Suggestions for changing the MPK systemFollow

1Suggestion: When you zone in to any new area while on foot, you receive a very short 'invincible' like state to avoid 50000 mobs hitting you at once. This state will also disable you from attacking or engaging any mobs to avoid people somehow 'cheating the system' and 'zone tanking.' (This feauture can be turned on or off)


2 When someone binds a mob or zones it, the mobs usually take their time getting back to their homepoint. How about giving every mob 'Warp'? this will ensure when someone trains 40 Crawlers that they wont be coming back through every camp on their path and tearing them up.

That's all for now, keep up the good work!

Ok, I didn’t read all 8 pages, so forgive me if I mention something that’s already been suggested.

Suggestion: Make all HNMs, and popped NM (and some highly camped NMs) instanced dynamis style. Ok, so let me explain this some, I’ll use fafnir as an example. Over all, he would still pop the same (so, 21-24 hour respawn). The difference is that when someone gets claim, he would disappear. When he disappears, two things happen. First, the person that gets claim gets an hourglass that’s keyed for that instance (which will have fafnir and the flys just like they would have normally). Second, a ??? appears where fafnir was claimed at.

Now, the person that got the hourglass can make copies and give it out to everyone they want in the fight (this allows more then one alliance to go in). But, once they’re in there, the normal rules of only one alliance can fight fafnir apply. Then apply some time rules to prevent abuse. After the person gets the hourglass, they have 5 minutes to get in the instanced zone and start the fight. If they don’t start fighting in the 5 minutes, they will get kicked, their hourglass will become worthless, and fafnir repops for others to claim. If everyone is dead for 3 minutes, they get kicked. Also, put a cap on the max time they can fight (for example, 2 hours fafnir, 6 hours for the big wyrms, ect.). If they don’t kill fafnir by then, they will be kicked and fafnir will respawn to be claimed again (and at full health too). If they leave and come back in, then they get the super weak like they do with dynamis.

Also, have the drops go into a global lot system, like dynamis. And have everyone in the instance get the title. There are lots of fights now where an add alliance is needed, they should be able to get the title too if they aren’t a smn or blm. When a group is in fighting, other people when they check the ??? should get a report on the HNM’s HP.

This would also open up more types of fights. They could make a zone that only allowed 36 people, but everyone could attack (just like in dynamis).

I'd like to point out one "positive" to Bind/Shadowbind that could be resolved if SE fixed another problem. When doing Escort in GC/EN/CN people spawn the NPC and then leave them at the zoneline. If there was an easier way to despawn them... I can't count the number of times I've had to grab a mob, bind it next to the NPC to kill it, then kill the mob after the NPC was dead. (I'd also note that I've always been responsible about this and no PC has ever gotten hit by the mob when I've done it. We always have someone on the other side of the zoneline to ask people to wait a few seconds until the deed is done and I reclaim the mob to kill it.) There needs to be a better way to keep the NPC in play for the people who actually want to use them, 'cause it'd suck to have to wait a half hour for them to despawn if Bind/Shadowbind didn't kill them any more --;

Suggestion: What about making it so that players have a chance of running away if a monster aggroes them (whether by MPK or by accident)? Instead of chasing all the way to a zone, monsters could get bored and stop chasing the player after a little while, and then (as others have suggested) run back to their starting point and ignore all the aggro-able players on the way.

I don't play anymore but I'm really glad to see that players' suggestions are being incorporated into the game! :)



Edited, Fri Nov 4 13:47:21 2005 by Enide

i dont know if this will get though but this totlay nothing to do with MPK


I have a idea about the personal NPC
I though it would be nice if the npc could zone with you though the diffent areas.

In my experiance, MPKing people happens mostly when someone is is able to claim an NM befor someone else, Sure there are those occations when someone makes someone else mad enough to train a monster to there location. How ever I have never been MPKed like this, but Iv been MPKed while camping a NM many times, so my suggestion has to deal with mainly NM spawns.

1. (This isnt a necessary change to the MPK system. Just an idea to spread claims out to more players, after all lots of mages are forces to level warrior just to compeat with the campers that can pull a NM with an instant job ability such as provoke) Make NM's forced spawns, by retrive a spawning item off of lower level monsets in the area. Then trading the item to a ???. This should be as rare to get as Coffer Keys or as the bane of anyone level 50, the Peice of Acient Papyrus, and should be Rare/Ex. In this way there should be no question to who the claim belongs to. Alos make the ??? appear in random locations throughout the area and it should appear after a predeterminded time just as normal NM spawns are determined, to prevent overcamping. Now people are compeating over who can trade the item to the ??? rather than the NM itself, and also allows players that dont have instant abilitys to have a chance to claim there NM.

