[Yeargdribble]

Originally Posted by IfritnoItazura

Also, I don't use the Windower macros--strictly 6 lines of commands per key press for this Lv.67 Red Mage. No RDM or BRD in my LS uses Windower macros, to my knowledge.

I don't mean to sound like a prick, but 67 RDM and a 75 RDM who does lot of endgame stuff are different. Try sleeping bat in Dynamis without full enfeebling gear. Once you actually start collecting better gear you will find yourself constantly needing to switch out various sets to be more efficient and in certain situations it's downright mandatory to have specific builds. If you're chainstunning something like Dynamis Lord you need to swap on full Dark skill gear. Dark skill also for Aspir macros, then back to full enfeebling for sleeps, elemental or damage gear for nukes.

I don't understand this; does /recast not work for BP's? (I haven't played SMN.)

No... probably because what would you recast? /recast "Healing Ruby" ? Or any of the other bazillion BPs? Additionally, you can only see the recast when your pet is OUT and allows you to look at their BP list. There is no universal BP timer running anywhere for you. It's inefficient to keep your pets out for XP situations because they sap your MP too quickly, so you're flying blind unless you keep a stopwatch or you're running Bloodpace.



Just keep in mind that most of the issues I'm talking about are relating to endgame material and situations. These don't work like your average XP PT. Fighting Jormungand or trying to win a CoP Dynamis is nothing like XP and requires a higher level of skill and requires you to call on a lot of situational gear at times. TP spam isn't that bad in a STATIC XP PT. You all know each other and you have only your TP calls.

However, when you're in an alliance fighting something there's a LOT more spam. You may have a stun line trying to communicate who is the next stunner in a line while TP calls are flying around and people in charge are also trying to tell people what to do. It's a different world and it's a world that a lot of people (not a lot here, but still a very sizable portion of the population) participate in.

Also, being able to see the rest of the alliances MP is important especially for healers in these situations. If they are constantly calling our their MP that's even more spam in the log.

[Murphie]

I just use multiple macros to switch all my gear. I've been doing it for quite some time. It's entirely possible to exist without Windower macros.

PS2 users have managed without them for years. I see no reason why PC users can't.

[Effedup]

Originally Posted by IfritnoItazura

Let's not make a mountain out of a few mole hills? ^_^;

Seriously...people have been bitching for years about lack of an official windower (myself included)...now that SE is getting close to putting one out people are STILL complaining that it's either A) Not Good Enough, or B) Too Little Too Late.

Yeah, it took 5 years of grumbling from the player community at large for them to take notice...but at least they ARE taking notice. I haven't been playing 5 years, mind you, but at least it's a step in the right direction...

Besides, where does one draw the line between "useful" information and plain old dumbing down? I play FFXI for the challenge of it...if I wanted to play something easy I'd do like everyone keeps telling me to do and switch to WoW...

[Yeargdribble]

Originally Posted by Murphie

I just use multiple macros to switch all my gear. I've been doing it for quite some time. It's entirely possible to exist without Windower macros.
PS2 users have managed without them for years. I see no reason why PC users can't.

I did too for most of my time playing FFXI. However, it's kinda like mopping a kitchen with a toothbrush. Why should you have to when it can be done better and more efficiently. Also, even with extended macros (I only use a handful of them for quick gear changes and the rest of my macros are normal) I have over 100 macros for BRD. There's just not room in set up to make 5 macros on one line for a single friggin' gear switch.

Originally Posted by Effedup

Besides, where does one draw the line between "useful" information and plain old dumbing down? I play FFXI for the challenge of it...if I wanted to play something easy I'd do like everyone keeps telling me to do and switch to WoW...

But exactly what is the challenge of FFXI? The biggest challenge is getting a PT on an unpopular job. Or perhaps it's trying to make money which so strongly runs the economy, yet is so difficult to get.

The challenge in FFXI is in the time sinks. Just because it took longer to get something doesn't mean it was more challenging or make it more worth it. How do you get a Ridill? You sit in Dragon's Aery with a group whom you've sold your life to for 6+ months in hopes that they will get the claim and they will beat a piss easy dragon and you'll get lucky enough to get the 1% drop rate. That's not difficulty... it's frustration.

When trying to compare WoW vs FFXI don't mix up actually challenge based on skill and challenge based on arbitrary issues that are more frustrating than actually skillfully challenging.

[Akashimo]

Off topicish; I'm starting to feel the direction of these posts are getting close to flaming. Or the tone of the text is in my opinion.
On topic;
The challenge is what you want it to be to put it simply. That is the point of being an adventurer is to find a challenge and see it through to the end. The ideas something is becoming frustrating is only when the goal becomes to obesesive.

[Legal Fish]

FFXI is by no means losing players at a rate much greater than the amount they are losing players. There are new players everyday and people don't tend to quit as often as they say. It's natural to think that this game is only losing players because you probably only hang out with people who've been playing for awhile or worse, forums. If you actually spend time by newbie towns, you'll see that there is a ton of new players every week.

