Increasing xp gained by dps classes in leveling dungeons

[kikix12]

MMO's that are heavily community-oriented all have the same problems that are inherent from that. Most people are screwed while few elitists trump the rest. And I'm not using the word elitist in a negative light here. It is a fact that if a group is made with elites, capable of doing any content in the game, that adding people that show no promise whatsoever will lower the groups ability to successfully clear it consistently. The ones with less fortune will end up waiting even more than in this game. I did play an MMO that still goes on since 2007, despite being published by a company that literally killed DOZENS of wildly successful titles with their absurd greed and completely broken item mall. And you know what?! Looking for a party for a single dungeon (which is not instanced by the way, so everyone was sharing it...or rather, everyone was stealing the mobs from everyone else) could take over half an hour or hour...as a tank or healer. And the chats available made it as easy as it can get to call out to party members.

A single boss that died in about a minute or two, was a matter of waiting for HOURS literally doing nothing (cause you couldn't move away or you'd miss it), because not only did you have to find a party, but also also had to wait for the spawn. Fun times...

If that's what you miss...well, your choice. I don't, really. Duty Finder is a godsend that can make this MMO game into a game that you can play with little interruption to the flow, while STILL interact with other people if you want. Alternatively, you can just think of the three other members of the party as AI ranging from "You've been duped" to "Da Vinci would hide in a corner". Seriously, you wouldn't know a difference unless you've been really trying.

By the way, MMO stands for "massive multiplayer online", not "massive community online". The name does not imply it's a community-based game, just that there are many completely strangers around the player. It could very well be a totally single-player experience with no party, guilds or even chat, and still be an MMO, if you can see other players walking around.

[FaileExperiment]

What about individually increasing the bonus XP/tomes awarded at the end of a dungeon run, based on how long you were in the queue? Up to a predetermined maximum to keep things from getting ridiculous. The idea being that a dps who spends 25m in the queue vs. a tank who spends 30s, end up with roughly the same about of tomes/xp per hour, assuming they queued continually.

But either way it wouldn't be based on role, but queue time.

[Gemina]

I didn't read the whole thread, so I apologize in advance if I repeat anything. However, I sympathize with long DPS queues, I really do. But those frustrated need to understand that the shorter queue times for tanks and healers is an incentive to level those classes and jobs. There is no disputing that these two roles carry a heavier responsibility, and as a result fewer players level them, and even fewer choose them as their main job.

You need to realize that the queue times are so long because SO many players main DPS jobs. Giving them an exp bonus would only bait the hook for even more DPS players. If you really want to help DPS queues, you need to toss on some plate armor, or robes and queue up as a tank or healer. This doesn't help level your own DPS job, but you're helping the community, and if more people did this, DPS queue times would go down, including your own.

I also want to echo that I never see DPS players consume food in dungeons. I mean they spent 20+ minutes in the queue, and then turn around and don't eat anything, throwing away ALL of that bonus exp! I really wouldn't be asking for exp bonuses in dungeons if you already are not using the bonuses the game provides for you.

[Zumi]

Queue times are long because there are more DPS jobs than tanks/healers. A lot of people like me have to goal to cap all the jobs in the game. This makes us spend much more time leveling dps jobs 8 of them while only doing 3 tanks and 3 healers. If I could use my lv 70 pld and have the exp go to another job I would always be tanking.

[Laerune]

Queue times are long because there are more DPS jobs than tanks/healers. A lot of people like me have to goal to cap all the jobs in the game. This makes us spend much more time leveling dps jobs 8 of them while only doing 3 tanks and 3 healers. If I could use my lv 70 pld and have the exp go to another job I would always be tanking.

Indeed, I remember with Heavenswards (the first 3-4 months) the queue for DPS was pretty fast, because people were exploring the new healer and tank classes. I understand that most Dark Knight were played by Warrior's or Paladin's, but leveling those classes, helped DPS players enter the instance alot sooner.

Two new DPS classes was a mistake, I hope the next expansion adds new tanks and healer classes.

[Arrius]

Indeed, I remember with Heavenswards (the first 3-4 months) the queue for DPS was pretty fast, because people were exploring the new healer and tank classes. I understand that most Dark Knight were played by Warrior's or Paladin's, but leveling those classes, helped DPS players enter the instance alot sooner.

Two new DPS classes was a mistake, I hope the next expansion adds new tanks and healer classes.

People were going for tank and healers in HW because the Machinist sucked bad on release and was on par with the disappointment the Bard experienced as well with all the Gauss Barrel/Wanderer's Minuet issue.
If it would've been a DPS job similar to the Red Mage and Samurai in terms of playstyle and attractiveness, the outcome would've been quite different.

[Snow_Princess]

Indeed, I remember with Heavenswards (the first 3-4 months) the queue for DPS was pretty fast, because people were exploring the new healer and tank classes. I understand that most Dark Knight were played by Warrior's or Paladin's, but leveling those classes, helped DPS players enter the instance alot sooner.

Two new DPS classes was a mistake, I hope the next expansion adds new tanks and healer classes.

I do agree with that but the issue is balance, they can't even balance healers or tanks between them when it is 3/3. I am guessing it is why they just did 2 new dps because they know they have issues balancing healer and tank jobs. They also intentionally made rdm and sam on the stronger side of things, so if they did that with healer and tank, it would cause issues for high end stuff and make it too weak you are just repeating hw, 3.0

[FaileExperiment]

Indeed, I remember with Heavenswards (the first 3-4 months) the queue for DPS was pretty fast, because people were exploring the new healer and tank classes. I understand that most Dark Knight were played by Warrior's or Paladin's, but leveling those classes, helped DPS players enter the instance alot sooner.

