Komoto's Official Explanation of Surplus

[Meresgi]

It doesn't matter if they add surplus or not in regards to botters because they'll keep botting until they are capped. Once they are capped, they'll still bot. Therefore, we are going to penalize the actual paying customers that play the game legitimately to avoid "botters" leveling to the level cap.

But botters botting beyond the 0% won't be accomplishing anything. I think someone said that most world monsters will only be dropping materials and crystals and not weapons/armor and what not. Not sure if that holds true to retail. I can see what you're saying though, and yeah china botz will still bot, but it takes away at least some of the temptation for an average person to go get a bot. I know a ton of people botted in Aion due to the horrible xp curve to it.

[Meko]

They can make EXP'ing fun and easy without breaking the game is my whole point. They've already added leves which shows they want casual players to level at a decent pace coupled with the hardcore players. With that being said, why not kill surplus and let people play. If the game is fun and the classes are fun, people will level them anyway. We all did in FFXI and not because they put a cap or limit on it but rather each class worked well with one another and the grouping was fun. It was fun to group, kill shit, make EXP and get new abilities (although they were slow to roll with abilities lol).

[Purrrfect]

Honestly, debating on the merit of the system is pretty moot at this point, I don't think anyone believe it's a good implementation. If this is a deal breaker for you, then fine. Discussing how to take advantage of it despite the fatigue is more constructive. People just need to learn to let go and move on.

troof.

Maybe they'll remove it once they see it affecting their bottom line, but until then you either play the game because you like it as a whole, or you don't. Some people enjoy the leveling process just as much as others enjoy endgame content solely.

[Kaisha]

[EDIT] Nvm.

[omegaB]

Do you people arguing for this shit really think its a good idea? Or are you semi trolling/ like to be contradictory.


The System has no merit at all.

bots dont need to be high level to manipulate the economy. By leveling everything 24 hours you will have all crafts and more money and items your still gonna get bitched by the hardcore, they will control the economy. they will tell you how to party.

they will have more abilities than you and better gear. in fact casuals will be even more effected by the hardcore than they were before, they will not be able to afford the best items at each level, because they will be competing or paying someone who has made 3 times the money. happened in beta. look forward to paying 80k gil to get a weapon every time you reach a new leveling plateau because it will always be in demand, it will always be one of the harder things to make, and everybody will have money but have you, because you only play 2 hours a week. and you had to pay all your money at level 13 to get the level 13 weapon. they may protect you from hours, but they arent protecting you from money.

really this is just a headache, i played with it, and most people who had it happened walked around wondering when is it magically going to return and im going to have to stop playing the class i want

Its not just about grinding, say you want to craft, you run out of crystals, (happens a lot) your pug hit surplus already on the first day, well now its a waste to farm with it, because it will get no exp, and it will screw up your rest to get surplus away time. You want to explore the map, but some mobs will agro, but why take your fav class to do it, when any exp you get from fighting or testing mobs messes up your surplus downtime, or you get 0 exp for an encounter which will probably be long. You cant do any mission, quest or story on your main because of the same thing, or if you do that you will have diminishing returns. Heck they will have marks leves and class specific leves, if these involving fighting at all its a waste if you leveled them.

well you could just not play your favorite class, maybe your pug is good at farming, so i should not do any leves with the class i like the best, and want to play. Or i only help people with my marauder.

If yall love the system so much, why not just have an exp cap for all leveling in a week, sound good? nope sounds bad, because its going to penalize you for your playstyle and make you think about every decsion you make on what job to play, welcome to the same sucky system working against you.

@ kaisha its basically the exact same thing. the threshold is in fact a certain number of exp. they are limiting how much exp you can get in one class in a week, same thing.

[miokomioko]

The damage has been done... they need to speak up about relieving the penalties some, or abolishing the system for one of bonuses (while probably nerfing exp entirely) in order for them to make up what they have already lost due to horrible journalism.

Thread lock request!

[Kaisha]

The damage has been done... they need to speak up about relieving the penalties some, or abolishing the system for one of bonuses (while probably nerfing exp entirely) in order for them to make up what they have already lost due to horrible journalism.

Thread lock request!

The threshold values are being reexamined, and we plan to further adjust the different rates of earnable points based on feedback from our testers.

The diminishing results experienced during gathering are a function related to that class alone, and have no connection to this progression system. We are in the process of adjusting this system, and plan to make changes based on tester feedback.

