Could SE at least pretend to do an Effort ?

I mean, we are nearly 2 expansion in.

If the existing appearances ain't scratching your fashion itch, then anything else that comes up as undyeable dungeon sets probably won't do either.
And lets be real - Unless you can color them, they usually get instantly glamoured over anyway.

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Originally Posted by Gleipni

No,i took that exemple on purpose,because punching people is bad yes,but what do you think it is for a compagny make a lot of money,using somecjeap method to get more money ?

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Assault is a legal and moral issue, re-used gear in an MMO is not a legal or moral issue, I can't be clearer than that.

Also, I think that you'll find that designing and implementing gear is actually kind of difficult to do within time constraints, especially when SE's employees have other stuff to work on, and not just content for this game but likely other SE games too.

I have a feeling this is because they poured so many resources into Eureka.

I'm not sure why they keep churning out dungeons at this point.

If the glamour isn't worth it, the ilv isn't worth it, the tomes aren't worth it due to more efficient sources, the difficulty is too easy and there isn't any other replay value then who are they making dungeons for? The only target audience I can think of is fresh lv70's trying to gear up, but then they're only a very temporary ilv stepping stone into better content, assuming the fresh lv70 doesn't just buy crafted.

They're putting in lots of resources patch after patch after patch to throw out dungeons to a tiny niche audience and giving the endgame player nothing worthwhile. And if a game has less endgame activity, then what is the new player aiming to gear up for?

I'd love to see them take a good look at dungeons. Make them relevant for all players.

I'm not one of them, but a lot of people like to run dungeons with roulettes. The ilvl is about to increase, and the tomes will be useful for everyone. Tomes are needed to craft the gear.

Edit: I'm not sure why this thread hasn't been merged with the other one. They simply moved the original thread to dungeons.

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Originally Posted by Liam_Harper

I'm not sure why they keep churning out dungeons at this point.

If the glamour isn't worth it, the ilv isn't worth it, the tomes aren't worth it due to more efficient sources, the difficulty is too easy and there isn't any other replay value then who are they making dungeons for? The only target audience I can think of is fresh lv70's trying to gear up, but then they're only a very temporary ilv stepping stone into better content, assuming the fresh lv70 doesn't just buy crafted.

They're putting in lots of resources patch after patch after patch to throw out dungeons to a tiny niche audience and giving the endgame player nothing worthwhile. And if a game has less endgame activity, then what is the new player aiming to gear up for?

I'd love to see them take a good look at dungeons. Make them relevant for all players.

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Dungeons are now niche content.... in an RPG?

(Yes yes, an MMORPG, but it's got a lot of traditional RPG blood in it still, and can essentially be played like one - level your single class through the story, play each dungeon once as you reach it, continue onwards.)

If this was a standard single-player RPG, you'd only do the dungeon once anyway. Maybe go back in for treasure or side rooms that you missed, but you wouldn't complete it over and over.

An RPG without dungeons would be very empty.

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Originally Posted by Ayer2015

Assuming the FF14 census number are correct and ff14 maintains 620,00 active global subscriptions, I fail to how how anyone could fault customers having certain expectations of the product. With those sub numbers SE is pulling in 9mil every month...

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FWIW, it's not as much as you think at this scale. First the fact that many are paying less than that, and payment processors take a cut. Global development and localization-related employee costs alone (salaries, benefits, insurance, facilities, taxes, etc.) will probably eat up at least a third of that. Then you have technical infrastructure for the game and supporting services itself (likely thousands of servers and the staff supporting that infrastructure). Then you have your global voice acting talent and production costs (at a premium because of the synchronized schedule). Then you have your marketing/advertising costs (incl. having a big presence at all the trade shows). Then you have your customer support staff and all that infrastructure. Then you have corporate supporting services like legal, finance, HR, and management that have their cut. Then you have outsourcing for various parts of development that they don't have the staff to do in-house. All this and they still have to cover their sunk costs (like 1.x), plus contribute at least some money to the company's bottom line, hopefully.

I'm not saying they're poor or anything (I know the "small indie company" meme as well as anyone), but at the same time, I think people just look at numbers like $8-9 million and think "that's an insane amount of money!" -- but for a project of this scale, it's just going to basically be covering their costs. The merchandise (which has its own costs, incl. production and distribution) and various up-sales are probably where any actual profit comes from. MMOs are really expensive.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

An RPG without dungeons would be very empty.

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Not really. Not every RPG, even JRPG's, are fantasy games, thus certain content that is labeled "dungeon" is really just another example of a self-enclosed puzzle.

Take something like a licensed game (eg Batman, X-Men, Sailor Moon, etc) usually an RPG based on a licensed property is legally bound to include certain elements and not whole-cloth create new ones. We may call them dungeons in a fantasy game, but really they're just another zone/instance/puzzle with additional combat rules attached in the case of a MMORPG. In a single player game like Mass Effect or Fallout that isn't a fantasy game on the surface, still has places to explore, they just come in a different forms like planets, buildings, spaceships, etc.

