New Relic weapon quest - are we down to 1 hour content already?

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Originally Posted by Deceptus

I've always said they really need to release their relics MUCH earlier than they do.

ARR had it at 2.0 and it gave fall back content if you were bored.

This current halfway through an expansion life cycle content is a really bad idea IMHO.



How about neither extreme? It shouldn't be one step only and it shouldn't require 100 hours to complete. A nice middle ground isn't unrealistic.

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This, absolutely this...

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Originally Posted by Rai_Takara

I'm glad we DON'T have Eureka as I thought it was terrible content for relics and only existed to show people that old school MMO gameplay is the way of the past. The only good thing that came from Eureka was the Baldesian Arsenal. Relics should have never been a part of it, but without holding relics hostage inside them, very few would bother with Eureka as is, especially prior to BA's release.

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If they removed all gear from savage and ultimate tier fights. Very few people would bother to do them.

That argument works for all content in the game. Without reward the content is pointless, does not matter what it is.

Eureka at least was content to do for months, this is content for the next week tops.

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Originally Posted by Ranaku

I am more upset that they locked the dyable jobgear behind a extreme trial. Sad that they choosed to punish casuals because they created a giant contenthole.

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ARR ones were behind high tier crafts, Heavensward literally behind the static breaker savage boss, Stormblood behind Eureka grind.
Dyeing AF gear was never something to be done casualy at their respective launch patches.

Eureka is way better content than previous attempts. Made you have to actually work than nowadays deal with RNG and tomes farming. The latter of which is now brain dead easy as poetics are being spilled out of every bit of content possible from levels 50-70. Not to mention people still run Eureka daily for glams, gear, gil, emotes and housing pieces, ect. Some are still doing it as we speak just for the hell of it. Icing on the cake, Eureka is a great way to get those poetics currently. Further making the previous relics even easier to grind for. I won't praise it for being the best content we could have gotten for relics. Hell, it at times can be just awful depending on what you need to get done, or was before updates. But, I won't deny it has a charm to it that ARR books will never give. This first step as opposed to Anemos is absolute crap. And, I can't believe I can say this with a straight face. Anemos is better than Gangos by a long shot. As grindy and tedious as it can be, it was still full of more than what this first step can ever hope to give.
The remark of it, 'only existed to show people that old school MMO gameplay is the way of the past.' is a load of... If that's the case, I would much rather have the past than what's going on in the present. Feels like a modern participation trophy than an earned relic. Wasn't expecting anything hardcore, but I wanted to at least work for something better. Not feel like little Suzy that drags the team down the entire game and still gets a medal of how 'awesome' she is.

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Originally Posted by Xatsh

If they removed all gear from savage and ultimate tier fights. Very few people would bother to do them.

That argument works for all content in the game. Without reward the content is pointless, does not matter what it is.

Eureka at least was content to do for months, this is content for the next week tops.

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While it would put a damper on participation, people enjoy doing raids with or without rewards to hangout. Eureka was different, I argue. If you weren't leveling together with friends, there'd be a level difference introduced. This made it so you couldn't help your friends. It also replaced the old way of doing relics where you could make progress on the tome steps by just playing the game how you wanted to. For a vast majority of those that bothered to do Eureka, it was afk until NM spawned. To top if off, most of the relics themselves were uninspired and some who hoped the suffering would be worth it with an awesome glam piece were disappointed.

But I'm glad SE learned their lesson. Otherwise they would have done Eureka again. I'm just hoping what they do come up with is similar to ARR/HW again.

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Originally Posted by Brignadalee

The remark of it, 'only existed to show people that old school MMO gameplay is the way of the past.' is a load of... If that's the case, I would much rather have the past than what's going on in the present. Feels like a modern participation trophy than an earned relic. Wasn't expecting anything hardcore, but I wanted to at least work for something better. Not feel like little Suzy that drags the team down the entire game and still gets a medal of how 'awesome' she is.

