Diadem and Savage - I can't deal with it anymore

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Originally Posted by gzuscry

Its realy sad to read all those raiders and to realize (i knew it from very beggining) that they are sooooo petty about that one single special carrot called the exlusive gear, not only exclusive they want it to be the best. And they only care about best gear, they dont care for personal chalenge and the feeling of 'I CAN DO IT', noo-- if the best gear comes from farming lvl1 monsters they would farm it all day without ever setting foot in any other content. People like those are the ones that, lets say, never climb the everest, because you know there is no special gold loot chest. The only thing on their minds is to have this one bling to shine all over the place to make them feel like they are some kind of god bestowed kings. Its very boring to play with such ppl they are the one that speed, mass pull everything and are first to complain. It is very funny to see those raiders emerge at predictable time when that hard content is clearable stably with general error margin included (call it an intended gear-up). And they poison every single content they set foot in. If I could I would blacklist them globaly, to never be included in their parties and even to never read their comments in forum also to never let my comments (opinion) get in their way, because simply to me they are empty spaces or atleast i would preffer to eliminate them from any form of virtual, physical interactions.

Personaly i think best gear should never be in raid, that is one of the worst places to place stat-oriented gear reward, because the very fact is that raid is hard and you need the best gear to clear it. Current equation of gear acquisition is perpetualy constructed in a way that after your first clear or bis gear upgrade you are ever further driven away from incentive to help other/later player, for you content is accelerated (and that means constant acceleration) from there onward, but the one who comes later is driven further and further away from getting on the stage of equal footing.
Imagine a sports where disciplines first occrurance first prize would be better gear for next discipline so the one who comes first in the first discipline is praticaly set to win every other that follows and the gap grows with each race , becasue statwise (and stats are the only thing that practicaly matter) he is better set win. This is the current situation in the gear placement in the game and sadely this treand is accross practicaly every MMO there is where there is some RPG elemnt attached with stat growth.

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The hypocrisy in these kinds of statements is just astounding.

Boohoo the raiders want to keep gear from the lowly casuals. I don't want to raid but I want access to all of the best gear! Those selfish raiders! What about me, me me! I want access to all the gear, but the selfish raiders want to keep it all to themselves!

Oh and lets step back into reality a bit here. A 500DPS i185 DRG isn't going to become a 1300DPS machine with i210 gear. It just isn't happening.

whoa this thread. o.O

but seriously, with all the flavors in the world, why choose salty?

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Originally Posted by zosia

Yeah, the part you don't get is that raiders don't get full 220 or 230 gear day one of the new raid coming in 3.2. It can take a few months (even more if we look at alex savage) for raiders to get this high end gear. By the time most raiders get a full set, the "catch up" patch comes along before we can even savor the rewards of our hard work.

Why would it be so bad for the ilvl catch up gear come out with each new installment of the 8-man raiding content? So, instead of having catch up every 3 months, having it every six months. Obviously gear progression would need to be tweaked for a six month duration, such as giving casual players a way to get ilvl 205 if raid gear is ilvl210. That's how it works in virtually every other vertical progression mmo.

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That would be fine but then there is the other part raiders seem to forget about, more options? Why would you want to limit yourself to raid specific gear when the catch up patch hits plus what about people that didn't jump onto savage on day 1 and the people who are raid orientated but sometimes struggle and some other options to gear faster to help give there dps a boost especially since savage is such an extreme dps check. It is quite astonishing that these petty arguments as a general rule only gimps raiders in the long run.

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Originally Posted by Yurihyuga

That would be fine but then there is the other part raiders seem to forget about, more options? Why would you want to limit yourself to raid specific gear when the catch up patch hits plus what about people that didn't jump onto savage on day 1 and the people who are raid orientated but sometimes struggle and some other options to gear faster to help give there dps a boost especially since savage is such an extreme dps check. It is quite astonishing that these petty arguments as a general rule only gimps raiders in the long run.

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We can just do what every other vertical progression mmo does? We don't need to throw the baby out with the bath water here. In other games, adjustments are made throughout the raid tier to boost clear rates when progress trends stagnate. The same can be done in this game.

A dev team dose not need to invalidate the entire body of rewards of a current raid tier to boost clear rates.

Personally, I have cleared AS4 and I like the diadem. I like the idea behind the diadem and I've enjoyed playing some of my rarily played classes in the diadem to get them gear. Anyone who decides to take a minute to actually think about how 3.2 will play out should realize that Diadem gear isn't going to be as relevant as you think.

3.2 Is going to introduce :

Story Alex 5-8/9 with gear better than Savage, and a new Tomestone, this means that the Diadem gear you do wear into Savage Alex (which might not come out for atleast a week or two after Alex Story) won't be sticking around long after you start clearing content. ~ 3-4 weeks into 3.2 and you probably won't have any pink gear left on your mains.

