Relaxed Muscle
Member
Is a shitty way to involve crafters and gatherers using things that should be standard features.
Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn |OT3| LFT Full Relic and DL Required
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Is a shitty way to involve crafters and gatherers using things that should be standard features.
Diversity is always a good option, as it stands, people are walking around in one of two possible gear sets per job and that is dumb and lends nothing to the world.
crackbabyjr
Member
Until everyone is running around in Snow/Lightning/Valentine outfits. I'll get sick of seeing those quick.
As opposed to everyone running around in CT or myth gear? Options are always better so I don't see much case for an opposite side.
Zomba13
Member
I'm always for vanity options in everything. Right now you have a mix of AF2/Myth equips, Allagan and CT gear and before that what used to be AK gear and Darklight. With vanity you can use what you feel like using. Some might use it for silly costumes like the valentines stuff, some might use it for full CT armour, some might use it for mid/low level stuff that looks cool and yeah, some might just wear Lightning/Snow stuff.
The way I'd handle it (and I'm not a game designer or anyone that'll ever work on an MMO) would be you have a vanity slot for each piece and you can use any piece of equip in that slot that is 1) at or below your current level and 2) equip-able by your class.
If I needed to take gil out of the economy then there would be a charge or quest or something to unlock the ability, either per slot or per class or something or make it so there is a charge every time you slot in a new (as in not used in the slot before) item. So you could slot in a helm of light for 100g and then an onion helm for 100g and then when you put the helm of light back in it'd be free because you paid the fee.
The way I'd handle it (and I'm not a game designer or anyone that'll ever work on an MMO) would be you have a vanity slot for each piece and you can use any piece of equip in that slot that is 1) at or below your current level and 2) equip-able by your class.
If I needed to take gil out of the economy then there would be a charge or quest or something to unlock the ability, either per slot or per class or something or make it so there is a charge every time you slot in a new (as in not used in the slot before) item. So you could slot in a helm of light for 100g and then an onion helm for 100g and then when you put the helm of light back in it'd be free because you paid the fee.
Yup, I'm even more liberal with it and the bolded shouldn't even need to be a limitation, if you want to play dress up as a dragoon while flinging around fireballs, feel free. The only place it would even possibly matter is PvP except 1) PvP in this game blows and is hardly competitive and 2) a good PvPer shouldn't be looking at your armor to decipher what you are playing as, they should be looking at the buffs you have up.
devious.one
Member
Why not?
Vanity easily fits into the same category as dye creation and materia melding.
Because the precadent has been set over and over and over again that this should be a basic, out of the box feature. You shouldn't have to level a crafting job or pay someone else to be able to display the clothes you want to display on your character.
Isn't this just a "I want me me me" attitude? Certainly they could do it simpler, save your vanity to your gear set or have separate tab for vanity only, but the method they chose is one to involve crafters/gatherers and encourage economic activity. The insistence on "standard features" ignores the fact that other MMOs are not launching with a vanity system, so what 'standard feature' is it? Why is it shitty to involve crafters and gatherers in vanity system when it's clearly something that will be in demand and therefore generate transactions between players, in an MMO?
I'm not defending the system they implemented, but I think it's not wrong to implement a more complicated system so that it can serve multiple purposes.
It's not about taking gil out of the economy, it's a system designed to increase money flow between players rather than between player and npc. Even assuming SE wants to take gil out, the system you suggested would be paltry sums to take out of the economy, especially since you're setting it so slotting an item in and out will be free after the first time. That's very little money pulled out.
Is the Mirage Prism (seriously, wtf with that name SE?) actually supposed to help the game's economy? I thought it was just a vanity system made more complicated because...well, SE. =x
As long as everyone can do everything, the game's economy will never, ever be fixed.
As long as everyone can do everything, the game's economy will never, ever be fixed.
Sure it is and that's ok. When other MMOs dont launch with a vanity system, they get shit from me as well, it is still a feature that should be up-front and accounted for. A me-centric attitude is ok for the basic things and there shouldnt be a bunch of hurdles to jump through to achieve that. Being able to make your character look the way you want them to look is the epitome of basic features.
Oh, I'm sure SE thinks it'll be good for the economy but 2-3 weeks after the patch comes out, the prices will have dropped to such a negligible amount that it'll just be a complicated system for no real reason.
devious.one
Member
So because other games have this feature set another way, no other MMOs to come out can ever add their own flavor to it?
