The End of FFXI, Beginning of ROSE Online

FFXI has taken a back seat in my life following the disaster in Japan where the servers went down. Since that period of time, I have only logged into the game little more than twice.

It dawned on me and my friends that what started out as a game to enjoy together became far more than that. Dedicating time and resources to accomplish the newer content had become quite taxing - and something we no longer had patience for. Before the days of Abyssea, we were quite happy leveling jobs somewhat slowly, attempting to lowman various NMs, and all in all just enjoy doing things together. Now with the introduction of Abyssea, it became more important to try the newer content. This was more so important because we could, as a lowman LS, successfully defeat the majority of the new NMs and encounters to the extent where we would be able to eventually get fully geared with the newest equipment available. What would have been a pipe dream to myself as a somewhat casual and social player could be a reality.

It started out being exciting, exploring and attempting new and unseen NMs with little to no information recorded. Months past, the Linkshell had all reached the new level caps, and the grind, pressure and otherwise time consuming events to squire the new gear had been well underway.

At this point, being a mostly EU linkshell, quite a lot of members had to sacrifice time to be able to let our friends across the pond play with us. Everyone in the UK turned up promptly on time, with pop items farmed over the course of the week ready to do what had been pre-planned. Hours into the early morning, we mostly had accomplished everything we wanted each week, only to rinse and repeat the same for the following weekend.

Abyssea became the main focus. No time was spent doing alternate content such as Salvage, Walk of Echoes or Nyzul Isle despite several of the 'core' members wanting to, be it for Emp. weapons, or just for fun. Why should we spend so much time organising events for people who wont show up to things we'd like to do?

The downtime of the servers brought this to our realisation. It just didn't seem worth it anymore. That coupled with the fact that our postgraduate courses demanded a lot of attention left us not wanting to go back to the game.

Honestly, by the time Abyssea reached its peak, my beloved RDM seemed somewhat redundant for NM fights.  The majority of debuffs didn't stick on the most important fights, everyone who needs Refresh has it through sub alongside convert, and the Cures just cannot keep up with that of a White Mage. My White Mage was quite well geared, however I would shy away from playing the job because I knew other people wanted to main it and I would never lot on the gear if someone else needed it - so I wouldn't make any real progression.

My only incentive for playing was Corsair. Having leveled it to cap, invested gil in bullets, getting some pretty nice equipment from Abyssea, and being able to bring some okay buffs to the group, it seemed quite fun. However on NM fights I just couldn't put out any damage, and let's face it, there are so many buffs in Abyssea that you may not even notice it the COR has missed a roll rotation. The only thing that could make my Corsair useful would have been the acquisition of the Wildfire weapon skill. This was something I had more or less given up on following the large disinterest of the Linkshell to join me in Walk of Echoes. I did try to farm coins with two members quite often, however the drop rate was pretty poor, and with stray people wandering in and generally messing up the whole experience, it seemed like a lost cause. Trying to clear/farm WoE with three people can be tough, and it became something we would try on a regular basis. It was just not fun, and not fair of me to ask my friends to help me out so often for such little return.

With my COR essentially gimped, my RDM redundant, my WHM taking a back seat and no interest to play my SCH, I had no incentive to play the game anymore.

Recently, several people whom I played FFXI with have taken up ROSE Online. The game is free-to-pay, with microtransactions supporting what is a very cute and casual game. The game is essentially flawed for various reasons;

1. Path finding is terrible.
2. Party health bars don't refresh often.
3. Click to move. Think Diablo 2.
4. Key bindings are forces on the F1-F12 keys.
5. Free to play means player base is mostly ~12years old.
6. Music loops every 10seconds.
7. Quests system is awful, no clue as to where to go and find things, or hand things in.
8. The world map only shows what region you're in, not where in the region.
9. No auction house, only player stalls.
10. Buggy terrain/bridges allows for players to fall through the world and get stuck occasionally.
11. Quest system usually requires you to damage/last hit monsters... Not ideal for healing classes.

So why play? It can be quite fun, and its something that me and my friends can enjoy messing around on for a while.

I am currently planning on becoming a Cleric (Priest/White Mage type class). MP is never an issue with how I've skilled up, however healing still poses a problem. Not because of MP? Then it must be that your healing spells are weak? Nope, I can cure most of my party members from almost 0 to full HP with two of my spells. The problem lies in the health bars... They just don't refresh often enough. Following a heal, it can take up to 8 seconds or so for the health bar to refresh showing them back on full HP. This can work in the opposite direction too. Someone can die in a matter of moments because I have no idea that they need healing - the game just doesn't tell me.

I joked with my friends that the healing in this game is essentially luck based. I have little inclination as to who needs healing, or by how much. I literally select anyone with less than 100% health, and spam all three of my cure spells in succession until I see they are at full health again... It is not really fun or challenging. Mostly a test of patience and a great deal of luck.

Fortunately the penalty for dying is almost non-existent. 3% exp loss is nothing.

So what is the incentive to playing? There are NMs, which seem okay to fight. The characters are all really cute, and it is pretty funny to see my friends look like angels and such :D It is very casual, so we don't need to invest a great deal of time into doing anything. But by far the most important reason to play is to be able to hang out with my friends again, in an environment where there is little to no stress involved.
 http://www.roseonlinegame.com/