Raider to Non-Raider: an exhibition on thoughts and misconceptions

[Ibi]

If you think that the top raiders didn't complain about the difficulty of the content during progression, you weren't paying attention.

I was quoting a post that was trying to suggest that SE should never listen to "raiders", on the basis that "they" both complained that Coil was too easy and that Alexander Savage is too hard, and so they clearly have no idea what they want.

It was an intentional oversimplification to indicate that perhaps "raiders" aren't a single group with a single opinion, and perhaps the people who were complaining that Coil was too easy aren't the same people who are now complaining that their statics are falling apart because Alexander Savage is too hard.

As for the two being night and day, they're obviously different in ways. But, you are getting caught up on details rather than understanding the actual point.

Your exact words were "it's no different", which was the crux of what I was objecting to.

I don't think you can just dismiss needing seven other people as just another detail. Reducing it to "That time also goes into networking" is a huge oversimplification.

Time and effort invested in leveling jobs is time and effort spent playing the game. Time and effort spent networking is time and effort spent doing additional work on top of playing the game.

It has absolutely nothing to do with how much effort it is, it's a completely different kind of activity, only tangentially related to someone's ability to actually play the game.

[Renault]

I was quoting a post that was trying to suggest that SE should never listen to "raiders", on the basis that "they" both complained that Coil was too easy and that Alexander Savage is too hard, and so they clearly have no idea what they want.

We do know what we want, a BALANCED raid. As stated many times in this thread, A4S (and maybe A3S) were tuned numbers wise with top-tier players in mind. The majority of raiders are good, but not EXCEPTIONAL, which is what you need to be to even have a chance at clearing Alex Savage right now. There is such a thing as something being "too hot" and then "too cold". SE needs to get it just right (which I thought coil was IMO), so we shouldn't stop giving them our well constructed feedback.

[UBERHAXED]

The majority of raiders are good...

Gonna leave this here: https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme..._to_be_a_good/

It also talks specifically about the last 2 floors.

[RiceisNice]

Gonna leave this here: https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme..._to_be_a_good/

It also talks specifically about the last 2 floors.

The thread specifically targets people who think they're good and why they can't clear A3S+. It's not exactly related to this thread that's mostly targetted to the mid-core people (IE, those that cleared FCoB but not SCoB savage)

[UBERHAXED]

The thread specifically targets people who think they're good and why they can't clear A3S+. It's not exactly related to this thread that's mostly targetted to the mid-core people (IE, those that cleared FCoB but not SCoB savage)

It's actually targeted at people who think they are good players because the clears FCOB without nerfs. Then complain that there is something wrong with the last floors because they are apparently good players.

[Alahra]

It's actually targeted at people who think they are good players because the clears FCOB without nerfs. Then complain that there is something wrong with the last floors because they are apparently good players.

I've never really seen that argument made. I have seen people who have cleared FCOB state that they wish there was content closer in difficulty to it though, as they know they aren't cut out for Savage.

[RiceisNice]

It's actually targeted at people who think they are good players because the clears FCOB without nerfs. Then complain that there is something wrong with the last floors because they are apparently good players.

It'd be the first time I've heard of this perspective then. Whatever's "wrong" with the last set of floors is a matter of perspective (whether it's the wrong difficulty tuning, or the mechanics are wrongly accommodated for latency).

On my end, I feel that it' wrong that there's hardly any content catered to people who felt that FCoB was the right range of difficulty, and now all we have for those individuals is A1S and A2S (which the developers even admitted that they had tuned these floors to be comparable to FCoB, while 3 and 4 were comparable to SCoB savage) for the 4+ months of content desert, longer if 3.1 doesn't add anything for those players. It's the general census that A3S and A4S are way over tuned (even for the hardcore of players according to Elysyum IIRC) regardless of who the target audience was.

Either case though, the link still doesn't hold much relevance to who the primary focus group is being discussed within the topic. On top of that, the OP there has a rather high standard of "good" which again, is pretty subjective. The matter of fact is that it's just way overtuned and the majority census can agree upon that.

[zosia]

It's actually targeted at people who think they are good players because the clears FCOB without nerfs. Then complain that there is something wrong with the last floors because they are apparently good players.

There is a difference. a3s and a4s are clearable by exceptional players. The players who cleared FCoB are good players, especially by comparision to the rest of the player base.

I am on a4s now and I would like raids that are tuned better. a4s seems like a crapola fest the encounter team pooped out. That's why people cheese the fight. The best fight in the game, the top of the content mountain, a4s is cheesable.

Get out of here with this good/bad player point, it's a semantics based argument that adds absolutely no depth to the conversation.

Does it really matter if players are technically good or bad? There is still a major content gap that the binding coil series previously filled.

Also, just to lay that entire reddit thread to rest, I will quote a previous post of mine.

Link to the interview with Elysium, the world first a4s kill

Even for the hardcore players most of us feel that Alexander Savage was tuned a little too high,” Gouka admitted. “Maybe something that takes two to three weeks is fine, but when you’re spending an entire month essentially on the same fight it gets a little bit ridiculous.

