DPS is the job of DPS.

[Xerek]

"Content has been getting easier"

How many Shinryu posts in 4.0 launch were there again? I also so plenty for the solo mission in 4.1. If it's getting easier I don't know how people are getting this far.

A8 normal was harder then O1S and O2S. Shinryu was so much of a problem because he was old difficulty, while the rest of Stormblood was way easier. Tell me what 4.x dungeon was even close to The Vault's difficulty. Four of us ran Skalla...blind...on launch day, and cleared with just one wipe. And that was to the first boss, not the last. I ran all floors of Omega normal the week it launched without a single wipe. In fact, in 10+ weekly runs of Omega normal, I wiped once on O3. O1N-O4N were all easier then Shinryu normal.

...and you don't think content is easier now?

[Jijifli]

A8 normal was harder then O1S and O2S. Shinryu was so much of a problem because he was old difficulty, while the rest of Stormblood was way easier. Tell me what 4.x dungeon was even close to The Vault's difficulty. Four of us ran Skalla...blind...on launch day, and cleared with just one wipe. And that was to the first boss, not the last. I ran all floors of Omega normal the week it launched without a single wipe. In fact, in 10+ weekly runs of Omega normal, I wiped once on O3. O1N-O4N were all easier then Shinryu normal.

...and you don't think content is easier now?

Vault was 0 issue. In fact, I went heals for it. A8 normal reused mechanics from A6, meaning people already saw half of the fight's mechanics. In fact, the only "hard" part of Normal Alex was, hillariously, the first one, because nobody wanted to hit 0.5.

Yet Shinryu "Kept the casuals from playing the game." I'm not saying it's getting harder. It's just not getting easier. I heard more cries on Shinryu normal than I heard for Final Steps, and I heard a LOT on how terrible Final Steps is to a casual.

[Sebazy]

"Content has been getting easier"

How many Shinryu posts in 4.0 launch were there again? I also so plenty for the solo mission in 4.1. If it's getting easier I don't know how people are getting this far.

<snip>

Yet Shinryu "Kept the casuals from playing the game." I'm not saying it's getting harder. It's just not getting easier. I heard more cries on Shinryu normal than I heard for Final Steps, and I heard a LOT on how terrible Final Steps is to a casual.

I very much doubt we will see dungeons like Amdapor Keep or Pharos Sirius again, nor will we see primals like Thordan Ex. Even 2.0 Titan HM was a pretty significant slugfest with a huge amount of aoe damage back when most people were still wearing Darklight.

Imho the game has typically got easier across the board, it makes sense for SE to spend what little they still do on FFXIV on content that's going to reach the most amount of people. And as such, the first half of this raid tier is by far the easiest and most accessible yet.

Whilst yes, you could rightly claim that Unending Coil is also pretty clearly the hardest content we've ever seen (And yes, it really frustrates me that my group has 0 interest in running it), it's also almost entirely made out of recycled assets and mechanics and as such, likely cost comparatively little manpower to develop vs Omega which is fair enough given the minuscule portion of the player base that's ever going to experience much of it outside of a youtube replay.

Final Steps was a weird one really. It wasn't at all challenging, it just relied on people reading prompts to understand a critical mechanic, something which a frighteningly significant portion of the player base has always had difficulty doing.

[Hestzhyen]

A8 normal was harder then O1S and O2S. Shinryu was so much of a problem because he was old difficulty, while the rest of Stormblood was way easier. Tell me what 4.x dungeon was even close to The Vault's difficulty. Four of us ran Skalla...blind...on launch day, and cleared with just one wipe. And that was to the first boss, not the last. I ran all floors of Omega normal the week it launched without a single wipe. In fact, in 10+ weekly runs of Omega normal, I wiped once on O3. O1N-O4N were all easier then Shinryu normal.

...and you don't think content is easier now?

I think SE is trying to balance where they put the hard content. The MSQ isn't too hard so everyone can do it. That goes for dungeons associated with it too. The Lakshimi and Susano'o story trials were so easy I was seriously let down. But then Shinryu happened and I was feeling better- the last fight of the story up to that point SHOULD be hard. We were fighting a demi-god at the climax of the arc! SE put the hard fight where it mattered- the big epic showdown between us and a uniquely powerful enemy- and not in the random story fights. I'm not a huge fan of coasting through the story on cruise control but I understand that content everyone's meant to do should be accessible to... everyone. The EX trials also felt a little soft but so did Ravana EX and Bismarck EX on HW launch. We got harder trials later on, and Shinryu EX thrashes anyone who can't comfortably do Thordan EX, which was not a cakewalk. I think SE will release more difficult trials mixed with easier ones for the life of SB like they did with HW. It seemed to strike a decent balance between "challenge" and "frustration" for the people who were into them.

Omega normal is pathetically easy. It's also meant for people to 1) get introduced to a few new mechanics for Savage and 2) for normal/mid-core people to get okay gear. It's only 320- a step up from the Ala Mhigan gear and worse than Creation and Savage and takes weeks to collect tokens for one exchange. You could skip them entirely and deck yourself out in crafted gear if you wanted to. Point being, it's not meant to be hard. I think 1 and 2 were TOO easy, but 3 and 4 make me hope that they'll be gradually upping the difficulty with successive additions. (If 5 is as braindead as 1 I will be sorely disappointed.)

Savage was easier this time around too. But again, I'm hoping that it's a prelude for things to come. I don't think things will get as hard as Gordias outside of Ultimate difficulty but I'll be pleased if they ramp the difficulty going forward. Basically we have to wait all the way until 4.2 until we'll have any idea of what's going to happen... we can't really look at Alex for this, since its swings in difficulty were a huge source of contention in the raiding community. SE has to improve that so we're going in mostly blind as far as their ambitions for Omega, both Normal and Savage.

I hope you aren't right. A nagging part of me is saying "SE is dumbing everything but Ultimate down because people complain" but I think that little voice should stuff it until we see what's coming next. I'm not one to hold out hope that SE will do the sensible thing but it's not going to hurt to hold opinions until we see what's on the table.