Milkman 1up Interview 5/22/09

[Kyari]

I don't think a couple of new weapons are going to make PUP or DNC more useful. =/

I can understand the point of PUP weapons - an emphasis on pet stats and such - but what possible combination of unique features would a Dancer knife need?

[Spider-Dan]

Honestly, if CoP came out right now, as it originally was, but with all the new level sync and gear sync stuff, I firmly believe it would be considered far and away the best MMO expansion in any game ever.

When will people realize that their hard-on for CoP's storyline has NOTHING to do with the actual quality of the game?

Even right now, many CoP zones are useless level-capped wastelands full of true-detect mobs around every corner. I don't know about you, but gear sync or not, running around with no access to any of my job-specific merits is not what I call a "good time," particularly on the jobs for which Squenix substituted cat2 merits for actually fixing problems with the job itself (e.g. COR, PUP, DNC).

Furthermore, level-sync has NOTHING to do with finding the job you need; level caps perform the same function, automatically! The only real difference between 2009 CoP missions and 2006 CoP missions is that you don't have to mule gear. The tedious treks across the planet to view a 30-second cutscene are still there.

I still wonder how many of the people who complain about the excessive ease of TAU's missions soloed their way through them all, or completed them on a job of the level that they were designed for? Making a fight harder is never very complicated.

[Byrthnoth]

They can scale our level to a zone; why can't they scale a monster's level to us? I'm sure people would use Level Sync and abuse it to some point, but if they did it well enough then it'd never be an issue. Plus, why is SE designing missions for level 65s when most of the people who play have at least one 75?

[Gergall]

Okay, so they told us no more expansions because they were releasing mini-expansions, and now they're probably saying no more mini-expansions.

No, the one guy is speaking for himself when he says he probably won't do any more storyline writing for addons after Moogle and Shantotto are done.

[Malacite]

Fuck Masato Kato...

What the fuck happened man? YOU WROTE CT AND XG

Yar and the head of the Dev Team is the guy who directed those games and other gems...


It's a fucking shame. Personally I'd like to know why the fuck WotG is taking so mother fucking LONG. Seriously, they're taking even longer than they did with ToAU it's ridiculous.

[fantasticdan]

1UP: Why can't players obtain all three armors at once? Was it just to keep things consistent with other rewards, like Rajas Rings?

KO: That's exactly correct. The same considerations were made for the three armors as other mission reward items such as the Rajas Rings.

Should have followed this up with with a question about why the hell expansion rewards like raja's are limited like this in the first place.

[Plow]

When will people realize that their hard-on for CoP's storyline has NOTHING to do with the actual quality of the game?

Even right now, many CoP zones are useless level-capped wastelands full of true-detect mobs around every corner.

Yeah, of course we never see anyone with swift belts, voyager sallets, soboros, etc. The few that do have them clearly got them on their way to missions.

Someone should really look into those spiffy ouriyu and bahamut fights too, kinda sad how nobody's ever in there for those.

It's also unfortunate how there's nobody doing the promy enm's and the level 35 earrings, toreador's ring, etc. totally don't exist. And of course all that rse is trash.

I don't know about you, but gear sync or not, running around with no access to any of my job-specific merits is not what I call a "good time," particularly on the jobs for which Squenix substituted cat2 merits for actually fixing problems with the job itself (e.g. COR, PUP, DNC).

I'll admit here, my primary jobs are war, nin, drk, smn, and blu, so, yeah, that was not an issue I really considered.

Furthermore, level-sync has NOTHING to do with finding the job you need; level caps perform the same function, automatically! The only real difference between 2009 CoP missions and 2006 CoP missions is that you don't have to mule gear. The tedious treks across the planet to view a 30-second cutscene are still there.

There was a time during ToAU when I set my hp in aht urhgan, other than that I've had my hp next to the windurst outpost warper pretty much the entirety of the game. I also leveled nin to 52 early on for boots.

A million things aren't near as bad in CoP as people always thought they were because we were all a hell of a lot newer then. Once people figured out how to read maps properly (and proper maps were made of course), and got used to the methods for reducing travel time, things weren't nearly as bad as people thought.

The only real issue that still stands now I would say was the length of some of the dungeon crawls, specifically palace, with no real opportunity for a "time out." But hey, ya know, having 1 mission in the whole expansion that's going to actually require a group of people to sit down and concentrate for a couple hours doesn't seem all that bad, really.

