I think Crystal Tower queues need a new Band-Aid fix (or preferably, a real fix)

Yesterday, I waited 89 minutes for World of Darkness, then 45 minutes for LOTA. Today, I just gave up on a 126 minute Syrcus Tower queue, and now I have all 3 checked and I'm up to 34 minutes.

I'm just trying to complete this Weekly Quest for Relic Oil. I can't even imagine what this is like for a player that's trying to get something like a full set of CT Glamour, or a minion.

It's not very nice to leave content like this with massive queue times, and the best attempt at a solution so far being a short-term bribe for one step of the Anima Relic.

Compare this to something like ARR EX Trials, or Coil Turns, which also have queues often approaching ∞:

• I can't Undersize / Unsync CT.
• I can't even PF CT, because of the requirement of finding 3 groups of 8, especially without a Poetics bonus to bribe them (and even then, waiting for an entire Alliance to fill for 50 Poetics is worth no one's time).

The design itself is also a mess: One queue redundantly requires 6 Tanks and 12 DPS. The other two queues require 3 Tanks and 15 DPS. So queue balancing is a mess if someone checks all 3 raids at once (and most will if they're doing the Weekly, etc).

SE, could you please do... something? Preferably with longer-term vision than a single Relic step that can be skipped with Eso farming and, even in a best-case scenario, most players would be done with in about 5 weeks?

Please understand, I very much enjoy FFXIV, and I enjoy running the CT raids. My sole frustration here is the same issue that drives me away from PvP content — the idea that it's somehow okay to let players sit in queue for 60+ minutes, and still not get to actually play something.

Just rip off the Band-Aid and do something like:

• Alliance Roulette (Yes, just do it, you know you want to)
• Allow Undersize CT.
• Re-tune CT raids for fewer players (such as 1 Full Party).
• Scale CT raids like Frontlines (if 24 players available, 24 version; if 8 players available, 8 version)
• Allow partially-filled Alliances to begin (No CT raid really needs 3-6 Tanks, 6 Heals, or 12-15 DPS, especially at the beginning).

I just want to play your game's content. Please help that happen?

Replay in this game is bad. I wouldn't run any of the old content unless I had too, which makes it even worse. Even though they force us to run old content in order to bring life into them it fails. Once everyone has their shiny item they don't care about the dungeon anymore and we go back to the old long queue times. Just like the 5 Aether Oils step on the Anima, why would I run the Crystal tower anymore? I don't need anything from there and doing it feels like a chore. Just like every dungeon in this game it feels like a chore. If only they made dungeons fun, I would run them all the time, just like in other MMO's.

Easy fix: Duty Roulette 24 man raid

Then again I probably wouldn't even do the Roulette. I haven't even capped my Law stones in 2 months. They really need to change the dungeons to make them more fun.

we don't need another quest that forces us to run the stupid towers, including world of darkness. Just add it to the list of dungeons that can be done undersized/unsync and we should be alright.

Does raid finder work for this? It is classified as one under duty finder, but I have yet to dabble into raid finder since I have no need for it presently.

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Originally Posted by LunaFaye

we don't need another quest that forces us to run the stupid towers, including world of darkness. Just add it to the list of dungeons that can be done undersized/unsync and we should be alright.

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I would honestly prefer it become a roulette type thing.

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Originally Posted by Parawill

Does raid finder work for this? It is classified as one under duty finder, but I have yet to dabble into raid finder since I have no need for it presently.

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nope, Raid Finder is probably not what you think it is, it's not what i thought it would be.

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Originally Posted by LunaFaye

we don't need another quest that forces us to run the stupid towers, including world of darkness. Just add it to the list of dungeons that can be done undersized/unsync and we should be alright.

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I know, I'm sorry. I know that a lot of veteran players are tired of being forced back in to content they burned-out on a long time ago.

Maybe Undersized really is the best compromise. It makes me sad to see great fight designs thrown away to three-shot kills and overgearing, but if players don't want to do old stuff any more, forcing them to do it isn't a very nice solution either.

I think a lot of this tension could also be alleviated if SE added a separate pool of incentives to Sync or Minimum Level content, so players that are up for running older stuff can feel motivated and rewarded for doing it, while everyone else can just Unsync and move on with their day (or avoid the old content entirely).

