Interesting Interview With Sakai and Hamasaki

[Jene-chan]

A few things.

Also I think conquer crests were a mistake.

RNG based progression is not fun or rewarding. Crests are just a natural extension of the CF system (or Phantasy Stone Online if you wanna think about it that way) and it gives players an actual way of progressing towards strong weapons instead of them being relegated to a dice roll. PSO1 was purely RNG based progression (you have some rose-tinted glasses going on about PSO1 too), but online game design has evolved and the player's expectations have evolved with it. Even the Noclip documentary that was linked on page 1 covers this when SquareEnix management thought they could get away with the same stuff they did at the time of FF11's launch with FF14 1.0 and we all know how that went. PSO1 design philosophy is antiquated.

RNG based progression also doesn't reward individual player effort. Player A could be doing all of the given damage in an MPA and Player B could be borderline AFK, but between those two players, in regards to drops, effort isn't a factor in that equation -- just the dice roll at the end that determines what you get (combined with Rare Drop up stuff, of course). Granted, the amount of Crests you get isn't based on effort but you can do all of the EQs that drop them and clear Solo EX on as many classes as you can as a way of your effort being "rewarded".

Also, almost all of the weapons offered in Zieg's exchange shop at over one and a half years old at this point. The weapons in general are good though some have been power crept by Atra or other weapons. Some of them are worthless like Akatsuki (do I even need to explain this one) and Quelle Windea (powercrept by Atra TMG and only GU mains will pick them up for the invul effect). The good ones (Lavis, EPD, Kazami, Quelle Scarlet, Spread, Ryucross) represent large improvements to how the classes are played/geared. Comparing Lavis attack speed/lack of hitstun to any vanilla wand at this point is jarring. EPD makes gearing for Force way easier even though the upcoming Elemental Conversion change may make EPD slightly less worthwhile (this is another topic entirely).

I would rather have crests as an actual method of progression than saying "well I wish my Techer was better but here's hoping Lavis drops" while hoisting all of your enjoyment on the low chance that RNG actually works in your favor. Don't forget that before crests and the overall 14* drop rate buff, you saw people with 14*s but it was far, far less common.

I'm pretty critical of the dev team of PSO2 but crests is one of the good things they've done in recent times even if the weapons you get from them are largely inferior to their +35 versions.

[zandra117]

I see that they are still sticking to the 10 year plan

[Digital Doom]

Agree to disagree. I like rng

[Zorak000]

yeah though it needs some tweaking; the Law of Averages is spread over the entire playerbase, which leads to some people swimming in drops while others see absolutely nothing no matter how much they play

outside of some shien, guren, and egg drops, the only 14* i've gotten was a glide giroia, and believe you me I've ran a lot of EQs. meanwhile I see a couple teammates positively drowning in them, one of them dreads finding stuff because he simply cannot afford to properly upgrade everything he has so far, he's gotten more 14* drops from enchanted forest than bode units, which he only has one of so far.

[Digital Doom]

yeah though it needs some tweaking; the Law of Averages is spread over the entire playerbase, which leads to some people swimming in drops while others see absolutely nothing no matter how much they play

It’s hard for me to relate since I got a epd back off boosted mommy when almost no one had one, and got a spread needle from a forest trigger back when not many had them. Which were some of my most memorable and fun moments in pso2. But ya guess your right, I have friends who play more than me and have just 0-1 14*s. I watched the ff14 was very interesting, I played ff14 for about 2 years ,
I quit right before the expansion came out with the new classes like samurai and dancer. Came back to pso2. Think it’s time to go back and check out ff14, the deep dungeon stuff and some new content looks super fun , plus I miss the music.

[Kintama]

Do we have any translation of these?

[milranduil]

Agree to disagree. I like rng

rng is fine until you can't sell the best weps in the game. you have such a hard-on for pso1 which is fine. what did pso1 do differently? trading. you could get super lucky by finding SJS in PW4 but then sell it to the highest bidder, easy peasy. all of the best gear in pso2, for a long time now, has ALL been hunt it yourself and pray to the gods because there is literally no other way.

if crests didn't exist, i would still not have epd/kazami, the main weps for the 2 classes i enjoy the most, after 19 months despite having run EQ and forest religiously. that's over a year and a half. i know plenty of people who hunted for psycho wand, heavens punisher, SJS etc. in pso1 who ran for a fraction of that time to get the rare they wanted. pso2 is worse rng and you cannot trade end-game gear.

