Dynamis Shells?

[Korietsu]

This topic doesn't really hold merit for the Advanced board, so, I'm posting here. Now as HNM shells are around and the majority of said shells do in house dynamis, How willing are people to do out of house dynamis? I've seen quite a few shells such as Lordwaifk's and DynamisBums on this board, but I haven't seen much else. Which brings me to my next questions, how do these shells keep members? Are the runs hosted, or split entry to ensure that people want to do their best to not waste money? I'm sure a DKP system would be fine for outlands/dreamworld dynamis items. Any suggestions? At the moment I'm craving dynamis and I can't seem to find a shell on my server that allows guest runs, or that's doing the areas I want. Its either all closed in house stuff, or noobs so to speak doing city wins.

[Amele]

my server must be strange.

we're mostly out of house dynamis at the moment; and the majority of the most accomplished NA/EU shells are independent rather than hls.

most use a dkp system, based just on attendance; most use job priority primarily either declared 'main / second' or 'only 70+ jobs'. without exception, the better shells are either sponsor paid (a sponsor buys glass and keeps some/all of the currency) or sell the currency to fund runs.

since selling currency ends up with extra gil, the usual use is to either dkp:gil, cover item expenses for outlands / cop, or provide a per diem to the members.

[Grey Jorildyn]

in my experiences, single-event linkshells generally fail. a good point system with silent bidding helps but in the long-run people just keep accumulating points and you can't control drops so things just go downhill. new members are discouraged from joining because of it except to leech wins. if a ton of AF drops, then the linkshell can be successful.

Titan also has several out-house dynamis linkshells. none are really that spectacular, but they get the job done. generally the glass is split, unless there's a sponsor, and they give 1 point per run. early-leavers and late-comers usually get the same points as people that stay for the whole run too, which hurts their system. i doubt any use a DKP, and probably have bid-on-drop.

[Osede]

The main problem of a dynamis only shell is that the member flows are very large. In the past, my shell got around 30-40s member, which average of 10 members in and out for every months. The problem that pissing me is that most ppl coming in to get 4 cities clear since their hnmls ask them to. (yeah, but in the end I use some trick so that they will stuck forever to not able to get 4 cities clear, althought this sound bad). well, currently the shell reduce to 20s-30s member which 80% of members are been joining for 2years.

for the hourglass, initially the 100 drops are mostly keep by shell to sell so that ls can sponsor the hourglass. Then thanks to the mass inflation during 2005, now we got alots left over gil that member can lot on the 100 too.

still, the main problem for my shell not the member, but is the drop rate and competiting of ls to go into dynamix xar. Everytime will had to random with 1-2 ls to get into the xar...

the drop rate is kinda sad some times,when 80% clearing 4 cities still got only 3-5 afs. oh and we use a strange point system, pm is want to know.

[grover]

My shell is a Dynamis / Limbus shell that uses a points system (separate for each). Our runs are sponsored by relic upgraders. We only use points for Iceland AFs (Highest points that wants to spend em, and is 70+). City runs everyone sets a comment, and if you are 65+ w/ comment you can lot regardless of points. You can also set comment if you are under 65, but can't lot until all who have comment & 65+ have the AF. Points are given out as such. 1 for being in zone at gather time, 1 for being their at clear, and 1 for being there when run ends. I think this system works well. It helps us keep up attendance for cities. No system will be perfect, but I'm pretty happy with this one.

And yeah, on Hades, there are a lot of Dynamis only shells, and they seem to do just fine.

[Kaylia]

A dynamis linkshell need a core of 12 members that will go every times imo. It's not that hard to get that many people within a shell or a friend circle. There will always be a need for dynamis, so getting additional member isn't that hard based on that.

If the LS is open, a dkp system would be nice, but you can't afford making something where new people will never get a chance to lot. After 5-10 runs, I believe a new member should have the same lotting right as an old members...otherwise, they wont bother comming.

[Lexa]

My ls is tiny, but consists of a few reulars from my endgame shell, the rest I shout for every week, and I sponsor all runs personally (stage 3 of Aegis). I shout because there's just not enough interest within my own ls to do ls-only runs, not to mention several of them go with a large dynamis shell that's an offspring of one of the largest NA HNMLS on my server, which - quite frankly, I don't blame them for, having seen said dyna ls in action.

[evilpaul]

The LS I'm in has a two tiered point system and uses a main job lot.

People declare their main job lot and get 1 point for showing up on time, +0.5 for being early -0.5 for being late. New members join with -2 points. The total points and dedication points each goes up or down like stated before, but dedication points are reset to 0 when you get a piece of relic on your main job. If there's no main job people for a piece that drops or everyone already has it, it's "trash" and you can use some of your total points to get the piece if you desire.

