Time for FFXI "Classic"?

[D44kpunk]

At least Gred has the balls to reply with a thought out argument and he will have a discussion. I'd bet a Behemoth Steak D44k won't respond to my post because he can't slam another person's opinion or somehow make him seem better than X so to speak.

Serious question, if a person did find that a challenge, what exactly are you suggesting about that person?

i'm not sure what you don't understand, as gred correctly pointed out, you guys don't come here to try and discuss the merits of the 75 era, you come here to insult it. you don't want a discussion you want a crucifixion. are you trying to bait me into insulting you or something? that's pretty sad dude.

gred alluded to it already anyways

Also I could refute every point but Ill just say that anyone could have any gear because mercing existed since day 1. So any scrub pld could have that gear without doing the content during that era, killing any point of exclusion you made.

this is entirely false, as someone that played on your server a few times no one merced until WoTG. modern day ffxi though virtually everything is for sale and it's for sale AT THE TIME OF RELEASE.

[Draylo]

No it isnt false. Ive been playing since day1 and have been apart of many end game LS and we did have buyers. Hauteclair was garbage that many sold, not many bothered with Khim. I also recall wanting to buy a bahamut staff because my LS barely did that fight and we had a long line. You either dont remember or werent around during those times.

[Gredival]

Damn dude, you know you have that saved in a notepad file.

The entire thing is forty pages single spaced in Word. I have thought out every possible angle and argument. Usually only a fraction is relevant to a discussion before someone pulls a coward move like you and says they could argue but won't bother.

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

[Draylo]

It isnt a coward move, I dont have time to articulate a long response to you and I have said multiple times that I wont
It is not worth the time when neither of our opinions will change nor SE. We would be wasting time and I dont care to.

[Kanriel]

1. The game itself became easier in Abyssea and Voidwatch. Cruor enchancements, Atma, Temp items. These fundamentally removed the concept of tanking from the game, made healing easier, removed the concept of crowd control from fights, removed the need to min-max gear to do good damage.

Yeah, I'm not going to argue pro-Abyssea/Voidwatch. I didn't play that era. I don't mind them looking back, but there's no nostalgia for me there.

2. Lowmanning itself is an easier form of gameplay. There is a natural challenge inherent in large group situations that cannot be attained simply by adjusting the amount of people down. The larger the fight the more opportunities for intricacy. It requires a higher level of collective skill when you impose the need for organization/coordination. For example, all the things I pointed out in my previous point removed the need for a group to show restraint and employ proper crowd control. Those were organizational/coordination challenges for your support players. The group had to be able to collectively react to a situation and work together. When fights are limited to lowman groups the level of intricacy is constrained. Yes, you can have a multi-faceted encounter with just 7-9 people. However the level of complication is always shallower than with 18 people. Think about it this way: a group of three people tasked with additional spawn crowd control can be charged with controlling more mobs than three times the amount one person should be able to handle. If a single person handles crowd control the spawns must be limited by however many spells he has. The encounter has to designed such that one person can do it all. However if you design the encounter for a large group and can assign three people to crowd control, you can increase the amount of spawns by more than three because they can stagger their spells. The very nature of a larger group expands the challenges you can throw in because you can force them to rely on good timing and organization to handle more than they could each do individually. This is the essence of a good team becomes greater than merely the sum of its parts.

That depends inherently on if the content was created for lowman or if you're low-manning it. Omen was originally created for 6 players, and it actually had some solid difficulty attached to it in some cases (Kyou's move, Unfettered Bravado, did 10k damage split, if you only had 6/7 (pet) targets, that was a hefty damage to soak, and he could curse everyone to 1-1.2k hp just before it...)

As an overall, I'm not sure exactly what content you're referencing here, though. Do you mean Dynamis with its adds and links? Because current XI has that. Do you mean how you would have people kiting the aggro mobs near the 3 ground Wyrm's? I used to do that kiting, it's useful to the group, but there's not really difficulty to it. Even in the 75 days you had groups that would cut down on how many people that used because the biggest difficulty when using a large group is that most players are bad, and so a small elite group would be better.

3. Competition is an inherent value in video games. "But video games aren't a competition, they are supposed to be fun!" Yes, games are supposed to be fun. Here's the kicker. Competition makes games fun. Games rely on a sense of mastery/challenge to be fun. But mastery is relative. We value the acquisition of skills and the mastery of skills, but we judge the quality of our skills and the degree of our mastery through comparisons to other. People in a cooking contest enjoy the cooking because there's an element of mastery involved by comparing how good their food is relative to others. They want to validate their mastery through recognition compared to others. FFXI is primarily a game based on PvE (player vs. environment). The theme of XI is adventurers; this was reiterated in Abyssea's storyline itself. Given that, competition in this game should center on PvE. In other words the contest to be the best adventurer is a contest about who best conquers the environment of Vanadiel. The best way then to challenge players to get better than one another is to force them to compete for a limited resource.

