Rough Draft: Q&A 2008 Thread.

[Akashimo]

Okay, let's get this thread under way. While you guys post on anything new/old to discuss, I'm gonna to some digging on our older Q&A posts and link them in this post.

Also, keep the dead horse topics out of here. I'm going to make a new thread just for that if you want to talk about a dead horse.

Lastly, any note worthy good questions, I'll quote into this post. Now let the games begin!

Edits:
http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/general-ffxi-discussion/71779-q-dead-horse-discussion.html#post780433
http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/site-news/64996-february-ask-squareenix-submission.html
http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/general-ffxi-discussion/65514-questions-se-doesn-t-answer.html
http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/ask-squareenix-questions/64787-will-there-improvements-search-function.html
http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/ask-squareenix-questions/71683-pet-jobs-endgame.html
http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/ask-squareenix-questions/67031-would-se-consider-tweaking-updating-af1s-level-capped-situations.html
http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/ask-squareenix-questions/65001-will-there-any-new-aditions-npc-system.html

What is the real tech reason, why our characters reload the way they do after we equip something, or change equipment, and could you change it for at least PC users so we don't "blink".

For people that change equipment ALOT, blinking in and out is very annoying, and kind of ruins the experience.
What I think would be more effective is if there was an in-game bulletin board type of system. Something where you can go and register your job level statistics, missions or quest needs for others to see.

In a way, this option is already there in the Linkshell Community Beta profiles, but it often doesn't reach far enough and it technically isn't in-game. And too many things are allowed to be masked, including mission progress. I'm OK with possible jobs a player doesn't enjoy being masked from the list of options and the list just being slimmed down to what you want to seek on.

I think such a feature would make it all the more easy to organize missions and find parties, perhaps even leave the player an option to list thier party-style preference.

You could go to this "board", register what jobs you wish to level, your party-stule preference and what missions or quests you need and it would be viewable to the public. If you completed a mission, the system would just update your progress to whichever mission you were on at present.
* Many times, you have responded to questions about the search function with statements that you intend for us to use search comments for a variety of different things, which combined amount to vast amounts of information. However, from the perspective of an English speaker the search comments are very small -- while Japanese has kanji, English does not; while spaces between words are optional in Japanese, they're required in English; on average, one kana character conveys as much sound as two English letters. In effect, while a Japanese search comment can contain a tanka and haiku, an English search comment can only contain a haiku. Has the devteam considered the difficulty of creating informative search comments in English in the space provided?

* While putting other available jobs in one's search comment is effective at level 75, when job levels are likely to be equal anyway, search comments do not allow a level 40 party to know that a player currently seeking on a level 60 job is also willing to play on another, level 40 job. To use search comments in this instance would be ludicrous, as this would mean that a party leader would have to read search comments at every level range with very little chance of reward. Do you plan to implement anything to allow a player the option to seek on jobs of differing levels at the same time?

* Players in the game are very unobservant of search comments. The majority of English-speaking players do not use them, perhaps in part because the function doesn't present itself readily to those who wish to put up a seek flag, perhaps in part due to the frustratingly short length, perhaps in part because of the narrow assumptions about XP parties that are common in the community. People fail to notice the dots that indicate the presence of a search comment, and send out tells before the search comment has time to transfer and scroll onto their screens. Do you plan to implement anything to make search comments a greater part of the party-seeking and party-forming experience?
* When SCH was introduced to the game, the development team stated that they felt SCH wasn't a mage, but yet, as of the March 2008 update in which SCH was completed, it pretty much can assimilated any mage role quite capably sans Summoning, Haste and Refresh. What are your plans for WHM, RDM, BLM and SMN now that SCH can assimilate most of thier supportive and offensive aspects and how do you plan to make these jobs more unique?

* SCH and PUP are the only jobs that do not have questable weaponskills due to thier low ratings in weapons. Are there any plans for another questable spell for SCH or an automation frame for PUP so they both can have a similar quested ability or Weaponskill that other jobs presently enjoy?

* Will DNC and SCH be getting unique JSEs akin to CoP level 72 JSEs or perhaps be added to one of the existing CoP JSEs? Similarly, are there any plans for these jobs to be added to existing abjuration gear?

[Malacite]

Will there be any adjustments to the availability of consumables such as Shuriken and Ninja Tools? Currently these are all craftable, but shuriken in particular are extremely expensive to make and often not worth bothering with because of that.

