Castrum grind might stop me from subbing

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Originally Posted by Bizniztyme

Before you open your mouth at all and call everyone a white knight, people have the right to disagree with his concerns.

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We'll never get nice things now will we?
People have an opinion and you guys dash and bash people.
Reason why 1.0 screwed over because they listened to no one.
They need to listen here so they can take things into thought.
Stop saying every single thing in this game is fine, it's not.
They could just have every dungeon here a level 50 to acquire tomes that way we can re-run old dungeons that usually ran by once.
Nope, can't have that suggestions...Everything is fine. -Rolls eyes;

Welp, have fun OP with whatever game you've come across.
Perhaps you come back when the game flourishes a bit.

Castrum grinding is a symptom of a much larger problem. The problem isn't that it's boring to repeat, and that we need more dungeons to provide more variety. The problem is that the entire end-game theme of repeating dungeons is part of a forced, linear system of progression that is limiting what players are allowed to do with their time in Eorzea -- a world that could easily have been made into a "theme park", as it has been built with the potential for so much more content than mindless dungeon spamming.

Variety in end-game dungeons isn't what we need to be asking for. That will only serve as a short-term mask to one symptom of the root problems with this game. We need to be asking for reasons to level our other jobs. We need to be asking for more ways to gear them so they can all be equally viable. And in order to accomplish this, we need to be asking for more horizontally-scaling content so that we can still be viable if we play whatever job we're in the mood for on any given day.

The game needs to go beyond spamming dungeons for tokens, or raiding one raid at a time in a forced progression pattern for the next tier of vertically-scaling, linear gear. Before you say that we need these things in order to keep players motivated, keep in mind that these things only encourage players to limit themselves to one of nine jobs, meaning that they are currently cheating players out of 88.9% of the game's potential play value. Is that really a worthwhile trade-off? I'd wager that most players would say "no." Especially when you combine this game's current focus on one job per player with the game's inclusion of the holy trinity, which is a combination that limits which of your friends you can play with.

Don't get me wrong -- dungeons and raids aren't bad things to give to players, nor is the holy trinity inherently bad. The WAY that this game has implemented them, however, is confused and misguided, as it contradicts the entire multi-job character system. The multi-job character system could have multiplied the enjoyment of every single end-game activity from launch onward by a factor of nine and allowed players to party with any friends they liked, and yet all signs indicate that the system is going to be completely ignored save for unlocking a few extra actions on your main job. It's a real shame, when you actually think about all of the potential that's being completely overlooked.

I don't think saying leave and come back later is facetious or snide or "white knighting." What MMO has had tons to do in end-game at launch recently? WAR, Rift, SWTOR, TERA, GW2, etc. all launched with grindy, repetitive, or non-existent end-game. This just how MMOs are. Building the 1-50/60/70/80 experience and the major features of the game takes priority to end-game content for the first portion of an MMO's life.

If you find end-game dissatisfying, then wait a bit and keep an eye on the game's patches.

I agree, OP. It's a pretty miserable way to gear for endgame. Sucks the life right out of my eyes everytime I queue up. I'm on the back 9 now, but I have to force myself to login and finish the grind. I'm doing so with the hopes that further endgame content will make it worthwhile. I guess we'll see.

I just break it up. Run CM 5-6 times a week, but make sure I switch jobs so I do not get burnt out 2 on whm, 2 on brd, and 2 on mnk. Then I'll run some AK usually only 3-5 again on different classes. Have not beaten Titan yet (actually still working on Garuda), primarily do those on mnk. Mix in some crafting and gathering for a half hour here or there and I find my time in game quite enjoyable. I think it's only as grindy as you make it.

The game just came out. Give it time. The first major content patch isn't even out yet. Like a fine wine or a good scotch, it takes time to age and get a good flavor. Sure the grind can be boring, but just think of how much attached you are to your character and all the good memories you've made with other players.

But, you can always hold off on subscribing and wait until 2.1 comes out.

