Premier Site Q&A Part 2 on ZAM

[Gwynplaine]

Since part 1 was posted to this section I'll assume this is the proper place for it.

In Part 2 of their Premier Site Q&A sessions, the Square Enix Development team answered two questions from the ZAM team. Japanese translation available below the cut.


1. Recently, Evolith stones became obtainable from Brown Treasure Caskets in various areas of the game. Since this primarily excludes Treasures of Aht Urhgan and Wings of the Goddess areas due to caskets not appearing in them, what other plans are there to further increase how Evoliths will be obtained?

Our original vision for the Evolith system was to allow for easy and stress-free customization of equipment, and we are aware that the system in its current state has not quite achieved that.
The last version update saw a number of changes to bring the system closer to this vision, and we intend to continue improving the variety and increasing attainability of evolith, including but not limited to addressing the particular areas mentioned.

2. What expansion in the weapons and armor that can be etched for Evolith attachment can we expect to see in the future? Will any existing weapons and armor that currently cannot be used in Synergy be usable in further expansions of the system?

Our first priority is to address those aspects of the system that are currently causing frustration to our players. As one example, the next version update will make it possible to remove individual apertures or pieces of evolith one at a time.
More expansions and refinements are planned for further down the line. As Evolith and Trial of the Magians both feature customization of equipment, we intend to build upon each system in such a way that each will offer players its own unique enjoyments and benefits.
As for equipment, yes, certain existing pieces of equipment will be made customizable in the future. All-new pieces of customizable equipment will also be added. As the level cap increase ushers in stronger characters and new game dynamics, we will do our best to strike the right balance and timing so that players will be able to enjoy a wide range of equipment in the ever-evolving world of Vana'diel!

http://ffxi.allakhazam.com/story.html?story=22378

The change to wiping apertures is good. But mainly evolith gear is just going to remain junk until some more universal stats are introduced. Which is too bad since a lot of the gear looks so damn cool.

[Maurauc]

I think SE have realised that many evoliths are useless, and are hopefully gonna add ones that are more specific to what we currently do and use. That's the vibe I'm getting.

But hey, it's SE, so who knows what they're thinking?

[Sho]

They need to make my Concordia more useful >_> for all the hell I went through to get it.

[Spira]

perhaps the recolored noct, saio and hauberk sets will be part of the new customizable eq?

the evolith system definitely needs work.. if it can be more customizable and flexible.. surely more people will use it as compared to now

[Jeryhn]

Honestly, some of the evoliths available right now are pretty good. Considering the current trend of meriting on deliciously weak pink birds, making customizable gear specifically for things like meriting can offer huge advantages.

A good example is an Engetsuto +1 with a Polearm WS: Acc+ evolith attached to it, easily comparable to Tomoe when used by WARs and SAMs. Another good example would be a Ginhaku Haidate with vs. Birds: Attack+ and Accuracy+ as a good WS piece for NINs and MNKs (easily trumps Shura legs on WS for both). It's also possible to make some Ebur Gants for RDM: MP, MND, Magic Acc, Enmity- and a complete spread of great evolith options like Light elemental healing magic: Enmity-, Earth elemental enhancing magic: casting time -% and other things that could be great for an RDM's general use.

The real usefulness of the system will likely become fleshed out in making customizable gear specifically for gaining EXP beyond 75, or meriting. As it stands, the Evolith system doesn't seem to be one that'll be compatible with endgame events or missions or quests - rather for great options for grinding.

[Karbuncle]

There are definitely several pieces of the current Evolith gear that have their places in specific situations and universal, but far to many of them are udderly useless piles of shit (See the level 58~ Shit like Styrne Byrnie, Alacer Aketon, which costs 1mil~ to craft).

I hope they add more Evolith thats not family specific i really do, thats what we need .

Maybe i'm different, but i don't enjoy the thought of carrying around 20 different armor sets based solely on what mob family i'll be fighting that day

[Spira]

some of the weapon ones, especially the aern weapons were good..
but the whole ebon ebur furia was pretty crappy most of the time, since they placed size limitations in addition to shape... so good evoliths of a particular kind can only go into certain specific slots.. which made it very user unfriendly.

