Heavensward Ilevel Requirements. Strange Design Choice?

[Aduu Avagnar]

Staples in some MMOs. Not that it changes anything just because another game is guilty of the same flaws. It's punishment via tedium, plain and simple.

 

Either make multi-classing viable on one character outside of the magic classes or give those eight character slots some incentive. It's really not that hard either way.

multi classing is very viable outside of the magic classes. I speak as someone who has all of them leveled and reasonably geared....

 

and I /really/ don't see how its a punishment, they don't want people to have no reason to play, so they artifically elongate the time spent in game by gating stuff through caps and lockouts. It's a business design that is proven to work, and is an inconvenience at worst.

[Swashbuckler]

multi classing is very viable outside of the magic classes. I speak as someone who has all of them leveled and reasonably geared....

 

and I /really/ don't see how its a punishment, they don't want people to have no reason to play, so they artifically elongate the time spent in game by gating stuff through caps and lockouts. It's a business design that is proven to work, and is an inconvenience at worst.

 

That still does not explain why they chose to give us 8 character slots. And if we choose to use up all of those other slots, we're punished by having to go through the MSQ's again. (I wouldn't mind having to level them, I actually like leveling.)

 

By all intents and purposes, they should have just charged us the price of the game, the $14.95 a month sub, and only give us 1 character slot. Period.

 

But I get that this is how they made their game. So... /shrug

[Aduu Avagnar]

multi classing is very viable outside of the magic classes. I speak as someone who has all of them leveled and reasonably geared....

 

and I /really/ don't see how its a punishment, they don't want people to have no reason to play, so they artifically elongate the time spent in game by gating stuff through caps and lockouts. It's a business design that is proven to work, and is an inconvenience at worst.

 

That still does not explain why they chose to give us 8 character slots. And if we choose to use up all of those other slots, we're punished by having to go through the MSQ's again. (I wouldn't mind having to level them, I actually like leveling.)

 

By all intents and purposes, they should have just charged us the price of the game, the $14.95 a month sub, and only give us 1 character slot. Period.

 

But I get that this is how they made their game. So... /shrug

There is the option to pay less and only have one character slot per server.

[LiadansWhisper]

 

 

 

But this conversation really goes nowhere if no one actually mentions exactly what it is that they dislike about playing X class versus playing Y class versus playing another video game entirely. What do you actually like? What does the game fail at? How would another class fix those failures and/or pander more towards your particular sensibilities?

 

I'm not saying it fails, I'm saying I'm just not interested in it.  I'm not interested in rotations (DPS), nor does Tanking feel very appealing to me (as it is dominated by various rotations, though it is more "flexible" in that regard than a DPS role is).  Healing is on-the-fly, with 0 rotations and 100% priority system.  The spells I choose to use, and how I choose to use them can change from encounter to encounter, sometimes even in subsequent clears of the same encounter because every single encounter has the potential to be radically different from a healing point of view.

 

See, DPS fight the boss, and tanks fight the boss and the DPS trying to pull threat.  But Healers fight the boss, the ground, the DPS and the tanks, all at the same time, while generally needing to have to think ahead nearly all of the time as you are dealing with a limited resource and need to have the right things ready at the right time.

 

Nothing else comes anywhere close to the exhilaration I've felt while healing, and I have played DPS and tanking roles at some point in nearly every game I've played.

 

I love healing so, so much. :lol:

[Swashbuckler]

There is the option to pay less and only have one character slot per server.

I know that, I made mention of it earlier. Great price of $12.95 a month!

 

That still doesn't explain why they gave us that option, then punish us for taking that option for only two dollars more!

[Gone.]

multi classing is very viable outside of the magic classes. I speak as someone who has all of them leveled and reasonably geared....

 

and I /really/ don't see how its a punishment, they don't want people to have no reason to play, so they artifically elongate the time spent in game by gating stuff through caps and lockouts. It's a business design that is proven to work, and is an inconvenience at worst.

 

Not exactly. Say you pick up BRD, but you've been a mage at heart. Well, guess what? Now you have to pick up 34 levels of LNC just so you won't run out of TP and have a reasonable burst, all skills you won't be able to use on anything but those two classes. That is hardly an incentive, especially with all the gear nonsense; only soldiery gear is able to be acquired on a reasonable time frame. Everything else is either luck and/or a grind.

