Trusts and squadron

[kikix12]

To flesh out a little further on the overarching system thing, it could be done sort of like the Doman reconstruction.

This actually sounds quite fun and would help land and hand get some significance for yer average player. If they do plan on making an instanced housing, this would be a good way to go about it.

And seeing as it could be some sort of instanced "personal land HUB", both the Squadron and Trust system being located in it wouldn't really be lore-breaking nor cause mechanical issues either. Maybe it'll tie into the "farm" that they mentioned as well? I don't think they'd make the mistake of making limited farms like there is with houses, so instanced content like that is not unbelievable at all.

[Nyvara]

I'm hoping that trust will be a system like EQ2 which has Mercenaries. They are NPCs sometimes notable sometimes generic which level as you do can be equipped with gear. They come in different rarities the more rare they are the stronger they are. But none are so strong as to carry you in endgame content.

Anther thing that will make some of you moan they sell packs of mercs for RL $ in the typical gatcha fashion. Not as bad as it sounds since quests and rep grinding can reward some pretty strong companions.

[Beckett]

Jeez, I forgot all about the chocobo companion. More completely dropped content from SE. I hope they don't drop Squadrons in the same way.

At the very least, I hope we can use our leveled up Squadron members as Trusts. At least then all the work we've put into them won't be completely wasted.

[Hayden]

There are days I don't feel like doing content with other people, as strange as that sounds, yea It is an MMO and "people are the effing point". Most of the time I don't mind hopping in a PUG and meeting new people, it is fun. Personally, it'll be nice to have the OPTION to skip the 18 minute long DPS queue once in a while....

[Alleo]

I am honestly not sure why they did not just use the Squadron system for this because this sounds a lot like it just with certain NPCs. If there is nothing more behind that, then they could just have used a new glamour options that turns your squadron into certain NPCs.

In the end this is still a MMO and I am not sure if I like it that they are part of Shadowbringers thus current content. First squadrons still cant go into every dungeon becaue of the mechanics so I kinda wonder if they made it better (and if so why not use it on Squadron?) or if they made dungeons with less mechanics so that even NPCs can go through with it, which would be horrible..

Also what if they are easily unlocked and are better than the random players? Wouldnt a lot of people just use them to run through dungeons? How would this affect the queues?

I can understand squadrons for older stuff, especially for DD players. But for new content? Shouldnt there be 100% enough people trying to do it so that they dont need them?

I will give my final judgement when its in the game, but right now I kinda wonder why we even need that...

[KisaiTenshi]

I'm all for this if it's an expansion of the squadron we currently have. Otherwise I am of the opinion of why do we even need this? I didn't get those guys to 60 so they can sit around four out of seven days in the week like they do now. T_T

A brand new FFXIV player comes to the game, and somehow gets to level 15, now they're ready to do Sastasha, but don't want to play with other people because
a) They're shy
b) They're new
c) They're bad
d) They've heard about how toxic some faction of the playerbase is and don't want anything to do with them.

Regardless of why, Squadrons are not available yet, so something needs to slot into that for players who just want to play the game without involving any real people. Once that person gets a feel for the 2.0 dungeons that players cry in agony of doing anyway, they may actually learn how to play that content as it was designed, and not "the meta demands it" way.

I've pointed out before where the Squadrons break rules that players can not (eg Medica II at all levels, and are about three times more durable than the player to begin with) and this is more of the same issue. SE's solution to making the Squadrons play content was not to make them less stupid, but to make them more tanky than a fully geared synced player.

Also what if they are easily unlocked and are better than the random players? Wouldnt a lot of people just use them to run through dungeons? How would this affect the queues?

I can understand squadrons for older stuff, especially for DD players. But for new content? Shouldnt there be 100% enough people trying to do it so that they dont need them?

That is probably the point really. It's a solution to the "toxic player" dilemma where people don't want to queue because they don't want to queue as a specific role, and have only really been carried through content. For those players, they will -never- be good enough for the asinine demands made in the party finder anyway, so why not just give them something that works as a practice. After all, the raiders have been saying all along that Stone Sea Sky is useless. Just what content will Trusts be permitted in?

[Alleo]

That is probably the point really. It's a solution to the "toxic player" dilemma where people don't want to queue because they don't want to queue as a specific role, and have only really been carried through content. For those players, they will -never- be good enough for the asinine demands made in the party finder anyway, so why not just give them something that works as a practice. After all, the raiders have been saying all along that Stone Sea Sky is useless. Just what content will Trusts be permitted in?

Why just look at the worst case? I do run content with mostly randoms and honestly I barely even saw the example you gave. I mean yes there are some people that have really high standards but most that are annoyed at others are it for a reason. Honestly if you have a healer in lvl 70 content that cant keep people alive even with small pulls and good DDs and tank then there is a problem with the healer and not the rest of the group.

The question is, are the NPCs even good enough to make up for such a bad player? Because right now if you are bad you often just get carriered through content because its not that hard. A NPC at the same time might not be able to do that. So I am not sure if this really helps bad players. Honestly imo this is more for those that are sick of exactly those bad players thus want a smoother run (if the NPCs can handle all of it) which then means that all the good people might get out of the duty finder thus more bad people are left. One can imagine how those runs will go.

On the other hands if those NPCs are too good and carry someone really bad through the content then they wont learn a thing.

It also could be that runs with these NPCs dont give exp or even other rewards like stones. But then I question, why we even need them at all because people would still need to queue for content the normal way if they want to progress their character.

[Delmontyb]

How do you guys feel about the trust system? Is it going to be standalone or part of the squadron system? Or will it replace squadrons?

I'm curious about this as well. Personally, I am hoping for some type of joined system. Meaning, it's fine to have a "Squad" and a "Trust" but let's say "Squads" are only for dungeons, and Trust is only for the open world, that will seem silly in the long run. I'd love it if you are able to build out a squad via your trusts, that way it's not just in-game NPCs but also characters from the Squad. What I'm getting at is, I don't want new systems that do similar things but aren't related in any way.

[Balipu]

I think the purpose is different.

Trust is there to clear MSQ duties so that you don't get stuck with 30 minute waiting times with your DPS class.

Squadrons are there to help you level your grand company rank.

Chocobo companions are there cause they are a discarded prototype of later systems (diadem, hunting logs, guildhests, normal mode trials, base classes...etc).

[Renato]

If it will reduce the downtime with queue times as a DPS, I'm all for it. The amount of game time lost waiting for a dungeon queue freaking sucks. I started maining tank classes because the queue times were instant. And while I don't regret it because I learned to love tanking, I shouldn't have to change my playstyle to get actually prgoress in the game the way I want to.