A Disabled Raider's Review of Patch 7.0 Duty Design

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Originally Posted by Valence

"Because I have no problems with certain things, then people having problems with those things must be of bad faith, disingenuous, or not even trying."

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This is actually pretty disingenuous on your part which is ironic. The problem I have is not that he fins the mechanic hard to follow. It's that he was able to do savage content and perform well which has things that are hard to follow. Because there's no way you're getting a 95 in M2S with a mechanic that's "ultimate level" and having a hard time in a dungeon.

What's so problematic for you there? There is also casual (or especially extreme) mechanics that cause me legit more trouble than some savage ones as well.

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Originally Posted by ExiaKuromonji

This is actually pretty disingenuous on your part which is ironic. The problem I have is not that he fins the mechanic hard to follow. It's that he was able to do savage content and perform well which has things that are hard to follow. Because there's no way you're getting a 95 in M2S with a mechanic that's "ultimate level" and having a hard time in a dungeon.

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I'm not sure why that's necessarily hard to understand in that.

I had a friend who could crunch calculus problems in no time but noted that he couldn't count actual physical things --say, the number of cars in a lot-- past a dozen or so as quickly as a five-year-old could (especially if there was any movement or change in perspective). His brain simply couldn't track and exclude what was already counted, especially with the aforementioned orientation, let alone handle groups of objects quickly. He was fully aware of the issue and trying different techniques to address it, but for the time being, it was simply a process his brain could not handle normally.

Why should it be inconceivable for one particular algorithm to be harder for one person to process than for an "average" person even if their typical competence is well above said average?

I do think the mentioned mechanic wasn't a particularly good (or, certainly not widely relevant) example of the broader skew of changes the OP treats as an issue, but still...

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

I'm not sure why that's necessarily hard to understand in that.

I had a friend who could crunch calculus problems in no time but noted that he couldn't count actual physical things --say, the number of cars in a lot-- past a dozen or so as quickly as a five-year-old could (especially if there was any movement or change in perspective). His brain simply couldn't track and exclude what was already counted, especially with the aforementioned orientation, let alone handle groups of objects quickly. He was fully aware of the issue and trying different techniques to address it, but for the time being, it was simply a process his brain could not handle normally.

Why should it be inconceivable for one particular algorithm to be harder for one person to process than for an "average" person even if their typical competence is well above said average?

I do think the mentioned mechanic wasn't a particularly good (or, certainly not widely relevant) example of the broader skew of changes the OP treats as an issue, but still...

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Dunno. Finally giving the whole post an honest try. it'll take a while. But there hasn't been much to change my mind on this despite trying to approach it as someone who's not annoyed and someone who's legit trying to understand it. I just finished reading his first post entirely. It seems to come down to he doesn't like physically demanding mechanics and I do. I mean there's not much either side can do about this difference in opinion so we just need to move past it. It appears most people like DT design more than EWs. It sucks it's not working out for him. But I'm not about to suggest we go back to fight design that I find less fun just to please someone else.

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Why should it be inconceivable for one particular algorithm to be harder for one person to process than for an "average" person even if their typical competence is well above said average?

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I'll try to answer this though. it's because he compared Alarum to Grand octet. Which were apparently "alike". So I think this is closer to comparing your calculus example with another calculus example then you're letting on. Grand Octet is also a mechanic that gets cheesed so it's a bit skewed I will admit. The difference is Alarum is completely random (if there's a pattern I still haven't seen it). But it's also less punishing. Any death or mistake is likely going to be a guaranteed wipe in Octet, even with it being cheesed. Because there's way more things to pay attention to after. And missing a tower will still kill the party even with tank LB3.

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Originally Posted by ExiaKuromonji

The difference is Alarum is completely random (if there's a pattern I still haven't seen it). But it's also less punishing

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There is no pattern to Alarum Pheromones, each bee spawns at a random place and targets a random player(i assume you talk about that Honey Bee Lovely Phase), there is not much to understand about it, the only trick is to keep moving and not standing still , like not standing still at all,just keep running, while the entire party moves in a large circle around the room, if you think you get cornered you can use KB resist to prevent falling out of the arena.
I have tried multiple strategies during week 1 in a static and nothing worked, just running in a big circle is a the best solution and paying attention if there is a bee right infront of you.

Grand Octet is not exactly the same, since the dragons spawn in a set pattern (still some RNG involved) but the solution to both mechanics is kinda similar, i would say grand octet is a lot more difficult to solve because you need to pay attention if you got a marker or not and react accordingly.

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Originally Posted by ExiaKuromonji

Dunno. Finally giving the whole post an honest try. it'll take a while.

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It's some 30+ pages, iirc, so that's understandable.

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It seems to come down to he doesn't like physically demanding mechanics and I do. I mean there's not much either side can do about this difference in opinion so we just need to move past it.