 

And I'm sorry, but if you have to artificially elongate progress in a video game to keep people in it, then the problem lies not with the pacing, but with the core design itself. Ironically, FFXIV doesn't have this problem, so why does SQX bother? Cosmetics and housing are the only real end-game, not a hackneyed treadmill that only a minority will enjoy for a few months before picking up the next new shiny MMO.

[Aduu Avagnar]

multi classing is very viable outside of the magic classes. I speak as someone who has all of them leveled and reasonably geared....

 

and I /really/ don't see how its a punishment, they don't want people to have no reason to play, so they artifically elongate the time spent in game by gating stuff through caps and lockouts. It's a business design that is proven to work, and is an inconvenience at worst.

 

Not exactly. Say you pick up BRD, but you've been a mage at heart. Well, guess what? Now you have to pick up 34 levels of LNC just so you won't run out of TP and have a reasonable burst, all skills you won't be able to use on anything but those two classes. That is hardly an incentive, especially with all the gear nonsense; only soldiery gear is able to be acquired on a reasonable time frame. Everything else is either luck and/or a grind.

 

And I'm sorry, but if you have to artificially elongate progress in a video game to keep people in it, then the problem lies not with the pacing, but with the core design itself. Ironically, FFXIV doesn't have this problem, so why does SQX bother? Cosmetics and housing are the only real end-game, not a hackneyed treadmill.

as I said, an inconvenience. I need 34 levels of lancer to do my job well? fair enough, lets go get them. and if you've been a mage? you've likely built up a sizable ammount of gear and soldiery whilst playing that mage. Most of my classes were already decently geared by the moment they hit 50 due to greed rolls.

 

it is likely there because it is there in WoW, and this game does borrow heavily from that, but I feel diverges in many, many good ways. Also, the real end game is Coil (soon to be alexander), not cosmetics. Unless you are refering to the coil gear.

[LiadansWhisper]

Pretty sure everyone who responded negatively to Zyrusticae's post missed the point. None of you are subscribers for the sole reason that you're a White Mage. Or a Ninja. Or a Warrior. You have other motivators too, and those motivators also fall under "the entire game."

 

I was talking about this with someone else just a few minutes ago, and this is my stance on it.

 

I don't have that mindset, no.  I play the game for a specific role as opposed to a specific class.  With that said, however, I abjectly refuse to condemn or belittle someone for looking at the game differently.

 

Not everyone is going to view the game the way I do.  I have an almost harsh, "You do what is necessary for the raid's success, because that is the goal and your personal enjoyment is secondary in a group scenario."  In World of Warcraft, I leveled multiple characters of the same class and role (i.e. multiple Priests, Shaman, Druids, etc) for the purposes of class-stacking and split runs with my raid group.  When I found out that I couldn't play my favorite and preferred spec in our raid because they needed me to play the spec that I quite literally detested, I sucked it up and swapped to that spec and geared for it.  Because, for me, the success of my raid was way more important.

 

But that's my mindset, and it won't be everyone's mindset, nor should it be.  And I do remember how long it took for me to branch out from my original spec and class when I first started playing, and WoW was a much easier game to level in, given that I had all of those shiny quests and didn't have to worry about cross-class abilities.  If someone only likes WHM and that's the only thing that's keeping them going, that's totally okay.  It's not my mindset, and it never will be, but they have a right to that mindset.  It's not stupid, wrong, or even narrowminded.  Sometimes you just really fall in love with one playstyle and end up hating another (reference: I adore Holy Priest, I detest Disc, but I play them both in WoW. I do know people who refuse to play one spec or another).  There's nothing wrong with that.

[LiadansWhisper]

The thing is, the game is designed to not need alts. The only downside to that is the inventory space. The entire game is built around the fact that you can do everything on one character. I don't see that changing as it is a core feature of the game.

 

You forgot tome caps, cross-class skills, gear lockouts, etc.

 

FFXIV punishes you for doing everything on one character to begin with, contrary to how it's advertised. Either have one or the other, you know?

 

I honestly don't agree with you on this one.  It's not "punishment."  It's a way of extending the content, and it's practiced in one form or another by every successful MMO.

 

Staples in some MMOs. Not that it changes anything just because another game is guilty of the same flaws. It's punishment via tedium, plain and simple.

