[Firewind]

Originally Posted by Omgwtfbbqkitten

I think I'm just ready for a new experinece, FFXIV sounds like it will provide, but its not the only MMO that's looking that way. If DCU Online proves to be everything it says it is so far, that could be fun too. These two are the most appealing because you know the writers and artists that make the other related content are behind it.

I don't fall under #2, I'm just sick of #2. As I've said before, if elsewhere, its more to the end that having all this tricked out gear just isn't that mindblowing to me anymore, particularly because there's no mystery to it anymore. I'm personally amazed people waste so much time getting a RDM relic hat when its really just for show most of the time. Plenty of people that get full relic sets are still shit players anyway.

If SE dropped some new jobs out of nowhere, I might get excited again. I know that's what kept me going though last year, anyway.

I pretty much agree with that whole bolded statement there and that was the sentiment I was trying to get accross in my post but failed badly at it. It's probably why Aion interests me a lot: at least the game is new which is what is dragging a lot of people to it.

I'm not saying the game is ZOMG AWESOME or terrible yet since I haven't played enough of the full version of the game to really say much about it other than it feels a lot like Lineage II with actual character customisation but it's a new experience.

I think wanting a new experience and FFXI beginning to die rather ungracefully is why I'm losing interest and would rather wait until FFXIV than try to organise yet another run to get the shiny, pointy, hat from the Moogle expansion for my WHM.

That and Kujata is pretty much dead. You know your server is in trouble when you log in at prime time (US time which is about 1-3am for me) and less than 200 people are on at a given time.

[Armando]

So, you still want to blame SE for everything we get or end up having to deal with? Ok, fine. I think I have plenty of evidence to the contrary.

No you don't. You have examples of stuff that SE implemented properly and the players had to go and ruin. That's not AMK's case, or ACP's case. The add-on scenarios are sucky because SE made them sucky. Your examples are true but have 0 relevance.

[Malacite]

It's pretty clear why the 1st two mini-expansions were so horrid... just remember who's been in charge of them X.x ;the game's original story writer, and we all remember how poorly written the original story was. I mean I enjoyed Zilart and the rank 6+ missions to some extent, but it they still fail hard compared to CoP's epic story & missions.

[Armando]

and we all remember how poorly written the original story was.

Uh. What?

Zilart and Rank 6+ were poorly designed mainly due to lack of level capping and annoying amounts of traveling, but it wasn't poorly written even if it pales in comparison to CoP. That's like saying Sarutabaruta was poorly designed because Cape Riverne looks so epic. I don't know if the other nation's missions suck but Windurst's storyline was awesome and RoZ explained a shitload and had some pretty cool fights.

That aside, I highly doubt the scenario writer is the main person in charge of determining which time sinks they'll use between cutscenes.

[Dyft]

Ok, Just a few opinions, these are my opinions, I am entitled to them and they are in no way fact or have any factual backing.

First, I would LOVE to see Geomancer. I absolutely loved Geomancer... I suppose the best way to explain it would be to go back to the overly simplistic hybrid theory that they they are a warrior style fighter with elemental spells that would effect the terrrain. Like if someone was standing on water you could use the water they were standing in against them. With the way they have the weather effect stuff on SCH i think its a very viable class addition.

I would also LOVE to see a Mime class... now THAT was fun... for anyone who once again dident play any of the tactics. The mime could mimic any 1 thing that the party did on its round... so if a whm cast cure a blm cast fire and a drg jumped the mime could jump cure or fire. Now granted this class would be the WORST for solo play (obvious reasons) but none the less was a very fun job to play that has appeared in a FF title prior to FFXI.


As far as a lot of the lost love im reading about in this thread spicifically, I feel that for a lot of you FFXI was your first mmo. I have played quite a few over the years, and I can tell you. No matter how much you loved a game you WILL eventually get tired of it.. how many of the games from your childhood do you still play? I mean I still OWN and CAN play FFVII for PS, Super Mario Brothers 3 on Wii and NES etc etc, yet I play them MAYBE a few times a year... USUALLY when someones like oh wow i used to LOVE that game.. then we will play a while then go on with our lives. Eventually the same will happen with FFXI. You will eventually find a game you like playing more and play it.

Now as far as expantions. I would bet large sums of money that there will be MORE expantions for FFXI. First off, FFXI and FFIV will not even be close to the same game. Why would SE turn the servers off of a game that is producing a profit? Even with FFIV comes out and a LARGE portion of the playerbase tries it out. I'll still have my FFXI accounts (yes i have 2) active. There is a large possibility that I may not like FFIV, so there is no way I would go through the headache of canceling my accounts to turn around a month later and turn them back on. Hell I wouldent even save any money that way as I would still be on the month I had already payed for it.