Zero-sum competition between the player base is good. It drives the player base to work harder to top each other, it increases the fun of the game, it increases the value of accomplishments. The claim system rewards the group who brings the most people willing to actually pay attention, balanced against giving everyone a shot proportionate to their own collective effort camping. That sounds pretty fair. As far as skinner boxes go I'd rather have a lever mechanism that is a competition between me and the other rats vs. a skinner box where we all run our own individual treadmills and race to see who gets lucky with the lever mechanism first. Plus I think farming systems are tedious and would rather just fight the big bads than go through tech trees all the time.

This is entirely subjective and your opinion. Zero-sum is in no way a requirement for those concepts, though, just the hardest and "purist" form of it. You can still do challenges such as who can clear content the fastest (the very concept of speedrunning, one of the oldest forms of game competition) and who can do it with less characters/players, etc. without needing a zero-sum scenario. Personally, I find zero-sum fucking stupid, but it's clear based on your avatar here that's a difference in opinion. Though on that topic, my issue with zero-sum in the context of FFXI is that meritocracy isn't how this game works. Random Number Generators are. Your signature right there, it's not "skill" that got you a defending ring, it was the 5% chance it dropped. Obtaining that item had vastly more to do with being lucky than being skilled. And that was always the biggest factor in the 75 days. Lucky bitches won. Didn't make them good, but they would go around and brag about it.

4. World spawns rewards I'd argue the best system is a meritocracy which rewards the most skilled, regardless of comparative time dedication. We do not crown NBA champions or Superbowl winners based on how much practice they did, we crown them based on who is the best at the game... determined by the competition.

World Spawns are far from perfect at this... but are much better at it than instances. World Spawns blend a bit of "most time dedication" (in a communal sense; the group that puts in the most hours, when you consider each individual member's contributions separately, tends to have a claiming advantage) with direct competition and skill test (you don't get to wipe and try again, you mess up if someone's better than you they will kill it instead).

Some people legitimately didn't have schedules that were conducive to world spawn systems. However I do believe that, if devoted, anyone could attain almost anything EVENTUALLY from an HNMLS as long as they were willing to put in whatever time they did have to a linkshell. (Except for Defending Ring due to its rarity, you could just plain out never see it drop ever).

More people simply refused to level support jobs to gain entry into an HNMLS because they expect to be able to come in as a dime a dozen DPS/tank (and probably poorly geared at that since your objective in joining an HNMLS is to get gear).

Some stuff, even in games, is supposed to be hard. Shut up and do it. And if you can't, well that's where you rank as a player. Just like most kids aren't gonna get into Harvard, you can't have everyone be the best at a game. When Relics came out, SE specifically said not everyone was supposed to get one. Similarly, I think not everyone was supposed to get Ridill, Adaberk, Dramatica, and D-Ring.

I am NOT advocating that you have to play the game a certain way. My opinion is simply that not everyone deserves top level rewards in virtue of playing. FFXI is like any other game. Go play Street Fighter or StarCraft at your own pace and your own way; the game is there for you to enjoy. But if you don't excel then you don't get ranked into the highest leagues.

There is no shame in that unless you yourself are making a value judgment based on that. And if you are, maybe you care a bit more about your relative position in that competition than you want to admit.

Instances with a timer and tuned appropriately can offer the same thing as "Don't wipe or someone else gets to fight". Spawned bosses that require spending millions of gil (or the NM farming associated with Warder of Courage) and resetting SP's give you a punishment for a loss. In Omen for example, a good team will always have time leftover to handle one fuck up and wipe, a bad group probably won't. There's a very clear difference in skill in the modern game. Just watch streams to see people timing out on Omen bosses...

Overall your point is correct that world spawns have some manner of meritocracy, but as you also covered, it's also mostly about who shows up the most. So if you're a good player that works 60 hours a week and barely plays, you're going to get beat by the unemployed dude in mommy's basement who can make every single world spawn. In the current game, a good player gets to work for their gear upgrades regardless of having other commitments in life, and skill/socialization is the main importance, not time spent on the game. I'd argue that's a better form of meritocracy.

