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Your thought on Elite HuntsFollow

#77 Jul 13 2014 at 6:15 PM Rating: Excellent
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sandpark wrote:
For now yes. That doesn't mean there can't be adjustments in the next few weeks. Perhaps they allowed it to be unlimited to see if they're servers could withstand huge loads in tight areas. Perhaps they allowed it to see if people preferred this over dungeons. Or perhaps they plan to remove the lockout timers from dungeons.

If the answer is obvious then why do people presume that SE is dumb or do not know how to implement content competently, I didn't say perfectly. Maybe the obvious answer is they meant to for reasons only known to the developers. I am not defending them. I am just saying they have turned this game around pretty good.

They are not idiots.


I guess that just seems somewhat more plausible than SE making their content a complete mess upon launch in order to do something like test their server load.

It's not like it's the first time SE has made some odd decisions before. The housing prices created an uproar and were changed shortly after to be more reasonable. They created a weekly lockout restriction in CT and still allowed loot to drop to someone who didn't pass if everyone leaves immediately after the dungeon has completed, even if it's seconds later. They let people drag others into later coil turns and prevent they from joining previous turns for the week with no prompt. Heck, just recently with frontlines it required 72 people to hit the "commence" button until it was immediately hotpatched, and anyone who's played CT with only 24 people could have told you beforehand that this was a bad idea. All of these create some plainly obvious issues too (some of them like the CT loot thing were predicted by players before CT even came out), but they still made their way into the game. I don't know if SE has some grand scheme involved in making hunts the way they did, but I don't think it's unreasonable that some players are writing it off as simply bad content with all of the issues people are having (the latest mentioned in this topic about mobs disappearing if there's too many players is another game breaking feature, and it's not even the first time it's popped up in this game).

Edited, Jul 13th 2014 8:16pm by Susanoh
#78 Jul 13 2014 at 8:13 PM Rating: Excellent
Theonehio wrote:
Even in XI's Magian Trials you got full credit as long as you're in party (and within exp range which chances are you will be.)

This is something I can agree should be changed.
#79 Jul 13 2014 at 8:21 PM Rating: Excellent
Unfortunately as a person who favors the PvRNG content (please tell me you got that) I guess my opinion would be a bit more leniant towards PvE stuff and gear drops etc. I don't need the latest and greatest in combat gear, although I do need to get around to the atma stuff or whatever that is soon cause I am interested in NIN, and I don't wanna really farm it later on...hehe.

I am wondering if the hunt system is just bugged (like as far as everyone getting same target or whatever)... would it be as bad if people had varied targets? I haven't done it so I couldn't say.
#80 Jul 13 2014 at 9:55 PM Rating: Excellent
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The fixed target is deliberate. And the reason why that's the case is pretty simple. For those of us who were XI vets at least into the Abyssea area, you might recall some trials being tied to NMs people didn't want to fight all that often. Maybe it was for an unpopular job. Maybe the NM was a pain to pop. Maybe the NM itself was just really annoying even with atmas. Regardless, you've still have people who'd occasionally want to tackle those foes and simply couldn't find the help. Could be a timing thing. Could be they didn't have the right job(s) to make a group work. Maybe they just had issues with some other folks wanting the same thing. Whatever the reason, the challenge became harder than it needed to be.

Fast forward to XIV, though, with no claim system in place and the ability for oodles of people to pitch in with the same objective. Gone, at least for now, is the hassle of trying to form up a group, intentionally competing with others, and ideally not having to plan your life around the game. Just log in, go to the right area, and hope for the best. It's not perfect, obviously, but it's fundamentally more casual friendly to lock people onto a single objective than it is to spread the server out over dozens.

SE being tight lipped about the specifics of this system until patch day is their own fault, though. I could say I would've warned them, just via past MMO experience (and my habit of pondering worst case scenarios). Others could have and would likely have done the same. Basically, devs aren't the only ones who learn from past mistakes in games.
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#81 Jul 13 2014 at 11:31 PM Rating: Default
Susanoh wrote:
sandpark wrote:
I am sure this was their plan to begin with. The player base just has an it has to be 100% perfect from the get go or you hear it from us the day after it releases. It takes time to introduce new systems and see the metrics of how things are playing out.