The only thing I wish they would have added was a Title to go with my Gobbie Mount for downing AS4. So I can roleplay as a good player even better. :3 Other than that, you don't need gear to prove that you are a good player.

It's not just casuals who have benefitted from Diadem. Actually I see more mid/hardcore people doing it than casual.

Personally I hope this leads to some horizontal progresseru so I can get a trait that lets me Proc Bootshine to apply Dragon Kick's effect when Demolish Crits. :3 So I can crit more Bootshinerus.

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Originally Posted by Astral145

So please stop crying over sub stats because it really doesn't matter with the current system we have. Now if we had a horizontal progression system that places rare and unique traits on gear then I can see Diadem being a huge freaking problem. Because normally in horizontal progression systems the BiS gear is found in the hardest content.

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If you were to equip a set that overloaded you on nothing but accuracy, you'd do less damage than if you were using a set that was loaded with crit/det/sksp. Secondary stats, when you're talking about an entire set of gear's worth, actually do make a pretty big difference (unless you're talking about Parry, where you need several hundred points to get a paltry 1% mitigation).

People aren't even upset that the Diadem gives gear that's equal to the current raid tier. That happens every raid cycle. The Diadem currently has the potential to give gear that is vastly superior to even the raid gear.

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Originally Posted by gzuscry

I like to generalize about a huge portion of the playerbase based on how a few people act.

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Yes, we noticed. That's an awfully large brush that you're painting an awful lot of people with. Please stop.

People raid for many different reasons, gear being only one of them.

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Originally Posted by Ladon

Oh and lets step back into reality a bit here. A 500DPS i185 DRG isn't going to become a 1300DPS machine with i210 gear. It just isn't happening.

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650 dps machine! Or more likely, 650 dps floor tank. :3

I like the addition to this new of content. It's gives variety to stats. So not all 210 are the same. It keeps you in constant gear checks, because of random stats. Before diadem once you get BIS gear from eso and Alex savage you've seen them all and you run around d wearing the same thing. With diadem there's balance. That's means you can create your BIS in most un-orthodox way. But it works. Also 3.2 will balance that even more with raid and eso gear being meldable .

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Originally Posted by zosia

We can just do what every other vertical progression mmo does? We don't need to throw the baby out with the bath water here. In other games, adjustments are made throughout the raid tier to boost clear rates when progress trends stagnate. The same can be done in this game.

A dev team dose not need to invalidate the entire body of rewards of a current raid tier to boost clear rates.

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This pretty much.

I'm just going along for the ride now to see what they do with 3.2 based on feedback they've received and ideas they've already had set for the patches.

Need is subjective and this entire OP is way to generalized to even take seriously.

IMO a great player is someone who is willing to do whatever it takes to allow the team to accomplish it's goals and contribute to this end effectively.
This includes using foods or potions for progression and anything else that may be necessary (gear/relics/etc.) I'm willing to make investments and I want my teammates to be on the same level personally. A person who is willing to go extra lengths is much bigger asset then one who will not. Period.

As far as what other players are doing Idc. It doesn't matter who else thinks what about how I've achieved my ends and double so if they can't be bothered to beat the fight themselves.

As far as the current savage raid I'm not impressed and I don't think it is very engaging. At least not like coil was.

As far as diadem I think it's fine within the vertical progression goes. . The raid problem existed before diadem and is nothing new. Although I do think diadem should be throwing out 205 and 200 gear respectively for a little more of incentive towards raiding. I don't think savage is properly incentivized. I also think story mode could have been a little harder.

I am +1 your thread because I do agree with you... for the most part. There are somethings that I think you might be looking at incorrectly, though.

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Originally Posted by Aikaal

[*]There is a serious lack of "the world is in danger" in Alexander. Seriously it seems we're chasing goblins that are looking for shinies inside Alexander. I mean wtf?[*]In Coil of Bahamut, we were dealing with the primal that destroyed the world 5 years ago. We found his minions on his damn Right Hand. We faced Nael; the fight was epic! PHOENIX in FCoB? That was a bigger thing than fighting Bahamut Prime! Alexander? Nope, no, nothing exciting. It is simply disappointing. Thordan Extreme should have been A4S in term of excitement.

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I remember the First Coil of Bahamut being lackluster in story content. You are pretty much playing detective to the aftermath of the fight we see at the start of ARR; nothing super interesting. It isn't until Turn 9 where shit really starts to get good. So, what I am saying is, "wait until the story is a bit fleshed out before jumping the gun."

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Originally Posted by Aikaal

Diadem *snip*

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Diadem is by far one of the worst things to happen in an MMO that is trying to solidify itself as a serious raiding game (or an MMO with a serious raiding scene). This content is a slap in the face to anyone who wants to take raiding seriously. Ya, and I never though about how the items in diadem will make crafted gear obsolete.

