Mediocrity should NOT be the standard for players in any content.

[Packetdancer]

As for the very easy and easy setting.... how did we get this far without it then? I don't mean to sound harsh or rude, but we went this far without those settings, how did handicapped and even just casual players manage to do things like that Sadu instance or the role quests before the end of ShB without the "very easy" and "easy" options? I would imagine it took them a couple tries but they ended up learning what they needed to do, right?

My friend who had the nerve damage to his hands never played FFXIV, but on other games he would temporarily change his password and ask one of his trusted friends to log in as him and get him past a piece of content he simply was not physically capable of beating. His problem was never "I don't see how you beat this", his problem would be "I literally cannot push the keys fast enough to beat this due to the damage to my hands." Oh, he'd try for a week solid or more before giving up, but if he couldn't beat it he'd ask someone else to do it for him.

Literally the reason I thought of him when I saw that difficulty setting for the first time was that I went, "Oh... he'd have loved that. It'd have made him more self-sufficient."

Personally I feel the issue is that very little motivates people to improve. People can learn if they want to, but they simply don't.

I'm going to politely—but vehemently—disagree here.

A friend who started playing about two months ago chose to be a tank main, and she was struggling badly early on. She found she was having issues holding aggro and tracking when mobs got away from her, and it was frustrating. She didn't get any help from PUGs either when she asked if there was something she was doing wrong.

When we then played together -- three of us who she already knew joining her on a run -- we were able to help clarify that even though she was using AoE to grab mobs at the beginning of a pull she wasn't continuing to do it regularly and so was losing them. And I was able to explain the aggro markers in the enemy list and what they meant about whether or not you have (or are gaining/losing) aggro on a given enemy. Once she had those two bits of information things went much more smoothly, and she's since matured into a good tank.

But the game did not give her the tools to succeed as a tank initially, nor did it tell her where to go to find those tools, and her efforts to learn were sort of in opposition to the efforts of PUGs to get through the dungeon as quickly as possible for tomes of various forms. In the end she got those tools from friends she already knew, which is great! Working together and learning from each other is how we improve!

But if you don't already have friends in game, and you don't encounter people who are patient and willing to teach, it would probably be immensely frustrating.

[Aurelius2625]

It's on the person to get better. The game doesn't do a great job, and I'll be the FIRST to admit that. However, it's up to each person to learn the finer details of play and to get better at the game on their own.

When I played Monster Hunter World, although the tutorials are vastly superior to this game, I still took it upon myself to learn advanced tips for everything and maximize my experience...this was done on my own.

If you are garbage at this game it's because you have decided that's what you ought to be. In real life, if you want to get better at something, you look for information and expertise. You take new information in, fact check it, and see if the information is viable and either keep it or discard it in favor of new, more accurate information.

YMMV. If you want to be good, you gain experience through practice and experimentation. That's just the nature of the beast. There's no way around it. Why am I so good at tanking? I worked hard at it to squeeze every bit out of it. I asked where I could find a community to discuss optimizing: I found the Balance, and I've done work on my own when I couldn't get a good answer for something.

[QT_Melon]

I am at a loss where people are making an argument over solo instances may be the cause of people quitting being too easy or difficult.

I actually see more viable criticsm that if its too difficult people will quit than it being too easy.

The end game content where people have to work with one another is where it matters.

What number of people quit over solo instances being TOO EASY? I know ppl have quit due to fetch quest slog but most of the rage over solo instances is used as an argument over OTHER players.

Right now I know there are camps of players simply playing FFXIV for story and care of nothing else. There are camps that generally don't care about story and are interested in other content that generally requires groups (unless you are a mini game addict in Gold Saucer or a gatherer/crafter).

[Aurelius2625]

No. No it really shouldn't.

Think about what you are saying. You are saying the game should continue to get harder throughout its lifespan. That's an inbuilt self-destruct button right there that no developer would consider for a second. Nothing in life works that way for goodness sake.

I'm a writer. I started writing as a child and it was hard for a long time. But I worked at it and I improved and it started to get easier. Now I make money out of it. I continue to improve even now because I love writing and it matters to me. But if it had continued to get harder every time I went up a level, even though I was trying to improve, I would have given up.

