New Relic weapon quest - are we down to 1 hour content already?

[Xtrasweettea]

You all understand that this "1 Hour" of Content comes after multiple hours of Alliance raids and quests, right?

It seems everyone either missed this part or is ignoring it:

Players must first complete the main scenario quest "Shadowbringers" and the sidequest "The City of Lost Angels."

That is straight out of the patch notes.

If you were like me, and had no interest in the Ivalice raids back in Stormblood, if you want the i485 relic, you have to do the whole Ivalice quest-line.

There's that grind, there's that "needing to go through older content to help the newbs," there's that "we need story", etc. that people kept asking for back during Eureka. It's just that some of you already completed it and didn't know about it, so grats and all that.

[SamRF]

What's enjoyable about grinding 10 mindless dungeons/following a train all day for weapons and armor that you may not even need since Raid gear is better stat-wise anyways?

I'd rather spend an hour having some small modicum of fun than spend 3-6 months on a soul sucking and literally mindless grind just to slap a glow effect on a weapon skin I already unlocked, heck, I'd rather spend 10 minutes doing something enjoyable than spend an hour doing something that's about as thrilling as watching paint dry. People already have things to do, they do it every single day, do we really need to spend half a year doing the worst content in the entire game for some excuse to have high level characters running through low level zones?

Some people enjoy grinding though. There are MMOs dedicated to grinding and people play them because they enjoy it. FFXIV offered this grinding itch with the relic usually for those who want to grind. We already have plenty of cutscenes and story in MSQ and sidequests. They should have kept relic for those interested in grinding IMO.

Note that if it were too grindy for you, you could just avoid doing it since there are other ways to get similar or better weapon. It's definitely not a requirement to do the relic.

However we do have the fate grinding in Shadowbringers so arguably the grinding itch can be satisfied that way already.

[Iscah]

Excuse me? Dungeon?

No, we got a solo duty. A one time, solo duty.

I did have "dungeon" in quote marks initially. It is a unique, unrecycled zone that is structured like a dungeon.

I'm also still coming from a JRPG mindset. There's nothing unremarkable about a one-time-only zone. You always play a dungeon once and move on. It's the endless repetition that seems strange.

Because doing things to earn a reward is literally how gear treadmill games work?

If Savage didn't offer gear, no-one would play them. If Ultimate didn't give rewards, no-one would play it. If dungeons didn't offer tomestones, no-one would run them after doing their MSQ.

If we continue down the line of "If you don't want to put yourself through that" then what next? Free Savage gear for logging in to the game because many people don't like/want to do Savage raiding?

If you got "free savage gear for logging in", it wouldn't be savage gear.

Hyperbolic examples aside, obviously there's a balance between getting things for free and having them locked behind a tedious grind, and there could have been more focus on the weapons themselves.

But I still don't see where the appeal is in being forced to do activities repeatedly to "make progress". I want to engage with content because it's enjoyable or a new challenge, and come back to it only if I actually want to do it again, not because the game designers have decided I should have to do it another ten times.

I skip EX/Savage content for the most part, but for the few times I've learned a fight, once I beat it I feel like I've succeeded and I'm finished with it, not ready to do it another X times. (Unless I want a particular glamour from it, at any rate - but I'd still prefer to not have to grind for it.)

I'm here because I enjoy the story, worldbuilding, character designs and glamours. I enjoy dungeons but the RNG of item drops is frustrating. I'm happy to "do things" to get stuff, but not to do it repeatedly.

And I actually would get more enjoyment out of getting some things instantaneously if I could. I love the PVP glamours and I have a long list of things I want for my characters, but I don't like PVP itself. I will be playing PVP to earn them... but I'd be much happier if I didn't have to and could skip straight to the enjoyable bit of dressing my characters up in those awesome costumes and seeing how good they look. The few hours' worth of PVP gameplay could be spent on something else - MSQ progression on an alt, another game entirely, get away from the TV and draw or read or do all the other things I've got to get on with.

Maybe it's just about choosing what to grind - I have several alts that all need to get through the game sooner or later, and get levelled up to equip glamours. But again, given the choice, I'd rather be able to skip that grind and jump into playing with those glamours, then spend time on getting through the story instead of running Sastasha for EXP yet again. I know I can't, but I'd like to.