SE has decided to make this the only activity in the entire game that awards sand and oils of time with no lockout. The mobs involved melt in seconds, the weekly elite hunt is the same for everyone. It doesn't take months of analysis and data to realize what the outcome was going to be. Being the only path to progress in terms of having top tier equipment for the entire left and right side outside of coil (and now a possible weekly lockout oil/accessories but not sands/left side equipment in CT), there is absolutely no doubt what was going to happen. A lot of players looking to progress were going to want to participate, and the content would get zerged. I don't see how anyone could have predicted any different, let alone the people who develop this game.


So you say, but nobody in the universe thus far has been good at predicting human behavior accurately. The Hunt is not some exception to this. SE did nudge people into playing the content a certain way through design (compete to be able to bypass the lockouts) but beyond that they can only guess how the playerbase would react. They were probably working on some fundamentally flawed prediction that the playerbase wouldn't be so stupid as to take the competition so far that everyone participating in the competition probably hates their life yet do it anyway. Any degree of "healthy" or "sane" is thrown out of the window for the shot at +1 epeen.

It could have all been different if the flawed assumption that the players play this game because it is "fun" had been true.

Edited, Jul 14th 2014 5:33am by Hyanmen
#82 Jul 14 2014 at 1:11 AM Rating: Excellent
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Hyanmen wrote:
So you say, but nobody in the universe thus far has been good at predicting human behavior accurately. The Hunt is not some exception to this. SE did nudge people into playing the content a certain way through design (compete to be able to bypass the lockouts) but beyond that they can only guess how the playerbase would react. They were probably working on some fundamentally flawed prediction that the playerbase wouldn't be so stupid as to take the competition so far that everyone participating in the competition probably hates their life yet do it anyway. Any degree of "healthy" or "sane" is thrown out of the window for the shot at +1 epeen.

It could have all been different if the flawed assumption that the players play this game because it is "fun" had been true.


I don't think this is that complicated to predict. FFXIV is a game based on progression. The idea in a game like this is that you play through content and progress your character. I haven't played too many MMOs personally that are based primarily on enjoying the content without the whole "carrot on a stick" attached. Guild Wars is arguably one. But FFXIV with its tiered equipment sets and restrictions on who can have "the best" stuff through either lockouts or grinding, is clearly meant to be a progression game.

That players would want to progress in a progression game isn't much of a stretch. If you made sands and oils drops from low level ladybugs, a ton of people would go camp ladybugs. If you made them drops from guild leves, people would spam all their allowances. I don't need to have a master's degree in psychology to predict that if there's one single activity in a progression MMO that contains unlimited access to upgrades for the highest form of progress, and every other activity in the game that provides similar rewards is heavily restricted, that players are going to flock to this activity. If hunts were not meant to be zerged down by large numbers of players, they shouldn't be the sole activity that allows players to progress with unrestricted access.
#83 Jul 14 2014 at 7:17 AM Rating: Excellent
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If they took the lock off of just the oils in ST and made them a slightly rarer drop they wouldn't even have to touch the hunt system.
#84 Jul 14 2014 at 7:37 AM Rating: Good
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Some observations if they want to make hunts better for everyone:

1. The daily hunts should give more than 1 and 2 seals. There is no incentive to ever visit the hunt log.
2. S and A Ranks should spawn more often. Morning and early weekday hunt groups can ruin things for the afternoon and weekend players.
3. The targets should detect how many people are hitting it, and adjust HP accordingly. I realize this may be difficult, but at least make S ranks on the difficulty of Odin and Behemoth, fully aware that they might wipe some hunts. A ranks should be half the difficulty of Odin / Behemoth, and B ranks should be able to be downed by a team of 4 - 8.
#85 Jul 14 2014 at 9:52 AM Rating: Excellent
I actually spent several hours in hunt parties yesterday, and I actually really enjoyed it... will definitely be doing more tonight.

That said, the system definitely needs adjusting. My suggestions are:

1. More HP for all elite marks, especially A and S ranks, which draw the most attention from hunting hordes.
2. Alleviate the contribution requirements for getting full credit.
3. Put a weekly cap on how many allied seals people can earn. I'd recommend 400 seals per week.

