I feel like raiding is pointless in this game

[Zenji]

I've been raiding since Coil and I've been in several raid groups from casual to midcore. For me the allure of raiding doesn't come from the content or the loot, it comes from how much fun your having with your static. There should be this feeling of comradery. Kinda like that ffxiv commercial where the childhood friends took down Titan. Sure the trial is laughable now but they had a blast. There are groups that function like robots, no talking no joking around and things get real boring real quick like that. Just my opinion.

[TankHunter678]

Set bonuses could work without a skill tree by granting traits instead of skill bonuses.

Although it would cause some more item bloat... they could make 2p set bonuses that consist of weapon and off-hand for unique abilities to a class. Or make an off-hand that is purely an ability modifier trait.

Example could be Bards could get Quiver's for the off-hand slot, one of them could be Wind Aspect Arrows which grant a 10% better proc rate on Straighter Shot.

That being said, can lead to a number of balance issues by itself doing that.

[Sandpark]

I am a firm believer people suck at this game because it hand holds you endlessly. There is no incentive to improve. If we had a proper difficulty curve throughout all content, this wouldn't be nearly the same issue. Frankly speaking, normal mode shouldn't be an absolute joke. This way players who cannot commit or simply aren't interested in a harder challenge, still have something to work towards. Savage, meanwhile, shouldn't be entirely inaccessible. Gordias did no one any favours. Midas, on the other hand, was a solid tier that with some mild tweaks, particularly to A6, could have easily remained the de factor Savage.

All that being said, XIV needs more content in general. Everything being made easier only means we have far less to do long term. While I am not bored per se, it's more due to social interactions than content.

I am a firm believer people suck at this game because some people just have a ceiling. Somethings are just more natural for others. Normal Joe can improve his basketball game, but if the natural skill is not there he cannot become an NBA superstar, maybe an ok player with unshakable will and working hard. No content should be an absolute joke. If most of the playerbase still die frequently and don't get consistent clears then it is not a joke.

The players who can't/won't commit to raids have three possible reasons.
1.They cannot get good enough
2.They cannot or will not get 24 other players in a static and practice a routine hours upon hours.
3.There is not a lot to do besides raids here if progressing persistently on your combat class is your sole goal, minus hunts or faceroll stuff.

So it's kind of do raids or do something else way easier or not combat focused.

Easier has nothing to do with having long term goals in my opinion. Even if SE made the most difficult raids ever, only an elite would beat if fast. Their online guides would lead to the slightly less skilled getting it done. While everyone not up to snuff would try/die/and try to find something else to do.

Somebody will beat content fast even if most don't.

The main things that affect long term activities is:
1.Finding something you're able to do consistently progressing slowly
2.Gating (It's a naughty word, but no amount of skill can overcome it)
3.Long Persistent content(Content that regardless of skill takes tremendous amounts of time to achieve)

To reach the widest possible base it has to be something that requires thought, competent execution(not flawless execution), and allows people to depend on one another without requiring you to live in the game or be at a standstill without others. Currently after MSQ if you don't trial or raid most stuff is braindead easy or requires you to kill things on lower level content.

Anyways not calling you out because from your post it seems you are pretty good at raids and it's good there is stuff you can do. I just want something different besides raids personally. Something challenging but not finger pretzel super challenging that is pretty easy to get groups for that dynamically scale, not fates, not hunts, not relic farming at beginner areas.

[Delily]

That being said, can lead to a number of balance issues by itself doing that.

Which is something that needs to be mentioned. A lot of the design of FFXIV is to help reduce the constant churn of balancing. Just using tanks as an example, if we have 3 skills trees per tank, that would mean the devs would need to balance 9 separate classes with each other, just for a role. If we had gear like we do in XI, that would add even more complexity to the balancing act, because now you'd need to factor in gear when balancing (and there still would be BiS sets like there are in XI.) . By keeping the classes in roles and standardizing the gear, it reduces the constant tweaking.

[Kosmos992k]

Although it would cause some more item bloat... they could make 2p set bonuses that consist of weapon and off-hand for unique abilities to a class. Or make an off-hand that is purely an ability modifier trait.

Example could be Bards could get Quiver's for the off-hand slot, one of them could be Wind Aspect Arrows which grant a 10% better proc rate on Straighter Shot.

That being said, can lead to a number of balance issues by itself doing that.

If the impact is scaled properly for anything that affects direct damage taken or given, it could be scaled to be the rough equivalent of 5-10 ilvls. With things like poison resistance I guess it depends how they handle the resistances. Status and elemental resistance have always been a mystery since we have the scores by can do nothing to modify them, so one has to wonder whether they are purely for show or not.

