An evening of two MMOs

Interesting night last night... playing two MMOs one after another. FFXI just released the latest update with the level 99 cap increase. I figure I'd talk a bit about the FFXI update, content and some TOR progress.

Downloading
According to SE's very own website at http://www.playonline.com/ff11us/polnews/news21190.shtml, this latest update is 137.1MB for the Windows version and should take 15 minutes. Actual experience: About 2+ hours, and it took 3 attempts before the FFXI client would check my files, and another 4 before the actual download started. In contrast, the TOR's entire game client is about 20GB and took about 3 hours to download from scratch on a AT&T U-Verse connection without interruption. I guess after all these years SE is still stuck on DSL?

FFXI Update Content
Feels like FFXI is going back to the old days... The FFXI content update consists of:

- More trials and item collection to get +2 relic gear (Yes, the gear from Dynamis )
- More exp & griding... Level cap raised to 20, more merits can be put into HP/MP, and a new category of merit-unlocked weapon skills
- More battlefields - Walk of Echos is expanded...
- Some minor, but expected gameplay enhancements... like higher tier spells, most jug pets for BSTs
- Waiting time between Chocobo races is now reduced from 24 hours to 20 hours (Does ANYONE other than Talint do Chocobo racing?)
- Major updates to the UI -- high quality fonts, change of the look of the macro palette on the top of the screen

Overall not too big of an update. The big things for content are the level cap increase to 99, and the new weaponskill merits. The WS merits are quested + merited, so you have to do some sort of quest once you reach level 96+ and reach a certain skill level. I haven't explored this yet as I haven't reached level 96! (more on this later) You can max out up to 3 different weapon skills with the limits that are placed here, so figure out your favorite jobs!

The UI upgrades are... well, I'm still having trouble parsing the fact that SE, after so many years, is finally enhancing the UI for PCs! I'm not sure what to think of this... on one hand I do like the idea of the fonts FINALLY being in a higher quality, and that the macro palette bar being updated so that it is both larger and can display the full title of the macro. On the other hand, the change is very jarring and it's taking time to get used to. I'll stare at my macro bar trying to figure out which bar I'm on, looking for the abbreviations that I've grown used to over the years. The worst part of the UI update is that the UI is back to the ugly FFXI fonts, menu items and icons again. I hate the look & feel and I've been using XI View (http://forums.windower.net/topic/11510-xi-view-v110-user-interface-9262011/) I guess I'll have to put up with it until XI View updates.

Level 99 limit break
Recently, SE developers had a few interesting comments on the Abyssea add-ons: "It became something a little different than what longtime FFXI players were used to. On the one hand, it was great that people enjoyed it, but there is also the loss of game balance to consider. Now we are going back into existing content to re-establish some balance."

Well, with the latest level cap break fight, it feels like SE is definitely going back to the old ways. Here are some examples:
- Ex item that drops from certain mobs to qualify for the fight... I've never seen Kuftal Tunnel so crowded before! More players than mobs!
- Remember mismelts, anima, and all those special items that you have to spend hours to farm up for a single fight to weaken the mob enough to make it possible to win? This one has it too.
- Remember the Maat fight and how people used to go 0/20 on it on some jobs, getting one-shot by Asuran Fists and coming up with all sorts of crazy strategies to tackle it? Where it is partly luck whether Maat would go Chainspell Dia or Chainspell Aero III on you? It's baaaaaaaack, and this time it's on a party scale instead of for individuals!
- And remember the lag from having 40 players in one BCNM trying to get in? The laaaaaaaag!

To be fair, I actually didn't have to do most of the farming. Since I'm on the west coast, AND since even after I got home, I had to wait 2 hours to download just over 100MB, by the time I actually GOT onto FFXI, Kelhor(Rooks), Ohemgee, Blutantaru and Rizon had already farmed up all their Ex items, and Kel had even farmed up two of the items to weaken the enemy, having spent hours on it. To quote Kel: "this item for the genkai is quit-worthy so far".

After I got on, Kel & I went to get one last Ex item for me... most of that time was spent actually waiting for a stupid rock to go down in Kuftal tunnel so that we could actually get to the mobs that dropped the item. The basement of Kuftal was a mess, with so many people running around that I could barely figure out who we were fighting, but we managed to get the drop in about 3 mobs.

