Side Grade Gears, Is It Working?

Well I know the I level will be move to 129 in the future. But is side grade gears working? There's good side grades and there's bad.
Delve 2 is good side grades. Gives us something to work on. Bad side grades is high level avatar fights. Barely anybody wants to do it. Good but annoying side grade is ouryu did like 20 and never got anything.

When delve one first came out it was awesome. Spent 4+ hours fighting tax'et. Trying to get in plasm runs. Finally defeating tojil then shark.

When will we get back that level of excitement? And we heard nothing yet from November updates. Hopefully something good will happen and Get the people back in the game.

Go here:

http://www.bluegartr.com/threads/118737-Dev-Tracker-Discussion

There is where most people keep hours and hours complaining lack of stuffs, mechanics, make wild speculations, philosophing, whatever else you feel like to do when you think the end is near.

Wait what? Who said I think the end is near? I'm busy working on my daurabla 99. Just wish more people would log in and saying side grade gears is not working.

this is exactly the problem the game is faceing atm

How is Ouryu a good side grade but avatars a bad one? I do them all the time with my LS and some of the drops are really nice like the FC torque that lets you skip two+ weeks of meebles. Side grades are a good thing and it keeps people doing various content. As far as the second part of the question, no idea, I hope soon.

there are a couple items worth using from avatars, but i wouldn't say FC torque is one of them

it's more like 4 hours of meebles, and most people have been playing over 2 weeks.. for the average player, orunmila's is easier to get, and for any player it's better

the fights are a complete joke and the drops are garbage, this is a trend that needs to be broken.. but there's the problem of weakening existing content even further through gear buffs

don't think there's an easy solution, but there hasn't been a drop worth getting excited about for months(puppet in peril/geshho/shadow lord/headwind/avatars are all essentially garbage)..

incursion capes are mildly interesting and the content is scalable which is a step in the right direction, but you can get every exclusive drop in an afternoon while going 123-130ish.. only use of 135+ is bragging rights since the gil drops crashed into the floor and you get more loot/hr spamming gramk at a reasonable level

something that scales like incursion, has unique rewards programmed as high as players actually get, and has a few *WHOA* drops in the higher range would be lovely

Hey draylo,

Ouryu has 3 items that's once u get it u use those until something better comes. Out of the 6 avatars fights maybe 1 or 2 items are good. And I'm not going to spend 10+ fights doing it to come possibly empty handed. Incursion is nice but I spend time on it and got kinda nothing.

Delve 2 is nice side grade delve 1 was really fun. Well yea people raged over it but oh wells. Just kinda tired of all these battlefields. I still have things from aa I didn't get or didn't drop or drop but out lotted. I sound like I am complaining but was just asking is side grade working or vertical gear movement better.

It's nice when delve 1 came out there was Oatixur that took the best people a few months to get.

Yea that's what I think too. If they make some sorta near unattainable awesome gear at level 135 incursion then people would do it.

it's no-one's job to entertain your brain cells except for you.

The game will live in infamy; if you can't find a group of homies to skype out over and gear each others new toy jobs; iono what too say.

Side grade been working for this game for many years. Once the Adoulin came out with the gear that crushed a lot of stuff, people complained 24/7. You can't please any of them, they will *** regardless so I would hope SE sticks to side grades for now. Once the new ilevel comes out I would guess that is where AF3 will destroy everything once again.

135 isn't really near unattainable, there are people doing 140 or higher

there's just no reason to do higher level atm, coffers have no hidden data so they're the same regardless of where obtained and you get more coffers/hr spamming at around 130 where no SP are needed for a quick kill

if they don't want to add unique drops, they could either have weighted coffer increase better or set up a system so the drops are based on the level you ran

just some thoughts in no particular order, i like incursion as an event because you can farm merit/JP and still have a chance of pulling out some interesting gear.. they just could've done a better job on the scaling

They could simply just:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ntIsEkV-UEk

Wait what? It's nice to have the battlefield gear but how many hours should I spend on it? 10 fights in 4 hours over 2-3 days? Those 4 hours I can make 3 to 8 million doing delve, void-watch to make progress towards daurabla 99. I like to spend time to make progression. I don't like to spend time coming empty handed.

then do that why ask.

There are a few things plagueing the game

1) people waiting on shouts, but don't wanna do them unless they are difficult and you are throwing PLD+rng at it (perfect failproof setup)

2) people would rather do nothing than do a run on normal with a competently geared, but a less than ideal setup.

3) people just farm/buy gil and buy the gear they want from mercs.

4) closed groups cap out on gear they want and have no incentive to group again for the battlefield especially with randoms unless they are in the merc biz.
(yo my perfect RME static multiboxing group with outside buffs spanks VD and capped on gear already omg this game is so EZ).

Even though i've had really good luck with getting drops on normal when I dont have the people to run difficult, I think the droprates could be a bit more generous to get people to run bc's more often.

I don't think the game needs more new gear every update,
I think they need to fix the problem of people not wanting to actually *do* the content as often as the developers think we will.
People seem to put up with grinding out merits enough to get the 1 piece of gear they want the most for their main from a bc, and then stop bothering.
If the drops were more plentiful, people would gear more jobs and alts and *maybe* run the content more often.

Ask what?

if its working. do your own thing and let the masses of 'omg new content' retards go for the worthless runs.

I can't chat about ffxi in this website now according to you?

OP stated he doesn't like how the game is with one aspect - Side Grade Equipment where Each Avatar drops arguably 1 good item, so you get 6 people to spam 1 nm for everyone to want the same gear.

I do see the issue with this.

this more sounds like complaining about having to do an event that he doesnt get anything from. instead he wants to just skip it, and not help anyone, to go and do his 'please invite me' item.