No other single mission requires more than about an hour to get to the fight and do it, as long as you're not dying in the process. Admittedly, it's a bit excessively punishing for newer players considering the levels a lot of it is for.

The biggest single problem at the time was the result of the fact that you needed level capped gear, and how that piled on to the fact that fewer people had multiple jobs leveled up.

The fact that you needed level capped gear basically created a situation where people needed statics to progress. It was too painful to carry all that extra gear and not know when you'd need it, let alone the crazy price fluctuations if you tried to just buy it when you needed it and sell back then.

But, then, if you're not flexible, getting a static is rough. It's not that you couldn't go through all of cop on one job... it's just that taking 6 people through all of it and 4-5 of them only having one job is going to bring a whole new level of difficulty. Honestly looking back, that's probably why so much of it was 30 and 40 cap, as then at least what people were leveling for subjobs to their main became viable.

I still wonder how many of the people who complain about the excessive ease of TAU's missions soloed their way through them all, or completed them on a job of the level that they were designed for? Making a fight harder is never very complicated.

I assure you, I try to solo pretty much everything. In ToAU I soloed basically everything outside of khim (including lamiae) up to the last 2 fights, which we did in like an hour with ls group.

[Spider-Dan]

Yeah, of course we never see anyone with swift belts, voyager sallets, soboros, etc. The few that do have them clearly got them on their way to missions.

Someone should really look into those spiffy ouriyu and bahamut fights too, kinda sad how nobody's ever in there for those.

It's also unfortunate how there's nobody doing the promy enm's and the level 35 earrings, toreador's ring, etc. totally don't exist. And of course all that rse is trash.

If I understand you correctly, your argument is that putting these rewards in the middle of/behind a level-capped zone full of true-detect mobs... is a credit to CoP?

Trying to get your group to the destination without (multiple) deaths due to true-detect aggro is not the sort of "challenge" that I enjoy, particularly in pickup groups. There is a reason why "Metal Gear Solid: Lagged Online Edition" has not been introduced.

This speaks to the overarching principle (and primary failure) of CoP's "challenge" philosophy. Every mission has the same tedious, idiotic challenge: navigate your way past floor after floor of true-detect mobs with your hands tied behind your back. (Oh, and make sure that everyone else in your group does it, too.) Gear-syncing does nothing to affect this "challenge," as the goal (if you're "doing it right") is not to fight at all.

And you didn't need a static because of gear space or any such triviality; mules hold plenty of gear, and anyone who repeatedly sold lowbie gear after CoP release had more money than brains. You needed a static because pickup groups were f*cking death and if you didn't want to spend 2 hours trying to climb Promy-Vahzl (or re-fight Mammets five times), you needed to make sure that you had people you could trust NOT to be idiots.

[Belgaer]

Koggelmander.

It's not a Blue Mage specific sword. The person in the interview was talking about Kilij-type swords.

[Wolfknight]

It's not a Blue Mage specific sword. The person in the interview was talking about Kilij-type swords.

it was still created massively for blu, no other job on it benefits from it really, so it might aswell be blu only, it was clearly made with blue mage in mind, I think pup could use such a weapon, though I am not sure what they could do for dnc besides blau type weapon.

[Plow]

If I understand you correctly, your argument is that putting these rewards in the middle of/behind a level-capped zone full of true-detect mobs... is a credit to CoP?

Those zones were part of the missions, I mean, what the hell do you want, Lufaise, Misareaux, Attohwa, URange, New/Old Mov, Bibiki... that's 7 pretty damn big zones... consider the scope of pso'xja, the new dynamises, the enm system, and Sea... and you still have it in you to complain about some zones being level capped when they offer FAR more than any uncapped zones with mobs around that same level...

The level cap specifically allows them to give us better rewards from those zones than if they just allowed us to run through uncapped and leave the nm's easily soloable.

Trying to get your group to the destination without (multiple) deaths due to true-detect aggro is not the sort of "challenge" that I enjoy, particularly in pickup groups. There is a reason why "Metal Gear Solid: Lagged Online Edition" has not been introduced.

This speaks to the overarching principle (and primary failure) of CoP's "challenge" philosophy. Every mission has the same tedious, idiotic challenge: navigate your way past floor after floor of true-detect mobs with your hands tied behind your back. (Oh, and make sure that everyone else in your group does it, too.) Gear-syncing does nothing to affect this "challenge," as the goal (if you're "doing it right") is not to fight at all.

