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[Plywood]

I've had some of the most terrible runs on Aurum Vale this past Christmas week. AURUM VALE* Ignore debuff stacks, don't dodge for shit, wonder what's going wrong have it pointed out to them, ignore anyway. sigh

*

Spoiler

With randoms that are level synced down at that

 

[Ken]

Maybe they don't like fruits.

 

[ReginaldXIV]

Which new raid cause savage has tokens. Do you mean void ark?

Yeah, I wish Void Ark had tokens, so much gear drops in to the void (hah) due to everyone looking for specific pieces.

 

[Plywood]

Maybe they don't like fruits.

I giggled.

 

[Frumix]

DF quality has been exquisitely bad recently. It's one thing to be new and the other to be completely irrevocably dumb, so it's always pleasing when you find somebody who doesn't know what they're doing but are willing to follow advice and improve.

 

[Omni]

I wiped several times on Toto-Rak yesterday... Toto-Rak

I don't even know what to say. Tank refused to take agro and I had at least 7 enemies on me. I die since I'm trying to heal through it, of course (not that it did much since the adds can interrupt you). Then I'm forced to run back from the start, where the enemies latch onto me on the way and it happens again. Add in the tank raging at the DPS for going the wrong way (they were newbies) and things fall apart quickly. Everyone quit... haha.

 

[WolvenOne]

I wiped several times on Toto-Rak yesterday... Toto-Rak

I don't even know what to say. Tank refused to take agro and I had at least 7 enemies on me. I die since I'm trying to heal through it, of course (not that it did much since the adds can interrupt you). Then I'm forced to run back from the start, where the enemies latch onto me on the way and it happens again. Add in the tank raging at the DPS for going the wrong way (they were newbies) and things fall apart quickly. Everyone quit... haha.

I am so flipping thankful that I'm always the tank when I'm duty-finding things. That doesn't make bad runs impossible mind you, but there's so much less that can go wrong when the tank knows how to run a dungeon reasonably well.

 

[Frumix]

I am so flipping thankful that I'm always the tank when I'm duty-finding things. That doesn't make bad runs impossible mind you, but there's so much less that can go wrong when the tank knows how to run a dungeon reasonably well.

When you're DPS, the tank can't hold hate or takes forever between pulls.
When you're tanking, the healer falls asleep or you're leading on DPS throughout the dungeon.
When you're a healer, the tank doesn't use CDs.

YOU CAN'T WIN

 

[WolvenOne]

When you're DPS, the tank can't hold hate or takes forever between pulls.
When you're tanking, the healer falls asleep or you're leading on DPS throughout the dungeon.
When you're a healer, the tank doesn't use CDs.

YOU CAN'T WIN

I'm a Warrior, I can compensate for underwhelming healing to an extent at least, and if the DPS are slow it just means the dungeon will take a little longer, that's a bit annoying if you're trying to farm something but for the most part it's not a huge deal.

At least it heavily reduces the chances of the party wiping, over and over and over.

 

[Ken]

Geirskogul is really hard!

 

[Omni]

Never understood why tanks are so reluctant to use their CDs. I can't even remember the last time I saw someone in the DF pop Living Dead or HG or whatever during big pulls. What exactly are you saving it for?!

Also slightly related, I hate the condescending comments that people seem to make when they see you use Benediction in dungeons. I spammed holy and purposely burnt through my MP to water down these mobs... It's a free heal, so why wouldn't I use it as often as possible? I'm honestly tempted to make a macro to explain what I'm doing at the start of these things. Haha

 

[KuroNeeko]

Just upgraded to a PS4 and decided to bite on FFXIV again.

Going to start fresh, but looks like the JP GAF Linkshell is gone.
Is Ultros it for GAF?

I can't believe this game has been out for over two years already. Does it still feel like it's good shape or is the majority of the population at max level and awaiting new content? Is the player population still holding, or is there a visible decline?

I guess I'm asking, have I come back to a dead game or has FFXIV still "got it"?

 

[Ken]

Just upgraded to a PS4 and decided to bite on FFXIV again.

Going to start fresh, but looks like the JP GAF Linkshell is gone.
Is Ultros it for GAF?

I can't believe this game has been out for over two years already. Does it still feel like it's good shape or is the majority of the population at max level and awaiting new content? Is the player population still holding, or is there a visible decline?

I guess I'm asking, have I come back to a dead game or has FFXIV still "got it"?

Ultros for NA GAF. If you play from Japan in the evenings, you probably won't have much luck on Ultros since it'll be the dead hours when it's your prime time.