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Originally Posted by Aikaal

l'll end saying in 3.15 SE will allow us to get Dips so everybody will have 210 weapons. They might release new relics in 3.15 that will be iLevel 210. You know, the item we've been told it was suppose to follow us the entire time that is still iLevel 135? That's the biggest lie I've heard. we should already have iLevel 205-210 relics and Gordian weapons should have been iLevel 215, 5 iLevel higher to it's worth raiding.

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During 2.x the Coil weapons were always 5 ilvls higher then the current relic. Once they were about to release the new coils, they upted the weapons +5 ilvls. This is simply SE oversight not being handled properly. Actually, the entire ilvl gearing system for 3.0 and 3.1 is terrible, and can easily be fixed if they take 30-45 minutes to come up with a detailed gearing plan.

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Originally Posted by Aikaal

But it's not worth raiding anymore, it will worth less raiding when everybody gets free Dips to upgrade their weapon.

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I think you are raiding for the wrong reason. This is simply a "Carrot and Stick" mentality when it comes to raiding, and I would be hard pressed to believe that you might not have any reason as to why you left your static due to drama. Although, as you mentioned, if you were one of the first groups to clear AS3 during its release, then you know that skill in raid is far greater than the acquisition of gear. And the fact that players will easily receive 210 gear, either from Diadumb or free Artifact gear upgrades should mean absolutely nothing to you. Someone who is full 210 ardent and artifact gear just means they grind low tier content. I don't mean to tell you how to think and such, but I know this kind of mentality when it comes to raiding is cancerous. You cleared the content, one of the best raiders out there, and you will be getting gear that other will not be able to get; is that not enough?

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Originally Posted by xvshanevx

I remember the First Coil of Bahamut being lackluster in story content. You are pretty much playing detective to the aftermath of the fight we see at the start of ARR; nothing super interesting. It isn't until Turn 9 where shit really starts to get good. So, what I am saying is, "wait until the story is a bit fleshed out before jumping the gun."

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Even BCoB ended on a better hook than Alexander has, with the implications of Louisoix (whom we saw first hand sacrifice himself for the legacy players) is still alive, and the threat you previously thought was stopped is, well infact, regenerating. Alexander, we quite literally have a plot token which prevents Alexander from ever becoming fully a threat, and ends on a very weak note that's best summarized as "It's not over yet!". On top of that, BCoB ended with more questions than answers, enshrouding further backstory behind it. Alexander literally has its own little plot wrapped up without a hook to the next installation and in general, lacks both the mystery and sense of urgency (which is due to it being mostly told and not shown just how big of a problem Alexander itself really is, nor does it quite help that the main antagonist is a goblin whom are general treated as comic relief related to cheesemake, has a pet cat and in general is just hard to take him seriously)

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Originally Posted by xvshanevx

I think you are raiding for the wrong reason. This is simply a "Carrot and Stick" mentality when it comes to raiding, and I would be hard pressed to believe that you might not have any reason as to why you left your static due to drama. Although, as you mentioned, if you were one of the first groups to clear AS3 during its release, then you know that skill in raid is far greater than the acquisition of gear. And the fact that players will easily receive 210 gear, either from Diadumb or free Artifact gear upgrades should mean absolutely nothing to you. Someone who is full 210 ardent and artifact gear just means they grind low tier content. I don't mean to tell you how to think and such, but I know this kind of mentality when it comes to raiding is cancerous. You cleared the content, one of the best raiders out there, and you will be getting gear that other will not be able to get; is that not enough?

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One thing to note is that Aikall said that raiding is worth less, not rendered worthless. To me, Savage is pretty shallow as it and just straight up isn't fun if you're the group that does 2 hour raid nights, three times a week and head bang on A3s with an utter lack of progression. If a group is only doing savage for ilvl210 and nothing much else beyond that, then yes, they'd have less of a reason to do Savage with the introduction of upgrade mats in void ark, and diadem in general. If it's more on the context of "for fun" or "clearing", well that's already been a huge hit/miss with savage in general due to the difficulty discrepancy between it and normal mode, if the huge player exodus as well as the all-time low clear rate means anything.

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Originally Posted by RiceisNice

One thing to note is that Aikall said that raiding is worth less, not rendered worthless.

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Pretty much. Raiding is worthless but it did become more worthless with Diadem giving better gear.

It's the typical SE approach when they want to attract mass of desperate players to do content because lets face it, Diadem is a mess and they were right in putting 210 gear to force people to do it. Nevertheless it isn't quite fair and I'm not favoring SE's choices.


Raiders had it hard with savage but only because people were pushing it too fast and not as intended, although at this point, ironically, you can say SE had higher expectations for A3S by now with all the i205 weapons and void arc tokens. The only unparalleled reward from savage is the weapon so you should be glad SE wasn't crazy enough to give those out in the Diadem. I'm going to say that it is unfair to give 210 BiS out carelessly even if they are rare in drops. People should put more effort to get the best gear in the game and from there be able to progress in the next raiding tier. In conclusion, SE needs to stop spoon-feeding and spoiling the playerbase when it's not needed and overtuning content with ridiculous expectations. Much contradictions from your content design team SE. Please find balance.

