The ONE thing Square-Enix should change to make this game the only MMORPG for me

[Kronosan]

Dear friends,
I've played ffxi since the japanese version. I love and hate this game. I loved everything about it until I hit the 50's and started to sit in jeuno looking for a party. I know there are a ton of things you can do besides level up a job, but the point is that I couldn't do what I wanted when I wanted to. FLFP XI. It wasnt such a fanciful experience anymore. I'd sit in town and wait for the right jobs to log on or hope a party, which had already been going for who knows how many hours,needed me. What was once a game of thrill and excitement became a nightmare. Let me tell you, there is nothing fun and exciting about looking for a party. People would drop out at the last moment. Parties that needed me would disband when I got there. The jobs I wanted to play were surprisingly the choice of many others. Sometimes the competition would mean scarce parties for weeks on end. just ugh. uhghhhh.
NOW, I know you can say that this adversity makes the game much more rewarding, but who are you kidding? Not me. I want to face adversity in the shape of a mighty dragon or a boss of a perilous dungeon. I don't want the adversity of making a party. THis is called masochism friends, it isn't healthy.
IF S-E were to just make grinding to 75 a little easier, and a little faster, would it throw a wrench in anything? The end game content and missions could be left just as hard as they are now. It seems the only thing that could happen is more people are unable to resist FFXI's charms. I have no problem with challenging battles, but making a party sometimes is the most challenging and disheartening of all experiences I've ever faced in LIFE!. THe difficulty of the grind is just a big source of so much negative energy.
I have left and come back to FFXI several times, being drawn by everything, but the difficulty of leveling and party formation, which turns me off. Sitting in town looking for a party that might never happen is just such a total waste of time, even for an MMORPG, that I cannot allow myself to play it any longer.
From a successful business perspective:
If it was easier to get to 75, would it mean people would just quit sooner? NO, I would get almost every job to 75! I might even do it all over again on another character! With all the job specific things you can collect it would last forever. IF you can't find a party at level 50? NO problem you can solo. You will never sit in town feeling like you are totally wasting time ever again!
If you could solo even making half the experience you make in parties, the game would simply be irresistable to me. WOuld this make BST obsolete? NO, they could solo monsters for twice the exp as other jobs!
HOW FFXI COULD BE MADE EASIER, BUT NOT ANY LESS INTERESTING:
ONe of my biggest problems with FFXI is the severity of party balance. Not only should every job be able to solo, but many other party formations should be completely workable with the help of subjobs. Let's say I'm a warrior level 60 and I want to party, but there are no healers or mp refreshers online. NO party! time to log off and regret playing the job I wanted to or even FFXI entirely.
NO, what should be a viable option is for everyone who is online, regardless of main jobs, to be able to sub WHM and actually function successfully as a party. A ragtag party of adventurers subbing whm should be able to make a fulfilling experience gaining party. I recall in the original final fantasy being able to make almost any party combination work. Giving the player this freedom to play any main job they want with the subjob acting as a true support for their decision would be a godsend to this game. ALL those dragoons and dark knight's looking for a party could sub whm and brd and get to work. This would definitely prolong the life in this game! Imagine, you and some friends could actually make a duo or trio and party all the way to 75 with whatever jobs you liked. You wouldn't have to take a hit and switch to the jobs that every party needed. It's FINAL FANTASY, NOT FINAL COMPROMISE! Also if it wasn't such a rigid experience to gain levels people might take more risks moving around in a zone, slaying a larger variety of monsters instead of camping spawns in one spot. yawn.
FFXI looks as good as any MMORPG out or coming out in the future. It truly has a timeless quality to it. * A round of applause for the artists at Square-Enix* THe gameplay is the only thing I wish I could fix.
I very badly would like to come back to FFXI, but i just can't allow myself to put that much time into something that sometimes doesn't reciprocate with me.
THen what am i Doing posting this here? Well, I hope that by some odd chance somebody with influence reads this and takes it to heart.
FFXI would probably never see a drastic change like this, but I can dream. It's the kind of tweaking that wouldn't be very costly. A handful of employees could accomplish this kind of change. It would purely be in the numbers.
Any thoughts, anybody? AM I coming out of nowhere? Do I really just *not* get FFXI? Having played it as long as anybody I think I understand it just as well as the next guy.
Sincerely,
the Galka in the back

[largedopantwhite]

This is why I personally believe that there should be a way to use your subjob at a higher level than 37 (assuming both the main and sub are leveled completely). Maybe with merits, a quest, whatever. Then people like myself (and I'm not alone) who have time constraints would be more flexible when it comes to soloing or improvising roles in a party.
One example. Red Mage gets Refresh at 41. If you sub the job, you're never going to be able to use it, even at level 75. Now, if you could get the level up to 41 (or higher), you'd have more flexibility as to what your main could be (maybe a WHM/RDM combo).
Another example, WHM gets Haste at 40. Again, if you could, say, be War75/WHM40, you'd be much more viable in a pickup party.
Point is, there needs to be a more leeway system with the jobs as they are set up. The way it's designed now is so restrictive and suffocating that you cannot solo with all but maybe 4 jobs, having an 'improper' race/job/subjob combo blacklists you from parties, and setting up a party post-30ish (or earlier) can take hours.
I'd also recommend being able to unlock the usage of certain items to a main job that a subjob has (say, a WHM/BRD can use instruments), but I can see too much potential for abuse and twinking with that.

[Kronosan]

Let's spoon.

[Jei]

It sounds weird to me honestly... playing since... umm, since.... jp version? Then you should have known how much EXP has already been REDUCED to level up post 50. You know how much easier it is to gain EXP now compare to when the game was still young, Right?

Right?

... I played since JP version too.... The EXP reduction 2 years ago I think (?) made levelling up 50% faster already. Today, we even got our ToA that we can easily level from 60 to 75 in a week. I'm serious.

