Leveling and 50/60/70/80 Roulettes should be reorganized + Alliance Roulette concerns

[SaitoHikari]

This may be slightly unrelated but I think the ability to earn glam from these old raids is too...punishing. In this environment where everyone drops their item level to do the level 50 raids, I've done Labyrinth of the Ancients a dozen of times a month, yet I still don't have the full Fuma gear set for my Ninja. Because I'm trying for this set, I always queuing as the same class and repeating this dungeon to the point of tedium. These old raids provide no useful gear anymore so the only reason we run it is for glam and tokens. I really wish the Alliance roulette rewarded raid tokens that allowed the gear sets to be redeemed eventually one at a time, perhaps with tokens so we can finally complete the gears sets eventually. Because as is, I feel like I'm wasting my time when I don't get a level 50 raid. I like the Ivalice armor sets but the raid pacing is slow and the loot drop RNG / greed rolling makes getting the gear a nightmare.

If I had a more reasonable method of getting Ivalice glam, I would be more encouraged to not manipulate my item levels to get the faster raids which have the gear I want. Sure someone might suggest to me to not use the Alliance Roulette to get my glam but those tomes are the only thing actually progressing my character.

That's true. The devs should let us exchange the Alliance raid tokens for specific gear pieces for glam purposes too. Make currency for the crystal tower raid series for that purpose too, while we're at it.

(And also overhaul the currency tab to include the Alliance raid tokens, at that. I have 38 Dun Scaith shillings, and I'm not tossing them out, period.)

[ctcc42]

Ok I am just going to address the alliance roulette.

I think a lot of people who limit their ilvl do so not because they don't want want to run the content. They do it because they don't want to invest their time without receiving a reward.

I am not a fan of 24 man content. The reason being that they mostly fall into one of two categories.

Category one is exemplified by the crystal tower. Its boring. I can sign up, follow the group. just hit my basic combo rotation and watch an anime on another screen while I wait to get my reward.

Category two is exemplified by orbonne. The content is engaging, and commands my attention. Nothing wrong with its difficulty level. BUT I have only 1/24th control over whether I get a reward in this content. I need the people who signed up hoping for a category one experience to stick around, learn the mechanics and not vote abandon every time cid wipes them.

So how do we fix this? We need to divorce the category one raids from the category two raids. The problem with alliance roulette is that people who are only interested in the category one experience end up in category two. I would far rather wait longer for an enjoyable raid with people who want to do it too, then to wait for a duty to pop that will ultimately end in a vote abandon because half those in it dont want to be there.

I hope it doesn't sound like I am blaming people who would like to just the crystal tower over and over. Your not my people. I don't understand you. But I respect your right to play what you enjoy and I really don't want to hold you hostage in something you do not.

If there were two alliance roullets, or maybe one for each raid series, I think a lot of people who lower their ilvl currently would run orbonne. I know some people do it to avoid the content itself. But I am pretty sure a good number are doing it to avoid dumping an hour of their life into something with no reward due to vote abandon. Fix that and I think they will sign up... probably... am I being too hopeful hear?

[Tridus]

So how do we fix this? We need to divorce the category one raids from the category two raids. The problem with alliance roulette is that people who are only interested in the category one experience end up in category two. I would far rather wait longer for an enjoyable raid with people who want to do it too, then to wait for a duty to pop that will ultimately end in a vote abandon because half those in it dont want to be there.

I hope it doesn't sound like I am blaming people who would like to just the crystal tower over and over. Your not my people. I don't understand you. But I respect your right to play what you enjoy and I really don't want to hold you hostage in something you do not.

If there were two alliance roullets, or maybe one for each raid series, I think a lot of people who lower their ilvl currently would run orbonne. I know some people do it to avoid the content itself. But I am pretty sure a good number are doing it to avoid dumping an hour of their life into something with no reward due to vote abandon. Fix that and I think they will sign up... probably... am I being too hopeful hear?

I don't think they would. The people in question want the reward for the least effort possible, and CT you can watch TV and still get the reward because it's so trivialized. Part of that is that Labyrinth item level syncs at something like double the level the dungeon was tuned for. Orbonne syncs much closer to it's intended level and that makes it much less forgiving. You could help it now by raising the sync level on Orbonne so it gets easier with 80 gear in ShB. Or you could make CT harder by syncing it down to 70 and making people actually do mechanics.

The problem now is that I wasn't around when Orbonne was current, so I want to get it done. The queue is appalling, and eliminating that problem is the entire reason Alliance Roulette was created. It's currently not fulfilling it's intended function due to all the people exploiting it to get CT. Meanwhile, CT is so mind numbingly boring that I don't even want to queue for the roulette at all anymore. Mixing it up more would help a lot.

They need to put an ilvl requirement on it, or not have the raids in the roulette that aren't current content (so the one that comes out in 5.1) care about ilvl and put people in no matter what so this problem ends. People will learn how to do Orbonne again if it comes up more than never. Making it easier by boosting the sync level would help too. And nerf the crap out of CT rewards while you're at it so it reflects the effort going in.

[Tridus]

Notice something? The list of 50/60/70 dungeons (currently 40, will soon be 43) is far larger than the list of Leveling dungeons (27). Yet the roulette for the former tends to have far longer queue times than that of the latter, since the latter in the eyes of the community is currently far more rewarding than the former. This has led to certain points in player progression where queue times for story-required dungeons in the 50/60/70 category end up absurdly long, especially for DPS players. (Plus 'Duty Roulette: 50/60/70 Dungeons currently clips in the duty finder screen. If that isn't an argument towards re-organizing it to this development team, I don't know what is.)

