Level Cap Increase Thoughts

The huge announcement out of Vanafest on Sunday was that of something that is literally going to change FFXI completely. They decided it was time to increase the level cap.

Not just to 80.

All the way to 99.

It's going to come in 3 stages over the course of 2010. If I had to guess, we'll see level 80 in June, 90 in Sept. and 99 in Dec.

My initial reaction to this was one of anger. I dislike the grind of leveling a job. It's why, after all these years, I have only 4 jobs at 75. Then I thought about it a bit and realized pretty quickly it adds a rather new perspective about this game.

That perspective would be an entirely new way to play the job that I started playing this game for. Obviously, things still have to be fleshed out a bit, but the thought of a DRG/WAR using Aggressor is very entertaining to me. The thought of DRG/DRK using Absorb-STR or Absorb-TP is entertaining. DRG/WHM or DRG/RDM being able to cast Cure IV and Haste on myself while soloing or even Refresh while subbing /RDM. Imagine the different possibilities from the BLU magic combination when you have 12 more levels of spells to work with when BLU is set as your sub. Your own dispel? (Blank Gaze) An aspir spell? (MP Drainkiss) Or how about your own haste? (Refueling).

There are a lot of possibilities.

On paper, the biggest beneficiaries are going to be the mages. A White Mage that can sub RDM, utilize convert and potentially cast Refresh on themselves is a force to be reckoned with. A Bard that can do that almost instantly becomes a main healer. Accession/Manifestation from subbing Scholar? Mage jobs all of a sudden have access to AoE Aspir. White Mage in particular would have access to an extra AoE Erase or two beyond what Divine Veil and Esuna provide? (On a side note, does that possibly make Esuna nearly obsolete already?) Will a Scholar be able to sub White Mage or Red Mage and cast Hastega? Even better (and a very huge personal annoyance of mine), will be potentially anyone subbing White Mage being able to cast Stona. Even for the Summoners out there with their humongous MP pools, how does being able to cast Cure IV and become an even more effective healer for a party sound?

Red Mages around the world might be able to rejoice at the fact they'll never have to sub Dark Knight again. Hell, most people will since a Red Mage subbing Dark Knight usually means an element of your crowd control has just been severely limited. They'll be able to Chainspell Stun by subbing Black Mage.

What about some combination that most would consider dumb at the moment like DRK/SCH? Manifestation Drain II, Absorb-STR or Absorb-TP? Wow. Einherjar would never be the same.

Again, there are a veritable fuckton of possibilities. I'm not dumb enough to believe that SE is just going to willy-nilly raise the level cap without imposing some limitations on the power of subjob spells and abilities though. I can see them placing something along the lines of 5% haste or 1mp/tic refresh when cast as a sub instead of the full 15% and 3mp/tic.

Admittedly, I was getting bored with FFXI. I came to this realization after hooking up that repaired XBox 360. I wasn't considering quitting the game or anything, but I found myself less likely to log in to do random events aside from the ones that I was already committed to by virtue of my position in Obsidian. This game needed something like this to happen in order to keep it fresh and to keep people paying for it.

The biggest question though is, "Why now?" If SE had truly intended for the game's level cap to be 99 from the getgo and had to work gradually to get there, why wait 6+ years to do it? They've spent all of this time building this game's activities around level 75 characters. Gear is designed for that. Monsters are designed for that. Without existing monster adjustments, a lot of the end game stuff technically becomes "Easy Prey" or below.

Call me naive, but I'm pretty sure SE has taken that into account. The only thing people really have a legit reason to be pissed about is that SE took so long to actually implement this. You get to 75, you move onto the next job if you want or you go merit. People have had that sense of closure or attaining their goals for far too long and now SE has essentially said "Nuh-uh, you're not done yet!"

A number of people have stated this feels like the last hurrah for XI. I wouldn't go as far to say it's the last hurrah. This would normally be the part where I point out the original EQ's long term success and the sheer number of expansions that have been released for it. To this logic however, I say...

If SE can dump a level 99 cap raise on us, they're capable of just about anything and you never know what they'll have in store as long as the game continues to be a profitable one for them.

Lastly, I want to address this:

ZOMG THIS IS JUST ANOTHER CASH GRAB BY SE!!!

Anyone who says that has never run a business, doesn't understand how business works and just needs to shove some pie in their pieholes. Go sit in the corner, and never say anything again.

Businesses exist to get you to buy their product. It's ultimately your choice to buy it. Anything anyone puts on the market that requires you to hand some form of currency over for is a cash grab.

Anyway, I came around to this information pretty quickly after some initial anger. Obviously, there's still a LOT left to unfold in how they handle it, but only time will tell and people who have already made up their minds to quit because they don't want to level anymore just need to understand that it's likely not going to be mandatory for you to level to 99. This game is built around 75. Barring drastic changes, I doubt that's going to change much and only the new content areas will likely be affected with it.

I'm not going to be in any rush to get to 99. I'll level when I have time and with friends. That's what the game is there for. :)