Are the numbers too high?

[Rydin]

In Final Fantasy... Most stats capped at 255, and even then you didn't get a stat that high unless you were definitely at level 99... and when you did.. you were ungodly....
At str 255 you were hitting just about everything for max damage

Final fantasy:
Attack on Best weapon: 134
Def on best body piece: 45

Final fantasy II:
Attack on Best weapon: 199
Def on best body piece: 75

Final fantasy III:
Attack on Best weapon: 156
Def on best body piece: 60

Final fantasy IV:
Attack on Best weapon: 255
Def on best body piece: 100

Final fantasy V:
Attack on Best weapon: 180
Def on best body piece: 18

Final fantasy VI:
Attack on Best weapon: 255
Def on best body piece: 128

Final fantasy VII:
Attack on Best weapon: 100
Def on best body piece: 100 (on accessory. no other gear used)

Final fantasy VIII:
Attack on Best weapon: 30
Def on best body piece: No def... VIT capped at 255 and you were God strong

Final fantasy IX:
Attack on Best weapon: 108
Def on best body piece: 62

Final fantasy X:
Attack on Best weapon: Str derived from Sphere Grid... caps at 255
Def on best body piece: Also Derived from Sphere grid... max is 255

Final fantasy XI:
Attack on Best weapon: 137
Def on best body piece: 69

Final fantasy XII:
Attack on Best weapon: 150
Def on best body piece: 61

ok... My decently well geared Lancer has:
Damage output 151
Attack 588
Str 296
Piety 276
Def 541

Def on best body piece in the game: 182 (Sentinel Cuirass)

Those are high numbers that, first of all, are not very typical of what we've come to expect in Final Fantasy

I know all numbers are relative.... But if thats the case.. everything else should also scale up
Take the Cobalt mitt gaunlets that everyone loves to put on gives 3 strength
3 strength.....

but when your damage output is 151, Str is 296 and Attack is 588, how can you convince me that my damage dealer should be wearing gloves that give 3 str?
Why wouldn't I just put on some Level 18 Leather Mitts
I know you're thinking that I can't put Tier IV materia on the Leather Mitts.... so you'd miss out on 30 attack power with a Tier IV heavens fist

But 5 different stats make up your attack... so you'd be missing 5% of 1 of 5 damage stats

whats the point of this thread? what am I saying?
whats the tl;dr?
If the stats are going to be higher... then there needs to be a bigger stat boost from better gear and Materia....


Its why people say gear doesn't matter or stats don't matter
they do... the stats work fine...
but if the content is balanced for my lancer wearing Cobalt Mitt Gauntlets and we've already proven that wearing a level 18 pair of gaunlets is not noticeably worse.... then thats how people go into battle wearing anything

[Dragon]

Well it wasn't entirely different in FFXI, like remember those ACC+3 gloves? Or the ATK+4 rings/earrings? Actually, the stats while relative are generally better even per comparison with XI since we have materia.

Perhaps the reason gear doesn't matter may be that character stats are too high, which I've often wondered why myself (I think XI had the superior stat system).

[Rydin]

Well it wasn't entirely different in FFXI, like remember those ACC+3 gloves? Or the ATK+4 rings/earrings? Actually, the stats while relative are generally better even per comparison with XI since we have materia.

Perhaps the reason gear doesn't matter may be that character stats are too high, which I've often wondered why myself (I think XI had the superior stat system).

Thats what I'm saying....
If your attack is 40... then +4 is a 10 percent increase
If your attack is 588... the +4 attack is laughable

Lets do a comparison... with my same Lancer
Damage Output
Fully geared 151
Nude, wearing only Ifrit Harpoon 151

Attack
Fully geared 588
Nude wearing only Ifrit Harpoon 532

Strength
Fully Geared 296
Nude wearing only Ifrit Harpoon 256

Piety
Fully geared 276
Nude wearing only Ifrit Harpoon 235

Magic Defense (Everything Ifrit does is Magic Damage, accept the swipes that only hit the tank)
Fully Geared 356 fire resistence
Wearing only the Ifrit Harpoon 356 Fire resistence

And THAT is why people can beat Ifrit Naked

The ONLY THING I get from Gear is defense....
which, even for the tank, does very little against Ifrit anyway

And as far as the damage stats... Damage Output is by far the most important....
Stats matter... they're just so high that its difficult to bring about a noticeable change

[DoctorMog]

SE needs to take some 7th grade math and

SUBDIVIDE!

Divide by the least common denominator. Balance accordingly.

