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

[silentwindfr]

- team play: exept the bard song all the rest are base of the trinity. it's not team play, team play will recquire that people will cover each other or work together. here it's every dps do them cycle while respecting the pattern and that all, tank and healer are the only one that really do a bits of teamplay, but like said before it's the base of the trinity, without this why bring a healer or a tank.

- Artificial way to increase the difficulty of combat: it's the main trouble we have, they are like the dev of wow that did discover the frenesy and did place them on every boss for make sure a fight don't go too long. here it's like the dev saying, don't do something we don't want! if you don't follow our pattern you are dead! we are following one way to beat the game almost like kids holding the hand the dev have give us. indeed time to time player do find stuff that dev didn't think. (like for the dive of T5) but they are rare.

- more human and less machine content: by making fight fully scripted, they strips us of our humanity and force us to follow a rail, we are not different than a bot, following one pattern and only one. i'm almost surprise no one have made bot for this content! human are an adaptable race, but in FF14, we don't use this capacity!

some people say, if we don't do scripted it will be chaos... yes, it will be chaos and that maybe what they need to look after for a time, make the fight more chaotic, not in the way that we will die for nothing, but in the way, that RL will have a real role, that offtank will have a role, that control will have a role, that our teamplay can exist finally. soo far we are only looking to a CS where we need to press the button and be at the right place when is needed, nothing much.

a fight is chaos, trying to order it at this extend make them blend to the point to lack of deepth.

ps: i haven't gone very far for the team play, but if you want talk of teamplay, let's talk of the Skill chain and mana burst from FF11... this is was teamplay.

[zlotjko]

^
@ team play, guess bards do not play tp song. Drgs do not boost bards damage nor have high dmg burst for a melee. Mnks do not have mantra, reduce the int of the boss, can off tank for a short amount of times if needed. Melee LB? Then magic dps, as lords of the aoe dps, smns that can ress. Blms that can sleep, bind. Schs and Whm that can off tank for short periods of time. When you change your team composition (not go 2 tanks or 2 healers), and have mechanics that require that someone goes out of his usual rotation that should be his second nature, you should be able to see a lot of teamwork, because all players are trying to compensate for the lack of certain class in some phases for the benefit in some other phases.

Seeing a WHM or SCH tank 1 golem, bard kiting the other while the only tank tanks the last one, shows you some of that. Especially when you are yet to do that for the first time. When it becomes a routine, it just means that you have are doing it a way that works for you and your team the best. A (unlucky) crit(s) or drop in focus can easily show you how fragile some things are. Then there are weapon upgrades that change the fight (different aggro distribution) and needs modifying your current strat usually mid fight. Changing who uses LB depending on the situation. When things do not go wrong, it doesn't mean that the fight design is bad, it means you are doing it good enough.

What i see is that people that have not even tried coil savage are asking for fights that are more rng dependent but require less gear. Do the boring mechanics fight first, then fill your need for rng with savage coils. Until you have done that, you have no right to talk about team play or different balance.

Reminds me of a DRG who couldn't place meteors in T9 properly then left the game because the game was too easy...

[silentwindfr]

monk that reduce int.... well magnificient. i guess you means the virus from ACN... whatever.
anyway, we do have skill that can be used for teamplay, but that happend rarelly, outside the bard and it song (and i have said it), the other teamplay mechanic are lackluster.

you are talking of the savage Coil, but us we are talking of the whole end game, not only a small part that are designed for 2-4% of the population. all i see there it's someone that are happy with the mechanic used by the game, that nice, it's your right. however, it's our right to say that it's far to be enough! scripted fight, artificial difficulty and lack of teamplay are by far what make this game far to be amazing.

and i will be rude one second, we don't need to do Savage coil, for say that most of the game are bland and without deepth. you are simply the one arrogant and coming here saying you hold the truth and that our opinion don't have any value because we don't do what you do. i know a loot of hardcore gamer that have simply abandon the game because of all the stuff that was pointed soo far. you like DDR fight it's your right... it's your right to defend it... but it's rude to try to make our opinion less important because we don't have try savage coil. the game is not only means for 2-4% of the population!

i know a lot of people that want to play in end game, but stop, because they find it boring and tasteless. we don't ask for a CS or to be hold the hand while the whole fight. but we don't ask too for mechanic like insta kill to be over used for make sure people will follow the script. because that the whole point of all this talk. the fact that the devellopper are not designing a fight with a challenge, but design a cut scene interactive. if they continue on this way, we will get a dragon's lair multiplayer, where you do have less of 1 second for react in group before die automatically.

i don't say, that the fight don't recquire skill, i say that the skill asked are not enough: coordination, adaptability, teamplay, reactivity and intelligence must be tested while a fight. you can even add personal skill to it and group skill. soo far it's not what it's tested in FF14: ARR.