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Originally Posted by Rushx

most mmo's are super casual these days

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You all mix casual and easy up being casual means it might take you a week or two longer than a hardcore player. Where Easy or what you call "Casual" skill doesn't matter seeing as its easy and obtained fast. Please stop using the term "Casual" when you should be saying "Easy". Also seeing as you want a "Easy" game I wouldn't subscribe because endgame here won't be "Casual" as you say or "Easy" as the real casual players call it. Also for the record Casual describes the gamer not the game.

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Originally Posted by M4Fade

Couldn't have said it better myself.

This "grind" would be much more fun and bearable if everything had a chance to drop stuff. Maybe even extra tomes.

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Eventually, they'll hopefully add stuff like that. For the time being though, this is our endgame. This is meant to be the gate that limits us until they can push out more content. People are just impatient on such matters, or have the "grass is greener" mentality. Look at the game for itself, not for what it is compared to others. Play the game with a clean slate, and maybe things will work out for the best.

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Originally Posted by Arriverderci

We'll never get nice things now will we?
People have an opinion and you guys dash and bash people.
Reason why 1.0 screwed over because they listened to no one.
They need to listen here so they can take things into thought.
Stop saying every single thing in this game is fine, it's not.
They could just have every dungeon here a level 50 to acquire tomes that way we can re-run old dungeons that usually ran by once.
Nope, can't have that suggestions...Everything is fine. -Rolls eyes;

Welp, have fun OP with whatever game you've come across.
Perhaps you come back when the game flourishes a bit.

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So people that doesn't agree with the OP can't have their own opinions without being called a White Knight and are open season to be bashed....Gotcha....ROLLS EYES.

And get off your high horse, noone said everything was fine and dandy, seems like you had that thought in your head and just wanted to ramble about it. Don't put words in my mouth.

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Originally Posted by Noshpan

The game just came out. Give it time. The first major content patch isn't even out yet. Like a fine wine or a good scotch, it takes time to age and get a good flavor. Sure the grind can be boring, but just think of how much attached you are to your character and all the good memories you've made with other players.

But, you can always hold off on subscribing and wait until 2.1 comes out.

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2.1's content has already been announced. What new content is it bringing? Three more dungeons for us to continue our mindless dungeon grind with. We'll also get a new raid to further divide players and more tightly lock people into one main job by introducing yet another tier of gear to the game's forced, linear progression path. Nothing's slated to change for the better -- plans are only for the reinforcement of what we are already experiencing. It will be new content, but nothing truly NEW. Only new in the sense of us getting more of the same -- the same being the source of all of the complaints in this thread, so it's not necessarily a good thing.

No incentives to level more jobs by making it viable to gear them up. Nothing to help tear down the gear score walls that divide the playerbase and limit our gameplay choices -- instead we get plans to add more walls. We'll get extreme mode primals, although as it is most people still can't get a good group for hard mode Titan, so you can imagine how many people are looking forward to that. Also we will be getting daily quests, which COULD be a good way to get end-game players out into the world for once, if they're actually made to feel fun and rewarding -- something that everybody will naturally be skeptical about when they hear the word "daily" preceding anything, so I'll avoid getting my hopes up on that until we get more details.

And nobody had better even try the argument about PvP coming for those who want something else -- unless this game figures out how to fix its clunky servers, PvP is going to be nigh unplayable for the foreseeable future.

I don't mean to be all doom and gloom though. On the contrary, the bright side here is that all of this stuff was intended by the developers to be included at launch. That means that 2.1 isn't meant to be a reply to our cries, and we shouldn't be surprised that it's more of the same. Therefore my point, in response to your quote, is that 2.1 actually isn't what we should be examining if we want to see the direction that the game will take in response to our feedback. If the developers are listening to us, then they will instead be planning 2.2 in response to our feedback. We just have to hold onto hope until we hear the details about 2.2, and then we will see if our feedback is actually being taken into consideration. So don't give up on the game yet folks, and keep speaking up about what you want to improve. There's still time for FFXIV to surprise us.