Raider to Non-Raider: an exhibition on thoughts and misconceptions

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Originally Posted by kalasnikov

Thats just 1 point of view. I still find t7 much more horrid than a3s. No need to use fancy words or making lengthy posts about it. Alexander savage is half coil difficulty half savage difficulty.

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You misunderstood the meaning in my statement. Alexander's failures in game design go further than just difficulty. It's not even the difficulty that's the real problem here.

I'll give you a thumbs up in agreement over how bad T7 was as a fight though. (T7 was on the top of my list of worst designed fights in the game until I truly got to feel how many design sins they just carelessly threw into A3S.)

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Originally Posted by HorseBoots

You misunderstood the meaning in my statement. Alexander's failures in game design go further than just difficulty. It's not even the difficulty that's the real problem here.

I'll give you a thumbs up in agreement over how bad T7 was as a fight though. (T7 was on the top of my list of worst designed fights in the game until I truly got to feel how many design sins they just carelessly threw into A3S.)

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come on... the "REAL PROBLEM" with A3S and A4S is the mind of the players... just because it's different the way you fight it doesn't mean it's wrong... A3S is AOE healing Based for the most of it and A4S is the "strangest" one in terms of mechanics... because basically to deal with it on ilv 210- you need to kill someone in your party in order to beat the dps check... it's a really strange stuff... to sacrifice someone to kill the boss in time but this is the way to clear it so far ... I think we will see some "wierd" mechanics at the next floors

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Originally Posted by Umbreon_skystorm

come on... the "REAL PROBLEM" with A3S and A4S is the mind of the players... just because it's different the way you fight it doesn't mean it's wrong... A3S is AOE healing Based for the most of it and A4S is the "strangest" one in terms of mechanics... because basically to deal with it on ilv 210- you need to kill someone in your party in order to beat the dps check... it's a really strange stuff... to sacrifice someone to kill the boss in time but this is the way to clear it so far ... I think we will see some "wierd" mechanics at the next floors

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Except that's not how the mechanic is supposed to work its just that almost anytime that a debuff needs to be passed they have some kind of thing that can be cheesed hence why they sac people in a4s the actual mechanic is a lot more complicated then that.

As for A3 its a lot more then just an aoe healing based fight its just a poorly designed fight.

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Originally Posted by Pluvia

Except that's not how the mechanic is supposed to work its just that almost anytime that a debuff needs to be passed they have some kind of thing that can be cheesed hence why they sac people in a4s the actual mechanic is a lot more complicated then that.

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This is a really nice point in my opinion... Players managed to cheat on A4S ahahahahah or maybe... this was Yoshi-P plans since the beggining

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Originally Posted by Umbreon_skystorm

This is a really nice point in my opinion... Players managed to cheat on A4S ahahahahah or maybe... this was Yoshi-P plans since the beggining

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The sac method was literally impossible to discover on Square's internal testing servers. When SE playtest upcoming content it's done on a locally hosted server, resulting in 0 ping. There's no server ticking, which is what allows the method to even happen. This can also be the culprit to peoples complaints about plenty of A3S' rng passing woes.

Yes, in it's current state A3S is beatable, but the process is needlessly more complicated due to having to account for RNG stacked on RNG stacked on RNG while at the same time having to fight Square's awful server ticking netcode which can and will just kill you even if you preformed the mechanic properly.

Pre-Twister Nerf Twintania was also clearable in its initial state too, but they still had the decency to adjusting the tuning on the mechanic to accommodate to latency better.

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Originally Posted by HorseBoots

The sac method was literally impossible to discover on Square's internal testing servers. When SE playtest upcoming content it's done on a locally hosted server, resulting in 0 ping. There's no server ticking, which is what allows the method to even happen. This can also be the culprit to peoples complaints about plenty of A3S' rng passing woes.

Yes, in it's current state A3S is beatable, but the process is needlessly more complicated due to having to account for RNG stacked on RNG stacked on RNG while at the same time having to fight Square's awful server ticking netcode which can and will just kill you even if you preformed the mechanic properly.

Pre-Twister Nerf Twintania was also clearable in its initial state too, but they still had the decency to adjusting the tuning on the mechanic to accommodate to latency better.

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Hold my like dude rsrsrs
I Agree that Ping Based and RNG based sucks, but just like ninja, we need to adapt our way to play... unfortunately... just like Titan EX.... A3S give us Head aches forever xD
But I dunno... I always think... If someone cleared it... no matter the difficulties found ... I can clear it too

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Originally Posted by kalasnikov

Those who cleared within 1 month or less before echo had 135 relic weapons and world of darkness with more gear and coats to use, and we havent even reached that stage on this raid yet.