5. You didn't have to play the HNMLS style of you didn't want to. XI never lacked for content. There was a ton of stuff to do in FFXI that most of us just never bothered with because the rewards are insufficient. There was tons of content for non-HNMLS players in 75 cap that no one touched. Did you get Rank 10 on all 3 nations? Did you do those WotG missions/quests that didn't have rewards (finished well after most players left)? Assault? SCNM? ANNM? Nyzul? MMM? ToaU Beastmen Generals?

If the "fun" is to be had in doing content, then all there needs to be is content to do right? It shouldn't matter that the reward for all of that content was paltry.

The fact that people didn't do content that had no rewards reveals that there was an integral relationship between the enjoyment of content and its rewards. Content has to have some terminal uptake to motivate people to do it. We're not here to consume content for fun in and of itself, we played because we were in a skinner box. We are seeking that chemically stimulated euphoria we get from mastering certain tasks and being given treats for that mastery. Which means there is incentive as a matter of fact to make the treats harder to get.

People always react adversely to gear rarity, regardless of how that rarity is implemented. When gear was available through low man instances in Salvage people STILL were willing to cheat. The world spawn system is a red herring excuse. People just want to expend minimal effort to get gear.

I quit early in WotG because the game got bland as fuck, so no, didn't do WotG. I have rank 10 in every nation now, but forget when I accomplished that. Possibly was back in the day though, as I started Windurst and think I've been Bastokan since before SoA, with Sandy done in between...

I'd argue that "the rewards were insufficient" fit for far more than the pre-HNM stuff, it fit for almost the entire 75 era. I quit, effectively, because of the "relic curse". When you spend all that time grinding and working towards something, and you reach the payoff, and you go, "What the fuck have I been doing with my life?" And that very much encompasses the 75 era, and as you alluded to here, people were quitting. They were quitting during the 75 era. The game was dying before "Abyssea ruined FFXI."

You're right that it's because people wanted gear. And current FFXI has taken a mostly different approach to "great rarity". Instead of making almost all the good shit incredibly fucking rare, a few pieces are incredibly rare, everything is some level of grind, and there's just a ton more gear to acquire. You get the euphoria, you feel your character progress, and you get to do content that feels worthy of your time.

XI content was slower than other MMOs; it worked because XI was created from the start to work on horizontal progression. It isn't about the amount of gear. It's about permanence of progression.

Lifting the 75 cap was a reset switch that, inherently, was bad because it introduced vertical progression.

And the fact is that in the end it tanked the player base. Casuals yearned for a reset. They got it. They loved it. Subscriptions spiked.

Then when they maxed out in gear because NOTHING in Abyssea was a challenge, they got bored and left. Subscriptions cratered. Now you lost the casuals with no attention span, and the hardcore players that were just screwed over left as well.

Ito invested in the wrong player base. Zero-sum server capped World Spawns were the best way to introduce sufficient supply control on gear. And the playerbase didn't know what was best for them.

Again, I'm not here arguing FOR Abyssea. It was arguably good (or terrible) for the time period, but the current game has VERY little to do with Abyssea, and is more of a refined version of the 75 era.

Vertical progression happens over long periods of time still in XI, so it is more like horizontal than vertical. But you seem to be arguing Abyssea vs 75, which isn't really relevant to todays XI to 75, so...

You have to rate content scaled to the capabilities of the time. Fafnir was a lot harder when we used Adaman PLD/WAR with Earth Staff and before BLM potency merits and GHorn Ballads.

Also even near the end of 75 cap, as trivial as you make Fafhogg out to be, I will stand by the following statement: pre-twohand patch, an alliance of players all with median level skill for their jobs, arranged in a typically sufficient alliance (tank party, blm party, skillchainers) would not have the coordination, skill, reaction time, gear, etc. to beat Fafnir before rage. I'm basing this off the level of quality of a normal player as I have experienced it and watching tons of start-up shout LS go in and fail miserable at Fafnir.

Being a successful HNMLS demands a much different skillset from its members. It is a skill set 80% of the players in this game lack. It tests timing, understanding of positioning, reaction time, and yes the ability to simply fucking listen. I think people who lack these skills shouldn't succeed at this game. The biggest example I can give you is Shamshir and Hauteclaire. A wretched tank PLD who can kill 300 crabs but couldn't tank his way out of a paper bag can get Shamshir. Hauteclaire requires a halfway decent LS, and maybe it sadly doesn't require that you personally tanked Khimaira, it does mean you ideally are a competent enough player that an LS that can do Khimaira keeps you around.

