Here we go again

[FlorineC]

This simply illustrates how out of touch you are.

You can call me out of touch if you want but I don't really think I am. The fight design in this game isn't based around having fast reflexes or adapting to unforeseeable circumstance on the fly, it's based around memorizing a timeline with a handful of variations. It's about memorizing the steps to a dance and then executing that dance. The dance rarely changes, and when it does it only changes to a small handful of other possibilities. You look at a mechanic like CT from FRU and at first you think "oh my god there's so much going on that I have to react to how does anyone do this?" But then you take the time to study and learn the dance, and you realize all you do is look at your two debuffs and do one of 8 or so things. So you study what those 8 things are and when and why you do them, you get your hands on the mechanic a few times to practice the timing, and boom, you've mastered CT. It's really, honestly not any harder than that. Every mechanic in this game is just memorizing a handful of things to do in a specific order, and doing them. Every fight is made up of a handful of these handfuls. Barring disability, literally anyone can do that if they put the time and effort in. Again, if you don't want to put that time and effort in, that's entirely fair, but that's what the game is, and that doesn't mean you're incapable of playing it.

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 do you also get mad when other games drop dlc a year after you finished them, and you have to take a bit to re-learn how to play? Do you tell the developers they need to make a game easier because life got in the way and you fell off of if, but wanted to pick back up where you left off 6 months later and you don't remember what you were doing or how to play? The idea that all msq content has to be instantly and effortlessly winnable for people haven't engaged in pve in a patch is kind of unfeasible because it means that every dungeon has to be a tutorial dungeon and ruins the experience for anyone who actually plays the game regularly.

I literally said that "twitchy reflexes" is the "wrong kind of difficulty in this game."

What does it matter whether the devs think that 1s vs 2s vs 3s vs 983547s is where to draw the line? The underlying concept is flat wrong.

I would argue that the game doesn't require twitchy reflexes in any content besides maybe Air Force One, and also asks what makes you the arbiter of what is the right or wrong kind of difficulty in this game. Furthermore, it matters where the devs thing to draw the line because they're the ones making the game. I thought that much would be obvious.

[Mawlzy]

Do those skills include looking down at the floor?

Do you want to be rude, or do you want to have a sensible discussion?

I'll take the low-probability option and explain to you exactly my experience of the second boss.

I prefer to play MCH, but I tend to survive better on WAR hence I played WAR. For those of you who dislike Wuk Lamat, you'll be pleased to know she died twice because I forgot to put on tank stance. Once we got that sorted out...

Second boss. I figure I can only hit the one I'm tethered to. Lucky guess. Get yeeted in. Okay. I'm dueling this thing.

I guess first are some irrelevant auto-attacks, then objects start appearing. Okay the barrette things produce line AoEs, they come in pairs so there's the jumping into where the first one went off business, then there are spherical things that drop, yip circle AoEs with a tiny avoid area, okay, and some wiggly things that move I need to avoid. Fine.

Died to all this as I figured out what the AoEs were, but that was expected, No worries, go again.

Second time, things are not going great. I've now noticed there's a donut AoE I hadn't see before. Not too sure why SE thinks 4 overlapping AoEs are necessary in a MSQ dungeon but I keep plugging away.

Get one-shot by something. Puzzled.

Third time. Exact same result.

Tab out, watch a guide. Oh there's a spell that needs to be interrupted. Okay. Write the name of the cast on my notepad.

Fourth time. Check I have an interrupt on my hotbar. Yip. Go again. Mistime the interrupt, die. No problem. We're making progress.

Fifth time. Nail the interrupt, immediately thereafter die to the tankbuster. Right, so hold more mit for the tankbuster.

Sixth time. Seem to survive the tankbuster but die shortly thereafter.

By about the ninth time I realize the problem is I'm picking up vuln stacks like a drunk pulling quarters from the fountains outside Caesars Palace. So I put all my focus on doing a better job of avoiding the AoEs. Rewatch the guide at 0.25x. Try to plot a path that minimizes getting clipped.

And I can't do it. I kept going until somewhere between 15 and 20 wipes, and by that point I'd had enough.

So yeah, I was looking at the floor.

