It's that time again folks! (Tomestone thread)

[DevilsDontFly]

I don't have every job to 60 but for those that do... Are you all struggling to keep all 13 (15 or 16 at 4.0) jobs geared?

Short answer: Yes.
Long answer: The game lets you have all the jobs with only one character but it seems like it's faster to gear up every job if you have multiple characters because of the weekly lockout. I understand that some people might want to be the very best at only tanking, or dpsing or healing. But the game itself has a system that allows everyone, if they so desire, to play everything. Of course you will be gearing up 3 tanks or 3 healers at once when you pick one, but for the DPS it can be way more frustrating.

I can gear up my WAR and end up having a PLD and a DRK equaly geared saving the weapon. The same doesn't apply to the DPS role, since I can only gear up SMN/BLM or BRD/MCH.

And what makes it even worse is the fact that the roulettes are flawed. Why the expert roulette is locked behind the same two dungeons? Other than that, the dungeon system of this game is ridiculously unrewarding, so at some point you need a lot of patience in order not to get bored once you finish gearing up one job and jump to a second or third one. I've been doing that since... Tomestones of Mythology.

Since then we had Soldiery, Poetics, Law, Esoterics, Lore, and the system always follows the same path. It's essentially the same thing, with the same system and same mechanics, but with a different name and city to exchange everything for. I wish SE to realize that both groups of players, casual and hardcore, are getting bored with that and change the state of the game but we all know they want to follow the "safe" formula as much as they can.

Don't get me wrong, I love this game, but the whole "Do this dungeon one thousand times in order to gear up more than one job if you so desire" isn't the answer to make things more appealing to dedicated, long term players.

[DevilsDontFly]

In fact everything would be leagues better if the 450 weekly lockout only worked for the job you were playing when you got your tomestones. Queue as tank, get tank tomestones. And so on. Wouldn't fully fix the issue but it would require people to play their jobs in order to get their tomestones, add diversity to the "grinding" system and wouldn't punish players that actually enjoy grinding those dungeons to get their tomestones. 450 tomes lockout per job seems way better imho.

[Nalien]

Gear in this game just isn't exciting for me... I'd love more horizontal progression (which is my justification for linking this as usual), but even the current vertical progression could work better IMO, if it just wasn't so damn rapid... I can't get excited over item levels when they're replaced and redundant so quickly... Building a system built around weekly lockouts was a real mistake IMO, it makes gearing up feel less rewarding and more like a job... You meet your weekly quota and they reward you with some standard gear as a result... There is no excitement there for me... Something like Diadem could have worked nicely, I mean it's a terrible event, but the RNG nature of drops, with no real caps, could have made for some exciting drops... Could have, but never will, because the way itemization is set up in this game means someone who farts around in the Roulettes should get pretty much the same item level rewards as someone who actually plays the game...

Doesn't help that most of the content I enjoy, item levels simply don't matter... We'll be getting what, item level 260 from Scriptures? PvP and Aquapolis are capped at item level 150... Deep Dungeons doesn't even use item levels... Item levels are pretty much just a formality at this point... Even numbered patch, time for my item level to start rising again for no real reason... Visuals are the only thing to really get excited for, #GlamourIsTheTrueEndgame and all that... Beyond that, the rate of progression just makes already easy content easier... I might enjoy regular dungeons if they were a bit more challenging, but everyone just ends up so over geared for them that challenge goes out the window... Even before we're over geared, dungeons seem to be tuned such that both DPS can have brain damage and not impact the run much... I'd love to try duoing some of these dungeons, like I can (solo) the 2.0 stuff, perhaps then I'd be more excited for higher item levels because it might make previously impossible runs possible... Arguably that right there already applies for 2.0 stuff, I should care about item level so I can enjoy doing 2.0 stuff low man some more... Problem is the lack of purpose behind doing that content... Perhaps the Wondrous Tails thing will change that, but right now it's just "Do it for the challenge, then cross it off", repetition tends to kill challenge... I do Zodiac weapons occasionally, just to justify doing this, but there isn't much of a reason beyond that... Gil arguably, there is some good money to be made from EX Primal drops and Coil glamours, but... I stopped needing Gil a long time ago...

[Astral145]

I have hated the tomestone system all the way back to 2.0. I also hate RNG... My last run in POTD from floors 1 - 50 I got +2 +1 lvls on the gear (Currently the gear is +23 +22). On Floors 41 - 49 there were 4 silver chests total and all 4 chest blew up in our faces. So if you dont include floor 50 boss then I only got +1 on my weapon from silver chests from floors 1 - 49 which is pathetic and extremely annoying. Its border line trolling by the dev team.

FFXIV really needs a new and better gearing system. A system that rewards you by doing content and finishing quests. Tomestones are boring, RNG is annoying and boring. Lineer is boring. I want to be able to gear up at least 1 tank, 1 healer and 3 dps w/out being held captive by a system that doesn't work with having multiple (ALL) jobs at 60.

Here is what I would like to see at least for the Left sided pieces (armor). I would like to see the Job guilds brought back into the equation. Instead of tomestones weekly lockouts why not have weekly job lock outs. Heres an example. Lets say for the sake argument you enjoy DRK, WHM, NIN, BLM and BRD and would like to gear them up each week w/out having to worrying about tomestone lockouts. All you have to do is go the guilds for each of those jobs and start a quest.