I know some people aren't fans of weekly caps, but caps definitely serve a purpose, and they'd be helpful here. Even if the cap was at 750/week, you'd still eliminate that fringe element of craziness that's spoiling this content for so many others.

Edited, Jul 14th 2014 8:52am by Thayos
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#86 Jul 14 2014 at 10:11 AM Rating: Default
Susanoh wrote:
Hyanmen wrote:
So you say, but nobody in the universe thus far has been good at predicting human behavior accurately. The Hunt is not some exception to this. SE did nudge people into playing the content a certain way through design (compete to be able to bypass the lockouts) but beyond that they can only guess how the playerbase would react. They were probably working on some fundamentally flawed prediction that the playerbase wouldn't be so stupid as to take the competition so far that everyone participating in the competition probably hates their life yet do it anyway. Any degree of "healthy" or "sane" is thrown out of the window for the shot at +1 epeen.

It could have all been different if the flawed assumption that the players play this game because it is "fun" had been true.


I don't think this is that complicated to predict. FFXIV is a game based on progression. The idea in a game like this is that you play through content and progress your character. I haven't played too many MMOs personally that are based primarily on enjoying the content without the whole "carrot on a stick" attached. Guild Wars is arguably one. But FFXIV with its tiered equipment sets and restrictions on who can have "the best" stuff through either lockouts or grinding, is clearly meant to be a progression game.

That players would want to progress in a progression game isn't much of a stretch. If you made sands and oils drops from low level ladybugs, a ton of people would go camp ladybugs. If you made them drops from guild leves, people would spam all their allowances. I don't need to have a master's degree in psychology to predict that if there's one single activity in a progression MMO that contains unlimited access to upgrades for the highest form of progress, and every other activity in the game that provides similar rewards is heavily restricted, that players are going to flock to this activity. If hunts were not meant to be zerged down by large numbers of players, they shouldn't be the sole activity that allows players to progress with unrestricted access.


It is not complicated to predict the things you said, but they do not make The Hunt "bad" content. SE knew all of these things. What is harder to predict is the ferocity of the players to compete for the scarce resources in a virtual video game that they choose to play with zero obligations or attachments, and the community mindset that follows. There was always going to be competition, and competition is not inherently bad. However the extent at which people take the competition for epeen that amounts to nothing of substance in reality is what's completely out of any proportions, and something SE couldn't accurately predict beforehand (and now needs to address).

Edited, Jul 14th 2014 4:12pm by Hyanmen
#87 Jul 14 2014 at 10:32 AM Rating: Excellent
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However the extent at which people take the competition for epeen that amounts to nothing of substance in reality is what's completely out of any proportions, and something SE couldn't accurately predict beforehand (and now needs to address).


I've said it before, and I'll say it again... a criticism I have about SE is they seem to have lost touch with the hardcore nature of their audience. Just because many of us are more "casual" now doesn't mean that we're not still hardcore at heart. Take away the responsibilities we didn't have 10 or 12 years ago, and many of us would be just as hardcore now as we were then. There's a big, huge gray area between hardcore and casual gaming that many of us live in.

We're seeing that with hunts. Clearly, SE doesn't design systems that they think we're going to dislike... so they clearly designed hunts as being a casual-friendly NM system that people could do to fill the time around dungeons, raids, CT, etc.

Nope!

That's not how we roll. We look at hunts, see that we can get Sands of Time much faster than we can through T8, and we spam it to hell and back regardless of whether we're having fun doing it.

I seriously don't think SE expected that to happen. I guess we'll see, though, depending on whether the hunts are adjusted during the next week or two.

Edited, Jul 14th 2014 9:33am by Thayos
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#88 Jul 14 2014 at 10:56 AM Rating: Decent
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LebargeX wrote:
If they took the lock off of just the oils in ST and made them a slightly rarer drop they wouldn't even have to touch the hunt system.


