RMT Bots Have Won...

Pretty sure we've covered this in a lot of threads, but at least on the highest tier fights, I don't see it as needing to get lucky. I see it as needing to create a group able to consistantly perform well and try a few times to win. If you have to try Bumba 15 times, that's still perfectly reasonable for the goal, and if you're doing everything right every time you'll win within those tries. Realistically, if you perform perfectly you'd have a well over 50% chance at any of the T3s.

I prefer to view it the other way around. The design serves to prevent a shitty group from getting lucky and getting an undeserved win because they can manage a coherent run one in 20 tries, by making that statistically unlikely. Most of the people crying about luck aren't even trying the fights in the first place, or at least not consistantly, or they'd have won.

If you have the jobs, the gear, the strategy, and do everything correctly.. you'll win relatively fast. This is a fact for everything except Bumba V25. There are perfectly reasonable complaints about how high the job and gear barriers are, or how few people are willing to do the content, but at this point in time the luck is solely a cope.

How many groups do you know of that have the jobs, gear, and coordination to be able to win with correct luck rolls, but do not have the win yet? There aren't any, because the reward is high enough that you'll go daily for a week or two and get the win. The groups capable of winning are annoyed by the luck component, sure. But they still get their wins.

If you don't have the win, it's because you don't have a group or you aren't good enough to get it. It's not because luck is keeping you down. The people crying about luck are largely folks who couldn't even clear the easier T3V25, which don't need any to begin with.

It sounds to me like you want it easy enough that a PUG could win, if the stars aligned correctly. That honestly sounds more luck based than the current system, where a group needs to be disciplined enough to continue trying and choreograph the fight until it's routine.

Did I missed some context in your post? (I might since the discussion is kinda lengthy). I wasn't comparing one specific content to another, I only said if content has no cooldown then bringing an extra friend can be much easier. Ambuscade is used as one example, replace it with another cooldown-less content like escha it would work the same.

Difficulty is another topic, of course high difficulty content will block some people from joining. Duration of the run is indeed relevant though. I imagine a content that takes 1hr+ to do would favor static again.

If you interpret everything as support for your point, you can never be wrong. You're still the dude drooling and trying to rationalize that someone in your group with R30 Nyame couldn't have possibly earned it.

Repeating a fight until you understand it and can do everything correctly is part of serious endgame in any MMO, it's not unique to FFXI. If the NM had a 10% chance of dropping a full set of R30 Nyame, the result would be the same. The luck excuse is just that, an excuse, because if you had the ability to kill it you would've done it by now. You obviously don't.

Fact: You need some luck to kill Bumba V25. Maybe 1 in 8 runs can be made into a win.
Fact: You also need very good equipment, the correct jobs, and coordination to turn that 1 in 8 runs into a win.
Fact: This only applies to Bumba. All T3 are winnable at least 1/3 of the time, most are winnable over 1/2 the time.

Opinion: If you haven't actually tried the fights and lost, crying about luck is just a way of personally rationalizing ignoring the content. It's easy to make an excuse for why you don't have something to validate your own ego, but I find it hard to believe any serious player with a group capable of winning is going to refuse to do so because it might take a week or two of daily runs to do so. Doubly so when those same people are fine with doing daily Sortie.

This is it right here. Have said it before, the fights are so mind numbingly annoying no one that has cleared them wants to help a group still needing it, or friends still needing it.

"Make a static" may or may not work on Asura but small servers have a paucity of geared players that can actually do V20+ content. Add to that statics with clears and no interest to revisit those fights and people quitting and you have content hardly anyone is doing.

Thorny is typically always right, but not in the narcissistic *** kind of way. He spends a lot of time and energy, meticulously understanding a lot of practical and technical details. Then, he holds up those details with a magnifying glass to a variety of opinions and emotions and arrives at a sensible conclusion.

It's because that he is generally amenable to new information that he is also usually right. Once in a while, he indexes on different variables than you or I would, but it's not a bad thing.

Having said that, I believe you. There are a few people I suspect, were carried to ML50 and R30 in 200 days of playtime.

it only becomes a situation of luck in auras/etc once your group has the gear/proper sets of such gear/fight knowledge/coordination necessary to succeed.


There's a huge barrier of regular things that can screw your group up long before "luck" becomes what stops folk.

Mentionable that because there is a luck barrier, that prevents some amount from ever even attempting it.

The fact that it exists is more imposing than the fact that it can happen.

Or because someone in your group (often more than one) is not good enough to get it and the rest of the pt can't always compensate for it.

Sorry, had to be said!
Humour aside, Thorny is alas quite right once more.
It's a sour pill to swallow but I can't really seem to find anything wrong in the perspective he provided.
Sad but true?


Only thing I can say is that the game isn't particularly good, with this type of content at least, into making it look attractive, or interesting, or inviting.
So many things together can feel so frustrating (I suspect more than they actually really are, more often than not) that a lot of people will feel so demoralized they won't even want to try.
Which is quite stupid (but human?) and brings us back exactly to what Thorny was saying, after all.

I'm not sure about that 1/2 number, they seem to really favor whatever aura is the worst. One time were clearing Ongo V25 for a friend, 3/4 runs at Matk down on the first aura with the 4th having macc down. 2/4 runs also had Macc down on the 2nd aura. I've seen attack down on Tree so often we just planned to have it, making the run really about getting a 5 on Wild Card while under 40 for another burst of MS. Kalunga / Shark just don't get Magic Def Down and you'll be ok, even Attack Down won't stop you since those are just endurance fights with plenty of time for a win. Bee is similar but also have to worry about Droning knocking out Scherzo. Shark I've seen random insane numbers, got hit with a 3K Aquatic Lance even with full buffs and an extremely solid defense set, every other time was a few hundred.

