Dev Tracker - News, Discussions

The only thing that bugs me about the updated REM upgrade and it might never come to pass but, if the requirements are very difficult for non-AG weapons it could potentially give a large advantage to a very small percentage of the playerbase.

I can see the logic of giving people who afterglowed an easier upgrade path but I think the difference should be akin to AG weapons upgrading pretty instantly and non-AG taking maybe a week.

That's the point.
Regardless how difficult it would be and how big the difference would be between AG and non-AG owners, there will be someone who gets butthurt.
Either the AG owners get an easy upgrade and the non-AG owners an AG-like trial, then almost all non-AG owners will never be able to upgrade...
Or the non-AG owners get a moderate effordable trial. Then the AG-owners will loose their exceptional position.

That's not happening at all. What's happening is that certain people feel entitled to special consideration by the developers and are pouting if they don't get it. Develops have limited man hours to work on development and thus any work on making AG users feel like special snowflakes will mean less work on some other aspect of the game. Furthermore those same entitled players are fine with crab bucketing other players as long as it means they get to keep their special exclusive status.

SE should of never, ever, created REM's to be these huge time sink weapons and they definitely should of never created the stupidly that was "After Glow!". That kind of baggage only serves to limit future design decisions.

So does the super revitalizer resets 1 hour ability? I'm 1k kill away and the freshly digest that just came out says it doesn't reset SP abilities. Can someone clear this up? Thanks

They used to but the December update removed their ability to reset 1hrs.

I have zero issue with AG folks just turning in their weapon to the NPC and instantly getting it upgraded. Non-AG should take a week or two of semi-casual play or approximately 24 hours of game play give or take.

Wow so it's instant use AND doesn't reset SPs lol that's a crazy nerf.

Do you mean they should've never created them from the start? As in, relics shouldn't have existed in 2004 era? I don't know about that, the game was designed around having super long-term goals for players to sink their time into.

It's pretty obvious that the reason they made REM solo-able circa 2011 was to keep even more people playing. Kind of a lazy design, but it worked.

Then they destroyed all the player base they've built with the iLv system.

The problem with FFXI is that these changes (making old gear obsolete) happened all of a sudden, without warning. In other games, you know that when a new patch/expansion is due, your gear will be replaced by better, easier to obtain ones. But in FFXI you could've been working on your mythic for months/years and finish it, only to be replaced the next day by an nq weapon (literally what happened with Sylow).

I can see why people would get upset. It doesn't have to be because it's their only means of boosting their self-esteem, it's simply because they feel that the devs are messing with them, so to speak. You don't need to be a loser with no life to get upset about it. Plenty of my friends who have jobs and families got upset, actually it can be a reason to be more upset about it ("Sorry SE, but I don't have time for your BS anymore"), whereas an addict with no life would probably just get over it and reroll (there are countless examples of that).

I heard that the same thing is happening in FFXIV, they just announced a new line of relic weapons that is a grind fest as usual. Since the previous line of relics was completely outdated with the release of the new expansion, I can see why players would be wary of investing any amount of time in such weapons again.

EDIT: I also want to mention that an item you slowly work on over a long period of time is very different from a drop, no matter how hard it is to obtain that drop.

Super long term time sinks are horrible for MMO's because they severely limit future content potential. Weapons made in 2004 are now presenting design problems in 2015. It doesn't matter how you implement them because you can't possibly predict what will happen over a decade in the future.

Instead relic weapons should of been obtainable within a few months of 2004 era game play. The currency requirement should of been 1/5th of what it was. Same for Mythics and Emps post 90. Level 90 Emps were about right for obtainment time. If they were replaced nobody would of really cared as they didn't involved an obscene time investment to being with.

Yea u are right. People with families and large amount of outside rl work load would get most upset with rems getting replaced after a huge Time investment and the people who plays this 24/7 would just invest more time. That's why I'm hesitant to make these weapons and instead focus on gearing jobs and updating sets for jobs that can be useful right away.