It's kind of in the sort-of-dead-lull state but you can still find plenty of people during random things during prime time Ultros. If you haven't been playing almost daily for two years then there should be a good amount of content to check out.

Unfortunately, XIV feels like it's squandering its second wind with a pretty weak expansion so far, but I think it's still a good MMO compared to other stuff currently out, maybe? The next few major patches seem like they'll be the deciding point for a lot of longtime subscribers.

 

[KuroNeeko]

Ultros for NA GAF. If you play from Japan in the evenings, you probably won't have much luck on Ultros since it'll be the dead hours when it's your prime time.

Would it make that big of a difference? I mean, I know there's a "prime time" and an off-time, but say in a game like WoW, I knew I could find instances, PvP, and whatnot even in the late evening / earning morning hours.

Unfortunately, XIV feels like it's squandering its second wind with a pretty weak expansion so far, but I think it's still a good MMO compared to other stuff currently out, maybe? The next few major patches seem like they'll be the deciding point for a lot of longtime subscribers

That's too bad. I know the game is just over two years old, but I think that's still fairly young for a title that managed to get so many positive reviews. Oh well, I'm not sure what I really expected.

Thanks for the reply!

 

[Ken]

Would it make that big of a difference? I mean, I know there's a "prime time" and an off-time, but say in a game like WoW, I knew I could find instances, PvP, and whatnot even in the late evening / earning morning hours.

Duty Finder is cross server so yeah, you can still get stuff done at those hours. But trying to do stuff on Ultros itself will be difficult, not to mention the dead social scene and ghost towns. Just doesn't seem worth it to join for a free company of people that mostly won't be awake when you're on, IMO.

That's too bad. I know the game is just over two years old, but I think that's still fairly young for a title that managed to get so many positive reviews. Oh well, I'm not sure what I really expected.

Thanks for the reply!

I'm really hoping they turn it around since this is the first MMO I've stuck with for so long.

 

[Kagari]

DF quality has been exquisitely bad recently. It's one thing to be new and the other to be completely irrevocably dumb, so it's always pleasing when you find somebody who doesn't know what they're doing but are willing to follow advice and improve.

Maybe it depends on the time of day? I haven't had any problems lately except for a Snowcloak yesterday where a tank was doing really small pulls.

 

[HylianScribe]

I...can't handle this...

 

[tiggerkiddo]

DF has been fine. Though I have noticed more and more I am able to get away with running in Deliverance but that's probably from just getting more comfortable with tanking than anything else.

 

[Cmagus]

I...can't handle this...

Did you buy a lalafell?

Introducing, Lalafell!!

 

[Tiops]

Unfortunately, XIV feels like it's squandering its second wind with a pretty weak expansion so far, but I think it's still a good MMO compared to other stuff currently out, maybe? The next few major patches seem like they'll be the deciding point for a lot of longtime subscribers.

Really? Do we have any info on active players decreasing badly recently? I didn't notice anything on Behemoth, it's as active as always and the queue times didn't change. We even have a lot of PF entries now because of the Anima weapon.

 

[Tabris]

See you guys in 4.0! Going to unsubscribe this thread so I don't get enticed back in as I'll have a really busy year :O

Have a great time guys!

 

[SliceSabre]

I...can't handle this...

Adorable.

 

[aceface]

Looks like someone's found love with a lalafell. Grats, Korra. <3

 

[Squishy3]

The Lalafell off to the side is already planning his needlessly complex misdeeds to break them apart.

 

[Allard]

Really? Do we have any info on active players decreasing badly recently? I didn't notice anything on Behemoth, it's as active as always and the queue times didn't change. We even have a lot of PF entries now because of the Anima weapon.

A lot of peoples thoughts on a dieing game is the company of people who leave it. My FC which used to have a ton of people constantly playing and played well into the first two months of the expansion is down to only 7 active people on a daily basis and half of those don't even do much content. Some of it is burnout others are not happy with the itemization system in game and the lack of content just made them feel like leaving instead of getting frustrated by it, others were unhappy with the state of crafting. There are a variety of reasons for people leaving but the end result is just the content currently is too little and too little varied at that. Up until the anima weapon quest there wasn't anything for anyone to work towards anymore, but sure as hell wasn't going to bring a bunch of people back either.

People playing the game are worried that if those people stay away from the game for too long they may never feel like coming back, which is why a lot of us want to see 3.2 be better then it appears to be. I am sure there are probably a bunch of new players joining the game to even out some of the loss which is why at least when it comes to the party finder and duty finder it may not be as noticeable, but from a community stand point a lot of long time people are leaving which makes those players feel like its a dying game.