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Likely. I do think there's some alarm to be raised, though, if the game were so broadly swinging towards one particular form of difficulty, since doing so would often occlude other forms of difficulty or one's leverage with content containing those other forms.

We could also point at certain forms being more problematic than others for mostly objective reasons. Those dependent on reactivity disproportionately affect those with physical mechanical issues and with higher ping. Those dependent on memorization, well, tend not to offer as much later -- becoming both narrowly accessible and without longevity, more akin to a puzzle to be solved than repeatable content. But even those, both, are fine and even advantageous to the game in reasonable quantities.

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I'll try to answer this though. it's because he compared Alarum to Grand octet.

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Ahh, I see. Because you had mentioned a "dungeon" mechanic, I thought you were referring to that of a literal dungeon -- i.e., his bit on Greatest Labyrinth -- in what I replied to.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Ahh, I see. Because you had mentioned a "dungeon" mechanic, I thought you were referring to that of a literal dungeon -- i.e., his bit on Greatest Labyrinth -- in what I replied to.

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Maybe I shouldn't make responses when I'm not in the best mood (should be obvious lol). I was actually talking about 2 different things he said and at some point it got mixed up.

The bit on Greatest Labyrinth was so long that I could only see it as a wild rant. I haven't got that far yet in my "actual" read. The bit about Alarum and Grand Octet was the comparison that confused me the most. But where I'm at in reading makes me think he did this in PF, which I think does Mario Kart (my static gave up on this, we hated this strategy). And he wouldn't be the only one I've seen judging a game mechanic based on PF experience (look at you Light Rampant)

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Originally Posted by Arohk

There is no pattern to Alarum Pheromones, each bee spawns at a random place and targets a random player(i assume you talk about that Honey Bee Lovely Phase), there is not much to understand about it, the only trick is to keep moving and not standing still , like not standing still at all,just keep running, while the entire party moves in a large circle around the room, if you think you get cornered you can use KB resist to prevent falling out of the arena.
I have tried multiple strategies during week 1 in a static and nothing worked, just running in a big circle is a the best solution and paying attention if there is a bee right infront of you.

Grand Octet is not exactly the same, since the dragons spawn in a set pattern (still some RNG involved) but the solution to both mechanics is kinda similar, i would say grand octet is a lot more difficult to solve because you need to pay attention if you got a marker or not and react accordingly.

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Yeah my static tried the Mario Kart thing as we wanted to stick with what PF was doing. But we honestly had better results having the MT (me) keeping her middle at all times and everyone for themselves dodging. The odd thing is this seemed waaaay easier for us. It didn't seem to make sense to have a patterned strategy for a mechanic without a pattern. And now I consistently get through it without being hit despite almost never having moved the boss as the main tank. Maybe this becomes harder with someone who has trouble keeping the boss middle for melees. I dunno. I don't consider myself a top tier player. I was 1 of the weaker players in our TOP static that took 2300 pulls to clear after all.

I feel it kinda goes beyond EW vs DT differences, which in my opinion are small since both follow the exact same design. It's just some specifics of this design has been pushed up and up since at least ShB as far as I'm concerned. I started noticing this in EW last expansion notably with Criterion or some of the last savage tiers. This expansion that kind of mechanics seem to be creeping up significantly, which is definitely a question of capabilities, affinities and tastes. Personally I hate it, it's not what I signed up for when I started playing.

I’m aware this is a couple weeks old, but screw it – I wanted to tell you THANK YOU for articulating this issue so flawlessly. I didn’t read 100% of the fight overviews, but I absolutely read most of this literal college thesis on why DT’s ‘difficulty bump’ feels so genuinely bad, but only for very specific people.

I don’t do savage, and only VERY VERY occasionally touch extreme, but I have prog raided in other games – I just basically retired from it after extreme burnout from the last one I progged back in SWTOR. Even so, I’ve still not raided at your level before, even back then, so while I understood more or less what was wrong, I absolutely could not articulate it in such a precise and clear manner.

I’ve been colloquially referring to the ‘difficulty bump’ as ’The visual sh*t slurry that DT calls difficulty’, which is more or less exactly what you’ve outlined as being EXACTLY the issue with a huge portion of these fights. The lack of visual clarity, which only effects extremely specific people this badly, seems to be such a root cause of so many of these complaints – and the fact that so many of them get shouted down with ‘Lol git gud scrub’ is maddening.

I'm gonna have to make a second post because of silly character limits, but I do have a point of reference that you may appreciate to note when it comes to the 'visual clarity' issues.

So, the second boss on Vanguard was visual hell for me, and I don’t have colorblindness OR super significant visual impairment. I’m nearsighted, but my glasses are very up-to-date, and I’ve had a full medical workup on my eyes within the last two years, with no issues found besides being hopelessly nearsighted. But the fact the arena around it has the exact same color scheme as the boss’s attacks had me having no idea what was giving me paralysis for the first two wipes I had (I ran with NPCs, so when the paralysis eventually deleted me, it was a wipe).

