This live letter was a massive disappointment

[VelKallor]

Honestly I would love to see Savage criterion to be horizontal progression for savage gearing, ie it gives the same ilvl as savage with different stats/materia/something as there is no actual horizontal gearing in the game. That being said if the normal criterion gave ilvl in between normal and savage gear it could also be used as an alternative gearing method, or give more casual players content to get slightly better gear and do harder content without going into savage. This is all with the caveat that you are already ~8 weeks into the savage tier and alot of raiders are probably going to be fully geared or nearly there and this can provide another avenue to flesh out their gear, help them get the last little push of gear to get them through the final savage fights, or even start gearing an alternate role. Variant difficulty is honestly there for the story and you have a reason to do it 12 times if that's your thing and doesn't necessarily need gear drops or anything for longevity if the criterion difficulties exist and have it covered.

Okay, THIS is the kind of answer I had hoped for. Amenara, we agree, and I can definitely get behind this.

Well put.

EDIT: Amenara: I just sent your post via the suggestions interface ingame. Lets hope they look at it.

[Rolder50]

It WAS. Ten years ago. Times change..demographics change, people change. Lalin: Ill drop this in and Id like you to go off and think on it.

The average MMO gamer these days is in their mid thirties, job, kids, commitments. A growing percentage are older..a LOT older, with the 50+ bracket slowly climbing. They are called "grey gamers", also in that bracket are a growing playerbase of women, which I am absolutely DELIGHTED to see.

The playerbase is maturing across a lot of platforms. The old MMO "grindfest" was attuned..shall we say..for a younger audience..time being for older people what it is...a premium.

Ive actually said this before: demographics drive game design.

Something to consider, no?

Yes and no. Money is the driving factor, especially for MMOs which are expensive and risky. It just so happens that older folks have more disposable income.

But that's also why we have seen rises in lootboxes and P2W mechanics in various genres; because they make money, even if it's at the cost of game quality.

[Kes13a]

Everyone always has this Perfect View, and then Pickachu Face Hardcore when Reality sets in and tells them "Thats not realistic"

I mean if that "small indie company" Blizzard could never accomplish it....

I for one would love "balance" everyone I know would... but what is "balance" varies per person, and if it was easy, game devs would done it YEARS ago. homogeneity IS balance.. but not very fun as we all know... but people still ask for it like its easy and companies just refuse to do it.

[Amenara]

Okay, THIS is the kind of answer I had hoped for. Amenara, we agree, and I can definitely get behind this.

Well put.

EDIT: Amenara: I just sent your post via the suggestions interface ingame. Lets hope they look at it.

I appreciate the sentiment and maybe it will be taken into consideration for future criterions if they keep going with it.

[Rolder50]

I mean if that "small indie company" Blizzard could never accomplish it....

I for one would love "balance" everyone I know would... but what is "balance" varies per person, and if it was easy, game devs would done it YEARS ago. homogeneity IS balance.. but not very fun as we all know... but people still ask for it like its easy and companies just refuse to do it.

I'd say that perfect balance is impossible, but relatively good balance is. The problem is that the latter often comes at the cost of variety and enjoyability in class design. WoW vs FF14 is a great example of this. WoW allows for a ton of talent and gear variety. Consequently, it's nigh on impossible to have everything balanced. But when we look at FF14, all the jobs are pretty dang close within their respective roles. But as a cost, all the jobs feel pretty samey and there is literally zero customization at all.

[Velvet_Lunarfang]

Well next month I'll be in Diablo 4 which has been fun. Ninja should be what Rogue is in D4. Using poison skills, shadow skills instead they wanted to be like Naruto and be goofy. FFXIV decided to go take a low risk low rewards system and it's catching up quick to them. Sadly no one will call out the devs on their mediocre decisions and instead live in a drug induced haze like everything is good and not let it be fixed

[Kisshu]

So looking at the patch content for me.

MSQ: 1-2 days
Pandemonium NM: 1-2 days + weekly
Unreal: Weekly
Variant: Around 1 week for the 12 stories plus some farming for items
Bluemage: 1-2 days for leveling, then around 1 week for spells and quests
Hildibrand: 1-2 days, relic tomes slowly
Island Sanctuary: AFK for 2 weeks to get to max rank

Looks like PVP will be the thing that keeps me mostly in the game besides weekly locks I guess. Good thing FF XVI drops in june, not a lot will tie me down in 6.4 as the more "lenghty" content is in 6.45.

[Reinha]

MSQ: 1-2 days
Pandemonium NM: 1-2 days + weekly
Unreal: Weekly
Variant: Around 1 week for the 12 stories plus some farming for items
Bluemage: 1-2 days for leveling, then around 1 week for spells and quests
Hildibrand: 1-2 days, relic tomes slowly
Island Sanctuary: AFK for 2 weeks to get to max rank

This for me plus I'll also be trying ocean fishing, savage (10 weeks if I'm optimistic), extreme, criterion (about 1 month for reclears), pvp series rank 25 (150 matches) and getting+decorating a mansion if auto-demolition is back on soon and I win one. I'll also be making gil, doing some hunt trains and spawning S ranks, farming some raid+trial mounts I skipped and trying to get further solo in Orthos. Pretty excited for what's next! Especially the story.

[Derio]

I liked it. But I really wish they had went over criterion rewards other than the new mount. I would say the even number patches have been on point this expansion in terms of content as a whole. It is the odd number patches where we have seen content be flat.

[subatomic]

It WAS. Ten years ago. Times change..demographics change, people change. Lalin: Ill drop this in and Id like you to go off and think on it.

The average MMO gamer these days is in their mid thirties, job, kids, commitments. A growing percentage are older..a LOT older, with the 50+ bracket slowly climbing. They are called "grey gamers", also in that bracket are a growing playerbase of women, which I am absolutely DELIGHTED to see.

The playerbase is maturing across a lot of platforms. The old MMO "grindfest" was attuned..shall we say..for a younger audience..time being for older people what it is...a premium.

Ive actually said this before: demographics drive game design.

Something to consider, no?

Fully agreed <3

Seems like some people want to treat this game as a full time job. Those people should just play P2W KMMOs instead.