You highly overestimate the difficulty of the true sight mobs you're talking about if you kill them instead of running around like idiots when they aggro. I remember forming alliances to climb promys, and get a nice little laugh out of it every time I solo to the top floor on npc quest weekly.

Also, the goal of "not to fight at all" is pretty clearly your own personal goal, and not the intention of the developers. No, they really didn't build the zones planning for you to wait 10 minutes for true sight mobs to move to that 1 square inch of space where they won't aggro as you pass.

If you look at CoP as a *MASSIVE* series of adventures, through hugely varied areas, with every kind of monster imaginable to face off with, and a series of challenging NM fights, combined with far and away the best storyline in a first tier MMO by miles, it really is a pretty amazing expansion.

If you view it as a shitton of aimless running around so you can spam enter through the next cutscene all in the way of you getting your rajas ring and some torques, then, yeah, it sucks, sorry. WTF are you doing playing a Final Fantasy game btw?

And you didn't need a static because of gear space or any such triviality; mules hold plenty of gear, and anyone who repeatedly sold lowbie gear after CoP release had more money than brains. You needed a static because pickup groups were f*cking death and if you didn't want to spend 2 hours trying to climb Promy-Vahzl (or re-fight Mammets five times), you needed to make sure that you had people you could trust NOT to be idiots.

Again, people making it out to be simpler or harder than it really is to suit their arguments.

Maintaining that gear, be it through mules, buy and sell, or simple storage space, was a pain in the ass. It added a huge unnecessary time sink, and it occupied a whole lot of your money for extended periods of time if you were truly gearing up well for it.

Actually doing the fights and the zones to get to them? Not nearly as bad as people make it out to be, have you forgotten that there were actually even some good exp spots for those very same mobs you're complaining about so much?

Say what you will about just the equipment, if CoP came out now and we could sync all our gear, and you can ask random people that have multiple jobs to come, and they don't have to think "oh then I'll have to get all this gear and blah blah," and you get decent exp in capped areas so people might think twice about trying to sneak past that super evil mean VT low evas low defense mob... yeah, it would all add up to CoP being damn near perfect.

Especially given the level of skill and understanding among the playerbase now, the bc fights would all be entirely different monsters...

Not that you couldn't just astral flow/manafont your way through every single bc with ease anyway... but yeah.


Anyway, yeah, if you treated CoP like MGS and spammed enter through every cutscene, I'm sorry, you missed out on something pretty amazing.


edit: also, in response to this:

and anyone who repeatedly sold lowbie gear after CoP release had more money than brains.

If you didn't, you lost a fair bit of money, because it pretty much all consistently dropped over time outside of the massive inflation period.

[Spider-Dan]

DNC would benefit more from M.Kris than from Blau.

Additionally, I think Squenix may not want to give DNC access to Blau for a more specific reason: they don't want DNCs dumping TP at 100. If DNC gets access to Blau, then (because of how Blau compares to other daggers) any future fix that they give DNC that doesn't account for never-having-more-than-100-TP will result in immediate "this update is worthless and fixes nothing!" whining.

[Plow]

though I am not sure what they could do for dnc besides blau type weapon.

Maybe something with a hidden massive subtle blow bonus or some shit? I dunno, it would prob have to pretty much cap their subtle without any extra gear to really serve its purpose.

Maybe something like sirocco set to overwrite sambas, so you could offhand it and keep sambas up with mainhand and get significantly better dot from your offhand. (edit: er... I mean, to proc over sambas, not overwrite)


Or... just... a dnc only multi hit dagger.

[Spider-Dan]

The level cap specifically allows them to give us better rewards from those zones than if they just allowed us to run through uncapped and leave the nm's easily soloable.

Which is why mobs like Simurgh, Charybdis, and Kreutzet are easily soloable, right? Or why Sozu Rogberry, Alkyoneus, and Big Bomb are in the middle of level-capped zones?

You highly overestimate the difficulty of the true sight mobs you're talking about if you kill them instead of running around like idiots when they aggro.

Way to miss the point.

If you want to kill the mobs, then sure, kill them. But it's dumb to expect everyone to resneak/invis up to get past all the wyverns and morbols and clusters only to get one person get aggroed by one hippo and have EVERYONE have to stop and fight, then do it all over again.

Straight smash-and-grab is prohibitively long. Stealth places too much emphasis on each individual person being as good at MGS as the best person. And this really wouldn't even be that much of an issue, except you don't have access to most of the well-worn tools that allow you to deal with this kind of sh*t.

