Is the concept of a FC already dead?

[Bucy]

The game spends it's entire design philosiphy on making group play or a sense of community the last thing on peoples mind. You spend the entire trip to 50 mostly solo and beyond that you only ever "need" people for Binding coil.

If SE made forming, maintaining, and growing FCs and raid groups easier, they could make more challenging content.

[Shougun]

If SE made forming, maintaining, and growing FCs and raid groups easier, they could make more challenging content.

Existence of hard content isn't a problem I think, just that the content has lockouts that care not for a FC not equally split into teams of 8 all ready to static. Growing a FC runs into problems others have mentioned here like people not interested in joining a FC that doesn't have a house or a house of X size or a space open on that locked out content.

I believe adding in more content worthwhile with the current lockout system really wouldn't help- and any content that is harder than the current hard content and doesn't offer equal or same rewards is not worth doing, and it would have the current lockout system if the rewards are as such. So adding more hard dungeon content would not change much without other facilities changing first. Imo.

[Sadana]

It takes a lot of work to run a FC, coordinate groups, and keep people motivated. You can't just set up a FC and expect things to happen on their own. It also takes a LOT of determination and patience. Running a FC is a bit of an exercise in futility, that whole 'herding cats' thing. XD So you have to be tough enough to put up with that feeling over long periods of time. I personally encourage a friendly atmosphere and that goes a long way.

Set goals.
Motivate people.
Be patient.
Have fun! ^^

[Welsper59]

Maybe if raid weren't 8 men exclusive clubs.

This is a huge thing for this topic. Many raids can currently be undermanned by significant numbers (4-man Twintania anyone?), but many people do not want to resort to pugs for their FC groups simply because they're forced to to just start it. SE seems to want people to experience the content, but they're also afraid of letting people do that to participate in content under their own limitations, under fear of seclusion of players that want to solo (queue).

You can't have it all be roses and ponies, but for the MMORPG genre, the possibility of doing things with groups that you know should take precedence over solo queue play. Solo queuing, which IS something I do on occasion, is the equivalent of viewing the game like a generic online one (e.g. Diablo 2/3, FPS games, etc). Games that do not necessarily require more than just yourself to accomplish your goals and are essentially reset in the process (you just keep your current status/progress of character). Solo queuing is perfectly acceptable, but what's not is restricting grouped play in fear of hindering the solo style.

I'm a dominantly solo player, and always on the lookout for ways to solo things in MMORPGs. Raids/dungeons that have mechanics that MIGHT make it possible to solo something? I'm all over it the instant I learn of it. For this game, soloing places like Haukke Manor and Cutter's Cry as SCH was fun as hell. Long and definitely not as efficient as just queuing for it, but at least it offered a bit of a challenge that was decently rewarding. Beating the average or norm is part of the appeal in games like this. Knowing you and/or your group can beat something that is otherwise designed for more people does not undermine the content as much as it gives the players involved a sense of accomplishment.

[Gilthas]

We don't have a house yet which is the biggest detriment to our fc as no one really wants to join a homeless fc but with prices as absurd as they are and only a couple ppl working on getting the gil its such a slow crawl that will break more fcs than help. It's a catch 22.

You're joking right?

I've been barely putting an effort into making gil and I've made almost 6 mil in 2 months.

People that think that even S houses cost a ridiculous amount of gil don't actually try to save gil.

[Welsper59]

You're joking right?

I've been barely putting an effort into making gil and I've made almost 6 mil in 2 months.

People that think that even S houses cost a ridiculous amount of gil don't actually try to save gil.

Or they don't bother to spend a few seconds looking at their inventory and looking them up on the boards. A new player in my FC wanted some pointers on how he can make gil, despite not even being lv40. I told him to go lvl a miner and sell shards or certain other low lvl goods (like Alumen). Within a single day, he managed to add over 150k gil to his original 8k gil.

[Nicobo]

.... so many ppl complain about not having a fc or a raid group but then its impossible to get these ppl in a fc or a raid group?...

By the way, I don't see ppl complain no "fc / raid group", most ppl just complain many contents "no static no clear" ^^;

[Staris]

We had bigger PVE guilds in ultima online, and we didn't even have raids.
So don't blame 8 people raids for your inability to find a community.

Blame console players without keyboards !

[MilesSaintboroguh]

No, blame the people who either refuse to join a FC or set their standards too high.

[Shougun]

We had bigger PVE guilds in ultima online, and we didn't even have raids.
So don't blame 8 people raids for your inability to find a community.

Blame console players without keyboards !

BiS for Ultima Online wasn't in 8 man locked out content though, afaik. BiS is for FFXIV, therefore people want to join a community that isn't really a community as much as it is really a niche (an 8 man static with some decent friends "on da side"). The only problem with changing (not dropping) the lockout is that FC's will start to sell wins sooner than usual. SE could nip that in the bud if it really bothers them by making selling wins against the ToS, which would be hilarious but quite effective. Imo the gain for FC's is greater than the sooner /sells in shout. Before I went on a break my FC -frequently- had in length discussions on how to work the raid, a big pia that always left someone out and not part of the niche.

Lockouts cause a 150 man FC to become a niche FC where you got "the 8 amigos" and "the leftovers". I've seen a few FC obtain two clearing groups, but mostly I hear of secondary and third groups just failing because they got the left overs of the first group. I'm not trying to change this thread into -all about lockouts- so apologize that being my focus. But I'm very sincere in believing that it adds unnecessary extra stress and ends a determent for the community mentality at large.

While hunts are not the best example and are further off topic they do show, for my server, an example where content not locked out actually causes people to make larger groups to work together. I've had a few LS create 3 to 4 hunting groups. There are other issues with hunts including the chance to teleport to an area with it dead already, but the point is just to show how when content isnt locked people will be more likely to group. This actually goes in turn to support what you said about PvE content in Ultima. Content not locking lead to more people being able to communicate and work together and -not- develop the little niche as often.

Edit: for PS3 players at least the ones I know, they do have keyboards.