Player Opinions: ToAU

[Isiolia]

What they could have done though is made items like that "In Battlefield" and had them work in BCNMs/KSNMs/ISNMs/Assault/Salvage/Dynamis/Einherjar/Limbus, etc. Then there'd be more confidence that they'd continue to work for WoTG, and not be tossed aside like Conquest gear.

[Croaker]

ToAU.

The T stands for Treasures. When they make a title like that it leads one to believe something really great is comming. I remember when they first released the title and some pictures of some ruins in Aydweewa Subterrane, my mind was thinking of a grand Indiana Jones type adventure, very long, very very hard, and the possiblity of something to rival relic weapons at the end.

Now that it is over??? I think it was fun, added some nice stuff, but too easy and still leaves me wondering what the 'treasure' was supposed to be. I ask my friends and some say the treasure was the crown, some say the treasure is the AC the beastmen try to steal. Both of those explainations seem very weak. There was a CS with a huge cavern filled with gold, but we didn't get to loot it. There is some great gear from the HNM, Nyzul and salvage, but all of that is disconnected from the main story line.

Im still waiting for some epic treasure. This expansion should have been called ETiAU (Easy Times in Aht Urhgan)

[Lordender]

ToaU was way too easy that I'm really gonna be disappointed if Wings of the Goddess doesn't make the game hard again with HNM's that don't drop dead within 2hours of being found spawned.

[Spira]

ToAU.

The T stands for Treasures. When they make a title like that it leads one to believe something really great is comming. I remember when they first released the title and some pictures of some ruins in Aydweewa Subterrane, my mind was thinking of a grand Indiana Jones type adventure, very long, very very hard, and the possiblity of something to rival relic weapons at the end.

Now that it is over??? I think it was fun, added some nice stuff, but too easy and still leaves me wondering what the 'treasure' was supposed to be. I ask my friends and some say the treasure was the crown, some say the treasure is the AC the beastmen try to steal. Both of those explainations seem very weak. There was a CS with a huge cavern filled with gold, but we didn't get to loot it. There is some great gear from the HNM, Nyzul and salvage, but all of that is disconnected from the main story line.

Im still waiting for some epic treasure. This expansion should have been called ETiAU (Easy Times in Aht Urhgan)

actually, the expansion titles almost always refer to something that is related to the mission plotline..

spoiler warning

Rise of the Zilart (Visions of Zilart if translated from JP). The Zilart were an ancient race. The vision was originally referring to Eald'Narches vision of the Zilart rising to rejoin the Gods in paradise... as symbolized by the platform they used to achieve this.. Tu'Lia

Chains of Promathia. We all know who Promathia is. The chains refer to the 5 races, who Altana bestowed tiny fragments of his darkness so that he wouldn't die from it.

so Treasures of Aht Urhgan isn't any different. Aht Urhgan is the western capital of the Near East empire. The treasures are the candescences which play important roles in the ToA missions as they are needed to power the Iron Colossus for Alexander to possess, where he will bring about the Age of Judgment when that happens.. destroying life as we know it in Aht Urhgan.

[Kyreth]

I viewed CoP as a choke hold on the playerbase. Hell missions, level capped zones all over the place (I leveled two jobs -just to do CoP missions-), etc.

ToAU gave me that painful tingly rush you get when someone finally lets go and all the blood starts flowing again.

Things I love: ToAU has lots of small, delicious bites. There isn't one sweeping mission series that contains the entire real storyline of ToAU- you find a bit here in a random quest, a chunk there running through Assault, another chunk doing the Serpent Generals, and so on. It also means we don't get the massive rewards at the end of said CoP uber-mission chains, but I don't friggin' care. My friend's DRK has a beautiful new Perdu Scythe and armor from Assaults, I just helped a friend finish a Morrigan's Robe, and I've got a nice mix of shiny armor that does the job and waits patiently for my COR to hit 70+. I love Besieged. I honestly think the time should be extended slightly- say, to 90 minutes instead of 60, but I understand why it's 60. With WoTG, 60 minutes may seem like twice that soon.

