Please put some resources into FC's

[Voidedge_Ragna]

The current state of FC's is really confusing to me, it feels like in an MMO that prides itself with community (true or not) they give very little about the communities in game.

Problem: FC's are glorified chatrooms with attached buffs and a pretty house (sometimes)

Our FC is currently sitting on over 100mil FC credits, we have been established 7 years ago and now as a community stretch over multiple games.

Because of this i had a peek at how lost ark handles their guilds ... and let me interrupt you here "well play it then" wont help because im not a fan of the playstyle and enjoy my time on FFXIV but we should always hope for improvements.

They have weeklies, research etc. Why can we not have a system similar that gives meaning to fc credits? They at this moment serve 1 purpose ... ceruleum AND its only relevant to very small fc's or solo player fc's.

I sold Ceruleum but stopped, because you cant buy more then 99 a time and its not uncommon for some solo players to do deals on 20 stacks of 999 hoping to get a better price ... thats 200 lines in FC chat with "has bought 99 tanks" its disruptive and its all for like 2-3mil gil because credits at this point are worthless.

Why is the message board system we have not added to FC's ... there's not even a voting system in the FC by default.

SE did nothing for 4 years regarding FC's and the one thing they did after that?
Increase Rank from 8 to 30? Damn that's prolly a lot of things we got for that ... right?

We got 2 new boxes in the FC chest ... okay that's a start, what else? More passive actions space, ohhh so the FC leader only goes to the GC to buy Actions all 6 days and not 5? Amazing, im sure the FC profits from this.

The last 10 ranks are prestige and you can feel good you have them but they add nothing.

The last change to Actions was made in HW ... can we please review some of those things as we are now 6 years later.

We need a sink for credits, there's so many good things that would make sense yet we get credits faster and faster ... Ilv of dungeon dropped gear increases every patch and GC trade in contribute to FC points ... same as HQ crafting which also is Level based in terms of rewards.

Also can we talk about "ranks" as a fc privilege we hand out, because if you give someone this rank, they can rank themselves up above their rank and others who are at the top down. If anything it should let you rank others up to your level not give you a wildcard to do what you want. We had no problems with this ... but why ...

Please SE ... throw some crumbs our way, at least acknowledge the need for it or simply get rid of credits.

[IckeDerTyp]

Agreed!

/10

[Jojoya]

SE is aware of rank related issues though it's been almost 2 years since they said they were considering what changes to make and implement.

https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...b1046155e63703

Hopefully it's a topic that YoshiP will be revisiting in the Live Letter this weekend.

They did stress that it's up to the FC Master to use caution when granting ranks promotion/demotion privileges (or any other rank privileges, to be honest).

As for some of your other comments/ideas:

Problem: FC's are glorified chatrooms with attached buffs and a pretty house (sometimes)

That isn't a problem with SE and the FC system design. SE rightly doesn't want to dictate what activities a FC can do. If your FC feels like no more than a glorified chat room, that's a problem with the FC leadership. It's up to the officers and members of a FC to organize activities for the FC to do together. There are a lot of FCs that will actively farm content together and hold other events because their officers and members put in the effort.

RE: company credits - very active FCs will inevitably end up with a surplus of these just as very active players end up with a surplus of gil they'll never spend. MMOs can't be balanced around the most active players that earn more because that leads to frustration among new/infrequent players when they can't get the items they need/want due to high cost.

Still, there are some things SE could do. Top of the list to me would be add the grade 3 FC buffs to the GC QMs for purchase with credits so even FCs without a house will have access to them.

Second would be to make Company Credits the currency for purchase of a FC house instead of gil (that would put a big dent into shell FCs used solely for house flipping and/or workshop profiteering). Small but active FCs would still be able to earn enough credits to get a house though it would take some weeks instead of a brand new FC being eligible to purchase a house within a few hours of creation.

Third would be add more items to the GC QM and Resident Caretaker that can be sold on the MB for gil that FCs could use to fund their activities/events. The dozen or so items that can currently be purchased and sold on the MB aren't worth much because all FCs are selling the same thing.

One thing that SE should do is restructure the amount of Company Credits generated by certain activities (especially activities that are done solo). Crafting and Expert Deliveries seem to generate a very high amount compared to other activity and that puts FCs that focus on other content at a disadvantage.

RE:Fellowships - there's nothing stopping a FC from creating a Fellowship. It's not something that needs to be added by default when not every FC will want one and they are simple to set up if a FC does want one.

RE: all the new ranks without perks - my guess is that was intentional so FCs wouldn't feel pressured into gaining all the new ranks as fast as possible. Now SE can add the perks at a later date and the more active FCs will automatically gain them. It would have been pointless for SE to add the new ranks without some plan for them. Prestige isn't gained from getting something that has no purpose - it's more likely to make people look like fools for wasting their time.

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It would be nice if you gave a bit more information about Lost Ark's system. Saying "weeklies, research" doesn't do much to describe what those are and what value they offer.

I remember WoW's guild level and perk system, and how it ended up a problem in the long run. While a formal structure can seem like a good thing on the surface, FCs should be free to create their own meaning and identity rather than have the game dictate it or offer a reward system that ends up abused by FC leadership.

[Voidedge_Ragna]

This is correct, and im not asking for a sink that can get 100mil credits out and i understand we might be a outliner but there currently is no sink at all, they implemented a gatcha type for GC credits, something similar might work for FC's.

Another problem is ... no matter what they add now, the FC credit value is so diluted that even if a sink is implemented it might be to late or will only punish small FC's

Our FC is doing 2-3 events per week and been going strong for 7 years, but those things always happen with means outside of the game, since even the FC Msg is super limited and yes you can add fellowship and we did because of those exact problems but imo it could just be a option to connect these 2 systems on a easier level, you still for sample have to invite everyone over to the fellowship.

The idea of purchasing land with points seems rather interesting even if i feel its bit late for that now. Grade 3 actions should be obtainable with credits i agree on this.

An upgrade system that offers minor rewards could work as well, spending x amount of credits to increase the chocobo training exp from 1% to 1.5% would hurt noone yet still gives a meaning to credits, this could have a lot of potential upgrades, its however important to balance this to not make small fc's actually miss out things that can be considered crucial.

[Jojoya]

its however important to balance this to not make small fc's actually miss out things that can be considered crucial.

Definitely this agree that it's important for small FCs not to be at a disadvantage, which is probably another reason why more formal FC content hasn't been added. Anything based on participation will heavily favor larger FCs in the long term if not also the short term. Players should feel free to pick a FC that fits their style instead of feeling forced into a large FC for the sake of additional perks/rewards.

Still curious about your Lost Ark comment, though. What are the details of their content, and does it avoid the "small FC/guild will fall behind and be at a disadvantage" pitfalls? Inspiration can be found in other games (much of FFXIV basic design was inspired by WoW, which was in turn inspired by older MMOs like Everquest and Runescape).