The Secrets of Party Formation

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The Secrets of Party Formation; How we form Saturday Assault rosters
Topic Started: Jun 10 2007, 10:31 PM (612 Views)
Rentwokay	Jun 10 2007, 10:31 PM Post #1
The Mushroom King Posts: 2,253 Group: Admin Member #1 Joined: June 13, 2006	MercenaryCentral is not a linkshell that was created to appeal to everyone with an interest in Assault. As is mentioned many times in various places around this website, we appeal most to players who are interested in an even balance of ranking up and points accumulation from a variety of Staging Points. As such, players who are interested in using each ID tag for a unique Assault clear farming points from one Staging Point exclusively exploring Nyzul Isle exclusively are better off forming a static Assault party and targeting those goals in a more efficient fashion. That being said, as the person in charge of creating the rosters for both our Wednesday and Saturday Assaults, a lot of people have questions about how the process actually takes place and why there is so much bookkeeping necessary to support our current methods. With this week marking the one-year anniversary of MercenaryCentral and, consequentially, one year in the evolution of our strategies, achievements, and rosters, I feel now is a suitable time to explain to all our members why exactly they find themselves where they are every Wednesday evening. The Sign-Up Deadline The sign-up deadline for every Assault event passes at 8:00pm EST on the evening prior to the event itself. The purpose of this deadline is to ensure that members who have signed up have ample time to prepare for their assigned roles, and also to allow the officer who forms such parties (i.e. myself) ample time to decide on the best party formations given the pool of available members. In short, it allows us to get started as close to our scheduled start time as possible, without a lot of unnecessary waiting around. If you visit the Upcoming Events forum and see that a stickied sign-up thread is locked, that means the party formation process is taking place. If you have not signed up yet, this means that you will not be placed into the initial rosters for the evening and will be considered an "extra". If you are suddenly unable to make it to an event, a second post in the relevant sign-up thread is appreciated, though not required, as it prepares us for the inevitable and allows us to plan around it in advance; possibly drawing from the pool of extras to replace you in one of the party rosters. Regardless of the circumstances, anyone who participates in Assault and has not signed up by the deadline is not allowed to lot on any items throughout the course of the evening, barring extreme cases where they are the only members capable of using a specific rare appraisal. Choosing Staging Points For Saturday events, the Staging Point is chosen following a regular rotation. Each Staging Point is given equal attention and repeated once every six weeks. The rotation is as follows: Leujaoam Sanctum Lebros Cavern Mamool Ja Training Grounds Ilrusi Atoll Periqia Nyzul Isle During the week where Nyzul Isle is the scheduled Saturday run, the corresponding Wednesday run will take place in Nyzul Isle as well. At the time of this writing, the linkshell has not progressed far enough into Nyzul Isle to make Mega Boss farming feasible on a regular basis, though once possible, Wednesday Assaults will be reserved for floor advancement and token farming, whereas Saturday Assaults will be reserved for Mega Boss farming. Wednesday Assaults are the events for which the Staging Point decision process is most complicated. Members are encouraged to get acquainted with the Completed Assaults thread in the Expanded Roster, which tracks each active member's progress throughout the available Assault missions. While this thread functions as a means of comparing progress between members, it is also the most-effective tool an officer has when choosing a Wednesday evening's Staging Point. After the sign-up deadline has passed, the ranks and names of each linkshell member with a valid post is noted. Once this list has been compiled, the corresponding Completed Assaults entry from that player is compiled into a separate post in the thread, trimming out only the clears and needed clears relevant to that particular pool of participating members. There are a few cases when a player is not placed in this condensed Completed Assaults list: if the player is a new recruit, to give priority to active members if the player is an active linkshell member who has not completed an Expanded Roster entry, to avoid inaccurately favoring a specific zone if the player is of a certain "cut-off" rank or higher, to save possible clears for future rank advancement Using this condensed roster, the required clears for each Staging Point and each rank are tallied. From that tally, the Staging Point for the evening is chosen. It is usually the area with the highest total of required clears across all ranks, or the area with the single Assault requiring the most clears across all Staging Points. To avoid redundancy (which invokes a general feeling of boredom), a different Staging Point may be chosen if it would force the linkshell to schedule the same Staging Point back-to-back. This is not a perfect system. MercenaryCentral does not consider the Lebros Cavern PFC Assault "Lebros Supplies" for any of its events, which in turn causes Lebros Cavern to be represented slightly less than the other Staging Points for Wednesday events. At the same time, the system still succeeds at making every evening as productive as possible without having to deal with the issues of juggling multiple zones at once. Choosing Assaults MercenaryCentral has a number of "favorite" Assaults that are generally preferred for Saturday farming events because they are feasible for small parties with little regard for job consideration. Because we harbor members of all mercenary ranks, however, lower-ranking Assaults are still scheduled to accommodate such members. Generally, enough low-rank Assault parties are formed to accommodate all low ranking members that have signed up. All other members are placed into preferred Assault groups. If a high-ranking member is required for a low-rank Assault party, members designated as "extras" are given a higher priority for such positions, followed by members that are not able to lot for such events, followed by all other linkshell members as chosen randomly. The lists below give a rough impression of preferred Assaults for Saturday farming runs, in order from highest to lowest rank: Leujaoam Sanctum Counting Sheep (3 members) Orichalcum Survey Leujaoam Cleansing Lebros Cavern Evade & Escape (3-4 