Translations (JP to English)

[Reinheart]

Enmity Question

Marc started a thread asking players to post their concerns regarding the new enmity system and we got Rep/Dev response so here goes.

Original Thread Link: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/15112

パッチ１．１８ではオートアタックに加え、敵視のアルゴリズムもすべて変更する。FF11の敵対心のような"揮発型"ではなく、"加算型"の敵視システムになる。具体的には、モンスターを占有してからバトル終了まで敵視は積み上げられていく事になる。
In patch 1.18 along with auto attack, enmity/hate algorithm will all be changed. Unlike FF11's enmity system, it will be addition system. Basically the enmity will keep gaining while claiming the monster. (no subtraction)

これを受けて、少し疑問に思う事があります。
After reading this I had some concerns.

揮発でない事を利用して、ＢＯＳＳ戦などターゲットを盾に確実に固定したい状況では、盾以外の全員でケアルシャワーをする事で各自の敵視を分散、盾への敵視が溜まった所で参戦みたいな事が戦術として確立されるんではないかと想像します。
Using this type of system people may come up with strategy for boss battles where you want to make the hate fixed to the tank during boss battles, having the tank gain hate while rest wait in the back and aoe curing everyone to split the hate, once hate on tank is enough starting the battle.

また、加算型の問題として、盾が沈んでしまった場合は、他のメンバーの敵視蓄積量に追いつくには、相当な時間を要する場合もあるわけで、このあたりの仕様がどうなっているのか気になるところです。
Another problem with this addition system, when the tank dies (for the tank) to get back to the same hate amount as other members might take a while, how is this going to be addressed is my concern.

仮に、死亡時に敵視のリセットが無い仕様だとしても問題があると思います。
もし、敵視のリセットがない場合は、盾はレイズを受けてもなお、敵視リストのトップにある事から、すぐさま敵の追い討ちを受ける事になります。
Even if there was no hate reset when dying I think there is a problem
If there was no hate reset, when the tank receives raise (resurrect), since he/she is on top of the enmity list, he/she will get attacked right away.

挑発系のアビリティの存在意義について
敵視は常に加算されるというならば、挑発系のアビリティは、リキャスト毎に使った方が、トータルの蓄積量から見れば正解のような気がします。リキャストを 余すと言う事は、戦闘時間の長さから見て稼げていない事になると思います。つまり、挑発系のアビリティの使い所という意味で存在が薄れてくるような気がし ます。
The reason for having provoking like abilities
If the system is going to be addition system like above, provoking like abilities should be used every time when recast is possible to control overall accumulation. If it becomes like it lessons the purpose on when to use the provoke (since you're just spamming whenever available.)

Putting this one up since it has 8 like buttons so far when posting this.
I never played WoW myself (can't stand the graphics although all my friends play it) so correct me if this part is wrong.

WoWの場合だと挑発には以下の二つの効果があります。
In WoW there are two effects for provoke

１．一定時間敵視に関係なく挑発使用者にターゲットを固定するdebuffをつける
２．挑発使用者の敵視の量を現在最も敵視を稼いでいる人のものと同じにする
1. Putting a debuff on the people using provoke to lock the target.
2. Making those who can provoke to make same enmity level as the player with most enmity/hate.

敵視の上昇量はほとんどない、ってのがミソですね。WoWにおいて挑発はリキャスト毎に使うものではなく、盾交代時や敵視がそれてしまった等の緊急時に使うものになっているわけです。この仕様丸々パクッちゃってもいいんじゃないかな！
The problem is there is no limit to amount of enmity gained. In WoW provoke isn't something you use every time when recast is possible, it's used when changing tanks or when enmity/hate moves as emergency. I think it's OK to take this whole idea!

皆さん、こんばんは。
Good Evening Everyone,

盾に十分敵視が溜まるまで、他のパーティメンバーは周辺で待機という戦法が可能になってしまうのではないかという点について松井に話を聞いてきました。
I have asked Matsui if its possible to have situations where the while the tank is gaining hate, having other party members on standby.

その懸念は開発チームでも考えています。現状では盾の性能が優秀であるためそのような戦闘になってしまう可能性はあります。ただし今回は改修の第一弾にな り、今後も敵視関連のアクションの調整、敵視コントロールの調整は行っていきます。まずは実際にプレイしていただき、今後もフォーラムでフィードバックを お願いします。
The dev team also has the same anxiety regarding this. Currently the tanks skills are good and the that type of battle might be possible. But this is the first change and in later we will make adjustments to hate related actions, hate control adjustments. Please try it out first and keep us informed with feedback through the forums.