I'll take one hour of entertainment over being forced to go through a hour of tedium (or several) to "earn" that hour of entertainment.

[Awful]

Not gonna lie pretty disappointed with the relic that is was done literally in an hour, while i'm glad it's not Atma 5.0 I wish it was tied to at least the EX Trial, Like complete it once and get the material needed for the new Relic and then poof you're done. The only reason to do the new EX is just for glamour and to me it's just not worth it, while it's slightly harder then Ruby Weapon EX that's not saying much as that fight was on rails giving you a spectacle on the eyes not on difficulty.

These patches have been heavily 1.0 based with Nael and Cid and while it's great we got some context with his past they could have done so much more with his memory to make it so that you have to fix his memories and then fight the big bad at the end. It just seems to me they wanted to put certain characters in the spot light from 1.0 in the sake of this expansion being a continuation of the 1.0 story and it ending that way too, all in all it's good don't get me wrong but there's no staying power.

It's just get poetics (AKA run MSQ roulette and Alliance roulette a day), get free weapon, the only reason to run Ruby EX now is for the mount and for some reason a weapon since some of the tank weapons (like DRK) are mostly Tenacity with low Crit which doesn't beat out the Ruby wep or Crystarium weapon so if you have those the weapons relics are just meh. Hopefully next patch we get some good updates because I was asking "is this finished? Where's the rest of it?".

[Ramesses]

/Chuckles...

Nineteen pages already.

Let's be brutally honest: the storyline was definitely way more than an hour (if one actually took time to digest the dialogue) and I thoroughly enjoyed the revealing information regarding the Blades of Gunnhildr-- plus the battles were very interesting. There was a sense of "closure" for a charcater and we got to experience what really went down at that Citadel--- many of us have been waiting for almost five years for that bit of information.

Not to mention, the new BGM in that new area was very very nice.

So enjoy the new weapon, go practice on clearing a certain new Extreme battle several times over--- and mentally prepare for the relic grind that is obviously incoming with future patches.

[yukiiyuki]

You all understand that this "1 Hour" of Content comes after multiple hours of Alliance raids and quests, right?

It seems everyone either missed this part or is ignoring it:

Players must first complete the main scenario quest "Shadowbringers" and the sidequest "The City of Lost Angels."

That is straight out of the patch notes.

If you were like me, and had no interest in the Ivalice raids back in Stormblood, if you want the i485 relic, you have to do the whole Ivalice quest-line.

There's that grind, there's that "needing to go through older content to help the newbs," there's that "we need story", etc. that people kept asking for back during Eureka. It's just that some of you already completed it and didn't know about it, so grats and all that.

Well, for opening raids, you need to be 70 lvl, that means you need to go through main story since lvl 1, also you need gear, you missed whole game, so much content. It's not like we actually played the game and was ready for relic farm.

[ForteNightshade]

What's enjoyable about grinding 10 mindless dungeons/following a train all day for weapons and armor that you may not even need since Raid gear is better stat-wise anyways?

I'd rather spend an hour having some small modicum of fun than spend 3-6 months on a soul sucking and literally mindless grind just to slap a glow effect on a weapon skin I already unlocked, heck, I'd rather spend 10 minutes doing something enjoyable than spend an hour doing something that's about as thrilling as watching paint dry. People already have things to do, they do it every single day, do we really need to spend half a year doing the worst content in the entire game for some excuse to have high level characters running through low level zones?

How about we take a third option and demand something better than either extreme? I wouldn't want a boring FATE grind like the Atma again any more than I like essentially being handed three relics through no effort beyond the fact Poetics are so worthless to me nowadays, I capped on them months ago. There should be a middle ground to strife for where we have a decently long grind but it's at least decently enjoyable.

/Chuckles...

Nineteen pages already.

Let's be brutally honest: the storyline was definitely way more than an hour (if one actually took time to digest the dialogue) and I thoroughly enjoyed the revealing information regarding the Blades of Gunnhildr-- plus the battles were very interesting. There was a sense of "closure" for a charcater and we got to experience what really went down at that Citadel--- many of us have been waiting for almost five years for that bit of information.

