The difficulty of Normal Content in this game needs to increase.

[Atelier-Bagur]

Well...
1 - That's not an argument. That's an opinion I'm not advocating for anything. To you, the game doesn't need to have difficulty to be enjoyable. Well, I don't like Savage but I'm comfortable with the examples I listed. Does it mean that just because I want something a bit more complex, I need to start getting into Savage and EXes? Advocating for something extra doesn't imply the deletion of whatever there is right now. If anything, I'd say I want there to be more of such content, rather than it being so one-sided on either end. There is no spectrum half the time. I often need to wait and be surprised that complex content exists rather than knowing it's coming.

2 - I'd like the game to have more content like the one I described, but I understand why they don't do it. Amarande says it best: MMOs don't respect working adults, who already have to spend their energy daily and don't want to come home to a tryhardy game. Just because I'm fine with that doesn't mean that it's the best approach. And the approach they have does seem to work, since it's one of the reasons the game is so popular.

3 - Savage and EX's aren't the same as CLL or Orbonne Monastery. Like, at all.

Edit: Also, just to clarify. I mostly wrote that in response to VelKallor's post which was directed at raiders.
It's kind of why I prefaced it with "I don't raid, I'm in the casual crowd, but I prefer the harder content". Because it's not just a matter of raiders disliking casual content, it's that there are casual players who do prefer the harder type of content. But they are not the only ones, and I daresay I'm probably in a minority. People who prefer the easier type of content likely vastly outnumber me. And I have no problem with that.

CLL and Orbonne arent hard at all and not as good examples as people like to make them out to be. The mechanics arent as punishing for new players. whats truly considered hard in this game is having a fight be an abundance of mechanics that each member must resolve themselves or else risk a wipe for the whole group and having tight dps check such as in Savage and EXs.

[Kes13a]

CLL and Orbonne arent hard at all and not as good examples as people like to make them out to be. The mechanics arent as punishing for new players. whats truly considered hard in this game is having a fight be an abundance of mechanics that each member must resolve themselves or else risk a wipe for the whole group and having tight dps check such as in Savage and EXs.

thats why I myself will not do Savage or Ex, I am a decent enough player, but ... my brain does not get some mechanics, and even worse, having to decide independently where to go if everyone has to go to a different spot. I forget which Eden one it is, but the one with the birds... it seems easy enough but my brain just does not process it. but thats a personal limitation and I am okay with missing those. I have a friend who does them so I live vicariously through her exploits lol

[Midareyukki]

I feel like I should clarify?

I don't think that I'm lacking in content at all. I can fully enjoy "easy casual content" just fine. That does not get invalidated at all by me saying "but I prefer the content that's on the harder/challenging side". And saying so in turn doesn't mean I instantly only want to see EX and Savage level of content. Because... let's be honest, that's asinine. What sort of masochist wants that? ^^;

I prefer fights that are like "Oh, okay, so you've come this far, you know these mechanics, let's shake it up a little bit". Nothing too fancy. Take Kefka Normal. The core of the fight is taking mechanics that you've already seen umpteen times by then, and then reverse them. Look markers? Don't look. Don't stand markers? Stand on it.
Argath does this. Truth mask, Liar mask. So too does Ultima with her wind, changing the AoEs and pushing them up a bit. A bit less obvious than Kefka for sure, but that's the same.

It's not like I want this sort of content all the time either. Not to mention how some casual content like normal trials can also get a bit annoying by fight design alone? I know Barbariccia phase 2 is meant to be hectic, but for me it's just chaotic and I don't like it. Especially not as a caster.

If anything, I'd say the game needs more midcore-type content. MORE. Not delete everything else.
On one hand, I don't want dungeons to be so challenging that it bothers newcomers and casual people. Stuff that would impede progression. Even if I did enjoy Shinryu at launch, because I know people have a life outside the game. Some of us do touch grass.
On the other hand... I also don't want Syrcus Tower-levels of boredom either. If that's your prerrogative, great, but mine isn't, and there are pieces of content where I'd prefer to have a more challenging thing.

And that should not mean that I want Savage-level of content. I know what's being said: "You want harder content, you have it". But we rarely do, not to this level. This nice, comfortable level where it's not too easy to the point of falling asleep and actually respects the fact that you've learned the game up to that far. But also not hard enough to the point of frustration and requiring to prog things.

And lastly because I love this point:

thats why I myself will not do Savage or Ex, I am a decent enough player, but ... my brain does not get some mechanics, and even worse, having to decide independently where to go if everyone has to go to a different spot. I forget which Eden one it is, but the one with the birds... it seems easy enough but my brain just does not process it. but thats a personal limitation and I am okay with missing those. I have a friend who does them so I live vicariously through her exploits lol

Yeah. I have colourblindness. I struggle with direction-based mechanics a lot. Zodiark's spins? Yeah no, my brain did not compute that on Extreme at all, I needed people to guide me. Yes, I make ridiculous efforts to deal with them sometimes (ask me how my clears of Tsukuyomi EX were, the method I have for knowing whether to go in/out left/right was so stupid that other people said that I made it harder than the fight actually was). It doesn't mean I expect people to do these efforts. I shouldn't and I don't. Because I'm not the one to go to people and say "You who are struggling should keep struggling because I find it amusing".


I do not want my sort of difficulty to replace the difficulty we currently have on casual content. And I never said so. But it's true that it's not something expected. It often comes bundled into something that's meant for casuals, but then turns out it ends up not being so. And what happens? People complain. People say it's too hard. People dislike it immensely. People say it's unfair. People go on forums and social media asking for it to be nerfed. And sometimes it does, often to the point of rendering the fight super piddly.
And there needs to be a better balance of that. Of side content that's more "midcore" than just Extremes. Of side content that isn't challenging but on content that's supposed to be for the average player. I don't find that fair.

And what I also don't find fair is that I prefer is being taken as what I feel the game should do. I happen to have a preference for these sorts of contents. I should not be told, however, to go play Savage just because of a preference for midcore content. Because yeah. I can enjoy and I do enjoy the easy content too. I like dungeons, I like Treasure Maps, I am amused by Euphrosyne. It's just not the sort of content that makes me go "Oh hell yeah!". And Savage isn't it either.

I'll just leave it at this bc I know it's going to leave people incensed either way, so... Just know that me being in support of normal content needing an increase in difficulty doesn't mean that there isn't a place for the easy content everyone loves.