Aht Urghan Large-Scale Event Interview

[Gergall]

-Question about going left or right on the rune of release and if the planned those to be random floors or if one path is easier then the other.

I have to agree with asking what is the point of choosing left or right between two completely random floors that you can't preview and will never exist again as soon as your instanced run is over.

One thing we do know is that the rare "free floor" objective can only follow a left/right decision. While this has an impact on the rarity of free floors, that same rarity could have been achieved without the left/right choices.

The only other point of left/right choices is that when you choose path before a boss floor, and then you get a boss you didn't want, you get to make a comment like "guess I should have picked left."

Seriously, there is no point to this...thanks for reading my random nonsense post. It was almost as pointless as Nyzul left/right choices.

[miokomioko]

Or, as you decided not to consider, there might be some consistancy betwee right/left on specific floors that no one cares/bothers/thought to investigate. There could be a "path of least resistance" that is tied to taking specific routes and determined forks in the road. It might not apply for the floor(s) you enter on, but it may apply to the right or left when you are given the choice.

For example, if there was a consistant right/left option given every time on a specific floor (let's say floor 77)... with enough data, maybe it could be found out that there are generally easier floors (code/itg/free) on the left of 77, while heading to the right would yield more difficult tasks (gears/flayers/hinderance/etc).

It would take a while to figure out, and I know people get boners from eachother when they talk shit about FFXI developers, but level designing doesn't usually involve adding options/decisions like these if they have absolutely no impact on your gameplay. It's one less thing for them to add if it's not going to have any effect considering the instanced nature. Time is money.

[pchan]

-The tiger was guessed to prevent the mobs from being strengthened, but not sure it that was confirmed 100%.
-The pop conditions of the sheep and if its random
.

No it's the opposite, you don't kill the tiger, you let it depop. It will make next wave stronger or something.

[Ahlah]

50% HP is a good guide, I have only seen 1 cocktice NM popped at 5% HP. If time is running low and party members need more drops from other floor probably make sense to just kill rampart after 50% mark and move on.

[miokomioko]

50% HP is a good guide, I have only seen 1 cocktice NM popped at 5% HP. If time is running low and party members need more drops from other floor probably make sense to just kill rampart after 50% mark and move on.

People responding about this have proven that 50% is not a good guide. This morning, at somewhere below 50%, our rampart began popping Gate Widows... 7 of them. (No drops at all but that's beside the point!) This is something we need to find out a pattern to. Data about moon/weather/day/jobs/etc/etc/etc about runs that you took a Rampart from 100% to 0% on. Killing it early would void the data.

I thought it had been quite obvious that there's some predetermining factor that a Rampart is either "on" or "off" as trends seemed to show that either 0 NMs popped, or 3~8 popped. I just want to know why everything has to be a big secrets game with them... give us some hints... is he going to get fired for spilling the beans on how we can start to get some benefits of doing this shit every day?

[Ahlah]

If you read the reponse again, in nearly all cases NM spawned at really low hp if none spawns prior to 50%, I am not going to question the validity of your claim, just try to point out based on simple logic it will be more beneficial to move on if you need drops from other ramparts, otherwise stick to the current rampart.

[Acturus]

If you read the reponse again, in nearly all cases NM spawned at really low hp if none spawns prior to 50%, I am not going to question the validity of your claim, just try to point out based on simple logic it will be more beneficial to move on if you need drops from other ramparts, otherwise stick to the current rampart.

Agreed. I thought Aurik and his group ran the NM statistics back when Salvage was new. If it's not popped by 50%, odds of any pops are statistically low and usually not worth the time spent if there are other targets to hit.

[Khajit]

Ditch the rampart and go for what? Another rampart that will take a decent chunk of time to even get to while not having enough time to spare for a full rampart or boss?
I've had ramparts where it started spewing out Nms at the start then gave out none afterward so it's not like having a few NMs pop at the start is a guarantee either. Random shit is random.

[Kerberoz]

Last bhaf, a single bee popped at 90% then no more popped -.- Shit's random. I've seen them pop none before 50% and multiple after, too.

