The Hunt - a game breaking feature

[Geist]

As someone also from Excalibur who has been a participant in so called hunt groups over the last few days, I can say it has not torn the community apart like OP suggests, but has brought them together, at least on Excalibur.

Roxi, I can only praise the hard effort (up to and including the TS server in question) some people have invested into the Hunts (I can think of Vandes who spent hours studying their behavior, same server as ours), but I daresay we still have a small way to go, even on Excalibur that, as you noted, is enjoying a fairly better situation.

The change in the way B-ranks are handled has lessened the problem, I'll give you that: but just as an example, I've seen that familiar sequence (large group of people occupying the zone -> casting ready skills while surrounding the mob -> announcing pull within a certain timeframe and then someone letting loose at a moment's notice) still taking place in East Gridania just the other day.

In that instance, the poor fellow who had initially sighted the monster and shouted its location to share it with everybody else didn't even get a party invite, and although it's certainly possible that most parties were full or late in replying because everybody was spamming actions (I know our party leader was, as sweet as she is, and that made getting the full reward a tad bitter), in my opinion that's reason enough to work harder on communicating and sharing with other players, since we have the kind of instruments and infrastructure you mentioned in your post.

In the same vein, I believe we'll have to find a counter to the early pulls. Explaining why it isn't astute but rather disruptive, even going to the extent of benching the jerks for a round or two so that they may get a hint... I think that was being discussed even before the patch hit.

By the by, this is meant as encouragement first and foremost, since you seem to be a honest believer in a better community - let's hope we can (hopefully!) avoid pack mentality and try to be as inclusive as possible. And of course, just my two gils.