Relic Quest 2.45Follow

I just find it so hilariously ironic - People normally **** talk XI in the XIV community yet in my Relic/Mythic/Empyrean grind I at least benefited from additional drops like selling unused currency, or the Relic pieces that dropped (mainly accessories back in the prime days), blowing through my tags and gearing out jobs in Nyzul gear and such.

Here..you're literally grinding for the sake of it and some steps are so unnecessary it's funny. But alas, Naoki Yoshida can do no wrong.

They are focusing too much on trying to prevent RMT from being a thing. It's always going to be a thing no matter what they do. They should just give it up already and let us have an economy. If they want to stop RMT then they need to have people monitor what is going on. That costs money, but were paying a sub fee so some of that money SHOULD be going towards something like this. How many times playing both FFXI and FFXIV have I seen trains of suspicious people doing really odd things, yet nothing is done about for a loooooong time, if ever. Even though gil in this game is still mostly useless, RMT's are still able to sell it. With housing, materia for novus, and now this, people need large quantities of gil quickly. With almost nothing being profitable enough and fast enough, it gets people to seriously consider buying gil rather than farming it. What should be done? I don't know. What I do know is that what they are doing to combat RMT just isn't working, and real players shouldn't have to suffer because of it.

Actually by the time the Relic Weapons equate the weapons of the Coil patch, they are superior due to higher secondary stats. As such the 135 Zodiac weapon will likely be superior to that of the Coil Weapons depending on the stat build of the wielder.

Also, I feel the comparison is fair. These are weapons that take long-term investments in wielding and as they continue to progress, it is likely that fewer people will take them to fully upgraded form.

FFXI's 'rarity' factor for relics, by many FFXI players, was seen as a determent, not a boon. Content that seems un-achievable gets underplayed and reduces the play value of the product - thus a lower sustained subscription rate. The pyramid factor of the relic weapons was poor design form the get go, which is why the current FFXIV development team so fundamentally changed the concept.

Right now, Dreadwyrm weapons will beat out Zodiacs, mainly due to the 10 ilvl difference. This is due to the philosophy difference between FFXIV and FFXI. But when you match ilvl to ilvl, which will likely happen in 2.55 by my guess. These weapons will be superior, then the cycle will continue.

There is no 'one best weapon' because it's vertical a progression game rather than horizontal one. What Relic's here serves is a weapon that is steadfast. Instead of throwing away weapons as they run out of date, you update it - and it will continually grow in strength and change in form. You can take this one of two ways. One, that Relic Weapons as FFXI standards go, do not exist in FFXIv, which Hio's attempt at belittling FFXIV completely fails as he's off category. Or, you can say that Zodiac path weapons in FFXIV take similar form to what Relics in FFXI are now - the weapons you hold onto and upgrade through the patches. In which case FFXIV has learned from FFXI's feedback and adapted it into a vertical progression mechanic.

Hardcore Raiders who are worried about their Epeen get their time ahead of the curve by grabbing their Raid Weapons which peak as best earlier in the raid rotation, while Relic hunters get a weapon they keep and work on, and wind up being stronger weapons by the end of the raid rotation. Personally, my limited time for the game kind of prevents me from keeping a Relic up to date, but I still work on it, even though I have a superior weapon. The process is far and away more enjoyable than FFXI's relic ever was - and that alone says something.

There will always be a "one best weapon" precisely because the game is a vertical progression. The majority of the time it is the current endgame dungeon, as long as their design decision holds, then the Zodiac weapon catches up (barely) before the next "one best weapon" is released again. Loot range gods aside, it is massively easier (and cheaper) to obtain a Coil weapon than it is to obtain a Zodiac weapon. They bank on the fact that the average player has an addictive personality and will happily grind these weapons out regardless of whatever speedbumps they dream up.

The real joke for me is the perception that Zodiac weapons are somehow for the Casual crowd and raid-level weapons are for the Hardcore players. I could never consider someone who is at current stage Zodiac as anything other than Hardcore. Significantly moreso than someone who logs on one or two nights a week to complete current Coil and prays their weapon drops. The time investment to obtain a Zodiac weapon is massive.

Ding ding. Though, Hio seems to have a rage ***** for Yoshida, lobbing out lines like he can do no wrong in angst. Probably solely because I dared to say in the past XIV has a higher ceiling of potential than their precious XI does at this point. Meanwhile, I'd probably be one of the more harsh critics of things XIV has done under the casual banner, or lack thereof. Still, I get to be a fanboy.

Anyway, Magian trials were mentioned above, which was probably the closest XI got, I'd agree. And bite-sized chunks of progression are pretty cool for the casual player, yes, but one also needs to be careful about snowballing all of that together. As a result, I'd say XI suffered from too many steps, too many objective points, and basically being unfun grinds nearer to the ending points of the system. Consider further that any job likely needed multiple weapons for niche purposes, and it was easy for people to feel burnt out or even come to hate the system entirely. So, while I'd rather have such a system in place than none at all, care must still be expressed.

XIV also has the looming specter of what to do with Zodiacs come 3.0. You can't really keep level 50 content "hard to do" when the new cap is 60. This will mean reductions in trade-ins will be needed, drop rates improved like with Atma a bit back, and so on through the chain just so getting a "top 50 weapon" isn't a task that takes weeks or even months when you're 60 and just using some junk green that's way better. Or do they implement a more simpler catch up quest that yields the final product? Then again, they could just wave it all off and say the new weapon line is totally unrelated. It's basically a crappy place to be in because SE will make someone unhappy as I'd argue their system isn't quite right at present. And the whole hardcore content masquerading as casual is a part of it.

I know you have a hard on for attacking my posts, but even you seen how people always state that Yoshida is basically perfection. There's no angst here kiddo, sorry to disappoint you, yet again. However you seem extremely butthurt based on this comment though.

I'd say my biggest problem with the relic is due to how fast gear progresses in this game. I'm ok with having a long term goal, but if you take your time, by the time you are done, the ilvl has already been raised. The amount of effort for the little time that the relic is a current weapon doesn't match up.

I can understand they wanted it to be something you can't do in a day(like the original relic). They seem to have gone too far in the other direction. If they can find a balance between two, it might be be ok.

When they forced battle/craft/gatherer to collide I liked Tanaka's idea better (Hamlet Defense, which yes was already set to be release long before the dev shuffle), that way you don't have crafters trying to rape you ontop of the already long time commitment. It's gotten to the point a non friend/FC crafter will ask you for your mats and 400-500k+ just to craft it.

You may as well have bought the damn item completed at that point.