FFXI Interview August

[Celeras]

The best endgame items in the game come from a 3 year old expansion. Thus far, the last two expansions have done nothing to solve this, leading to the same content being rehashed over and over by the majority of the community. The CoP encounters, such as the three wyrms and new dynamis' were a nice addition, but as with most newer content added to the game post-RoZ, they arent worth the effort to be actively pursued because of their lackluster loot tables.

1- What is being done to make the newer, more challenging encounters more appealing to players?

2- Along those same lines, When we will get better endgame equipment to help push us away from 3 year old content? We arent asking to make this content obsolete, but a second tier is sorely needed in the endgame.

[Mifaco]

1. In a previous version update, the potency and casting time of elemental Bar-spells was adjusted. As it stands now, however, status Bar-spells are borderline useless and are mostly used in situations to prevent more useful buffs, like Reraise, from being dispelled.

Are there any plans to adjust the potency/casting time/MP cost of these spells, and if so, how?

[RanDom_ErrOr]

Originally posted by: Lordwafik
2
Why is it so, that a genuine player can identify who is RMT, living in sky 24/7, and their highly trained and well paid GMs cannot? If this is not the case, this "no tolerance" to RMT policy is rather false.

Are the players better than GMs at their own job? It was said by SE a long time ago that monopoly will NOT be accepted nor tolerated, yet RMT monopolize sky with nothing.

Has anyone here played Ultima Online (No, Probibly not...)? If anyone has, you'll realise how crappy GMs on FFXI really are. [GM]Dave reminds me about what Ultima Online GMs used to do. They would f&^$ with you. "I'm stuck, can you warp me back to town?" *GM warps ImaNoob into the equivalent of Mamool Ja* *ImaNoob gets ass raped* When someone was caught botting, they'd be banned. Investigation? 3 minutes tops.


The real reason RMT wont stop is this: SE is making $12.95 / month per account without mules. That is the reason why. $$ > Player happyness on MMORPGs. These simple mass bannings of RMT gil stockpiles is nothing but a diversion tactic used by the company to make you think they're actually doing anything usefull.

Pull the wool over the eyes of the masses, do a little dance, and make everyone think you're doing what they want. (Hey, these guys would do great in politics I bet.) Boom, everyone loves you, you're becoming rich off of nothing, and letting the game slip into the nether-reaches of shittyness.

Thats why SE doesn't do Windower bans or just break Windower all together (otherwise they'd lose 85%-95% of the PC users) and say goodbye to FFXI profit margin.

I know I'm not the first (or will be the last to say it) but its honestly something that people need to realise. Company Profit > Player's Happiness. The only issue is when a large portion of the Player Base actually takes action like quitting for a month.

If you want to send a message to S.E. Quit FFXI for a month. Get everyone to do it. Cancel your account, wait 1 month, and reopen your account. Money talks, and when enough players do that, S.E. will listen. If you can get 200 people per server to quit for one month (with 33 servers)

That will be $85,470 in lost profit from S.E. (with only a single char, this doesn't include mules etc.)

200 people from a server isn't alot really. Shouts in Jeuno & Al Zabhi would gather enough attention to a website or a petetion. I think that would be more than adequate to send a message to the higher ups @ S.E that things need to change.

Originally posted by: further
you wish loldrg

loldrg is so cliche. perhaps you should use lolpld now that S.E. had to spoon feed them {Auto-Refresh}.

[rahskala]

Be a little bit more specific than "What are you going to do about PUP?". Get a short list of the precise issues and possibly a suggestion on what to do to fix them, and ask him about that instead.

The same goes for every other question. Just saying "What are you going to do about Foobars?" will probably get a response like "We don't have any plans to do anything about Foobars."

[Norelco]

Q: Can you implement something in the game where if you camp the same NM over and over, for example Sky pop item NMs, in a given timeframe (say 24 hours), that it makes it more difficult for the same group of individuals to claim the NM when it respawns hours later? This would be a countermeasure against any group of individuals that wish to monopolize the same NM spawn after spawn.

For example, there is a supposed delay now when HNM spawn before anyone can claim it. Can it be implemented that if you got the last claim on a Sky NM that delay would be increased. The more party members who participated in the last kill, the greater the delay.

[SephYuyX]

Dear Sage,

When are we going to see more wallpaper and music downloads for POL? I love them so.

PS. Please make CoP access soloable.

Sincerely,
Me.

[Zalius]

M.body is still a situational piece, granted it's the best for that situation but it's still situational (aka pld/nin won't need m.body as much as pld/war)

Thats the kinda thing SE wants to do, but the majority of the armour in the game is 100% useless, SE need to add more varied fights where the situation to use something else arises.

