My thinking about Alex normal/savage. Issue IMHO inside

Other games did raiding right other then World of Warcraft.

Look at SWTOR. While the game is not very good, its raiding now as well as its story is 100x better then FF14, sorry. I guess you could say I am used to raids taking more time and actually requiring trash clears that can drop raid equiv. loot.

Will I go into Alex savage? No honestly because its not really a raid. Its 1-2 trash pulls and then one boss and then you are done. However if it was on par with Ulduar or ICC you bet.

I know some will not agree with this thread but that is just how I feel. I come from games where raiding took time, effort, and was challenging.

If a group has Alex Savage on 100% complete farm you effectively can run the whole thing in one night with putting around 1-2 hours in MAX. No raid I have ever done in any other MMORPG was ever completed in an hour or two besides that stupid raid right before ICC. When that was completed we had other end game stuff we could do.

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Envoyé par Madjames

Other games did raiding right other then World of Warcraft.

Look at SWTOR. While the game is not very good, its raiding now as well as its story is 100x better then FF14, sorry. I guess you could say I am used to raids taking more time and actually requiring trash clears that can drop raid equiv. loot.

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I don't know how it is now, but on launch the raiding with SWTOR was pathetic at best, that's not saying FFXIV is any better. Wildstar has the best raids and world design bar none, if only Blizzard or SE snatched up their team instead of hiring from inside. I also found SWTOR's story incredibly boring, but then again I find Star Wars boring. The cutscene system, choices, and voice acting are all significantly better than FFXIV but that's understandable. Yoshida and the team didn't have $200,000,000 to just blow after the disaster that was 1.0.

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Envoyé par Colorful

I don't know how it is now, but on launch the raiding with SWTOR was pathetic at best, that's not saying FFXIV is any better. Wildstar has the best raids and world design bar none, if only Blizzard or SE snatched up their team instead of hiring from inside. I also found SWTOR's story incredibly boring, but then again I find Star Wars boring. The cutscene system, choices, and voice acting are all significantly better than FFXIV but that's understandable. Yoshida and the team didn't have $200,000,000 to just blow after the disaster that was 1.0.

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The first raid was crap in SWTOR. I got through the entire regular mode in 3 hours the very first run through with my guild. However, the Palace and raiding since then has improved a whole lot. Star Wars is sci-fi and I left due to it going F2P and the game just being bland. However to me, the Imperial Agents story was the best story I have been through in a long time.

I have not nor will I try wildstar. Not interested at all. Ill stick with FF14 and hope the end game scene gets better.

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Envoyé par Madjames

Other games did raiding right other then World of Warcraft.
Look at SWTOR. While the game is not very good, its raiding now as well as its story is 100x better then FF14, sorry. I guess you could say I am used to raids taking more time and actually requiring trash clears that can drop raid equiv. loot.

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What would stop people from just farming trash for raid gear?

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Envoyé par Madjames

I have not nor will I try wildstar. Not interested at all. Ill stick with FF14 and hope the end game scene gets better.

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If your idea of "better" is "takes hours and hours to run" you're going to be waiting awhile. This is a theme park MMO, meaning the experience tends to be broad but shallow. There's a wide variety of things to do, but none of them has much in the way of depth. I honestly kind of like the "bite sized" raid design the way it's done now. We get one raid that's split into four very manageable parts. It's nice during progression, because it allows you to effectively "save" your progress if you have limited time per raid session. Get past A1, don't have to do it again till next week and you can practice on A2. I'd rather it be set up that way than to have to deal with getting past A1 every time my static sits down to raid for awhile. If you can progress faster, that's still an option too.

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Envoyé par Ashkendor

If your idea of "better" is "takes hours and hours to run" you're going to be waiting awhile. This is a theme park MMO, meaning the experience tends to be broad but shallow. There's a wide variety of things to do, but none of them has much in the way of depth. I honestly kind of like the "bite sized" raid design the way it's done now. We get one raid that's split into four very manageable parts. It's nice during progression, because it allows you to effectively "save" your progress if you have limited time per raid session. Get past A1, don't have to do it again till next week and you can practice on A2. I'd rather it be set up that way than to have to deal with getting past A1 every time my static sits down to raid for awhile. If you can progress faster, that's still an option too.

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Wrong here sorry. World of warcraft's raids have 13-15 bosses per raid. Once you get past the first boss it saves that progress. Then you move onto the next raid boss. The raids are huge, and very fun (Looking at you Ulduar and ICC). Those raids were not shallow and crap. They were the best raiding experience I have ever had. The same is said for SWTOR raids as well.

