Grinding in FFXIV vs Other MMOs

As FFXIV player do you enjoy grinding for power? Or do you prefer time gating each week you do 2 hours of grind and that's it?

As MMO player I find more people who enjoys grinding bozja as an example is grinding area for power but it is specific to special area.

So what are you standing for.. is it weekly time gating or grinding for power like other MMOs?

Time gating killed this game. There's no reason to be subbed year round. Just buy the expansion, beat it, maybe do one savage tier for fun, unsub until next expansion and catch up everything you missed in like 1 day or 2.

Hardly any reason to stick around or build communities in this game as its design actively discourages it.

I find Bozja and Eureka grinding fun, yes.

But obviously the result of that is grinding it and then being done with it. It can also have the downside of, because you can grind it all at once, it can burn you out, whereas the timegating actually forces you to take breaks so that you don't overdo it.

A lot of people actually didn't like Eureka and Bozja. Most people did not like Eureka on release - the vast majority of people talked negatively about it at the time. In all the game chats, it felt like people were having the time of their life in there, but when you asked them they said they didn't like it. And I think a big reason for that is they did it all at once and didn't space it out like I did.

How I did Eureka when it was current was to just hop in there casually for 3 hours a week. It was very casual, but each time it was a lot of fun and a chill grind. But a lot of people will do it all at once, grind all relics and burn themselves out.

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Originally Posted by Ath192

Time gating killed this game. There's no reason to be subbed year round. Just buy the expansion, beat it, maybe do one savage tier for fun, unsub until next expansion and catch up everything you missed in like 1 day or 2.

Hardly any reason to stick around or build communities in this game as its design actively discourages it.

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Yuuuuuuup and this is a huge part of why it's so hard to build FCs nowadays. Used to help build a community FC from the ground up, but sure enough during one of these scheduled 4 month downtime periods, most of them quit and keeping it going was impossible. Yoshida encouraging people to take breaks is great, but it also kills the sense of community this game can have unless you're part of one of those rp communities or those dance club communities that just log in and idle in a basement. even my hardcore raider friends basically just log in on tuesday, do their weeklies, and then log off lol. Now imagine being a casual who's caught up to Dawntrail and doesn't care about savage. What do you do, spam FATEs? Hit up the Gold Saucer? Easier to just quit, than go out of your way to squeeze blood from a stone. And that's what loads of people do, and the communities they were a part of get deader and their free companies rot until they're down to literally 1 guy who feels compelled to log in so the house doesn't disappear until he, too, vanishes or makes his own solo fc.

And all of this is to say nothing of the appealing allure of solo fcs, or the way there's almost no objective incentive to be in someone else's fc when you can just make your own and have all the same benefits, but that's unrelated to the main topic. I'm just mad that this game goes out of its way to kill guilds unless you just spam limsa all day and recruit strangers or your guild is basically your tiny friend group and you're just praying none of them quit I guess.

I prefer grinding, but to a certain amount, and sadly FF14 does neither grinding nor time-gating well.

You either get content that takes 1 day of savage reclears/hunt trains/unreal trial etc. then 10min daily for 6 days, or heck you have fishing where 99% of your time is spent waiting to fish for 10min...

...or you get 1000 s-ranks, 1 timeworn relic per DR run when you need 250+ runs, 50 alliance rolos that take minimum 20-30min each run etc. like the grind is so artificial and so poorly thought out you wanna kick a dev in the balls so they can feel a fraction of the pain they wanna put you through. Nobody on the team sat down, thought how would a sane person split this up to stay sane, oh they can't because they gotta grab at least 1 run per day for a fucking year and hope people still run this shit after after 100+ days.

As long as its reasonable, I prefer the grind, I can jump on, do it on my own time, jump off, progress made, happy. Eureka/Bozja has some of those good parts, and some of those bad parts.

Fuck anything time-gated though, it'd be dead content in a week if you didn't so you are just stretching it to desperately try and make it last except it just breeds resentment and hate for you and your content instead. Specially when none of the time gating really matters at all, which is why I just stopped doing it.

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Originally Posted by Ath192

Time gating killed this game. There's no reason to be subbed year round. Just buy the expansion, beat it, maybe do one savage tier for fun, unsub until next expansion, and catch up everything you missed in like 1 day or 2.

There is hardly any reason to stick around or build communities in this game as its design actively discourages it.