 

[Cmagus]

A lot of peoples thoughts on a dieing game is the company of people who leave it. My FC which used to have a ton of people constantly playing and played well into the first two months of the expansion is down to only 7 active people on a daily basis and half of those don't even do much content. Some of it is burnout others are not happy with the itemization system in game and the lack of content just made them feel like leaving instead of getting frustrated by it, others were unhappy with the state of crafting. There are a variety of reasons for people leaving but the end result is just the content currently is too little and too little varied at that. Up until the anima weapon quest there wasn't anything for anyone to work towards anymore, but sure as hell wasn't going to bring a bunch of people back either.

People playing the game are worried that if those people stay away from the game for too long they may never feel like coming back, which is why a lot of us want to see 3.2 be better then it appears to be. I am sure there are probably a bunch of new players joining the game to even out some of the loss which is why at least when it comes to the party finder and duty finder it may not be as noticeable, but from a community stand point a lot of long time people are leaving which makes those players feel like its a dying game.

I think more will be back for 3.2. Sargatanas is pretty quiet right now and there really isn't much going on.You can tell that people came back once 3.1 hit but many seemed to leave again.

 

[WolvenOne]

A lot of peoples thoughts on a dieing game is the company of people who leave it. My FC which used to have a ton of people constantly playing and played well into the first two months of the expansion is down to only 7 active people on a daily basis and half of those don't even do much content. Some of it is burnout others are not happy with the itemization system in game and the lack of content just made them feel like leaving instead of getting frustrated by it, others were unhappy with the state of crafting. There are a variety of reasons for people leaving but the end result is just the content currently is too little and too little varied at that. Up until the anima weapon quest there wasn't anything for anyone to work towards anymore, but sure as hell wasn't going to bring a bunch of people back either.

People playing the game are worried that if those people stay away from the game for too long they may never feel like coming back, which is why a lot of us want to see 3.2 be better then it appears to be. I am sure there are probably a bunch of new players joining the game to even out some of the loss which is why at least when it comes to the party finder and duty finder it may not be as noticeable, but from a community stand point a lot of long time people are leaving which makes those players feel like its a dying game.

Yeah, honestly considering how many times I get the new player bonus, (at least once daily, usually 3-4 times daily,) it's pretty obvious that new players are still entering the game. It's the long time player base that's thinning out some, and some of that is inevitable.

But, yeah they just need to add more long term projects for people to do. Especially with raiding being the way it is right now. Granted, raiding should be in a better spot come 3.2, assuming they really are rolling back the difficulty to roughly Coil level. Yes I know, really high skill level players will plow right through it, but many more players simply aren't ready for something significantly more difficult then that.

PS: Another reason why lowering the difficulty of Alexander is so important, is because of all of the new players. It's not really reasonable to expect players that weren't around for Coil to be able to go into Alexander Savage and not struggle. Maybe if they were a hard core raider in another MMO, but honestly I don't think we get too many of those at this point.

 

[aceface]

Yeah, honestly considering how many times I get the new player bonus, (at least once daily, usually 3-4 times daily,) it's pretty obvious that new players are still entering the game. It's the long time player base that's thinning out some, and some of that is inevitable.

But, yeah they just need to add more long term projects for people to do. Especially with raiding being the way it is right now. Granted, raiding should be in a better spot come 3.2, assuming they really are rolling back the difficulty to roughly Coil level. Yes I know, really high skill level players will plow right through it, but many more players simply aren't ready for something significantly more difficult then that.

I've seen tons of new players since that humble bundle went up. Hopefully some stick around.

 

[WolvenOne]

I've seen tons of new players since that humble bundle went up. Hopefully some stick around.

Oh, I saw shrubs on a pretty regular basis even before then, though the Humble Bundle has definitely created a new influx of players this past week.

That probably isn't the reason I keep getting the new player bonus on level 50 dungeons and trials and whatnot though. XD

 

[Cmagus]

Oh, I saw shrubs on a pretty regular basis even before then, though the Humble Bundle has definitely created a new influx of players this past week.

That probably isn't the reason I keep getting the new player bonus on level 50 dungeons and trials and whatnot though. XD

I mean it's pretty much how they have the game designed. The reason they rehash content is so that new players have people to play with so that their bottom end doesn't phase out however it's hurting the top end of players. Personally I'm happy to get that new player bonus it's really helping with the relics right now.

 

[iammeiam]

3.2'll be interesting; I'm mostly worried that it's going to be the last straw for a lot of people on the fence. Outside of the raid angle, I'll be curious to see if they have actual things to flesh out the patch beyond the mandatory checklist items.

