Is FFXI Dying?

This ^^^ regarding the ML is spot on !!!

Had they done that, you'd complain there's nothing to do when not doing events because the exemplar points were better from events.

You'd be upset you're literally riding all cooldowns for optimal exemplar and bored when you burned them all. You'd never be able to "go to sortie as anything but geo, I can't get good exemplar points on any of my jobs"

They chose the better option, for obvious reasons. The lesser of two complainers.

I just think it's funny that they are called Master Levels but they don't require clearing Master Trials

They should make clearing master trials give a paltry EP+5% per.

Its not much, but people would actually try for them.

If the kid who bots ML is still getting his a$$ kicked in by Bumba, what was the point? Why was it so important if it has no bearing on the most difficult content in the game?

People who dont bot nor RMT ML's are also getting their ***pushed in by Bumba.

Theres no correlation between the two.

Right, so WTF is the point of risking your account for no gain?

Plenty of stories of people getting banned because they typoed their scoreboard command to say, ergo running scoreboard is a risk.

You risk your account every time you join a PuG with random people. Never know if that Tarutaru will pretend they're Shantotto and POS around the area and you get got by proxy.

Before it even gets there, those kids who were duping sandworm were not just innocent bystanders in a group. Everyone who was participating knew damn well they were exploiting. If you didn't, you deserved to be banned for being that *** stupid.


They wouldn't ban an entire group of players simply because one of them blurted out a third party software command. They don't ban people who join JP/ML bot groups because those players aren't bots. They ban players who meet their burden of proof for cheating, whether that be manual afk checks or other exploits that are picked up by SE's STF bot.

which content ruined the game for you/everyone and made you/them take break or quit?

Farming primes is the last one.

Those incels arent getting their weapons in 15 minutos and are rioting like that.

I'm still playing so strike my answer if it's disqualified somehow, but...

I don't like daily content. Don't get me wrong, I'm fine checking flowers, yelling at my raptor and tossing a carrot at my chocobo. I can tolerate that for about 10 minutes. I really didn't want to add hours of content to my 'daily list of chores'.


It doesn't work well in this community either. As you can see, we're prone to burn out. Not too many people are OK with a relaxed schedule and just enjoying the game. Kinda disappointing given it's all we've got left.

Agreed. I’m sure I’m not the only one who really only gets weekends and/or certain days to play and wants to push out as much as possible while I have the opportunity to do so. But nooooo we can only do the actual thing we wanna do once or twice a day if you saved a tag beforehand… Yipeee…

I know they do it to keep everyone from “weekending” everything too quickly but I wish they had a better way of doing it. Maybe have the tags accumulate with a 7 tag limit or something.

Oh well

I stopped playing a year ago i think. The reason for me to take a break was the massive rmt shouts, the massive grind needed for ml. The jobspecific needs to get into the big fights. Also missing a gmt orriented ls. Also a lack of big ls event stuff. Only dyna D is for 18/18 alliance sadly.
Also i played soo much endgame you somehow get annoyed when stuff isnt going smooth as it can be.
I still miss the game and the people i played with tho. I have been playing for 20 or more years. Also the monthly pay for me was something to think about. Costs about 25 euros per month for a full acount. Which is insane for a game this old. But i (we) need the space to play all the jobs including a crafter job.
Other downfall is the multiboxing, which i understand. Sadly people rather multibox cos its easier for them and they get to keep all the stuff.
Also when you almost have everything its basicly only a 2hr per day game. Do sortie, odyssey and your omen and its done for the day.
Still missing 2 or 3 v25 wins, but i can say i have done most of it :)
Miss you guys and maybe see you again when i feel like playing again.
Maybe ill return, who knows. But to have fun in the game you need a good ls, with nice people and your timeframe.

If God gives me resources and knowledge, i promise to build a private server, so we can play up till Delve 1.0 and Delve 2.0 without ilv.

Lets make FFXI Great Again!

A master trial maat fight for each job to get access to master levels, that could have been fun and could have given the addition of the system a bit more substance.

Its such a copout excuse because is still an entire ~60 hour window for people to do their "weekending" (Friday evening - sunday night)

Pretty sure people said they have?

I think the issue with weekending at the same rate is just that their instances are garbage and can't scale to the extent needed. If you had people doing 3 sorties in a row on friday and saturday (as disgusting as that sounds), you'd probably see considerably more congestion.

There needs to be some kind of middle ground though, because it's clear nobody likes dailies and we're past the point where primes are new and exclusive. I expect we'll probably see it sometime this year, but it won't be as generous as anyone is hoping.

As far as master levels, people obviously aren't meant to get ML50 asap like everyone else has said. You can do everything in the game at ML35, there are only a few subs that get anything significant from 56-59[and odyssey doesn't even have subs]. People bot to 50 because the bots make it easy, and that spreads a perception that you actually need ML50 or that it has a considerable impact. It's not a calculated effort/risk:reward decision that players would make if they didn't see all the 'best' players sitting around with it.

This. People are constantly talking about what ML they have, what ML they need, what ML the other people completing content are, whether or not we need to gain more ML, etc. and I think it completely misses the point. Execution, communication, proper gearing, and decision-making are 1000x as important as ML, but ML are much more visible so people feel the need to have them.

Doesn't help that bots are literally everywhere and it's so socially accepted. People think they're doing themselves some great favors by botting a bunch of ML and it will help them be more successful but it's just not the case most of the time, IMO.

I guess theoretically you can do both, get ML and also work on gear, sets, strategies, skills, etc. but it's often been my experience that people focus way too much on the smaller levers (ML) and ignore the larger ones (everything else), then wonder why they're not successful.