Well, it's not necessarily possible to three-man a certain boss. Take into account the boss's mechanic in LoTA. You have to stand on the pads, but I'm certain one person is not possible unless they adjust to it being based on the party. Also to note, Alliances are only capable of being made with other 8-man parties. This would make it difficult unless they allowed Alliances to be any amount(max 8 people).

The thing you have to note is CoD's Dark Cloud mechanic. The amount of clouds is large, and also get heavied when a bunch of people(i.e. 3 Alliances) are all in front of them whaling on them. 3 people attempting this would not be feasible, as CoD would get too many damage stacks and wipe the party regardless of iLv.

CT was made for 24-man raid specifically, and it's been that way for a long time. The best way SE can reimplement CT now is add more quests linked to other things. They linked it to the relic for that reason because it was collecting lots of dust despite people legitimately trying to get into the queue itself and play it. #MakeCTGreatAgain

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Originally Posted by HyperiusUltima

Well, it's not necessarily possible to three-man a certain boss. Take into account the boss's mechanic in LoTA. You have to stand on the pads, but I'm certain one person is not possible unless they adjust to it being based on the party. Also to note, Alliances are only capable of being made with other 8-man parties. This would make it difficult unless they allowed Alliances to be any amount(max 8 people).

The thing you have to note is CoD's Dark Cloud mechanic. The amount of clouds is large, and also get heavied when a bunch of people(i.e. 3 Alliances) are all in front of them whaling on them. 3 people attempting this would not be feasible, as CoD would get too many damage stacks and wipe the party regardless of iLv.

CT was made for 24-man raid specifically, and it's been that way for a long time. The best way SE can reimplement CT now is add more quests linked to other things. They linked it to the relic for that reason because it was collecting lots of dust despite people legitimately trying to get into the queue itself and play it. #MakeCTGreatAgain

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No one said something about 3 people. If you have some friends you'll get probably 8-12 people together and that should be enough. Don't forget, that most players are 100+ ilvl above the max ilvl from that time and of course 10 level higher which means more powerfull skills.

It would be nice if it would be possible to do the CT's in a undersized party, even if i don't want to go in there anytime soon. Maybe if i could do it unsync with some friends, who knows.

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Originally Posted by HyperiusUltima

Well, it's not necessarily possible to three-man a certain boss.

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Well, Undersize option does not guarantee completion, it simply puts matters entirely in the party's hands to figure out how to clear the content. For example, Coil T9 still needs a certain minimum number of players (and Savage T9 most definitely does). It's just something parties work around when forming.

SE has also changed some mechanics already to make content more friendly to Undersize parties. For example, reducing the number of players required to activate the pads in Coil T11.

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Originally Posted by HyperiusUltima

The best way SE can reimplement CT now is add more quests linked to other things.

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See, I personally would be fine with this, because I love all content and I don't mind an excuse to do anything from ARR, even Sync'd (or Min Level, if anyone was ever interested).

But, as someone earlier posted to indicate, not everyone is fine with this. Some players loathe, or at least are increasingly-frustrated by, being jammed back into old content they feel 'done' with. And I think the feelings of that portion of the community (which by indications, may be a majority) do need to be considered as well.

Another possible adjustment would be to allow CT raids to begin with a partially-filled Alliance.

For example, today our WOD queue stalled for 30 minutes at 3/3 Tanks, 6/6 Heals, and 14/15 DPS. I mean, really? Usually 2-3 DPS in a CT run are either AFK or auto-attacking, we could easily have started with 14 DPS and let the 15th back-fill in later.

Players with In-Progress selected are already prepared for this, and if someone is only queuing for, eg, the Weekly Oil, or the Minipet from the last boss, I don't think they'd even consider it a bad thing to get backfilled into a run.

I waited 219 minutes for Labyrinth of the Ancients today. Finally, to fill up the missing slots I asked everyone in my FC and LSs.

But that's nothing compared to waiting 8+ hours for Ultima's Bane.
And then one of the tanks was a DRK who didn't have provoke.

To play devil's advocate with to this statement, I always do nothing but auto-attacks during the first two rounds of the bone dragon fight. One less dps contributing to the boss's death, in my mind, gives the tanks more time to pick up and deal with the skeletons. Once round 3 hits, though, I go all out, and I don't hold back on other bosses unless it looks like I'm about to rip threat away (rare, but it happens). Point being, don't judge the dps by what you see them doing at a glance...unless they're doing it consistently throughout the raid, then yeah.