[Supersnow845]

But like……..how?

The tankbuster goes off after like 3 mechanics. Let’s say you get hit by one of the barrettes trying to avoid it and make your life easier by intentionally standing in one of the circles from the dropped balls. At worst you’ll go into the TB with 3 vuln. You can facetank the tankbusters with 3 vuln stacks ignoring mitigation

Like with the position of mechanics you actively have to be chasing vuln stacks to take enough damage from the TB to be one shot

[Mawlzy]

...snip... something about FRU (what's that? thought "CT" was crystal tower?)... usual claim anyone can do anything despite it being clearly false... blah blah.. Oh, actual question:

So do you also get mad when other games drop dlc a year after you finished them, and you have to take a bit to re-learn how to play? Do you tell the developers they need to make a game easier because life got in the way and you fell off of if, but wanted to pick back up where you left off 6 months later and you don't remember what you were doing or how to play

No and no. If I'm rusty or haven't played a game in a while, I figure it is my responsibility to get up to speed with the content I enjoy. The problem I have had with instanced PvE in 14 is that, not only is it side content to what I actually enjoy doing, some of it is required content, and from my perspective it has changed massively.

It has got faster, with more visual clutter, more rushing to the safe spot. Into Stormblood, MSQ dungeons weren't the dance you describe. I freely admit I am bad at such content. It has reached the point that it is completely unenjoyable, hence I've quit.

Completely my decision.

However, as discussed at length in this thread, there are solutions to this issue that take nothing away from people who like a challenge, that would enable people like me to progress the MSQ, thus allowing them to keep doing the things they enjoy like crafting, gathering and PvP.

Nobody has told me why this would be the end of the world. All we get is:

Player A: How can people struggle with this? It's sooooo easy.

Player B: It's not easy for me, but it would be if...

Player A: Shut up! Play Animal Crossing!!!

But like……..how?

The tankbuster goes off after like 3 mechanics. Let’s say you get hit by one of the barrettes trying to avoid it and make your life easier by intentionally standing in one of the circles from the dropped balls. At worst you’ll go into the TB with 3 vuln. You can facetank the tankbusters with 3 vuln stacks ignoring mitigation

Like with the position of mechanics you actively have to be chasing vuln stacks to take enough damage from the TB to be one shot

I dunno, honey. I can't tell my FRU from my UWU. But I promise you I'm trying to avoid getting vuln stacks rather than collecting them.

Oh to save anyone asking, ilvl 740 gear with materia and tank food.

[Volgia]

Do you want to be rude, or do you want to have a sensible discussion?

I'll take the low-probability option and explain to you exactly my experience of the second boss.

Man I wish I was at that level to figure out a boss, that sounds like fun. I breezed my way through it, just avoided all the AoEs and was gucci.

[Mawlzy]

Man I wish I was at that level to figure out a boss, that sounds like fun. I breezed my way through it, just avoided all the AoEs and was gucci.

I get that if you enjoy dungeons it must be a downer when they present zero challenge. It's why when I play chess against Stockfish I choose a setting where I figure to lose 90% of the time. I like testing myself.

Wouldn't it be more fun for you if dungeons came with difficulty options?

[Volgia]

I get that if you enjoy dungeons it must be a downer when they present zero challenge. It's why when I play chess against Stockfish I choose a setting where I figure to lose 90% of the time. I like testing myself.

Wouldn't it be more fun for you if dungeons came with difficulty options?

I would like a harder mode yeah. But I think the problem with separating it into optional content and making the story mode way too easy it kind of takes me out of my immersion. Like if you spend 50 hours of story time hyping up a looming threat like Thordan and when you get to finally fight him none of his attacks really hurt you and you take him out real fast, it takes me out of my immersion.

The other thing is that while it's nice to have NPCs to do the story mode I think this is an area where if you were with people they would have helped you clear, dungeons are the only time where hardcore and casual players collide.

[Mawlzy]

I would like a harder mode yeah. But I think the problem with separating it into optional content and making the story mode way too easy it kind of takes me out of my immersion. Like if you spend 50 hours of story time hyping up a looming threat like Thordan and when you get to finally fight him none of his attacks really hurt you and you take him out real fast, it takes me out of my immersion.

