Mistaking difficulty for other things

[Dragon]

Having to look left and right at the same time.

I do that all the time, what's your problem?

Is it wrong to ask for difficult content as soon as it's released? Personally I would like a challenge that's nearly unbeatable as soon as it's released and as testing goes weaken it a tad to see how it works. That way it'll keep people wanting to try to beat it for the rewards, and people won't be through the whole thing within a few weeks (maybe days) and just quit running it altogether. And it'd be an extra perk for those LS elitists that manage to beat the content, because they'd have bragging rights for the rest of the game's existence as long as they have proof to show that they did it, and when they did it.

I agree.

All content should be difficult to beat when it first comes out, and then dwindles over on a monthly-scheduled system by the devs.

Topic: I remember hating the caps in FFXI, then I started playing more games without the level caps (well that or those MMORPGs' version of level caps that were more like level restrictions), and at the end of the day I realized I'd rather have the level caps implemented in FFXI since it can keep content fresh and/or at least keeps content from 'disappearing' because you're too high for said content or the sort thereof.

Then once level caps are implemented, it would be nice to start seeing level-scaled quests and missions too. Like instead of removing the cap for the promies, you could go in as Lv.30 or Lv.75 after beating them while capped at Lv.30. (Though to prevent abuse, you would have to exit to join others for the other cap; otherwise you wouldn't be able to group up or interact with anyone not under the same level cap.)

[Dragon]

the minute someone gains "bragging rights" over a pretend fight is the day ff community dwindles to the depths of the wow community sadly. ewwwww
not to mention the "elitists". thats exactly what this game does NOT need tyvm.

Never FFXI'd much, I take it?

[Xeak]

Thanks for agreeing with my Dragon. And MistyMew, ever think that it's because of those elitists that the rest of us actually learn how to kill certain things? I wouldn't doubt at all if the first THM to beat the high level NMs solo was just some bored elitist looking for a challenge (or suicidal), and same goes for the people who just decided to start killing level 99 mobs as well. Not saying that it was in fact elitists who started that, but more than likely it could've been. And honestly, a game without elitists isn't possible. They're going to be there no matter what, whether the game completely sucks or if it's the most bad ass game out there.

[Rhianu]

Difficulty = (chance of failure) x (penalty for failure)

Personally, I like my games to have a high chance of failure, but a low or non-existent penalty for failure. That way, I have to play well and play smart in order to overcome the obstacles of the game, but I don't get frustrated or angry when I get killed.

[weeble]

Difficulty = (chance of failure) x (penalty for failure)

Personally, I like my games to have a high chance of failure, but a low or non-existent penalty for failure. That way, I have to play well and play smart in order to overcome the obstacles of the game, but I don't get frustrated or angry when I get killed.

pretty much same, though no failure pentalties i like only cause ...with them people end up quiting if you don't rip threw it in 1-2 tries ..so no penalty can keep most people trying long as the group don't suck and it's just really hard content.

for non mmo games i am the same but i don't like repeating things. i'll play on hardest mode and quit usually. never playing it again. with mmo's it's all repetetive, but i like stuff like cop where it was very hard and i didn't really need to do it again. if they could make something like cop and add it in every 6months i'd never leave this game.

[lenn1]

the minute someone gains "bragging rights" over a pretend fight is the day ff community dwindles to the depths of the wow community sadly. ewwwww
not to mention the "elitists". thats exactly what this game does NOT need tyvm.

Sense of accomplishment is doing something to brag about, and that's what most are asking for in difficulty. Anything to get the community going is welcomed, weather it's negative or positive. Right now outside of your LS there is no community in this game.

[Platinumstorm]

My post at this time is useless but at some point I would be increasing the time it takes to level from 1-20, and decreasing the time it takes to level from 20-50, while developing challenging content to get through for all level ranges. Challenge should come from mechanisms from both the player's class and the monster's ability, not from the time it takes you to get leveled up.

We aren't in a "content wave," yet, because core systems are still being redesigned, but once core systems are finished, then content needs to be fleshed out for all level ranges.

