The Ifrit Fight is Dangerous to the Community.

[Murugan]

As opposed to what, exactly? The current FFXIV is already a gear grind with no soul or enjoyment; a barren wasteland devoid of any meaningful content. You have two instanced dungeons that have no real purpose in the world (there's supposedly imperial plots that take you inside them, only one has no imperials at all, while the other has imperials that aren't even related to the end goal of the instance, and they both end with you fighting bosses that literally come out of nowhere and you kill them because they're bad guys, I guess), a bunch of world bosses you have no reason to go hunt and kill other than the fact that they exist and they drop shinies, some strongholds where your raid just stands around farming keys off of bosses and mini-bosses as they respawn in order to open chests with crappy drop rates, and a single-room boss fight whose major difficulties are related to problems with game animations and network lag more than the actual fight mechanics. And really, what motivations do you currently have to continue playing the game aside from acquiring gear and maintaining a social circle? It can't be the levelling process, where your options are to mindlessly kill the local wildlife for no purpose other than the earning of imaginary points, or the completion of your daily allotment of kill and fetch quests to the same end; there's no way in hell that's more entertaining than doing quest chains that will grant you experience, items, and money as you advance in the game's story, which leads you to instanced dungeons to raid with friends and strangers alike and preps you for the endgame where you'll finally get to make progress towards defeating the game's Big Bad.

Yoshi-P needs to hurry up and get this abortion over with so we can get acquainted with the new kid.

I could attack you with 100+ word run on sentences too, but I'll just say this instead:

• Ifrit is absolutely not a gear check.
• WoW endgame is now almost entirely a horribly "grindy" gear check.
• Drudging through an encounter just for gear (which gives you no challenge or sense of accomplishment) and then attempting what is supposed to be the "challenging" content is what makes it soulless and takes away from the enjoyment.

Also I get it you don't like the game at all. Maybe you should quit? (I'm confused why you decided to unload all that nonsense on me as if I might care)

I like the story/lore/empire dynamic. I like the Ifrit storyline alright, I managed even not to be offended by the Darkhold story line when I did it. Certainly better than the cheesy storylines they hock in WoW's endgame.

[Quanta]

You have the choice to join a LS that does not care about HM content. To continue your wow example, Blizzard gave players the choice to do content in either 10 or 25 player mode, at normal or hard difficulty for each and there are different people focusing on each of the modes offered.

His argument in that regard is that, when they finally decided on a way to implement it in the interface, you were forced to clear Normal mode once before you could advance to the Hard mode. Like what we have now with Ifrit, only both fights were tuned for the level cap as opposed to having a throwaway fight for the midpoint of the game's levelling curve.

[SilvertearRen]

As opposed to what, exactly? The current FFXIV is already a gear grind with no soul or enjoyment; a barren wasteland devoid of any meaningful content. You have two instanced dungeons that have no real purpose in the world --snipped because the poster can't be arsed to read the rest....

Yoshi-P needs to hurry up and get this abortion over with so we can get acquainted with the new kid.

You know what I believe is vital to giving games a soul of their own? Choice.

[SilvertearRen]

I could attack you with 100+ word run on sentences too, but I'll just say this instead:

• Drudging through an encounter just for gear (which gives you no challenge or sense of accomplishment) and then attempting what is supposed to be the "challenging" content is what makes it soulless and takes away from the enjoyment.

This is not the objective of my proposal. The objective is to create a lower-end version of the endgame content that anybody can do, regardless of gear, while also accepting penalties to the rewards. That is to say, the design I am proposing does NOT give you any better gear than what is commercially available on the Market. The only better gear would be in the hard encounter version.

Others have brought up questions about this as to why people would do the easy mode in the first place - easy answer: There will always be people who will be repeatedly frustrated at the hard mode, and would probably want to do the normal mode to dissect the content more readily, so they would be better-armed with knowledge to tackle the hard mode.

