Rank cap increase every 1-2 years discussion thread

[Sol_Aureus]

First off, I'm aware that Yoshida has said that this is only in the concept stage at the moment, and is quite a long ways off, however, I believe it's an important enough topic to discuss now, before they start working on content with this in mind.

Here's the quote where I got this information:

(Quote from http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...563#post205563 )

Hi all, this is producer/director Yoshida.

First off, I’d just like to say that I am not by any means saying that characters shouldn’t have to level, or that we should get rid of leveling up itself, or that leveling is boring. If there was anyone that took it this way, I apologize. I myself am a huge role playing gamer, I love MMOs, and I’ve even worked on a recent Dragon Quest title, so I understand the pleasure and fun aspects of character growth. With that said, this does not mean that we are getting rid of it.

Of course, when you consider the unique characteristics of MMOs, planning to reach the level cap within a week isn’t entirely accurate. The ideal image is one where if you play every day for 2 hours or so, you will be able to reach the max cap on one class in about 3-4 months. Naturally, if you make detours or spend a whole day just chatting with friends, the distance and time to reach the cap will increase. One of the important things we would like players to think is “if I keep playing, I too can reach the highest rank.”

I was a hardcore EverQuest player and I know of the struggles involved in getting to that point. Truth be told, I really loved it. However, dying and losing 2 weeks’ worth of EXP, going insane trying to make EXP parties... I don’t think those features are important in the future of FFXIV.

While this is only concept phase right now, we are planning to increase the rank cap for growth once every 1-2 years, and will be implementing elements such as additional classes and jobs in the future.

However, I think what you’re all really concerned about is whether or not the end-game content and reasons for growing your character are going to be worthwhile or not. All I can say to that is that I will give it my utmost best!

Additionally, in the midst of the current battle adjustments, I think that rapidly inserting content (specifically battle-related content), when taking into account the overall situation, can be considered a pretty rash decision under normal circumstances. Since the foundation of game design is usually to first focus on finalizing the battle system, and then to implement content that utilizes the finished system, we are running a lot of risks launching the instanced raids and the Ifrit battle at this time. ^^;

I want to state just how much we appreciate all of you that are playing in these conditions, and let you know that we’ll continue with our best effort to implement content alongside the battle and foundational-related fixes.

First off, I'd like to say that the following is my OPINION. I'm not trying to state anything as fact. Please don't think that I am. I also reference FFXI a lot because it's a game that I played for 7 years and I greatly enjoyed, and I don't think that it's unreasonable to use my past experiences with an MMO I greatly enjoyed to formulate my opinion on the MMO I currently play :P.

Personally, I am very strongly against this. One of the main reasons I liked FFXI over other MMOs was the fact that the level cap stayed at 75 for a very long time (the entire 7 years I played) and gear that was released was designed to be complimentary to gear that was already out, so people would still want to do very old endgame events like Dynamis because they still wanted the gear from it.

I really dislike MMOs that constantly raise the level cap, simply because it makes it seem like all the effort that we put into getting our previous gear is worthless, because the new Level 60 body is WAY better then the level 50 body that I spent 6 months trying to get. I'm not saying that the new, higher level gear always comparable to the old gear; In my opinion, a level 60 body SHOULD be better then a level 50 body. However, constantly making gear that was coveted become essentially useless, and thinking that a level cap raise is necessary for the growth of an MMO is not something that I agree with.

FFXI demonstrated to me that you can keep the level cap the same and just build content that's complimentary to the old content, instead of essentially killing off the old content, since no one wants the gear from it any more, because all the gear from the new content is so many times better.

If the level cap is raised every 1-2 years, I think that the old content will become completely unused, and players will probably be able to go through the new content in the 1-2 years before the next level cap raise. This will cause the players to end up just waiting for the next content patch without much to do.

Quite a few years down the line, I'd like to see FFXIV endgame having so much content to choose from that we couldn't possibly do it all! (when I stopped playing FFXI we had: Dynamis, Sky, Sea, Limbus, HNM, ZNM, Assault, Nyzul Isle, Salvage, and Einherjar, those are all I can remember at the moment. But This content was so substantial that even with a LOT of free time I couldn't fit it all in my schedule!)

EDIT:
A few people have brought up the prospect of upgradable gear, having the player's current gear become upgradable to the new level cap via crafting, which I think is an outstanding Idea. The downside being that the old content itself will be laughably easy to go through (since it's tailored to lower levels) so there wouldn't be a challenge getting the new gear. However if the developers do decide to go with a level cap raise, I sincerely hope that they consider this option.


In any case, those are my thoughts on the matter. If you have your own thoughts on the matter, please post so we can get this discussion going!