My thinking about Alex normal/savage. Issue IMHO inside

[Dante_V]

Congrats on your clear man.

[Ibi]

2) Small number of bosses makes the difficulty jump seem worse. If there were four bosses before living liquid it wouldn't be quite as bad to be stuck on him, for example. I know this would increase development time, but I don't think anyone would mind if they re-used models and mechanics in order to provide a few filler bosses. They can drop items that re-skin models and aren't part of a set (something this game seems to lack almost entirely) and stuff like that.

There would be complaints, at length, about how lazy SE are, and how could they recycle so much content, etc.

They should still do it, but there will be complaints no matter what they do.

[Brannigan]

That's true. I always kind of got the impression that the people who were complaining about raids being too easy and content being recycled weren't actually doing the content they were complaining about, so I don't think there'd be much change in that department.

[Colorful]

snip

WoW reuses models for bosses in WoW but still manages to keep things interesting with varied environments in a singular raid, no complaints there, 6-7 out of 14 bosses are reused models with differences in armour and the like (Siege of Orgrimmar). They just have to be smart about it, don't throw in an exact model and call it a new boss. Put some unique armour on a Hyur model, increase their size (like in the Vault) and there you go, a boss model is done. I don't think the models take all that much time to develop, it's the mechanics and environments...

Also didn't they use reuse models in both Turn 2 (ads), Turn 6 (I could have sworn I've seen that model before?) and turn 8 with the Avatar? If SE were to create blatant rips of both models and textures they'd be called lazy, and rightfully so.

[Spellbinder]

I was quite happy with FCOB's difficulty, and we weren't really informed prior to release that Savage was going to be a level of difficulty beyond that. The information we got in general suggested that Savage was just the new name for the standard raid difficulty to differentiate it from the "Normal" mode.

Maybe not in English, but the JP community was pretty aware of what was coming. (loose translations below)


Player asks Yoshi-P about Alexander at NicoNico Choukaigi 2015 - 4/25/2015
http://jp.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodest.../blog/2192330/

K：アレキ零式っていうのは、侵攻編の零式とイコールと考えたらいいのか、それとも真成変プラスアルファなのか？
K: So for Alexander (Savage), would you say it will be about as hard as Second Coil of Bahamut (Savage)? Or closer to Final Coil?

吉田：真成編の零式だと思ってもらっていたほうが、イメージは近いかもしれないです。
Yoshi-P: It might be better to think of it as something closer to a Savage version of Final Coil of Bahamut.

K:じゃあ零式は零式なんですね
K: So Savage really is going to be Savage, then?

吉田：はい
Yoshi-P: Yes

A tweet relaying information from Fan Festival 2014 12/19/2014 - 12/20/2014
https://twitter.com/Sir_gawainPoet/s...rc=twsrc%5Etfw

3.0で実装されるアレクサンダーについて
Alexander in 3.0

・アレクサンダーのハードは零式より、ちょっと難易度高い。
・The "hard" version of Alexander will be a little harder than Savage

・ノーマルとハードにリワード差を設けている
・The rewards for normal and hard will be separate

・だからまずはノーマルをクリアして装備を整えてハードを攻略する。などの段階を踏んでいって欲しい
・First they want us to clear normal to ready our gear, then tackle the hard version

Interview with Yoshi-P - 8/13/2015
http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/docs...13_715888.html

「零式」とは言っても、全くクリアできないと楽しくもなんともないと思うので、1・2層はある程度の難易度で抑えました。頑張れば希望も見えるし勝ちに行けるという風にバトルチームが上手く調整してくれたと思います。3・4層に関してはまさに「零式」というレベルの調整にしてあります。
If you couldn't clear Savage at all I don't think it'd be very fun, so we've toned down the difficutly a little for the first and second floors. The battle team has taken care to design them so players will be able to clear them if they pull together and try hard enough. When you reach the third and fourth floors, that's where the real "Savage" difficulty kicks in.

And for good measure, someone on Reddit picked up on it as well. I guess it was ignored.

Alexander hard will be harder than Savage Coil, drops higher IL than normal - date listed as 8 months ago
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...n_savage_coil/

Yoshida's comments during today's Tokaigi event.
Regarding how fast Final Coil was cleared.
・The top raiders were too good
・Everyone else started copying them (rising tide and all that stuff)
・It was not their intention for crafted gear to become necessary. They were supposed to be catch-up gear for returning players.

