New Content Suggestion: Unreal Dungeons

A recent thread and a few reoccurring requests and complaints got me thinking. I believe I have come up with a solution that won't require a huge amount dev time to properly implement. My suggestion: Unreal Dungeons. These would be older dungeons retuned for the current max level, expect current patch gear and would have "unnerfed" mechanics similar to the Unreal trials.

I imagine a Unreal Dungeon would work like this:

• Ilevel:
  • Min - Augmented uncapped Tomestone gear/last cycle Savage gear for even patches and Normal Mode Raid/New Crafted Gear for odd patches.
  • Expected - Normal Mode Raid gear/New Crafted Gear for even patches and capped Tomestone/New Alliance Raid gear for odd patches.
  • Max - Augmented Capped Tomestone/Current Savage gear.
• Rewards - Tomestones and Faux Leaves:
  • Each boss rewards a few Leaves when killed with the final boss rewarding more.
  • A target clear time that rewards additional leaves if completed within the time limit.
  • Optional objectives depending on the dungeon. Possible examples being:
    • Optional minibosses.
    • Hostage rescue.
    • Minimized deaths.
    • Terrain usage.
    • Mechanic avoidance
  • Weekly cap of about 20 that can be farmed over multiple runs. Only 2 to 4 runs should be needed to cap. The Unreal Trial rewards would be independent of the Unreal Dungeon rewards.

A few Dungeons I think worthy of the Unreal treatment:

• Brayflox Longstop
• Sunken Temple of Qarn
• Aurum Vale
• Wanderer's Palace
• Amdapor Keep
• Pharos Sirius
• Halatali (Hard)

What are your thoughts on my new content suggestion?

>aurum vale unreal

Sir this is the FFXIV official forum, not Satan's suggestion box.

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Originally Posted by Ammokkx

>aurum vale unreal

Sir this is the FFXIV official forum, not Satan's suggestion box.

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What? You dont want even more mobs to fight while dodging everything

I'd suggest Sastasha get that treatment, but i'm pretty sure that's just Anamnesis Anyder

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Originally Posted by Ammokkx

>aurum vale unreal

Sir this is the FFXIV official forum, not Satan's suggestion box.

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But he only suggested AV and Sirius. Not Bardam's, Vault, or Aumarot (Savage) :P

The Vault Unreal. SICKNESS MUST BE PURGED.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

A few Dungeons I think worthy of the Unreal treatment:

• Brayflox Longstop
• Sunken Temple of Qarn
  
• Aurum Vale
• Wanderer's Palace
• Amdapor Keep
• Pharos Sirius
• Halatali (Hard)

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https://64.media.tumblr.com/19a0aa24...csglo1_500.gif

now that we've gotten our jokes about one of the suggested dungeons out of the way, this is actually really neat sounding, and would be a great way to get more to do with our endgame gear.

LOL

People can barely tolerate dungeons taking more than 17 minutes, let alone a full-on run against mobs scaled to your actual gear. But on a serious note though, if anyone is BiS on any patch level, then the chances are the dungeon won't really sate their hunger. Dungeons aren't really something to get excited about.

I'd personally be a fan of them taking the final fight from a given raid tier, upscaling it to current BiS, and allowing people to challenge the savage encounter in its full might. Basically the Faux Hollows of savage encounters.

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Originally Posted by Ammokkx

>aurum vale unreal

Sir this is the FFXIV official forum, not Satan's suggestion box.

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I'm not suggesting that AV (Unreal) would force you to run it synced to level 47 in i47 gear. You would still have all your end game weaponskill, spells and abilities.

People are regularly complaining about dungeons not being difficult enough and their end game gear being useless.

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Originally Posted by TheMightyMollusk

The Vault Unreal. SICKNESS MUST BE PURGED.

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Another good one.

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Originally Posted by Morningstar1337

But he only suggested AV and Sirius. Not Bardam's, Vault, or Aumarot (Savage) :P

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Those would be good Unreals for 7.0 and later. It would give the player base a fair amount of time to "forget" those dungeons.

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Originally Posted by Zanarkand-Ronso

...snip...

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So another vote for Aurum Vale as the first Unreal dungeon?

I'd be all for it. I'd rather do an unreal dungeon than an unreal trial.

