State Of Your Server

These are observations I have made on Unicorn server during the last, roughly, 4 months:

Overall, I have observed a huge drop in player knowledge and ability. I do not know if this is contained only on Unicorn, but more and more I am running across RDMs who don't/won't enfeeb, haste or refresh; PLDs who only voke or perform an enmity generating JA when they lose hate, but not as an effort to prevent that from happening; THFs who won't use or simply don't understand SATA and who show up to a pt claiming to not have ranged so they do not have to pull; endgame BLMs who do not have /rdm and refuse to level it favoring /nin instead from their days soloing/duoing to 75 and who are also missing basic spells; the list could go on to include almost every job available to us at this time.

Every single party I've had in the last month has had at least one person with an underleveled subjob, and quite a few have included multiple people in this position. When I say underleveled, I do not mean the ocassional 62PLD/30WAR that we've all run across from time to time, but I am referring to job combos like 58THF/12NIN.

Yesterday's typically full, popular camp locations have quickly become today's wastelands, save for a few FOVers. Valkurm, at this time, has 10 people in zone, no parties; Qufim Island is currently populated with 19 characters, only one party.

Are these observations conveying a general state of the entire game at this time, or is this lackluster, carefree attidude contained to Unicorn only?

What drastic, and even non-drastic, changes have you observed on your server recently that is altering the landscape of what we were accustomed to while playing FFXI?

What is the meripo situation looking like? or the 55+ camps?

I think a mixture of AFB and FOV are why there's not too many low level parties going on any more.

I'm really not too sure about party situations. I only leveled some DNC levels in party and it seemed fine. Rest was solo/duo (using FOV), and a little of it was AFB'd.

Job before that was PLD. I was able to get through PLD decently fast from 1-75. Took I'd say maybe 3 months at most.

So on Shiva server, while I was there, it seemed still pretty active. Though I had ran into some low levelish people who didn't have a clue about what they were doing. On Gilga, I haven't had much time to do the things I did on Shiva. So I really can't comment on that. However during camps I do see quite a few people using FOV while seeking.

As of right now (~2:15am EDT), there are 2 55+ parties in both Wajaom and Bhaflau Thickets, which honestly is high from what I've been observing as of late. Also as of right now, there are 2 meripos taking place in the Thickets.

Generally speaking, I have spent hours upon hours lfg for meripos as rdm, whm, drk, rng. I don't know if my timing is off and I'm simply missing the smaller NA crowd that is here (generally play from 4-8pm and 11p-3a) or if that smaller NA crowd is simply only meritting with people they already know.

In all honesty, Nixx, I would not recommend Unicorn at all unless you already know people here. Getting established here, attempting to make even a small group of friends has proved to be beyond challenging. >.>

Shiva seems tasty and she was my favorite summon. I'm most likely gonna head there but I still got about 2 weeks to think about it. Edit-> Yea Unicorn doenst sound so good right now lol.

You sir have made my night, thank you. I lol'ed harder than I probably should've.

I've been noticing this a lot longer than 4 months.

I just x-fered back to Levi from Carby and I have to say that I seen the same things as the op and have noticed far less people in "advanced" area's
i.e Sky Sea etc etc.

Also I have seen a major jump in price in most high lvl crafted gear and food.

I am starting to think they might combine some servers here in the near future which would probably be good overall for the player base because last week on Carby i did a /sea all and came up with under 1k people on a Friday at 7pm est.

Things seem a bit... off... on Remora as well. AFB shouts have replaced the random lfg shouts I remember seeing in Whitegate. ({experience Points}{party}58-59{do you need it?}{Paladin}{Ninja}{Yes please}^^) While I'd like to provide anecdotal evidence of the decline of the overall knowledge of the playerbase, I can say with some pride that Shinsokus are now 1/7 the price of an Onimaru.

Now, if I could just have a word with the SAM I saw TPing in a meritpo with a Bushido Cape last night...

Lots of new players? Does this indicate that an MMO is dying? Or that it is still alive and kicking? People on Odin complain that it's impossible to find someone to do CoP because everyone has already finished it. When I see people leveling 55+ in Qufim like it's the only zone left to level in, I sometimes help them get their Kazham keys, show them how to build a decent PT and they're like "OMG, new zones! the game is bigger than I thought"... >.>

Help them understand and if they're acting dumb and not following advices, give them time, natural selection will make the lamest ones quit, most likely.

