A Vision of Abyssea Review

 With most all aspects of the zones explored since its release, and with "Scars of Abyssea" less than a month away, I thought now was the best time to give my impressions on "Vision of Abyssea", the first of three add-on battlefields allowing access to the lands of Abyssea, a world lying parallel to Vana'diel.

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Please note that this is my personal opinion of Vision of Abyssea and should not be considered the viewpoints of Zam.com

 This is an expansion done right.

 This seems to be the general concensus amongst the player base in regards to "Vision of Abyssea", the first of three add-on battlefield events scheduled to be released this year for Final Fantasy XI. In the days following the announcement of its release, I was skeptical about its success, since the Abyssea add-ons seemed to be geared more towards combat and battles rather than story-telling, which was an integral part of what makes Final Fantasy...well, Final Fantasy. Once I got my hands on it though, I realized that my apprehension wasn't well-founded, for while the story surrounding Abyssea is presently not very deep, what it offers as far as experience gaining and notorious monster battles more than makes up for it. Though I wouldn't go so far as to say that "Vision of Abyssea" is perfect, Square Enix did many things right in its creation.

 With the introduction of Abyssea, the conventional six-man experience party, and by extension the entire conventional way of gaining experience, was altered. In recent years, parties were divided based on jobs, whereupon melee jobs would be party amongst themselves in what was dubbed a "tp burn" or "melee burn" party, whereas mage jobs (specifically black mages) would find themselves segregated from such parties. Instead, they would have to make due with far slower experience gaining "manaburn" parties, or worse yet, solo their experience points. In Abyssea experience parties though, one of the keys to success is the building of "azure light" by delivering killshots on mobs with magic. Over time, this increases the chance of blue treasure chests, known as a sturdy pyxis, to spawn after the mob dies, and these blue chests can contain time extensions. It's not uncommon for organized Abyssea groups to stay in a zone for several hours beyond the normal time limits and rack up unmatched amounts of experience and limit points. So for this level of exp gain to be available to both melee and mage jobs is a big step in the right direction.

 Another change to appear in Abyssea is in the field of Notorious Monsters. Since the addition of "Zeni Notorious Monsters", or "ZNMs" for short, Square Enix has been adjusting end game content to be more low-man friendly as well as allow players to obtain good weapons and gear without camping a certain mob for several hours at a time or worse, resort to using illegal third party programs to "bot claim". In Abyssea, all Notorious Monsters are either popped by using items or time pops with very short respawn times. This allows players to go in and get more immediate results with the limited amount of time they have rather than spending hours and days on end hoping to be lucky enough for a certain monster to spawn. The items for those force popped NMs are easy to obtain, coming from nearby monsters in the area or from golden sturdy pyxides, and can be bought or sold on the Auction House, allowing those that can't spend the time to farm the pops to just purchase them.

 Visions of Abyssea isn't without its faults though, and while these faults are few, their impact is too significant to ignore.

 Some major crafting skills took a crippling blow with the introduction of Visions of Abyssea, most notably Woodworking and Bonecraft. Several of the new Notorious Monsters in Abyssea areas drop synthesis materials that were originally quite scarce, which lead equipment crafted with them to be highly profitable. With the market flooded with these synthesis materials, the prices for them have plummeted, which in turn has severely decreased the synthed item's overall worth. What once was a rare and highly coveted item is now something cheap enough that could be bought on an impulse. Alongside the recent trend of Synergy being Square Enix's craft of focus, this has left most all of the "older" crafters with a reduced income

 Another major issue that's come out of Abyssea revolves around the same players coming in at extremely low levels and "leeching" experience points to level up, in some cases staying useful by being a designated pyxis opener, but in others doing absolutely nothing to benefit the group he or she is in. This results in a player reaching level eighty with little to no actual knowledge of how to play their job, grossly uncapped skills, and no idea how to properly gear themselves. Though this behavior has been going on since before Abyssea was added with Level Syncing and the infamous "Astral Burns", its addition brought it to a new level, because it is now open to a larger group to take advantage of it. This leads to another aspect of why leeching in Abyssea is more harmful than its worth; it requires the rest of the alliance to pick up the slack of the one "leecher". This isn't so bad if the player has taken the time to stock up on Forbidden Keys to open up pyxides, because at least they're doing something to benefit the other members of the alliance, but when it's players that are contributing absolutely nothing, then it becomes an issue. It's common to remove someone from a party when they're not doing anything but leeching experience, so there's no reason why it should be acceptable in an alliance just because there's more people. That spot could be filled by another damage dealing or nuking job, which could allow for faster kills and more experience points for the group.

