Dev Tracker - Discussion

why when I give my opinion that differs from the hive mind people assume I'm miserable - I just want a better ffxi. Being Okey Dokey with ***while watching my friends drop off like flys these past years does give me a bad taste but I'm here for the long term.

I know I can be annoying but I still wanna be friends

Sorry, just seen many posts from you unhappy with SE and the game so I did assume, which is not good. Didn't mean to single you out but I'd love to see a more positive atmosphere here for those of us that are here for the long term. I'm sure I'm just as annoying so let's be friends :)

Ironically, if each of our characters were locked to a single job forever, everyone would be fawning at how much content this game has to offer and how much replayability it had.

I took over a year off (partly) because I became so frustrated with SE not doing enough for the game. When I returned I was refreshed and don't care anymore. I'll play the game for my friends until I decide it is time to leave again. SE is not going to do anymore than they have been doing. The sooner people figure this out, the better off they will be.

Could also just not do sortie

They didn't.
FFXI players told them.

Which means they noticed. I thought it was obvious I didn't mean they found this issue on their own. Just because players tell them things does not mean they take the time to read and pass it on.

There was just usually the caveat of "well maybe they'll add some more stuff down the line" cope, once you're told your game's in maint. mode that largely removes that possibility, might get a new fight here or there but nothing expansive, so for once when you're done you are truly done.

At least they were upfront about it, agree with nynja the real worst was was that just dead zone that was XIV launch and even several months prior before it was unveiled where updates just dried up for seemingly no reason and what content that was added was just darts on a board shots at keeping players busy, which might get 1 or 2 additions then its abandoned and they try something else. At least ody and sortie were extensive additions with some longevity to them

If I was running FFXI, I would do things to keep subs:

Double the segments in Odyssey. Making segments less important would allow people to still collect them but allow groups more flexibility in doing A/B. It would also allow more v15-25 attempts with less penalty for failing. Add a reward for getting MM45, a mount and a reduced Moglophone timer.

Make Galli more attainable for people without a static.. This can be done 50 different ways but keep the Galli flowing but keep Primes locked behind Psyche. Want a stage 4? Pay your monthly sub for Psyches.

Make Sortie RoE Objectives reset monthly. Stay subbed for your 4 +1s and a +2.

Keep the money flowing with some QoL handouts while working on the next carrot event. Another Peaches fight would be a smart start.

It's easy to postulate.

Now how do you convince the C-Suite that this time/money are better spent for zero return, as opposed to spending that time on 14.

Theres more money in the bluehaired *** demo, than the 40 year old basement dweller demo. (so sayeth the 70 year old clueless men)

You guys need to think outside the box.

If I was the big boss in SE I would make a change that increase segments, gallimaufry, spark/accolades limit, extra EP for each extra subscription you have.

Just give up on new players and invest in the whales that still play FFXI.

Force every single player to 6-box, bring a new golden era do FFXI.

IDK, I think coming up with ideas that will increase subs (through people coming back or retaining those who are here) isn't all that simple.

Wouldn't be opposed to most of Taint's ideas, but I wonder who it would convince.

Are there people quitting because they can't get enough segments?
Are there people quitting because they can't get enough muffins?
Are there people quitting because they regularly fight all 9 Sortie bosses, but don't get enough earrings while doing so?

Is there anyone who quit who would see "we doubled segs" and decide to re-subscribe?

I agree with Nariont's premise above: people quit because there's no new content coming and they're already finished (in their minds) with and/or don't enjoy the content that exists. Making it "more accessible" or easier to get caught up on won't convince them to come back.

If I was running FFXI I don't know what the hell I would do to increase subs in the long-term. I think without new content it would be really challenging to encourage people to stay subbed and even more difficult to convince people who quit to come back. I guess I would try to invest into community-building somehow. Create an official LFG Discord group, official forums for LFG? Official strategy sharing, pay people to put out guides for content, stream FFXI? Improve the in-game tools for grouping up, stuff like that. Create filters for hours of play, how geared up you are, which clears you already have or are looking to get, etc. Not sure how economically viable it would be but something like giving a free sub to FFXI to current subscribers of FFXIV, possibly just for a limited period of time, could be an interesting option.

I think there are TONS of players out there who are similarly-geared and looking to do the same content but they don't realize each other exists or don't want to take on leadership roles. Even on smaller servers it's possible to find 3, 4, 5, or even 6 people to do stuff together, but there aren't good tools to find those people.

There are hundreds of sufficiently geared and qualified players. To accomplish anything but the last 1% (v20+ and the master trials no one cares about)

They lack leadership skills
They lack confidence
And they all play warrior and corsair

There are no healers or tanks or hasters

It is a fundamental failing of the players. No ability to meet and communicate with other humans. Or willingness to play blm or whm or bard or run .... and not get stuck on them forever.

It takes very little effort to have a serviceable whm rdm brd geo and zero reason anyone shouldn't be able to do everything up to v20 gaol. But they lack any drive to do so. As little effort as it takes, it takes less to complain about it.