As a result, Ninja's A- throwing skill goes completely to waste. Also, why not simplify all the ninjutsu synthesis recipies under one craft (Alchemy) to make funding the job easier? Rangers only need to choose between Woodworking or Alchemy to make either Bolts and Arrows, or Bullets. Beastmasters can choose alchemy or cooking for jug pets, etc. So why is it that Ninjas can't choose between 1 craft for shuriken and another for tools?

This would make the job much more easily accessible and provide players with more enjoyment from having 3 different playstyles to choose from instead of just the usual blink tanking style.


EDIT: Also, are they any plans to adjust the recipe for Kaburra Arrows? As it stands, the performance gained from them often does not warrant the extreme cost compared to Demon Arrows or Silver Bullets.

[Kailea]

What is the real tech reason, why our characters reload the way they do after we equip something, or change equipment, and could you change it for at least PC users so we don't "blink".

For people that change equipment ALOT, blinking in and out is very annoying, and kind of ruins the experience.

[Aksannyi]

I will watch this thread but nothing is creeping to mind at the moment ... the thought of Dynamis imminent is already numbing the brain. -.-

[IfritnoItazura]

I thought admin/moderators usually reserve the rights to organize and select the questions for themselves? :P

Perhaps you are planning to bribe them by offering to underwrite the cost of the trip to go see S-E's next fan festival as an incentive to use the list you select instead? :biggrin:

[Malacite]

For people that change equipment ALOT, blinking in and out is very annoying, and kind of ruins the experience.

It also cuts out skillchain information for some reason...

[Aksannyi]

It also cuts out skillchain information for some reason...
That is annoying. As someone who tries to MB when I get the chance (Holy FTW) I hate when the light they're supposedly doing doesn't show up.

[Akashimo]

Perhaps you are planning to bribe them by offering to underwrite the cost of the trip to go see S-E's next fan festival as an incentive to use the list you select instead?
I didn't thought about that until now....

[Pteryx]

You forgot this one:
http://www.ffxionline.com/forums/site-news/69248-development-team-interview-questions-answers.html

Since the SC+MB question wasn't asked and the fallout from meleeburn dominance is only worsening, I think we need a reformulation:


While we appreciate the improvement to skillchain accuracy you have implemented and the introduction of the Castle Oztroja [S] zone, these changes have had little to no impact on the immense popularity of the "meleeburn" or "TPburn" party style. It is possible to get extreme XP per hour with little risk by this method; no other party style comes close to its efficiency. As such, the community is experiencing a deep divide between those who want the most XP per hour and those who wish to experience other types of XP party, with the former having greater power within the game framework. Do you intend to implement anything that rewards traditional complex teamwork within the context of XP parties, or which allows players not interested in meleeburn to find each other without being derided or harassed by meleeburn players?The first question we actually asked last time seems to have been completely misunderstood; perhaps we could rephrase it somehow. Darned if I know how to put it, though.

I personally think that SE doesn't understand the problems with the search function. Here is my attempt at formulating some old questions such that they cannot be misinterpreted and/or simply dismissed:

Many times, you have responded to questions about the search function with statements that you intend for us to use search comments for a variety of different things, which combined amount to vast amounts of information. However, from the perspective of an English speaker the search comments are very small -- while Japanese has kanji, English does not; while spaces between words are optional in Japanese, they're required in English; on average, one kana character conveys as much sound as two English letters. In effect, while a Japanese search comment can contain a tanka and haiku, an English search comment can only contain a haiku. Has the devteam considered the difficulty of creating informative search comments in English in the space provided?

While putting other available jobs in one's search comment is effective at level 75, when job levels are likely to be equal anyway, search comments do not allow a level 40 party to know that a player currently seeking on a level 60 job is also willing to play on another, level 40 job. To use search comments in this instance would be ludicrous, as this would mean that a party leader would have to read search comments at every level range with very little chance of reward. Do you plan to implement anything to allow a player the option to seek on jobs of differing levels at the same time?

