[Aleera]

Not really complaining about the gil, dynamis usually nets you more than you spend. But the fact that there's often quite a few people who walk out empty handed or disappointed each time is what gets me. You take limbus for instance. You spend 15k for the entry fee, everyone pays 15k to get in, but each person walks out (assuming your group splits coin drops evenly at the end) with enough coins each person makes profit off it. Even if you don't get the AF+1 drop you need, each person still walks out a little richer. But with dynamis, some groups of upwards of 30 people enter, only one person has to pay, usually gets their gil back and then some, but quite a few of those other people walk out empty handed cause of shit drop rates. So no, it's not really about the gil, but both events require you to pay to get in, but don't really evenly reward you, either.

[.Sotek.]

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but if I spend a million gil+ a week doing events, I better expect a good amount of drops in the event, not lucky to just get one piece.

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Granted, one of those said drops was a RDM hat (finally), is that enough to justify spending millions of gil doing the zone?

With Dynamis you're probably not spending anything and you're not getting anything, a waste of time at best. Both of you clearly talked about gil, though.

Again, I agree with the drop rates being awful. I've seen more RDM hats and Tabards drop than I have seen anything I want. Fuck I had a Tabard drop to me because no one wanted it.

[Velhart]

.Sotek., on 03 June 2010 - 12:36 PM, said:

What's the problem with spending money of events? Almost all of them easily make you more money than you spent on them.
Not that I disagree with the ridiculous drop rates in this game, but using gil as a reason to be upset about them seems stupid when they're cheap as fuck and should make you money.

It isn't cheap, maybe not to the people who have time to dedicate themselves to crafting and farming on a daily basis, which is time some people do not have, and SE does not acknowledge those type of players. Other MMO's have a large player base because they don't have ridiculous kind of requirements to participate in end game events. Hell even in WoW, to get the Shadowmourne, it technically does not require any gold out of your pocket to complete the quests, sure its difficult to get, but it at least opens up opportunities for everyone instead of people who spend a large amount of hours a day earning the gil to do "one" event.

[.Sotek.]

What events are these exactly? If you're running a Dynamis shell, thats the only way you'll spend 1mil in a week and with Dynamis you should easily make that back if not fucking double it.
Limbus is the only event I can think of that actually costs everyone involved gil and thats fucking 15k. The minimum coins I've got back is 2 and thats only 3k off covering the cost. Forgive me for not caring about the people who can't make 3k in 3 days.

Events in FFXI are time sinks, nothing more. Upgrading Relic/Mythic weapons or Salvage armor is a different story. Even then I'd say Mythics and Salvage is more time sink than gil.

[Aleera]

It's more of the gil:reward ratio than just spending gil on it at all. But yeah... It's an even bigger waste of time when I know some people wait years for a piece to drop. And with AFv3 coming out soon on the horizon, I don't think people will be willing to spend more time and gil on 6 year old gear that may be outdated soon.. So hopefully SE will realize this and up the drop rates again soon.

And damn, I wish I had your LS. lol If only we had THF hands, PLD bodies and RDM hats drop more frequently... lol We rarely see any of those.

[Velhart]

.Sotek., on 03 June 2010 - 01:46 PM, said:

What events are these exactly? If you're running a Dynamis shell, thats the only way you'll spend 1mil in a week and with Dynamis you should easily make that back if not fucking double it.
Limbus is the only even I can think of that actually costs everyone involved gil and thats fucking 15k. The minimum coins I've got back is 2 and thats only 3k off covering the cost. Forgive me for not caring about the people who can't make 2k in 3 days.

Events in FFXI are time sinks, nothing more. Upgrading Relic/Mythic weapons or Salvage armor is a different story. Even then I'd say Mythics and Salvage is more time sink than gil.

What in Dynamis are you getting back if you are saving the coins to upgrade? Every Dynamis shell I was ever in, the person running it always saved the coins. I can agree with you if it is all for purely gear hunting, but 90% of people who run Dynamis do it for upgrading. And yes, even 15k can be expensive to some. When I played FFXI, I had only enough time to do one event with the LS at night and that was it, I never got the spare time to go out and make gil. The point is to not make you care, but SE not caring about it's suscribed players who do not have all the time in the day to make gil to participate in these events. Can say what you want, but almost everything in this game revolves around gil one way or another, which is not a good thing, and one of the many reasons that there is such a decline in the game today, some people are just fed up with it.

I don't disagree with what you think, and you do make points to an extent, but a game just ends up being no fun using these methods of gameplay.

[Aleera]

.Sotek., on 03 June 2010 - 01:46 PM, said:

What events are these exactly? If you're running a Dynamis shell, thats the only way you'll spend 1mil in a week and with Dynamis you should easily make that back if not fucking double it.
Limbus is the only even I can think of that actually costs everyone involved gil and thats fucking 15k. The minimum coins I've got back is 2 and thats only 3k off covering the cost. Forgive me for not caring about the people who can't make 2k in 3 days.

Events in FFXI are time sinks, nothing more. Upgrading Relic/Mythic weapons or Salvage armor is a different story. Even then I'd say Mythics and Salvage is more time sink than gil.