Oh well, sorry. I got kinda surprised when you mentioned you played since JP version but still being angry to level up post 50.... That's something you should have gotten used to long ago... or rather, quit long ago if you didn't like it.

I won't blame you for what you hate. But EXP has already been made easier. Many times.

Any everytime it gets easier, many players got angry.

[Kronosan]

Yeah it's late/early, I think i should emphasize that the thing which should be improved is the Parties. I don't mind the amount of experience we have to get. It's the difficulty a player will run into trying to get started on that experience. The last job I wanted to play was warrior and on my lvl 62 warrior many times there simply was not the correct jobs online to make a realistic party. Maybe it's the time of day I can play, or the server I'm on, but for whatever reason the game is not my friend sometimes. And it seems like it should be since I pay for it. Could I get away with sometimes not paying? I just cannot get the correct jobs together nearly half the time to get that experience. IF only there were more "correct" combinations of jobs. and maybe more leeway with the number of players needed to party.
My cousin sold his soul and got rng and brd to 75 easy before I even got one job to 75... I think the fact that I've played since JP and have not gotten to 75 yet says something. It's not that I could not make it. It is that I did not want to, because it would mean so much downtime. I'm a very capable player, it's just that I have rerolled so many times because it was more appealing than the LFP grind at 50-74.
and LOL, players get angry because they just got done shoving that log up you know where and then S-E says "oh didn't you get the memo?"
Besides, I don't think making more party combinations work would anger anybody as long as they were playing the jobs they wanted for the right reasons.

[Murphie]

Well, if you don't want a 75, then why worry about how difficult it is to get to 75? That shouldn't affect you at all.

[Kronosan]

I would like to experience level 75, but I don't want to experience the pain inbetween. ANd you KNOW there is pain. THere is not only fun to be had. And I don't mean the pain of putting time into a party. I only mean the time put into the forming of parties, or the lack of parties in general.


If FFXI parties were able to be more flexible would YOU quit?
I would get to 75 with less pain, would that bother YOU?

another problem with me not getting to 75 by choice is that when I am deciding whether to play FFXI or WoW, the great end game content of FFXI doesn't exist to me.
THis might not bother you, but it certainly bothers S-E, the guys writing the checks to make this game possible.

[Omecle]

I had no problems getting to level 75, don't know what you're on about.

[Balfree]

I highly disagree with absolute "solo", that defeats the purpose of mmorpgs all together.

But there is one small thing that could be done to ease the burden, and that is... the damn players need to think for themselves.

I've had BST RDM NIN exp pt, I've had NIN RDM exp PT, i've had PLD RDM WAR exp pt, i've had PUP RDM MNK exp pt, ive had BRD RDM NIN exp pt, i've had COUNTLESS party formations, duos, trios, 4 man parties, 5 man parties, and regular parties, i'm glad to say i can come up with any party at any time, the only thing you need to do is stop thinking through guides and other people's opinions.

Have you tried chaining EM's with a duo? Have you tried Ts with a trio? VTs with 4 people? Have you tried to have a BST in your party? How about PUP tank? BLM main healer? RDM melee? NIN dd?

Do not be afraid to experiment, sure, its hard to convince other people, but you need to convice yourself first, and you need to convice yourself that this is a dynamic game we have, how many times have you decided that you just want to do something youre not "SUPPOSED" to?

The latest party i had was PUP PUP SMN RDM BLU BST, we had 9 vs 1, it was freakin sweet, the best party i had as BLU so far, PUP tanks are off the scale if done right, just an example.

Get a couple friends, go trio EM/Ts for gods sake, i cant fathom why a 3 man PT has to sit in jeuno waiting for more people to show up, they could be getting SOME exp while looking for people, it just boils down to one little thing...

LAZYNESS.

Get crackin', FFXI is anything but linear.

Dont take me wrongly, i agree with you, but i dont blame the game mechanics, ive tested them and ive succeeded, it has been fun doing so aswell.

One thing i whole heartily agree with you is about subs, it is quite ridiculous the ammount of MP you get from mage subs, for example. You should also be able to get alot more traits, and they should be meaningfull, resist virus makes less sense than a monkey humping a coconut. In terms of MP, you should get the same pool as if the job was your main, only lvl 37 max, it is not. edit: very broken english, what i mean to say is that you should get the MP of your sub job without the current penalty, if a 37 RDM main has 300 MP, a WAR75/RDM37 should also have 300 MP due to the sub.

MP regain is also ridiculously slow, i understand the concept, but i disagree with the means, all mages should have auto-refresh, even if it was 1 tick per 5 seconds, in the same subject, potions shouldnt be so expensive, honestly, if hi-potion tanks were like 1k each, would you not solo using hi-potions? If you could stack potions like in other MMORPGs, would you not be able to solo more? Or bypass the need for more than one healer?

Juices and potions need to STACK, god DAMNIT they need to stack, SE needs to open their eyes, that would be a humongous benefit in parties, it does not replace a refresher, but god does it help...

Those are my ultimate beefs with conventional exping sessions.