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Your example allows for the natural pacing of overgearing to make the content easier (because you have access to tomestones, twines and coats without ever having to clear T13 anyway before WoD was added), that seems like a fair compromise. We're already getting esos and gear from A1/A2, and even then, a ten ilvl difference won't really resolve a lot of the issues that most groups have with A3S.

Also keep in mind that this necessarily does not work with fights like T5, T9, T13 or pre-SCoB as a whole because mechanics will kill you regardless of the Ilvl/echo.

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There is no raid of the tier of FCoB because that's not the intention of the development team. They want to make raids last the entire content cycle. Also, why do people want FCoB difficulty raids? SCoB was far more challenging.

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The problem is that you keep trying to cater to the upper percentage of players who want hard content (and again, some of those players even say teh current content is overtuned). If devs are to do something like this, they'd have to be able to cover the majority demographics of the playerbase, and savage does not do that and you practically know this. If you need to ask the bolded part at this point, then I really feel that you either have not paid attention to the discussion at hand, or really don't care for the context and continue to chime with posts that aren't relevant. Whether it was their intent or not, the game is starting to bleed subs and (this I can personally confirm with both friends and my server) playerbases are falling apart because they didn't put out anything to bide over the players who are not in the top percentage. In an MMO.

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Originally Posted by Umbreon_skystorm

snip.

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Given enough time and dedication anyone could eventually do anything. But that is no excuse for bad game design. Alexander savage, regardless of difficulty, is below the quality players, casual, midcore, or hardcore expected from the design team. When you're in an industry where you are regularly creating products for consumers, your harshest critics will always be your biggest fans.

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Originally Posted by HorseBoots

Given enough time and dedication anyone could eventually do anything. But that is no excuse for bad game design. Alexander savage, regardless of difficulty, is below the quality players, casual, midcore, or hardcore expected from the design team. When you're in an industry where you are regularly creating products for consumers, your harshest critics will always be your biggest fans.

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With that said though, how much is needed is also a factor, which again seems to be missing the target for a good chunk of the playerbase, the middle ground one. A good handful of statics (mine included) only do 2 hours of raid a week for 3 days. While I'm fine with the fact that we can't necessarily spare the time and commitment to learn (and retain) A3S progression, I'm not fine that this is the content that's supposed to bide us over until 3.1 (which may not add to the raiding scene since we're getting void ark and exploration voyages). It ultimately just becomes a wall banger for us.

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Originally Posted by HorseBoots

Given enough time and dedication anyone could eventually do anything. But that is no excuse for bad game design. Alexander savage, regardless of difficulty, is below the quality players, casual, midcore, or hardcore expected from the design team. When you're in an industry where you are regularly creating products for consumers, your harshest critics will always be your biggest fans.

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Maybe this poor design is a reflex of the work they had in 3.0... to be honest this is a HUGE Step to the FFXIV in general, but unfortunately the balance of the classes and the creation of 3 new classes could be the reason why the first 4 flors from alexander were made this way... lets wait to see A5 on... IN MY OPINION , I think the Alexander was pretty well designed compared to BCoil.... maybe they are holding the best Ideas to the end (just like that god-like mechanic on T13)

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Originally Posted by Umbreon_skystorm

Maybe this poor design is a reflex of the work they had in 3.0... to be honest this is a HUGE Step to the FFXIV in general, but unfortunately the balance of the classes and the creation of 3 new classes could be the reason why the first 4 flors from alexander were made this way... lets wait to see A5 on... IN MY OPINION , I think the Alexander was pretty well designed compared to BCoil.... maybe they are holding the best Ideas to the end (just like that god-like mechanic on T13)

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It's their first time adding multiple tiers of difficulty to one raiding scene, so there's that. Whether or not its a step in the right direction is up in the air, either because normal is too easy, or savage is too hard (both leading to the middleground not having any content to last them until 3.1, though I'm personally on the end of normal being too easy).

Meeting deadlines or not is not an excuse to push out subpar/unchecked or even broken products (such as bugs). We get the game the way it is, we're going to critic it the way it is.

The design of alexander in general though, I'd say it's too soon to make a call. What I will say is that there's absolutely no build up to Alexader (which BCoB had the benefit of having the ending of 1.0 bookends into 2.0), and there's really no sense of urgency when it comes to Alexander. Everything we hear about it's threat is just taking for their word.

