Magian Trials

[Yucie]

You don't play catch up when you join late most of MMOs in the market. You just level normally and get quickly back to an acceptable gear level enabling you to do latest content, without going through the same grind veteran players went.

Start WoW today, you won't have to grind through BC>WOTLK the same way veterans players did. The best epic weapon of the previous expansion is usually not even better than an average blue of the current expansion (or even green sometime).

Top players aren't literately years ahead gear wise. They are only ahead until the next tier of equip/expansion arrives and normalize everything back again. Constant progression forces top players to continually play if they want to maintain themselves at the top. While casuals/new players aren't left that far behind.

By having a weapon that you upgrade the same way as some trials (kill X times the same monster to get to the next level), you are only creating a gap that is mostly linear between veterans and new players. Progression shouldn't be linear over the years.

The latest content should be hard to progress through, the old content should be quick to do. XI was probably one of the worse MMO regarding this. Especially pre-Abyssea.

WoW is entirely different. Each time WoW introduces a new patch with new dungeons, they annihilate any gear you acquired previously and negate the gear's existence by introducing new sets much sooner than they actually have to; so basically, WoW results in players constantly grinding through dungeons to get top-tier gear for the duration of that patch, before the next patch destroys all the hard work and effort you put forth, just to have you do it again, and again.

And even so, a new player that just joined said MMO will still have to grind to cap, and work to get gear; that's playing catch-up. What MMO gets rid of that step by giving you an instantly level-capped character with moderate equips?

MMOs will have catch up, one way or another, whether it's leveling or getting gear, or both.

[Elexia]

WoW is entirely different. Each time WoW introduces a new patch with new dungeons, they annihilate any gear you acquired previously and negate the gear's existence by introducing new sets much sooner than they actually have to; so basically, WoW results in players constantly grinding through dungeons to get top-tier gear for the duration of that patch, before the next patch destroys all the hard work and effort you put forth, just to have you do it again, and again.

And even so, a new player that just joined said MMO will still have to grind to cap, and work to get gear; that's playing catch-up. What MMO gets rid of that step by giving you an instantly level-capped character with moderate equips?

MMOs will have catch up, one way or another, whether it's leveling or getting gear, or both.

Antipika just fights against anything and tries to say "bad things" only happened in FFXI.

[Antipika]

WoW is entirely different. Each time WoW introduces a new patch with new dungeons, they annihilate any gear you acquired previously and negate the gear's existence by introducing new sets much sooner than they actually have to; so basically, WoW results in players constantly grinding through dungeons to get top-tier gear for the duration of that patch, before the next patch destroys all the hard work and effort you put forth, just to have you do it again, and again.

That's just what I said, with different words.

And even so, a new player that just joined said MMO will still have to grind to cap, and work to get gear; that's playing catch-up. What MMO gets rid of that step by giving you an instantly level-capped character with moderate equips?

MMOs will have catch up, one way or another, whether it's leveling or getting gear, or both.

Well, World of Warcraft. That's called scroll of resurrection. Ok you're not capped, just 80. That still makes the grind rather fast.

I never said that you will be 100% instantly leveled and geared like veteran players, this is a MMO after all... I just said that it is moderately quick and I don't call that "playing catch up".

But I think really good gear should be lasting (2-3 yrs min), and if a new player stops playing for awhile it should take them awhile to get the gear.

WoW is a crazy extreme... there is no reward for players to do content now, why spend the time and work to get something if it will be complete crap in a few months. Why spend the months and month gearing your ls, when a newby in 1yr can join and get better gear in 1 week just from doing leveling quest.

That's basically the FF XI pre-Abyssea way of thinking. Drop rate are awful, it takes years to get gear, but the counter part is : your gear doesn't get obsolete quickly and even when a new BiS item is available, usually it's only couple items you need to change (or it's a minor upgrade).

And that's what made me leave when level cap increase was announced after "working" (well it's supposed to be a game and be fun) toward getting geared at 75. Doing Salvage every day, 365 days a year, no exception. Dynamis/Limbus/Ein, every 72 hours, always. 100% attendance. Etc. When you really work hard for your gear, yes you don't want it to become obsolete.

This system have its limit however. It discourages players who left to come back and it discourages new players to join. And that's a big problem for MMOs editors nowadays. We cannot just take XI and say "Well it worked ok with XI, there was new players even if the game was 6-7 years old (talking pre-Aby). The market isn't the same now.

If XI would have stayed the way it was before, without any nerf (meaning you still struggle to just clear things like CoP), the gap between veteran players and new players would be too large and no one could join today unless getting completely carried through the content by several veteran players.

The "modern MMO" approach is just different. Everything is tier'd, progression is highly vertical. You get your gear relatively quick (usually 4~6 months top), but the counter part is, your gear is only good until the next tier comes out.

