7.0 doomium has got to stop

[VelKallor]

It's players who have the human psychology of enjoying being in an environment with other living people and being able to interact with them, but they want to do it at their own controlled pace and not be forced into having responsibility to other people for mechanics, performance, etc.

Nailed it, thanks. BTW your crafter pvp post had me giggling my head off last night.

Bravo.

I, like many others, do not like to be FORCED into socialising, I prefer to do it when it suits ME. Hence my continued reluctance to the point of literally noping out of after workplace "socialising"..I had to tolerate these..people..in my work hours,. but other than that I wanted nothing to do with them.

[Supersnow845]

Which is entirely the problem; that is not what 14 was designed as

Now I’ll fully accept the title of 14 boomer screaming at clouds but you can’t deny from our perspective we’ve been shafted pretty hard here, we built this game into what it is, it was our contribution that allowed them to bounce back from legacy and then when the game gets worldwide popular they basically dump us off for appealing to the people who basically want a living lobby for their single player game

Again I know I’m a boomer screaming at clouds and I know the approach square has gone with is more profitable because it has a wider audience and they have to do less work but that doesn’t mean I won’t continue to be annoyed they won’t even meet me in the middle on anything anymore

If you dumped someone who started in 6.x into 3.x they would probably combust on the spot, now that doesn’t mean we have to go back to 3.x but come on, there is little of the game I stuck with through legacy even left anymore

[VelKallor]

they basically dump us off for appealing to the people who basically want a living lobby for their single player game

With all respect, your conclusions leave little room for a middle ground between the two. That can be done, you know, it doesnt have to run from one extreme to the other.

[Supersnow845]

With all respect, your conclusions leave little room for a middle ground between the two. That can be done, you know, it doesnt have to run from one extreme to the other.

I think you’ll find most extremely old players would agree something of SB calibre is a perfect middle ground,

for people who invested time into mastering complex jobs and finding rewards in a variety of levels of content SB wasn’t too overly homogenised, meanwhile it wasn’t unapproachable like alot of HW was or straight up unintuitive like legacy or ARR was, but it also wasn’t excessively casual focused to the detriment of a lot of the older players like a good chunk of ShB and EW are

Now I’m not saying return to 4.0 im using it as a yard stick, SB had its fair share of missteps (SB lilies I’ll never forgive how terrible you were) but in hindsight it was probably the most balanced of the 4 expansions from the perspective of how the gameplay balance has changed

[VelKallor]

Supersnow: we both would agree that when we discuss HW and SB expansions, players are more than happy to state that there are things removed they NEVER want to see again.

Combat cross class changes? Having yo learn one skill on one character to be able to use it on another? Theres complexity, then theres needless complication. I agree its a hard balance to keep

From a crafters POV? Heavensward crafting?

UGH GOD no thanks...that was a hot mess. The crafters "specialist actions" like "whistle whilst you work"? Didnt.

When they were removed, no one was sorry to see them go. No one.

I cant speak as to balance, but I was an SMN main back in 2019, I thank the devs for what it is now. My hands DEFINITELY say thank you.

[Supersnow845]

Supersnow: we both would agree that when we discuss HW and SB expansions, players are more than happy to state that there are things removed they NEVER want to see again. From a crafters POV?

Heavensward crafting? UGH GOD no thanks...that was a hot mess. The crafters "specialist actions" like "whistle whilst you work"? Didnt.

When they were removed, no one was sorry to see them go. No one. I cant speak as to balance, but I was an SMN main back in 2019, I thank the devs for what it is now. My hands DEFINITELY say thank you.

Yes there are things that were removed that shouldn’t come back, that’s literally not my point at all, my point is that SB of the 5 expansions offered the best balance between retaining the old complexity of HW without making it excessively anti casual, that doesn’t mean SB was perfect nor would I suggest winding the game back to SB, I’m simply using it as a very broad yard stick of the state of the game

Pointing to specific “things” that were particularly bad in one expansion or another don’t change my point (I don’t actually care about SB lilies I just make a point to include them in every post I make that references stormblood), my point is HW and ARR are too old and messy, ShB and EW are too casual focused and streamlined, SB provided the best central balance

[VelKallor]

my point is HW and ARR are too old and messy, ShB and EW are too casual focused and streamlined, SB provided the best central balance

Apologies, I may have misread your intent. I agree.

[Ivtrix]

When you can point me to "widespread" feedback outside this echo chamber, let me know.

Calls the forum an echo chamber but won’t leave the confines of his own bubble

Ironic

[Eorzean_username]

[...]we built this game into what it is, it was our contribution that allowed them to bounce back from legacy and then when the game gets worldwide popular they basically dump us off for appealing to the people who basically want a living lobby for their single player game

Yeah, I think that's a brutally-accurate way of summarising it.

The thing is, I think that a more... uh... I don't know the right buzzword, "agile" maybe? ...development team, or company, or whatever, might well have been able to do both.

Or hell, I mean SWTOR, for example, just gives their "Story Mode" duties a cracked and overpowered companion-helper who basically tanks, heals, and kills everything for you... and then they otherwise just leave the design of the "dungeons" alone, because Super Helper won't let you die no matter how badly you're mangling the mechanics.

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...But XIV's devs have... uhhh I'm lacking the vocabulary for a good word, but like, "Person who can never just do anything simply, and has to overthink and overcomplicate everything"... syndrome.

Like they can't just create the option of queuing into "Story" versions of instances with a nutter Echo buff that lets you just solo it and move on.

Instead they have to overdesign it, and make it a full-fledged "feature", with individual NPC companions with distinct personalities, and rotations, and commentaries, and unique AI reactions and behaviors for everything.

...Which then bloats the design and development time immensely for a feature that isn't really "content" at all for any of their playerbase that doesn't want to solo — but still eats up resources to implement.

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It's the kind of overthinking and "robust" solution that always seems super-charming "on paper"... but then becomes kind-of questionable in the long-term, after the initial novelty wears off.

Then, once they've already done it and stuck their feet into the metaphorical "quicksand", they're now "trapped" with continuing to hemorrhage time and resources into developing and supporting said bizarro-feature indefinitely... when they could have just chosen a way more efficient solution to begin with, if they weren't so obsessed with "doing it in a unique and clever way that's special and a feature".

See also: Blue Mage, Island Sanctuary, Lord of Verminion, Squadrons, Diadem, etc.

And this issue isn't limited to XIV's team, it's just a game-designer weakness to be sucked into stubborn, overambitious, somewhat-irrational ideas that end up becoming dubious development-sinks — see WOW's Garrisons.

Bad example. "Story Mode" for SWTOR was always playable solo.

Hi, that's literally factually inaccurate!

SWTOR in fact has a "Story Mode" of every single plot-related "dungeon", created as a separate version, which the Story guides you through, and gives you a helper NPC to make it basically unfailable.

And this was implemented specifically because players complained about needing to find groups to complete the "dungeon" storylines which were pretty important to the plot and storytelling — and absolutely, 100%, could not be solo'd, especially in the early days before it got powercreeped like MMOs always do.

[DPZ2]

Or hell, I mean SWTOR, for example, just gives their "Story Mode" duties ...

Bad example. "Story Mode" for SWTOR was always playable solo. World of Warcrafts "story" was always playable solo. Rifts "story" was always playable solo. Why?

Because story mode in other MMORPGs did not require a single dungeon or trial instance in order to move to end game. Heck, you could get to max level by picking herbs in WoW.