Simplicity over complexity, time to change.

[Exstal]

SE not trying to attract the WoW crowd. They are extremely dumbing down WoW and putting a FF skin on it to attract the people who though WoW was too hardcore of a game to play.

World of Warcraft is so dated. It's such an ugly looking game.

[skaterger]

Do I like walking for 15 minutes for no reason? No. Do I like a challenge in getting to an instance first? Yes. Have you ever played a game that required you to travel through dangerous territory every time you want to run an instance? I really don't see your point about making raid content easier either, sure of course people will want to take the easier road, for that one piece of content. If that means I have to spend a week or a month acquiring the necessary tools to do one fight, that would be a godsend in contrast to: beat previous raid > queue new raid > log off for 7 days. Do you like to simply rush from one endgame instance to the next with nothing in between? Unless the only thing you have ever experienced is instanced raids and know no other way I don't see how anyone in their right mind would love that.

I remember when I was level 30+ in Vanilla Wow.I had to walk for 15 minutes through Theramore Isle, across the Barrens, took the elevator down, across Southern Barrens and partway into Mulgore to get to Razorfen Downs. The first time was pretty epic, seeing the vast stretch of desert land, the roaming vultures and the wandering quillboar. The second time was pretty good too. The third time, not so much. By the fifth time, I was putting my character on auto run and surfing the web while checking back every minute or so to make sure I didn't die. Seeing that we needed at least 2 players at the summoning stone to summon the rest of the party to the instance, everyone didn't want to make the 15 minute trek on foot that they have made hundereds of times previously. Oh and don't get me wrong, there were dangerous monsters along the way, elites in packs of 4 or 5 that could 1 shot you along the way. But guess what we did, we just ran past them. On a related note, many players all purposely killed themselves so they could get to the other side of the map faster when they respawned. People do not want to run through the same place they had over and over again, and that was what lead to expert, then artisan and flying mounts and finally DF. You see, many of us don't have to be visually motivated (i.e. seeing the game world or other people around us constantly) to make us feel like we are immersed or invested in an MMO. We can run an instance and realize that there are thousands of others in the game world. To assume that others must see things the way you do or they are playing the game wrong is downright obnoxious.

You see, when you talk about rushing through content, you just don't get the point. My aim was never to rush through content, we are a semi casual group, our members often have real life commitments which lead to last minute cancellations. Our bard has isp issues that we have to cancel at least once a week. I feel comfortable at this pace because it fits my schedule because I no longer have 12 hours to burn straight like I did 10 years ago. Even though I can clear SCOB in 1 day now, I still find myself occupied with lots of other things to do in game; dailies, crafting, pvp, collecting glamour, hunts etc. Just because you refuse to do certain things because you deem them as "not your vision of what an mmo should be" doesn't mean that it is wrong or others feel the same way. You also neglect that these "1 day a week" raiders comprise of less than 1% of the entire playerbase. Many are still happily engaged working on T8 and T9, so its not as if they have a lack of things to do. Many don't give a flying hoot about raids and are still enjoying themselves doing other things. Their opinion means no less than yours as they are paying the same subscription fee.

Um.... MNKs do deal about 20% more DMG than any other class when equally geared, cmon, you should know this with that High Allagan book. Imagine leveling a class and finding out people don't like it? Clearly you don't play that BLM of yours or have never played WoW, FFXI, RIFT, Aion, Tera. Again, you failed to read "Prefectly balanced" and you're stretching to extremes for examples. Skill in a game that requires next to none being the defining factor? What kind of drab and shallow rollfaceonkeyboard game did you come from oh former raid leader? All these grand ideas of what an MMO is or should be but have you played anything outside of WoW or one of it's clones? It really sounds like all you're interested in or ever experienced is raiding and you know no other kind of content outside of it. Open your eyes and look around at the world. No MMO is perfectly balanced or ever will be, nowhere is there a level playing field, never will we be without exclusion for one reason or another, there is more to MMOs than raiding. You're completely delusional, If anyone is high my friend, it's you over there in the rose colored glasses.

