On topic (as per the OP), not being able to invite party members in combat is a flaw IMO. I understand why it is there, and I even agree with it, however it makes partying very difficult, especially with NMs. I'm not talking about party swapping. I'm talking about three people getting together to kill an NM for drops the can actually use, and being able to manage (if just barely) until one person drops.

Today, for example, I was fighting Unknown Soldier. A rank 35 LNC, a rank 35 Arc, and a 25 Con. We were surviving, and it was taking a long time to kill, but we were managing. Then, the arc dropped because of connection lost. Now its just me and the con. We survived, but as the only DD, I -could not- out-damage the NM's drain attack. We tried for 30min and could not, under any circumstances, get it below 50% health. We had to disengage, run away, re-invite the arc, and then go back in. We were lucky there was no one else there to re-claim before we could.

This is a prime example of why this needs to be addressed. For us this was a fun, hard battle; at our ranks it is exactly the sort of battle that FF is supposed to be about. Not easy, but takes skill, but not impossible.

Couple this with the fact that outside healers cannot heal people engaged with NMs, and it means if you are relying on a main healer and you loose them in the combat, you are screwed.

Now, I happen to agree with what they are trying to do, but they need to do it in a way that doesn't hamper play. My suggestion would be that if someone joins a party mid-engage, they have some sort of weakness. Its a simple, elegent solution, that mitigates the problem of cycling players.

But I would say, whats wrong with cycling players? My LS frequently goes out to do things that, at our ranks, take a lot of people. Only we're limited to 8 people now because of a lack of alliances. We go out NM hunting and we have to have two parties trading out claims just for our own LS? Thats kind of silly, IMO.

Anyhow, that's my two cents.