Quote Originally Posted by Schubalts View Post
Do you realize that optimal rank/class gear still exists? Do you realize that a similar algorithm is exactly what optimal rank/class gear already did and currently does? The only difference is that the game now tells you how much the attack/defense is lowered.

I can wear optimal rank-39 steel armor right now, but due to the level difference, it would actually be worse than what I have on now. The stat-dropping algorithm is alive and well in the game.
Yep, they're just trying to move us to Materia slotted gear, which can't be done on older gear (which is where the majority of the optimal gear lie) which is why they mentioned balancing, since they'd have to rebalance pretty much everything with the inclusion of Materia which would also have to be balance on optimal gear.

The thing is, it's just much easier to balance a set value and add to it (materia for example) than it is to augment scaling gear, which is why other MMOs haven't really done it in mass and used what works in terms of gear systems, not because they didn't think of doing something new, but because it's actually a lot of hassle to get proper balance on it, even though Unreal and Havok can do it 'out of the box', but for MMOs it's always a finicky beast.