This game is on a terrible state right now.

[Jojoya]

They should think that people are sad that this new content is finished after just 4 hours (12 runs for the notes, one takes 20 minutens) and that there is no reason to ever set foot into this new awesome dungeon again (well I thought it was boring but whatever).

Even if you go slow the variant dungeon can barely entertain you for more than 3 evenings.

And criterion is overtuned for the majority of playerbase and yes it takes too much effort for too little rewards. When you have to decide between progressing savage raids or criterion dungeon... which one rewards your time spent better?

I suppose that depends on not just what rewards you enjoy but what rewards you currently need/desire.

Generally, we're always going to prioritize content that gives us what we currently feel we need first. Once that needs is taken care of, then we move to the things we want or maybe just find fun.

Perhaps the problem with Criterion was really the timing. It was released a few weeks after Abyssos. It makes sense that Criterion wouldn't feel compelling when it doesn't reward BiS gear at a time in the expansion cycle that players are farming for the new BiS gear.

How would players have felt if Criterion had been released in 6.35 instead of 6.25? By then, most statics would have had Abyssos cleared and BiS gear for at least their main jobs if not also one or two of their alt jobs. They've got less to do and are starting to think about 6.4. Perhaps they aren't interested in the glamour or housing items for personal use but they're a good way to make gil for buying the things that will be needed to start Anabaseios progression.

Do you think timing the release differently might have made players (not necessarily yourself) feel better about Criterion?

Edit to add in that one glaring problem with Criterion is it failed to address the lack of midcore content the player base is looking for. But it was still something that was innovative for the game and should be given credit for at least that much.

[SannaR]

I noticed how those that seem to be so upset at venues the most in this thread are from EU servers. And the normal look of the game? Wth does that even mean? The game is a hodgepodge of aesthetics. You have medieval, steampunk, art deco, ancient greek, brutalism (yes that's a style of architecture), nomadic looks, a mix of ancient China/Japan/Korea, and yes modern looks (thanks to Eulmore and Garlemald). The dance pole was a wanted item ever since people saw them in the beehive in Eulmore. Also I guess it's only ok to ask for modern stuff when you guys ask for it. Or does the ask for 1940s/1950s era military outfits not count as modern? What do you have against 1950s normal wear that one might see at a university? Or are you talking about the street ware that barely exists?

Oh and before anyone tries to make it look as though I like the university outfit or the street wear they're not to my taste. Or at least most of it isn't. Some parts by themselves I like the look of. Just the overall look isn't my cup of tea. I also am not going to shame someone else for liking it.

[Tint]

Do you think timing the release differently might have made players (not necessarily yourself) feel better about Criterion?

Edit to add in that one glaring problem with Criterion is it failed to address the lack of midcore content the player base is looking for. But it was still something that was innovative for the game and should be given credit for at least that much.

I think the main problem are the rewards, not the timing. Savage raiders will clear Criterion sooner or later. In the long weeks between patch 6.5 and the next expansion this will become a good way to spend your time while hyped up for 7.0.

A more desireable mount would help as well, instead of an ugly chair.

But the main problem is the lack of gear. It takes basically as much effort to keep a static group of 8 people together as it takes to clear the fights. Many people could clear savage but don't want to bother with so many people or even random parties.

But a savage mode for 4 people? And with gear? That would lower the barrier of entry for many people. But of course then savage raids compete directly with criterion and likely savage will lose out.

I would love to have an alternative to savage raids, but I guess the better way would be to place Criterion below savage, more in line with ex trials, more approachable for the average player. Then they probably can put gear with a lower item level into it (10 ilvl below savage? Shared lockout with savage? Upgradeable in the next patch?) and they have to add a nice mount.

----

Well I personally plan to do Criterion. But our 4 man party wants to do the Deep Dungeons first, just finished Heavon on High and everyone got the horse mount. I will likely never run out of things to do. Over 20k hours logged and the list of stuff I want to do goes on and on.
But I see that the content we got in EW is lackluster anyway. I am only really satisfied with Eureka Orthos.

----

Edit:

The problem Criterion is so hard to incorporate into the game is a gripe I have for a long time: Tomestone gear is just too good. There is no room between savage raids and tomestone gear for anything.

In 2.0 the tomestone gear was kind of a failsafe for the raid gear. But the raids have their own failsafe mechanic added. Tomestone gear simply has no business being that strong. It should be dialed back to the level of normal raid and crafted gear. Then not only can Criterion get it's own gear, the 24 man raid gear will become more than just glamour as well.

[kpxmanifesto]

Lmao, perfect representation.