There is a difference between adding flavor and adding obnoxious obstacles. For example, you could have a base vanity system (which I believe WoW has? Idk didn't play that annoyign game for long) where your character just shows whats equipped on your vanity page, there is also a system like SWTOR has where you buy "shells" and the actual gear you get from raids or pvp or whatever actually have different slotted materials (in the case of SWTOR, each gear had three pieces: armoring, enhancement, and mod) and you just slot those 3 or whatever number of pieces into your gear shell. Both are legitimate systems and the player can handle it themselves without any huge pre-req, the only big difference between those two is the money sink but the meat of the issue is that you should be able to work on your own schedule for modifying your own character instead of being a slave to someone else just because they fell into the crafting time sink. If SE really wanted to add their own flavor, I'm sure they could have done it in a less offensive way.
The vanity system they're implementing probably will help the economy, since it means a lot more Gil has to pass through hands multiple times, especially if players change their minds about what items they want to have set to vanity.
That said, yeah it's a little obtuse. Still I don't think it's worth making a huge fuss about it. XD
That said, yeah it's a little obtuse. Still I don't think it's worth making a huge fuss about it. XD
Augemitbutter
Member
anything that gives crafters more work is fine by me.
That's the real issue, they are just setting it up so people won't even bother playing around with it much because why keep forking your money over to another player in an already unhealthy and strained economy.
Edit: And I know it won't stay expensive because the market is so unhealthy but because of the way this game is set up, if the price of these crystals stays even vaguely high, it doesn't really make much money for the crafters, you end up with people who just say screw it because they don't want to waste money that they don't have or they will just decide to plop down for the big investment and level the crafter they need themselves since this game just lets everyone be everything anyway. And the rich people that would spend money frivilously? Those are already the level 50 crafters.
Except it is not a "standard feature" or a necessity. Unless your game has for particular reasons importance in visual identity (DCUO), then the priorities are implementing gameplay systems and not a vanity system, which is a thing to show and not a thing to do. With a more complex implementation they can turn it into an activity and also include crafting. Your last statement contradicts itself, because the "real reason" SE implemented the prisms is because they think it will be good for the economy, and therefore it's not "a complicated system for no real reason".
Judging by your heated rage over vanity, do you not prove to be exactly the person who will have demand for vanity prisms? Do you not prove to be exactly the person who will have multiple changes in prisms, and therefore exchange more money for prisms with other players, because you will spend for it? If that's the case, then isn't the glamour prism system doing exactly what it is intended to?
You didn't put time into crafting, so you feel offended you have to pay those who did? Do you feel offended when you have to pay for food?
Because the way the FFXIV economy tends to work, people are going to undercut prices on all but the highest level equipment anyway. So it won't be expensive after very long.
Also, a number of players already have crafting jobs, so they'll be able to play around with it for even less. None of this doesn't make it any less obtuse, but lets not pretend it's some huge hurdle that breaks the game. If you're not leveling up a crafting class, there's hardly anything to spend money on right now anyway. XD
Edit: Also, you can always just, see how things will look by equipping the normally, before deciding to pay to have them set to vanity.
theSlacker
Member
All things considered I personally would still rather see people in the gear they are wearing instead of the gear they prefer the look of. I am a big immersion mmo person though, where I would prefer things to work look and act according the the logic of the gameworld.
I guess another step along the path of my favored genre changing into something that appeals more to others and less to me. Time to learn to cope with loss.
It will save the economy the same way PvP and housing did.
Amen. For all the shit FFXI system got by players, at least Tanaka back then understood what made economy work.
devious.one
Member
Nothing about what aceface posted sounds like a "huge pre-req" though. Is it so daunting to have to ask a crafter to give you a hand? This is a MMO, player to player interaction should be something that is wanted, not avoided.
Going off of your arguement, why have crafters at all, I should be able to do everything myself.
I'll bite, why is visual identity so important in DCUO and not in other MMOs? And no, your psycho-analysis has fallen flat on its face. A vanity system would have been a welcome addition that I would have had a lot of fun with but this mini-shit show will just make me ignore the feature because it is poorly implemented and I'd be surprised if there weren't many more just like me. Your last line was just an uneeded snarky comment so I'll pass.
