Dev Tracker - Discussion

I don't agree, I get FFXI is all about low drop rates but they also take things too far.

Shinryu armor and weapons are best farmed in Trove. That isn't good design. +1 cases being super rare plus RNG on top of RNG isn't good design. The memebers of this forum have offered dozens of solutions that wouldn't cap you out in a month but also reward players over time.

The RoEs objectives should be monthly, great subscription carrot and would barely change +2 acquisition in the long run. (you could easily go years without seeing the your main jobs from a monthly +2 and never see a perfect +2)

Your continuing to participate, means you agree, even if you say otherwise.

Every time you enter a bcnm, or an event, you say I enjoy this.

Change occurs when more people decide they do not like this. By not entering.

cases should give earrings for the job you're on

You're assuming the design goal was to get everyone to spam Shinryu for all the items. Trove needs to stay appealing because of the people who pay for extra mules and keep sub active just to avoid missing out on it. That's why they added all the extra vouchers with TVR. I wouldn't be surprised if they only added Shinryu in the first place so they could later throw the drops in trove.

It's not content that was meant to last forever, it was super packed for a couple months then died off. But, Crepuscular is now arguably the most desirable drop in trove.

It reduces the value of doing the content. Right now, a group clearing 9/9s gets maybe 40 old cases+1 on a good month (~2 +2 earrings). Adding a free +2 earring every month is more than a 50% boost for a group that's already maxing out, that's not 'barely changing'.

More importantly, nobody is unsubscribing because they do a 9/9 every day and haven't seen the earring they want yet. People who can't regularly do Sortie aren't going to suddenly be able to do it because of a RoE, they're just going to pay someone to clear it once a month and quit at the same pace they would've otherwise. People who do 9/9s will quit out of boredom when they realize they have nothing to do besides Sortie.

I for one, do not like the idea of trading 10 earrings for a +1 (or 10 +1 for a +2) that's really inventory intensive because they don't stack. (and honestly might be more sadistic than the existing system) The Old cases? sure. I'd rather change a full stack of regular for the +1. Seems to be on par with the regular 'upgrade' rate anyways.

Aminon has been out for 2 1/2 years and a good chunk of the playerbase still hasnt seen a +2 earring for their primary job, let alone a capped +2 earring.

The goal of sortie is Prime weapons, NOT earrings.


21,920,000 documented Galli farmed, plus whatever is on his character, and for that he's still missing the following earrings:
Bard
Samurai
Dragonn
Dancer

I have no reason to believe he's NPC'd them as he's keeping duplicates on a mule. After amassing 22 million Galli over 30 months, a +2 earring from every job should have entered your inventory at some point in time.

Exactly, it's a bonus that should make you happy. Giving it to you would remove the excitement from the grind and help you realize that you are just collecting points that will never bring you happiness.

It is an intentional design decision; you are engaging with the loot box mechanic every time you get a case+1. If you got your earrings, you wouldn't be any more. If you had a guaranteed case+2 every month, there'd be more incentive to just skip runs and do it monthly.

The argument isn't that the rate is fair or that you can get what you want. It's that they made the best choice for engagement, and it obviously worked. If you've ever heard the half-joking comment, "Guess I have to level XXX now" after someone pulled a +2 earring.. that's kind of the point.

Thorny already said most of my points better than I could, but I just want to add one other thing:

I think part of the disconnect here is the difference in perspectives for players and developers.

For Sortie, devs are thinking something like:
"We only have 3 months to put this thing together and it has to last for 5+ years, even under the most hardcore, no-life circumstances"

Meanwhile, players are thinking:
"If I play this hardcore, I expect to get all the rewards in a reasonable amount of time"

...These are, in case you hadn't noticed, diametrically opposed viewpoints. The dev wants to make the most out of the content and ensure that players have something to do, and the player wants to get the carrot.

This is why

The members of the forum have come up with a bunch of ideas to get them exactly what they want in a short period of time, and the devs have done everything they can to avoid getting players exactly what they want in a short period of time.

As soon as you catch that car, you're gonna realize there's no reason to run anymore and then your friends are gonna be like "damn, I miss Taint, I wish he'd come back." Hopefully they don't quit also, since they don't have anyone to fill your role. Something something snowball something something death spiral.

Totally agree. Sometimes, SE tells you what job to play next.

I can't tell you how many times I had specific jobs in mind for a character but then Oseem gave me unexpected augments or SE gave a rare item that completely changed my plans.

aka: Sortie's goal is prime weapons, and earrings are a bonus to that content.

aka: people wont be doing sortie for prime weapons and they'll just go once a month for a guaranteed +2 case.