As for the base idea, I'd be all for this, specifically because of a) what you mentioned, and b) getting full groups but having one or two people not click in and force the rest of us to wait another hour.

I don't know why they don't keep the weekly reward up to date with gear, adding Mhachi Matter as a reward. That way people can still gear their upgrade from Ark and WC and if they want extra, do the old raids.

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Originally Posted by Genaxx

I don't know why they don't keep the weekly reward up to date with gear, adding Mhachi Matter as a reward. That way people can still gear their upgrade from Ark and WC and if they want extra, do the old raids.

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They won't add the matter to old raids because that's 2 matters per week you could get, which would allow people to gear up faster and quit sooner.

They could adjust damage and such and make it a level 60 raid maybe :l I know that cuts off ARR players but I don't know it maybe some sort of level sync midway between 50 -60 average ilevel and allow all levels in between in?

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Originally Posted by MilesSaintboroguh

They won't add the matter to old raids because that's 2 matters per week you could get, which would allow people to gear up faster and quit sooner.

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Matter is used to exchange for grade V materia, which you can get as much as you want in a week, wouldn't make a difference.

And right now, people quit for a lot of other reasons rather than gearing up too fast.

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Originally Posted by Genaxx

Matter is used to exchange for grade V materia, which you can get as much as you want in a week, wouldn't make a difference.

And right now, people quit for a lot of other reasons rather than gearing up too fast.

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I always get those two things mixed up.

Although it may not be related, it is worth pointing out. One of the things I do not like about rerunning old 24-man content is it reminds me of the horrors of having to rerun the damn thing for a specific loot. Even nowadays it still takes roughly 45 minutes to run a CT, ST, and WoD. I would not mind it if it was unsync, time would be reduced by quite a bit.

I waited something like an hour and twenty minutes for WoD yesterday. During that time the queue fake-popped about six or seven times but someone withdrew and a few times it took me back to seemingly the only person in the queue.

Part of the issue is people queuing for multiple duties. So it can look like I have a nearly full party, then Syrcus will fill up and most of my queue gets moved to that instance, leaving only me or one or two others queued solely for WoD.

Frustrating, but there's really nothing you can do. I spent the time getting legendary Noko medals, and by the time I actually loaded in I was 13/15, so the time wasn't wasted. If I didn't have the event to work on, I would have been working on beast tribes and crafting.

When I was working towards the weekly thing you can do for the i230 anima weapon, the timer was up to 200 minutes on LOTA since I hadn't done that questline. needless to say, I'd rather farm the 9k-ish eso's to buy the oil. Although saying that, I'm not farming 50k eso's for the 3rd step on i210 anyways, so it's a moot point.

Regardless, I agree.

They'll likely do what they did with Coil and throw the crafting materials needed to make dyeable versions of the Crystal Tower sets.

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Originally Posted by Caj814

They'll likely do what they did with Coil and throw the crafting materials needed to make dyeable versions of the Crystal Tower sets.

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That's another Band-Aid, though. It will help temporarily as a surge of players rush in to profit off the new fad fashion, and then settle back to normal queue population (perhaps slightly elevated).

We had the Aether Oil rush, but then that died out as most players who care finished up that Anima step. We have Allagan Catalysts as part of the current Anima options, but they're cheap on MB and there are much more efficient options than CT (plus a Mhachi item).

Likewise with Coil, honestly. Each time the Dyeable versions have come out, there's an initial flood of PFs for that Coil tier, then a few weeks later it's back to previous levels of interest (with slight elevation).

Brief fad incentives don't solve the actual issues with the queue times, especially for the steady stream of newer players who happen to arrive at a piece of content too late for the most recent artificial rush.

But, as noted earlier, dumping even more Roulettes on players, or otherwise coercing them into older content isn't a clean solution either. It's great for new players, who can experience the content Sync'd and more exciting, but it also nudges veteran players closer and closer to complete burn-out. Unsynced is merciful to veterans, but definitely takes something away from the experience for newer players.

As is unfortunately often the case, I have many observations, but no perfect solutions.

I think this would be good for Yoshi P to answer in one of his Live Letters, since this is becoming quite the prominent issue. Hopefully there will be Q&A somewhere along the line to at least help alleviate the queue times for CT and the like.