Now i need to work, ><

[Kronosan]

I like this Ballfree guy.
You're absolutely right solo isn't the point of MMORPGs,but it wouldnt hurt if it were a possibility when you only have one hour to play and a party no matter how flexible just will not happen. As long as insentives to party still existed the ability to solo wouldn't hurt this game at all. If anything the 2-3 people on that are around the same level LFP should band together and be able to start getting experience no matter how many are in the party. I absolutely hate logging on wanting to get experience points only to find there is not enough my level on looking for party to get it done. Makes me dread what the game might be like as the population continues to ween. Also the buddy system with improvements could be an excellent aid to overall enjoyment.
I feel strength returning to my Galka veins.
I'll give that warrior one more shot! : )
I'm uninstalling WOW!!!! that cheap floozie
FFXI, let's get married and settle down.
I only hate FFXI because I love it so much ^^

OH and yeah i remember trying to chain EM with my drg friend at level 60. I was a taru DRk and he was a taru DRG. ... We died too often to make it a realistic way to level up. Every fight would make us rest for what felt like 5 minutes. Every fight there was a chance one of us would die. More often than not that one to die was me :)

taru DRK +taru buddy w/ Super jump = dead Taru DRK

lol, jk he wouldnt do that to me, I would end up with hate anyways, and he had no way to get the hate. His wyvern would get the hate with its breaths and i had to save it. The majority of jobs aren't really made for parties with less than 6 people. BLU BST and NIN are really the only jobs suited for such a party

[Bricklayer]

One thing i whole heartily agree with you is about subs, it is quite ridiculous the ammount of MP you get from mage subs, for example. You should also be able to get alot more traits, and they should be meaningfull, resist virus makes less sense than a monkey humping a coconut. In terms of MP, you should get the same pool as if the job was your main, only lvl 37 max, it is not.


Thank God I wasn't drinking anything when I read that part.

[Kronosan]

One more thought:

The experience should more fairly scale to the number of people in a party, A la Diablo II. I think Diablo II was a very successful multiplayer game. Diablo II increased the difficulty and the experience gained by the monsters so that split among the players it was roughly the same as when you were soloing if not better. IT MADE EXPERIENCE A NON-ISSUE. You could worry more about the fun adventure and less about how much experience you were making. Every FFXI player has to be an analyst constantly paying attention to how good experience is. It is a cause of a lot of negative energy. People will be picky about parties they join, understandably. THey can make a lot more experience with one party than they can in another. People will understandably be annoyed by these people. People have less fun and more worries. A party of three should be able to get just as much experience as a party of six. THE DIFFICULTY OF FACING MONSTERS WITH LESS PEOPLE SHOULD BE REFLECTED IN THE AMOUNT OF EXPERIENCE GAINED. IF you were to take a monster that 6 would fight with only 3 you should get twice the experience. It would be impossible, but what this means is if you fight something twice as easy you should get the experience the 6 would have gotten fighting the monster twice as hard.

And by twice as easy i dont mean half the level. Clearly a level 30 monster would be way more than twice as easy as a level 60 monster to level 50s

At level 60 an EVen MAtch is NOT an even match. If you could even win when you fight an even match with a level 60 It should give you way more experience than 100..
Currently you have to worry about how much experience you will get first, and how much fun you will have second. YOu have to put on your suit and tie and take out the calculators. Cuts will have to be made. THis is business. We can't party with this mix. It won't be enough of a profit. It isn't all fun and games.
Currently 3 people cannot get nearly as much experience as a party of 6 and it prohibits exciting things like risk taking and adventure. Last time i checked that's what these games were supposedly all about.

ANd yeah I'm kind of cynical, but with good reason.


I JUST USE CAPS TO SORT OF ORGANIZE POINTS FOR THOSE THAT SKIM. hope nobody takes it for arrogant ranting. I HUMBLY SUBMIT MY MIND : )

and man do i need an editor...

[Murphie]

I would like to experience level 75, but I don't want to experience the pain inbetween. ANd you KNOW there is pain. THere is not only fun to be had. And I don't mean the pain of putting time into a party. I only mean the time put into the forming of parties, or the lack of parties in general.


If FFXI parties were able to be more flexible would YOU quit?
I would get to 75 with less pain, would that bother YOU?

another problem with me not getting to 75 by choice is that when I am deciding whether to play FFXI or WoW, the great end game content of FFXI doesn't exist to me.
THis might not bother you, but it certainly bothers S-E, the guys writing the checks to make this game possible.FFXI isn't for everyone. Maybe you're just not the right customer for this game. SE seems pretty content with their subscription levels, and thousands of players have absolutely no problems getting to 75. Most people that have been playing as long as you have are on their fifth or sixth 75. There really isn't that much of a problem from 50-75 these days.

It sounds as though the problem you have is more player based than game design. There isn't any problem in the game mechanic to prohibit putting parties together. It only becomes an issue when there aren't the jobs/players you need to form a good party. That's not SE's fault.

[Kronosan]

It only becomes an issue when there aren't the jobs/players you need to form a good party. That's not SE's fault.

If S-E's game mechanics make "not enough players to party" an issue, are not the game mechanics possibly an issue? I think nearly all of the game mechanics are fine. The pace of battles doesn't bother me. The inability to jump does not bother me. I love the gameplay. There are less abilities and spells than in most MMORPG's, but quantity is not always better than quality and this is the case with FFXI. It is simply a quality game. The changes to the party mechanics would not cause mass chaos. The game would just rock a lot harder.


The Things S-E Could Improve
Chapter 2
There is a level of inaccessibility when it comes to the amount of time required to form a party in the higher levels. I don't think S-E 's game design is necessarily wrong, I just think there could be improvements to make it more accessible to players who cannot tolerate wasting a few hours trying to put a party together. What bugs a lot of people is the amount of unproductive time put into this game when it comes to trying to get experience points. People can put a lot of time into these games, but that is already a stretch for some. To then discover that half the time you will get nothing out of the time you put in is just ludicrous.
If you don't have a problem with this that is great for you. Me and my friends cannot do it. We have commitments that won't allow it. Even in the warning at the start of the game: dont play too much, don't forget loved ones etc. They say don't play too much, but the game speaks differently. It says stay logged on for long periods of time. Always scout for possible parties. Don't do your work You might miss that party.
I think square should make improvements because they can. This is an issue that has a solution. As of right now FFXI is not for everybody, but would it really bother you if it was? And by everybody I don't mean lousy players. The majority of people that would consider returning to FFXI are mostly mature players with time constraints due to work or family. Again i don't mean make the game incredibly easy i just think the issue of not being able to party sometimes is a serious deterrent. If I'm going to invest time I don't want there to be a possibility of no return. On some nights this can happen. No return at end game is much different than no return trying to get to end game. If i were to put time into killing an HNM and it was unsuccessful it wouldn't bother me as much as trying to put a party together and not being successful.


