Current State of End-Game Contents - A Blog Post from A Japanese Player

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Originally Posted by LilaAquillina

Sky in FFXI. Suzaku didn't have a set rotation, but it was largely irrelevant since your tank would just be standing there doing his thing while the healer does his and the DDs do his. At some point in time, it was guaranteed Suzaku would chainspell, and then you shadowbind or chainspell stun him back and continue doing your thing. Isn't that mechanics-driven?

Thing X happen so we all do thing Y - That's mechanics, no?

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Yes, but that's the only mechanic in the fight. Otherwise you literally just stood there and mashed away.

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How about just asking for separate content that will benefit both sides?

Instead of being sarcastic and unhelpful to the situation overall.

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Majority of FATE bosses is basically what they want. Zergable, tank/spank, zero skill fights.

First of all thanks so much for the translation OP

This closely aligns a chat I had the other week or so with my JP friend (I play on a JP server for fun/old times sake), he was telling me on the JP forums and JP players in general were having the same gripes as you described.

Another forum thread about the "Carrot on a stick" http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...-On-The-String

Addresses one of the issues, that item levels were irrelevant, and now that makes total sense, because in a mechanics based system items simply don't matter. And I will add that because of these issues that the OP mentioned, the consequence is that:



Aiming for item/weapon rewards is no longer motivational, after all why aim for that item if only one job can use it, it won't affect a fight much anyways and most of all I can't use it to help others clear the fight? Though not the primary reason to get better gear, one large reason that benefits the community is the ability to compensate another player's mistakes by covering for them one way or another.


Anyways I completely agree, my sub will expire at the end of the month finally, I've definitely lost my motivation to keep going and hope Yoshi sees the path they are going down is wrong.

Awesome post, and I both agree and disagree to many parts of it. I have never been a fan of weekly lockouts, because that is just an artificial way of extending the gameplay time. If you can only attempt it once a week that means only 4 attempts at your loot in a single month. If people are completely loot driven, of course they'll stay subscribed for another month to try to get that loot. I've always preferred items being semi-rare with as many chances as you like. Not to the point of Atma though, that drop rate is... something else. I wonder what the official drop rate % is?

On the topic of insta death mechanics, I'm divided. I love Titan HM and Ex because I know I'm skilled enough (if memorizing a set pattern and knowing when/where to move can be called skill, lmao) to down it. Think Dark Souls. Very difficult situations thrown at you, satisfaction at finally learning how to perfectly manage the situation. I think that most content should be difficult in the sense that you have to play your class well rather than knowing how to dodge well. There should be mechanics though, yes.

Not insta kill mechanics, but ones that if you fail to learn it and get hit by it 3-4 times in one fight then you'll finally die. Maybe a stacking damage debuff that only affects damage inflicted from this mechanic? Or maybe it should be something where it does what ever the mechanic is once every minute (or at set hp % intervals. Maybe he does it once at 90% then again at 70%) to give you a chance to learn it. If you get hit by it at that point, simple recovery. The next time he does it (again either at a set time interval or something like 50% health), it does it twice in a row and this time if you fail to dodge both you get hurt pretty bad. It does this maybe once or twice, then progresses to the point where when the mechanic happens (time intervals again or boss health maybe 30% and/or 10%) it does it 3-4 times in a row. At this point if you haven't learned to dodge it and you get hit by all of them, you WILL die. But if you've learned it even enough to dodge it once or twice you'll be hurt but alive. The same thing with a stacking debuff that only affects the mechanic damage would work even if he only does it once every time. Each time you fail to dodge it you take more damage from it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7cQtbMtODk

Oh, I think I get it now. Well, a wee bit of randomness would be fun, though by nature gamers tend to analyze any randomness down to its DNA and then it becomes predictable.

Well, thank you for the explanations.

Personally.. the OP was an interesting read. I can't 100% agree with it. I spent entirely too much time in Sky and I'd classify those fights as boring. Also, pop-item farming can burn in Hades.

I'm not sure how I'd make the current end-game fights more fun, short of simply introducing more of them.