The LS is sponsoring an upgrade for one of the members on most runs, but other people can sponsor to upgrade their own relic or to sell coins for a few points + the glass also.

We've got a core of people who come and have some join and leave periodically as well. Works pretty well I think.

[Zosi]

I'll just post my experiences, which are rather different than the general assumption about "open" shells.

I'm in a very successful independent shell. We were the first NA shell on Lakshmi to kill DL, first to win each of the CoP zones including Tav, and we're one of (if not the) longest continuously running NA Dynamis shells on the server. We've kept doing runs through a lot of times when competing shells (both HNMLS-associated and fellow independent shells) have folded due to low attendance. How do we keep our members, and keep new members itching to post applications? It's the same as any competitive field, you kick ass and try to be better than the competition.

As for our rules, we have a bidding DKP system. Simple version, you earn one point per run, and bid as many as you'd like on AF for your main lot. In addition to main lot, we have sub70 and sub60 tiers, which you can assign to any job that's over 70 and over 60, respectively. Main lots are regulated to certain max numbers, but sublots are pretty open. There's a 10 point cost to switch your main lot, and your remaining points are capped at 20, and you can only switch main lots if you've been your current main for 90 days or more and haven't lotted any AF2 as main lot for 30 days. It's a system that has been changed a lot due to suggestions and problems we've encountered, but it works well for us currently.

Regarding the contrast between HNMLS and "single-event" LSs, there's a lot of differences that people gloss over. It's true that we have higher turnover than an HNMLS-associated Dynamis shell, because once someone gets the AF they need, there's always a chance they'll leave to join their HNMLS or just quit Dynamis altogether. However, more turnover can definitely be a good thing in some cases. We're able to judge someone's abilities and make the call on whether they should be a member entirely based on their performance in Dynamis. We don't get stuck with "dead weight" members who are allowed to come to Dynamis because they're in the HNMLS, but are totally worthless (or plain dangerous) in Dynamis because they can't pay attention for 3-4 hours at a time. When people suck in Dynamis, we can kick them.

Oh, and we let all currency autodistro, including 100 pieces. We've never allowed sponsoring, and probably never will.

[Vigilia]

Depends on server it seems, on Asura only about half a dozen biggest HNM LSes run their own Dynamis regularly and then some smaller shells that only do occasional farming runs and whatnot.

There are several open Dynamis linkshells on Asura nearly everyone can join, I'm at the moment part of running United (that I originally started and then had to take a break from due to work but now back again) and I was in Manaburn for all of its existence. All of the ones that I know of run on the same concept that you still have to apply, there are minimum requirements you need to meet just as with applying to any LS and once you're a member you need to fulfill minimum attendance requirements to be able to lot. There is no point system (most open LSes on Asura don't run a point system, you need to risk a huge luck factor on getting AF2 sometimes), but there are limits to what you can lot and who can lot. Depending on zone we usually have a sponsor that pays for the hourglass in return for all the currency or we collect the currency into a LS bank that then sells it and pays for the hourglass. Other shells operate similarly, some share cost of glass and let everyone share currency. In terms of strategy United's never been groundbreaking, we've "only" been going for little over a year and a half, but we farm well enough, do CoP zones and whatnot and get some nice drops so there's never been a lack of people wanting to join. There are some Dynamis groups on Asura that focus on ice zones only while others ignore CoP zones, we do all zones in a rotation. CoP runs you need to usually sign up for beforehand to avoid overbooking. Current memberlist has 95 names but we do both EU and NA timezone runs each week so that evens out really nicely.

Yes, the constant change in memberbase is slightly annoying. Some only join for certain zone clears, so you need to keep doing clear runs over and over again for new members.. but then you end up killing bosses every time when you just farm cities anyway so it's not really that big a deal. And we've learnt to stop trying to cater for the n00bs and trying to make sure that everyone that's new to the shell can enter every run we do. Early weeks we tried to please everyone and just got gray hairs to ourselves out of it, not worth it. Now we do very specific "must clear" city/beaucedine runs every few months and otherwise just focus on having fun and getting the best drops we can. While it irritates me to see some peeps blatantly join just for clears and then bugger off, it's much more rewarding to see members that had never set foot into Dynamis before over the course of a couple of weeks become excellent in it and learn to enjoy it as much as I do.

