HorizonXI – Era+ 75 Cap FFXI Server Launching December 17th, 2022

[Kipling]

• Website: https://horizonxi.com/
• Discord: https://discord.gg/horizonxi

A new FFXI adventure is just on the horizon! Launching December 17th, 2022 at 10:00AM EST, HorizonXI is a single box progression server starting at the Chains of Promathia expansion utilizing our unique "Era+" approach. Through Era+, HorizonXI will sequentially implement all existing FFXI content at level 75 while embracing the game's original horizontal progression system - preserving the social networking and group oriented play FFXI is known for. Below is our launch trailer which provides an overview of what the server offers while also giving a sneak peek at some of our Era+ content.

Many of our staff are old BG posters and we wanted to post here for anyone who might be interested in our project. Thank you again to the admins for giving us permission to do so. We already have almost 4500 people on our discord and we are growing fast!



What is Era+?

Adventurers on HorizonXI will have the opportunity to engage in an experience that allows them to relive the magic and mystery of FFXI, like when it was first released over two decades ago. We have designed our server to include new and exciting things that keep the spirit of discovery alive, including new experience point camps, slight modifications to previously underutilized equipment, and more to be uncovered in-game. Adventurers are also free to pursue the in-game path that best fits their interests and play styles rather than feeling forced into playing jobs and strategies most aligned to the "META" (most effective tactics available) that existed in the past and continues to exist on most current FFXI private servers. Through a light touch to jobs and content that we refer to as our Era+ approach, we have designed a server that will excite and support a variety of players.

A New Sense of Discovery through Era+ Enhancements

Our dedicated balance team has ensured that none of our balancing has drastically altered the identity of the level 75 cap era experience we all know and love. More specifically, we have accomplished the goal of re-imagining discovery and job viability through slight job tweaks to provide better overall class balance, minor adjustments to key encounters and content, and minor gameplay tweaks.

Previews of our job balancing can be seen here.

The core pillar of job balancing for HorizonXI has been that all jobs must retain their level 75 cap identity. The era balance experience has been preserved by only making minimal adjustments to some jobs. Any adjustments directly solve an existing balance problem in era, and all solutions carry the mandates of: (a) feeling appropriate for the level 75 cap era; and (b) pushing a job closer to its core identity in the 75 cap era. Any balancing will be monitored by the developers and actively adjusted as needed once the server has launched.

Custom Launcher for Easy Installation

HorizonXI will also have its own custom launcher to help players easily install the client and connect to the server. We are actively working on this launcher now and our goal is to have it available at launch, if not soon after launch. Many players want to explore private servers but often find the installation process burdensome and complicated, but the custom launcher makes it simple.



Through the HorizonXI launcher, Adventurers can easily install and update the game, all while having the option to add custom music and dats - adding a new twist to the FFXI experience. You can check out some of the custom dats and music we are adding in our Developer Blog #6. Rest assured that any custom additions are optional, and you can easily choose to preserve the original game aesthetics if desired.

Who Are We?

The HorizonXI team is composed of over 100 volunteers who are extremely passionate about Final Fantasy XI. The team is split between developers, balancers, testers, community managers, translators, artists, musicians, game masters (GMs), and community creators. All of the team members are extremely experienced FFXI players, with a combined total of over 1400 years of player, linkshell leader, private server developer, and GM experience. Furthermore, it is especially notable that many of our developers have previously worked on other major FFXI private servers, providing quality content to hundreds of active players. It is our goal to leverage our prior experiences into a polished and balanced stream of 75-era FFXI content for HorizonXI adventurers to enjoy.

While we are currently fully staffed, we are always looking to expand the team if the right talent becomes available. If you are interested in joining our team, please check out our discord!

Want to Know More?

Have further questions not answered in this post? We have additional information on our website and discord, including text summaries of our Developer Blogs where we answer community questions and show off content. We are also happy to talk about the server and answer any questions in this thread. We hope to see you in Vana’diel on December 17th!

[Ragns]

One Account Per IP Address

RIP my old XI setup

[Falisa]

Hey! Not sure if anyone remembers me but I used to be pretty active on here awhile ago. I'm part of the staff of this server, name is Critical on there. Looking forward to seeing some familiar faces if anyone feels like giving us a try!