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Originally Posted by Anze-chan

It's the typical SE approach when they want to attract mass of desperate players to do content because lets face it, Diadem is a mess and they were right in putting 210 gear to force people to do it. Nevertheless it isn't quite fair and I'm not favoring SE's choices.

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SE lacks content and they use content like Diadem to build time because they have no content. Diadem offers better gear than raid so people started grinding. SE nerfed the drop rate because it was going too fast. Diadem is a time sink and nothing more. A time sink that gives better gear than raid content.

Why do you think we still haven't got our relic in 3.x? I'm gonna tell you, it would be easy to do 1 quest and you have to collect items. It wouldn't be the first time and it's easy to code. It's likely the so-called relic that is suppose to follow you for the rest of the game (still iLevel 135 since 3.1) The relic is simply a time sink tool now. It's gonna be the same 210 (unlikely but maybe 215) and it will be better than any weapon because you'll be able to choose the stats.

It's fine they use the relic to keep people busy but I'm not an idiot and I don't like when someone thinks he can treat me like one.

Actually the main stats to worry about for top tier raiding in FFXIV (based on jobs are) are INT, STR, DEX, MND, VIT followed by acc cap for each job you play. Once you cap acc then worry about Crit, Det and Skill/Spell speed. Crit, det and SS need to be balanced too much of 1 of these can be a dps loss. Here's a couple examples DRG needs a minimum of 590 ss to do the optimum rotation after that worry about balancing crit and det. However, to much skill speed on mnk or nin will be a dps loss due to tp strain so its best to balance crit, ss and det but that is up for debate.

The million dollar question is how much of each sub stat do we really need to actually start seeing a difference? The fact is crit is based off of RNG there is no debating this fact. Even if you can manage to get 1000 crit you still will only be at 30% to 40% chance to crit because the devs cap it. What the actual cap is for crit is unknown. You can go in to the savage raids with all i210 ESO gear and you will still pull very high numbers if you know your job. Even if you start mixing and matching Savage gear with eso gear your over all dps will not be that much different. If you don't believe me then test it on a dummy. Any crit you do is all based on RNG and I bet you if you did 10 tests on a dummy with lets say 700 crit then did 10 tests with lets say 600 crit it will be about the same in crit% chance. Granted you will do a little more damage with 700 crit because crit now effects the damage a crit will do but its still very minimal almost to the point its not recognizable.

This is why I would rather have traits attached to certain gear pieces from raids or eso gear or relic weapons. Like adding a 20% to 30% greater chance (35% + 30% = 65%) of doing a crit on certain skills. Or increasing damage/heals/mitigation on certain skills for the duration of the rotation and as long you keep the rotation up it will keep increasing after every final hit on that rotation till you hit a cap. If you stop for "x" amount of time for whatever reason then it will simply start over once you apply the last skill in your rotation. There are limitless combinations of traits that can be added to each job and it would really make gear hunting a lot more enjoyable then chasing after sub stats. :cool:

Sub stats in this game are a joke and really don't have that much value vs main stats especially now in 3.0.:confused:

I kinda like the idea with gear giving special effects to skills... in theory. In reality I don't think it's possible to actually make such a system balanced. It would only lead to even less of a choice in gear, since some skills are better than other ones. So BiS would be even more cemented than it is now (were it's a really small difference), considering everyone would just want to go with whatever gear gave the bonus to the "best" skills, giving gear (even on the same ilvl) a huge difference between them.

I think the common and reasonable suggestion was to have special materia drop from raid content that effectively act as traits. Materia that do unique things like "reduce the CD on shield swipe from 15s to 5s," "Increase the max duration of Blood of the Dragon to 40s," or "Thrill of Battle now grants a stack of Wrath or Abandon."

It does create an issue with future gear, though. Unless removing special materia doesn't actually destroy the materia, you'll have to run old content for unique materia to meld onto your gear from the next raid tier. On one hand it extends the longevity of old content. On the other hand... I think it does so in a very forced and unpleasant way. Maybe you can move the Materia from the old raid tier to tome vendors after each new raid patch.

The only problem with "Trait Materia/Gear" is that it turns the game into horizontal progression (I personally love horizontal progression, as imho it feels like it helps with immersion that this specific boss drops these super good gloves, and so you get your band of merry men and women together to go hunt it). But Horizontal Progression will not work well with the current set up Raid > Catch up > Raid > Catch up patches.