The other thing is that while it's nice to have NPCs to do the story mode I think this is an area where if you were with people they would have helped you clear, dungeons are the only time where hardcore and casual players collide.

You'll appreciate based on the exchanges in this thread, that's precisely why some of us play with NPCs.

But I totally get the bit about immersion which is why I think MSQ should have optional difficulty settings. You miss out on really feeling like you battled The Big Bad. I come out when I run w/ players after spending most of my time flat on my face, and the Scions tell me how amazing I am.

[Rasera00]

I think people lost track of the thread, so I'm gonna try and loop it back a bit, and then give my own feedback at the same time.

I see absolutely zero reason not to let duty support/trust have NPC resses and difficulties below normal mode. You could even just input a skip dungeon button too, does it really matter for MSQ? People play FF14 for whatever reasons they want to, let people play the way they want to play and do combat in whatever solo way they want.

But... there is an expected baseline for multiplayer to accommodate the largest amount of players, and that's the line the devs have currently chosen to draw, for better or worse. Tying raid progression and currency to expert dungeons is where a lot of this animosity comes in, and where a lot of pushback to making the game "braindead" mostly stems from. You feel you have to cap this currency because it's the only way to get this loot, so you have to do these dungeons, so it better be interesting, or it better be fast.

So to me, the answer is really simple. Let people do duty finder and trusts at any difficulty they want. Let people skip it solo if they really just want the story, or are here for other reasons. But gate expert queues behind completing duty finder/trust on normal with either NPC resses disabled or limited. If people are worried about botting and loot, either disable the loot, or better yet, make the loot "replicas" like we have for relics. This way even the single players can use the glams if they like them.

There's really no reason to not let duty support and trust have difficulty scaling. If you gate random queuing behind an expected difficulty, then you can maintain and upkeep a set difficulty for the larger multiplayer base as well. You get to make everyone happy, or at least, less likely to be upset with or by others.

[PharisHanasaki]

However, as discussed at length in this thread, there are solutions to this issue that take nothing away from people who like a challenge, that would enable people like me to progress the MSQ, thus allowing them to keep doing the things they enjoy like crafting, gathering and PvP.

Nobody has told me why this would be the end of the world. All we get is:

Player A: How can people struggle with this? It's sooooo easy.

Player B: It's not easy for me, but it would be if...

Player A: Shut up! Play Animal Crossing!!!



I dunno, honey. I can't tell my FRU from my UWU. But I promise you I'm trying to avoid getting vuln stacks rather than collecting them.

Oh to save anyone asking, ilvl 740 gear with materia and tank food.

I figure you are just ragebaiting at this point, but in the remote case that you are not, and are simply unable to read or ignoring everything that has been said that does not agree with you, trusts are already the solo mode. The only time they let go of your hand to make a dungeon remotely interesting the game suddenly becomes unplayable to you.

You don’t seem to recall how or when you got to this level, because clearly you don’t play often. (You post more than me and I got over 17,000 hrs logged on steam, not proud at all). You don’t remember dungeons, bosses, mechanics….

As for how it affects us, let me remind you that not everything is Black and White. There is not just casuals and raiders, but there are in betweens. And for years said casuals have requested “accesibility” (yes, in quotes, because accesibility means making the game accessible to as many players with special needs such as, but certainly not limited to, people with color blindness, light sensitivy, impaired vision or mobility, etc, as possible, while your “accesibility” means I just wanna be done with this now pls because I can’t be bother to do it so why can’t I skip now so I can go play poker and EVE online), and what has happened is jobs got overly simplified so casuals could play more, now not even raiders bother with some of said jobs, and those who liked the original jobs are now left deciding which weapon suits my healer glam best because mechanically there is not much difference. Were jobs perfect before? No. Where thy fun? For those of us who played and took the time to master them, yes.

The devs have a history of applying a single patch to all, and honestly you’re not willing to put even a little of bit of effort if you can react to 6 simultaneous poker games but cannot zoom in to pay attention to a single, slowly moving aoe. You have yet failed to explain how it is a “game difficulty” problem.