Players in the game are very unobservant of search comments. The majority of English-speaking players do not use them, perhaps in part because the function doesn't present itself readily to those who wish to put up a seek flag, perhaps in part due to the frustratingly short length, perhaps in part because of the narrow assumptions about XP parties that are common in the community. People fail to notice the dots that indicate the presence of a search comment, and send out tells before the search comment has time to transfer and scroll onto their screens. Do you plan to implement anything to make search comments a greater part of the party-seeking and party-forming experience?Those are my biggest questions, anyway. -- Pteryx

[Malacite]

DURR! DURR! I ARE SE! I IZ TEH VAGUE!!!!


J000 KANT WIN TEH INTERNETZ!!1!!!1ONE!@!!!!!


... Okay sorry. for some reason that's exactly what comes to mind whne I try to understand SE's thought process/policies on various issues at times.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

I still don't understand the need for "seeking on multiple jobs" thing, I think that's really just going to end up jerking other players around - what happens when you get a responses for both at the same time. Maybe I'm just more single minded and independant about what I level, but I've never found the need to seek for one job while I'm seeking on another currently.

If its merits you want, then go merit. If not, attend to your other job levelling needs.

What I think would be more effective is if there was an in-game bulletin board type of system. Something where you can go and register your job level statistics, missions or quest needs for others to see. Those interested will find you and contact you in game.

In a way, this option is already there in the Linkshell Community Beta profiles, but it often doesn't reach far enough and it technically isn't in-game. And too many things are allowed to be masked, including mission progress. I'm OK with possible jobs a player doesn't enjoy being masked from the list of options and the list just being slimmed down to what you want to seek on, but mission progress should be an open book.

I think such a feature would make it all the more easy to organize missions and find parties, perhaps even leave the player an option to list thier party-style preference.

You could go to this "board", register what jobs you wish to level, your party-stule preference and what missions or quests you need and it would be viewable to the public. If you completed a mission, the system would just update your progress to whichever mission you were on at present.

[Saren]

I still don't understand the need for "seeking on multiple jobs" thing, I think that's really just going to end up jerking other players around - what happens when you get a responses for both at the same time. Maybe I'm just more single minded and independant about what I level, but I've never found the need to seek for one job while I'm seeking on another currently.

Finding parties is hard in certain level ranges and if people want to level more than two jobs at once then why penalize them for it? I don't think most players have the total dependence on parties that you are implying either, at least not anymore; lack of parties is making people more adventurous about soloing and campaign attendance is fairly solid. Bing able to solo or campaign som exp on your level 50 drk, seek on that while also seeking on your level 30 sam (that you need to complete for a subjob) would be nice for example.

Honestly the thing I think this would be really nice for is seeking on a lower job while you are doing something else a higher job. Farming on your 75 thf while seeking on your level 55 war? Sure you can farm on a 55 war and probably scrape some exp too but why farm on war when you can farm on thf? Camping O-kotes while seeking on your level 25 mnk? It not like a level 25 mnk can do anything but cower in most of Castle Oztroja.


What I think would be more effective is if there was an in-game bulletin board type of system. Something where you can go and register your job level statistics, missions or quest needs for others to see. Those interested will find you and contact you in game.

For missions I think this is a really good idea, the search comment provision for missions just isn't user friendly enough.

For jobs I don't think it would work mostly because job levels can change too quickly so most people will not keep them up to date (how many people keep their job information up to date on the forum?) and most of the people on the list at any one time probably aren't going to want to party. Even if you are actively leveling a job most people have other commitments and in game time that cannot be spent levelling.

The search comment system is good because putting your flag up says 'I'm not doing anything that I can't drop at short notice, I want to exp and I probably have 2 hours minimum', you can also look at the number of people who currently want to party in your level range instantly and see if it's worth trying to put a party together and if so what sort of party, what roles might be missing etc. A message board system doesn't allow for that kind of immediacy of information, all you are going to do is make potential party leaders trawl through a lot of people who probably don't want to party right now anyway or aren't at that level in that job anymore and not improve things. The search comment system we have is fine for levelling, it just needs a couple of extra features to make it great.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Honestly the thing I think this would be really nice for is seeking on a lower job while you are doing something else a higher job. Farming on your 75 thf while seeking on your level 55 war? Sure you can farm on a 55 war and probably scrape some exp too but why farm on war when you can farm on thf? Camping O-kotes while seeking on your level 25 mnk? It not like a level 25 mnk can do anything but cower in most of Castle Oztroja.