If I had boots that proc'd an auto attack or some other thing, then they would be far more useful than the 8Str or 10Str I would get from the boots of a higher iLv if they didn't have the same or better trait. So then we see that newer gear that comes into the game isn't as good as older gear. This means brand new gear is invalidated by old gear from ~2-3 patches ago. While this is common going from Raid > To Catchup patch because people who raided are geared until the next raid content. SE doesn't want use using the same boots from say Raid patch 3.0 until raid patch 3.4 when finally a better pair of boots are out.

Along with this it makes BISing a lot more important than being like 7~20 theorectical strength higher than non BIS gear of the same iLv

I don't know what the issue is- gear is constantly made worthless in this game... why is this anything different? If you are still playing this game for gear, surely you have learned that it has a shelf life of maybe a month at most.

As far as whether the "best" gear comes from a raid or a quest or wherever... it doesn't matter..it will be somewhere else in a month or so- so get over it. You will never hold onto the "best" gear in a game that deprecates gear so fast.

I think the "insult to raiders" comments are amusing. I wouldn't think there would still be raiders playing that had any expectations of gear or progression. This is just a vertical progression game where players are expected to spam/grind for gear... it's always just been about grinding- whether raid, 5 man, or whatever.

Hi Aikaal and all,

I agree about the Alexander Savage thoughts (recycled, boring, etc.) and the lack of skill check vs. gear check.

But I'd say that for Diadem, while it currently isn't optimally used, it has *potential* and I welcome MORE variety for end game activities, not less.

We shouldn't be calling for nerfing Diadem, but rather how can the Dev Team improve it so that it can be a satisfying, viable End Game Raid.

In Final Fantasy XI there was room for both Sky *and* Dynamis (and Sea, and HNM Kings, BCNMs, etc.). I'm not saying Diadem is like Dynamis, but I hope it can develop to be more interesting.

There is a "Diadem (HARD)" mode already. And it's certainly harder than Normal or Easier, but still relatively straight forward right now.

I can see the Dev Team developing Diadem Hard to have more uses for the Caves. For Side Paths, for secret Islands, where you fight Secret Bosses / HNMs for rare drops / cool Key Items.

They could add more meaningful Side Objectives to Diadem (not just gather 16 items, etc.), where completing these Objectives will force spawn a Boss / World Event that you have to clear to get a Platinum Chest with rare drops, Mats, etc.

There's nothing wrong with having more than 1 venue drop BiS Gear. It should just be satisfying, challenging and meaningful. More variety is always better than having just 1 End Game Raid.

I hope the Dev Team develops The Diadem into something more exciting, with Side Paths, Secret Bosses / HNMs, Objectives, etc.

I think every day I should have a chance at Diadem 210 gear, just for logging in. But I know people would complain that I got gear for nothing while they worked so hard getting their Diadem gear.

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Originally Posted by Kiara

(..) while it currently isn't optimally used, it has *potential* (..)

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Do you remember 1.x?
We thought same and we got 2.x ...
You still having *hope* is good, but after 4 years my hope is slowly fading.

Edit: SE should just get rid of RNG in EVERYTHING

Edit2:

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Originally Posted by Anze-chan

(..) People should put more effort to get the best gear in the game (..)

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You talk as if every 210 gear that drops is BiS - it is RANDOM and most is trash

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Originally Posted by Kiara

Hi Aikaal and all,
But I'd say that for Diadem, while it currently isn't optimally used, it has *potential* and I welcome MORE variety for end game activities, not less.

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There is potential for Diadem and I would have enjoyed it if they had properly used the concept. Diadem shouldn't be use to get gear and be a grindfest.

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Originally Posted by Ossom

If I had boots that proc'd an auto attack or some other thing, then they would be far more useful than the 8Str or 10Str I would get from the boots of a higher iLv if they didn't have the same or better trait.

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Materia is universal, and can be melded to anything that has a slot. No worries about one piece of gear being too good for an extended period of time, since you could affix any Materia to any gear. It's a great idea to have more depth in the Materia system than, "+xx (insert stat)"; I'm all for it. It would certainly disrupt the great amount of balance we have in the game, but it's becoming stale with how simplistic it is.

I'd be all for set bonuses too. It's actually strange they haven't moved forward with it yet, considering there's already gear in game that utilizes this feature. Set effects would make mixing and matching for BiS far more interesting, especially when you add in a more interesting Materia system.

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Originally Posted by Aikaal

There is potential for Diadem and I would have enjoyed it if they had properly used the concept. Diadem shouldn't be use to get gear and be a grindfest.

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There was potential for diadem and they wasted it.
Diadem is nothing more than a giant fate with brainless grind. I did it twice and will never step a feet in it anymore.

It could have been really fun: objectives, HNM fight with minimal strat and knowledges, but no, it tastes like a fate and is finally a wasted content.

And yea, by handling i210 bis with no efforts they also killed the raiding community, like if gobalexander didnt do it already (hello A3s/A4s fake difficulty based on gear check).

