Observations about the FTG system
In this thread I will explain why I believe Hybrid FTG system will eventually hurt the social aspect of game more than it's trying to fix it. My main focus will be the community's behavior as a whole and the possible long-term effects.
We all know already about the Hybrid FTG system and how it works so I will skip the introduction.
Supposedly, one of the purposes of this newly introduced system (besides inidrectly telling people to stop being autist lardasses and go outside) is to encourage people to group in Party and to promote the Master & Apprentice system.
Now with the patch, not only people is constantly looking for party, but there is also a high demand of Masters and Apprentices due to the fact that this is the only method to bypass FTG system.
How it works:
To be a Master, you must be level 40.
To be an Apprentice, you must be between level 10 and 30.
One Apprentice can have three Masters, while one Master can has 3 Apprentices.
The issues:
There is now a huge demand of Masters and Apprentices, and there are not enough Masters.
There is a huge gap between level 30 and 40, many Master won't be willing to take low level Apprentices because that will make them unable to run certain dungeons.
Due to Masters becoming more picky, there is a lot of people left Masterless.
It gets worse:
Less people is willing to help those players who are not their Apprentices. For example, way before the FTG patch, I struggled with the level 23 Into The Abyss quests because no one was willing to help me do those quests, not even people of my same level, not even the guild I had at that time. Now in the time post-FTG patch it's even harder to find someone willing to help you.
What happens with you after you turn 30? You are left completely alone: You can't be a Master, you can't be an apprentice, and everyone is obsessed with Farming Dark Overlord Training Camp. Before FTG system, it was hard to find someone willing to help you. After FTG patch, good luck trying to find a Party: Everyone has limited points (very limited if you are 40) and no one is willing to waste them in some random kid that needs help.
To conclude:
Instead of promoting a healthy and more friendly community, FTG system is actually reavealing the worst out of the Dragon Nest community. Master are becoming more intolerant to noobs and newbies, level 30 to 39 players are left alone and, what I consider more important, less players are willing to help each other just for the sake of it. One of the things I consider the most beautiful part of playing a MMO game, and one of the aspects that speaks to best about a community of how some random stranger agrees to help you just because you asked for it without expecting any form of payment (something I still practice even after FTG patch). It makes you feel like you are not alone and that truly everyone is a human we can connect with.
Now thanks to the FTG system that limits one's gameplay, these people will slowly disappear and everyone will become nothing more than an NPC. Newcomers may feel like they are playing a single player game, and what's the point of playing an MMO alone when the selling point is being an online community?
I won't ask for the FTG system to be removed all together, instead I want to purpose new features that will make the system more bearable:
Possible Solution No.1: Reward the players for taking breaks
Fatigue: weariness from bodily or mental exertion. The concept behind the first solution I want to purpose is behind the word "Fatigue" itself. What do we do in real life when we feel fatigue? We take a break until we recover ourselves. I believe this can be applied to the game too.
For example, we recover FTG points for every hour we stay offline. This can be a fixed amount, or the amount can increase per hour we stay offline (XX points + 20% for the next hours) to promote people to take longer breaks. It can also come with a temporal improvement of the drop rate depeding on how many hours you kept yourself away.
Possible Solution No. 2: The Simple Path: Reduce FTG points consumed
This person explains it.
-I will update this area if I ever get another idea-
And that's everything I have to say.
I hope this thread becomes a good ground of discussion instead of being ran over by "FTG SYSTEM SUCKS" post.
I tried to write this post as formal and at the same time as proffessional as possible (except for the images, I know it isn't the more mature thing to do but I didn't want it to be a block of text either). English is my second language so my vocabulary is kinda limited. Sorry for my bad english.