How is ilvl an issue while leveling?

[Lium]

I saw in a couple threads this past week people complaining about ilvls while leveling. One player said it was hard for them to keep up and do duties because they didn't have the proper ilvl, and another player was complaining about people in DF not having appropriate gear.

This is an honest question from a super casual. How is that possible? My main job, RDM, is currently level 69 with ilvl 285 gear doing absolutely nothing but MSQ quests, dungeons and trials.

The only time I do sidequests is when I have to grind to level up to progress through the MSQ, and even those quests give gear sometimes.

Are the people saying they are having a hard time with ilvls skipping the MSQ or something? This should not be an issue while leveling. Item levels are something you worry about once you hit max level. Out of all the complaints I've seen about this game, this one is by far the weirdest.

What am I missing here?

[Rongway]

Item levels are something you worry about once you hit max level.

Tanks whose gear is not current will have lower HP and lower defense. Healers whose gear is not current will have weaker heals. If both the tank and the healer are undergeared, the tank might have a three-hit KO threshold and the healer might only restore 1/3 health with a tier II heal. In such a scenario, the tank will die, because the mobs will hit faster than the healer can heal.

DDs who are undergeared can turn a 15 minute run into a 25 minute run -- a 67% increase.

This is not just an issue at cap, and in actuality it is much less of an issue at cap because cap dungeons have minimum iLv requirements, and the other party members can often make up for a minimally-geared party member by being obscenely overgeared themselves. However, during leveling dungeons, which don't have a minimum iLv requirement, the party members are capped fairly low as well, so there is less room for them to make up for someone whose gear is outdated.


An extreme example for my own personal experience, I once had to heal a Sastasha run with a tank who had an average iLv somewhere between 1 and 2. He had one accessory, and his gear totaled only 24 item levels. One hit from a single trash mob would take him down to--no hyperbole--one third health. Despite my gear being syncked to the max, and my pre-casting heals, the only way we could keep him alive was to pull the things off him so that he wasn't tanking. This type of workaround, which should be avoided anyway because it doesn't give a tank the chance to learn to tank, does not work in later leveling dungeons, as trash mobs hit too hard for a healer or a DD to survive.

[Vstarstruck]

I saw in a couple threads this past week people complaining about ilvls while leveling. One player said it was hard for them to keep up and do duties because they didn't have the proper ilvl, and another player was complaining about people in DF not having appropriate gear.

This is an honest question from a super casual. How is that possible? My main job, RDM, is currently level 69 with ilvl 285 gear doing absolutely nothing but MSQ quests, dungeons and trials.

The only time I do sidequests is when I have to grind to level up to progress through the MSQ, and even those quests give gear sometimes.

Are the people saying they are having a hard time with ilvls skipping the MSQ or something? This should not be an issue while leveling. Item levels are something you worry about once you hit max level. Out of all the complaints I've seen about this game, this one is by far the weirdest.

What am I missing here?

What you are missing how lazy people can be. I have kicked a few a few times because they enter expert having under i290 gear (the level 70 job quest gives this) while not knowing how to basic rotation. You are trying to apply logic, and trying you best in comparison to people that want to rush to level to 70 in 5 days or whatever because they do not care about the 3 other people they make put extra effort.

Picture someone entering a level 69 DF with ilevel 250 or worse and compare that to your 285, that is what people are concerned about. Then there are people that wear gear that does not even fit their job, resulting in tanks having less hp then healers/ DPS. People are not asking for strict gating, just gating that filters out this BS.

People are tried of dealing with drama with people (one person sometimes to defend them "Oh it is not savage it is not a big deal" "Oh do not be elitist over gear despite the person being oneshoted by unlovable damage") with those that are clearly not ready to be in dungeon (insert name)

[SpiritMuse]

You won't have the same access to quests and free gear for any additional jobs you level, since you've already done them. That's the issue. Then it can be hard/annoying to keep up because you outlevel dungeons faster than you get the gear from them, and some people don't even bother at all.

[InkstainedGwyn]

What am I missing here?

Remember that you can only do MSQ once. This doesn't absolve people of needing proper ilvl to do dungeons - else it's a burden on the group - but after the first class you take through MSQ, you won't be getting those easy/free upgrades again. And most people don't want to grind dungeons to get a full set of gear. If it's their second class, that might be the issue. If they're on their first and selling their MSQ gear or turning it in for seals, that's their fault.

[Colt47]

Well, not sure if this is what is being referred to here, but there is an issue with using POTD to level vs other means such as the DF. Since you get barely any money and no gear from POTD, you basically have to keep doing POTD until level 60 after you get past level 55, as the upgraded end game armor iLvL falls behind after that point. Not to mention I think we are about to hit another age of this with the next deep dungeon getting released in the following patch.

[kikix12]

At lvl50, 60 and 70 it is easy to get an acceptable gear (actually the best-in-slot for 50-55 and 60-~65) using poetics. Both the lvl50 and 60 gear CAN last till 60/70 respectively, if augmented, even for a tank and healer...but you're likely to get a gear drop here or there to upgrade along the way. Neither requires you to set a single foot into any gear-dependent party content.

It is also possible to buy NPC stuff.

One can get high level gear for tomestones at lvl70, or at least ilvl310 from easy-to-get hunts. That gear is cheap and the Centurio Seals are much easier to come across than the lower-level seals, and gives quite decent experience on its own, too.


In other words, the problem is with people not caring to put a "decent" piece of gear even if that decent gear is basically effortless to get.

[RLofOBFL]

It is Ironically far worse to be under level while levelling. Classes gain an immense amount of defense. 270 tank body piece for example is 480 defense, whereas the 288 drop from Abanium is 868. Compare that to the 290 being 911 and 370 being 1139.

[Raven2014]

Item levels are something you worry about once you hit max level. Out of all the complaints I've seen about this game, this one is by far the weirdest.
What am I missing here?

What you missing is playing a healer trying to heal a severely under-geared tank, wipe, and got kicked.

Source: me playing SCH, running lvl69 castrum dungeon, tank died several times a long the way, and we wiped twice on the last boss. DPS started berating me for "not knowing how to heal". When I point out that the tank is in a full set lvl60 gear, (The SB crafted 60, not the poetic 60), the tank went like "I'm poor don't judge me" and the ignorant DPSs start wailing about "his gears is fine you just don't know how to heal!". After a couple mins I was booted out.


Granted, that was the ONLY time I was kicked from a party for that reason, but I lost count how many time I have to burst my arse healing an undergear tank. Under gear DPS is a problem too, because it can mean something mobs are still up after the tank/healer already run out of cool down and MP. Under-geared healer is bad too, although less severe. Do-able? Yes. But by no mean enjoyable.

[hynaku]

This same thing has happened to me few times to. That's why I won't heal anymore when I use duty finder. I have seen to many tanks under geared and they blame the healer when they die. Then they kick you because they get mad because they keep dying because of being under geared and not dodging aoe attacks. First time got kicked tank took 2 hits from normal mobs and died before could cast one heal spell. Then checked his gear he had a lot caster and healer gear equipped not tank gear.