The trash mobs in WOTLK had a Low low % chance to drop raid gear, rare crafting materials, mount parts, and other stuff. You did NOT see it every week you raided, you were lucky to see it one piece every other week if that. The chance is their though that is what makes trash mobs in raids needed and acceptable because of that chance. Some in Ulduar also had a chance of dropping pieces for a mount. If you acquired all of the pieces you could build a motorbike. Again though they were a very low drop rate's. Also when you cleared the trash the first time it would not reset until the whole raid reset once a week. So if the low low drop rate didn't drop anything that week then that was it, you waited for those low drop chance gear/materials until the next week when the raid bosses and trash reset. It was just a little something extra to have a chance at getting stuff is all.

The end game scene in this game sadly needs to be reworked. The raids are shallow. I do not even consider them raids. Four bosses to me is not acceptable when other games offer raids that have 13-15 raid bosses per raid. Why would you be ok with less content to do, when other games offer 10x the content for the same price as the game you are currently playing?

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Envoyé par Madjames

The end game scene in this game sadly needs to be reworked. The raids are shallow. I do not even consider them raids. Four bosses to me is not acceptable when other games offer raids that have 13-15 raid bosses per raid. Why would you be ok with less content to do, when other games offer 10x the content for the same price as the game you are currently playing?

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Because raiding isn't all that many of us do. I'm fine with the setup. I'm sorry that you aren't. The endgame raiding community makes up a very small portion of the playerbase and of those people, only a fraction play the game only for the raids.

That's not saying I like Alexander. I find the story and the fights pretty lackluster overall so far (though I've heard A3S is the most fun one, so we'll see how that goes). I think that Coil was a far better raid both for lore and for engaging encounters, though.

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Envoyé par Ashkendor

Because raiding isn't all that many of us do. I'm fine with the setup. I'm sorry that you aren't. The endgame raiding community makes up a very small portion of the playerbase and of those people, only a fraction play the game only for the raids.

That's not saying I like Alexander. I find the story and the fights pretty lackluster overall so far (though I've heard A3S is the most fun one, so we'll see how that goes). I think that Coil was a far better raid both for lore and for engaging encounters, though.

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Raiding is not all anyone in this game does, me included. However, Raids are here. I am a veteran raider. Alex is sadly not anywhere near as beautiful and thought out as Ulduar for example. The issue is that raiding at end game is the Main focus in this game. If it was not then the best gear imaginable would not be available by only raiding. When people hit end game they raid and grind for gear, its that simple. The raids should be rewarding, challenging, time consuming, and above all fun. I am not saying a raid should take 7 days to complete but on farm, it should take more then 1-2 hours at most to clear unlike alex now that takes 1-2 hours on savage mode if you have it on full farm.

No one has given me any good example on why raids should not have more time and effort put into them unlike now. Now Alex looks like a slapped together raid that took roughly a day or 2 max to create. Ulduar on the other hand took a lot longer then that because it had more things to do inside it and more stuff to see (14 bosses compared to alex 4. Dozens of trash mobes compared to alex's 1)

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Envoyé par Madjames

Raiding is not all anyone in this game does, me included.

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It... doesn't look like you raid at all. Unless this is an alt? I dunno, I find it hard to take this thread seriously when it doesn't even seem like you've given the endgame content a fair try. Sorry, but Alexander Normal isn't anything even remotely resembling endgame. :/

I miss Coil. I'm going to go glamour farm the crap out of it sometime soon.

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Envoyé par Ashkendor

It... doesn't look like you raid at all. Unless this is an alt? I dunno, I find it hard to take this thread seriously when it doesn't even seem like you've given the endgame content a fair try. Sorry, but Alexander Normal isn't anything even remotely resembling endgame. :/

I miss Coil. I'm going to go glamour farm the crap out of it sometime soon.

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I have raided heroic 10/25 man content as well as normal mode 10/25 in more raids then I can count in other MMORPG's. The problem with this games raiding is that either you raid the way easy stuff or raid the brick wall difficulty which is on par with Heroic mode 10/25 man heroic raids back in WOTLK days of wow. I will not go and bang my head against a wall to do a raid that has only 4 bosses + 1 trash pull, that is not a raid nor is it worth the effort. Sadly normal mode is raiding and is considered end game progression.