2. (This is my main idea to avoid MPK while fighting a NM) After the NM is claimed to prevent the MPK, should the claiming player/party get KOed, after a set ammount if they are unable to Raise, the NM should despawn making it unavaliable to anyone else in the area. This would make MPKing a spawner player/party useless.

I enjoy the aggro system and dont think that you need to change it in this case, Avoiding outside aggro is a part of alot of NM fights and think that to avoid MPK in this case is to eliminate the reasone for the majority of the reasons for MPKing someone. TO GET THE NM CLAIM

Edited, Fri Nov 4 14:23:15 2005 by Daraco

My suggestion is simple, make it so that when a Bst uses "Leave" or when a mob links onto a mob the name changes from Yellow to Green. This Green name states that the mob can't link to another character and no longer will aggro any other player. Go from Green to Yellow when the mob loses sight of the linked player and wanders back to it's spawn point.

What this would fix:

A BST can't MPK players because once they use leave the mob would no longer be able to link or aggro other players. It would also take care of the "bst exp problem" where when you try and exp of a bst pet you don't recieve any exp. With the mob's name green we would know not to exp of that mob.

It would also solve the train problem for the obvious reasons. It would also inform players that these mobs are currently linked to a player or are on thier way back to thier spawn point.

-Ok frist look at why MPK sux it's mostly the >Death> part right.
so instead of trying 2 change everything else why not just eliminate the EXP loss! Then MPK wont realy mater or who does it. why not lose CP instead of EXP still a punishment for death but not losing 4-6hrs of lving up because of some jerk.-

-Personally i like the system as is example: if you make it so you cannot attack or pull mob before it reaches its start then what if you wanted to pull 2 mobs for EXP Chain, or even help another party whose ranger made a crapy pull, or high lv help from saving you.-

-And the link system is neer flawless if you get a link useing /ra you shouldnt be pulling. might be nice if pops waited least 30sec before they arggo though. As for Trained to zone mobs like in Crawlers Nest just make the mobs get to start point faster waiting an Hour everytime this happens is just rediculious. <btw Released pets should arggo but you should make a sleeping food or something to use in reward function so you can run if you want or just a new Trait/ability >Weakened ally- released pet will sleep for 30sec after release.-
Last of all if someone does report mpk how hard is it to check the logs of both ppl invloved?

Introduction

First off, Ahkore, you're a brave soul for dropping in on this lot here (and I do include myself in that "this lot" remark). MPKing is probably the single most frustrating aspects of the game, whether it winds up being an intentional assault or simply just someone that can't control their aggro depositing a mountain of monsters at your feet. And there are a lot of suggestions in this thread, some of them more logical and feasable than others.

A Little Background

But I think it's important to start with why MPKing is possible, and actually, why the game mechanics allow it at all. In terms of the current MMO market, FFXI is probably the most difficult game out there. I've played most of them myself, and I don't think you're going to find a lot of people who disagree with that point. FFXI is geared towards a high challenge factor. And in the end, that sense of constant danger helps define combat and party dynamics from within the game.

One of the greatest dangers in normal FFXI partying is the dreaded "link". Even if you have a good group of people, and even if your mages know their roles (Elemental Seal + Sleep), a link can cause a major problem for a party, even wipe it out entirely if it happens on the end of a tightly calculated chain. That is part of the "danger factor" of FFXI. A good party knows where to camp, what to pull, when to pull, and how to avoid getting aggro from another monster during a fight.

But lets' also talk about fighting for a moment. In a market where some games allow a player to fight off multiple enemies at once, solo, FFXI follows the Final Fantasy model of having a party of adventurers do the fighting. That increases the "social" aspect of the game many times over, but it also requires that monsters be significantly harder to kill than in other games. Which means that simply eating one too many monsters can bring swift, unyielding death to a group that was otherwise doing all right. That's part of the game. I think, on some level, we are all fine with that. And I don't necessarily think that should change. If I wanted an easy game, I'd go re-activate my WoW account. ~_^

Who's To Blame

The problem is that good players get frustrated when they die through no fault of their own. It's one thing if your puller accidentally gets a linked MOB, but it's quite another when someone drops a world of pain into your camp. Especially if your party has gone through great pains to function properly. And really, when you get down to it, there are two types of MPKs. Intentional, and unintentional.