Also, the goal of "not to fight at all" is pretty clearly your own personal goal, and not the intention of the developers.

Again, funny how sneak and invisible (you know, those spells WHICH SOLE PURPOSE FOR EXISTING is TO ALLOW YOU TO TRAVEL WITHOUT AGGRO) seem to work pretty damn well for the vast majority of every other expansions' missions.

If you look at CoP as a *MASSIVE* series of adventures, through hugely varied areas, with every kind of monster imaginable to face off with, and a series of challenging NM fights, combined with far and away the best storyline in a first tier MMO by miles, it really is a pretty amazing expansion.

a) I don't think CoP's storyline is all that invincible to begin with; I personally enjoyed TAU's missions+Serpent Generals far more
b) every other thing you said applies to every retail expansion in this game (if you want to compare RoZ, TAU, or WoG to CoP in monster or locale variety, be my guest)

Maintaining that gear, be it through mules, buy and sell, or simple storage space, was a pain in the ass.

This would carry more weight if this game didn't practically require mules anyway. CoP just meant that your mules had less free space.

Actually doing the fights and the zones to get to them? Not nearly as bad as people make it out to be, have you forgotten that there were actually even some good exp spots for those very same mobs you're complaining about so much?

Please, enlighten me with tales of level-capped exp parties where you got half-exp for being over the cap.

And honestly, I would avoid bringing up any mention of exp spots, as CoP's direct successor made the entirety of CoP exping look pointless and foolish by about day 3.

Say what you will about just the equipment, if CoP came out now and we could sync all our gear, and you can ask random people that have multiple jobs to come, and they don't have to think "oh then I'll have to get all this gear and blah blah," and you get decent exp in capped areas so people might think twice about trying to sneak past that super evil mean VT low evas low defense mob... yeah, it would all add up to CoP being damn near perfect.

So if I understand you correctly:

- take ACP level-capped Delkfutt climb (which has been received with such outstanding praise to this point, right?)
- make it take place in some alternate-world Bizarro Delkfutt, where high-level escorts cannot accompany you
- liberally sprinkle in true-detect mobs
- oh yeah, do this for every mission in the expansion

...this is the formula for perfect gameplay?

[Plow]

Which is why mobs like Simurgh, Charybdis, and Kreutzet are easily soloable, right? Or why Sozu Rogberry, Alkyoneus, and Big Bomb are in the middle of level-capped zones?

Because none of those mobs are in areas surrounded by aggro or anything...

And there definitely was nothing at all like that in CoP. Nope, it definitely wasn't the expansion that finally brought us decent poppable nm's or anything, either. None of the mobs you specifically mentioned have been changed for the better in the model of CoP, that's for sure.

Way to miss the point.

Tell me about it.

If you want to kill the mobs, then sure, kill them. But it's dumb to expect everyone to resneak/invis up to get past all the wyverns and morbols and clusters only to get one person get aggroed by one hippo and have EVERYONE have to stop and fight, then do it all over again.

Oh lawd, fighting monsters? In MY MMO? We're not having this! Fuck this, I'm out, afk Mist.

Straight smash-and-grab is prohibitively long. Stealth places too much emphasis on each individual person being as good at MGS as the best person. And this really wouldn't even be that much of an issue, except you don't have access to most of the well-worn tools that allow you to deal with this kind of sh*t.

Heaven forbid you have some kind of balance, and sneak through the reasonable places, and fight in the places the developers clearly intended you to have to fight.

I mean, it's not like tons of the true sight mobs in CoP drop some kind of key or item needed for mission progression or even force pop nm or anything.

Again, funny how sneak and invisible (you know, those spells WHICH SOLE PURPOSE FOR EXISTING is TO ALLOW YOU TO TRAVEL WITHOUT AGGRO) seem to work pretty damn well for the vast majority of every other expansions' missions.

What? You mean every expansion isn't exactly the same? Damn, that would be fun.

But hey, at least you don't have to worry about having your hands tied behind your back while you deal with true sight shit that has absolutely no purpose whatsoever other than to slow you down in Salvage, Nyzul, or Assault.

a) I don't think CoP's storyline is all that invincible to begin with; I personally enjoyed TAU's missions+Serpent Generals far more

That's cool, people that spam enter through cutscenes have no chance whatsoever of appreciating CoP, fortunately for them ToAU cutscenes were all video + like 5 lines of text.

b) every other thing you said applies to every retail expansion in this game (if you want to compare RoZ, TAU, or WoG to CoP in monster or locale variety, be my guest)

Outside of considering rank 10 on all countries + all of zilart together, (and probably even then), the other expansions are miniscule in terms of real story. The argument could be made for all of assault to be considered story I suppose, but the way to portray it favorably to CoP would be to compare assault etc directly to just the enm's and pop NM's.

