8 man "raids" = final content?

[Kiara]

I think it's a bigger issue actually orchestrating a fluid 24-man content that is actually challengive, meaningful and not allowing people to just leech away at it. We have yet to see a single 24-man raid that's more than just a loot fest where half the people half-afk watching Netflix.

The same company (albeit different teams) was able to create and execute a 64 Player Raid in Final Fantasy XI known as "Dynamis."

In the early years (pre-nerf), Dynamis was an exciting, engaging, challenging massive Raid that required coordination and team work to get through.

Dynamis-Xarcabard (early years), had a Main End Boss that was a challenge to reach, had other NMs that could drop important Gear / Items needed for End Game, and had Side Paths with Alternate NMs to kill to get drops for your Relic Quest (in that game, Relics were Hardcore and the Best Weapon for a long time), so it mattered.

Your entire Raid could get wiped out by a bad pull and aggro from additional groups if you weren't paying attention, so "no," there was no room to Netflix in the early years of this Raid.

It felt like a huge accomplishment to get through, and every Enemy killed (even "trash mobs") could drop Rare Currency that players could keep, or sell, or pool together to help someone accomplish their years-long Relic grind.

I realize it's a different time now, and people don't like this type of stuff any more. But I hope we get something akin to a Sky from XI, or Dynamis Lite perhaps in 3.0. It was great inviting multiple LSs, Friends, others on the Server to all group together and participate.

[Wournsfeik_Untawhasyn]

Dynamis related stuff

Dynamis was also after 75 grueling levels of the game punishing you if you didn't learn how every iota of your job worked. You can't have the levelling game be what it is right now AND THEN suddenly go 'I hope all this unchallenging content where the punishment is a small fee in gil taught you every single niche thing about your abilities and when to use them. Because now you're going to need to etch out a niche in the already existing endgame player set, find 50+ other 'not bad players' and pray that they don't already have groups they run with. (There's also a reason FFXI turned it's back on that model. And you can cite that it's dying today all you'd like, but it probably would've been dead without a pulse years sooner if not for what Abyssea and Adoulin did.)

Oh, and hey, you're going to need to learn who all the other raiders on your server are, because if you try to schedule when they do, guess what you're gonna get? A pissing match that takes place over the course of an hour. Oh, and the best part about this system? If you're a guild leader it's great because you'll be rolling in all that Ancient Currency and have your Relic in... oh, let's say a month, probably more like half a year if you're lucky given FFXI time sinks. But if you're not part of the core six people responsible for the raid? Well, maybe they'll toss some gil your way with all the ancient currency nobody needs.

It was a system that favored corrupt guild leaders who could swindle people into running with them, and there was more than one case of this. But finding 7 other people out of the plethora of people that you play well with and are good is not actually mind numbingly time consuming.

[SpookyGhost]

Dynamis was also after 75 grueling levels of the game punishing you if you didn't learn how every iota of your job worked.

Really good point, and one I've noticed since way early on in XIV. Leveling in this game doesn't even prepare you for Coil, let alone something as complicated as Dynamis.

[Wournsfeik_Untawhasyn]

Which in itself is fine enough. I went from pre-50 through HL Dungeons and Primals into Coil. I learned as I went and fell on my face more than once. But I did play (and still do play) FFXI, so I hold a certain regard for learning what your skills do and experimenting to get the most out of them.

Hopefully Heavensward will be a bit harder and force you to learn a bit more. These last couple of MSQ trials have me hoping that they mean it when they say that ARR was meant to reintroduce and teach, and that HW will be made with the baseline ARR set in mind.