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Exactly. It's literally meta to play an expansion at lauch. Bask in the hype. Ignore it for two years. Rise and repeat. A lot of the FCs I have been in have been like that. People disappear for years at a time and come back to do the new thing and leave again.

I just don't know how they would fix it? Wow added one of the best pieces of solo progression in decades, and I got bored of it pretty quickly. I hate Bozja and Eureka. I'm just kinda lost on what is good content to do over time. I'm currently subbed to get everything to 100. I don't have much, and I'm going slow, but it's a boring journey.

I like Bozja. The grind is quite enjoyable and you can do it completely at your own pace. As a bonus, you get to level alt jobs through it, so it feels like, no matter how little, you are always making some kind of progress both in and outside of it. I'm not much of a fan of time gating. I'm willing to accept it to some degree, but FFXIV pairs it with insane content droughts. I see those as the biggest issue. I relate to trying to keep an FC going but it being really hard when there's nothing to do for months at a time. People are off playing other games, barely anyone shows up for in-game events and I can't really blame them.

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Originally Posted by Ardeth

Exactly. It's literally meta to play an expansion at lauch. Bask in the hype. Ignore it for two years. Rise and repeat. A lot of the FCs I have been in have been like that. People disappear for years at a time and come back to do the new thing and leave again.

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I just hate how this changed... my FC was never THAT full but usually during major stuff you had your core members being there, but now, so many just dissapear as they either burned, or just bored out... Im kinda done looking for new ppl, it just feels pointless to even try. Unless youre into the Live simulator stuff and mods which i despise with all my being lol

I feel it lacks sometimes. I've been playing some of the other MMOs, including one that recently released (T&L) alongside WoW and FFXIV. I feel we could have more FC interactions, and more replayability with special stuff dropping from dungeons and whatnot. I understand the casual mindset regarding the game design in itself, but I don't know. I just log, do stuff, level an alt, talk with the folks on FC, and theres that.

Why would I bother hunting gear other than for glam? Anything you grind or put effort into gets replaced by a crafted item or in the next patch.
There's no proper ladder for loot, no in between, no "building up gear to try this dungeon" or building your stats. Nothing to work for, nothing to feel accomplished by aside from making a good looking glam.

Would be nice to run dungeons and grind in open world content with your FC for loot, drops, materials, anything. Instead of playing a dance simulator in boxed out arena fights.

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Originally Posted by mtPrimo

I feel it lacks sometimes. I've been playing some of the other MMOs, including one that recently released (T&L) alongside WoW and FFXIV. I feel we could have more FC interactions, and more replayability with special stuff dropping from dungeons and whatnot. I understand the casual mindset regarding the game design in itself, but I don't know. I just log, do stuff, level an alt, talk with the folks on FC, and theres that.

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I have never played an MMO in a long time since 2020 but I tried T&L and went to first open area dungeon.. I just stick to that place for 2 hours of having fun with friends.. gearing and looting to enhance my gear.. it is just fun experience I don't remember that I had before in FFXIV normal content only I'm bozja when I get glimps of that feeling

Implying that I have time for more than one MMO? lol

The time gating is a design supposed to level and smooth out the curve of the progression through any new kind of content, gearing, etc. It's a meta system that does its job (new tomes for cutting edge progression versus old tomes for catch up is the most basic example), but only at a macro level. If there is nothing repeatable within that framework, then it falls flat on its ass for the reasons evoked above by people. But, it remains an important, core part of any MMO and XIV has it right at the most basic level. When it comes to dailies, weeklies, those are good, and are NOT part of repeatable content, as you do them once and move on every time you connect: they actually are part of the time gated progression system and help people with less time catch up faster as well as people leveling catch up with decent queues. This part is a healthy system.

My problem with XIV is the grind, which is does extremely badly. There is little reasons to keep running instances beyond spamming highest level dungeons to level up, and even if you could, you'd end up with heavily scripted systems that feel incredibly dull and repetitive to actually grind. Then we do have some grindable content that is usually part of relic weapons, and we have seen how miserably dull it can be: light farming, fate farming, instance farming... Did you genuinely have fun by spamming A1S or A9S unsynced? Do you genuinely have fun hitting hundreds of mobs that do nothing in Eureka just to pop a NM that has a couple of tricks and acts as a glorified FATE? What of Bozja's CEs? They were better FATEs but still remained FATEs on the exact same overworld than in normal areas stripped of its dangers like we had in Eureka. And they essentially behaved like a boss in a circle area regurgitating the same mechanics we've seen countless times everywhere and like for Eureka the only redeemable feature of both was the spicy amount of casualties (if you were a healer, nothing fun for other jobs). Once you had seen all those things once, it fell back into the same pit of scripted repeatability.

