Another rant about S ranks

[Jojoya]

They're more or less fine as they are, and if you want to have much say in how your server handles them, join the groups that organize the content.

That is misleading and has led to some of the current problems.

It is open world content open to all who are interested in participating. No one has to join a group to spawn a S rank and kill it, nor do those groups own the content and have any control over it.

If a map party is out in the world and stumbles across a Rank A hunt, they're free to kill that hunt if they want. They are under no obligation to ignore it so it can be part of a later train.

While most of us like to share doing the content with other players, which is why we formed groups and set up relays to inform other players, not everyone does for reasons that become quickly apparent when you attend the current trains and S ranks. The whining and entitlement displayed gets to be a turn-off.

I do not blame those hunters who have separated themselves from the organized community. Sometimes I find myself wanting to join them, though I don't because being part of the community also has its appeal if I ignore those who are always complaining because they think everyone should be waiting on them.

Those who want to take part in the Hunt need to remember a few things:

The content is designed to be Kill on Sight. Don't expect others to wait for you. Drop what you're doing and get there now.

Don't assume the relay you got was sent the moment the S rank was spawned. Spawners sometimes delay relays slightly if they're coordinating things with other spawners. If you're relying on Centurio Hunts and the relay was generated by FiloBot, that only gets sent when someone using the associated mod enters the zone. There have been times when I've spawned things and manually relayed the spawn to Centurio Hunts (which is after I send out notifications to my in-game linkshells and cwls) and the bot doesn't pick it up until 3-4 minutes later. Faloop is completely reliant on manual input - if the spawner or someone else with reporting permissions forgets to report the spawn right away, those relying on Faloop may be getting delayed notification. That leads to:

Early pulls are not always early. There have been times I've waited 6-7 minutes to pull something I spawned and there would still be someone complaining about an early pull. Even if the hunt is pulled before the wait time the community usually prefers, that is acceptable under the game's rules since the content is meant to be Kill On Sight. Don't bother wasting time reporting early pulls to the GMs. They aren't going to do anything.

Accept that players are not intended to make it to every hunt kill. If you miss out on some, there will be more spawning in the minutes, hours, days, weeks, and months ahead. Don't respond with "but muh achieves". Those achievements are intended to be long term grinds lasting the length of the expansion or longer depending on how much you play and how much of your time played is devoted to the Hunt.

[Tygari]

I feel the best solution is to have marks give a level down aura that reduces players levels to the marks level. This aura should fade over time. It will allow people to kill on sight while reducing early pulling. Players can't insta kill it if their the same level as the mark or slightly over it.

[Besame]

Honestly, I would not be doing hunt trains if there were no nuts nor tomestones to be had. I physically cannot run dungeons like I used to BUT...that does not mean I condone the 3rd partyTracker/mod users that give themselves an unfair advantage. I'd like no mods and no world visits. We used to make that work. I even helped flag mobs back then. I see other worlds come to mine consistantly and nab mobs because we seem worn out or apathetic...perhaps we are My suggestion is to join a discord that runs groups on your server and others in the area. There are conductors that do not run bullit trains and stop for a short time so people can get out of the last area lag and into the next for the kill. I hate bullits so I seek those out and have fun doing them because I like doing mechanics and actually killing bosses. Conductors are usually good about posting if it is a bullit or not and you learn real fast who not to go with if you enjoy the hunt like I do.

[dspguy]

I've been playing this game for 11 years now. Generally speaking, early in expansion cycles, the early pulls are more common. As the expansion ages, the frequency of early pulls drops with an occasional rise early on in patch cycles X.1, X.3 and X.5 when we can exchange hunt marks for tomestone gear upgrades.

[KageTokage]

For being world bosses typically attended by 100+ people S ranks really should have more HP then the first tier savage bosses.

On average the DT S ranks are hovering at around 83 million HP which is the same as the second savage Archadion boss...a boss meant to be killed by a mere eight people in about 10 minutes.

[Payadopa]

There is no such thing as pulling early. Am I supposed to check every Discord server in existence?

If anything, every world hopper should receive a debuff for hunts for an hour as to discourage trains.

[Infindox]

There is no such thing as pulling early. Am I supposed to check every Discord server in existence?

If anything, every world hopper should receive a debuff for hunts for an hour as to discourage trains.

Tell that to everyone who hops on the trains for easier gear upgrades when that option pops up or because they actually just you know... Like conducting trains so more people rewarded, or doing trains because they enjoy it.

Jojoya is correct in stating that you aren't expected to get to every pull and they are intended to be a grind. But there's a reason the hunt community has a bad reputation with some people, and your attitude towards the rewards (not caring at all about other people) is partly the reason.

[Jojoya]

There is no such thing as pulling early. Am I supposed to check every Discord server in existence?

If anything, every world hopper should receive a debuff for hunts for an hour as to discourage trains.

Trains will happen regardless. Players had started organizing them going back to end of Heavensward and they were pretty much a standard by the time I began hunting mid Stormblood. They're way too efficient when it comes to rewards for player time.

If SE wants to discourage trains, they need to change the respawn timers. The current 4 to 6 hours creates a tidy window for consistent train organization.

If the respawn window was 2 to 8 hours instead, trains would become a clean up crew at best because most players don't have the time to hang around that long waiting for a train to form. They would kill what gets found as its found or they skip hunts in favor of doing more efficient content for their tomestones.

Personally, I'd be behind SE doing that. I enjoy the actual hunting. I also dislike the massive entitlement that has been generated within the community by those who think that they should be able to get to every kill and that others should be forced to wait for them so they can.

[Payadopa]

Tell that to everyone who hops on the trains for easier gear upgrades when that option pops up or because they actually just you know... Like conducting trains so more people rewarded, or doing trains because they enjoy it.

Jojoya is correct in stating that you aren't expected to get to every pull and they are intended to be a grind. But there's a reason the hunt community has a bad reputation with some people, and your attitude towards the rewards (not caring at all about other people) is partly the reason.

I enjoy not zerg rushing. And, again, early pulling doesn't exist. Not my problem if a Discord makes up fantasy rules.

[EponaTBHSMH]

If anything, every world hopper should receive a debuff for hunts for an hour as to discourage trains.

I believe the same way early pulling isn't something to get mad at, trains are also not a problem

At the end of the day this is content that's not about to get regulated by SE anytime soon, so as a hunter you just do things according to what your goals are and the current reality of things.

You can pull an S rank at the time you see fit, you can also pull an A rank whenever you want without joining any train.

The only problem with the latter is that it might take a while cuz a lot of other hunters are waiting for trains for convenience reasons.