Instanced Raids Unveiled!

[Starlord]

Raid, doesn't necessarily mean 30 people, It could very well mean 4-8 people Vsing 200-300 mobs ( Monsters being the Raid part) but that's how I look at it

[Mug]

I think the whole "massive" aspect of the term MMO will come more in to play if the game manages to pick up and gain more players than it loses. As it is now 4-8 player parties are perfect, in my humble opinion.

[Abriael]

On the JP forums someone said... isn't 4-8 only instance dungeons basically same as MO and not MMO?

I must agree.. how is 4-8 players instance dungeon.. a RAID? or a MMO?

ù

Why exactly should we care about the use of a term in other MMORPGs?

[DurtiMonkeyToe]

Even without a cap, you wouldn't be playing content "appropriate to your level" anyway. Blazing through a rank 25 dungeon as a rank 50 character is not playing content "appropriate to your level".

I agree that it isn't appropriate to my level, but I would be MORE likely to run it and enjoy the content without the cap rather than play my class 25 levels below what it actually is. That is why capping the low-level dungeon would be penalizing higher level players rather than rewarding them.

[Rentahamster]

On the JP forums someone said... isn't 4-8 only instance dungeons basically same as MO and not MMO?

I must agree.. how is 4-8 players instance dungeon.. a RAID? or a MMO?

Sure, it's not that "massive", but it's still multiplayer content, and that doesn't really bother me.

In another thread, I outlined some examples of content that is open-world and could be possible for "massive" amounts of people to partake in.

LINK: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...l=1#post187299

Another type of addition that I think would make the environment more interesting:

Another new MMO, Rift, has random events in which a portal opens up at some place on the map, and monsters pour out. Players then group up and kill off the monsters.

I was thinking that this kind of concept could be incorporated into FF14, but altered in a way to fit the world and add excitement.

My inspiration for this also comes from FF11, specifically, Fort Ghelsba. I would love partying with my friends and having an adventure - penetrating the stronghold's defenses and working our way in and defeating the mobs within. It was always the same everytime, however, and there wasn't really any real impact on the world. Kill all the orcs one day, they'd be back in a few minutes anyway, no big deal.

So here's the plan:

Once every few days, a beast tribe hamlet is spawned at some remote area of the map in each region (kobold hamlet for la noscea, amaljaa hamlet for thanalan, ixal hamlet in the black shroud, along with goblin, qiqirn, reaver, and bandit hamlets as well)

Each beast tribe hamlet isn't just some temporary 5 minute event, but rather a decently sized town full of enemies to fight. A "mini Fort Ghelsba", so to speak.

Players go in, fight a bunch of mobs, rescue NPCs, search for loot, seek out boss monsters, destroy structures, etc.

Players who had a hand in the beast-tribe hamlet destruction are further rewarded with faction points, fame points, achievement points, whatever.

Hamlet spawn locations are random, or picked by the devs, and put in remote areas, without telling anyone, so that players have to actively explore the world if they want to find any new beast tribe towns. (Hey now, this would be pretty fun to do if we had chocobos, huh? ( http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/10792-DevTalk-Chocobo-Thread.-Riding!-Raising!-Racing!-You-Know-You-Want-Your-Fix )

Rank caps are put in place so that Rank 50 players can't just ransack a Rank 30 beast town in 10 minutes. Temporary level-matching system in place so that high rank players can still participate in lower ranked assaults.

[Teknoman]

I think the word raid dungeon was only used in the english letter. That and to bring up WoW again...I didnt see people complaining about small sets of players cutting through instance dungeons. Or even XI with assault type things.

Im sure there will be much larger instance dungeons in the future, but these are just normal dungeons, not end game super challenging things.

[Abriael]

Anyone with a brain would easily understand and approve them introducing group-based dungeons (that currently aren't ing game) before they introduce dungeons for multiple groups.

[Physic]

honestly i dount have much love for content for extremely large parties, takes forever to organize, or requires creating massive groups with loot policy like signing a multimillion dollar contract.
I rem trying to organize 60 people back in early dynamis days, damn ill pass.

[RedAffinity]

Of course, however it never went as far as bouncing back and forth saying, "oh this is how its going to be" lines yes I have seen some in this thread like. for instance " Toto-Rak looks exactly the same as Tam/Muy" What proof is there 1 Picture of a particular spot? I really can't form a well thought out Opinion with only 1 picture and a back story of the place.

But my entire argument here isn't that i'm assuming the entire area will be a paste of existing zones, my argument is in defense of some of us expressing our lack of enthusiasm based on what was shown. It's really simple, some people are taking our opinions and spinning it into trolling or being outright negative.

If the areas are in fact creative from an artistic and visual point, and a sample of that was shown, I'd genuinely be excited. Yet again for what seems like the 100th time, the fact remains the two areas shown in the preview indicate areas that look inspired (god help me if i used the word copy-paste or rehash...) by areas that already exist in the game. Am I claiming the dungeons WILL be? negative. I simply don't know what the final product will be and it'd be ignorant of me to assume otherwise.

Why is that difficult to understand? :P I'm not impressed with the preview, end of story. I'm open to being impressed with the final product, but i'm not impressed with the preview *loop*

[Rentahamster]

I agree that it isn't appropriate to my level, but I would be MORE likely to run it and enjoy the content without the cap rather than play my class 25 levels below what it actually is. That is why capping the low-level dungeon would be penalizing higher level players rather than rewarding them.

Do you at least agree that from a game design perspective - the lack of a level cap kills challenge and replayability, and thus the shelf life, or "freshness", so to speak, of the new content?

The only time someone is ever going to play the rank 25 dungeon AS a rank 25 class (i.e. at a rank appropriate for what the content was designed for) is when they are a noobie and don't have any other class higher than that. A majority of the time, once a player has a class that is higher than rank 25, he is going to run the dungeon at that higher rank just because it would be easier and faster that way. When there are tangible rewards and loot on the line, no one is going to purposely gimp themselves if they don't have to.

In the entirety of any particular player's life in FF14, the period of time where his highest battle class is only rank 25 is a very, very small time period. Once the player achieves a high rank and is allowed to blaze through low rank content, that content is no longer interesting and the players clamor for more, thus putting even more pressure on the devs.

With a rank cap, the content is kept challenging for all players, no matter how many high rank classes they may have, thus extending the replayability of the dungeon.