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As I mentioned above, considering SE isn't doing the same again shows it wasn't worth repeating. It's also funny you say that as Eureka was just a participation trophy. You had to touch an NM and you got all you needed. The only "work" was running between NMs.

I completely disagree Eureka was content that people could hang out in. Because it was not all gogogogo, dodge,dodge, omg not enough dmg 1 shot wipe. You actually had some downtime or farming off mobs.

Savage and such people do because it is primary progression. Look at Savage Coil of Bahamut in ARR (only granted titles)... almost no one did it most did not even attempt it because it was deemed a pointless waste of time. I never seen anyone say hey I want to relax tonight, lets go into savage.

And I am sorry the ARR/HW relics were god awful. Made you spam low level trash dungeons 100s of times. I would rather do Eureka with 1/10 the xp gain then that horrific garbage again. It was just a way for SE to get veterans to play with low levels coming into the game to keep all the content populated.

And also how was relics in ARR/HW any different difficulty wise, you did content that was designed to be unfailable (Dungeons) or Fates(Also unfailable).

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Originally Posted by Rai_Takara

To be fair, they did tell us this step was the easy step, so I'm not bummed out with it. On top of that I think this EX trial is better than Ruby Weapon in presentation and difficulty.

What isn't okay though is that we've consistently got less content this expansion and the reason for that has not been explained. The assumption is possibly ARR rework, but without confirmation, that's just giving SE a free pass which I don't think they should be given.

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This has essentially been my issue. We keep getting told they're diverting funds elsewhere yet I'm not seeing it. I suppose you could argue it cost more to develop the solo instance but if that were the case then I don't know if it's a worthwhile trade since a solo instance is one and done. At the very least, the EX trial is much better than Ruby.

To be honest, I think having the first step or two being easy attracts more casual people into getting it started, or at least helping them catch up a little easier.

Then, on the 3rd step and beyond, they can slap something a bit more ridiculous on you, and some of the casuals will go "meh, I'm fine with what I have." and stop there, but other casuals might go "well, I came this far... why stop now?" and put some effort into trying for the 3rd step. This group of casuals might not have even started if the first step was too grindy/difficult.

Kinda like the DoL/DoH tools. If I had sidled up to the NPC and saw that they were far too ridiculous, I wouldn't have even started it, knowing I would never get anything useful to me out of it.

But when I saw that the base tool was better than the HQ Crafted I had made for myself, I was like "huh, well, even if I don't finish it, it's better than what I have..."

And then I did the first step and went "cool, this is even better."

Now, granted my tools are still not BiS, but they are better than what I had, and progress is progress, nonetheless. I have determined that the 2nd step for DoL is not that bad at all and I will definitely do that, and those tools are a good slice better than what I had before 5.25 was released.

The DoH? I did the first step on BSM and I determined that the 2nd is do-able but with a bit of work. Which is fine, I don't mind that.

I fully expect the 3rd step, however, to be absolutely ridiculous. I may, or may not bother doing it. But even if I don't, I still end up with something that I am content and happy with. I would actually support the 3rd+ step being something geared towards hardcores. I get something, hardcores get something, and we all win.

I would surmise that the same is for the combat weapons; the first couple steps are easy, then it ramps up later. In so-doing, they are giving everybody a little slice of the pie.

When Eureka came out in Stormblood, I saw those nice looking +2 weapons, but then I heard what you had to *DO* to get those weapons, and I was like "NOPE!" and just NOPE'd right on out of there after a few battles. I didn't have big fancy FC groups to carry me through Eureka at the time and so I skipped that whole section of content.

If they had made the +2 Eureka weapons a bit more sensible... I could have been tempted to at least start it, and I would have gotten some fun out of it. But no, I skipped the entirety of Eureka knowing I would never get the +2 weapon whatsoever. What's the point in starting something you know you will never see a tangible reward from while it's current?

Having witnessed half of an Alliance (that's 12 people) Leave Duty as soon as Orbonne started...

Nope. This is fine. Might make them stop being such pansies.