Does anyone else see the problem with these two statements?
Not to mention that monthly Old Case +2 is still subject to the RNG of job selection.

To be clear, this was all from Dex. I dont have a 2nd character on account that I run sortie on to get additional drop chances.

I'm EXTREMELY Fortunate to have gotten 38 earrings. My static mates get like... half as many as me. Of the 38 earrings, i'm ONLY missing BRD DRG and SAM, you missed the maculele near the bottom. I've gotten 5 Max rolls: 2 BLU, 1 SMN, 1 DRK, 1 THF. The earring I've gotten the most of was THF, I have 4 of them, while I have a couple of jobs with 3 drops each.

I think Thorny's assessment of 40 a month might be lacking, but its super anecdotal. Some weeks we get multiple runs where we get 2 or 3 free +1s before killing aminon, then some weeks we ONLY get +1s from aminon. Tough to say.

While I don't disagree that the content's primary pull is Galli for armor/weapons and the earrings are the icing on the cake... i'm at the point where my primary chase is the last 3 jobs i'm missing. I'm sitting on just shy of 15m galli and I don't really know what weapon to make next, nor do I care. I could hang up the mantle tomorrow but I want to finish the earring hunt at this point.

The fact that many players who do the same amount of content as me have less than 10 earrings is frankly disgusting, and unacceptable. The drop rate is horrible, and then on top of that theres the extremely stingy stat roll that leans heavily towards the low end of +16.

You may not agree with it, but making the RoE's monthly (hell i'd even do weekly) would alleviate this pain point without having to change the RNG on the rolls at all. Weaker/Newer/Less fortunate players would get guaranteed rolls at a set rate, and most as you say would still continue to do the content anyway. I'd venture to guess i'm in the extreme minority of the game in that I do sortie strictly for earrings.

I mean there is a much easier way they could fix this than adding trading mechanisms, etc. Just increase the 5% of +1 in an NQ case and +2 in +1 case to 10%, then in another year to 15% then to 20% after another year and leave it there. This way they just need to change two values in the code, no new NPC, trading logic, etc.

When you make the run more valuable under certain contexts, you devalue it in other contexts.

You need to be pretty severely hooked to do Sortie every day for points when you don't even know what you're going to make next. The earring provides a small bit of variety/luck, which makes the event more interesting. Every time you go in, you know you could get that earring you really want.

Once that's gone, it's just you and your points. It might not be the primary motivation, but it plays into it. You don't have to agree with me though, since apparently SE does. They'll make it more common when they feel it's in their best interest, they don't care that you think it's too harsh. They only care if you unsub or stop doing the content.

The silliest part of this is that you can get a +1 earring in a very reasonable amount of time if you're able to kill Aminon. It's damn near the same thing, and the only difference is being able to say you're done with it, rather than a meaningful increase in strength. It's like MT said; you want to be done, they don't want you to be. Be glad they gave you NQs and +1s instead of just a single very rare equivalent to the +2.

There isnt really other content in the game once you beat Odyssey fully... other than helping people out. Plus I like playing with my friends.
It's hard to continue to set arbitrary goals just for the purpose of finding more avenues to increase my playtime.

I dont disagree with your assessment, but i'd push back on the amount of impact a monthly handout would have on the amount of participation. For example, there has to be players that stopped doing sortie all together because they were soured by the drop rate on earrings or became frustrated when they didnt get the job they wanted after x amount of runs. Had they made the RoE monthly, Even if I had gotten... 10? (how long has it been since they added the RoE) more +2 earrings, I'd wager I still wouldnt have the last 3 jobs I'm chasing and I'd still be going after them, but many players on the lower end could perhaps be more excited to continue or engage with the content more than they do currently. At least weaker players would be more incentivized to work towards an Aminon kill here and there. I only see this as a boon for the game

It's obviously unfortunate that the lack of content has forced SE to try to milk us for as long as possible with each piece of content they put out with trash drop rates or terribly long grinds tied to a daily activity. But from a developer standpoint I get it, they want to continue to keep the money coming in

This covers everyone doing Sortie daily now that have been for years IMO.
Horn is a serious upgrade, gun may be useful for some things, the rest are just toys to make grinding sortie slightly less painful each day.

Gating content behind the 2% chance of an old case +1 becoming an earring +2, relying on the chance you get the job you want out of the 22 jobs, and then getting a decent roll (25% chance?) is not good content, especially when its 30 months old already.

