The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

[Skoal]

The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)
In the ever-present attempt to render Campaign more agreeable to the player palate, the September version update will play host to a veritable smorgasbord of additions and tweaks, adjustments and tunings!


And now is as good a time as any to let the players in on some of what we've got in store.

Beastman Confederate Stronghold Notorious Monsters
In a turn of events that bodes only ill, a new class of beastman elite will be garrisoned at each of the strongholds located in La Vaule [S], Beadeaux [S], and Castle Oztroja [S]. Each group is comprised of a total of eight notorious monsters, their very presence mocking the Allied Forces' efforts from behind well-defended walls.

Defeating these new NMs will result in a marked decrease in the defensive capabilities(*1) of the strongholds under beastman control. In addition, they may drop treasure items which can be used by players to increase the defenses of the Allied Forces' own strongholds. Thus, their significance in the outcome of the war can hardly be overlooked.

Further, amassing a collection of eight Key Items by felling all of a stronghold's NMs will grant players the opportunity to enter a battlefield (*2) where even more dangerous foes await...

*1: Defensive capabilities refers specifically to a total of eight Campaign-related factors, such as funds, tactics, reconnaissance, etc. These statistics can be checked by either talking to the proper Campaign NPCs in any of the three nations, or from the Region Info option under the Main Menu.
*2: Only one of the members entering the battlefield is required to be in possession of the eight Key Items.

Influence Over Areas
It has been noted that the trend on many servers since the implementation of Campaign has been for the Allied Forces to fall well behind the Beastman Confederate in terms of influence over areas, with the disparity being quite difficult to overcome once in place.
Therefore, the coming version update will usher in several changes that will make it easier to win influence, with the goal of increasing the likelihood of areas changing hands as the war rages on.

Another area of the Campaign system which will see further enhancement in September is that of freelances. To take just one example, players can look forward to a new wandering scholar NPC who, once recruited, will take up residence in your nation's capital and aid the war effort by readily dispensing invaluable information.

Campaign Battle Performance Assessments
The judging of player performances in Campaign battles at the hands of Campaign Arbiters will see several adjustments. These changes will focus primarily on the use of enhancing magic and songs, though there will also be adjustments to the methods of calculation, as well as limits placed upon single assessments.

Simplification of Campaign Evaluation Standards
The requirements needed for each medal become more and more stringent as a player progresses in rank. However, recent trends indicate that as the conditions necessary in the upper ranks become more demanding, considerably more time is demanded of players to either maintain their current rank, or to advance via further promotion. The end result is an inability for players to enjoy the ease of participation and simple battle system as originally intended.

In response to this, players can expect the standards of Campaign evaluations to be simplified in order to make the entire process more agreeable and accessible.

New Campaign Ops
New Campaign Ops focusing on the wartime training of physicians are also in development. Successful completion of these Ops will ultimately serve to ease the strategic defense of the Allied Forces' areas, and hold the Beastman Confederate at bay.

FINAL FANTASY XI Official Web Site

[Balfree]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

Sweet.

New battlefields... interesting.

Thanks Skoal

[Luna]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

I hardly ever do campaign anymore...... but still good to know thanks =] I just wish they would start giving us some more useful information instead of this.... crap lol Like I dunno..... job changes?

[BurningPanther]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

Simplification of Campaign Evaluation Standards
The requirements needed for each medal become more and more stringent as a player progresses in rank. However, recent trends indicate that as the conditions necessary in the upper ranks become more demanding, considerably more time is demanded of players to either maintain their current rank, or to advance via further promotion. The end result is an inability for players to enjoy the ease of participation and simple battle system as originally intended.

In response to this, players can expect the standards of Campaign evaluations to be simplified in order to make the entire process more agreeable and accessible.

This looks promising. It would be nice to hope for an elimination of Medal penalty for Campaign inactivity, though the verbage doesn't suggest they'll go quite that far. At any rate, it would be nice to see a relaxation in medal acquisition/retention requirements, optional events are better when they actually feel optional.