An equally skilled monk will only deal 20% more damage than a Drg in T8, and only if they are able to get constant peons and are relieved of duties to keep GL3 up. A monk can never deal 20% more damage than me in T9, I promise you that. You might need to tell the other DPS in your group to step things up a notch. Um..if you want to get into semantics, okay, I concede, no game will ever be perfectly balanced. That does not mean that games should never try and let balance run riot. As much as you disagree, I think the game is pretty well balanced atm. This game isn't hard? Ok keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel any better. I guess you've cleared savage coil then. I come from a guild that was the server second for Sunwell in BC (you can check this character on the server Dath'Remar). Is this game hard? Hell no. I don't think any mmo that I played in the last 5 years I found hard. Anyone that has played mmo or games in general for a long time would have picked up a basic skillset that applies to most games. The skills that I use now are the same ones I picked up 20 years ago when I first started playing my first pc game. I wished I played FFXI or 1.23, then I would be qualified to tell you that it is not hard. Sadly I didn't, so I can't say that but I wish someone that played those can come in here and say it.

I guess you never rolled a shadow priest or ret paladin in bc, cause they were never invited to raids. I also read the same thing about some XI classes, though I never see you people admit it. I guess it doesn't matter so long as it doesn't happen to you. Screw the noobs, so long as I play an OP class, the rest can go to hell. I'll just be as OPed as I want.

[Felessan]

Reading through a lot of the dev trackers and notice a trend of favoring to answers questions about vanity, housing, chocobo's, etc.

People in general like these topics a lot.

But avoiding the more potent topics.

Buffer/debuffer jobs was already explained in details as unnecessary complexity. We already have a number of buffs/debuffs split across different classes. And what you want is actually simplifying game as you'll no longer need to think about party organization to get desired buffs/debuffs.

Many are still happily engaged working on T8 and T9, so its not as if they have a lack of things to do.

I know quite a lot of people who still "works" on their Twintania kills. They don't really cares about "game should be difficult" though, they are just casuals that spend some time in game.

I think part of the problem is that MMOs have become built around progression of some sort. We're lead through what often times amount to a un-engaging trek to the endgame which is often times revolves around gearscore, instances, etc...

People needs motivation and goal, not just social bonds. Otherwise most will have a serious doubt - "why pay a subscription fee, when I can get the same in F2P... oh well, I can chat with friends in Skype, I even not need MMO for that".
MMO converges back to usual games, where game should be interesting, somewhat challenging (but not grindy or insanely difficult right off the start) and quality made. And social interaction is just a nice addition.
Otherwise it'll be a niche game for niche people.

In contrast 2.0's Castrum Meridanum is: Queue DF, run through it as fast as possible ignoring the fact half the players don't even know their jobs.

Answer = i100 as ilvl trumps all else.

There are a number of cases where it's not true, not on a weapon side though.

Were armor and weapons able to be made augmentable by a crafter and later augmented by the owner it would create a lucrative market and a gil sink for every player type so long as obtaining them was relatively easy, say something like materia or augment drops in L50 dungeons. This adds incentive for the content, creates a sustainable market and an actual purpose for gil.

And leads to typical for FFXI situation "buy to win" and segregation and elitism when you either have large sums of money or you have not.
A small portion of people are entrepreneurs and many does not have time/dedication to farm for hours, so for them even a million gil already a sizable amount of money. And million gil for actual gear in FFXIV is nothing, crafted and fully melded ilvl70 accessory cost 1 mil per piece in 2.0. Fully melded Saurian/Cashmere/etc gear in 2.2 priced at 2+ mil. T4 crit/det materia on my server priced at 350-400+k per piece, making "optimal" 44/31 crit/det Novus be priced at around 10 millions.
And this is when only most hardcore and dedicated spend money on relatively unneeded and marginal upgrades, if they are become actual upgrades the prices will go up even more and we will see FFXI again. Where you are a gimp without HQ staves, but they are priced so high, that you requires weeks/months of casual farm to gets them.