I'd be more willing to give SE a pass on their economy "reason" if they hadn't fucked up the game economy themselves with poor decision after poor decision.
irfaanator
Banned
if people don't want to accept what the vanity system is, then don't. it really doesn't matter at all if you complain or not. yoship probably doesn't care
It's funny you say that because the economy is in the shitter because people can do everything themselves. That being said, this is a case where it would be good to give control to the individual but let's do it the opposite way because "lol SE"
If true, then yoship's game will be heading towards the gutter faster than you can say "Please Understand." An MMO that isn't keeping its ears open to the community is one that won't last long at all.
theSlacker
Member
I can answer that, but maybe not in the way she was intending it. More in my own line of reasoning way. Costumes work into the gameworld of DCUO and are not actual protection, but serve more of the purpose of your personal indication and identification. In the spirit of being a comic book super hero being a unique snowflake makes perfect sense and fits.
Armor in a game like this serves as your protection and has reasoning behind its "power". Stuff like the Allagan armor is made by an ancient advanced society and has "gameworld" reasons for being not only used for combat, but for it's strength.
Also her last line, while snarky, does actually represent the people that mmos are going to greater lengths to pander to, even if it may not represent you.
Actually, the economy being bad has very little with people being able to do everything themselves. Despite being able to very few people participate in the game in this way.
Granted, I haven't played DCUO in a LONG time so I could be horribly outdated but I seem to remember really strong armor sets modeled after each of the mentors. Wouldn't that be the same thing as the current allagan armor? Seems double standard-ish.
And yeah, I don't get how wanting to give your character their own style is somehow pandering to someone. Do you see everyone dressing the same in real life? No
Now, I'll patiently wait for someone to attack my real life comment with something ridiculous like "well, I don't see people chucking fireballs at gaint yellow men in real life either"
Oh really? I bet it's pretty rare to find a hard-core raider these days who isn't a culinarian. When people see what they are spending money on, they stop wanting to spend money on it and instead just jump onto whatever class can make it and go that route instead. Without any type of limitation to that system, people will do that indefinitely.
irfaanator
Banned
well don't gotta play then I guess
the_sun_king
Member
Vanity = srs bzns
define hard-core raider in this game
This seems like a bad attitude to take at large. I'd assume you post here because you like the game? Telling people "oh don't like it, don't play" just leads to less people investing time and money into the game which, alternatively, means less resources they can use to work on and better the game. Seems counter-intuitive rather than just acknowledging that its a destructive path if what you said in your first post was actually true.
Hyperbole much?
I don't know if you know this, but shells were crafted.
Moreover, if you could get shells for cheap, then there's no "huge pre-req" to glamour crystals, just buy them from market board.
DC Universe Online involves superheroes, whose identities are very tightly tied to visual appearance (just ask in the Comics thread on OT). Which is why visual appearance matters a good deal in that game compared to other games.
My "psycho analysis" has hardly fallen flat on its face. You're going to get the prisms when everyone else does. It's not even seen action yet and you're claiming "poor implementation". Do you know why the economy is considered "bad"? The economy is bad for sellers, but good for buyers, because there are many people who make things and the best gear is obtainable without going through crafters. So supply of various items is high, the prices low, and people have difficulty making money. In short, the glamour prisms will actually be in abundant supply and at low prices, which is good for you! If you don't even understand the reasons why the game economy is "fucked up", then what does your "giving SE a pass" even matter?
The question of "Do you feel offended when you have to buy food?" is legitimate considering you're calling the implementation of the vanity system 'offensive'. High quality food is crafted by other players in the game and posted on the market board to people who don't want to make the food or can't make the food. Which part of it is snarky, when you obviously can't craft so you have to buy the food? The same applies to the vanity system! Except it's more likely that the prisms will be cheaper than endgame food. Dyes are doable by every craft at level 30, you don't see dye prices skyrocketing to unaffordable levels.
theSlacker
Member
When I see people going to war or battle, yes. Workers tend to wear the same kind of stuff to depending on the job. So yes, and that kinda is the point behind my point of view. I like my mmos to serve as actual worlds as much as they can. Wear your goofy outfits and vanity gear when your character can survive with it on.
As for your spoiler, don't worry, you aren't going to get that from me. One of the banes of me talking about immersion in video games and mmos are people that try to equate "wanting things to make sense according the the set up gameworld" to "wanting realism". It is also why I try not to use the world "realistic" and instead always use something like "makes sense in a gameworld", as you may have noticed.
As you can tell I take my vidya way more serious then it should, but it is my escapism. Also I am a turbo nerd.
lol yeah I know I chuckled a bit too when I said, honestly, just anyone who would want to keep a steady supply of food and potions on them.