Campaign Battle Performance Assessments
The judging of player performances in Campaign battles at the hands of Campaign Arbiters will see several adjustments. These changes will focus primarily on the use of enhancing magic and songs, though there will also be adjustments to the methods of calculation, as well as limits placed upon single assessments.

This worries me. We're all aware of the developers'(and players') concerns over /BRD-/WHM botters, and while a decrease in Allied Tag refresh rate doesn't irk me so much, I do worry they'll drop a nerf bomb on spells and songs, which are already undervalued as it is.

[Karinya]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

Interesting... We'll have to see what effect it has.

In particular, if there is sufficient incentive for players to go kill the beastmen staff officers (for lack of a better name). How much is sufficient depends on how many players it takes to defeat them... few people are going to get an alliance together and run into Oztroja[s] for something that helps the overall war effort but doesn't personally benefit any member of that alliance. Especially repeatedly as would need to be the case. You're talking about (possibly) a multiple hour effort by multiple people who, quite bluntly, could be running Limbus or something in that same time instead. So they might do it once or twice because new content is cool, but after that they'll lose interest without some sort of meaningful reward.

Large allied note bounties on the beastmen general staff would help, but eventually people will run out of things to do with their AN. Unless you introduce new and highly desirable AN rewards... half a million AN for a defending ring, ridill, hauteclaire, or other EX drop from a bot-claimed timer HNM combined with 10k/person AN bounties on the beastmen staffs would certainly get *me* interested in killing them, I can tell you.
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This worries me. We're all aware of the developers'(and players') concerns over /BRD-/WHM botters, and while a decrease in Allied Tag refresh rate doesn't irk me so much, I do worry they'll drop a nerf bomb on spells and songs, which are already undervalued as it is.

A simple fix would be to give 0 credit for buffs and heals cast on a player who currently has no hate from any campaign enemy. (Buffing or healing an NPC should still count, even between waves - but you have to at least walk over to where the NPCs are to do that.) Players who want to spam buffs for credit have to at least go tag something first (and when it dies, tag something else, etc.); bots aren't smart enough to do that (especially in a way that consistently doesn't get them killed), so they'd be useless.

Raise should be an exception - obviously a dead player can't have current hate, but they must have been fighting in order to die, so any raise that doesn't give the no-effect message should count.

Players wouldn't get anything for casting reraise, etc. right after they get up (or get tags), but it's a small sacrifice to shut down the bots. (Alternatively, an exception could be made for weakened players, on the grounds that they must have been fighting something to get killed, and therefore anyone who casts on a weakened player is near and contributing to the action. I don't see any way to abuse this, but there might be one.)

At the same time, buffs and heals cast on players who *have* hate could be increased in value based on how much hate the target has, or from how many mobs. (Of course those are the same factors that influence how much hate the caster gets for casting the buff.)

Main BRDs (or other buff-heavy jobs) might need to try to get into a party with people who are actively fighting in order to get decent credit for buffing them. Encouraging people to form ad-hoc parties in Campaign would be a good thing as far as I'm concerned - it already happens fairly often in Besieged, but in Campaign you'll have 18 people all soloing the same mob.

Anyway, linking the rewards to current hate would tie them to actual ongoing fighting, and eliminate "contributing" by sitting in a corner.

[Satimasu]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

It's nice the /BRD bots are going to get owned. That irked the wife so much she stopped doing Campaign, or tried to MPK them.

These will be nice additions. I only hope people will actually try to go after the NM's. It's already bad enough they won't even go to the strongholds after having all the areas.

[Gobo]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

This worries me. We're all aware of the developers'(and players') concerns over /BRD-/WHM botters, and while a decrease in Allied Tag refresh rate doesn't irk me so much, I do worry they'll drop a nerf bomb on spells and songs, which are already undervalued as it is.

Its really a simple fix. Since Enhancing on Self and All Song buffs are evaluated seperately from healing, Enfeebles (song and spell), Raising, Enhancing on others and nukes, all they have to do is kill the cap per tag on Self buffs (from the current 150 exp/tag, to something like 10 exp/tag) and separate Song buffs on self from song buffs on others (currently counted together with a cap of 300 exp/tag) and give the former are very low exp cap per tag. With the current way points are given per self enhancing and song cast, the bots would cap that category per tag in 1 spell and would get horrid exp/tag (min).

