someone wants to do it in small to solo play has nothing to do with "Casualifying" the game. Like playing dark souls single player and then screaming Y SO CASUAL - no one would do that?

And I think the problem with NA PUGs is that most NA players are Linkshell Onry, so if you are a part of a Linkshell PUG (mix of a couple linkshells) you are probably in good hands, but a true non consistent PUG sometimes you have to worry lol.

[Raikki]

Assuming someone wants to do it in small to solo play has nothing to do with "Casualifying" the game.

Maybe there's a misunderstanding here, but when I read "I want to be able to PUG everything", it comes across as "I want content to be easy enough for my PUGs to beat" because that's the only thing holding back a PUG from doing everything. You can PUG anything in the game right now if the players are good enough. The only reason it's easier for dedicated linkshells (apart from scheduling) is because the typical NA PUG will always consist of people who are woefully underprepared for the content and aren't willing to invest enough effort into it. People like that should not be able to clear all the content in the game. That's all I'm saying.

[Elexia]

No. Just no. Casualifying the game to the point that barely-capable-of-beating-Ifrit-level PUGs can do everything would absolutely destroy the game. You can PUG enough in the game already without demanding to be allowed to PUG relic weapons of all things. Let those of us who care about skill keep something to play for please.

How will SE get people to play their MMO then? Did you not see how easy all new MMOs have been the past quarter of a decade?

Really, Relic acquisition, especially Hamlet pre-req needs tuning and people can deny it all they want, it doesn't even take skill to do..it's not even a measure of your skill, just a measure of how much time you're willing to dump into nothing realistically which is all the Hamlet Def portion is. When you need the Beastmen KI and the seals you're pretty much told in a fancy way: "This is to waste your time, now you can actually start the quest you were looking for."

3x of each seal is flatout stating it's to waste your time, you only really need 1 of each, but that would kill the event too quickly, which if anyone here actually played FFXI you would know SE is the king of forcing people into events or buying items they didn't want to bother with, i.e There's 100% no reason to ever buy Balrahn's Eyepatch, ever....until you decide you want a Mythic weapon and pray you bought every other item you wanted or else you'll be blowing 100k ichor on something that serves no purpose.

So yes, no one truly wants it to be "easier" or "more casual" but most people want it to be logical and the Hamlet Def step is just to waste your time, much like the SB portion is designed to waste your time, especially if you ignore the reasoning for it.

[Raikki]

So yes, no one truly wants it to be "easier" or "more casual" but most people want it to be logical and the Hamlet Def step is just to waste your time, much like the SB portion is designed to waste your time, especially if you ignore the reasoning for it.

It's no different an issue than the Darklight or primal weapon drop rate. There's too little content, so we have to spam it mindlessly to waste our time. We already know that's being changed in 2.0. Everything in 1.x is like this, it's nothing new. So what's so special about the hamlet grind?

The hamlet seals portion of the relic quest was intended as a pseudo-hard limit on the amount of relics that can be obtained over a certain span of time.

The devs realized that no matter how difficult battles are, FFXIV players are resourceful enough to master them (as proven with the Garuda fight). They also realized that no matter how much grinding is required, FFXIV players will just power through it -- almost 24/7 in some cases.

You know the hamlet step only has to be done once, right? If you had to re-do it for each relic it would be a limit, but once you do it once you can knock out 7/7 relics in short order (once you've done the quest once you can plow through subsequent relic cycles in 3-4 days each no problem).

[Zantetsuken]

You know the hamlet step only has to be done once, right? If you had to re-do it for each relic it would be a limit, but once you do it once you can knock out 7/7 relics in short order (once you've done the quest once you can plow through subsequent relic cycles in 3-4 days each no problem).

True,

I should have said that the seal system was intended as a limit on how many players could obtain relics per server over time.

You're right though, once you have your first, the rest can be obtained in short order.