This is a GAME. People play it to have FUN. Some are a great deal better at it than others, and they're playing in the Championship League. The folks who play in the Sunday League know they'll never make it to the Championship and they're happy with that. They work on their skills and improve to the level that they're capable of. Telling them they're not allowed to play anymore because the game got made harder, telling them Sunday League play isn't allowed anymore and they have to quit, that's really what you want? Do you not grasp the concept that people are different, and the vast majority have a skill ceiling that keeps them in the Sunday League?

The MSQ part of this game should be available to everyone who pays a sub. Nobody should be locked out of progressing through the MSQ because of difficulty that increases relentlessly, unceasingly, for as long as the game expands. Optional content, fine. Gate that all you want. Make it as hard as you want. Insist that people have to be a certain standard to get into that optional content.

You need to understand that most people - contrary to what this forum seems to think - are trying hard. They want to improve. They work on their skills and learning mechanics and everything else. BUT THEY ARE INHERENTLY NOT AS SKILLFUL AS YOU AND THEY NEVER WILL BE. SE knows this, and they have no intention of abandoning 80% of their player base and subs based upon your reasoning.

edit: I'm not saying there aren't trolls and bad eggs out there, but they are in the minority. Sadly people - like me - who try hard and want to improve are put off from doing anything that might be considered 'harder' content by the way we get spoken to in (for example) alliance raids because we're still learning mechanics and we mess up.

Bad people should be shamed into feeling bad, and never playing again. Only Ultimate level raiders are allowed in this game. And yes, I DO pay your sub young man.

[Mahoukenshi]

Bad people should be shamed into feeling bad, and never playing again. Only Ultimate level raiders are allowed in this game. And yes, I DO pay your sub young man.

That's the biggest pile of crap I've been reading, even if were to be meant as jest or trolling. And I've read A LOT of stupid things. Congrats, champ.

[QT_Melon]

Was someone responding to these posts thinking this is how hardcore players and their fanbase acts?

[AngelCheese77]

There is a few ways SE could handle dealing with some of the points you bring up.

1. Make class quests mandatory. Since some skills during levels 1-50 are locked behind doing class quests, make it so that you need to do the required class quests before a dungeon. For example, back in the day (and even now I think?) Shield Lob is given at the level 15 class quest. But of course the first dungeon is level 15, and I've seen many Gladiators not have Shield Lob because ... they didn't know they had to do their job quests for it.

2. Do not allow jump potions for first character created on an account. I do feel alot of issues are because people buy jump potions to bypass lower level content, not necessarily story (meaning they want to be level 70 when they do ARR). Keeping new accounts from buying jump potions could possibly help with end dungeon content and players who don't know how to play their class.

3. Better tutorials not shoved into a forgotten page. I can't count how many times I've been in a DF party where at least one player doesn't know what a Limit Break is, because the tooltip comes up in the middle of fighting, and what's the first thing people ususally do? That's right, close the window without reading it because they don't want to die. Find better ways to deal with battle tutorials and the Hall of Novice.

Keep in mind though that points 1 and 3 -even if a player does it - doesn't guarantee they they still won't give a crap about trying to play. Maybe SE could make it so there is an Achievement when the Hall of Novice is done, though that could cause issues with harassing in groups (you know, saying the player is bad even though they did the HoN etc).

Or, which is what I do, give some advice and if they don't want to try to do better, leave the dungeon. It isn't worth the time and aggrivation as you can't control or change other people.

[AngelCheese77]

There's been some instances where I've seen people complain about the fight with Ra jit and that fight still hasn't been changed.

The problems with the fight with Ran'jit is that you fight him with a character you aren't used to doing, and that it takes pretty much perfect timing to get certain skills off to use. My husband had to do that fight multiple times, and even on lower difficulty (though he has a handicap which can make certain things in a battle difficult). I was able to do it on the first try on Normal, but there was a LOT of buttclenching moments and lots of cursing.

[AngelCheese77]

If I run into one more 70+ WHM that doesn't use Regen the whole run I will not be held responsible for my actions. OP may be going a bit over board but SE really need to add something to make sure player know the basics before allowing them to drag the rest of us down

As a WHM main, it irks me to no end seeing other WHM not using Cure II or Regen in fights. Even just recently my sister left a DF party in AV because the healer only used Cure. Just ... Cure. Nothing else. I'm sure you can figure out how that went.

