Step in the rite direction but...

[iAeris]

truth be told im new to game and unsure of how i create party or use link shell?

[viperld]

I also think the patch did a lot right as well as a lot wrong.

Companies feel really fun to me (dialog, quests), and I like the prospect of being able to earn points and spend them on gear and items.

The new skill graphics and abolition of the stamina gauge feel great to me also.

I play THM so I can't really say how the update effected mele's, but as a mage I feel that the game is definitely more difficult now. Not all of the new difficulty feels necessary though.

For example, I like doing damage but understand that those who can heal carry the responsibility to do so. With no more healing aoe I find it a lot harder to help parties survive (with lag and the difficulty in targeting it's sometimes impossible for me to make good use of sacrifice/cure). MP costs for sacrifice/cure are unreasonable (75mp or so?). I mean you can argue that it's ok, but given that you have to cure so much more since aoe is gone it really isn't.

Repairs are better but still fundamentally off I believe. I don't remember who I heard recommend this but armor damage only upon death sounds a lot better. Conceptually speaking gear degrades much too quickly. It's like, am I wearing armor or paper lol.

All in all I like the patch and think the developers should give themselves a pat on the back.

My recommendations are to lower healing magic mp costs, make healing aoe again (if you really want 14 to be different from 11 don't start adopting concepts like dedicated curaga), make gear degrade a lot less (crafters already make money selling all the gear so repairs are meh anyway), and continue adding awesome dialog to the game!