They're very different styles of expansion, and honestly if you really like ToAU stuff best... you might want to consider WoW >.> It's much more time constraint and "trick"-centric, which, in my opinion, our combat system just doesn't provide enough options for. See: AV.

I much prefer the brute force fights like the CoP missions to the ToAU stuff. I mean, honestly, it's mind boggling to me that you can complain about CoP having too much true sight stuff and tying your hands behind your back etc., and then rave about ToAU. 90% of ToAU is some combination of mgs + restrictions + whatever the "trick" is for that specific scenario.

This would carry more weight if this game didn't practically require mules anyway. CoP just meant that your mules had less free space.

When CoP came out I would say most people that post here had 1 job, maybe 2 in the 60-75 range. The VAST majority of people posting on bg would've leveled their 2nd job in bibiki at least, if not their first. Maybe 2, 3 subs leveled 30+ if they were pretty serious, but definitely wouldn't be keeping gear around for them before that unless they weren't finished.

You can argue it all you want, every time someone asked for CoP you had to consider "do I have the gear, how much of a pain in the ass will it be to get the gear, can I just go naked?"

You had issues with travel time, I did not. I have issues with space, you do not. Welcome to life.

Please, enlighten me with tales of level-capped exp parties where you got half-exp for being over the cap.

I think it was about 37 that the Wyverns in riverne were great exp. Promys were awesome jungle alternatives when everyone and their dogs were leveling new jobs for missions, and still leveling sj etc. They put in a bonus for merit points in capped areas too, it still wasn't great, but it wasn't bad either.

And honestly, I would avoid bringing up any mention of exp spots, as CoP's direct successor made the entirety of CoP exping look pointless and foolish by about day 3.

CoP's direct successor made great exp camps by giving you an exp bonus.

Dude, before CoP, we leveled on Cockatrice. COCKATRICE! For like 10 total levels! People would invite me on drk to bones parties regularly... CoP improved quality of exp camps dramatically, URange was amazing for well geared groups, ToAU gave some slightly better merit mob spawn patterns, but used an artificial bonus to make them really good.

So if I understand you correctly:

- take ACP level-capped Delkfutt climb (which has been received with such outstanding praise to this point, right?)

Because CoP was fucking TOTALLY running through an EXACT mission everyone did 5 years ago. Totally. That's an entirely honest and valid argument you're making here.

- make it take place in some alternate-world Bizarro Delkfutt, where high-level escorts cannot accompany you
- liberally sprinkle in true-detect mobs
- oh yeah, do this for every mission in the expansion

There's true sight mobs all over that longass run to Sea Lion's Den, I know. They match up well with those 18 Tiamat spawns on the way to Boneyard.

It's also too bad they didn't have any "wham you're there, fight this dood" missions 2 seconds from where you base yourself during the mission. And it would've been super nice if for some of them you could like make it so that most of the mobs don't aggro, and have like 3 fights to worry about on the way through. Guess they weren't considerate enough.

...this is the formula for perfect gameplay?

If by "this," you mean "selective memory," then apparently so.

[Spider-Dan]

Because none of those mobs are in areas surrounded by aggro or anything...

The key detail being "aggro that ignores buffs specifically designed to prevent aggro."

And there definitely was nothing at all like that in CoP. Nope, it definitely wasn't the expansion that finally brought us decent poppable nm's or anything, either.

CoP invented sky?

I mean, it's not like tons of the true sight mobs in CoP drop some kind of key or item needed for mission progression or even force pop nm or anything.

Lots of mobs in this game drop lots of things. The difference is that sometimes, you actually DON'T want to fight them, because a) you already have the Rare item they drop or b) you have no interest in, say, a map of Promyvion-Mea.

You mean every expansion isn't exactly the same? Damn, that would be fun.

The point being that CoP is the outlier, and not in a good sense, which is why every expansion before and after ditched CoP's failed philosophies.

But hey, at least you don't have to worry about having your hands tied behind your back while you deal with true sight shit that has absolutely no purpose whatsoever other than to slow you down in Salvage, Nyzul, or Assault.

