Level cap increase every 1-2 years.

[WillRiker]

I think raising the cap every 1-2 years is a wonderful idea! It means that SE will have to continue evolving the game to keep up with the ever changing levels in the game which will probably mean:

-New gear coming out for new ranks
-New recipes for crafters
-New areas for gatherers
-New areas, hopefully new mobs as well
-New dungeons and other content
-New abilities
-New skills
-New challenges
-New NM's for higher rank

This will keep hardcore players who DO want new things to fill their time with interested.

As for Midcore and Casual, usually they just want to have fun... and since the game will constantly expand every 1-2 years, they as well will never run out of things to do.

I see no negatives to this... and at least they aren't pulling a FFXI where everyone worked hard for like 6+ years totally pimping out their characters and spending tons of money and time to to Dyna etc to get the best of the best.... then get told:

"oh yeah we know you've been doing all of this for sooooo many years... but we are gonna add like 20+ levels to the game.. yeah... sorry."


At least we know it's coming, that the game will evolve and change with additions every 1-2 years, and we will have new challenges.

Love the idea!

In theory, yes it is a good idea.

In practice, increasing level cap actually has a detrimental effect/

It reduces the number of events to only the one, or two, newly released events. It also obliterates the prospect of gear which require a long term plan to obtain. Entire dungeons and nm/hnm become obsolete over night. Crafting recipy's considered good, pre-update, are now obsolete and only the newest and greatest is ever made.

Really, raising level caps have bad effects on games, and should be done as a last resort. It is the developers essentially giving up. A prime example of this that most of us share is ffxi. It went for years, and years, without the need for raising the cap. And, by every measure, it was among the most successful mmo's in history. Now, post level cap increase, it is a shell of its former self.

[giftforce]

I am against this. The only barrier to content should be skill, not level.

[alexi14]

In theory, yes it is a good idea.

In practice, increasing level cap actually has a detrimental effect/

It reduces the number of events to only the one, or two, newly released events. It also obliterates the prospect of gear which require a long term plan to obtain. Entire dungeons and nm/hnm become obsolete over night. Crafting recipy's considered good, pre-update, are now obsolete and only the newest and greatest is ever made.

Really, raising level caps have bad effects on games, and should be done as a last resort. It is the developers essentially giving up. A prime example of this that most of us share is ffxi. It went for years, and years, without the need for raising the cap. And, by every measure, it was among the most successful mmo's in history. Now, post level cap increase, it is a shell of its former self.

A+++++

When we get to the point where we have NOTHING to do left... bring in FF online III!

5 years from now, graphics will be out of date anyway.

[Gasher]

The initial level cap system used in FFXI was very well balanced imo. There is nothing wrong with increasing the level cap but I feel it should be done on a play-by-play basis.

Jericho, I thumbs-up'd your initial post of keeping the level cap static. And yes - I also agree with the 80, 90 or even level 99 (but NEVER 100!) cap in general areas (zones which are part of the basic game mechanics). My contribution to this thread would be that expansions could absolutely come with further increases in level cap but these caps should only be viable in the expansion-content related areas. This is not a complex thing really and I can't see a problem with it story wise and as far as technology goes it should be easy enough to implement.

So in short. Put a 'normal-stage' level/rank cap, say 75 (for ol' times sake) in all major areas of the game. As more content gets released this cap can then be adjusted up or down depending on the content and it's target audience.

Now I hear someone saying "There will be issues with gear from higher level content! Players want to wear/show-off/brag their über ninja laz0r harness +3 that they got from this one awesome rank 99 instance! And they wanna do it whilst being AFK in Ul'dah!" Ok, fine. That feature is already in game. Just wear the item but it's true power is not active until the item is within it's content-origin zone.

Now. Here's a picture of a kitten.

[alexi14]

The initial level cap system used in FFXI was very well balanced imo. There is nothing wrong with increasing the level cap but I feel it should be done on a play-by-play basis.

Jericho, I thumbs-up'd your initial post of keeping the level cap static. And yes - I also agree with the 80, 90 or even level 99 (but NEVER 100!) cap in general areas (zones which are part of the basic game mechanics). My contribution to this thread would be that expansions could absolutely come with further increases in level cap but these caps should only be viable in the expansion-content related areas. This is not a complex thing really and I can't see a problem with it story wise and as far as technology goes it should be easy enough to implement.

So in short. Put a 'normal-stage' level/rank cap, say 75 (for ol' times sake) in all major areas of the game. As more content gets released this cap can then be adjusted up or down depending on the content and it's target audience.

Now I hear someone saying "There will be issues with gear from higher level content! Players want to wear/show-off/brag their über ninja laz0r harness +3 that they got from this one awesome rank 99 instance! And they wanna do it whilst being AFK in Ul'dah!" Ok, fine. That feature is already in game. Just wear the item but it's true power is not active until the item is within it's content-origin zone.

Now. Here's a picture of a kitten.

Yes, but now that lvl 75 with super mega-awsome puppy gear +3 is going to be jealous at the lvl 99

[Murugan]

The initial level cap system used in FFXI was very well balanced imo. There is nothing wrong with increasing the level cap but I feel it should be done on a play-by-play basis.