Not really, its been the downfall for plenty of MMOs before.
When you say shells were crafted, were you talking about SWTOR? Because yeah, some where but you could also get shells as loot drops which means it wasn't only tied to one system in the game and anyone willing to put time in to ANY system could get different shells.
The DC universe thing is still a double standard to me, people want to look different from each other, idc if you are a superhero or a monk.
As for the rest of your post, I'll look on in hopeful optimism but it doesn't seem like a system that'll be worth my time when they could have just gone for a less obtuse system.
I can kind of see where you are coming from and yes, there will be people that just want to run around as an ilvl 90 bikini mage but there are some people that just think this level 20 armor had a really cool design and it still looks like a capable piece of gear but the thing that sets it apart is the arbitrary numbers on it.
devious.one
Member
There is other, much more heavier contributing reasons to why the economy isn't doing as well as it should be.
I'm pretty sure they don't see vanity as being the sole provider for saving the economy, but as a small step forward? Sure.
There's more to economies than cooking your own food. When studying economics one the most important things to observe is opportunity costs. Sure guy number X can cook his own food, but is he going to go and spend the 2 hours to gather the requirements? No, they are going to buy the ingredients (stimulate the economy) because it would save them money to do so. When the economy was at its healthiest and the crafters were making the most potential profits do you think they were farming Tomes of Philosophy? No. The most profitable crafters bought the requirements because the time investment to gather themselves was too high.
The real reason the economy is bad is because SE flooded the market with materials. So much materials that the supply outweighed the demand quickly. To make it worse they are really slow at banning bots who make the problem even worse. The next thing they did was create over inflated house prices to remove some of the savings people had. The problem with this suddenly the game when from people spending money haphazardly to saving their money for housing.
tiggerkiddo
Member
Well whatever they can do to make it worth it for crafters to be around, the better. I liked it when it was worth trying to craft stuff.
I concur with this assessment. I'd also add that the value of Level 70 Crafted Gear went down dramatically because of how much easier it was to get Myth, Allagan, and Crystal Tower gear. In 2.0, if somebody wanted to gear up for Coil their options were Myth, which they accumulated slowly, Darklight gear, or Crafted Level 70 gear. Even if the third option was the least popular of the three, far more people took that route now than in 2.1. A month into 2.1, and I hardly saw anyone in, "mostly Darklight," and I see even fewer people in Crafted 70 gear, the community had by in large moved on.
They just aren't very desirable sets anymore. So not only are there too many materials, but the demand for the products made from those materials has declined significantly.
EDIT: In the very near term, I think the best way to fix the economy would be to introduce iLvl95 Crafted Gear in 2.2, made from Materials that could be with Myth Tomes. I'd also increase the max level for Materia by one, so people had incentive to do things like Spiritbind Darklight armor and such, and give iLvl95 armor Materia slots.
This, combined with Vanity slots, would be a huge shot in the arm to the in-game economy. As iLvl95 Armor completely decked out in Materia would probably come darn close to matching the best armor drops made available in 2.2.
Of course there is but cooking your own food is one of the easiest examples to point to because a lot of have use of that service atm. I guess I should re-phrase my argument, did everyone being able to do everything cause the economy to fall? no but what it does do is makes it much harder to recover and the real problem is that it is a problem that gets worse over time. The culinarian is a good starting step, people need food, one job can make it, people will eventually say to themselves "maybe it would just be more worth it if I could make that food myself" give it some time and suddenly we have a bunch of 50 culinarians. Now say these crystal things could only be made by weaver (arbitrary choice, I know it isnt true), people would buy crystals for a while, same process, now we have a bunch of 50 weavers, this goes on and one as the game evolves, now how do you recover the economy as this becomes more and more common place? Anything you introduce, people can probably do cheaply themselves instead of going with other people and now you are just banking on people spending money because they don't have time or are lazy.
darkblade77
Member
I can't count the number of times I've read this exact line of commentary on GAF, on LS boards, and on the official forums over the past few years, because the dev team decided to take a hard line on something the poster doesn't like, who then assumes the community at large reflects his/her extreme line of thinking on the topic.
It's shallow, hollow hyperbole. S-E hasn't suddenly become deaf to community input, and a MMO that allows consumer decisions to always take priority might as well have zero vision. They are not always going to listen, and it is not always in their best interest to listen, full stop.
Also FWIW, full i90 SCH/MNK here, allagan weapons on both classes, weekly Twin clears, etc etc... I haven't touched the DoL/DoH crafting professions in months. I think the only one I even have at 50 is FSH.
