Thoughts on the Yoshi P AMA?

[Bonoki]

I think the problem with UCoB and UwU is that it's all a mind trick being played in people's minds. These fights are hard, there is no denying that. But it has diminishing returns with each new expansion that causes people to forget that they are hard. At this point you could probably unsync UCoB and UwU and very little of the community would actually care since they already don't view them as meaningful anymore. The truth is though, these fights are still hard, it's just we keep getting harder new content that raises the bar. So, our perception changes that these fights are casual even though nothing has changed about the fight. When the bar is risen, we lower the threshold collectively as a community for where "hardcore" begins, I guess.

I'm mostly morbidly curious to see what they do at Fan Fest. Hrothgar women are going to be very niche but much like roegadyn women the very loud 'mUsClE mOmMy' crowd will shout to the high heavens about how awesome they are only to not actually play them in large numbers. Meanwhile I'm over here wondering if and when they're finally going to give Highlander men better faces or at least authentic eyebrows which have been requested since the days of ARR.

As someone who feels the effects of the "You're just another copy and paste generic catgirl" memes from people that interact with me (sometimes from other catgirls). One thing that I really noticed about this community is that they are extremely loud about trying set yourself apart with your character even at the expense of making yourself ugly looking because it's "unique". Unique being the new pretty even if you look horribly. Yet all these people that want you to be unique will be playing standard generic things themselves. I see a lot with the femroe hype. Everyone going on about how attractive they are but you won't see people play it. It really minds boggles me at times.

[Absurdity]

I think the problem with UCoB and UwU is that it's all a mind trick being played in people's minds. These fights are hard, there is no denying that. But it has diminishing returns with each new expansion that causes people to forget that they are hard. At this point you could probably unsync UCoB and UwU and very little of the community would actually care since they already don't view them as meaningful anymore. The truth is though, these fights are still hard, it's just we keep getting harder new content that raises the bar. So, our perception changes that these fights are casual even though nothing has changed about the fight. When the bar is risen, we lower the threshold collectively as a community for where "hardcore" begins, I guess.

They are still hard but they are actively getting easier with each expansion (at least with the current design trajectory), it's not just the players remembering it wrong. All the job simplifications, potency buffs, even new jobs that the fight was never designed for, have had an impact on how difficult the old content is.
Sure, the mechanical execution you have to perform is often still the same (not in all cases) but everything besides the mechanics dance has gotten easier.

[Rikizza]

He said they will add more options to character creation yayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyuyy

[HollowedDoll]

I'm going to keep my expectations low.

[MisterNublet]

Gameplay ranks low in a videogame? That's enough FF forums for today.

Any other game the community would light a fire under the dev's arses for such abysmal and boring gameplay.

[Saraide]

Gameplay ranks low in a videogame? That's enough FF forums for today.

MMO fans are far more concerned with rewards and treadmills than they are with gameplay. That's why the genre is bad.

[Iscah]

Gameplay ranks low in a videogame? That's enough FF forums for today.

That's not at all what I mean. Rather, I think a lot of players only need to find the gameplay "enjoyable" without fussing over the minutiae of skill potencies and gauge management and optimal rotations. They may be content as long as skills are satisfying to use and the boss fight has cool mechanics.

[Tsumdere]

I think the problem with UCoB and UwU is that it's all a mind trick being played in people's minds. These fights are hard, there is no denying that. But it has diminishing returns with each new expansion that causes people to forget that they are hard. At this point you could probably unsync UCoB and UwU and very little of the community would actually care since they already don't view them as meaningful anymore. The truth is though, these fights are still hard, it's just we keep getting harder new content that raises the bar. So, our perception changes that these fights are casual even though nothing has changed about the fight. When the bar is risen, we lower the threshold collectively as a community for where "hardcore" begins, I guess.

You are partially right about people getting better - Tenstrike used to be very hard for me, but after TOP flex-o-rama it's nothing - but other factors have changed UCoB and UWU.

Increased potencies across the board mean that damage is irrelevant and you can live through things you couldn't live through before. My most recent clear of UCoB we died 17 times in total, with 2 deaths in Golden and cleared far, far before enrage. Despite the deaths, we brought him down to 40% before he phased to Golden. High damage means you skip mechanics too. No, you can't skip any of the Bahamut trios but you can delete half of Twin/Nael/Adds and avoid doing mechanics there. You can kill Golden fast enough you only see a couple of rounds of Exaflares instead of all of them.
I also lived through a Quickmarch tankbuster on RPR.

The mechs are the same, but the margin of error has increased dramatically which makes the fights easier.

They are still hard but they are actively getting easier with each expansion (at least with the current design trajectory), it's not just the players remembering it wrong. All the job simplifications, potency buffs, even new jobs that the fight was never designed for, have had an impact on how difficult the old content is.
Sure, the mechanical execution you have to perform is often still the same (not in all cases) but everything besides the mechanics dance has gotten easier.

Wrote all that and then saw this comment lol!

SMN/SGE/GNB are extremely powerful. More powerful than any job was at the release of UCoB/UWU. You bring a decent SMN and you can bet you won't fail the DPS 'checks' no matter how spaghetti the other DPS are being.

[Nestama]

Oh. Why- Actually, I would ask why its like that, and not just something you can activate in the Another Criterion of your choice rather than a separate duty, but then I remind myself that so many systems and ideas they implement are half-baked messes, and it all makes sense.

There's also an enrage timer for the entire run as well. I think the second you pull a mob, or even the second you start is when the timer starts counting down (I think you have ~20 minutes).

[Tsumdere]

Yeah, my expectations are buried deep in the ground at this point. They teased the concept of Garlemald having some content around rebuilding a portion of it that never amounted to anything and although it could be added in the future...there's only so long someone can wait for the additions that they'd like to see before they cease caring.

I'm mostly morbidly curious to see what they do at Fan Fest. Hrothgar women are going to be very niche but much like roegadyn women the very loud 'mUsClE mOmMy' crowd will shout to the high heavens about how awesome they are only to not actually play them in large numbers. Meanwhile I'm over here wondering if and when they're finally going to give Highlander men better faces or at least authentic eyebrows which have been requested since the days of ARR.

Exploratory or reconstruction content would excite me somewhat, but that's mostly because it's the only bit of content that makes the game feel like a real MMO that isn't raiding.

Unironically, I think Hrothgar women will be more popular than Roe women depending on their animations and if they don't make them look like goofy stuffed animals like the males. Tauren and Troll females hold a respectable amount of players in WoW. WoW is a different demographic and nothing will surpass the cat-lizard crowd, but maybe they will be a little more popular than expected. Time will tell. I could absolutely be wrong because a beast race in Final Fantasy is certainly a coin-toss.

P.S. I love your signature. I adore Nero. Shame we don't have a broad face like that without settling on "old" or "no eyebrows".