~Poll~ Longer fights <Do you want it?>

[Jocko]

It's stupid. it doesn't take 200 stabs with a sword to kill somebody.

This is such an asinine leap of logic, it's nearly mind boggling

No one simply wants the fights to take longer, we just want the average encounter (As in, non NM and boss fights) to have more depth and complexity than they currently do. Whether that's by random mobs, or the group leve idea mentioned.

"can't believe how this is turning out. people really want depth? It's stupid"

I can't fathom why anyone would want to continuously battle just one mob at a time. Group vs group feels much more lively

And again, I don't think anyone is arguing for 1vs1 scenarios either. Even as far as group encounters are concerned, there's little depth in the day to day mob slaughtering that goes on. However, I do believe it's hard to balance an encounter with 8+ mobs to be less chaotic, and they really shouldn't be, that's the point, but I also believe that 8+ encounters shouldn't be the norm for that very reason. Having encounters designed like that is fine, even fun in the right situations, but it should be balanced along side more thoughtful encounters as well. Encounters where Dodo's status ailments need to be prepared for, bringing a WHM with Esuna on standby to help the tank, while another keeps it debuffed, and the DPS have to adjust positioning to avoid it's breath attacks. 40 seconds later, encounter done, exp rewarded, move on to the next. That's what I'm asking for.

[Rokien]

can't believe how this is turning out. people really want longer fights? It's stupid. it doesn't take 200 stabs with a sword to kill somebody. If you want long fights, fight bosses and NMs. There are plenty of fights of varying lengths in the game.

Yes because it makes sense for one mob to die from 100 different hits from the next mob. Whether it be an NM or not. You cut something in the throat it will die.

Also it's sooo fuun killing one mob for 15mins 100+ times....... at least normal mobs have more variety to them, and if they get their AI up, it's 100xs better than just killing the same mob over and over again.

[Shurrikhan]

Yes because it makes sense for one mob to die from 100 different hits from the next mob. Whether it be an NM or not. You cut something in the throat it will die.

Also it's sooo fuun killing one mob for 15mins 100+ times....... at least normal mobs have more variety to them, and if they get their AI up, it's 100xs better than just killing the same mob over and over again.

I pretty well have to agree with this, if only tangentially.

For starters, it's just weird expecting realism from a game, let alone this one. It's going to be ridiculous, or it's going to be a little more ridiculous. Not much of a difference at the point where something who's head has been cloven open several times is still attacking you.

150x same mob = mob's layer of depth (x % of unique behavior or abilities it's able to use) + mob's group strategy layer of depth. Not much of an increase, especially when, as is common for AOE situations, much of their 'uniqueness' will go unseen due to being killed too soon. Yes, group aspects of strategy come in and of their own, but they're nothing great. Each person does their job right, repetitively, and you'll hardly notice in your typical xp party. And in current implementation, there's virtually no unique mob 'group' behavior.

I don't necessarily see that as an argument for a specific length of fight. It's just that with the reaction speed of this game, using any weaponskills at all requires the mob to survive the first caster barrage, and won't be worthwhile without the target also surviving the rest of the AoEs. At less than 10 seconds a mob, granted that can be a bit of an extreme, we essentially are only using 1-2 abilities per class. Fire-Fira, Pummel-Aura or just Aura. Hence the lacking 'depth.'

If the game's reactivity were faster, time's requested would change again; it's a matter of steps, not seconds. If AoEs weren't the only thing viable for these situations, time changes would have already happened naturally. Doesn't matter how the added depth is accomplished.

Some random stuff that would add depth as long as the gameplay needed could be done:

• More AI behavior based off group combat, perhaps including triggers from nearby ally deaths.
• AoE maximums or fewer "pure AoEs" (damage dealt equally over area, and instead something like damage starting in the center and being absorbed or reduced from maximum as it expands outward, or the opposite; more unique patterns)
• Ways for AoEs to play off 'source' ST attacks
• Reasons for patterned orders of killing

P.S. Someone's probably already said this before, but mob difficulty doesn't have anything to necessarily do with leveling speed, as they can always award more xp proportionally.

[Hyrist]

A group should not need 40 second to take down a single Dodo. I'm sorry. That thing should be dead no greater than 15 seconds in. It's a bird, and not a dangerous one.

Now, if you were saying a group takes on a flock of birds. Then yes, about 40 seconds for a group on group fight consisting of fodder mobs. Longer if say, the enemy group is humanoids, as they should be more challenging enemies then the local fauna.

Now, on the field and in controlled events can be different. Suddenly those weak Dodos are savage killer-dodos trained by the Ixal to rip your face off. They might take a bit longer than than your average Dodo.