The real issue of XIV is that grind doesn't work well within because XIV is literally built around rigid scripts with almost no rng elements, and it's plagued the game in literally almost every aspect of it but pvp (and even then, before the new pvp, I'd argue that Feast was exactly that: scripted to the bone).

What I like in this game, you don't have to grind that much to gain bis in this game. Playing f2p mmo is like having another full time job which I don't like.

What I would like to change is that old BIS gear can not even compete with new crafting gear once new season start. Old BIS should be at least entry level gear for next savage.

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Originally Posted by Sunako

What I like in this game, you don't have to grind that much to gain bis in this game. Playing f2p mmo is like having another full time job which I don't like.

What I would like to change is that old BIS gear can not even compete with new crafting gear once new season start. Old BIS should be at least entry level gear for next savage.

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As an "outsider" to Raiding ive never understood that... so we grind out Savage gear, have 735, but the first tier of 7.2 will bring 750(?) crafted and normal raid gear, plus new tome stuff so the old Savage stuff is pointless?

Ive always felt they need to spread out Ilvl way further, so we actually can progress...

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Originally Posted by Kuroka

As an "outsider" to Raiding ive never understood that... so we grind out Savage gear, have 735, but the first tier of 7.2 will bring 750(?) crafted and normal raid gear, plus new tome stuff so the old Savage stuff is pointless?

Ive always felt they need to spread out Ilvl way further, so we actually can progress...

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Or make that progress matter more, but you'd have gatekeeping either way.

I just don't see much of a future in it with these developers. All we really have to look forward to as casuals is content that people hated. I know now people who jump to defend it, but people hated Eureka. People hated Bozja. They will hate the new one. Islands launched as this hyper casual content. People hated it. Could we expand on it and fix it? Nope, just make a new one.

I just can't see this development team being that competent. I'm sorry, I just can't. Exploratory zone 3.0 is just going to be the same boring grindy convaluted mess that it always is. Please look forward to it!

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Originally Posted by Ardeth

Or make that progress matter more, but you'd have gatekeeping either way.

I just don't see much of a future in it with these developers. All we really have to look forward to as casuals is content that people hated. I know now people who jump to defend it, but people hated Eureka. People hated Bozja. They will hate the new one. Islands launched as this hyper casual content. People hated it. Could we expand on it and fix it? Nope, just make a new one.

I just can't see this development team being that competent. I'm sorry, I just can't. Exploratory zone 3.0 is just going to be the same boring grindy convaluted mess that it always is. Please look forward to it!

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I think the problem is Mr. Yoshi team is trying to reinvent the wheel.. we already have successful formula for this kind of content.. trying to add things that will make things much more complicated without achieving meaningful results is what led them to make this kind of content even worst

Im only interested in high end pve (which last longer than any casual stuff), and even with this, I unsub maybe for 12-15 month total each expansion, and I dont do any grind (relics/fates/achievments)

So I really dont get how casuals can stay subbed

I don't like grinding at all.
I don't mind doing a thing I enjoy a few more times for something, and I enjoy the number-go-up from levelling, but there's a threshold for me between the acceptable and where it's just a grind and therefore a chore I avoid because I've got enough of those IRL.
I like to get what I want relatively quickly and generally do the various gameplay components just for the inherent fun of them. Making them a long arduous grind to get something is rather a demotivating factor to me than the other way around. What could be fun is now work, and I'll resent the respective games for it.

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Originally Posted by PaleYonder

I don't like grinding at all.
I don't mind doing a thing I enjoy a few more times for something, and I enjoy the number-go-up from levelling, but there's a threshold for me between the acceptable and where it's just a grind and therefore a chore I avoid because I've got enough of those IRL.
I like to get what I want relatively quickly and generally do the various gameplay components just for the inherent fun of them. Making them a long arduous grind to get something is rather a demotivating factor to me than the other way around. What could be fun is now work, and I'll resent the respective games for it.

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I feel like theres a cultural difference between MMO players. Some like to earn their stuff with effort, grind, rng and participation, a pathway.

Some want their dopamine hit right now and everything right now, without effort, just participation and showing up.

Playground vs earning it. Both are fine. But I dont think CHORES please either demographic.

