Chaotic is midcore, in case you were wondering

[Jeeqbit]

Why are we suddenly considering extremes and Savages midcore? Will Ultimates be midcore next?

Because there are a lot of extremes that you can just coast through, follow a dorito for or get a lot of rez through. Let me think of some past examples:

• Limitless Blue Extreme (I legit farmed that in Duty Finder in HW as a newish tank)
• Sophia Extreme (honestly this was rough if the healers weren't good or the tanks didn't know what swaps are, but you could beat it with deaths and you can follow a dorito for it)
• Pool of Tribute Extreme (meme was that everyone 1 shot this and healed through it, MINE runs are still 1 shots)
• Emanation Extreme (kinda got a bit more to it? But it wasn't seen as a big hurdle at the time and I even cleared it in Mentor Roulette once with randoms)
• Great Hunt Extreme (tbh I tried teaching this when it released and it was hopeless because they had to leave when I'd taught them most of the mechs, but I've cleared it with randoms and sprouts almost 30 times in Mentor Roulette)
• Byakko Extreme (literally cleared this in 3 pulls on release, similar story with the Unreal version, it's insanely forgiving, also cleared it with sprouts MINE sometimes in 1 pull or in the full timer)
• Suzaku Extreme (this was more intimidating in PF but due to the release of Red Mages, they and healers were able to carry parties through with loads of deaths, so it was ultimately realistic to prog through to a clear.)
• Seiryu Extreme (again, due to the release of Red Mage, the unlimited rez just makes the whole thing kinda trivial even with deaths and vulns)
• Dark Inside Extreme (if you followed the dorito you could clear barely knowing the fight, tanks only needed to know the swap)
• Mothercrystal Extreme (rougher than the previous one, some people will see it as hard but kinda boring to me personally, I joined to help full parties of new endgame players clear it successfully within the timer)
• Innocence Extreme (total joke, full parties of sprouts can 1 or 2 shot this, come on)
• Dancing Plague Extreme (required prog, very mechanical, but very realistic to clear as a parties of sprouts within the timer tbh, it's fun but wasn't hard imo)
• Cinder Drift Extreme (the checkpoint halfway through made it a total joke to clear and with good DPS lots of the first phase got skipped, just needed tanks to know what tanking is)
• Final Day Extreme (a lot of people think this was hard but you could dorito a lot of it, luck out, rez a lot, it was forgiving enough that if you had the capability to learn then you'd get through it eventually. Tanks could solo through half the fight)
• Storm's Crown Extreme (half of people think this was hard, others would see it as easy, I found it easy but half the parties I joined thought it was "hard", ultimately if they progged through the whole timer they'd probably clear it)
• Mount Ordeals Extreme (insanely trivial and boring, the most important bits you could dorito, rez or healer LB3, then you could skip the hardest bit Limit Cut at the end with enough DPS)
• (You know what, I'll skip Voidcast Daiz because a lot of people couldn't do Double Meteor much less Gales2)
• Abyssal Fracture Extreme (I was the dorito in many first time clear parties and I helped so many people clear due to myself doing this so, it had a hard bit for many in meteor placement but it wasn't really that hard tbh). I do feel like the stuff after was hard as well and easy to get killed as a DPS, so maybe this one isn't quite so midcore, but the amount of people I helped clear this says otherwise - easier to help them clear than Voidcast Daiz was.
• Valigarmanda Extreme (depending on the party, you will either just prog pretty far but not clear or it'll be a total joke even if you die and skip stuff, it's meant for people that never did an Ex before)

[Reylap]

Their mechanics matter because if you do them wrong you WILL die, but you don’t take the rest of the raid with you and they don’t need specific strat coordination that on NA basically necessitates PF

And then you put BA as an example. Conviniently not mentioning that BA has a lot of coordinations needed that back when it was launched and even until ShB, people are mostly joining BA statics/discords to hear callouts. Not to also forget that BA is 40 MINUTES LONG fight that no person would be able to blind prog it in 1 or 2 lockouts and understand every mechanic. MOST people would be reading guides about BA in the same way that MOST people usually don't blind prog Extremes and look for guides as well

BTW, I agree that BA is a midcore content, just not in a way you're describing what midcore should be.

You put Diablo armament as midcore difficulty, even though if said fight was put like in an alliance roulette, it wouldve been on similar difficulty to Ultima (ivalice) or even Cidolfus on patch. So are you saying the requirements to enter Dalrialda is the midcore element? Or the difficulty of the fight?

Again, I'm agreeing that Bozja as a content overall, is a definite midcore content. But your logic that you shouldn't take the rest of the raid if you die is flawed logic of difficulty because Extreme fights ARE like that. You could have deaths in the double digit and some extremes are still clearable within 2-3 lockouts, blind btw. The only reason why extreme feels more punishing is because it is only an 8 man fight and that means there are more responsibility on the individual level compared to the big scale content.

