Dev Tracker: Discussion

[Kincard]

Just like back in...well, every era of XI (and most online games in existence), the fact that players are unreasonable and demand everyone has x equipment doesn't mean it's impossible to beat the content without them. It's a lot easier for them to balance content a given ilevel now because there's a "standard" stat to go off of (skill, base stats etc). Dauradabla is probably the only absurdly unbalanced item left and they did mention they might add a +1 song instrument.

[Toth]

Just like back in...well, every era of XI (and most online games in existence), the fact that players are unreasonable and demand everyone has x equipment doesn't mean it's impossible to beat the content without them. It's a lot easier for them to balance content a given ilevel now because there's a "standard" stat to go off of (skill, base stats etc). Dauradabla is probably the only absurdly unbalanced item left and they did mention they might add a +1 song instrument.

Where is my gun with +1 rolls

[arus2001]

Where is my gun with +1 rolls

You'll get a R/E bullet. Then you'll shoot it accidentally.

[dasva]

You mean bullet that has a chance to fire on it's own instantly each roll!

[dasva]

http://www.playonline.com/pcd/topics...57/detail.html Woop! Double monipulator exp and other stuffs until next monday.

Ya know it says it doesn't apply to abyssea but I just got twice the xp right now than I did last night killing the same nm... anyone else seeing anything like that?

[NynJa]

Theorycrafting

abyssea NM's have fixed xp, and SE coded the double xp to only ignore abyssea xp gain, of mobs killed in a row +1

[Sechs]

Eh, I dunno, that kinda sucks I guess, but is there any salvage stuff that's still good?

Marduk Legs are very good for BRD.
Skadi Feet very good for jobs who can equip them.
Skadi Body still the only 7% DW body for some jobs altough at this point I don't think it's worth using over other ilevel options, maybe for stuff like Dynamis etc?
Marduk feet have +1 smn skill over other options (duh...)
Marduk body/hands still a nice option for precast, but there are better ones these days.

I'm starting to stretch it to find useful pieces. There's probably something else but it's hardly anything vital, except maybe the first 2 I listed which are still very good.

[Sechs]

It's when you get 4 song +4 Brds that no other support can even come close in the whole picture.

Thinkin back about it, I dunno what they were thinking when they created Daurdabla.
I mean, in which other situation in this game you have a job which, alone, covers EXACTELY the role of TWO spots?
Having a Daubla99 BRD in your pt is like having a 7men party with TWO bards.
How can you even remotely hope to balance that?

I mean, I'm starting to think it was a very weak design choice on their end.

[dasva]

Probably figured increases in the number of songs had diminishing returns. Which they do but not enough to really call it balanced. At least not at the 4 spot... after that maybe. So if they do make an easily obtainable 3 song instrument it might help regular brds compare with duab brds. Of course then they will more flagrantly design content with 4+ songs in mind.

Though in a way at the time having an ochain pld in alot of situations was better than having even an entire pt of plds as far as tanking goes. So bad they had to repurpose the face shield

[Sechs]

I'm all for adding an easy to obtain +1 instrument, but if they do that they kinda need to address the 90>99 trials and make them easier, or owners who "worked hard" obtain their lv90 Daubla will be rightfully pissed.
I'm not realistically expecting for that to happen, but in a just world it should!

[NynJa]

I'm all for adding an easy to obtain +1 instrument, but if they do that they kinda need to address the 90>99 trials and make them easier, or owners who "worked hard" obtain their lv90 Daubla will be rightfully pissed.
I'm not realistically expecting for that to happen, but in a just world it should!

Change 99 dur to "increases song duration" and drop it back to 3 songs.

99 dur owners butthurt? Boo fucking hoo. I watched my 0.01% drop rate TK go from prestige relic to everyday commodity overnight. Maat's cap owners watched the required XP needed drop about 25% or so. Relic owners watched the rarity of their weapon go from pretty rare to "my mules mules mule has one", and then got steamrolled by emp weapons. DRG's went from a DD powerhouse to a laughing stock. RNG's did too for a while.

If its causing such a discrepancy in balancing (GOD I HATE THAT WORD) content, where the difficulty scale tips so fucking much, just say "fuck you, were undoing this, deal with it" and adjust the harp.

[Kincard]

Expertise Ring is a 10 charge ring, top lel.

