Portable Orchestrion

[Popoto-Pancake]

\o/ Hello!

So, i was thinking recently how nice it would be if we could have a portable orchestrion on our characters. Doesn't have to be just a user interface option, but maybe an actual item, kind of like the tomestone phone.

The idea is having something that will allow us to play specific Orchestrion Rolls as background music, that way we can select what's playing on the background while we fly around doing fates, crafting or other stuff outside of dungeons/raids etc.

I love the FFXIV music, but some city-background songs get boring after a while.. and it would be nice to have an IN-Game feature to maybe play some of the orchestrions we have on an "mp3"-like device.

It could be a interface like the Fashion Accessories for Umbrellas, but you select an orchestrion to play in the background.

Yes, i know, you can just disable BGM then play something on Spotify/YouTube or whatever, but it would be a nice quality of life service to have this option within the game.

[DrWho2010]

agghgh this topic AGAIN. please do a search before posting.

it is not possible to do this in the open world. not with the way the game's audio is coded and the need for data to be carried around everywhere.

there is a reason why Orchestrions are limited to where they can be used you know!

[Popoto-Pancake]

oh no, how dare i post something in the forums without doing a search before...
how dare i not spend more time in the forum.. oh no, would you look at that, i have only 1 post.. pff peasant, shame on me.

idk if i dare look at your 2.5k posts, given the way your reply starts dude.. go have some water and calm ur moustache.

[Mykll]

Seems like the basic tech is already there. You can carry around however many different specific mount music.

[Enkidoh]

Seems like the basic tech is already there. You can carry around however many different specific mount music.

Mount music works by using the same secondary music channel that battle themes use while muting the primary (zone music) channel (hence why you can't mount when you're under attack), and the mount's coding tells the client what track to use - this is also why most mounts just use a default theme but that some have special themes, each mount needs to be coded individually if a unique music track is needed to play, and that includes existing mounts that have to be retroactively changed to play a unique theme, each mount has to have this change to it's coding made individually, a costly and time-consuming activity.

The fact is, a portable orchestrion simply is not possible due to how the game's sound is coded (with the aforementioned primary and secondary channels, as the secondary channel which the orchestrion normally uses is required for battle music and mount themes and hence the channel is already needed to be kept 'free' for that reason - as you don't have battles inside houses, that secondary channel is thus free to be used by the orchestrion there). SE knows it's a greatly desired request from players though, but sadly it just isn't a possibility.

[Mykll]

That makes sense, but still seems like an easier enough task.

You say mount music uses secondary channel. Same as battle themes. Same as orchestrion. And it seems like there is already a priority going, where mount music, if selected in settings, takes priority over normal music. They would just need to figure out which of orchestrion or mount music to be priority over the other, with both being priority over normal music. Do they want players to hear orchestrion above mount, or mount first, then when dismount orchestrion, and when in combat, combat.

Nothing extra needs to be done for orchestrion music itself as they are already tied into the game. They don't need to be tied to an object like a mount. Playing music is as simple as a slight addition to the already used Orchestrion List. Some little button or box or something to play the one song. Or heck like minions, mounts and emotes have a small favorite list, and have it play those. I guess there could be an additional thing under Collection instead but that seems redundant providing they can make a clean O List UI change.

It seems weird that a secondary channel is the main reason why you can't mount in combat (versus SE just not wanting you to), and you can have 2 different streams of sounds share one channel, with a determined order of priority, but you can't have 3 share 1 channel with a priority. Using music already in game that's not tied to any object like a mount.

[DrWho2010]

because orchestrion rolls are optional, not everyone will have the same list of music - this means that more information needs to be carried on the individuals character. devs have said in the past they try to limit this as much as possible.

[Callinon]

Why do so many people labor under the impression that "that's how it's coded" is some kind of answer to the question? Change how it's coded. It's just code. It's not magic. It's been correctly pointed out that the game is already capable of playing a music track audible to only the player and not to others. That's the tech needed for this. After that it's just a matter of managing the data transfers involved. Perhaps a limited playlist you could put together in the presence of a full-size orchestrion that would then be able to come with you into the world without creating any kind of undue burden on the server... not that orchestrion data is all that large. I'd be STUNNED if the whole thing was more than a kilobyte per character... perhaps two.

Oh and

Mount music works by using the same secondary music channel that battle themes use while muting the primary (zone music) channel (hence why you can't mount when you're under attack)

That's not even sort of why you can't mount in combat.

[DrWho2010]

yes let's just "Change the coding" like it's as simple as that. smh

[Callinon]

yes let's just "Change the coding" like it's as simple as that. smh

It... is as simple as that. How do you think any changes happen in any program ever? I'll admit that back when source code had to be chiseled into stone tablets making changes was a mite more difficult, but those were dark times and we don't do that anymore.