Yoshida-san: Smoother Camera Options, Separate PVP Rules, and Long Term Goals for 2.0

[Kiara]

To: Yoshida-san and the FFXIV Development Team,

Since we're in a slow period (players' side), there were 3 core issues that I had concerns about for Final Fantasy XIV 2.0's Launch, that I didn't see answered yet (sorry if they were answered, I didn't see them in the Dev Tracker).

1. Give Players the Option to Adjust the Camera Speed / Smoothness. Right now the Game Camera shown in the Alpha Videos is too fast and too reactive (“twitchy”) for me, and for those that do not play PVP games. Watching all of the FF 14 2.0 Alpha Videos shown so far, I (and many of my friends) are getting Motion Sickness (乗り物酔い) from watching them.
   
   There are many people around the world that cannot play FPS (First Person Shooter) games, because they get Motion Sickness (乗り物酔い). The current Camera you have in the Alpha Test for Final Fantasy 14 2.0 is very fast, and very reactive. It is the same as a “FPS Camera” (1st Person Shooter Camera).
   
   I know you enjoy PVP, and the super fast Camera shown in the Alpha videos seems to be great for those that enjoy a Call Of Duty / Modern Warfare / Fast, Zippy Camera, but please give us the Option in the Game Configuration section to be able to:
   
   Adjust Camera Speed / Adjust Camera Turning Speed
   
   Let us choose how SMOOTH and how SLOW we want the Camera to turn and react (especially when playing Keyboard Only). Even in Final Fantasy 14 Version 1.0 you gave us the Option to adjust how Fast or Slow we wanted the Camera to Turn / React. Please give us this option so that players who get Motion Sickness (乗り物酔い) (and that do not care about PVP or instantly spinning the camera) and that want a Smoother, more Polished Camera Turning Behavior can enjoy your new Final Fantasy 14 Version 2.0! おねがいします！
   
   
   
2. Please Separate the Rules for PVP and PVE games. I remember reading one comment (but I can't find the Dev Response (or was it in a Live Letter?)) where it was intimating that PVP and PVE Rules were going to be one and the same. While it might be easier to have only 1 set of rules for all gameplay, it also creates many problems when you have to try and adjust every Job’s Weaponskills (WS) and Magic Spells because something is “too powerful” or “too weak” in PVP, but it’s fine in PVE (Normal Game vs. A.I. and NPCs).
   
   Look at BLIZZARD and their worldwide success. Even Blizzard has separate rules (different rules) for PVP games and PVE (story gameplay / normal) games. In their ever popular StarCraft II (which thrives on Online Competition), they have different rules and units (e.g., No Firebats) in PVP games compared to their Normal / Story games. My friends and I are very afraid you will inevitably find some Attack that worked great in the main FF 14 PVE game (against A.I. / Bosses), but was “too powerful” in PVP, and as a result, you want to weaken (change) it. But then you have affected the great feeling in PVE, for the sake of trying to fix PVP. It becomes too messy.
   
   
   
3. Long Term Goals / Long Term Equipment. While I understand the need to always put out a new Reward to keep players interested in your game, one of the downsides to constantly releasing New Equipment / Weapons that are better than the previous "Best" Equipment, is that it invalidates the Players' efforts with every release. So far in FF 14 1.0, we have seen all the "Best" Equipment get replaced every few months:
   
   Originally, Dzemael drops were the best. Ifrit Weapons were “the best” you could get, but then the Moogle Weapons and Garuda Weapons replaced them, only a few months later. But now we have Relic Weapons. Many of us fear that you will make New Weapons and New Equipment that replaces the Relic Weapons after only a few months (but I know you said they could be upgraded).
   
   I know it is difficult to balance giving players new goals and new rewards (incentives) to keep them playing, compared to allowing them to keep 1 set of equipment that is “the best” for awhile, but having the best equipment replaced every few months is too fast. I hope you consider allowing us to achieve some powerful equipment and long-term goals that can last for more than just 3 - 6 months or so. By releasing new equipment that turns out to be the best (#1) every few months, it makes your most dedicated players feel like all their hard work was thrown away, and is very unsatisfying.
   
   

Final Fantasy 14 Version 2.0 is looking so beautiful and amazing right now (in the Alpha Videos)! (^_^) I'm really looking forward to Version 2.0, but also afraid about these 3 issues (written above). Thanks for your time! I write this in the hopes to see FF 14 become the wonderful game it deserves to be!