[Digital Doom]

rng is fine until you can't sell the best weps in the game. you have such a hard-on for pso1 which is fine. what did pso1 do differently? trading. you could get super lucky by finding SJS in PW4 but then sell it to the highest bidder, easy peasy. all of the best gear in pso2, for a long time now, has ALL been hunt it yourself and pray to the gods because there is literally no other way.

if crests didn't exist, i would still not have epd/kazami, the main weps for the 2 classes i enjoy the most, after 19 months despite having run EQ and forest religiously. that's over a year and a half. i know plenty of people who hunted for psycho wand, heavens punisher, SJS etc. in pso1 who ran for a fraction of that time to get the rare they wanted. pso2 is worse rng and you cannot trade end-game gear.

I guess we aren’t allowed to have opinions here. As far as a hard- on, I just said I like rng , it’s always added some surprise or excitement to the game. I use a couple crest weapons also, including for my main class GU, but I never was a big baby about it not dropping, I’m glad I haven’t got one to drop yet because it gives me something to still try to get in this game. That’s what enchanted forest is for , all the babies who cry about not getting there best weapons should go live in that place until they get them. Have a nice day. Because face it , once you get all classes to 85 and have every 14* Weapon you want , there isn’t shit to do in this game , trust me I know.

[XrosBlader821]

I guess we aren’t allowed to have opinions here. As far as a hard- on, I just said I like rng , it’s always added some surprise or excitement to the game. I use a couple crest weapons also, including for my main class GU, but I never was a big baby about it not dropping, I’m glad I haven’t got one to drop yet because it gives me something to still try to get in this game. That’s what enchanted forest is for , all the babies who cry about not getting there best weapons should go live in that place until they get them. Have a nice day. Because face it , once you get all classes to 85 and have every 14* Weapon you want , there isn’t shit to do in this game , trust me I know.

Yeah because everyone who couldn't drop that weapon for over a year is a crying baby, right. You're lucky because your main is Gunner, aka one of the best classes in terms of DPS. Try playing Te and realize how miserable your time is going to be without Lavis. Or try playing Fo and realize how fun Element Conversion is, building a rainbow sets of Weapons is fun. OR play Su and realize how you're pretty much forced to affix S-ATK (the most expensive Affix type) because T-ATK only became viable with thanks to Rykros. Conqueror crests are the best thing to happen since the EP5 backlash.

[Jene-chan]

I guess we aren’t allowed to have opinions here. As far as a hard- on, I just said I like rng , it’s always added some surprise or excitement to the game. I use a couple crest weapons also, including for my main class GU, but I never was a big baby about it not dropping, I’m glad I haven’t got one to drop yet because it gives me something to still try to get in this game. That’s what enchanted forest is for , all the babies who cry about not getting there best weapons should go live in that place until they get them. Have a nice day. Because face it , once you get all classes to 85 and have every 14* Weapon you want , there isn’t shit to do in this game , trust me I know.

I find it amusing that you like RNG and a few posts back you bring up how you want to go back to FF14, which is a game that thrives on content-based progression and gear isn't RNG at all in that game.

Also, it varies by person but I've been playing PSO2 pretty avidly since Dragon dropped back in 12/17 and I've gotten exactly 3 14*s - Gear Experience, Kazami and Spread Needle. I don't even like Katana Braver but here I am with a +35 Kazami. People I know have been showered in 14*s while I basically got nothing for around 5 months. In the meantime of that, however, I was busy grinding on crests and got the weapons that I did want so at least I was able to make progression in that sense but if we didn't have that, it would be a complete shit show.

Saying you like RNG is fine but being unable to understand why people don't like luck based progression is a bit baffling. Also saying "just go live in EF" is also pretty dumb considering our complaint is "we want measurable progression" and you're essentially "just go live in RNG land".