Why Will S.E Not Uncap Merits

Equivocator does have a point, though. Even if you don't think timesink = difficulty, I know many people that do, and it simply is not true.

Actually, merits were introduced in the June 29, 2004 update. And based on this Vana'diel Tribune article I found archived, released June 30, 2005 (a full year later), I would say you are mistaken.

You're right about one thing: That I am wrong to assume SE's intention about how they wanted us to enjoy the game. Over-extrapolating is a mistake I often make.

You wrong about one thing: You are doing the same thing, except instead, you're merely preaching the opposite opinion... ^-^;

Assuming is never the right thing to do. Perhaps even SE didn't care and was merely experimenting stuff to see how players would react.

Keep in mind that before Rise of the Zilart came out, the game had very low ratings in Japan. It was pretty much criticized as being an abomination and a shame to the series (don't ask for sources, have fun looking at the original 2002 ratings from Japanese magazines though).

SE, realizing that people were expecting more than a stupid Everquest clone (which FF XI pretty much was, really), tried very hard and made the game a lot more attractive, especially with CoP, but also through a constant flow of free updates. One day, old players will tell you, they added rain. And people would stand there, waiting for rain to fall... Also, CoP was quite a stunt indeed, considering it was merely an "expansion", it made a pretty average MMO quite captivating all of a sudden. Whatever Rise of the Zilart tried very hard to achieve, Chains of Promathia truly excelled at.

So... I'm not too sure if stating that the game was first allowing players to be an "army of clones" (as someone above so brilliantly illustrated) makes a valid point to justify that the game should have been kept today what it was initially. It was very unpopular in Japan back then... In fact, it clearly sucked.

time sink = difficulty in the sense that most of us who play FFXI have real life ***going on, so ***in-game takes longer.

Huh, guess merits came about a lot earlier than I thought, albeit in a very limited way (when were combat/magic merits first available?).

But as per Equiv's point, right from day 1 FFXI has been unique in that it allows you to change jobs at will with no penalty, yet only certain combinations of jobs can reach their full potential.

I can't see why SE would consciously decide to let one person fully merit blm,rdm,sch,sam,drg but not smn,brd. It just turned out that way. If anything I'd assume they did it so nobody can be completely overpowered in ONE job, rather than reaching full potential in several.

In fact, aside from stats and hp/mp, I don't think opening up the rest of the merits completely would be at all game-breaking. Aside from blm,rdm,sch with elemental/enfeebling/dark/lolhealing, no jobs would really benefit from capping all combat/magic merits (that I can think of). Is it really game-breaking to allow a sam to be proficient in both polearm and GK? Well they can be anyway, but they wouldn't be able to cap parrying AND evasion. (whoop dee doo)

If an entirely dedicated PLD with sword/evasion/shield/parrying decides to level another DD job, those sword and shield merits aren't doing ***while he's waving around a Gaxe.

And if (assuming merits are open) someone has completely capped all combat skills, that's not going to help much when they decide to level a mage job.

If you're talking about specialising in only one job, rdm,blm,sch,whm are the exception. They're the only jobs (unless you count drk elemental magic <_<) that would be advantaged by having more than 16 magic skill merits. Even brd wouldn't benefit greatly due to the very limited use of stringed instruments. Not one melee job is advantaged by having more than 20 combat merits, except for adding a little versatility in weapons, which is a very situational thing.

Aside from those 4 jobs, you could be completely capped on every skill and it wouldn't make a damn difference on a job by job basis. If I've levelled BLM to 75 and got all the exact same gear as Antipika, why should I be put at a disadvantage just because I chose to level as well? My blu merits don't advantage my blm in any way and vise versa.

September 14, 2004, also before Maat's Cap.

Oh I wasn't trying to use that as my argument, I was just wondering that time.

I know. Just driving the point home, especially to that guy who said merits were "relatively new" ?.?

I didn't know something established 5 and a half years ago was "new."

What about... New kids on the Block!?! They been out over 20 years

I've always ran with the idea that as you level your jobs to 75, the cap of merits increases. Potentially, raising RDM to 75 would grant you access to enfeebling, elemental, enhancing, etc, as it does already, however... after capping those out, if you were to raise your Summoner to 75, it would unlock summoning magic with a completely different cap, rather than throwing all the magical skills into one catagory.

It would be easier done if the different magical skills were separated into their own perspective classes group. It would require more work on the players part, but would allow you to cap your various skills, attributes, stats, etc.

