Grand Company Ranks

[Yhximott]

I tried to find an existing thread on the subject, but I'm guessing the conversation is pretty old.

Same old story: There are three sets of ranks that have yet to be made available to us despite them having been present since at least 2.0 (when I joined). It would be incredible to get some viable gear (competitive with tombstone gear if used with a sanction perhaps?) and items from the higher ranks. Some new quest content maybe?

Did I perhaps miss a live letter address of this? Are there any plans, or have they made it clear that they have no intention of advancing the GC content?

[Dualblade]

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...=1#post3635325

Q: In a previous Letter LIVE, you mentioned a type of content where you could make your own platoon, but I was curious about the progress of this.

A: This is content that has had some hardships during the planning stage, but we are planning to add this in Patch 3.4. However, I cannot make any promises right now as to whether we will be able to add dungeons that you can bring your platoon to at the same time. Though, we will be unlocking the second lieutenant rank for grand companies at that time.

In regards to companies, we will be adding new items that can be purchased from grand companies in Patch 3.3.

From today's Live Letter. Platoons are supposed to a part of GC content, and hopefully soon but maybe not till 4.0 xpac.

[Yhximott]

When they say "unlocking the second lieutenant rank" I'm guessing they mean they'll be removing that as the cap? Since 2LT is already an achievable rank.

[Preypacer]

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...=1#post3635325

From today's Live Letter. Platoons are supposed to a part of GC content, and hopefully soon but maybe not till 4.0 xpac.

Disclaimer: What follows is just me expressing concerns about the system, in the absence of more specific details. I'm not, in any way, pretending or presuming to know exactly how it will be. Please keep that in mind while reading.

I remember Yoshi-P touching on this in a previous Live Letter, or an interview. He basically mentioned wanting to bring something like FFXII's Gambit system into FFXIV. That system would become part of the Platoons.


Now, while I enjoyed that system in theory - the idea of sorta "programming" your party members to be semi-automated - I enjoyed it in the context of FFXII, a single player FF game.

That he wants to bring it to FFXIV has me a bit concerned. I've not seen any kind of specific info about this anywhere, but I have seen him mention, a few times now, that he'd like players to be able to use it in Dungeons, though I've not seen him explain in what capacity.

Now, I *seriously* hope this is side content, separate from dungeons/trials/relevant content that we currently do through Duty Finder or even Party Finder. Further, I hope the rewards are separate from those attainable through normal content, and only provide rewards through your GC, etc.

My reasons are pretty much two-fold:
1) This game is already quite solo-friendly for the vast majority of it. Dungeons and Trials are pretty much the only compulsory content that requires a group of players to complete. Adding a way for people to bring a Platoon of semi-automated characters through, instead of queueing up with other players, would be undermining one of the few truly multiplayer elements this game has. Why even call it a MMO at that point,if that's what he has in mind.

2) I've seen people compare it to the Trust system in FFXI. That's a fair comparison, from what we know so far (very little). Understand, in FFXI the Trust system works and is arguably necessary, because the game is old. The population is substantially lower, and is largely at the end of the content. Thanks to Abyssea making power-leveling to 99 a stupidly easy endeavor, people doing multiplayer content, outside of end-game stuff, has already been mostly dead for a long time now. Outside of end-game stuff, the mantra has become "power-level to 99, get some Trusts, and solo it". Thanks to sweeping, unnecessary changes made through Abyssea (which SE themselves would later admit were a mistake), any sense of player interdependence, outside of a few activities, is dead, and has been for some years now.

So, I'd like to see some more specific information on that system and what role/niche he expects it to fill in the game. I really hope he delves into it more in future letters, interviews, etc.

If he says anything on the level of "I'd like to allow players to use a Platoon to complete game content solo, rather than using Duty/Party Finder to do so", then I would - at that point - officially say he's jumped the shark with FFXIV, and has given up on even pretending to care about player interaction or interdependence; that FFXIV will have effectively become a single player game with an only superficial multiplayer component.

Again, that's a big, glaring if, and I'm not jumping to conclusions here. I'm just concerned that might be where he wants to take it, because he's already shown a predilection for making things ever faster, easier and more convenient, even when they don't need to be.

Would really like to hear more details about this system and what space he sees it filling in the game.

My two gil.

[Alberel]

Disclaimer: What follows is just me expressing concerns about the system, in the absence of more specific details. I'm not, in any way, pretending or presuming to know exactly how it will be. Please keep that in mind while reading.

/snip

My two gil.

To be totally fair, even if you could take an entire NPC squad into dungeons with you I doubt they would be faster than a party of real players. It's a valid concern though. I'm curious what the intent for this feature is.

[Preypacer]

To be totally fair, even if you could take an entire NPC squad into dungeons with you I doubt they would be faster than a party of real players. It's a valid concern though. I'm curious what the intent for this feature is.

Well, from what I've seen in my time playing MMOs, there's a good number of people who will happily solo, even if doing so means progressing a bit more slowly. Players will, and have done things in MMOs that are extremely counter-intuitive in the long-term, solely because they see immediate benefit in the short-term. I've long believed, and continue to, that many players tend to be their own worst enemies.

And, were Yoshi-P to, in his naive belief that players won't abuse/misuse anything he introduces, open that can of worms... forget it. The demands for making soloing more rewarding and making Platoons a more viable alternative to grouping would inevitably follow. Why would I say that? Because it's what happens any time any developer, in any MMO, makes even the slightest concession to a certain portion of their player base. It's never enough and they always insist on getting more.

We've already seen it happen in a number of situations in XIV.

Anyway, I hope Platoons never even come close to introducing that kind of possibility, and that my concerns are all for naught. I really do.

[Niwashi]

Dungeons and Trials are pretty much the only compulsory content that requires a group of players to complete. Adding a way for people to bring a Platoon of semi-automated characters through, instead of queueing up with other players, would be undermining one of the few truly multiplayer elements this game has. Why even call it a MMO at that point,if that's what he has in mind.

Well, it isn't an MMO in dungeons or trials anyway. MMO stands for Massively Multiplayer Online (game). In a dungeon or trial, it isn't massively multiplayer, just normal (minimally) multiplayer. "Massively Multiplayer" doesn't apply to having three or seven other people in your party. There's nothing massive about that. The term applies to the fact that you're playing together in the same world with thousands of other players, any of whom can come along and interact with what you're doing. The only place this (or any other) game is "Massively Multiplayer" is in the open world, not in instanced group content. FATEs and Hunts are this game's Massively Multiplayer combat content.

[Dualblade]

I'm assuming thats what it means, yes, but not sure if we'll get all the ranks unlocked.

[MaethusXion]

HOPEFULLY they mean "second lieutenant rank" as in "the next rank with lieutenant in the name", but seeing as we're not getting anything really worthwhile for GCs til 3.4 or later, we can keep bugging them about it in the live letters...

[Niwashi]

As for platoons becoming a viable alternative to grouping, there are places where that would be a good thing. Praetorium, for instance, has been essentially unplayable for a very long time, because its overall design would be far better suited to soloing than to playing with a group. If we could bring some NPCs along with us to solo it, then we could finally go back and actually play that content for real. That one alone would be worth some drop in team content.

I do think there should be limitations on how much can be soloed using platoons, with a fair amount of content still requiring groups. SE will need to find a balance that allows stuff like that that really should be soloed to be soloable, while still maintaining some other non-soloable content as well.