More Difficult Single Player Content Please

There was a pretty good point made here.

Most of you folks don't *just* want the challenge.

Say they add a difficulty slider to content. There's absolutely NO other rewards to doing it on a harder difficulty except that sense of achievement you got by doing it on a harder level.

Would you do it? Or would you come here and whine that you don't get anything special for doing it on a harder difficulty? You want some way to show you did it on a harder difficulty than that "scrub" next to you, right?

That's the problem.

You could always, you know, screenshot it, or video record it, for your own validation(I've done both of the above), but it doesn't mean anything to anyone else, and many of you want it to. "I did this and you didn't".

For the record:

I *do* screenshot and record everything. >.>
http://imgur.com/a/tBKPt

https://youtu.be/iAUK3svp3ms

The thing with "difficult stuff" is that people want a purpose for doing things that are harder than necessary.
Sure, there might be the odd one who finds satisfaction in doing outstanding things that nobody else would be able to see (unless they stream it), but that's how humans work.

What some people want is more recognition in a virtual world where everyone's the hero and nobody's "better" than others.
Driving the devs to up the level of the content does nothing for the average player. If anything, it turns them off.

I've been raid leader for MC, BWL, Naxx in Vanilla WOW, when you had to juggle 100 people to fill the 40 spots for the next progression raid and the pain you went through to get a team for that (wiping for hours on new content because undergeared and new mechanics to learn, Razorgore or Vaelastrasz for example) showed me clearly where the problem lies. People are content with "good" gear if the step from good to great is too steep.

Now, this was 10 years ago and my lazy days are over. I'm working, with a hellish commute to boot. I'm also married and want to spend time with my wife, so I now lack time and energy for things like Alex Savage and I'm cool with that.
I kind of grew to be the type of player I couldn't understand back then, and I think those who cry for "more challenge" when they really are just bored because of not enough variation will get there one day, too.

I think additional ways to obtain things for personal satisfaction should be solo as to not water down the player base for the core raiding community, hence my chocobo dungeon mode suggestion. Rewards should be for the chocobo. Exp boni, coloring food for their feathers, dye and glamours for their bardings and whatever one could come up with.

If I want to challenge myself while playing solo, I just go into dungeons/trials solo and see if I can clear it, if its easy then I move up to the next difficulty tier.

It may give no rewards, but it sure can be fun.

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Originally Posted by TouchandFeel

If I want to challenge myself while playing solo, I just go into dungeons/trials solo and see if I can clear it, if its easy then I move up to the next difficulty tier.

It may give no rewards, but it sure can be fun.

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Yea, but imagine doing that kind of stuff gave rewards. Titles, normally unobtainable glamours, extra skills for your chocobo.
Then more people had an incentive to do the same and we wouldn't have threads like this.

Never add more options with no proper rewards. As much as people might beg for them, in the end, they'll only complain about "the grind".
Also, adding things like better-than-normal gear would lead to people complaining about "gated content" and "grind" again.

I feel the chocobo for example is severely unterutilized by the game, where there's so much potential to add a new layer of progression on a personal level. Or, heck, your retainers. Make them useless buffbots like the followers in Diablo 3, a nice personal story, a questline for them, some rewards like retainer gear to power their buffs up. It's stuff like this the game lacks.

Right now it's "higher level, better items" and that's MMORPG Generation 2 stuff. I thought FFXIV was ambitious and wanted to go for Gen 3. Then why clinge to all the old concepts? New ideas don't have to be groundbreaking or overly hard. They just have to add things to do.

Make dungeons where fighting is easy, but there are other things to do. Add randomized dungeons. Add a "bottomless dungeon" where your progress is saved when you get to checkpoints, solo and/or with chocobo/retainers.

There, tons of stuff to do. A bottomless dungeon would also last through all future expansions.

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Originally Posted by kazeandi

Yea, but imagine doing that kind of stuff gave rewards. Titles, normally unobtainable glamours, extra skills for your chocobo.
Then more people had an incentive to do the same and we wouldn't have threads like this.

Never add more options with no proper rewards. As much as people might beg for them, in the end, they'll only complain about "the grind".
Also, adding things like better-than-normal gear would lead to people complaining about "gated content" and "grind" again.

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That's what drives me crazy at times about some of the community. "It's too easy I'm bored we need challenges!!" -> "..but you could make it harder on yourself to make a challenge?" -> "no, there's no reward for that, I want everyone to have to do it harder!!"

I do wish job quests involved you learning how to play your actual job with the 50 and 60 quests culminating in a battle where you have to put all your knowledge of the class to the test. A GLD quest was the only one i know that actually told you how to use flash.

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Originally Posted by raela

That's what drives me crazy at times about some of the community. "It's too easy I'm bored we need challenges!!" -> "..but you could make it harder on yourself to make a challenge?" -> "no, there's no reward for that, I want everyone to have to do it harder!!"

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Don't let that get to you. It's normal human behaviour.

What we're dealing with here is the need to stand out for people who lack direction and/or self esteem in an anonymous online world. People want bragging rights. That's Type A.

Then we have people with a lot of free time to sink in a game (with FFXIV being their current game of choice) who got bored after burning through content at a fast pace. That's Type B.

Then we have veterans who've been playing consistently for years and have seen it all and get sick of incarnation 225 of "fight through trash to kick boss with 3 other players" and would love some variation, that's Type C.

What we all have in common is that nobody of us wants to feel like we just wasted the 2 hours we had to play and achieved nothing.
How about something completely worthless but nice if you're out to get it, like, say, black barding dye, or maybe a certain glow for your weapon that does nothing but making it look nice?

Mission accomplished.

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Originally Posted by kazeandi

There, tons of stuff to do. A bottomless dungeon would also last through all future expansions.

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Roguelikes.

And gods do I hate Roguelikes.

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Originally Posted by Nadirah

Roguelikes.

And gods do I hate Roguelikes.

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No, no permanent death.

It would be a personal thing, you could do it solo (or with companion) and push your limits.
You could also obtain gear similar to raid stuff at levels of difficulty equivalent to the skill needed in raids, maybe slightly worse, so raids don't run into trouble recruiting members.
Not everyone of us is bad just because we don't raid.

They already have a single player experience in the game with the MSQ, but the story has an end and has to be expanded with every content patch. Such a dungeon wouldn't. It would give you something else to do, open up a new option. Options are always good, as long as they present a proper purpose.

It would also be optional.

I love a challenge so I support this, but then again people don't. So optional challenging single player content would be great.