I've been saying this to my friends the few times I've logged in lately. (yeah I'm about over 14 for now) I'm far from the "start new raid the week it's released" hardcore but I consider myself mostly hardcore. I only beat Titan EX recently and that was because I didn't even ATTEMPT it because I didn't want to deal with OTHER people. Sure I'm human and I make mistakes but I tend to pick up new fights pretty quick(I stopped dying on our third wipe and haven't died since) I guess that makes me "skilled" but I was bored out of my mind because it wasn't "fun," like at all.

I haven't bothered with the second turn because it's all just more of the same in a different coat of paint to me. I do think these scripted events do need to exist, but EVERY fight is just lazy imo. Also personally I don't think amazing memories should really count as "skill"... Guess that's just gonna piss people off.


How about "should I use this move or this one right now?" There's almost NONE of that once you've got it memorized, and that's why I'm so bored. Adaptability? forget it. It's learn or die and start over.

I played FF11 for most of a decade and I don't remember it ever being "easy" until Abyssea >.> Y'all are nuts. Sure most fights could be won with just throwing people at it but a lot of them could also be done with a minimal group of very skilled players. I also played WoW a lot and I think the raids there have a nice mix of scripts and random stuff. *shrug* I just think it's WAY too far in one direction right now.

I think simply writing this person off as a casual apologist is a serious mistake if this game is going to have longevity.

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Originally Posted by Ooshima

If you can't observe a preset, scripted battle it will be even tougher to do randomized battles.

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I think you're forgetting a key other point the OP mentioned though, that the random effects you need to dodge are not insta-kill mechanics.

What's that mean? Well if you're a DPS with good gear, or a good healer, you can compensate for their screw up. This may motivate you to get better gear or try harder for that gear because you know it may turn around a fight, saving you and your friends time, a huge benefit I believe.

Which fights were difficult aside from the obviously broken AV/PW? Abyssea gets bashed a lot (mainly because it went crazy with 3x Atma) but the enemies in there were actually mechanical. Briareus/Cuelebre/Micua... Serpentes Gloves NM for instance from the first three Abyssea zones all had interesting mechanics, especially done lowman. Lowman RDM on things like Cuelebre/Mict without Atma was a very refreshing challenge for XI. Abyssea only became easy when they overdid the Atma/buff thing.

Not surprisingly you have people here that consider any criticism to be a critique of their "accomplishments"... you get the typical "they want faceroll" garbage posts by threatened players.

This was a good post that didn't advocate complete removal of these mechanics... just more variety and not having all fights be nothing more than a collection of mechanics.

In other words, stop making all fights just gimmicks...especially when it kills motivation for gear or penalizes grouping. So what if you could zerg something? Who cares? If you want to roll against 20, 30, 40 others- go for it! Maybe not all content should be zergable.. but thiscurrent setup is pretty bland and lazy, imo.

- Oh yeah I really care about doing the same primal with "moar gimmicks"... cause I can get a drop... that really is nothing but vanity. Yeah, I really care about "Coil 2".. which isn't a zone, it's a couple of single instance boss fights. It's a couple of rooms.

The treadmill isn't even subtle... and the rewards don't matter.....

This is a good post on the forums, and I do agree with it because the current build of the game relies too heavily on a static 8 man group versus a more social aspect making FC pointless. I enjoy the game a lot, but i can see how these "walls" can be unappealing to casual and mainstream players who just like anyone else wants to get to the next step. There does need to be some kind of middle ground to where the success rate of completing end game content is higher than it's current rate of success.

Mechanics make the fights interesting. One of the things said was why not make enemies just tough. Would you like to sit and fight a solo enemy just standing there attacking for 20 minutes? Why would you like to do it in a party then?

In the end we just need more. More sidequests, STORIES, memories, and fights. Which I'm sure will come.

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Originally Posted by Raenryong

Which fights were difficult aside from the obviously broken AV/PW? Abyssea gets bashed a lot (mainly because it went crazy with 3x Atma) but the enemies in there were actually mechanical. Briareus/Cuelebre/Micua... Serpentes Gloves NM for instance from the first three Abyssea zones all had interesting mechanics, especially done lowman. Lowman RDM on things like Cuelebre/Mict without Atma was a very refreshing challenge for XI. Abyssea only became easy when they overdid the Atma/buff thing.

