Terrible mechanics for Alts.

[Gilthas]

What bothers me about leveling Alts is the combination of limited space and a lack of useful information.

Your inventory and armory on this game can fill up quickly and there is no description on the gear that allows you tell which pieces you have reserved for different gear sets. So after accidentally dumping several pieces of gear I was wearing on my other classes in an effort to clean up my inventory... I said to heck with this and told my alts to kiss my backside.

If they would put special labels on gear that I have saved to gear-sets it would help. At least it would me.

Um, or you could just pay more attention to what you do?

Don't get me wrong, a label thing would be a nice feature, but its certainly not even close to being necessary.

[Zakalwe]

There are no mechanics for alts. Alts funciton exactly the same way as mains. SE has already responded to this issue and they have no intention of changing it. [Snip]

Alts do not function the same as all other characters in the game. If they did there would be no issue. Your 'main' can friend and trade with anyone in the game but your own other-character alts. The fix should be ridiculously easy. SE persists in its RMT justification, even though actual practice in the game has shown this to be no impediment at all. I'll grant that SE had a reason for their initial decision, but since the post-live reality has shown the original decision to be flawed, it should be time for the slight modification needed to fix the problem.

[Alhanelem]

They shouldn't charge people for alts if they aren't even going to let you mule between them.

Uhm, what? They DONT charge people for alts. That was removed in ARR. The normal plan costs the same as the basic plan if you pay for more of it at once, and even the basic plan lets you have more than one character.

Alts do not function the same as all other characters in the game.

Alts DO function 100% exactly the same. The same that you state is true for the main is also true for the alts.

I still don't understand why you need a mule in the first place, we get tons of storage that's more than plenty as long as you don't keep every single piece of monster entrails from every monster in the game. Sell it or use it. But, as has probably been mentioned before, you can add an alt to your free company, stick things in the free company box and pick them up on the other character.

[Tupsi]

Alts do not function the same as all other characters in the game.

I made an alt to test your theory. I was able to walk, talk to npcs, use chat channels, progress in quests, switch classes, work on said classes and unlock retainers - So far it seems exactly 100% like my main...oh you're talking about the ONE function you can't do and use it as a glorified mule or to "get around lockouts"?

[Naunet]

I made an alt to test your theory. I was able to walk, talk to npcs, use chat channels, progress in quests, switch classes, work on said classes and unlock retainers - So far it seems exactly 100% like my main...oh you're talking about the ONE function you can't do and use it as a glorified mule or to "get around lockouts"?

Being able to mail between characters is not an unusual thing. This is a standard function in just about any MMO out there and not something that people really think about when they have it. When we don't, though? It's painfully noticeable.

There are a lot of things in XIV that fall into that category, sadly.

[Tupsi]

Being able to mail between characters is not an unusual thing. This is a standard function in just about any MMO out there and not something that people really think about when they have it. When we don't, though? It's painfully noticeable.

There are a lot of things in XIV that fall into that category, sadly.

Indeed, but after all, it's more along the lines of what people wished for during 1.2x since they were just so bothered by the RMT clogging up teleports (and stabilizing prices even though money was no issue in 1.x) - This is why the saying "be careful what you wish for" is very relevant when trying to offer "suggestions" for a revamped MMO. Even in XI you could which was made by the same people -yoshi.

[Musashidon]

To everyone who says you can do everything on one character, you're mistaken.

Once you hit 50 you're restricted to gearing one class with myth tomes provided you want to make good use of your tomes, and you're locked out of coil once you've run it on one class.

If this game we're like others where there were no armory system and you just simply made alts, none of those restrictions would exist. You could run all endgame content with the class of your choice, and optimally gear said class.

So no, you can't do everything with a single character. Just most of it. There have been quite a few design choices that are baffling. They make a payment plan for alts, and then discourage against their use by making it impossible for you to utilize your assets between characters without the help of a third party. Then they implement an armory system that allows for all classes and then restrict your ability to optimally play all classes but one.

just becauseyou can only do coil once or get 300 tomes at a time doesn't mean you can't do everything on one character it's not like once you do coil on your tank no matter how many times you do it you're stuck with your tank everytime or once you start buying tank gear you can never buy any other myth gear, you're just restricted to do it slower so this isn't correct you can do everything on one character just some are slower

also alts are for rp reason only. no other reason for it. it's that simple or people who think that the myth cap and coil lockout is unfair and uses multiple characters but that wasn't intended but it's not wrong either so yes se has made alts for rp reason only.

[Alcide]

just becauseyou can only do coil once or get 300 tomes at a time doesn't mean you can't do everything on one character it's not like once you do coil on your tank no matter how many times you do it you're stuck with your tank everytime or once you start buying tank gear you can never buy any other myth gear, you're just restricted to do it slower so this isn't correct you can do everything on one character just some are slower

also alts are for rp reason only. no other reason for it. it's that simple or people who think that the myth cap and coil lockout is unfair and uses multiple characters but that wasn't intended but it's not wrong either so yes se has made alts for rp reason only.

Yea I'm totally gonna buy one myth gear per job and after about 3 months (at which point every job should have one myth piece) I'm gonna join a Coil group, but only if they allow me to change job every week.

[Allyra]

also alts are for rp reason only. no other reason for it. it's that simple or people who think that the myth cap and coil lockout is unfair and uses multiple characters but that wasn't intended but it's not wrong either so yes se has made alts for rp reason only.

That's why they made rp servers....oh wait....

I honestly have to believe you are trolling.

[Niqote]

I think this could be remedied simply enough. Instead of needing a user to 'be online' to accept a friend request, you could send the request to their mail as an option also.
(You retain the current way to make/accept friend requests - it's just you have a second option to do it via the mail moogle separately as well)

Log on 'you have a friend request' - accept or deny or block as options.
That way you can friend list your alternative account/s and send mail easily.

Unfortunately... the thought of 'friend request spam' comes to mind. Well there could be an option to 'Automatically reject friend requests via mail' - as I said above you will still have the current options for requesting while people are online so this will have minimal impact on players as well as retain defenses against RMTs and abusers/trolls/uglythingsthatgobumpinthenight.

Next is 'But it allows RMTs to transfer to each other easier' - Well... it becomes an issue of 'Anti RMT practices make it harder on players' - which is why it seems so 'Anti-alternative character' as the OP has put it... it is really not, but when the players support RMT - they will never go away and the majority who don't support RMT have to suffer for it :c