I feel like Horn stage 5 is a significant upgrade to any teams arsenal, and the only Prime worth considering making above whatever one's arbitrary 'favorite' job would be.

Outside of that, literally all other weapons are great at stage 4, leaning more towards 2 handers and the dagger for viability... and its literally whatever you like. The exception being shield which is fine enough at stage 2 or 3.

I find it interesting you mentioned gun more than any other weapon. It's fine, but nothing exceptional. In majority of scenarios at stage 4 id rather use Fomal or Arma, and I dont think stage 5 changes that much. I do enjoy the benefits of the bullet on my COR as a nice stat stick, but nothing more. I rarely even pull it out

I don't think this is as big of a minority as you may assume - the earrings are far and away BIS for (most) jobs at +1 and the +2s beat out many equipment sets.

Earrings are (in theory) an easier thing to obtain for casual or infrequent players as there are plenty of blue chests you can pop solo or low-man in Sortie. You should have many chances for earrings on your way up to completing an Empyrean armor set or killing top floor bosses.

The +1 rate is "fine" I suppose. I do have +1 earrings for all of my main / fully geared jobs (MNK, BLU, WAR, BLM, THF, DRG, SAM, DRK, COR) but several of them are the lowest possible roll. This is from doing Sortie every day when it first launched and now doing a 6 boss clear once every week or two. For two years of content that is abysmally bad and I have yet to see a single +2 of any kind. Others in my playgroup have received at least one +2 for what it is worth.

Shinryu drops and +2 earrings hurt because there is absolutely no illusion of fairness or reward for skill. You're completely at the mercy of RNG luck and you cannot do anything to improve your luck no matter how you try.

I don't use it all that often, mostly because COR isn't really a shooting job that often and RNG is mostly a meme, but in my experience the prime is a massive boost to damage for arebati over fomalhaut or Armageddon, especially considering the WS wall and SC properties.

That's fair. I've only gotten to RNG for Arebati... so I was locked into Annihilator

No different than Dynamis D Volte armor (especially windy Megaboss for Volte Haubert). No different from Omen bodies or Ou Hands. No different from absurd Shinryu drop rate. The only reason these got "corrected" is because they threw them into Trove so they ended up as a lottery, or because other pieces of armor (i.e. Sakpata destroys Volte set) replaced it.

It's literally the exact same process they have been doing with everything for years, SE isn't reinventing anything. After a few years of an event, it becomes dated, so SE eases restrictions and makes the shinies easier to get. New event is released, super harsh grind/criteria. Rinse/repeat. See Domain Invasion (Besieged 15 is going to be EXACTLY like DI, but super worse due to timing). Oh, and Limbus 3.0 is going to be an even worse grind than Omen/Dynamis/Sortie was for JSE. But we're not there yet. But the grind needs to be terrible (from SE's perspective) so that you do it. Otherwise, you'd finish it once and never touch it again.

Why do you think they put 3 Old Cases +1 in the VanaBout rewards? You wouldn't touch that ***if it wasn't there, and you KNOW you're not getting a +2 from those 3 cases, but you will do it anyways.

So in about 3-5 years, you can absolutely bank on Sortie earrings being released through some other means. Or they throw it in Trove. Or Shami's Box. Or Emporox's Pot. Or Ambuscade 3.0. You're just going to have to either grind the ***out until your eyes turn purple, or come back in a few years when they make getting the +2 earring you want* easier

*

You can go through every REMAD or whatever and there's really only a handful of massive upgrades across all of them. And it's mostly just the BRD/PLD ones, Idris/Yagrush and maybe Epeolatry. The rest are just your favorite job's "toy".

My hope is that Prime Weapon augments come and just completely obliterate the current meta. (But I wholly expect them to drop just like Aeonic augments, so I'll be very sad).

If I had to choose, Prime Weapons would earn RP to Rank 15, then become Usable versions and dispense something of value to that job. DDs could get unique food? Mages item's that grant special status effects? Beastmaster = new jug pets?

I know this is totally copium, but imagine if they dispensed Gallimaufry Amplifiers? Haha, that's so hilarious and cruel at the same time.

I disagree that prime weapons are just toys.

From experience, the stage 5 Gkt is so far ahead of any other Gkt option I don't even switch from it when spamming jinpu. The pdl often out does what tp bonus aeonic gives, depending how much attack you have. 99k jinpu with prime is the same as 99k jinpu with aeonic but you don't lose AM from switching.

