Dawntrail's 8-man raid discussion

[Voidmage]

It's a disease caused by using souls that destroys your own soul. I'm not hooked.

It's like if you sat down and thought "hmm what could be a major downside of using feral souls??" and picked the very first thing you thought of. "Well what if you just destroy your own soul?"

I actually like it.
The plot starts slow but not too slow.
The thing with the soul detoriating was actually already implied in the MSQ with how the soul device works. (“Fills” your missing aether of the soul after death and a feral soul almost overrides your personality)

I’m sure it won’t stay there. Alone the implication to use our more dense soul as a medicine is… kinda nightmare fuel with how nonchalant they talk about that. It’s really creepy and with the fighting to the death because they have spare souls just shows how far gone the entire system is.
I’m also pretty sure the entire thing with the “champions having their soul safes for later” will get important and is probably the main goal why they wanted us in the first place.
To use the WoL’s soul as an amusement system in the future.

Gives me nightmares tbh.

[Khutulun]

The fact that the fights even got me to consider coming out of raid retirement for Savage is a huge compliment, since even Ultimate wasn't doing it.

Story is just Chapter 3 from Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door and I am absolutely here for it.

This was enjoyable overall. A direct hit. Honey B Lovely, I have high expectations for your fight.

I feel less insane knowing I'm not the only one with that story opinion.

[Glacierre]

I found the MSQ so bad it was offensive and insulting. However, I'm really pleased with the raid series! The concept of a tournament arc for a raid is inherently exciting, it's great.

The fights themselves are so silly and campy in the best way possible. I love the focus on female stories, characters, and dynamics. The announcer is great, the crowds are great, the colours pop. Folks don't know we're the WoL, so us being special because we don't use souls is satisfying. Using beast souls for entertainment, people recognizing the WoL's strength, us chilling with Black Cat, the plot with her sister (it makes sense, there's stakes, there's a dilemma, it's topical), everything lands. I love that Black Cat admires us and isn't a sore loser, she's my homie. The raid series doesn't take itself seriously and it's very effective.

It goes without saying that the fights themselves are great too. Love the mechanics, and the thought put into the fights is very charming (the ref-bot, the funny attack names, HONEY B. LOVELY <3, Cheater McCheaterFace, etc). Everything was such a fresh air and returned my agency after Wuk Lamat. It just oozed pure fun. This gives me a good feeling about FRU, which is a huge deal to me because I want FRU to be my ultimate Ultimate.

[DarkCobalt]

The 2nd fight kind of puts me off of the tier not gonna lie, I really dislike the whole themeing and the bullet hell nature of the fight (it just doesn't work with FF's snapshot), and as if Moogle King and Titania weren't already brainrot-inducing enough with their soundtracks...

But the rest were ok. Nothing special, just ok. More of the usual. I'm not really seeing the "fresh mechanics" people keep describing, I guess I'm just burned out on "dodge aoe telegraph, stack, spread, tower" which is most of the normal raid mechanics that have been reused and recycled and telegraphed 5 seconds in advance for the past 3 expansions now. I think there's like 1 truly new mechanic with the knockbacks on Black Cat but that's about it? So idk, not exactly enough to surprise me or keep me engaged at this point.

[Wildheaven182]

Fun meets the bare minimum. But things do need to be new and creative from here on. Choreographed dancing into the correct places to stand wont carry the game another 10 years, let alone 3.

[fioravictorine]

Arcadion was great - It was a short, simple and fun story with likeable characters

I also like that I get to be myself again and not Wuk Lamat's mind controlled slave

[Voidmage]

The 2nd fight kind of puts me off of the tier not gonna lie, I really dislike the whole themeing and the bullet hell nature of the fight (it just doesn't work with FF's snapshot), and as if Moogle King and Titania weren't already brainrot-inducing enough with their soundtracks...

But the rest were ok. Nothing special, just ok. More of the usual. I'm not really seeing the "fresh mechanics" people keep describing, I guess I'm just burned out on "dodge aoe telegraph, stack, spread, tower" which is most of the normal raid mechanics that have been reused and recycled and telegraphed 5 seconds in advance for the past 3 expansions now. I think there's like 1 truly new mechanic with the knockbacks on Black Cat but that's about it? So idk, not exactly enough to surprise me or keep me engaged at this point.

I think it’s less about all mechanics being new but having those in normal in the first place.

The knock back with the breaking tiles makes it so players have to pay attention and not just move out and move in again.

The heart mechanic makes it so players actually have to quickly agree who takes what towers instead of just standing together.

The bomb one with the left right mechanic can quickly throw players of with the directiona being random.

The last boss is just aoes sure but they can have quite the snap shooting and the left right up to 5 times really has to make you memorize it.

All those are simple mechanics true but they are in normal mode where there are no position macros.

I like it. It’s not too hard but you have to pay attention again.
Reminds me of Stormblood raids.

The fresh mechanics were said to start in later patches also.

I criticize the devs for the MSQ and some job changes but this time I really have to give them credit here.
Sure it’s all not groundbreaking but it’s a nice “bleeding” of dormer harder content into normal now without overtuning it.
That’s just my opinion.

[Sani2341]

I actually like it.
The plot starts slow but not too slow.
The thing with the soul detoriating was actually already implied in the MSQ with how the soul device works. (“Fills” your missing aether of the soul after death and a feral soul almost overrides your personality)

I’m sure it won’t stay there. Alone the implication to use our more dense soul as a medicine is… kinda nightmare fuel with how nonchalant they talk about that. It’s really creepy and with the fighting to the death because they have spare souls just shows how far gone the entire system is.
I’m also pretty sure the entire thing with the “champions having their soul safes for later” will get important and is probably the main goal why they wanted us in the first place.
To use the WoL’s soul as an amusement system in the future.

Gives me nightmares tbh.

It's a very cyberpunk story.

Using souls to let your prized Gladiators fight to the death while making them use steroids that'll kill them in a way the general system for increased life expectancy isn't set up to help with. All to enterain the masses and make a Profit.

Add a Rival arena/Fighting Organisation to try and support is in breaking this one/exposing it's secrets next tier and we'd need be in full on 'Corpos hiring mercs to mess each other up' territory.

[Astronema]

It's a very cyberpunk story.

Using souls to let your prized Gladiators fight to the death while making them use steroids that'll kill them in a way the general system for increased life expectancy isn't set up to help with. All to enterain the masses and make a Profit.

Add a Rival arena/Fighting Organisation to try and support is in breaking this one/exposing it's secrets next tier and we'd need be in full on 'Corpos hiring mercs to mess each other up' territory.

yet none of it feels right. the storytelling is just off. They are trying to transplant a different games story into the game. the one scene after finishing a round i felt like my wol was a Kardashian. Everything about dawntrail is like that though as if they rolled dice to choose what tropes to use.

[Sani2341]

yet none of it feels right. the storytelling is just off. They are trying to transplant a different games story into the game. the one scene after finishing a round i felt like my wol was a Kardashian.

Hm , and here I more got the Impression of being an athlete making the mistake of Walking Out the public exit after an Event.
Probably was even tame for that considering how easily some sport fans throw fists over their favorites losing.