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Originally Posted by Niyuka

It takes about 1 hour to get, provided you have the Poetics ready, 3 relic weapons. Of that 1 hour, the vast majority is watching cutscenes, with just one pretty cool-looking long solo instance - which apparently can even be put on Very Easy so that the moderately cool fights (of which there are only 2) are also semi-AFK wins.

Is this the level of content we are down to now, SE? 1hour to not just invalidate the entire weapon tier from Ruby (for most classes, sorry GNB), and hand out multiple relics, but also to have content that is so uninspired, boring and non-interactive? Half the writing is atrocious and boring, and the instance (which, again, is a good piece of content by current standards) is much more style over substance.

People need content to sink their teeth into. We need playtime, after you drained so much out of the game with the 5.x patches already (shortening almost every progression, levelling process and gearing substantially was bad for the game already), we want to be entertained, not just passively watching the same NPCs from the last 6 years to spam well-known emotes in cutscenes without voiceover, blathering lines full of magitek mumbo jumbo that we have all heard before. And then the weapons are just freely given out to everyone.

I sincerely hope the Ex trial provides more fun tonight, even though the gear is (as usual) released already outdated and more or less worse than the free stuff all of us already got handed to us in the easy Eden version.

Along with the Easter Event, we are looking at a truly bleak, sad, minimalist effort on behalf of the company that just half a year ago released an amazing expansion - and now seriously botches the lifecycle.
EVERY OTHER RELIC WEAPON QUESTLINE was better than this. EASILY.

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I'll just post this here-- (taken directly from the patch notes)

Future Resistance Weapon Quests:
Resistance weapons can be enhanced further by completing the story quests that will be added in future patches. Please note that enhancing these weapons may require players to invest a significant amount of time.

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Originally Posted by Ramesses

I'll just post this here-- (taken directly from the patch notes)

Future Resistance Weapon Quests:
Resistance weapons can be enhanced further by completing the story quests that will be added in future patches. Please note that enhancing these weapons may require players to invest a significant amount of time.

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Yup, let everybody get a small taste, and some will go further, others won't, but at least Most people will get something out of it, rather than it being an exclusive club for Hardcores-only.

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Originally Posted by Maeka

Yup, let everybody get a small taste, and some will go further, others won't, but at least Most people will get something out of it, rather than it being an exclusive club for Hardcores-only.

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Exactly Maeka, exactly!

After the going through the crazy days of Atma in 2014, then the insane relic quests of Heavensward, and THEN the mind bending crap that was Eureka-- now SE gives us suspiciously wonderful relic base weapons but they leave that particular sentence quietly tucked away within the patch notes?

Be rest assured that the Devs are going to put us through a seriously mad grind. Definitely be prepared but at least this time people will be able to do aspects of it solo and at their own pace.

Come to think of it. FF7 was supposed to be out. But it was delayed. And it would be stupid to delay XIV's release schedule to line up with 7's release. By all means, a solid chunk of the player base wouldn't even be online.

As someone that preordered the game and really enjoyed the relic steps up to Zenith I'm really really really happy that the first step of the new relic isn't a boring grindy slog that some people seem to really enjoy, especially given that relic weapons aren't even all that great, there's no reason for them to be this disgusting time-waster in the game. If you want a weapon to tout your own horn you're way better off with Ultimate content since pretty much any relic in the entire game can be summed as 'repeat boring trash content ad nauseam' until you finally have enough of whatever plot relevant guff Gerolt told you to grab and that's just not something to really brag about.

Might be an unpopular opinion but farming mobs until your fingers go numb isn't content I want to get from an MMO.

Meanwhile the first step is a fun little jaunt through scenic locales with some NPC interaction and a little world building, it's enjoyable and you can bang it out in a half hour if you just want to rush through it and watch all the cutscenes later, nothing to really complain about since it's balanced so that basically anyone can do the content themselves.

I am sincerely not looking forward to whatever comes next since the developers have this weird idea that relic weapons shouldn't be enjoyable.

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Originally Posted by Boa-Noah

I am sincerely not looking forward to whatever comes next since the developers have this weird idea that relic weapons shouldn't be enjoyable.