And this is in no way a move to keep players from leaving. It hardly changes the status quo at all. It is just something they realized needed to be done because the players wanted it.

[DakAttack]

Testify!

[IfritnoItazura]

Originally Posted by Yeargdribble

I don't mean to sound like a prick, but 67 RDM and a 75 RDM who does lot of endgame stuff are different. Try sleeping bat in Dynamis without full enfeebling gear. Once you actually start collecting better gear you will find yourself constantly needing to switch out various sets to be more efficient and in certain situations it's downright mandatory to have specific builds.

*shrug* I go to exp parties with something like 55/60 inventory, mostly with gears used in macro switches. My sister plays Lv.75 RDM in Dynamis for the past two years--using PS2 only. (Finally completed Relic armor set for RDM last week. lol.)

I suspect more than half of the JP players are PS2 players as well. Avesta appears to be one, and s/he certainly has numerous gear swaps. All these end-game JP players on PS2 certainly are not using Windowers or any Windower plug-in's. I suspect plenty of NA players do just fine without Windower as well.

Windower macro is not a necessity if you keep a proper perspective.

Originally Posted by Yeargdribble

No... probably because what would you recast? /recast "Healing Ruby" ? Or any of the other bazillion BPs? Additionally, you can only see the recast when your pet is OUT and allows you to look at their BP list.

I didn't know that. That is a game flaw which S-E should fix, rather than relying on third party software.

[Vyuru]

Oh, I'll grumble and mumble a little bit about too little too late at first, but I AM very happy to see SE start doing these things. I would love it if they actually had a developer who would talk to people on the ask SE forum who we could talk to and bounce ideas off of, that'd just be insanely cool.

[Yeargdribble]

Originally Posted by Legal Fish

FFXI is by no means losing players at a rate much greater than the amount they are losing players. There are new players everyday and people don't tend to quit as often as they say. It's natural to think that this game is only losing players because you probably only hang out with people who've been playing for awhile or worse, forums. If you actually spend time by newbie towns, you'll see that there is a ton of new players every week.

Have you leveled a mid-range job lately? There are less people around. Cities? I remember when cities were crazy and there were teleports being sold like crazy etc. They are incredibly tame these days. The dunes are less busy (and I've heard it's the case on other servers). But aside from all of that... when you do a /sea all these days during primetime you get a significantly smaller number than you once did.

And this is in no way a move to keep players from leaving. It hardly changes the status quo at all. It is just something they realized needed to be done because the players wanted it.

If they are just doing it because players wanted it, then why didn't they do it when players wanted it 3 years ago? There are a ton of things that they are suddenly getting on the ball about within the last 6 months or so that they've ignored for years.

Originally Posted by IfritnoItazura

That is a game flaw which S-E should fix, rather than relying on third party software.

Yup. Something SMNs have been asking for for quite some time and SE has yet to implement it.

I would love it if they actually had a developer who would talk to people on the ask SE forum who we could talk to and bounce ideas off of, that'd just be insanely cool.

Oh, you mean like WoW? Yeah, it's a great idea and provides instant feedback but SE is lazy. What about the whole Bercus thing? They said they would keep a correspondence with him and they have failed to do so. Even when they translated it into Japanese to make it easier SE fails to stand up to the promise they've made to the community multiple times about staying in touch and having discussion.


Not to turn this into a WoW vs FFXI thing (because they are very very different game), but it wasn't until I started playing WoW that I really noticed how much SE blew chunks. FFXI was my first MMORPG and I just accepted things as being par for the course. But you look at WoW and they've had windower and cheating is far less of a problem than in FFXI. They have addons that 3rd party developers can make that everyone can use and it's not a problem. They don't have a rampant RMT problem. They have GMs that fix things and take care of problems.

None of those things have to do with the game mechanics (like soloability etc). Those are just business issues that Blizzard takes care of ten time better than SE and really shows me that I shouldn't be making excuses for the developers of FFXI (like I used to and like so many that haven't played WoW do). We tend to view SE through blurry love goggles when it comes to their shoddy development sometimes.

[Raydeus]

Hmmm, I think SE really needs a much better costumer service and to pay more attention to players about issues like RMT, and to actually let players know they are paying attention.

However, when it comes to game features and balance I rather see SE not giving too much weight to player whining and stuff like that. I've visited many MMOG forums and watching Devs bend to every whine from their more vocal costumers really makes them look bad.

There's a difference between listening to player sugestions and concerns (and letting players know you as a dev are actually listening) and bending to each and every one of their tantrums so they don't quit your game.

[Moaku Hyena]

YES!
EFFIN' YES!
You have finally earned my loyalty, SE!

FINALLY, SE. Implementing a Windowed Mode was something I needed after your dang client froze on me so many times...