Salvage is good. Nyzul Isle is good.

The adjustments to the game as a whole during the ToAU expansion have been without a doubt positive. Not perfect- but the obvious attention to the playerbase (without kissing their collective rear end by debalancing the game) has been very much appreciated. If I went in detail, it'd be a small book.

Things I hate:

ToAU's change to the 50+ experience/merit party system. Superfragile monsters that get decimated so badly, it's a wonder the common colibri hasn't gone extinct from overhunting or someone manages to roof their Mog House with imp wings. A few chigoes in the right places would do wonders. It's making the average player dumber, and that's not good. Monsters that are good experience but take a truly mixed "tradtional" style PT as opposed to the mana/TP burn types to fight properly = win. I'm 75. I want fights against monsters that don't fold faster than me tapping a Bumblebee with my fist, please. And go ahead, make them so tough I can't chain them. Just give them a healthy reward for defeating one.

ToAU Beastmen kings/NM's/areas. Under-used areas, ripe for transformation into more areas to ease the choke on ToAU's meriting camps, interesting NM hunting, and good reasons for HNM-level groups to get some time in the Reef/Mamool/Zhaylom. They're fun fights, but without any appreciable shiny bits...people aren't doing them in.

[BRP]

I would say the Gordeus was the major treasure of Aht Urhgan. Then again, more spoilers,
Aphmau's puppets could also be considered the other treasures. Overall, Alexander is probably what mean collectively as "Treasures".

Also,

YOU JUST LOST THE GAME

[Isiolia]

They say directly in the CS dialog that Nashmeria is the true treasure of Aht Urgan, if I recall.

[layoneil]

They say directly in the CS dialog that Nashmeria is the true treasure of Aht Urgan, if I recall.

no arguments here.

[Arkanna]

I'll give SE an overall thumbs-up on TAU, even though there's some disappointment there for me.

The Good: SE has gotten a lot better at making cutscenes. Many of them are hilarious. Low-man, instanced content like Assault, Nyzul Isle, and Salvage are very enjoyable, with solid rewards and are very do-able for married family guys like myself. Large zones with interesting new monsters I feel are a good thing, even though some of them are the most annoying fucking things in the world (I hate mobs eating my food); at least it's something different. The overall "style" of everything in TAU is very nice, and is visually appealling. The squishy mobs and Sanction bonuses make it easier overall to get to 75, which reduces much of the grind that used to be associated with leveling. Remember exp'ing in Valley of Sorrows? How about Kuftal crabs? Boyahda crawlers? That shit kinda sucked. Oh yeah, one more thing for here: Beseiged. It's a lag-fest, but it's unique and it offers a very efficient way to gain IS which can in turn be used to buy new items or exchange for AH'able currency.

The Bad: The missions were too easy for my liking. Only Gessho and the final Alexander BCNM provided any challenge at all imo, and that challenge was small. I actually LIKED CoP being as difficult as it used to be, before all the nerfing began. TAU HNM's are strange ... I put them under bad things because while they are much different than RotZ HNM's, they don't solve the problem. Making pop windows much wider does necessitate using scouts to spot the HNM's and in turn does kill off the botting problem, but only the most dedicated people are gonna sit in Caedarva Mire watching for Khim for many hours on end. Top that off with either a complete lack of valuable drops (Hydra), or single, valuable-but-rare drops (Khim), and you have a pretty unrewarding experience. I mean, c'mon, even the RotZ HNM's, as flawed as they are, had varying degrees of quality to their drops. Short of being D.Feet'd by Aspid, they're all at least worthwhile to camp. Last thing: the ease of exp'ing to 75. Yes I know I listed that in both the good and bad spots, but it really allows the newer players to get away with being terrible players ... back when Sky Weapon burns were just becoming popular, players still had to be well-equipped to do well, and they had to know what they were doing. Nowadays, it's far too common to see terrible, terrible players getting to 75 by riding the coattails of people that actually know how to gear themselves and actually take the time to be GOOD at their jobs.