[TummieGaruda]

In my opinion, the Evolith system is a partial failure. One of the most obvious issues with Evoliths is the situational pieces that you end up creating. The vs. Family evoliths are what hold the ebon/ebur/furia sets from being outstanding pieces. Currently, you can go out and make a very nice MNK bodypiece with +18 Attack +17 accuracy +4 Str +4 Dex and increased critical hitrate. The downside is that the 10 of the attack and 9 of the accuracy is only gained when you fight birds. Not only that, but you have to have the ebur pigment to align the elements properly to allow Accuracy and Attack evoliths to make Shinku Togi. Not a lot of people have access to LS's that do Oupire/Zirnitra/Scylla from which these ebur pigments drop from. I am fortunate to be in a LS that does these, and maybe 1-2 people in our shell have created ebur pieces.

What would have made this system more successful is if the NPC could store up to 30 Evoliths, or gave you an evolith satchel where you can store all of your evoliths, and you can put them on gear and remove them as you see fit. That way, having vs Family evoliths wouldn't be so bad. If you were heading to sea, you can throw some Vs Luminians on your ebur gear, and then afterwards if you want to do a merit pt on birds, you could remove those evoliths place them back in your satchel and then put your Vs Birds evolith on your gear.

Most people won't even consider spending one mil plus on some of the body pieces (And the horrid Aptant droprate) to create a situational piece.

[Karbuncle]

I agree with you as i've mentioned in my first post but

Zirnitra or w/e can be duo'd/trio'd by BLM's/RDM's and Oupire can be taken down by a solid group of 6, Tank/Healer/DD/BRD(COR)/etc.

So Ebur pigment is easier to obtain, plus its 100% Drop from those.

SKylla i don't know.


Evolith Satchel would be nice :\, and if they can give us just Non-family-specific Evolith with Acc/Atk/etc i'd be happy. fuck i'd be happy if they gave us a Vs.Family:Haste evolith =x

[Dooom]

Our first priority is to address those aspects of the system that are currently causing frustration to our players.

Frankly, I think the biggest problem is the complexity of the system. Most people look at it on wiki and have their eyes go @.@. Furthermore, regarding the VS. family evoliths, we don't know what level camps 80 and beyond will involve, so a good meriting piece you make today for vs. birds may become obsolete in two month's time.

[Priran]

Can we please not ruin anything else with evolith? Shit sucks, they made locked caskets an even bigger pain in the ass since Evoliths are the only thing inside 9 times out of 10 and completely useless 10 times out of 10.

[Seanr]

The vs. Family evoliths are what hold the ebon/ebur/furia sets from being outstanding pieces.

Evoliths are patially shit because of this. or having to make elemental pieces, I could see if they Synergy Armors were cheap to make, but it's just stupidly rediculous in it's current form.

[Gwynplaine]

Frankly, I think the biggest problem is the complexity of the system. Most people look at it on wiki and have their eyes go @.@. Furthermore, regarding the VS. family evoliths, we don't know what level camps 80 and beyond will involve, so a good meriting piece you make today for vs. birds may become obsolete in two month's time.

Well I don't understand why people get the impression Evolith is too complicated.

All you gotta do is get an etchable piece of equipment from the AH or crafted. Get the proper Aptant drop from an NM then synergize it into your gear. Then get a pigment to drop from an NM if you want certain aperture stats. Have your gear synergized with the pigment then have it etched until you get the right HQ sized slots etched. Sign up for Hunt Registries and farm some Scylds until you can fight the NM that grants the Evolith stat you want. Kill the NM's for the Evoliths you want and then repeat until you get stats you approve of. Now check to make sure your armor is compatible with the stats you want to add. Each symbol assigns to a specific type of stat. Oh and the aperture has to be the proper size and element to hold your Evolith. Your ready to add the stats, now just synergize them onto your gear.

That's all there is to it. It's not noncompartmental pharmacokinetics analysis ffs.

[Lucavi]

^

Awesome. I love that "summary". Evoliths for Dummies, truly.

[ronin sparthos]

In my opinion, the Evolith system is a partial failure. One of the most obvious issues with Evoliths is the situational pieces that you end up creating. The vs. Family evoliths are what hold the ebon/ebur/furia sets from being outstanding pieces. Currently, you can go out and make a very nice MNK bodypiece with +18 Attack +17 accuracy +4 Str +4 Dex and increased critical hitrate. The downside is that the 10 of the attack and 9 of the accuracy is only gained when you fight birds. Not only that, but you have to have the ebur pigment to align the elements properly to allow Accuracy and Attack evoliths to make Shinku Togi. Not a lot of people have access to LS's that do Oupire/Zirnitra/Scylla from which these ebur pigments drop from. I am fortunate to be in a LS that does these, and maybe 1-2 people in our shell have created ebur pieces.

