Request to Eliminate or Reduce Party Requirements

[Teuciont]

I'm not talking about early on. I'm talking about later on. Some of my fondest memories of XI are from leveling and everyone I met in XI was through a leveling party. You partied with the same people a lot because they were around the same level as you. It was that kind of defining experience that got lost with level sync. You don't meet new people, you roll with your friends and LS mates. It has nothing to do with the xp, it had to do with the experience that I sincerely hope they don't decide to throw away from the start because people want things to be easy, as in getting the max xp at the prime level with only people you know so you don't have to leave that comfort zone.

[Estellios]

Partying with the same people in your level range over a long stretch of levels isn't anything different from only XPing with your friends. Some people will do one, some people will do both. I sincerely doubt everybody has the exact same schedule as their friends. As was said before, we just need more things to do to build community.

You also don't have to use level sync at all if you don't want to, but you will run into situations where you have to wait 3 hours for a tank or healer or whatever to log on because there is no one around at your level. More people would also avoid powerleveling to play with their friends if it was implemented, I know I would. People shouldn't have to suffer through not being able to play with people they want to play with.

[Teuciont]

"Its archaic, level sync is the future"
Stopped reading there. Resorting to the "Old school, you're so barbaric" argument is the lowest and most brainless way out of an argument anymore, and it seems to be the scapegoat of most everyone on this forum that can't realize that maybe some features were the way they were in old MMOs because they were good. Mario jumped in the first Mario jumps now. Old=/=Bad, "embrace the future" is nothing short of laziness in favor of a more coherent response.

And what "new" MMO do you know that even has level sync? Who said it was "the future?" You?

[Croy]

"Its archaic, level sync is the future"
Stopped reading there. Resorting to the "Old school, you're so barbaric" argument is the lowest and most brainless way out of an argument anymore, and it seems to be the scapegoat of most everyone on this forum that can't realize that maybe some features were the way they were in old MMOs because they were good. Mario jumped in the first Mario jumps now. Old=/=Bad, "embrace the future" is nothing short of laziness in favor of a more coherent response.

Its archaic because the whole point of the old EXP system is implementing disparity between players who want to EXP with other people, which is counter to actually allowing players the ability to engage and actually play with one another within the community. It actually detracts from the community. Implementation is where fault lies and how it functions within the world but to shun level sync as a community killer is bizzaro world talk, it allows so many avenues to let people to play with one another, and does so in such a convenient fashion. It allows higher level players the ability to be rewarded and play equally with those that are just starting, which allows those players to actually mingle in the high end instead of hitting it when they get there. It allows dungeon experience the ability to be played as it was intended if people wanted to, even if there best job is way too high at that point. And 'if' a person so wanted and had friends, they could go visit another location to EXP at using another players level as the base, giving that person a new leveling experience without actually changing the class. The only negative of level sync is balance of mob strength and the EXP reward, if its uniform across all mobs or at least across all levels there should not be one 'single' area everyone goes to anymore then it is now, its just becomes more convenient to you know... actually do the things you set out to do and do it quicker.

[Teuciont]

Okay. If you want the devs to spend time they could be using to develop content to rebalance nearly every piece of gear and implement algorithms to put in a feature that detracts people from having a genuine leveling experience, alright.

You never answered me as to what "future" MMO does that. WoW didn't do it. GW2 isn't going to do it. lolSWTOR isn't going to do it. TERA isn't going to do it. So uh... maybe they don't for a reason? Maybe they like having mobs a certain level guide you through areas so that new people can explore new areas and not be stuck in one place? And don't give me that "there's no one good leveling place." That's bullshit. It's Valkurm till 20. Qufim to 35. Birds till 75.

Now with abyssea, it's just Qufim to 30 then abyssea. Altepa Desert? Yhuntunga Jungle? The fuck are thoselol.

[Croy]

Okay. If you want the devs to spend time they could be using to develop content to rebalance nearly every piece of gear and implement algorithms to put in a feature that detracts people from having a genuine leveling experience, alright.