FFXI isn't for everyone. Maybe you're just not the right customer for this game.

Is my suggestion so outlandish to make me a customer not worth having? It seems you are suggesting this? If a restaurant was making burgers that looked and smelled great but tasted a little bitter would it just not be for everyone? wouldnt everyone like better burgers? Isn't this silly? come now, lets all eat the tastiest burgers possible.
silly analogy but it rings true. I've never had a problem with the population in an MMORPG being as strong as it possibly can be.

Throw a dog a bone

[Murphie]

That's a poor analogy. It would be more like you go to a restaurant where they are serving very tasty burgers that you just don't happen to like. Everyone else seems to enjoy it, and the restaurant is doing great business. Why should they change it just because you don't like the way they taste?

It would honestly bother me a bit if SE were to try and dumb down the game so that more people would subscribe. One of the things that I like about this game is the challenge. I like that you can't just go from 1-75 in a matter of weeks (and actually you can, as the recent expansion proved). Keeping the challenge level high weeds out those who can't hack it, and I like it that way.

I really think you're exaggerating the issue with regard to getting a group. Sure, depending on the time of day you seek, the job you play, and how well you play when you do get parties will all affect how fast you level. If you're a DD who doesn't bother to make yourself stand out, then yeah, it's going to take a while to get 75. If you are a job that is rarer, or if you make a point of going above and beyond, or if you make your own parties, then you're not going to have as much trouble.

Really, I just don't think it's as big an issue as you're making it out to be.

[Kronosan]

explain to me how any of the suggestions i've made would dumb this game down. How would more diverse job choices and therefore more role playing dumb down the experience? Seems like it could possibly be more rich than your wildest dreams.

Let's say I wanted to level a drg. COudl i do 1-75 in a week.. not even close.

And is not being able to party sometimes tasty? do you love when that happens?

And I wouldnt necessarily want to go to 75 in weeks. I just don't like the hang ups when there arent enough people to party. I don't mind how long it takes to get experience once you are IN a party.

I sound like two sides arguing because thats what happens when a game has good and bad things. The bad things in a game don't make the good in it even better. The crappy things in life do that.

THe traffic coming home from work makes FFXI sweet. The traffic getting a party does not.
Let's agree to disagree Murphie I'm curious what others have to say on this.

[Murphie]

There are already 18 jobs in the game, resulting in quite a few options when combined with a sub. Sure, we could use at least one more tank, and maybe another healer, but my god. The problem is that there are too many DD jobs, and everyone wants to play them because healing and tanking aren't super awesome or something.

I never have any problems partying. Regardless, it's a problem with the player base, not with game design. If you aren't having much luck with parties, take it up with the people who play on your server. Not SE.

Personally, I think your ideas have very little merit. The game has flaws, yes, but the suggestions you've made aren't going to improve the things I think are wrong with FFXI. But that's me.

[Kronosan]

Personally, I think your ideas have very little merit.
ditto.
I sensationalize a bit yes, but it doesn't mean it isnt an issue to a lot of people. It would make the difference between me playing FFXI insted of WoW.



IDEA: a formulated thought or opinion

Well, if you don't want a 75, then why worry about how difficult it is to get to 75? That shouldn't affect you at all.
Personally, I think your ideas have very little merit.
There are already 18 jobs in the game, resulting in...
Regardless, it's a problem with the player base, not with game design.
take it up with the people who play on your server. Not SE
I didn't suggest anything, genius. XD

[Murphie]

I didn't suggest anything, genius. XD

Honestly, if you want to level faster or more consistently, either set up a static with these friends of yours who also have trouble leveling, or play a job that gets invites really fast. It's just that simple.

[Neomage]

One thing I wish se would do is make it possible for all jobs to do something in a solo quest to earn mabye a max. of 10k EXP/week as a supliment or if they really hate partying or just can't find one, at least get to where the fun stuff is. Level 1-10 was fun. The dunes where murder but an experiance to remember. And how did you feel when you first steped into Jeuno?

Between levels 40 and 70 that majesticy fades are your stuck with a redundant monotoned level grind that there is no alternative to get to the rest of the fun content. By no means is the level grind hard, but it's to tireing to put up with. I havn't joined an EXP party on my 66 BLM for 2 months because I don't want to put up with the repeating agony of 85% of parties(some 15% are actually fun) just to get four levels and hit 70 and join my friends in endgame.

[ikkleste]

I both agree and disagree with the OP in a way.

I don't beleive the owness is on SE to change anything here. THe fact is that picking just about any 6 people with give you some sort of party that can exp. Particularly if people are flexible with their subs. The problem is that 97% of the people don't just want some exp. They want an optimum party that will give them max exp.
And theres the rub. Even if SE tweaked things so more parties were viable theres always gonna be a "best" and while so many people refuse to settle for anything but the "best" all the other options get ignored. It's exactly whats happening right now.
Six months ago people whined and bitched about not being able to find a healer/refresher/tank, there were too many melee LFG. If they got a healer/tank/refresher/DD/DD/DD party they could get X exp/hr if they only had DD/DD/DD/DD/DD/healer they would only get Y exp/hr. SE makes burn parties a better option (able to earn Z exp/hr) and people still whine. Because theres a new "best". X exp/hr isn't good enough anymore they need Z to even consider partying. Has the old party setup gone away? No, the camps are still there. But people want in on the "best". For the the old setups are no longer viable options.

Sadly it doesn't matter what SE does, theres always going to be a "best" setup
and the mentaltiy for a lot in the game is that only the best is good enough. SE could make every setup "viable options" but there will only be one best option and that is the one that most people are going to go for.

