Dev Tracker: Discussion

[Kincard]

I didn't say SoA was the worst expansion, I just said it wasn't very good. To be fair I heavily weigh the story/lore stuff myself, as well as general exploration which I think SoA didn't do that well. I will agree that it was probably the best in terms of actual game content which is plenty important so I can understand if someone likes SoA a lot. It's the reason CoP had a lukewarm reception when it first came out- it really didn't add much in the ways of things to do.

Also SoA areas were just as "corridory" or whatever as ToAU really. I think my bigger beef, though, is that some of the areas aren't visually striking enough. The aerial views that Spira gave us early on had me really excited (back when we thought Colkhab's lair was a giant mushroom), but when they started previews on the live stream I thought it looked too similar to foresty areas we've already seen. Compare that to the very colorful Wajaom or the dimly-lit forest in Zitah. Yorcia is pretty good though, and I like Hennetiel's purple waters and the way you progress through the area by knocking down trees. Ra'Kaznar's pretty neat too.

[Odesseiron]

Don't know if this has been added to the discussion already, but just speaking hypothetically. What if SE for FFXI took a Blizz Diablo 3 approach.

Blizzard is releasing Necromancer as DLC in Diablo 3. Most people are moaning about not getting a full on expansion, etc. Others seems to be fine with it.

Let's say SE added quests for Time Mage and Alchemist and included AF and everything with it. (including some story content to go with it). No new areas though. Catch is it's a one time $9.99 fee Would you guys plunk down the money? I think most of community probably would.

[Damane]

Don't know if this has been added to the discussion already, but just speaking hypothetically. What if SE for FFXI took a Blizz Diablo 3 approach.

Blizzard is releasing Necromancer as DLC in Diablo 3. Most people are moaning about not getting a full on expansion, etc. Others seems to be fine with it.

Let's say SE added quests for Time Mage and Alchemist and included AF and everything with it. (including some story content to go with it). No new areas though. Catch is it's a one time $9.99 fee Would you guys plunk down the money? I think most of community probably would.

i would, hell i wish they would introduce new jobs without an expansion (albeit i would love an expansion). New jobs allways change the Meta-Game and are exciting in FFXI.

[Seha]

Would.

[dasva]

Some new dev posts. 1 is the officially translated January update outline. Very curious what the vague adding rewards to certain battlefields is as well as "Add new properties" for trusts.

One of the non translated ones looks like general platitudes of thanks for the feedback about omen we hear the complaints but adjustments take time. And the other one is something about chat logs. Think it's about what appears on each log when you do the 2 log view

[Destinye]

Don't know if this has been added to the discussion already, but just speaking hypothetically. What if SE for FFXI took a Blizz Diablo 3 approach.

Blizzard is releasing Necromancer as DLC in Diablo 3. Most people are moaning about not getting a full on expansion, etc. Others seems to be fine with it.

Let's say SE added quests for Time Mage and Alchemist and included AF and everything with it. (including some story content to go with it). No new areas though. Catch is it's a one time $9.99 fee Would you guys plunk down the money? I think most of community probably would.

The 6 Mini-add ons did extremely well so I'd be all for it, it's realistically a proper way to inject new content in XI as long as XIV remains a thing. SE wouldn't get too crazy with it (since when you think about it, Moogle Kupodetat/Shantotto/Crystaline was bought for the ending rewards more than anything) so it's not really that far out of the realm of possibilities.

As for expansion design, well they did say RoV was something they had in mind just not in the exact format. One thing they did well with XI was plan everything out so whether or not cuts happened in x expansion definitely shows but they seemed good at trying to keep things consistent. SoA I loved but it's an expansion that would have been amazing if it came out during XI's prime. Similar to how WoTG suffered because of XIV 1.0's development, it should have been more of an "update" to XI since the whole time travel aspect and alternate realities is literally the perfect excuse for an "overhaul" if they got touchy about lore similar to how they won't let us do common sense stuff in XIV because of lore shields.

[Fwahm]

Some new dev posts. 1 is the officially translated January update outline. Very curious what the vague adding rewards to certain battlefields is as well as "Add new properties" for trusts.

One of the non translated ones looks like general platitudes of thanks for the feedback about omen we hear the complaints but adjustments take time. And the other one is something about chat logs. Think it's about what appears on each log when you do the 2 log view

The trusts thing is likely them adding gear haste to them, like they've mentioned planning to do.