So are you emphazising that midcore should allow people who kept dying and generally not contributing a lot to the fight to be cleared? Yeah, they have done this, in the ENTIRE mainstream content of this game. Be it MSQ, Dungeons, Normal Raids, Alliance Raids, Treasure Hunts, etc.

The game has 0 friction during it's mainstream content making people considering wiping a raid is a too hardcore is seriously funny. Maybe we should consider that after playing FIVE expansion of 10 YEARS content, having Square baby the players this much is not a good direction.

[Myon88]

Any definition that classifies content by when it is cleared is flawed, outside of outgearing and unsynching considerations.

Gear is inextricably linked to time where savage clears are concerned, so there's no contradiction there. Every week that passes you get stronger with more tome gear, making dps checks and survivability easier. There is also the element of being able to benefit from efficient strats that take time to be consolidated and disseminated among the community.

[Supersnow845]

snip

BA’s length and coordinating spawning tristitia are functionally irrelevant to my overall point, when I say BA’s approx difficulty I basically mean it’s bosses. Amongst the 4/5 bosses there is 2 points of coordination

1) pulling art and owain at the same time which CLL and dal both also do so it doesn’t really count
2) ozma meteors and bleed baits

Meteors on ozma are really only a nightmare because ozma does black hole and you can’t easily rezz people. Dump off the weird rezz restrictions on BA and not have black hole end the instance and you would basically have what I consider the exact level of difficulty I want with this hypothesised content; which is basically also where the rough difficulty of the Diablo armament falls and launch orbornne as well

Saying “people who die and don’t contribute shouldn’t be babied” doesn’t really work in practice because the only way to deter that is body checks

Basically what I’m arguing for is the very top end of the most difficult alliance raids in diffciulty; BA in terms of its boss difficulty (not its coordination to spawn tristitia) as a template for rough difficulty


The reason extremes don’t fall into this despite not being mechanically much harder is for NA/EU they require time investment for strat arrangement and organisation within PF

[BigCheez]

Why are we suddenly considering extremes and Savages midcore? Will Ultimates be midcore next?

Because it is midcore content. You can approach extreme/savage very casually and still clear while it's relevant. Ultimate is not midcore because it has gear requirements and requires a much higher degree of planning and coordination to clear.

If you're looking for duty finder-friendly content that can be beaten in one session by anyone who queues up, that's casual content.

Casual:
Dungeons, Trials, Normal Raids, Alliance Raids, Exploration Zones, Deep Dungeons, Variant Dungeons

Midcore:
Extreme, Unreal, Savage, Criterion, Chaotic

Hardcore:
Ultimate, Criterion (Savage)

There's some leeway here because a group could have a hardcore approach to savage and clear in the first few days, but generally speaking - this is the split of content in FFXIV.

[Reylap]

BA’s length and coordinating spawning tristitia are functionally irrelevant to my overall point, when I say BA’s approx difficulty I basically mean it’s bosses. Amongst the 4/5 bosses there is 2 points of coordination

1) pulling art and owain at the same time which CLL and dal both also do so it doesn’t really count
2) ozma meteors and bleed baits

Meteors on ozma are really only a nightmare because ozma does black hole and you can’t easily rezz people. Dump off the weird rezz restrictions on BA and not have black hole end the instance and you would basically have what I consider the exact level of difficulty I want with this hypothesised content; which is basically also where the rough difficulty of the Diablo armament falls and launch orbornne as well

Saying “people who die and don’t contribute shouldn’t be babied” doesn’t really work in practice because the only way to deter that is body checks

Basically what I’m arguing for is the very top end of the most difficult alliance raids in diffciulty; BA in terms of its boss difficulty (not its coordination to spawn tristitia) as a template for rough difficulty


The reason extremes don’t fall into this despite not being mechanically much harder is for NA/EU they require time investment for strat arrangement and organisation within PF

Again, you're using logic that you contradict yourselfs on your own sentence.
You said BA's lenght and coordination time are functionally irrelevant to your point (which is you defining what a midcore is).
and THEN you said at the end of the sentence that Extremes require time investment because you need to organize from PF (and you think organizing 56 people in BA is faster?) even though mechanically extreme is not that much harder.

???

What do you mean "people who die and don't contribute shouldn't be babied" doesn't work it practice? I already told you people being babied is the MAJORITY of this game. Hard body checks that makes prog multiple days or even months exist only in some savage floors and ultimates. Which we are already agree we consider those hardcores.

If you consider that the difficulty of BA or Diablo is "tough" difficulty, so how many times exactly that an average player need to "prog" it until it clears? 1 lockout? By that definition Alliance or Normal is midcore because you just need 1 lockout without any coordination at all and no communication. You get the occasional wipes when first launched. But you will clear it. The very top end of alliance difficulty is still CASUAL level of difficulty simply because the number of players in it. Your hypothetical content already exist in this game.

[Supersnow845]

Again, you're using logic that you contradict yourselfs on your own sentence.
You said BA's lenght and coordination time are functionally irrelevant to your point (which is you defining what a midcore is).
and THEN you said at the end of the sentence that Extremes require time investment because you need to organize from PF (and you think organizing 56 people in BA is faster?) even though mechanically extreme is not that much harder.

