Compilation: Capped Dungeons, pro and contra arguments

[Chinook]

Thanks for taking the time to do this Rinsui.

I had some time on my lunch time, so long wall of text incoming.


Adding a pro-cap argument:

Adding a scaling cap allows the r30 dungeon to become a new, simple, rewarding and fun alternative way to get sp with your friends, even though they are lower or higher in ranks than you.


Another pro-cap argument:

Since the parties will be formed of only 4 people, X and Y jobs will soon be identified as the most effective ones by the community. Some players will have a hard time finding groups (who doesn’t know people who got frustrated and quit because they picked up dragoon and dark knight when FFXI launched?).

Having a cap of r30 means that people can use their sub-jobs (if their job isn’t effective for the content) or rank one up on in few days (even if they’re casuals).


Pro-cap counterargument (even tho I’m pro-cap) of the following argument:

- With capped content, low level equipment remains valuable. Crafters are happy because there's a steady demand for low level gear, and even low level NM drops will retain their epicness forever.

You can equip any gear in FFXIV and will scale (they said they’d look that, they already made new gear more exclusive, but we don’t know about hard ranks yet and it might never come). So it prolly won’t create a significant demand for mid-rank gear in the current system.

However, that counter argument also makes up a positive point for cap versus the FFXI cap that we know since FFXI gear system required you to have multiple sets of them for capped stuff, which was annoying to many).

Also, they can still make valuable r30 gear that can be turned into r40 and r50 drop in this dungeon if it’s capped. Otherwise, the gear will lose all its value if the dungeon can be rushed ...

... which links to the following pro argument:

Keeping the dungeon challenging means that SE can put long-term rewards like currency and that kind of stuff in it to encourage re-playability and make the content last longer (and it means 50% of the available content atm).


It is also linked to the following counterargument of:

- With capped content, you'd be able to store low level equipment for each job you intend to enter the dungeon with. Given the limited storage space we have, that's a definite no-go.

See comments above. For the sake of copy-pasting help:

You can equip any gear in FFXIV and will scale/adjust.


Counterargument of:

- People should be free to decide on the degree of challenge of a dungeon.

This argument works on both sides ... We’re actually not free to decide the degree of the challenge in an uncapped dungeon either ... Everything will be easy if your main and favorite class is r50 (like the majority of the current active players).

There are even some non-hardcore people who already have all their classes above 30 (r40 is the 50% mark toward r50, so r30 must be like 20%, I can’t personally check).


Counterargument for:

- Once most players reach higher levels, there will be noone left to do the low level dungeons with. So it should be possible to solo those dungeons with a high level job.

I actually see this argument against cap as a procap argument .Making the dungeon re-playable, with a cap allowing and rewarding everyone from r25 to r50 to go in, counters this.

A cap will actually create what’s talked about in this argument. It will make it boring for the r50, and unless the drops are 100%, they won’t go in 10x to help the new players out.



For people who will say “who cares about a r30 dungeon, go do the r50 if you want a challenge”, the r50 dungeon will suffer too once the rank cap of r50 is increased (which is confirmed). And some people want to enjoy all the content as it’s intended to be.


I wish we could build tables in these forums to put arguments side by side. Arguments and counterarguments of both sides will eventually appear in both sections.


Basically, the main issue opposing both sides, which we’ll never solve because it’s kind of philosophical, is the following:

Human nature makes people ALWAYS choose the easiest and most effective path.

Procap people believe in this, and pro-uncap people do not.


Challenge and re-playability is just a matter of personal taste I guess.

[Krausus]

This argument works on both sides ... We’re actually not free to decide the degree of the challenge in an uncapped dungeon either ... Everything will be easy if your main and favorite class is r50 (like the majority of the current active players).

Yes you are, all you need to do is decide not to take a rank 50 in there with you

[Perrin_Aybarra]

Yes you are, all you need to do is decide not to take a rank 50 in there with you

that is true, but at some point everyone will have classes over 30 and a new player coming in trying to actually get a party of 4 30s will have a really hard time.
1- because of the lack of available people at rank 30,
2- because the available people also have to have a complementing class
3-there will be more people just wanting to have an easy run and have a 50 tag along since they probably already seen the place.

