Suggestions for changing the MPK systemFollow

Here's a major issue... make CFH impossible on NM/HNM, but not everything "Impossible to gauge" Summons/Pets from HNM/NM should still be CFH. Like Kirins lesser gods should be able to CFH for on Kirin and the real version of the gods and what not, CFH should be disabled by the system.

Okay, forget reading the 10~ pages... chances of this being said already, 90%

Basically what I'm getting from the suggestion about no-aggro until they get back to home is... well... just that.

If you implement it, make sure they don't link on the way back 'home' either, or it will just be a waste of time.

Regarding the issue of MPK during battles with mobs that have highly desirable drops, (serket, simurgh, kirin, etc.) perhaps the issue could be solved by only allowing interaction between players with the same linkshell equipped.

Ie: A fight vs Jormungand requires a great deal more than 18ppl to succeed.. There are going to be additional melee building TP for WS/SC, combat mages resting for MP, healers healing the main combat alliance, even additional parties/alliances to handle other mobs that may spawn and interfere with the battle, etc... All of which are the commonly used and logical actions for 90%+ of those successful.
As the system is now, a 2nd non-related group of players could train in a bunch of mobs into the area the fight vs the Wyrm is occurring in, purposefully lose hate by whatever means, allowing "their" mobs to wreak havoc on those involved in the fight against the wyrm.
Or, that 2nd group could focus on exploiting the "loss of claim" bug that occurs frequently for short periods of time during long battles, in an attempt to outright steal the contested mob, often when the mob has been reduced to a pathetic state by the legitimate players, resulting in an easy kill and theft of the dropped items.
There are other means of MPK/griefing, but I feel that these could be the simplest to fix.. That's right, simple to fix.

Suggested Fix: Limit the interactions of those involved in a fight against any NM to those equipped with the same linkshell. ^^
This would not alter the current combat system much at all, except effectively putting a linkshell-limited /blockaid up on all members in the same immediate area (longbow/casting range basically) as the NM that is being fought.

Fix #2: Eliminate the "loss of claim" bug that occurs during these longer battles when a player with the NM's attention dies/DCs/disengages (or warps/teles/zones for that matter.) I personally like the suggestion that as long as anyone on a NM's hatelist lives, it stays claimed.. This would also insure that the big NMs that necessitate multi-alliance battles are not futile efforts, with the same group that started the fight retaining claim until every member is dead/zoned..
It seems truly unfair for a group not involved with the wearing down of an impossibly difficult NM to end up grabbing the claim, kill, and loot due to this.

Fix #3: Somewhat related to #2, eliminate the same "loss of claim" effect for BST due to their pets. It does not seem unfair to me for a BST to use the tactic of killing 2 mobs at the same time with a strong pet, but it is unfair for other players to exploit the bug at this time to steal the claim of any of that BST's targets.. I believe this is also what causes some BST to become bitter and willing to MPK others for little reason. Eliminating this problem could reduce the issue of BST MPK'ing to a non-issue. ^^

Fix #4: Please increase the spawn rate of normal NMs that only drop R/Ex equips! >_< For instance, if Argus was a 30min pop, then the competition on it would rapidly fade. Worries of MPK'ing would evaporate as well.. This should be done on all the lower level NMs that drop the lower lvl equipment (40 or lower) that are considered "end-game" equips... Peacock Charm, Leaping Boots, Archer's Ring are all very good examples of this... and while the recent changes to alternate, yet identical, R/Ex drops was a smart move, there needs to also be an increase in both the spawn times and drop rates of these kinds of equips... Having to camp Leaping Lizzy for days, getting many claims and kills, but not getting the drop is a frustrating experience, both for the veteran who is looking to get "the best" equipment, and the newer player who wants "the best at my level" equipment but has to compete for the claim with the veteran.. when no one gets the item, no one is happy.. Also, regarding this type of issue, please consider making all 21-24hr NMs have a 100% droprate of R/Ex equips... ^^;;; It is unbelievably frustrating to spend days and weeks of available game time repeatedly camping/killing a NM that only drops a R/Ex equip, but not getting the drop... I'm sure that if they were 100%, there would even be more players willing to help each other out, while now, they shrug off help requests due to them most likely being a pure waste of time.