They still would as it would be lottable by everyone in the raid.
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#89 Jul 14 2014 at 12:28 PM Rating: Excellent
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Hyanmen wrote:
It is not complicated to predict the things you said, but they do not make The Hunt "bad" content. SE knew all of these things. What is harder to predict is the ferocity of the players to compete for the scarce resources in a virtual video game that they choose to play with zero obligations or attachments, and the community mindset that follows. There was always going to be competition, and competition is not inherently bad. However the extent at which people take the competition for epeen that amounts to nothing of substance in reality is what's completely out of any proportions, and something SE couldn't accurately predict beforehand (and now needs to address).


Is it really though? Players do want to progress if a clear progression path is available. A high level of competition makes hunts a chore to participate in due to many factors such as extremely low HP for mobs, high contribution level necessary to receive max rewards (and weekly credit if you're doing that), and the simple fact that the more people there are doing hunts, the less likely you are to get to your mob.

Individual players are going to look at hunts, look at the rewards, and see it offers true end game progression unrestricted. Naturally a lot of these players are going to want to participate. I'm sure a lot of the people hunting would love it if 90% of the people trying it out just said "***** this, I'm out" leaving a few small parties to enjoy the system as it may have supposedly been intended, but a lot of them don't want to be the ones to bow out. They want to progress, and they'd probably do something else in order to do it if it was available. If frontlines could be used as an alternative to hunts, or dungeons/tomes, or anything else in order to get sands, a lot of people would probably use it as an alternative. But it isn't. If you don't do hunts, then you either do weekly lockout content (which many players feel is a bit out of their reach anyway, especially when it comes to coil, either because they can't handle it themselves or they don't have a static and pick up groups for coil is a huge gamble and often not a very pleasant experience) or you just don't progress any more at all.

If SE honestly did not predict that a lot of players were going to think "I'd like to progress in this game, and hunts appear to be my only option (either because they feel excluded from weekly lockout content or they already completed it for the week)" then I don't know what to say other than that it appears SE may be very out of touch with players. Even if they did create hunts to be taken down by small groups and would have hoped that if too many people were doing it, that they'd realize they were having a bad time and back off, this would be a really odd line of thinking IMO. Why create progression content that you'd prefer most of your user base just doesn't do? Why offer incentives that damn near everyone in the game is going to want specifically in content that is horrible when trying to sustain a large number of people? Especially considering that it only takes a small number of people to run around killing all of these things off. Even if 75% of players interested in hunts were to take a casual approach, that other 25% taking the mega efficient approach is going to down these things with ease. It could probably be much lower than 25% and they'd still obliterate them. To think that they wouldn't would be completely oblivious to player habits.
#90 Jul 14 2014 at 2:00 PM Rating: Excellent
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It's strange to me that my daily targets can be harder than the elite ones and for less reward. Depends on timing, but sometimes you get that FATE on steroids. It took me a good 5 minutes + to wear down Bubbly Bernie earlier with others jumping in too.Smiley: lol
#91 Jul 14 2014 at 2:19 PM Rating: Excellent
Just read a post on the OF from someone who claims to be trolling hunt parties/linkshells by renaming his chocobo with the names of elite marks. He'll ride out to a mark's zone, head to a remote location and then pop his choco... says the giant mob arrives within minutes. Smiley: lol

Such a great way to troll radar plugin users!
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#92 Jul 14 2014 at 2:34 PM Rating: Excellent
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Thayos wrote:
Just read a post on the OF from someone who claims to be trolling hunt parties/linkshells by renaming his chocobo with the names of elite marks. He'll ride out to a mark's zone, head to a remote location and then pop his choco... says the giant mob arrives within minutes. Smiley: lol

Such a great way to troll radar plugin users!


... So doing this.
#93 Jul 14 2014 at 2:49 PM Rating: Decent
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Thayos wrote:
Just read a post on the OF from someone who claims to be trolling hunt parties/linkshells by renaming his chocobo with the names of elite marks. He'll ride out to a mark's zone, head to a remote location and then pop his choco... says the giant mob arrives within minutes. Smiley: lol

Such a great way to troll radar plugin users!


Yep been doing this and kept a screenshot/short video of people who did it and forwarded it to the STF lol. I was so far out of the way it's impossible to know it would be "spawned" there when no one was near me at all then all of a sudden bam..30 people out of nowhere.
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#94 Jul 14 2014 at 2:50 PM Rating: Excellent
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Yep. Good way to confirm cheaters on your server as well. Just put up a chocobo as an Elite mark, sit where the mark may normally show up, ready screenshot, and bam. Caught in the act.