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From what I remember mostly I'd say it was mostly the BCNM/instanced stuff before everything was zerged. Zergs suck -_- Dynamis Lord uh, Omega/Ultima, even some of the story fights were difficult till newer gear came out. The kings were hard for a time. The dragons of CoP were really hard, and they all had "mechanics" that you couldn't just tank and spank. I do agree with lowmanning Abyssea stuff too.

I dunno, nothing in 14 so far has given me that "rush" I got from some of the stuff in 11 did. Could be my nostalgia, who knows.

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Originally Posted by Jubez187

Laziness. Some people DON'T WANT to do the research. They don't wanna go on reddit and see the plethora of rotation guides. They don't parse and push themselves. That's why. Even at the end of the day though, knowing how to handle bosses is more important than handling the class. If you can dodge and pay attention to boss mechanics, and remember them well..you're a FFXIV God. It doesn't really matter about how well you manage CD's or how high your DPS is

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That's completely untrue. A DPS who does poor DPS is horrible regardless of whether they survive or not. Not making a DPS check = wipe, no matter how well you dodge. There are also instances where a very high dps player can mess up, die, and still have the most damage at the end of the fight. A healer who can't heal but can dodge well ... you'll end up with a dead party.

I agree with pretty much everything written by the original poster.

My biggest complaint about FFXIV endgame is, you can't play endgame with all your friends on the jobs you and they want to play. You need 8 people to attend on very specific jobs, no flexibility allowed. If someone is missing, you either need to cancel event or progress and leave 1 person behind for a whole week.
From developer perspective, I understand it is hard to make a fun and challenging content allowing flexibility. The lazy option is to make scripted fights executed by 2Tank+2Healer+4DPS. The game doesn't care who your friends are. The equation has to be perfect or you don't get to play.

My second complaint is, Coil T5 and Titan Ex are too unbalanced and do not allow casual players to clear them. Producer Yoshida said that there will be no more echo increases for Coil because players win it currently at decent rate. I laughed so hard. A casual player clears T5 or Titan Ex if he farms up 1-2M gil and pays for the win. Supposedly developers play this game privately - log on your private characters, make a party and help some PUG casuals get the win. I do just that to help my FC/LS casuals, and the task is just horrendous. We get 5-6 people through party finder and they keep flying off the arena within 2 minutes.

I know when making the game the developers heavily studied other MMOs on the market, but failed to get some good ideas from them. Like, WoW had weekly raid lockouts, but then developer figured out that people want to challenge the fights more than just once, either for fun, or more importantly to help their FC/LS/friends to not feel left behind. So they made it that every week you are able to cast lots only on your first win. After that, you can play again, but can not lot anything. FFXIV Developers reasoning for not doing the same is that they don't want people who are too weak to access content they don't deserve to win. It messes up with schedule, equations, content progression and what not. Nowhere in that one person's desire to play with as many people (this is MMO...) whatever, whenever, however they enjoy. We're treated like pieces of chess, not people trying to enjoy a game with friends.

I wonder how many of the Coil/EX fights in this game could be easily beat with bot scripts controlling each party member.

Actually...

I have a sneaking suspicion this is exactly how these battles are tested internally.


Lower dev costs and variables... faster iterations, cleaner results, apples-to-apples feedback...

yep...

ARR is a bot-vs-bot world. We're just playing in it.

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I spent entirely too much time in Sky and I'd classify those fights as boring.

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I liked it, but a big part of that was that I liked helping out my LS members getting stuff. That and spending time doing stuff with them.

Anyway, I sort of agree with the OP. In many fights, it's more that you fight the mechanics instead of the boss itself. Almost feels like they could remove some bosses and just have you survive x min by staying out of markers on the ground.

Imo i think OP is going along the lines of
" what ever happened to improvision? "
Barely there are times you\\'ll be able to improvise during the fight.
All the improv usually happens outside the fight. Theory crafting?
Turn 2 enrage, smn using titan to tank mog ex, ifrit HM and caster LB3, etc all were devised after the fight due to observations during the fight.
None were intended by the devs but ppl made it happen and so it became the norm of the majority.
Because of this, the potential improv that could happen due to whatever reasons is drastically lowered thus causing the fight to be all planned out before even stepping in.