[zlotjko]

Dragons kick, opo-opo form bonus: reduces targets blunt resistance and INT by 10%, duration 15 sec. (you might want to reread rest of your main class skills too).
Now lets continue the debate.

CDs (cooldown skills) are meant to be used. If you are not using them, you are showing how you contribute to your teams effort. Making healing easier for 15 sec isn't a bad way to get on a healers good side.

Savage coil, is for players that want a greater challenge. If you are bored with usual stuff, want something that tests your limits, go there. It simple. Maybe just 2-4% will complete it, but that doesn't mean you can't have fun trying. Or you just want the loot and the title?

As for the whole or should we say, rest of the game (without savage coil), its a training ground for content like the savage coil.
If you can't clear that other content that is boring and heavily scripted (for some players), that means you aren't ready for the real challenge.
If you have cleared it, nothing is stopping you to try savage. But don't say that you want harder stuff when you can't clear the current one.

Tbh am not sure what you are asking for.
You want more RNG in the rest of the game, more mechanics that require quick reaction and test skill, when the 60-70% of the current population can't clear the current one.
Then devs go out of their way to create content that has more RNG, higher difficulty, requires that all players on the team use everything they got,all the time, and you say, its just for the elite 2-4%.
You have the option. Not using it, is your choice. Its like you want to skip college and go straight for PHD, then say that PHD is only for 2-4%.
Finish everything rest first, and then there is a challenge waiting for you. You want to bring the challenge to college and then even less people will be able to finish it, which then will reduce the overall players and start slowly to kill FFXIV (for example Titan Ex, which immo needs to be a little tweaked, like more time till WotL hits, lag wise and maybe a little more ilvl required).

Am i arrogant? Yes, i am, thus am not offended or consider you rude for pointing that out. But that doesn't mean that there aren't more options available for you and your team. It just means that you are not using those options.

Daily things, like normal dungeons, are supposed to be fun and easy. Halatali HM and Tam-Tara HM also have interesting boss fights. Stone Vigil HM last boss also requires that you keep an eye on the bosses. It can even 1shot a 110 ilvl mnk with blood for blood (thou it will not kill you without it).

Tbh i think you and some other players want more frequent updates because you get bored doing same things all the time, yet have no ambition to even try to get to the real challenge.

P.S. Sorry if using "you" sounds like am targeting you as an individual, its not my goal. Its meant for general population that has a similar mindset you like, not you as an individual. (trying not to be personal about the topic/issue)

[polyhedral]

constantly dying to silly gimmicks isn't fun. spending hours dying isn't fun.

[Defteros]

constantly dying to silly gimmicks isn't fun. spending hours dying isn't fun.

if you are still dying to these "silly gimmicks", after hours dying and trying, it's time you stop doing endgame, and start spending your time by leveling a DoL.

[Jacost]

What we're asking for is content that is around the same level of difficulty, but requires on-the-fly adaption to changing circumstances in the fight rather than just memorization of the enemy attack pattern. Something that actually feels like a fight rather than just an exam you study for. Not harder, just a different kind of challenge. Savage Coil is only there for people who can already clear the Second Coil consistently, when most of the playerbase has yet to clear Turn 5. I don't want uber-hard content, I just want content that requires that I use a part of my brain other than my memory.

ATM the only content that feels like that is healing, and occasionally tanking. Which is why the healing classes are my favourite to play.

[Fendred]

The easiest explanation is that this kind of combat has been done so much in the massively-multiplayer variant of RPGs that people are not really all that enchanted with it anymore. People come for the content, but stay for the people. However, western developers only pushed the combat ever slightly forward because they hinged the success of their games far too much on that fact. When Yoshida and Co undertook the task of updating their MMORPG (and they've done a great job at that), they looked heavily at western and korean MMORPGs who had been stuck in the evolutionary malaise of the last decade.

