Esoteric gear doesn't feel like AF2

[Iromi]

Agreed, OP! In 1.x when the job AF came out..we had REALLY good stories and quests that had to be defeated with a full group for our AF. Not only did it feel like an accomplishment, they had a wonderful story to go with it.

I was extremely let down when I saw it was just thrown into the usual 2.0 "roulette" grind. :/

[Gilraen]

I think we're forgetting something that alot of people are hating about Heavensward right now... quests. It's FULL of them. I literally lost count of how many I've done just in getting to level 60, and that's with me having skipped the ones between level 57-60 because of dungeon grinding for gear. The disgruntlement of having to do more just for AF2 would have been palpable. I do think the tomes vendor wasn't the best choice but at least it doesn't play into the growing unhappiness that is the quest grind.

[SuzakuCMX]

In 1.0 you had to open specific treasure coffers in the end-game dungeons that would only spawn if you had the quest.

Also I'm very displeased that AF2 was made to be the weekly-limited currency reward. What kind of BS is that? The original AF was given as a quest reward, the dyeable versions crafted, and the upgraded versions from tomes (and later dungeon drops). That's a much better model than "hey guess what you get to grind for 3 months to look like what we expect your job to look like!"

Tomestones in general should be handled like FFXI; BCNMs/KSNMs/ENMs/ISNMs/etc.

I can't be the only person who's bored of the tomestone grind by now... I'd much rather have a fairly simple tomestone grind, with a fairly simple trial at the end of it for a piece of gear, than just a boring tomestone grind...

Sounds a lot like the Hunt seals for Law upgrade except with infinitely more RNG. And people absolutely hated hunt grinding anyways.

As an aside I also dislike how a lot of the AF2 gear looks, especially for the healers.

Astrologian hat is half as tall as I am so it looks ridiculous. Scholar robe jacket thing is weirdly cut in the front. White Mage hood has a weird skullcap in it for some reason and the robe looks like some weird AF1 and Cashmere Robe hybrid monstrosity.

[Nalien]

Sounds a lot like the Hunt seals for Law upgrade except with infinitely more RNG. And people absolutely hated hunt grinding anyways.

How?

You'd go out and obtain 990 Esoterics. Buy an item for 990 Esoterics. Go to a predetermined location. Trade that item to enter the Trial. Kill it and get your drop, presumably an item which is traded for a specific weapon unless they want to design a dozen encounters just for the weapons. Where's the RNG in that, exactly? It's literally just an extra step in obtain the item. Perhaps the only issue I can see is if you fail the Trial, but they could easily make it so the pop item doesn't expire upon use, or they could have some balls and say "If you fail this ridiculously easy Trial you deserve to lose those Esoterics".

People hated Hunts because you either had a slow grind with the Mark Bills, which suck out right anyway, or you had a mindless server-zergfest with the A/S Ranks. None of which was particularly interesting or engaging. Trials are enclosed encounters and can thus not only actually be balanced, but they can also be well designed and interesting... Hunts are awful, I won't argue that...

Honestly, the only good open world content team-XIV has produced to date is Treasure Maps, and the "best" that ever got was Alexandrite farming. Were it not for the ridiculous amount of Alexandrite required, and the annoyingly slow rate at which you could obtain those Maps, that actually would have been some of the better content they added in 2.#. For what I'm suggesting, just imagine those Alexandrite Maps, except you buy them with Esoterics and they drop whatever piece of gear you'd otherwise be buying. There's no RNG, potentially no failure, it's just an extra step in obtaining the gear. Although going back a few posts and realizing I don't particularly like waiting three weeks for one item, I think I'd much rather see items broken down to provide multiple Trials... You'd still need three weeks to obtain a weapon, but over those three weeks you're doing several Trials for it, rather than just getting the 990 Esoterics and doing one Trial that I'd previously suggested, or getting 990 Esoterics and just getting the weapon, which we currently have...

[AriaEnia]

I don't remember eso gears are artifact gears. Who were the ones calling eso gears artifact gears? They're not even relics, no history about those gears at all, they are brand new.

[Nektulos-Tuor]

I would rather you do a story to get "upgrade" components to the armor/weapons.

[Warlyx]

I don't remember eso gears are artifact gears. Who were the ones calling eso gears artifact gears? They're not even relics, no history about those gears at all, they are brand new.

[silentwindfr]

about the hunt it's mostly because the system is only a FATE system without UI... more bad you have too few prey for the population of the server. but i digress, i still remember when i have get my monk AF while the V1 i was feeling quite happy it was rewarding. same for the first relic, while the 2.0.... indeed with a good group it was easy, but let's be honest, it was more rewarding than any method they have add later.

i'm sad they haven't simply put the AF2 behind quest and trial, if they wasn't wanting to do a trial at 8, why not like the V1 only a sort of trial at 4. worst, the upgrade system that feel like something quite lazy... and how we will get the upgrade in the 3.1, it will probably one item per week from a quest asking to do the new raid at 24....

about the people complaining about the quest number of heavenward, the trouble come from the exp needed for reach the max level, the quest was not enough rewarding asking us to do tons of them for get our level up.

[Airget]

I don't recall how exactly the Ninja AF was obtained, but I do remember it being very lackluster. Although finishing the set upon hitting level 50 felt like a reward and added some sentimental value to the armour. I'm honestly indifferent otherwise, the appearance blows AF1 away, and that's what really matters to me, I do get your point though.

I hope the relic/mythic (or whatever they decide to call it) weapon has an epic story attached and not just something that felt rather tacked on like the original.

He ordered them from his homeland and then hid them across the land for you to find, instead of you know just handing it to you lol.

[Obysuca]

"hey guess what you get to grind for 3 months to look like what we expect your job to look like!"

"And then right when you look like the job, new gear! Your's is now trash!" -.-