Will WotG be FFXI's BC?

[Krelian]

I think SE is going to continue to take steps in the right direction with WoTG. I hope it will add only positives to our current game. They significantly improved end-game by phasing out Ridill, E.Body, and all that with salvage armors and by making jobs like Samurai/Dragoon/Dark Knight elite. So now having a good merit party or doing a small numbers end-game event well does not rely on how many members your LS recruits and how many HNMs it can bot with a cheat program to equip warriors. All they've left to add is a replacement for herald's gaiters (which they will) and we will be set. Also I like how they placed a new baller HNM inside an event area, i.e. Odin. Don't have to sit around for 21-24 or 21-72 hours to watch the big HNM conglomerate bot Odin, you get a shot at him on your own time without interference. If they continue to focus making FFXI a game where players can choose what to do with their time and less about 21-24 or 21-72 hour spawns, I think it will be incredible fun for a big majority. It goes without saying that as player power increases everything becomes easier, so of course with WoTG out all the old world NMs, etc will be even easier than before. I hope SE will add some new NMs, HNMs, etc, scaled to the new player power in event type areas. So, in conclusion, given what they've managed to accomplish with ToAU, I have very high hopes for WoTG, and everyone I know is excited about it as well. I don't know if we owe credit to the competition of WoW, or SE losing business, but they have finally begun to listen to us after several years.

[Eander]

Well, prior to BC, I played WoW on a *cough*pirate*cough* server and was thoroughly unimpressed (which was probably due to the private server aspect, I realize.) BC, along with the urges of a few of my friends who play WoW, was enough to draw me in to actually give the legit WoW a try. Once I got going, I managed to get a Blood Elf Rogue to like 15, got bored, then came back like a month later and got another Shadow Priest to like 32 and quit again. I wasn't really drawn to BC because of end game content, though my friends were nutting over it. I really liked the lore of the Blood Elves and the idea of being able to level up without necessarily being in a party. From what I've seen so far of WotG, I don't see anything that particularly appeals to the straight out of the box "Ok, now what do I do?" player like I was with WoW.

Sidenote:
My problem with WoW (that eventually made me quit my Shadow Priest at 32) was that if there wasn't an instance suited to your level range that you could just spam over and over to level, gaining exp was some of the most grotesquely repetitive, annoying bullshit that I'd ever partaken in my life. Honestly, I have no clue how WoW people who play FFXI and whine about how boring parties are can possibly think that doing 15 "kill 10-25 of this monster and come back to me" quests to gain half a level is any better. Being fair, I realize that even though the quests were dumb, repetitive, and suicide-inspiring, at least doing them gave you some relatively easy form of solo exp while looking for a party, which FFXI completely and utterly lacks. However, in my mind WoW will always lack the community dynamic that FFXI has, even if FFXI does force it upon you.

Back to the question at hand, I really don't think that players are going to be "alienated" by WotG. I've been at this since US PC release, and there are rather few things SE could do that would piss me off enough to say that they've completely screwed me to the point of not wanting to play anymore as people say was commonplace with BC's introduction. People that are whining about "oh if this isn't amazing I'm quitting" blah blah blah are on the way out the door anyway. While I'd love to believe that WotG will add fantastic new things that we all will adore, I can think realistically enough to know that whatever comes out with the expansion will more likely than not suck complete ass until 1-2 patches down the line. So regardless, people are going to be pissed and either put up with it and stay or QQ and go. I personally only still play this game for my friends on it (which I think is rather common, nowadays), so regardless of what this expansion brings, I'll probably keep on chuggin like I have been for years.