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Originally Posted by Pluvia

Dervy a person who is probably the most respected on these forums for doing a boatload for the community sums it up well in these posts.
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...iculty/cvqfdwp

A3s is a stupid and poorly designed fight that is a cluster of hope the servers work right.

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He writes his opinion.

For me this fight is very funny.

This is my opinion.

Both are nothing else than personal opinions.

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Originally Posted by RiceisNice

It's their first time adding multiple tiers of difficulty to one raiding scene, so there's that. Whether or not its a step in the right direction is up in the air, either because normal is too easy, or savage is too hard (both leading to the middleground not having any content to last them until 3.1, though I'm personally on the end of normal being too easy).

The design of alexander in general though, I'd say it's too soon to make a call. What I will say is that there's absolutely no build up to Alexader (which BCoB had the benefit of having the ending of 1.0 bookends into 2.0), and there's really no sense of urgency when it comes to Alexander. Everything we hear about it's threat is just taking for their word.

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We need to ask ourselves one thing... did we have a midcore content on 2.X? I know... it was the previous coils... but during the Bcoil only we didn't have a mid-core content too.... the normal mode I think it was made to create a way to non hardcore ppl at least keep in touch with the story

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Originally Posted by KarstenS

He writes his opinion.

For me this fight is very funny.

This is my opinion.

Both are nothing else than personal opinions.

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There's a difference between saying "I enjoy this content" and "This content may be tuned too highly, such that players will no longer be having fun" (which carries the implied problem of players leaving the game because they aren't enjoying it in a way that justifies the money they spend to play it). Dervy and others are offering reasoned critiques of the content, which are not invalidated simply because someone else enjoys it. You might enjoy it, but 5 other people might not, and if the ratio of the number people that enjoy the content to the number of people that don't is too far in favor of the latter category rather than the former, it's possible changes need to be made for the health of the game as a whole (i.e., subscription numbers).

Raid-level content is always going to appeal to a smaller subset of players than the greater population, so it needs to attract a certain optimal number of players so that the development time spent on it is worthwhile. This is even more true when the raid content is one of the only main avenues of content in the game at any given time (which is normally the case in the first patch of every raid tier).

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Originally Posted by Umbreon_skystorm

We need to ask ourselves one thing... did we have a midcore content on 2.X? I know... it was the previous coils... but during the Bcoil only we didn't have a mid-core content too.... the normal mode I think it was made to create a way to non hardcore ppl at least keep in touch with the story

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I'd say BCoB and SCoB post echo are definitely more oriented to what we see in normal mode alexander now (being DFable and all, the success rate would have to be relatively high for Df content), while FCoB hit the mid-core ground just right (where echo would definitely make the fights easier, they didn't have to make any direct adjustments to the fights themselves, unlike SCoB).

I haven't done BCoB without echo, but from what I've seen and hear, it's closely comparable to A1S and A2S (where the devs even said it'd be comparable FCoB, and we were able to clear it after a few weeks with my aforementioned raiding schedule). SCoB though, T7 is and T9 are definite outliers but nowhere near the frustration as A3S if only for the fact that the checks aren't as strict with relative Ilvl gear.

I was on the side that "players should be able to see story content and not have to require the commitment of a relatively high-skill static to do so", until they released FCoB and the fights were perfectly tuned for that. You could say that the developers were still getting their bearings after recovering from 1.0, and you have a much more clear cut playerbase that do not already have established statics, groups and all that.

You also need to see 3.0 as an expansion, rather than entirely new game with a clean slate. You still have players from 2.0 that have formed up groups and FCs to clear content for FCoB. Once you throw those content designs out the window, you're losing that playerbase (much like throwing the progression of DoH/DoL, which unfortunately they also mucked that up too)

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Originally Posted by Alahra

"This content may be tuned too highly, such that players will no longer be having fun" (which carries the implied problem of players leaving the game because they aren't enjoying it in a way that justifies the money they spend to play it).

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If you reduce the cause of that issue just to this one point, you would be right.

But there are other issues, that most discussing people seems to forget over and over.

How rewarding is it to finish bosses AS?

In Coil you stepped forward in the story. In Coil you discovered the next piece of challange. In Coil you got unique looking gear.

All these things are completely missing in AS.

I know many raiders that stopped raiding or playing the game at all. The majority of them did say "Alexander savage is not interesting" or "I don't like that Steampunk stuff" or "I've seen everything already in normal mode" or "The savage bosses are the same as the normal ones. Thats not different enough for me".