And here's the crux of the issue:

When doing, say, Assault, I expect the event to be a challenge. If I had to walk through a level-capped zone full of true-detect mobs just to get to the f*cking ENTRANCE to Assault, I would probably have a problem with that.

I mean, seriously: do you really expect people to form static groups to complete missions on an indefinite regular basis, like they do for Dynamis or sky or Einherjar or Salvage? This is not a subtle difference, here.

That's cool, people that spam enter through cutscenes have no chance whatsoever of appreciating CoP, fortunately for them ToAU cutscenes were all video + like 5 lines of text.

Wait, if I spam enter through every cutscene to get to the rewards, why would I even do Serpent Generals to begin with? And why would I have any opinion of TAU's mission storyline, especially when the reward is incredibly mediocre?

Nah, best not to think too hard about that. Anyone who does not intrinsically appreciate the objective quality of CoP's storyline must not have actually read it.

But let's nip this line of argument in the bud right now: there is no logical requirement whatsoever for a good storyline to require tedious artificially-handicapped fetch quests. Every storyline-based argument that you make for CoP (and against any other expansion) boils down to nothing more than "I wish the other expansions had better writing."

Outside of considering rank 10 on all countries + all of zilart together, (and probably even then), the other expansions are miniscule in terms of real story.

Was that a bait-and-switch? You just praised CoP for its monster and locale variety, when it's practically the worst retail expansion in that regard.

When CoP came out I would say most people that post here had 1 job, maybe 2 in the 60-75 range.

[...]

You can argue it all you want, every time someone asked for CoP you had to consider "do I have the gear, how much of a pain in the ass will it be to get the gear, can I just go naked?"

Yes, in the same sense and to the extent that if someone asks a person to help on one of their uncommonly used 75s NOW, they would have to consider how much of a pain in the ass it is to mule over their gear.

I think it was about 37 that the Wyverns in riverne were great exp. Promys were awesome jungle alternatives when everyone and their dogs were leveling new jobs for missions, and still leveling sj etc. They put in a bonus for merit points in capped areas too, it still wasn't great, but it wasn't bad either.

I gave you a hint, but you apparently ignored it.

The "bonus" for merit points was that you actually got full limit points. The reason that this is categorized as a "bonus" is because if you were receiving exp points for a level-capped job, your exp was HALVED.

The reason why people didn't exp in level-capped zones is because Squenix went out of their way to specifically and intentionally discourage that from taking place. (And they're still doing it; notice how level-sync doesn't work in level-capped areas?) Another win for the CoP team!

CoP's direct successor made great exp camps by giving you an exp bonus.

a) Um, that's correct? Besieged is a TAU event. Successful defenses in Besieged provide many benefits, one of which is increased exp.
b) I don't remember getting 85% of my current Sanction-boosted exp/hr during CoP. Do you?

CoP improved quality of exp camps dramatically, URange was amazing for well geared groups, ToAU gave some slightly better merit mob spawn patterns, but used an artificial bonus to make them really good.

Quick, what were the top 5 exp camps during CoP's reign?

a) KRT (i.e. not CoP)
b) Lufaise Abraxas (hi 25% penalty to slashing and blunt)
c) Nexus (i.e. not CoP)
d) sky front weapons (i.e. not CoP)
e) Uletab demons

If CoP was a "dramatic improvement," why did we still have people fighting over KRT and sky camps up until the day TAU came out?

As a point of reference, Mire was considered a godly camp without compare in TAU's early days, utterly destroying anything CoP had to offer. Now it is considered beneath any self-respecting 75.

Because CoP was fucking TOTALLY running through an EXACT mission everyone did 5 years ago. Totally. That's an entirely honest and valid argument you're making here.

Are you saying that the reason people are complaining about Delkfutt climb is because they've "already done it" (which mission was it that had you climbing Delkfutt checking waypoints, again?), and NOT because of the idiotic level-cap shenanigans? Then where are all the people complaining about the Fei'Yin parts of ACP? Check the honesty of your own argument there, chief.

[Plow]

The key detail being "aggro that ignores buffs specifically designed to prevent aggro."

Kind of like how magic aggro and hp aggro work in the areas around the mobs you listed?

CoP invented sky?

Sky was a campfest, camping for pop items to pop force pop nm's kind of defeats the purpose. Hence the fact that they changed sky to mirror cop style for the most important parts.

Lots of mobs in this game drop lots of things. The difference is that sometimes, you actually DON'T want to fight them, because a) you already have the Rare item they drop or b) you have no interest in, say, a map of Promyvion-Mea.