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Originally Posted by Kaurhz

People can barely tolerate dungeons taking more than 17 minutes, let alone a full-on run against mobs scaled to your actual gear. But on a serious note though, if anyone is BiS on any patch level, then the chances are the dungeon won't really sate their hunger. Dungeons aren't really something to get excited about.

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The complaints about dungeons being braindead and "big pull and AoE down" meta are both more or less a result of how much we outgear dungeons at release. The average active player tends to outgear expert dungeons by about 30 to 40 ilevels at their release and end the patch cycle as much as 60 to 70 ilevels over. Dungeons that you start out 10 ilevels undergeared and end the patch only 10 to 20 ilevels over would be a significant change.

I also suggested dungeons that have interest and/or unusual mechanics in the areas between bosses. Can you save all the goblins before the dragons kill them? Dodge and escape the giant invincible killer Tonberries? Will you use the terain traps to speed up killing the trash packs? These are mechanics that make dungeons more than wall to wall corridor pulls.

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Originally Posted by Kaurhz

People can barely tolerate dungeons taking more than 17 minutes, let alone a full-on run against mobs scaled to your actual gear. But on a serious note though, if anyone is BiS on any patch level, then the chances are the dungeon won't really sate their hunger. Dungeons aren't really something to get excited about.

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1. Its likely gonna be on a weekly lockout over a daily one, so I'd think it'd be something people can make time for (since they're not expected to farm it or run it ad nauseum). 2. As the above post (which turns out is also a response) mentions the reason for the boredom is it being overgeared on arrival (By design. Leveling dungeons and Auamrot are relatively stricter), which a ilevel sync to AF level would address.

Plus they could also spice up the rewards on a weekly lockout beyond just the privilege to play Faux Hollows, For example a special universal mats used to craft unlocked (and maybe even dyeable) versions of the original dungeon's gear (with new recipes being added instead of replacing older ones)

For example for the Vault Unreal you would get a mat called "Mnemosyte" which would be used for unlocked dyeable versions of the Dungeon gear (which does have dyeable counterparts as crafted gear of the same level, but are restricted by Role lines). The models for said dungeon gear were already made generic but undyeable in the Heavens' Ward cosplay Set. Later a patch would change it to Sirensong Sea but it would still drop the Mnemosyte and add recipes for unlocked versions of the Ghost Baroque gear that woudne't replace the Halonic replicas. Any Weapons would instead of being updated would have a more subtle glowey effect to their accents,like the Elemental+1 Armor

Woudne't work for all dungeons (some designs are generic or lackluster even before they changed the Aetherial lefthand gear, and some like SHB's first l80 dungeon don't reward armor or Accs,...then there's cases like ARF), but its a good start if you fear Faux Hollows alone wont get people queuing for them.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

The complaints about dungeons being braindead and "big pull and AoE down" meta are both more or less a result of how much we outgear dungeons at release. The average active player tends to outgear expert dungeons by about 30 to 40 ilevels at their release and end the patch cycle as much as 60 to 70 ilevels over. Dungeons that you start out 10 ilevels undergeared and end the patch only 10 to 20 ilevels over would be a significant change.

I also suggested dungeons that have interest and/or unusual mechanics in the areas between bosses. Can you save all the goblins before the dragons kill them? Dodge and escape the giant invincible killer Tonberries? Will you use the terain traps to speed up killing the trash packs? These are mechanics that make dungeons more than wall to wall corridor pulls.

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It certainly doesn't help with the matter that we outgear them, no, but that isn't really the point, dungeons don't exactly provide a lot of challenges in the first place, especially if you manage to make BiS for a current tier, whether you do or don't incratorpoe unique challenges or points of interest, there's only really so far you can go with a dungeon without adding on a lot of development time. I feel the nr would ovelty factowear down fast before it simply becomes but another weekly chore irrespective of what challenges you may incorporate. Granted, it would give a use to those that are already in Best-in-slot, or near the effective gear cap, but if they're going to add something which necessitates Best-in-Slot, certainly would be nice if that content reflected the expected competency, for example, a savage encounter upscaled.

The beauty of Unreal trials is that it can take a significant time to complete them, even going as far as a couple of lockouts for the average player and very little in the leeway for errors, a dungeon on the other hand I just don't see the enjoyment factor being there, personally.

Don't get me wrong, it's an interesting idea, I just personally think the novelty factor for players would wear down pretty fast before it becomes simply another chore.