 

Either make multi-classing viable on one character outside of the magic classes or give those eight character slots some incentive. It's really not that hard either way.

 

Staples in every successful, raiding-focused MMO.  WoW does it.  SWTOR does it.  Rift does it.  Wildstar does it.  Name me a wildly successful MMO with a serious raiding endgame that doesn't engage in content gating via tomes, raid lockouts, etc?

 

 

 

That still does not explain why they chose to give us 8 character slots. And if we choose to use up all of those other slots, we're punished by having to go through the MSQ's again. (I wouldn't mind having to level them, I actually like leveling.)

 

By all intents and purposes, they should have just charged us the price of the game, the $14.95 a month sub, and only give us 1 character slot. Period.

 

But I get that this is how they made their game. So... /shrug

 

There are some people who will play enough to fill those slots up and actually level the characters in all the classes.  I personally think it's insane, but they do it.

 

I don't really care if I have 8 character slots or not.  I'm very content with my one character.

 

 

 

 

Not exactly. Say you pick up BRD, but you've been a mage at heart. Well, guess what? Now you have to pick up 34 levels of LNC just so you won't run out of TP and have a reasonable burst, all skills you won't be able to use on anything but those two classes. That is hardly an incentive, especially with all the gear nonsense; only soldiery gear is able to be acquired on a reasonable time frame. Everything else is either luck and/or a grind.

 

And I'm sorry, but if you have to artificially elongate progress in a video game to keep people in it, then the problem lies not with the pacing, but with the core design itself. Ironically, FFXIV doesn't have this problem, so why does SQX bother? Cosmetics and housing are the only real end-game, not a hackneyed treadmill that only a minority will enjoy for a few months before picking up the next new shiny MMO.

 

That's a personal opinion.  There are many people very devoted to the PvE endgame, and you have no right to denigrate their focus.

 

What's more, you were complaining earlier that SE won't let us grind Tomes and gear all day erry day, but now you're complaining about having to grind classes to get cross-classes.  I'm entirely confused as to how you are working this out logically.

[BroodingFicus]

The thing is, the game is designed to not need alts. The only downside to that is the inventory space. The entire game is built around the fact that you can do everything on one character. I don't see that changing as it is a core feature of the game.

 

You forgot tome caps, cross-class skills, gear lockouts, etc.

 

FFXIV punishes you for doing everything on one character to begin with, contrary to how it's advertised. Either have one or the other, you know?

 

I do understand what you are saying here. If someone has only one character and reaches the tome cap they are done for that week until it resets even though they may have multiple classes they need to grind for. On the other hand if that person has say a WHM as one character and a Pally as another, they can finish one and then go grind out the other. Same thing goes for gear lockouts. Its the idea of keeping someone around by giving them something to do vs keeping them around because you restricted their progress on purpose and now they have to sit on their hands for a week. All MMO's have lockouts etc...at least all the ones I've ever played. However none of the other MMO's, all of which do contain the same lockouts, hated on alts so viciously as FFXIV and I think that makes these things that are generally excused as staples suddenly much more irritating because we are noticing them in an unpleasant way. 

 

Personally it seems like the new job gating is just another example of FFXIV discouraging alts but their message has never been clear. Please do not make additional characters. We don't like it. But here is a new race...and you don't get more inventory even with all these classes to level and all the gear you have to carry around...and your tome cap is the same for all your classes...so are your gear lockouts. But please...don't make more characters...even though you are paying us for 8 slots. There are very real benefits to having multiple characters aside from just looks or RP. 

 

In the same way that it is personal choice which class/job you play or do not, it really should also be player choice if they wish to put all their proverbial eggs in one basket or not. Especially since square gave us SO MANY EGGS and is now offering shinier baskets. I suppose you can make the choice but it is frowned upon by making it a chore. It is the same chore that new and returning players will face if they wish to pick up new classes due to the restrictions set in place so maybe someone will take notice one day. Probably not but we can dream.

[Naunet]

it is likely there because it is there in WoW, and this game does borrow heavily from that, but I feel diverges in many, many good ways. Also, the real end game is Coil (soon to be alexander), not cosmetics. Unless you are refering to the coil gear.