 In closing, though Vision of Abyssea isn't perfect, it has made significant steps towards improving the way Final Fantasy XI is played. Should the next two Abyssea add-ons prove to be as game-breaking, then the days ahead for Vana'diel are truly bright.

Comments

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eh
# Aug 25 2010 at 1:52 AM Rating: Decent
While i agree with some stuff here i have ot say the biggest down side of aby is that normal PTs are hving a hard time finding members now since 65+ all the mages are in aby and 70+ you have lost all your DDs and tanks so it makes it a bit difficult 55+ to find a normal EXP pt.
otherwise i find aby great
bleeh
# Aug 24 2010 at 1:21 PM Rating: Good
{plot}{can I have it?}
{time}{limit}{no, thanks}


Also, can we get something that doesn't involve grinding the same exp mobs or half dozen uninteresting NMs over and over and over to advance?

CoP was expansion done right. Abyssea just feels like a halfassed attempt to toss in enough time sinks to keep people playing till FFXIV with minimal effort.
#REDACTED, Posted: Aug 24 2010 at 12:40 PM, Rating: Sub-Default, (Expand Post) I fail to see how people believe that leveling up in this game teaches you how to play a job. Unless you are a support class or tank, the jobs are *ALL* incredibly basic. Every single melee DPS class entails running to the mob, hitting auto-attack, using a weaponskill when TP hits 100, and *maybe* using a job ability if it does damage (or affects it in any way). Black Mages need no mention because the moronic playerbase barely invites them anyway since it slows down the melee-tards. Support classes takes 5 minutes to figure out, and tanking classes are maybe half an hour of getting used to the rhythm of their rotation.
Abyssea
# Aug 24 2010 at 4:18 AM Rating: Good
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2,689 posts
I really like the Abyssea concept. I do agree about the leeches. I think that as long as you restrict the pure leeches to one and make them buy keys and work as the chest opener its ok. I agree though, rushing through jobs makes for weaker players - however for some its a godsend. I know one guy who got his MNK from 40-80 and merited... However he took the time out to skillup and now he's bringing it to events to learn to play. In that situation its not quite as crucial as say an inexperienced main tank or healer. Still, we won't be throwing him at anything significant until he's up to speed.

We kick people who afk after 15 mins without notice. We allow peeps to afk for say 20mins if they have a a rl issue but if they're gone substantially longer, they're gone. Usually within ls parties it hasn't happened. We've had the odd issue... but a swift kick soon brings them into line.

People also realise that parties don't work if the kills/pulls/cures/nukes don't come fast enough. It's only fun when it's going well. I've found that the quality of parties and alliances in Abyssea has improved since release.

I'm not convinced I'm taking all 7 jobs to 90 though ;) Looking forward to Scars.
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l e e c h
# Aug 24 2010 at 3:48 AM Rating: Good
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2,626 posts
I fully agree with your report, with exception to this:

Quote:
Another major issue that's come out of Abyssea revolves around the same players coming in at extremely low levels and "leeching" experience points to level up, in some cases staying useful by being a designated pyxis opener, but in others doing absolutely nothing to benefit the group he or she is in.


I believe it was a problem at first, but in the last 2-3weeks, i've seen leaders kick ppl if they afk for more than 15mins, and theres only ever one leech in pty. Whether leech is the correct word for this is debatable, because you don't need to be a high level to open chests. If SE put a cap of level 60 for opening chests, I doubt you will see players lower than 60 joining the alliance. If you did, then there would be some serious unrest.

The chest opener & good leadership are integral parts of making the alliance work. If you do start an abyssea pty at level 30, your exp starts 1-5exp/kill instead of 75-100.
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