members) Excavation Duty Mamool Ja Training Grounds Breaking Morale Imperial Agent Rescue Ilrusi Atoll Lamia No. 13 Golden Salvage Periqia Shooting Down the Baron Seagull Grounded Wednesday Assaults work around the concept of a "Key Assault," or the Assault that requires the most attention (e.g. the largest number of active players require the clear from the Assault) within the Staging Point. Three key Assaults are chosen for the evening - one for each of the three "rounds" - in descending order, beginning with the Assault that requires the most clears. The priority during each round is to complete the key Assault successfully, and only after that objective is completed does the linkshell move on to the next round. The first step in choosing Assaults for a Wednesday run is to determine the key Assault for that run and arrange a party for it. If more than six members require the specific clear (or if fewer than six members need it, but would not allow for a balanced party if all included at once), multiple parties will be created. Once the key Assault parties have been arranged, a party for low-ranking members is created to ensure they have something to participate in during the round. This party is bound by the lowest-ranking member in attendance and is, thus, usually a PSC- or PFC-ranked Assault. If other members of the linkshell require these low-rank clears, they are given the highest priority for the additional places in the party, assuming they are not needed in the key Assault party. All other participating members of the linkshell are arranged into other parties. Depending on the status of the leftover members, these parties attempt to address the need for clears in some of the less-urgent Assaults, including those where only one or two members in attendance need the clear. In other cases - particularly if there are fewer than six members remaining to form a party - a farming party is created. A farming party is a general term used by officers for a party in which none of the members require the first-time clear. Farming parties are avoided as much as possible on Wednesday runs but are formed with excess members when no first-time clears can be obtained. A farming party is welcome to do any Assault in the evening's chosen Staging Point - either for points, items, or fun - as well as Nyzul Isle Investigation, in order to improve our linkshell's standing in that area. Certain Assaults are rarely (or never) attempted by the linkshell. The most infamous of these is the aforementioned "Lebros Supplies" Assault in Lebros Cavern. Because of the high difficulty, high cost, and extreme prejudice against any job that can't use Powder Boots, the linkshell avoids it and will continue to avoid it unless Square-Enix decides to adjust it. In addition to Lebros Supplies, Assaults of the highest ranks are generally not attempted so as to save clears for the future additions to the mercenary rank system. There are discussions to allow specific high-ranking members of MercenaryCentral to "request" specific Assaults for Saturday farming runs for the purposes of farming rare appraisals, but such plans need to be discussed further until they can be implemented. Creating Parties Saturday Assaults attempt to create the smallest parties possible without sacrificing the ability to win reasonably. As such, many of the rosters for Saturday Assaults consist of only 3-4 members. Low-ranking Assaults are generally much more difficult, however, and are often attempted with larger parties. Such larger parties are avoided whenever possible because of the penalty to Assault Points that they impose. In the case of certain Assaults with very specific job-oriented strategies (i.e. Golden Salvage, Lamia No. 13), optimal parties may also include a few "leech" members so that everyone who signed up may make some progress throughout the course of the event. This is a disadvantage to those who will be actively participating in the pursuit of a win, but such sacrifices are necessary to preserve the spirit of "mutual achievement" that MercenaryCentral tries to encourage. The Nyzul Isle Investigation Assault has proven to be a great challenge for this linkshell, though we still continue to explore the area in hopes of benefiting everyone in the long run. Nyzul Isle parties place a very sharp focus on damage, often condensing the support sector of the party to ensure faster kills. Nyzul Isle parties also include a BLM whenever possible because of the chance that the party will encounter melee-resistant monsters. On some occasions when an abundance of mages are present, a Manaburn-style Nyzul Isle party is created and has performed very well. Because of the special requirements of Nyzul Isle parties, it may not be possible for every such party to be optimal. For that reason, and because of the five-floor nature of progression in Nyzul Isle, instead of creating a greater number of sub-optimal parties that won't make much progress, the greater resources of the linkshell will be condensed into fewer parties. Leftover members will be allowed to either attempt Nyzul Isle as a smaller group, or attempt other suitable Assault runs. Every scheduled Nyzul Isle party must contain a MercenaryCentral officer in order to consolidate linkshell progress. I understand every member's desire to have their own access to Nyzul Isle floors, but when the linkshell makes such efforts to progress, such progress needs to stay within the linkshell to be lucrative for everyone. During Wednesday Assault events, priority for a place in a specific party is, obviously, given to somebody who needs the clear for the particular Assault. Additional party members are arbitrarily filled based on the need for certain jobs and roles. Leftover members are placed into additional farming parties as necessary. If you require first-time clears from the chosen Staging Point and you were not placed in a party that would yield such clears during a Wednesday event, it is most likely because you have not updated your Expanded Roster entry. In all cases, keeping an updated Expanded Roster entry makes the party formation process much easier and allows the events themselves to accomplish much more. Please make an effort to update your Expanded Roster when you first join the linkshell and whenever you complete an Assault on your own time.
	Rentwokay Rank: Windurst Rank 9, Assault First Lieutenant, Wings of Honor Current Missions: Windurst 9-2, ZM Complete, CoP Complete, ToAU 29, WotG 7, ACP Complete, MCE Complete, ASA 1 Jobs Obtained: All Job Levels: SMN58, WHM75, BLU40, RDM40, BLM40, SCH40, WAR40 AF: SMN 6/6, WHM 6/6 Crafts: Cooking 80+2 Alchemy 70+2 Clothcraft 55+1 Fishing 44+4 Active Linkshells: GamerRevolution, MercenaryCentral


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