とのことでした。引き続きフィードバックをお願いします！
Please continue to give feedbacks!

[Reinheart]

Continues from last post, not Rep response so not going to post on OP just thought this was a good comment/suggestion.

　
モンスター側で対応する方向もあると思う。
I think it can be adjusted from the monsters side too.

敵視関連のPC側の調整がある程度落ち着けば、当然モンスター側の行動やWSなどで特殊な効果(ヘイトリセット技)などの実装も検討されるでしょう。
Once the PC side hate adjustments are settles, their should definitely be monster side actions, WS that resets the hate.
　
　加算型の仕組みには、単体でみると問題点もここで多く出ているようにあるとおもいます。ですが、バトルシステム全体で調整を考えていけば、よりタクティカルな戦闘を演出できる要素だと私は考えます。
When looking at the addition (accumulating) system by itself it can be take as how everyone is stating on this thread. But I believe looking at battle system as a whole, it's possible to perform more tactical battle.

　たとえば、挑発すると暴走する敵がいたり、一定以上の敵視を稼いだメンバーがいる場合、強力な範囲技を発動したり・・・考えられる仕組みはいくらでもつくれると思います。
For example, when provoking having a mob that goes berserk (go crazy), once a player gains enough hate/enmity mob using a strong AOE... can think of many different things.

　ただ単にPC側の調整や一部のアビリティーの強弱を問題視するのではなく、モンスターの行動AIも含めたバトルシステム全体としての敵視をより面白いものにしていくための議論がもたれることが建築的だと考えます。[
Not just adjusting the PC side's abilities by strengthening or weakening but making it more interesting by remodeling the monsters action AI, and battle system.

I agree with his point, all this enmity stuff doesn't have to be made by player abilities adjustments but having ways like he explained should resolve other issues that may arise with this new enmity system. Pretty sure dev team is smart enough and already has this in plan but it's good someone actually pointed it out since no one was talking about this on the JP thread.

[viion]

I am very concerned about this enmity thing now, especially that once a tank dies, hes pretty much useless unless provoke or other skills Glad has is insanely overpowered which would just make the enmity system redudent.

All this delay to "Balance" things and ensure Quality Control and then when it comes it will need more fixing, be unbalanced, be a disaster and everyone going to get very angry again.

SE are not thinking things through.

[Betelgeuzah]

All this delay to "Balance" things and ensure Quality Control and then when it comes it will need more fixing, be unbalanced, be a disaster and everyone going to get very angry again.

SE are not thinking things through.

Expecting design to be perfect right out of the door is too much asked. Quality control means getting rid of bugs. At the end of the day, as long as the design is only slightly off it's going right as planned. We are here to help them take care of the details, but they themselves need to get the big picture right. No developer is perfect, but perfection can be attained with good use of external assistance.

There will be design issues regardless, but instead of thinking too much about the details by themselves they are making us do the work for them. It is significantly more efficient that way.

[Ashthra]

Honestly, I prefer the WoW method of taunts only being used for emergencies/tank swaps instead of a continual hate-builder, but I suppose that's personal preference. Regardless, truly accumulative hate shouldn't be bad provided classes have ways to drop aggro, either permanently or temporarily, ensuring that a tank could catch up if something goes wrong. However, if other classes don't have a detaunt of some kind, and tanks don't have a WoW-style "oh shit" taunt to quickly re-establish aggro, things might get very ugly, very fast.

But then, maybe that's the point.

[Seif]

Wow I don't know what to say about the latest news. I really thought SE had learned from it's mistakes and decided to use a hate system that they've done before and seen to work.

While I appreciate their willingness to innovate I didn't think they'd risk screwing it up the second time around. Well let's hope for the best when this thing arrives.

[viion]

I've never played WoW so I cannot use any form of experience from its hate system.

It just seems to me that the idea of having a built up hate is a very bad idea, as stated by the concerned posters. My vision is fighting an NM, tank is owning/tanking and holding like a pro and spamming all his voke abilities and what not (come on this is an FF game, we're all used to spamming voke and such that wont change) and having this insane hate count that maybe the mob suddenly 1shots him or silences the casters or some other unfortunate circumstance that the tank dies, lost 7 minutes of hate while everyone else still has all that hate. And he also has to spend 3 minutes doing nothing while weakened plus the time delay of being ressed, this could lead to 10-12 minutes of hate to catch up, which just sounds absolutely ridiculous lol it makes absolute no sense.