I'm just not seeing the benefit, mostly because you could update this system and it would be so intricate that even fewer NAs would use it than they do now.

[Ziero]

What is the real tech reason, why our characters reload the way they do after we equip something, or change equipment, and could you change it for at least PC users so we don't "blink".

For people that change equipment ALOT, blinking in and out is very annoying, and kind of ruins the experience.

The reason is that the game is loading a new graphical dat. To do that it has to remove the old while put in the new. Go out and take two identical looking pieces of gear and swap them back and forth, you won't blink.

[Saren]

I'm just not seeing the benefit, mostly because you could update this system and it would be so intricate that even fewer NAs would use it than they do now.

How intricate is it to have a couple of drop down lists when you are doing a search comment for you to pick the main and sub you want to seek on, especially if they come up by default with your current jobs settings? I really don't think a simple addition like that is going to put off anyone who currently uses search comments.

I don't think search comment is nearly as much of an NA/JP thing as people say either, I don't think I can remember ever seeing an NA friend seek without a search comment up. It's much more do with what level and what job is seeking. You don't see a lot of search comments in the dunes because people either don't know about them or they've been before and aren't taking the dunes seriously. In the 40-60 range seeing a drk or thf without a search comment to advertise themselves is rare, a nin or bard in the same range probably didn't have time to put on up before they got an invite or didn't bother because they can be fairly sure of an invite if there is a party forming.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Jotting these questions down before I forget them:

When SCH was introduced to the game, the development team stated that they felt SCH wasn't a mage, but yet, as of the March 2008 update in which SCH was completed, it pretty much can assimilated any mage role quite capably sans Summoning, Haste and Refresh. What are your plans for WHM, RDM, BLM and SMN now that SCH can assimilate most of thier supportive and offensive aspects and how do you plan to make these jobs more unique?


SCH and PUP are the only jobs that do not have questable weaponskills due to thier low ratings in weapons. Are there any plans for another questable spell for SCH or an automation frame for PUP so they both can have a similar quested ability or Weaponskill that other jobs presently enjoy?



Will DNC and SCH be getting unique JSEs akin to CoP level 72 JSEs or perhaps be added to one of the existing CoP JSEs? Similarly, are there any plans for these jobs to be added to existing abjuration gear?

[IfritnoItazura]

I don't think search comment is nearly as much of an NA/JP thing as people say either, I don't think I can remember ever seeing an NA friend seek without a search comment up. It's much more do with what level and what job is seeking.
Well, my own experiences seem to differ. I tend to seek at "in between" time, around 11 p.m. or 12 p.m. PDT, which is 3 or 4 p.m. JST, which is the tail end of NA hours and before the start of JP prime time. So, people online tend to be about half and half in terms of English and Japanese speakers.

Levels do make a difference; just about every trip through Valkrum Dunes, almost all the people seeking with search comments have them in Japanese. On many nights, I was the only person with English in search comments.

At Lv.75, certainly I see many more English comments--around 50% or less of people with 'E' or 'JE' have search comments. At least 90% of the seekers with 'J' flag up have comments, though, by comparison.

* * *

Edit:

I don't think adding more features to the search system would necessarily mean people would use comments more or better utilize the search system. Also, don't think more comment length is needed; longer paragraphs just means fewer people would read.

As is, when I set type to "others" and put in "Linkshell Event", I'd get merit party invites with seek flag up during NA prime time. People in U.S. are not even paying attention to the existing features and comments, more of anything wouldn't make much of a difference.

[Aksannyi]

As is, when I set type to "others" and put in "Linkshell Event", I'd get merit party invites with seek flag up during NA prime time. People in U.S. are not even paying attention to the existing features and comments, more of anything wouldn't make much of a difference.

I find this to be especially true if I'm in Ve'Lugannon Palace or Dynamis-Windurst. Come on, it's pretty obvious I'm not looking for a merit party in one of those places. Especially Dynamis.

[Jonastb]

I would love to ability to seek on multiple jobs at once. This would be much easier than trying to guess at what job might be invited at that time. I am leveling SCH and BLM and meriting on MNK. I would love to put all three up and go craft or farm, and wait for an invite on one of them. This would sure as hell beat getting all dolled up for SCH to go and sit in the Dunes and wait and wait and wait, and find out later I could have gotten a merit party on MNK instead. A lot less wasted time!