It\\'s just impossible for SE to give a damn about this as they have bigger things on their minds
I.e gold saucer, 2.28, 2.3, other minor patches, probs frontlines as to how they took time to promote it.

I gave up on Titan EX because it's BORRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRING!

First 10-12 times I attempted it, I messed up.

Next 40-50 times I attemped it, I ran everything flawlessly and watched someone else mess up, got frustarted, then ran it again and watched the same thing happen.



If SE is going to continue with the scripts, maybe they could mix it up and have a boss that has 5-6 different scripts that it is capable of running... and your job is to figure out what script you're dealing with, and battle accordingly? At least that would provide some level of critical thinking.

Doing the same fight OVER and OVER without any change in the mechanics is just flat out boring. The end result of victory isn't a really a sense of accomplishment, it's more a dull "cool, onto the next thing" type feeling.

It's like memorizing the answers to a test and then sitting down and filling them out without even bothering to look at the questions. There's not a whole lot of reward felt when your teacher hands you the test back with the "A" on it, because you didn't really even know the material, you just memorized the answers. The real reward is in mastering the material and being able to demonstrate it in a practical setting, no matter what is thrown at you.


Anyways, I spend most of my time in game these days crafting, doing dailies, and leveling up alternate classes... I don't even bother with the scripted stuff anymore, it makes me want to poke my eyes out with pins.

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All the improv usually happens outside the fight.

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That is not improvisation though, that is planning.

Great post that accurately describes why I haven't logged on and played in several months although I still pay my sub.

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Originally Posted by Amberion

In many fights, it's more that you fight the mechanics instead of the boss itself. Almost feels like they could remove some bosses and just have you survive x min by staying out of markers on the ground.

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Theatrhythm Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn™

I kid, I kid

I do recognize boss fights have this "do-or-die" mechanics, which may give a boring appeal to the fight once you master ir, or when you don't. However, from my experience this far, I have been in awful/awesome/meh runs, and some of them the group I was in had to improvise either because some party member dced or whatever. Guess what? The group nailed it. I've had tankless fights, healerless fights, and so on. Is the content rough? Is it demanding? Is it too much of the same? My two cents: with proper gear (not over gear) and proper synchrony AND class know-how you can beat this game and enjoy it.

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Originally Posted by Iriadysa

This seems to be the underlying driving force behind the outcries to make content easier or, as the OP proposes, gear carried.

The only reason I have to dislike huge roadblocks is the fact that it stops me from accessing other content. This would never be a problem if there was a shit ton of content to choose from, which is not the case in XIV due to its self-obsolescence tendencies, but this is a completely different topic.

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That is exactly what I am referring to, instead of making content easier, just release content for other type of players. Leave Coil alone, why must it be fixed? Why must the end game spectrum have to change? It's supposed to be that "type" of hard. Make other content for other players that they can also use to progress in some way or another.

Also I'd like to add that while I don't agree or disagree with scripted fights and such, or the way they're made hard, like the whole team jump rope, it IS annoying, but doesn't mean that, in essence that coil should be made less mechanic based around. Just different mechanics that are still annoying but you can survive. After getting gear, it's much easier to recover from mistakes. As you adapt so does the room for error decrease and the room for recovery increases.

Cont.To the fights it demands immense effort, like second coil: I would not change them. To Titan (NM, HM, EXM) - AOE's come out too fast and due to kill you if you lag. So the fight should be redone having that a lot of players do not have or own stellar internet connection and dodging in that fight is 100% essential. (do-or-die lag as a mechanic is a real issue).

Totally agree

today i started coil 6 training and stared thinking, why i'm doing this? why do i have to memorise every mechanic of each boss or primal in this game?

this is not fun to do, titan EX was very hard the first 3 months of training with random people, but now when i got my static that dont make mistakes, its boring.

and the fact that i have to leave friends back and cant help them do it is another thing.

So i just ran garuda Extreme again: WTF are you guys talking about? this is why i love this game that fight was FUN, sure we wiped a few times but we got through it when we learned from our mistakes and all worked together, you might call it repetitive but i dont think that at all, also notice how a large majority of the people in favour of the op are people who have quit the game or have not logged into the game in ages..........