[Dzian]

No content should be an absolute joke. If most of the playerbase still die frequently and don't get consistent clears then it is not a joke

The problem is the whole games an absute joke. Because of how easy content is. I would bet less than 1 single percent of all dungeons runs fail to clear a dungeon. Because they're a joke.

I can't imagine many omega story or story mode trials have a substantial fail rate either because they're a joke.

The whole game should be harder because I fully agree with this

No content should be an absolute joke.

I would say the reason extremes and savage have higher fail rates is because to many players are used to the game being an absolute joke.

[Gemina]

"It's too easy" they cry. Meanwhile in reality, people struggle to beat O1s savage. Nice try, but the difficulty is just right.

This is where I was going.

The way I see this is like a rubix cube, complex puzzle, math problem, or anything that requires a mental process. They all have a solution and once you figure it out, the challenge goes away. The true challenge, is finding this solution. In an 8-man raid, even with a static, if its new to them and they all go in blind, it's going to be challenging. They have to figure out how the mechanics work, and the coordination between the 8 of them. Once this is solved, then the only challenge left of the raid is to not screw up, and if all of you are good at not screwing up, then there's not much left as far as challenge goes.

It is this very reason why I love PUGs. For every single instance, the challenge is never the same.

[Sandpark]

The problem is the whole games an absute joke. Because of how easy content is. I would bet less than 1 single percent of all dungeons runs fail to clear a dungeon. Because they're a joke.

I can't imagine many omega story or story mode trials have a substantial fail rate either because they're a joke.

The whole game should be harder because I fully agree with this


I would say the reason extremes and savage have higher fail rates is because to many players are used to the game being an absolute joke.

Is the game considered a hardcore game? Absolutely not.
The developer actually hints at accessibility in most interviews.

Story being easy-mildly challenging is fine by me. The basic traditional FF formula for most FF. If the entire story was Savage only we would have even less people completing the MSQ and less players in general.

I agree on most dungeons to a degree. I doubt SE will go back and add savage dungeons for every dungeon in game.

Even hard mode is a bit easy. It's when things start getting into extreme or harder that the playerbase starts getting divided.

A tad more difficulty in general would be nice. But more than difficulty I think the game could use more variance. Regardless of difficulty, once a content is mastered since it is defined and heavily scripted it becomes a cakewalk for the players who master a certain content and for the others who struggle it becomes ugly. You either a master of rotations and dodging, or an occasional master of rotations and dodging. Jump-rope.

I was speaking more to how about the game is built. Let me use a basketball videogame for example.

Most of the game outside extreme/savage raids or trials is like:

• Open world- A practice shootaround pregame, no stress, no people depending on you.
• Dungeons/certain hunts- Are like a preseason game. You have to work with team-members but still little stress or people depending on you. Team synergy is there but not truly demanding.
• Extreme+ raids/trials- Are like the nba championships. To win you have to execute almost flawlessly, your team members have to execute flawlessly, but team synergy works the same way it did in the easier content.

No matter the content if it is group based. Even though you are in a party. It is like you are playing alone.

People rarely talk or strategize except before/after the content or when crap starts hitting the fan.
You dance around doing your dribble sets and either do them to perfection or stumble but your dribble sets don't lead to synergy in itself
Party buffs are sort of synergy oriented but only in a number because most player's A, B, C skills don't interact with each other aka the other party members skill.

Even the limit break though built up by the entire party is solo because only one player interacts with the system.
The make or break moments are group dependent but the means are solo centric. By the means I mean each player must do the jump rope almost flawlessly on their own and if someone falters here comes the big bad skill that one shots the party with no means to mitigate it through last minute party synergy.

The enemies do not care which job you are or party composition only your role because whatever skills you used worked on the previous 100 fights will work on this one, so it comes down to dodge or die.

I want more team synergy,variance, and a harder type of difficulty besides reflex/memorization in quest, open world, basically everywhere.

Instead of always.. I see the eye,I turn around let there be an optional.

• I see the eye, I cast barstonra.
• Maybe even let the paladin have a reflective shield move that can protect players behind him that requires a barstone buff from healer.(That's some Medusa stuff going on..)
• Or I see the eye I hack the opponent's eye so the party receives a less potent stone debuff.
• Maybe even make the eye hack require a two party member weaponskill synergy.

Or instead of I see the stack symbol during Ifrit run to the group.

Maybe have a party synergy move that mitigates fire damage.

[Alleo]

That tiger is 2000 hunts who's doing 2000 hunts exactly

Even if we take that away its still lots of items that you can get through hunts, which is easy content. Just comparing the newest minions and the mount speed with the reused but dyeable gear and one mount makes one really feel that there is nothing that rewarding in the raids.