Making the next raid tier 'easier' will be interesting to see, since there are a lot of ways they could do that, some worse than others. I'm guessing the gear wall will still be a thing, but we'll end up with something closer to the A4S HP checks with a little below A3S DPS check, so world first groups probably will just blow it up and be done fairly quickly. The rest of us will take time, and that's fine, and much like T9 and T13 you'll see a lot of clears of the tier either at the last minute or after relic makes raid-tier weapons accessible to people who haven't cleared the tier yet.

I just hope the fights are actually entertaining to farm.

 

[scy]

I just hope the fights are actually entertaining to farm.

End of the day, this will be the most important part probably. Looking forward to fights simply for the fights will be a good thing. Hopefully some of that can be delivered on.

Curious on the mentor thing if it'll be anything more than another-roulette-to-do for most people. That seems to be the only major non-raid thing brought up I think?

 

[WolvenOne]

3.2'll be interesting; I'm mostly worried that it's going to be the last straw for a lot of people on the fence. Outside of the raid angle, I'll be curious to see if they have actual things to flesh out the patch beyond the mandatory checklist items.

Making the next raid tier 'easier' will be interesting to see, since there are a lot of ways they could do that, some worse than others. I'm guessing the gear wall will still be a thing, but we'll end up with something closer to the A4S HP checks with a little below A3S DPS check, so world first groups probably will just blow it up and be done fairly quickly. The rest of us will take time, and that's fine, and much like T9 and T13 you'll see a lot of clears of the tier either at the last minute or after relic makes raid-tier weapons accessible to people who haven't cleared the tier yet.

I just hope the fights are actually entertaining to farm.

One thing I'd like the developers to do, but I'm not expecting, is to start putting a single bleeding edge trial for the progression groups, in odd numbered patches. I'd make this fight essentially require all players to be at max ilvl for the current raid cycle, so the meta for bleeding edge players would essentially become. Clear the current Hard raid and get it on farm long enough to get everyone their gear. Spend the next month or two learning the new Super Savage trial in the subsequent odd numbered patch. Granted, this doesn't really solve the issue with the middle tier of players not really having enough to do, but at least this makes it so people that breeze through the hard raid aren't put into a position where they only log in once a week.

Alas, the thing I can't figure out is what prize to give players for clearing this, dropping gear seems like a bad idea, but that'd leave mounts, titles, glamour items, etc.

I'd also like them to revisit the Relic a bit, since it's one of the few long term projects people can pick up at end-game aside from raiding. Mind you, I don't think their current meta for the relic is dramatically off, but it could use some tweaking. Right now it's designed so that one weapon will keep most players occupied for a month or longer, instead they should assume that most players will want relics for 2-3 different classes, and portion out the grind accordingly. Also, while I understand the reasoning behind abandoning the meta of the original Relic Reborn stage of the grind, some of the smaller upgrades probably should resemble that and require players to complete at least one trial on par with the original HM trials. So long as there isn't a ring-out function, most players will get through just fine.

 

[rubius01]

One thing I'd like the developers to do, but I'm not expecting, is to start putting a single bleeding edge trial for the progression groups, in odd numbered patches. I'd make this fight essentially require all players to be at max ilvl for the current raid cycle, so the meta for bleeding edge players would essentially become. Clear the current Hard raid and get it on farm long enough to get everyone their gear. Spend the next month or two learning the new Super Savage trial in the subsequent odd numbered patch. Granted, this doesn't really solve the issue with the middle tier of players not really having enough to do, but at least this makes it so people that breeze through the hard raid aren't put into a position where they only log in once a week.

Alas, the thing I can't figure out is what prize to give players for clearing this, dropping gear seems like a bad idea, but that'd leave mounts, titles, glamour items, etc.

That's what they should've done instead of tuning savage to luceriza and elysiam standards. But honestly, we still would have the same static drama as we did though.

 

[iammeiam]

One thing I'd like the developers to do, but I'm not expecting, is to start putting a single bleeding edge trial for the progression groups, in odd numbered patches. I'd make this fight essentially require all players to be at max ilvl for the current raid cycle, so the meta for bleeding edge players would essentially become. Clear the current Hard raid and get it on farm long enough to get everyone their gear. Spend the next month or two learning the new Super Savage trial in the subsequent odd numbered patch. Granted, this doesn't really solve the issue with the middle tier of players not really having enough to do, but at least this makes it so people that breeze through the hard raid aren't put into a position where they only log in once a week.