Releveling another character, doing all the same missions, all the same quests, all the same easy Rare/Ex mobs just so you can have all your jobs fully merited is one massive time sink.

End result in doing that? You have X number of jobs fully merited.
End result in a raise in merit cap? You have X number of jobs fully merited.

The only difference in the 2 systems is Time and more money for SE.
No difference in Skill, No preschool playground. Just one massive timesink.

A rise in the Merit cap isn't going to make it any easier. (Which seems to be your main argument.) Someone could have the exact same efect, just with more time and more characters. Actually, after the initial time investment, switching to characters fully geared is probably quicker then swapping equipment out of your Mogsafe.

So I think what you're saying is that if people are willing to put up with the difficulty (re: Time SINK) of leveling different characters, they can benefit from capped merits. So you're ok with the game being a 'preschool playground' as long as people level on different characters to do so?

P.S. Also, I said in my first post that I made the Magic Merit choices and am quite happy with those choices.

Maybe on FF XI yeah. But again played other game, and it was the same ***, well even worse actually. Took me like 2 years of PvP in Dark Age of Camelot to acquire and high rank and get "special abilities" (works like merits basically). While my main character was "powerful" my alt were average because I didn't PvP much with these, so they were basically meritless. I didn't QQ and just accepted it. I like the fact that career player are able to more powerful.

And again merits makes a difference, but doesn't make your character unplayable if you don't have any. Especially since you are still able to merits group 1/2 merits for each job. Be happy that SE didn't even limit these.

***.

How comes giving player more power aren't gonna make the game become easier ?

Unfortunately 99% of these -someone- won't have the same effect because they do not have enough time to level another character etc.

Therefore your point is not valid.

Those same people wouldn't have time to level other jobs, or even merit!

Right back at you mate ;)

I'm so sorry you think that 90% of this game is a timesink. Perhaps you should stop playing. Hint: FFXI is not just end game, mmmkay?

Wrong. You seem to be forgetting that you'll have a bunch of overpowered people, and a bunch of weak *** mobs. Should they adjust the difficulty of these mobs to compensate for a bunch of overpowered people? Oh no, cause people would *** that it's too hard, just like they did for CoP!

Again, if everything in this game to you is a time sink, it's time for you to quit and move on.

Uh...yes it is. Merit's capped in all attributes, all weapons, all spell skills, all combat skills. What's your goal of the game, to be unstoppable? Invincible? Go back to playing console games with Game Skark, little boy. Leave the MMOs to the people who actually enjoy a challenge.

How is it a preschool playground if you're subjected to the same thing everyone else is? You can have a BRD with capped singing and wind without having to worry about meriting your BLM on the same character.

Then pipe down. Don't try to fix something that isn't broken.

Man, so many stupid points, I give in.

Sorry, i dident bother reading the 4 pages, but, heres my 2 cent

i dont like the idea of uncapping Stats, MP/HP, and job sections, but Melee i dont understand why not? i mean you cant dual wield 3 weapons..... and seeing as you can already cap two weapons 8/8 you can already cap Dagger, and Katana if you want, or Axe / Sword so you already can have max merits on a dual wield so? Being able to cap another weapon iset going to effect one job anyway? its just going to help your two hand job i dont see the problem of being able to do something like 8/8 Katana 8/8 Dagger, and 8/8 Gkt or whatever, because its not going to overpower any one job

What about people who have more than 2 melee jobs leveled?

I mean, a WAR would love to cap GA, and a SAM would love to cap GK, but what if the player, who happens to be a WAR and SAM, also levels DRG? They can't cap Polearm thanks to his previous 8/8 in GA/GK. Does that mean his is screwed now?

Thats what im saying is why isent melee uncapped, because its not going to overpower any one job, its like saying "Oh you cant have more than two weapons merited because you can now dual wield 2handed" Herrpadurrrrppppp
Since he has GA and GKT capped why cant we cap Polearm too, its silly because you cant.

poor BRDs still can't go to their full potential either.

They have only 3 magic skills, and they use all 3 too...

Magic is pritty much the same, other than the fact that RDM could cap every magic skill and be overpowered that way, but its pritty much the same princapal you are not getting any help from singing merits while on WHM so whats the big deal? In my mind they probably will never uncap merits, and if they do they will uncap everything, and then it will be overpowered because any job with Every slot they want 5/5 or 8/8 or whatever you want :/

IMO, they should make merits so that you can adjust them in your mog house or something.

To be clear, I wouldn't propose a system where you could freely unassign/reassign merits from every category. That'd drastically reduce the number needed, since you'd only need to "fully merit" one job, and then move merits around when you swap from one to another.

