I don't try to hide my elitism. I'm a whore for great gear, and I enjoy being a smurfing awesome RDM. That said, you'd be surprised how mild my elitism is compared to a large portion of the other people involved in endgame.Originally Posted by Loony BoB
The reason I don't encourage experimentation widely is mainly for one reason: it hampers your ability to get things done in the game. Naturally having better gear or a more efficient sub will make things easier, but that's not what I mean. Let me try and use an example which doesn't include an "extreme" deviation like WHM/WAR.
I know someone who likes to role play in FFXI. This governed everything she did, including what jobs she would play as. She limited herself to jobs which used magic. This meant that while she would not allow herself to level WAR, she decided to level PLD anyway. She made it to about level 60 using PLD/RDM--a combination that proves very effective in certain circumstances, but is largely more trouble than it's worth in exp. parties--by trioing with two of her friends. PLD/RDM is very popular in a lot of situations. I helped a friend experiment with it in an exp. party ages ago before it had become not only acceptable but perhaps even encouraged to have the support job readily available. The results of our experimentation, by the way, were that while it can certainly work, the lack of defender and provoke make it more trouble than its worth for exping.
First of all, trioing to 60 on PLD is a laborious task. It takes effin' forever, but she was happy to do it because she was doing it with two of her friends. I encourage this sort of experimentation. She wasn't wasting anyone's time except her own and those who consented to have their time wasted (and I imagine it did waste an awful lot of time compared to regular exp. parties on PLD/WAR).
However, after she got to about level 60, it became unbearably slow for one of her compatriots, so he stopped going. She and the other person were not able to make progress as a duo, so she attempted to find parties on her PLD/RDM. She would get invites to parties and they would ask her to change her support job to /WAR. She would explain she didn't have the job, and more often than not, people would just drop her from the party.
She would get very upset by this, and she stopped talking to me after I asked her, "What did you expect?"
When I preach a certain level of conformity, I preach it on the basis that it's the only way to really get things done in the game. If you're willing to take the long way around and make things harder on yourself if you find experimenting more fun, I wish you good will and good luck. I just think that people should be aware of the potential consequences of deviating from the norm. If you're willing to accept those consequences and not bitch about it, fine. Unfortunately, in most cases I've encountered, people who want to deviate from the norm and experiment also like to bitch that people aren't willing to play with them. As I've stated before: I don't mind if you waste your time being inefficient, but don't waste mine in the process.
It just seems awfully odd to try and deviate from what is accepted by the community in a game in which you're largely dependent on the community to get much of anything done. FFXI's game design, one which doesn't merely encourage cooperation in large numbers, but demands it seems ill-suited to any significant experimentation.
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