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You gotta keep in mind that this is the same company behind Final Fantasy XI.

Even the ARR and Heavensward Relics, and especially Eureka, are child's play compared to what they expected you to do in FFXI. Have fun grinding up millions upon millions of gil in buying thousands of coins that only drop in a weekly raid-type content that you can only do for an X amount of time (which had an absurd entry fee to begin with, back during its day before the price was nerfed), and then have to kill ludicrously hard bosses for some of the other items needed to actually finish the weapon.

And they know that some of the FFXIV players are former FFXI players, and some of these people have Stockholm Syndrome when it comes to ludicrous grinding in Korean-style MMOs, as some of them played back during the days of Evergrind and the like, back when MMOs were all about grind and absolutely nothing else.

I suppose those people deserve to have their "fun" grinding just as much as we "younguns" deserve to have what we would call meaningful content (fun battles, nice cutscenes, good story, beautiful locales).

The only problem is with past relics, the grind-loving people got theirs... and the rest of us, didn't. This new approach is genius, it allows us both to get what we want.

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Originally Posted by Ramesses

I'll just post this here-- (taken directly from the patch notes)

Future Resistance Weapon Quests:
Resistance weapons can be enhanced further by completing the story quests that will be added in future patches. Please note that enhancing these weapons may require players to invest a significant amount of time.

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This line gave me hope.. but I was kinda disappointed when the end of the quest just handed me the weapon and was like "You can also just go practically buy more of these with common tomestones". ... done.. No growing the weapon or logging kills on it for the next stage.. just.. we're done for now.

.. super psyched it's not linked to eureka though, that sucked.

most ppl who got relics in ffxi got them with the assistance of their guild, some ppl did grind the whole thing out. But that was a rare exception.

Typically guilds pooled money in guild banks and such and bought currency which was rewarded for player coming to content or some similar system. A higher tier endgame guild could churn out a relic every 1-3 months depending on activity lvls at content.

And I do not think anyone wants that style grind back, even us "Old Timers". We just want a meaningful non-short lived content that last more then a few weeks.

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I am sincerely not looking forward to whatever comes next since the developers have this weird idea that relic weapons shouldn't be enjoyable.

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Whats enjoyable about 2 mindless minibosses and an EX trial that you may not even need to do for armor you actually want (given that Anemos armor was decoupled it from the good stuff) being the entirety of the relic content for 3-6 months?

Eureka and the previous relic steps by this point in the expansions life were at least content that got people doing things with other people beyond the 1 roulette you need to do every other day to cap your weekly tomestones.

the content was good. great story! really well done dungeon maps! great fights.. but it was waaaayyyyyy tooooo short!!! you gotta add some grind to this

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Originally Posted by Barraind

Whats enjoyable about 2 mindless minibosses and an EX trial that you may not even need to do for armor you actually want (given that Anemos armor was decoupled it from the good stuff) being the entirety of the relic content for 3-6 months?

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What's enjoyable about grinding 10 mindless dungeons/following a train all day for weapons and armor that you may not even need since Raid gear is better stat-wise anyways?

I'd rather spend an hour having some small modicum of fun than spend 3-6 months on a soul sucking and literally mindless grind just to slap a glow effect on a weapon skin I already unlocked, heck, I'd rather spend 10 minutes doing something enjoyable than spend an hour doing something that's about as thrilling as watching paint dry. People already have things to do, they do it every single day, do we really need to spend half a year doing the worst content in the entire game for some excuse to have high level characters running through low level zones?

You all understand that this "1 Hour" of Content comes after multiple hours of Alliance raids and quests, right?

It seems everyone either missed this part or is ignoring it:

Players must first complete the main scenario quest "Shadowbringers" and the sidequest "The City of Lost Angels."

That is straight out of the patch notes.

If you were like me, and had no interest in the Ivalice raids back in Stormblood, if you want the i485 relic, you have to do the whole Ivalice quest-line.

