So, how is Pagos?

[Nixxe]

I never played FFXI, and I am a player of FFXIV. I don't just post on the forums. Others don't normally speak up, when people actively choose to be bitter and angry.

I deliberately didn't specify FFXI because the nostalgia source doesn't matter. You may think yourself a representative of some sort of silent majority, but you're not. All indication is that this has been very poorly received and people are forcing themselves to do it, but are not enjoying it. Personally, I'm not even bitter or angry. I just see a development blunder that should have never occurred. Subbing or not subbing is a very impersonal and dispassionate thing for me and always has been.

[HyoMinPark]

It's a relic. It's shouldn't be just handed over.

Literally no one is asking for the developers to just hand a relic weapon to them. They’re asking for the content it’s tied to, to not be mind-numbingly unengaging. They’re asking for progression in Pagos to not feel so tedious, and like you aren’t getting anywhere even after hours of chaining mobs (this is also a complaint JP players have had).

My biggest complaint was that, after 6 hours, I was still only level 22 (Challenge Log did that mostly, btw), my hand/wrist was aching from spamming a combat system that mob chaining just does not work with, and I was still nowhere close to level 23 by the time I left. I’d only participated in 4 NMs (Snow Queen twice, and Ash Dragon and Taxim once).

People can hate on the NM train all they want, but at least in Anemos, players had the option to chain mobs if they wanted, and others had the option of the NM train if mob-chaining wasn’t their thing—I frequently saw people doing both. In Pagos, it’s “chain mobs because we didn’t like the NM train and tried to destroy it, sorry not sorry”. That’s not content I enjoy, and I’m just flat out not participating in the relic for the rest of Stormblood at this rate. Or waiting until it’s nerfed so hard I can get it for glamour—which is all it’s good for for me anyways, because I raid and have access to the i375 weapons.

Inb4 I’m told I just want things easy, I did 2 Anima relics before ANY of the steps were nerfed in HW, a third with half of the steps not nerfed (Umbrite beyond, though I didn’t finish it because I didn’t like the final look of the WHM relic), and I went back and did SCH and PLD not too long after 4.0 was released. I also work on 3 ARR relics when I’m bored (BRD, WHM, SCH). For current relics, I have all 15 Anemos weapons, and am over 50% done on getting all the Anemos gear sets. I’m not one to shy away from putting effort into things when I feel like my effort is being rewarded—but I don’t feel that way in Pagos.

[InkstainedGwyn]

You may think yourself a representative of some sort of silent majority, but you're not.

This. I keep hearing "there's a huge number of people who love it they just don't speak up" but... where? I don't see them on the forums, I don't see them on reddit, I don't hear them in game in any of the FCs or LSs I'm in, I don't see them in Pagos itself and it's been acknowledged that when people went into Anemos to look for people to "just chain" instead of run the train, they couldn't find anyone. That doesn't sound like a "huge portion of of the population who like it" to me.

You like it? That's great. I wish they'd given us Eureka without the relic attached so that people such as yourself who enjoy it could play it. I have the sneaking suspicion that if they'd divorced the two they would have found that a tiny fraction of the community was actually playing it - but I'll fully admit that I have no proof there.

[Theodric]

One of the worst aspects so far has to be the early pulls. Pagos is a team effort, so anyone killing things that spawn NM's are contributing. Working on a single NM at a time isn't efficient...so it's not unusual for people to spread out across the map. Given that many people don't have a map or all three aetherytes unlocked that can be problematic. More than once I've been in the upper left portion of the map trying to spawn a NM only for something to spawn at the low level areas and be melted down in the couple of minutes it takes to return, use the aetheryte at the base and then run to the NM in question.

In XI, at least, you could freely count on the community blacklisting players guilty of such things. In modern MMO's, though, systems are in place to protect such individuals. You can't name and shame. You can't punish them. You can try and shun them, though even with a notorious reputation on their server they're still likely to get groups through the duty finder/cross world instances. It's a real shame. Naturally one of the infamous players on Balmung guilty of pulling hunts as soon as they're spotted (even if he didn't help spawn them and the spawn group are waiting for all their members to show up) is one of the people pulling NM's as soon as they spawn in Eureka.

[Alym]

I tried, I really did. After finally hitting 30 last night, I logged in today and tried to get a party for over an hour. When I finally got one, we did one chain of 30 and then disbanded. I just can't do it anymore. I can't try to get a party for 1-2 hours just to do a boring but attention intensive activity for hours on end for a glamour weapon. The entire party today kept talking about how bored they were and how terrible Pagos is. I don't know where the mythical majority is that loves this content because I can't find it anywhere; not on reddit, not in my LSs or FC (where it seems to be universally reviled), and certainly not in Pagos. The 1-2 shout trollers in Pagos who claim to love it are definitely not a majority.

I think, for the first time since 1.0, I'll be ignoring relic. This may be the beginning of the end of FFXIV for me.

[Bernkastelx]

I'd rather just sit in anemos fate train till 35 regardless of how much slower it is got a month perhaps longer till next patch. They really need to take a hard look at pagos and the hotfix just decreasing the hp in bunny fates is laughable at best.

[Derio]

Pagos is supposed to be casual friendly. However it is not. This is the worse relic and driving players away until 4.4

[Ayer2015]

I find dungeons very boring, but I know a lot of other people like dungeons. That's why I don't demand that dungeons be very different. What you see as fun and engaging, others may not.

You are absolutely right, which is why I'm playing wow now again.

[ximxim]

Try the party finder instead of searching for a group inside of pagos.
Not sure how the situation is on your DC but on chaos I see pf groups looking for "lower" levels pretty regulary.
Usually these partys stay together for atlast 1 hour instead of people leaving after one NM forcing you to search for new people which should help you level up.

I did tried PF, and they are always, literally always looking players with EL 30+
Also I tried to shout looking for a party or tried to make one, all I get is birds chirping...

This whole Eureka thing is just disheartening. It suppose to be casual friendly not hardcore friendly geez!

And for White knights, step aside and get off of your high horse... Logically, when majority of the players do not have fun, then there is something wrong with it. We complaint because we care about the game. And no, we do not want the relics to be handed to us just like that, stop with that dumb argument of yours. Thxbai

[Liam_Harper]

I always find comments about the "vocal minority" rather interesting.

Let's say a vocal minority dislike Pagos and it's actually super popular with the silent majority who love grinding. Why would it be bad then if they upped the NM spawn? The "silent majority" love endless mob grinding for no reward and would of course choose this content over the NM train. The NM train would then fail because only the tiny vocal minority would be doing it and wouldn't have enough participants, right? So it wouldn't make a difference.

It's not like mob grinding as an activity would be immediately abandoned by all but a tiny handful, so few in number they could barely scrape a group of 8 together, or anything like that.