 

This game take's WoW's strategy of elongating content and kicks it to such a high degree that it may as well be on a completely different dimensional plane. You really shouldn't try and compare the two as though they are remotely similar, because they are not. WoW doesn't lock classes behind the entire span of old world content. WoW doesn't even lock zones! You could get to Dalaran as a level 1 if you wanted. Now, I don't play WoW anymore, but I'm pretty sure they haven't retroactively changed any of that.

 

I also disagree that the 1-character sub (and the ability to do everything on one character... well, everything except be a different race) justifies these kinds of decisions. SE offers 8 character slots, and you pay more than the people utilizing the 1 character. But then they're going to laugh in your face despite you giving them additional money? Haha! Not cool.

 

For what it's worth, the prospect of not only being forced to complete the MSQ but also having to level through an entire class that I don't want to be in order to play what I want (Au Ra AST) was enough for me to decide NOT to re-subscribe.

[Dravus]

It's fine to dislike specific aspects of the game. What's not fine is implying that the developers - who have been meeting immense success so far - should suddenly change large aspects of the game to appease what is likely nothing more than a vocal minority of players.

 

Not every game is going to be custom tailored to an individual's personal tastes. What's interesting is that I've seen some of the more vocal critics of FFXIV's mechanics go under the same name elsewhere when they've invested in other MMO's and...they've complained there too. Which makes me suspect that it's going to be very difficult for any MMO to truly appease them and leave them satisfied.

[Kellach Woods]

Wait a second, do I need to have all of these shitty MSQs done before I can do Early Access?

 

You get access to Early Access regardless of your status with the MSQ, but if you haven't done them you will not be able to access Ishgard proper.

 

From what we know to get access to Ishgard you need MSQ complete.

[Naunet]

It's fine to dislike specific aspects of the game. What's not fine is implying that the developers - who have been meeting immense success so far - should suddenly change large aspects of the game to appease what is likely nothing more than a vocal minority of players.

 

Pretending that not locking classes behind MSQ/50 levels is changing "large aspects of the game"... Hah.

 

No. It's not.

[Gone.]

as I said, an inconvenience. I need 34 levels of lancer to do my job well? fair enough, lets go get them. and if you've been a mage? you've likely built up a sizable ammount of gear and soldiery whilst playing that mage. Most of my classes were already decently geared by the moment they hit 50 due to greed rolls.

 

it is likely there because it is there in WoW, and this game does borrow heavily from that, but I feel diverges in many, many good ways. Also, the real end game is Coil (soon to be alexander), not cosmetics. Unless you are refering to the coil gear.

 

Soldiery maybe, but other gear? Maybe if you're lucky with the rolls.

 

And Coil... endgame? Please, so few people touch Coil that it's a wonder it even has any support at this point. There's a reason it's frequently nerfed and I'm pretty sure it's not because of a high attract rate.

 

Let's be honest: most are here for the continuing story, the fanservice to previous games in the series and like all MMOs, playing dress-up. That's FFXIV in a nutshell.

 

I honestly don't agree with you on this one.  It's not "punishment."  It's a way of extending the content, and it's practiced in one form or another by every successful MMO.

 

Staples in every successful, raiding-focused MMO.  WoW does it.  SWTOR does it.  Rift does it.  Wildstar does it.  Name me a wildly successful MMO with a serious raiding endgame that doesn't engage in content gating via tomes, raid lockouts, etc?

 

And like I said, just because another game does it doesn't make it good design by default.

 

FFXIV is hardly raiding-focused, anyway. It's story-driven, something it only shares in common with The Secret World and The Old Republic.

 

That's a personal opinion.  There are many people very devoted to the PvE endgame, and you have no right to denigrate their focus.

 

What's more, you were complaining earlier that SE won't let us grind Tomes and gear all day erry day, but now you're complaining about having to grind classes to get cross-classes.  I'm entirely confused as to how you are working this out logically.

 

Who said anything about denigrating? I'm just pointing out that the hardcore audience is never satisfied for the long-term and designing solely for them is a disaster waiting to happen. See: Wildstar.

 

Also you missed the point entirely. No one should have to grind out of necessity. If you want to, sure, go for it, but it should not be a mandatory facet just to accomplish the basest of goals.

 

Leveling is not a grind in this game; you can make significant progress daily without any thought whatsoever. All I'm saying is there's no real incentive to do it on one character when only the magic and tank jobs share gear easily and that's if you're lucky with dice rolls to begin with.