[Julian]

How long until this gets mired in drama and falls apart like the rest?

I never understood the hardon for 75 cap. If you're balancing shit for a good experience, what's stopping you from balancing around 99 instead? Too much work? Too different from the "retail experience"? Where do you draw the line on that? (I've always been interested in coding a new/different/custom experience from the ground up, but being bound to that retail experience/nostalgia is super limiting.)

Ohi Falisa! (*'-')b

[Annona]

How long until this gets mired in drama and falls apart like the rest?

I never understood the hardon for 75 cap. If you're balancing shit for a good experience, what's stopping you from balancing around 99 instead? Too much work? Too different from the "retail experience"? Where do you draw the line on that? (I've always been interested in coding a new/different/custom experience from the ground up, but being bound to that retail experience/nostalgia is super limiting.)

Ohi Falisa! (*'-')b

Hi there! I am one of the Community Managers for HorizonXI. You've posed some great questions for our team.

First and foremost, we hold our staff to extremely high professional standards. While there is always a human element to any organization, you will find that we operate under a comprehensive Staff Code of Conduct, which is public for all to see in our Discord. We take this CoC very seriously, having seen the challenges other private servers have faced in terms of decision-making and ethics.

Second, the 75-cap era, for our staff and many of the adventurers that we hope to serve, just hits on all the right MMO gaming feels. The community aspect from that time, especially the camaraderie developed between linkshell mates, and the group play dynamics that came from that era are really what pushes the nostalgia button for so many. As such, horizontal progression based on the era in which most of our players have the fondest memories and mirrors what we think was the "best version" of FFXI gameplay, just makes the most sense for our team. Of course, there are those who may love and cherish other eras of FFXI; we hope those folks find their special place on retail or other private servers.

[Bippin]

How long until this gets mired in drama and falls apart like the rest?

I have not followed any other private server is this common for all of them?

[Druin]

My concern is that XI is such a population-driven game in the 75 era. If it doesn't get enough people then finding random xp parties is gonna be a nightmare. That's one the reasons the Trust system was implemented in the original.

[Kipling]

My concern is that XI is such a population-driven game in the 75 era. If it doesn't get enough people then finding random xp parties is gonna be a nightmare. That's one the reasons the Trust system was implemented in the original.

We are expecting a big population based on our current engagement numbers. We had over 400 people show up for just our stress test (which most players will not care to participate in), and most servers don't break that number for actual launch. We're also currently surging in growth in our discord (500+ members in the last 5 days), so we are expecting a healthy launch population. But obviously it's hard to know exact numbers until we get there.

[Karbuncle]

Second, the 75-cap era, for our staff and many of the adventurers that we hope to serve, just hits on all the right MMO gaming feels. The community aspect from that time, especially the camaraderie developed between linkshell mates, and the group play dynamics that came from that era are really what pushes the nostalgia button for so many. As such, horizontal progression based on the era in which most of our players have the fondest memories and mirrors what we think was the "best version" of FFXI gameplay, just makes the most sense for our team. Of course, there are those who may love and cherish other eras of FFXI; we hope those folks find their special place on retail or other private servers.

Good logic I think.

I fell in love with FFXI, but heck, it wasn't until deep 99 era where they essentially said "We're killing the game for XIV lol" that I ended up quitting, though I still come back from time to time and have loads of fun. I think the only thing the 99 Era is missing is those "Reasons to explore" the 75 era had. I miss NMs, useless or otherwise, I just fucking miss having those to camp/challenge me/kill when I had nothing else I could do alone, and they took that from me to modernize the MMO :\. Those things could excite me, and the 99 era had none of those, or very very little... thankfully WOTG still tried.

I think XI got shittier for people post 75 for a lot of reasons but never forget a lot of that 75 era love was entirely because you were younger, had more free time, were more outgoing and open to making friends due to that young age, and it was likely one of your first MMO experiences making everything feel new. Not that the 75 era was innately better, it was just during that time was when you were most receptive to it.

So yah, I do wish you guys the best of luck, I hope this hits the spot for you and the magic lasts, I just personally know it wouldn't for me no matter how much I love XI :\. I never liked the HNMLS/Business hierarchy aspects and never will. Plus the acronym DKP makes me want to stab someone.