Jericho, I thumbs-up'd your initial post of keeping the level cap static. And yes - I also agree with the 80, 90 or even level 99 (but NEVER 100!) cap in general areas (zones which are part of the basic game mechanics). My contribution to this thread would be that expansions could absolutely come with further increases in level cap but these caps should only be viable in the expansion-content related areas. This is not a complex thing really and I can't see a problem with it story wise and as far as technology goes it should be easy enough to implement.

So in short. Put a 'normal-stage' level/rank cap, say 75 (for ol' times sake) in all major areas of the game. As more content gets released this cap can then be adjusted up or down depending on the content and it's target audience.

Now I hear someone saying "There will be issues with gear from higher level content! Players want to wear/show-off/brag their über ninja laz0r harness +3 that they got from this one awesome rank 99 instance! And they wanna do it whilst being AFK in Ul'dah!" Ok, fine. That feature is already in game. Just wear the item but it's true power is not active until the item is within it's content-origin zone.

Now. Here's a picture of a kitten.

I'm fine with expansion content giving rewards that are useful in that expansion only actually. I think having various sets of equipment for different situations/mobs/areas etc. is a good thing. However why does that that need a rank increase even? If we are talking about effects that would only work there why do we need to add a leveling component to it, and if they wanted one why couldn't that leveling component be something like the planned materia system instead?

I'd much rather have that than a level increase every 1-2 years for the life of the game. I'd like the final level cap to be reached within a year or two like it was in XI. There are many other ways to progress characters without destroying old content.

[Gasher]

I'm fine with expansion content giving rewards that are useful in that expansion only actually. I think having various sets of equipment for different situations/mobs/areas etc. is a good thing. However why does that that need a rank increase even? If we are talking about effects that would only work there why do we need to add a leveling component to it, and if they wanted one why couldn't that leveling component be something like the planned materia system instead?

I'd much rather have that than a level increase every 1-2 years for the life of the game. I'd like the final level cap to be reached within a year or two like it was in XI. There are many other ways to progress characters without destroying old content.

Good call. Thumbs-upped!

I think the main point of my post was to say that IF there would ever be a need to up the level cap. It should be done on a play-by-play basis. Not that there ever was going to be such a need!

[KaiKatzchen]

In theory, yes it is a good idea.

In practice, increasing level cap actually has a detrimental effect/

It reduces the number of events to only the one, or two, newly released events. It also obliterates the prospect of gear which require a long term plan to obtain. Entire dungeons and nm/hnm become obsolete over night. Crafting recipy's considered good, pre-update, are now obsolete and only the newest and greatest is ever made.

Really, raising level caps have bad effects on games, and should be done as a last resort. It is the developers essentially giving up. A prime example of this that most of us share is ffxi. It went for years, and years, without the need for raising the cap. And, by every measure, it was among the most successful mmo's in history. Now, post level cap increase, it is a shell of its former self.

I'm sorry I do not agree with you. I feel with FFXI it was more how the cap raise was done and the way the add ons were put into the game (I.E. allowing such low level people into Abyssea so it became a big leech fest), not the cap increase itself.

For one SE waited WAY too long to put in those increases. I don't know if this is correct, but there were rumors that .dat miners found some of the items for the Abyssea add on's years before they released it.

They also put out too many levels too fast... seriously. Vision of Abyssea came out in June 2010... level cap raised. Scars of Abyssea came out in September of 2010, another cap raise... Heroes of Abyssea came out in December of 2010... yet another cap raise! Yeah I'd get annoyed if they threw about 15 levels on me in 6 months then made me wait for (what) 8 months now and they haven't finished? People know the other 10 levels are coming and after a rush of all these add on's, nothing... Of course it hurt the game and pissed people off.

But raising the level cap every 1-2 years is a lot more sensible, look at how WoW did it and they are not hurting at all in any way.

Original cap was 60 when it came out in November of 2004.
A little over 2 years (January of 2007) later Burning Crusade came out and it was raised to 70.
In 2008 Wrath of the Linch King came out and raised it to 80.
Cataclysm came out in Dec 2010 and raised it to 85.

Their game isn't hurting at all and they are doing raises in their cap roughly every 1-2 years, so your theory on it having a bad effect on games and only being done as a last resort is not 100% accurate. If it is done in the wrong way, I.E. tossing tons levels on someone in 6 months... yeah its gonna probably cause problems. But if you take it slow and steady, making it to where it's not some hurricane coming down on you and people are aware it's happening and the game makers give people time to do the content that is added in, then it goes a lot smoother.

I feel SE, in this case, is learning from the mistakes they made with FFXI's cap increase and is doing it the proper way this time by balancing out the cap increases and letting us know they will raise every 1-2 years.

[RedAffinity]

I dislike change, but once the dust settles I embrace it. So while I'd like a definite cap, I think it's for the greater good if there's a level increase.

With that said, I wasn't a fan of 4 years of level 75, then sudden bump up to 99 in FFXI. 2 Years feels like a good amount later on in its life. Obviously 50 is too low currently so that'll be bumped up soon I assume.

[DurtiMonkeyToe]

So everyone that doesn't want a level cap increase wants to just smack into a wall of progression at level 50? This doesn't make sense to me, sorry.