An RPG with no "overworld" is still a world. Ultima Underworld I and II, have slightly different takes on this. In UWI, you're just thrown into the literal dungeon at the beginning and it's the first video game that really looks anything like a modern MMORPG. So you spend most of the game fighting monsters, and other people who had been thrown into the dungeon years ago if you piss them off. Then you discover that there's like dwarves elsewhere in the dungeon, who have always been there. The game doesn't present you with MMO-like quests, you find someone, you either talk to them, or you can kill them. UWII the "hub" world is the castle that has been encased in blackrock (so it has become a dungeon,) but you find a thing in the basement that lets you into several parallel worlds, one of which is a flying castle with sentient cats, and your decisions ultimately send it violently to the ground to progress. Both Underworld games, gear wear, the necessity to eat, and consumable items are a thing, so if you spend too much time doing silly things or insist on destroying things, you can actually block your progress and will need to start the game over. Much like Ultima 1-8, you can block your progress by doing stupid things like going on murder sprees. But Ultima 7 was GTA long before GTA. Ultima 7 had "dungeons" but they were extensions of the overworld, and operate similarly to Oblivion/Skyrim/Fallout, where killing key NPC's, makes them stay dead. But games like Fallout 3 and Skyrim just infinitely respawn certain types of monsters on the field, but you can completely clear a "dungeon" and it stays clear, because those mobs were part of the "dungeon puzzle".

FFXIV's dungeon's really have very little puzzle to them. The sunken temple of Qarn is the only one with a direct puzzle in it. How do you exactly make a puzzle that everyone has to do, but can't be spoiled by videos/walkthroughs? That's the conundrum with trying to make any game last beyond it's initial release week. Really FFXIV's dungeons are more like dance choroegraphy. You have to do everything in order, or you're going to be doing it again.

Content that isn't dungeon/instance based, would have to be more puzzle-oriented, and the internet makes puzzle solving too easy. Dungeons could use a RNG element to determine which doors are locked and unlocked, which traps activate, and which paths are dead ends. eg, there are multiple solutions to getting to Boss room C, but you can choose to do boss A or B, both or neither, if the starting conditions open the path that way, or you could find the keys and choose to bypass A and B. PotD/HoH does a bit of this, but doesn't really present any solution other than "kill everything to progress"

Like Wizardy Online wasn't a great game, but at least their dungeons offered different kinds of puzzles, for example one dungeon had you answer 5 quizzes to unlock the next area. Another dungeon had you do quests for a NPC within the dungeon. Like each dungeon was a puzzle itself, and not something you were going to complete in 10 minutes, it was something you could spend all week on. Thus each dungeon was more like Eureka in design, but without the intense grind to solve it.

Since when are dungeons puzzle oriented...

It's not about "game production" or giving the developers a break! They chose vertical progression over horizontal progression, so they have to keep up with the Joneses.

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Originally Posted by Ayer2015

Assuming the FF14 census number are correct and ff14 maintains 620,00 active global subscriptions, I fail to how how anyone could fault customers having certain expectations of the product. With those sub numbers SE is pulling in 9mil every month...

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Not to fully defend SE given their Triple A status what the other person said is right, need to take into account costs for production. Though at that point you would question allocation of funds from SE’s end and why their “Hail Mary” of a game reboot isn’t getting proper love.

That aside the 620k is a rough estimate of active “Characters”, not accounts but characters themselves. The active sub count is probably lower than that by a good margin given some of those characters can be alts of another. Add on that and solely rp oriented accounts and the number would probably fall under 500k or so.

Again all developers use assets more than once for good reason. It's not about being lazy, it's just being smart with their time, producing a higher volume of content in the same amount of time by not always starting from scratch on everything. It's still hundreds of staff working flat out every day, they just have them focus on more important things than dungeon loot.

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Originally Posted by KisaiTenshi

Not really. Not every RPG, even JRPG's, are fantasy games, thus certain content that is labeled "dungeon" is really just another example of a self-enclosed puzzle.

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I'm sorry, I really don't understand what you are trying to say.

Why "not really"? I never said anything about RPGs only being fantasy games, or that by "dungeon" I was meaning something more specific than "any area in an RPG where the focus is fighting monsters and reaching a boss at the end". Of course it can be a building or a spaceship. I never said it couldn't. Both Liam and I were using "dungeon" as a generic term.

You don't seem to have said anything to argue against the statement you quoted. I said an RPG without dungeons would be empty, and you've made a list of all the different variations of dungeons you can find in RPGs. I can't see where the contradiction is.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

I'm sorry, I really don't understand what you are trying to say.

Why "not really"? I never said anything about RPGs only being fantasy games, or that by "dungeon" I was meaning something more specific than "any area in an RPG where the focus is fighting monsters and reaching a boss at the end". Of course it can be a building or a spaceship. I never said it couldn't. Both Liam and I were using "dungeon" as a generic term.

You don't seem to have said anything to argue against the statement you quoted. I said an RPG without dungeons would be empty, and you've made a list of all the different variations of dungeons you can find in RPGs. I can't see where the contradiction is.

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There is no contradiction. You said RPG's without dungeons would be really empty. Just the term "dungeon" is specific to fantasy RPG context when there are similar kinds of RPG's and MMORPG's which use self-contained sections of the game as "dungeons" even though they may be planets, buildings or spaceships/bases.