/win

[Rydin]

SE needs to take some 7th grade math and

SUBDIVIDE!

Divide by the least common denominator. Balance accordingly.

/win

Yea... they multiplied all stats by 10 and forgot to apply that to stat boosts... etc....
Its just so horribly balanced....
My Glad has over 800 defense fully geared... what is 1... or even 2 defense tier IVs going to do for me?
His HP is over 4000 (It's over 9000)
what is HP 60 going to do? Furthermore.. at that point... do i even remotely give a crap about a Tier IV Bloodthirst that is 60hp vs a Tier IV Bloodthirst that is 70hp?

The only stat on all gear that even remotely matters is Defense
and Even that is skewed
The level 49 Cobalt Plate gear is your best Tank stuff.... And with it... fully geared.. with party bonus, protect and food... I am at 860 defense
If I switched Every piece to the Level 39 Steel gear... you'd expect me to be gimpy....
You know what my defense would be? 700
What about all the little extra stats? The Level 39 Steel Cuirass has +6 Vitality, +3 Attack... The Level 49 cobalt has +7 Vitality and +4 attack
What? My damn attack is 500 and my vitality is over 300. What am I really losing?

Thats like getting demoted at your job so you now have less hours and less responsibility...
Oh and you now make 1$ less a week...
I'd gladly take that demotion

[Urthdigger]

I need to read shit better

[Rydin]

I think the numbers are fine. They make balance easier by allowing the devs to increase in smaller increments. If we assume the same general amount of power compared to the enemies, but the numbers are simply smaller, it means any increase is more significant.

For an extreme example of why this can be bad, look at refresh in FFXI, at least when the cap was still 75. Because the numbers gotten back from any form of refresh were so small (I believe the highest from any given source is 3, from the spell), even getting an extra +1 refresh from a piece of gear was a big thing, and as a result only higher-end pieces had it.

Using bigger numbers, bonuses can be given in smaller increments. Let's say in the above example, all the numbers were multiplied by 3, so the refresh spell gave 9 MP a tick, armor give 3 MP a tick, and maximum MP and spell cost were all 3x as much. It would be possible for them to add lower level, more common armor that gives 1 or 2 MP a tick. On the HP side of things, they not only have more freedom to add regen effects, but they can also be more liberal in adding damage reduction effects like phalanx (FFXI phalanx, which reduced a static amount of damage from each hit), or bonuses to stoneskin.

This also extends to the various other combat statistics as well. In FFXI, it wasn't uncommon to see a piece of low level gear get used for many levels, simply because it was the only piece for that slot that increased that stat, and usually by a small amount too, like 2 or 3. By using bigger numbers, SE can gradually increase the stats available from a slot, without each one having to be a huge leap in quality.

Larger numbers can work... but everything needs to scale accordingly...
The best gloves can't give 3 strength when you're strength is 296, attack is 588 and damage output is 151
Because you balance content for people wearing the higher level gear....
If 200 of your 296 Str and 400 of your 588 Attack was stats from the gear you're wearing then someone naked would do crap damage compared to someone fully geared. Because then nude you'd have 96 Str and 188 Attack
Instead... You get tons of stats from the Stat fairy
I stress this point because this is the 1 thing thats wrong with this game that hasn't been acknowledged and isn't being actively worked on
Do you understand that the difference between being Nude or being Fully well geared is less than 10% total dps?
And its not because the stats dont work... its because the stats dont change

[Urthdigger]

I am aware of that, I've seen the people beating endgame stuff in santa outfits, but I believe that to be a different issue entirely. Though, I'd rather see them reduce naked stats or increase the stats from gear (More likely the former than the latter), rather than divide stats across the board.

[Ruisu]

So long as I'm not dealing 9,999 (let alone 99,999), I don't really care about the stat numbers. It's an MMO, there will be retardedly high numbers. Also XIII does this too. Oh well.

[Asiaine]

Hello,

Is it possible that we are looking at this wrong?

Perhapse SE's intention was that stats from equipment should be unimportant? Perhaps the intent is that those pieces of equipment should be able to give a LITTLE extra help, a little extra edge. But otherwise not be that important? Perhaps the goal really was a 10-20% boost (depending on how good and how much materia you add)?

This would fall in line with the 'casual' intent? So casual adventurers would 'at worst' be only 10-20% behind the most hardcore adventurer, and therefore not feel bad?

Maybe I'm mistaken and SE has said something to the opposite. Or not. But some nice sticky from the devs posted till the end of time on this topic would be well appreciated.