Attaining King gear required devotion and commitment. Not only within an HNMLS to earn the right to lot on gear, but to gain entry into an HNMLS.

The exact same thing can be said about current content in the game. I've regularly watched streams of people taking full alliances into Omen and struggling to win in time, even seen some groups wipe. And Dyna wave 3 is a whole new plane of difficulty than Omen, most groups you'll see streaming it are terrible and do not do well for it. And they even made it fun to get those clears. The "clear" is from either defeating the wave 3 boss (20mil HP) or dealing 30 mil damage to the boss. So a bad group won't ever clear it, an okay group will have to do it over and over again, chipping away at that 30mil, and a good group will get the clear in a run, maybe two. And you can go back to spending your time a lot better once you have the clear (since there's sadly shit rewards for repeating it). So that's not a concept that's specific to 75 FFXI. Maybe again in an Abyssea vs 75 contest, but that's not what today is.

[Kalmado]

i'm not sure what you don't understand, as gred correctly pointed out, you guys don't come here to try and discuss the merits of the 75 era, you come here to insult it. you don't want a discussion you want a crucifixion. are you trying to bait me into insulting you or something? that's pretty sad dude.

gred alluded to it already anyways

You made a remark. I asked you what you meant exactly, as in specifically, by that remark. You haven't responded. It's that simple.

You probably find Mario kart on 50cc to be a challenge too.

Serious question, if a person did find that a challenge, what exactly are you suggesting about that person?

[Kanriel]

i'm not sure what you don't understand, as gred correctly pointed out, you guys don't come here to try and discuss the merits of the 75 era, you come here to insult it. you don't want a discussion you want a crucifixion. are you trying to bait me into insulting you or something? that's pretty sad dude.

gred alluded to it already anyways



this is entirely false, as someone that played on your server a few times no one merced until WoTG. modern day ffxi though virtually everything is for sale and it's for sale AT THE TIME OF RELEASE.

Nela merc'd shit on Shiva, which is one of the reasons original NA HNMLS hated him, because he was out there just to make gil when they were trying to gear their people. Then eventually DL started selling stuff, and so did the others. Mercing existed WELL before WotG. I was a self-righteous holy boy who hated the concept of that stuff and even I was aware of it existing.

Also, no idea where you got the bit about me not using gearswap. I use gearswap and I enjoy doing so and the gear acquisition that goes with it. I don't enjoy the action of swapping the gear itself, that's absurd. I enjoy being able to build my sets.

[Gredival]

It isnt a coward move, I dont have time to articulate a long response to you and I have said multiple times that I wont
It is not worth the time when neither of our opinions will change nor SE. We would be wasting time and I dont care to.

So my point again. You don't want to have a discussion; you just wanted to repeat your opinion.

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

[Draylo]

You wont change my opinion and I have more information because I have played through every era of FFXI

[Gredival]

And that's not relevant because I have identified distinct values that should be prioritized which are uniquely satisfied by HNMs. The fact you played eight more years of shittier versions of the game that you liked better doesn't matter unless you can refute either 1) my identified values, 2) why 75 cap HNM end game has a unique internal link to accessing those values, 3) that a later version of XI accesses these values better.

[Gredival]

Also, as I pointed out, you're inherently biased to prefer versions of the game where you weren't restricted to being a have-not. You are the exact type of person that wanted a reset switch, wants accessibility, and benefits from upending the system.

So yes, no shit you liked 99 cap better.

[Kanriel]

And that's not relevant because I have identified distinct values that should be prioritized which are uniquely satisfied by HNMs. The fact you played eight more years of shittier versions of the game that you liked better doesn't matter unless you can refute either 1) my identified values, 2) why 75 cap HNM end game has a unique internal link to accessing those values, 3) that a later version of XI accesses these values better.

Bolded the important part. I don't think a majority of 75 era FFXI players have those values, in fact, considering your (classic) elitism, you are very aware of this as well. Which in the end, ruins your entire argument because this is at its core a discussion on whether people would play a classic server, and you're here stating that in your very specific set of values shared by only a small minority of players, 75 era was best.

[Draylo]

Also, as I pointed out, you're inherently biased to prefer versions of the game where you weren't restricted to being a have-not. You are the exact type of person that wanted a reset switch, wants accessibility, and benefits from upending the system.

So yes, no shit you liked 99 cap better.

I had everything during the 75 cap except a relic. I did every single piece of content successfully and I am sure you know that. No idea where you think I was a "have not" lol. I like the game better now for countless reasons.

