Exploratory Content Misteps

I am dying of boredom farming for all the mettle buffs in zadnor right now so I just want to talk about the things that make exploratory content worse than it should be.

Bozja
Bozja assisted with one of Eureka's problems by downsizing to 2 instances rather than 4. Unfortunately the instances are so barren and boring aesthetically. They contrived all instances into 3 "zones" which severely limited the creativity of building areas that they had with Eureka. They are flat and linear. But at least there isn't heat waves.

Bozja added a lot of annoying things, one being collectibles. The field notes are cool but collecting them all is horribly painful. Random RNG chance? Over 40+ dalriada's to get one of the notes? Its a bit much honestly and wasn't needed. Make the field notes cost clusters and its just as good.

Speaking of clusters, the clusters system is pretty good. +1 bozja

In-instance zones. BA was succeeded by CLL and Dalriada. Both of which suffered heavily from the rewards not being good enough to entice people over running fates. Even worse, they were designed with success not in mind. To this day you can not solo if you are the only person who enters, and worse than that the first boss of each splits the raid which rarely works with randoms.

The NM/Fate system was also made argueably worse. CE's that limit how many people can participate. Add in the duels, that require players to perfectly complete a CE to have a chance at participating. The duels are easily the worst designed piece of content and then to make them the only reliable way to get the rarest field notes was just rude. Difficult content should not be so selective and limited in attempts.

On top of this they went from Eureka which for completionist sake, was way more friendly than bozja. You had relics, rate, but purchaseable items from NM's which anyone could participate in, and you had achievements for BA.

Bozja went ham on everything Eureka did and it made it way less enjoyable. THe mettle buffs were painful to work on over the elemental gear.

Its nice they had DR Savage that you could queue for with a team akin to BA. But DR Normal is a wasteland now which is really horrible for people who want all the relics. Its insane that they created CLL, Dalriada and Delubrum.

Seriously I'm so unhappy with Bozja as someone who likes to get all the exploratory achievements. They made this place hell to play.

As my wife liked to say, it feels like Bozja came first and Eureka was made later, on some parts lol

It feels so wasted...

I like just about everything about Bozja. I find it a really relaxing place to be and I think it flows really well. I always feel like I have at least two different goals that I can simultaneously be working towards at all times. I'm someone who loved Eureka as well and I think Bozja is a lovely improvement. I do agree that the scenery could have been nicer. It's not a pretty place by any stretch, especially compared to some gorgeous stuff in Eureka, and a few more interesting landmarks could have done wonders. I don't know if I'll ever recover from knowing that we won't ever see the planned Dalmasca content though. I miss you, Matsuno!