Is Baldesian Arsenal discord a mistake?

[Toshu]

If they're a huge raid premade and politely ask people to leave portals for them and you snipe it. You're just being a jerk.

How about when a group has 4-5 groups already and are actively recruiting from inside the instance like it was intended and the big group that comes in see's that you are recruiting and says since you are not a full 56-man group you have to wait for us to finish. No telling how long that is. I've seen groups go in back to back leaving other out in the wind to do their support NM with little to no reward or chance to have a shot to even learn.

[Kazgrel]

The "method" of access Baldesion Arsenal is a horrible mistake.

Just spent a hour in a party that constantly had to dip in and out of Hydatos hoping and praying for a clean instance, but nope, different groups were already in each one.

Future "public dungeons" like this need to be done via DF. End of discussion.

[HyoMinPark]

They've got a much friendlier community in JP; people are less inclined to getting carried and try to pull their own weight and they're generally more humble. I firmly believe that the reason they clear stuff on a much broader scale than both EU and NA is because of their social culture and not actual skill level in terms of gameplay. Over here, we've got the every-man-for-himself mentality (which actually pmuch didn't exist until modern age MMORPGs) and it's a real shame.

Eh, there have been instances on JP servers of players sniping the portals to BA, and one where an entire instance collectively refused to kill the outside NM to allow further progression inside BA (not Ovni but the other one that spawns where you need Feint L and Dispel L).

On Aether, when I've tried to do it there's been less players sniping portals and more instances just not being interested in going in. I did get in once last night, but only made it to the East/West boss rooms (and the other side failed to kill their add, causing us to wipe but it was still fun).

[Stanelis]

Ok so last night i actually find a pt in the discord but for the 2 hours i was in the pt we can't even get in BA once because some other big allaince claim the instance is their and refuse to leave. There were also complain in discord that there are snipping issue.

I believe it is a symptom of a problem; the discord breed elitism. IF the people are not invite to the discord, they can basically never get in BA as a party, net alone train and get crystal to boost their equipment. Every level 60 have a right to go in BA as long as they help fight the UFO and get gold. So the sniper/ pug only have 1 way to go in, they snip the portal when it turn red. I believe the discord requirement is a mistake.

The mistake is the way BA works.

1) without any premades, nobody enter BA,
2) if there are premades, then random players in the instance starts to want to enter BA,
3) if two premades enter the area, then a gentleman agreement must be found between the involved groups (in the french discord we apply the : "first alliance in the fresh instance get the portals" rule).

Honestly, it should be possible to make 48 men groups in the PF then enter BA by using an aetheric stabilizer for the whole group (in a similar way with hos the dynamis hourglass worked in FFXI). But the current system is a mess. No instance system was as broken as this one in FFXI.

But it really feels terrible to explain to random players who want to snipe portals they wn't achieve anything because then the whole instance will leave and they ll find themselves alone in BA (as such wasting maybe 1 hour of everybody's time, as it often takes 45 min to find a free hydatos instance).

[Xellos2099]

The mistake is the way BA works.

1) without any premades, nobody enter BA,
2) if there are premades, then random players in the instance starts to want to enter BA,
3) if two premades enter the area, then a gentleman agreement must be found between the involved groups (in the french discord we apply the : "first alliance in the fresh instance get the portals" rule).

Honestly, it should be possible to make 48 men groups in the PF then enter BA by using an aetheric stabilizer for the whole group (in a similar way with hos the dynamis hourglass worked in FFXI). But the current system is a mess. No instance system was as broken as this one in FFXI.

But it really feels terrible to explain to random players who want to snipe portals they wn't achieve anything because then the whole instance will leave and they ll find themselves alone in BA (as such wasting maybe 1 hour of everybody's time, as it often takes 45 min to find a free hydatos instance).

Well Dynamis have a system where you can do it repeatly. Maybe an enforce cooldown where if a group enter they can;t reenter for how long.

[Myon88]

They need to either segregate them, or do more to help parties in BA contribute to the rest of the instance, because apart from one extra FATE they can spawn (which might not even happen if they wipe before AV) BA alliances are a net detriment to the instance as a whole. Spawning more fates that rarely drop items from inside the dungeon, or killing things inside grants a buff to all the players in the instance outside, things like that.

To your average person in Hydatos, the presence of a BA alliance in the instance is a liability because that's 50~ people that are not contributing to spawning normal NMs and other activity, that's 1/3 of the entire instance and they can't be replaced by newcomers for an hour or more. It effectively turns the instance semi-dead on the spot for the sole benefit of that alliance. It's not as simple as simply leaving and finding another instance either, as someone who got to the instance first has things like chains, logos actions, and fairy buffs that will disappear when they exit. If you're wondering why there are cases of people not helping to clear the support fate out of spite, it's probably because people don't like being treated as waterboys while the BA alliance gets all the rewards. It's simple game theory, people will sometimes act against their own best interest if they feel the system as a whole is rigged against them, and it allows them to punish the other party.