Not to mention, the new BGM in that new area was very very nice.

So enjoy the new weapon, go practice on clearing a certain new Extreme battle several times over--- and mentally prepare for the relic grind that is obviously incoming with future patches.

Depends on if you're a slow reader or not I suppose. I took my time and was done within an hour or so. Admittedly, I did enjoy the second half when a certain NPC comes in and the solo instance starts. Beyond that though, I was a bit bored if I'm being honest. Things took far too long to actually get going. Of course, that's down to personal taste.

As for the BGM. If you're referring to the EX trial, it's the old dungeon theme they replaced last patch. So it isn't new.

Prepare how? By playing another game? That's part of why people are complaining. They want more of a reason to play FFXIV yet there simply isn't one.

[EdwinLi]

I think the Hardcore aspect of the Relic for 5.X this time is going to be split between the Casual for weapons and Hardcore for armor sets.

If Weapon progress is simply obtained as we progress through the Resistance storyline ( with some tome farming to gather alt 5.0 relic weapons) then it is more for casuals.

Relic Armor set appears to be behind the Extreme Trial of the Resistance storyline content so it maybe here where the hardcore grinding begins as upgrading these Relic armor through the more time and effort style contents.

However, this is all just a guess for now until we see more updates to how they will progress Relic weapons and Relic Armor sets.

[Ramesses]

How about we take a third option and demand something better than either extreme? I wouldn't want a boring FATE grind like the Atma again any more than I like essentially being handed three relics through no effort beyond the fact Poetics are so worthless to me nowadays, I capped on them months ago. There should be a middle ground to strife for where we have a decently long grind but it's at least decently enjoyable.

Depends on if you're a slow reader or not I suppose. I took my time and was done within an hour or so. Admittedly, I did enjoy the second half when a certain NPC comes in and the solo instance starts. Beyond that though, I was a bit bored if I'm being honest. Things took far too long to actually get going. Of course, that's down to personal taste.

As for the BGM. If you're referring to the EX trial, it's the old dungeon theme they replaced last patch. So it isn't new.

Prepare how? By playing another game? That's part of why people are complaining. They want more of a reason to play FFXIV yet there simply isn't one.

This is where I never cease to be astounded by how players like you continue to swiftly rush through the tale without really absorbing what is being laid out before them. I surmise you have completed the quest, thus you may open the minor spoilers below:

• Did you grasp the additional lore regarding the two Legati of the IVth legion?
• Did you really grasp the incredible FFXII references-- assuming you have played that wonderful game?
• Did you grasp the information regarding the unique relationship between that legion and the Emperor?
• Did you grasp Bajsaljen's history and what profession he was initially chasing before he became the leader?
• Did you grasp the significance of Menenius and his family?
• Did you grasp the history of how Castrum Lacus Litore came about and it's significant similarities to the real life Alamut Castle?
• Did you really understand the real significance of Gerolt's cutscenes with a certain wealthy person?

I was able to absorb all that by just taking my main charcater through the quest-- I might learn even more when I take my second main charcater through sometime tomorrow. Heck, I might even pick up some more hidden nuances while I take my current third character on Diabolos through Stormblood.

Slow reader you say? I'm a very prolific reader-- when I need to do my speed reading I easily notch around 500 to 600 words per minute. When I need to speed read with retention, I slow down to about almost 350 to 400 per minute and I do it with a 85% to 90% retention-- it's one of the reasons I excelled at both my Masters degrees.

By the way-- regarding your question "prepare how?" -- I'm now almost convinced you were not around for the insanely mad relic grinds of ARR's Atma, Heavensward's Anima, and Stormblood's Eureka. Players who truly went through those times understand exactly what I mean by mentally preparing for the grind ahead.

Now head back in-game and go try to figure out all the additional lore I just mentioned above.

[Xtrasweettea]

Well, for opening raids, you need to be 70 lvl, that means you need to go through main story since lvl 1, also you need gear, you missed whole game, so much content. It's not like we actually played the game and was ready for relic farm.

I am so sorry, I didn't play the game.