Open Dynamis has proven very successful since after few peeps join they tend to bring their friends from their own linkshells with them so in the end you never end up with a complete pick and mix of people but rather a merger of a handful of larger shells and groups of friends. This means that most peeps already know how to work well together and there is little to no drama. There's little chance of anyone ninja lotting AF2 since everyone knows everyone else and the repercussions of your actions in Dynamis would indirectly carry over to your main LS. And yes, like Zosi pointed out, someone's entry to an HNM LS can be decided by their actions in Dynamis. In a mixed group not only the people present see if you act like a jerk, but you can rest assured all their friends will hear about it too if your application ever shows up on their linkshell's forum. Everyone bringing their friends also greatly cuts down on the number of fucktards you may have to deal with, I'm really happy to say that at the moment I don't have any grade A idiots to worry about that would had somehow snuck into the LS. Sure there are some stubborn gits that are stuck in their ways, but nothing more. Also, with open shells everyone is bound to find one that has runs at a time that's suitable for them.

I believe Fellowship LS is Asura's biggest English-speaking Dynamis LS and they run a forum where we collectively schedule our runs (even though there are certain rogue and RMT shells that do not abide to common courtesy occasionally foiling best laid plans). http://www.fellowshipls.com/forum/YaBB.pl

The current list of Asuran linkshells that do regular Dynamis as listed on Fellowship:

Asura Dynamis Shell's:
AF2Doesn'tExist - (Leader) Yrpaine - Website
AFTwoForJoo - (Leader) Voodoolord
Beerfest - (Leader) Chozander, Arkan, Sohjiro and Jadrorand - Website
BoundlessSouls - (Leader) Soucont
Cassiope - (Leader) Auriane
Chakra - (Leaders) Ishadowl, Perpnos, Shiroh, Dalex, Erolyn, Sanctuarymaiden, Orowin, Dajociont
CrimsonAlliance - (Leader) Dation - Website
Convergence (Prec/KTD) - (Leaders) - Coming Soon
Darkness - (Leader) Camulos
DynamisDreamland - (Leaders) Blakavar, Bdigs, Jennsen, Iloteye Grigoris, and Deole - Website
DynamisLordsII - (Leaders) Prophetloki, Fredjan, Ghikque, Tiggerette, Hottamale and Ariestas - Website
DynamisRoyal - (Leader) Elma - Website
DynamisTwilight - (Leader) Ariestas, Phishman - Website
Fellowship - (Leader) Bestovian - Website
HopelessAbandon - (Leaders) Syon, Veln
Hyperion/Deviance - (Leader) Ikuni
Illusion - (Leader) Stee - Website
KirinTheDestroyers - (Leaders) Enki & Krandor - Website
Machina - (Contacts) - Deegan & Indiana - Website
Manifestos - (Leaders) Deathangel, Eske, Ghys
Muteki - (Leaders) Fhernias, Elma - Website
Precedence - (Leaders) Tomodachi, Anri and Alaana - Website
Rebirth - (Leaders) Tommi & Kingsalomon - Website
Remedy - (Leaders) Bluedemon, Diavolo, Palonious, Rittik, Selits - Website
Renaissance - (Leader) Rasputen - Website
SilverSeaDynamis - (Leaders) Loden
SML - (Leaders) Lordwafik & Aurik - Website
SoulsofSacrifice - (Leaders) Retrorev, Dakotalee
Tribe - (Leaders) Lancealot, Sinister, Orophinn - Website
United - (Leaders) Scudley, Dragonhaven, Estharion and Ozmo- Website
Veritas/DynamisInterlopers - (Leaders) Kemberly, Salvatore, Mictain
Void - (Leaders) Soup & Selits- Website

The list should be accurate and out of those 32 shells listed 2/3 are open shells that almost anyone with half a brain can join.

Go to their sites if you're curious about comparing various shells, some forums require registration before you can view them though.

Some end up being short-lived, with the sponsorship method it's common for someone to start a Dynamis LS to fund their relic upgrade. When the relic's done or when the upgrader realises how big the task is (i.e. they run out of money or get bored) usually the LS will die away. Some shells start off as closed linkshell Dynamis runs but with peeps getting bored of Dynamis or attendance otherwise dwindling they choose to open their runs to everyone.

The open-for-all ones that have endured for a year or more such as Manaburn at its time and of the list above AF2doesntexist, Fellowship, Void and United, all share one common denominator: good organisation. They all have (as far as I know) sensible leaders and groups of core members (the solid 10 or so members that show up at nearly every run that someone already mentioned in this thread are priceless) that everyone listens to which is extremely important at an event where you get people from various linkshells who are used to different methods and tactics. Nobody wants to do Dynamis that ends in chaos and wipe (apart from eating an astral flow sometimes), once you establish a reputation on your server of being able to win zones and get lucky with AF2 drops a couple of times, you're sorted.

[Garret]

I run an open Dynamis LS on Valefor, DynamisX.