Their presence also locks out everyone else from pugging BA which robs people of getting experience on the first half of the dungeon. Here on JP BA is pugged constantly with parties formed on the spot before the Ovni fate spawns, instead of outside the instance. You will not be clearing Ozma week one like that, but it means the item and experience level of the average player will gradually rise, and I wouldn't be surprised to see a true pug Ozma clear within a month. This is the same slow and steady approach that prioritizes cooperation that's responsible for their greater regional success in PvE content.

They should take a cue from their own Diadem content and have a separate queue that preformed raids can use to get their own 56m instance, because the way these preformed groups engage with the content is completely contrary to the way BA was designed to be entered by the average person.

[Nihility]

They need to either segregate them, or do more to help parties in BA contribute to the rest of the instance, because apart from one extra FATE they can spawn (which might not even happen if they wipe before AV) BA alliances are a net detriment to the instance as a whole. Spawning more fates that rarely drop items from inside the dungeon, or killing things inside grants a buff to all the players in the instance outside, things like that.

To your average person in Hydatos, the presence of a BA alliance in the instance is a liability because that's 50~ people that are not contributing to spawning normal NMs and other activity, that's 1/3 of the entire instance and they can't be replaced by newcomers for an hour or more. It effectively turns the instance semi-dead on the spot for the sole benefit of that alliance. It's not as simple as simply leaving and finding another instance either, as someone who got to the instance first has things like chains, logos actions, and fairy buffs that will disappear when they exit. If you're wondering why there are cases of people not helping to clear the support fate out of spite, it's probably because people don't like being treated as waterboys while the BA alliance gets all the rewards.

Their presence also locks out everyone else from pugging BA which robs people of getting experience on the first half of the dungeon. Here on JP BA is pugged constantly with parties formed on the spot before the Ovni fate spawns, instead of outside the instance. You will not be clearing Ozma week one like that, but it means the item and experience level of the average player will gradually rise, and I wouldn't be surprised to see a true pug Ozma clear within a month. This is the same slow and steady approach that prioritizes cooperation that's responsible for their greater regional success in PvE content.

They should take a cue from their own Diadem content and have a separate queue that preformed raids can use to get their own 56m instance, because the way these preformed groups engage with the content is completely contrary to the way BA was designed to be entered by the average person.

Is Eureka and 24 man dungeons in JP server full of people who's mindset seems to be "attack unmoving until i die and wait for a res to repeat" ?
because that's a big reason getting pugs seems to result in everyone just quitting rather than try at all around here

[CyrilLucifer]

They need to either segregate them, or do more to help parties in BA contribute to the rest of the instance, because apart from one extra FATE they can spawn (which might not even happen if they wipe before AV) BA alliances are a net detriment to the instance as a whole. Spawning more fates that rarely drop items from inside the dungeon, or killing things inside grants a buff to all the players in the instance outside, things like that.

To your average person in Hydatos, the presence of a BA alliance in the instance is a liability because that's 50~ people that are not contributing to spawning normal NMs and other activity, that's 1/3 of the entire instance and they can't be replaced by newcomers for an hour or more. It effectively turns the instance semi-dead on the spot for the sole benefit of that alliance. It's not as simple as simply leaving and finding another instance either, as someone who got to the instance first has things like chains, logos actions, and fairy buffs that will disappear when they exit. If you're wondering why there are cases of people not helping to clear the support fate out of spite, it's probably because people don't like being treated as waterboys while the BA alliance gets all the rewards. It's simple game theory, people will sometimes act against their own best interest if they feel the system as a whole is rigged against them, and it allows them to punish the other party.

Fantastic post.
This is exactly right.

The Arsenal is interesting content but it's also an active detriment to the people outside, say, crystal farming. They gain nothing from helping and they get a dead instance.
It needs to be segregated if SE plans similar content in the future.

[Toshu]

One thing they could actually do that would be beneficial would be to have the Ovni NM give a specific item that is uique and one time use to allow players to enter BA from the outside by turning it into Rodney. This is one of the better ways that I think could fix the issue with people sniping portals. Yes, his defeats the purpose of having an open dungeon. I think this would alleviate the whole situation that is going on with people and not being able to do BA. Tonight my group tried for 3 hours before giving up. We even waited for the current group to get out and when they did we asked if we could go in and they said they were going back in and to wait their turn. We even helped their support group by killing the Support NM.