Stormblood Duty Support

[GaiusDrakon]

I watched TOP drain the very soul out of one of my FC members. Out of all of the Ultimates, it seems that TOP is over the top and not fun compared to the others. The almost universal thing I hear people say when they finish it is… thank god it’s over, finally, I’m free. This is not what you want to hear from players.

Normal dungeons are very far away from anything close to TOP. Hello, middle ground?

That said, the Ultimate/raid design of focusing on one-shots is another issue separately and is something that I've already said is getting worse before. Modern raids are KFC/McDonald's.

[Jojoya]

It is a little unfortunate if they're having to dumb down the dungeons for the sake of making them workable for trusts.

I wouldn't mind it if they did total revamps of the fights like with Praetorium but it sounds more like they just kinda...removed mechanics that wouldn't work with trusts.

Ascian Prime in ARF shows that there are ways to make the fights still feel challenging even if the mechanics aren't as complex. It's far less forgiving now than in the past thanks to the ilvl sync when players could ignore mechanics with a very low risk of dying.

[GaiusDrakon]

Ascian Prime in ARF shows that there are ways to make the fights still feel challenging even if the mechanics aren't as complex. It's far less forgiving now than in the past thanks to the ilvl sync when players could ignore mechanics with a very low risk of dying.

>ARF
>challenging

LMAO ok

[SnowVix]

LMAO Steps of Faith

It's literally a 12-minute fight against a dummy and some adds and the only mechanic is to stand to the side and you auto-solve everything

They could've at least tried to incorporate the dragonkillers into the fight but nooooo gotta dumb down everything for the 50 IQ new players.

You mean what steps of faith has been since about 3.0? Just because you had to walk with it doesn't make it not a training dummy

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

>ARF
>challenging

LMAO ok

It is objectively more difficult now than it was before.

[NekoMataMata]

I miss the elemental towers but I think the fight has more mechanics now. It's a mix up anyways. With trusts the elemental towers wouldn't be difficult to solve since you could just copy the trust NPCs.

It is objectively more difficult now than it was before.

It is. I've seen wipes on the last boss of ARF because sprout healers didn't catch on quickly enough. I actually saw so many of them that I stopped using ARF for my poetic farm when working on HW relics and switched to Baelsar's Wall.

[TaleraRistain]

>ARF
>challenging

LMAO ok

It can be challenging now if a sprout doesn't pick up on the ice and fire mechanic quickly enough. Especially a healer.

I rather like the new Steps of Faith instance. Pre-revamp it was just people running along with the dragon and mostly even ignoring adds. Now it has phases where you feel like it's a real battle to keep Ishgard safe.

Haven't tried the new Stormblood dungeons yet except Sirensong. I don't think they changed any mechs in that one.

[GaiusDrakon]

Now it has phases where you feel like it's a real battle to keep Ishgard safe.

?__?

What phases? The phases are literally all just hit adds and hit Vishap, and run occasionally?

This is as boring as old Steps except old Steps you had dragonkillers to play with at least.

[TaleraRistain]

?__?

What phases? The phases are literally all just hit adds and hit Vishap, and run occasionally?

This is as boring as old Steps except old Steps you had dragonkillers to play with at least.

Not phases in the true sense like what you see in a boss fight. But those points where you get Down for the Count and have to retreat add to the tension and the NPC flavor text makes it feel like you're giving everything you have to stop Vishap from reaching Ishgard. It may not be mechanically challenging but the atmosphere makes it feel like much more of an accomplishment than just 8 people running after a boss. You really feel like you earned that asylum in Ishgard and understand why people feel so strongly toward the Warrior of Light for what they did.

[vanaii]

New Stormblood's changes weren't nearly as drastic as new ARR/Heavensward.

I did notice the difference in the Abania/Ala Mhigo dungeons, but I wasn't really disappointed in them. Heck, the only thing I'm missing from Stormblood is the 1v1 with Lyse-- that was like a third of the trailer.

I noticed a few extra sections cut -- like the aetherwhatsit to fight Fordola -- but that worked just fine after Urianger popped in to ramble about what we just did.

Overall ARR is the best it's ever been, Heavensward got some help, and Stormblood cut out a lot of busywork.