Even if he lost only half, he would be on par of the lowest hate gainers, maybe some laid back healer and while weakened this is not good but it could create some tension (or well force the player to stand their idling for 3 mins), but still even when weakened he has to gain it all back and it will be very tough to pull back the hate because as he is trying to catch up everyone else's hate is just moving forward.

Its like having pit stops in the middle of a drag race lol.

If the system is in WoW and/or other games and seems to work, then I guess I'm just not looking at it from the right perspective and will have to wait until I can get my hands on it before judging.

[Ava]

Expecting design to be perfect right out of the door is too much asked. Quality control means getting rid of bugs. At the end of the day, as long as the design is only slightly off it's going right as planned. We are here to help them take care of the details, but they themselves need to get the big picture right. No developer is perfect, but perfection can be attained with good use of external assistance.

There will be design issues regardless, but instead of thinking too much about the details by themselves they are making us do the work for them. It is significantly more efficient that way.

You're right, but it could be argued that if this is their intention (to deliver us an idea and have us work out the kinks), then why the F dont we have a separate test server? This is why MMOs have test servers, so the community can help test the freshest content out and provide live feedback straight to the dev's emails.

FFXI got one, here's to hoping they are working on one for FFXIV. =|

[Kailok]

You're right, but it could be argued that if this is their intention (to deliver us an idea and have us work out the kinks), then why the F dont we have a separate test server? This is why MMOs have test servers, so the community can help test the freshest content out and provide live feedback straight to the dev's emails.

FFXI got one, here's to hoping they are working on one for FFXIV. =|

Yes, I hope they end up making one as well. However, I hope they make it so that characters on that server only are free to make, but you can only have one (to prevent an overload of new characters). I mean, if I have to pay the extra for a character on the test server, I will. It'd be nice to see what's in the making for the real servers.

[Betelgeuzah]

You're right, but it could be argued that if this is their intention (to deliver us an idea and have us work out the kinks), then why the F dont we have a separate test server? This is why MMOs have test servers, so the community can help test the freshest content out and provide live feedback straight to the dev's emails.

FFXI got one, here's to hoping they are working on one for FFXIV. =|

The devs/reps already commented on this (don't remember whether we got a translation for it though) but in a nutshell this game's internal build has not and will not be in a shape to be tested for some time to come. For a test server to work the game has to be actually functional, and this game has not been so.

Imagine this: you have a non-existant hate system that is being changed from the very core. It is all over the place. How do you go about testing it? How can you give proper feedback when it doesn't function even on the basic level?

Now imagine the same, except this time every stat algorithm is the same way.

As far as AA goes, how do you test the game when the AA is out of sync with the server? What if there is no actual AA mechanic, you are still using stamina bar, but the server already functions as if AA was implemented? There are so many variables to this, and they would all have to work across the globe at all stages in development; otherwise you couldn't fight anything.

Lastly, imagine all of this together. You can't test them separately because they belong together. They only make sense together. AA, new stats, damage algorithms, enmity, materia system, dungeons, server architechture, item renovations, graphical adjustments. It's all just a big mess and most importantly there are only 3 stages to their development:

1) it doesn't function, untestable.
2) it functions properly, but the design is slightly off. Implement to live servers.
3) collect feedback, work out the design issues. Flesh the system out.

So at the end of the day, at this point it doesn't matter whether there is a single test server or whether every current server acts as one. When all this content becomes functional, it is implemented to be tested externally (the earliest point at which it even can be tested).

This isn't just a new raid instance, or an event, or an additional gameplay feature on top of the basic features (those are the things that test servers are used for- testing additional layers on top of the foundation).

Once we get to the point when features like AH, battle regimens, UI additions and content become the dev team's primary focus (in other words, additional layers on top of the existing foundation), a test server can be created as well.

It just seems to me that the idea of having a built up hate is a very bad idea, as stated by the concerned posters. My vision is fighting an NM, tank is owning/ tanking and holding like a pro and spamming all his voke abilities and what not (come on this is an FF game, we're all used to spamming voke and such that wont change) and having this insane hate count that maybe the mob suddenly 1shots him or silences the casters or some other unfortunate circumstance that the tank dies, lost 7 minutes of hate while everyone else still has all that hate. And he also has to spend 3 minutes doing nothing while weakened plus the time delay of being ressed, this could lead to 10-12 minutes of hate to catch up, which just sounds absolutely ridiculous lol it makes absolute no sense.

It's pretty simple: you just lost the fight. If it's good game design the bosses won't be so cheap. In XI it was a-okay because stalling actually worked. Here you die, you suck, you lose.