I play since beta and agree that 3.X so far is more of an disappointment. I am rather late progression but a mid to hardcore player.
My raid history started in 2.1 with CT and then people needed a tank (don't ask about my skill lol) for BCoB in Jan '14 and from then on I used to have a raid group (with 2 little breaks). I was always behind on progression and I honestly didn't mind it because I held back for friends (had blind run static 'till August).
Firsttime Alex NM was a total diappointment. We wiped once to Faust and were like "OK T1 it is"... and imagine the disappointment we felt when the actual boss is even more a T1 copy with a tad of T7 (linking of adds) and rest of the turns didn't surprise either.
My static disbanded a 3 weeks into Heavensward so I started pugging. Primals were rather fast cleared (1 week for Bismarck;2 for Ravana).
The reason I started Savage was to challenge myself because thats when I can enjoy myself the most.
I joined a A1S training seen the Split thing and adds and knew from a kill video how to handle it... so next group I joined was a kill group because I felt confident enough. Sadly the group lacked a load of DPS, so took me 2,5 weeks more to join a group that made it with me to 3% then kicked me for no reason or any comment (my experience when helping out with static runs was rather utterly disappointing last few weeks) besides a "healers don't do enough DPS"... yea adjust your damn parser to boss downtimes man >.< - same weekend found a static lacking a healer "no bonus" they accepted me and we oneshot.
Around that time I joined a late starting static that as fast disbanded in week 3 because people didn't want to put effort because same stuff as NM - or simply were irreliable; so had to reform the team to start progressing even later.
Until now cleared only A2S with the team and havent even started on A3S; only XP I have for A3S is equal concentration in a PUG 3 weeks ago. Looking forward to start on statickiller #1 and will see who will stick around.

With 3.1 new content came... Diadem the brain-off-button-mashing I cba to actually run it regularly. I run 1-2 of em in the week for Spoils to get Materia for 3.2, the chances of real BiS is too low.
Void Ark... I run one full run for upgrade item then loot and cba to finish the run... does mean something because farmed CT/ST/WoD a lot back then :o
Thordan was a content I could put effort in. Had week after patch off and took 15 hrs of PFing training for certain phases, meeting people and kicking them from party due to lack of experience (think were only 2 people overall though) to clear it. I really love this fight even though its 99.9% recycled mechanics. It is a challenge and it is fun.
Helped my 2 closest friends to get their kills and still join training and can easily farm if I don't have my recent shitty lags. Need to get static through now (meteors/spear with static :/)...

Anyway Thordan is the most fun fight in 3.X so far and I hope SE adds more like it but please stop recycling all mechanics - surprise us and stop adding button mash simulators like Diadem and also make next part of Ark something I could like...

I'm personally all for more ways to get 210 gear. But the difficulty must match the reward. Tomes? Maybe make one dungeon really hard and the other one about the same difficulty they keep it at. Both offer ESO but the excessively harder dungeon drops you some item that let's you raise your ESO cap by 10 points.

diadem? Make more mechanics for how trash responds with other trash. Maybe two raptor's can bind you and combo with the T. rex. To get out you must stun either the raptor or the Trex. So many interesting ways to make these things NOT a mindless grind fest and offer different levels of difficulty. Easy diadem? No mechanics and 180 only. Hard? 210 can drop but only from the hardest fights that have real mechanics.

Im under no delusions that the 210 i got from diadem is bis, i can probably find better, more consistently, in raids.

People don't get what a dice roll getting good 210s from diadem is, sure i have a 210 piece, but its not better than the raid 210, and I'll still need to check out the raid if i want consistenly good 210s. Otherwise im back to trying to get lucky on the right job.

Diadem is essentially hunts (or fates), which i blame in the first place for players in full fledged gear but do not know how to play their class..., lol. *Not the case with all players mind you
It had and i think still has potential however. (Diadem)
Honestly giving the item to upgrade eso gear from Void ark was far too early on in the expansion in my opinion. It truly did make Savage pointless to those that have been running or attempting it and really other then the mount, gear was the only reason for many to run Savage.

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Originally Posted by Maero

Diadem is essentially hunts (or fates), which i blame in the first place for players in full fledged gear but do not know how to play their class..., lol. *Not the case with all players mind you
It had and i think still has potential however. (Diadem)
Honestly giving the item to upgrade eso gear from Void ark was far too early on in the expansion in my opinion. It truly did make Savage pointless to those that have been running or attempting it and really other then the mount, gear was the only reason for many to run Savage.

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Diadem hasn't been out that long unnerfed to be "the reason people don't know how to play their class." There is no difference in the intervals between patches for ugrade gear being available, save for the extended length of time between 3.0 and 3.1, which was experienced across the board.

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Originally Posted by Kallera

Diadem hasn't been out that long unnerfed to be "the reason people don't know how to play their class." There is no difference in the intervals between patches for ugrade gear being available, save for the extended length of time between 3.0 and 3.1, which was experienced across the board.