[Sechs]

Nynja I personally wouldn't mind Daur99 going to 3 songs like Daur90, I would welcome such a change because I consider 4 songs to be way too overpowered.
But at the same time you can't really compare the changes you wrote with a change like this. It would be too big and honestly too unfair for players who managed to get their daubla to 99.
It's never going to happen.

[Mikkel]

Personally, i would rather see them change Songs/BP wards/rolls to work across the entire alliance. Then place a cap of 4 songs/person with clarion call the only thing that can put a 5th song up. Free up a slot in alliance content for other jobs if you have a 3-4 song BRD and make you have to consider more carefully which songs you want. This way we get rid of the whole party swapping bs also. While they're at it make sambas and Geo enhancing auras work for the whole alliance also... Should function as one large party.

[Sechs]

Not sure if the "working for all alliance" could be easily solved from a technical point of view, but judging from how they work on everybody around when you're inside Reives, I'm leaning to think it shouldn't be a tech issue.
Aside that, some form of buff limiting should be implemented so that people stop overbuffing with 2000 swaps, before BCs etc.
It has gone too far, imho, and it makes things more complicated for them to balance while creating new fights.
Other games solve this easily with party dropping. When someone who cast a buff drops the pt, that pt loses the buff. Altough this MIGHT be something they can't easily do with their techs.

There already is a cap on songs, it's shared by COR rolls and it's 12 atm if I recall.
They should split rolls from songs and absolutely place a cap on max songs, altough 4 seems a bit too small.
It would also be a pain for BRDs if songs went Alliance-wide. You're not considering the fact that different players/parties need different songs.
Good luck pianissimoing songs for 10+ people lol


tl;dr
I like your idea in general, something has to be done about buff overstacking imho, but I'm not sure what you proposed would be the right solution.

[Malithar]

Geo enhancing auras work for the whole alliance also... Should function as one large party.

When Geo was first announced, I honestly thought that's how they would work. Surely SE wouldn't have us tossing down bigass glowy bubbles and have it party only...right?.... -_-;

Would love to see that change, at the least. Can get behind Sambas as well since it's a debuff to the enemy that should apply for anyone hitting it, but rolls and songs might be a bit much. idk, maybe it's just the Geo in me wanting all the cake and fuck Brd/Cor. Party swapping feels like a cheap trick to circumvent a system, and stacking 12 songs/rolls creates a rather massive difference between DD output of differing alliances.

[Revati]

There's no hope for geo to compete with bard as long as they're the only job with super haste.

[Prothescar]

GEO definitely needs more than just alliance wide buffs, though that would be a start. It needs stronger ones to go with it, especially since it will seemingly always be limited to having only two spells active at once, unlike BRD and COR. Alternatively, they can stop riding so high on the "they can't be resisted" train and just make GEO's debuffs stronger. Sure, they can't miss or be erased, however one of the two is extremely easy to remove and the other can be quite easy as well if the enemy has ridiculous AoEs, and they're expensive to reapply: significantly moreso than any other. The price is being paid elsewhere.

In summary:
-Give Geo and Indi spells the ability to affect the entire alliance
*Wouldn't fix the entire problem, but finding a slot in a party for a GEO when other jobs can fill them more aptly is an issue.

-Give GEO stronger buffs and enhance existing debuffs
*High MP cost, fragility of the luopan, potential fragility and maintenance cost of the GEO, and forever being locked to having only two available buffs/debuffs active at once outweighs their 100%, non erasable, non dispelable landrate.


Regain, some form of Haste (NOT straight delay reduction like Blitzer's Roll, maybe JA haste or something so that it works in tandem with BRD rather than attempting to replace or compete with it), and maybe a double/triple/quadruple attack buff would help a lot.

[Draylo]

They can if their buff hits the whole alliance, otherwise not at all tbh.

[Mikkel]

It would also be a pain for BRDs if songs went Alliance-wide. You're not considering the fact that different players/parties need different songs.
Good luck pianissimoing songs for 10+ people lol

It would be like 2004 all over again! Brds developing involuntary twitches bc people dont know how to position themselves for songs. Who doesnt miss that?

But the time you'd save not needing to swap between 2-3 parties would give you plenty of extra time to get the appropriate songs on people... besides, who doesnt want to spend more time actually playing their main job? BRDs JA song rotation then play their sub job for 7+mins.

Having buffs wear off when the BRD leaves the party would just mean people will want to bring MORE BRDs to events... which just means even less room for other jobs.