[Draylo]

Dbl

[Gredival]

Bolded the important part. I don't think a majority of 75 era FFXI players have those values, in fact, considering your (classic) elitism, you are very aware of this as well. Which in the end, ruins your entire argument because this is at its core a discussion on whether people would play a classic server, and you're here stating that in your very specific set of values shared by only a small minority of players, 75 era was best.

But I'm also arguing that the player base didn't know what's best for them. That was the whole argument about how Abyssea was well-received and increased subs only to leave them more decimated than before.

People don't like rarity and exclusion; however they are necessary and make the game better.

[Kanriel]

But I'm also arguing that the player base didn't know what's best for them. That was the whole argument about how Abyssea was well-received and increased subs only to leave them more decimated than before.

People don't like rarity and exclusion; however they are necessary and make the game better.

Which is why the current game is the best. It has rarity and exclusion through virtue of there being vastly more "rare and exclusive" things, while toning down the grind necessary for a single rarity. You still have glimpses of the things you seem to hold dear, but people see things as more attainable, which keeps them playing.

[D44kpunk]

Bolded the important part. I don't think a majority of 75 era FFXI players have those values, in fact, considering your (classic) elitism, you are very aware of this as well. Which in the end, ruins your entire argument because this is at its core a discussion on whether people would play a classic server, and you're here stating that in your very specific set of values shared by only a small minority of players, 75 era was best.

wow classic still has a higher population than live.

nasomi/eden are the 2nd and 3rd biggest ffxi servers. you could cry and claim that this is because it's free, but not a single person i know that plays nasomi/eden would have a problem paying $13/mo for it.

i assume if you delete all the 8boxed bots on asura nasomi might have it beat too (don't you play 4? there are rules on both servers about # of accounts from an IP. asura would go to 500 people if SE had these rules.)

also Nela/HORNET didn't sell anything. they wouldn't even talk to NA players. if you're claiming that you have some hidden knowledge that only you possess as a non-japanese speaking person that nela was selling to japanese people please post proof. i know you don't have proof though

[Draylo]

They should do that honestly, would encourage people to actually team up.

[Gredival]

That depends inherently on if the content was created for lowman or if you're low-manning it. Omen was originally created for 6 players, and it actually had some solid difficulty attached to it in some cases (Kyou's move, Unfettered Bravado, did 10k damage split, if you only had 6/7 (pet) targets, that was a hefty damage to soak, and he could curse everyone to 1-1.2k hp just before it...)

See the part where I note that 18-person content is inherently more intricate because adding additional members imposes organizational challenges that literally cannot exist in a 6-person set up, such as staggering debuffs/sleeps or stun orders.

Do you mean how you would have people kiting the aggro mobs near the 3 ground Wyrm's? I used to do that kiting, it's useful to the group, but there's not really difficulty to it.

More things for people to do means more chances of failure, then things go wrong and you lose claim and the mob. Groups should be punished if they link Darters or elementals or what not.

The hardest example if you want specifics would be doing Bahamut 2 and controlling the three Wyrm pops.

Even in the 75 days you had groups that would cut down on how many people that used because the biggest difficulty when using a large group is that most players are bad, and so a small elite group would be better.

Which is my argument for the HNM ecosystem and elitism. Good LSes cut the fat. Bad people don't get their gear. Git gud.

This is entirely subjective and your opinion. Zero-sum is in no way a requirement for those concepts, though, just the hardest and "purist" form of it. You can still do challenges such as who can clear content the fastest (the very concept of speedrunning, one of the oldest forms of game competition) and who can do it with less characters/players, etc. without needing a zero-sum scenario. Personally, I find zero-sum fucking stupid, but it's clear based on your avatar here that's a difference in opinion.

It was the best and most efficient way to hard cap the supply of equipment, which given the slow rate of content I pointed out, is key to preserving lateral progression.

Though on that topic, my issue with zero-sum in the context of FFXI is that meritocracy isn't how this game works. Random Number Generators are. Your signature right there, it's not "skill" that got you a defending ring, it was the 5% chance it dropped. Obtaining that item had vastly more to do with being lucky than being skilled. And that was always the biggest factor in the 75 days. Lucky bitches won. Didn't make them good, but they would go around and brag about it.

Who is going to have a better chance of getting lucky, the people who don't camp or the people who, as you described, set alarms and built their sleeping schedule around Kings?