Intentional: Look, the word "gilseller" is going to come up sooner or later, so it might as well be now. Gilsellers are the number one source of intentional MPKing. Anyone who's partied outside of Qufim can tell you that. Some groups will MPK you only if you're going after their MOB of choice. Others will MPK you just for being in the area (literally because they don't want the lag while they are fighting their target MOB). That is especially frustrating when their MOB pops in a commonly used XP area (Kuftal Tunnel, anyone?). Of course, other bouts of intentional MPKing are often at the hands of jaded (and usually unskilled) former party members. We've all had a few "y u kikz me i mpk j00!"s over the course of our FFXI career.

Unintentional: Unintentional MPKs may NOT be a situation that the development team wants to correct. They may think it adds a challenging, dangerous flavor to the game. To be honest, I say this game is plenty challenging enough without someone named "Tehhotness" rushing towards my party with four angry monsters ripping chunks off his flesh shouting "heal plz!" at me before promptly dropping dead. And it's not just individual stupidity at work. You can't walk outside of Kazham without finding four angry Goblins staring you in the face. For that matter "Crawler Trains" are a well known phenominon, and just uttering the phrase Garlaige Citadel can cause people to go into spastic MPK shock.

Solutions

There are a lot of ways to adjust MOB behavior that wouldn't significantly change the game dynamics, but would make the whole issue of MPKing less frustrating for the player base. And really, the MPK system hurts the majority of players in favor of either a) a corrupt minority or b) no one at all. Any system in the game that unfairly hurts good players and only has those upsides needs some look-see.

Return To Your Posts: Many MMOs have solved the problem of training MOBs onto another player by giving the MOBs a sort of "Fighting Radius". Which is to say, if a MOB finds itself without a target or anyone on its hate list, and it is outside of a given radius, it will return to its original post before it is able to aggro anyone again. This radius should be a reasonable size. I'd recommend setting it at roughly the same distance that you are able to draw your weapon on a MOB. Anything that's that close to a party was a potential link on its own anyway. On the other hand, anything farther away than that was almost certainly brought there by someone else.

The Run Down: Another thing unique to FFXI is the lenghts (quite literally) that MOBs will go to chase down a player. Now, on one hand, I can understand why that's in place. As far as you sometimes have to pull MOBs in this game, you don't want your target giving up and running home too easily. And you also want there to be a point to spells like Deordorize (though the last time I saw someone cast it not as a joke. . . well, I can't even remember). On the other hand, the idea that I could run by a MOB on one end of a zone and it will follow me all the way to the damn blasted other end is getting a bit stale. Maybe MOBs need a "Persuit Radius" as well, outside of which they will simply give up (and presumably then follow the Return To Your Posts rule).

My Pet Monster: I would also suggest that released BST pets automatically have the two above-mentioned rules applied to them. In other words, they will not aggro anyone unrelated to the BST's activities until they have, at least, returned to their original spawn. Like any other affected monster, this would not happen until their business with the BST is complete, whatever that may be.

Finders Keepers: I am sure that there is some reason monsters loose their claim after a certain amount of time. It never seems to benefit me or my party (for example, if someone else has attacked a MOB that already has hate against me, that claim never seems to go away), but it has been a severe problem for my party many times. An MPKer can sit there spamming a macro on a MOB you have claimed (something like Jump for example). In that brief instant where you lose your claim, his Jump will activate. A move like Jump isnt enough to steal aggro away from your party, but you WILL lose the claim. Which means that you suddenly have a very angry MOB attacking you and you cannot hurt it back. In short, this simply has to go. If the reasoning behind it was to prevent players from keeping a MOB claimed, but untouched, then modify the loss of a claimed MOB by whether or not it has been damaged by the player or party holding the claim.

I'll Kill You All: Unfortunately, none of these suggestions will prevent players from luring an AoE-happy MOB towards other players (especially players of a much lower level) and letting it kill them by default. The problem is as rampant in the Jungles (there it's accidental. . . Dream Flower anyone?) as it is other places, and taking a stray Goblin Bomb to the face when you weren't even pestering the blasted monster is a situation that's both familiar and frustrating to most of the playerbase. In short, MOB AoEs are a way that a player can be damaged by a fight that a completely independant player is taking part in. Now, one could argue that it's just part of the game, and in real life it would be a genuine danger. However, that argument works counter to the entire claiming system in the first place! So MOB AoEs hurting anyone but the party that aggroed (or is currently holding claim). . . gotta go.