Are you getting the picture here. Some general hunts should be more difficult, others should be easy. As you go up through the levels, the fauna should seem easier, even if their so-called 'level' is higher than say the scrapings you were fighting easier. The trained ones? Should be more highly trained like you are, giving you more difficulty.

The disparity between field monsters and beast-men at higher levels is apparent, and actually sensible given the lore. That's not to say your idea to have more depth in combat is wrong, we just have to take diversity into effect when we recommend it - there should be fodder that tries to be dangerous by numbers, and winds up being AoEd to death. I agree that we should have alternatives - but they should be intelligent implemented to have little impact on the above described concept.

[Jocko]

Now, if you were saying a group takes on a flock of birds.

Sorry, I should have specified, I was thinking on the terms of 3 or so birds (Although preferably, I'd love for group encounters to be mixed, similar to single player FF titles, instead of the usual MMO standard of having specific mob camps)

I'm sorry. That thing should be dead no greater than 15 seconds in. It's a bird, and not a dangerous one.

This sort of logic has always bothered me. Why does a mob have to be easy because it's not grand in presentation? A Dodo has it's own unique characteristics, and looking at it as "Well, it's just a bird" detracts from that in my opinion. I understand that the first level Dodo's are used to ease players into things and that later versions can expand upon that, but my example encounter is what I would consider 'easy' or 'basic', the standard for which progression, well, progresses on.

[Soukyuu]

people are stuck on XI mechanics

Because everyone played FFXI, right? Right? <_<

A group should not need 40 second to take down a single Dodo. I'm sorry. That thing should be dead no greater than 15 seconds in. It's a bird, and not a dangerous one.

Now, if you were saying a group takes on a flock of birds. Then yes, about 40 seconds for a group on group fight consisting of fodder mobs. Longer if say, the enemy group is humanoids, as they should be more challenging enemies then the local fauna.

So you're actually agreeing with me? Because currently a flock of birds doesn't live 40 seconds in most cases.

[Alhanelem]

No one simply wants the fights to take longer, we just want the average encounter (As in, non NM and boss fights) to have more depth and complexity than they currently do.

The thing is, any such depth and complexity is artificial. No fight with any common rabble-rouser enemy should take more than 10-20 seconds, period. you swing your sword and cut his heart out, or burn him to ash with a fire spell, or whatever. He's not standing after that. Either that or he does the same thing to you and you're dead.

I'd like to see a bit more risk without making fights longer. I'm suprised that I have to go 5 levels up or more to get an enemy that's even a little threatening. Then one or two levels more, and it's an impossible encounter. There's something really out of whack with stat scaling in this game. It's not as bad as when the game first came out though, I'll say that much.

[Jynx]

The thing is, any such depth and complexity is artificial. No fight with any common rabble-rouser enemy should take more than 10-20 seconds, period.

Do all open world monster need to be reduced to this?


I much rather my open world monsters and "Rabble rousers" as you so call them to look like this.




I certanly don't want them to be killed in 15-20 seconds I mean christ why even bother giving monsters TP moves if they aren't even supposed to survive long enough to kill them.

Have people regressed so far into their instanced shells that they only want difficult unique monsters to be hidden away from the world unless we wave our fingers at a gate to summon them? Is it really so bad to have strong monsters wandering the wilderness with no othe goal than to murder you (and provide some hard to gather loot)? Are people so afraid of something happening outside some confines they control that they just wont let it happen.

Bah I say.

[Alhanelem]

Do all open world monster need to be reduced to this?


I much rather my open world monsters and "Rabble rousers" as you so call them to look like this.




I certanly don't want them to be killed in 15-20 seconds I mean christ why even bother giving monsters TP moves if they aren't even supposed to survive long enough to kill them.

Have people regressed so far into their instanced shells that they only want difficult unique monsters to be hidden away from the world unless we wave our fingers at a gate to summon them? Is it really so bad to have strong monsters wandering the wilderness with no othe goal than to murder you (and provide some hard to gather loot)? Are people so afraid of something happening outside some confines they control that they just wont let it happen.

Bah I say.

The stuff you pictured is not the sort of thing that should be scattered all over the world. If a giant-ass sand worm or plant thing or what have you is encountered, I expect it to take longer to kill than a sheep or a goat or member of the five (current) races.

That being said, I said nothing of instancing, so you're crossing into an unrelated topic. As I pointed out before, the length of an encounter should be porportionate to the rarity, percieved strength and size, level, intimidation factor, yada yada of the monster.

The kind of monster you pepper the landscape over vs big scary bad guy hiding in dark corner of universe. One fight should last longer than the other, three guesses which.

[Skies]

Also i've just remembered a thing.
You do know that any AoE maxes at 8 targets, right? (or was it 10, cannot remember exactly) Any single AoE utilized will cap at that number of targets, so it's not like if you do a humungous pull you'll run out of targets too soon.