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Yoshi-P says “people get tired of contents after about 3 months”, and that's absolutely wrong. Everyone played these things for years at a time, and even the more recent Abyssea update had me playing for well over a year.

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On this note.. If that's true, then we are stuck with Coil T6-9 for SIX months..
T1-5 only lasted us for Six months due to having to level and gearing up

before anyone replies but.. but we have CT! ... please what a joke We need "alot" more Endgame content other then Coil

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Originally Posted by Rose_Vilehart

So i just ran garuda Extreme again: WTF are you guys talking about? this is why i love this game that fight was FUN, sure we wiped a few times but we got through it when we learned from our mistakes and all worked together, you might call it repetitive but i dont think that at all, also notice how a large majority of the people in favour of the op are people who have quit the game or have not logged into the game in ages..........

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That's cool if you enjoy the fight, but I think a fight that repeats itself in the exact same way from beginning to end every time would be considered repetitive by any definition.

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Originally Posted by Dirth

On this note.. If that's true, then we are stuck with Coil T6-9 for SIX months..
T1-5 only lasted us for Six months due to having to level and gearing up

before anyone replies but.. but we have CT! ... please what a joke We need "alot" more Endgame content other then Coil

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While i agree..........the whole game isnt just endgame dude, there is a ton of other stuff being added that looks real damn fun im trying that gold saucer out the minute its released

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Originally Posted by Susanoh

That's cool if you enjoy the fight, but I think a fight that repeats itself in the exact same way from beginning to end every time would be considered repetitive by any definition.

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And yet still more fun and interesting than this entire thread would lead me to believe and ANYTHING on wow (before you say anything, yes i played wow for years i really didn't like it, only didn't leave because of my guild i was actually kinda happy when it got full of assholes cause it meant i was free), hell the entire party had massive fun with it and a lot of other in game content so that says a lot to me about these forums.

I have to say I agree with the OP about the instant death mechanics. There are just too many of them and they make the game boring honestly. As long as you have can learn the dance, you will always win. If one person can't, you will pretty much always lose.

It is so heavy in this game that it makes all other types of player skill irrelevant. Sure you can have a couple of instant death mechanics here and there but especially in primal fights, that's all there is to a battle. Being able to do your rotations and having good gear only matters in a handful of DPS checks scattered throughout the game.

It's not that I want them to do away with the dance. Not dancing is just as boring. But it would be nice if they could find a balance. Right now it is 100% team jump rope (lol) or die. And that's just lame.

I agree. I only hate mechanic stuff cause if one person stinks it brings the party down. The good players can't do anything lol. I think I agree with what he said but the complete opposite spectrum

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Originally Posted by Aeshira

I have to say I agree with the OP about the instant death mechanics. There are just too many of them and they make the game boring honestly. As long as you have can learn the dance, you will always win. If one person can't, you will pretty much always lose.

It is so heavy in this game that it makes all other types of player skill irrelevant. Sure you can have a couple of instant death mechanics here and there but especially in primal fights, that's all there is to a battle. Being able to do your rotations and having good gear only matters in a handful of DPS checks scattered throughout the game.

It's not that I want them to do away with the dance. Not dancing is just as boring. But it would be nice if they could find a balance. Right now it is 100% team jump rope (lol) or die. And that's just lame.

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The only part of the guys post i agree with, allagan rot and titan should have thier 1 hit kill moves because thats what makes the fight but we have way too many 1 hit kill moves

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Originally Posted by Mooserocka33

I agree. I only hate mechanic stuff cause if one person stinks it brings the party down. The good players can't do anything lol. I think I agree with what he said but the complete opposite spectrum

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The "good players" should be picking up the slack like actual good players do, you are exaggerating way to much when you say 1 person (unless they are the only heal, srsly even a bad tank can be salvaged with a good enough heal) can screw up the dungeon/trial/raid entirely.

also you hate game mechanics?......................maybe its just because im taking a game design course right now but that was the dumbest thing i have seen on the thread

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Originally Posted by Rose_Vilehart

So i just ran garuda Extreme again: WTF are you guys talking about? this is why i love this game that fight was FUN, sure we wiped a few times but we got through it when we learned from our mistakes and all worked together, you might call it repetitive but i dont think that at all, also notice how a large majority of the people in favour of the op are people who have quit the game or have not logged into the game in ages..........