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I read it as them blaming hunts/fates for players not knowing how to play their class, not blaming Diadem.

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Originally Posted by Maero

SNIP

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Well there are two points here... they haven't been properly incentivizing their Savage content. I for one am not a fan of BIS in general but that is besides the point. The second is that this is (and has always) been the catch up patch. Those who cant to x content can go do this other thing to get what they need. I am nearly certain that the next major patch will have a new ilvl tied to it. Something that people should keep in mind is that Savage was out for 5 months before Diadem/Void was released.

I think I am late to the game here, but ohh well here we go.

First, in regard to Alexander's story. There is some fault in the structure, but I think most people are being too quick to call it out. I think we are getting into something bigger in the next tier. My guess is the goblins are going to unleash something within Alexander that they shouldn't have and either get brushed aside or destroyed, revealing the actual threat of Alexander, making the stakes feel much higher. What SE should of done with this is show how high the stakes are by showing it's power. This was also a fault in the first Binding Coils tier, the difference was that we had the events from 1.xx to let us know that the stakes are high and if Bahamut got unleashed it could cause a second calamity. People should wait till the next Alexander tier to see how things play out before making a true judgement call to the whole story. Its fair to criticize however on how the first part was presented.

Raid structure. Yoshi-P has said recently that they do not have the man power to create three difficulty tiers for raids (this is complete nonsense by the way). So between Easy > Normal > Savage, one has to be taken out of the equation. All the casual players are going to come after me for saying this and I have said it in the past, but between these three, Easy needs to taken out. Seriously, every content in this game is catered towards casual play. This one raid dungeon, and I empathize on that number, one piece of content in this game that is suppose to be catered to a more hardcore play style, and then people say that Savage needs to be taken out.

Really? So we need to turn this game completely casual? This game is already unbalanced in making everything non-hardcore and grindy, and then you say that Savage mode should not be in the game. It is complete utter nonsense and I can't believe some actually believe it shouldn't be around. Hard raiding content has to exist, the hardcore base needs something to strive for, and no, not Final Coil level difficulty will cut it. There needs to be at least one piece of content in this game that does test the best of the best for this game.

Easy mode in raids are only a short term solution. It has no real lasting appeal. This is content that is apparently suppose to last at least till the next odd number patch and people got sick of it and stopped going in after they geared up one to two jobs. I will get the argument that "I am entitled to get the story of this raid." Sure, eventually. Story in itself is a reward, and should be treated as such, especially in content like this. There is much more satisfaction in taking out a very difficult fight and getting story content as a reward for a first time clear. Easy mode for the most part just handed it to you, devaluing it. It is a shame that people only look upon reward as something that has to be in item form.

How raiding should be structured is that it needs to appeal to midcore and hardcore players. Letting echo buff and mechanics debuff come into play when the content is outdated. Normal mode should be on the difficulty level of Final Coil, where it is difficult and challenging, but a decent midcore group who communicate well can overcome it in time and not too stressful mechanics wise. Savage should definitely be for the best of the best players who want to take on over the top difficult content. Of course Savage needs to contain the very best gear, achievements, and titles. I am basically describing Second Coil's structure here.

This set up allows players to work their way up in content more naturally. Right now there is a huge spike in difficulty going from Easy to Savage. There is no midcore like in between for it. For raiding, this does need to exist. As much as I love the Thordan fight, it is not the answer for midcore players. If people would like to argue with me on this, just note that raiding is more dead than it has ever been because the two difficulty tiers express the extreme in their own right, making it unappealing to a lot.

If Yoshi-P wants to hire more man power and make it a three difficulty raid structure. I would be okay with that. It goes against my story = reward argument, but still better than the mess we have currently.

For Diadem. This content is a complete mess and poorly thought out. There is so many better ways this could of been approached and many in here have pointed out. It is a pure grind fest from start to finish. There is little to no thought process in terms of accomplishing what needs to be done. How it should of worked is first, the gear should not of been ilvl210. This we are talking about, is gear that can potentially surpass gear that is given in the hardest content in the game. This should never be a thing. At best it should be ilvl200. The place should be a means of gearing alternate jobs and on the gathering side, more rare material from gathering for current and future content. Someone can argue with me that item upgrades from doing Void Ark or hunts are there also, they at least put more of a gate on obtaining them.

It also should of made you perform specific tasks to obtain higher tier reward. Nothing too difficult, but something to have you think instead of semi-afk'ing pressing 1 > 2 > 3 the whole time. Something like having to find a hidden chest containing a pop item to pop an NM that drops an item to spawn an even bigger NM. It should of had that nice blend of Dynamis/Sky/Sea from FFXI, but it failed to bring what was good about those three pieces of content.