Tbh that's looking in hindsight. I mean, pre-Abyssea, the game had a lot going for it, and it wasn't like those working on relics and mythics represented a significant number of players. Relics were pretty cool, legendary items that made people go "ooooooh!" when they saw them (I still remember a JP player I saw with Sphairai in Jeuno circa 2004 who went out to Rolanberry with me to show me Final Heaven lol), but everyone knew they were not for everyone to obtain.

Fast-forward to 2011-2013 and those working on RME represented a sizable, probably the major part of the player base. It didn't make any sense to me that they'd decide to risk upsetting the majority of the player base overnight.
And then they apologized and made plans to make RME at least relevant.
And then they gave the players the finger again :P

If that's the case, ffxi won't have enough content to last long enough as a mmo. You said 24 hours of playtime to obtain skill 269 weapon, it's just killing the game with even less dev resource now. Research shows avg MMO Player play 22hr a week. Most of my friend def play more than 2hr a day, so they can get one in less than 2 weeks. Play 12 days to get the best weapon in game that's 30% ahead of everything else? Why would you even pay sub for 1 month then?

FFXI NEEDS long term goal to make money, period. Those who ask ffxi to follow wow model weren't aware of development resource difference.



No one is asking for "special consideration", in fact AG owners already got their special consideration which is faster upgrade. We're simply asking SE to give us more respect on the time we spent in this game, because you know, we have rl as well(what a surprise?). I don't have issue with old NM being easier to kill and drops easier to obtain as lv cap goes up, it just happens in MMORPG. But I do have issue with "make you grind a weapon for 500 hr 3 years ago, then change the grind time from 500 hr to 5hr for no reason that really benefits game design" this sort of ***.

For some reason this discussion kept turning into "you just have high self esteem" "you just wanna be special" and "you don't have rl" stereotype discussion, if that's not animosity toward AG owners, then idk what it is.

It's mostly from the same handful of people, projecting much?

It seems as if you think that because AG owners want some value for their efforts and that is "special consideration" and they should just eat ***while everyone else benefits. The realistic side of this is that the trial will probably not even be that bad (and lol 24 hours to complete, I bet it will be as *** up as that.) This team doesn't have the resources to give AG owners proper due, hell not even a refund of that the ***they spent at the least.

In the end they will end up getting ***, but because its less than 5% of the population nobody cares and is even hate bandwagoning against them. Like how dare they want something more out of it. As far as everyone getting a glow, I don't care outside of the fact it will look HELP I AM TRAPPED IN 2006 PLEASE SEND A TIME MACHINE. The main issue was the compensation will be nowhere close to the original effort, it might be too early but its just venting at this point.

Now I understand why bg has a thread where they only post the news, and one where they discuss them...

What's going to happen is going to happen and regardless of the events, someone is going to feel slighted and express butthurt, and no one will care. After a while the upgrade items or tasks will be easier than not and cheap as hell (see: Plutons, etc.)

OR they'll be stupid annoying to get like VW drops currently are, and the price will go up.

One way or another, some people will suck it up and do it because it's worth it to them, some won't because it's not.

Moving along.

If that was the case, this would have not been the FFXI it was. Some people enjoy doing challenging things to obtain a goal. Some people enjoy doing repetitive things to obtain a goal. Some people enjoy (or at least tolerate) doing both.
And yes, is certainly had elements of a Skinner box. But there was a huge span of potential optimization (and cooperation), that you simply didn't (and really still don't) get in other games.

You don't (or at least didn't) play FFXI because it was easy.

AGgravating thread.

I actually don't mind the grind, its something to keep busy and work towards like a long-term goal. I think its important for MMO's to have those tbh but it depends on the grind. At least you can substitute farming the actual items with gil to buy them with.

Yes SE learned the hard way not to create ridiculously huge time investments into singular items / events. It creates this situation were a very small, yet extremely vocal and active minority get them and use them as status symbols. From that point on the developer can't make anything that out ranks those status symbols without it requiring equally obscene time investment without pissing them off. This puts an artificial cap on all future expansion or battle systems which just serves as a huge albatross around their necks. All content should be replaceable in a year or two time span.