The argument "its to hard for me", I don't remember someone of them said this.

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Originally Posted by kalasnikov

Thats just 1 point of view. I still find t7 much more horrid than a3s. No need to use fancy words or making lengthy posts about it. Alexander savage is half coil difficulty half savage difficulty.

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So, now, instead of having four bosses catered to the midcore raid crowd, they have two. You don't expect people to be upset about that?

Also, since there is a large spike of difficulty breaking statics, the talent pool for a3s and a4s is shirking to the point where if you loose a static member, your static might fall apart. Again, it goes deeper than "Wah wah its too hard!!!!1"

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Originally Posted by RiceisNice

IYou also need to see 3.0 as an expansion, rather than entirely new game with a clean slate. You still have players from 2.0 that have formed up groups and FCs to clear content for FCoB. Once you throw those content designs out the window, you're losing that playerbase (much like throwing the progression of DoH/DoL, which unfortunately they also mucked that up too)

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This is one of the best points I have seen made. The social raiding structures from ARR are in absolute shambles! I can take pics and post them here with how dead so many of the end game link shells have become. It's gilga or bust at this point.

I really hope sky pirate is the midcore content that this game needs to rekindle some of the interest lost over alex savage.

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Originally Posted by NFaelivrin

Also: The ridiculous semantic argument as to what constitutes a good player a few pages back is laughable. It doesn't matter how you paint it, or how good your A3S clear makes you feel about your skill in a videogame, when the overall effect of a raid is that your game's raid community starts undergoing total collapse, with the endgame community of multiple smaller servers fleeing to Gilgamesh in a desperate attempt to recruit better players, leaving the smaller servers even smaller, then you have made a bad design decision. Yoshida said managing a MMO is like managing a country, and in this case they've made a decision that benefits solely the 1% of the most dedicated, best players with the most time to play, that alienates the 10% or so of people who were competent enough to raid Coil but don't have the time or skill to get past the ridiculous A3S wall. I don't think you need a doctorate to know 1% < 10%, specially when that 10% consisted of usually dedicated fans of the game, IE, the community's backbone.

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qft. Also, thumbs up for days!

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Originally Posted by RiceisNice

SNIP

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I agree with you in some parts... A3S is a really big change in the difficulty, but T5,T8 and T9 were the Difficulty jumps from the Coil of bahamut, even with a Ilv 130 gear I saw tons of times, ppl making mistakes on them... It took me 1 month with ilv 110 to clear T9 with 10% eccho... I think the problem is the eccho... you know that on 3.1 onward they will put a 10%,20% eccho on your head and It will be easier... but if you take it off... its hell with the ilv gearI remember on T10 we need Adlo+ SS to keep the boss target alive during that rush, with 3 ppl soaking dmg... (I agree with you in the rest of your comment ^^ )
Maybe since so many ppl cleared FCOIL with eecho that DEVs thought we were match to all the Floors from alexander but they see now that they exagerated on the difficulty... It's just like Five night at freedy's 4, on the previous games people realized all the tricks in a single month and then the creator believing it will still happen, he created something so hard to descover that no one created the right theory about it in two months and now he is releasing an update to help ppl find the right story about it

edited part : I'm using a lot of "maybe" because I dunno what they were thinking to creat the difficulty levels, etc.. but there must be a reason xD

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Originally Posted by Fynlar

I did. I don't necessarily agree with all of it. Like I said, I agree more with the post he quoted rather than his post itself.

Unless you're really just trying to say "don't post if you don't agree with the OP" to which I will kindly say, ahahahaha, no.

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Can you explain how it is possible to disagree with the absolutely objective, self-evident notion that "not all raiders are of the same skill level, and in fact rather than a homogeneous blob of mindless, identical robots, they're a demographic of people with diverse levels of commitment to the game, as well as skill?". Please, seriously, explain to me how you disagree with that, give a reasonable argument as to why, in fact, anybody who has ever set foot in any of this game's progression 8man raids in this game is, in fact, an identical clone of each other, and all, universally, without any dissent, demanded that raids be made harder, only to get mad when they actually were. Painting with broad strokes probably makes you feel clever but in reality it, well, makes you look like you're way out of your field here.