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Originally Posted by Kaurhz

LOL

People can barely tolerate dungeons taking more than 17 minutes, let alone a full-on run against mobs scaled to your actual gear. But on a serious note though, if anyone is BiS on any patch level, then the chances are the dungeon won't really sate their hunger. Dungeons aren't really something to get excited about.

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I don't think that applies in this case. The reason people can't stand dungeons taking longer than 15-20 minutes is because of how boring they are, nothing in the endgame dungeons is in any way threatening or even remotely complicated, they're an absolute snoozefest. I would have no issue with dungeons taking longer if they actually challenge more than my ability to not fall asleep.



Best example for this being the case are the deep dungeons on the last 30 floors. Their design is pretty similar to normal dungeons, a bunch of rooms connected by straight corridors with a boss at the end. Unlike any expert dungeons however you barely even notice how long those 10 floors take because it actually challenges your party in various ways, often at the same time, along the way. Dealing with traps, high incoming tank damage, enemy mechanics, floor debuffs, collecting as much treasure as possible, all while racing against the clock to finish the boss in time.

Considering the reasons they gave us for only having one Unreal trial a patch, I doubt this will happen for dungeons.

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Originally Posted by Absurdity

I don't think that applies in this case. The reason people can't stand dungeons taking longer than 15-20 minutes is because of how boring they are, nothing in the endgame dungeons is in any way threatening or even remotely complicated, they're an absolute snoozefest.

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Players aren't thinking about how interesting (or not) a dungeon is. Anything gets boring after you've repeated it several times.

What they're really thinking about is loot and what they need to do to get more of it in whatever time they have available to play.

When the reward is the same regardless of how much time is spent in the dungeon, it's natural to want to get it over and done with as fast as possible so the player can move onto the next piece of content and the next reward.

Make a dungeon too annoying without increasing the reward to compensate and players will simply avoid the dungeon in favor of other dungeons that are more efficient when it comes to loot rewarded for time spent.

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Originally Posted by Kaurhz

It certainly doesn't help with the matter that we outgear them, no, but that isn't really the point, dungeons don't exactly provide a lot of challenges in the first place, especially if you manage to make BiS for a current tier, whether you do or don't incratorpoe unique challenges or points of interest, there's only really so far you can go with a dungeon without adding on a lot of development time. I feel the nr would ovelty factowear down fast before it simply becomes but another weekly chore irrespective of what challenges you may incorporate. Granted, it would give a use to those that are already in Best-in-slot, or near the effective gear cap, but if they're going to add something which necessitates Best-in-Slot, certainly would be nice if that content reflected the expected competency, for example, a savage encounter upscaled.

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A savage encounter upscale is only going to intrigue a small percentage of the player base and that playerbase is already served better by the Ultimate trials. Unreal dungeons would be targeted more towards the "midcore" playerbase that ends each patch cycle in non-BiS Augmented Tomestone rather than the "hardcore" Savage raider who ends even numbered patches with Savage on farm.

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The beauty of Unreal trials is that it can take a significant time to complete them, even going as far as a couple of lockouts for the average player and very little in the leeway for errors, a dungeon on the other hand I just don't see the enjoyment factor being there, personally.

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Shiva Unreal only takes a significant amount of time to complete on average because the vast majority of currently active players never did Shiva Ex on release and therefore never actually learned it. The primary goal of the Unreal series is to let the new players experience the classic Trials as current content. Upscale a more resent trial (such as Suzaku) and completion rate would be much higher and faster as the average player would be more familiar with the fight.

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Don't get me wrong, it's an interesting idea, I just personally think the novelty factor for players would wear down pretty fast before it becomes simply another chore.

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Considering that each Unreal dungeon would only have about a 3 month lifespan getting sick of it would be far less of a factor compared to doing the same Expert dungeon you have overgeared for 6 months in a row.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

Ilevel:

• Min - Augmented uncapped Tomestone gear/last cycle Savage gear for even patches and Normal Mode Raid/New Crafted Gear for odd patches.
• Expected - Normal Mode Raid gear/New Crafted Gear for even patches and capped Tomestone/New Alliance Raid gear for odd patches.
• Max - Augmented Capped Tomestone/Current Savage gear.

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I would prefer it to use the existing unreal sync of 435 rather than your system, but otherwise, I'm up for it, assuming I can just queue for it. Is any dungeon content ever something that you're expected to use the PF for in NA region?

