More Horizontal Progression please

[Kaurie]

No, there really wouldn't.

The way dps checks work is you'd find the mathematically best gear for that encounter and wear it, regardless of all else.

If you don't, you aren't beating it.

That may be a problem more with the mechanics of a DPS check than with horizontal progression

[Nektulos-Tuor]

No, there really wouldn't.

The way dps checks work is you'd find the mathematically best gear for that encounter and wear it, regardless of all else.

If you don't, you aren't beating it.

We are not talking about very specific fights or the game. We are talking about Horizontal Progression in general.

Indeed, you do need enough dps to beat the encounter. However, what if the encounter also hit very hard. You need survivability as well and sustain. However, you need to also damage it fast enough to kill it.

If you and everyone go full DPS you will die to damage from the creature.
If you and everyone go full Healing and Sustain, you won't be able to do enough damage to the creature.
So, you need to form a raid of people who have both good damage, and good healing, using their play-styles. Which means some will have more healing based procs whilst others will have more damage based procs. Whilst some will like both, or mixing it up.

This means, every proc is viable.

Awnser.

If an effect or item has a huge advantage (over 30%) in a fight against every other item. Then it is no longer a choice, thus it immediately becomes vertical. Even if it started out horizontal. Vertical Progression means there is one best choice, and there are upgrades to that best choice.

Multiple ways of handling the same situation is true horizontal progression.

[Nadirah]

the quote you responded to was for FFXIV in general.

I don't count how things "used" to be when we are discussing the present.

DPS and healers have not *needed* pentamelded accessories in HW.

And they were not desired to be so by dev team, as they "broke" Coil. I'm surprised they didn't do more to prevent it honestly.

Tanks rarely actually have the choice. If you're not getting melded stuff you get a few fending and the rest slaying until you get more gear, and then you get rid of all the fending because DPS is king.

[Iromi]

nope we have no rapport with se at all sadly.

they do not reply, suggestions are NOT forwarded, in game suggestions is as bad as talking to oneself.
when the game does dwindle..(and it will) it will not be from lack of us trying...but from no interaction from them.

i hope i am wrong, it has such potential but so far im not impressed by the developers nor CM input at all.

Yeh for real...I just saw a reply to some music thing on the dev tracker...but yet these game changing threads and concerns get nothing.

[SendohJin]

To add my 2 cents, I think that it would be great to have multiple gear items of the same ilvl, same weapon damage, same main stat with more 'fun' secondary stats. I was playing Diablo III the other day and had an item that randomly spawned minions around me who went and exploded on the enemy. This was one heck of a fun stat. I am not saying add this one in particular, but something more 'fun' than crit rate and det would be great.

what they should add are job specific stats.

Enochian+ (increase duration)
Astral Fire+ (increase potency)
Aetherflow+ (reduce recast)
Dreadwyrm Trance+ (increase duration)
Galvanize+ (increase potency)
Blood of the Dragon+ (increase duration)
Jump+ (increase potency)
Cover+ (increase range)
etc.

when you have enough of certain pieces your rotation can even change. i would implement these things as materia (probably untradable).

[karateorangutang]

yes, but that doesn't mean you can't have some degree of both.

This theory crafting of what qualifies as horizontal progression is interesting and all...

How about we bring it back to FFXIV and provide ideas of how we can implement horizontal progression. I think we can all agree that SE is not going to go entirely horizontal and will keep the vertical model. Therefore we want a hybrid anyway, so let's stop fussing over what is 100% horizontal and what isn't.

To add my 2 cents, I think that it would be great to have multiple gear items of the same ilvl, same weapon damage, same main stat with more 'fun' secondary stats. I was playing Diablo III the other day and had an item that randomly spawned minions around me who went and exploded on the enemy. This was one heck of a fun stat. I am not saying add this one in particular, but something more 'fun' than crit rate and det would be great.

Aside from what I think there is only one way to enter this sort of thing into the meta and not have one gear being sought after more than another. That's *drum roll please* RNG baby!!

If you truly want gear that is horizontal then you'd need some way to augment current gears.

For example: Timmy the Tall who is a Paladin has his Hauteclaire. He does a quest and at the end of said quest he gets a random augment based on a option that he picks from Willa the Witch NPC. Options are Defense, Offense, Magic Offense, and Healing. You would get a random buff out of that category with the inability to change it.

To do this in fairness though you'd have to make sure that the buffs weren't very powerful so as not to prioritize one player over another based on equivalent gears. That's where things get really sketchy with horizontal progression.

[Ibi]

They would only be horizontal if said boss took the same amount of damage regardless of type.

So a well-balanced proc would be instead of a fireball, it would be a boulder that did physical damage.