It's a matter of taste, faster or slower gearing cycle. (Right now XIV has been stagnant, so we cannot even talk about any cycle ) We will see what Yoshida will do with ARR, but since he said that ARR should see a level cap increase after the first big patch, I'd say we can expect the game to take a vertical progression approach. How fast? Depends how fast SE can create content.

[MicahZerrshia]

What about bringing them over from FFXI?

Not entirely in the same manner perhaps, but I think it'd be a cool way to enhance drops from older content to keep them relevant when the new stuff rolls out.

It also creates an interesting take on balance, as Garuda is much harder than Ifrit, and her weapons are better too - but what if you could do a trial with an Ifrit weapon to enhance it and bring it up to speed? Same thing goes for our AF - it sucks when you have to put away any kind of really pretty (or otherwise beloved) gear just because it's become outdated by new stuff.

The ToM were a great addition to XI, particularly the Empyrean weapons (up until the 95 patch anyway, ugh damn plates) and I think XIV could really benefit from something similar. However, gear that is enhanced via trials should be rendered non-meldable.


On a side note, I also propose again allowing us to meld Unique items with a single materia to customize them. Just a single little modification to jazz up our favorite gear and differentiate a little more from each other.

NO NO NO and let me repeat again NO

I HATE the magians system in xi. Kill 300 of this and 300 of that oh and then give us 55 of these geodes that have a drop rate worse than the primal weapons. NO NO NO NO NO

Magians was implimented into xi as a time sync to keep ppl playing while they fix xiv to keep ppls money coming in. They are the biggest pain in the backside xi has to offer and not to mention the most BORING thing that they could have given us. Not only are the kill trials something that makes you want to shoot yourself in the foot, having to farm 1-4 ki than kill the same nm 25-50 times...twice and another 33-75 times on top of the insanely boring camping of the 1 hr respawn lottery nm for empy weapons make you wanna shoot yourself in the other foot.

On the bright side these trials also led me to other games such as TERA, Skyrim, Rift and other such games. I cancelled my xi account due to the aby bomb and the magians nightmare, resubscribed after SoA was announced but am so bored with it will most likely recancel my xi subscription within in the next couple weeks so I can give my focus and money to games that deserve my time.

If they want to put in an upgrade system they need to do it another way. The mythics system in xi was nice aside from the insane amount of alex they wanted you to farm. So let me say this to magians in xiv again...

NO

[Baxter]

NO NO NO and let me repeat again NO

I HATE the magians system in xi. Kill 300 of this and 300 of that oh and then give us 55 of these geodes that have a drop rate worse than the primal weapons. NO NO NO NO NO

Magians was implimented into xi as a time sync to keep ppl playing while they fix xiv to keep ppls money coming in. They are the biggest pain in the backside xi has to offer and not to mention the most BORING thing that they could have given us. Not only are the kill trials something that makes you want to shoot yourself in the foot, having to farm 1-4 ki than kill the same nm 25-50 times...twice and another 33-75 times on top of the insanely boring camping of the 1 hr respawn lottery nm for empy weapons make you wanna shoot yourself in the other foot.

On the bright side these trials also led me to other games such as TERA, Skyrim, Rift and other such games. I cancelled my xi account due to the aby bomb and the magians nightmare, resubscribed after SoA was announced but am so bored with it will most likely recancel my xi subscription within in the next couple weeks so I can give my focus and money to games that deserve my time.

If they want to put in an upgrade system they need to do it another way. The mythics system in xi was nice aside from the insane amount of alex they wanted you to farm. So let me say this to magians in xiv again...

NO

There is a such thing as middle ground. Also, killing bosses in the mythic system is really no different in the magian system. If you were working on empyrean path that's pretty much all you were doing were killing bosses. Again, middle ground goes a long way. Okay so you hate killing trash mobs, how about progressive updated gear through completion of raids and defeating bosses?

See? It doesn't have to invalidate a great concept that had poor execution.

[MicahZerrshia]

There is a such thing as middle ground. Also, killing bosses in the mythic system is really no different in the magian system. If you were working on empyrean path that's pretty much all you were doing were killing bosses. Again, middle ground goes a long way. Okay so you hate killing trash mobs, how about progressive updated gear through completion of raids and defeating bosses?

See? It doesn't have to invalidate a great concept that had poor execution.

I didnt say it was a bad concept, but the way se does it is horrible. Having to kill bosses is one thing but having to kill the same boss 25-50 times with NO story line or anything that entertains or makes doing it interesting is a whole different one. Progressively upgrading gear is a good idea, the magians model of doing it however is not. I addressed the magians system itself in my post.