No we would of had a much better game. Giant obscene time sinks for singular rewards are very bad for MMO's. They create this huge division in the player base with a small vocal and active minority thinking they are special and should have special treatment because of the time investment they did. Then you get the vastly larger silent majority who now has an artificial limit placed on them by the developers to keep that minority feeling like the special snowflakes they think they are.

REM's should of taken 1/5th the effort or less and should of never been upgraded. Just have them transform and become a KI that enables the WS to be used and call it a day. That would of opened the doors for a lot more expansion and playability in the game design.

If a few "hard core" players feel bad, great them can go play LoL, CoD or some other competitive game to get their dopamine fix. Those games are designed around player rankings and "I'm better then you" mentalities.

If that's the case they should just have REM's be bought through sparks. let the casuals get some obsolete weapons so other weapons can take its place because I noticed lots of people in game uses sparks gear.

More like a MMO that can't even survive past WoW era. The "better game" in your opinion does not necessary means it can sell and make money, which is more important if you even want to keep playing the game. I think Okami is a better game than Maple Story, unfortunately there are no Okami 2 because the game couldn't even survive in the market.


Do you truly understand how MMO works? Lol. Ever since EQ/lineage era, people have been competing with each other. Players bot, buy gil, sell character and in game items, start drama between guilds. Players in those games do all those thing because of all those "I'm better than you" mentality, while game dev makes profit from all those extra accounts and in game money trade. Those game would not even survive over a decade and had multi-million sub if it wasn't built around this mentality.

Yes, all the pre-WoW era masterpiece MMO titles such as EQ, Lineage, FFXI won't survive for more than 1 year if there are no timesink element. MMO had competitive nature even before FFXI exist. If you have played MMO in same era as XI, both EQ and lineage are 10x more time sink than current FFXI.

What you mentioned in your above post, is more like a MMO YOU want to play, but that doesn't mean MMO can survive if it's designed that way. Once a friend in gaming industry told me Blizzard hire psychologists to implement designs that makes player more "addicted" to the game, so they can keep paying every month. As much as I wish I can spend 1hr a day, 3 days a week on a video game and play casually so I have more real life time to do something else, MMO designers simply can't let that happen, or else they won't make enough money after people finish every content and quit. They need to implement designs to make me play 2+hr a day(and still can't finish everything in a month) instead.

And the best solution is time sink.

Long story short, if you can't accept time sink element in MMO, then F2P or other genre is better for you.

Also all that "it's all because someone wants to be better than others" talk made me wonder if you truly understand other's POV from pages back. This entire argument about AG was based the fact that SE made absurd timesink grind and then changed the requirement later. They're purposely wasting other's time. If they have told people "we have plans to make Mythic/AG/whatever easier to obtain after 2 years", none of the rage would have happen because I wouldn't choose to grind them in the first place, I'd just wait until it's easier to obtain.

And no, not just I spent more time on them than everyone else on it, I also gain zero actual benefit from getting it before everyone else and spent 3 times more gil on it. I didn't grind a mythic to gain a "Loook I get it before everyone else" bragging right, I grind it to improve my pt performance and a better chance to get party invite, which is something that actually benefits myself, not a hollow and useless title/status. Since everyone else has it too, the actual benefit are long gone.

Anyways, this rant has been going on for pages and I'm sure nobody else would care anyways, so I'll just stop here.

This, and Milamber's mention of Skinner's box reminded me of two articles I read before:

-Behavioral game design, dated 2001.

-And 10 years of behavioral game design with Bungie's research boss, dated 2012. Same author.

All those people who quit and complained when REM were outdated sure were a vocal minority huh? I typically agree with the things you post but this is just silly.

I wonder if AG ppl going to sue SE for their years of grinding, I mean investment in ffxi when SE pull the plug or cant maintain a decent amount of population for them to show off that achievement.

Has there been any word on the 7th Nakuual (sic?) For SoA?

I'm gonna let you in on a secret...

The divide doesn't exist and never did unless you rolled with linkshells that forced it on you. The only fights that came close to these requirements were special fights that pushed everything to the limits and didn't even offer anything that changed how other content was played. They were obviously not for everyone, just like how Kings, Grand Wyrms, and other HNMs were not for everyone. In fact they were probably way more attainable than those special Open World NMs.