Here we go again

[Mawlzy]

Am I truly so disconnected because I don’t think the dungeons are that hard … like I feel gaslighted

Maybe these people just don’t run ANY content enough? Like none of this is new mechanics. There’s a level 70 dungeon ( the burn drone 2nd boss) which has the same blue spikes coming from the side you dodge

You seem genuinely interested, so I'll gladly offer some speculations from my own experience.

When 7.3 dropped, the peak player count increased by a factor of 3. What were those 2/3rds of the players doing since 7.2? Possibly playing other games. They almost certainly weren't running FFXIV dungeons. Why would they?

I don't recall how many required dungeons there are in 7.0-7.2, but multiply that by two (I ran an alt through to the end of 7.2) and that is close to the number of dungeons I have run in the period from June 28 2024 to today. I spent 99% of my time in PvP and a bunch of other activities.

You mention a level 70 dungeon. I have no recollection of that dungeon, no idea what a burn drone is, and never recall seeing blue spikes. I imagine that is true of many players.

So I think you're onto something. A significant fraction of the player base only runs dungeons when they are compelled to do so. This is probably because they don't much enjoy running dungeons, and spend their time engaged with all the other activities FF14 offers. The mostly likely reason someone doesn't like something in a game is because they are bad at it to begin with.

Thus when confronted with the latest one, which they are required to clear so they can find out what happens in the story, they are primed to be pissed off, completely out of practice, and have no long-term knowledge of mechanics because they simply haven't run many dungeons over the last few years. And in some cases it's doubtless true that if such players just practiced more and ran lots of dungeons, they'd find the latest one easier. But many players do not, because to them dungeons are an irritant that only serve to gate progress.

The consensus in this thread appears to be that such players are not playing the game properly and should just leave. I'm personally fine with that for myself, but it does have consequences.

The first boss in the new dungeon is the hardest. Because he heckles with the mechanics. But he has very little HP and they can't upfront one-shot you. You can only die if you got spanked by 2 or 3 hits at once. The second one is just a vibe check. The third one is almost exactly the same as Mt. Gulgs second boss but replace the water donut with lightning orbital line nukes.

I found the first boss trivial and the second boss impossible. People have different skills.