[Zamphire]

I hate people who whine about not being able to get parties. I've taken 7 jobs past 50 (I have two characters) and through a little work on my part a compromise you can almost always make a party. First, do /sea all inv 48-52 that will give you a range of people who are looking for a party in a level range of 50. There's almost always at least 1 or 2 people you can build a party with. NIN or PLD for a tabk, if not grab two melees with /nin, perferably war/nin to dual blink tank. RDM, WHM, SMN for healer. Can't find those? get ANY 2 mages and have them sub whm, they can heal. As long as you have 1 tank and 1 healer you can make a group. If there's not any on the inv list, start looking for people that are not activily seeking. /sea all whm 48-52. Yes, it gets annoying to be the whm that gets invites when they aren't seeking, but you've gotta make a party somehow and most dont mind as long as you only ask once. Just go down the list sending {Party} {Do you need it?} to every WHM that isn't in a party. Repeate for the rest of the jobs. If you do this, there's about 1/50 chance you wont be able to make a party. In which case, go level another job or farm/craft or something while lfp, you can always use more money.

[queenuma]

I never have any problems partying. Regardless, it's a problem with the player base, not with game design. If you aren't having much luck with parties, take it up with the people who play on your server. Not SE.

Murphie stop abusing that nail, its got enough headache as it is :wasted:

The problem is most definatly the players. Everyone is unwilling to do anything without this or that job in their party. My 54drk hasn't had a party for weeks as a result. Is my gear crap? No. Do I have a bad reputation? No, quite the opposite actually. Have I had parties at 5/6 that won't leave Jeuno until they find a brd or cor? Yes and it sucks.

It would seem that most players are not content with 4-5k an hour in a reasonable party, they would rather wait 6 hours for a certain job to appear so they can get their 6,7 or even 8k per hour. Its infuriating.

Got an almost full party but can't find a tank?
Quick Mr Whm you'd better disband and go back to sitting with your flag up then.

Here's an alternative I offered my last party but they simply laughed and wouldn't take it as a serious option. If you have a whm or rdm in the party and you are lacking a tank get them to sub war, equip a wind staff and go fight worms. Rdm/war casting silence with a wind staff, spamming enfeebles and voke is the best worm tank. As long as they keep hate the worm will never.... let me just emphasise that, NEVER! hit anyone in the party. This also works if you have a rng in the party. Have them sub war, voke and go all out on their DD and the whm or rdm only has to cast silence. Simple as that.

Can't find a refresher and you have a pld tank.
Oh no!!! Call the police! Evil Mr Downtime is about to visit.

So you'll have downtime without a refresher, wonderful. Consider though that slow experience gain is infinatly faster than no experience gain. If your pld or whm is that desperate for refresh have all the party take juice components with them. 6 members with a couple of stacks of water crystals and oranges each will last longer than you think.


Of course the chances of either of these options being used are slim to nil. Whats that you say Slim?...... Slim?....... nope he's gone. Ah well, guess everyone is content with what they're getting :wtf:

P.S for those who may doubt the rdm/war tanking worms. I did it in Kuftal quite easily a long time ago so I do have first hand experience.

[KoukiRyu]

I agree with Zamph here...I made it to 75 on MNK, and most people say that MNK is lfp forever...I made my own parties by doing exactly what he said, just going down the list, seeking or not, and asking people just once if they were up for partying. If you can't make a party like that, then it's definitely the players on your server, or your server as a whole. Although, I do really like the idea of being able to solo more...I personally solo Easy Prey Lesser Colibri while partying, I mean it's only like 30 exp per each one, and I can only kill 3 or 4 before needing to rest, but it's not that bad. Being able to take Even Matches...or at least Decent Challenges solo past 30 would be really nice, because those that con for that are far too hard -_-

[Zamphire]

Also, something that alot of people don't know, but a fully level BST sub will let you charm things equivilent to your mains level. Charm is almost completely CHR based. So as long as you have enough CHR (grab a few CHR rings) you can go out and solo BST style on almost any job.

[Celeal]

Or try to form a full or partial static party with friends. Just make sure your static contain some key role like a tank or refresher. The rest can be fill in from pick-ups (form your own parties).

You can start a partial static with a minimum of 2 people.

[Kaickul]

Honestly I am not about to drain my brain reading that wall of text, but from what I can gather from skimming and reading other posts this is what I guessing it read.


Gimme, gimme, gimme, me, me, me, my, my, my, now, now, now... becuase I am yet another an instant gratification whore.



Everyone who has stayed with this game has had to work for their rewards like everyone (almost) else and if they didnt like the work... well ...go do something else.

[Hantz]

http://www.playonline.com/pcd/topics/ff11us/detail/871/871_8.jpg

"The ONE thing Square-Enix should change to make this game the only MMORPG for me"

Oh wait...that wasn't it? Oh I see. You wanted something else....

[Omni]

I agree with others in that its not up to SE to make your leveling experience quick and instantaneous whenever you want it to be.

The thing about wow is that it provides everything for you, right away, right now. I think this causes players to be spoiled in a sense when they come to ffxi. You really need to have patience.

If you still want to play but still dont have any time, really, do other stuff. I have as busy of a schedule as any of you. I work full time, irl happenings, etc. It's a bit better now but the past 2 yrs, I had probably 4-5 hours a week to play. I logon, seek right away. If I dont get an inv. w/i the first 30min, I go find something else to do while my inv is still up.

The problem isnt with the game or the jobs, its just lazy people. When I see at the 75 range, you find 40-60 ppl seeking. Plenty of tanks, healers, refreshers, and dd seeking. 30min later you find the same ppl still seeking. Why? No one wants to make their own pt. No one wants to lead. Times I get a pt where someone half way through forming, they say they dont want to lead anymore. Then everyone else says they dont want to lead. If PT leader leaves during a PT, no one wants to pick up lead. Everyone just wants to go along and not have to do anything and reap the XP.