Also: The ridiculous semantic argument as to what constitutes a good player a few pages back is laughable. It doesn't matter how you paint it, or how good your A3S clear makes you feel about your skill in a videogame, when the overall effect of a raid is that your game's raid community starts undergoing total collapse, with the endgame community of multiple smaller servers fleeing to Gilgamesh in a desperate attempt to recruit better players, leaving the smaller servers even smaller, then you have made a bad design decision. Yoshida said managing a MMO is like managing a country, and in this case they've made a decision that benefits solely the 1% of the most dedicated, best players with the most time to play, that alienates the 10% or so of people who were competent enough to raid Coil but don't have the time or skill to get past the ridiculous A3S wall. I don't think you need a doctorate to know 1% < 10%, specially when that 10% consisted of usually dedicated fans of the game, IE, the community's backbone.

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Originally Posted by Umbreon_skystorm

I agree with you in some parts... A3S is a really big change in the difficulty, but T5,T8 and T9 were the Difficulty jumps from the Coil of bahamut ,even with a Ilv 130 gear I saw tons of times, ppl making mistakes on them... It took me 1 month with ilv 110 to clear T9 with 10% eccho... I think the problem is the eccho... you know that on 3.1 onward they will put a 10%,20% eccho on your head and It will be easier... but if you take it off... its hell with the ilv gearI remember on T10 we need Adlo+ SS to keep the boss target alive during that rush, with 3 ppl soaking dmg... (I agree with you in the rest of your comment ^^ )
Maybe since so many ppl cleared FCOIL with eecho that DEVs thought we were match to all the Floors from alexander but they see now that they exagerated on the difficulty... It's just like Five night at freedy's 4, on the previous games people realized all the tricks in a single month and then the creator believing it will still happen, he created something so hard to descover that no one created the right theory about it in two months and now he is releasing an update to help ppl find the right story about it

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The thing is, Savage is meant to be hard (or at the very least, nerfing the hard content so it becomes more acessible, rather than nerfing mid core to be more accessible is counter-intutive, especially when a normal mode already exists), I don't think they'll introduce echo (or even mechanical nerfs) like they did to SCoB, because there was no alternative for people who don't or couldn't do statics. Which goes back to my previous point, the problem may very well be that normal is too easy compared to savage being too hard (both leading to the same result, the middleground have no content).

Speaking from another perspective, would you rather middle-ground content eventually get nerfed (via echo and overgearring) to allow it to be cleared with DF, or have the hardest content be eventually nerfed to become more accessible to middle ground when we already have a normal/DF mode available from the start? To me, the latter sounds a bit more reasonable, as it's content/story that becomes more acessible overtime as it gets older, while the latter only really offers challenge and higher ilvl (both of which gets rendered moot if you make the fight easier anyway)

And I also think you're trying to justify the changes from a developmental standpoint, as a player. The fact is, the "why and how" of how the fights are designed doesn't really matter to the players, its what they are given that matters at the end of the day. The developers could take a look back on their thought process (or lack of in some cases) to see where they have gone wrong that had led to them bleeding subs or the player base collapsing.

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Can you explain how it is possible to disagree with the absolutely objective, self-evident notion that "not all raiders are of the same skill level, and in fact rather than a homogeneous blob of mindless, identical robots, they're a demographic of people with diverse levels of commitment to the game, as well as skill?". Please, seriously, explain to me how you disagree with that, give a reasonable argument as to why, in fact, anybody who has ever set foot in any of this game's progression 8man raids in this game is, in fact, an identical clone of each other, and all, universally, without any dissent, demanded that raids be made harder, only to get mad when they actually were. Painting with broad strokes probably makes you feel clever but in reality it, well, makes you look like you're way out of your field here.

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Because ultimately, when you cut out all the bloat, all that's really left there is a whine about how we got a hard raid after people clamored for a hard raid in 3.0.

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Originally Posted by KarstenS

The argument "its to hard for me", I don't remember someone of them said this.

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I don't think anyone would come right out and say it like that for one, but considering that the difficulty of Savage has been a concern not just among midcore players, but those at the cutting edge of progression like Elysium, I'd wager that some folks have elected not to do Savage because the difficulty is too high for it to be fun. I wouldn't say necessarily that I'm *incapable* of doing Savage, but given the level of play necessary to complete AS3/4, I have no desire to partake in it, as pushing myself to that level of play is not fun for me.

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Originally Posted by Fynlar

Because ultimately, when you cut out all the bloat, all that's really left there is a whine about how we got a hard raid after people clamored for a hard raid in 3.0.

