Expert / Savage Solo Role Specific Challenges Would Rejuvinate The Game

I feel the biggest problem this game faces is a lack of "worthwhile" and "realistic" challenges for the average player to overcome.

If you're an average player it is not "realistic" for that player to do end-game raids (I'm talking about savage content and what was previously binding coil of Bahamut). End-game raiding is simply not realistic for most because you need a dedicated group of eight and a substantial time commitment.

Currently the only "worthwhile" challenge for a player that is not raiding is Expert Knights of the Round. Void Ark, expert dungeons, roulettes are not "challenges" - they are initially fun events which quickly diminish into chores. Thus when the average player defeats Expert Knights of the Round - what incentive does that player have to further gear up? How can a game sustain itself by only presenting a single "worthwhile" challenge each patch for the vast majority of its audience to complete?

This is why I feel that the game needs expert / savage difficulty solo role specific challenges (solo instance battles and/or boss fights). Imagine if each patch released with three different solo challenges (one for DPS, one for healers and one for tanks). These challenges would be of a savage type difficulty initially and would progress towards an expert challenge if you reached the item level cap. The player could attempt these challenges anytime they wish without needing to find a party or worry about other party members getting frustrated and rage quitting.

The player would be able to learn the advanced concepts of the game and would be highly incentivised to play three different type of jobs and max each of them out (to experience all of the challenges). Think of it as learning to take down a difficult Dark Souls boss. Every time you earned a new piece of gear - you'll want to jump back into that solo challenge to see if you can take it down. The lesser skilled players would be able to catch up in later patches with the item level increase. The vast majority of players will have a challenge that they will spend weeks looking forward to completing (as opposed to new patch content that they complete in a day).

MMOs used to be about gearing up to overcome challenges. If the toughest challenges are only raid specific - a large chunk of the audience fully loses incentive to gear-up / play the game. There is already plenty of content for players who don't like challenges. What fun is new patch content if "all" of it can be completed without any thought or effort within a single day? It's time that the average player is given challenges that they need to work towards (gear-up and practice) to overcome.

I would love this.

How is over-gearing fun? How about you....(HATE to say it).....but 'git gud'?. How is this fun? Go play a single player game if you want a single player challenge? You're actually asking the devs of a multi-player game to dedicate a massive amount of time to make solo player content? I'm not sure you've even touched Savage. You certainly can not complete it within a day without any thought or effort.

Am I missing something crucial? It's 7am. And I think Tasmania is on fire...is the smoke preventing me from knowing a thing?

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Originally Posted by Pence

How is over-gearing fun? How about you....(HATE to say it).....but 'git gud'?. How is this fun? Go play a single player game if you want a single player challenge? You're actually asking the devs of a multi-player game to dedicate a massive amount of time to make solo player content? I'm not sure you've even touched Savage. You certainly can not complete it within a day without any thought or effort.

Am I missing something crucial? It's 7am. And I think Tasmania is on fire...is the smoke preventing me from knowing a thing?

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Here's the problem in a nutshell. If my party of four is item level 145 and we challenge the item level 145 dungeons - they are still an easy challenge. We gear up so that we can unlock the 170 level dungeons...and they are still an easy challenge. Majority of us are merely gearing up to unlock more mindless challenges (fun at first but quickly diminishes into a chore). Other than raids and the once per patch expert trial - there really are no legitimate challenges to overcome. Matters are made worse when you factor that 90% of the community (likely more) simply do not have the flexibility / time to commit to a raid static necessary to take down a savage difficulty raid. Thus 90% of us have merely one challenge to take down each patch (the expert trial).

Solo savage content is something that anyone (regardless of their real life schedules) could challenge. It provides "everyone" an incentive to gear up to overcome challenges (as opposed to merely gearing up to open up more easy content). Everyone will still be "gearing up" as a group (via roulettes, normal raids, hunts, exploration missions, etc.). Only now - those of us without the ability to commit to a raid - can take on difficult challenges as well. Without any challenges to overcome - what is the point?

You raise a good point about development resources. I just feel that something has to give. Maybe you're a raider? One expert trial every four months is not enough "challenge" to satisfy the vast majority of players. Literally everything else we do in the game is mindless. Can you not see the problem?

There's a reason majority unsubscribe a week after a patch. They have completed everything that they ever possibly will (they ignore the raids). There need to be more difficult challenges within reach to keep the game active.

If the avaerage player can beat Thordan ex I wonder what I am lol.

To your suggestion I doubt many will go for those solo challenges if there won't be rewards that are worth it.