As for job changes, I know they said long ago that many job adjustments were coming, but it's been so long since then I'm not really seeing WotG as the giant catalyst that sets them off in one fell swoop. Outside of the huge anti-skyRMT patch, very few times has SE made large sweeping changes to ANYTHING, let alone to important job mechanics like people are worrying about in this thread. More specifically, if SE does nerf /NIN (which would impact not just Ninja, but nearly every job in the game), outside of massive overhauls to many jobs to provide them some dependable survival method, I can see many, many players getting pissed off and potentially leaving. A /NIN nerf wouldn't affect me directly, as I don't RDM/NIN tank and don't have any other jobs that really need it. However, I don't want to go back to the days of aerial armor rotations at sky gods, sleeping Fafnir every X minutes because the WHMs are out of MP, etc etc. There are other things (like if they give Scholar refresgha >) that would greatly piss me off, but they wouldn't be enough to cause a mass exodus from the game. As hard as it is for me to say, I really think that SE is finally beginning to grasp their players' mindset, and that doing anything drastic will certainly not be taken lying down.

Plus, everyone will be so excited that we finally know how to beat AV, they'll be unable to make themselves leave!

....right?










....right?

[Jeryhn]

Wait wait wait wait!

(Cait Sith meme is punishable by death in this thread.)

YOU SAW A CAIT SITH MEME IN A THREAD? WHERE?!

[Therin]

I think SE is going to continue to take steps in the right direction with WoTG. I hope it will add only positives to our current game. They significantly improved end-game by phasing out Ridill, E.Body, and all that with salvage armors and by making jobs like Samurai/Dragoon/Dark Knight elite. So now having a good merit party or doing a small numbers end-game event well does not rely on how many members your LS recruits and how many HNMs it can bot with a cheat program to equip warriors. All they've left to add is a replacement for herald's gaiters (which they will) and we will be set. Also I like how they placed a new baller HNM inside an event area, i.e. Odin. Don't have to sit around for 21-24 or 21-72 hours to watch the big HNM conglomerate bot Odin, you get a shot at him on your own time without interference. If they continue to focus making FFXI a game where players can choose what to do with their time and less about 21-24 or 21-72 hour spawns, I think it will be incredible fun for a big majority. It goes without saying that as player power increases everything becomes easier, so of course with WoTG out all the old world NMs, etc will be even easier than before. I hope SE will add some new NMs, HNMs, etc, scaled to the new player power in event type areas. So, in conclusion, given what they've managed to accomplish with ToAU, I have very high hopes for WoTG, and everyone I know is excited about it as well. I don't know if we owe credit to the competition of WoW, or SE losing business, but they have finally begun to listen to us after several years.

This is one of those posts that makes it pretty obvious that the author doesn't do end-game, lol.

[Luto]

I wouldn't exactly say they've phased out Ridill, Ebody, etc. The newer gear they've given us is good, but it's kind of (imo) filler gear. Some pieces are really good, but you look at it and you're like "it's kind of like a -1 version of <insert item>" (example: yigit golmek vs manteel). Yeah, it's definitely great for more casual players, but with that you have to think of the more hardcore players and maybe they really want the real deal instead. I do like the direction SE is going with balancing the hardcore/casual player thing.

I don't think we'll ever see a time when someone pops on LS "Hey, Fafnir has been up for three days, wanna go kill it?" "lolfafnir". I think it will always be camped, even if it's eventually phased out to the point it's just a stepping stone for a LS. (Sky > Fafnir > etc).

And yeah, I realize SMN isn't the end all be all of CoP, but it's near idiot proof and that's one the things about almost anything in the game (again, imo). I don't see it as "How can we complete X objective without Y happening?" I see it more as "How can we complete X objective without someone being an idiot and making Y thing happen?" I tend to stick to the easy route with CoP and I take my SMN/BLM/etc burns through. In one of my Ouryu attempts we brought a THF (friend of a BLM) and let them leech.

It was the only time I've actually seen a Spike Flail to my party aside from Vrtra. I'll let you figure out how it happened but it involved an idiot, an Icarus Wing and a SATAWS. -_-

SE is taking (small) steps in the right direction without question, but on the other hand, we still deal with things that go unanswered/fixed for long periods of time, or what we think to be bs excuses/reasons.