I never set out to get a D-Ring. PLD and NIN weren't my mains. But I camped every single King, every single day -- even after I got the one King item I actually wanted (Hecatomb Subligar) -- because that kept my LS on top. Then we got lucky one night with no main tanks on and Panda told me to lot it.

I consider that ring as proof that sweat and blood get rewarded. I camped more than career tanks and got the holy grail for it.

Instances with a timer and tuned appropriately can offer the same thing as "Don't wipe or someone else gets to fight". Spawned bosses that require spending millions of gil (or the NM farming associated with Warder of Courage) and resetting SP's give you a punishment for a loss. In Omen for example, a good team will always have time leftover to handle one fuck up and wipe, a bad group probably won't. There's a very clear difference in skill in the modern game. Just watch streams to see people timing out on Omen bosses...

Compare the amount of D-Rings pre-??? and post-???

You're talking literally 20x the amount of rings. Sever limited is key.

Overall your point is correct that world spawns have some manner of meritocracy, but as you also covered, it's also mostly about who shows up the most. So if you're a good player that works 60 hours a week and barely plays, you're going to get beat by the unemployed dude in mommy's basement who can make every single world spawn. In the current game, a good player gets to work for their gear upgrades regardless of having other commitments in life, and skill/socialization is the main importance, not time spent on the game. I'd argue that's a better form of meritocracy.

Por que no los dos? You make spawns harder as the game gets older. Tiamat was harder than Fafnir. That's the skill barrier. Then you reward dedication and sacrifice through the zero sum aspect (which has other ancillary benefits I've already pointed out).

We shouldn't reward the people who have the best excuses not to play.

I'd argue that "the rewards were insufficient" fit for far more than the pre-HNM stuff, it fit for almost the entire 75 era. I quit, effectively, because of the "relic curse". When you spend all that time grinding and working towards something, and you reach the payoff, and you go, "What the fuck have I been doing with my life?" And that very much encompasses the 75 era, and as you alluded to here, people were quitting. They were quitting during the 75 era. The game was dying before "Abyssea ruined FFXI."

As I alluded to before, I got my Hecatomb Subligar, which to me was basically a relic, and I kept camping. The only difference is that I allowed myself to take a vacation vs. sacrificing anything and everything to make it to the pit every day.

Players are either after gear or they are after competition. If they are after the first, the easy solution is more content (i.e. more world spawns). There were still tons of room for lateral progression at 75 cap gear. Hell they could have raised the level cap and kept HNM gear relevant by introducing upgrade paths which required the base items... or even put upgrade items on the HNMs.

If they are after the second, the only way to keep them is by creating artificial rarity.

You're right that it's because people wanted gear. And current FFXI has taken a mostly different approach to "great rarity". Instead of making almost all the good shit incredibly fucking rare, a few pieces are incredibly rare, everything is some level of grind, and there's just a ton more gear to acquire. You get the euphoria, you feel your character progress, and you get to do content that feels worthy of your time.

People should be gear capped relative to their position in the server hierarchy. I don't believe in a mediocre player getting to work a little bit every day and eventually getting a reward. I was absolutely ideologically opposed to HNMLS selling R/Ex items for this reason. You want a Ridill? Your ass should be in the pit proportional to how important it is to you. Not farming 20M somewhere else to buy it. You need to be good enough for an HNMLS to deem you worthy of it.

but the current game has VERY little to do with Abyssea, and is more of a refined version of the 75 era.

And it could have been built without the abomination that was the level cap raise.

Vertical progression happens over long periods of time still in XI, so it is more like horizontal than vertical. But you seem to be arguing Abyssea vs 75, which isn't really relevant to todays XI to 75, so...

I'm arguing HNM centric end game vs. anything else.

The exact same thing can be said about current content in the game. I've regularly watched streams of people taking full alliances into Omen and struggling to win in time, even seen some groups wipe. And Dyna wave 3 is a whole new plane of difficulty than Omen, most groups you'll see streaming it are terrible and do not do well for it. And they even made it fun to get those clears. The "clear" is from either defeating the wave 3 boss (20mil HP) or dealing 30 mil damage to the boss. So a bad group won't ever clear it, an okay group will have to do it over and over again, chipping away at that 30mil, and a good group will get the clear in a run, maybe two. And you can go back to spending your time a lot better once you have the clear (since there's sadly shit rewards for repeating it). So that's not a concept that's specific to 75 FFXI. Maybe again in an Abyssea vs 75 contest, but that's not what today is.

It's not zero-sum.

[D44kpunk]

Looks like the kids retreated to ffxiah to insult the 75 era in the most recent thread about it there.

What a life!