I hate the idea of Echo Buff. It should be part of some easy server not whole game.

[Nadrojj]

They need it, a lot of people who don't have the skill to complete some of the harder instances are leaving the game, a game that caters to casuals can't afford their core audience to leave because they can't beat some content. I'm not a huge fan of it, but you can toggle it, so you aren't forced to use it.

[Mindylou]

i am thrilled for the echo buff!!
thank you se for considering your entire playerbase and not just the too vocal minority D
good job! this attitude will indeed earn the game the most profit and long life.

stop whining op , toggle it off and r e l a x.

[PArcher]

Ah, I was referring to just the ADS fight at the end of the turn, but yes you're right. Not having to wait around for the last clock tick + blitzing the mini death stars at the beginning does make the whole turn a LOT faster. ^_^

Honestly, even just ADS it should be about the same amount of time. Maybe 30 seconds or so faster with Enrage due to dodging, but overall not that much of a loss IMO, esp compared to the extra 5-ish minutes waiting to start Enrage...

[cotti]

And I hate the idea of you not even trying to understand how the Echo works before crying out loud about it, OP.

[HaiHai]

I've said this already in another thread, so here's the short version.

Will you still be able to be landslided off the side in titan with echo? Yes.
Will you still have to drop the plume to protect yourself in Garuda Ex? Yes.
Will you still have handle conflags properly in Twintania? Yes.
Will you still be able to be knocked into a wall from divebombs? Yes.

Will you still have to observe the fights mechanics or wipe? Yes.

Echo buff is a nerf, I'm not saying it isn't. However, you will still have to learn the mechanics to win the fight. Once you know the mechanics, you're going to win the fight anyway. All the echo buff does is make it a bit faster, less prone to RNG, and lesser consequences from silly human errors.

I have to respectfully disagree with this. One shot mechanics may not be effected by the echo buff, but they are hardly the worst part of most of the "difficult" encounters in this game.

Titan X for example, landslides are probably the easiest mechanics of the encounter to deal with other than the prison gaols. Dealing with triple stack bombs during slides, weights, plumes and double plumes are are more difficult. I see people die to those infinity more than landslide. All if which will be incredibly less punishing with the echo buff. Dps phase checks like heart/nails will now also be irrelevant.

As far as conflags are concerned on Twin. They are actually of no consequence now, because they do not one shot players. I have seen tanks with enough hp and gear actually survive exploding conflags, and with 30% more hp it's possible that everyone else will too. Not to mention, the most difficult part of conflags was never placing them, but actually having your dps be geared and play well enough to down them before the timer ends. Which also is now irrelevant with the echo buff dmg buff. Snakes, adds during twisters, enrage timer, death sentences, also all now irrelevant with echo.

My point is that with the echo buffs, you don't need to learn the mechanics to win the fight anymore. Both getting knocked into walls by divebomb and getting blown up by twisters are salvageable failures, easily fixed by rezzes which will now be even easier to do with buffs to healing making mana less precious and dmg buffs making it less important the dps remains alive for beating enrage/mechanics.

30% is like having another 2 players in your group worth of dmg and healing, like you are doing the fight with 10 people instead of 8.

Can you not the know the fight at all and complete it? Probably not.

Can you play terribly and still defeat the encounter? Probably.

[Yoohre_WildRiver]

can this be abused? i see a full party forcing wipe to get an easy kill and stacking echo buffs

[Velo_Vandore]

I think there's a misconception that players who want to experience content at it's highest difficulty will always push on to end game quickly, and players who choose to take their time are not capable of, or interested in, clearing very difficult content.

I don't mind other players doing easy mode, and I don't want to play with "hardcore" players exclusively, so I think an easy mode server is not the answer. Most times I play real casual and take my time, but I am sad to know the price is that I'll always be playing a nerfed end game when it's ex-end game.

Square-enix could try to maintain both a 100% difficulty mode, and a relaxed mode. The players who play for the challenge itself wouldn't need any extra achievement or reward for the 100% difficulty mode. The fact is it's more work to maintain two difficulty modes, and we don't know if this would be well used or in high demand. Why should they bother if the 100% difficulty mode never gets used anyway and everyone just grinds for loot on easy mode? Would you use the mode knowing the rewards are no greater? Let Square-enix know!

edit: And guys - I'm talking 100% difficulty mode! Even if the buff is optional the "alleviated" ADS "High Voltage", even if only a minor amount will mean you can't ever prove to other, or more importantly, to yourself, you could have done it in it's original state.

Finally, I wonder, if the 100% difficulty mode option was maintained, would the sense motivation / urgency to progress be relaxed in many players, and how might that affect player distribution across low to high content, and could it ultimately affect subscriptions, whether positive or negative?

[Alwryn]

snip

I'm about to head out the door, wish I had time for a more detail post.


Anyway. Fair points. However.

Twisters, what if the healers to tank gets hit by them? What if they get hit by divebombs? What if the healers stand too close to twintania and get twister adds on them, too close to be able to kill them? What if people are running twisters all over each other? What if a dps doesn't move when he gets marked for conflag and jails half the raid?

Yes, the mechanics are easier, but only once you have a understanding of how to work them, which was my point. I think we're both coming from the same direction, just looking at it from different angles.

[PArcher]

Square-enix could try to maintain both a 100% difficulty mode, and a relaxed mode. The players who play for the challenge itself wouldn't need any extra achievement or reward for the 100% difficulty mode. The fact is it's more work to maintain two difficulty modes, and we don't know if this would be well used or in high demand. Why should they bother if the 100% difficulty mode never gets used anyway and everyone just grinds for loot on easy mode? Would you use the mode knowing the rewards are no greater? Let Square-enix know!

You do know that the difficulty is unchanged if you don't wipe, and even if you wipe you can remove the buff that lowers the difficulty?

[Velo_Vandore]

You do know that the difficulty is unchanged if you don't wipe, and even if you wipe you can remove the buff that lowers the difficulty?

for some content yes, but for coil (the hardest content):

2 weeks after the patch 2.2 release
　　　・The effect will automatically be activated upon entry of the instance.
　　　・Your HP, damage dealt, and cure potency will be increased by 10%.

- 8 weeks after the patch 2.2 release
　　　・The effect will automatically be activated upon entry of the instance.
　　　・Your HP, damage dealt, and cure potency will be increased by 30%.

- 2 weeks after the patch 2.2 release
　　　・You will be able to enter the dungeon through the Duty Finder (solo).
　　　・The reflection damage of the Clockwork Knights in Turn 4 will be alleviated.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...-Updates/page4

Essentially this means that for coil, I can never have the opportunity to complete the content at the original maximum difficulty. This makes me sad. I'm not saying there will be no challenge, but the option to play the hardest version will not exist. You can rush through to the next end game content sure, but that's not what I'm after.