[oxx2]

what new job changes?

[epigram]

I'm a bit of a noob in this game but this is how I've seen it.

Back in Just zilart expansion land life was fun, no-one knew anything. The story line was easy to progress through.

When CoP came out it started out fun. It was my first new expansion and exploring was great. But it didn't really fix any issues with the over-packed at that time king camps. However, it was a total bomb for the casual or non-hardcore player. The BC and story progression made no sense what-so-ever for your average pickup pt's. So in the end it cut out a huge chunk of the population from content that they purchased, and the game lost a lot of people over it.

SE at this time needed to learn that storyline content and BC's should be easy, additional content can and should be hard.

End game also sorta sucked. Although limbus was fun, CoP dynamis sorta blew chunks with regard to drop rates and just being annoying. Wyrms also were pointless, you either fight one that drops nothing worth a damn, or you fight over tiamat.

ToAU fixed a lot of these things and changed the game dynamics a lot. Holy shit batman I can just get two other people together and do something with a reward! I can get easy exp and have a little fun! There is some hard content as well! About the only people who didn't win in this expansion were people with Panzer +1 hats.

WotG will be a win as long as it's similar to ToAU. You need hard content, but this should NOT be inclusive of the main storyline. Let additional content be difficult instead.

[Lordwafik]

Remember all the "FFXI is dieying" threads? That's what this thread reminds me of.

Expansion is gonna be hot, 2 new jobs, a ton of content and storyline. Don't think I can be bored / idle when the expansion comes out due to campaign. God I'd hate it if I still was forced to king camp with this expansion out.

[vagus]

Each expansion that SE has released has had highs and lows. However, people always forget the patches that come along with the game. These "patches" are what makes players happy. This happened with the tier 2 upgrades, and recently the 2H weapon upgrade. If anything, expansion packs are only for new videos and storyline. Lol. Personally the best "expansion" has to be Zilart. To this day, people continue to farm this area. Storyline wise, CoP is incredible. ToAU was a mixture of CoP & Zilart. They had end game events (salvage, nyzul isle, assault) for the hardcore and unlike previous expansions, didn't require an insanely powerful alliance or party to complete.

I doubt this expansion will be the "downfall" of ffxi. Aslong as JP continue to play, there will be a FFXI for NA's. Heh. The Final Fantasy series is huge in Japan. I just wish SE would introduce some new areas to xp during the 50-70 areas. :D

[Zarath]

And yeah, I realize SMN isn't the end all be all of CoP, but it's near idiot proof and that's one the things about almost anything in the game (again, imo). I don't see it as "How can we complete X objective without Y happening?" I see it more as "How can we complete X objective without someone being an idiot and making Y thing happen?" I tend to stick to the easy route with CoP and I take my SMN/BLM/etc burns through. In one of my Ouryu attempts we brought a THF (friend of a BLM) and let them leech.

It was the only time I've actually seen a Spike Flail to my party aside from Vrtra. I'll let you figure out how it happened but it involved an idiot, an Icarus Wing and a SATAWS. -_-

Well I can't say such things do prop up even with the best of players, but for every situation, there is usually a solution. Yea sometimes Y occurs due to X's actions, but working out kinks and problems is one of the challenges I enjoy about CoP. Doing XXX pt configuration, though easy and simple to implement, creates unnecessary difficulties in finding said jobs. They do however take out the usual need of a dry run, my bread and butter experience generator for CoP now, just to get these people some experience on what to expect.

Everything outside of pretty much 6-4 really has a rigid party configuration, and sometimes worrying about X only leads to lessening the value of your team mates. Yes there are idiots in this game, however it's more likely you'll find more skilled player with half a mind and noobs actually understanding and listening to what better people have to say.

