4-month patch cycle was a lie. It's almost 4.5 months now.

[Atelier-Bagur]

"We" are not comparing any standards, but if you mean me, then it's tricky to make comparisons with ShB, because it was affected by Covid. Since covid is irrelevant now, but we still have same patch cycles, I would expect EW to be noticeably better than ShB, yet we don't even have trial storyline, relic weapons were implemented in the least creative way possible, we have no relic armor sets, we have job design and balance issues, and all 3 new varied contents have serious design flaws.



TL;DR: Don't keep your hopes and expectations up, settle with mediocrity.

We had 2 Ultimates, Trial series being integrated into the MSQ, a new Deep Dungeon, 2 new pieces of content that's constantly getting updated, PvP rework, old msq dungeons being Duty Supported for new players.

Tell me where the mediocrity is? Oh the fact that Bozja and the Shb relic had you waste so much of your time in many of its steps? Bozja's saving grace was its 2 raids. I'm not counting DR because that boss gauntlet became a snore fest in how long and boring it gets once you know the mechanics and made even longer if parties don't take advantage of essences. Also the fact that you had to run it 7 or so times for a single relic killed any satisfaction and fun the raid had, which thankfully wasn't the case for CLL and Dalriada where you didn't had to run it as much.

Let's also not forget the dreaded memory grinds with spamming Antitower, having to farm specific items from fates in specific sections of each zone....which gets worse because 90% of Zadnor players congregate in z3 instead of z1 or z2. And then ofcourse having to spam old raids too.

Grinds are such an outdated and terrible design that KILLS the fun of these content systems. If they lessened it, then these steps would've been fun.

Stop promoting grind as if they're of quality. This is the same argument over dunderheads arguing over how 100+ hours in a game is considered quality when all of that time is just padded out mindless garbage. You're the one supporting mediocrity here friend.

[Deo14]

We had 2 Ultimates, Trial series being integrated into the MSQ, a new Deep Dungeon, 2 new pieces of content that's constantly getting updated, PvP rework, old msq dungeons being Duty Supported for new players.

Tell me where the mediocrity is? Oh the fact that Bozja and the Shb relic had you waste so much of your time in many of its steps? Bozja's saving grace was its 2 raids. I'm not counting DR because that boss gauntlet became a snore fest in how long and boring it gets once you know the mechanics and made even longer if parties don't take advantage of essences. Also the fact that you had to run it 7 or so times for a single relic killed any satisfaction and fun the raid had, which thankfully wasn't the case for CLL and Dalriada where you didn't had to run it as much.

Let's also not forget the dreaded memory grinds with spamming Antitower, having to farm specific items from fates in specific sections of each zone....which gets worse because 90% of Zadnor players congregate in z3 instead of z1 or z2. And then ofcourse having to spam old raids too.

Grinds are such an outdated and terrible design that KILLS the fun of these content systems. If they lessened it, then these steps would've been fun.

Stop promoting grind as if they're of quality. This is the same argument over dunderheads arguing over how 100+ hours in a game is considered quality when all of that time is just padded out mindless garbage. You're the one supporting mediocrity here friend.

DSR was meant for ShB, TOP from what I've heard, was possibly worst ultimate. Trial storyline being integrated to MSQ is still net negative. It always had separate story, so instead of trial + MSQ we get MSQ only. And that MSQ is mediocre on top of that.

EO is just another DD, which has nothing innovative in it, it's just reskin. V&C fell flat because of terrible rewards, and they haven't learned or updated anything when they released Rokkon. IS is simply barebones, you click on nodes, and do some spreadsheets, all systems in it are extremely shallow. It had updates, but none of them were game changer, it still lacks the meat. PvP rework was good, but it just needs more to it. Servers are terrible for PvP, and stun locks are prevalent, it needs more updates and not just some job balancing and more maps.

Duty support, well, that's just making single player game out of MMORPG, which is questionable to say the least. They removed some good mechanics from dungeons just so the AI can handle it. The cool Yeti boss fight in Snowcloak, where you were building snowballs and then kicked it into boss? That's gone, amongst others.

I really hate that this game attracts people who never played and never liked MMORPGs. Grinds are building stone of this genre. Important is that there are good grinds and bad grinds. Just because there was bad grind once, you would rather not see any grind ever again? And if you did relics in ShB, then why? You acknowledge it's waste of your time, so why were you doing it? Why didn't you just play another game?

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

[...]I really hate that this game attracts people who never played and never liked MMORPGs. Grinds are building stone of this genre. Important is that there are good grinds and bad grinds. Just because there was bad grind once, you would rather not see any grind ever again? And if you did relics in ShB, then why? You acknowledge it's waste of your time, so why were you doing it? Why didn't you just play another game?

I'm gonna steal this part of your reply.

[Nebelheim]

I really hate that this game attracts people who never played and never liked MMORPGs. Grinds are building stone of this genre. Important is that there are good grinds and bad grinds. Just because there was bad grind once, you would rather not see any grind ever again? And if you did relics in ShB, then why? You acknowledge it's waste of your time, so why were you doing it? Why didn't you just play another game?

Most gamers now want instant rewards and gratification and handed things then sit in limsa rather then actually do content and grind. I miss the old days of mmos where there was grinds and if you didn't want to grind there was still things you could find to do or just chat.

[Renathras]

We had 2 Ultimates, Trial series being integrated into the MSQ, a new Deep Dungeon, 2 new pieces of content that's constantly getting updated, PvP rework, old msq dungeons being Duty Supported for new players.

Tell me where the mediocrity is? Oh the fact that Bozja and the Shb relic had you waste so much of your time...

I was with you until exactly here. I don't disagree with your overall point that ShB gets treated with more deference than it should, but I've always liked Eureka and Bozja content precisely BECAUSE I can spend a while on it. It makes it good "fallback" content late in patches when I've gone through all the other patch content. That's why I think such things are valuable.