Or people in your group don't want to be the guy who had to replace the guy. The core of your point here is that endgame isn't for everyone. There will always be more people that have time to do Sheol G clears than actual people who have the gear/skill/ect to clear it. No shame at all in playing with friends, but it doesn't always translate.

I generally agree with what Thorny is saying, if you spend enough time going at it then you'll win, even if it takes 30 attempts, you can do so many in a short run that you will eventually win in a week or so of trying. In two hours, you can do ~5-6 runs incl reset times, so it's not hard to repeat it until you win and it's not even a huge time suck. In the earlier days after it was released, people figuring out strats were winning within a week or two of starting a NM and having to swap strats up, so these days with all the info available, it shouldn't take that long.

That said, you can call it coping or whatever, but 1/3-1/2 is a huge stretch IMO. I've seen these fights go south sub 5% to various factors outside players control too many times and I don't know anyone winning these fights 33-50% of the time, even people who have cleared them multiple times in the past. I think that number is probably fair for v20, but not v25.

This hasn't been my experience, but I suppose I don't have rigid data to disprove it either. I do think there is a degree of confirmation bias; you're likely to remember a streak of bad auras, especially if it was on a NM that you considered a pain in the ***.

I think this is a matter of interpretation. Winnable means that the conditions set by the fight do not make it impossible. How many of those 5% losses would have been wins if the players were a little more geared, made one less mistake, had 10 more master levels, etc..? There are auras that make them more difficult, but strong groups can still kill Ongo with MAB and MACC down auras, for instance. Thus, those auras do not make the fight unwinnable.

Attack down below 40 on tree is a very difficult DPS check, and may be impossible without WC like Saevel said. But, that's still only one aura option and you have a shot at recovering it with a different luck roll. MDef down can be a straight loss with current strategies, but we don't know that there aren't other viable strategies either.

I'm not saying a group that can't manage a 33/50% win rate on these NMs is bad by any means, just outlining that the 'luck' rolls here really are not demanding, and on top of that, the playerbase has still not fully explored every possible strategy for these NMs.

For that matter, everyone is still hung up on single moglophone runs for everything except Arebati/Bumba(and weak groups Ongo). While it's true that the increasing bar to remove aura makes double runs tricky, it's also possible a highly defensive strategy could chip away a meaningful percent with aura up on first moglophone, leaving second with no accumulated aura procs and a lower damage bar.

I know statics of good players that have spent several months on a single T3 V25. Several, months.

Granted, yes, these are single phone runs. Not really seeing anything even close to a 33% chance to win a V25.

If this isn't hyperbole or straight up made up nonsense, I think you need to consider where you draw the line for "good". Perhaps you could explain where the luck element comes into play so severely that people not making significant mistakes would need several months of attempts to beat a T3. Some details on which T3 and what setup they're using might also help. I'm not seeing it.

Have said it before, on small servers there is a very real and severe paucity of people that have the gear, ability and inclination to even attempt V25s.

These are literally the only statics doing it. I don't know any of them that can win even 33% of the time. Eg, Kalunga V25, multiple months of attempts with Run or Pld, Whm, Cor, Drk, Brd, Rdm (sometimes Geo). On v20 I preferred Pld tanking adds to having a Whm, most groups seem to use whm and rdm though.

On my server I know of exactly two groups that have beat Kalunga V25. That's it. No one has got to Bumba v25 let alone beat it.

I'm really not trying to be a ***, I fully acknowledge there's a shortage of people who are geared and capable of doing these fights, especially on small servers. I've said it myself. That makes it very hard to get the wins on small servers, the content is exclusionary and there's not really a pipeline to get people up to par for it any more.

But, you're not really arguing a decent case for them being luck based. If a group needs months of attempts to scrape together a Kalunga win with the correct setup, there is a serious disconnect somewhere in their gear, coordination, etc. RMT shout to sell Kalunga V25 on Asura and win with a buyer they have not practiced with in a matter of hours. It's one of the easiest T3.

I don't disagree, though I do not have a static or done much of V25s to say what the issue is.

Is there something wrong with talking with people that do Odyssey while not being in those statics?

The thing I'm trying to point out is that one person has done the content hundreds of times and probably cleared it dozens and is sharing their experience, and you're trying to deny it with your experience of talking to people and occasionally filling in on some unsuccessful runs.

Pretty sure this is the reason.

I did not suggest skill is not involved. I pointed out one week or so of attempts per clear is not what the average group is experiencing, based on facts from groups that I speak to.

As I have no interest in doing V25s, have little experience with them also. Seeing these groups take months and still fail is part of why I have no interest in them.

Rather daily sortie than waste time on that shiz.

I agree that Bots have Won. We are very on topic.

Yeah getting the clears is all about getting six people and just keep hammering at it until you win. There are so many things that are 100% out of your control and will just straight up ruin your run. Droning that knocks out scherzo followed by a Incisive on one of your primary DD's, instant lose. Your group can play a perfect fight, make every correct decision, take every precaution, and the boss can just say "nope you lose" and that's all there is to it. On T3's at least, T2 and below are all reliably killable regardless of RNGJesus.

I absolutely loath this kind of difficulty, the "bettah get bery bery rucky" type.