Leveling is a dumb concept and just for show in FFXIV. Theres 0 meat to it. Its just about the destination not the journey. Same with the "do 500000000 pvp matches over 10 years to get a title" gearing is worhtless too. Its just for show. So are the stats aside for the min maxers

The grind in other MMOs is a form of time gating and in some cases in kind of turns into something of a hostage situation. If you decide for whatever reason to not log in for a week or two then you are forever behind, so you must log in daily and weekly in order to keep up to access new content.

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Originally Posted by Hallarem

I feel like theres a cultural difference between MMO players. Some like to earn their stuff with effort, grind, rng and participation, a pathway.

Some want their dopamine hit right now and everything right now, without effort, just participation and showing up.

Playground vs earning it. Both are fine. But I dont think CHORES please either demographic.

Leveling is a dumb concept and just for show in FFXIV. Theres 0 meat to it. Its just about the destination not the journey. Same with the "do 500000000 pvp matches over 10 years to get a title" gearing is worhtless too. Its just for show. So are the stats aside for the min maxers

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For me it's if I do the thing and the bar doesn't move, it makes me upset. I have no issue with something taking a month to do. If the progression feels meaningful. Like Bozja and Eureka suck. Because the max level feels like I'm climbing a hill made of sand. I make slight progress. I put in 2 hours, and my return in the end is almost meaningless. I'm going to eventually make it, but it's agonizing to deal with. That's the kind of stuff I absolutely hate in most games and this game. 100 pvp wins for a coat that you can't even dye is ridiculous. Considering you can't call on that being 100 games or 10,000 games. It makes me resent them more than think of it as some kind of long-term goal.

But to me, Bozja and Eureka are prime examples of a terrible system of leveling being added as something to do. Something that punishes you for trial and error and exploration. Ironically, the exploratory zones punish you for exploring and taking risks, but just the fact that right now at level 21 in Zadnor, the experience gain is so bad it's burning me out. The zones are dead, and even DC is hoping I can't seem to find anyone doing Z2 or even grinding FATEs it's just dead. It's content death. To me, that's bad content. When I start thinking, SquareEnix should put it on the cash shop to ease my suffering. When the game becomes a prison. Everyone likes to immediately assume everyone just wants things for nothing, but I just want things to respect my time. When the grind becomes a chore, you have failed as a game developer.

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Originally Posted by Hallarem

gearing is worhtless too. Its just for show. So are the stats aside for the min maxers

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I think gearing have that purpose, if you can not clear the fight during first week, you can get little bit handicap every week by having more gear. People who play optimally, can clear everything with entry level gear. People who are less skilled, can still clear the same content later with more gear. That way same content can serve people with different skill levels.

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Originally Posted by Ardeth

For me it's if I do the thing and the bar doesn't move, it makes me upset. I have no issue with something taking a month to do. If the progression feels meaningful. Like Bozja and Eureka suck. Because the max level feels like I'm climbing a hill made of sand. I make slight progress. I put in 2 hours, and my return in the end is almost meaningless. I'm going to eventually make it, but it's agonizing to deal with. That's the kind of stuff I absolutely hate in most games and this game. 100 pvp wins for a coat that you can't even dye is ridiculous. Considering you can't call on that being 100 games or 10,000 games. It makes me resent them more than think of it as some kind of long-term goal.

But to me, Bozja and Eureka are prime examples of a terrible system of leveling being added as something to do. Something that punishes you for trial and error and exploration. Ironically, the exploratory zones punish you for exploring and taking risks, but just the fact that right now at level 21 in Zadnor, the experience gain is so bad it's burning me out. The zones are dead, and even DC is hoping I can't seem to find anyone doing Z2 or even grinding FATEs it's just dead. It's content death. To me, that's bad content. When I start thinking, SquareEnix should put it on the cash shop to ease my suffering. When the game becomes a prison. Everyone likes to immediately assume everyone just wants things for nothing, but I just want things to respect my time. When the grind becomes a chore, you have failed as a game developer.

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I know Yoshi one day will stop doing exploration zone because "people don't like it so we remove it" and you will find people who praise Yoshi P decision because yes he is right many people don't like it you know why? "re-inventing the wheel" trying to do something not different but worst.. like how other systems in the game that has been removed for the same reason "people don't like it" yes they don't like how you approach things trying to re-inventing the wheel people like how formula of exploration dungeons, areas in other games.. just copy paste like how FFXIV 2.0 copy paste WoW for their good systems

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Originally Posted by Sunako

I think gearing have that purpose, if you can not clear the fight during first week, you can get little bit handicap every week by having more gear. People who play optimally, can clear everything with entry level gear. People who are less skilled, can still clear the same content later with more gear. That way same content can serve people with different skill levels.