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

A savage encounter upscale is only going to intrigue a small percentage of the player base and that playerbase is already served better by the Ultimate trials. Unreal dungeons would be targeted more towards the "midcore" playerbase that ends each patch cycle in non-BiS Augmented Tomestone rather than the "hardcore" Savage raider who ends even numbered patches with Savage on farm.



Shiva Unreal only takes a significant amount of time to complete on average because the vast majority of currently active players never did Shiva Ex on release and therefore never actually learned it. The primary goal of the Unreal series is to let the new players experience the classic Trials as current content. Upscale a more resent trial (such as Suzaku) and completion rate would be much higher and faster as the average player would be more familiar with the fight.



Considering that each Unreal dungeon would only have about a 3 month lifespan getting sick of it would be far less of a factor compared to doing the same Expert dungeon you have overgeared for 6 months in a row.

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Honestly, if you were going to incorporate unreal dungeons, it would probably be better to have the dungeons catered towards the iLv currently seen in Unreal primals, and then have Unreal trials act like that for those with higher iLv, perhaps it could even be implemented later on in the patch cycle and give players gear that is just a cut above the savage gear counterpart on a weekly-lockout, which would then give players a chance to then bridge the gap between 1 tier to the next without needing to go ham on crafted, but instead a cheaper and more viable alternative.

As the post above really, players won't care how interesting a dungeon is, it will fairly quickly turn into something that is a means to an end, so whether it is a 3 month, or 6-month lifespan, the result will be the same fairly quickly. Not caring about how good or interesting the dungeon is, and just instead wanting an in-out reward with very little tedium. I just don't see unreal dungeons attracting the same level of attention as what an unreal trial would.

People do the extreme trials for the challenge, to experience an encounter they otherwise hadn't experienced before, dungeons, on the other hand, is a means to an end for the vast majority of players so the amount of interest you'll actually build for the content itself without it being a monotonous weekly activity is already... Besides, if you're going to not lock it behind a modicum of standards then you will very quickly turn to have issues with it, especially if tanks join and don't use Cooldowns, or if DPS end up doing single-target damage on aoe packs.. That already sticks out like a sore thumb in overgeared dungeons, let alone on a nigh minimum item level dungeon. Lord could only imagine just how much worse people would be with their attitude when people don't play according to other peoples' standards

Hell a lot of people hated Amaurot alone just because it took so long, let alone an Amaurot that would take even longer

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

So another vote for Aurum Vale as the first Unreal dungeon?

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Every dungeon on that list could be cool and fun....except Vale.
That Toxic Swamp can take a hike

Let's be real here.... Unreal/Mythic Plus (which is pretty much what this is) dungeons won't change anything.

It will be something neat and fun and offer a new challenge and experience. But then the novelty will wear off and people will go right back to complaints about it not being challenging enough, or that it takes to long, and the content will see less attention.
Especally if there arnt any/enough satisfactory rewards for the endeavor

Aurum Vale is just broccoli with cheese sauce. Yum yum!

I love this idea. It's a great one. They could add in most every side dungeon and give us three of them in the Unreal format.

I'd love to see:

Pharos Sirius - Pre-Nerf version
Lost City of Amdapor
Wanderer's Palace HM

As for the gearing for it... I'd just like for them to set it to an item level that we actually have weapons and accessory's available for, rather than this weird i435. That way we can meld sets just for the Unreals, rather than having to look and weigh whether 5 ilvls beats the materia slots.

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Originally Posted by linayar

I would prefer it to use the existing unreal sync of 435 rather than your system, but otherwise, I'm up for it, assuming I can just queue for it. Is any dungeon content ever something that you're expected to use the PF for in NA region?

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/hiss some of us have skill/ spell speed tiers to hit, you know.

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Originally Posted by Mavrias

/hiss some of us have skill/ spell speed tiers to hit, you know.

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You can hit that tier all you want in raid content. This will be a dungeon content, not even a trial like current Unreal, so you'll be able to adjust without sacrificing too much.

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Originally Posted by linayar

You can hit that tier all you want in raid content. This will be a dungeon content, not even a trial like current Unreal, so you'll be able to adjust without sacrificing too much.

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Except some jobs are borderline unplayable without the right skill/spellspeed tiers and it just makes playing a job in that synced content unnecessarily frustrating, doesn't matter if it's in raids, trials, dungeons or while rearranging the furniture in your house.

