Dark Devices - Exploitation

[MLew0032]

Square will probably only do something once they realize they are losing alot customers since they seem to only care about the money they make and for now people only want to FATE/endgame spam.

[MitArgento]

i seem to be ruining it alot for people it seems, dunno why they get so mad, but it is exploitation of the fate it shouldnt be the way it is

right with you on that, everytime i see it pop up i kill the lambs asap ;D, sometimes the rage is quite amusing

[Vizarie]

right with you on that, everytime i see it pop up i kill the lambs asap ;D, sometimes the rage is quite amusing

ive been reported by 10 off people after ruining 3 so far blacklisted by over 100 people, im doing our cause proud

[xRitzx]

I basically just do FATEs for the seals and occasionally XP so I'm a FATE noob. I did Dark Devices Sunday and noticed the first phase took ridiculously long. I wasn't in a FATE party and made very poor progress because I only got kills when I targeted enemies first using flash. So I had no intentions or benefits of using the exploit to farm mobs. With that said, does this exploit only happen when the boss spawns at the final FATE stage or can the earlier stages be prolonged by focusing on the mobs?

[CrimsonJenn]

As far as i know, people only generally use the first phase for farming.

[pandabearcat]

Thats because the first phase is the only one that can be farmed.

I don't see the big deal. Isn't that FATE exactly what the "FATE nerfers" want people to do? One of the options people push is to have monsters give more exp and having chain farming be a thing. Well, look, here is chain farming at its finest.

So...whats wrong with it?

[CrimsonJenn]

Personally, I don't want fates nerfed. I want them to be the "dynamic content" they claim to be. There's nothing dynamic about standing in a single spot and pressing your aoe button repeatedly and reaping the rewards or following around a hoard of players to a fate that ends in under a minute - there's no danger - there's no thrill. Its repetitive, boring, rehashed MMO content - but it has the potential to be better. And chain farming is an idea some could get behind, but not at the expense and abuse of other content like FATES. The thrill that many people find during chain farming is the timer and the finding of the monster in time to keep the chain going. Having the monsters handed to you on a silver platter and having them have below normal monster statistics while still reaping the full benefit is what is wrong with it.

Here is an interesting article that popped up in the forums recently for those who haven't seen it: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/96418-This...

[xRitzx]

As far as i know, people only generally use the first phase for farming.

Thanks I wasn't sure. After reading more closely through this thread, I see you have to kill lambs for the main objective. I'm also on PS3 and might have not been able to see the lambs because everything is crowded at this FATE and I only see about 30 players/NPCs at a time.

As for the topic.
I feel this is similar to the AK speed runs because people are in disagreement on how they want to complete the task. If AK speed runs were really an exploit, they would have been designed differently before launch. The real problem was AK speed runners were being rude and obnoxious to first-timers that want to run the entire dungeon and not be rushed. There was even a thread supporting the implementation of an anti-speed run mechanism that had arguments for both sides. SE implemented that mechanism and there are less arguments between speed runners and first-timers now in AK.

With DD, SE hasn't publicly told us that this is an exploit and if they thought it was one then it wouldn't have been designed this way from launch all the way up to today. The problem is there are people that want to do the FATE as fast as possible and there are others that want to grind the first phase. People are being blacklisted and reported on both sides of this. People are being rude and obnoxious to people in-game like what happened in AK.

TL;DR The serious problem here is people are harassing each other on both sides of this DD "exploit". If they fixed AK because of harassment issues, they should fix DD too.

[CrimsonJenn]

The thing with exploitation is, its impossible to completely stop, you can't predict every possible loophole players will find ahead of time nor can you see every unintentional design flaw. Its a part of gaming of which all players are accustomed to - whether it be knowing a particular spot a boss can't AOE in, or running tight circles around objects in pvp. Many exploitations are embraced and often turned into interesting features in the future.

As far as speed runs go, none of those dungeons were tested in the beta - they were bound to have a flaw or two, as far as I've seen monsters don't generally heel in many other dungeons.

[GordonLiu]

If this is an exploit then so was being a NIN tank in XI. SE never intended it; it was supposed to DD as well as debuff, but the players saw different potential and ran with it. SE are good about jumping on things they see as exploits, and they haven't done anything about this. It seems to be an intended option for players to collaborate on.

One can (and several have) make the argument that it's cheap, but you know what? FATE is cheap even without the ability to cash in big on a particular one. You can't complain that people are losing out on a learning or fun experience by not-making grinding take as long as humanly possible. FATEs often amount to mindless aoe spamming, blind voking, and the healing of people who don't need it. It's not like people aren't learning their jobs because they aren't doing FATEs for long enough.