In a sense, a completely, correctly, designed open-world system would be seamless, and the term "dungeon" would just be referring to the landmark. Where as "hub+spoke" systems are games like PSO2 which simply have no overworld, everything is a "dungeon"

That's all I was getting at here. FFXIV's dungeons are self-contained really-short pieces of content, and that is what is making it feel repetitive. It would only be worse with any kind of player-set tunables (Eg WoW's Mythic+), which is why that should not be the way to make content harder. Nobody uses the minimum ilevel as it is, because it doesn't offer rewards, and most players just unsync content to farm rewards, thus really making the longevity of any content that isn't new also super-short.

An open world system could feel empty without dungeon-style landmarks in it, but that wouldn't remove other kinds of content from it (Eg crafting.) Especially if the crafting allows for creating permanent structures. Certain areas of the game can change over time, thus giving a reason to stick around areas that are busy and abandon areas that are ruled by players intent on playing warlords.

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Originally Posted by KisaiTenshi

There is no contradiction. You said RPG's without dungeons would be really empty. Just the term "dungeon" is specific to fantasy RPG context when there are similar kinds of RPG's and MMORPG's which use self-contained sections of the game as "dungeons" even though they may be planets, buildings or spaceships/bases.

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So basically you're arguing a distinction that I wasn't using in my post - and personally don't believe exists. I'd use the term generically regardless of the story genre.

Let me rephrase then.

An RPG without [areas in which the focus is exploration and battling enemies] would be empty. It would be lacking one of the defining features of RPG gameplay.

I'm not talking about giving them "replayability" or "endgame value", my point is that they belong in the game even if they don't have any. They are part of the "traditional RPG" experience within the game, and I don't believe it's a waste of resources (as Liam was saying) to make them. They are part of the game, and a dynamic way of experiencing parts of the story.

ie. Would you (generic-you) rather explore the Burn as a dungeon, or watch the characters hike through it?

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Originally Posted by CorbinDallas

Potentially (though unconfirmed) FIFTEEN unique sets for Eureka Pyros, since they confirmed we're getting armour this time around.

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I wouldn't be surprised if SE ends up slapping a glow onto the old SB AF and call it a day.

Feedback: This gear set looks too much like previous gear sets. (I) am disappointed and uninspired because gear sets are a large factor in why (I) enjoy new content.

Whining and Crying: SE sucks so bad, it's unbelievable. Why can't they do what (WE, or EVERYONE) wants them to do. SE (CAN, SHOULD, IS TOO LAZY TO)... do the "minimum." They don't care. The game is dying. It must be because (the dev team is over worked, aren't getting enough support, don't have the leadership of...insert uneducated speculation) Blah, blah, blah...

It is easy to say "I'm critical of the game because I love it." However, 99% of us aren't likely to be a professional game developer. Those who claim to be "lovingly offering constructive criticism" aren't confining themselves to feedback. They dilute the useful stuff by indulging in speculation and the self-serving airing of grievances. Please don't generalize, you are NOT speaking on behalf of a majority, you only believe that or are choosing not to cite your primary sources that prove it's a majority.

PS: Optimism and encouraging others to be more optimistic is not white knighting...

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Originally Posted by Iscah

ie. Would you (generic-you) rather explore the Burn as a dungeon, or watch the characters hike through it?

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That depends, if it's a 16-part dungeon (eg more like original coil,) yes if it keeps the player on-task. If it's a single 10-15 minute dungeon, I'd rather just wander around it and have the time consuming fights as trials, even if they are not "primals".

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Originally Posted by KisaiTenshi

There is no contradiction. You said RPG's without dungeons would be really empty. Just the term "dungeon" is specific to fantasy RPG context when there are similar kinds of RPG's and MMORPG's which use self-contained sections of the game as "dungeons" even though they may be planets, buildings or spaceships/bases.

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You are awfully heavy-handed with those semantics. In the video game world(and MMORPGs specifically) dungeons refer to some sort of area that you have to fight your way through to a boss, usually with twists, turns, loot, traps, etc.

This idea that non-fantasy games don't have them is silly. Metroid(and metroid-vania) games take place in dungeons. City of Heroes was pretty much nothing but dungeons. Wildstar had them. SWTOR has them.

Most people just refer to them all as 'dungeons' regardless of what the game devs call it. Just like if I'm explaining my FC to someone who isn't playing FFXIV, I'd call it a guild because that is what it is.

Who cares. They should fold the patch team into the division working on the next expansion.

Gear reskins are fine. Specially if they come as dyable or with prettier color patterns. Other MMOs do it way more often than XIV does.

I won't be mad because of that. I'm mad because they picked one of the ugliest set they ever released to reskin in 4.4 when we have a thread of requests for dyable version of gear that is mostly ignored by the Devs, appearently.

Yes - I'm eagerly awaiting my dyeable Woad set and Fuma set!

I do enjoy how mine got moved to dungeon forums where it can die, but this one being the exact same thread got by just fine.

It's okay square. I'm not upset or anything. *Sniffle*