There's that grind, there's that "needing to go through older content to help the newbs," there's that "we need story", etc. that people kept asking for back during Eureka. It's just that some of you already completed it and didn't know about it, so grats and all that.

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Originally Posted by Boa-Noah

What's enjoyable about grinding 10 mindless dungeons/following a train all day for weapons and armor that you may not even need since Raid gear is better stat-wise anyways?

I'd rather spend an hour having some small modicum of fun than spend 3-6 months on a soul sucking and literally mindless grind just to slap a glow effect on a weapon skin I already unlocked, heck, I'd rather spend 10 minutes doing something enjoyable than spend an hour doing something that's about as thrilling as watching paint dry. People already have things to do, they do it every single day, do we really need to spend half a year doing the worst content in the entire game for some excuse to have high level characters running through low level zones?

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Some people enjoy grinding though. There are MMOs dedicated to grinding and people play them because they enjoy it. FFXIV offered this grinding itch with the relic usually for those who want to grind. We already have plenty of cutscenes and story in MSQ and sidequests. They should have kept relic for those interested in grinding IMO.

Note that if it were too grindy for you, you could just avoid doing it since there are other ways to get similar or better weapon. It's definitely not a requirement to do the relic.

However we do have the fate grinding in Shadowbringers so arguably the grinding itch can be satisfied that way already.

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Originally Posted by Kalise

Excuse me? Dungeon?

No, we got a solo duty. A one time, solo duty.

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I did have "dungeon" in quote marks initially. It is a unique, unrecycled zone that is structured like a dungeon.

I'm also still coming from a JRPG mindset. There's nothing unremarkable about a one-time-only zone. You always play a dungeon once and move on. It's the endless repetition that seems strange.

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Originally Posted by Kalise

Because doing things to earn a reward is literally how gear treadmill games work?

If Savage didn't offer gear, no-one would play them. If Ultimate didn't give rewards, no-one would play it. If dungeons didn't offer tomestones, no-one would run them after doing their MSQ.

If we continue down the line of "If you don't want to put yourself through that" then what next? Free Savage gear for logging in to the game because many people don't like/want to do Savage raiding?

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If you got "free savage gear for logging in", it wouldn't be savage gear.

Hyperbolic examples aside, obviously there's a balance between getting things for free and having them locked behind a tedious grind, and there could have been more focus on the weapons themselves.

But I still don't see where the appeal is in being forced to do activities repeatedly to "make progress". I want to engage with content because it's enjoyable or a new challenge, and come back to it only if I actually want to do it again, not because the game designers have decided I should have to do it another ten times.

I skip EX/Savage content for the most part, but for the few times I've learned a fight, once I beat it I feel like I've succeeded and I'm finished with it, not ready to do it another X times. (Unless I want a particular glamour from it, at any rate - but I'd still prefer to not have to grind for it.)

I'm here because I enjoy the story, worldbuilding, character designs and glamours. I enjoy dungeons but the RNG of item drops is frustrating. I'm happy to "do things" to get stuff, but not to do it repeatedly.

And I actually would get more enjoyment out of getting some things instantaneously if I could. I love the PVP glamours and I have a long list of things I want for my characters, but I don't like PVP itself. I will be playing PVP to earn them... but I'd be much happier if I didn't have to and could skip straight to the enjoyable bit of dressing my characters up in those awesome costumes and seeing how good they look. The few hours' worth of PVP gameplay could be spent on something else - MSQ progression on an alt, another game entirely, get away from the TV and draw or read or do all the other things I've got to get on with.

Maybe it's just about choosing what to grind - I have several alts that all need to get through the game sooner or later, and get levelled up to equip glamours. But again, given the choice, I'd rather be able to skip that grind and jump into playing with those glamours, then spend time on getting through the story instead of running Sastasha for EXP yet again. I know I can't, but I'd like to.

I'll take one hour of entertainment over being forced to go through a hour of tedium (or several) to "earn" that hour of entertainment.