And sometimes, the developers want you to have to fight your way to shit, and not just sneak through.

And, sometimes, it's even fun and productive.

The point being that CoP is the outlier, and not in a good sense, which is why every expansion before and after ditched CoP's failed philosophies.

If you don't see how every expansion before and after has either changed to adopt some of cop's strategies (sky, the nm's you mentioned), or built further upon the improvements CoP brought about (enm's are an entirely different beast than bcnm ever were, and directly led to the objective based concepts of assault and nyzul, as well as MMM, and the more interesting campaign ops)

And here's the crux of the issue:

When doing, say, Assault, I expect the event to be a challenge. If I had to walk through a level-capped zone full of true-detect mobs just to get to the f*cking ENTRANCE to Assault, I would probably have a problem with that.

Think, real hard, about what you just said.

I mean, seriously: do you really expect people to form static groups to complete missions on an indefinite regular basis, like they do for Dynamis or sky or Einherjar or Salvage? This is not a subtle difference, here.

Perhaps some of us would rather have an endless stream of challenging missions than a bunch of 30 minute bc's to run around between...

Some of us really don't hate moving around the world, you know...

Wait, if I spam enter through every cutscene to get to the rewards, why would I even do Serpent Generals to begin with? And why would I have any opinion of TAU's mission storyline, especially when the reward is incredibly mediocre?

Nah, best not to think too hard about that. Anyone who does not intrinsically appreciate the objective quality of CoP's storyline must not have actually read it.

There is far, far, far, far more to the CoP story than any other part of the game.

But let's nip this line of argument in the bud right now: there is no logical requirement whatsoever for a good storyline to require tedious artificially-handicapped fetch quests. Every storyline-based argument that you make for CoP (and against any other expansion) boils down to nothing more than "I wish the other expansions had better writing."

Absolutely not. Quality is a factor, massive quantity combined with quality is a win.

Was that a bait-and-switch? You just praised CoP for its monster and locale variety, when it's practically the worst retail expansion in that regard.

Uh... excuse me? I don't even know how to respond to that because I can't fathom the thought process behind it. CoP is fucking HUGE, with as big a variation in zone style and mobs as anything.

Yes, in the same sense and to the extent that if someone asks a person to help on one of their uncommonly used 75s NOW, they would have to consider how much of a pain in the ass it is to mule over their gear.

Yeah, exactly. Back then, people's subjobs etc were equivalent to a 75 job they never use now. Nobody likes dealing with that.

I gave you a hint, but you apparently ignored it.

The "bonus" for merit points was that you actually got full limit points. The reason that this is categorized as a "bonus" is because if you were receiving exp points for a level-capped job, your exp was HALVED.

It wasn't halved, it really wasn't that bad at all. IIRC it was proportionate with your level, so yeah maybe if you were 75 it was halved. There were also no tier 2 merits, no pups etc. to worry about.

And, get this... you could go in there at levels under the cap. Amazing, I know, but it actually does allow you in.

The reason why people didn't exp in level-capped zones is because Squenix went out of their way to specifically and intentionally discourage that from taking place. (And they're still doing it; notice how level-sync doesn't work in level-capped areas?) Another win for the CoP team!

They were intentionally trying to prevent people *OVER THE CAP OF THAT ZONE* from going back and leveling there. In case you still haven't managed to figure it out, it was designed around the fact tha tmost people didn't have a 75 job then, let alone multiple.

a) Um, that's correct? Besieged is a TAU event. Successful defenses in Besieged provide many benefits, one of which is increased exp.

Besieged doesn't mean ToAU camps are massively better, it means sanction > signet, which is a big fucking duh, and does not reflect on CoP in the least.

b) I don't remember getting 85% of my current Sanction-boosted exp/hr during CoP. Do you?

I don't remember everybody and their dogs having an Ebody, and AH sams being able to outparse the ebodies. I do remember coming damn close to pre-2h buff exp levels in Bibiki and Urange both, though. But like I said, ToAU did bring some better spawn patterns in a couple places.

Quick, what were the top 5 exp camps during CoP's reign?

a) KRT (i.e. not CoP)
b) Lufaise Abraxas (hi 25% penalty to slashing and blunt)
c) Nexus (i.e. not CoP)
d) sky front weapons (i.e. not CoP)
e) Uletab demons

Rams? Fomor?

And hey guess what, SHIT OTHER THAN MERITS MATTERED THEN. I hate to break it to you but when the vast majority of the population doesn't have a 75 job, the top 5 merit camps really don't mean much.