Apart from the off-topicness, wtf are they planning to do with PUP?

It doesn't matter if people complain about it.


I can see it now....

String link

except no, cause keeping the automaton alive isn't a problem. It's the damage scale and lack of abilities past level 30, lack of attachments and lack of frame, which are probably gonna get added later, but I bet the damage scale is still gonna suck.

who was that guy that told me i fell into a sarchasm?

[Devek]

Question:

Why not give GMs decent tools to detect hacks?

You can compare mob+0x90 to tell when a mob "spawns" and mob+0x11c to see who has claim on it..

Do they lack programmers or do they not care?

EDIT: And is Sage Sundi even aware that mobs can be claimed with melee attacks? :/

[Karny]

Q. Is there going to be any adjustment for Signet bonuses?

Sanctions +15% of exp and possible selection with refresh/regen/extra food duration is so much better than Signet Conquest Points. That it makes exping on old areas unwanted. This imbalance makes new ToAU areas packed. Also exp rates differ quite alot.

Suggestion.

Change Signet to be more wanted and change old areas pop times to be something to ToAU, 15min pop times on exp mobs is ridiculous compared to 5min in ToAU areas. Old areas can't support the amount of people that new areas can, still both are packed on prime times. It's sad to not be able to exp because of every place if full.

[Norelco]

Q. Is there going to be any adjustment for Signet bonuses?

Sanctions +15% of exp and possible selection with refresh/regen/extra food duration is so much better than Signet Conquest Points. That it makes exping on old areas unwanted. This imbalance makes new ToAU areas packed. Also exp rates differ quite alot.

Suggestion.

Change Signet to be more wanted and change old areas pop times to be something to ToAU, 15min pop times on exp mobs is ridiculous compared to 5min in ToAU areas. Old areas can't support the amount of people that new areas can, still both are packed on prime times. It's sad to not be able to exp because of every place if full.

Good question.

[Ksandra]

my questions: (keep in mind some of these aren't "omg this has to be done" but things I've always wondered about or at least hoped for and tend to get overlooked at these interviews and haven't been listed in the thread so far).

1. Auction House:

Part of the problem with both inflation and undercutting is based on the fact there's an auction house history, and that the winning bid goes to the person who put it up for the lowest amount versus the first person to put the item up that is under the bid. Are there any thoughts to changing the auction house to try to counter inflation/undercutting to help balance the game out?


2. Characters:

Many of us have been playing the same character for years and it is a lot to ask to lvl a whole new character as that can take forever. Are there any plans to allow a one time race/toon change for those who are sick of having to look at the same toon day in day out? Or along those lines are there any plans to ever make a 6th race and would old players get a chance to change their toon to that race as a one-time-only option?


3. Kings:

Are there any thoughts to either taking the old kings and putting them into bcnms instead of 24 hour pops? It is no longer about healthy competition at these camps, rather who can bot faster or who can mpk the best in order to get (still) some of the best items in the game. Or perhaps keeping the kings where they are but also giving quests to access seperate bcnm fights with them that also drop the abj/ridills/D.Ring/etc.

4. Space:

Any plans to increase inventory space? The current increase of storage with the mog locker is a really nice additions, but it would also be nice (espeicially for brds rangers and others), for an increase in inventory considering the amount of gear that has to be taken around for any particular job.

Are there any plans to add more sets to the armor npc storer? Things like fishing/mining/digging gear are sets that aren't often used but end up taking four slots each for those that use them. Also low-lvl gear like lizard were overlooked. (many are at the point where they are getting all their subjobs up and lvling several jobs to 75). Vise-versa a lot of end-game gear has been overlooked as well, errant, JSE sets, etc. Adding AFv2 gear to the storage npc would be a huge bonus too since it's come to the point where many people have 3,4, and more jobs at 75 and want to get sets for all of them. Lastly, will there ever be a possibility to allow the storing of the +1 sets (AF +1, seers +1, etc.)? This storage npc I thought was a really great idea but it seems like you haven't added sets to it, which would make it even better.

5. Pictures:

For PS2 (and possible Xbox players, not sure if this is an issue), will you ever allow them to take screenshots that include the chat/player/menus/etc on the screen? Also currently the only way to get those pictures onto your computer is a long process of sending 5 at a time to your email address and downloading them from there. Are there any thoughts as to maybe allowing a default email so when you take a screenshot it gets mailed to that email address, or allow access to these pictures to download through the pol website?

That's all I can think of for now, again these aren't huge things but I never see people ask them in interviews, people tend to always focus on rmt and botters, so trying to thing of things that haven't been asked before. If I think of anymore I'll edit it into this post. XD

[epigram]

Q. My ls has issues with sky, we still need armor from there but camping Despot, Ulli, Zipacna for 3 hours with a small chance of getting any of them has caused us to move on to getting people through sea so at least we can get limbus items. Is there any chance that you could change sky around so people could actually fight the nm's and get the items they need without having to spend several days camping an nm for a trigger?