OK~ i think getting rid off the ability of mpk may cause a few other problems, yes i would like mpk to be a thing if the past but~ Since it's a big problem i may have a idea, forgive me if it has allready been posted in one form or another... When a mob<s> links~ and the person it is going afther zones,warps,dies ect... it should loes its ability to agro some one for atleast 1/4 of it's trip back to it's spawn point. The claimed mob <not linked, should just not agro for 5 seconds~ I do not beleave AOE should hit only party members. It won't make much cents if a bomb drops and only the person fighting it gets hit, i also don't think these ideas should fall into play in areas like dynamis. These are my ideas, i would like mpk to go away but i don't want to see it get easyer for every day partying reguarding mpk

-Madwraith

MPK HAPPENS FOR A REASON!! and how do you know this guy really works for s/e anyways? And why does everyone keep saying the same idea's? sounds to me like the beastmaster's keep on getting all the blame or screwed somehow, !!!first off more then half the mpk problem is you have a party that get's killed an cry's mpk to the gm so you have 6 people against the 1 beastmaster who either died,zoned,mischarmed or just had his almost dead NM stolen because s/e only gives the target 5 seconds before it can be reclaimed or had his ONLY place to level up taken over by a party that refuses to find another camp. ASK YOURSELF --- WHY DID I GET MPK'ed...

Sugggestion: Decrease the time between spawns on some very difficult NMs. Perhaps people who MPK would have less reason to try and hijack an alliance's NM attempt if they knew that in an hour or two - instead of days or weeks - there would be another chance to defeat it the 'right' way.

Besides... Fighting NMs is fun, why make the opportunity to engage in this game activity so rare? Worried about devaluing the drops? Meh. Nothing can make the fun you had while killing the monster any less valuable.

All the suggestions you guys talked about are great, But what about the RMT? you cant Mine in Gusgen mines in Slyph.

i seriously think that if you guys (GM) were more aware of the problems of RMT that messes up this wonderful games economy.

It's really sad and depressing when you call a GM and they do abouslutley not one thing about it. take for instance Mammingway on sylph beastmen blood sells for 70k a stack. now look at the price history, then do a /sea all mam every time you log in, it does not take a rocket scientist to figure out wow over the last 3 months this guys hasnt slept one day. also all the lvl 50 drg running around gusgen mines. who also never sleep and never leave there spot, I even had one admit to me she's rmt 16 y/o from china charater name domape. I then called a GM 1 hour 15 minutes later he answers my call. I had asked him to view my /tell logs so he could see for him self what she had said.
here it is 3 months later the same charater is still minning gusgen mines.

On Sylph alot of players have resorted to MPKing the RMT players.
Such as Chest Backhamme freindly/Heroism LS that is a RMT LS.

I guess what I am Saying is. Untill you get Rid of the RMT players then dont do away with MPKing, other wise you are actively taking away the only way we can fight back.

Oh btw here's a huge Hint on what programs you are looking for.
http://www.cannotlinkto/

Edit for spelling and grammar.

Heres mine:

1. When a Monster is zoned, that monster will not argo or link for a certain time or distance on its way back to its original spawn. Possibly not link or argo at all till back at this spawn.

2. Same for the above for leaved bst pets.

3. Make leaved bst pets unable to be claimed for a short time.
Not applied to party members.
( so people cant abuse or basically mpk a bst.)

*~Suggestion~*

1) Have it so that if somone is bringing a monster or a chain of monsters to mpk a party or alliance with in a certain range of the nm. The mob will stop and use draw in to bring the person back, so the person HAS to fight the monster or they will die. Even if the person dies, the mob will be out of range. But if a mob or mobs come with in range on its own, it will aggro the party or alliance.

2) With bst pets, make them go through the somewhat the same way as #1 but if the pet comes with-in range, have it move out of range with out aggroing and have it reaggro again after its out of range

Edited, Fri Nov 4 16:17:43 2005 by DnightX

After reading mostly all the posts I really like the following suggestions.
For the random hnm suggestion, however the GM would need to be invisible/not targetable for this not to give away when it is gonna pop. After the spawn & claim the gm should be visible to all so that ppl know there is a chance that they could be caught mpk’n & that gm’s are gonna be watching. I think that on the second suggestion you’d have to make sure that these ppl have a clean record, perhaps talk to several random ppl (pick ppl who are on during same time & have many game hrs) as well ls mates…do you know ___? Tell me about ___? etc. Do this anonymously so they don’t know you’re a gm, that way they can’t know & fake their answers.

RamseySylph:

Suggestion #1: At a randomly selected time Issue a [GM] to watch over the spawn of a popularly camped HNM, if a [GM] would simply watch the events of a Serket pop, a Fafnir/Nidhogg pop etc, they may be able to easily deduce rule breaking behavior made by those players present. Serket can be especially violent, with RMT running rampant and trying to MPK everyone around.