Not gonna lie pretty disappointed with the relic that is was done literally in an hour, while i'm glad it's not Atma 5.0 I wish it was tied to at least the EX Trial, Like complete it once and get the material needed for the new Relic and then poof you're done. The only reason to do the new EX is just for glamour and to me it's just not worth it, while it's slightly harder then Ruby Weapon EX that's not saying much as that fight was on rails giving you a spectacle on the eyes not on difficulty.

These patches have been heavily 1.0 based with Nael and Cid and while it's great we got some context with his past they could have done so much more with his memory to make it so that you have to fix his memories and then fight the big bad at the end. It just seems to me they wanted to put certain characters in the spot light from 1.0 in the sake of this expansion being a continuation of the 1.0 story and it ending that way too, all in all it's good don't get me wrong but there's no staying power.

It's just get poetics (AKA run MSQ roulette and Alliance roulette a day), get free weapon, the only reason to run Ruby EX now is for the mount and for some reason a weapon since some of the tank weapons (like DRK) are mostly Tenacity with low Crit which doesn't beat out the Ruby wep or Crystarium weapon so if you have those the weapons relics are just meh. Hopefully next patch we get some good updates because I was asking "is this finished? Where's the rest of it?".

/Chuckles...

Nineteen pages already.

Let's be brutally honest: the storyline was definitely way more than an hour (if one actually took time to digest the dialogue) and I thoroughly enjoyed the revealing information regarding the Blades of Gunnhildr-- plus the battles were very interesting. There was a sense of "closure" for a charcater and we got to experience what really went down at that Citadel--- many of us have been waiting for almost five years for that bit of information.

Not to mention, the new BGM in that new area was very very nice.

So enjoy the new weapon, go practice on clearing a certain new Extreme battle several times over--- and mentally prepare for the relic grind that is obviously incoming with future patches.

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Originally Posted by Xtrasweettea

You all understand that this "1 Hour" of Content comes after multiple hours of Alliance raids and quests, right?

It seems everyone either missed this part or is ignoring it:

Players must first complete the main scenario quest "Shadowbringers" and the sidequest "The City of Lost Angels."

That is straight out of the patch notes.

If you were like me, and had no interest in the Ivalice raids back in Stormblood, if you want the i485 relic, you have to do the whole Ivalice quest-line.

There's that grind, there's that "needing to go through older content to help the newbs," there's that "we need story", etc. that people kept asking for back during Eureka. It's just that some of you already completed it and didn't know about it, so grats and all that.

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Well, for opening raids, you need to be 70 lvl, that means you need to go through main story since lvl 1, also you need gear, you missed whole game, so much content. It's not like we actually played the game and was ready for relic farm.

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Originally Posted by Boa-Noah

What's enjoyable about grinding 10 mindless dungeons/following a train all day for weapons and armor that you may not even need since Raid gear is better stat-wise anyways?

I'd rather spend an hour having some small modicum of fun than spend 3-6 months on a soul sucking and literally mindless grind just to slap a glow effect on a weapon skin I already unlocked, heck, I'd rather spend 10 minutes doing something enjoyable than spend an hour doing something that's about as thrilling as watching paint dry. People already have things to do, they do it every single day, do we really need to spend half a year doing the worst content in the entire game for some excuse to have high level characters running through low level zones?

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How about we take a third option and demand something better than either extreme? I wouldn't want a boring FATE grind like the Atma again any more than I like essentially being handed three relics through no effort beyond the fact Poetics are so worthless to me nowadays, I capped on them months ago. There should be a middle ground to strife for where we have a decently long grind but it's at least decently enjoyable.

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Originally Posted by Ramesses

/Chuckles...

Nineteen pages already.

Let's be brutally honest: the storyline was definitely way more than an hour (if one actually took time to digest the dialogue) and I thoroughly enjoyed the revealing information regarding the Blades of Gunnhildr-- plus the battles were very interesting. There was a sense of "closure" for a charcater and we got to experience what really went down at that Citadel--- many of us have been waiting for almost five years for that bit of information.

Not to mention, the new BGM in that new area was very very nice.