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I guess most PCT players are skilled and MCH players are just bad players from your assumption

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Originally Posted by BabyYoda

I guess most PCT players are skilled and MCH players are just bad players from your assumption

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What gear system has anything to do with job balance or job popularity? This same system existed in several extensions before the PCT even existed. If the job balance makes you bitter, you should talk about it in another thread instead of derailing this one.

I wish they would go back to the FFXI mindset and instead of having weekly lock outs it was by timers. Complete X content, can go again in 48 hours. But they also made that work by not making a single piece of content outdated (until they dropped the abyssea bomb that is and destroyed 10 years of good will and hard work overnight) because absolutely everything you earned was still useful in some way or another. Like Relic weapons not outdating when Mythrics were introduced. Then Relic and Mythic weapons not outdating when Empys were introduced and so on. I would gladly do more ARR relics if I could use them for more than just glam. They are the nicest looking ones out of them all, but I really hate spending that much time and gil on what turns out to be just a glam piece. let me further upgrade these too!

I also wish there was a better level grind than just roulettes or fates. Fates are catatonically boring since they haven't changed or added anything new since ARR and even then they were so boring a whole lot of ppl just botted them, like they still do today because the content is so lackluster and mind numbing. And for what, a few levels and a mount... Meanwhile roulettes, even on aether, you sometimes have to wait 45 minutes for a single run. And as someone who has been leveling, the skill level of players is dropping harder and harder with every week to the point that I just simply leave before the first boss because my back is sore from all the carrying Ive been doing lately. Literally got a run yesterday in the lvl 97 dungeon where the tank opened with that "Hello everyone, How are my cuties today! UwU" junk (which makes me instantly dislike you anyway) then single pack pulled. I immediately left after pull 1.

Glam is a big problem too. They give us grinds, but its just for glams. whoop de freakin doo Forcing a grind for glam items just feels absolutely pointless for a whole large chunk of the playerbase and those who could be.

Said grinds are always just on single bosses in square or circle arenas too. Even our "raids" are just a series of single bosses. Or worse...Fates, "but these ones are totally different guys we swear! Now go do the same fates you have been doing for 14 years but this time with 2 new actions woooooo!" At least in XI they were smart enough to give us huge raids with vastly different mechanics and objectives where even the trash mobs had a chance at dropping something worthwhile and therefore were worthwhile to grind. They really really need to be more creative. This is SE for crying out loud. They used to lead the pack. Now though, not so much.

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Originally Posted by Ardeth

Or make that progress matter more, but you'd have gatekeeping either way.

I just don't see much of a future in it with these developers. All we really have to look forward to as casuals is content that people hated. I know now people who jump to defend it, but people hated Eureka. People hated Bozja. They will hate the new one. Islands launched as this hyper casual content. People hated it. Could we expand on it and fix it? Nope, just make a new one.

I just can't see this development team being that competent. I'm sorry, I just can't. Exploratory zone 3.0 is just going to be the same boring grindy convaluted mess that it always is. Please look forward to it!

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To me Bozja felt like the downgrade compared to Eureka... it hat its nice parts but overall.... meh. And the NEED to stop with the "do xyz 200x" grinds...

The first Eureka part was actually fun at times, but we didnt play as they wanted so they slowed us down by force for the 2nd part... I do think theyre competent, but either theyre being held back, or just drop the ball themselves...

I dislike grinding for power in any mmo
but i love grinding for cosmetics and money

Honestly just remove leveling. Its just empty numbers. We all know theres no journey or flavor in gaining levels. Its just busy work and gatekeeping your latest flashy cinematic moves you need to cram i to your already bloated rotation in the latest expansion.

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Originally Posted by Ardeth

Or make that progress matter more, but you'd have gatekeeping either way.

I just don't see much of a future in it with these developers. All we really have to look forward to as casuals is content that people hated. I know now people who jump to defend it, but people hated Eureka. People hated Bozja. They will hate the new one. Islands launched as this hyper casual content. People hated it. Could we expand on it and fix it? Nope, just make a new one.

