Hi All,

Fantastic Letter from Producer Yoshida!

If anything Yoshida-san seems to be keeping in touch with all of us players, listening to the worries we've had on the changes, such as Guildleves going Solo and "What about Party SP?" etc. This part of the Letter sounds particularly exciting:

We’re hurrying to bring in adjustments to enemy distribution, respawn timers, linked-enemy bonuses, and party bonuses to make skill point awards in public areas even tastier when playing in a party. Regarding linking, the current specs for fixed “enemy groups” will see large-scale changes towards a system more capable of addressing the combat potential of parties.

In attempting to cover the expansiveness of some zones, the current distribution of enemies left some wide gaps between them. This is another area high on our list of priorities that will see heavy adjustments.

Putting together a party isn’t all ponies and rainbows—there’s the time and effort spent getting the setup right and traveling to a camp, the risks involved when battling strong enemies, and so on. It’s an investment on the part of players, and we’re going to make sure skill point awards reflect that.
It sounds like we may be getting XP Chain / Linking Bonuses, maybe even in this 1.18 patch. Incentivizing the Players / Parties to kill more efficiently to get Chain Bonuses is sweet.

Also,
More instanced raids are on the way, as well. I hope you’ll enjoy choosing between light and full party raids based on whatever kind of groups you find yourself in from day to day. And don’t forget about public dungeons, because we sure haven’t!
Very cool. Only 2 more days to Patch 1.18!