Since they put barrier on new ARR MSQ instance...

[dspguy]

Lots of dungeons are part of the MSQ. It is still strange to me that Castrum/Prae are treated differently.

[Daeriion_Aeradiir]

Lots of dungeons are part of the MSQ. It is still strange to me that Castrum/Prae are treated differently.

99% of said dungeons also have at most one cutscene at the beginning that the party can't skip if one person wants to watch it due to the barrier, followed by one 10-15s cutscene of the final boss of the dungeon swooping in and roaring.
Meanwhile praetorium & Castrum have multiple minutes worth of actual plot relevant cutscenes, they're not comparable in the slightest.

The bosses aren't complete jokes and don't die in a few seconds anymore, we should be able to skip them.

Even a 3 man party could still defeat Nero 2x over before the cutscene before him could finish. if not for his add phase, you could also beat Gaius 2x over before his cutscene finished. Letting the cutscenes be skippable even with the tweaked bosses would still cause new players to completely miss out on fights, hence why they're not skippable period. Since you -know- if one of the watching players is a dps, 90% of groups will have no trouble ditching them and just start fighting since it'll be faster than waiting, circling back to the exact same problem that led to the whole cutscene lock in the first place: ruining the experience of first timers.

[dspguy]

99% of said dungeons also have at most one cutscene at the beginning that the party can't skip if one person wants to watch it due to the barrier, followed by one 10-15s cutscene of the final boss of the dungeon swooping in and roaring.
Meanwhile praetorium & Castrum have multiple minutes worth of actual plot relevant cutscenes, they're not comparable in the slightest.

How often do you run Prae/Castrum and have a new player? Those "non-new-player" runs shouldn't have a forced cutscene. Ever. No other dungeon does that. Why is Castrum/Prae different?

[VelKallor]

How often do you run Prae/Castrum and have a new player?

Every single day.

Why is Castrum/Prae different?

End of the Ultimate Weapon storyline / end of ARR MSQ.

THATS why.

[dspguy]

Every single day.



End of the Ultimate Weapon storyline / end of ARR MSQ.

THATS why.

That's not an answer. Every expansion has a "last dungeon" or trial. Every storyline has a last trial/dungeon/raid. None of those cutscenes are forced. Nearly 10 years of FFXIV - these are the only dungeons with forced cutscenes.

If the reward isn't great enough, players won't run it more than once. Cutscenes or not.

[Striker44]

That's not an answer. Every expansion has a "last dungeon" or trial. Every storyline has a last trial/dungeon/raid. None of those cutscenes are forced. Nearly 10 years of FFXIV - these are the only dungeons with forced cutscenes.

If the reward isn't great enough, players won't run it more than once. Cutscenes or not.

Yeah, it's not so much that it's the "end" of something, but it's the amount of story that occurs during cutscenes in those end-of-ARR dungeons specifically. None of the xpacs since have come anywhere close to the amount of mid-run cutscenes that you see in Prae. And the regularity that MSQ roulette always runs is plenty of evidence that the rewards are more than sufficient for people to run it regularly.

[VelKallor]

That's not an answer.

It is the answer, only its one you dont like.

very expansion has a "last dungeon" or trial. Every storyline has a last trial/dungeon/raid. None of those cutscenes are forced. Nearly 10 years of FFXIV - these are the only dungeons with forced cutscenes.

If the reward isn't great enough, players won't run it more than once. Cutscenes or not.

Which is why the rewards are commensurate with the time expectation.

Its really this simple: accept the cutscenes and time commitment, or dont queue.

[Asteldian]

I've not had a new guy in the MS roulette for about 6 months.
The solution is pretty simple - whenever you do a dungeon when someone s new, the game recognizes it and gives a bonus. Since the game knows if people are new or not, then if no one in the group is new, allow the videos to be skipped.

Though honestly, Praetorium is the least of my issues - boring cutscenes for 15 mins I can handle, it's the Ultima Weapon fight that needs addressing - the whole first phase is just so boring, the mob is just a punching bag and it goes on too long. Remove the whole phase, let the fight start with the long vid and just do the second phase....or just massively reduce its hp for the first phase

[dspguy]

It is the answer, only its one you dont like.



Which is why the rewards are commensurate with the time expectation.

Its really this simple: accept the cutscenes and time commitment, or dont queue.

Just seems like bad design on their part. They probably should have just removed MSQ roulette entirely and make those dungeons run with the scions or something. For full disclosure, I abused the hell out of Castrum/Prae before it was changed. New expansion drops - run that daily. 45-90% of a level plus poetics that I use to buy the augmented gear to take new jobs to 90. Eventually I had the cutscenes down to a science. CS-> make coffee, kill boss, CS -> clean a room in the house, kill boss, CS -> clean another room. My house was never cleaner than when I was running the old Praetorium.

I know the updated MSQ roulette aren't going to change. It just doesn't make any sense to force cutscenes when no one needs them.

[Gemina]

Lots of dungeons are part of the MSQ. It is still strange to me that Castrum/Prae are treated differently.

They're treated differently because these encounters were designed when the game was still in its adolescent stages. What people don't want to hear is that the problem was never the cutscenes. The problem stemmed from designing these encounters in such a way that players could exploit them, and rake in those sweet, sweet rewards.

Dev team's response: