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[Cmagus]

So those monsters are coming on the 15th?

 

[DrDogg]

I don't have any skills from my CON sub anymore (we have a CON healer in our static party, I don't need to do any healing except in emergencies). My debuffs last long enough during the fight to be useful - make sure you've got a decent amount of INT and PIE, and having the element points for those spells might help too, not sure. I do prebuff right before a fight with Sacrifice II, since the Regen is so darn nice (it doesn't last all that long, but it helps the start of the fight).

I have max INT, PIE, MND, Lightning, Ice, and Earth for my rank. Debuffs simply don't last long enough to make THM more valuable than a DD DoW. This is even more significant in post-patch parties when killing as fast as possible is the most important thing.

I also think you're missing my point. THM + CON is good. Whether you're subbing CON or there's a CON in your party. My point is that THM alone, without a CON, is useless. Can you honestly tell me that a THM without any CON abilities is more useful than a CON without any THM abilities, or a party with a CON where the THM can be replaced by a hard-hitting DoW? THM DoT doesn't last long enough to inflict enough damage to out sparse a DD DoW.

Coming from someone who has a 50 CON and a 33 THM you are somewhat right about the sub thing. But honestly, with THM overall casting range, width and length they own CON all day long. Once I get my THM to 50 I will probably never play on my CON ever again, unless theres some reason too.

I kind of thought you were higher rank, with a lot of the comments you make :lol

Are you referring to casting range pre-patch or post-patch? In my experience post-patch, CON has more range than THM. But perhaps I'm looking at it from a different point of view? I can stand well outside of mob attack range and heal my entire party as CON. It really feels to me as though I have to stand much closer with THM.

I also believe that having a casting radius around any target is significantly more effective and versatile than a cone projected from the THM.

As for my rank, it doesn't require a high rank in this game to know how things work. My physical level is 40 and I've been playing the game since beta. I'm also comparing CON and THM to my mage classes in FFXI where I had almost all of them at 75 and have spent years in parties and endgame.

Having higher rank THM and CON, do you really feel the class has changed significantly from the 20s?

If you can get your party to cooperate, THM is a way better healer than CON. I would still get both Cure II and Sac II on a THM main just so I had 2 healing spells though.

I don't have to get my party to cooperate to be an effective healer as CON. That alone negates anything else you can say about that.

Because the THM AoE projects from the THM, a THM will always successfully heal himself when he casts. However since the CON AoE is a circle around the target, if the CON is outside the circle's range he will fail to heal himself when he heal the party if he is too far away from the target. This was an endless source of frustration for CONs back when there were raptor parties because they had to stand close enough for their own AoE to hit them but not so close that the raptor would oneshot them when they attack. Meanwhile the THM could stand just about wherever and hit himself and the whole party which was so conveniently clumped right in front of the raptor's mouth. :lol

I have not fought raptors, and maybe this was an issue before the extended casting range post-patch. But why are your CONs standing close enough to get hit? Even before the patch I could always stay outside of AoE range and still heal my party just fine.

 

[Teknoman]

Love me some goblins and flans.

The description makes it sound like Flans can wallchange mid-battle? That could make for some awesome NM fights.

Patch on the 15th was actually a bit sooner than I expected, too - can't wait to read the change list.

Yup, gives them enough time to roll it out, and start pumping up people for the end of the year patch.

More monsters, more adjusted distributions, UI adjustments, and hopefully even more content than whats been talked about thus far should make it a nice update.

Anything coming at the end of December is probably completely unknown, unless they move the first update of 2011 to the end of December.

EDIT: Dogg's right on range. Mages really shouldnt be that close to the enemy unless the spell calls for it. Same for Hunters and Lancers to a certain extent.

EDIT 2: Looking at the dream attire stuff again, it seems they do have the ability to add real non-leve quests to the game, since you actually have to deliver boxes to hamlets.

 

[FrankNitty]

Are you referring to casting range pre-patch or post-patch? In my experience post-patch, CON has more range than THM. But perhaps I'm looking at it from a different point of view? I can stand well outside of mob attack range and heal my entire party as CON. It really feels to me as though I have to stand much closer with THM.

I also believe that having a casting radius around any target is significantly more effective and versatile than a cone projected from the THM.

As for my rank, it doesn't require a high rank in this game to know how things work. My physical level is 40 and I've been playing the game since beta. I'm also comparing CON and THM to my mage classes in FFXI where I had almost all of them at 75 and have spent years in parties and endgame.

Having higher rank THM and CON, do you really feel the class has changed significantly from the 20s?

Regarding casting range Im referring to both pre and post patch. You do have a nice range with CON but the radius is still small, where THM's range goes just as far if not further, and covers the same width basically.

I would perfer CON to have a same range but a larger radius. If they had that I would play it all the time. I'll test it some to make sure but I'm pretty certain of this.

The class doesnt really change that much, just the application of it. Ecspaically what you can and cannot fight, and also with things like firm conviction. Also just FYI with darts, if using the Elemental brands they hit harder then some melee weapons if speced correctly...

True you dont have to have a really high rank to know how things work but you don't even have many of the skills/traits, your hitting soft caps, and still presumably in horizon/nanawa type areas so far.

You are right though, in many cases if you were to just have THM and noting else and didnt have a CON sub, a THM would be worthless if you say needed shell, paralyna, poisona, etc but if you didnt need that, a THM by themsevles is viable as a healer. For fights that you can actually use debuffs THM pull their weight. Plus that 80% potential dmg reduction from firm conviction is a nice trait also when your get hit for less then a GLD does...or anyone else for that matter.

Why compare mages from 2 different games where it is painfully obvious they are trying to make it different? Just seems like your looking for things to complain about. Maybe its just me though. The classes need some work without a doubt, but the games are different. I spent years in FFXI and had RDM, BLM, BRD, COR at 75 and a DRK at 69 before I quit, did endgame kings, wyrms, etc etc, and to compare them imho is silly, they are just too different. Sounds like you want to play FFXI

 

[Londa]

Yup, gives them enough time to roll it out, and start pumping up people for the end of the year patch.

More monsters, more adjusted distributions, UI adjustments, and hopefully even more content than whats been talked about thus far should make it a nice update.

Anything coming at the end of December is probably completely unknown, unless they move the first update of 2011 to the end of December.

EDIT: Dogg's right on range. Mages really shouldnt be that close to the enemy unless the spell calls for it. Same for Hunters and Lancers to a certain extent.

EDIT 2: Looking at the dream attire stuff again, it seems they do have the ability to add real non-leve quests to the game, since you actually have to deliver boxes to hamlets.

I re-read some of the expected things they will add after 2011 and they mention non level item exchange quest. So that sounds very FFXI quest. brb will post the actual text with a url.

blah, can't find it but I swear I saw it on the lodestone. I would keep looking but I'm swamped for time cause of homework.

 

[pancakesandsex]

Totally getting christmas gear.

 

[Zomba13]

You know what? I was actually going to come back for the xmas event. That was until I read tthat you have to make the Christmas stuff. Fuck that. I want events to be fun and not just a slightly different type of the stuff I hated.

 

[Jinko]

Bit disappointing that the gear is makable.

Should have been part of a quest line or dropped from random mobs.

 

[Kandinsky]

I don't know if anyone has made it to the cap but is Ifirit in the game yet ? Just found him in the model viewer and was curious he looks pretty badass

Wait, model viewer? link please.

 

[Dreamwriter]

You know what? I was actually going to come back for the xmas event. That was until I read tthat you have to make the Christmas stuff. Fuck that. I want events to be fun and not just a slightly different type of the stuff I hated.

You could get the stuff from another weaver, only requires Rank 11. Instead of doing a quest finding an NPC, instead you have a quest finding a Weaver

 

[jiggle]

bet ppl will be bazaaring those around the NPC within minutes

 

[RurouniZel]

I have a general question for you all.

Is it just me, or is exp HEAVILY skewed toward crafting? I'm primarily a Gladiator, but 80% of my EXP comes from Blacksmithing and Armoring. Seriously, no matter how much time I let pass by between playing (to let the exp bucket empty), whenever I fight monsters around my rank (I'm rank 22 GLA) who take me nearly all of my HP to kill, I'll get a measly 200-300 EXP tops, whereas I do crafting (rank 18), even rank 10 shit gives me a minimum of 1000 EXP, and anything higher is 1500-2000 EXP per creation. I seriously do the crafting for the sole purpose of EXP gain, not for repairs (though I'm sure that'll help eventually). Same with SP, I'll be lucky to get 100-200 SP for a levequest enemy, even with Guardian Aspect on, whereas crafting I'm getting at least 250, and usually around 350-450 per craft. The only reason I'm not insanely higher in rank for BLA or ARM is because I split between the two.

Am I doing something wrong, or is the game just designed that way?

 

[Unknown Soldier]

I have a general question for you all.

Is it just me, or is exp HEAVILY skewed toward crafting? I'm primarily a Gladiator, but 80% of my EXP comes from Blacksmithing and Armoring. Seriously, no matter how much time I let pass by between playing (to let the exp bucket empty), whenever I fight monsters around my rank (I'm rank 22 GLA) who take me nearly all of my HP to kill, I'll get a measly 200-300 EXP tops, whereas I do crafting (rank 18), even rank 10 shit gives me a minimum of 1000 EXP, and anything higher is 1500-2000 EXP per creation. I seriously do the crafting for the sole purpose of EXP gain, not for repairs (though I'm sure that'll help eventually). Same with SP, I'll be lucky to get 100-200 SP for a levequest enemy, even with Guardian Aspect on, whereas crafting I'm getting at least 250, and usually around 350-450 per craft. The only reason I'm not insanely higher in rank for BLA or ARM is because I split between the two.

Am I doing something wrong, or is the game just designed that way?

It's designed that way. The first people to hit physical level 50 were crafters.

 

[Teknoman]

You know what? I was actually going to come back for the xmas event. That was until I read tthat you have to make the Christmas stuff. Fuck that. I want events to be fun and not just a slightly different type of the stuff I hated.

You dont have to make it. You can deliver presents to kids in the various hamlets and get the items that way.

Gifts

Powdered Sugar
Young Dodo Roaster
Dodo Stuffing
Dream Hat Materials
Dream Tunic Materials
Dream Boots Materials
Twinklebox

*Presents are available for pick up once every four hours (earth time), with up to six being held for each adventurer in the event that they cannot collect their gifts right away. For example, if an adventurer returns to a bell 20 hours after receiving their last present, there will be five new presents waiting.

Receive a twinklebox? Why not pass it along to one of Eorzea's less-fortunate children? There are NPCs in each of the six hamlets collecting donations, and presenting good Samaritans with Dream attire.

EDIT: Yeah, SP and EXP outside of guildleves still needs tweaking.

 

[Rentahamster]

In my opinion, THM AoE is much better than CON AoE.

1. It has a longer range.

2. You always hit yourself along with everyone else when doing heals and buffs.


AoE circle for CON spells should be larger, IMO.

 

[TAJ]

I hate the game, and haven't played for a while, but I'll probably put some more time into it just after Christmas.

 

[Gromph]

bet ppl will be bazaaring those around the NPC within minutes

I already sell Dormose Fur And got mine to craft the entire set.

 

[Teknoman]

I hate the game, and haven't played for a while, but I'll probably put some more time into it just after Christmas.

Best time probably, since there will have been 2 major patches by them, or at least by the end of December.

 

[Margalis]

Can I get a little better explanation on AOE?

So if I'm a THM and I cast an AOE heal on anyone that always hits me as well?

Also how are you guys switching between single target and AOE? Right now I haven't partied very much, so I don't use AOE buffs very often, though I do use AOE attacks. Right now I just type /aoe on in the command window...

For spellcasting I use exclusively keyboard macros, not sure if I should create an aoe and non aoe version of every spell or a generic on/off macro or what.

Finally is there a downside to AOE use? Less potency per target, or higher cost?

Thanks!

 

[SuperLurker]

Can I get a little better explanation on AOE?

So if I'm a THM and I cast an AOE heal on anyone that always hits me as well?

When you cast an AOE as a THM you basically only choose the direction that it goes, it originates at you and spreads out in a cone shape towards the target. If it's a friendly spell it will always hit you. CON AOEs hit their primary target and any others that are within a certain radius of that target, so they can AOE without hitting themselves.

Also how are you guys switching between single target and AOE? Right now I haven't partied very much, so I don't use AOE buffs very often, though I do use AOE attacks. Right now I just type /aoe on in the command window...

For spellcasting I use exclusively keyboard macros, not sure if I should create an aoe and non aoe version of every spell or a generic on/off macro or what.

Finally is there a downside to AOE use? Less potency per target, or higher cost?

Thanks!

If you cast a spell using the hotbar it will give you the choice of whether or not you want it to be AOE. A little green button will pop up that toggles AOE on/off, you can either click the button or press 'Z' by default to switch modes. There's no downside to doing an AOE, other than the fact that the more you heal the more aggro you're going to draw and offensive spells will potentially hit other groups.

 

[Gromph]

December Version Updates (12/14/2010)
As promised in the Topics post of December 10, we would today like to announce the date and content details of the forthcoming mid-December version update.

◆Date & Times
Wednesday, December 15, 2010 from 3:00 p.m. to Thursday, December 16, 2010 at 12:00 a.m.

◆Contents
New enemies, including notorious monsters
New guildleves
Many new recipes
Further improvements to the naming and organization of market wards
An additional free retainer slot
Improved response times on the retainer exchange interface
Further improvements to the user interface
Increased text limit for chat log input
For a complete list of changes, please see the comprehensive details posted on the day of the version update.

◆Second December Version Update
The development team is continuing to take player feedback to heart concerning the item search feature of the market wards. We are currently aiming to introduce the first of several changes by year's end, and assure you that additional improvements will be ongoing in order to make a more intuitive and functional system.

Details regarding the date and content of the second December version update will be announced in a future Topics post.

Until then, we hope that you continue to enjoy your adventures in Eorzea!


Oh yes!!

An additional free retainer slot

I'm always 100/100 9X/100

 

[Unknown Soldier]

In my opinion, THM AoE is much better than CON AoE.

1. It has a longer range.

2. You always hit yourself along with everyone else when doing heals and buffs.


AoE circle for CON spells should be larger, IMO.

Yeah, that's what I was trying to say with many more unnecessary words above. THM AoE is hax, plain and simple, as long as people know your AoE is a cone and don't stand in stupid places relative to you. But they'll learn pretty quickly where to stand after they've died a few times while everybody else is finishing the fight at 100% health, including the THM since the THM heals himself no matter who else in the party is healed or not.

People don't realize that THM kills so slowly solo for a reason. Once the THM has Firm Conviction and Sacrifice II and Cure II, he is basically invincible. THMs can solo piestes, they can solo raptors, they can solo anything. It will take them a million years to kill one but they can't be killed, period, unless the player just get bored of plinking away at the mob and lets it kill him.

 

[jiggle]

New guildleves

dear god i hope it means new rewards
last things we need are more gils or guild marks that we can't even spend
rank40 leves are so horrible right now cuz of that

 

[RurouniZel]

It's designed that way. The first people to hit physical level 50 were crafters.

Ah I see. Glad I'm not the only one then. ^^

 

[Londa]

Increased text limit for chat log input

Wonderful

 

[Salaadin]

Sounds promising. I havent played in over 2 weeks...Im kinda excited to hop back on again.

 

[Teknoman]

Hopefully new guildleves covers all rank ranges too. Further improvements and naming for wards sounds cool, and I guess they are just shifting the early 2011 planned update to late December.

 

[Ronok]

Hello! I haven't played in so long (Misaki Rena in case you forgot :lol) but I'm considering starting up again soon. What exactly has changed in my long absence? I stopped around about the time that the first trial period extension was announced....

 

[Teknoman]

C'mon party SP tweak...

 

[Ravidrath]

I hope that with the addition of new leves they'll be replacing some of the existing ones, but I doubt that will be the case.

Each point should not have more than 1 of the same leve archetype, be they runners, imps in disguise or Necrologos.

I'd also love to see at least one new type of gathering leve, for the secondary tools. The supply of dyes and things would be so much better if there were leves that produced them consistently.

 

[demosthenes]

Finally got on again and hit a couple ranks here and there. MRD finally to 25 :lol

Anyone in the LS planning on making the Santa gear?

 

[Canti]

dear god i hope it means new rewards
last things we need are more gils or guild marks that we can't even spend
rank40 leves are so horrible right now cuz of that

It would be great if you could use guildmarks to buy rare/ex gear.

I'm also looking forward to more gathering leves, needs more variety to get people more interested in gathering roles.

 

[MomoPufflet]

I jizzed at the chatlog character increase. Now I can finally stretch the chatlog across the bottom of the screen like XI. Now we just need a damned way to instantly expand and collapse the log to fullscreen for easy reading, also like XI.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Hello! I haven't played in so long (Misaki Rena in case you forgot :lol) but I'm considering starting up again soon. What exactly has changed in my long absence? I stopped around about the time that the first trial period extension was announced....

Rena kawaii desune! :lol

Did you stop before the patch in November? Becasue everything started changing around then, and tomorrow everything is going to change again. Many things got better, some things got worse, but everything certainly was different. Oh, right, and Tanaka got fired.

 

[Cmagus]

Grinded like a mad man yesterday.Decided to start crafting up all my materials I had stacks for. Went from Archer lvl 19 -21 Physical lvl 19 -21 Carpenter lvl 7- 10 Weaver lvl 10 - 11.
Leves didn't do much but I pretty much camped at Bloodshore and crafted then ran huge 9-15 player behests every hour for a few hours made out pretty nicely

 

[Teknoman]

:lol I wouldnt say he got fired.

 

[DrDogg]

Why compare mages from 2 different games where it is painfully obvious they are trying to make it different? Just seems like your looking for things to complain about. Maybe its just me though. The classes need some work without a doubt, but the games are different. I spent years in FFXI and had RDM, BLM, BRD, COR at 75 and a DRK at 69 before I quit, did endgame kings, wyrms, etc etc, and to compare them imho is silly, they are just too different. Sounds like you want to play FFXI

I don't really feel the games are that different, especially when comparing the mage classes. You're casting 99% of the same spells, with the same effects and the same uses. Aside from the AoE aspect, casting Cure II as a CON is exactly the same as casting Cure II as a WHM.

I don't have to look for things to complain about. I log on and it's all right there in front of me. :lol The game is shit, plain and simple. And the most important aspect of the game, for me, has not yet been addressed.

In all honesty, if the classes were deeper and more challenging, and there was a point to partying for SP beyond guildleves, I wouldn't have many complaints.

 

[Zomba13]

You dont have to make it. You can deliver presents to kids in the various hamlets and get the items that way.

Gifts

Powdered Sugar
Young Dodo Roaster
Dodo Stuffing
Dream Hat Materials
Dream Tunic Materials
Dream Boots Materials
Twinklebox

*Presents are available for pick up once every four hours (earth time), with up to six being held for each adventurer in the event that they cannot collect their gifts right away. For example, if an adventurer returns to a bell 20 hours after receiving their last present, there will be five new presents waiting.

Receive a twinklebox? Why not pass it along to one of Eorzea's less-fortunate children? There are NPCs in each of the six hamlets collecting donations, and presenting good Samaritans with Dream attire.

EDIT: Yeah, SP and EXP outside of guildleves still needs tweaking.

Oh, I might come back then. I just skimmed the news post and saw Dream ___ Materials and looked at the list of what you need to make them and got annoyed.

EDIT: Yup, I'm updating ffxiv now. I think I'll try it again now seeing as amazon still haven't delivered my Cataclysm (yeah, postage problems. That explains why me and my dad got other orders that were placed after my Cata order).

 

[Rentahamster]

Looks like the next patch isn't just for the Christmas stuff. Good news.

 

[Rentahamster]

Regarding SP and stuff,

I thought that this discussion on Core is worth noting - especially this post by Tekno Viking that ties in to my thoughts on the current SP gain mechanic: http://www.ffxivcore.com/topic/2854...he-sp-fix/page__st__40__p__438265#entry438265

Normally I'm not on pacifistas side, but in this thread i am with him that SP gains isn't "imbalanced" or "broken" or something that needs an emergency fix.

If they reward grouping enough, it will make soloing and small duos/trios so inneficient by comparison no one will do it.

Right now, you can solo, or you can get in a 15 man group, and you will get about the same xp/hour.

My Linkshell groups every single night for 3-5 hours. Our groups are 10-15 strong. We either do leves/behests, or we go murder everything in a dungeon (like tam tara or mistbeard).

Either way we end up with 10Kish per hour. on a bad night, maybe 9k/hour. on a good night, maybe 12/13k.

When our groups arent running, i solo subjobs on doblyns and get similar amounts of xp/hour.

Sometimes, when im soloing, a friend will ask me what im doing, and asks to join. We team up and get less xp/kill, but we kill faster and guess what. yep. about 10k per hour.


System is balanced. for any sized group. if you cant get sp grouping you are doing it wrong. if you cant get good sp soloing you are doing it wrong.


NOTE: This assumes you realize it is no longer viable to fight extremely difficult mobs. The name of the game is farming weaker mobs. Interestingly enough for those comparing to FFXI, its kind of like a merit PT. at 75 you can solo a greater colibri, or a mamool ja, or an imp. However when you get 5 buddies you can blow them up at an incredible pace. chaining T mobs for lots of xp/hour. It was just as zergy as this is, and hell abyssea is even more zergy.

The current system isn't horrible, but it isn't perfect, either. Same as the previous system. You are bound to ruffle a few feathers when you change something that so many people were used to. All it takes is some testing and some time to grow in to the new system and see what works and what doesn't.

Personally, I would disagree on the point where solo play is rewarded just as much as party play. This is an MMO; the social aspect should be encouraged and rewarded. Cooperation, skill, effort, and strategy should be rewarded to a greater extent than mediocre play.

We've switched from large parties zerging raptors and efts to small parties zerging doblyns and coblyns, and I'd prefer a system that doesn't reward any sort of zerging as much.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

:lol I wouldnt say he got fired.

He was given a sword and told to fall on it. This is technically different from someone just running him through with that sword but the outcome was the same.

 

[Londa]

I didn't need someone on a forum to tell me that the SP isn't bad. I never had a problem with it because I would kill stuff that didn't take forever to die. The faster you kill the more exp you will get a session.

Killing hard to kill mobs for uber exp will kill the mages mp and there will be more wait in between kills. The current system kind of forced everyone to kill weaker mobs since killing a yellow-red for 100-150 rank points is not appealing to anyone.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

I don't really feel the games are that different, especially when comparing the mage classes. You're casting 99% of the same spells, with the same effects and the same uses. Aside from the AoE aspect, casting Cure II as a CON is exactly the same as casting Cure II as a WHM.

I don't have to look for things to complain about. I log on and it's all right there in front of me. :lol The game is shit, plain and simple. And the most important aspect of the game, for me, has not yet been addressed.

In all honesty, if the classes were deeper and more challenging, and there was a point to partying for SP beyond guildleves, I wouldn't have many complaints.

The funny thing is, I was actually doing some r20 leves with some LS peeps just last night and a couple of them were for THM and CON marks, so I would up healing them for a good portion of last night. I hadn't thought much about during the grinding I did to get my THM and CON to 20 so I could solo my archer more effectively, but I really enjoy playing the mage classes in this game. Being a mage in FFXIV isn't intentionally a chore and where the punishment if you make one mistake is you and the whole party all wipe. I always felt bad when the healers overhealed in other games and got themselves killed keeping the rest of the party alive, it always seemed unfair to me that doing their job resulted in death for them. Meanwhile being the mage in FFXIV is actually pretty fun, which I guess is the antithesis of what you seem to want from the mage classes. I actually found myself feeling kind of sad when we finished up the leves I had THM and CON marks for and went back to ranking up my marauder.

 

[TheFatOne]

Did they say anything about increasing performance? The only reason I don't play now is that the game actually runs worse since the last patch for me. Any time I go into LL I get about 15 FPS.

Edit: If it was a steady 15 FPS I might just play through it, but the game chugs and stutters like crazy now.

 

[Teknoman]

Like being a mage now, wait until giant buffalo roam Eorzea.

Seriously, the wider areas of Eorzea seem like they'll end up like Gran Pulse (for those of you who played XIII). Cant wait to see the XIV version of an Adamantoise or the size of Behemoth ingame.

Steelfleece was big, but these Buffalo make it seem like a medium size monster by comparison, so heres to nuking and debuffing the crap out of them. Also noticed that some varity of normal monsters are bigger than others (Seasalt Puk in La Noscea vs the Puk in Black Shroud) so hopefully we see more of that as well.

As for the Goblins, going to guess that those campfires all over are Gobbie spots. Weapons...i'm still hoping that new sword is actually a greatsword and is implemented this month (since it was shown with the update info in that issue of Famitsu) along with many new weapons to use throughout the ranks.

Better have special battle music for free roaming NMs too.

Did they say anything about increasing performance? The only reason I don't play now is that the game actually runs worse since the last patch for me. Any time I go into LL I get about 15 FPS.

Edit: If it was a steady 15 FPS I might just play through it, but the game chugs and stutters like crazy now.

Did you mess with either of the drawing options?

EDIT 2: Think the NMs might drop actual weapons too?

About those giant buffalo:
Their thick hides are almost impossible to penetrate, and it is rumored that the weapons of champions unsuccessful in felling the beasts can sometimes be found still lodged under the shaggy coats.

Could just be referring to the bloody lance head...but it would be nice for a few other actual weapon drops.

 

[TheFatOne]

Did you mess with either of the drawing options?

Nope I didn't mess with any of the settings. After the first big patch my performance took a big hit.

 

[DrDogg]

The funny thing is, I was actually doing some r20 leves with some LS peeps just last night and a couple of them were for THM and CON marks, so I would up healing them for a good portion of last night. I hadn't thought much about during the grinding I did to get my THM and CON to 20 so I could solo my archer more effectively, but I really enjoy playing the mage classes in this game. Being a mage in FFXIV isn't intentionally a chore and where the punishment if you make one mistake is you and the whole party all wipe. I always felt bad when the healers overhealed in other games and got themselves killed keeping the rest of the party alive, it always seemed unfair to me that doing their job resulted in death for them. Meanwhile being the mage in FFXIV is actually pretty fun, which I guess is the antithesis of what you seem to want from the mage classes. I actually found myself feeling kind of sad when we finished up the leves I had THM and CON marks for and went back to ranking up my marauder.