So enjoy the new weapon, go practice on clearing a certain new Extreme battle several times over--- and mentally prepare for the relic grind that is obviously incoming with future patches.

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Depends on if you're a slow reader or not I suppose. I took my time and was done within an hour or so. Admittedly, I did enjoy the second half when a certain NPC comes in and the solo instance starts. Beyond that though, I was a bit bored if I'm being honest. Things took far too long to actually get going. Of course, that's down to personal taste.

As for the BGM. If you're referring to the EX trial, it's the old dungeon theme they replaced last patch. So it isn't new.

Prepare how? By playing another game? That's part of why people are complaining. They want more of a reason to play FFXIV yet there simply isn't one.

I think the Hardcore aspect of the Relic for 5.X this time is going to be split between the Casual for weapons and Hardcore for armor sets.

If Weapon progress is simply obtained as we progress through the Resistance storyline ( with some tome farming to gather alt 5.0 relic weapons) then it is more for casuals.

Relic Armor set appears to be behind the Extreme Trial of the Resistance storyline content so it maybe here where the hardcore grinding begins as upgrading these Relic armor through the more time and effort style contents.

However, this is all just a guess for now until we see more updates to how they will progress Relic weapons and Relic Armor sets.

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Originally Posted by ForteNightshade

How about we take a third option and demand something better than either extreme? I wouldn't want a boring FATE grind like the Atma again any more than I like essentially being handed three relics through no effort beyond the fact Poetics are so worthless to me nowadays, I capped on them months ago. There should be a middle ground to strife for where we have a decently long grind but it's at least decently enjoyable.

Depends on if you're a slow reader or not I suppose. I took my time and was done within an hour or so. Admittedly, I did enjoy the second half when a certain NPC comes in and the solo instance starts. Beyond that though, I was a bit bored if I'm being honest. Things took far too long to actually get going. Of course, that's down to personal taste.

As for the BGM. If you're referring to the EX trial, it's the old dungeon theme they replaced last patch. So it isn't new.

Prepare how? By playing another game? That's part of why people are complaining. They want more of a reason to play FFXIV yet there simply isn't one.

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This is where I never cease to be astounded by how players like you continue to swiftly rush through the tale without really absorbing what is being laid out before them. I surmise you have completed the quest, thus you may open the minor spoilers below:

• Did you grasp the additional lore regarding the two Legati of the IVth legion?
• Did you really grasp the incredible FFXII references-- assuming you have played that wonderful game?
• Did you grasp the information regarding the unique relationship between that legion and the Emperor?
• Did you grasp Bajsaljen's history and what profession he was initially chasing before he became the leader?
• Did you grasp the significance of Menenius and his family?
• Did you grasp the history of how Castrum Lacus Litore came about and it's significant similarities to the real life Alamut Castle?
• Did you really understand the real significance of Gerolt's cutscenes with a certain wealthy person?

I was able to absorb all that by just taking my main charcater through the quest-- I might learn even more when I take my second main charcater through sometime tomorrow. Heck, I might even pick up some more hidden nuances while I take my current third character on Diabolos through Stormblood.

Slow reader you say? I'm a very prolific reader-- when I need to do my speed reading I easily notch around 500 to 600 words per minute. When I need to speed read with retention, I slow down to about almost 350 to 400 per minute and I do it with a 85% to 90% retention-- it's one of the reasons I excelled at both my Masters degrees.

By the way-- regarding your question "prepare how?" -- I'm now almost convinced you were not around for the insanely mad relic grinds of ARR's Atma, Heavensward's Anima, and Stormblood's Eureka. Players who truly went through those times understand exactly what I mean by mentally preparing for the grind ahead.

Now head back in-game and go try to figure out all the additional lore I just mentioned above.

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Originally Posted by yukiiyuki

Well, for opening raids, you need to be 70 lvl, that means you need to go through main story since lvl 1, also you need gear, you missed whole game, so much content. It's not like we actually played the game and was ready for relic farm.

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I am so sorry, I didn't play the game.