We've been around for quite a while and have been pretty successful.

Our rules have changed over the years to adapt to membership needs but we currently run a pretty simple point system with different costs for different zones, so new members can easily rack up enough points to lot against old members on city AF2, but have to attend a decent amount longer in order to lot against them for a Xarcabard piece. Works pretty for instance and basically gets rid of the cherry pickers.

The Dynamis LS is actually run as an offshoot of our Endgame LS since we don't do strictly in house Dynamis, so the majority of the runs are also sponsored by our LS, however we only sponsor for the singles and with our typical attendance we usually net 250-300 singles so the sponsor rarely gets screwed (sponsor gets the first 100 bill in a Northlands zone to balance out the lesser singles there). So 100 currencies are typically just a standard lot item, and you have to choose between lotting them or AF2.

Our rules tend to balance out pretty well for our LS, been around for over 2 years and still average 36+ people per run. We do CoP zones as well but attendance has been down just enough to make DL clears pretty rough, no Kraken Drk so typically I find us short just enough people to make the odds of clearing not worth the time investment.

I think the real trick to any open Dynamis shell is to balance your rules out to who you are expecting to attend, every LS is going to be a bit different and you've just got to see what works for you and what you want out of it. Lots of different methods for running shells.

[Zragnarok]

I don't know if there a lot of public Dynamis LS left on Ifrit, I think most of them are in house. Maybe Judai can confirm this, he probably knows more than me about that.

As for our, it's based on funding a relic shield for one of our PLD so all currency and 100s are lotted by officers. It's mandotary for our End Game LS members and those who are accepeted in our Dynamis LS to attend the run. What I mean is not that you have to log on everytime we doing a run, everyone got IRL things to do and it's understanable, but you can't be exping, doing quest or whatever else while we doing Dynamis. The Dynamis shell is independant from our End Game shell and we accept members from outside after they fill up an application form and we decide if we let them in or not.

The hourglass is paid by the shell and the run is free for all members. We use a system of Main lot and Rot lot. You chose a main lot of one AF2 and you need to be within 3 lvl of being able to equip it. Rot lot is when noone as the desired AF2 in main or it already dropped and those who got it as main already got it, then all those who got it as rot can lot it. And if an AF2 drop and noone set it as main or rot, one officer will call it "Free lot" on the chat and anyone, regardless of the job and lvl can lot.

To be able to lot, you need to have attended 4 runs. You'll still be able to lot before the 4 runs if you want one AF2 that is about to be called "Free lot" though.

As for Ice zones, since the drop rate isn't as good as main cities, we use tiers based on attendence. Those with good attendance will be on tier 1 on their main AF2 and they will be in the rot section of a second AF2. You can move up and down on tier relatively to your attendence, officers decide weither or not you should still be on that tier or not. New members will start at tier 3 but it's not so hard to get on tier 2 and 1 if you have a good attendance.

[Vedder]

To run an "out of house" Dynamis LS, you just need a competent core group and good job balance.

If you got good pullers and callers who can get your people wins, and kill lots of mobs so that lots of AF2 and pennies drop, then you'll have happy members.

Although, I do currently implement a Northlands points system, the key is to not set something in stone on day one and leave it alone forever... things will need to change as you grow.

Flexible and fair ftw.

[Zosi]

Open and HNM-associated shells are about 50/50 here on Lakshmi. We're pretty rare with our no-sponsorship policy, but it works for us because most of our members are quite happy to only do 1-2 cities per month, a schedule that'd really suck in a sponsorship LS. Not having to worry about currency at all means we can do more CoP/Northlands without hearing whining about how person X needs Bronzepieces, so we should do Sandy.

We still have a bunch of upgraders, including two finished relics (H2H and bow) and a stage 4 GK, but they fund it pretty much entirely out of pocket. Lakshmi's pretty behind on NA relics anyways, we have... two Aegises (Jordainavon and Aerec, both recently finished), one Kikoku (Nars), one Spharai (Zoya), one Yoichi (Enneisevoli), two stage 4 GKs (Ciampolo and Sharps) and a stage 4 Gaxe (Muffins).

Maybe it's different on other servers, but one of my favorite parts about being in an "open" LS is that I get to do shit with a bigger group than just my HNMLS. We pretty much leave HNM drama at the door and work together during the 6-8 hours a week we're together. The only time there's really cross-LS drama is when people are late due to a HNM camp, but that's rare enough that it's only happened 2-3 times in the year or so I've been in LS. It's also kinda useful for someone to be able to do Dynamis with a group that represents a lot of the major HNMLSs on Lakshmi, they get to familiarize themselves with the LSs and often end up applying to one eventually.