Find a friend, alternate making PTs together. If not, just do a little research on where to camp, and start making your own. Dont hesitate. Say this is where you are going, and this is what we are killing. People will listen.

Theres no amount of code that SE can implement to make you play with others. If you dont initiate anything, what do you expect to happen?

[queenuma]

Omni, I find I have the opposite trouble. I don't mind being the leader and will constantly try to setup my own party but in-demand jobs are such arses these days. If I start a party and get a whm if I don't have a brd/rdm/tank within 10 mins of them joining they leave and stick their flag back up. Five minutes later I've got a tank to join so am about to invite the whm again and I usually see:

Tank>> {Party} {/no} {White Mage}? {No Thanks}

So the tank will then drop, the whm will join again check the member list, see no tank then drop and won't accept another invite. Its not like I don't communicate what I'm doing to the party either.

Plain and simple, there is nothing SE can do about this bar equipping the game with a USB connected Forkmatic 9000.

That's right folks! The Forkmatic 9000 for all of your eye forking needs.

[Omni]

I see what you are saying. That usually happens to me in the earlier levels. Where most players that are usually less experienced. They tend to be real premadonna-ish about everything.

Usually towards the later stages of the game, people understand what it takes to put a pt together, and are pretty patient. Though you still get your lame idiots from time to time.

I have to admit, I dont normally like leading PTs on my own. If I have a buddy PTing with me, I'll do it but I usually dont form my own pts. In doing so, I stare at 40 other people thinking the exact same thing. :p Difference is, I have plenty of other things to do if I dont pt, so no biggie.

[Zamphire]

I'm {Impossable to gauge!} at creating parties. That's one of the things I pride myself on. Usually a party I put together is a really good party.

[Clever Ninja]

I don't even wait half an hour. After 5 minutes I start searching to see whose seeking. With the exception of rare occasions, I can almost always make a complete party. And since I have my own seperate list of 'People to not party with' that I started when I first entered the Dunes, don't have to deal with the same bs twice.

If I'm playing a mage class though, I usually don't have to wait 5 minutes. Or 1 minute. Or even have my flag up >_>.

[Murphie]

Well, at least I don't feel so unreasonble now (not that I really thought I was being unreasonable, but whatev).

[Vyuru]

I either have the same problem as Queenuma, or people want to be invited when I have 5/6 people in my party, then they join other parties, it gets rather frustrating at times.

I don't think jobs need to be made more versatile, people just need to be more open to new things.

I mean, hey, as drg/rdm with AF helmet, I main healed a party in the Mire fighting Jnun with a taru paladin tank, I can main heal almost anything but tri bats, pugils, spiders, and maybe raptors.

Those fire crawlers that people like to exp on now don't count since I see level 68 paladins with full hp get one shotted on watersday >.>

Also, people need to play their jobs to the fullest, I see FAR too many red mages with "main heal no thanks" in their search comment, or white mages who refuse to party with thiefs, the list just goes on.

Need a dispeller? Grab a blm/rdm. Need refresh? If you need it so badly consider a dragoon/bard, refresh for mages and AoE haste for melees saving the mages that much more mp, I'd be willing to sacrifice some damage to do that for a party.

Besides, mages don't need refresh, grab some cookies, a dark staff, and a blm sub, rest for 20 seconds, you'll have full mp back, exaggerated I know, but it's true, only paladins should have refresh because many use spells to cure themselves and for hate gain, no other job needs it. Any mage can sub rdm for dispel past lvl 64, so needing a brd or a rdm for dispel is a moot point, and in 13 levels of using dispel I have yet to see it ever resisted, I honestly don't think it can be resisted. I don't know about magic finale though.

There, now any party can work without needing brd or rdm, which have been the major hangups in building my parties, but people won't ever go with anything but the "best" setups.

[Aeni]

If I'm playing a mage class though, I usually don't have to wait 5 minutes. Or 1 minute. Or even have my flag up >_>.

You're just lucky or in an unusual time slot where everyone else is watching Survivor on TV. When I go LFP on RDM, I find 10 other RDMs LFP. Try to form a party and whoops! No wonder so many RDMs LFP... there's no melee at all!!!!

[Kronosan]

I think some of these veterans minsunderstand. I'm not looking for the work to be easy. I just think that sometimes the work has no returns. And that's lousy. When you log on to FFXI you can end up wasting time trying to get an exp party going. One should be able to log on and get to work more easily. The work itself can remain hard and long and repetitive. That doesn't bother me as much as not being able to even get to work at all.

[Vyuru]

Well, I don't know if it's we don't understand, because (just using the exp party as an example) if parties were more flexible, there wouldn't be this much work.

Most people want a very specific party grouping, if they don't get it, they won't party, period. It seems to me that what you are complaining about was created by the players themselves.

Should SE change this? Well, I dunno, this is SE's game, and I assume that it is working how they designed it. But I think that SE should also adjust to how the players play the game.

So while I do kind of agree with you, I do think that this is a playerbase fault, and I think SE should focus on other aspects of the game first, especially since there are 4 ways to get exp scrolls that I know of, escort missions, chocobo races, those extermination quests and garrisons. You can also do ENMs for exp. Some of these can be done solo, and some you need a group of people to do, most of those net you neat items and gil as additional rewards and can be done at least once a week. They are all very fun and if I had more time to play, I would be organizing linkshell events around these again like I used to.

If you did an ENM in all of the battlefields once a week, you could get what, 16k exp per week while making gil at the same time? Sure, you need to get to a certain stage in CoP missions to access all of the ENMs, but most of them sound easy, but there is alot of travel time involved.

So I think the exp grind is just fine the way it is, but I'll still complain about not finding any thiefs to party with ever since I got Wheeling Thrust :P

[Clever Ninja]

You're just lucky or in an unusual time slot where everyone else is watching Survivor on TV. When I go LFP on RDM, I find 10 other RDMs LFP. Try to form a party and whoops! No wonder so many RDMs LFP... there's no melee at all!!!!