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People did, but are you 100% certain that it's the *same* people that wanted a hard raid that are now complaining? I know myself and others felt that FCOB was great and got the difficulty just right. While I'm all for other players having harder content, I would have much rather it came in addition to, rather than at the expense of content at FCOB's rough difficulty level.

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Originally Posted by RiceisNice

The thing is, Savage is meant to be hard (or at the very least, nerfing the hard content so it becomes more acessible, rather than nerfing mid core to be more accessible is counter-intutive, especially when a normal mode already exists), I don't think they'll introduce echo (or even mechanical nerfs) like they did to SCoB, because there was no alternative for people who don't or couldn't do statics.

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I'm relatively sure they'll still add Echo to Alex Savage, as they'll still most likely move it to DF in 3.2 to allow room for the new Savage raid to be on the dedicated raid server. Echo and mechanical nerfs are all but required for content like AS3 or AS4 to function at some level in DF content. I'm personally hopeful they don't overnerf things (as they did with SCOB), though. BCOB and FCOB had very little in the way of mechanics changes, which I think is a better way to preserve the content after it's no longer current.

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Originally Posted by Fynlar

Because ultimately, when you cut out all the bloat, all that's really left there is a whine about how we got a hard raid after people clamored for a hard raid in 3.0.

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"When you cut out all the bloat" is an interesting euphemism for "when you absolutely remove all details from this situation and skew it towards my uninformed opinion, based entirely on a couple of posts I might have or not seen in these forums". At least it saves you some words, even if it makes you look even more lost than you already looked. Can you show me some evidence of this clamoring for a hard raid? I don't mean "1 or 2 OF posts", I mean something that empirically demonstrates that "WE WANT HARDER RAID" was an universally held opinion among raiders, this also means you have to make sure not to include the weird people who wanted coil to be harder without even clearing T2. Oh wait, I don't think you can actually provide this evidence, because, you see friend, it does not exist. Haha, how weird is that, it's almost as if people who beat some bosses in this game are actually diverse and not some kind of diabolical conspiracy who meet up in their secret base to plan out how to ruin the rest of the game for casuals while rubbing their hands and twirling their mustaches and patting each other in the back about their satanic, unholy parse numbers. Now go bother somebody else with your childish oversimplifications.

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Originally Posted by Fynlar

Because ultimately, when you cut out all the bloat, all that's really left there is a whine about how we got a hard raid after people clamored for a hard raid in 3.0.

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Fallacy of the single cause
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallac...e_single_cause

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Originally Posted by NFaelivrin

Can you explain how it is possible to disagree with the absolutely objective, self-evident notion that "not all raiders are of the same skill level, and in fact rather than a homogeneous blob of mindless, identical robots, they're a demographic of people with diverse levels of commitment to the game, as well as skill?". Please, seriously, explain to me how you disagree with that, give a reasonable argument as to why, in fact, anybody who has ever set foot in any of this game's progression 8man raids in this game is, in fact, an identical clone of each other, and all, universally, without any dissent, demanded that raids be made harder, only to get mad when they actually were. Painting with broad strokes probably makes you feel clever but in reality it, well, makes you look like you're way out of your field here.

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It's not worth the time to reply to a person who reduces this entire problem to a single issue of "people can't make up their minds and whine about it." Fynlar never address the points or provides feedback here. The only substance his posts carry is the fact that there was a small minority asking for harder raids in ARR. The concept that MANY players really enjoyed ARR raiding eludes him.

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Originally Posted by Alahra

People did, but are you 100% certain that it's the *same* people that wanted a hard raid that are now complaining? I know myself and others felt that FCOB was great and got the difficulty just right. While I'm all for other players having harder content, I would have much rather it came in addition to, rather than at the expense of content at FCOB's rough difficulty level.

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Well said!

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"When you cut out all the bloat" is an interesting euphemism for "when you absolutely remove all details from this situation and skew it towards my uninformed opinion, based entirely on a couple of posts I might have or not seen in these forums". At least it saves you some words, even if it makes you look even more lost than you already looked. Can you show me some evidence of this clamoring for a hard raid? I don't mean "1 or 2 OF posts", I mean something that empirically demonstrates that "WE WANT HARDER RAID" was an universally held opinion among raiders, this also means you have to make sure not to include the weird people who wanted coil to be harder without even clearing T2. Oh wait, I don't think you can actually provide this evidence, because, you see friend, it does not exist. Haha, how weird is that, it's almost as if people who beat some bosses in this game are actually diverse and not some kind of diabolical conspiracy who meet up in their secret base to plan out how to ruin the rest of the game for casuals while rubbing their hands and twirling their mustaches and patting each other in the back about their satanic, unholy parse numbers. Now go bother somebody else with your childish oversimplifications.