Problem is the cheaters can smoke-screen themselves by sending their LS mates who don't know what's going on.
#95 Jul 14 2014 at 2:57 PM Rating: Excellent
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Problem is the cheaters can smoke-screen themselves by sending their LS mates who don't know what's going on.


Yep.

I see a mark's name with coordinates in ls or party chat, and that's where I'm going, even if all that's waiting is Theonehio and his bird. Of the 30 people who show up, probably only one or two of them have any kind of plugin.

But it's still pretty damn funny! I obviously take myself much less seriously than others who I've encountered in this game.

Edited, Jul 14th 2014 1:58pm by Thayos
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#96 Jul 14 2014 at 4:32 PM Rating: Excellent
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Would be fun to get a group(s) of folks together and have 10 or 20 people rename their choco the same thing. Fill the zone up FTW lol
#97 Jul 14 2014 at 4:35 PM Rating: Default
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I've made it my new hobby to follow any large group of people I see running around in a zone until I find the mark they're after and then pull it before they can. Yeah, it's a **** move, but it's also the only way I'm able to get any credit for a mob that's going to die in less than fifteen seconds.

Edited, Jul 14th 2014 6:36pm by Turin
#98 Jul 14 2014 at 4:50 PM Rating: Excellent
Turin, are you on Hyperion? If so, then I think you're in my hunt LS.
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#99 Jul 14 2014 at 5:13 PM Rating: Excellent
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Theonehio wrote:
Thayos wrote:
Just read a post on the OF from someone who claims to be trolling hunt parties/linkshells by renaming his chocobo with the names of elite marks. He'll ride out to a mark's zone, head to a remote location and then pop his choco... says the giant mob arrives within minutes. Smiley: lol

Such a great way to troll radar plugin users!


Yep been doing this and kept a screenshot/short video of people who did it and forwarded it to the STF lol. I was so far out of the way it's impossible to know it would be "spawned" there when no one was near me at all then all of a sudden bam..30 people out of nowhere.

I've seen the same thing happen with people's Choco's and Characters named after FFXI NM's. So many people are hunting, you get one person running by who thinks it's funny to post it in their Hunt LS, and next thing you know it's spread to every hunt LS. It's not necessarily an indication of cheating.
#100 Jul 14 2014 at 5:18 PM Rating: Excellent
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Susanoh wrote:
Hyanmen wrote:
It is not complicated to predict the things you said, but they do not make The Hunt "bad" content. SE knew all of these things. What is harder to predict is the ferocity of the players to compete for the scarce resources in a virtual video game that they choose to play with zero obligations or attachments, and the community mindset that follows. There was always going to be competition, and competition is not inherently bad. However the extent at which people take the competition for epeen that amounts to nothing of substance in reality is what's completely out of any proportions, and something SE couldn't accurately predict beforehand (and now needs to address).


Is it really though?

Given past energy to try and shoot me down on casual, alternative progression paths, it seems we've gone from "It shouldn't be done!" to "We had no idea people would want it!" Attempting to correlate it solely to epeen is a stretch. It may be a factor for some, but you can bet there are those who don't want to fudge with Coil or just spam dungeons and wait for their respective queues. This issue itself isn't too different than Rift's fumbling with Zone Event bosses and them getting downed before people could get to them, especially in lowbie areas before incentive to level sync and "force capping" was implemented. As is, the boss HP would be set based on people who participated in the event prior with most ZEs now offering the end reward assuming you contributed in earlier phases.

As for Thayos' talk on caps, they're not needed. Simply turning the valve off isn't a guarantee things won't be crowded when an uncapped player decides to jump into the fray. What ultimately needs to be fixed is the survivability of mobs, the ability to target them and keep them targeted in crowded areas, and finally a means to pop your own NMs for yourself or a group to guarantee some spontaneous content. I doubt many would argue with upping the daily/weekly bill rewards, too.
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#101 Jul 14 2014 at 5:26 PM Rating: Good
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Thayos wrote:
Turin, are you on Hyperion? If so, then I think you're in my hunt LS.


Nope, I'm on Ultros.
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