It's time to redesign Level Sync

[Zumi]

FFXIV could do it like wow's level sync where you keep all your abilities you know so far but everything is scaled down. Makes the game feel better once you hit max level.

[Mysticdraggon]

level sync makes FFXIVs progression unlike any game i've seen. it makes it seem leveling in general feel just pointless. the only scenario where a player would see the difference between level 1-69 and level 70 is if he/she defeats a level 1-69 world mob. anything else that matters in the game is synced.

the worst part about it is that it's completely necessary for new players. while its true that seeing a level 70 all-skill player is a good source of motivation, there are new players that will see it as unfair advantage when a much higher leveled player steals an enemy kill. specifically the same feeling you get when your trying to farm enemy drops on low level mobs as a low level player, then suddenly a level 70 player comes needing 99+HQ of said item drop.

level sync is simply meant for a game like this.

[Vhailor]

Rather than create an imbalance, I'd rather jobs just got full combos earlier. There's absolutely no reason why a 3-ability combo with an oGCD can't be had for all melee classes by level 18.

Actually, in point of fact, I think there's enough of an imbalance already inherent in the fact that level-synced players keep all of their Role abilities. As a WHM in Sastasha at level 70, I get Esuna, Lucid Dreaming, Swiftcast, Protect, and Largesse (I'd swap one for Cleric's Stance, if I knew what dungeon I was jumping into). A level 18 WHM in that same dungeon, freshly leveled, would get either Cleric's Stance, Protect, or the ever-useless Break. That's already a healthy advantage, to say nothing of the fact that my higher-level gear essentially means I have capped base gear stats for the dungeon, which a real level 18 is less likely to have.

Could you imagine adding Aero III, Holy, and Regen on top of that? I could probably out-damage most natural level 18 DPS-role classes with those, simply based on my AoE capabilities alone - unless they nerfed them to the point where it wouldn't be worth using them.

All in all, I sympathize with the frustration, but I'd rather see job complexity increase more rapidly and be available earlier, rather than witness what would surely be an imbalanced mess (especially since it's SE we're talking about).

[ErryK]

There's absolutely no reason why a 3-ability combo with an oGCD can't be had for all melee classes by level 18.

There is, it's called game design. That's what balancing content is all about.

This isn't about knowing ur job well, it's about making low level dungeons less boring for max level players.

When I get Sastasha in roulette, I don't even wanna play.

Just unsub at this point, it seems like you don't want to play anything that isn't Lv70 content, and of which there is very little at the moment.

[Vhailor]

There is, it's called game design. That's what balancing content is all about.

Horseshit. That's what over-emphasizing a slow learning curve is all about. SE introduces abilities far too gradually in FFXIV, generally speaking, and the game is less interesting (both for level synced and newer players) for it. It has absolutely nothing to do with content balance, and the phrase "game design" must be something that just sounded good to you, considering that it encompasses everything gameplay-related in FFXIV, and would apply to abilities gained regardless of how quickly they were introduced.

Brutal, right? Having to make intelligent decisions regarding when to hold back and when to cut loose. Sounds almost like...gaming.. Then again, 70% of legal adults can't even follow a speed limit sign when driving, so maybe they are better off having else make their decisions for them.

The main problem is that most people that I've seen, in DF at least, cut loose first, and blame the tank or healer for the run going badly second. Sure, they could get vote-kicked for screwing things up, but realistically speaking, I think it would just lead to a lot of stress within low-level parties.

Also, adults are fully capable of following a speed limit sign (they all got their license, after all, which requires obeying the speed limits). It's that they don't want to, or feel the posted speed limit sign is too low, or need to surpass it in order to keep with the speed of traffic. Just saying.

[ErryK]

Horseshit. That's what over-emphasizing a slow learning curve is all about. SE introduces abilities far too gradually in FFXIV, generally speaking, and the game is less interesting (both for level synced and newer players) for it. It has absolutely nothing to do with content balance, and the phrase "game design" must be something that just sounded good to you, considering that it encompasses everything gameplay-related in FFXIV, and would apply to abilities gained regardless of how quickly they were introduced.

Just don't play low level content if it's going to get your knickers into a twist. The game gives abilities at a good pace. You get your full combo at 30, and with the increases to EXP it takes less than a week to get to 50, even 60, but that's besides the point. Next you're gonna tell me that single player games should reward all abilities by Level 2.

[KisaiTenshi]

If you are a level 70 synced down to level 20, your abilities remain but they are statistically reduced to match level 20 damage/healing output. This means your rotations stay the same but your damage and healing is significantly reduced to match the dungeons content.

This can't/won't work because of scale. The levels are designed to use those skills that are available at that level, some which have DoT's or other effects. What should be happening is that the ilevel-sync needs to be capped so that someone in i310 gear can't blow away someone in ilevel 20 gear. In i310 gear you can rip hate off the tank if you use cure before they hit 30% hp, where as when you play this as a new Conjurer cure will barely do more than 20%. If you play a tank in any of the pre-30 dungeons, the DPS and Healer will rip hate from you if you're not in equal gear (partially fixed in the current patch.) It's much harder to play a tank if your gear is below the parties gear, because the party will generate more hate than you can.

As a recent example, as the Off-tank in a Praetorium run, In Sword Oath I was #2 for the boss (in i255 gear,) but I was also within 95% of ripping the hate from the MT who was also Paladin in Shield Oath in i120 gear. I didn't want to rip hate completely from them, so I cut the combos in half when it got that close, (because spinning the boss is annoying.)

The more or less way to make it less boring is to make all skills you'd use in a combo normally but instead of "do nothing", fallback to a similar skill. That way you're not having to change your play style just for these dungeons. Your 'bar' would just show aliased skills as available, but if you look at the tool tip it will say "Alias of (skill) until level X"

eg Fast blade, Riot Blade and Shield Lob are the only skills you have normally in a level 16 dungeon for Gladiator/Paladin. If you hit Rage of Halone, do the animation for Rage of Halone, but do Riot Blade. On a Conjurer/White Mage, if you hit Cure II, do Cure I if Cure II is not available. It may be a little confusing, but if you normally leveled on these dungeons, those skills would not even be on your bar. Only PotD is making them available before you earned them.

If you make everything available, you would quite literately have to re-tool every dungeon so that the trash mobs hit harder and have much much more HP to take into account the AOE skills everyone has.

[Limecat]

Other games do this and it works beautifully. As the current state of it becomes more and more sour over time, I say just pick up the damn vase and smash it on the ground to see what's inside. Adjustments can be made as needed while the players cavort in the pile of pieces.

[Berethos]

Other games do this and it works beautifully. As the current state of it becomes more and more sour over time, I say just pick up the damn vase and smash it on the ground to see what's inside. Adjustments can be made as needed while the players cavort in the pile of pieces.

Yeah, brilliant idea.

Break it and piss players off so the few that can't handle either doing their lower level abilities or just not queuing for leveling roulette when higher level can be satisfied with a system they think will work but will have to be nerfed the higher level player so heavily that it lands on the other side of fun and is miserable again.

I see that plan going just swimmingly.

Also, I'm curious as to which MMOs have nailed this? Besides WoW, of course, which I've already detailed on how what it does is different than level sync and why using it as a direct comparison is a mistake.