The Ugly: Einherjar. Fix that fucking bullshit, please. Right now it's an event that might as well have been designed by drooling retards with bananas stuck in their asses.

In spite of my "bad" section being longer than my "good" section, I'll give SE credit where it is due: TAU reinvented the game for me in a time where I was very bored with it and was ready to move on. Overall grade for TAU: 8/10.

[Gwynplaine]

Saying that AU paved the way for lazy, bad players seems like a really artificial complaint to me. The player is responsible for their own skill or lack thereof.

The lack of an endgame "gods" type area doesn't really bother me personally. I dislike predictable repetition, which is why I loved how AU broke away from the traditional so much. I hope they continue to make new types of experiences rather than copy preceding expansions formula.

On the whole CoP vs. ToAU storyline missions thing. CoP, to me, felt like it was the main storyline of FFXI, and as such the storyline was longer, the missions harder, and the cutscenes were more wordy and convoluted. The story itself was essentially a mystery on an epic scale. AU felt more like an action oriented, comedy. The characterization and writing was clever and full of game referential fan service. Aphmau and Naja will easily garner your love or your hatred. The final few missions did feel rushed and had too much happening all at once. Overall difficulty was done well, and slowly climbed over time.

One thing I did not miss during AU missions were the amount of traveling to get cutscenes. CoP simply refused to throw you a bone when it came to advancing the story. You had to go anywhere and everywhere the next CS leaves you at, whether it meant double trips to Mine Shaft #2716 and a return to Cid or not. AU has a narrative that included a mixing of points of view. In this way the scenes could all be played out together and didn't require you to run to the damn Imperial gate every single time the empress chimed in, or run to the Ashu Talif every time Luzaf popped up. And, let's face it, part of the length of CoP had more to do with pointless filler (hello thar chapter 7).

In accordance with it's length and challenge CoP's final reward was an item with useful stats good for 100% of the time. The rewards worth really depends on what kinds of things you do. If you are someone who spends a lot of time in instanced areas, you should get a lot of use out of it. I often do a lot of assault/salvage/the ashu talif quests, and I love my ring refresh on top of sanction refresh, and storm fife ballads. The mission line was relatively easier, and this expansions specialty was instanced events, therefore it just makes sense it's reward would be less than CoP and aimed at AU activities.

I forgot to mention my biggest gripe with AU. The fact that it's activities involve an "element of luck that prevents its successful completion despite thorough preparation and planning." That was infamously quoted by SE themselves during the 6th Vana'diel Census. Nyzul Isle's randomly generated goals and floors, Einherjars randomly generated enemies, and to a lesser extent Assault's luck based missions (specifically; Orichalcum Survey, Supplies Recovery, Imperial Agent Rescue, and spawning the NM during Blitzkrieg). I think the intent for this was so that players would choose balanced jobs and party setups since they couldn't predict what they encounter. This isn't the best way to achieve this however, and it's a frustrating waste of time to be defeated by whatever 1 or 0 the program decides to cough up. This is far less important to Assault because the system allows you to pick and choose any missions you like to rank up (having to do those specific missions is still a dreadful pain). The fact that one of the luck based assault were rank one was extremely off putting for a number of people I know. Rank one assault was the first experience players had with this new event, and it made an awful first impression in a time when assault was new, unknown, and as of yet unpopular.

[Croaker]

so Treasures of Aht Urhgan isn't any different. Aht Urhgan is the western capital of the Near East empire. The treasures are the candescences which play important roles in the ToA missions as they are needed to power the Iron Colossus for Alexander to possess, where he will bring about the Age of Judgment when that happens.. destroying life as we know it in Aht Urhgan.

I would say the Gordeus was the major treasure of Aht Urhgan.

They say directly in the CS dialog that Nashmeria is the true treasure of Aht Urgan, if I recall.

I can't disagree with any of those theories. You could follow that up with "the treasure is the happy feeling you get from beating the final mission."

However, passing any those things off as the advertised "treasure" in an expansion called "treasures of aht urhgan" is increadibly lame.

