Whistles and Fifes

[Zorixas]

I want to ask everyone:
Is it fun to fight a battle 99 times and wait nine months for a prize? Is everyone okay with this?

Edit: It seems that the question itself is being lost. All I ask for is a simple and honest answer, so I'll give my answer to my own question as an example. Feel free to share your experiences and opinions as well.

No, it's not fun to fight the same battle 99 times. Personally, it's a chore after the 20th time. 30 times if I enjoyed the battle, but there's only so many times that I can enjoy fighting the same boss over and over.
No, it's not fun to wait 9 months for my hard work to pay off, I am not okay with it. If you're going to make someone work hard for something, at the very least let's have the payoff right away. I'm glad that there's at least a cap on the number of tries to say, "Enough is enough, here you go, you worked hard for it." But to wait 3-9 months for that? Why? What's the point in doing that? What possible reason is there for such a long wait time?
I beat Sephirot 99 times, it was frustrating, but at least I bought the falcon when I was finished, so there was some satisfaction in it. I beat Suzaku 99 times, and now I have the totems just sitting there in my inventory and no wolf (didn't even see the fife drop at any point after around the 30th battle), which makes it even more infuriating.

Those are my thoughts on the matter. What are you thoughts?

[Jillian]

No, I do not think it is but, we don't have much of a choice.

[Vidu]

I'm okay-er with this than with the old ARR-system without any tokens.

And you mention a sort of important thing here when you talk about a "prize" - would it be much of a prize if it didnt involve some sort of effort? How attached are you to the mounts that are simply handed to you by the mainquest or that you bought for real money or MGP? How much of a "reward" would an EX-primal mount be if it would just pop up in your inventory after your first clear? And how often would you run the content again afterwards?

Because here is my next point: Having to farm up to 99 tokens might be incredibly annoying for you, but at the same time you're not playing this game alone and its already incredibly annoying and disheartning for new people who finally catch up and reach the current EX-primal 2 or 3 months after its release only to realise that basically no one is doing it anymore and they cant find a party for it. They need to add a reward to this content that keeps it alive longer so make sure that people can still play it later. And I'm okay with that - and much more okay than with this attitude of "I want everything for myself and right now!"

Personally, I generally enjoy EX-primal fights and I also enjoy having "something to work on" - I dont enjoy them enough to just run them 10 times a day just for the sake of it, but as long as I have my goal infront of me, I'm very much okay with doing most of them. I'm actually always a bit "sad" when I get my dog or my 99 tokens and am looking at the PFs a week later, seeing all those farm-groups that I have no reason to join anymore.
And since the mounts are far, far, far from content that is really required to play the game, I dont mind waiting for the token-exchange. I have enough Tsuyu-tokens lying around to buy the dog once I can, but until then I'm perfectly happy with picking from the 78 mounts that I currently have.

Bottomline:
They need to extend the contents-life both to ensure that new people can get into it more easly and to give us "something to do" because as always: They cant pump out content at the rate we consume it.
And at least I dont mind this, specially since those mounts are very much optional - and not having to rely only on being blessed by the RNGods is a good thing. At the same time I feel that having to do this fight 99 times is a good way of still keeping the dogs rare enough that they do feel like a "prize", a "reward" and not something that just everyone gets automatically.

[Kuroka]

At least give us a fallback. Like 300 totems on release, 200 after 2-3 weeks, 99 at next patch or 2-3 weeks before it, so ppl farm it before the next one is out^^

[DrWho2010]

if the game had a limited lifespan i would think they would provide means to get stuff earlier but there is no need to do so since the game has no end date in sight.

[Zorixas]

No, I do not think it is but, we don't have much of a choice.

Well, if you did have a choice, within reason, what would you prefer it to be like?
I'm more for about 50 times and have the ability to buy it right away. 9 months is just insane, there's no point to the waiting at all, let alone 3-9 months.

[Zorixas]

At least give us a fallback. Like 300 totems on release, 200 after 2-3 weeks, 99 at next patch or 2-3 weeks before it, so ppl farm it before the next one is out^^

I would lose my mind after 200.

[Zorixas]

if the game had a limited lifespan i would think they would provide means to get stuff earlier but there is no need to do so since the game has no end date in sight.

... But is doing it fun? And do you mind the wait?

[Jillian]

Well, if you did have a choice, within reason, what would you prefer it to be like?
I'm more for about 50 times and have the ability to buy it right away. 9 months is just insane, there's no point to the waiting at all, let alone 3-9 months.

I think 99 tomes is reasonable if we could buy it right away or within a period of up to 3 months. The length of time we have to wait stinks but, I doubt SE will make any changes to it.

[Cidel]

Is it fun to fight a battle 99 times

Ew. No. For me, most of the EX primals cease being "fun" after like the 10th choreographed clear or so. After some point, it stops feeling like a "challenge" and instead just a waiting game to see who finally trips-up in whatever "farm" group you're in. And of course, if no one does, great. I then proceed to get bored after a handful of clears. Oh, and then disappointment after opening each chest.

and wait nine months for a prize?

Again, no. But I'm actually at least glad for the option to trade-in your consolation totems. That was actually something they added sometime during HW after a bit of requesting from players here (and they made no mention about doing that beforehand even!). I do personally find it a bit unnecessary for there to be such a long wait for the trade-in at all, and some of the counter-arguments in favor of it strike me as disingenuous.

So...

Is everyone okay with this?

If it wasn't already obvious about me, not really. But the likely reason they do this is not entirely lost on me either. I get it, they need a "carrot" besides ilevel weapons to incentivize people to keep running their trials. But you know what they say about doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results? That's right, insanity farming EX trials

Again, I do appreciate having trade-ins at all. And I think that 99, while a challenge in patience, is a fair asking price; it's a safeguard to those of us (which I daresay is a lot) who can't ever seem to outroll 7 other people. My main problem with the current system is having players wait until like 2 primals/half a year later; which I don't think really helps keep the content "alive" except for the few who are just that heavily invested in their variable ratio schedule. Most just seem to stop after the 99th totem and are just sick of the trial.