Suggestion #2: Have a single or small group of [GM]s who run a player based orginization on each server, this would allow you to darastically increase your manpower without needlessly increasing costs. Do not neccesarily give these volunteers and [GM] powers or abilities, however make them able to easily contact the head [GM] quickly to report any indescent and rule breaking activities. But do not make this system NPC based like a Mentor system where everyone can join. An applicant should be required to meet with the [GM] for their server in a one-on-one interview much like an application for a real job. To encourage activity possibly create a small in-game salary.

Mistress Melphina

2) suggestion: I like the system of implementing a way to see where your GM call is in the que. I place a call and get "There are 34 GM calls before you". I then have no way of knowing the status of my call 10 minutes later and no way of knowing if the GM is soon coming. Am I now 15th in line?? 2nd?? still 28th?? I have no idea. Please fix this.

Much of what I'm thinking has been said already, like so many others. Some of the ideas, though they seem nice at first, are very situational and won't work all the time (like AoE damage not effecting outside players).

Though my ideas may seem "off topic" they are more on topic than some of the other posts. In order to address "MPK" we have to look at it as a cause and effect relationship. Its more psychological than it is tangible. We have to ask "Why?" do people MPK and address THAT answer. Though people may find various answers to "Why" most of us already know. 10% of people who MPK don't like someone and are doing it as revenge/dislike or because they think its funny. The other 90% of the time its because they want an enemy who drops something they can sell.

My thoughts as far as MPK goes are:

1. I like the idea of not having a monster become unclaimed until its 100% full on life. This makes it easily fair in every sense. This would highly discourage those who choose to MPK to get the claim and for them to have a quicker battle.

2. IMPLEMENT MORE RARE/EX ON DESIRABLE ITEMS. In fact, 90-100% of every item dropped from an NM should be Rare/Ex. NMs should be there for people who NEED the gear, not for those who want to make a quick gil. Leaping Boots and Emperor's Hairpin were the first step. Now, we need Rare/Ex Ochiudo's Kote, Jujitsu Gi (yes, I know its used in a synth), and all the other items that are highly desirable. I myself work too much now to be able to make enough gil to purchase most of this, and we have botters, 24/7 gil seller campers, and other people who won't even use the drop. NMs are for people who WANT the gear without taking the quick route of just buying it.

3. More Rare/Ex item ENM battles. Make Palborough Mines, Horlais Peak, and Giddues into ENM battles as well, creating more accessible places with more options. (For these, make it so no items drops that isn't rare/ex, people won't care about it if they aren't going to use it). The biggest problem is equipment options. People don't care about a piece of gear with defense and no stats, we want additional stats, effects, and skills. People MPK for money almost 90% of the time (the other 10% is because they don't like someone). If we take away their "money" making scheme, they WILL stop.

4. Make a maximum number of link that one person can have total. Or better yet, make it so the party itself can only have a certain number of links. 4 or 5 would be fairly reasonable. Its enough to detract a group with a bad puller (they have to learn, taking it away doesn't help anyone), but not enough to throw off a group facing a high level notorious monster or HNM.

5. Create an ability to make the sneak, invisible, and deodorize spells AoE. It can become a Job Ability for White Mage (most probable) or become an -aga spell. Either way, this would most definitely help out avoiding intentional and unintentional trains. (Perhaps there should also be a way for this effect to last WHILE fighting a monster thats already been engaged. That way there is no aggro while fighting. Afterwards, if another is pulled THEN the effect would wear off.) For example: Party A pulls a bat in Garliage Citadel. Ninja A trains undead and bats to the zone. Party A's White Mage uses Sneakga or an AoE enhancing spell to make sneak hit all party members at once. Sneak does not wear as the party has ALREADY engaged the enemy, after the enemy is dead, THEN sneak will wear if someone attacks another enemy. The trained monsters then pass the group with NO aggro. (Also, please fix the randomness on sneak, invisible and deodorize! Make it so enhancing skill affects the MINIMUM time it lasts, so many people are tired of their spell wearing off three seconds after its cast!)

5b. Additionally, make it so trained enemies who are far away from their original spawn point don't stop 16 times before heading back. As soon as the person who trained them loses hate (zones out or dies), the monsters immediatly make a B-line straight to their original area.