If CoP was a "dramatic improvement," why did we still have people fighting over KRT and sky camps up until the day TAU came out?

Because CoP didn't go "hey look how awesome these exp camps are, they give you 15% exp free and make T mobs worthwhile exp."

And you know what? The good parties didn't. When we went to sky to exp during CoP with was with melee whm and shit, and we could still overkill the entire front 2 rooms and lose chains due to no mobs. Dhen we wanted good exp we went to URange, it was no comparison. Outdoor vs indoor, period.

As a point of reference, Mire was considered a godly camp without compare in TAU's early days, utterly destroying anything CoP had to offer. Now it is considered beneath any self-respecting 75.

As a point of reference, mana burns, smn burns, and really good normal pt's were happy with 4k/hr around 75 going into CoP. If you were lucky enough to be a rng, war, or mnk, you could sub nin and still do enough dmg to keep good chains in krt or sky and maybe push 6k. Some of the extremely few top notch geared players that took the time to memorize paths could push KRT a bit higher. Oh, yeah, and decked out nin were top notch DD.

Insert URange/Bibiki, good gear and skill = 8-10k/hr. Skillchain pt, melee pt, rng pt, any works.

A lot of things have changed since CoP's early days, and claiming CoP didn't improve the situation for both exp and merits rather dramatically is paramount to saying you didn't even play before CoP. That's the only way you could make that statement and honestly believe it.

Are you saying that the reason people are complaining about Delkfutt climb is because they've "already done it" (which mission was it that had you climbing Delkfutt checking waypoints, again?), and NOT because of the idiotic level-cap shenanigans? Then where are all the people complaining about the Fei'Yin parts of ACP? Check the honesty of your own argument there, chief.

Last I checked, people were complaining about every single part of ACP. Most specific complaints were about having to grind too weak mobs for a longass time...

I mean, seriously, if one of the best body pieces in the game for pretty much every job in one way or another isn't worth fighting 10-15 decent challenge mobs (not that you can't mgs it all anyway, I have) because you have to do it in a level cap that doesn't require any extra gear, I really don't know what to tell you.

I wouldn't mind the climb at all, in fact I had a damn good time when it was called mission 3-3 and none of us were much over level 30 anyway.


In the end you're looking at it through a jaded lens, the game got so much easier since CoP that you're looking back at it as an absolute hell when that was simply not the case, and where it did suck was primarily because you needed good low level gear and experienced players which were few and far between at that point.

I can't even explain to you how much stupid shit and just all around noobness we put ourselves through... when I was running missions with the person that wrote the guide 90% of later people have to thank for getting them through CoP.


In the end, as a pure endgame expansion, CoP had its bright spots all along (the pop nm's, wyrms including b+o, enm, the new merit camps, diabolos, etc.), and in the spots where it failed it has been improved dramatically (sea, other than AV). It's pretty darn good.

As an overall game experience cop is amazing in the quantity of entertaining content, if you're not just rushing through it as fast as possible to get to the next piece of loot. If you truly despise dungeon crawling, then I guess it's not for you, but in the big picture of mmo's it's pretty damn well done.

The reality is that the 2 expansions serve very different purposes, and if you utterly and completely ignore the concepts behind them, it's going to skew your perception.

[Hyan]

I didn't like how the CoP zones were almost completely designed for the mission purposes.. When I first got the expansion I cleared promies and minotaur and then didn't even know the whole expansion existed until after a good year+, since it consisted of only missions which I couldn't do at the time. SE had the idea of "let's finish the missions before adding anything else" which I feel was a bad direction to take. After they finished the story it got better with ENM's limbus and stuff, but I do have to say that I prefer them adding both other content and story rather than focusing only on one aspect at the time. That's what I feel ToAU did right.

[Andradi]

As a relatively new player (started last August) staticing through CoP with my linkshell, (funtimes, the story is really picking up) something I am rather curious about:

How the fuck did you guys figure out certain parts of this? (Assuming .dat mining was not used/existed back then?)

The most obvious thing that comes to mind is the two keyed door in the Sacrarium, but a lot of the mission progression without a guide seems pretty damn vague going by in-game descriptions.

[Xno Kappa]

Koggelmander doesn't exist. I'm assuming I have to level PUP to go 1/1 on it since I'm currently 0/??? with my BLU. Therefore it is not specifically tailored to BLU, it's just there to piss them off.