Q. Where is this solo content and low level play content you talked about last time?

[Norelco]

2. Characters:

Many of us have been playing the same character for years and it is a lot to ask to lvl a whole new character as that can take forever. Are there any plans to allow a one time race/toon change for those who are sick of having to look at the same toon day in day out? Or along those lines are there any plans to ever make a 6th race and would old players get a chance to change their toon to that race as a one-time-only option?

This would contradict the storyline.

[inafume]

The best endgame items in the game come from a 3 year old expansion. Thus far, the last two expansions have done nothing to solve this, leading to the same content being rehashed over and over by the majority of the community.

That's somewhat false. The best endgame items that take any significant (reasonable) amount of time and effort to get come from a 3 year old expansion. Maybe you forget that Arabian-looking hat that everyone drooled over when the expansion items were released? It was just so easy to get that people have sorta minimized its importance and significance.

[Ksandra]

2. Characters:

Many of us have been playing the same character for years and it is a lot to ask to lvl a whole new character as that can take forever. Are there any plans to allow a one time race/toon change for those who are sick of having to look at the same toon day in day out? Or along those lines are there any plans to ever make a 6th race and would old players get a chance to change their toon to that race as a one-time-only option?

This would contradict the storyline.

I fought with prince trion in the rank 10 sandy mission, and he doesn't recognize me in toau. The storyline is already contradicted.

[bercus]

Here are my Q's I'd like answered :

1
Why does SE rarely ever go back on it's design, even though many players would like these older things changed to suit their requests?

For example, CoP dynamis, many many many people complain they would like time extensions laid out around the zone, so we can spend more time inside, yet after submitting my suggestions many times, with alot of other people, it feels like it's falling on deaf ears.

The maximum time in Normal dynamis = 3.5hours, all zones. Maximum time in CoP dynamis is 2 hours. We are missing 1.5hours that we would like.

Why are there no adjustment to loot pools on CoP wyrms and jailers? True, they are an older part of the game, but it does not mean they should not be paid attention to.

So in conclusion : Why do older sections of the game receive 0% attention from the dev team, when a few simple fixes can change them for the better?
They keep telling us to use the comments and suggestions, we use them, and the devs dont even listen.

2
Why is it so, that a genuine player can identify who is RMT, living in sky 24/7, and their highly trained and well paid GMs cannot? If this is not the case, this "no tolerance" to RMT policy is rather false.

Are the players better than GMs at their own job? It was said by SE a long time ago that monopoly will NOT be accepted nor tolerated, yet RMT monopolize sky with nothing.

3
Do they have any more plans for any areas along the lines of dynamis and limbus? They are amazing and we could use more battle dungeons(that do NOT share the same timers).

Thanks so far for all the questions, not only to you wafik, if I cant ask any of the questions if they become to many, I will just hand him/them the paper and let him/them answer via Mail. I hope till the Interview is that you guys have even more to ask .

Anyway very good points so far. Easier for me to use questions in good englisch then i translate it from german into english >.<

[huckster]

Please ask Sage Sundi to finally reveal the mystery of Treasure Hunter. We know that you don't have to do the killing blow, as TH is effective in the party but:
- does it apply to the whole alliance?
- how does Thief's Knife and Assassin's Armlets work (they both give Treasure Hunter+1, but study on over 3000 drops showed that it means Drop rate +1% - so sucks pretty much)
- will more THFs in a party contribute to higher TH?

[Teffy]

Not a big issue, but would it be impossibly hard to give us 10 or so slots to sell items on AH instead of the current 7. It's just a real beast when you're crafting non stackable or slow selling items that are too expensive to NPC. Already have four mules, maybe I should just craft slower.

[MisterBob]

Please ask Sage Sundi to finally reveal the mystery of Treasure Hunter. We know that you don't have to do the killing blow, as TH is effective in the party but:
- does it apply to the whole alliance?
- how does Thief's Knife and Assassin's Armlets work (they both give Treasure Hunter+1, but study on over 3000 drops showed that it means Drop rate +1% - so sucks pretty much)
- will more THFs in a party contribute to higher TH?

Don't waste valuable question time on questions they won't answer.

[NynJa]

Keiki Usui (Sage Sundi) a few others and hopefully some ppl of the Development Team will be present in this years Games Convention 2006 in germany.

I stopped caring there, because last interview I read of his, he was claiming X when Y happened.

"ToAU will be about soloing and low lvls"
"dynamis currency can only be obtained in dynamis"
"bla bla bla"