If you spend 15k on limbus, most people walk out with enough coins to cover their fees, if not most of the fee. Again, limbus is not the issue here... Putting 500k into dynamis (regardless of making enough to cover fees back) is only for one person buying the glass. What about the other people who walk into dynamis, waste 3 hours of their time, and walk out empty handed? Twice a week, for years, and still never see the piece they want drop. Of course, they walk in with paying nothing, walk out with nothing, but what about the lost time? Or when glasses are split among participating members? It's still costing someone 500k to get in in the first place. But again, it's not so much the gil, it's the fact that you can spend 15k a person (usually 6-10 people doing limbus at a time), costing maybe 150k max, and everyone makes their money back, or gets coins used for items from Sagheera. There's compensation. 500k divided by figure.. 25 people max? 20k a pop, not everyone gets compensated, and it takes 3 hours vs half an hour, generally speaking. So again, the gil/time:reward ratio is very unbalanced for dynamis. Limbus isn't even in the question.

[.Sotek.]

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I don't disagree with what you think, and you do make points to an extent, but a game just ends up being no fun using these methods of gameplay.

What methods? Making one person pay and the rest leech? Really, your arguing about gil when it is a problem for only one person in a LS. The rest are only losing time. Gil has little to do with people quiting, people don't enjoy doing the same event for 3 hours twice a week and getting nothing, they're not actually spending anything and the person who is is making money (even if they're going for relic, they've halved the cost). It's the time cost that's pissing people off, not the gil cost.

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What about the other people who walk into dynamis, waste 3 hours of their time, and walk out empty handed?

Are you serious? That's my bloody point.
You both said gil was what cost people in events and was making people quit. I said it's the bloody time sink.

[Aleera]

And I'm not disagreeing with you... I'm saying it's the combination of gil AND time vs. the rewards you get back VS. other events. Limbus is a non-issue because it's well balanced with time/gil:reward. Dynamis is not. Yes, Salvage drop rates blow even worse than dynamis, but at least you can do Salvage more than twice a week, and it doesn't cost you anything to enter other than doing assaults which can reward you as well. Plus alexandrite drops and sells pretty fast. And it doesn't take nearly as long as dynamis would. That is the point I'm trying to make. Plus certain times dreamlands and tav don't often reward you back with as much currency as some other zones, either. And their drop rates on accessories, -1 gear and AFv2 is just as atrocious.

[Velhart]

Not getting what I am trying to say. Point I am making is that you can't get far without dedicating gil/time in the game. We all agree that the game is a major time sinker, but to actually get the high end stuff you want in the game, it requires endless amount of gameplay time to get it, like relic weapons from Dynamis. Unlike what I am doing in WoW, my schedule is the same as it was in FFXI, but I can still accomplish getting what I need from ICC10 and ICC25 to get the Shadowmourne without having to take a ton of gold out of my pocket to do it. It is wrong of me to compare two different games, but this concept gives opportunities to everyone and still difficult to the point that it is very rare to see a player with one.

I am debating with myself if I am arguing with you or agreeing with you. Point I am trying to make is, the game revolves heavilly around gil in almost any given situation, which some people do not have time for, and SE does not make any major attempts to make the game more for the casual player who can't farm gil for hours. But all I am griping about is why FFXIV is coming out anyways.

Anyways, I think we are suppose to be talking about MMM in here, my bad, haha.

[pathwriter]

Velhart, your point about Shadowmourne is... weak at best. I've forgotten what the crafting material is, but that's gold, no matter how you cut it. It's gold that your spending by use, in that you get it as a drop from a boss (and it somehow doesn't go to the guild?) or you spend your Frost Emblems for it, but you're still spending. Raiding in WoW involves moderate expenditure, too, unless you're going to hang around a guild that wipes twice to regular mode Marrowgar before finally beating him.

Honestly, though, gil is the least of smart players' worries. I was in a Dynamis shell that was exploitative as fuck, all the currency went to one person who funneled it as she saw fit. Now, admittedly, most of it got sold to shell members at a nominal price (well below market value), but more than enough lines her pockets and funds the relics that she underutilizes. If you need currency from Dynamis just to support yourself, then you wouldn't hang around that shell, obviously. But, frankly, even with a modest playtime, it's not hard to pick up a couple hundred thousand gil per week and that's more than enough to sustain oneself. With most gear being drops and largely Rare/Ex instead of crafted or sellable, the need for liquid currency is even more laughable.

Either way, SE has taken the extreme route when it comes to keeping people playing. The irritating thing is that it works. People are still doing Dynamis 7 years after it was released for the items of questionable worth or that are simply irreplaceable, and some of them have literally been waiting years to get a Duelist's Chapeau or Scout's Socks. SE dangles just enough carrots in front of just enough noses to keep people interested. Then there's things like Salvage and Moblin Mazes. Interest in both, at least as far as drops from MMM are concerned, has been dropping off sharply as the obsessives have gotten their shit and the people who, like me, lost patience after 6 months of almost fruitless running have learned their lesson. Some kind of balance needs to be struck, but if they keep to the same weird conditions and lousy drop rates as all other items in MMM, I imagine Sadistiq will be aptly named indeed and will have few if any visitors past the first couple weeks.

[Velhart]

That is always the thing I liked about FFXI over other MMO's. Events in FFXI only got "barely" outdated at best. Even saying that, people are still doing Sky/Sea/Dynamis/Limbus and so on after 7 years, which is a great concept. I don't know what will happen when the cap is taken up to 99 at the end of this year, but it is a big accomplishment to keep people on those events for that long.

I might be putting a sock in my mouth saying that, but Pathwriter did bring up a lot of good points. When you haven't played for 1 1/2 years, it is kind of natural to look at the negatives of something.

[Corrderio]

Lets just agree the drop rate in XI is shit and move on?

[Prothescar]

Time = money.