6. Alternatively, creating "warnings" for certain players who are reported numerous times for training on purpose/MPKing. These warnings will serve as notice to those who are partying in areas and also can be used by GMs to suspend someone who is an avid MPKer.

7. Fix the Bind problem! The original puller/linker should have hate, not a random party who has NOT hit the enemy nor has any menas to defend themselves.

Sehira above me has some great ideas as well, actually using the intimidation chart to keep some monsters away from each other would not only alleviate many MPK problems, but lend another dimension of realism to the game. This is probably one of the better suggestions I've read throughout the entire discussion and just wanted to say I agree with it whole heartedly.


Again, there are two kinds of MPK that has to be addressed, the MPK out of desperation or for money (NM MPKing) or the MPKing because someone thinks its funny or doens't like someone else (Revenge/dislike).

1. a level 75 guy will not take damage from a monster in valkrum dunes
2. if the high level persons happens to have blaze spikes up, the monster will take damage which causes the party to recieve 0 exp.

What if;
Instead of making it so Mining points stop popping when camped or botted, they continued to pop as usual but occasionally mining a point would spawn a mob or NM to fight.

To work, the mob would pop Green, would not agro to pet attacks, would attack only the miner that popped it.
These mobs would be a lvl equal to the average lvl of mobs in a given area say Gusgen mines would be as powerful as the highest to mid lvl mobs in that area.

This would be just enough to quickly dispatch anyone seeking to bot mining points. They could not be called for help on so it would be a solo battle if the person was not in party.

Rewards for killing the mobs, and types of mobs popped could be.

Mining points: Worm/Skeleton; drop: ore, minerals, stones, ancient beast coins, Rare/Ex or temp items usable by miners to improve mining results.

Logging points: Bee/Bird; drop: logs, lumber, fruit, ancient bst coins, Rare/ex or temp items for logging results.

Harvesting points: Crawler/Beetle: Grasses, dropped items, fruit, ancient bst coins, Rare/ex or temp items for harvesting results.

Better or hq items could be obtainable from random NM versions of the mobs which could pop instead of normal versions at any time without warning.

To ensure that botting does not continue, a timer would not be in place instead mobs could pop as soon as the next mining point or as late as the tenth. This is similar to the antifishing bot measures taken but possibilities of items or rewards would make mining/logging/harvesting more appealing to players and reduce over pricing in Auction houses.

Also wouldn't it be nice to see a mining botter or Haho being beaten down by a mob or NM that they just popped . Lovebaobao would become so poor it would be hilarious. Dead mining bots give me this warm and fuzzy psychotic feeling all over and make me so happy.

The logical locations for this sort of thing would be Gusgen mines where CGF are notorious for monopolizing entrance area mining points, as well as other easily accessed area's of the game.

Just this much would make mining experience much nicer for everyone but the RMT/CGF/gilsellers. As for mpking get rid of the bugs and the chinese gil farmers/sellers and there goes your problems. We the players of FFXI are tired of the "Blind Eye" that is turned on CGF, if you google FFXI you will get 3 legitimate websites as well as several sites such as IGE, and MOGS and other foreign companies.

That is what people see when they look up FFXI. Not players raving about how great an experience it is but sales people hawking game currency at competitively low prices, and forums like this where people rant and rave about how corrupt the system is and make noise about in game drama.

We love this game or this site wouldnt exist, we want the game to do well and continue the story that is being told. We don't want to be taxed by these wastes of life called RMT or CGF. We want to spend our time adventuring but we want to do it legitimately.

Also you should know about a bug in your system that allows people to remove the .dat files for certain linking mobs around the Ground kings. You need to have the game scan the files on every system accessing the network and block entry to anyone missing these files, a flag should be placed on any account missing the files for any mobs.

This bug gives certain individuals an advantage in heavily contested area's. Accounts with tampered with .dat files should be suspended upon regaining access for cheating, as violation of the TOS. This scan can easily be done during the next update as a required measure to sign back on. The .dat files that should be of concern are the files for Darters in Dragons Aery. Or if it helps make it so if a .dat file is missing for any part of an area including all mobs the character will glitch or recieve a FFXI error.

To prevent botting and MPKing all a GM needs do is appear at the actual spawn time when the HNM 21-24 hr spawn packet is dropped in. GM's can see 3rd party programming supposedly, this would kill botters fast and stop MPKing as those responsible are removed mid kill. Most HNM's/Kings/ect are stagger spawn no 2 spawn at the same time in the same period. It is actually very possible to have a GM present at all HNM pops exactly when most of the activity is occuring.