Why No Melds?

[Atoli]

I don't know why you would play an RPG and not care about making your character as strong as you can.

Because I can? For example, I play Pokemon with the ones I find cute, which are almost always babies, never fully evolved ones.
I'm always amused by people who tell me "THEY ARE SUPPOSED TO EVOLVE, WHY DO YOU KEEP THEM WEAK ON PURPOSE?!"
I also try to beat most RPGs with the least amount of grind possible, and NEVER get to level 99 or whatever the max is of that particular game.
Because it is more fun/more of a challenge that way, and because I don't see any reason to spend time on getting any stronger than what I absolutely need to. If I can beat it on a very low level, why would I bother getting stronger than that?
Sounds like nothing but a waste of time to me

I mean, this is like saying "Why would you buy Scripture gear or farm alex normal? You don't need it".

Actually, I've said that on this very forum again and again. To be exact, to everyone who always comes here to complain about the weekly grind for tomes despite not raiding - if you don't enjoy the grind for grinding's sake, AND you don't NEED the gear for savage, just don't bother..^^
I know lots of people who do not care about capping tomes each week. I even know some who do not farm Alex NM at all (only did it once for the story).
They do just fine in normal content, and why wouldn't they, after all, SE makes it pretty clear what ilvl is required for which content..

I just love when people are like this, and then rage when they wipe on something like A12 normal at 5%.

Better gear than minimum ilvl has always been nothing but a safety net. It helps to deal with mess-ups, but if you do not mess up, it is not required at all (how common mess-ups are in pug groups is a different topic entirely, though).
My best friend cleared Sophia EX 10 lvl below minimum ilvl, no melds. So what does that make her?

I could get behind a stance of "I get stronger because it is a MMO, since that will make it easier on the other people I play with" but "I get stronger because it is an RPG"? Makes no sense to me at all.

[Reptiletc]

I mostly only meld into "finished" gear, so I most likely won't meld any rank V materia into my 260 gear until I turn it 270. Maybe a few rank IV crit and SS materia here and there.

[Velox]

I only play 2 days a week, sometimes 3...for a handful of hours each day. Having materia melded is not going to make or break anything for me because I lack the time to get them and I lack the time to do the content that would require them.

[ElHeggunte]

IV's are free and so easy to get that any reason you can come up with for not using them just seems like an excuse to be lazy. Just try saying it out loud:

"Nope, I'm going to turn down a free upgrade to character strength that only requires a few minutes of my time every few months"

That's what most of the people in this thread sound like to me.

Maybe once upon a time when you could only get good materia through extensive spiritbonding and praying to the RNG gods would not melding make sense, but at this point in the game where IV's are so easy to get that SE may as well cut out the middleman and mail you some once a day I can't fathom why anyone would refuse to at least use them on their main character and class.

[Claire_Pendragon]

IV's are free and so easy to get that any reason you can come up with for not using them just seems like an excuse to be lazy. Just try saying it out loud:

"Nope, I'm going to turn down a free upgrade to character strength that only requires a few minutes of my time every few months"

That's what most of the people in this thread sound like to me.

Maybe once upon a time when you could only get good materia through extensive spiritbonding and praying to the RNG gods would not melding make sense, but at this point in the game where IV's are so easy to get that SE may as well cut out the middleman and mail you some once a day I can't fathom why anyone would refuse to at least use them on their main character and class.

I only TODAY learned u can get free g4 materia from beastmen tribes. (I have rep in 3.0 beastmen tribes, and ixali only)
So its going to take a lot longer than what u suggest, for someone like me. (plus most of the people I know dont know this, nor have any rep yet in beastmen tribes)

[LunarEmerald]

Main thing for me is the price of materia. With tier 5s running in the 3-400k per each, melding your gear (even guaranteed slots) is too pricey.

You don't have to meld Vs. Since I don't raid, I go with IVs. I don't need perfect stats but the extra bonus is still nice. You can easily get IVs for free doing beastman quests.

Or sell Vs you get and use the gil to buy IVs that are 1/5 the price.

[MomomiMomi]

IV's are free and so easy to get that any reason you can come up with for not using them just seems like an excuse to be lazy. Just try saying it out loud:

"Nope, I'm going to turn down a free upgrade to character strength that only requires a few minutes of my time every few months"

That's what most of the people in this thread sound like to me.

Maybe once upon a time when you could only get good materia through extensive spiritbonding and praying to the RNG gods would not melding make sense, but at this point in the game where IV's are so easy to get that SE may as well cut out the middleman and mail you some once a day I can't fathom why anyone would refuse to at least use them on their main character and class.

There ain't no such thing as a free lunch.

[LunarEmerald]

Materia in this game is overrated. Full V melds barely give 1.5% dps increase for a dps job. It matters for world first groups, but for people casually running expert dungeons or story mode Alexander it's not important (they can, for example, increase their dps by 30% just by doing optimal rotations and they are not doing it either). So why they should care about 1.5% when they don't care about 30%?

I'm pretty sure that's a made up statistic. You know every 30 points or so of crit is worth 1 weapon damage. Full melding gives over 120 additional crit. That's 4 points worth of weapon damage. Not melding at all is like using a i230 weapon instead of i250. It's a significant difference.

Also, world first statics manage to bypass gear/dps checks with pentamelded gear in the past, because secondaries you meld are not to be underestimated.

I'd say not melding is more a 6% dps loss rather than 1.5%. You're gimping yourself pretty hard and causing runs to go slower.

[Zojha]

There ain't no such thing as a free lunch.

And even death costs you your life.

[heynowjose]

I keep up with ILV and have my sophia weapons on all my 60s but I don't meld bc it's not needed. I just don't see the point. I can clear all the content I want to clear without melding. I can sell materia for money to spend on things I do want to do, like housing for example or crafting. Melding has no benefit for my gameplay or gaming experience so I just don't bother.