I'm basically not going to say no to adding new content, but I'm really, really opposed to anything being balanced around max iLevel+bleeding edge players. I mean, we're talking groups who took out A3S after a week, with Ravana weapons, and then scaling difficulty up to account for another 20 ilevels. It'd be a much more demanding fight than anything we've seen. That level of difficulty is straight up insane and would render the trial useless for all but probably less than 50 groups worldwide until the next tier. Plus gear walls just aren't fun. A4S is balanced pretty heavily around assuming a certain level of player HP; less than that and you're in for a really bad time (especially if for some crazy reason you're doing Nisi), more than that and eventually a lot of the mechanics aren't going to matter as much.

I do think there should be something in the odd-numbered patches for the 'hardcore' group in general. I like the idea they had with Savage SCoB -- reuse old content, have it play differently, have it be challenging--and am pretty disappointed we never got Savage FCoB. Them revisiting old content and releasing new, scary iterations on odd-numbered patches would be ideal, really. Chop up CT and release CT Savage, come up with yet another way to make Titan crazy and release that, Shiva has basically needed a Savage version since introduction, etc.

I'd just tune it a little lower than you're aiming. World first groups by their nature are going to blow things up quickly; that's their goal and they go hard for it, and I think they kind of expect that. The really super hardcore groups are pretty good at finding ways to introduce challenge into fights without them being tuned to be impossible at anything less than max gearing. Leave it tuned low enough that other people can aspire to it, too.

Alas, the thing I can't figure out is what prize to give players for clearing this, dropping gear seems like a bad idea, but that'd leave mounts, titles, glamour items, etc.

We've seen that titles alone won't do it, but I think a lot of that just falls back on 'is it fun' and 'are we bored enough to do this yet?' I think if it were a regular thing--raid groups could expect even numbered patches would have progression raids and odd numbers would have challenge bonus raids--people would take to it eventually regardless. Savage SCoB as a one-off that essentially only rewarded bragging rights was a freak event.

 

[WolvenOne]

I'm basically not going to say no to adding new content, but I'm really, really opposed to anything being balanced around max iLevel+bleeding edge players. I mean, we're talking groups who took out A3S after a week, with Ravana weapons, and then scaling difficulty up to account for another 20 ilevels. It'd be a much more demanding fight than anything we've seen. That level of difficulty is straight up insane and would render the trial useless for all but probably less than 50 groups worldwide until the next tier. Plus gear walls just aren't fun. A4S is balanced pretty heavily around assuming a certain level of player HP; less than that and you're in for a really bad time (especially if for some crazy reason you're doing Nisi), more than that and eventually a lot of the mechanics aren't going to matter as much.

I do think there should be something in the odd-numbered patches for the 'hardcore' group in general. I like the idea they had with Savage SCoB -- reuse old content, have it play differently, have it be challenging--and am pretty disappointed we never got Savage FCoB. Them revisiting old content and releasing new, scary iterations on odd-numbered patches would be ideal, really. Chop up CT and release CT Savage, come up with yet another way to make Titan crazy and release that, Shiva has basically needed a Savage version since introduction, etc.

I'd just tune it a little lower than you're aiming. World first groups by their nature are going to blow things up quickly; that's their goal and they go hard for it, and I think they kind of expect that. The really super hardcore groups are pretty good at finding ways to introduce challenge into fights without them being tuned to be impossible at anything less than max gearing. Leave it tuned low enough that other people can aspire to it, too.



We've seen that titles alone won't do it, but I think a lot of that just falls back on 'is it fun' and 'are we bored enough to do this yet?' I think if it were a regular thing--raid groups could expect even numbered patches would have progression raids and odd numbers would have challenge bonus raids--people would take to it eventually regardless. Savage SCoB as a one-off that essentially only rewarded bragging rights was a freak event.

Okay, I wasn't really thinking it should be, THAT hardcore. I kinda figured the ultra bleeding edge groups would make short use of anything outside of the absolute absurd. I more meant that the average hardcore group would need to have everyone near their max ilvl, and require a month or two to clear (depending how much time they want to pump into the fight.)

Also, yeah personally I'd lean towards Savage Primals. Maybe tweak the sky-boxes a little, remix the battle themes, stuff like that. Savage twenty four mans and Savage FCoB might be a bit tough to re-use in this manner, since they're all multiple trials and all that.

 

[Valor]

I don't see a problem with logging in just to raid. That's how some people want to use their sub time. That isn't a problem, in my eyes, since they're still staying subbed and are finding their enjoyment in the game. Trying to keep people like that around is kind of hard to do because like Tabris constantly said when he was with us (rip): he didn't want to do any of that other stuff. There's no reason to cater to people like that since they're gonna end up doing what they do regardless of what kind of incentives you try and give them to stay around.