Contrary to you, I think grinds are the joy of this content, especially when it happens in the Exploration Zone so people can hang out and vibe together. It's OPTIONAL content, so it's okay if it takes a page from old school MMOs. The point is to have something shiny to glam with (and usually other things you can get along the way) that you can waste time in just chillin' and working at your own pace or falling back on when you've done everything else the latest patch has to offer. For people that don't want to grind...well...you aren't the target audience? If you're the type to run Savage and then raidlog in Limsa or cancel your sub until the next patch, the content is probably not made for you.

Not all content in the game is for everyone. I don't run Ultimates. I RARELY run Savages. I run Extremes fairly often, but this expansion haven't done that many of those.

...and that's fine. That content is for the people that want it, just as Exploration Zones are for the people that want IT. I don't get this idea that Exploration Zones aren't allowed because some people don't like them. If "everyone has to like it" is the rule, there'd literally be no content because even MSQ, the thing most done by the playerbase (something like 70%), isn't liked by everyone. There's literally NO content that could pass that "standard".

The only real issue I had with it is that it was often more efficient to gather the parts outside of Bozja. I think it should be possible to get the Relic outside of the Exploration Zones (for people that don't like EZs [heh, ironically counter-reality abbreviation...]), but I don't think it should be FAR MORE EFFICIENT to do so. Though I'd also like to note 6 Antitower runs takes less time and is less grindy than getting 1500 tomes is now. So of all the steps to complain about, you complained about the least grindy one that is arguably the least grindy single step of any Relic in FFXIV's history INCLUDING the current one?

It always had separate story, so instead of trial + MSQ we get MSQ only.

I'm a bit confused about this. We never got MORE Trials. So we're getting the same amount of battle content, making this an odd critique to me.

If you mean "more story", a lot of the "more story" has been hit and miss.

Notwithstanding that at least one Trial in each tended to be part of the MSQ post-X.0 (Shiva I believe, Nidhogg, Tsuyu, and Warrior of Light were)...

ARR: You're sent to kill more Primals by Urianger in the Waking Sands...and that's it. There's no additional story to any of the base ones, with Leviathan and Ramuh and Moogle Mog basically being extensions of the MSQ storybeat of Beast Tribes summoning. Shiva kind of set up HW, but I think her story WAS part of the MSQ. It's been a while so I don't remember. Odin was just kinda...there, and reused some assets from the existing FATE anyway. Because there was literally a FATE of him. I'd be like if Ixion was the last Trial in SB. Oh, and a couple of extras from Hilde. 3, to be exact, Big Bridge, Dragon's Neck, and Big Keep. Oh, and the Relic related Chimera and Hydra.

HW: Waring Triad was an interesting enough story, but pretty thin gruel considering. We got to hang out with Krile some and meet Unu, so that was cool, but we learned RELATIVELY little information and there were no long-term lore implications. Nidhogg was not only part of the MSQ but was the culmination of the entire Dragonsong story. Don't remember if Hilde had another Trail for us in HW. For some reason I don't THINK that it did...but I'd have to check.

SB: The one where the extra Trials were never interesting to me. At no point did I find the Four Lords story interesting. Maybe if I was more versed in Eastern/Oriental lore, but I'm not. So there are these animals that somehow awaken and then live for thousands of years, but become beasts if they succumb to their emotions, so the answer is...to have them succumb to their emotions and then beat them senseless. Okay, fine. Oh, and one of them thinks we're hear ancient lover who died a thousand years ago. In fact, BECAUSE these were so disconnected from the MSQ is probably the reason this is my single least favorite Trial series. There were no real stakes in terms of the story. Maybe they'd go on a rampage - eventually - and someone else - probably a small army of Samurai - would put them down. Wooooo. No story connection, no lore expansion (Warring Triad at least went into some lore about Merycidia, the Echo, and even the Thirteenth). There was nothing interesting about them, and I more felt relief at having the checkbox once they were done than anything. The fights were okay, it was just I had no real INTEREST in them. And of course we have a rematch with Gil-er, "Yojimbo". Also had The Great Hunt, though that was weird and not like...normal...Trials/Extremes.

ShB: Again we have a MSQ Trial in 5.3 in WoL. While not the culmination of the story in the way Nidhogg was, it was kind of the "Scouring of the Shire" epilogue that tied everything together after the main events that preceded it. We got two bonus Trials, one of which was tied directly to the Exploration Zone (Varis as Cid's suppressed memory mechanism stand-in of his father) and the Sorrows of Wyrlyt story, which is the first time that a completely stand-alone Trial series actually had a REALLY GOOD story that had a pretty satisfying ending (and touching epilogue with Tataru's Grand Endeavor in EW) that COULD also have future lore implications as well. No Hilde, no Hilde Trial(s).

EW: This is the first time not just one post-X.0 Trail has had story involvement, rather all of them have done so (though...I think I heard something about a bonus Trail at Fanfest that I guess may come in 4.5? Possibly as part of Hilde...). With no exploration zone, there have been no Exploration Zone related Trials, and with not being ARR, no Relic related Trials, and despite heavily featuring Hildebrand, no Hilde related Trials. So...yeah.

I think it's less "no independent story" (as ShB was literally the only one to do that really well) and more a far lesser number of total Trials to date. In 6.5 we'll probably get ZerEx, and in 6.55, we MAY get whatever that mystery Trial is, but that will probably be it. Man, Island Sanctuary and Criterion REALLY taxed the budget. I mean, I guess you could call some of those fights up there, but...different audience, I think. Criterion Savage is more for Savage people that want smaller group content, not for the midcore types that typically do Extremes.

It's like EW has been "the expansion without midcore content".