The fight itself was... stupid, in my opinion. Using the weakening item makes the mob run around in random patterns, making it impossible to WS on as a melee fighter. I made the mistake of taking hate for one second and he one-shot me (on DNC) through full shadows. His WSs take Kelhor's PLD down to the double-digit HP range. Weaponskills do under 100 damage normally... and yes, this is Empyrean weapons too. It was an easy loss.

After doing some research, I found that this fight, like most of the other SE fights, isn't about skill but more about finding out the "tricks" to the fight. This is what I've found so far:
- The mob normally takes minimal damage. Weapon skill damage is hugely reduced as well to a cap of maybe 100 per hit. Multi-hit weapon skills might help, as do dual-wield + en-spells
- When you use the weakening item, damage is returned to normal, BUT the stupid mob is running all over the place, making it hard to even hit, much less weapon skill on. (Mob is too far away anyone?)
- And yes, his weapon skills will pretty much one-shot anyone except a really good PLD. For PLDs, he'll self-skillchain to two-shot!

From the forums, known strategies to work are:
- 5x BST, 1x WHM -- Pets tank, can probably sub SMNs for some BSTs.
- O-Chain + Almace PLD, 4x DDs, WHM -- Yes, make sure you get a PLD with an Empy shield. Wonder if Aegis would work?
- SMN, 4xDD, BRD, or SMN 3x DD, BRD, COR -- All out zerg -- Soul Voice, SMN uses Perfect Defense and hope you win, or hope that the COR's Wild Card resets 2-hrs to let you survive. DDs should be MNKs using Hundred Fists or Kraken Club DRKs.
- SCH, SMN, 4xDD -- Fast DDs either dual-wielders or MNKs. En-spells to actually do damage, SMN for Perfect Defense again... SCH's new 2-hr spell can do a lot of damage too.

Mostly zerg strategies. I'm also thinking that one possible way to do it would be if *everyone* has one of those stupid items that makes the mob run around in circles and does not attack, and everyone brings a ranged DD (BLM or RNG) Of course, this will take hours and hours of farming and hoping that the 5 minute fight will go well.

We're back to the old days of FFXI.

Personal thoughts on FFXI
Last night I logged after losing the fight and went over to play The Old Republic. I'm not sure when, or even IF people want to try the fight again. It's so frustrating and time consuming. It no longer feels like playing a game but actually more like doing chores.

Speaking of chores, with this latest level cap raise, your new homework & assignments are:
- Go exp your jobs for 4 more levels. The more jobs you have, the more you have to do! Though, this really doesn't take THAT long and it's fairly mindless. Fuuji likes to watch Korean or Japanese Dramas. We put entertainment in your entertainment so that you can be entertained while you play FFXI!
- Go grind out merits. You'll need them for more HP/MP merits and those new weapon skills
- Go quest the new weapon skills...

Pretty grindy... that's not counting the new dynamis grinding you have to do if you want the new +2 gear either. Dynamis is limited to between 1-2 hours per day though, and you need something like 30 drops to upgrade piece of relic, so that should keep you busy for the next 2-3 years.

Val might have read me right... since finishing my Twasthar and completing the WotG storyline, I haven't really been motivated to play. Now that we've essentially finished the basic EW for the entire ProScientia(ForScience) linkshell, and that Voidwatch is such a pain (hello 3 straight weeks of losses!) it's hard to want to log in to FFXI. Especially when in order to make it to weekday events I basically have to triple my commute time due to commuting during rush-hour traffic(and even then I'm late over half the time!)