The causal players pay the bills for games like this that are persistent. Those are the people you should target with many patches and stuff (which is what they do for the most part). The people who only raid are going to raid no matter how shitty the raid tier is. Savage Alex is the perfect example of it. We bitch and moan about A3S and A4S all day long but at the end of the day I'm logging in tonight to wipe in A4 some more. SE doesn't have to worry about my sub anytime soon. They should focus on keeping the sprouts plentiful. All I want is well-designed fights that I will enjoy. Even if I enjoy them for a month and a half before they're farm content, that's fine with me.

I liked farming Final Coil. It was fun for me from the first time I stepped into the fights right up until 3.0 dropped. That's really all that raiders want, in the end.

 

[WolvenOne]

I don't see a problem with logging in just to raid. That's how some people want to use their sub time. That isn't a problem, in my eyes, since they're still staying subbed and are finding their enjoyment in the game. Trying to keep people like that around is kind of hard to do because like Tabris constantly said when he was with us (rip): he didn't want to do any of that other stuff. There's no reason to cater to people like that since they're gonna end up doing what they do regardless of what kind of incentives you try and give them to stay around.

The causal players pay the bills for games like this that are persistent. Those are the people you should target with many patches and stuff (which is what they do for the most part). The people who only raid are going to raid no matter how shitty the raid tier is. Savage Alex is the perfect example of it. We bitch and moan about A3S and A4S all day long but at the end of the day I'm logging in tonight to wipe in A4 some more. SE doesn't have to worry about my sub anytime soon. They should focus on keeping the sprouts plentiful. All I want is well-designed fights that I will enjoy. Even if I enjoy them for a month and a half before they're farm content, that's fine with me.

I liked farming Final Coil. It was fun for me from the first time I stepped into the fights right up until 3.0 dropped. That's really all that raiders want, in the end.

Oh, I agree.

That's why I'm talking a single savage trial instead of an entire raid, why I'm against using progression gear as a reward for this, etc etc etc. Basically I see this as the ultra-cheap method of satisfying a niche demand within the games community.

The game DEFINITELY needs more casual trials and the like at level 60. I realize we're only one patch in, but I'm still waiting for 3.X's Battle on the Big Bridge moment. Where we start getting fun little popcorn trials that're short, easy, fun, etc etc etc.

 

[PhillipCostigan]

yeah, I remember the days of farming Coil until like 5 AM with people cos the fights were fun and there were always people up for farming. Was a good way to play with people outside your group too.

Alex probably won't have that. People just want to do their lockouts once a week and not have to bother going back in there cos it sucks.

 

[scy]

I do think there should be something in the odd-numbered patches for the 'hardcore' group in general. I like the idea they had with Savage SCoB -- reuse old content, have it play differently, have it be challenging--and am pretty disappointed we never got Savage FCoB. Them revisiting old content and releasing new, scary iterations on odd-numbered patches would be ideal, really. Chop up CT and release CT Savage, come up with yet another way to make Titan crazy and release that, Shiva has basically needed a Savage version since introduction, etc.

It's weird that they're so all-in on reusing old content as much as possible everywhere ... except raiding. Raiders will care the least if it's reused content I think, simply giving them a fun and exciting thing to do that's relevant will drive them. The Wind-Up Ifrit could have been a good excuse to add an Ifrit Savage with an accessory and mount/glamour item along with tying the crafted drop there. Adds some more things to do which is all that really needs to be done.

They do right with the HM dungeons being a new take on their normal modes and really need to look into doing that more with the old raids or trials.

I liked farming Final Coil. It was fun for me from the first time I stepped into the fights right up until 3.0 dropped. That's really all that raiders want, in the end.

Pretty much. Enjoy the content for awhile, that's enough.

 

[WolvenOne]

yeah, I remember the days of farming Coil until like 5 AM with people cos the fights were fun and there were always people up for farming. Was a good way to play with people outside your group too.

Alex probably won't have that. People just want to do their lockouts once a week and not have to bother going back in there cos it sucks.

Oh, I get that.

It's a shame because there are aspects of A3S I actually really enjoy, and if the fight were even a LITTLE more forgiving I think most people would have a lot of fun with it. Problem is there are moments in the fight that feel like the battle designer is giving players the middle finger, and that kinda ruins the fun for a lot of people.