You never answered me as to what "future" MMO does that. WoW didn't do it. GW2 isn't going to do it. lolSWTOR isn't going to do it. TERA isn't going to do it. So uh... maybe they don't for a reason? Maybe they like having mobs a certain level guide you through areas so that new people can explore new areas and not be stuck in one place? And don't give me that "there's no one good leveling place." That's bullshit. It's Valkurm till 20. Qufim to 35. Birds till 75.

Now with abyssea, it's just Qufim to 30 then abyssea. Altepa Desert? Yhuntunga Jungle? The fuck are thoselol.

First off Abyssea is an issue, not level sync, that is a design flaw, and not a flaw with a completely irrelevant feature in Level sync. Its also imbalanced. FFXIV is not anywhere NEAR as imbalanced as FFXI's system, so it won't take that long to change mob balancing (There is not one single 'mob' that completely overwhelms the population, and if there was it would not be a problem with level sync, those mobs would be exploited no matter the level if they exist over the course of the games levels), at that points its mob distribution, there are now tons of camps with lots of mobs, and those mobs all spawn very fast, so there won't spawn balancing issues that FFXI has (Dungeon mobs spawn in 15 minutes, 'some' field mobs spawn in 12 minutes, the rest spawn in 5 minutes unless your in abyssea, in which case all spawn time fail in comparison). The only thing they have to work on combat stat balancing and gear balancing around the system and they have said they were going to look into implementing level sync way before the first part of the combat overhaul was put into place, there is no sudden 'change' that needs to happen in the design process like its going to add that much to dev time.

Secondly you just referenced the mmo king of community disenfranchisement with World of Warcraft. You either had friends or you leveled solo, pick groups were very rare, this got even worse as time went on. It was solo to the cap and hope you find a good guild. What did they do to remedy this? They implemented a system that 'synced' you into a group for a specific instance around your level range, the trade off is you didn't need to go out into the world anymore, you hardly ever played with people in your own server, and when you hit the highest level you did the same thing over and over again and you either did it with friends or did it with other players either on your server or not on your server, but you didn't need to engage in it. You want to tell me the future isn't level sync, complain about how it destroys communities and you bring up WoW as your counter? And as for SWTOR and GW2. They both have a form of syncing. PvP is completely level synced unless your in the open world, and if you are not synced, you need to group up with people who happened to playing in your area, otherwise you do everything solo, EVERYTHING. Its unknown how the community will flourish in the end game, but the leveling experience leading up to it is far from a great future in community. Tera I haven't played nor heard enough about to make an opinion but GW2 they have storyline sync where people of a variety of levels can participate in the same content and get something out of it.

The point is level sync isn't the problem with community, there are far more damaging features that can do that, the key is implementation and FFXIV is far more ready for level sync then FFXI was when it was introduced, and for FFXI it has only gotten worse, but that is not because of level sync, its because they implemented another EXP system that completely broke all the exp mechanics up to that point in abyssea, and then later Heros of Abyssea quest system.

[Teuciont]

So what you're trying to get at is that if mobs awarded more xp the higher level you got, making the xp requirement raise at the same rate, that people wouldn't stay level synced in a level 20 area for 30 levels?

[Croy]

So what you're trying to get at is that if mobs awarded more xp the higher level you got, making the xp requirement raise at the same rate, that people wouldn't stay level synced in a level 20 area for 30 levels?

No, I am for respawn rate and 'potential' camps to be uniform. If you have weak mobs, they give less EXP to compensate for the faster kill rate, harder mobs give more EXP but the penalty is the fights take longer, but respawn needs to also compensate for this system so that camps at all levels can have the same EXP potential. The problem in Qufim is a couple things... one its a camp right outside a major city and has lots of mobs that don't link together, but are 'safe'. Two camps were easier to plvl (This is one of the biggest if not the biggest reason) The jungle got less people and so did the crawlers nest because it was harder to get to the places (Jungle) and had less satisfactory respawn conditions (Crawlers), and the actual places the mobs spawned at made constantly pulling less appealing. Basically the prime places to level in the lvl 30-60 range before ToA were all in dungeons, when they added more mid range field mobs with faster spawn timers and lots of dependable spawns, those camps died, and they died before level sync happened. And then when ToA came and they added Colibri, and even Mamool and imp spawns, the 60-75 camps that used to exist got devastated. They were inefficient and harder to get to. I know people even before level sync that wouldn't even level unless they got the camp they wanted as they thought it was a waste of time, at least with level sync the 'good' camps got a wider camp pool. And then we have the Summoning 2 hour Exploit using level sync, that once again was a flaw in the system, not with level sync itself.

