Current State of End-Game Contents - A Blog Post from A Japanese Player

[Yukiko]

Its sad, so many are selling iLvL 93+ Accounts...
FFXIV has a big Problem in endgame, because it is not fun!

[Nikraaa]

Brutal Mode and Shiva aren't 2.3.

Well, ok for Shiva but are you sure about Brutal Coil?

[Anatha]

I agree with the OP, there's no two ways about it, mechanics driven content is flawed. When everything is down to gathering 8 people who have patterns memorized, skill at your own role is rendered completely meaningless, the gear you've obtained, of no import.

There ARE ways to make things challenging without relying on such gimmicks, and some of them were outlined in the opening posts. This game would benefit from taking that advice.

[Atreides]

Endgame is just fine, the raid content is challenging, people hit a brickwall, some overcome it others don't.
Imo thats how it's suppose to be, I enjoyed the challenge and look forward for the brutal modes. I find the fact funny that some people call it casual when most of them haven't even cleared coil yet.
They just use the excuse "It's so boring and mechanic driven, thats not a challenge it's a design flaw." for me it translates to "It's too hard, I can't deal with mechanics please make it tank and spank."
For some reason many people seem to think that in order for it to be a good game everyone should be able to clear the top tier content...
I haven't seen an MMO that provides challenge without mechanics and I've played a lot.

[Melithea]

The original argument is that the current design of the fights and of the game overall is not fun to many in the playerbase across every play style.

Right. I've seen the arguments that apparently Turn 4 is the perfect balance of fun and challenging. It's no coincidence, then, that Turn 4 is about the hardest content in the game that you can simply overgear and faceroll with 0 thought process required from anyone but the off-tank for about 6 seconds toward the end. Is that really what fun is? Getting carried by your gear? The current battles have a place in the game. The problem with Titan isn't even the infamous instant-death shots. It's the unraisable death. Which oddly enough, is shared by Leviathan EX and yet practically nobody complains about this fight.

There's also a huge issue with the way this problem is being framed. People are taking issue with "mechanics-driven battles". The alternative to this would be battles with no mechanics. Think about what that would be. NO mechanics would mean every fight is basically the same as trash mobs. Are trash mobs fun? The only suggestion that the OP comes even close to making is truly randomized fights that use moves in an unpredictable order. I'm not sure if people realize that this would actually be both harder and less fun than what we have now. Yoshida has already explained why this is a terrible idea and basically takes victory out of the hands of the players entirely. Nobody has offered a real solution of how to remove mechanics and make content fun while keeping it challenging other than making the monsters stronger.

That's like saying grinding FATEs in Coerthas is more fun than grinding FATEs in East Shroud because the monsters are stronger.

[Kuwagami]

The problem with Titan isn't even the infamous instant-death shots. It's the unraisable death. Which oddly enough, is shared by Leviathan EX and yet practically nobody complains about this fight.

Leviathan is actually way more manageable with death. The only cause of unraisable death are derped slams or derped hysteria. It's not a race against lag. Both can be overcome by players eventually. While landslide is mostly overcome by your connection nowadays. Skill or reflex or whatever comes after the lag check (even if now server lag is out of the problem. SE can't fix every FAI problem individually obviously)

Coming from a "400ms on bad days" player, there is a whole world between both fight's unraisable mechanics. But yeah "fundamentally" they're not different.

There's also a huge issue with the way this problem is being framed. People are taking issue with "mechanics-driven battles". The alternative to this would be battles with no mechanics. Think about what that would be.

Why do people always see the world in black or white ? Couldn't the alternative to "mechanics-driven battles" just be "battle with mechanics" ?

Think hydra : few things to dodge, a grand total of 2 mechanics (adds and hysteria)
chimera : actually a bad example but still, 1 AoE to dodge, an other to silence, and a skill to avoid. Others are "don't stand in cones or it'll hurt"

Moogle Ex : only mechanics are "the king will revive his minions" and "the king will periodically buff nearby minions" (and delta strike if you want). All the other things to do in this fight is damage management to hit the king as hard as possible between each phase.

For these fights, even if eventually you may end up doing the same things every time you do them, are not driven by the mechanics. Once the mechanics are dealt with, you can do whatever you want. As opposed to (let's say) Titan HM/EX or T6 where you have to deal with a new mechanic as soon as the previous ends. Or as opposed to a plain "tank and spank" fight

[Roris]

Mechanics driven fights are fine as long as all the mechanics are fun and well executed and aren't just overconvoluted or thrown in droves for the sake of it, having reached T9 in Second Coil it sure is something figuring stuff out and executing it, but it isn't really that fun, it all just feels too mechanic. The closest comparison is a precision platformer like Super Meat Boy or I wanna be the guy, you have to time everything at the right moment and a small slip by you or someone else will probably mess it all up and make you go back to the very start of the level, as someone who 100% + whatever the extra % in SMB was, it's just as unfun as in there too.