[catmato]

I think my bigger beef, though, is that some of the areas aren't visually striking enough. The aerial views that Spira gave us early on had me really excited (back when we thought Colkhab's lair was a giant mushroom), but when they started previews on the live stream I thought it looked too similar to foresty areas we've already seen.

Don't forget using the same music tracks for multiple outdoor zones (ciezak/yahse, morimar, marjami).

[Destinye]

Don't forget using the same music tracks for multiple outdoor zones (ciezak/yahse, morimar, marjami).

I didn't mind this because it made the wilderness feel 'bigger' so to speak. I did feel they could do a lot more with the zones but there's only so much you can do with what's supposed to be uncharted territory (aside geomancers) and such.

[Kyte]

Doubt that's the reason.
SoA's longer ending (we were originally supposed to go into that other dimension and fight a different form of Hades. The final fight was supposed to take place there with the help of August and blahblah) was cut way before RoV even came into their minds.

I'm well aware of what got cut- and I would restate that it's obvious it got cut due to being told to wrap things up. We were still being shown concept art of Tartarus up until around 8 months before their official announcement.

[arus2001]

Don't know if this has been added to the discussion already, but just speaking hypothetically. What if SE for FFXI took a Blizz Diablo 3 approach.

Blizzard is releasing Necromancer as DLC in Diablo 3. Most people are moaning about not getting a full on expansion, etc. Others seems to be fine with it.

Let's say SE added quests for Time Mage and Alchemist and included AF and everything with it. (including some story content to go with it). No new areas though. Catch is it's a one time $9.99 fee Would you guys plunk down the money? I think most of community probably would.

While Blizzard's current pricing point for Necro is unknown, I'll at least cut them a bit of slack since D3 has no cash generation beyond initial box sales. XI, however, does not have that excuse with the sub fee still being intact and unchanged despite skeleton crew status. Thus, I'd staunchly oppose DLC in this vein. Now, if it meant a solid set of quest lines related to the job and perhaps some additional world building and a new zone or two, I'd be a bit more receptive at perhaps $5 a pop, but any more still feels a hell of a lot like double dipping. And the longer micro-transactions are kept from holding content hostage from players, the better gaming will be for the players.

XI's mini add-ons were perhaps a fluke, as I think most bought into the first hoping for more than what we got. The last dealing with Shantotto more or less played on fandom, while the combined reward for having the three probably did the rest in tempting people to buy, even if the Nexus Cape's applications were niche at a time where transit was still pretty sluggish for players. And perhaps the greatest cocktease of it all was Aldo not finding his sister in Selbina. Overall, people craving new content isn't something I'd call unnatural, but I think this whole topic needs a stern expectation from the players to SE.

[Kincard]

ACP really pissed me off when it first came out (Aldo not reuniting with Emelyn actually isn't the central issue, it's just the cherry on top of what was a total non-plot), and I refused to buy either of the two other addons and even skipped on Visions of Abyssea for a pretty long time because I saw it as similar bullshit. In principle I'd probably be against selling a Job as a $10 DLC, but yeah, it would certainly work with this playerbase. It's probably not going to happen though since they've already proved they can make an extra $4 a month per person selling inventory space, why do anything that actually requires effort?

[Celebrindor]

A job is probably the one thing they could throw out there as DLC and get good response. Considering how underwhelming the 3 "story" based mini expansions were, I really doubt SE would get the financial response they desire by doing that again.

A job though, could almost become a forced purchase depending on the meta change it causes.

I'd rather see them take time and add master job quests for the existing jobs that include a BC type solo fight against a famous NPC for your job class as well as some gathering and storyline elements, resulting in a Su3 category after you get your 2100JPs, and that would open up possibilities for "Master" level gear, both rare/ex or crafted from crazy mats.

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[Hitou]

I doubt they could add new jobs if they wanted to. I'd require making new graphics for AF etc, and job abilities, and they've already stated they basically can't do anything that involved anymore graphically due to lack of dev kits/ man-power/ whatever the real reason is. I don't know why people want even more jobs in a game that barely uses 1/3rd of the existing jobs for real content anyway. Aside from the "it's new and shiny" factor it'd just end up being either broken like GEO or totally useless like most melee jobs.

I can definitely see them adding more mini-expansions with no plot and $10 gear you can only use on one job though.

[dasva]

I'd rather see them take time and add master job quests for the existing jobs that include a BC type solo fight against a famous NPC for your job class as well as some gathering and storyline elements, resulting in a Su3 category after you get your 2100JPs, and that would open up possibilities for "Master" level gear, both rare/ex or crafted from crazy mats.