I have said other times that the raiding needs to be overhauled. Wow's raiding did it right.

raid finder (easy as alex normal)
10 man regular (not as hard as savage mode alex but significantly more difficult then raid finder.)
10 man heroic (harder then the other 2 listed)

25 man worked the same way

Having only 2 extremes is not a good policy and there needs to be a third difficulty which is the raid I would go to if it was offered. This difficulty being between alex normal and alex savage.

This is my main and my Ilevel is 180. I have seen all the end game raiding this game has to offer in game, on youtube, and research as well as comparing it to my 18 years of MMORPG playing. With all of that in mind, I think I have enough knowledge to gauge how lacking the raiding content in this game is compared to other products on the market.

This game has the potential to be a good all around game (even raiding). The issue is that SE just needs to start making their raids more memorable, time consuming, difficult, and over all fun. I mention Ulduar because it was designed perfectly and was open to many different people (Some for more difficult fights, some for not so difficult but it was how you wanted to play) . You could not clear Ulduar heroic 10 man in one night of raiding, not even on farm unless you spent a good portion of the evening/night time doing it and when that was done you had 10 man regular to do as well as 25 regular/heroic mode to go through as well if you so choose.

I see no reason why SE should not be held to the same standard as other developers when it comes to making end game content. Asking for more content to do that is both more rewarding and time consuming is not a bad request. It would give everyone at end game something to do. I see no issue with asking SE to be held on the same standard that other MMORPGs on the market right now are doing that are F2P. It is kinda sad when a F2P game is pushing out more end game content that is both more rewarding, has multiple difficulty levels, as well as very large raids compared to a subscription. I find it sad that SE's raid size is effectively the size of one hallway and one room when compared with other raids on the market from F2P games that have multiple hallways and rooms divided over a huge castle.

I personally see a section of a Raid, like the Binding Coil of Bahamut (BCOB), The Second Coil of Bahamut (SCOB), The Final Coil of Bahamut (FCOB) and Alexander: Gordias as 1 Raid with 4 to 5 Bosses which have been divided into separate Turns and Floors, so that groups can queue up for a specific Boss.

If you would take all Floors from Alexander: Gordias and stitch them together, you would a raid which (in size) is comparable to the “Terrace of Endless Spring”-raid from Mists of Pandaria. If you look at it like that, it doesn’t seem so bad. The only problem is, that we only get 1 of these “Coil” or “Alexander” raids every other (even numbered) patch, so 1 new raid every 6 months.

Next to Coil and Alexander, we also get 24 man Raids, namely The Crystal Tower and now the Void Ark (which will be released with 3.1). These raids however are not divided into separate floors and feels more like a Raid then Coil/Alexander does. We get a new 24-man Raid every other (odd numbered) patch, so like Coil/Alexander, we would get 1 new 24-man Raid every 6 months.

If they follow the same trend as they did in 2.x, we should be seeing 3 8-Man Raids and 3 24-man Raids during the 3.x patch cycle.

The main differences between these 2 types of Raids, is that Coil/Alexander are 8 man Raids, while the Crystal Tower/Void Ark are Alliance (24-main) raids. Next to that, the 24-man raids were a lot easier than their 8-man counterparts and were mostly used as a “stepping stone” for the 8-man raids. But, that was until the release of the Alexander Raid, with it’s “Normal” and “Savage” mode.

While i understand why the FFXIV team decided to split each 8-main Raid into separate Turns / Floors (to save the progress the group has made an give them the opportunity to continue where they left off the next day), they feel extremely small. This is due to the fact that Alexander Normal Floors aren’t difficult to clear. While our group was still working on Coil, we bashed our heads against these bosses for hours before managing a clear. That was something we were working towards as a group. This made the Raid relevant for an extended period of time.

But, now that we’ve farmed Alexander: Gordias for a few weeks, in order to gear our characters for Savage, we’ve lost the drive to keep on farming it. For us, it was starting to feel like a grind, rather than a fun challenge within a few weeks. A real shame.

I don’t want SE to remove Alexander Normal, because it will give people the means to see the whole story, but the difference between Alexander Normal and Savage is a bit too large. If that means that they can add an Alexander “Hard” mode, which is similar to Coil, that would make us a lot happier.