So we can count out anything lucrative or repetitive gil sinks, any kind of rare sellable world drops or the ability to low man farm content for rare instance drops, basically 1/4 of what makes MMOs fun and rewarding...

There are actually a lot of things that are very expensive, can be exploited by RMT and quite popular (so they have nice liquidity). They just moved out of actual battle content to avoid creating segregation. Rare minions cost fortune, materials for many glamour items/fancy furniture are very expensive, but they can be obtain through simple grind, a lengthy one though.

[Kazama]

I guess you never rolled a shadow priest or ret paladin in bc, cause they were never invited to raids. I also read the same thing about some XI classes, though I never see you people admit it.

No, I didn't, I "rolled" a Frost Mage, hit 65 in three days and gave my account away for free.

You just repeated my point... Every game has classes that nobody wants, oh well, adapt. Debating this any further with you is utterly pointless as you have no wider experience to pull from other than WoW. Not trying to say I'm better than you or that my opinion somehow counts more because i've played half a dozen MMOs over the span of almost two decades. What I'm saying is that your opinion is biased because you have never experienced a horizontal progression. I get that you're in love with XIV that's great, it is a really good game for casual MMO players who are on their first or second MMOs and I will not deny that. That doesn't mean I myself have to like the ease or simplicity of it and can't ask for something more does it?

Don't get me wrong either, I don't hate this game. I'm honestly just legitimately sad that they decided to throw away every good piece of FFXI and XIV 1.0 along with the few bad elements and replace it with something that has no soul at all. I mean, sorry to poke fun but have you ever heard the term "Through rose colored glasses"? I can't help but find your view and you glamour incredibly ironic. I'm done now, enjoy the game

[Tupsi]

Buffer/debuffer jobs was already explained in details as unnecessary complexity.

Issue is though, our debuffs are "after the fact" deuffs. The only direct debuffs we have are from Warlo...Summo....Arcanist, everything else is on weaponskill use or a "combo" - Someone who specializes in it would go a long way to adding depth to this game. It's not even 'complex', it just ...makes the game not feel so mundane battlewise. I mean Maplestory has more depth to its gameplay in comparison and anyone who's played it knows that's just a spam fest.

And leads to typical for FFXI situation "buy to win" and segregation and elitism when you either have large sums of money or you have not

You do realize this exists in XIV right now, right? It's not a 'FFXI situation" because FFXI was not the first nor last MMO to exist.

[skaterger]

No, I didn't, I "rolled" a Frost Mage, hit 65 in three days and gave my account away for free.

You just repeated my point... Every game has classes that nobody wants, oh well, adapt. Debating this any further with you is utterly pointless as you have no wider experience to pull from other than WoW. Not trying to say I'm better than you or that my opinion somehow counts more because i've played half a dozen MMOs over the span of almost two decades. What I'm saying is that your opinion is biased because you have never experienced a horizontal progression. I get that you're in love with XIV that's great, it is a really good game for casual MMO players who are on their first or second MMOs and I will not deny that. That doesn't mean I myself have to like the ease or simplicity of it and can't ask for something more does it?

Don't get me wrong either, I don't hate this game. I'm honestly just legitimately sad that they decided to throw away every good piece of FFXI and XIV 1.0 along with the few bad elements and replace it with something that has no soul at all. I mean, sorry to poke fun but have you ever heard the term "Through rose colored glasses"? I can't help but find your view and you glamour incredibly ironic. I'm done now, enjoy the game

I wonder if you ever played the game Ragnarok Online? Played that game for many years too. You could have an creator deal a massive amount of damage to an mvp or a monk cast asura strike which can 1 shot some mvps. As such, classes like sin cross and alchemist were highly sought after while rogues were never brought to mvp parties. Also yeah, my magnus exorcismus priest could only solo places like Glast Helm and Nameless Island cause all I could kill was undead. Hated that. Took me about 2 months to farm for str accessories and 3x hydra card before I could duo stormy knight with a friend. I've played games with horizontal progression, it just got tedious after a while. Many of these games were f2p games and couldn't produce content fast enough so horizontal progression was a way to make content last longer.