What would have made this system more successful is if the NPC could store up to 30 Evoliths, or gave you an evolith satchel where you can store all of your evoliths, and you can put them on gear and remove them as you see fit. That way, having vs Family evoliths wouldn't be so bad. If you were heading to sea, you can throw some Vs Luminians on your ebur gear, and then afterwards if you want to do a merit pt on birds, you could remove those evoliths place them back in your satchel and then put your Vs Birds evolith on your gear.

Most people won't even consider spending one mil plus on some of the body pieces (And the horrid Aptant droprate) to create a situational piece.

This.

Evoliths should have been something you could change on the fly like a PUPs attachments or BLU spells. Get your evolith, give to an NPC and access via a menu.

You go into a menu, equip the evoliths appropriate for what you are fighting and so long as you've already etched the gear it should just be a plug 'n play system. This way you could not only collect different evoliths for different situation (SE wins here, keeping you busy) but you could also have one piece of gear work for multiple tasks.

Aptant/pigment droprates wouldn't be bad if you had greater variety in what you could do with the gear. Currently some pieces function well on their own but the evolith system sucks because you have to manually socket on the evoliths in town for seemingly no reason.

[Gwynplaine]

That could be cool. It would be like Materia which everyone is familiar with. But knowing Square there would be something like a limit of only one evolith swap per tally week or something mind-numbingly obtuse like that that makes it useless.

[Siatdiat]

This.

Evoliths should have been something you could change on the fly like a PUPs attachments or BLU spells. Get your evolith, give to an NPC and access via a menu.

You go into a menu, equip the evoliths appropriate for what you are fighting and so long as you've already etched the gear it should just be a plug 'n play system. This way you could not only collect different evoliths for different situation (SE wins here, keeping you busy) but you could also have one piece of gear work for multiple tasks.

Aptant/pigment droprates wouldn't be bad if you had greater variety in what you could do with the gear. Currently some pieces function well on their own but the evolith system sucks because you have to manually socket on the evoliths in town for seemingly no reason.

So, make it so you can switch familys on the fly for whatever you are doing atm? How about make it much simpler and just remove the family requirement? The family requirement is the worst one. I think the magic type requirement and the weapon requirement are not near as bad as having bonuses only active on specific families. The weapon and magic type requirements are the best, since it just takes a multi job piece of gear and asks you to customize it further for one job which I dont think is that big of a deal. I.E. putting dagger bonuses on a set for thf, or putting blue magic bonuses for blu.

If it was limited to this and maybe gave slightly more worthwhile buffs to the skills mentioned, I think it would see alot more use than it does. As it is now if I even see people wearing it, they are doing it afk in town for looks.

[Spira]

Evoliths were definitely made more complicated than they needed to be..
They initially tied evoliths to Synergy probably because they needed something to ensure the continuity of the use of synergy..

but Evoliths never took off partly because of this. It'd be so much easier if you could just pay an NPC to etch slots for you.

The more standalone evoliths are, the better it would have been.

its overcomplicated when it could be so much simpler and still be tweakable.

kinda like why many people prefer iPhone over a Google Nexus or a Mac over a PC.

[Corrderio]

Evolith had some potential, however I think they shot themselves in the foot when evolith abilities would only kick in under certain conditions (vs. Family and certain magic skill/elemental combo).

[Cutriss]

The change to wiping apertures is good. But mainly evolith gear is just going to remain junk until some more universal stats are introduced. Which is too bad since a lot of the gear looks so damn cool.

I still don't really give a damn about evoliths for all the above reasons, but I'm hopeful that the above change means they might also be reasonable about allowing Augments to be erased off equipment. Seriously, FoV elite regimens would be much more popular if they had an NPC that would, say, allow you to pay some fixed fee (perhaps the NPC price of the equipment in question, or some small multiple of it) to cleanse it of augments and allow you to try again. 10k to let you reroll Haguns over and over until you get DMG+2 instead of CHR+1 MND+1 STR-3?