Alright, I'm not gonna lie. It's cause my mages are low level. Highest is 23 RDM >_>. Hades has a shortage of low level mages, so I get rapid invites ;_;.

[Theyaden]

One more thought:

The experience should more fairly scale to the number of people in a party, A la Diablo II. I think Diablo II was a very successful multiplayer game. Diablo II increased the difficulty and the experience gained by the monsters so that split among the players it was roughly the same as when you were soloing if not better. IT MADE EXPERIENCE A NON-ISSUE. You could worry more about the fun adventure and less about how much experience you were making.


/em huddles in the fetal position
/say nooo... I don't want Godly plate of the Whale at level 1... nooo not another hacked character with 9999 hp and mp trying the blaze me to death.

Seriously though Diablo and Diablo II were so overrun by cheaters PKing people it was seriously hard to enjoy beyond 3 weeks of play. It was improved in II a bit but it was a short term cheaters paradise and the ease of xp left very little feel of accomplishment. I could blaze through levels, kill Myphisto rinse and repeat but it was never a challenge even when you don't dupe/hack exc.

It was enjoyable for when you feel like just butchering an area, but didn't have long term chalenge to sustain a gammer. As much as we may complain about things being tough and anoying to do it's that same ammount of difficulty that keeps us comming back for more. I will agree waiting for pt's can be annoying, but thats a matter of players rather than game mechanics. Short of having multiserver leveling areas that allow access only to those within a set level range say 40-47 45-52 exc I'm not sure how SE would resolve the problem of pt's higher levels. Advertising in your ls for a static pt or linkshell party might help you also.
Best of luck and goodnight

[Blowy]

Dear friends,
NOW, I know you can say that this adversity makes the game much more rewarding, but who are you kidding? Not me. I want to face adversity in the shape of a mighty dragon or a boss of a perilous dungeon. I don't want the adversity of making a party. THis is called masochism friends, it isn't healthy.
IF S-E were to just make grinding to 75 a little easier, and a little faster, would it throw a wrench in anything? The end game content and missions could be left just as hard as they are now. It seems the only thing that could happen is more people are unable to resist FFXI's charms. I have no problem with challenging battles, but making a party sometimes is the most challenging and disheartening of all experiences I've ever faced in LIFE!. THe difficulty of the grind is just a big source of so much negative energy.

They reduced the exp required to get to 75 by about 12%.
They increased the amount of experience gained by killing all EP/DCs, in some cases by up to 100%.
They gave us rings which essentially give you a free 1000exp every day.
They increased the cap on exp from 200exp per mob to 300exp.
They added merits to L75 jobs which can make your character much stronger when levelling future lower level jobs.
They added an adventuring fellow to help you solo mobs.
They added easy quests which require 15minutes running to get free exp.
They added a soloable ENM which also gives free exp.

... but if only they'd make things a little easier for us!!!!

(oh yeah, you get a 15% bonus to your exp when exping in Aht Urghan if you use the free sanction...)

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Needed an advil to read all that (seriously, there's just no need for huge, overly verbose block paragraphs, cut it down a little).

There's a game for you out there, its called World of Warcraft and its ease of gaining EXP solo is utterly misleading to the endgame content you get. You go from not needing anyone for most of the game to needing lots of people at the end of it. FFXI makes no apologies about you needing people and it pretty much does it from the start.

I don't want a game where lots of people can solo, it would take away from the fun of being able to do so now as DRG, BST, RDM, NIN, BLU and THF. People stay away from jobs like BST because they're hard to do and people who enjoy that for the solo like the distinction of being able to do so, for example. If everyone can solo, why be a BST or one fo the other jobs.

And while giving people stackable juices wouldn't harm BRD or COR, it would really damage RDM in terms of invites. We already have Sanction Refresh, Vermy Cloaks and other ways to get it, I'm not a RDM nowadays, but let's not gut the job of its biggest invite incentive. Unless Refresh and Juice Refresh can be made to stack, RDM would get hurt here.

And personally, I think a few subjobs are already broken enough - /THF, /SAM and /NIN. /THF already robs most THF mains of a PT slot, their role in enmity control is taken away from them, Trick Attack should have been job-exclusive. /SAM has had its ups and downs, but the introduction of Absorb-TP has gutted SAM as a main to a certain extent, being able to exploit that further with /SAM's TP abilities hurts SAM as a main now, make it exclusive to SAM.

I mean, why is it DRG is the only class that gets a JA and pet that's totally exclusive to it? Why can't other jobs have some exclusives under sub?

And that leaves us with /NIN. This is where FFXI gets the most unbalanced and also where SE made one of this biggest mistakes - putting Utsusemi: Ni in subjob range. The biggest problem with is that RNGs were punished last year for the same thing WARs and other jobs exploit it for now - damage mitigation. RNGs once unleashed huge damage for no consequences by subbing /NIN. Now everyone else does, but RNG remains nerfed on the damage end. Hypocritical to say the least.

Last year, RNG was also problematic because at high levels there were so few places to EXP. A roaming PT of RNGs could decimate a zone and leave other PTs with tablescrap EXP, all the while not taking much in the way of damage thanks to /NIN. After RNG got their damage cut, WARs just picked up where RNG left off and actively do the same thing.

Just because we have more places to do merit now doesn't balance things out. RNG remains nerfed while other jobs still openly exploit /NIN - big damage with no damage taken in return -either alter their damage too or just suck it up and move Ni past subjob level.

Now endgame tanks are starting to lose out their roles to a freaking support class because of /NIN and another little mistake known as Raptor Mazurka. A useless gimmick as far as travel goes, yet it enrages gods and kings alike. Did I mention the flurry of terrible BRDs now invading the class in hopes of exploting this?

And you want this game to be broken further purely because you can't make the cut for PTs? Sorry, but we have enough problems as is.