[LyonheartLakshmi]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

Influence Over Areas
It has been noted that the trend on many servers since the implementation of Campaign has been for the Allied Forces to fall well behind the Beastman Confederate in terms of influence over areas, with the disparity being quite difficult to overcome once in place.

Therefore, the coming version update will usher in several changes that will make it easier to win influence, with the goal of increasing the likelihood of areas changing hands as the war rages on.

Good. Glad to see that SE is going to attempt to re-balance campaign. However...

In the ever-present attempt to render Campaign more agreeable to the player palate...

Ever-present attempt, eh SE? Campaign is busted. It has been busted for several months. And it's going to stay busted for about another month. Now is not the time to toot your horn about how your efforts to make Campaign palatable to players. The decreasing participation in Campaign is the result of what happened the last time SE attempted to make Campaign "more agreeable".

[Dim Mahk]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

I personnaly wouldnt say that Campaign is "busted"... I really like this little thing they had added. But I really hope for one they handel these BRD spamers and what not. I also would like the fact that it will get easier to take over stronghold in multy areas... Because atm it is difficult to just hold more than 2 strongholds. On Diablos server Bastokens take pride in competing in Campaign and earning land and xp/allied notes. However, ....

*I wish they implement a announcement of some sort about the current battle tatics and what not that have been taken and so indiviual players can help to acheive that goal for that week*

just feels like too many players just think Campaign battle is all about go to area that is underseiged and go rack up xp. If we really want to gain some additional fun out of this people need to be working twords the same goal. ehh think I'm just venting now?!

[Armando]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

Ever-present attempt, eh SE? Campaign is busted. It has been busted for several months. And it's going to stay busted for about another month. Now is not the time to toot your horn about how your efforts to make Campaign palatable to players. The decreasing participation in Campaign is the result of what happened the last time SE attempted to make Campaign "more agreeable".

They're not tooting their own horn so much as they're letting us know that they're constantly working on improving Campaign.

'Sides, if Campaign was too easy before then it was in as much need of an adjustment than if it's too hard. It's not like they broke the game like they did during that week after the first two-hander adjustment.

[Raydeus]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

There are many ways to kill xp for /brd etc. parasites without affecting legit Enhancing heavy jobs participating in Campaign.

I just hope SE doesn't go retarded on this.

[Kitalrez]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

A simple fix would be to give 0 credit for buffs and heals cast on a player who currently has no hate from any campaign enemy. (Buffing or healing an NPC should still count, even between waves - but you have to at least walk over to where the NPCs are to do that.) Players who want to spam buffs for credit have to at least go tag something first (and when it dies, tag something else, etc.); bots aren't smart enough to do that (especially in a way that consistently doesn't get them killed), so they'd be useless.

Raise should be an exception - obviously a dead player can't have current hate, but they must have been fighting in order to die, so any raise that doesn't give the no-effect message should count.

Players wouldn't get anything for casting reraise, etc. right after they get up (or get tags), but it's a small sacrifice to shut down the bots. (Alternatively, an exception could be made for weakened players, on the grounds that they must have been fighting something to get killed, and therefore anyone who casts on a weakened player is near and contributing to the action. I don't see any way to abuse this, but there might be one.)

At the same time, buffs and heals cast on players who *have* hate could be increased in value based on how much hate the target has, or from how many mobs. (Of course those are the same factors that influence how much hate the caster gets for casting the buff.)

Main BRDs (or other buff-heavy jobs) might need to try to get into a party with people who are actively fighting in order to get decent credit for buffing them. Encouraging people to form ad-hoc parties in Campaign would be a good thing as far as I'm concerned - it already happens fairly often in Besieged, but in Campaign you'll have 18 people all soloing the same mob.

Anyway, linking the rewards to current hate would tie them to actual ongoing fighting, and eliminate "contributing" by sitting in a corner.