The absolute best players in the world, the people who downed a4s before any other team, feel that these fights are not tuned properly. There is no debate to be had by "good" or "bad" raiders and being able to complete content in ARR v.s Heavensward.

The best players, without any room for contention, feel the same way we do.

[UBERHAXED]

...a3s and a4s are clearable by exceptional players.
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The players who cleared FCoB are good players...
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...I will quote a previous post of mine.

Link to the interview with Elysium, the world first a4s kill

The absolute best players in the world...
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... the people who downed a4s before any other team...
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... feel that these fights are not tuned properly. There is no debate to be had by "good" or "bad" raiders and being able to complete content in ARR v.s Heavensward.

The best players...
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feel the same way...
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...we do.

There are also players who play less, also completed the fourth floor and did not share the same opinion. Just to let you know, they cleared before other played because they practiced the fight for a lot more time. Some people choose to only raid 20 hours a week. Clearing quickly because you have the time to put in practice does not make you the best, nor does it mean your opinion is the same as other players. Of course, I do think that they are the best players in the game. But not for the reasoning you just gave. You are a good example of why people do not directly vote for president in the US. Apparently, just a small group of people's opinion is equivalent to millions of people. BTW, some people are working adults and don't take weeks off from work every time a patch drops. Don't use clear time to determine whose opinion matters.

The thread I linked had clearly laid the issue and this was that people over estimate their own achievement and think that clearing some particular fight means that they are good players. Sure, it takes some skill to do (let's a pick a random fight) moggle mog ex. But clearing the fight didn't mean you were good. Which is why the poster explained that the people clearing FCOB weren't as a good of players that they thought they were. It doesn't take much to do a lot of the coil fights (let's pick on T5):

T5 required that you look over your head and moved to a spot. Later it required you to look at a cast bar and keep moving. That was the whole fight. DPS check is not a mechanic. People who can dps well can play their class. That's expected before you get into fights. This fight had some random elements (who got chosen for the mechanic) but either these were controllable (conflags and fireballs) or it didn't matter that it was random because every one did the same thing regardless of whether the mechanic chose you (divebombs and twisters). The last element of the fight you can even ignore completely (hatches). The skill level required to clear this fight was not high. So clearing this fight did not automatically mean you were a skilled player.

Let's a look at another fight, a fight apparently so difficult that it no longer exists in the game, T7:

In T7, the main feature was that there were many instant kill mechanics, in which your teammates kill you. As everyone knows, if you get petrified, then any additional damage instantly kills you. Cool so far right? We can just avoid being petrified. But only one mechanic can you even save yourself from being petrified (petrifaction). Cursed voice and shriek petrified everyone but the user. You also have someone else petrify a renaud before it mauls your face in. First fight in the game where you actually have to trust your teammates to not fall asleep in the fight. Sure there were other stuff in the fight (renauds, dps checks, etc.) but nothing like trying to avoid death every 20 seconds from your own teammates. However in the end, all of these were handled simply (everyone face the edge, designate a ranged to stand far from boss, build The Great Wall of Renaud, shrieked person always run to the same location, etc) and the randomness seemed kind of a non issue. Once again this fight did not require vast amount of skill to complete (and now boss gives you a rope to hang her since none of the above even kills you).

We can fast forward to A3S, but there's no point. People are already convinced that good players cannot clear the fight and it was only meant for professional gamers with no life to clear and any stories of regular groups clearing it are made up lies. But the fact is that there are many who do clear the fight. And the misconception that clearing some other content would mean that you are able to clear unrelated content is clearly false. Clearing coil did not give you the skills to clear alex, nor did it even adequately prepare you. Half the problem is that the difficulty when down from second coil to final coil (didn't see any nerfs to final coil before adding to DF). If the difficulty trend had went up from second coil and final coil was on the level of savage second coil, then maybe we would have a smoother transition to alex. But in no way can you say that you are good based on what you cleared in the past when these fights are vastly different and test players in different ways (well you can say that all of the difficulty in coil is a subset of alex, but I digress). Of course, clearing savage alex doesn't mean you are good either. It means that your skills as a player were adequate to complete the challenge, nothing more.

You also like linking to an interview which people with different opinions than other people share their thoughts. Should I link to Donald Trump when people complain about unemployment? Apparently he's doing something right and everyone shares the same opinion and since he's the best player in the economy, his opinion is fact. Wonder why that guy isn't president (hmm...)?

[Alahra]

Semantic debate over whether Elysium's raid group are "the best" or "some of the best" players aside, it's still notable when a group of such caliber feels the fights may have been tuned a bit too tightly. Debating over whether an individual player or raid group is "good" kind of misses the point of the thread entirely.

In ARR, many players were "good enough" to participate in and clear the game's primary endgame raid content. In HW, a significant number of those players are no longer "good enough," and that means fewer players are able to partake in the primary endgame content. Overall, that's not really a good thing, unless suitable content is brought in to satisfy those players that are now alienated by this new, higher level of difficulty. It also means developer resources are being spent on content that an even smaller percentage of the playerbase will partake in than did so in ARR, which is ultimately not an efficient way to develop and run the game. Finding the right balance is tricky (it took WoW something like 10 years, from what I understand), but it's still important to find it.