Two new DPS classes was a mistake, I hope the next expansion adds new tanks and healer classes.

But after those 3-4 months, DPS queues went back to about what they are now. Adding tanks and healers only led to a temporary boost. Had SB included them, at this point in the timeline, we'd be no different than we are now. I don't think giving incentive's to playing a healer/tank role is the answer, as they already have plenty of that and it clearly hasn't worked. Tanks play tanks because that's what they want to do, incentives only work temporarily.

The fixes to queue times should really center around fixing the fundamental core role issues with Tanks and Healers. And with that, I mean they should both be as stress-free and smooth to play as any DPS. In the mean time, increasing xp per time spent in the queue would help alleviate the DPS queue tax .

[Dzian]

This would at least make up for the discrepancy in queue times, putting the leveling ability on par with tanks and healers.

I know there are lots of ways to level dps classes outside of dungeons, but the game is basically dungeon based. Using other leveling methods effectively hampers dps skill set at end game.

Thoughts?

All you'd do then is push people away from tanks and healers even more. because if it takes a dps 2 runs of doma castle to get from 65-67. but takes a tank 4 runs.. to get the same 2 levels how is that remotely fair...
The result is even less people are going to play tanks / healers because it's twice as much work for the same amount of experience.

You want to encourage people to play tanks and healers not push them away from it by giving them less rewards than if they went as a dps..

A better idea that has been suggested a lot in one form or another is make the AIN rewards exp scrolls / items (kinda like mimatettes memoires if you played XI)make those scrolls the equivelant of 15-20% of a level each they need to scale as you go level up.
a static exp reward wouldn't work. 250k exp is a lot at 45 but it's nothing at 65... so it needs to scale. so at 69 for example one of them scrolls might be over 2 million exp.

This then allows players to queue as whatever AIN is which benefits queue times for everyone but it also still allows level there desired jobs.
Something like this also has the advantage of being incredibly simple to implement. there's next to no work or coding involved that doesn't already exist within the game. so the resources required to put it in place would be almost zero.

It's a much better solution than trying to rebalance all content around 5-6 man light parties or 10-12 man full parties...

The end result would be significantly faster queues for every single player. even the DPS players that didn't want to play as AIN. why??

Because if you have 50 players in the dps queue for levelling roulette for example. and youre #50 lets say, your queue times are typically going to be quite long.

If you added the scrolls or something similar. Then even if only 10 of those 50 players in the queue decided to queue as AIN and use the reward scroll instead of getting direct exp. Those 10 people would then also take another 20 dps out of the queue with them,
thus slashing the dps queue times and size by almost 60% even for the players sat at the back..

What this means is that guy who was joined a queue at number 50 or higher. might find he's typically joining queues around position 20 in the queue and is going to get a group that much faster.

If you do something like this and EVERYONE wins. and I mean everyone. there's isn't a player in the game who would not benefit in some way.

A:- players who want to level a dps quickly can queue as AIN and take advantage of near instant queues. while still being able to get decent progress on there dps job.

B:- players who want to play as only DPS and not willing to play as AIN will also level faster because queue times will be shorter as a result of A.

C:- By tying the reward to AIN you could connect it to all roulettes not just levelling which in turn could result in a huge reduction in queue times across most of the game for everyone. even the antisocial guy who has no friends or social connections..

There would be no losers..

If you want to improve things that's how you do it. You incentivise people to play AIN, because the more people that do that the shorter the queues get for everyone else. You do not punish the less desirable rolls with lower exp/tomes rewards. all that does is push people away from those roles

I really don't know what more they can do about DPS ques. There are always going to be more DPS than Tanks and Healers. They've already implemented a number of incentives to encourage more Tanks and Healers

What they can do is give players something that actually need. If players are queuing levelling as a dps it's because they want to level a dps. The only thing they need is exp.

Cracked clusters and stuff helped a few but the issue there is a lot of the t6 materia is currently worthless and were at a point where people who do meld are already melded so simply don't need it. I think that's why the levelling queues have gone way back up to almost hour long in some cases. because people don't need cracked clusters.

Players want or need exp and that's why they are all queuing fps jobs. My paladin got to 70 and hasn't touched a roulette since because what I need is exp. And I can't get that as a 70 paladin. So I presently queue as a65 black mage. after that maybe ill queue as bard or monk. so my paladin still wont be used for roulettes... that's the problem..

If I could get exp for black mage playing AIN then I'd queue paladin and take 2 more fps out of the queue in the process. That's 3 people less in the queue straight away. Just from 1 person making a change. That might have made everyone else queue 2 mins shorter.

That's what they need to fix if they really want to improve queue times. Give players who are willing to play AIN a means to get exp because exp is why they are in the queue in the first place

[Zojha]

You want to encourage people to play tanks and healers not push them away from it by giving them less rewards than if they went as a dps..

Actually, you should want to neither encourage nor discourage anyone from playing a particular role - You should simply want to empower people to play whatever they prefer without repercussions.

In that, XP scrolls are fairly pointless. It's just another reward you throw at people that will completely lose all value the moment they got what they wanted, like Seals, like Cracked Clusters, like Tomes, like Gil, like any other material reward. Moreover, it's a pointless reward unless you level jobs for completion sake - If you level a job to actually PLAY it, because it seems FUN, not playing it defeats the purpose of leveling it - That person isn't going to forever queue as a different job than the one they actually want to play. And what's even worse, it does nothing for non-leveling roulette queue times, so even if these people tank and heal their way to 70, they're suddenly hit by a queue wall anyway.

It's a temporary measure to fix a permanent issue and an incomplete one at that. I grant you that it's "easy" - Because it's a bandaid. And bandaids are fine to tide people over while you're working on an actual fix - They cannot and should not replace the actual fix however.