More like after you get master it opens up the ability to break past your jp limits to get the promised 30/30 in each category. Ah yeah another 2250 jps to get per job to get ultra master

[Byrthnoth]

The current campaign is making me wish SE had done almost literally anything with Monstrosity.

Monstrosity could have been, for instance, Nexon's mobile FFXI starting point. Playing as a monster is already about as simplified as FFXI gets. You run from place to place and attack things, which typically only requires about 1-3 actions. If they can't make a working phone UI for that, then mobile FFXI would have no future anyway. Toss in some leaderboard "Most Notorious Monster" bullshit and microtransaction bells and whistles, potentially with some mobile-only event like Monster v. Monster in Arena, and you've got a mobile game.

The phone game could potentially stand by itself, but FFXI players could have been motivated by the ability to use an Instinct on your main character for some weekly infamy fee. So you log in on your phone and dick around maiming bitches as Daring Dancer Gigaworm, and then when you get home at night your character is stronger. If they wanted to keep Belligerency involved, they could give monsters a chance to drop their instinct (as well as substantial Infamy) for players who kill them. Don't want to level multiple monsters to 90 so you can get Behemoth Instinct III or keep leveling monsters to sustain your Infamy? Go kill a few level 90 Behemoths! So taking down players as parties would be an entry point to the content for casual FFXI players, and you could pick whether you want to do a coordinated group activity (NMonipulator hunting) or just farm your way to better stats.

Complimentary changes I would have made to the system:
1) Open up a few more zones to belligerency. NMs are supposed to be a little elusive.
2) Switch it so both players and monsters use Infamy, if they don't currently.
3) No claim on players or monsters during belligerency. Alliances can gang up, but only the killshot party potentially gets a reward so the system tilts towards 6v1 fights. At the same time, if you're out XPing your Adamantoise and you lure a group of adventurers, a friendly nearby Behemoth could come help you wreck them. None of this might actually be a change. I've never seen anyone try to fight me in Belligerency.

#thingsthatwontbe

[Fwahm]

I think there'd be some backlash if you put something as powerful as instincts behind a weekly paywall and another game.

[Byrthnoth]

idk, in the system I was dreaming up you'd still be able to play Monstrosity through FFXI.

[Warusha]

The current campaign is making me wish SE had done almost literally anything with Monstrosity.

Monstrosity could have been, for instance, Nexon's mobile FFXI starting point. Playing as a monster is already about as simplified as FFXI gets. You run from place to place and attack things, which typically only requires about 1-3 actions. If they can't make a working phone UI for that, then mobile FFXI would have no future anyway. Toss in some leaderboard "Most Notorious Monster" bullshit and microtransaction bells and whistles, potentially with some mobile-only event like Monster v. Monster in Arena, and you've got a mobile game.

The phone game could potentially stand by itself, but FFXI players could have been motivated by the ability to use an Instinct on your main character for some weekly infamy fee. So you log in on your phone and dick around maiming bitches as Daring Dancer Gigaworm, and then when you get home at night your character is stronger. If they wanted to keep Belligerency involved, they could give monsters a chance to drop their instinct (as well as substantial Infamy) for players who kill them. Don't want to level multiple monsters to 90 so you can get Behemoth Instinct III or keep leveling monsters to sustain your Infamy? Go kill a few level 90 Behemoths! So taking down players as parties would be an entry point to the content for casual FFXI players, and you could pick whether you want to do a coordinated group activity (NMonipulator hunting) or just farm your way to better stats.

Complimentary changes I would have made to the system:
1) Open up a few more zones to belligerency. NMs are supposed to be a little elusive.
2) Switch it so both players and monsters use Infamy, if they don't currently.
3) No claim on players or monsters during belligerency. Alliances can gang up, but only the killshot party potentially gets a reward so the system tilts towards 6v1 fights. At the same time, if you're out XPing your Adamantoise and you lure a group of adventurers, a friendly nearby Behemoth could come help you wreck them. None of this might actually be a change. I've never seen anyone try to fight me in Belligerency.

#thingsthatwontbe

Fite me IRL bro.

[Scythiroth]

Only hope for Monstrosity at this point is SE adding it to FF14.

I really enjoyed the leveling and unlocking new things aspect of it and wish they would have, at the very least, finished off the monster families in FF11. More rewards and stuff from it probably would have been a good idea as well, since I assume that is what turned people off from it.