But, also it would be great if we could go through a raid like Alexander: Gordias in one go, like for instance “The Word of Darkness”. Slap a few challenging trash packs here and there and i’d be a very happy Mi’qote indeed. (^_~ )

I’d like to think that FFXIV is still evolving and expanding on things the team has learned through the years with the development with 2.x and Heavensward. I believe that the team has set a basis/foundation for Final Fantasy XIV with 2.x and is trying to expand on it by implementing new types of content for us to partake in (like the Airship Exploration), in 3.0 while maintaining the flow of game they’ve set with 2.x. Once they’ve added different types of content with the upcoming patches, they could start working on improving existing systems like the way they go about creating Raids and creating a more diverse set of encounters which do not depend on one-shot mechanics and high DPS walls.

“Rome wasn’t build in a day.”

So, I’m keeping an open mind when it comes to the development of Heavensward and i look forward to what SE has in store for us with the rest of the 3.x patches (and beyond).

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Envoyé par Madjames

Having only 2 extremes is not a good policy and there needs to be a third difficulty which is the raid I would go to if it was offered. This difficulty being between alex normal and alex savage.

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I can't say that I want a bunch more trash added. We find ways around the trash if we can anyway; just look at BCoB's turn 1, where sac pulling became a thing just to avoid it having to deal with it. After that, they started putting in walls that you can't pass till you kill the trash. Ugh. The trash is actually completely removed from Savage Alexander aside from Faust in A1, but he's really more of a mini-boss/gatekeeper/dps gauge much like the ADS was in BCoB. If you can't pass Faust, there's no way you'd pass the boss.

That said, I could totally get on board with another difficulty level. Yes, the community asked for a "story mode" so that more people could experience the story, and SE delivered on that. It's great that it was implemented (the story itself is sorta lackluster, but that's another issue entirely; hopefully it improves with the next raid tier), but you're right that we're missing something. What we have now is "faceroll" and "facedesk", because the difficulty for the higher tier mode was cranked up to 11 instead of staying the same. A1 and A2 are about the same difficulty as FCoB was, but A3 and A4 take it to a whole new level. It'd be nice to have a happy medium somewhere in there instead of a stomp-fest both ways - one for us and one for the raid bosses.

In any case, you should give some thought to participating in endgame instead of turning up your nose at it out of principle. You might actually be pleasantly surprised. You can go back and do the old raid content synced to minimum item level if you want a challenge. T5 in at-level gear was something to contend with. Twintania is still one of the biggest bitches this game ever served up to us. I'm sure Nael Deus Darnus in T9 was probably just as bad in at-level gear, but I haven't experienced that myself as of yet. xD

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Envoyé par Aldora

I personally see a section of a Raid, like the Binding Coil of Bahamut (BCOB), The Second Coil of Bahamut (SCOB), The Final Coil of Bahamut (FCOB) and Alexander: Gordias as 1 Raid with 4 to 5 Bosses which have been divided into separate Turns and Floors, so that groups can queue up for a specific Boss.

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This is exactly how I view it.

I stopped reading at "WoW"

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Envoyé par melisande

I stopped reading at "WoW"

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How come? Other games have done raids a lot better this this. Wow is one of them, SWTOR is another.

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Envoyé par Madjames

The first raid was crap in SWTOR. I got through the entire regular mode in 3 hours the very first run through with my guild. However, the Palace and raiding since then has improved a whole lot. Star Wars is sci-fi and I left due to it going F2P and the game just being bland. However to me, the Imperial Agents story was the best story I have been through in a long time.

I have not nor will I try wildstar. Not interested at all. Ill stick with FF14 and hope the end game scene gets better.

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I'm not the largest fan of sci fi, but SWTOR just falls flat in that regard too. The storytelling was very bland and while that works for fantasy at times, I think you need to step it up when doing sci fi in order to make it more interesting. I mean, when you're throwing the gods of creation, demons and giant dragons at a story it's bound to peak some interests, but scifi can't go around doing that so they need to step it up.

I wouldn't recommend WildStar as is regardless, they're having horrible server issues due to the large load. If your concern is with the F2P model I'd say you don't need to worry, believe it or not it's actually more fair than FFXIV with its subscription. You can buy things on the cash shop with items earned through normal gameplay, or buy them outright with cash. I believe this also includes things like WildStar's Fantasia, just goes to show how greedy SE is. I suppose Blizzard is more to blame for setting that standard though. Otherwise I understand, the cartoony art and gameplay may not be for everyone.

I don't believe FFXIV's endgame will ever get better, we've had FFXIV for 2 years now and and they've stuck to the exact same model, except now we're waiting longer than ever between patches. FFXIV has a lot of great qualities and does many things better than other MMOs on the market currently, but raiding is not one of those things. If your primary interest is raiding I'd suggest two-timing it with a secondary MMO. :p

Whatever they do the next alex nm needs to be harder IMO. It's just not engaging or challenging as it is now and it wears you down by the time you hit savage. Def needs to be a middle ground.

