Difficulty of Dungeons

What i do like on the latest dungeon is the first long pull, it think its about the largest pulls we ever got, which is kinda fun even when its just trash.

As a relative new player (started playing in january), I just started ShB content, and i think one of the mayor problems is that, maybe since HW, all the dungeons are pretty straight, you only need to know bosses' mechanics, but not about the dungeon itself, like in Hakkune Manore, or The Tam-Tara Deepcroft, were you need to do little things in order to be able to advance, or do a little backtracking, most new are just advancing, and defeating enemies, with no interaction.

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Originally Posted by KDChronos

As a relative new player (started playing in january), I just started ShB content, and i think one of the mayor problems is that, maybe since HW, all the dungeons are pretty straight, you only need to know bosses' mechanics, but not about the dungeon itself, like in Hakkune Manore, or The Tam-Tara Deepcroft, were you need to do little things in order to be able to advance, or do a little backtracking, most new are just advancing, and defeating enemies, with no interaction.

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Is it really, though?
Players will always try to find the path of least resistance. This is especially true for Tam-Tara (since you also mentioned this). "What about that alternative corridor? Nah, nothing's special in it, let's just push through."

There is no incentive in traversing through the alternative & optional paths in ARR dungeons besides maps completion achievement and for some of them, GC hunting log. Another example is Sunken Temple of Qarn. I've been seeing more and more players who don't even bother trying to do the puzzles correctly before the last boss, because it's simply faster to skip those two face statues we encounter and power through the ambush trap. Extra rooms? What's that?

Heck, even Sastasha gets similar treatment, first timer or not. "Map achievement? What's that?"
Some players don't bother trying to complete all those optional chambers after the 2nd boss. In my opinion, devs moving away from designing such dungeon is a good move to avoid wasting resources from creating a potentially obsolete content. They are good on paper, but in real practice: this is what we get.

Some puzzles would be neat. I wouldn't mind that. Might be a cool idea to create some puzzles that can be rapidly resolved after learning how it works so that farming doesn't get needlessly extended in terms of how long it takes.

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Originally Posted by Kuroka

What i do like on the latest dungeon is the first long pull, it think its about the largest pulls we ever got, which is kinda fun even when its just trash.

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I dunno, it's close but the final pull in Tam Tara might still be king.
But I totally agree, it is fun~

I personally like the feel of dungeons as-is. It's like a (insert fav food here) that you can eat repeatedly for years so long as you don't try to eat it too many times in one week.

Hard dungeons are fun once... maybe twice.

And after that, people will skip them and do whatever dungeon is the easiest. Even hardcore players, because their goal at that point isn't 'to do a dungeon that challenges me' it's 'get my tomestones fuck I just need tomestones to get this thing.'

This game used to have hard dungeons, Pharos Sirius is a good example. No one did it. People wouldn't even unlock it once they knew it was hard. Any time, ever, in the history of this game, when a dungeon hasn't been faceroll loot-n-scoots, ever, every single time... people would skip it. They'd bail in roulettes. You still see people doing this to some ARR dungeons in 2021.

The community including the hardcore have shown through their actions they do not want hard dungeons.

I would love them to include branching paths with optional bosses, and you get more reward if you clear the dungeon with all optional bosses killed.

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Originally Posted by Yuella

I would love them to include branching paths with optional bosses, and you get more reward if you clear the dungeon with all optional bosses killed.

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The issue with this would be.. once the rewards were no longer relevant (IE a new dungeon came out with more gear, everyone's gotten the cosmetic/minion/mount rewards) from those branching paths... no one would do them anymore, it'd just be the fastest path to the end for tomestones. And then the problem would crop up in Duty Finder: someone doing it for the first time vs 3 people who have already mined the optional paths for the rewards and don't need them means that the new person gets pushed down the straight path much like how sprouts would get pushed to skip cutscenes in Castrum and Prae until the Devs made the cutscenes unskippable.

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Originally Posted by DrWho2010

dungeons are supposed to be get in, get out though. I don't want to be spending upwards of 45 minutes in one.

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The dungeons don't need to be long. They simply need to be more challenging. The reward for doing them well will be a speedy run.

If it is already determined that leveling dungeons will not be fun content, we don't need them as in-game chores. Just have the game automatically mail me gear when I ding. How can FFXIV have so many beautifully-designed classes and no lowbie content where I can use them? It is like having a sportscar that is not allowed to go above 40 mph, shift gears or make turns.

Haukke Manor is a perfect example of a missed opportunity in FFXIV dungeon design.

Do you know how cool it would be if SE used the mansion layout as a way to create both chaos & cool fights? You have staircases, multiple floors, chambers and balconies. Imagine if enemies starting trotting towards you from multiple angles? Instead, you have groups of enemies quietly sitting in each side room like it was a love hotel. If enemies are going to wait to be "activated", it completely spoils the amazing experience that could be had with enemies from the front and back, using line-of-sight to break enemy casts, leading groups of mobs into massive AOE casts while avoiding pulling the entire instance...

These dungeons can be so much more than palette-swapped hallways & group of mobs every 10 paces!

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Originally Posted by NYCLouisGamer

Haukke Manor is a perfect example of a missed opportunity in FFXIV dungeon design.

Do you know how cool it would be if SE used the mansion layout as a way to create both chaos & cool fights? You have staircases, multiple floors, chambers and balconies. Imagine if enemies starting trotting towards you from multiple angles? Instead, you have groups of enemies quietly sitting in each side room like it was a love hotel. If enemies are going to wait to be "activated", it completely spoils the amazing experience that could be had with enemies from the front and back, using line-of-sight to break enemy casts, leading groups of mobs into massive AOE casts while avoiding pulling the entire instance...

These dungeons can be so much more than palette-swapped hallways & group of mobs every 10 paces!

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I don't know about you, but I feel the potential of Haukke Manor was pretty perfectly capitalized on Deep Dungeons.

There is at least one dungeon with a puzzle that no one does. Usually because tanks role play as flash in this game and the rewards for doing the puzzle are lacking.

As for dungeons. The reason they are a joke, is that the maximum item level is too high for the dungeon. A balanced dungeon would require a party to safely handle one group. Has difficulty on handling two groups at a time. And 3 groups would be certain death. Removing the role playing as flash from the equation.

The fix could be as simple as a setting "Force minimum item level while giving rewards based on character level" on duty finder.

So if you enter a level 20 dungeon with a character that is level 80. You enter as if you got the lowest item level for the dungeon. And in exchange you get rewards for a level 80 character instead of rewards for a level 20 character. That of course would require individualized chests. Some people will do it. Some will turn the setting off and keep role playing as flash. But the choice would be there.

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Originally Posted by ItMe

I don't know about you, but I feel the potential of Haukke Manor was pretty perfectly capitalized on Deep Dungeons.

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But good dungeons are supposed to be baseline gameplay for a Light Party, rather than fully optional side content like POTD.

And POTD is too easy for the most part, hence there being no need to force a Tank/Healer/DPS/DPS comp like in regular dungeons. The only "problem" in POTD is enemies dying too quickly!