I think most people have taken the attitude of "FFXIV is coming out why bother anymore" and so they don't take FFXI as seriously any more or just don't care. However, I've seen a definite increase in new players, sandy is over run by red question marks at the moment. Not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing.

Yeah there is a whole new breed of fail on Unicorn.

I mentioned this in the FFXIAH LS topic but I had a Qufim party the other day with a PLD27/WAR05 and a WHM who was casting silence on crabs to "stop their AoE bubble attack"

On the plus side, I play with a ton of good players from multiple linkshells so I don't experience that a lot.

Another thing that annoys me...

Everytime I get a pre ToAU area party the question "Where is our PL?" comes up.

I've seen this on Asura as well. As a matter of fact, last night I was in a merit pt (BRD, COR (me), RDM, SAM, WAR, WAR) and I tell you, this was the worst pt I've seen in quite a long time.

Where should I start? RDM had NO CLUE on where to stand (he chose to be right up on the melee, so I couldn't give him evoker's, and the melee.....they were GOD AWFUL! I'm not just talking crappy gear either (even though the gear was bad), but just overall performance.

These guys couldn't hit for ***....even with mad/hunter's, we couldn't hold a chain past 5. I don't know if this is the cause of apathy towards the game, level sync, FoV, AFB, etc., but this is happening all too often these days, I couldn't take the pt anymore when the BRD pulled a mob and instead of voking it, they simply followed it while the mob bashed the BRD into submission.

Yep its like this alot too on the Pheonix . Most ppl stay on Qufim syncing to 21-24 . Most 75s wont sync down cuz they cant live with out thier 'pimp' gear choosing to LFP in Campain Battle , which is where most of the 55+ choose to Lv , or so it would seem . I would have to say that most ppl choose the solo routes thru Campain or FoV Vs conventional EXP PTs for what ever reason . The Jungles of Elshimo are empty save for the few that FoV there , rarely is there an actual PT there . In trying to help a friend new to FFXI get to 75 (currently @lolDRG67) it's hard to make a PT of his LV , we usually sync to 55-63 , or 68 because ppl refuse to EXP of anything that isnt a Colibri , Puk , or Imp . Ask someone to EXP in a CP at 55+ and they drop PT or refuse .

This has been posted by someone every few months since almost right after the NA release. It isn't anything new, you are just running into bad players and being more observent looking for them.

As someone who's done about 175ish merits as the pulling BRD, I can tell you this isn't a new development at all. :P

I definitely acknowledge that, depending on who you ask, the sky has been falling for quite some time. All of us who have played for any substantial amount of time have horror stories of people who did not seem to have a clue.

The change that I have observed is that instead of running into one or two of these misfits a month, it's now 2-3+ a party, every party, every time.

I failed to preface my OP by saying that I have only been on Unicorn for 5-6 months, and by doing so, readily confess that I am far from the expert on the true duration of how long Unicorn has been on this rapid path of decline. Maybe what I've seen is nothing new and just the way things have always been here, but Excesspain referring to a "whole new breed of fail" appears to indicate otherwise.

There's a player in my LS who recently attained 75 PLD. He accomplished this with having his WAR only at lv 30, DNC at 31, NIN at 21, and WHM at 20. I fail to see the logic of why anyone would do this. I do not understand what he thinks he'll be able to do with that PLD now that he's 75. Some may argue that he's merely on a path to Maat's Cap (though PLD is his 2nd 75), but if that was the case, why not stop at 66? Or 70? Why grind through to 75, only to not have it wanted for any event, LS or otherwise?

Is there any server left that is not dominated by laziness, AFB, MMM, and solo FoV to level 60, then campaign the rest of the way?

Hades is the home of the devil and it's very hot here.

Not trying to start anything, but what's wrong with MMM? I personally find it a fun way to get exp with a couple of friends.

As for the OP, I'd say I'm noticing more douchery and idiotic things on Hades, but odds are they were always there, I just didn't see them. In 2 days I've ran into a PLD who couldn't tank, a SAM who was in a lv. 56 party on lolibri but was treating it like a meripo and almost dying multiple times, actually dying once, a SCH/SMN (lv. 71 synced to 56) :/, and a douchebag who claimed, and I quote, 'Shitty players solo in party areas {End Key}', just because my friend and I (who were duoing) didn't want to move from the Lesser Colibri camp in the Thickets. I was there for an hour before he showed up. Oh, and the real kicker is that there was only one party in Wajaom Woodlands at the time. I saved that little convo if anyone wants to see, lol.