[ForteNightshade]

snip

The release of Criterion wouldn't have changed the reaction.

People need an incentive to keep farming content intended to last a whole patch cycle, much less several. Take Euphrosyne, for example. If you remove the rewards, which are primarily glamour and not gear upgrades for a lot of people, the raid is dead within the same month. Trying to unlock it in a later patch would take hours of sitting in queue. All this despite people openly praising the content save for it a being a bit too easy.

You can apply this to almost any piece of content. In fact, one of the reasons Trials can take forever (Endsinger, Shinryu, Barba and etc) is the roulette gives paltry rewards. Thus, people don't often queue. The same problem arises with Legacy Roulette.

Circling back to Criterion, it suffered from a bigger problem: tuning. For whatever reason they decided against their original plan of a Normal, EX and Savage variant. The EX version is on par with the current Abyssos tier's earlier fights. One could make a strong argument Zeless Gah is even harder than Carby or Hegemone. So now we're taking on near Savage caliber bosses for an ugly chair mount you could just buy outright. Savage is even more comical, demanding you play perfect for... a single grade X materia. The latter is downright insulting and completely destroys any reason to farm the content.

At the end of the day, Criterion just doesn't have an audience for how they've tuned it. Due to the increased difficulty of the supposed "EX" version, it pushes out the majority of midcore players and the Savage version just isn't with the investment for one than a single clear. Innovation alone is not enough without replayability, which Criterion simply doesn't have.

[Deceptus]

Innovation alone is not enough without replayability,

A lesson CBU3 has seemed to have forgotten.

[Moonlite]

A response to a few posters, but try not to single anyone out. If you read part of the problem is old content. It isn't felt fun or very rewarding or just a general pain to do. The bicolor gems aren't a bad idea for fates, but they added a few reasonable items to start and then one unreasonable item and ignore it whole expansion. Why do I want to run fates again? I did Eureka and it was pretty casual, would be better if they tweaked it to 90. But I get to the end and find out I have to join discord and have certain abilities and do a bunch of other stuff. This is old content that is casual all the way to the end and then has a huge change in entry. From casual fun groups running around the zone to apply for spots on discord. Why would I want that when the rest is casual?



The game has years of content to do, that doesn't make it good. You can't honestly think old content is well designed and enjoyable in it's current state. The time between new content is to far apart. So when you go and do old content your like this isn't that fun. That doesn't diminish your enjoyment. Your enjoyment is not directly tied to if content is good for the masses. I liked 3.0 PvP (pre-exp) , that doesn't make it good. That also doesn't make it enjoyable for most people

[Atelier-Bagur]

A response to a few posters, but try not to single anyone out. If you read part of the problem is old content. It isn't felt fun or very rewarding or just a general pain to do. The bicolor gems aren't a bad idea for fates, but they added a few reasonable items to start and then one unreasonable item and ignore it whole expansion. Why do I want to run fates again? I did Eureka and it was pretty casual, would be better if they tweaked it to 90. But I get to the end and find out I have to join discord and have certain abilities and do a bunch of other stuff. This is old content that is casual all the way to the end and then has a huge change in entry. From casual fun groups running around the zone to apply for spots on discord. Why would I want that when the rest is casual?



The game has years of content to do, that doesn't make it good. You can't honestly think old content is well designed and enjoyable in it's current state. The time between new content is to far apart. So when you go and do old content your like this isn't that fun. That doesn't diminish your enjoyment. Your enjoyment is not directly tied to if content is good for the masses. I liked 3.0 PvP (pre-exp) , that doesn't make it good. That also doesn't make it enjoyable for most people

If they allowed max level players to use their full rotations while somehow syncing old dungeons and raids accordingly like some other big MMO that does a thing called "Timewalking" MHMHMMMM!!! Then that would easily solve the old content not being as fun issue.

[Hyperia]

If they allowed max level players to use their full rotations while somehow syncing old dungeons and raids accordingly like some other big MMO that does a thing called "Timewalking" MHMHMMMM!!! Then that would easily solve the old content not being as fun issue.

Only to a certain degree, while redoing old dungeons as challenging content at max level will be fun for a run or two, it’s still a 10 year old dungeon in the end that we have run umpteen times already.

I agree with previous posts that Criterion failed but my reason, besides the rewards, is that it was way overturned for the target audience. They should have been tuned at the same difficulty as casual raids or at most, EX trials.

[Absimiliard]

But which side? The side that is happy with the game or the side that is unhappy but thinks their angry rants in the forums are going to change anything?

Yes

/10char