[kiffkin]

Besides, mages don't need refresh, grab some cookies, a dark staff, and a blm sub, rest for 20 seconds, you'll have full mp back, exaggerated I know, but it's true, only paladins should have refresh because many use spells to cure themselves and for hate gain, no other job needs it.
A solo BST here, but the point is still the same (unless Dark Staff somehow works differently for mage mains). At level 51 I got a Dark Staff and, while it did cut my downtime considerably, it was still there, and a lot more than 20 seconds at a go. At 52 I got a Gaudy Harness and (limited) Auto-Refresh. I can now xp for hours with zero downtime. That's zero as in I can be down to 0 mp and red hp and still keep going without missing a beat.

Also, unless things have changed since last time I used cookies (it was certainly the case then, as I tried it), a mage who uses cookies can't use any other food at the same time.

[Oogami]

Aherm...

Absorb-TP is a Lv 45 DRK ability, unless you're talking about /SAM's nerfed Meditate.

And Dragoon is the only pet class that has no direct control over the pet. Summoners, Beastmasters and Puppetmaster respectively have Assault, Sic, Manouvers etc. to have a semblance of control. Dragoons only get Dismiss. The most control a Dragoon has over the Wyvern is the Healing Breath trigger. A Wyvern is a part of the Dragoon, and is more of a companion rather than a pet.

There is already another class with "exclusive" JA, and they had it way before "Call Wyvern" got changed from a 2HR to a JA.

Beastmaster.

Which ability? Lv 23 Call Beast.
Why? Jugs are Beastmaster only.
(Reading about them jugs makes me wanna play beastmaster...)

Besides, I have not seen many /SMN actually using their Avatars due to the inefficiency. That's already half exclusive if you ask me.

And yeah, you can't eat other food and still munch on cookies. But that's what I mostly eat during XP anyway. The only one time I found myself never having to /rest as a WHM was in Aht Urghan. Lv 55 BRD+RDM+Sanction Refresh is insane. Plus, I had a super PLD tank, so I was mostly casting Haste, Regen and Flash.

[dirtyclown]

OP, do me a favor. Wish in one hand and shit in the other, see which one fills up first. Changing game mechanics to make the game less strict on party setups is quite unlikely. And what's more unlikely is the playerbase changing their minds without being forced. It sucks that you get rubbed the wrong way but it happens. Nothing you can do about it except maybe find a couple other people with a similar mindset and form a static. As for the rest of you, potshots and "GTFO, go to WoW" posts confirm that the playerbase for this game is a bunch of assholes. Go against the grain, damnit!

[Telera]

I think the problem also lies more with the inabilty of the vast majority of the playerbase to think outside of the box. With my b/f and I (he's a dragoon, I am a summoner) agreeing to static our first jobs to 75, we usually *would* form our own parties, as the "Invite also ..." thing never works. Sometimes we would split up and go lfg and agree to quit at certain limits, but for the majority of 50-60 (where I've currently stopped b/c this game has burned me out) we would form our own parties.

The problem with that? Tanks seem to be in mysterious short supply on Ifrit. We would attempt making parties at various times of day, varying 'peaks' and still would find very few ninjas or paladins within our range that were not afk, in a party, or just unwilling.

On the converse, we decided to help a dragoon build a party in Al Zhabi one day, invited a blu, who promptly dropped because we had a war/nin Galka for a tank, as there were no 'full' Ninjas or Paladins. He came crawling back a half hour later asking to be let in, but we were full by then and doing quite well exp wise. The tank did quite well, excellent hate control. So we just filled up on 3 drg, a rdm, a whm, and myself. Next to zero downtime and excellent chaining.

And that blu missed out because he was unable to think outside of his little 'tank box' for post 50 or wtfe.

And he's just one example of the entire problem many people face even when they step up to make their own party. You get people who refuse to join or won't stay once they arrive just because 'xx job' isn't here. But people aren't going to change the way they think on this game because.. well, thinking must obviously be painful.

One of the best parties I ever had: 3x blu, whm, rdm, smn (myself). Oh noez! No Pld! No Nin! I'm sure people laughed at us as they went past, but we were handling ourselves very well. The blus were amazing.

[Vyuru]

And while giving people stackable juices wouldn't harm BRD or COR, it would really damage RDM in terms of invites.

But is that so bad? If they'd only do it, I wouldn't mind having a rdm main healer, or a rdm acting as a black mage, they don't have to be there only for refresh, which alot of people seem to think that's all rdm is about. The way I normally setup my parties is:

puller, tank, me, healer, 2x whatever

Pre refresh stages, I had alot of flexibility that I liked, I especially liked filling the last two slots with like a smn and a drk (I really love partying with dark knights) After lvl 43, everyone wants refresh and now I don't really have many options for the last slot. Yeah, I guess I do kind of resent it that it feels like I got backed into a corner with how I setup my parties.

Red mages may not be the best at main healing or straight out nuking, but they are not that far off with the right gear.


I mean, why is it DRG is the only class that gets a JA and pet that's totally exclusive to it?

Warrior with Aggressor, Monk with Chi Blast (I think), Red mage with Convert, and I think that's it, we are not the only class that gets a JA that is totally exclusive to it, but we do have two exclusive job abilities (Call Wyvern and Super Jump) where others only have one, if any.

And I'm not sure but aren't beastmaster jug pets usable only by a bst main?


/THF already robs most THF mains of a PT slot, their role in enmity control is taken away from them,

I've never understood that, when subbed, I've been told that TA only transfers 1/3 of the hate generated, so it seems kinda like a last resort to ask another melee to sub thf for hate control. I'd rather have a thf, SATA Viper bite, Shark Bite, Dancing Edge, it's all sick damage and they all close popular skillchains.

I'd have to look more at the /sam situation to really say anything about it (I will say that Hasso looks totally kickass and /sam may become my favorite exp sub over /war)

I agree with everything you said about /nin though.