For those of you that are new to the MMO scene.. an almost IDENTICAL situation to this has already happoned. SoE came out with EQ2. Since EQ2 came out there has been an additional 7-10(I've long since lost count sicne i dont play any more) expantions to come out for EQ and there are no signs of it slowing down in the future. This from a game that is over 13 years old. FFXI will most likely fall into the same boat. Honestly if you do your regedits to force supersampling on FFXI the graphics arnt even bad. Honestly there better then some games that STILL come out (99% of Wii games for example) from a graphic standpoint. The gameplay and story line is solid. No 1 person will every like anything in its entierty, but if they can keep the MAJORITY happy MOST of the time they wont every have any issues. The fact that FFXI is still running proves that they are doing this just fine. Examples of this would be Auto Assault (great concept rather fun little mmo) shut down after about 2 years... Hellgate London made it about a year. Age of Conan is already hurting and at risk of shut down. I could go on and on as this list is by no means short. The point is that FFXI still going strong (releaseing expantions is going strong as this shows the product is worthwile enough to take profits and put them back into product development. If the product were going defunct they would scrap it and move to product b.)

Anyhow my main view is that FFXI will keep kicking strong and will keep going long after 14 comes out.

Again thse are MY opinions and are in no way based on fact (other then refrences which your more then welcome to look up) No one at SE told me what their plans were for FFXI once FFIV comes out. This is just speculation based off of similar situations ive experianced in the past. Take it for what you will.

[Karinya]

Originally Posted by Armando

No, this is what SE, in their lapses of failure, gives. "Soloable mission content" in no way implies "go to these corners of the world and do some HELM in order to move this sad excuse of a plot along. But only slightly." It also doesn't imply "uncapped low level mission that can be soloed by high levels." You can't seriously be suggesting they can't do any better even if they are bending over and giving people what they want.

Look, if you don't like the minigame stuff, you're entitled to your opinion. But ISTM they wanted to do an expansion that wasn't all about fighting, and they certainly did do that. If you don't like it, there are plenty of other helmets in the game, you don't need that one. People that preordered don't get their $10 back, but that's a risk you take by preordering - you don't know what you're going to get, other than the gear whose stats were released in advance. (I wonder what they're going to give out as the rewards of the Shantotto expansion - pants?)

All that being said, I haven't finished it myself. But I think their attempt to make the expansion about something other than fighting one NM after another was interesting, even though it may be too much time consumed for too little reward (for players who are well equipped for fights and have lots of friends to help them through mission fights, but have to do all the HELM and chocobo digging etc. themselves).


P.S. You can repeat a lot of the add-on content for more rewards, sometimes including exp. And most of it can be done in small chunks without relying on anyone else. In other words, it's the long-awaited do-it-at-your-own-pace solo content for casual players (in addition to FoV and Campaign which also fill this role). But it doesn't give 20k/hr, so nobody cares.

Too many players today are not only expecting not to have to do anything you can't blow through in 30 sec with [insert overpowered endgame gear of choice], but also to get awesome rewards for having their hands held. I'd like to send every one of those whiny babies back to Grand Palace of Hu'Xzoi. Without a map. Personally, I'm hoping for Zvahl[s] and Walk of Echoes to be every bit as dangerous as sea, if not more so, and those TP-burning Utsusemi-spamming colibri abusers can go feed themselves to an amphiptere. ToAU has done a lot of damage to this game, in player skill and expectations as much as (or more than) anything else, but I don't think it's irreparable.

Also, get off my lawn. XD

[Malacite]

Originally Posted by Karinya

But ISTM they wanted to do an expansion that wasn't all about fighting

and failed miserably. Incidentally, that helmet is also the undisputed king for WS bar none. You're not beating 4 STR, 25 Acc and 5 attack.

[Armando]

Look, if you don't like the minigame stuff, you're entitled to your opinion.

Sorry, wasn't aware HELM and farming harmless mobs were minigames. Having a minigame timesink every time you fail the final battle is asinine too. Especially when the final battle can take up to 30 minutes.

[Karinya]

Originally Posted by Malacite

and failed miserably. Incidentally, that helmet is also the undisputed king for WS bar none. You're not beating 4 STR, 25 Acc and 5 attack.

Armando's a main PLD. How much acc do you need on Atonement? (Or str and atk, for that matter.)