Blind Rage: If a MOB is bound, or for whatever reason unable to attack a target that it hates, this ridiculous system where it can and will lash out at anyone else in the area needs to go, as well. A popular MPK technique is simply to bind angry MOBs in someone else's camp and give them the choice of being killed by the bound MOB, or running away and being killed by a link. MOBs should not attack someone that they have no hate against simply because their desired target is out of reach. Now, obviously I'm not talking about people outside the party that have earned hate against the MOB (via a genuine link or healing one of the MOB's hated targets). But in the case of a MOB just lashing out at the first player it can reach, especially if that player has done nothing to anger the MOB, that's patently unfair and is practically like giving people a free pass to MPK.

That's A Wrap

Well, I am about done yapping for the time being. And I'm likely not the first person to suggest any of the above ideas (the thought of reading through 9 pages of this sort of thing gives me the skivvers, so good luck to you, Akhore). I hope, at the very least, the context and answers I provided will explain not only what ought to be done, but why it ought to be done, and what specific problems it would solve.


Edited, Fri Nov 4 15:09:37 2005 by adennak

I feel the Bind/Shadowbind problem is a must fix. If a black mage binds a mob, and the mob is claimed, why does it hit me when I run by when I have no association with that person? Many people have pointed this out, and it is a serious problem.

I have an idea for the Train MPKing. The mob should have a "temperment gauge." So say a Samurai in AF is aggroes/attacks a funnel Bat in Garliage Citadel. The bats temperment gauge fills. He decides to zone it because people wouldn't help him and his monk friend open banishing gate #1. Of course he links every citadel bat, seize bat and wringrat on the way to the zone. Their "Tempement guage" fills but not as much, because they aren't has mad at the SAM as the on that he attacked or directly aggroed.

The SAM finally zones, but on the way he drug all those nasty bats past exp parties. But their "temperment gauges" are filled or slightly filled and they are really only mad at this SAM so they pay no attention to the exp parties as they fly back to their spawn points. So while the "temperment gauges" are filled they won't aggro anyone but the SAM that made them mad. Once the aggressor zones, the guage begins to lower. As long as the gauge is not empty, they won't aggro the exp parties, only the person that ticked them off in the first place.

Could even have levels to the gauge. Like a link or add is only a lvl 1 offense. It adds a little slice to the "temperment gauge" and maybe after the aggressor zones, it takes like 2 minutes (or reaching their spawn points) before they aggro anyone else but the person that linked them.

A direct aggro would be a lvl 2 offense and adds a bit more to the "temperment gauge." It takes 3 1/2 minutes (or them reaching their spawn point) before they will aggro anyone else but the person that they aggroed.

Lastly would be a direct attack or action taken on the mob. This would be a level 3 offense and their gauge would have a 5 minute cool down or them reaching their spawn point before they would aggro anyone else.

Okay, my suggestion is this...

Make the BST ability "Leave" not just make the monster become uncharmed, but also dissapear and return to it's spawn point with full HP, and will give full exp when fought. (this will also fix the part where parties can't tell if a monster was a BST pet or not, and end up fighting it for no exp)

Also, fix Bind. That's the most obvious thing at the moment.

I think we should not get hit by mob's aoe especially the mob is engaged by other people. I can't remember a number of time I died because mandy (the one that other parties are fighting) used aoe and i got put on sleep, then gob pop up and i got slaughter.
And when someone is zoning with 10 or more mobs that agro to me and suddenly 2-3 mobs lost hate and they ended on my camp agroing me and killing me.
Worst thing, I am zoning with like less than 50hp and it's like a tunnel that i am running past to get to zone. And there are parties fighting along the way and one of their mob did AOE, and I died. That's just lame.
And also I walked through zones, not knowing the other side has mobs that agro. I got to other side, before the screen pops up, I am already dead. The loading time between zones are killing me.

This may have been brought up. I haven't sifted through 10 + pages of posts. But where I live, the cops put up video servailence camaras to detur crime as well as have proof. If the main issue why GM's dont jail players who MPK is proof. This could solve that problem.
Suggestion: Place virtual cameras in all high mpk areas as described in previous posts. I also feel a noticable statment of GM action should be used. Perhaps a message in an area saying player x has been jailed for MPK.

Suggestion: Have trained mobs return to their spawn points after a zone train at their maximum speed. Thus returning the area back to normal faster.