As far as longer and more continuity in raids, I would be all for that. More like an adventure and less like a street fighter match.

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Envoyé par Dante_V

Whatever they do the next alex nm needs to be harder IMO. It's just not engaging or challenging as it is now and it wears you down by the time you hit savage. Def needs to be a middle ground.

As far as longer and more continuity in raids, I would be all for that. More like an adventure and less like a street fighter match.

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You said it in far less words then I have and got my whole point across thank you.

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Envoyé par Bernelli

:rolleyes:



Wrong. The most common complaints is that A3S is both poorly designed and is also a brick wall that destroys statics. Including groups that did SCOB savage.

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Poorly desgined in what way? It's a tough ass fight as it should be, if a static can't beat it and break up over it then its there problem.

It's pretty sad that in this forum even the suggestion of "make more fun content for the game" will be responded to with "go back to WoW". I think some people would be happy if we got 1 raid boss per expansion pack, at this rate, or if endgame was just hunts that would instantly give you a full set of i210 gear for a single successful kill. Even the whole "well not everybody raids" excuse falls apart now that we have a normal mode raid that practically everybody can participate in, so if they develop say, 8 raid bosses for Alexander they aren't developing 8 raid bosses just for the 1% of people who raid, they're also developing them for the people who do Alexander Normal, IE: most players.

If you're not raiding in this game, then what ARE you doing? Farming tomes? Triple Triad? Lol

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Envoyé par Mature

ALEX normal is the BEST thing that happened to HW. It kinda overshadows the fact that you don't need an static or beg people to help you. You just join the raid with a bunch of people and get on with it. It kinda as well makes people be at the same level equally. I am pleased with this and hopefully it will carry on all the way thru future patches.

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Tryed it once without static group and dear god it was horrible experience, i gotta give some serious respect for those that DF that thing every time, i simply cannot do it ever again.

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Envoyé par Martin_Arcainess

Poorly desgined in what way? It's a tough ass fight as it should be, if a static can't beat it and break up over it then its there problem.

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You're a fool if you seriously believe that the large amount of statics falling apart once they hit A3S isn't related to the raid itself.

@ OP (sry ur name is hard to type for me)

Ok, what PRE WoW mmo have you played that you could bring ideas from, so far you are only mentioning world of warcraft and swtor which was even labled by the devs as a WoW clone (the devs who promoted the game said think WoW but with lightsabers). I am asking because the only game you are mentioning is WoW, and as much as this might be a surprise, not everyone has played it or raided in it so may not understand what your saying or asking for (i sure as heck don't). And please do not take this the wrong way, but you are coming off like a too big of a WoW-fanboy, and seems like you want ff14 raids to be exactly like WoWs.

You are also basing your comments on one raid type which was JUST added to ff14. Coil only had a 2 modes, coil and coil savage. There was never a "story" mode for the adverage player base. I say give it some time for them to adjust it as they are still figuring out a balance.

If you are upset on the size, please take into consideration and look up past live letters, letters from the producer going as far as pre-lauch. I say this due to yoshida said time and time again content is set up in the way it is, so if a player can only play for an hour or two they can do stuff. All content is built on this time frame. You will not find content that last 3 or more hours on adverage.

If that is what you want, this may not be the game for you, as they may not change their stance on this.

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Envoyé par FoxyAreku

Man I feel bad for you

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There's plenty of games that have done crafting rather well and this is not one of them for me.

I cannot *stand* crafting in FFXIV. It's boring as balls.

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If you are upset on the size, please take into consideration and look up past live letters, letters from the producer going as far as pre-lauch. I say this due to yoshida said time and time again content is set up in the way it is, so if a player can only play for an hour or two they can do stuff.

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If the instance didn't expire in 90 minutes or whatever, killing one or two bosses in a 14 boss dungeon and then coming back the next day is perfectly feasible.

In both WoW and EverQuest 2, raids persist for the entirety of the lockout. If I walk into a raid instance and get saved to an ID(Mythic raiding in wow, any raiding period in EQ2), that raid instance stays the same exact way when I load into it. If I killed X and Y, but not Z, when anyone that enters with my ID goes in there, all they see is Z is alive, and any trash linked to it is alive.

It wouldnt work here, because regardless if you killed anything or not, the instance is "done" in 80 or 90 minutes, and you have to start completely over.