[Krausus]

that is true, but at some point everyone will have classes over 30 and a new player coming in trying to actually get a party of 4 30s will have a really hard time.
1- because of the lack of available people at rank 30,
2- because the available people also have to have a complementing class
3-there will be more people just wanting to have an easy run and have a 50 tag along since they probably already seen the place.

but there is plenty of time for that, you already know my biggest worry is taking time away from content development, and i have already stated that adding a cap feature when more time permits is fine with me, but as fragile as FFXIV is at this moment the devs IMO need to focus on adding unique content and get this game ready for PS3 release, not finding ways to make the same content more repeatable, I mean where have you been for the last 9 months I know I have been here repeating everything, I'm tired of repeating everything.

[Perrin_Aybarra]

but there is plenty of time for that, you already know my biggest worry is taking time away from content development, and i have already stated that adding a cap feature when more time permits is fine with me, but as fragile as FFXIV is at this moment the devs IMO need to focus on adding unique content and get this game ready for PS3 release, not finding ways to make the same content more repeatable, I mean where have you been for the last 9 months I know I have been here repeating everything, I'm tired of repeating everything.

Your point is valid and ill paste what I said earlier in another thread:

I'll stress the fact that no cap on those (and upcoming) dungeons just make them shallow and nothing can be built on it. If that is their intent, then I don't care for the to stay uncapped if they are not rewarding any type of lasting gears/fame/rep/items/currency.

That said, if they are just shallow content for SP, not rewarding any type of lasting gears/fame/rep/items/currency, I really hope for them to make more content that have some depths to them and that things like story missions and fights are capped and must be completed under cap in order to progress.

So both type of content can be viable, as long as one does not set a predecedent and norm for any upcoming content.

but to be fair, it would be lame if they were just another mean to SP... they could just fix the leves, behest and make party grind viable to serve that end and give dungeons a BCNM feel but with a dungeon concept to them.

[VydarrTyr]

Basically, the main issue opposing both sides, which we’ll never solve because it’s kind of philosophical, is the following:

Human nature makes people ALWAYS choose the easiest and most effective path.

Procap people believe in this, and pro-uncap people do not.

Your opinion on level caps disproves your hypothesis. If people always choose the easiest and most effective path, you would not be arguing for level caps. You'd be arguing against them.

The fact that you are arguing for level caps means that you are not choosing the easiest and most effective path. You're choosing a more difficult path.

[Rentahamster]

Your opinion on level caps disproves your hypothesis. If people always choose the easiest and most effective path, you would not be arguing for level caps. You'd be arguing against them.

The fact that you are arguing for level caps means that you are not choosing the easiest and most effective path. You're choosing a more difficult path.

Err, I don't think you understand the concept. Given the same reward, a human will choose the easiest path to get it. That's why the vast majority of players will choose to run the rank 25 dungeon on their rank 50 class since that is the easiest path to get the items.

Doing so would be detrimental to game balance.

Therefore, we need to implement a restriction, so that rank 50 players need to play the dungeon as a rank 30 class in order to eliminate the easier path. This maintains the level of difficulty and keeps balance in place.

[VydarrTyr]

Err, I don't think you understand the concept. Given the same reward, a human will choose the easiest path to get it. That's why the vast majority of players will choose to run the rank 25 dungeon on their rank 50 class since that is the easiest path to get the items.

I understand the concept. It's possible you're not understanding what I'm saying.

If "given the same reward, a human will choose the easiest path to get it," then why are you arguing for a level cap? I assume you're a human. And yet, you seem to want "the easiest path" to be blocked. You are not choosing the easiest path to get the reward. You're choosing a greater challenge.

I'm not saying that's better or worse for the game. I'm saying that your argument disproves this tenet.

[Rentahamster]

I understand the concept. It's possible you're not understanding what I'm saying.

If "given the same reward, a human will choose the easiest path to get it," then why are you arguing for a level cap? I assume you're a human. And yet, you seem to want "the easiest path" to be blocked. You are not choosing the easiest path to get the reward. You're choosing a greater challenge.

I'm not saying that's better or worse for the game. I'm saying that your argument disproves this tenet.

That's because we're discussing the concept within the context of game design and balance.

From a game design perspective, I want the cap in to preserve balance.

As a player, I am not going to enter the rank 25 dungeon as a rank 25 character (unless I'm running it for SP). If I have a choice, and if good items are on the line, I am always going to do it as a rank 50 character.


As a designer, you need to put in restrictions to the game since you know that it is in the player's self interest to do things the easiest way.


You are interpreting the statement, "given the same reward, a human will choose the easiest path to get it" far too strictly.

[Richard]

chin bringing the guns. that's my boy.