When comparing it to mythic my point was doing nyzul isle climbs, running einherjar or assaults and what not for tokens and ampoules and all that was not really too bad and you could help others get nyzul isle complete, get drops, gear, etc. Basically upgrading by raids and defeating bosses. In magians its just a pain to go kill 300 mobs and having it limited to game day or weather or pet kills. Or just killing time sync lolbosses in aby. Sure you may get a few ppl a couple +2 items but those are easily solo farmed and it can take over an hour just to set up a pt for it, salvage gear was not. The only bad part of the mythic was the amount of alex needed. They kindda overdid that one.

The current mmo market shys away from magians type grinding because a majority of ppl dont like to do it. Its just a handful and you can see that in the low numbers xi is generating. Sure there may be 20k active players per server but since myself and all of the ppl I know have a minimum of 3+ mules and at least 2 accounts which drastically reduces the number of actual players vs active chars.

A weapons upgrade system is one things but an utterly boring grindfest is a whole different story. I'm already on the brink of quitting xi again and if they want to make xiv successful they need to give players more options.

My big hope for xi is that they are just stalling to give us something fun and interesting to do. But Im not holding my breath at this point. SoA from the little that has been talked about so far in interviews and what not is meh at best. ARR sounds like it will be an exciting ride, something I am eagerly awaiting. Taking a page from the current xi no matter how 'classic' it is, would be a mistake.

[Vanguard319]

NO NO NO and let me repeat again NO

I HATE the magians system in xi. Kill 300 of this and 300 of that oh and then give us 55 of these geodes that have a drop rate worse than the primal weapons. NO NO NO NO NO

Magians was implimented into xi as a time sync to keep ppl playing while they fix xiv to keep ppls money coming in. They are the biggest pain in the backside xi has to offer and not to mention the most BORING thing that they could have given us. Not only are the kill trials something that makes you want to shoot yourself in the foot, having to farm 1-4 ki than kill the same nm 25-50 times...twice and another 33-75 times on top of the insanely boring camping of the 1 hr respawn lottery nm for empy weapons make you wanna shoot yourself in the other foot.

On the bright side these trials also led me to other games such as TERA, Skyrim, Rift and other such games. I cancelled my xi account due to the aby bomb and the magians nightmare, resubscribed after SoA was announced but am so bored with it will most likely recancel my xi subscription within in the next couple weeks so I can give my focus and money to games that deserve my time.

If they want to put in an upgrade system they need to do it another way. The mythics system in xi was nice aside from the insane amount of alex they wanted you to farm. So let me say this to magians in xiv again...

NO

lol, you think relic or mythic quests were better? You know the quests that could take YEARS (in real time) to complete? (if ever) At least with the magian trials, you could at least wind up with a decent enough weapon, so you were actually rewarded for the amount of time you put into it. In additon, the Empyrean weapons weren't nigh impossible to get, (was halfway to a Kannagi when I left XI) I don't mind putting effort into my pursuit of a rare or powerful weapon, but I'd rather not spend a considerable portion of my life on getting endgame gear.

[Elexia]

lol, you think relic or mythic quests were better? You know the quests that could take YEARS (in real time) to complete? (if ever) At least with the magian trials, you could at least wind up with a decent enough weapon, so you were actually rewarded for the amount of time you put into it. In additon, the Empyrean weapons weren't nigh impossible to get, (was halfway to a Kannagi when I left XI) I don't mind putting effort into my pursuit of a rare or powerful weapon, but I'd rather not spend a considerable portion of my life on getting endgame gear.

Uh yeah lol. You can get most Empyrean weapons stage 1 in a day or two if you're really dedicated and don't have shitty NM prereqa (like Hovering Hotpot). Kannagi and Almace is barely a few days work compared to Relic and Mythic which is at minimum 5 months work (Mythic) and at least a month (Relic) if you don't buy every bit of your currency.

People just really hate on anything XI related on these forums honestly, even if they're essentially the same systems found in other MMOs in a different skin.

[Vanguard319]

Uh yeah lol. You can get most Empyrean weapons stage 1 in a day or two if you're really dedicated and don't have shitty NM prereqa (like Hovering Hotpot). Kannagi and Almace is barely a few days work compared to Relic and Mythic which is at minimum 5 months work (Mythic) and at least a month (Relic) if you don't buy every bit of your currency.

People just really hate on anything XI related on these forums honestly, even if they're essentially the same systems found in other MMOs in a different skin.

yeah, like I said, you're reward is directly proportional to how much work you put into it, which is how it should be. I don't think it's so much hate for XI as it is apathy towards anything that requires you to actually work for something, whether it be an infinity +1 sword or gathering, or crafting, or whatever.

[Orophin]

Magian trials looked waaaaay more time consuming than I wanted to get involved with. First step for the RDM WS sword was to kill like 4 different NMs 3 separate times or something. I mean I guess it's acceptable being that you can solo most, if not all, of them but it's definitely way more effort than I'd want to put forth.

I'm probably a bit biased though since I only resubbed FFXI recently to get something to 99 so I can do all the story quests I never got done while I was playing five years ago.