Makes me wish any WHM who doesn't use Regen after the first few pulls get one shotted by a flying salmon.

[Valic]

I think more casual content instances, both solo and group should have more enrages

I just ran Dun Scathe as a healer today and something hit me... The first boss of this 24 man is probably the best designed boss I've seen in a long time in this game. It's pretty average casual content, but it still REQUIRES each role to do something specific to clear. Or else? There's an enrage (not sure if I'd call it a hard or soft one though). The healers have to cleanse doom off several party members in each alliance. The tanks unfortunately don't have much to do other than the usual tanking, but eh.... And dps HAVE to not die and know how to deal sufficient damage before the boss fills every panel of the platform with the "death" tiles or everyone dies. This is beautiful to me, healers have to know what esuna is or people die as well as how to heal from all the bleed dots going around and aoe's placed on players. There's a fundamental requirement to "try" in this fight or you simply don't progress. If mechanics aren't done or enough damage isn't done, alliances die, the consequence? Not enough damage, a wipe to start it over before you can progress. It's not as brutal as a savage mode because it's no where near as tight or demanding, but it STILL demands the basics of each role. The fight also takes its time in teaching you things too, at first placing a couple (possibly 3?) of the ice bricks on the ground following the aero knockback to teach you how to stop it. That's outstanding imo because some will live and recognize it, others will die early on, but you're given enough breathing room to learn from it or people can tell one another.

WE NEED MORE FIGHTS TO BE LIKE THIS. Not bonus rewards or increased difficulty... but DEMAND to do well enough to progress. You don't? Your punishment is you don't progress further in the instance. You beat it? GJ! You get to see the rest of the scenery and the boss battles/fights after this one! You get to progress and eventually win so long as you keep that up!.... People act as though when they queue, they're entitled to the reward they queue'd for. As if the win is supposed to be guaranteed, brainless, thoughtless, effortless. To some, that is the case because they understand how to do that type of content already and that to them is seen as "easy enough". That's simply perspective/subjective to each individual. Regardless of that perspective, there should be things always in place that punish the player for not being able to do the basics. Innocence or Titania, great example, though roughly boring way to go about "checking"... having an add phase with a gauge that reaches 100 causes a hard enrage. I'm not personally for hard enrages in fights, but these seem somewhat warranted with how they're done. Adds spawn, you have to make sure everyone's up to be able to have sufficient dps to clear the phase or it's a wipe. It's pretty forgiving since it's only that particular section of the fight, meaning once it is passes... well just keep going I guess? Fights like Susano are also decent because they setup a coordination between each role. If not dps'd hard/fast enough, the boss repeats the raidwide aoe heal check. Meaning, either the healer has to heal even harder through consecutive hard hitting raidwide aoes, tanks have to mitigate them to buy more time so dps don't die, or dps of course need to properly know how to execute the basis of their job's rotation/skillset. I think that type of design is beautiful too, because it's not a hard "NO" necessarily but it is till a no. If anything, I find it more fitting that the 24 man had a more hard wipe-like mechanic considering it's the last of its set and 24 man content normally should require more effort than most 4-8man content does.

TL;DR: Your punishment should be that you don't get to go further, explore, or feel wow'd. Your accomplishment, reward for clearing it, should be... that ya did it! Less about what is obtained and why you're doing it. More mechanics like soft enrages and ideas like it should be implemented and encourage that effort to be done in casual content so the average player is met with a fairly reasonable "learning gate".

To quote zelda sequelitis.... "the reward was the fact that, YA DID IT! Not that... ya found a thing...". In this case, the reward should be you succeeded in your effort, not "gimme my daily items I queue'd for and don't have to try for". Or the "gimme my achievement for this thing already". The incentive is already in place in that sense, to want to try to want to see more and do more. How? By learning how to be somewhat efficient with what you play by doing the bare basics for most normal/casual content, rather than ignoring the possibility that you could use some improvement somewhere that could possibly define whether your group succeeds or not.