Definitly it would be nice to get a re-tuned caplevel version of some dungeons, some Gems truly get lost do insane overgear... It would be a nice roulett and they could literally add it at 6.0, giving us 2-4 dungeons and add 2 every patch.

...idk they said they cant make aurum vale hard due missing stuff from the 1.0 to 2.0 mess, so that might affect that as well...


Basically just ANY conent that lets us keep our current level/gear/skillset would be nice...

An unreal dungeon isn't going to any different from a challenge perspective than the most recent dungeon. You will basically get 3-5 trash pulls with three walls that hit back and have inflated HP.

Not even worth the time.

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Originally Posted by Gemina

An unreal dungeon isn't going to any different from a challenge perspective than the most recent dungeon. You will basically get 3-5 trash pulls with three walls that hit back and have inflated HP.

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Its going to be very different due to not having the extra hp and dps that overgearing grants. The difference in between i440 and i500 is about 40% or more hp, 12% more Def and M.Def, 10% more weapon damage, 40% more main main stat and 63% more secondary stat. Max ilevel characters are roughly 50% tougher and deal over 100% more damage than min ilevel characters in Anamenesis Anyder. Fights end up taking less than half the time for a full geared character as one that barely qualifies for the dungeon.

The gap between i480 and i500 on the other hand is a 12% increase in hp, a 4.5% increase in Def and M.Def, a 2.5% increase in weapon damage, a 10% increase in main stat and a 13% increase in secondary stat.

Oh hey, this proposed content term sounds familiar. <_<

The devs just need to make their dungeons more entertaining with puzzles and power ups. Fighting damage sponges isn’t fun.

If they added unreal dungeons they'd need to think of a clever way to force wall to wall pulls. Something to prevent people from pulling single trash packs, which would just completely undermine the spirit (and arguably the point) of Unreal dungeons.
No crawling through these dungeons. Once you get in them you just GO!

Bardam mettle unreal but it only has the mongoose and Bison enemies

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Originally Posted by Kaurhz

Honestly, if you were going to incorporate unreal dungeons, it would probably be better to have the dungeons catered towards the iLv currently seen in Unreal primals, and then have Unreal trials act like that for those with higher iLv, perhaps it could even be implemented later on in the patch cycle and give players gear that is just a cut above the savage gear counterpart on a weekly-lockout, which would then give players a chance to then bridge the gap between 1 tier to the next without needing to go ham on crafted, but instead a cheaper and more viable alternative.

As the post above really, players won't care how interesting a dungeon is, it will fairly quickly turn into something that is a means to an end, so whether it is a 3 month, or 6-month lifespan, the result will be the same fairly quickly. Not caring about how good or interesting the dungeon is, and just instead wanting an in-out reward with very little tedium. I just don't see unreal dungeons attracting the same level of attention as what an unreal trial would.

People do the extreme trials for the challenge, to experience an encounter they otherwise hadn't experienced before, dungeons, on the other hand, is a means to an end for the vast majority of players so the amount of interest you'll actually build for the content itself without it being a monotonous weekly activity is already... Besides, if you're going to not lock it behind a modicum of standards then you will very quickly turn to have issues with it, especially if tanks join and don't use Cooldowns, or if DPS end up doing single-target damage on aoe packs.. That already sticks out like a sore thumb in overgeared dungeons, let alone on a nigh minimum item level dungeon. Lord could only imagine just how much worse people would be with their attitude when people don't play according to other peoples' standards

Hell a lot of people hated Amaurot alone just because it took so long, let alone an Amaurot that would take even longer

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This person gets it. 100% agreed. People complain dungeons take too long as it is now. Making them harder isn't going to change them. We need more unreal trials and harder fights period.. not dungeons.

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Originally Posted by Absurdity

Except some jobs are borderline unplayable without the right skill/spellspeed tiers and it just makes playing a job in that synced content unnecessarily frustrating, doesn't matter if it's in raids, trials, dungeons or while rearranging the furniture in your house.

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If, by unplayable, you mean it doesn't work well with group synergy, I believe that's only necessary for full party content, which this won't be.

If, instead, you mean it's not optimized on its own (without worrying about party synergy), again this is a dungeon content, which wouldn't require that optimization.

If, instead, you mean it doesn't feel good to play, that's subjective.

If, instead, you mean it won't be able to do mechanics, then that's the dev's job to work on, especially if they want to do more of this synced contents.