[Rentahamster]

It's mutual, then. Does it mean we can't compromise? I don't think so. We don't want this forum to get compared to the quacks leading governments worldwide, do we?

I'm going to add that I've already offered compromises on my part. Instead of outright demanding that the original fight be nerfed...

Plus, this kind of system COULD be applied exclusively to dungeon content as opposed to Primal fights, if we're going to end up leaving Primal fights alone.

While the idea has some merit, I tend to think that such a feature would take more time and effort than it's worth, really. I'd rather the dev team spend their resources developing more content and having to only balance it once, instead of multiple times for multiple difficulties.

[Quanta]

Also I get it you don't like the game at all. Maybe you should quit? (I'm confused why you decided to unload all that nonsense on me as if I might care)

Actually, since 1.19, I've warmed up to the game considerably, and have actually started to enjoy myself. That doesn't mean that I think the game isn't terrible in its current state, only that it's gotten better to a point where I can stand to be logged in for more than 10 minutes.

I like the story/lore/empire dynamic. I like the Ifrit storyline alright, I managed even not to be offended by the Darkhold story line when I did it. Certainly better than the cheesy storylines they hock in WoW's endgame.

WoW's storylines are cheesy comicbook fare to be sure, but they still manage to make you feel like a big goddamned hero by the end of them. They didn't have characters from the opening cutscenes jump in at the climax and do awesome shit while you laid on the ground helpless in a cutscene; you actually fought--and oftentimes killed--the villains, perhaps with some support from NPCs that came to assist you. It's an awesome feeling, and it seems we're finally getting it in FFXIV with Ifrit. Hopefully the trend continues.

[Murugan]

This is not the objective of my proposal. The objective is to create a lower-end version of the endgame content that anybody can do, regardless of gear, while also accepting penalties to the rewards. That is to say, the design I am proposing does NOT give you any better gear than what is commercially available on the Market. The only better gear would be in the hard encounter version.

Others have brought up questions about this as to why people would do the easy mode in the first place - easy answer: There will always be people who will be repeatedly frustrated at the hard mode, and would probably want to do the normal mode to dissect the content more readily, so they would be better-armed with knowledge to tackle the hard mode.

It is very unlikely that they would implement that way rather than what Lavani and Quanta seem to want which is the WoW model. So I'm against it, because the WoW model does ruin the endgame experience for many of us (and whether you people see it or not it affects casuals too who are just as if not more susceptible to the gear grind mentality present in WoW's endgame as "hardcore players").

[SilvertearRen]

It is very unlikely that they would implement that way rather than what Lavani and Quanta seem to want which is the WoW model. So I'm against it, because the WoW model does ruin the endgame experience for many of us (and whether you people see it or not it affects casuals too who are just as if not more susceptible to the gear grind mentality present in WoW's endgame as "hardcore players").

I agree with you on the WoW model. However, the WoW model works to an extent. Why not take what works, and refine it further? Which is what I am suggesting - we can make the gear drops from the inferior mode to be maybe +1 gear, like Cobalt Haubergeon +1's (or even NG's - could make it so that +1's drop rarely!). An unslotted +1 piece of gear is still generally inferior to an equivalent item that has the proper materia slotted into it.

While the idea has some merit, I tend to think that such a feature would take more time and effort than it's worth, really. I'd rather the dev team spend their resources developing more content and having to only balance it once, instead of multiple times for multiple difficulties.

Develop the system as a code template, make it a module that can be tailored or attached to each unique dungeon. It'll take more time, sure, but in the end it will make creating new content easier and less time-intensive.

[Celeras]

I'm sure this has been mentioned a million times as I didn't read anything but the OP, but I'm chiming in anyway.

That's why there's a level 30 version, baddie.

[Richard_BG]

I'm sure this has been mentioned a million times as I didn't read anything but the OP, but I'm chiming in anyway.

That's why there's a level 30 version, baddie.

direct and right to the point. i knew we recruited you for a reason!