They also plan on having a lot of other fixes for the open beta in September.

[miokomioko]

I'm expecting this to get a lot of attention from their developers, producers, executives, and PR people alike during the next phase, with plenty of heads butting between them in the process. It's damage much worse than the Pandemonium Warden fiasco.

[ascalon]

I am confused by the concept of "bonus skill points" that are mentioned in our official dev translation.

It says that they are only obtained after the maximum threshold is reached, so this implies that they are something different to "surplus skill points", which oddly aren't mentioned at all in the translation.

After 7 thresholds worth of being penalised by an increasing "tax" on the amount of skill/xp we earn per mob, why would they then give us something back for our efforts at reaching the cap. It doesn't make sense.

OR are "bonus skill points" their translation of "surplus skill points"? In which case, this is an obvious case of spin, trying to put a positive slant on a negative word despite the fact that in game, surplus skill points are in no way a bonus.

I don't get it. This translation has seemingly raised more questions for me than it has answered.

[omegaB]

they ran the whole translation through thier PR department. Bonus Exp, is a bonus in that its surplus exp, and it does nothing at all, and you cant use it ever. translation LOST EXP

they tried hard to take out negative words, and use big words and ideas to confuse ideas people wont like. they could just say after a set amount of exp earned you are penalized and will get less exp, the more exp you get after this point the less you can earn till it reaches 0

but that doesnt sound too good.

[miokomioko]

How can you gain "lost exp" as well as increase in a "lost exp" rank?

The way it has been set up implies it gets stored somewhere for some unknown or unused purpose.

[ascalon]

It is currently not used. Therefore it is lost to us. Taken away from us. However you want to swing it, it is skimmed off the top of our efforts like a tax and pooled somewhere without us having a choice about it.

Calling it "bonus" Xp, therefore, is just obvious spin, trying to turn a PR nightmare into something palatable for people who don't yet have all the information. Which is just stupid. The cat is already out of the bag. Trying to stuff it back in shouting "It's a bonus, really! It's a BONUS!" when most of the beta testers already know it is a penalty to get you to slow down, is a recipe for disaster.

SE's customer base aren't THAT stupid. They know when they're being jerked around.

Now, if they DO decide to tie an actual bonus to this pool of surplus skill points, then they have to make it something that is not particularly attractive. If it is in any way attractive -- say bonus leves, guild marks, or a percentage of bonus xp -- then that is going to work counter to their design intent. They want people to STOP levelling a particular class and try out others. Having any kind of exchangeable reward will not do this.

If the rewards aren't attractive, then its STILL not "Bonus". It is STILL a tax on your time and efforts.

[omegaB]

they said, they were exploring uses, but giving it any use defeats the purpose of surplus.

We are currently in the process of considering the means in which bonus skill points can be used. There have been suggestions for various types of incentives, but as encouraging people to play with that in mind defeats the purpose of this threshold system, we will be examining this issue very carefully

we cant give you any incentive, or it defeats the purpose.

logic dictates.

the purpose is not an incentive

too lose something, while gaining nothing, is a loss

surplus should be renamed to lost exp system

you earned 500 skill points
you recieve 200 skill points
you lost 300 skill.

[miokomioko]

Conspiracy theorist.

The game is still in beta testing. Hell, even when it's out of beta, it still won't be completed.

Lastly, it's not a tax on your time/efforts. It's a tax on your inability to fucking do something different.

they said, they were exploring uses, but giving it any use defeats the purpose of surplus.

Which is what everyone wants. Though they can't make the use/reward of it unique as it would punish the casual players they are aiming to please.

[ascalon]

Conspiracy theorist.

The game is still in beta testing. Hell, even when it's out of beta, it still won't be completed.

Lastly, it's not a tax on your time/efforts. It's a tax on your inability to fucking do something different.



Which is what everyone wants. Though they can't make the use/reward of it unique as it would punish the casual players they are aiming to please.

Of course it is a tax on my time and effort. If I'm in an awesome party, 3/4 of the way to next rank, I am going to want to push through to that rank. That's the incentive of level-based play, to ding, to get to that next tier of power. But the more I play, the harder it is to get there, thus taxing my effort and time. That's hardly difficult to understand.