The rewards are a big factor in that. Levelling roulette is far, far more rewarding that 50/60/70 roulette. If you're only doing one, you're doing levelling.

To address that problem, I propose that we re-categorize Leveling and 50/60/70/80 Roulette into Story Dungeon Roulette and Optional Dungeon Roulette. The reward for both roulettes should be equalized as well, having both roulettes award the same EXP/Poetics tome rewards as current Leveling Roulette (if below max level) and the same Goetia/etc. tome rewards as current 50/60/70 Roulette (if at max level).

Yes, that needs to be done. Your list makes sense, as well. Given that at this point 50/60/70 can put you at a low level than levelling can, I'm not sure why they are still spit up that way. The new list makes sense.

As an additional suggestion, the way roulettes determine which dungeon you get should be redone as well, to be weighted towards each players' current job level.

People don't like it when a party full of level 60+ players somehow ends up being dropped into Satasha. The game has a problem with many people reaching endgame without really knowing how to use some of their skills effectively. The daily method of leveling having a high chance of dropping you into a lower level dungeon where you can't practice using your new skills doesn't help the situation either.

Seriously, this. There's no need to make us do something at level 15 when the lowest level in the group is 72. That's just not fun.

Alliance Roulette... Where do I even begin?

The original purpose of Alliance Roulette was to revitalize the older 24-man raid series. Prior to the Roulette being introduced, the Crystal Tower raid series especially would frequently see queue times of 1-2+ hours.

Get rid of item level weighting for the Alliance Roulette. The roulette should not be manipulated in this way. Orbonne may be harder than the rest, but it wouldn't be the insurmountable task the community thinks it is if experienced players actually started doing it again, instead of it being a raid that is now more or less limited to new players who missed the train before. (If it's really needed, Orbonne could use a nerf too.)

Agreed. Orbonne could be fixed now by just raising it's item level sync so that all this shiny endgame 80 gear we're getting would help us in there. CT is so easy because the ilvl sync is so high that you're hilariously outgeared for it. Rabanastre is the same, it's a total joke now. Orbonne gives you very little cushion, and upping that would make a real difference without having to make drastic changes to the place.

I can't believe they're further incentitiving CT in 5.1 without fixing this. It's ridiculous.

[Barraind]

I would go a step further:

Leveling/storyline
50/60 roulette
70/80 roulette
Basic trials (ARR and HW mandatory trials including 4man ifrit, titan and garuda)
Advanced Trials (HW optional trials, SB, ShB trials)
MSQ (All non-optional 8 man encounters that heavily prioritizes players who havent completed those and are in queue, even if those would be in any other roulette [ie. no non-bonus run is formed unless theres nobody in queue meeting those criteria, which is absolutely not the case currently)

[Shurrikhan]

I'd honestly rather roulette just no longer give a flat bonus, even its daily one, but instead increase the instance-dependent completion reward to roughly the same effect on average, such that instances with lower typical completion times are not given disproportionately high rewards, or at least less disproportionate of rewards, by means of that flat bonus. Their exp should be slightly less than now, while the completion rewards granted by places like Orbonne should be a fair bit higher.

[Rhus]

Lvl roulette gives a bonus on 7m for me atm. 50/60/70 gives me 125k. That’s a problem.

Lvl dungeons also have much more mobs to kill than the 50/60 ones. That’s why people spammed Library and now spam Abania to get from 60-61 or 70-71. It’s more efficient than running the level 60/70 dungeons to get that extra lvl needed to start SB/Shb dungeons. Come next expansion we will probably spam Mt Gulg to get from 80-81 if it stays the same.

I also got a chuckle how you said in the op you want people to queue for Orbonne etc but then said Orbonne could use a nerf. Like that’s one reason why people don’t queue for it and your admitting it while arguing against it. Gave me a light chuckle so it did.

The other reason is time. Ally roulette gives the same regardless of the dungeon. Today I stripped off because I had 45 minutes before I had to leave. Got WoD, not so bad. Done it in about 25minutes. But I just didn’t have time to wipe to cid or yiazmat or hashmal etc and spend an hr or wait for parties to refill once people leave for the same reward I got from a 20/25 min WoD run or 15min Syrcus run. I got my xp and made it out I time to do rl stuff and had no stress

Your method doesn’t account for expert and their tomes which Square won’t scrap so that would need a rethink

[Deceptus]

Lvl roulette gives a bonus on 7m for me atm. 50/60/70 gives me 125k. That’s a problem.

This is basically why I haven't touched a 5/6/7 almost all of SB. It's not worth the time investment.

[Raltar]

Lvl roulette gives a bonus on 7m for me atm. 50/60/70 gives me 125k. That’s a problem.

The way leveling roulette works is that the closer to the level you are to the dungeon, the less bonus exp you get. Say you are 50 and get a 49 dungeon, the bonus will be much smaller than if you got a level 20 dungeon. I see this all the time when I'm in my 70s and I get a Shadowbringers dungeon and I only get a bonus of 2 million, but mobs give a ton of exp from killing them. But if I did a Heavensward dungeon, I would get a much higher bonus on completion, but the mobs don't give nearly as much exp for kills. It all balances out with the exp you get from the mobs. 50/60/70 still doesn't give much of a bonus, though.

[Xeronia]

I don't think people syncing their item level down is the real issue for Alliance raid. I think the real issue is no incentive for new players to unlock them at all past the Crystal Tower series as that will open their roulette or they got told completing it will help them understand Shadowbringers more. I know when I level alts with people I only pick up the Crystal Tower series as I normally do not want much from the other raid series as I have seen the stories already.