Some people are talking about satisfaction. There's not a lot of satisfaction in the game like someone else mentioned because there is so much money in the game; which makes acquiring gear feel trivial; especially since all of the weapons and armor are undervalued anyhow.

I think the worst part of lack of satisfaction are the terrible, terrible moves that you gain as you rank up. They make no impact and aren't significantly different from the other moves that you get, so there's no challenge to your moves, and for the most part you can just pick an assortment of moves that you like the animations for and use them.

I suppose most MMOs would rather their players just be bulked up with tons of content that they'll never bore of regardless of being so easy (like WoW). I think the easy content is a bore just going through it the first time, and getting whatever treasures from it isn't as rewarding, and those "elitists" who rule WoW shouldn't be considered elitists.

?

While WoW does baby people through leveling, the game does have interesting mechanisms in their raiding. This game has no interesting mechanisms in the game at all, and coordination is almost never required.

WoW's newest content patch has more casual player mechanics than FF14 has in the entire game for hardcore/casual mechanics combined.

You're correct that FFXIV needs players desperately, which means there has to be accessible content - and content that is aimed at the lower levels is arguably more important right now than content aimed at higher levels.

You're incorrect that WoW is full of pansies, as it has a wide assortment of players, but any WoW player could easily do any of the content in FFXIV provided they would last through the boredom in this game.

[syntaxlies]

I see a lot of people saying more difficulty is something they'd really want to see added to the game. A number of people are saying they want that more than anything. I even saw one person say that difficulty essentially equaled things that require more time and effort.

I really hope this is not what we are asking for. Something is not difficult because you have to spend more time on it. As for the effort part I get the feeling that its only considered effort because of the amount of time being put in.

But even if its because you have to fight nothing but mobs that are way higher level than you. Time and Effort is not Difficulty. Difficult things often require more time and effort but it doesn't work backwards.

I would much rather think of difficulty as something that is mentally engaging and challenging and of course still fun.

What is difficulty to you? Are we really just asking for more grind (time and effort) or is it really a challenging engaging experience that we're after? Clarity is important when the devs are listening so closely.

One last note, there was a dev response recently about them making crafting easier. I don't think it needs to be any easier but we can talk about that in another post.

you mean camping for 3 days for a 10 min window isn't difficult, wheres my dictionary.lol.

[lackofwords]

I don't care much for penalty, take a look at Abe Oddworld games, which the only penalty for dying was restarting from a checkpoint.

In my opinion, difficulty should be skill, and skill alone. What do I mean by skill? It is the ability to analyze your current situation, and apply the correct techniques to increase your chance of success.

I'm going to use a battle situation, since most players can relate to it.

Ever heard of the phrase 'knowing is half the battle'? Obviously, we can't always know what is going to happen when we encounter a "new" monster. However, overtime by battling the same monster you will gain knowledge about it, which would better help you analyze a live battle situation.
E.G. Peiste has a cone aoe attack, you would keep an eye out for it when it is charging up an attack. When you see it's eyes glowing, it is executing a paralyze attack, you should keep your paralyna ready for a quick response.

When everyone actually plays their best move in a battle situation, everyone can feel good about defeating a DIFFICULT monster.

[Phenidate]

The underlying main issue with the game is there is no feeling of accomplishment no reward.

So you have 2 issues of why people are complaining they are not the same.
-Difficulty does not = time , but the people who are bringing in the time complaint are doing so because atm square is taking 2-3 months to develop content which is good for 2hrs.... think about that for a sec.

Patch hasn't even been live for an hour and half and it only took you two hours to get through all the new content?
Impressive Doc; say mind if I borrow the Delorean for a bit?

You'll be saddened to know that adding content to a game is not as easy as writing up a story and loading it up to a server.

The general pipeline for new content to a game involves creating the assets, scripting any events and the minutiae for driving the content, any new game resources (items, characters, monsters, NPCs, dialogue) and THEN, testing all that, removing or replacing what didn't work, and then doing this for each piece of content.

With all the changes being made to the core of the game I'm taking a wild guess and saying its great they added what new content they did on top of the changes to the interface and combat.