As for being a conspiracy theorist, I'd like to ask where the conspiracy is in my post? They're using the word "bonus". Surplus is not a bonus. It is a penalty. That is not a conspiracy theory. For them to use the word bonus implies one of two things: that either the developers are addled and they believe penalizing you is beneficial, or they are trying to put a positive PR slant on what has no doubt been a bit of a disaster for them over the last few days.

[Kaiyoko]

Below is my experience with surplus, and might explain what exactly this "Bonus" part of surplus is.. Don't read if you wanna cause drama, just posting my experience to help calm the riots.

Spoiler: show

After reading this post on the NA forums the whole thing makes slightly more sense why there is a rank to surplus as well. In beta 3 I was able to reach rank 30 MAR w/o a problem. Kuro and Soap had exped with me a decent amount and we had noticed I would always gain quiet a bit more Skill then them when we all had surplus. I was normally 2-3 levels above them as well. One difference that I had early on to them was surplus rank. It started at 1 and rose to rank 15 on the first day on Phase 3, while my MAR rank was 17. They at this time had reached rank 15 CLASS with a surplus rank I believe highest i heard from Kuro was 8 at the end of day 1. I had started leveling before they logged on I believe and reached surplus to the point of only gaining 10% rank exp, while they had gained quiet a bit more. The next day the servers were shut down and we we're able to log on the day after our surplus had turned back yellow but their surplus was hitting them harder then me even though I had gained far more rank EXP then them.

The next week after this possible reset on Tues. I was able to level 2 days straight w/o having any surplus, and finally hit it again when I reached level 1/4 of the way into 24. Then I continued to exp through surplus reaching rank 20 surplus. I stopped for a day to work on smithing and was able to get that to 13 where I hit surplus for that, and grinded through that till rank 3 surplus. The next day my surplus had went away again to white after about 18 hours of being away from MAR. I hit the surplus threshold quickly again, but it did not seem to reach cap again at this point no matter how much I exped. I grinded constantly till 27 at this point and then decided to switch back to smithing rank 15 with rank 3 surplus. After a day away from smithing surplus was just as bad as the day before. The next day I returned to MAR where I started at white till 28 where I hit a 10% skill gain because of surplus. Returning to smithing it was white now, but I quickly returned to yellow with surplus.

I decided to grind at this point to close to 29 as I could. I hit surplus of 50% where I was having a hard time finding mobs that would give decent rank at this point so I was barely able to reach 29 with 1k rank into it. The next day leves/exp reset and ended up grinding through mine and others leves to 30 where I never reached surplus till about 2/3 way through 29, and it stayed at 10% of my rank exp at that point till 30.

The exp from phys always was declining never increased just how they said, so not gonna bother talking much about that. Did not seem to decrease as fast as rank though.

This leads me to believe that the surplus rank either increase the exp/time between each threshold or increase the rate of recovering from surplus. If this is true the best thing to do is grind like crazy to get your surplus rank high. I'm gonna test it in OB to makes sure, but through my experiences I'm fairly confident surplus acts as you body wearing down. However, the more you wear your body down, the faster it can recover and more endurance you have. So there seems to be a definite way around it.

[omegaB]

if they gonna have fatigue, the game needs steroids, heck id level cooking/alchemy if i could make some item that erases my surplus. And i pop em like no tommorow OHHHH YEAAAAAA.

might actually take money off the hardcore people who will be rich as hell and pimping casuals out for all their moneys in the current system.

[Zubis]

This leads me to believe that the surplus rank either increase the exp/time between each threshold or increase the rate of recovering from surplus. If this is true the best thing to do is grind like crazy to get your surplus rank high. I'm gonna test it in OB to makes sure, but through my experiences I'm fairly confident surplus acts as you body wearing down. However, the more you wear your body down, the faster it can recover and more endurance you have. So there seems to be a definite way around it.

Makes sense I guess, but didn't they quite clearly say they've yet to implement anything to use the surplus points for?

[Kaiyoko]

Makes sense I guess, but didn't they quite clearly say they've yet to implement anything to use the surplus points for?

Yeah, I know they didn't clearly say it, but when has SE ever given away all their secrets or even been explained 100% with anyone even the JPs... They expect us to figure out shit on our own, which is one thing I like about XI.

[miokomioko]

They expect us to figure out shit on our own, which is one thing I like about XI.

I kinda' agree, but I'm sure our feelings on this are not shared by many others.