I just can't see this development team being that competent. I'm sorry, I just can't. Exploratory zone 3.0 is just going to be the same boring grindy convaluted mess that it always is. Please look forward to it!

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Your personal opinion on field content doesn’t remotely translate to statistically how popular Bozja was

The only truly unpopular field content was diadem

I'm going to advocate for Bozja here. During ShB, that place was PACKED and was genuinely some of the most fun I've ever had in this game. I didn't play Eureka when it was current so it didn't have that same energy when I went back to try it, but I came to enjoy it more as I played it (except Pagos, hate that map). It's just a shame that when it's over, it's over, and it's hard to get people in there to run stuff again without finding Discord groups and actively making time for it, rather than just hopping in whenever to run it organically. Both of those felt like a good level of grind to me: Enough grind to keep me there doing the content, but not so much grind that I wanted to pull my hair out and quit. But as popular as Bozja was during its heyday, I also CONSTANTLY saw people who hated it and complained about how hard it was, how annoying it was to have to grind levels in it, how it was too hard, how it was punishing...

And all I could think was...then don't play it?? It's purely optional side content, but for a player like me, who wanted something challenging but not Savage level difficulty and time commitment at that point in time, it was perfect and exactly what I wanted. I have very fond memories of it.

I haven't played hardly any other MMOs besides this one, but I do think they need a better balance for time gating and grinding content. A little time gating is fine. Too much is frustrating and makes it hard to gear an alt job. A little bit of grinding is fine. I don't want to just be given a prize for showing up, that's boring, I want to work for and earn it. But doing something insane like 5000 FATEs (or whatever the actual number is, it's a lot is the point) is not a fun grind, that's ridiculous. I've played for years, cleared out FATEs in each zone, and I'm nowhere near that. I'm not doing that, that's way too much.

50/50 on this.

I mean, the Grind can be grating. But on the flipside I prefer it over the F2P business model which allows you to buy your way (R/L cash) to getting what you want immediately.... but then leaves you staring into the Endgame forest of "Whatnow?".

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Originally Posted by CuteBucket

I'm going to advocate for Bozja here. During ShB, that place was PACKED and was genuinely some of the most fun I've ever had in this game. I didn't play Eureka when it was current so it didn't have that same energy when I went back to try it, but I came to enjoy it more as I played it (except Pagos, hate that map). It's just a shame that when it's over, it's over, and it's hard to get people in there to run stuff again without finding Discord groups and actively making time for it, rather than just hopping in whenever to run it organically. Both of those felt like a good level of grind to me: Enough grind to keep me there doing the content, but not so much grind that I wanted to pull my hair out and quit. But as popular as Bozja was during its heyday, I also CONSTANTLY saw people who hated it and complained about how hard it was, how annoying it was to have to grind levels in it, how it was too hard, how it was punishing...

And all I could think was...then don't play it?? It's purely optional side content, but for a player like me, who wanted something challenging but not Savage level difficulty and time commitment at that point in time, it was perfect and exactly what I wanted. I have very fond memories of it.

I haven't played hardly any other MMOs besides this one, but I do think they need a better balance for time gating and grinding content. A little time gating is fine. Too much is frustrating and makes it hard to gear an alt job. A little bit of grinding is fine. I don't want to just be given a prize for showing up, that's boring, I want to work for and earn it. But doing something insane like 5000 FATEs (or whatever the actual number is, it's a lot is the point) is not a fun grind, that's ridiculous. I've played for years, cleared out FATEs in each zone, and I'm nowhere near that. I'm not doing that, that's way too much.

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Even now Bozja is pretty packed. I didn't even touch Bozja until I came back to FF14 during Dawntrail and finished the main story around late July. BSF during peak times when people get off work, at least on American Data Centers, is filled to the brim with people. Critical Engagements get 20+ people every single time and even CLL starts to fill. I had the most fun playing this game during Bozja... meeting a party and riding around farming with them and the chaos of Critical Engagements was awesome and makes me excited to try Dawntrail's field operations. I just hope people complaining about it don't negatively affect the new content and they focus on making it similar to Bozja because it felt just right with the grind and how long it took to finish, etc. My only hope is they don't make Delibrum Reginae a thing again to progress because you have to go out of your way out of the zone to do it. Make it focused only on large Critical Engagements designed like CLL and Dalriada, but also allow people to do raids outside the game for the relic so there's paths for both types of people.

They can add whatever grind they want. Just don't let vertical progression infect pvp