Upon the third pull, I realized I just JUST BARELY clipping the fences as I maneuvered around them for Battery Circuit, because I genuinely could barely see the outline of them, so even when I thought I was clear, I definitely was not. I had to stop doing DPS entirely (thank god for NPCs in this case) so that I could focus every braincell on being able to see the fences to get around them so I could survive Battery Circuit. The mechanic itself was IN NO WAY hard, and if I could have SEEN, I probably would have found it fun – the maze of fences adding some friction to the bog standard ‘spin mech’ sounds fun in theory! But I HATED IT - because you can't 'get gid' at something you can't frickin' see.

I fudged a few things in the third pull still, but once I figured out ‘if you have to move around the fences, literally just stop attacking so you can focus’, I managed to get through it. Needing three pulls to clear a boss is pretty unprecedented for me, I should note – normally, unless it was fueled by lag by my crap boondocks internet, two is all I need if I’m struggling. The fact it took me two pulls to even REALIZE why I was getting paralysis is...not a good sign, tbh.

Anyway. I hope for you, myself, and everyone else who I know are suffering from these exact same issues due to various physical limitations, that someone in the dev team gives at least half a da*m about retaining players with any flavor of visual impairment (you know, the single most common disability there is - think about how many people you know who wear glasses). Though given that the visual clarity issues seem to be getting worse with each patch, I wouldn't be surprised if most folks give up and move elsewhere soon enough. When a game is actively signaling that you are unwelcome, surprise! - people will leave because they feel unwelcome.

Truthfully, as an autistic person I definitely can relate to having difficulty with certain aspects of content like how DT went wild with the visual noise to give the impression of more complex mechanics. Sometimes it feels like I’m not fighting the content, I’m fighting my own eyes trying to adjust to the bosses doing a laser light show every 15 seconds lol. At least the jobs are all so easy you don’t need to look at hotbars anymore lol, that’s something.

Am I gonna ever make a post about this feedback or ever indicate suffering from these problems outside of this post? Hell, no! lol. You’re basically asking to get called a trash player making excuses for poor play. Honestly my best advice is just to suck it up and deal with it lol; you won’t find any sympathy on the forums. Also turn battle effects off when you do unfamiliar content lol.

I'm an MMO vet, so I'm very skilled at 'suck it up' - I'm mostly fine, tbh, most of DT is okay for me besides a few outliers (the second boss in Yuweyawata was specifically designed to make me contemplate setting my PC on fire in frustration, for example I swear to god I could feel some dev pointing directly at me and saying 'eff you in particular'), but as I am someone who is unaffected by 'lol git gud' commentary because I'm fully aware of what I am and am not good at, I do feel sort of compelled to keep adding my voice for the sake of people who aren't accustomed to this sort of ego-stroking kneejerk nonsense people do, and are scared off as a result. My first MMO was a full open PVP game at the tender age of 16, I have seen so, so much worse. Also, they may want to acquire a least a little reading comprehension, as well, if they don't want me to point and laugh in response when they attempt to make a 'lol learn to press buttons' argument.

Funny enough, I felt compelled to comment because I'm actually not that effected by a lot of DT - but many of my friends are, and they're terrified to say anything. Also, as someone who's prog raided (even if in a different MMO) - dying doesn't often phase me, and if I get annoyed enough that it does, I have the good sense to take a 10 hour break and come back when my brain isn't completely fried from previous attempts. Difficulty is not my issue - people with a lack of empathy and compassion are.

'Git gud' can't bother someone who isn't actually that phased by the "difficulty" - which, lets be real, the only 'difficulty' that's more low effort than just VFX vomit to obscure mechs is bullet sponginess.

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Originally Posted by Monolithic

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For me FFXIV is actually the first/only MMO I’ve properly played lol. I dabbled a little in XI when 1.X went down for the 2.0 maintenance, and I’ve played Elder Scrolls Online a little bit. So, I guess it may just seem worse to me because I don’t have anything else to compare it to really. I wasn’t active on the forums for those other games, for example, so maybe they’re a whole lot worse.

I should add too, in my view the ‘forum community’ and the ‘in-game community’ are two completely separate things. I’m lucky in that never seen the kind of arguing or contrarianism you see on the forums in-game; I think most people are much less aggressive than you’d expect from reading the forums lol.

And yeah I completely agree with the point that ‘difficulty isn’t the issue…’. I did raid way back in 2.0; Coils was more midcore content but I think it still counts lol. Although it was post-Twister-nerf i think lol.

It’s never been an issue of mechanical difficulty or misunderstanding the mechanics, it’s trying to get my brain and hands on the same page lol. And unfortunately one of the worst things for that is having people talking in my ear - it just makes it way too hard to concentrate on anything lol. I just stay away from that whole scene - not because the content stresses me out, the dealing with people does.