Granted, I'm saying this as somebody whom has only gotten to enrage on that fight, and has never actually cleared it. <_<;;

PS: I would expect the current Alexander Savage fights to be nerfed from orbit come 3.2. Seeing as 2nd Alexander is supposed to be closer to Coil level difficulty. Seems unlikely that they'd create a situation where the first raid is actively more difficult then the first raid.

 

[Imagine Wagons]

Was XI like this at the US launch? I know we had the advantage of an expac or two at start. I wonder if the content was paced like what we're seeing in XIV?

 

[iammeiam]

I don't see a problem with logging in just to raid. That's how some people want to use their sub time. That isn't a problem, in my eyes, since they're still staying subbed and are finding their enjoyment in the game.

They're also the people most likely to just quit when their group breaks up because they have limited attachment to the game outside of it. I mean, there have been a few tentative discussions of what happens if 3.2 is as underwhelming as 3.0 ended up being, and "just keep raiding anyway" wasn't exactly the popular answer. HW essentially failed everyone as long-term content and burned through a lot of the good will ARR built up; 3.2 needs to make somebody happy or they'll lose more people.

It's a shame because there are aspects of A3S I actually really enjoy, and if the fight were even a LITTLE more forgiving I think most people would have a lot of fun with it. Problem is there are moments in the fight that feel like the battle designer is giving players the middle finger, and that kinda ruins the fun for a lot of people.

Asami mentioned the mental game earlier, but it's the only reason I can think of people would view A3S at i209 as particularly unforgiving. At this point there are very, very few things that could go wrong that would guarantee a wipe (basically the Hand of Prayer/Parting/Pain section or an add escaping.) Beyond that, you can make pretty much any mistake and recover, people just remember how scary the fight was and panic at the first mishap. It's still a fight that is easy to turn a misstep into a failure cascade, but really you can make mistakes and still be okay. It's basically T13 around the time most groups started getting their clears; you can't blow the fight off the way you can 1/2, but one misstep isn't going to destroy you.

 

[Wilsongt]

Was XI like this at the US launch? I know we had the advantage of an expac or two at start. I wonder if the content was paced like what we're seeing in XIV?

No one knew for months. People were too busy grinding crabs to do end game.

/s

 

[WolvenOne]

Asami mentioned the mental game earlier, but it's the only reason I can think of people would view A3S at i209 as particularly unforgiving. At this point there are very, very few things that could go wrong that would guarantee a wipe (basically the Hand of Prayer/Parting/Pain section or an add escaping.) Beyond that, you can make pretty much any mistake and recover, people just remember how scary the fight was and panic at the first mishap. It's still a fight that is easy to turn a misstep into a failure cascade, but really you can make mistakes and still be okay. It's basically T13 around the time most groups started getting their clears; you can't blow the fight off the way you can 1/2, but one misstep isn't going to destroy you.

The three parts of A3S that feel most middle finger-esque to me are as follows.

1: Digititis. (Rot passing mechanics in general.)

2: Tank Tethers. (Uh, I've been on this tether for five seconds, why isn't it transferring over?!)

3: Embolis. (Oh for the love of Pete, move dagnabit! Why were you even standing there to begin wi *BOOM!*)

The first two are merely mechanics that lean heavily of aspects of the back-end that don't work very well. Path detection in this game seems to be kinda wonky, so you have instances where on one persons screen X was nowhere near Y and rot passed to the wrong person anyway, etc etc etc.

Embolis, is just one of those mechanics that punishes the whole party for one person being off the ball. It would've been fine if it just insta killed whomever it hit (for most groups that'd probably be a wipe during progression anyway,) but at least it'd allow the rest of the party to keep practicing the rest of the rest of the mechanics.

 

[Ken]

Embolis

Kill me

 

[Valor]

yeah, I remember the days of farming Coil until like 5 AM with people cos the fights were fun and there were always people up for farming. Was a good way to play with people outside your group too.

Alex probably won't have that. People just want to do their lockouts once a week and not have to bother going back in there cos it sucks.

It will absolutely not. Not this tier of raiding anyway. Maybe Alex 2 will. That's really what I'm hoping for, to be perfectly honest. I mean I enjoy A1S just fine, 2 is boring, 3 is great forever, and 4 is awful. I really do think they'll fix this in 3.2 and give us another nice final coil style raid. I heard that the guy who did Thordan EX is doing Alex 2? I'm very happy if this is true.

They do right with the HM dungeons being a new take on their normal modes and really need to look into doing that more with the old raids or trials.

Agreed.

The three parts of A3S that feel most middle finger-esque to me are as follows.

1: Digititis. (Rot passing mechanics in general.)