So I guess in summary, sometimes just throw some faith on your team and just hope for the best, sometimes u'll be pleasantly surprised on how things turn out. A balanced pt can do most if not all of CoP, specially if it's a skilled set of people with a good leader. Additionally Not saying that your line of thinking isn't valid though, and being a CoP vet, I can attest that sometimes I wish it was much easier <<;

[Lukias]

They significantly improved end-game by phasing out Ridill, E.Body, and all that with salvage armors and by making jobs like Samurai/Dragoon/Dark Knight elite.

Wait...

They phased out ridill and ebody?

If I got are's body I'd put it on my mannequin, right next to my askar body.

[spooky]

Will WotG be FFXI's BC?

No.

Can we lock the thread now?

[Kyupi/Kij]

I actually do think a bunch of items formerly considered superior have been phased out, but at least half of that is our own doing, and not even related to mechanics changes on S-E's side. If you assign a consistent point system to the stats on every major armor set from Zilart till now, I'm pretty sure things would come up pretty evenly. S-E's been real careful about how strong their new sets are, and allowing us to figure out how to use them (or how to not bother with them), and even if they're "good" for the current game (I think Ares suggests that they like our PLD/NINs) there's nothing that says that the player side will figure out some way that indirectly destroys their usefulness. I remember when Martial Body was a much more exciting drop than Earthen, and Paladins wearing haste gear would have been downright stupid. Most mechanics changes of late that wiped things like Ridill have actually made the player base stronger, and really, isn't that why you got the damn thing in the first place? Recent IM conversation:

Me: "I can't believe people QQ about the DEX = Accuracy change, ridiculous."
Friend: "Those are the people without common sense."

And for those people who keep bloody harping on how CoP was good because it was "challenging" and separated the chaff from the wheat or whatever, shut up. It's not always perfectly elite, but this forum has people who admire others that find ways to make new challenges most people would dismiss as impossible, and do it anyway, when they could have grabbed 5 other 75s and crushed it before I can finish taking a piss. I'm all for voluntary level capping so that more people can experience the same content together (and here's hoping for more of it), but CoP for most everyone here, let alone those who had to repeat it over and over for LS members, was frustrating, not challenging, because it took forever to find people that had or were willing to get the right equipment and right jobs for not one but multiple level caps. That part was a lot harder than the actual missions, which is silly. Maybe you're the crappy player for thinking they were hard? Or wait, that was just because you didn't have 4 Summoners, lol!

(Note: I lost several PM missions multiple times. With Summoners.)

[Zarath]

And for those people who keep bloody harping on how CoP was good because it was "challenging" and separated the chaff from the wheat or whatever, shut up. It's not always perfectly elite, but this forum has people who admire others that find ways to make new challenges most people would dismiss as impossible, and do it anyway, when they could have grabbed 5 other 75s and crushed it before I can finish taking a piss. I'm all for voluntary level capping so that more people can experience the same content together (and here's hoping for more of it), but CoP for most everyone here, let alone those who had to repeat it over and over for LS members, was frustrating, not challenging, because it took forever to find people that had or were willing to get the right equipment and right jobs for not one but multiple level caps. That part was a lot harder than the actual missions, which is silly. Maybe you're the crappy player for thinking they were hard? Or wait, that was just because you didn't have 4 Summoners, lol!

[flamebaiting]
Or your leader(s) sucked :D
[/flamebaiting]

I won't say CoP was the best expansion, I like ToAU better due to what it introduced, but it wasn't the end of ffxi, total shit expansion and was a total mistake on SE's part. It was a good expansion, not excellent like ToAU, or a game fixer that RotZ was, just good. It introduced many additional things, ie: swift belt, ENM, Ouryu ect.

[Lukias]

Needing a billion smns to do CoP is lawls. I went 1/1 on every fight with pld rng rdm smn whm blm before all the changes. The one time we used astral flow was to see if we could get ifrit to burst on the Snoll, cause that was fuuuunny.