What I mean is that you'd put points into, say, the Combat category, which would be a permanent upgrade to it. You could then shuffle around what those points are applied to within that category.

You'd still want as many, if not a few more merits per category than you have now. Reason being, you'd want enough into each category so that you'd have the option to configure the most costly configuration in each.

It'd also still provide something of a limit. IE, a WAR couldn't walk out of the mog house with 8/8 Sword, Axe, GAxe, Polearm, and so on. They'd still need to commit to a setup or two. A mage would still need to pick only two schools of magic to have full points into. It's no more "overpowering" to any one job than can already be done.

The difference is that every job in your repertoire would be able to have the same level of meriting. To me, that's logical - we can level all the jobs, we can gear them all very well, with only a few items that you can't have at the same time as others. We can skill everything up to the normal caps.


I mean, if they wanted to just let us merit everything in Combat/Magic to 8 (or 4 for defensive Combat skills), then that'd be fine by me too.

Merits help, but some are just more applicable across the board than others. People usually use jobs based on utility moreso than merit anyway.

This is the only post on this matter I have seen that I would have to say anything to. Tarutaru BLM with more HP = a walking bomb. Taru BLM are already suicidal, they drop the biggest nukes, and have the highest INT line. Give them more HP, and you'll see more dead Taru's than you ever thought possible. Would I love to have more HP as a taru? Absolutely! Did I know when I created my char 3 years ago that I was hindering myself from going melee simply based on my HP? Yes. Uncapped merits would allow for any race, any job, to be potentially limitless. I prefer the challenge; for example MB on KA when fighting SW. Do I drop a Burst II on MB and potentially get raped for my actions, or do I take the chickenshit way out and nuke lower so others die? Merits limit players to being great at some jobs and ok at others. Wheres the fun at when you have blue on every merit? Just would take the thrill out of playing imo.

I'd love for you to actually point out the "stupid" points instead of making a blanket statement and leaving it at that.

All I hear is "I'm indecisive as hell and want SE to baby me!"

8/8 sword for Pld Atonement, 4/4 Shield for Pld, 8/8 Gkt for Sam..

No other combat merits matter, period.

Seriously though, I do like this guy's idea tbh..

But at the end of the day, it's all about business. The more of a timesink they can make this game, the more revenue they can generate. As the revenue starts to taper off, they will nerf parts of this game to make it easier for mainstream players to keep them interested. WOW used to be semi-respectable as a MMO until they totally nerfed it. FFXI used to have some level of challenge (with the exception of AV and PW) until they kept catering to mainstream MMO players and newbies to keep subscription levels high.

Ultimately, SE could care less what you want, as long you keep paying their monthly fees =)

Wee Quote war's, they're fun!

I said doing it all again was a stupid time sink, not doing new stuff. There's still quest/missions I haven't done yet. It's fun for me, so i'll keep playing, thanks for your concern though. (btw Strawman argument)

Ummm... thats no different to it is, right now. I can make an alliance of 18 fully merited people, with just about any number of job combination in my LS. OMG all the mobs are too weak now!?!? Wait. What was your point again?
See above. You seem to repeat yourself a bit.

Once again, you seem to be missing this bit. People can already do this, A rise in the merit cap would just make it happen in a little less time. It's not going to make anything any easier.

Also, telling me to leave again, you really must be running out of things to say.

Umm if the merit cap was raised, i'm pretty sure that would be for everyone too. So everyone would be subject to the same thing, so how can it be a preschool playground? <Mind boogle>

Just because I like something, dosen't mean I dont think it can be improved.

MMO = time sink. Doesn't mean we're not enjoying ourselves while we waste countless hours, days, weeks, months, and/or years doing it. Why is everyone so up in arms and wanna fight each other over forums 24/7?

Did I not say on page 3 that this game was easy? Oh right! I did! So again, what's the point of making an easy game easier? Because you're indecisive and can't pick one or two jobs and stick with it? You need to have 4-5?

Learn to read, chap.

You're not making it easier though.

I think you need to learn to understand, Bro.

Explain how it's not making it easier. As far as I can see, no one in support of this has provided a better argument than the one I've mentioned.

And I ain't a "bro."

Explain how it is making it easier.

You're only argument is that it's making it easier, but you havent said how.

I could argue for convenience, but the only reason I want it is for selfish reasons. I love playing heaps of different jobs and I would love to play them all without having to sacrifice the abilities of one for the other. Without having to rehash over a lot of content I have no desire to repeat.