Dungeons we need to talk dungeons

[Artemiz]

It's hard to know what argument you are trying to make. But so far I've got:

1. Trying to say FFXI was equally as easy as XIV in its prime.
2. Defending that the difficulty level in 4 player dungeons should be so easy one person should be able to clear it alone.

The argument I'm trying to make is 4 man dungeons should be designed hard enough that it takes 4 people to clear it, because it is 4 player content, not 1 player content. If you disagree I understand. No biggie. Just getting my point across here that some people want to feel like they worked at least some for their hero status in the story as the Warrior of Light.

No FFXI is clearly harder, but much less popular. How much those two factors influence each other is open for debate but you used FFXI as an example of how harder is better. Im suggesting its difficulty caused a lot of people to quit.

My overall point about dungeon difficulty is that we have easy dungeons now as a direct consequence of the problems caused by having harder dungeons when the game launched. It used to be harder to tank, so we ended up with a shortage of tanks and tanks bailing at the start of certain dungeons. This lead to long queues. It used to be harder to heal, same thing, shortage of healers. We've had stricter DPS checks, it led to wipes and abandoned dungeon runs.

People are asking to start rolling that back, but with it you will get the problems back too.

Dungeons are designed for everyone to play. So they are tuned to make that possible with as little friction as possible. For players seeking a greater challenge the game has provided it. Asking to raise the difficulty floor will lead to less players, and more drama. SE know this, because we've seen it and done it before.

[RitsukoSonoda]

No FFXI is clearly harder, but much less popular. How much those two factors influence each other is open for debate but you used FFXI as an example of how harder is better. Im suggesting its difficulty caused a lot of people to quit.

My overall point about dungeon difficulty is that we have easy dungeons now as a direct consequence of the problems caused by having harder dungeons when the game launched. It used to be harder to tank, so we ended up with a shortage of tanks and tanks bailing at the start of certain dungeons. This lead to long queues. It used to be harder to heal, same thing, shortage of healers. We've had stricter DPS checks, it led to wipes and abandoned dungeon runs.

People are asking to start rolling that back, but with it you will get the problems back too.

Dungeons are designed for everyone to play. So they are tuned to make that possible with as little friction as possible. For players seeking a greater challenge the game has provided it. Asking to raise the difficulty floor will lead to less players, and more drama. SE know this, because we've seen it and done it before.

However making everything easier has resulted in other problems. Players that took the time to learn how to play the game are quitting because of boredom because the game is too easy resulting in people seeing various duties abandoned more often before they even start because the odds of encountering a player in DF that hasn't learned basic mechanics has increased. This also translates to problems with the content labeled "harder" because the easy mode players are not going to sit around satisfied with easy mode rewards. They want the shiny things they see in the "harder" content too. So it makes more sense to have the things leading up to that "harder" content be harder as well so that they're atleast prepared for the "harder" content when they jump into it. Back in the days you talk about where dungeons were harder it was fairly common to clear EX primals through DF. Now, not so much. Harder duties didn't make a shortage of tanks or healers. The playerbase created a shortage of tanks and healers. Anything SE does to try and "fix" this implied shortage is nothing more than using a band-aid to try and stop a leaking water pipe. This is due to a mentality of wanting to be the "hero" in the party and a majority of the player base associated this role with being the one that pushes button and makes big damage numbers hence DPS. Tanks will likely be the most in demand role when Endwalker launches simply because DPS and Healer are getting new job options. Tank and healer felt non existent when stormblood launched because they added 2 new dps jobs which were ones that were asked for by a large amount of the player base. Healer was the most in demand role when Shadowbringers launched because it launched with a new tank and DPS.

[Artemiz]

snip

But the game has never had so many players and its still rising. However many people leave because dungeons are too easy they are clearly being vastly outnumbered by the amount of new players starting, attracted in large part, by the accessibility of content.

I beg to differ about ex primals BTW, its always been party finder content for the vast majority.

And yes, new jobs effect queue times. I dont think anyone is arguing they don't.

[Shurrikhan]

But the game has never had so many players and its still rising. However many people leave because dungeons are too easy they are clearly being vastly outnumbered by the amount of new players starting, attracted in large part, by the accessibility of content.

Except you have no way of drawing causation there short of surveying a significant, random/representative sample and finding that, yes, the main reason they play is the lack of difficulty in dungeons or the ease (and thereby quickness) with which content can be consumed.

And even if they were all tell you, unequivocally, that they find the game better off for that quick consumption, that still wouldn't be enough to reasonably inform design because they aren't yet in a position where there are any costs in trade (i.e., where they'd actually run out of content), even while players for whom there is far less new content available see almost nothing but costs for design having favored to those newer players. And yet, unless you can forever and always draw in as many new players as you have players reach the end of available content, it's not sustainable. It's merely a pyramid scheme of favoring group B over former group A in order to draw in a larger group C to eventually replace A and B alike and draw group D, etc., etc.

[Artemiz]

Except you have no way of drawing causation there short of surveying a significant, random/representative sample and finding that, yes, the main reason they play is the lack of difficulty in dungeons or the ease (and thereby quickness) with which content can be consumed.

I didnt claim they did. I was countering a claim that people are leaving because dungeons are too easy. With dungeons being by far the majority of multi-player content new players experience then success is the best way of encouraging them to continue. You dont need a survey for that, its basic psychology.

[Shurrikhan]

I didnt claim they did. I was countering a claim that people are leaving because dungeons are too easy.

They... are, though. We don't know if that portion is significant, but unless our LS mates and Discord friends and the like are outright lying to us out of some nefarious ulterior motive, that group of people certainly do exist.

With dungeons being by far the majority of multi-player content new players experience then success is the best way of encouraging them to continue.

Encouragement and steadily lowering relative expectations are not necessarily, or even typically, the same thing.

[Artemiz]

They... are, though. We don't know if that portion is significant, but unless our LS mates and Discord friends and the like are outright lying to us out of some nefarious ulterior motive, that group of people certainly do exist.


Encouragement and steadily lowering relative expectations are not necessarily, or even typically, the same thing.

Im not claiming people are lying and I'm sure there are people quitting because they are bored. My point was that the playerbase is still expanding quite rapidly, especially for am MMO this old. So anyone quitting is being replaced by at least more than one new player. Its a shame for those who are bored, but the game is in good health regardless.

Im not sure what your saying with your last point, success is a very strong motivator, thats not really in doubt.

A quick edit just to add, it doesn't matter what you or I think about it, because I'm not trying to convince anyone. It was SE's decision to go down this route and I'm just trying to point out why. I will say though given how successful the game has been it does appear to have been a wise decision and any player unhappy with the difficulty of dungeons cam always do harder content.