[Amele]

The fact that one of the luck based assault were rank one was extremely off putting for a number of people I know. Rank one assault was the first experience players had with this new event, and it made an awful first impression in a time when assault was new, unknown, and as of yet unpopular.

which assault are you referring to? (I'm assuming you mean the mamook one) all of the other 'luck based' rank 1 assaults provide sufficient time for a focused group of more than 3 players to win via exhaustion of possible random choices. (mamook might too - I haven't done it very much since other mamool Ja assaults are both faster and more points.)

[Gwynplaine]

The fact that one of the luck based assault were rank one was extremely off putting for a number of people I know. Rank one assault was the first experience players had with this new event, and it made an awful first impression in a time when assault was new, unknown, and as of yet unpopular.

which assault are you referring to? (I'm assuming you mean the mamook one) all of the other 'luck based' rank 1 assaults provide sufficient time for a focused group of more than 3 players to win via exhaustion of possible random choices. (mamook might too - I haven't done it very much since other mamool Ja assaults are both faster and more points.)

Yes, Mamool Ja Training Grounds: Imperial Agent Rescue. Another one I forgot to mention would be Training Grounds: Azure Ailments. Having a chance for an enemy to use a particular attack, the attack having a chance to hit the doorway at all, having a chance the NPC will be in the room you choose is a lame first handshake with assault imo. I found it very backwards assault missions up to 5 seemed to get easier with rank.

[Lindstrom]

I already want to request my ToAU ring, picked Balrahn's but I hardly ever use it for the refresh, hope they add a chance to switch that up, preferably something that won't make me feel guilty for throwing away a treasure of the imperial family.

Also needs more Khromamantoise.

[Max™]

TreasureS.

There are lots of great things in there, I'd certainly love to have an Are's Cuirass, Askar Zucchetto, I'll enjoy the Haidate that I will actually have for a certainty soon (remember, this happened during the AU era, though it's RoZ content, haidateez for everyone!), and the Ring is pretty sweet, I do really hope they make it apply to Campaign and whatnot too though, would be such a wasted opportunity if not, and would really make the rewards a lot better if they were useable right off in the next expansion.

[Royal]

The DEX = Acc change for 2 handers is definately the biggest mistake the development team has done during the ToAU era, aside from that the game was substantially improved in pretty much every aspect (well, everything except the economy I guess).

About 4 pages late but, Fuck You.

[Max™]

The DEX = Acc change for 2 handers is definately the biggest mistake the development team has done during the ToAU era, aside from that the game was substantially improved in pretty much every aspect (well, everything except the economy I guess).

About 4 pages late but, Fuck You.

Missed that, and agreed >.>.

[Liselle]

I don't like the DEX = ACC change all that much. It's not that two-handers don't need the buff, but it should be somewhere else. The acc differential between 1H and 2H now means that having them together in parties causes complications with BRD|COR buffs, which I hope was an unintended consequence. That will make getting SC + MB parties back together difficult, because of the fragmented the DD population (not to mention TP gain), assuming we ever get away from this TP burn thing in the first place.

Biggest mistake during ToAU era? Jumping Jesus on a Pogo Stick, maybe it'd be a good idea to turn the hyperbole dial back a little bit before hitting "Submit".

[Max™]

Well, if I was in a party with 1h melees who needed Mad, then I could swap to Byrnie and TP in even less Acc than before, cool I guess. If they need Mad and Sushi, then something is wrong, but if they are using Sushi anyways, we can both benefit from Minuets.

2hers can accomodate 1hers if they try, the reverse wasn't really true before, 2h users were just kinda up a shit creek, was it extreme? Yeah. Did it actually turn out to be pretty balanced (except for Sams who were arguably best off pre-update)? Yeah, last I checked.

[VZX]

1 DEX for 1 accuracy makes accuracy bonus IV obsolete.

Back to ToAU content.... I personally like Assault and their rewards. They are good, if not some of them probably the best for certain situation, and not so hard to get or have "ridiculous drop rate". Assaults are fast and some of them can be fun too. I'm just hoping WotG can implement a similar system with equivalent prize.