Design Flaws with Atma, let me count the ways

[Ringabell]

Something isn't special when everyone has it.

It isn't special if a drunk chimpanzee has the required "skill" to acquire it either.

Who said anything about skill? No, the skill-gated weapon is High Allagan.

The Atma gate is not skill. The gate is the grind that god awful RNG.

I'm not arguing for Atmas. I'm on record saying that farming for Atmas really sucked.

That said, Atmas are behaving exactly as they were intended to behave. You can break down each line of my post and respond with laser precision and well-worded arguments to the contrary, but it wasn't a huge mistake. It was planned. They knew that having an obscenely low drop rate that must be over come 12 times would gate the weapon from the masses.

They aren't stupid.

Neither are they looking at this thread shaking their collective head thinking: "We'd better raise the drop rate to 10% so everyone can get one."

No way.

Again: "ATMA FARMING SUCKS". That is my stance. It wasn't fun. I felt it basically ate into the time that I could've spent doing beneficial things like levelling another job or crafting. I even gave up on it for a while, got a Wave weapon and began farming for a Mirror. Atma sucks. But it also serves the purpose SE intended it to serve.

[Avarghaladion]

But it also serves the purpose SE intended it to serve.

While I do appreciate your overall opinion in the matter, I disagree on this point. Most empirically, SE directly came out and said they were pushing back new relic content as a result of not nearly enough players having Atma done yet. Similarly, there were people done within a few hours of the patch and others who have gone hundreds of hours and thousands of FATEs without completion. This second point is an indication of an absence of a clear intent on SEs part, unless their goal was to create a completely inequitable gameplay experience. These directly indicate that it simply isn't working as they intended and it never was but unless their bottom line is shattered, like it was in 1.0, we will not ever hear an apology from SE or any admission that, hey, maybe we coulda done that better guys.

I have never heard a single person in game or irl say anything that wasn't completely negative in regards to Atma. The most thoughts I hear on the matter are that a person is either unsubscribing in response to the bad game design, ignoring the game entirely to enjoy other titles while they wait for it to be fixed, or ignoring the content entirely and hoping SE gives them a reason to stay in FFXIV. When I talk to people who originally planned on getting the game to play with me they have, all of them, changed their minds as a result of Atma. Irl friends, decade long FFXI veterans, who joined because I told them how fun the game was pre-2.2, and who weren't even done Prae yet, quit upon recognizing the direction the game was taking. Sure, we have Atma apologists but no one seems to think it's fun or a good idea whatsoever. I've also noticed a direct correlation between how readily a person defends Atma and how little time their farming required, though you are the exception as you do readily admit that it is completely horrible. At any rate, If SE's goal was to lose revenue than they have succeeded.

They aren't stupid.

Neither are they looking at this thread shaking their collective head thinking: "We'd better raise the drop rate to 10% so everyone can get one."

They're a -little- stupid lately... or at least someone somewhere in the design chain is pushing very very very bad ideas. Similarly to how you described it, Atma is just a stall tactic. Conscientious consumers readily recognize that SE is artificially padding the length of their game. No, they don't want to hand the items out but that doesn't mean there aren't creative solutions. Take i70 DoL tools for example. Fishing RNG grind is virtually identical to Atma with the exception that you get NQ items that you can trade in to an NPC for food that increases your chances at getting the item you actually need. They could have done this with great effect for Atma as it would put a carrot on a stick for gamers and even if they didn't get the drop there would still be discernible transparency; people would know that the mechanic was actually working because, hey, I keep getting NQ Atma drops. The Botanist/Miner routes could have also been employed to great effect. They could have made it so that Atma had a higher drop rate but that it was only obtainable under more specific conditions. They could have made it drop from specific FATEs under certain conditions, which would also satisfy the lore as the quest giver even says almost verbatum that that's how we're supposed to find it.

At best, they want players to ignore this relic step in favour of the other weapon options since they likely plan on gradually making relic the superior option in the near future. This is logical, from a long-term development reward:effort perspective and the inverse of what they did in end-of-days FFXI but the community is extreme toxic to one another and to the developers as a result. A lot of people feel alienated.

[AlexPayne]

I'm not so sure I entirely believe the people who claim to have been fate grinding for hundreds of hours with no luck. Hundreds of hours of grinding does not mean 90 hours of other activities and 10 hours of fates.

[Avarghaladion]

I'm not so sure I entirely believe the people who claim to have been fate grinding for hundreds of hours with no luck. Hundreds of hours of grinding does not mean 90 hours of other activities and 10 hours of fates.

There's nothing wrong with skepticism and while I can't speak for everyone I can assure you that it is entirely probable that most or all of the people claiming this on the forums are doing so honestly. My gf plays beside me and she worked at it very aggressively, doing pretty much nothing else in game until she finished, and it took her over 120 hours of FATEs not including any time she spent afk, eating, bio, etc. I play a bit more efficiently than her and I've personally just had a dry spell where I went approx 70-80hrs without having an Atma drop. I'm currently about 100hrs in, total, and only half done my set. I was all but convinced that my character was glitched, which is an other issue: due to lack of transparency and because of how the "content" is delivered there's no way of knowing if you're experiencing a bug

For reference, I am not a grind-squeamish player. When I was buying my FC's house I routinely went Fri-Sat-Sun with literally no sleep to keep retainers permanently stocked and I didn't make a peep about Relic/Mythic progression in XI, even when I did my pre-nerf 10000gillion EP kills to level the weapon up. I am a completionist in general, when it comes to gaming, and no grind in any game I've ever played has offended me to this degree. Members of my FC were working on Atma, at times, with my gf and they self-quoted over 120hrs as well. Knowing them I have no reason to disbelieve them.

In contrast, some people get multiple full sets in less time. Some people finish in less than a few hours. The system is utterly fubar.