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It was fun for me too, the first 20 times at least, I'll admit nowadays grinding for mirror even Leviathan EX is still fun once in a while when someone dies and you're racing the clock. The problem is it's like a multiplayer game not an MMO, after killing the boss enough times it gets boring, but in an MMO we want to take that weapon we earned and feel that the work was worth it. Now we do it for the initial fun, the hurrah moment of winning and then on to the next boss, if you are satisfied by just that, then like the OP says, read no further. Unfortunately many of us are not satisfied by just that.

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Originally Posted by EmiliM

Also, for those of you who think the current state of FFXIV is awesome, reading this might feel like a bit of a downer, so maybe you should not read any further if you're happy with things the way they are now.

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So if you're happy with the game that's great, are you saying we should just lower our expectations or just learn to enjoy what we have? You'll also notice that many of us who agree with the OP really resonate with his FFXI references, it's because we were used to much more depth and meaning to our accomplishments, than just a pat on the back, we did it or the adrenaline rush once in a while.

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Originally Posted by Rose_Vilehart

The "good players" should be picking up the slack like actual good players do, you are exaggerating way to much when you say 1 person (unless they are the only heal, srsly even a bad tank can be salvaged with a good enough heal) can screw up the dungeon/trial/raid entirely.

also you hate game mechanics?......................maybe its just because im taking a game design course right now but that was the dumbest thing i have seen on the thread

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The OP was very clear, some things are salvagable, but a tank getting hit by a divebomb maybe not so much: "In T5, there may be situations where you can recover from a poorly handled mechanic. But if you were to ask someone whether you can still win if the tanks died to a divebomb, the answer will always be "no"."
Or perhaps a Titan EX knock off the platform, maybe you can pull it off with -1 DPS, not 2 less probably. We're not saying there should be no unrecoverable mechanics but there are too many.

What we need is a balance between mechanics (make them less forgiving) and more dependency on gear - for a variety of reasons, we're now 25 pages deep, it'll be good to re-read the OP's post which was very well written and comment on that, rather than some people here who say mechanics are bad, some mechanics are fine, no arguments there.

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Originally Posted by Litre

It was fun for me too, the first 20 times at least, I'll admit nowadays grinding for mirror even Leviathan EX is still fun once in a while when someone dies and you're racing the clock. The problem is it's like a multiplayer game not an MMO, after killing the boss enough times it gets boring, but in an MMO we want to take that weapon we earned and feel that the work was worth it. Now we do it for the initial fun, the hurrah moment of winning and then on to the next boss, if you are satisfied by just that, then like the OP says, read no further. Unfortunately many of us are not satisfied by just that.

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........oh look at that killing the same enemy a couple of times is not as fun as the first few times you did it, who knew? this is totally an RPG only problem and not a problem of all games even single players ones you are just replaying.........

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Originally Posted by Mooserocka33

I agree. I only hate mechanic stuff cause if one person stinks it brings the party down. The good players can't do anything lol. I think I agree with what he said but the complete opposite spectrum

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So it is working fine.

The Second Coil isn't meant to be easy. It's meant to be the cutting edge of content, the place where everyone in your party must perform to their best ability, where minimal mistakes are made for the best rewards. And even with the mechanics there, you can see in many videos, many players kills of Turns 6 7 8 and 9 are sloppy. The Turn 9 world first from Blue Garter had how many deaths? 5 or 6 wasn't it?

With Echo and the higher item level gear in the Extreme Primals and 1-5 you can have many many deaths and recover fine (See here: 6 deaths in P4 of Twintania, we still won ), and even before the Echo the reason you saw so many people selling content is because people dying in those contents aren't the be all and end all.

As for instant deaths in T5. It currently serves as a barrier to entry to second coil. If you can't beat T5, I'm sorry you don't have a chance in T6+. I'm sure in future patches Twintania and Coil 1-5 will be nerfed further, so just wait till then.