Personally I really like Moogle EX because everything is mostly randomized and there isn't a strict order to things happening aside from phase changes, too bad people rarely do it because the rewards are just a neck accessory most people have by now.

[Pibz]

24-man content is easier than 8-man content by both design and definition. CT2 will be easier than Coil 1. People will be starting new characters and running CT2 two weeks later. Brutal Mode and Shiva aren't 2.3.



AbleGamers names Final Fantasy XIV accessible mainstream game of the year

Wow.. using an award that shows the game is well designed so that disabled people can enjoy most of it to show how the endgame encounters are ridiculously easy,regardless of how i feel on the subject, is just sad. Shame on you.
And wrong, brutal coil is 2.3 don't correct people when you are the one who's wrong.


As for the whole thread, why is this still going on?
They said they are nerfing the one shot mechanics on old fights, and they're introducing new Brutal Coil which is tuned higher and has more randomness in it. So seems more or less what the OP wanted.
So again, why are you guys still discussing this?

Personally I really like Moogle EX because everything is mostly randomized and there isn't a strict order to things happening aside from phase changes, too bad people rarely do it because the rewards are just a neck accessory most people have by now.

LOL, wut?!

[Iriadysa]

This game has 2000 hours of casual content and 2 hours of hardcore content, and the developers are catering to the elitists? Are you for real?

Without some difficult content, this is a Final Fantasy-flavored Second Life. Nobody should want that.

This is the argument I've been trying to explain to the numbheads that keep posting here, but the answer is either empty rhetoric, victimist end of the world preaching or a list of content that according to them is not casual enough (check that post by the guy with the BLM hat).

Apparently CT and coil 1 are "semi hardcore".

With views like that it's simply impossible to reconcile a middle ground because for these people something like CT or Coil 1 is already hard content. For any player with any semblance of skill, today's CT and Coil 1 are filler faceroll content.

Now, it's good that a game has filler easy mode semi rewarding content. It gives us something to do when we are bored and have no one competent to play with. We push the nifty DF button and there we have it, an instant raid that may give you a piece for one of your alt jobs. It also allows us to help friends that may be at a previous tier when it comes to end game. That this content exists is a good thing.

However, making all the top content like this is not.

The rest of the thread is filled with people trying to cover their complains with absurd logic and circle jerking ("omg, someone that thinks like me!" "omg, trying to reason with elitists is impossible!").

As I said before: this is the voracious casual crowd wanting to take the last 10% of the game that isn't casual. And apparently everyone else is toxic for not agreeing.

[Iriadysa]

Leviathan is actually way more manageable with death. The only cause of unraisable death are derped slams or derped hysteria. It's not a race against lag. Both can be overcome by players eventually. While landslide is mostly overcome by your connection nowadays. Skill or reflex or whatever comes after the lag check (even if now server lag is out of the problem. SE can't fix every FAI problem individually obviously)

Coming from a "400ms on bad days" player, there is a whole world between both fight's unraisable mechanics. But yeah "fundamentally" they're not different.

Good god, you lagging players simply cannot see other people happy, can you? Listen, "400ms on bad days" is not a connection fit for online gaming. You shouldn't be demanding an easier game just because you have subpar gear, this is just ridiculous. Of course you will have problems in Titan Ex with that piece of shit connection you use. If you can't do anything about it I pity you, but stop making that everyone else's problem. It's your own problem.

I do Titan Ex with 160+ms latency and everything is easy to dodge once you've understood the mechanics. LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE.

Moogle Ex : only mechanics are "the king will revive his minions" and "the king will periodically buff nearby minions" (and delta strike if you want). All the other things to do in this fight is damage management to hit the king as hard as possible between each phase.

Incidentally, Moogle Ex is miles easier than any other Ex primal. A fun one, however. The design of the fight is spot on to the intention and it's one of my favorite primals.

Should everything be like this? No.

Every time you see these people make their arguments they bring up examples of "acceptable content design" while the "unacceptable content" is limited to Titan Ex, T5 and Coil 2. And yet they won't realize that means most of the content is exactly what they want.

It's hilarious that you replied to someone who agreed with you. You did the very thing you accuse other people of doing, except change it to "omg, someone thinks like me!" "omg, trying to reason with casuals is impossible!".

Stay classy, hypocrisy.

Unless you have a reading impediment, for which I apologize if this insults you, I'm sure you will be able to see that I argument my position further than just circle jerking agreement.