Nah, can't be that simple. Hate itself isn't a good enough filter. Here's why: how much time do you have between the start of a campaign battle and when the first beastman actually spawns? It's generally about 5-10 minutes. Do you really want to stand around for that long doing nothing? Normally, players use this time to buff up. This way, you're facing that first beastman with full buffs and maybe an active ability or two. The first beastman wave that pops is usually massacred fairly fast unless they've been left alone to get stronger for a few days. It's subsequent waves and the NM that hold us up.

Why not take bar spells, (either single target or grouped), that affect only one person out of it? Maybe only give credit for baraera if it hits more than one PC at a time. Or, leave it as currently done, and tweak the options some, like making it harder to get new tags by increasing the wait time. Or just dropping the per-minute exp cap for self-buffs to 1/3 or 1/4 of what it is not. If it takes 4 times as long for that cap to go into effect, you'll still cap that category by the end of the battle, it'll just make it much harder for anyone to cap it more than once or twice in a battle.

Big thing though, when you start suggesting Campaign tweaks, look at the big picture. Always look at the big picture. You're doing what Malacite does when he suggests SMN tweaks for low-mid levels now. The suggestions are always good and workable, but once applied they also affect every other aspect of the job. Basically, everything he suggests on the low end, transfers up to the high end to make SMN ridiculously powerful and quasi-nerfs BLMs and RNGs. If you're going to nerf /whm and /brd exploits, make sure you don't do it in a way that nerfs people playing legitmately. If you straight up nerf those exp categories, you make everyone coming as BRD or WHM main shafted. Those categories are big parts of my exp when I group up on WHM in Campaign, (ok, so grouping is rare, but sometimes it happens). Making it take longer to affect a cap isn't going to hurt those of us playing legitimately. Making it cost way more mp is.

[Ziero]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

*I wish they implement a announcement of some sort about the current battle tatics and what not that have been taken and so indiviual players can help to acheive that goal for that week*

just feels like too many players just think Campaign battle is all about go to area that is underseiged and go rack up xp. If we really want to gain some additional fun out of this people need to be working twords the same goal. ehh think I'm just venting now?!

There's an NPC in each town who provides all information about your nations current strategies as well as the current status of each nation's (including beastmen) armies.

However the second part is the real problem. For many, Campaign is a "solo" event to get nothing more then EXP, as such, they don't care if we win or lose the fight as long as they get theirs. I feel this system of basis rewards on nothing but an individual effort is what's really screwing everything over. I believe that certain group rewards should be added to Campaign when certain goals are achieved. Things like bonus EXP added to all who fought and killed the NMs, or extra EXP earned for every active combatant when a wave is wiped out. Or when freelance mobs or Shadowtroops are killed, everyone gains more EXP. Or even getting less Exp when the NPCs are slaughtered wholesale as so often can happen. Just things to force people to work together more, while actually gaining stuff from the experiance.

I also think they should add special full time items and meds you can buy with AN, cheap foods people can buy and use for campaign or things like hi-pot drops or something just in case type of situations. Ammo and supplies would also be nice, but I understand why they wouldn't add those in the past. But still, there should be some sort of supply vendors other then the Tag NPCs during a fight. Make them work through AN instead of gil and make everyone happy.
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Nah, can't be that simple. *snip*

Actually it can be simple, just make it so you can only refresh tags once every 15-30 minutes or so. That would kill Brd buff bots as they'd only get a few hundred exp for botting while allowing real players plenty of time to fill up their caps before switching out. There's no downside unless you accept tags, drop tags accidentally then try and get new ones again instantly or something. Make it so the timer is in effect per zone (so if you fight in say Pash for 10 minutes, drop tags and warp to Bastok, you can still get tags in bastok) but resets when a new campaign starts.

[Raydeus]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

Finding people to do 3-person Ops has proven to be very difficult, it's kinda the same as people trying to make parties while in Campaign.

After all, most people (including myself) doing that stuff do it precisely to escape parties and the such.

Also, people wont do ops other than Offensive/Defensive/Streetsweeper until they are worth the time spent (when compared to simply fighting campaign at an outpost.)

[Malacite]

Re: The Campaign Continues! (08/15/2008)

Some of the 3-man ops you can solo too, like the Military Training Ops (the 1st two anyway) which are almost always in high demand.