Which I still think is stupid for raid content.

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Envoyé par Nadirah

I cannot *stand* crafting in FFXIV. It's boring as balls.

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Wait wut? this game has most involving crafting system i have ever encountered, instead of "press button to craft" you actually need a rotation and manage you buffs while doing that.

Alex normal mode has killed raiding and it painfully boring. It needs more challenge IMO.

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Envoyé par Dante_V

Alex normal mode has killed raiding and it painfully boring. It needs more challenge IMO.

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I'm not interested in arguing over opinions so I won't post beyond this, but I wanted to add mine to the forums to be heard. I actually believe Savage mode is what's killing raiding.

For some background, I'm raiding Savage mode Alex (currently on the last phase of A3S) and beat each tier of Coil before echo in ARR. I know lots of people in a lot of raid groups (or at least I did). All the raid groups I know didn't break up when Alex Normal was released because now they got to see the story easily. They didn't break up when Savage was released due to Normal mode burnout. However, one broke up when Faust/A1S was too hard of a DPS check for them. Almost all of the others fell apart on A3S. The fight was too much of a challenge. When raid groups are working for weeks or months on the same phase of the same fight, people get frustrated, bored, tired and burnt out. That's the point where people may say, "Well, I saw the story and A4 boss in Normal so... whatever. Bye!" but they never would've gotten to that point if Savage hadn't been tuned so high. To me, this clearly shows that the Normal mode isn't the problem; the lack of progression in the only real progression content is the issue.

I've been in three statics since the start of HW. The one I had going into 3.0 had been together for all of 2.0. They hated Alex Savage and the unchanged (since 2.0) gearing process. All of them but me and one other quit shortly after Savage was released. The next group I was in was rebuilding after half of their group quit because of A1S in the early weeks. They couldn't ever get 8 people on all at once to even enter Savage, so I left. The third group I am now in is with my real life best friend. I joined because their caster quit in A3S. Shortly after I joined, their PLD quit (due to real life scheduling issues) and we had a very tough time finding a replacement because no one wants to do Savage anymore. I'm wondering how long this group will survive, though. Our WAR has flat out told us that he only logs in to raid because we're his friends but he no longer likes the game and does not have fun in A3S. My best friend, our WHM, is pretty much of the exact same opinion as the WAR. Truth be told, I'm getting there myself. I have fun on Tuesdays when we clear A1 and 2S, but dread having to login for our A3S progression days because Savage is just not fun. It's tuned too high to be fun and A4S is supposedly even worse. As a group, we are now talking about cutting back a progression day because so many people are miserable.

Our group isn't the only one like this. Another group in my FC just decided they would no longer do A3S until 3.1. They said they will try it again then and, if it's still the same, they will likely stop raiding. This is on the heels of another group I know breaking up over fighting while progressing through A3S - the leader of my FC was in that group. She and most people in her group also rarely log on now either.

All of these people I listed were people who, like me, cleared all tiers of Coil before echo. They weren't casual raiders.

My point of showing all these examples is that I don't believe the easier Alex Normal is what's making people not want to do Savage. I think it is, in fact, the extremely challenging difficulty of Savage that is making people give up. So to say that the game "needs more challenge" is, I think, harmful feedback to the health of raiding.

We have the challenge in Savage now, but very few seem to actually like it. Add onto that the state of the game outside of raiding and it just makes things worse. Those are topics for other threads, however.

EDIT: To propose a solution, I believe Normal mode should stay the same including drops and ilvl, Hard mode should be added and tuned to the same difficulty of 2.0 Coil and be the main progression content in terms of drops, and Savage (if they insist it should continue to exist) should offer the exact same drops as the new hard mode but should also give an extra chest, titles, and/or small vanity rewards.

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Envoyé par Alym

EDIT: To propose a solution, I believe Normal mode should stay the same including drops and ilvl, Hard mode should be added and tuned to the same difficulty of 2.0 Coil and be the main progression content in terms of drops, and Savage (if they insist it should continue to exist) should offer the exact same drops as the new hard mode but should also give an extra chest, titles, and/or small vanity rewards.

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So like how Coil did it's entire thing, but with a Story mode. I think this is what people actually wanted when there was clamor for an easy-to-access mode, not to have the previous model (which catered well to its proponents) obliterated.

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Envoyé par Arashmin

So like how Coil did it's entire thing, but with a Story mode. I think this is what people actually wanted when there was clamor for an easy-to-access mode, not to have the previous model (which catered well to its proponents) obliterated.