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I've seen loads of testimonials talking about how FCoB was not hard enough (and compared to SCoB now after having gotten to do them both at level 60, I can see their point) and how there was a lot of hope for Alex Savage posing a challenge.

I'm not going to dig the ones on the forum up for you because that's going farther back than I care to search. Whether or not you choose to believe that this evidence existed isn't going to affect me one way or the other.

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Originally Posted by Fynlar

I've seen loads of testimonials talking about how FCoB was not hard enough (and compared to SCoB now after having gotten to do them both at level 60,

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Would you care to share them with the rest of us? While I don't doubt some folks wanted a harder challenge (probably those who really enjoyed SCOB Savage), all we're getting is hearsay at this point.

And even if some of *those* players wanted a harder raid, it doesn't mean the rest of us did.

From the top tier players who cleared and have it on farm, to those currently progressing, to those who decided it wasn't worth it and left... all have expressed the same sentiment (to some degree) that the fights in Savage are too hard, and/or otherwise badly designed. Are people really going to act as if the growing wave of criticism isn't an issue here, and persist with the claims that Savage is "fine", that it's "working as intended"?

It's one thing trying to keep players occupied for as long as possible, I get that. Doesn't mean that the methods SE used for this raid tier wasn't a poor one.

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Originally Posted by Fynlar

I've seen loads of testimonials talking about how FCoB was not hard enough (and compared to SCoB now after having gotten to do them both at level 60, I can see their point) and how there was a lot of hope for Alex Savage posing a challenge.
I'm not going to dig the ones on the forum up for you because that's going farther back than I care to search. Whether or not you choose to believe that this evidence existed isn't going to affect me one way or the other.

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Regardless if there was people providing feedback that they wanted harder raids, there is no guarantee that the same people who complained back then are the same people who complained now. How do you not understand that?

I mean, I appreciate the thread bumps, but if it's no different to you why even bother replying to this thread?

If this is all whining rabble, why even bother if all of this is no different to you? The main thing people want changed is savage, so that will have no impact on you. The only purpose you have served in this thread was to be divisive, that's really it. You don't even want to back your claims with evidence. Your investment in this thread has only served to show you in a less than favorable light, why are you even here at this point?

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Regardless if there was people providing feedback that they wanted harder raids, there is no guarantee that the same people who complained back then are the same people who complained now. How do you not understand that?

I mean, I appreciate the thread bumps, but if it's no different to you why even bother replying to this thread?

If this is all whining rabble, why even bother if all of this is no different to you? The main thing people want changed is savage, so that will have no impact on you. The only purpose you have served in this thread was to be divisive, that's really it. You don't even want to back your claims with evidence. Your investment in this thread has only served to show you in a less than favorable light, why are you even here at this point?

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Because I'm amused by the fact that no matter what SE does, people will complain.

Also amused at the fact that people asked for a harder raid and are now crying that they got it. Basically, just a whole lot of amusement.

*leans back and sips imaginary tea*

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Originally Posted by Fynlar

Because I'm amused by the fact that no matter what SE does, people will complain.

Also amused at the fact that people asked for a harder raid and are now crying that they got it. Basically, just a whole lot of amusement.

*leans back and sips imaginary tea*

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Sounds very fulfilling! Remind me to send you a fedora while we are at it.

All I want are actual raids like Ulduar, ICC, Karazhan, and any other good raids in wow. These are nothing but primal battles, they shouldn't even be counted as raids.

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Originally Posted by Fynlar

Because I'm amused by the fact that no matter what SE does, people will complain.

Also amused at the fact that people asked for a harder raid and are now crying that they got it. Basically, just a whole lot of amusement.

*leans back and sips imaginary tea*

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So you're amused by an occurrence that pretty much happens in everyday life? Your life must be so dull then. Not everyone is going to be pleased one way or the other, not to mention the fallacies you've used in your arguments further discredit the point you're trying to make.

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Originally Posted by UBERHAXED

Gonna leave this here: https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme..._to_be_a_good/

It also talks specifically about the last 2 floors.

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I've read this, and it's elitist garbage. I've cleared A3S and I still disagree with it. I see you, however, have not. So I have to wonder, why preach elitism if you are not among the elite? Seems silly and delusional.