I'd love to see it. That kind of stuff is interesting. When I first came to caitsith I felt like I was the new kid in Kansas from New york. Everytime I tried to give some advice people acted like I was insulting them. I been in 3 different endgame shells in the course of 4 weeks cause I spoke out on what they was doing wrong. I got kicked out of the shells for being right. One of the shell broke a week after I got kicked and the other 2 turned into socials thats how bad they were. People on caitsith dont take advice well. They esspecially dont take criticism well either.

This is why I only merit with LS mates period.

I refuse to be on BRD any longer than I have to, but when I am on BRD, and its for something like merits, then it has to be 6/6 LS mates or 5/6 LS mates and somebody from another endgame shell who I respect.

Stupidity has run rampant here, but you can't blame anyone about it. I for one enjoy the new influx of players, and see this as a perfect opportunity to teach them about certain aspects of this game.

I'd think its the same everywhere. imo SE have taken away everything that made this game better than other MMORPG's that I've played.

It used to be hard or atleast semi hard, every little thing you had to do in order to make any progress in this game was like a big achievement, these days they're pretty much handing everything out on a silver plate.

They might as well include 2 jobs of your own choice @ 75 and a free Maat's cap for anyone who pays for 3 months up front when they install the game.

When they make it this easy to lv thru AFB, Capmaign, FoV and what not ppl just stop caring.

Atleast when i started, to actually level a job was part of the fun, not just seeing how fast you could get as high lv as possible, thats not the case anymore, no one really bothers about the path to 75 anymore, its all about how fast you can get there.

They see why lolwow is so popular and think that they should emulate them.

Thing is, they don't understand that the actual reason why we play FFXI and not lolwow is because of the degrees of difficulty.

I think this mentality actually stems from players who have already done all the footwork many years before, and already have one or more lv75 jobs. Not from brand new players starting brand new accounts.

I have fallen heavy into HNM's, SCNM and other events and have noticed a giant slice of the playerbase that believe all you need is lv75 to fight these mobs.

Black mage is the chief offender of this attitude. Yes we all start somewhere and work our way up, but when I see many many BLM resist 50-75% on every single NM/HNM again and again you would think they would have the self awareness and respect to switch to a support job till they get their merits and a HQ stave or two situated.

White mage is the other bastion of lazy players IMO. Anyone who has experienced /sch know it's just about game changing, Penury + Cure V equals awesome in my book. Yet endlessly ppl show up /blm or /smn with no Cure Clogs, next to no merits and no bar-spell gear set (casting their half potency barspells over my fully powered ones haha).

The real attitude behind it all is, "who cares, we are doing fine" and i guess if we win, we win. But it stings when there is many amazing knowledgeable players who bring their A game and bust their *** everyday to grow and be more useful to their linkshells, only to carry dead weight and stand behind lazy players who have been there longer XD


I guess this is not unique to Unicorn, but all the same it makes the skilled and aware gems really stick out when you come across them:)

Because it has pretty yellow birds.

There was another thread on this forum that was debating about how useful /sch is to whm. Fact is, it may not be necessary in order to perform your job well, but I'd still think that any dedicated whm would have every subjob leveled that might have some use to them in an endgame situation. Although I enjoyed leveling smn more than any other sub (so much in fact that I took it to 75, lol) I really don't see there being any use to even have it leveled for whm anymore. /blm can be useful in the right situations, most times I just go /sch.

I like seeing lots of new players, but at the same time people level sync for so long in places like qufim and afb so much that they don't have the benefit of learning details about the gameplay/their job that we did. That's what's so dissapointing to have to deal with. :(

The FF14 thing has had a dramatic impact I havent quit, cause for some reason I'm 75% sure ff14 is going to blow chunks... why I don't know XD!!!

But anyway I remember last year(or 2) on April fools day. I went to FFXIclopedia and they put this thing about some new MMO and that SE was shutting down FFXI servers at the end of month. Instantly I was like what.... as I made my way to Whitegate to shout "Hey who wants free crap," I noticed the date. I was like oh >_>; LOL

So with this said I'm not surprised if many people loose hope in FF11 because of FF14, it's bound to happen.

They should just close down everything right now. Most servers are mainly endgaming right now. This game has been going on for over 8 years now. The game is corrupted as hell.