They didn't get banned for buying JP/ML. It was some other cheat or exploit and since SE is never specific, they'd never know.


The bot isn't doing anything exploitive like getting 3k TP/swing or breaking damage cap. Since they don't have a tool to detect automation, they generally don't care unless you're afk. Buyers are only at risk if they're also automated, otherwise you aren't breaking ToS.

https://support.na.square-enix.com/rule.php?id=20&la=1&tag=ff11user
2.2 Real Money Trading, Farming and Power-Leveling. You may not sell, purchase or exchange for real-world money or value any in-game currency, accounts, characters, in-game services, or in-game virtual items. You may not play the Game for the purpose of acquiring virtual items or advancement in game play on behalf of a third-party or for the purpose of selling any virtual assets to a third party for real-world money, specifically including “gold-farming” and power-leveling services.

Does this mean paying RMT, regardless if its via real money or in-game gil, to PL you is breaking ToS?

And lets go back to the very basic one:
2.1 Cheating and Botting. You may not create or use any cheats, bots, automation software, hacks, mods or any other unauthorized software designed to modify the Game and gameplay. In addition, you may not take advantage of game system bugs and exploits during gameplay.

This is all about RMT. You can't give money for in-game items, and also can't give money for in-game progression. This does not apply to paying gil for in-game services (merc, JP, etc.) in my opinion.


The person botting mobs is botting, but the person who's AFK in their party is not doing anything in this quote.

It is difficult to believe a claim that someone was banned for simply leeching off one of the RMT parties. I do not believe it is impossible; a poor investigation may lump them in. Circumstances such as leaving a character leeching on your own IP while other characters on the same IP farm for them could certainly lead to the leech character being implicated.

In practice, if someone claims they were banned for leeching and they've never ever done anything naughty, I would just assume they are lying.

That said, there are credible reports I've heard of people being banned for participating in dynamis-D or neo-nyzul runs where other members were aggressively cheating with warp tools. There is little room for deniability when your entire strategy is revolving around these tools, and anyone who is concerned about being actioned should probably think twice about running sortie with flee or pos users.

Whats worse on the moral compass:
Buying ML from RMT, thus supporting RMT
Botting your own ML



Maletaru, you use windower and addons. Ergo, youre equally breaking ToS.

Gotta agree here. I AFK'd one job to ML50, 2 others to 40+, and 5 others to 30+ without a hint of an issue. SE doesn't care about people paying bots to ML grind.

They don't exactly give you a long drawn out explanation of your ban when they ban you. The days where they drag you into jail are long gone and they didn't do that for mass hax bans back in the day either, you just logged in and were banned. When you call to figure it out and plead innocence, you'll get 3 different answers 3 different times, sometimes they'll even say they lifted the ban but never actually did so. It's just a brick wall.

They also rely heavily on reports. I have no doubt they have some detection for a few limited things, but not everything can be detected server side and they lack client side detections like some other MMOs.

Pretty much the only way you'll know the reason you were banned is if it was particularly obvious to you or whoever reported you decided to send you a /tell saying they reported you, which for whatever reason people used to do. They've banned people by association before during mass bans, but they've also banned people who did nothing wrong (myself included years ago) based on reporting. So I have no doubt someone was, at some point, banned for being in a AFK ML or JP party, but that number is probably really really low especially these days. That specific act may not be against the ToS, but they also don't give a ***and once it's done, it's done. I'd generally default to the person is coping or obscuring the fact they did something more egregious, but it's also not 100% outside the realm of possibility either. If you have a small # of GMs wading through reports, mistakes are going to be made.

They've never been mega consistent with bans and it's only gotten more inconsistent over the years.

If you're a returning player, I think it's a good idea to earn 500 JP yourself to practice your current class. Learn to use its job abilities, multi-step skillchains, develop muscle memory, and test your gear sets with Locus mobs preferably.

I wouldn't use self-botting on my original character, the one I've had since 2005, out of nostalgia and respect. Perhaps this is the reason I come back every year. If I lost it to a ban, it might be my final goodbye to the game.

Regarding the battle system: The game and the player base nowadays reward game sense, intelligent and adaptable players, and victories much more.

I believe that maximizing damage stays in the realm of "theorycrafting" and "spreadsheets," but in actual battles, these aren't as applicable as they were in the past. If you're a DD, you'll often find yourself using a hybrid set like "Malignance Attire gear + an ambuscade cape with M-evasion" for survival, leaving your full DD set aside.

For me, the jobs that fit the current philosophy of the game and are my favorites, especially if I have to attend an event with friends as a returning player, with trash V0 gear, and being rusty as hell are:

Ranged: RNG - If you know how to manage your "Enmity," you're the least troublesome for the group, acting like an NPC-BOT dealing damage from afar for "free."

2H: APOC-DRK with 5K HP is a God-Tier DD against difficult bosses due to its tremendous survivability.

1H: MNK - It's the 1H DD that hits the hardest, offering continuous white damage, especially in fights where bosses apply many negative statuses. With Mantra, you can reach 3500-4000 HP, enduring enemy attacks without dying. You have access to the Malignance set, self-healing with Chakra, and can use Chi-Blast and Shijin Spiral to reduce the boss's TP gain. It's my favorite.

In conclusion, in classic FFXI, even up to SoA pre-ILV, everything was based on zergs, and since we'd been doing the same battles for years, we knew them by heart. The "parse" was like a "mini-PvP" that boosted the fun. Buton the present, if you try to win a parse with a full DD-GLASS-CANNON set against a V20 boss, you'll end up dead in seconds.