Dear Square Enix! Make the game harder, not easier!

[Jynxii]

Lets be honest here you are not looking for "challenging" content. You are just looking for exclusive gear that you would only be able to obtain due to having more time on your hand.

Exclusive from the people suffering from poobrain?

The OP didn't ask for content that takes hours to clear, he asked for challenging content that can't be facerolled. Even some of the 'toughest' dungeons in Vanilla WoW (You know, when things actually required so skill/coordination) didn't take hours to clear, they were just challenging, and once you learnt the mechanics (and got a bit of gear), you could cruise through them in 3-4 hours.

Like everything, guides will be published, and even 'hard' content will be doable by people that put in a little bit of time to gear up before hand, and make an effort to learn something instead of calling BS mechanics or lag. Elitist or not, if you want to do 'end game' content/raids, and can't be bothered investing the time to get a full DL set before trying to burden yourself on 7 other players, then you need to re-evaluate your position.

A full darklight takes a bit of time to get; are you suggests HM Garuda / Titan should be doable with AF gear? Don't worry, a lot of people seem to think this as they pop up all the friggen time.

[Kraggy]

you could cruise through them in 3-4 hours.

LMAO, because people with real-lives can devote 3-4 hours uninterrupted to play a video game.

Fact is, as Blizzard admitted years ago and is more true today than ever, raiders are in the words of one of Trion's CM team "a SMALL MINORITY" and that holds for any MMO you care to name. As such the developers don't need to pander to these elitists because they don't bring in significant revenue and are not as important as they like to think they are.

If the vast majority of players don't get to see content, then things are broken.

[SakuraOmega]

LMAO, because people with real-lives can devote 3-4 hours uninterrupted to play a video game.

Students and the unemployed, probably, most others, no.

Fact is, as Blizzard admitted years ago and is more true today than ever, raiders are in the words of one of Trion's CM team "a SMALL MINORITY" and that holds for any MMO you care to name. As such the developers don't need to pander to these elitists because they don't bring in significant revenue and are not as important as they like to think they re.

what world do you live in? Cant devote 3-4 hours ? If you realy want your items you will Work out a time table. If you realy dont care, of course you wont have time. And You do have weekends. Any person can allocate 3-4 hours if they want to do something. Even tho you have 100% work, kids wife etc. You can make it work. If you cant well then you shouldnt realy play mmos and think your getting endgame

[Jynxii]

LMAO, because people with real-lives can devote 3-4 hours uninterrupted to play a video game.

Wait, you want major raid content that takes how long exactly? What is an 'ideal' length for a RAID, not one or two bosses, but an entire raid. If you want to down 8+ bosses in an hour, you are kidding yourself. It is not only an insult to the player base, but an insult to the content designers as well, who would no doubt have some amazing ideas, but have to make sure the fights are over in five minutes because the 'majority' can't invest 3 hours into it. You have primals that take 10-15 (less as you get more geared) which you can 'casually' do, and I'm pretty sure they have more single-boss, no-trash fights coming, so there is plenty of 'short' content. Also, when did it say it had to be uninterrupted?

It boggles me how you want an entire raid zone with multiple bosses and the usual trash mobs to be less than 3 hours. I mean, you invest so much time getting your Darklight gear, and if you aren't 'speed' running a normal dungeon will take you about 60 minutes (give or take). but you want to invest less than 3 hours for a piece of major content. Honestly, if you can't invest 3-4 hours over a 7 day period into FF14, you probably aren't geared enough to take on such content anyway.

Also, overcasualizing has two potential and damaging effects. Your 'hardk0re' players won't feel challenged, and unless they're after some form of 'world first' rep, will move on looking for a more challenging experience. Then you'll have your 'casuals' who want easier, more accessible content, but quickly become bored with it and move on to the 'next big game'.

People also need to realise that this isn't WoW, and the memories that (some) people made during the early days, and that big time investment, simply won't apply to FF14 for quite some time (unless you're legacy). Hell, even WoW is hemoraging players, and they've had at least a year (on most players) to build some kind of investment/loyalty/draw.

Ultimately you can't please everyone, and if you pander to one group, the other will get annoyed, but I think (and I could be wrong) that it would be wise for SE to slow play any 'buffs/nerfs' to the encounters. As I mentioned (and someone else did as well I believe), the content feels like it is in a good spot right now. Half the content is actually gated by (transparent) gear checks (dps/hps/HP), which isn't a matter of being inaccessible, just that you have to invest some time to get ready for it. Most of the mechanics are just patterns that any normal human being will learn after being exposed to it half a dozen times. I wonder if the content is actually 'too hard', or if people just aren't geared for it; I definitely had a far easier time fighting Chimera in my mostly Darklight set than when I attempted it with one or two pieces and the rest AF1 (although you can do it in AF1. This is a horrible example I know).