2: Tank Tethers. (Uh, I've been on this tether for five seconds, why isn't it transferring over?!)

3: Embolis. (Oh for the love of Pete, move dagnabit! Why were you even standing there to begin wi *BOOM!*)

The real issue with A3S more than anything people typically talk about is that it's such a great fight to end a raid tier. There's a great deal of satisfaction that happens when it's finally done. It's mechanics heavy like Bahamut was, and that's why it would have been better used to finish off the raid tier instead of what we currently have. I know people mention this a lot, but it really bears repeating because I think it's the biggest problem with A3.

 

[iammeiam]

1: Digititis. (Rot passing mechanics in general.)

2: Tank Tethers. (Uh, I've been on this tether for five seconds, why isn't it transferring over?!)

Setting aside that I feel like most of these are usually only really bad because both parties are trying to move at once, mostly because we have multiple people living the latency struggle and both of these manage to work out (seriously--Alena's lag is so bad he doesn't have to sprint to set off two Regulators which is nuts to me), but really my larger point is neither of these failing is a wipe. You can fail these, recover, and go on to clear. The Hand mechanics and Adds escaping are more guaranteed wipes IMO because they either give your entire party a bunch of horrible debuffs or give the boss a damage up stack that makes everything after pretty terrible.

3: Embolis. (Oh for the love of Pete, move dagnabit! Why were you even standing there to begin wi *BOOM!*)

With post-catchup iLevels, touching the pretty blue death ball isn't a guaranteed wipe either if you hit it on the second rotation. It does a bunch of damage, but with the VIT we all have now it's survivable. It's also a very small, slow-moving ball that moves along a straight path your group gets to determine so it's really hard to justify touching it in the first place.

Which is mostly what I mean about the mental game--any of those things can go wrong and groups can recover and move on, but there's a tendency to just wipe it as soon as they happen. If you have a bunch of people at lower HP when the Embolus touching happens, you'll wipe. If you fail Digi passes multiple times per pull, you're probably heading for enrage. But none of these are one-off errors that doom your run to failure.

 

[scy]

Okay but all three of those can be planned for to minimize the chances of people being off by simply removing some of the mistakes from even being possible. Digititis can be plotted to minimize moving parts so the RNG targeting isn't an issue. Drainage tether can be isolated to one of two spots and people can be further from the spawn so the tank has a lot more room to work with. There's no reason for anyone to be standing between Embolus and the boss anyway so they don't even need to know if it's there or not, simply that entire area is off-limits.

So I can agree that they're problem parts of the fight but that's kind of why they exist? To problem solve them. I dunno, most the hard parts of the fight can be planned for to the point that they're a simple thing to execute with no regard to the RNG parts of them. If they're being left to purely reactive or too many parts are moving at once, then sure they can be an issue but you don't have to do them that way.

Also, Embolus is probably the only one of those three that's outright a wipe. And that's probably just due to the damage up stack the boss gets, you can survive the explosion now.

 

[WolvenOne]

Okay but all three of those can be planned for to minimize the chances of people being off by simply removing some of the mistakes from even being possible. Digititis can be plotted to minimize moving parts so the RNG targeting isn't an issue. Drainage tether can be isolated to one of two spots and people can be further from the spawn so the tank has a lot more room to work with. There's no reason for anyone to be standing between Embolus and the boss anyway so they don't even need to know if it's there or not, simply that entire area is off-limits.

So I can agree that they're problem parts of the fight but that's kind of why they exist? To problem solve them. I dunno, most the hard parts of the fight can be planned for to the point that they're a simple thing to execute with no regard to the RNG parts of them. If they're being left to purely reactive or too many parts are moving at once, then sure they can be an issue but you don't have to do them that way.

Also, Embolus is probably the only one of those three that's outright a wipe. And that's probably just due to the damage up stack the boss gets, you can survive the explosion now.

Yeah, the explosion isn't the problem, it's the damage up buff the boss gets. And yeah, you can minimize the chances of digititis messing you up, though there's not much you can do about tank tethers if the server is just taking it's time recognizing the transfer.

Biggest struggle I've been having lately in the last phase, is the tether going through the Protean Wave marker. Wouldn't be a big deal if it transferred over nice and promptly, but half the time it seems to take 2-3 seconds to make the jump, which makes getting OUT of Protean in time a heck of a lot harder. >_<

And no, even with both players sitting absolutely still it can still take the servers a moment to transfer that tether from one player to another. It drives me nutty whenever it happens, but next time I'm in I'm going to try to compensate by positioning myself at a thinner part of the Proteon Wave, or where I think it's going to be rather.