Says the guy who's never played ffxi with another human being in his life.

The last two people I added to my ody group were primarily PLD mains. One of them had WHM as his second "main" job, and then shortly after that did SCH. Neither of them had COR, though both of them also had WAR, which is a nice job for a lot of things so I appreciated that they had it.

Other recent(ish) additions include a guy with all 22 jobs ML50, and one whose main is WHM, with backups of RDM, SCH, GEO.

Doesn't matter though because with a proper LFG system (in-game or otherwise), people could SEE what jobs are out there, what jobs are lacking, could see groups they want to join but they need to level GEO, BRD, SCH, or whatever to get into them and then make the adjustments. Or the SCH main could finally find the group that's missing a SCH, or whatever. Maybe a 6-boxer would see a group that he could put his "main" character into and would start doing group content, at least some of the time.

It's a visibility issue. There are dozens of people running around thinking there's nobody to do content with, passing each other in the night.

They tried to address this already with the linkshell handout NPC, problem being it was very barebones and ultimately relies on others to take up the responsibility on their own, which is largely how XI's always been in regards to bridge building.

Think anything that would require messing with the system is out of their scope, least they could have done was slap an RoE on it to even use those NPCs.

I think "new players" is a myth at this stage in the game. What new players.

Sure there is the odd exception, but that's single digit numbers that is not going to suddenly make management spend resources on XI.

It's typically returnees, but new players do hop in occasionally, Atleast that was the case on asura, but for various reasons they dont tend to stay
-Lack of other players to do content with
-Shouts are either dead or its just bot/merc shouts
-Path of progression is unclear unless they have people to ask or use the wiki

Depends on your server and where you hang out. I see new red ? every day running around S Sandy, probably most of whom are just checking the game out before the FFXIV raid, but are legit new players nonetheless.

Probably RMTs

No, Bahamut has the same salvage bots as Asura, but those are easily identifiable and easy to distinguish from real new accounts.

Nothing has fundamentally changed in twenty years.

Everyone wanted a ridil, no one wanted to heal or tank fluffy. Same as it's always been. 30 DD LFP and zero whms same in 2004 as it is in 2024.

Thats why theres 60 DD soloing ambuscade and 200 people botting with 5 trusts and zero people teaming up. Cant kill ***with 6 warriors. And 100% of the shouts that do happen are for whm tank and/or brd

Same as it always was, same as it will always be.

I feel like you’re over simplifying the issue and underselling the amount of people in different spots in life, most notably people with families.

For someone to come back and do the content (Ody + Sortie) andddd for them not to miss KI’s for stupid FOMO, you need 2.5 hrs a day/night average. Assuming you’re a good group who can get 12k segs each time. That’s crazy. People have lives outside of XI and the KI systems for Ody and Sortie are stupid as ***.

They saw that Omen had a good KI system that allowed people to bank KI’s and use them twice a week. Along with lockouts from Dyna that made that twice a week as well. Their thought process for Ody and Sortie makes no sense given past events. More leniency with this would definitely bring people back into the game 100%.

Its an unfair system and the people who feel that way should quit, not complain about it, while doing it anyway.

It's never(*) going to change. You're never going to progress past it, the game is over (for you). You've hit an impasse, and no matter how many times you slam your head into it, it's never going to budge.

That argument is great for other games that have clones. Not a unique MMO that has a system no other game has and you’ve poured thousands hours into.

Oh yeah, people with lives can't do 2.5 hours of events a night, but if they can only play twice/week, what they need is the ability to just do 7 hours of events on Tuesday night and then 8.5 more on Saturday. Hopefully this busy family life also involves a 9-hour straight block of free time every weekend; fortunately kids and families rarely do anything on the weekend.

You can just..not FOMO. Do 1 Sortie every other night and 2 seg farms every other night, there, 1 hour of events per night and all you "lost" is 4/5 of 1 Sortie run.

It never ceases to amaze me that somehow everyone is a busy family person but also they can't find anyone who understands their lifestyle and is willing to be chill about event times or frequencies. Is the FOMO call coming from inside the house? Who is applying this pressure to do every event every single night? Are these parents unable to find each other?

Again...solved by a good LFG system. Check boxes for the number of nights you'd like to go per week. Check boxes for "casual" or "strict" schedules. Check boxes for which days/week you are typically available. Hours of availability.

Not just people with families, everyone with limited time to play continuously benefits from going in and doing what they want to do without waiting on anyone or having to put a group together.

Can argue that's a lack of a good lfg system but that is only partly true. Most of the time, trusts or alts can be more reliable than humans in a game with a lot of mechanics that can't be explained on the fly.

Its amazing how some people can happily bootlock the daily "use it or lose it" entry mechanics of Ody/Sortie.

This is called; Sunk cost fallacy

If you make Sortie like Omen, you won't get any 3-4 Sortie in a row during weekend, unless on a dead server. You will get 2-3 hours of waiting in line to go in once and you will be so frustrated, you wouldn't go again.