The Old Republic -- Finished with Ord Mantell
TOR in contrast was very relaxing compared to FFXI. I'm surprised at how smoothly this launch is going. Among the things they are getting right are:

- Spreading out people among the various servers. You can choose the server you want to go to, but in TOR, there was a feature where you could set up your guild ahead of time and be assigned to a server together with the people you wanted to play with. I couldn't take advantage of this since 3/4 of the people who decided to come to TOR made that choice only after the guild signup period was over, but I'm betting that this is preventing any one server from being too congested.
- Instanced starter zones. I remember when I started FFXI during launch... You'd have 3-4 players going after every single rabbit or tunnel worm. This is still the case even now when FFXI has a content update which sends people after specific things. TOR has the ability to split off zones into multiple instances so the starter zones were not crowded at all. There are people running around, but you never feel like you have to go fight with someone over claim of a mob. I never saw my instance or Ord Mantell go over 150 people on the entire planet. I also saw that there were 3 instances of this planet on this server.
- No lag, no queuing, no network disconnects... Did I mention that it took 3 tries before I was able to start downloading the FFXI update?

Yesterday Ghiren got his TOR early-access invite. He pre-ordered back in September, so they are moving fast through the invites. I'm guessing everyone who pre-ordered, even those who only just pre-ordered this week, will be in by this weekend. We got together for some questing together on Ord Mantell. This is the starter zone for the Republic Trooper & Smuggler classes. I have to say, as much fun as it is playing TOR solo (which *is* a lot of fun, just like playing Mass Effect or Dragon Age), it's a lot more fun with a partner. Downtime went from minimal (maybe 15 seconds between major engagements) to none and it became more of a running & gunning affair. Taking on large groups of between 5-10 mobs with AoE attacks, group knockbacks, stuns and then mopping up the remainder is fun. Not to say that there aren't challenges -- there are plenty of elite mobs that take a pounding to take down, and "Heroic" quests which are designed for 2 or more people.

The best part of playing with someone else is the multi-player conversations. It's pretty funny to watch different people have different reactions. In this case, I'm the straight shooter Trooper who is loyal to the Republic, trying to do the best for the people and I'm partnered with a money grubbing sleezebag who's always looking for credits! Pretty sure there'll be funny moments like this: http://v.cdn.cad-comic.com/comics/cad-20111214-ef1ed.png

Another side effect is that by grouping up, you can enter the other class-specific areas and help out in those missions. You'll get to see the cutscenes from a different class, and see the conversations that your friend is doing. It's kinda like watching a movie, but you'll also get to shoot things up!

By the end of the evening, we had finished with our class quests and the optional side quests for Ord Mantell. By this time, you'll be level 10, have unlocked your first companion and be qualified for advanced class training, essentially the first specialization choice. Having companions also effectively fills in spots for a party so you can tackle larger challenges without having to find more people. At around level 10, you get to go up to the Republic fleet and take a shuttle to Courscant. This is also where crafting is taught, and you'll also get the first opportunities to take part in flashpoints and PvP battlefields.

Ascy with a big gun!

(I've been forgetting to take screenshots recently, so this post is light on pretty pics!)

For people joining later due to the early-access stuff... don't worry. I already have a ton of other characters made and will be playing a bunch of them too so there will almost be someone of the correct level to partner up with. So far I'm already thinking that my Jedi Knight is going to be aligned with the dark side xD

Problems with the TOR launch
Not every aspect of the launch is smooth... some of the problems are:

1. "OMG! I can't play yet!" People are raging about not being in the early-access yet as Bioware goes through the pre-orders. This leads to many thousands of pages of angry forum posts where people are raging that they haven't been permitted to play! I guess people want to rush to level cap? And... it leads to scary videos like this... http://www.swtorstrategies.com/2011/12/warning-cannot-be-unseen-francis-awaits.html

2. "OMG! My TOR playtime will be interrupted!" I find it pretty funny that people *in* early-access got upset that they would have to actually enter their product codes once the game officially goes live on the 20th to continue playing. People were upset that they might miss out on a few days (if not hours) of game time from between when the game launches and when they can pick up the game. This lead to a number of things... Amazon moved up their ship date for all pre-orders so that people will get them on the 16th instead of the 20th, and Bioware themselves just announced today that they are granting a 48-hour "grace period" for people to input their product keys (http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=301753)

Final thoughts
FFXI has been on life support, at least for me for a while. We'll see how long TOR can keep my interest. Remember, I used to be hot on WoW but lost interest after about 40 levels... So far TOR looks interesting, but we'll have to see how long that lasts.

Meanwhile... Darkorphen doesn't know this yet, but... he'll probably have to run the show on ProScientia for a while :)