Regarding Alexander in 3.0
・Alexander Hard will be harder than current Savage Coil.
・Differences between Normal and Hard will mianly be in rewards (different IL)
・Their concept is for people to clear Normal for gear before challenging Hard.

Hard should be impossible without gear from Normal.should would could blah blah blah. Nael shouldn't be beatable in i90 gear...

[Alahra]

Maybe not in English, but the JP community was pretty aware of what was coming. (loose translations below)

Ah, I'd never seen any of that. At least it wasn't a complete bait and switch, I suppose, but I have to admit I'm still pretty bitter. I want to raid.

[Spellbinder]

Ah, I'd never seen any of that. At least it wasn't a complete bait and switch, I suppose, but I have to admit I'm still pretty bitter. I want to raid.

I don't blame you. I enjoyed my time in the Binding Coil of Bahamut series, and I definitely think Final Coil of Bahamut found a nice balance. But when I heard how difficult Savage was going to be for Alexander, I knew I wasn't going to go anywhere near it. Even if it meant I wouldn't get higher item level gear. It's just not worth it for my enjoyment. I've resigned to sticking with normal difficulty, but I will say I was slightly disappointed in how easy it is. With that said, however, I'll stick with easier and refrain from bludgeoning my head into the wall that is Savage.

That's just my take on it. I know there are raiders that aren't satisfied with normal and may just not be up to the challenge of savage, left without a proper middleground. Though as someone mentioned in another thread, if they were to make a second tier inbetween normal and savage, players will probably just complain that they're rehashing content. Balancing the item levels and rewards would probably be a nightmare for the devs as well.

[Alahra]

I know there are raiders that aren't satisfied with normal and may just not be up to the challenge of savage, left without a proper middleground.

I'm definitely one of those. I don't think they can really do anything to save Alexander: Gordias at this point, but I'm hoping we'll see changes for future raid tiers. About the only thing they could have done for *this* tier, with how the item levels are structured, is have Alexander (Hard) provide i200 gear, and perhaps have those items upgradable to i210 with Gobdip/twine/coat (if they did that, they'd probably *not* want those items to drop from the Hard difficulty though--keep them on Savage and, later, Void Ark). But it's too late for that now.

[KarstenS]

Also didn't they use reuse models in both Turn 2 (ads), Turn 6 (I could have sworn I've seen that model before?) and turn 8 with the Avatar? If SE were to create blatant rips of both models and textures they'd be called lazy, and rightfully so.

There were alot of remodels:

T1: this snake is a world mob in Mor Dhona.
T2: Final Fantasy IV: Giant ob Babil, but new in FF14
T4: Final Fantasy XIII, but new in FF14
T5: Mobs in Corteas

T6: Mobs in the shrout
T7: Mor Dhona Mobs again? I've seen them somewhere
T8: Remodel of shrout tree
T9: Remodel of Garuda

T10: Coeurl
T11: Hydra (Relic fight)
T12+13: Other Final Fantasy games, but new in FF14

[xnonamex]

To be honest the main problem with this game's endgame is... lack of battle content. I mean we get 2-3 new dungeons that are faceroll easy that you need to grind for 3 months. 1-2 new primals every 3 months which you beat in 1-2 weeks to get your wep and there is no point in doing them after that because they become faceroll easy. and endgame raid which are all following the same pattern fight 1 boss. learn the positioning/rotation at each moment by heart and hope no one else fails. Furthermore there is really no point at all going for high level gear, because you actually only NEED (and this might even be questioned) in 2-3 single fights in each big raid expansion.

I just feel that there is way too little/diverse battle content at endgame. And that's not to say i don't like the game in general. I think it is one of the best made MMORPGS out there in overall game experience, but endgame content is seriously lacking. which is probably due to the small amount of resources allocated to the development of the game so they are just not capable of making more diverse stuff.

IMO the thing that keeps you hooked (and entertained) to game and makes it interesting for you is that you see your power grow, your proficiency grow, you know, get a bit better. And also the illusion that you are doing new stuff, which is fun etc. You know. That excitement and self satisfaction feeling. Just missing it here lately. And for the record i've been with this game since betas and beat all the coils back in days (for the people to whom this makes a difference).