They don't need to be revolutionary innovators. All they need to do is handle the problems that should have been dealt with no later than half a decade ago and people would be kissing their boots and calling them god.

[silentwindfr]

Dragons kick, opo-opo form bonus: reduces targets blunt resistance and INT by 10%, duration 15 sec. (you might want to reread rest of your main class skills too).

mea culpa, you was right about this one...
anyway, you miss the point totally, we do point that memorize and repeat long pattern while doing it with 7 other person and pray that everybody will do it. can be quite hard, if the personal skill of the member in this category is lacking. but, at the same time, it's quite accessible if you have the right person with you.

we are not robot, not everyone is the same... and not everyone want simply repeat the same lesson over and over and over for beat content. we want to have challenge, we don't say that the actual endgame is lacking a sort of challenge, however, it lack deepth. making it really fast boring and tasteless. if your group beat the content 1-2 times, it's over... it will beat it each time. because nothing can happend that will make the fight different.

another point, and this one anger me generally (not you there) the fact that people think that other can't evolve and get better at something... it's quite arrogant to think that the other can't learn, when it's one of the particularity of the mankind. but, for make people want to become better, the challenge need to be fun, and that not the case, it's frustration with all the one shoot mechanic... it's possible to make hard content, without use any one shoot mechanic or frenzy one! sadly in this recent years, most of the dev from mmorpg industry think it's needed to create a content that revolve around this artificial way to increase the difficulty of a content.

instead to offer us various challenge testing different capacity of the community, training them for be able to offer more variation, they fall in the simplicity of this easy mechanic.
and that what people like me say... we don't say that we can't face challenge like the one present, but that we don't feel the thrill to beat it... because it's too much boring. when you come from game that ask you to take decision instantly because the boss simply don't have any pattern... and arrive here. you can't say that this sort of challenge is fun or interesting.

Yoshida talk of make the game better for keep more player... sadly he fail drastically when it's about endgame content. reward are not always what drive people to face a fight... challenge and fun to do it's far more important than the reward.

The easiest explanation is that this kind of combat has been done so much in the massively-multiplayer variant of RPGs that people are not really all that enchanted with it anymore. People come for the content, but stay for the people. However, western developers only pushed the combat ever slightly forward because they hinged the success of their games far too much on that fact. When Yoshida and Co undertook the task of updating their MMORPG (and they've done a great job at that), they looked heavily at western and korean MMORPGs who had been stuck in the evolutionary malaise of the last decade.

They don't need to be revolutionary innovators. All they need to do is handle the problems that should have been dealt with no later than half a decade ago and people would be kissing their boots and calling them god.

this is sooo true. mmorpg, didn't really evolve in the last decade, because WoW did make the genre stagnate, what make a genre evolve and grow, it's the competition for many year wow didn't had true rival... and they haven't try to really evolve... in fact they have even make the genre take a few bad turn and need to be changed.

[Clavaat]

if your group beat the content 1-2 times, it's over... it will beat it each time. because nothing can happend that will make the fight different.

I have a lot of trouble understanding this argument. What would you suggest they do? This is the case of every video game ever. The fights at endgame have RNG, they are not the same every time. Sometimes you have to adjust your strat because a healer got selected for an enemy attack instead of a DPS, for example.

I'm not saying it wouldn't be cool, but there is no way to program a "true" AI that would all of a sudden change what it is doing for the sake of a player. Take Super Mario World for example: when you get to a boss, you have to first figure out what makes this boss different from a regular enemy, understand the arena, and learn to process beat it. This fight doesn't change. It is the same every time, except maybe he goes left instead of right (parallel would be my above example in FFXIV). Memorizing the fight doesn't mean you win every time, you can make mistakes. This is exactly the same as Sonic, Dark Souls, Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, etc.

Hell, even FFXI did this. You learn to kite Kirin, pull the adds, wait for the next, etc. I guess it was just easier...

I understand that coordinating that same kind of fight with 7 other people seems daunting, but just like any other video game, you break it down role-by-role and react accordingly. Like any other video game, it takes practice.