Alliance raids have no business being a relic step.

[Amnmaat]

The option to do old content is what made pre-Stormblood relics fun for me. Those that don't like it can do the new location (Bozja).
I want to show my support for giving us the option to do stuff outside of Eureka/Bozja.

[Arkevorkhat]

The option to do old content is what made pre-Stormblood relics fun for me. Those that don't like it can do the new location (Bozja).
I want to show my support for giving us the option to do stuff outside of Eureka/Bozja.

You obviously haven't actually looked into the requirements.
The development team have made it extremely clear that the zone content (Bozja) is NOT the intended method for getting the BOZJAN RESISTANCE weapons.
I like bozja, I greatly dislike Stormblood (and everything associated with it), I don't want to spend hours grinding the godawful Return to Ivalice raid series, nor do I want to spend dozens of hours in Stormblood zones grinding FATEs to try and hit a drop that has an estimated 10% drop rate, because the dev team desperately wants people to do Alliance Raids, because they refuse to admit that the design for them isn't a good fit for everyone, and that people should have a right to do the content they like, and not be punished for wanting to do the actual new content.

[Amnmaat]

You obviously haven't actually looked into the requirements.
The development team have made it extremely clear that the zone content (Bozja) is NOT the intended method for getting the BOZJAN RESISTANCE weapons.
I like bozja, I greatly dislike Stormblood (and everything associated with it), I don't want to spend hours grinding the godawful Return to Ivalice raid series, nor do I want to spend dozens of hours in Stormblood zones grinding FATEs to try and hit a drop that has an estimated 10% drop rate, because the dev team desperately wants people to do Alliance Raids, because they refuse to admit that the design for them isn't a good fit for everyone, and that people should have a right to do the content they like, and not be punished for wanting to do the actual new content.

The middle step is the only one that has no Bozja option, and you only need to do that step once; after your first weapon you can skip that middle step. Being able to do 2 out of 3 steps in Bozja isn't the end of the world.
Remember, those of us who hated Eureka had to go through Bozja before we could do relics outside of Bozja, so we're literally in the same situation of having to do Bozja or Raids once.

[Arkevorkhat]

The middle step is the only one that has no Bozja option, and you only need to do that step once; after your first weapon you can skip that middle step. Being able to do 2 out of 3 steps in Bozja isn't the end of the world.
Remember, those of us who hated Eureka had to go through Bozja before we could do relics outside of Bozja, so we're literally in the same situation of having to do Bozja or Raids once.

You greatly misunderstand the argument going on here.
The drop rates inside Bozja are so low that they may as well be zero; if you go into Bozja for the sole purpose of doing your relic, you're wasting your time.
It's not that it's literally impossible, it's that it's unfeasible. If I wanted to do a relic from scratch in Bozja and complete all of the steps that are possible to complete in Bozja, it would take me 10 times as long as it would to do it in HW and SB content.

It doesn't matter how much people hated Eureka. Bozja is a different beast, and has had a much better reception. Besides, what about the people who like the instanced zone style gameplay, what are they to do? Is it reasonable that because a subset of our community didn't like Eureka, that now even the people who did are forced out into content they don't want to do because SE believes balance is a zero-sum game, and that the only variables at play are drop-chance and time investment? What of people like myself, who greatly dislike 24-person raids, and when given the choice of doing them, or not getting a relic, are gonna choose not doing the relic, because there's no weapon SE could ever add to the game that would be worth it? What about them?

People who are saying that it's fine that Bozja and FATEs have such low drop rates are being selfish at best, and actively hostile to other playstyles (which mind you is explicitly prohibited by the FF14 ToS) at worst and really need to be re-examining why they play this game, because if your viewpoint is that your play-style is the only one that is valid, and all others need to be mechanically discouraged, you should be playing a single-player game.

[Packetdancer]

The drop rates inside Bozja are so low that they may as well be zero; if you go into Bozja for the sole purpose of doing your relic, you're wasting your time.

With the recent hotfix, the drop rates seem much improved, fwiw. They still could be better, but I was getting the various types of memories on the regular while in Bozja last night.

[Amnmaat]

1 alliance rate takes 20-30 minutes; I don't think you can convince me that you wouldn't drop 1 memory at Bozja during that time. Also remember you get 5 memories at Castrum Litore now.

[Arkevorkhat]

1 alliance rate takes 20-30 minutes; I don't think you can convince me that you wouldn't drop 1 memory at Bozja during that time. Also remember you get 5 memories at Castrum Litore now.

Come back when you're willing to discuss the topic at hand.

The Crystal Tower / Castrum step is not the issue at hand.
The issue at hand is the functional requirement to complete Stormblood and Heavensward alliance raids, the worst alliance raids in the game, in order to progress.

Before you say "oh the drop rates aren't that bad", 6 hours. 6 HOURS I have grinded FATEs, and I am not even halfway done.

[Amnmaat]

Come back when you're willing to discuss the topic at hand.

The Crystal Tower / Castrum step is not the issue at hand.
The issue at hand is the functional requirement to complete Stormblood and Heavensward alliance raids, the worst alliance raids in the game, in order to progress.

Before you say "oh the drop rates aren't that bad", 6 hours. 6 HOURS I have grinded FATEs, and I am not even halfway done.

I already addressed your stormblood raids issue.

You only have to do that once; just like those of us who prefer old content only had to level to rank 10 and run Castrum Litore once. Those 10 ranks took a very long time to get, it's a very long step. It's an equal give and take. You suffer through this second step once, and we suffer through the 10 ranks + Castrum Litore once. We're both being forced to run the same lengthy content we don't like; from a game design standpoint this is a very elegant way to make both sides try out each other's culture once and see if you like it. If not, you don't have to do that step ever again after your first relic.

[Arkevorkhat]

I already addressed your stormblood raids issue.

You only have to do that once; just like those of us who prefer old content only had to level to rank 10 and run Castrum Litore once. Those 10 ranks took a very long time to get, it's a very long step. It's an equal give and take. You suffer through this second step once, and we suffer through the 10 ranks + Castrum Litore once. We're both being forced to run the same lengthy content we don't like; from a game design standpoint this is a very elegant way to make both sides try out each other's culture once and see if you like it. If not, you don't have to do that step ever again after your first relic.

You're not listening.

I have tried your supposed side of this.
I hate the raids.
I had to do them to get to Bozja, and I nearly quit the damn game because they sucked so much.
I wanted to do this with FATEs as the developers explicitly said was an option.
The developers LIED in saying that by making it functionally impossible.
I'm sick and tired of people telling me that it's unreasonable that I am unwilling to do literally 8 duties out of this entire game. (HW and SB alliance raids + Aurum Vale and Dzemael Darkhold)

"I had to suffer, so should everyone else" is a pretty shit argument NGL.

[van_arn]

I'm just sitting here, bemused, that someone hates the most creative raid series of the game (Stormblood) enough to grind fates for 6 hours instead.