Anima + Personal Chocobos makes traveling less of an inconvenience, respawn times are fairly uniform and we already have the EXP strength discrepancies in place. The key is balancing them, but in the end it does't matter, whether you have level sync or not people will always goto the place with the least resistance, I just think it would be a good idea to remove one of the resistances (Level Discrepancy between players) and try to balance the camps so they give similar EXP so its more about camp bouncing rather then doing 'this or nothing' camp attitude that has plagued FFXI since BEFORE level sync.

[Teuciont]

The feeling of the world of XI was ruined long before Abyssea. Abyssea only delivered the finishing blow. Regardless of whether or not you believe level sync ruined the game is your opinion, as it is mine. It ruined XI for me, it obviously didn't for you. You thought it made the game "easier" and more "accessible," I feel it ripped the soul and gruff, rough around the edges experience and level of accomplishment you earned with each level, equipping new gear that would stay relevant for a while longer, going to new places. You can't tell me that players since level sync before abyssea went to the jungles or the desert. Or the mire or the volcano or Aydeewa. Or Crawler's Nest. Part of leveling for the first time in XI was the excitement I got from going to new places to level. "Crawler's Nest? What's that? I get to go there to grind and explore at the same time? Well that sounds awesome."

It boils down to you finding the game to be nothing more than a grind to 75/50 and me appreciating the game world, not caring when I got to 50 and not who it was with. Our opinions aren't going to change, so there's no real point in continuing to argue about it.

[Croy]

The feeling of the world of XI was ruined long before Abyssea. Abyssea only delivered the finishing blow. Regardless of whether or not you believe level sync ruined the game is your opinion, as it is mine. It ruined XI for me, it obviously didn't for you. You thought it made the game "easier" and more "accessible," I feel it ripped the soul and gruff, rough around the edges experience and level of accomplishment you earned with each level, equipping new gear that would stay relevant for a while longer, going to new places. You can't tell me that players since level sync before abyssea went to the jungles or the desert. Or the mire or the volcano or Aydeewa. Or Crawler's Nest. Part of leveling for the first time in XI was the excitement I got from going to new places to level. "Crawler's Nest? What's that? I get to go there to grind and explore at the same time? Well that sounds awesome."

It boils down to you finding the game to be nothing more than a grind to 75/50 and me appreciating the game world, not caring when I got to 50 and not who it was with. Our opinions aren't going to change, so there's no real point in continuing to argue about it.

Uh, I did. I went to the jungle, I went to the caverns, I even went to crawlers nest and the volcano. The mire? That was the PRIME level sync spot. Also the reason some other people stopped leveling those other places has absolutely nothing to do with level sync, they sucked. The dungeon areas sucked because of respawn timers, people avoided crawlers nest for the same reason. Until Abyssea and the changes to FoV I saw at least 3-4 parties at any one time in the two jungles, some at the mandy area, others near sahagin, hell I had like 5-6 parties in a weeks time playing at the volcane camp in Yhoator against gobs. If there is more then 2 groups, the EXP sucks regardless of level sync, spawn times just don't let you have more players, so people moved to other areas when it was too full. Now if mobs were more uniform with strength and respawn times, I bet you anything people would be more spread out so they don't need to compete with other players. But no lets live in the heyday of killing crawlers... crabs... crabs... crabs. 'occasional flies' and imps, oh and more crabs endlessly as we level, and don't get me started on the weak ass colibri's who popped up in ToAU and completely eviscerated EXP potential across the whole table, level sync didn't do this, the mobs strength and EXP potential did.