1st boss in the 1st level 100 dungeon (Arcadion 1-4 spoilers)

To be clear, I'm in no way complaining about the difficulty, but I'm curious to hear what others think.

For the first time since I did the MSQ, I was matched into Alexandria last night. And my team wiped repeatedly on the first boss's X's and O's mechanic before we finally beat it. Which is fine; it was funny and I like something that can give a bit of a challenge before it clicks and you beat it.

But I was reflecting on it afterwards, and I realized that I personally think that single mechanic is more difficult than anything in the normal Arcadion, including when multiple mechanics overlap. Specifically, that the window to move between each X or O had significantly less wiggle room than any other mechanic or set of mechanics that I could think of. Even the most frantic moments in Arcadion — like Bomb-Boy's spin with overlapping AoE's into a double-lariat — felt like they happened at a more relaxed pace with more wiggle room than this single mechanic from the first boss of a dungeon.

But that's just my subjective experience, and I'm curious to hear what others' experiences are. Did you find this move to be one of the more difficult ones to avoid? Or not? Different things can be harder or easier for different people, so I want to get outside of my head and hear your thoughts!

I don't really think so. This is basically just the final boss of Malikah's Well main gimmick in a different wrapper.

I can get through those mechanics without loosing a cast on picto or rdm. They give a lot of wiggle room.

I honestly think some of the dungeon bosses/normal trial mechanics are less forgiving than the normal raid mechnics (sometimes because of lisibility, sometimes because not resolving a mechanic force you to get hit by the (two) next ones). I think the real weird thing there is how you're supposed to nearly clip into the boss to resolve the mechanic (you sometime needed to get close, but never that close).

I mean, this is something we all learned in the Aetherochemical research facility..move when the lights turn off

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Originally Posted by LilimoLimomo

To be clear, I'm in no way complaining about the difficulty, but I'm curious to hear what others think.

For the first time since I did the MSQ, I was matched into Alexandria last night. And my team wiped repeatedly on the first boss's X's and O's mechanic before we finally beat it. Which is fine; it was funny and I like something that can give a bit of a challenge before it clicks and you beat it.

But I was reflecting on it afterwards, and I realized that I personally think that single mechanic is more difficult than anything in the normal Arcadion, including when multiple mechanics overlap. Specifically, that the window to move between each X or O had significantly less wiggle room than any other mechanic or set of mechanics that I could think of. Even the most frantic moments in Arcadion — like Bomb-Boy's spin with overlapping AoE's into a double-lariat — felt like they happened at a more relaxed pace with more wiggle room than this single mechanic from the first boss of a dungeon.

But that's just my subjective experience, and I'm curious to hear what others' experiences are. Did you find this move to be one of the more difficult ones to avoid? Or not? Different things can be harder or easier for different people, so I want to get outside of my head and hear your thoughts!

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In my opinion this boss is badly designed due to the two layers of mechanics superimposed over each other. Almost every player understands how to solve the + and o mechanics, even if they sometimes get hit. The problem is the other mechanic that's being added on top of it which is the two types of cones, which in themselves aren't a problem either, but the way they happen requires frankly fast movement and reaction (too fast for normal mode imo), leave relatively small spots to stand in that are on top of it hard to see, and the faint blue they have is relatively hard to discern being put beneath all the + and o markers and their orange AoEs. Combined, those two mechanics WILL kill people, because if you get hit by both, you die.

So in my opinion it's not that the boss is hard or anything due to mechanics, it's that there is some manner of artificial difficulty gated behind a (too) fast paced overwhelming visual vomit for the average player. Maybe it wasn't intended as part of the difficulty, or maybe it was, hard to say.

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Originally Posted by Elfidan

I don't really think so. This is basically just the final boss of Malikah's Well main gimmick in a different wrapper.

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It's interesting to hear you say that; I do see the similarities! I think if it were all O's or all X's, I'd probably feel the same way. Storge's mechanics are always all of a singular type, meaning you're either going from circle to circle to circle, or you're just moving out of the way of the X's as you need to. With this new boss, there's very little time to move from O to O to O; at my default movement speed, I find it manageable, but barely. But that in itself wouldn't feel particularly challenging.

For me I think what takes it up a hefty notch is that with the fast rate at which the X-O mechanic resolves, it can be tricky when I end up with a line of something like OXO. I need to be in the first circle, then not be in the X (which is blocking my path to the second circle), and then manage to get into that second circle before it resolves. And with my default movement speed, I find that to be something I need to basically be perfect to pull off. I guess it's that lack of wiggle room that makes it feel so challenging to me.

Again, not saying it should change or anything, just surprised by it. But it's also interesting to hear folks saying that it's not giving them trouble! Maybe it's some difference with how my brain is processing things.

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Originally Posted by Valence

In my opinion this boss is badly designed due to the two layers of mechanics superimposed over each other. Almost every player understands how to solve the + and o mechanics, even if they sometimes get hit. The problem is the other mechanic that's being added on top of it which is the two types of cones, which in themselves aren't a problem either, but the way they happen requires frankly fast movement and reaction (too fast for normal mode imo), leave relatively small spots to stand in that are on top of it hard to see, and the faint blue they have is relatively hard to discern being put beneath all the + and o markers and their orange AoEs. Combined, those two mechanics WILL kill people, because if you get hit by both, you die.

So in my opinion it's not that the boss is hard or anything due to mechanics, it's that there is some manner of artificial difficulty gated behind a (too) fast paced overwhelming visual vomit for the average player. Maybe it wasn't intended as part of the difficulty, or maybe it was, hard to say.

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Interesting, maybe I need to consider this more. When I was originally writing this post, I was thinking that it was funny that the overlapping mechanic actually didn't seem to make it any more difficult for me...but maybe that's not true? After all, even the easiest mechanic requires some amount of cognitive load to resolve, and whatever that amount is gets taken away from the ability to solve the X's and O's. Hmmm...

It's definitely one of the more technical bosses we've had in a dungeon. Whenever I get it in roulettes it's usually able to coax a couple of people into eating vulns, and it's 50/50 whether a first timer will die or not. Overall quite impressive for a dungeon boss.

The pace at which the symbols resolve is unusually fast compared to prior standards of dungeon content. It also requires the player to understand the more nuanced aspects of XIV's combat system - in particular, how snapshots and animations are disjointed. There's a segment that ends in a circle but also places the boss's 270 degree cleave under that circle. You have to exit the circle very quickly to avoid the latter, but waiting for its animation to play out completely will result in you having insufficient time to leave. For dungeon standards, the tolerances there are pretty tight.

In conjunction with the other two expert dungeons, they've clearly pushed the tuning up a notch as far as mechanics go. Personally I'm a fan, it makes them a lot more engaging and replayable in the long run.

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Originally Posted by LilimoLimomo

Maybe it's some difference with how my brain is processing things.

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Yeah, that's the main thing. Different people process mechs in their own way. For me it's not really a problem till the conal aoes start and that's mostly fine but the last boss of Alexandria for instance gives me all kind of issues towards the end of its routine.