Before prime: empy, sometimes aeonic
After prime: just prime

Same with Drg and polearm but even more so because Trishula is a weak aeonic (imo) and the prime polearm has pet stats too.

Same with dnc, prime is hands down their best weapon.

Jobs that use naegling.. You know the argument there. WS wall alone makes primes useful.

Drk idk, from what I have seen the scythe prime is a bit weak dps wise. Like the relic, its unique mechanic is keeping you alive and full of mp.

If you are about to argue the hands down best weapon for a job is "just" a toy then *all* Remas are just toys.

Yeah I just stopped chasing those ultra-rare drops and found other things to do with my time. I would argue that Omen and Volte bodies are not in the same tier of obscenely low drop rate as Shinryu or +2 earrings but it doesn't really matter.

(I'm not disagreeing with you, but applying context)
I think the "toys" argument or point is that the weapons themselves don't change anything about the job, especially the DD ones. Like, a prime spear is absurd damage right? But you pop out 80k Savage Blades with Naegling and something dies anyways, does it matter? Sure you can 99k Origin, but is Caladbolg's damage so inferior that the new weapon is a "must have"? (actually, Origin is a terrible example here, I would argue THIS prime is absolutely a game-changer, but most people aren't going to minmax the unique use case of it to make it matter, they just see it as more damage). It's just bigger numbers at the end of the day, but not actually a significant increase. This isn't specific to just primes, but all DD weapons in general.

If Origin gave you an additional DTII-25% or something, that would be ultra massive of a boost, because it would then change DRK from a hyper DD into the best Tank in the game. Now, I still think it does, and until there's enough Foenaria-5 DRKs in the game, we won't really be able to see how insane the weapon is. It's currently just seen by most as another "dd weapon"

If DRG prime gave the wyvern something like an aura effect that applied Attack+20% to the party, that bonus would be a huge for parties.

If BLU sword allowed you to use enhanced Blue Magic somehow, that would change the job a lot.

Instead, in all these examples, you're just throwing more damage on yourself.

Like, I'm pretty sure a DNC can deal capped 99k Rudra's under Climactic/Grand Pas with R15 Twashtar several times on Aminon before the wall ever matters, because of the amount of damage they are putting out. Does Mpu Gandring make a significant difference besides just circumventing the wall? Aminon dies in mere minutes regardless.

The same could be said about BRD's prime, but the difference is it significantly boosts everyone's DPS (actually, all of BRD's weapons are massive boosts), and basically removes the need for Daurdabla completely (minus small niche scenario). It's just the difference between weapons that fundamentally job or benefit everyone, vs ones that don't. Idris is a massive boost because of what it does for the entire group, Epeolatry not so much. It's all context, but it's a video game, and everything can be considered a toy (it's supposed to be fun).

The funny thing is, all of the old content (and even the new ML that was confirmed beaten by two groups) were cleared without any Primes. So at least up until now, they're not fundamentally allowing you to beat something you previously could not, which would encourage someone to make it because they were struggling to beat something. This is why I see people say all of the DD weapons are kind of just new shinies.

Anyways, I don't think the word "toys" is an insult, just a way of describing how players view the current game and weapons' landscape.

I agree they don't let you do anything you couldn't do before. Can do it faster/better yes, still same result.

Same could be said for Empyrean weapons, aeonics, relics and mythics.

The fact you can get any of those weapons without already having any other Rema is proof of that.

I disagree about "game changer" though. The polearm for example has pet level on it, unique to the prime. A +3 pet level at stage 5 is a game changer for Drg.

Origin giving you back MP as well as HP is a game changer for Drk.

And Damage Dealer jobs are supposed to do dmg. That's what they are for.

Hybrid jobs like blu are in a weird spot because they're not strictly damage dealers and nothing will beat utility of the mythic for blu.

Dnc - again it's nothing ground breaking, just makes it easier to cap 99k. In your scenario, a dnc with prime can be hitting those 99ks even without Grand Pas active.

I agree they're all "toys" as such. But dismissing primes as "like remas, just a bit more dmg" is too simplistic. Not that you did this Buukki, speaking in general.

You're talking about doing damage in.. sortie? Proving my point.

You can full clear Ody with 2 naegling WARs - 0 RMEA on the dds.

If the only purpose of them is to do the event which is to get them, and you don't need them to get them except for maybe doing runs 2% faster or getting 2% more galli per run, then it is a toy and it is a pointless endeavour.