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I think most of us were hoping for coil + echo as it was advertised honestly, but it looks like we're not going to get that.

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Envoyé par Alym

My point of showing all these examples is that I don't believe the easier Alex Normal is what's making people not want to do Savage. I think it is, in fact, the extremely challenging difficulty of Savage that is making people give up. So to say that the game "needs more challenge" is, I think, harmful feedback to the health of raiding.

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I can echo your sentiments from what I've seen on my server at least. One of Diabolos' oldest raiding FCs (and I think the oldest that hadn't transferred, but I could be wrong on that) broke up several weeks ago entirely because of AS3. As far as I know, only one FC has cleared AS4 on Diabolos at this point, too. A large number of folks that were raiders in ARR that I know don't have raid groups anymore, either, and I'm seeing many of those folks online less and less.

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Envoyé par Dante_V

Whatever they do the next alex nm needs to be harder IMO. It's just not engaging or challenging as it is now and it wears you down by the time you hit savage. Def needs to be a middle ground.

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Sorry to say but people who intend to do savage at any point are not the audience normal mode was created for. Now that airship exploration is coming you guys will hopefully not have to grind future nm alex floors and the forums will be clean of all the complaints how nm is too easy. Don't like it, don't do it.

I'm not saying a 3rd difficulty shouldn't be added. I would actually love a difficulty which could be pugged via PF but would offer a bigger challenge than nm. When does it end though? WoW ended up adding a 4th difficulty.

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Envoyé par Reinha

I'm not saying a 3rd difficulty shouldn't be added. I would actually love a difficulty which could be pugged via PF but would offer a bigger challenge than nm. When does it end though? WoW ended up adding a 4th difficulty.

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You say that as if every single release of standard coil turns didn't do exactly this when they were released.

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Envoyé par Ryel

You say that as if every single release of standard coil turns didn't do exactly this when they were released.

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You can pug Savage 1 and 2, what's your point? I think you know what they're requesting.

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Envoyé par Colorful

You can pug Savage 1 and 2, what's your point? I think you know what they're requesting.

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Oh i do, my point is simply that we had that option when it came to the BCoB series as a whole at least for a larger number of players, it was just many of the complaints during that time have gotten us where we are now.

Don't get me wrong i think the story mode addition was a good idea on paper but it was just poorly executed, had it been like coil with echo like they were advertising it as and not designed in a way that the gear rewards (combined with Esoterics) would be necessary to complete savage this whole thing would have gone down differently.

Instead there's now this odd imbalance of players; ones who have completed Savage Alex, ones who may complete it, and others who will never step foot into it at all, and for some of these players they're unfortunately looking at fighting the same 2 possibly 3 bosses for a 6-8 month period depending on the group. That's if they even stick with it that long as many groups are already disbanding or not bothering with it at all.

The airship content many keep hoping for is very quickly starting to sound like it'll be a bandaid that doesn't really solve the issue of our current raid design and gear distribution systems, if anything it might cause more issues if it turns out to be another version of hunts.

But here's hoping they prove that wrong and it's everything players are hoping it will be.

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Envoyé par Ryel

Don't get me wrong i think the story mode addition was a good idea on paper but it was just poorly executed, had it been like coil with echo like they were advertising it as and not designed in a way that the gear rewards (combined with Esoterics) would be necessary to complete savage this whole thing would have gone down differently.

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Story mode is not the issue for the majority of players. It allowed tenfold an amount of people to see what 8 man raiding is like, story included. Savage is the problem. How it requires nm gear (or waiting for eso gear) and story completion, how the difficulty curve is too steep and how there are no new mechanics compared to normal, are all problems to do with savage. When the only people complaining about the raiding situation are savage raiders it should be obvious that the fix should start there, either by adding a third difficulty or changing savage to be more forgiving. Leave normal mode alone.

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Envoyé par Synestra

Wait wut? this game has most involving crafting system i have ever encountered, instead of "press button to craft" you actually need a rotation and manage you buffs while doing that.

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You never played EQ2.

Absolutely loved its crafting system. Fail to counter that? In the beginning, it could *kill* you. Literally. Forge on isle of Refuge, best boss.

There was no rotation and there was no macro crafting. Spontaneously react to conditions that pop up or lose power(spent on abilities), progress, durability, hp or all.

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Envoyé par Nadirah

You never played EQ2.