???

What do you mean "people who die and don't contribute shouldn't be babied" doesn't work it practice? I already told you people being babied is the MAJORITY of this game. Hard body checks that makes prog multiple days or even months exist only in some savage floors and ultimates. Which we are already agree we consider those hardcores.

If you consider that the difficulty of BA or Diablo is "tough" difficulty, so how many times exactly that an average player need to "prog" it until it clears? 1 lockout? By that definition Alliance or Normal is midcore because you just need 1 lockout without any coordination at all and no communication. You get the occasional wipes when first launched. But you will clear it. The very top end of alliance difficulty is still CASUAL level of difficulty simply because the number of players in it. Your hypothetical content already exist in this game.

Because I’m talking about difficulty of the bosses in BA, not the length of the raid because this isn’t necessarily something that’s being applied to another alliance raid. BA’s coordination and length aspect here doesn’t factor into it because I’m discussing the rough difficulty of the boss. I’m saying “I’d like an 8 man raid roughly as hard as ozma” for example, by that logic the coordination of BA to assemble it is irrelevant

Compare a normal raid as it stands in rough difficulty today to a normal raid with roughly ozma’s/AV’s difficulty. An actual enrage, mechanics that will straight up kill you like AV’s puddles. There is a big difference here while also still being well below a true extreme

You are fixating too much on BA as a complete duty from start to finish and not just its rough difficulty as a point of comparison which is what I’m arguing from. An 8 man duty with the difficulty of ozma would take more pulls to clear blind than any current 8 man, and an alliance raid made of “4 ozma’s” would probably need more than one lockout to clear blind but your probably only fail each boss once or twice

[Oizen]

I think its pretty midcore.

[Reylap]

Your original point was what does it mean by Midcore and you fixated on the boss difficulty instead of the overall aspect of the content.
I disagree with that kind of thinking, but let us play your argument a bit here.

You like an 8th man raid of roughly Ozma level of difficulty, which is exactly what a normal raid is considering that in Ozma level of difficulty, the difficulty is being masked by the fact that there are 56 players contribution to the raid.

Do you want more individual mechanics without any consequence of wiping like BA or Diablo? Yeah thats normal raids. Let me give you an example

1) P10 webs placement, tower dodging
2) E12 Titan Junction, Shiva Junction
3) M2 Lives, M3 dashes and movements
4) O5 trains, O6 paints, O3 Hali Maze

You want a mechanic that straight up kills you like AV's puddles and have some more actual enrage. Okay,

1) 4 lords Extremes are literall individual mechs that almost has no impact on the overall party.
2) Innocence
3) Valigarmanda literally only has 1 body check mech and thats the tank buster
4) All of endwalker extreme except golbez has no body checks and all individual mechs.
5) The entire Unreal content because people need to realize that majority of old trials mechs are made in an era where none of the jobs have this much leeway thanks to the amount of simplification.

Difficulty of an 8th man raid is depended on the consequences of someone dying because you rely on less people. Asking just to do BA without understanding that BA mechanics or Diablos mechanic condensed down to 8 people without any of the dead consequences is just asking for casual level raid. Because that is EXACTLY what they do to normal raids, they make Savage first, and then remove all the consequence of dying so you can clear it.

Which is your fixation on whatever true extreme is, is weird tbh because I have mentioned multiple times that extreme is doable blind in 2-3 lockout even if it had body check and someone else in this chat have already mentioned the variety of extremes that even sprouts can clear in 1-2 lockout.

[Shougun]

The problem seems to be when you ask for casual content in this game you get content that a lobotomised 2 year old could clear and when you ask for midcore content you get low end of savage

Like they seem to be completely blind to the BA, launch orbornne range of content

I agree and think this is the kind of feedback that people should be giving instead of asking for "midcore content" and acting surprised when they get more extreme/savage difficulty content.

Casual content in XIV is largely too easy and doesn't have enough rewards associated with it or replay value. There needs to be more content around alliance raid difficulty and a reason to play it. Bonus points if it has some kind of variance and isn't just the same thing over and over again.

I can vibe with this chain. I do think I have seen a number of 'midcore' requests throughout the years that really boiled down to 'end game casual content' with the subtext of 'that isn't brain dead like a beast tribe quest'. If you're a casual it can sometimes feel like you can either choose no brain content or no content.


Honestly to me I just see 'mid core' content as it is being discussed here as training wheels content for hardcore lol. I suppose midcore solo stuff is interesting, but I'm not interested in any content that requires me to rely on others ability to study, anything, ever again. Like confidently, ever. Too much wasting time in FFXI / WoW for stuff I found in the end didn't offset the stress / annoyance, just need to delevel a few times in vanilla FFXI cause someone can't follow instructions to be like "nah, I'm good man- this is just not fun" lol (recommend statics for people who are able to meet that though). If I want hard content I want it to be solo (although for the purposes of an MMO I recommend party # scaling content that does this as much as possible, like WoW has with some of its stuff).