[Kipling]

Between kids and a demanding career I have much less time than ever to play games but those weekends and couple hours carved out that I do get to play with my friends/others in a highly social game is what makes 75 cap still special to me. I have not yet been able to find it anywhere else after lots of trying.

[Drai]

I wish you all the best of luck, honestly, FFXI was special for a lot of us, I met a lot of friends in that game that have since become IRL friends who I go on trips with every so often.

That being said the nostalgia of the past , for me at least, should stay where it is, in the past when I sometimes get on a kick to retry something I loved from in the past I often find that it can never live up to the memories I made back then, but I’ll always have those memories of getting ICP messages or ventrillo/teamspeak calls at 2-3 am because KB or Nid or Aspi was spawning, fighting with other groups in Sky over Zipacna, Ulli, etc, being a general LOLDRG cause my ass was useless for most endgame content lol.

Honestly I do wish you all the best with this, good luck guys!

[Pirian]

My concern is that XI is such a population-driven game in the 75 era. If it doesn't get enough people then finding random xp parties is gonna be a nightmare. That's one the reasons the Trust system was implemented in the original.

Parties for sure, but Dynamis is just going to be such a pain, to say nothing about the headache around exactly one person benefiting from an entire effort of a group of 30+ ppl for literally months. Sure, there are a couple pieces of equipment people benefit from, but even with terrible luck and drop rates many groups end up farming solely for the currency. Hope you guys have increased the currency drop rates, and drop rates overall but it doesn't look like you have. Having basically unlimited gil, it still took me over 2 months of buying currency at market rate + buying as much off a group I had run with for 2 years (only bought from them in those 2 months) to gather enough, to say nothing about all the other aspects of gathering ingredients or the arbitrary wait times once you start turning things in. The arbitrary wait times for everything, ugh. I hope you've axed them all. It's such a gatekeeper to content and locks people into doing content with an exclusive group.

I've played on a few custom servers over the years and the most fun ones were those that increased drop rates, decreased spawn times (or relegated them to spawn on item use), and removed the instance wait times. The biggest problem was always low server population, and even 500 is really low unless it's concentrated in a level range, which I guess it will be at first but that only lasts so long.

All that complaining aside, I probably will still check it out, but I doubt my interest will stay beyond a few weeks (even less if level caps are not automatically removed because ugh screw trying to compete with literally hundreds of people for level cap items)

[Prothescar]

Have seen questionable things in your Discord, mostly from the community, so I probably won't be touching this but good luck. Hopefully the chaff separates from the wheat quickly so you're not dealing with those types of people for long.

[Spicyryan]

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[Madeline]

Why no RDM tank?

Not for me really, but avoid the stupid shit the others have done and gone through and it'll be alright.

[Lucavi]

Are flee bots legal? What about PoS hacking? Claim botting? Its not "classic" XI unless everyone's fucking cheating at HNM spawns (literally the only thing that mattered during XI's "heyday") and spewing drama about it.

Complaints about the shitty human aspect of the game aside, I wish you luck. There were enjoyable nuggets of corn within the festering pile of dung that was human drama and tribalism in the game.

[Spicyryan]

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[Lucavi]

"Classic XI" is literally just "I enjoyed HNM camping when someone in my LS cheated to claim but I got to talk hot shit to other LSes because their cheaters got out-cheated by mine", but it is what it is.

[Madeline]

I want to run one of these as a straight up wild west experience like it really was tbh. I've talked extensively about doing so and I genuinely believe that half of the fun was getting away with shit you weren't supposed to while lording over the competition.

Honestly every server has way too much moderation. SE hardly did anything and that let us make of it what we wanted. Put up a server and watch the motherfuckers burn it down like the old days.

[Kipling]

Are flee bots legal? What about PoS hacking? Claim botting? Its not "classic" XI unless everyone's fucking cheating at HNM spawns (literally the only thing that mattered during XI's "heyday") and spewing drama about it.

Complaints about the shitty human aspect of the game aside, I wish you luck. There were enjoyable nuggets of corn within the festering pile of dung that was human drama and tribalism in the game.

No, we have a pretty comprehensive set of rules and all of those sorts of things would not be allowed. We are not collecting subs from users and this is an entirely free volunteer project, so we have an interest in keeping the playing field fair.