It depends on the job, the enemy, and what WS you're doing (and some jobs don't WS at all). Single hit WS usually don't need more acc (except for slug/sidewinder - but idk if the WS acc mod even affects WS racc).

In any case, no single piece of gear is going to change your damage by more than a few percent compared to the alternatives, except for the *really horribly* broken stuff like ridill, which this is not.

[Armando]

Armando's a main PLD. How much acc do you need on Atonement? (Or str and atk, for that matter.)

It's true, I really don't need it as a WS helmet. However, once I stop being lazy and log back into the game I have plans to take up WAR and DRG.

And even for PLD it's the ultimate hybrid helmet. I'll never find something with the offensive boosts of an O.Hat, 3/5ths of a W.Turban, 5 Attack, 3 Counter, +HP, and actually has Defense on top of all that.

But what really pissed me off about AMK was that it wasn't just more tedious than ACP, its plot was stupid and so short it has to be fed to you in spoonfuls. On top of that the final boss is lame as hell AND it has the more game-impacting reward of the two current add-ons. ACP was shorter, its story has ties to the game's plot and the final boss is definitely cooler both conceptually and in presentation.

I'm not looking for EZ mode missions. I'm just asking for missions that aren't stupid. They can do much, much better than this. They can put level caps on all missions so they present at least a small amount of challenge to high level players even when solo, and they can do much better quests than "HEY, THE ONLY WAY TO FIX YOUR HOUSE IS FOR YOU TO FIND THESE MATERIALS OFF OF THESE THREE KINDS OF BEASTMEN. WHILE YOU'RE AT IT, HELP ME GET LAID OK?"

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Thing is, if these missions were level capped as extensively as CoP and structured in that way, people would sit back and make it harder than it has to be. They'd cut corners, come without proper gear since they think level sync will totally cover that (which is sometimes and sometimes not, as our findings on level sync have shown).

CoPs were very preparation based and the last thing most players want to do is prepare or think. People in this game even fuckup the most braindead shit they're given.

"OK, we need you to go to the Ashu Talif through Caedarva Mire. That place has true sight mobs, bogs that can efeeble or buff you, qutrubb that aggro sight, Jnuns that aggro sound and shades that aggro to sound, job abilities and weapon skills."

And I swear it never fucking fails, half the party dies trying to get there because they don't pay attention, don't bring oils/powders, they somehow get spotted by one of the only two imps out there, panic, run towards the skeletons that blood/sound aggro and die near the enfeebling bog where the shades are roaming.

That or the get all the way out there and get "bored" by the zoneline and feel the need to kill shades, which lynch them the second they pop a JA or WS.

And then they want a raise.

This is who SE has to make missions for. I wouldn't be surpised if they got all the way to a mining point in AMK and somehow got killed by quadav or thought they could do the mission without pickaxes.

[Grizzlebeard]

Or they could just take the Dvucca Isle port through the Undersea Ruins and only have to worry about sneak.

Thing is though, you can say it's a player issue till you're blue in the face but the fact remains players will always take the path of least resistance. Whether that is killing colibris over all else or exp'ing in the easiest to access zones and at some point the buck stops with S-E and their design ethos.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Originally Posted by Grizzlebeard

Or they could just take the Dvucca Isle port through the Undersea Ruins and only have to worry about sneak.

Which takes upwards of 20-30 minutes to do because you're going by boat to Nashmau and you still cross over all the same exact mobs to get to the Ashu Talif zoneline.

And that's only if they don't forget the silverpiece or a permit to get into the runs, which they'll probably forget and have to run back to the AH and buy a silver at least. Or beg you for one when you got to the Ashu Talif in three minutes.

[Grizzlebeard]

Originally Posted by Omgwtfbbqkitten

Which takes upwards of 20-30 minutes to do because you're going by boat to Nashmau and you still cross over all the same exact mobs to get to the Ashu Talif zoneline..

You've lost me here. If you take the top left portal in the main Undersea Ruins entrance area you get ported to a room which then ports you to the exit to Dvucca Isle. From there you exit and run for a minute through fomor mobs to the Ashu Talif zoneline.

[Armando]

(Stuff)

This is who SE has to make missions for. I wouldn't be surpised if they got all the way to a mining point in AMK and somehow got killed by quadav or thought they could do the mission without pickaxes.

CoP's difficulty was based on a 6 man party. It's not hard to make a capped mission with the difficulty based on less than 6 people. It's not even hard to make the difficulty reasonable for a solo player. It's as easy as capping me at whatever level will cause whichever mob you want me to farm for no real reason to check as DC.