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Off topic. Vanguard crafting was pretty cool. But my favorite was SWG pre CU. Even the resources had different stats that randomised every fortnight. Different values of the stats affected different outcomes of the finished item. Add in expermintation to improve certain aspects made it extremely open. Found an awesome comnination of experimentation and resources? make a blue print and mass produce in a player made factory.

All loot (pretty much) was crafted and did decay to broken so had to replace which kept the market open, plus you found you're favorite crafters and stayed with them.

I used to buy armor by the crateload XD High kinetic resist crafted armor for PvE, high stun resist for PvP.

Oh and I remember launchday crafting in EQ2. watching the botters die in the forge never got old. Then again I remember spending a few hours grinding XP in Fallen Gate and having to walk to Freeport because I was overloaded with copper coins XD

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Envoyé par Sapphic

Oh and I remember launchday crafting in EQ2. watching the botters die in the forge never got old. Then again I remember spending a few hours grinding XP in Fallen Gate and having to walk to Freeport because I was overloaded with copper coins XD

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I'd always get it exchanged by my tank. Or find a mailbox somewhere to do it.

Still had the best crafting I've ever seen. Never played SWG, not a Star Wars person.

Just can't get into crafting here. Inter-dependencies bother me, too. A lot. *hate* that you essentially have to be an omnicrafter to have any kind of decent success and you have to buy a load of gear. Just annoying.

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Envoyé par Saccharin

This isn't WoW. This is not hardcore raiding game. Try Alex Savage. Normal difficulty WoW raids can be cleared on the first day.

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Well I don't know about that. Coil was pretty hardcore for most people and took months to clear. Even after months only a few raid groups ever cleared turn 5. I believe raids like Coil are what the OP is referring to.

I'd like to see a raid like Coil added. It doesn't have to be part of the main story just a solid raid that takes time to clear and is more engaging. Everything I am hearing about AS makes it sound like a cluster and not fun at all. Coil was a raid people looked forward to running every week even if all they did was wipe.

My thoughts: 2 things are needed in order to make 8-person raiding better in FFXIV: A few more bosses per raid, and an extra difficulty level - Hard.

Difficulty: Normal vs Hard should be selectable when you first unlock the raid, and extreme/savage should be as it is now - unlocked from the Minstrel when you complete the entire raid on normal/hard (yes, doing either should give credit for the necessary quests, tho hard should not be DF'able until the next patch). If you want a story reason for the difference between Normal and Hard, alright: for Normal mode your team snuck in and caught them unprepared. For Hard mode, you somehow alerted them in advance that you were coming and they were able to prepare some nastier surprises for you.

Bosses: If the raid were changed from having 4 linear single-boss zones to having 1 single-boss entry zone, 2-3 2-boss "wings" (that could be taken on in any order), and a zone with a single end boss, that would be a great start (6-8 bosses instead of 4). Some of the bosses could even be rehashes of older bosses (NOT from Alex, mind you), in order to save dev time.

Loot: All bosses should drop loot, and lockouts should be on a per-boss basis, with Normal being "until you get loot" and hard+ being "one chance per boss + one token per zone". Normal and Hard should (probably) not share a lockout, but people not wanting to do Normal shouldn't have to provided they have the gear or the skill to bypass it.

With regards to the Devs' MO being that stuff should be doable even for people who have little time to play, that's fine. Once a raid like the ones we have is on farm, it only takes about 10-20 minutes (max) per boss to kill each boss, so 2-3 bosses should still be doable in an hour, and the entire raid with 3-4 hours a week. And before content is on farm, 60-90 minutes is plenty of time for semi-casual players to be bashing their heads against a single boss.

Here's an example schedule with a 6-boss raid for which the first 5 bosses (entry and 2 wings) are on farm:

• Day 1: Kill the 5 bosses (15 minutes for the first boss, 30 minutes for each of the wings). Total: 1hr, 15m. If we still have time, get a few practice runs in on the final boss.
• Day 2: Go in and do our best to kill the final boss. Total time: 1.5 - 3 hours, depending on group preference.

For an 8-boss raid, it's similar, except I'd probably allocate 2 hours for the first 7 bosses. Once either is on complete farm, we split the farm between raid days, and perhaps even run each one twice with 4 mains and 4 alts. Even with the double run, a 6-boss raid would be 1.5 hrs per night, and an 8-boss would be 2 hrs per night. It just takes good scheduling and people being on time for the raid (if they're not, they get warned, then benched if it becomes a habit).

--Erim Nelhah