When i was your age...

… we had to to set up skill chains and magic bursts. TAs were necessary. We had to walk, 500 yalms to camp. In the snow. With no shoes.

God I really feel old when it comes to this game. So many concepts have become a thing of the past or soooo rarely used. 25k/h or gtfo! Hell, I remember when 10k/h was godly. Jobs like Sam were among the LOL, now so over powered that when the updates roll around they are the first thing people bitch about. Fire Crystals use to be income… now they just pay for your warp to WG.

But Night! Things change.

No shit. In the short 8 years this game has been out. FF has really seen it all. Jobs becoming stronger, weaker, then stronger again. Economy fluxing. Play styles changed more then you change your underwear.

Playing for as long as I have, you tend to get sent in your “ways”. Like I’m currently leveling Pld (yes, I'm leveling another damn job). Now, when one thinks of a Paladin, one thinks brick wall that can cure. Even though that is still true, because of how play style has changed, Plds gear their play style toward more of the “DD” side of things.

Some jobs don’t even use their main weapon. Sam’s like to use Polearm, I’ve heard Nin’s using Daggers, Mnks with Staffs. Now yes, I know thats all very situational. Bird Meripos, Pots, etc. Nothing is wrong with that, just takes an older player like myself a minute to get their mind around that.

Personally, I love a lot of the new play styles. But I think we’ve gotten to use to the soft and squishy of ToAU, and forgotten what real party dynamics are. I’m not surprised when I’m in an End Game shell and someone doesn’t know what a MB is, or how to do a SC. All we want PT wise is fast, fast and easy. If the PT isn’t doing 10k/k exp, outside of a meripo, the PT is doing it wrong. And the fact that the FFXI community has classified most of the jobs as useless, doesn’t help things.

I really do miss the days of planning out SCs and MBs to make the mob drop before Voke timer was up. Where mobs posed a real threat.

With SE dropping the lvl cap 99 on us. My hopes is that they force us to go back to that old skool way of PTing. But with 45k+ tnls, if it’s not more of the same ToAU crap, too many people will bitch, whine and moan that it takes to long to lvl. Personally I would rather slower EXP for more engaging fights. Something that requires me to pay attention and be 3 steps ahead.

But unfortunately, no matter how much SE fucks up this game. I can’t leave. FFXI has been too unique to quit. Most other, if not all other, MMORPGs out there are “twitch” style game play where you just spam out all your skill and spells. FFXI has been something I have not seen in a game outside of older single player RPGs.

FFXI in my honest opinion, did it right. Does it have the 9000 billion member that WoW has. No. Never will. Cuz FFXI is not an action game. It, in its base, is a Real Time Strategy. Yes, it can be mindless. But really requires thinking and planning.

I will be here till the end. As the last /servmes pops up telling me to /logout cuz the servers are shutting down forever. I’ll be sitting at the waters edge in Purgonorgo Isle, next Dark, reminiscing about the good times, the bad times, and everything in-between.

But until then…