My essay writing might not be great but I just want to chat about ffxi. Seems like a few people do agree with me.

If all friends need is a bard for battlefields I do join them. Will I shout for them? No. I never ask people to invite me for anything. I run a shell. Not sure how you know me better then me.

So much this. Often if I see someone shouting for a SKCNM or a MeritKINM... I'll go help them even if I don't need anything. (Assuming they're shouting for what I can give them.)

But there is also another problem, though it really has to do more with SKCNMs rather than real BCs:
Tank + Healing Magic + DDx4
That's it. Stop spending 3hrs shouting for a COR on your N SKCNM run.
You.
Don't.
Need.
A.
COR.
Or a BRD.
ESPECIALLY not on N!!
So many PUGs I've randomly joined (been a while since I needed papers too...) have stalled out because they can't get a BRD to want to do it... For NORMAL.
Even Difficult doesn't demand BRD/GEO/COR shenanigans... Really that's just VD.

I've done every SKCNM on N and D on my PLD, which has no Aegis or Ochain, and have even out-tanked a "higher level" PLD on RUN multiple times...
Which is another point of ire for me: just because you have Ochain/Priwen/117/118/119shield and "full 117" gear (eminent ***) does NOT make it so you can tank worth for ***.
SO many SKCNMs have I joined as PLD, but when asked if I have Ochain... Get kicked to WHM... And then the PLD they get is full eminence + Ochain... And is constantly dying so badly that I have to keep them alive.
Tanks shouldn't have to rely on WHMs for being kept floating in <VD SKCNMs.
At least good tanks don't.
And neither do I.
(I mean, jeeze! PLD has cures! Use them! And stop thinking <50%DT is acceptable!)

I hate when people shout for A/O PLD for N battles. For most fights, SKCNM especially, you don't even need a PLD for N.

Shouts for content lately:

Delve: Yorcia and rarely Tojil, nothing else.
Skirmish: Rakaznar >>> everything else. I haven't even seen any aluvion(sp?) shout for quite some time and that thing was only recently added.
High-tier BCs: no shout for yagudo, mamool, shadow lord, mithra at all and avatar shouts will probably die down soon since everyone wants the same item and people will start giving up.

There are so many side grade items, but so little incentive to do different fights.

Once you get your wins in delve, there is no reason to do anything but Yorcia unless you are helping a friend with their win or something like that. Not even mentioning job limitations (talking about the mentality, not saying you have to use same jobs forever).

Skirmish is... well, new weapons aren't well received by the players for good reasons and farming +2 stones and key item in Rakaznar is what really matters for most people.

Most High-tier BCs are usually "throw rangers at it or nothing" for the shout folk. Also most people are after the same item and shouts are mostly unreliable for doing anything beyond normal, except avatars for they seem to be the easiest fights.

Tl, dr; Side grades are not good enough reasons for diversity. It may be even worse now. At this point, we are literally drowning in side grades and people tend to go for the easiest; throwing gil at skirmish augments, spamming the hell out of yorcia and upgrading delve gear or making some quick cash from mats and airlixir.

NIN has it hard on some of the fights, cause shadows will get stripped often on the frequent AoE-TP moves... (Orc one especially comes to mind)
But overall, any of the three tank jobs can fulfill the "tank" slot of the tank-healer-DDx4 set.
I know I've tanked a few of the SKCNMs on D on RUN...
And if RUN can mitigate the damage... yeah... you don't need an Ochain-PLD for anything <VD.
(EDIT: Remember to cap your DT, fools!)

(One time I even got bitched at for being /dnc instead of /whatevertheywanted when they joined a shout my friend was doing... Sorry, but I like having the ability to -na myself of paralyze and have that random extra cure... and when it was time for them to punch the SMN -it was Throne Room and they were MNK- they couldn't even pull hate from me...)

Though I'm not saying that it doesn't help to have Ochain. (which is why I don't offer my PLD for VD or +119 BCs or Delve or whatnot.)
But it's not NEEDED, is the thing.

you don't need any tank for any SKC, a good sch, blm, rdm or brd can hold them all while contributing to the group in other ways(even on VD)

you can trio VD if you're decked out

doesn't really mean anything, pld is an easy and reliable way to do it and it won't go out of pickup demand anytime soon

That's true. There's multiple ways to do it, just for PUGs tank-healer-DDx4 is the easiest to generate the fastest.

Back when I actually needed papers for stuff when it was new, I can remember doing multiple of the SKCNMs via BRD sleeping everything until the DDs kill the one that's not asleep.

The side-grades are ok. For weapons, I think it's perfect. You have several sources of 119 weapons- REMs, JSE, Delve/2, Skirmish, and high-tier fights. For armor, it's a mixed bag. Delve is good. Its loot system is fantastic, and it's not too painful to spam. The high-tier fights kinda suck. Drop rates can be crappy, setups inflexible, and a lot of it is just worthless.

Hopefully the next Delve release improves things.


Shouting for Normal is just a fail, period. You can beat Difficult AA's with average-geared 109/117 rangers. And VD AA's can be downed with non-relic rangers quite easily, except Galka.

I joined a Garuda Normal yesterday and the pt couldn't fill up due to the lack of brd(and /shout on bad time), and the leader insisted that it's 100% wipe without a BRD so he isn't going wasting 20 merit on a fight that's 100% wipe.

It took me a while to convince him that spending 2hr to /shouting for a BRD is completely not worth the time since you can farm 20 merits in less than 1hr easily. Then he said unless I promise to let him leech 20 merits after wipe he isn't going. In end end I promised that I can let him leech if we wipe so we can finally go.

And we won.

And he still insisted that he should leech cuz the pt can win is all because of his awesomeness.

PUG these days.......