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Originally Posted by NFaelivrin

"When you cut out all the bloat" is an interesting euphemism for "when you absolutely remove all details from this situation and skew it towards my uninformed opinion, based entirely on a couple of posts I might have or not seen in these forums". At least it saves you some words, even if it makes you look even more lost than you already looked. Can you show me some evidence of this clamoring for a hard raid? I don't mean "1 or 2 OF posts", I mean something that empirically demonstrates that "WE WANT HARDER RAID" was an universally held opinion among raiders, this also means you have to make sure not to include the weird people who wanted coil to be harder without even clearing T2. Oh wait, I don't think you can actually provide this evidence, because, you see friend, it does not exist. Haha, how weird is that, it's almost as if people who beat some bosses in this game are actually diverse and not some kind of diabolical conspiracy who meet up in their secret base to plan out how to ruin the rest of the game for casuals while rubbing their hands and twirling their mustaches and patting each other in the back about their satanic, unholy parse numbers. Now go bother somebody else with your childish oversimplifications.

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I laughed, so true. Marry me.

I was perfectly content with coil level of difficulty AND having a savage version for those that wished for a harder challenge with no repercussion had on the normal tier raiders. Not this bs story mode straight to savage system they decided would be better.

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Originally Posted by UBERHAXED

Aside from the mountain of incorrect information about class you've never played, let's give some context here. Everyone know that if the player base finds an exploit, they will exploit said exploit (see A4S). Also if mechanics don't kill you, they will be ignored (see T2). This is why mechanics are the way they are now. Also fire doesn't "absorb" fire in real life, which is why the proverb (fight fire with fire) exists.

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LOL go check my character on FFXIV... I have MCH, BRD, BLM, SMN, SCH, DRG, AST and DRK at lvl 60.... MNK is level 58. ALL my other classes including crafts/gathering are sitting at 50+. I have also researched all the other classes via youtube and forums. So yea I pretty much got the 411 of all the jobs. Try and research before you throw accusations.

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Originally Posted by Renault

I've read this, and it's elitist garbage. I've cleared A3S and I still disagree with it. I see you, however, have not. So I have to wonder, why preach elitism if you are not among the elite? Seems silly and delusional.

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I did not even bother to check their toon when they posted. No wonder their t5, t9, and t13 comparison to a3s and a4s seemed strange.

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Originally Posted by Renault

I've read this, and it's elitist garbage. I've cleared A3S and I still disagree with it. I see you, however, have not. So I have to wonder, why preach elitism if you are not among the elite? Seems silly and delusional.

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Yeah, there's some decent incite in the post, such as pointing out there's a very heavy emphasis on reaction and whatnot, but he pretty much says himself that the post was designed to knock people down a notch when they think they're good.

Much less his definition of "good" almost anyone else would describe as "excellent". I don't think a lot of people would only consider the top 1-2% of players of a game, "good".

If anything he does highlight a main component of A3S that is a huge problem for a lot of groups, even if he was initially wrong and hyperbolic for the sake of putting people down. The RNG elements and the short windows to react to mechanics reward players who can think on their feat and are aware of the entire position and state of the raid. The problem is, no fights in the game have really focused on that before.There hasn't really been an easing in of mechanics here. Players haven't had to do complex combinations were all 8 members of a raid have to be able to specifically find another member, determine whether to move towards/away from them, and then do so in a way that's dodging an aoe. And the incredibly punishing consequences for the mechanics and the DPS requirements are icing on the cake.

I wouldn't hesitate to say that A3S is a horribly over designed fight.

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Originally Posted by CosmicKirby

The problem is, no fights in the game have really focused on that before.There hasn't really been an easing in of mechanics here.

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The only one I can think of that had anything comparable was Ramuh EX, where the timers on Thunder-whatsit were rather quick. Given latency, it was often pretty hard to avoid other people at times. But it was manageable with good positioning and whatnot. Still hate that fight though.

Another thing that has bothered me about A3S, is that the internal logic of the fight just doesn't make sense in the savage version.

In normal and during the phase changes, you can clearly see that Living Liquid has a set mass that takes time to reshape and split up. He starts as a large humanoid, he then changes into a hand, he then splits into 2 smaller hands, and he then forms a puddle with a waterspout and some smaller blobs.
In Savage's final phase he just says screw ALL OF THAT LOGIC, MASS IS IRRELEVANT. And proceeds to just spout out a 2nd hand, 3 puddles with water spouts, and remain in giant humanoid form. There was no effort to make the fight or tactics make sense, it's just all cobbled together in the name of difficulty.