Your point is made but I hope you aren't applying it to me? That response was made to someone else's specific point about how yoship probably doesn't care about criticism, whether that is true or not, idk but I was pointing out the obvious downfall of such logic.
Why do you try to not focus on the importance of time. The more tasks you do yourself the more time it takes. Which is why it's impossible to truly self sufficient. That is why countries outsource. They don't outsource because they can't do it themselves. They outsource because it's more efficient. Despite having the class someone can't do two things at once. Once that limitation is exists having all crafters is meaningless. To make things more clear to you. There is no crafting limitation in any MMO I've played. As in you could level every single crafting class if you wanted, across different characters but it's something that people have been doing for as long as I have been playing MMOs. The only difference here is that the classes are on one character.
If what you said where true the economy would have seen a steady decline over time. However it crashed within a few days of 2.1. That wasn't a coincidence.
darkblade77
Member
I'm just tired of reading about the leap that if there's even the slightest implication that S-E isn't going to consider player input about XYZ topic, the game is therefore good as dead.
theSlacker
Member
Well that is kind of the thing, and why I am disagreeing with you. The numbers are not, and shouldn't be, arbitrary for this specific kind of gameworld. They are a representation of the "power" that that piece of gear has from it's creation and reason for being in the game backed with actual story. It isn't just about what looks "just as protective". If people want to look cool in their lv 20 gear then go ahead, but getting that look should come with the stats that it has.
You seem to have a fundamental problem differentiating between the governing aspects of different "worlds". As a hero in a DC or Marvel comic world you are defined and made an individual by your unique, and completely personal, costume. There are of course enchanted items, but those too are often unique. The protection and "real world" strength of a costume takes second stage to fitting a unique mold that only applies to that specific character. In that way having a more customizable "look" makes sense within those worlds or realities. It has nothing to do with how much each individual person "wants" to look unique in each separate reality, just that in one it is an accepted fact that every single person looks different and in the other your are using specifically designed gear that has a reason for it's specific look.
Really though, you don't need to keep fighting this war, you have already won. There are more people that just want to be able to put on any set of gear they feel like wearing to do any activity they want to engage in in mmos, and don't care about the gameworld as a whole, so it is what mmo developers are going for. Sorry that they still try to make it make sense a little bit in the gameworld though, with giving an actual in game reason for your armor look to be different that is made using in game skills.
You can only make this case for the level 50 gear though. Before then, what is the difference between this level 44 gladiator set and this level 30 [insert whatever armor was used at level 30]. There is no lore or anything attached to any of these, its an arbitrary number. Even in the 50 gear, its contradicting itself CT gear and allagan gear make sense at being strong but whats up with the myth gear, maybe I missed an explanation but its just stronger gear that doesnt have a new gear model, I guess I could assume it is my AF gear enchanted to be stronger? but that's silly since I still have the unenchanted AF gear in my bag.
Now, maybe the numbers shouldn't be arbitrary but they really are in a lot of places in this game world.
Edit: And I'll concede the whole DC debate, I still don't completely agree but I'm not as immersed in comic book culture so I just may not be able to understand.
GraveRobberX
Platinum Trophy: Learned to Shit While Upright Again.
So most likely vanity items will have a ilvl cap?
So say my 35 MNK can't rock DL or CT gear at that time as vanity due to this or having pieces/any other equipment I like?
Gonna be funny you need to be this "___" ilvl before you can wear it, making vanity pretty pointless
Also vanity mixing and matching at the start will be pricey unless you got all crafts to 50 and maybe the gathering classes too
I have feeling all the new nodes coming in are bringing with it, the vanity crystals needed, mostly on a 1 hour node basis
So say my 35 MNK can't rock DL or CT gear at that time as vanity due to this or having pieces/any other equipment I like?
Gonna be funny you need to be this "___" ilvl before you can wear it, making vanity pretty pointless
Also vanity mixing and matching at the start will be pricey unless you got all crafts to 50 and maybe the gathering classes too
I have feeling all the new nodes coming in are bringing with it, the vanity crystals needed, mostly on a 1 hour node basis
Well while this is true, I think a lot of people are going to end up using Vanity to use the low level seasonal items during raids and such. You won't need to be a very high level for that.
Also, there's the ability to ignore things like the Tin Can Cat situation you get, when you're stuck in Darklight fending gear. XD
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