Keep at it, Yoshida-san! 頑張ってください！(^_^)/

[Jocko]

Excellent post. I agree point for point with everything brought up. To add a bit of my own flavor:

Long term goals
Interesting and rich world/lore
Pleasant and involved community

I believe these to be the three major pillars that make up a successful MMO. As of late, most modern MMO's I've played (Tera, Rift, SWTOR, GW2) often lack all three of these assets, instead focusing on instant gratification, minor gimmicks that do little to advance the genre, and solo oriented experiences. Please don't fall into these trappings Square; you may have blundered in a number of ways with XIV, but by the end of it's lifetime you had reached somewhat of a balance of my three mentioned pillars, making the game a shining beacon for those of us tired of the modern MMO market

[Babydoll]

Kiara, you always post such great ideas! I hope they take them into consideration!

[Radacci]

PvP isn't a primary goal of the game, but it's a big part of WoW. So it's not odd for WoW to focus a lot on PvP content.
I see no reason why they would re-balance PvE to fit PvP...
Besides XIV is more gear dependent, so there's no such thing as overpowered skills; there's just OP weapons (Relics)

What's wrong with tiered progression at cap?
You get gear at cap, then with that you can do harder content, to get better equips.
Later they release harder content, and you got new progression, for harder fights, with better loot.
It's when there's no more goals to fight for, that people get bored and quit.
You can't put materias in raid content anyways, so it's not an issue if they add new better stuff later. And in case you got multi melds, they might be better than new raid content anyways.

[Coyohma]

Please Separate the Rules for PVP and PVE games. I remember reading one comment (but I can't find the Dev Response (or was it in a Live Letter?)) where it was intimating that PVP and PVE Rules were going to be one and the same. While it might be easier to have only 1 set of rules for all gameplay, it also creates many problems when you have to try and adjust every Job’s Weaponskills (WS) and Magic Spells because something is “too powerful” or “too weak” in PVP, but it’s fine in PVE (Normal Game vs. A.I. and NPCs).

Look at BLIZZARD and their worldwide success. Even Blizzard has separate rules (different rules) for PVP games and PVE (story gameplay / normal) games. In their ever popular StarCraft II (which thrives on Online Competition), they have different rules and units (e.g., No Firebats) in PVP games compared to their Normal / Story games. My friends and I are very afraid you will inevitably find some Attack that worked great in the main FF 14 PVE game (against A.I. / Bosses), but was “too powerful” in PVP, and as a result, you want to weaken (change) it. But then you have affected the great feeling in PVE, for the sake of trying to fix PVP. It becomes too messy.

They have shown they intend to not only combine the two, but at each step we've seen them favor what's needed for PvP. Remember the decision to not allow movement while casting? There are several other examples. PvE will have to conform to what's balanced for PvP, according to Yoshida.

I won't go into a long paragraph on how this compromises PvE right now; it should be fairly obvious how it restricts them to generic means for each class/job.

Yoshida is creating the game he wants. PvP will be significant, boobs will jiggle -the question is whether this is the best decision for Final Fantasy, something that fans expect to fully deliver with PvE.

[Radacci]

They have shown they intend to not only combine the two, but at each step we've seen them favor what's needed for PvP. Remember the decision to not allow movement while casting? There are several other examples. PvE will have to conform to what's balanced for PvP, according to Yoshida.

I won't go into a long paragraph on how this compromises PvE right now; it should be fairly obvious how it restricts them to generic means for each class/job.

Yoshida is creating the game he wants. PvP will be significant, boobs will jiggle -the question is whether this is the best decision for Final Fantasy, something that fans expect to fully deliver with PvE.

FFXIV PvP: BLM vs rest.

[Millerna]

DAoC (Dark Age of Camelot, seemingly 1 of YoshiP's favorite MMOs) was PvP focussed, but still had great PvE balancing (eventually) Of course, DAoC was balanced for group PvP, rather than 1vs1, which meant that certain classes wouldn't be able to survive solo in PvP, but when in a group, they really shined. A good example of that was the healing specced Bard which was cannon fodder when running around solo, but could keep a whole group alive while on the move (speccing healing meant your mezzing/crowd control skills suffered a lot)

Balancing for 1vs1 on the other hand means that all classes will become nearly equal, and only damage types will be different.