Edit: Isn't there a rule somewhere about comparing FFXII and WoW? Hey Luto yo o oo o uuuu su uu uu cc c cckk

[Zalius]

BC was a wonderful expansion. Some people will never view change as a good thing

[Luto]

They significantly improved end-game by phasing out Ridill, E.Body, and all that with salvage armors and by making jobs like Samurai/Dragoon/Dark Knight elite.

Wait...

They phased out ridill and ebody?

If I got are's body I'd put it on my mannequin, right next to my askar body.

I'm glad someone else finally said that about Are's Body. It's a nice piece for people who can't obtain EBody, etc, but everytime someone says "omg pld tanking piece" I'm just like "lolwut?" Refresh is nice and all but enmity/hp/haste please.

(Anyways, I can talk on Vent/TS just fine now. :/ The codecs on the old server were way too high. I'm keeping tabs on you guys in Zaibatsu btw, good to see you guys back at it and doing well.)

[Xavier]

If Square hasn't already alienated you and made you feel like your time has been wasted, there isn't anything they can do.

Personally, I like the direction the game is heading, but thats because I've already given up on it being a progressive game. Its becoming more and more a story driven status-quo game, with smaller man content at its core. The more Square tries to focus on lore, the more 'interested' I become, the more 'Final Fantasy' the game feels, and the less frustated I get over the actual MMO shortcomings.

I've accepted the game for what it is, and can't wait to level Scholar or Dancer and goof off in the past. Square has taken the 'hardcore' out of the game, and it pissed me off for a long time. Its painfully obvious they aren't going to change, which leaves it up to me to change my expectations or quit, and I'm still playing.

Also, besides Limbus, CoP sucked for content. Sea is a waste of space compared to Sky. I don't know how people can defend it, with Zilart before it, and ToAU after it.

I'm glad someone else finally said that about Are's Body. It's a nice piece for people who can't obtain EBody, etc, but everytime someone says "omg pld tanking piece" I'm just like "lolwut?" Refresh is nice and all but enmity/hp/haste please.

What body with haste are you wearing on PLD? 3% HP isn't enough for you either? Sure, you're probably losing 3-4 enmity (or 8? if you do Tav a lot), but the trade off is Refresh. I don't know how you can say "lolwut" to that.

[Therin]

They significantly improved end-game by phasing out Ridill, E.Body, and all that with salvage armors and by making jobs like Samurai/Dragoon/Dark Knight elite.

Wait...

They phased out ridill and ebody?

If I got are's body I'd put it on my mannequin, right next to my askar body.

I'm glad someone else finally said that about Are's Body. It's a nice piece for people who can't obtain EBody, etc, but everytime someone says "omg pld tanking piece" I'm just like "lolwut?" Refresh is nice and all but enmity/hp/haste please.

(Anyways, I can talk on Vent/TS just fine now. :/ The codecs on the old server were way too high. I'm keeping tabs on you guys in Zaibatsu btw, good to see you guys back at it and doing well.)

There are no PLD body pieces with haste, and +4 enmity won't do shit if you're stacking +25 and still loading full haste. Sure, Valor is still better for kite fights but if you can go 100-0% in a Koenig Body on /NIN on a 16-minute Khimaira fight with full DDs without losing hate (which I've done) you sure as hell can do it even better with Ares. Not to mention, while using it, with Auto-Refresh and Refresh from a RDM, you get so much MP back that you can seriously say "Fuck you" to Ballads just go full 2x March. So in that case, you're technically getting Haste from your Ares body where no other piece of gear in the game offers that kind of flexibility.

Overall, it IS the best end-game body piece for PLD (there are still situations where Koenig/Valor are better, but I'd choose Ares in 90%+ of situations).

[Lukias]

I say "lolwut" to drk's and wars that full time it.

I understand if you got the are's body for your drk or war when you can't get ebody, but lawls at people that spent 12million on the ore when I spent 200k for what I think is a better piece. I'll pop on my parade gorget if I need refresh, which is only in conquest zones really and then again I can just rest with signet.