[Sophia_Grave]

I've already posted my thoughts in this thread, but something came to mind.

 

Let's assume that 3.0 has zero content under lv50. No new monsters or areas under lv50. That would mean that anything related to the 3.0 jobs (at least, from 30-50) would take place in ARR areas. With that in mind, they could have EASILY relocated the 3.0 jobs to ARR areas, locking them only behind a lv30 ARR job and an xpac purchase. After all, you can't level a lv30 job in a lv50 area, nor can you do a job quest involving lv50 mobs, can you?

 

Alternatively, let's assume that 3.0 does have content lv30-50 content specifically for the 3.0 jobs, even if its only job quests. What reasoning is there for an xpac owner who hasn't finished ARR to be locked out of that? It would make sense to lock them out of 50+ content, but 30-50 content? ARR itself has 50 content that anyone can travel to at lv1.

 

Further, there are a dozen ways to adapt a lore-friendly reason for the WoL to be able to go to Ishgard before the events of 2.55. WoL could have met a friendly smuggler. Ishgard could have noticed WoL's work with the Primals and extended a city-only invite. WoL could have a long lost relative, because who cares? How hard would it be for a lv30 quest to pop up that sends you to Ishgard's town so you can pick up the new jobs? Any other Ishgard content would obviously be locked via level or MSQ completion anyway, right? I'm trying to wrap my head around it, but it doesn't make any sense. There will already be a massive disconnect in continuity if the player starts out as an Au Ra, yet they allowed that. But for some reason, they won't allow you to pick up a new job until the MSQ tells you that you can? The more I think about it, the more it doesn't make sense.

[LiadansWhisper]

So I just saw this on another forum and thought it was cool.  If it's already been posted here, sorry, I didn't see it!

 

First off, equipment rewards will be added to the Main Scenario quests. He didn't go into too much detail here, but presumably this will help you reach the item level requirements for duties, if not bring you all the way there by itself.

 

Second, so that you can do the required content without getting stuck in queues for an eternity (especially for dps classes), players new to a given duty will be placed in a priority queue. Basically, you can go straight to the front of the line so you can progress your quests quickly.

 

Additionally, pre-50 main scenario quests will give double experience so you don't have to do side content, and if you own Heavensward you'll get experience from the 2.1-2.55 quests as well, so you can get a few levels before even entering Ishgard.

 

And if you have friends or a helpful FC, they're adding the ability to join with a partial group, bypass the duty finder, and not get level synced. (This part is actually from other articles) With this, if you really want to skip ahead even with the inprovements, you can just have a level 60 player rush you through the old content quickly. There are plenty of great FC's out there that would help with this.

[Kellach Woods]

It's been posted but in partial ways.

Even if the new players get priority in 2.1-2.55 content, it's more the number of available players at those dungeons that worries me rather than the priority thing. It's cool don't get me wrong, but it's really just a bandaid on a more grave wound in my opinion.

[LiadansWhisper]

It's been posted but in partial ways.

Even if the new players get priority in 2.1-2.55 content, it's more the number of available players at those dungeons that worries me rather than the priority thing. It's cool don't get me wrong, but it's really just a bandaid on a more grave wound in my opinion.

 

I was pretty fixated on the last part.

 

I will run the shit out of those previous duties on a max level character to help my friends.  Also being able to group WITH friends to do it would be amazing.

[Aduu Avagnar]

It's been posted but in partial ways.

Even if the new players get priority in 2.1-2.55 content, it's more the number of available players at those dungeons that worries me rather than the priority thing. It's cool don't get me wrong, but it's really just a bandaid on a more grave wound in my opinion.

Personally, as I've stated before, I believe that they are likely going to add this stuff to a roulette which people are likely to do, given the number of people that still do the lowlevel, high level and trial roulettes. I think it's going to be less of a grave wound as you believe.

[Kellach Woods]

I just wonder how much less people you will need to run them. If it's just 3/7 then it doesn't help as much, but if you can duo them or outright halve the amount of people then yeah I can definitely see it helping.

[LiadansWhisper]

I just wonder how much less people you will need to run them. If it's just 3/7 then it doesn't help as much, but if you can duo them or outright halve the amount of people then yeah I can definitely see it helping.