On a side note, DAoC had a non-instanced dungeon that combined PvE (including a raid boss) and PvP. Basically, the dungeon would only be open to those who had the most keeps claimed (or something similar). However, when a different realm took over some keeps, the dungeon would open up for that realm. Whoever was already in the dungeon were allowed to stay in there, so sooner or later 2 (or even all 3) realms would come across each other inside the dungeon. The best thing was that each realm had its own dungeon entrance, so not everyone was bunched together in 1 main entrance.

[strallaalaa]

i especially agree with the long term item thing. i can't repeat it enough how much i hate the way mmo's are these days and how they need to go back to ffxi type of game play for me to ever truly enjoy another mmo.

[Orophin]

Look at BLIZZARD and their worldwide success. Even Blizzard has separate rules (different rules) for PVP games and PVE (story gameplay / normal) games.

Since when did that happen? I played WoW up through the end of WotLK and changes to abilities for PvP always affected PvE abilities.

I know it is difficult to balance giving players new goals and new rewards (incentives) to keep them playing, compared to allowing them to keep 1 set of equipment that is “the best” for awhile, but having the best equipment replaced every few months is too fast. I hope you consider allowing us to achieve some powerful equipment and long-term goals that can last for more than just 3 - 6 months or so. By releasing new equipment that turns out to be the best (#1) every few months, it makes your most dedicated players feel like all their hard work was thrown away, and is very unsatisfying.

They just need to find a happy medium. If there isn't enough content apart from raids and the rewards associated with them, people will just stop playing. I'm sure SE's goal is to retain more than the people that stuck through 1.0, and that's all that'll probably realistically stick around once all relevant end-game content has been totally pillaged and there's nothing left to do.

We don't need a case like in FF11 where we're wearing the same gear for two years at a time either. Gear swapping doesn't seem to be viable in FF14, so having 50 different pieces of equipment for one job is rather meaningless.

[Mjollnir]

Agreed!

Weirdly, I do get motion sickness from some games (eg Oblivion), I haven't from the FFXIV vids, or some other FPS (Counterstrike was fine for me), so I've got my fingers crossed.

I feel more strongly about the other two issues.

I had wished PvP would be separate from PvE entirely, either through a Card Game, Chocobo Racing, minigames, or a sports-style game (the lesson to be learned from XI is that even just one reward from PvP content need to be relevant to PvE, so that the aspect isn't ignored utterly). If PvP balancing doesn't adversely affect the fun-level of PvE, especially considering each new job added, level cap raise and introduction of new gear makes it more complex, I won't have a problem. I'm trusting in Yoshi-P on this one!

As for rewards; from the perspective of a player who previously hasn't been able to challenge most end-game content with much success (via PUGs), making old end-game content rewards obsolete makes it so those of us who have taken their damned time getting to said content find it very hard to find groups to challenge those fights. If rewards are kept relevant (eg through side-grades), or a separate incentive for those who have a lot of time to play is introduced (eg reputation increase, rather than tradeable tokens), I feel it would lead to healthier long-term reward system.

Of course, with level-cap increase comes the need for higher-stat equipment, but equipment upgrades seem to be the better way rather than direct replacements.

What's wrong with tiered progression at cap?
You get gear at cap, then with that you can do harder content, to get better equips.
Later they release harder content, and you got new progression, for harder fights, with better loot.
It's when there's no more goals to fight for, that people get bored and quit.

For the majority of players, who don't complete 100% of content before the next patch, it becomes very difficult to do older content. It might be more sensible at that point to skip it entirely, which just leads to a dead in-game resource. For instance (pun!), returning in March to 1.0, I found it nearly impossible to access Toto-Rak. I know the gear was unnecessary, but I wanted to experience the dungeon and collect all the U/U pieces (I hate inventory space). If the gear from all dungeons around that level was the basic form for a gearset that could be upgraded through new content every time there was a level-cap increase, that would ensure it was kept relevant.

You can't put materias in raid content anyways, so it's not an issue if they add new better stuff later. And in case you got multi melds, they might be better than new raid content anyways.

Hm. Who says you can't put Materia in raid content? I think it's actually a pretty good idea, as long as only one of that kind of Materia can be melded to a given item (alongside other standard Materia). We'll see how the new Materia system shapes up soon, I guess!