[Lishje]

Looking at ZNMs, it feels like the strength gap of Tier 5’s Pandemonium Warden is far and away much wider than between Tiers 1-4. How many people did you expect would be needed to subdue this monster? Also, could you provide some kind of hint towards accomplishing this feat?

Sase: I would assume that a group of 18 people could take on Pandemonium Warden, but with more people you will have a better chance of defeating him. I cannot give you any specific strategies for defeating him, but I can promise you I did not design this monster to be unbeatable.

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHa

rofl.

[Suiram]

Nobody is saying "If you haven't seen an NM pop by X%, it's impossible for one to pop," it's not like post-maintenance Nidhogg. Seriously, to all of you who have the anecdotal reports of single NM pops, you know as well as I do that that's nowhere near the norm. The majority of the time no NMs pop. When they do pop, the vast majority of the time they pop early and often. You all know this. Then you get the rare case where one pops at the start and never again, or one pops only at the very end.

What do you do with this to best get items for your salvage group? If there was a casino with a roulette wheel that some days came up Red 75% of the time, and other days never came up Red at all, how many times would you let it come up Black before you left? It's that kind of question.

Let's say Ramparts are "On" or "Off", that when "Off" the NMs have a 0% chance of spawning, and when they are "On" it's a 5% chance. Then even in 3% of the runs where the Ramparts are "On" you will only see one NM pop. (On those assumptions, it's 8% for 2, 14% for 3, 18% for 4, 18% for 5, 15% for 6, 10% for 7, 6% for 8, 3% for 9, etc, but of course those numbers are skewed a bit because the next can't pop before the other has died and model fully disappeared, and because I pulled the 5% number out of my ass in the first place to make this point). My guess is that something like that 3% single-pop is going on in these cases.

The question is, at what % (if any) of no spawns do you leave so you can have a chance of something else in the zone. Answer probably depends on your group, how many drops you need from that NM versus the later NMs, or boss drops, etc. But hanging around for the dream of the lone pop isn't going to be the best course of action in most cases, it's probably more about the person wanting that drop raising a stink, or being the group leader and dictating it to the rest of them.

[Silenka]

We don't know for sure that there won't be any update to salvage this patch - they don't release EVERYTHING from the patch notes in the pre-patch updates after all...

[Hyan]

Yeah.. that depends on when this interview came out though.. If it came out just recently, it doesn't sound like we're getting the salvage update this Wed. :/

[Corrderio]

Meh, nothing surprising there. Mostly the typical "We can't say" stuff.

Why can't they just say they're sadistic and like to watch our frustration?

[Aksannyi]

Fuck Bhaflau. NMs don't pop from Ramparts. You're all seeing things.

[Silenka]

Fuck Bhaflau. NMs don't pop from Ramparts. You're all seeing things.

This!

[Rugazanami]

Hey. Pankration is Aht Urhgan content. Why are there no questions about that? I would have liked to know if SE was planning on adding any more prizes to spend my 500,000 jettons on

[Nattack]

[ramble]one of the reasons these minigames dont get much use (like pankration) is because SE seems too scared to implement them into other things, like they did with ... pankration. The only thing about pankration is you dont actually have to play it to get jettons, you can get plenty by trading imp gold if you want.

There is no driving factor in FFXI that even advertises Chocobo racing except for running into it. nobody who doesnt play it will know the top scores, or even how to play. if everything wasnt such a chore to do in ffxi, itd be much more attractive. with that being said, POL is FFXI's cancer. it's probably the reason why so many people are turned off by the game. logging in is a chore.

maybe if they would occasionally send a daily leaderboard to you with the high scores of various minigames that are included into ffxi. like that board game they have that ive never seen anyone play, ever.

i mean, i love the high scores. I used to go to arcades for them and play the old ones i loved.

me? galaga? fuck everything, im the goddamn batman

[/ramble]

[Astarael]

PW can be done with 18 eh? usual SE BS. I think someone's forgetting the time limit they just added.

[Nightmarelord]

Sase...... SSR..... RAGEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.