The best thing about this is that alliance roulette has level 70 dungeons now and they are fun even greatly nerfed because in every fight the alliance is mostly dead and you are really fightning to stay alive lol.

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As for the BGM. If you're referring to the EX trial, it's the old dungeon theme they replaced last patch. So it isn't new.

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I'm pretty sure they're talking about the new resistance area, it's got a new awesome BGM. I think you might want to turn your sound on.

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Originally Posted by RyuSaarva

The best thing about this is that alliance roulette has level 70 dungeons now and they are fun even greatly nerfed because in every fight the alliance is mostly dead and you are really fightning to stay alive lol.

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IMHO an awesome thing about this all which people are completely disregarding is that now finally people are unlocking Ivalice raids, and finally they'll pop in alliance raids roulette, giving us more than the same old I-wanna-poke-my-eyes-out LotA. Sure, some people will still cheese their ilvl but the problem was mostly that most people didn't even bother unlocking them, and those of us who wanted to couldn't because they never popped no matter how many hours you waited.
Now we just need something that forces people to unlock the HW ones too and we're gold.

And you're right, these runs with half of the people being first timers are very wipey and very fun. Yesterday I finally managed to do Orbonne as soon as I logged after patch, so that I could do the relic too, then with roulette had first Rabanastre and then Ridorana and my, was it fun. I hope it lasts.

Need do trial extreme to catch that weapons? o.ô
Well, grind is all right for me (I have 415 days of playtime), but I avoid hard things and never did trial extreme. Perhaps only going continue with my craft weapon.

The Ex Trial is for the dyeable versions of the artifact class gear, not the weapon.

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Originally Posted by Zefiris

Need do trial extreme to catch that weapons? o.ô
Well, grind is all right for me (I have 415 days of playtime), but I avoid hard things and never did trial extreme. Perhaps only going continue with my craft weapon.

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No, the trial is to get the dyable AF4. You get the first weapon with just a few hours of cutscenes and a beautiful solo instance, and the next ones with 1000 poetics, which is why this thread is about complaining it's too easy/fast.

Personally I don't really mind that the first step was easy, but... we are severely lacking in long term, casual, combat related content (aka grind).

As much as I hated Anemos and Pagos, they at least gave me a reason to play, besides doing relevant lockouts and capping currencies.

I was holding out for the relic weapon, but I guess we'll have to wait a few patches more for something to come.

This actually makes me want to laugh out loud. I enjoyed the actual story aspect of this first step. Like REALLY enjoyed. Running through that instance, the battle, the cutscenes (Some more than others), and I am very satisfied. But I should've expected to see a lot of people on the forums not liking it, actually severely hating it. But its just proof that people on both ends of the spectrum do exist.

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Originally Posted by Kanitezz

This actually makes me want to laugh out loud. I enjoyed the actual story aspect of this first step. Like REALLY enjoyed. Running through that instance, the battle, the cutscenes (Some more than others), and I am very satisfied. But I should've expected to see a lot of people on the forums not liking it, actually severely hating it. But its just proof that people on both ends of the spectrum do exist.

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I quite liked the story and the solo duty. I also loved how epic it felt as a Tank to step up with Thancred and block the big bad attack.

It's just, after that I was literally handed the Relic for free.

Like, literally free. Rowena even gave me the materials for free. Rowena gave me the materials for free.

With Gerolt just pulling a legendary weapon out of his butt. No, ridiculously convoluted method of gaining specific materials (No, that's memed in the Relic Tools with their "Oddly Specific" materials...), no needing to test the weapon to see how to power it up or tempering it by fighting.

Just a couple of slaps on an anvil with some magic words attained from a haphazard reconstruction of someone's memory (Which is hecking distorted af, yet the inscriptions on the replicas happened to be perfect, go figure)

The duty was good. But it wasn't really Relic worthy...

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Originally Posted by Kalise

Rowena even gave me the materials for free. Rowena gave me the materials for free.

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Actually the Resistance paid for it. She's supplying materiel to the Resistance, and presumably charging them. We were just there to collect it.