Part of the challenge in savage is when your teammates screw something up which causes a wipe. If you played a version of savage with CPU controlled players that always did everything perfectly then it would be a lot easier and thus not savage.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

There's a reason majority unsubscribe a week after a patch. They have completed everything that they ever possibly will (they ignore the raids). There need to be more difficult challenges within reach to keep the game active.

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This is one way. Depending on the rewards I might be up for doing it. I don't raid due mainly to the vitriol. I'm simply not going to join a bunch of people I don't know and get yelled at or listen to arguments for a few hours a week. A group of friends I have were going to do it. We were waiting for others to level and gear up, but it fell through. I think a lot of people fall into the category of maybe wanting to do it but not wishing to make the leap into a full-fledged static. Some solo activities like this might help. The content would just sit though if it didn't yield good enough rewards. No matter how fun it might be it would be finished in most people's minds once completed once.

Honesty..nah. If I wanted to play a single player mmo I'll play that kind of game. Till something like http://ffxiclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/Ru'Aun_Gardens gets added to this game, I'll have no need to take the so called end game of this game seriously.

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Originally Posted by Zumi

Part of the challenge in savage is when your teammates screw something up which causes a wipe. If you played a version of savage with CPU controlled players that always did everything perfectly then it would be a lot easier and thus not savage.

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Just put some RNG into the AI that let them screw up some mechanics randomly.
Also the more the raid get done the less errors the NPCs do (simulated learning effect)
And if the raid was not done for a week the errors increase again (simulated forgetting effect).

I don't play MMOs to do solo content, this would be a waste of resources imo.

All solo content can be done easily with A smn and his titan.

I really think something like a Battle Arena would well fit this bill and provide an interesting system for both Solo players and parties alike.

First off, it would definitely be something for the Gold Saucer and rewards could be both MGP, special mounts and other cosmetic items. You have the option of choosing to fight Solo, in 4-man or 8-man parties and you select a tier to challenge. The tier you choose has an MGP cost associated with it as a entry fee as well as determining the final payout of the challenge. The system will then generate a set of randomly picked encounters appropriate to the party (level and/or ilvl) and start the challenge. Now that these can include any mob in the game (save some like Primals, Ultima and other story specific enemies) though dynamically adjusted to provide a challenge to the current group without being totally unbeatable.

After each fight you get the opportunity to decide if you want to continue on to the next round, each round only rewarding you a portion of the overall value of the challenge tier, or quitting early and getting a reduced reward. If you quit you don't get to see what you would have had to fight, but if you continue and lose then you lose the reward entirely along with your entry fee.

I really think something like this could stir up a lot more interest, especially if you keep a leader board of who has cleared each tier the fastest.

WoW did something like this in their Pandaria expansion with the fight club (damned if I can remember its proper name). They also made it a bit of a spectator thing. Unfortunately it was very skewed towards certain classes to get past later challenges and/or gear-reliant. You got a lot of fun achievements and vanity stuff, but I don't recall it being very long-lasting content.

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Originally Posted by Pence

How is over-gearing fun? How about you....(HATE to say it).....but 'git gud'?. How is this fun? Go play a single player game if you want a single player challenge? You're actually asking the devs of a multi-player game to dedicate a massive amount of time to make solo player content? I'm not sure you've even touched Savage. You certainly can not complete it within a day without any thought or effort.

Am I missing something crucial? It's 7am. And I think Tasmania is on fire...is the smoke preventing me from knowing a thing?

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Yea i think you are. This guy pointed out something that imo rings a lot of bells.

Tons of people build themselves up with tome gear for what? What do they do then if they cant raid with the tome gear like its designed. This game can be so straightforward and linear its boring.

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Originally Posted by Morzy

Yea i think you are. This guy pointed out something that imo rings a lot of bells.

Tons of people build themselves up with tome gear for what? What do they do then if they cant raid with the tome gear like its designed. This game can be so straightforward and linear its boring.

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Not everyone buys tome gear for raiding, I would wager a majority get tome gear for the glamour. If tome gear is only for those who raid, then SE needs to make versions of tome gear with no stats for those who only want it for the looks.

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Originally Posted by FoxyAreku

I don't play MMOs to do solo content, this would be a waste of resources imo.

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I guess they should toss out crafting (you've seemingly done your fair share of this), exp quests, main story quests, etc.

There's a void of challenges for the average player. It's a legitimate issue. Every patch - a player who is not raiding - only gets one challenge (the expert trial). There will always be pvp, daily roulettes, weekly void ark runs and raiding. This is something additional to make the gear-up process more worthwhile for the vast majority of players.