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As for OP... Way too much to reply too but I disagree with most of it. As I said above, Second Coil should be unforgiving. I kinda agree with you maybe Allagan Rot should be nerfed in T2 now since it is "casual content" but since 0-click is a thing there's not any need too. Saying item level/echo is irrelevant because of instant death mechanics is wrong. It makes recovering from those deaths more forgiving. The higher damage from the gear/echo means you will encounter less of the mechanics per phase, resulting in less likelyhood for people dying.

I find it mind boggling you say Turn 4 was perfect balance of difficulty. On DPS that fight is so boring, there's nothing to do other than slight positioning and other than that, 1 DPS check that was pretty easy at ilvl 70, let alone 90+echo, it's easier than T1, atleast in T1 I had to move from platforms and make sure the 2 Caduceus are dying at the same time, and way, way back I was on feed duty.

Saying mechanics/gimmicks are bad is really strange, so do you just want the bosses to auto attack and then the players just do dps/heal/tank and see who wins? Or is the boss actually allowed some mechanics, just ones that aren't too punishing otherwise the game is too hard and too "mechanic-focused"?

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And saying players would prefer random fights, I doubt it. You can already see how many teams hate Turn 7 because of how Melusines shrieks and the add spawning works, and that's not even random, it just changes each week because your DPS changes depending on drops and pushes Melusines phases at different timings. If players are getting annoyed at that, something that resembles random but isn't even random, imagine how annoyed they will get at truly random elements.

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Originally Posted by Rose_Vilehart

........oh look at that killing the same enemy a couple of times is not as fun as the first few times you did it, who knew? this is totally an RPG only problem and not a problem of all games even single players ones you are just replaying.........

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No, I'm playing a game right now called Faster Than Light which is amazing! Random scenarios occur that I need to react to, even with a pause button the random elements make it exciting, multiple play-throughs have all been great. Right now FFXIV is almost completely scripted, that'll get boring much faster than if a fight introduced random elements that you need to react to.

And before you say it:

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Originally Posted by Ooshima

If you can't observe a preset, scripted battle it will be even tougher to do randomized battles.

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I think you're forgetting a key other point the OP mentioned though, that the random effects you need to dodge are not insta-kill mechanics.

What's that mean? Well if you're a DPS with good gear, or a good healer, you can compensate for their screw up. This may motivate you to get better gear or try harder for that gear because you know it may turn around a fight, saving you and your friends time, a huge benefit I believe. Right now, there are some mechanics (not all) , where you can only watch helplessly as they get knocked out of action completely, from which the remaining party is unlikely to recover from. If the developers placed less emphasis on mechanics, then with good enough gear and skill the rest of the party should be able to compensate and win more easily - it's all about balance.

This brings us back to a very important point, IF gear was made more relevant, that would be an additional reason for players to beat the bosses, other than the hurrah of winning and adrenaline rush, which I can find in any multiplayer game. Even many multiplayer (non-MMO) games have rewards that improve your win-rate.

But currently in FFXIV, as the OP mentioned, there are too many mechanics that make gear completely irrelevant, if Leeroy in T5 forgets to dodge divebomb and knocks everyone into the purple fire it's an insta-wipe. What if with good enough gear that fire could be resisted up to 50% damage, the guy who screws up dies but everyone else who has good enough resist gear gets taken down to 2k HP, if healers are on the ball they may be able to get the tank back up fast then aoe cure the rest. I would take this implementation over an echo buff any day! At least when someone screws up there is some chance, even if it's 5% and with good gear 10% chance we could recover -not 0%.

And when T5 first is released, nobody should have resist gear high enough to survive this mechanic, but later on absolutely! Why shouldn't I be able to in 2 months from now, take my friend who just started into T5, with my superior gear and help him carry it? I want him to catch up to 3rd coil or whatever the current content is anyways, with the status quo even 5 months from now there will still be people who can't get this mechanic down 100% and it only takes 1 out of 8 to kill everyone.

Mechanics are awesome, they just need to be less debilitating, for "mainstream" players, a term which the OP coined, sometimes you'll have fun, other times it may be frustrating when someone screws up and causes the whole party to wipe. Right now that's all there is, but what if you could lick your wounds, and try to beat some other quests and get some other better weapon then go back and try again, except this time when someone screws up, your 10% extra healing wand is able to salvage the fight? Right now, in some fights, not all, it's not possible. Titan EX and T5 is the main example for now.