Lets say on Tuesday after reset you want to get a piece of gear for BLM. You would go to the BLM guild who would then provide you with a quest. In this quest there would be some lore and some tasks. The first task will take you to the WVR guild who would then tell you that you will need x mats and x items. You will then venture out somewhere in the open world and run a few (FUN) tasks which can either be done SOLO OR IN A GROUP. Once you get the tasks you will venture out and complete them. Some will have you kill X monster(s) (NO FATES PLEASE) which will drop the required mat or help someone find a lost chocobo where you will fend off a hungry bear and then receive the required mat. Once completed you will then be instructed to run certain dungeon(s) with the current class to get the required items which drops at the end of the dungeon (100% drop rate). You will then go back to the WVR guild and then they will craft the armor piece for you with a 100% HQ guarantee or your money back. You will then travel back to the BLM guild where they will let you know that your gear can upgraded once you have the full set. Once you have that piece of gear in hand you will be locked for the week for BLM.

On Wednesday of the same week you decide you want a piece of gear for NIN. You will then go to the NIN's guild to pick up a quest which will instruct you to go the LTW's guild. Repeat the above for every class you wish to gear up for the rest of the week. This way you can gear up any class you wish at the same rate.

Now 24 person raids and other raid content should simply keep the same system that is in place now to keep it more alive for a longer span of time.

Leave tomes for the right sided pieces with a weekly cap of 800 tomes. As for the weapon bring in a legendary weapon quest line that is similar to relics but way more fun. This should take 2 weeks to complete. Dont use fates, gil sinks, crafted items or anything like that. Make it based on the armor system above. You go to the job guild in question then follow up with either BSM, CRP or ALC to get the required mats and items. Make it somewhat challenging and have some nice lore around each weapon. Make the task more meaningful and give us more exploration in the open world. Make us visit some weird and unused areas on the map. Make us open up a dialog with other players and even learn about some unknown NPC that were plopped on the map somewhere but learn that the npc played some part in some great battle and some how saved an entire squad from doom.

I digress.....Now to upgrade armor and weapons the devs could follow the same route as before but have more challenging things to do in the open world like have daily quests that kinda work like leves but with more challenging foes and mechanics that will upscale its difficulty based on party composition. If solo still make it challenging. But make the content revolve around the class in question not some random quests like we see in leves or beast tribe quests. There are so many things that can be done to make things way better than they are now.

What do you guys think would it be better or worse than the current system?

[Cakekizyy]

What do you guys think would it be better or worse than the current system?

I wouldn't like it due to requiring dungeon runs with a certain class. I like gearing up tanks, but don't like tanking group content.

[XiXiQ]

I stopped worrying about tomes long ago, it's a never-ending treadmill, and you'll never gear your other jobs with them. The 450 limit is just crazy. Now a 450 limit PER LEVEL 60 character would make them far more useful. (and even then, good luck to anyone wanting to cap that with every class levelled lol). I also find it annoying when I stop getting proper rewards for doing content. "you have recieved all the X you are allowed this week". I am not a child, and my time is not a cookie.

I tend not to care about the gated stuff - one token per week or one piece of gear per week or whatever ends up last on my list of things to do. 2+ months per job is... tiresome.

[Zojha]

I'm mostly shrugging my shoulders, since nothing actually changes.

I like token systems as such, but I honestly don't care how these tokens are named, colored, styled or facilitated. All I want is to not have loot competition and not suffer from RNG, because both of those suck. I also like the fact that dungeons aren't the only thing to reward tomes, so I don't feel very pressured to do them if I really don't feel it - I've capped with PvP in the past and even with Alexander more often than I'd like because lolRNG at the part rolls. I also like that DoH/DoL activities have absolutely no bearing on them.

I'm pretty much indifferent about the rest. Those are simply the aspects I'd like to see preserved in FFXIV gearing for non-raiders.

[aesteval]

I can understand someone doesn't like it but I don't get WHY they would. Power to you folks, no hate here.

It's pretty much the same thing with a different name and different ilvl. Not very creative, just predictable and repetitive. I'm not specifically hating on them or criticizing your view, I'm just trying to explain why I find them meh.

[Hayward]

And the jaded endgamers have reappeared again to rant about how high-level gear isn't exclusive to them and how they can't put "Armada Hauberk/Hagun/Ridill or GTFO" in the Raid Finder comments.

Tomestones are what they are, folks. A means for non-raiders to access gear to make content less difficult. You might not like the fact that it takes away any leverage you have as raiders, but FFXI showed team Yoshi that none of you can handle that leverage properly.

[Cinno]

And the jaded endgamers have reappeared again to rant about how high-level gear isn't exclusive to them and how they can't put "Armada Hauberk/Hagun/Ridill or GTFO" in the Raid Finder comments.

Tomestones are what they are, folks. A means for non-raiders to access gear to make content less difficult. You might not like the fact that it takes away any leverage you have as raiders, but FFXI showed team Yoshi that none of you can handle that leverage properly.

I dont think anyone here has complained about tomestones taking away from raiders? Not in this thread. People have simply been explaining why they personally like or dislike Tomestones. You're being agressive about something that hasnt even been mentioned here.

If you would like to stir up drama, please do so in another thread. This one has remained peaceful for far longer than most threads on this forum.