 

I think they're intending to let you duo them with max level characters, or something similar.  It reminds me of WoW and running old raids with lower level players for transmog gear.

[Caspar]

Wasn't the number of people who've made it to Final Coil on Western servers something embarassing like 12%?

I think it's awesome Square is even trying to make content harder. It takes balls to basically admit the game is too easy globally and try to push things forward. I felt that it was what they were saying with Steps, that we need to learn to play better together and up our game, because it was essentially easy content, but super hard due to the generally non-communicative and argumentative nature of English-speaking players. Nerfing it gave me mixed feelings; on one hand it was a drag to have to attempt Trials multiple times a day due to Steps, but on the other hand, I loved it because it could have been an excellent ultimatum: "Get your act together, there's going to be more stuff like this come HW."

 

I think others have said that they feel the game is catering to hardcore players too much already without HW in this thread, and I just wanted to point out that simply isn't true. If anything they need more content than they already have, as catering to those players will increase the game's longevity as more and more casual players get the practice necessary to become hardcore. Catering to a transient casual crowd who like new story content and leave the game when they finish collecting all the new low hanging fruit is not good for the game, and I'm glad they're moving away from that to an extent.

[Aduu Avagnar]

Wasn't the number of people who've made it to Final Coil on Western servers something embarassing like 12%?

I think it's awesome Square is even trying to make content harder. It takes balls to basically admit the game is too easy globally and try to push things forward. I felt that it was what they were saying with Steps, that we need to learn to play better together and up our game, because it was essentially easy content, but super hard due to the generally non-communicative and argumentative nature of English-speaking players. Nerfing it gave me mixed feelings; on one hand it was a drag to have to attempt Trials multiple times a day due to Steps, but on the other hand, I loved it because it could have been an excellent ultimatum: "Get your act together, there's going to be more stuff like this come HW."

 

I think others have said that they feel the game is catering to hardcore players too much already without HW in this thread, and I just wanted to point out that simply isn't true. If anything they need more content than they already have, as catering to those players will increase the game's longevity as more and more casual players get the practice necessary to become hardcore. Catering to a transient casual crowd who like new story content and leave the game when they finish collecting all the new low hanging fruit is not good for the game, and I'm glad they're moving away from that to an extent.

The number of hardcore players (I hate that term) is most likely lower than the number of casuals (That term also). It is usually, in recent times especially, the casuals that make up the majority of a player base. Gone are the days where the hardcore people were the sole makeup of a player base.

 

I am not saying it is a bad thing to have hard content. I love hard content, and the challenges that come with. But the devs have likely looked at the numbers and tried to strike a balance between the two.

[Caspar]

Wasn't the number of people who've made it to Final Coil on Western servers something embarassing like 12%?

I think it's awesome Square is even trying to make content harder. It takes balls to basically admit the game is too easy globally and try to push things forward. I felt that it was what they were saying with Steps, that we need to learn to play better together and up our game, because it was essentially easy content, but super hard due to the generally non-communicative and argumentative nature of English-speaking players. Nerfing it gave me mixed feelings; on one hand it was a drag to have to attempt Trials multiple times a day due to Steps, but on the other hand, I loved it because it could have been an excellent ultimatum: "Get your act together, there's going to be more stuff like this come HW."

 

I think others have said that they feel the game is catering to hardcore players too much already without HW in this thread, and I just wanted to point out that simply isn't true. If anything they need more content than they already have, as catering to those players will increase the game's longevity as more and more casual players get the practice necessary to become hardcore. Catering to a transient casual crowd who like new story content and leave the game when they finish collecting all the new low hanging fruit is not good for the game, and I'm glad they're moving away from that to an extent.

The number of hardcore players (I hate that term) is most likely lower than the number of casuals (That term also). It is usually, in recent times especially, the casuals that make up the majority of a player base. Gone are the days where the hardcore people were the sole makeup of a player base.

 

I am not saying it is a bad thing to have hard content. I love hard content, and the challenges that come with. But the devs have likely looked at the numbers and tried to strike a balance between the two.

Yeah, I figure that's fine. I also figure it's fine for them to slowly increase the amount of difficult content with each expansion and patch, as there is plenty of ground to cover getting there. Increasing the overall level of investment of players in the game is a smart move in my opinion; there need to be time sinks for an MMO to function and not simply bleed players like a certain other big name game.