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Originally Posted by Litre

*snip*

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actually no i was going to say this: you are asking a roleplaying a game..........a game in which you enter the role of someone usually in a fantasy world and follow them/you along their story and battles............to be completely randomized like FTL, which btw also has BS because whether or not you get enough parts to beat the last boss is ALSO random meaning you can play though the game only to find out the game screwed you, also FTL ships are not bosses, they are all basically just enemies, since the game take a strategy approach to it however they feel like bosses, the only actual boss is the last enemy and that boss has a slightly randomized ai but it is mostly scripted, i know i tested it......

Another thing you dont seem to understand: this is an rpg, most of the appeal of rpg bosses is looking at the boss, trying it, getting your ass whooped again and agian until you realize "ok i think i worked out his pattern now i know when to block/cast silence" and then figuring out the best strategy to beat them, this game would not benefit from bosses just doing random things halfway through the fight, no strategy would be able to be formulated and bosses would be considered "cheap", you destroy your own argument here.

Emilia, thank you for sharing your thoughts on the matter.

As someone who has been playing since Beta/early access, I haven't touched the Extreme Primals or the Binding Coils of Bahamut due to similar reasons you have mentioned. The mechanics in and of itself can be quite intimidating for players who want to experience the content for the first time, and I believe that might be due to the excessive number of instant-death conditions.

I don't consider myself a bad player by any means, but it is incredibly frustrating to find groups that are willing to remove other people mainly due to these mechanics. Like you have pointed out, no amount of gear or Echo will fix the issue at its core.

So what kind of content is out there for those of us who don't want to deal with these mechanics? Well, there is crafting; which is essentially irrelevant in the market and has little to no place in high-level endgame. Truth is, there is not much to do for us "casuals" that have no interest in Coils or Extreme Primals, and that is discouraging.

I want Square Enix to succeed, so don't take this as an attack. I sincerely hope they start addressing these things in the future patches.

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Originally Posted by Rose_Vilehart

Another thing you dont seem to understand: this is an rpg, most of the appeal of rpg bosses is looking at the boss, trying it, getting your ass whooped again and agian until you realize "ok i think i worked out his pattern now i know when to block/cast silence" and then figuring out the best strategy to beat them, this game would not benefit from bosses just doing random things halfway through the fight, no strategy would be able to be formulated and bosses would be considered "cheap", you destroy your own argument here.

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I do understand that appeal, I agreed that bosses are fun and the mechanics are great, and I do love the challenge of figuring out bosses, formulating strategies, etc... we want phases and some predictability of course BUT you are taking a total extreme here, I am not, and I hope nobody is advocating for completely random fights!

The OP and I both believe that the mechanics are too unforgiving, and there needs to be a better balance between mechanics, DPS checks and "some" (not complete) randomness.


- There should be some things that I can expect coming, and plan to dodge and memorize for, such as phases, mechanics and coordinated telegraphed attacks, but if it hits me it should not wipe the party.
- There should also be elements that I need to react to, and therefore are reliant on reflexes, not memorization

The benefit from this balance is that items are more relevant, if someone else fails to dodge the mechanic the party doesn't wipe and with good enough gear you can overcome that setback. If you fail to dodge a random attack through a small mistake you should not wipe either.

All FFXI players come from a game where there is a healthy balance between mechanics and reactionary situations, all these challenges can be surmounted with good enough gear, but only months after the content is released. This way the hardcore get a chance to beat it at the start and when they get better gear, they can help their guildmates through it later. This gives me an incentive to obtain that gear, which is also absent from the game due to the heavy reliance on insta-kill mechanics. In Second Coil, insta-kill mechanics are fine since this is the highest tier end-game, but why are storyline fights like this too? Like the OP says it leads to more frustration than there should be and some people giving up.

If SQEnix gave me an item, that enabled Tempered Will (knockback resist, probably specific to Earth damage at a certain level for balance purposes) on a 30 second timer, imagine the instant appeal! It should only be obtainable through far harder content, but still I would aim for that immediately, why? Because I have tons of friends in my LS that still have a hard time clearing Titan EX. But right now there is no such item, Titan EX you win or lose based on mechanics, if just a few people make one mistake, then no item and nobody can salvage the fight.