Less Memorization - More Reaction? (Trials/Raids/Bosses)

[Zumi]

The top players really have no trouble with whatever SE puts out. I think its only 5-10% of the playerbase that clears final coil of Bahamut every week. But those players will clear the raid regardless of the mechanics because they are skilled.

Its the middle and casual players the ones who don't clear final coil that have a problem with clearing content. Randomness is an difficulty increase in most cases will only have a effect for mid or casual players. Hardcore players will still clear it.

[Kosmos992k]

The top players really have no trouble with whatever SE puts out. I think its only 5-10% of the playerbase that clears final coil of Bahamut every week. But those players will clear the raid regardless of the mechanics because they are skilled.

Its the middle and casual players the ones who don't clear final coil that have a problem with clearing content. Randomness is an difficulty increase in most cases will only have a effect for mid or casual players. Hardcore players will still clear it.

I agree, simply making the encounters random would not work. What about applying a bit more logic to the boss encounters?

What I mean is, Titan (for example) has a set of moves that he can use - like we do, so we can make the fight interesting. Give Titan;

• a global cool down,
• a rule set for when and how to use the moves,
• rules about the order his skills should be used in to make use of status effects,
• a way to assign threat and target priority,
• grant the rock head a tiny amount of intelligence for decision making,
• finally add 2 tenths of a second "thinking" time to his decision making

The thinking time prevents the fights from becoming cheapened by obvious "cheating" by the AI. This also gives the players a chance to react to what is going on.

This could work for any/all bosses, and would still allow certain phases of a fight to be scripted if that is what the designers desire. It would make the fights more interesting because a) the boss would act based on the player actions, and the players would have to have a strategy to deal with the expected actions of the boss, as well as reacting to whatever the boss actually does.

To make things a little more 'realistic' the AI could get a little fuzzy when there are two or more viable options, occasionally picking the less optimal option.

This would make fights much more unique each time they are run, and maintain a level of difficulty over a longer period of time until players either over-gear the fight, or the attacks used by the Boss are nerfed to facilitate easier progression over time.

I just feel like this would work so much better since it does away with team jump rope, but does not introduce simple RNG based cheating boss attacks. It's a bit more work for the devs, but the end result would be much more satisfying for players - in my opinion.