Gear A: Adds an extra attack that deals X damage.
Gear B: Sometimes attacks three times dealing damage.
Gear C: Occasionally launches a saw that deals damage.

It shouldn't matter what type, unless all the types are the same. If they are different then its unbalanced procs.

Okay, fine, we'll use your jumping off point instead. The way I see it, there are three possible outcomes here.

Scenario 1: A, B, and C all do effectively equivalent damage on all fights. Maybe slight advantages here and there.

This is not choice. It's an illusion of choice, because while you have the option to use any of them, it also doesn't matter which one you use. Once you've acquired one, there's no reason to go after either of the others unless you're crazy about min-maxing.

Scenario 2: One of the three is the superior choice in all situations.

I think everyone agrees that this would be an example of vertical progression. You have a single best option and, once you have that, you no longer need concern yourself with other options.

Scenario 3: Different options are better for different situations.

Here's where the split is occurring. Most people in this thread would say this is horizontal progression.

You seem to have a further distinction:

Scenario 3a: Specific options are slightly superior in different situations. All options are viable in all situations.

You would call this horizontal progression, as would everyone else.

Scenario 3b: Specific options are marginally superior in different situations. Other options are still viable, but inferior.

You would call this vertical, most everyone else would call this horizontal.

What I'm trying to get you to clarify, and what you're consistently either avoiding or failing to answer, is where you think the line is between 3a and 3b.

What's the difference between a small advantage and a noticeable advantage?

[Ibi]

If an effect or item has a huge advantage (over 30%) in a fight against every other item. Then it is no longer a choice, thus it immediately becomes vertical. Even if it started out horizontal. Vertical Progression means there is one best choice, and there are upgrades to that best choice.

Multiple ways of handling the same situation is true horizontal progression.

Got it. >30%: Vertical. <30%: Horizontal.

Thank you for providing your completely arbitrary line.

[Zarzak]

Because you aren't getting western players to run the same bosses for 7 years.

You do know that with FFXI they didn't just stop adding bosses right? Like, there were new mobs, zones, and bosses added after Vanilla/Zilart. It's just they kept the older stuff relevant and a reason to go to. So instead of wiping your pool of content every patch, it grew and grew until there was a whole pool of bosses/zones/activities to do every day.

Doesn't even need to be horizontal... They just need to stop leapfrogging raid content with group content EVERY SINGLE DAMN RAID PATCH.

EQ was purely vertical (aside from clickies and such) but the content was still relevant for MULTIPLE EXPANSIONS.


To translate EQ into XIV's terms...

50 = ARR group 50 gear
60 = HW group 60 gear
70 = CT1
80 = CT2
90 = CT3
100 = Alex(N)
110 = Coil 1
120 = Coil 2
130 = Coil 3
140 = Alex(S) 1


Add on a couple more expansions depending on the era. Point is even with a new EXPANSION AND LEVEL CAP. The previous expansion's raids still provided superior gear to the new expansion's group gear. What did this mean?

It meant the casual/low tier raiders could raid content they were unable to beat at 50 at level 60 bringing the new spells/stats that come along with that and STILL GAIN MEANINGFUL PROGRESSION.

EQ's raid content was kept relevant for years through this and it's group content was kept relevant through the aug/aa system.

Modern MMOs they could literally delete Coil 1-3 and CT 1-3 tomorrow and no one would notice unless they wanted vanity items. There is 0 benefit for any player even the newest fresh 50 to step foot in either of these zone series because the content is designed to make them irrelivant as soon as something new is released.

If an effect or item has a huge advantage (over 30%) in a fight against every other item. Then it is no longer a choice, thus it immediately becomes vertical. Even if it started out horizontal. Vertical Progression means there is one best choice, and there are upgrades to that best choice.

Just because the top 1% have vertical progression (due to being on the bleeding edge and being able ot get the best of everything) doesn't mean the game has to be totally designed around the idea that no character wear anything but the best currently available.

The people new to raiding should be able to go to the Coil RAID, learn the fights, beat the fights, gain gear upgrades over what a faceroll GROUP dungeon provides. Keeping content relevant isn't a bad thing.

As the content is currently designed if you aren't clearing at least Alex savage 1/2 by now you may as well not even bother trying to start raiding. By the time you get a group together and start raiding they will drop group content that gives the same gear.

[Nektulos-Tuor]

Got it. >30%: Vertical. <30%: Horizontal.

Thank you for providing your completely arbitrary line.

If one item is 30% or better in a situation there is no need to use it over other items because there is such a huge difference in power. Sorry you disagree, but its the truth.

Thank you for arguing with me for no point or reason. I was trying to help you understand but it seems you just want to argue, for the sake of arguing.