Loot lockouts should be based on Job

[DoctorPepper]

This has been discussed previously but I feel like bringing it up again due to the recent announcement that loot will be locked out in CT.

Personally, one of the biggest attractions to this game, aside from the fact that it's Final Fantasy, is the innovative armory system they've put into place allowing you to experience multiple jobs on a single character. I love the idea surrounding this and being an altoholic in other games it's a big plus to me that I don't have to complete the same quests/missions on additional characters to experience a different style of gameplay.

That said, the biggest issue I'm finding with all these lockouts is that they are set per character rather than per job. I would be very happy if SE would reconsider their decision to make lockouts work in this fashion so that I can experience the other jobs without having to make an additional character.

I believe that if the lockouts on drops were based on the job that the item was meant for and that the tomes were given for use with your currently equipped job it would not only force people to experience said job to the fullest extent rather than using their tank/healer to grind tomes for other jobs, it would also provide incentive for people to log in more often.

If SE would reconsider their decision to make lockouts per character I think that a lot of people would be very happy and it would still provide a barrier so that even the most hardcore players can't fully gear every job in a short amount of time, which I'm assuming is the base reasoning behind the lockouts.

[Borfin]

You don't see how burnt out you'll get on content if you're able to do it ~9 times per week?

If anything, prior tier content should have job-based loot lockouts (i.e. CT), but not current tier (i.e. BC).

I did ToC in WoW when it was 4 separate loot lockouts... I can still recite Jaraxxus' intro speech from memory and that was years ago.

/shudder

[teoulas]

CT is not current tier. Plus I think I'll get bored more easily doing CT 1 time per week than 9 times per week cause if I do 1 time and 1 time coil then there is nothing else to do.

[DoctorPepper]

You don't see how burnt out you'll get on content if you're able to do it ~9 times per week?

If anything, prior tier content should have job-based loot lockouts (i.e. CT), but not current tier (i.e. BC).

How does getting burnt out have anything to do with this? Nobody is forcing people to play their other jobs but right now the armory system is completely pointless. Personally I would have a lot more fun if I had something to do besides craft/gather and grind 4 mans for philo once I'm capped, even moreso now that all my crafts are finished to 50.

[SeleneSinclair]

I personally liked the raid finder in World of Warcraft. You could loot off a boss once per week. Therefore, each individual boss' loot table could be different. You could raid as much as you wanted, but only get one piece per boss per lockout. Then, if Crystal Tower had 4 bosses you could have 4 per week.

Either or would work better.

[DoctorPepper]

I personally liked the raid finder in World of Warcraft. You could loot off a boss once per week. Therefore, each individual boss' loot table could be different. You could raid as much as you wanted, but only get one piece per boss per lockout. Then, if Crystal Tower had 4 bosses you could have 4 per week.

Either or would work better.

The thing is, in World of Warcraft, if you wanted to play another class you had to change characters. This game boasts their armory system and the fact that you don't have to change characters to play another job but in reality you do anyways. World of Warcraft may have had lockouts but since people had to use a different character to play another class the lockouts were not effecting them in the same manner.

[Zumi]

Big difference in WoW and most other MMOs is characters can only be 1 class. You pick your class when making the character and they are stuck with it for life. You want to play a different class you made an alt, which came with its own set of raid lockouts. Now in FFXIV your alts are all on the same character which only has 1 set of raid lockouts to use.

The thing is leveling other jobs on the same character is a lot easier then doing it on separate characters due to only having to do 1 set of missions and quests to unlock everything. In games like WoW you had to do all those quests and stuff over for your alt to level it. It takes around 3 weeks to 1 month to cap a character in WoW vs like 2-3 days in FFXIV.

[Borfin]

How does getting burnt out have anything to do with this? Nobody is forcing people to play their other jobs

snip for space

Nobody forcing anyone doesn't prevent people from trying to stay competitive. Having the option to have all of the classes geared will make SOME people feel like they have to do it, and in some cases they will.

I have more experience in WoW than any other MMO and this is comparable, so I'll use it again: You run into the same problem you had when 10 man/25 man separate lockouts were introduced in ToC - 4 different lockouts, one on 10m normal, one 10m heroic, 25m normal and 25m heroic. Guilds would run all four because they could in an attempt to gear up as many people/alts as fast as they could to keep their options open.

And as a tank at that time, I can tell you - I initially enjoyed ToC, by the end of it, I loathed the instance and to this day refuse to run it on any of my characters. ToC is widely regarded as one of the biggest flops of raid content introduced in the history of WoW and this is one of the largest reasons why.

If you run a SMN, can you honestly say your FC won't ask you to gear up your SCH so you can heal when their regular SCH is absent? What if you have a 50 PLD you've never touched? If you're in a competitive group, of course they will.

This many loot lockouts for current content is a bad idea. I like it for gearing alts in content that's already outdated, but when it's the best of the best stuff available... No, no, no, just no. I don't want BC turning into another ToC that I despise.

[Yashnaheen]

Regardless of how ARR compares to WoW... Which is entirely irrelevant..

You have more play time. You have more 50s. You can't get ahead on any one job, but you can gear more jobs. As you play more.

win/win

[Borfin]

Regardless of how ARR compares to WoW... Which is entirely irrelevant..

It's not. It's nearly identical in a LOT of ways, including the decisions devs are making with loot lockouts (and what some players, like OP are seeking) and the consequences of those decisions, which is what we're discussing here.

X game did something similar. These were the consequences of that decision in X game, and why that would be a bad decision to make in Y (same genre, even plays nearly identically!) game.

You have more play time. You have more 50s. You can't get ahead on any one job, but you can gear more jobs. As you play more.

Which is why it would be good for gearing alts in lower-tier content (CT) but bad for burning people out in current content (BC). FFXIV hasn't been around long enough for raider burnout to be widespread but I assure you, raiders do burn out.