Diadem is straight out boring and giving potential BiS gear to people who are just slamming their head on their keyboard for 90 minutes.

Overall, FFXIV does not know how to properly balance casual and hardcore play, and it definitely shows since 3.0. People have quit and broken up static groups over time because of this. SE really needs to step up on this.

Now to wait for the inevitable I am just an elitist counter-argument.

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Originally Posted by Velhart

First, in regard to Alexander's story. There is some fault in the structure, but I think most people are being too quick to call it out. I think we are getting into something bigger in the next tier. My guess is the goblins are going to unleash something within Alexander that they shouldn't have and either get brushed aside or destroyed, revealing the actual threat of Alexander, making the stakes feel much higher. What SE should of done with this is show how high the stakes are by showing it's power. This was also a fault in the first Binding Coils tier, the difference was that we had the events from 1.xx to let us know that the stakes are high and if Bahamut got unleashed it could cause a second calamity. People should wait till the next Alexander tier to see how things play out before making a true judgement call to the whole story. Its fair to criticize however on how the first part was presented.

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Again in BCoB's defense, it ended with a hook with the implications of Louisoix is still alive, despite us seeing first hand the man died for us and 2.0. It's not just a weak start, but it's essentially a weak closing to what feels like the storyline rather than setting up a follow up because we actually have a plot token in our hands that pretty much says "Alexander won't ever be fully active". There's little implications of there being more other than the fact that the villian said so, and that Alexander hasn't disappeared. We're waiting for them to make the next move and it just feels like an episodic thing in a 30-minute show rather than the next chapter in a novel (or even a to-be-continued in said 30-minute show)

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Originally Posted by Velhart

How raiding should be structured is that it needs to appeal to midcore and hardcore players. Letting echo buff and mechanics debuff come into play when the content is outdated. Normal mode should be on the difficulty level of Final Coil, where it is difficult and challenging, but a decent midcore group who communicate well can overcome it in time and not too stressful mechanics wise. Savage should definitely be for the best of the best players who want to take on over the top difficult content. Of course Savage needs to contain the very best gear, achievements, and titles. I am basically describing Second Coil's structure here.

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I was on this side until I saw what they did with FCob (which was hitting the middleground). That being said though, the story itself can become more accessible down the road with echo and mechanical nerfs (which is only really applicable to fights like unnerfed T7, FCoB got through just fine with almost zero mechanics nerf, only echo buff). Applying this to something like savage completely defeats the point of it.

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Originally Posted by RiceisNice

I was on this side until I saw what they did with FCob (which was hitting the middleground). That being said though, the story itself can become more accessible down the road with echo and mechanical nerfs (which is only really applicable to fights like unnerfed T7, FCoB got through just fine with almost zero mechanics nerf, only echo buff). Applying this to something like savage completely defeats the point of it.

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Sorry if I did not specify. The Normal mode should be the one with echo buff, not the Savage version. Savage needs to stay the way it is, I would even say keep an ilvl cap on it to retain it's difficulty. Gear may be outdated but the challenge for the most part is still intact even when the next tier raid comes in.

http://i.imgur.com/k9XRk6m.png

A friend of mine posted this picture few days ago. 210 pants have 160 off-stats. Thats 218 off-stats (Not counting gear gets less Piety and Det) People can argue they prefer an extra 40 crit or so on Scholar over 30 Det and 30 Spell Speed. People may also argue off-stats are pretty weak and they don't really matter. It doesn't change this piece has 58 extra off-stat. It is already superior to 210 crafted gear and even if they are to implement in 3.2 iLevel 220 gear in a normal mode, this is unlikely rushing pants is optimal anyways.

Brb puking~

diadem gear won't be meldable in 3.2 and will be purely for gearing alts in future it is having a temporary little shine that will subside soon and won't be BIS anymore just let it have its moment. Diadem will always be relevant though due to materia.

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Originally Posted by Aikaal

http://i.imgur.com/k9XRk6m.png

A friend of mine posted this picture few days ago. 210 pants have 160 off-stats. Thats 218 off-stats (Not counting gear gets less Piety and Det) People can argue they prefer an extra 40 crit or so on Scholar over 30 Det and 30 Spell Speed. People may also argue off-stats are pretty weak and they don't really matter. It doesn't change this piece has 58 extra off-stat. It is already superior to 210 crafted gear and even if they are to implement in 3.2 iLevel 220 gear in a normal mode, this is unlikely rushing pants is optimal anyways.

Brb puking~

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You're comparing i185 crafted gear to i210 Diadem gear. . . Of course weight wise the i210 is going to be greater than what's currently offered to crafted gear.

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Originally Posted by Airget

You're comparing i185 crafted gear to i210 Diadem gear. . . Of course weight wise the i210 is going to be greater than what's currently offered to crafted gear.

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Now I may be wrong, but I don't see where Aikaal says i185 in the post that you quoted.