The glasses pun were good, if only they were true And nah, I don't "love" ARR, if I did I would never have left to try Wildstar. I also think the game is far from perfect, as seen from suggestions I made earlier in this thread and http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...rove-ARR/page4. Sadly, the 1.23 and XI apologists seem to be demanding that ARR be either their way (XI and 1.23 clone) or the highway. I have no choice but to choose the lesser of 2 evils.

[Grizzlebeard]

World of Warcraft is so dated. It's such an ugly looking game.

Fun Ugly is subjective, don't forget that.

Yeah.

/10 Marmosets

[Felessan]

Issue is though, our debuffs are "after the fact" deuffs. The only direct debuffs we have are from Warlo...Summo....Arcanist, everything else is on weaponskill use or a "combo" - Someone who specializes in it would go a long way to adding depth to this game.

We have debuffs that increases all type of damage, we have a number of ability that reduces damage from mob, we have slow/gravity debuffs, bind, evasion down, buff for magic resistance, several shields etc.
Yes, some of them have additional damage or included in combos, but they are still the same debuffs/buffs as in every other mmo.
And the only reason to include buffer/debuffer class is for someone who likes to play to buff/debuff only, and it has nothing to do with "complexity" of the game.

It's not even 'complex', it just ...makes the game not feel so mundane battlewise. I mean Maplestory has more depth to its gameplay in comparison and anyone who's played it knows that's just a spam fest.

You know, FF14 combat in depth has nothing with spamfest. You can spam, but you result will be below average.

You do realize this exists in XIV right now, right? It's not a 'FFXI situation" because FFXI was not the first nor last MMO to exist.

Ok, you can say it's a situation for oldschool MMO that only hardcore crowd played, that have a very little playerbase where all that "insane grind", "lockouts" and all-content-wide elitism considered to be normal, so no casuals would dare to step into this territory. It was proven that it is bad for general population and for game to be "success in masses".
And not, FF14 does not have anything like this outside fashion items and super ultra hardcore part of 0.0001% population. You don't need crafting gear to pass through T9, nobody forces you to make Novus with best possible stat. Nobody really cares about how much money you got.
The maximum you might be asked for is a food, but it's cheap and spending like 20k a week is a joke as SE did bothered to provide constant stream of money for everyone, even though it's rather small, but it's still enough for basic activities like repairs, teleports and minimal food.

[Malamasala]

nobody forces you to make Novus with best possible stat.

This part is always backwards in MMOs. If you don't want to put effort into the game, you'll get hard mode because you will have weaker gear. And if playing hard mode is not putting effort into the game, then what is it?

Meanwhile you always have hardcore people complaiing that wearing all the best gear with ten melds on each makes the game too easy and hard content should be added.

The company that solves this dilemma first, will probably become legendary in the MMO history.

[Felessan]

This part is always backwards in MMOs. If you don't want to put effort into the game, you'll get hard mode because you will have weaker gear. And if playing hard mode is not putting effort into the game, then what is it?

Even within hardcore those who likes "farm months worth of gil to buy gear to make a progress" is a minority, the rest prefer actual complexity in organization, cooperation and quality of play of each member.
This is why for most part crafted gear is a little upgrade over drop/token items, and even those opportunities that existed in 2.0-2.1 were delayed/scaled down in 2.2-2.3 (we did not get crafted accessory in 2.2, only in 2.3, and even after we got it - it has 1 less stat, so you no longer can get hp *and* damage stats on par with top accessory that made crafted ilvl70 accessory so good) .

And making Novus have nothing to do with pushing efforts to the edge. Novus is not top weapon, HA is. Novus was introduced when the most dedicated already cleared T9, making all those efforts obsolete if you really pushing it for "the best gear". Novus is just an intermediate weapon where you can play with secondary stats, and as such it's out of the "top" territory and all those BiS talks. You can spent all those 10 mil for best combo, but it'll be mostly for your own joy and sense of acomplishment.
There is an explicit limit of how much of upgrade you can get for money and it intentionally kept low.