Congrats, SE! Now fix Ulli and stuff!

[AKosygin]

Originally Posted by Legal Fish

They already said this was coming in the interview with Bercus.

A lot of this seems underwhelming, like some very small changes to things that don't have problems at all (linkshells for example).

Legal Fish,

Thank you for sharing the information at the time of the release of the interview. Please provide a link to cite your information so that we may refer this to the SE Community Relations manager in regards to information release schedules.

Thank you,
AKosygin
FFXIOnline.com Moderation and Administration Team

[Tirrock]

The e-mail Bercus got mentioned they were considering it. They hadn't announced that they were doing it. (Yeah yeah, I'm not Legal Fish, but I woke up early and was bored.)

First of all, I must admit that I don't have the complete answers/news yet.
I have to apologies....and I'm very very sorry
However, I would like to disclose some of the answers now in this e-mail, so
you know we are working on it and so you can look forward to more answers
next week
(I'm on a business trip till the beginning of next week, but I'm expecting
to have everything completed by mid-next week)

One of the points you mentioned at the GC interview and in your Q&A was the
possibility of adding windower system to the game.
We use to explain the reason why we didn't support windower...but, we
understand this is very important to our players, and now we are eagerly
looking in to the possibility (seriously)

Not only the windower, but also the world transport system.
I can't go into any details but, we believe this is something that our
community would like and, as you know, our community is very important to us


Edit: If she means by world transport system the server switching 1 time to any you want.... hmm gonna ask her what she means

I would like to answer other questions in a document once I get all the
confirmation from the team.
The thing is, they were very busy with preparing the March patch.
This is "Off Record"... but some of your questions are related to this patch

Therefore, it is reeeeeally difficult to find out how much we can answer at
this stage...>_<
But, as I mentioned before, there should be some good news.
One of my colleagues in the JP team was saying that your community's
viewpoint is very good

Source:
http://www.bluegartrls.com/forum/vie...=488116#488116

[Theyaden]

1st off SE Thankyou very much for the windower feature being added logging out to check mining points, maps, and having to shutdown my antivirus when muling was a pain.

Originally Posted by Yeargdribble

Have you leveled a mid-range job lately? There are less people around. Cities? I remember when cities were crazy and there were teleports being sold like crazy etc. They are incredibly tame these days. The dunes are less busy (and I've heard it's the case on other servers). But aside from all of that... when you do a /sea all these days during primetime you get a significantly smaller number than you once did.

Yes, and I still find parties most reciently with ranger 2 weeks ago in the dunes, then Koro tunnel, then Qufim island. I didn't notice a shortage of parties camping those 3 zones.

Not sure on the # of players beyond there being enough that I had to compete for mobs since I've never kept track of the /see #'s.

Originally Posted by Yeargdribble

Not to turn this into a WoW vs FFXI thing (because they are very very different game), but it wasn't until I started playing WoW that I really noticed how much SE blew chunks. FFXI was my first MMORPG and I just accepted things as being par for the course. But you look at WoW and they've had windower and cheating is far less of a problem than in FFXI. They have addons that 3rd party developers can make that everyone can use and it's not a problem. They don't have a rampant RMT problem. They have GMs that fix things and take care of problems.

The Wow players I work with have complaints about Chinese goldfarmers ruining their game just like the FFXI playerbase and had comments on how work to run them out of an area without GM help just like in FFXI. People get banned from WOW for using bots to skillup as well as packet sniffers for claiming, exc. (If one is willing to look objectively it's amazing how simular many of the games are in administration and design it's usually differences in gameplay and where our friends are that draw us from one to another).

The part about the GM's being more willing to assist a player who's been hacked, lost items exc is true, just don't tick one of them off their ban process is more streamlined with fewer chances if you misbehave.

Originally Posted by Yeargdribble

None of those things have to do with the game mechanics (like soloability etc). Those are just business issues that Blizzard takes care of ten time better than SE and really shows me that I shouldn't be making excuses for the developers of FFXI (like I used to and like so many that haven't played WoW do). We tend to view SE through blurry love goggles when it comes to their shoddy development sometimes.

SE's GM interaction was legendary for awhile, but I haven't heard any recient horror stories so it probably got an overhaul.

GM's being able to restore items lost and having their rules posted for players to understand were also steps in the right direction tword being player friendly.

From the tone of your posts I take it SE did something nasty to you at some point? Naturally you don't have to answer, but I was curious due to the amount of venom aimed at FFXI in these posts. I prefer FFXI because of playstyle differences and prefering it's graphics style, but I don't hate WOW it's simply another MMO.

Edit: Adding links for 2 horror stories one for FFXI and one for WOW
Both are fairly old but give a sample of how bad the customer service can be for both systems.
FFXI: http://www.theorderls.com/phpBB2/vie...r=asc&start=15
WOW: http://digg.com/gaming_news/World_of...itech_keyboard