It's very, very clear that what you find "fun" is nothing like what I find "fun", and your experiences with FFXI are nothing like my experiences with the game.

In FFXI I rarely got hate as a healer because I played my job well. That was "fun" for me because I couldn't just mindlessly spam cure or not pay attention to what I was doing. The only time I ever got hate as WHM or RDM was when we had a bad tank and I had to compensate for that. Even then, in many cases I could keep myself alive long enough for the tank to get hate back. Again... all part of the challenge, which I find very entertaining.

In FFXIV, I think CON and THM are ridiculously boring because I can quite literally watch TV while playing and no one in my party will ever get close to death (not that it really matters if they die anyway). That is not what I call fun.

To me... challenge and difficulty to master = fun. That's what is severely lacking from FFXIV.

Regarding SP and stuff,

I thought that this discussion on Core is worth noting - especially this post by Tekno Viking that ties in to my thoughts on the current SP gain mechanic: http://www.ffxivcore.com/topic/2854...he-sp-fix/page__st__40__p__438265#entry438265

The current system isn't horrible, but it isn't perfect, either. Same as the previous system. You are bound to ruffle a few feathers when you change something that so many people were used to. All it takes is some testing and some time to grow in to the new system and see what works and what doesn't.

Personally, I would disagree on the point where solo play is rewarded just as much as party play. This is an MMO; the social aspect should be encouraged and rewarded. Cooperation, skill, effort, and strategy should be rewarded to a greater extent than mediocre play.

We've switched from large parties zerging raptors and efts to small parties zerging doblyns and coblyns, and I'd prefer a system that doesn't reward any sort of zerging as much.

While I can see why people say the system isn't broken, and is actually balanced, that's not really the problem... at least not for me. While I think party SP should be higher than solo SP, the real issue I have is that when you're forced to fight weaker mobs, it makes an already boring mage class even more boring.

Make the combat challenging and entertaining and I don't really care if parties are no better than solo play.

 

[Rentahamster]

I would have to say that so far, the most challenging fights for me have been multiple mobs fights on leves (like "Save the Lettuce Save the World" for example), and raptor fights (in the tank role).

When tanking/pulling raptors, I would have to pay very very close attention to my skills and make sure that I used stuff like defender, stayed still for steadfast, used buffs to build hate, and taunted often enough to keep hate, but not so often that I'd blow all my taunts and have nothing to use in a pinch.

I hardly had time to get any hits in, but it was necessary to manage my stamina and generate as much hate as I could (SP-wise, I still did okay, as voke and taunt gave a decent amount of SP on proc). Note regarding stamina resource management - I still feel that as a gameplay mechanic, in its current form, it's more of a hassle rather than a challenge and provider of gameplay depth.

I would have a much easier time when playing DD against raptors, as all I had to do was respec to STR and DEX and then press 11111111111WS1111WS1111111WS all day long.

All the mages had to so as curecurecurecurecure (and make sure protect and shell were up) all day long too. Fairly simple.


Ideally, I'd want the difficulty to be spread as evenly as possible amongst party members, although that seems pretty tricky to implement.

 

[Dreamwriter]

Nope I didn't mess with any of the settings. After the first big patch my performance took a big hit.

You should have messed with the settings, that's why your performance took a big hit. Square changed how the settings work in that patch, there are now two settings to set which make HUGE performance differences. If you have bad performance, you need to lower those (in the FFXIV Config program, not in-game settings).

 

[Ronok]

Rena kawaii desune! :lol

Did you stop before the patch in November? Becasue everything started changing around then, and tomorrow everything is going to change again. Many things got better, some things got worse, but everything certainly was different. Oh, right, and Tanaka got fired.

KAWAIIIII!!!!!

I may have stopped before the November patch! :lol I'm really not sure if I did or not. Honestly, Tanaka getting fired it what prompted me to poke my head in. :lol Reading through the past few pages it seems a lot of the complaints are the same as when I left, but other things do seem to be improving.