Overtuned MSQ 4-mans and subpar story ends 12-year journey

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

Spinning hands are 'temporary misdirection'. The only one other time I recall them putting this mech was in Rabanastre last boss and that one spins twice as fast than the one we see in Yuweyawata + happens at the same time with other mechanic. It's not new.

Nevertheless, try turning your camera to a completely top-down/bird view so you can see exactly which direction the hand is pointing (maybe also zoom out farther), then only press W/whichever keybind you have to move forward when they line up with where you want to go.

There's also no other on-going mechanic or target to attack when this happens. Just focus on the spinning hand. The only personal complaint that I have on this one is the giant crimson orb above the boss is positioned rather too perfect to block out the spinny hand from view.

While I have no issue issue with the last boss, I think they could probably tone down the jagged rock VFX a smidge - those bright orange bloom when they erupt are aggressively.... orange (lol).

[Daralii]

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I'd add Igeyorhm & Lahabrea/Ascian Prime to your encounter list, because people still have a lot of trouble with them in my experience and it's an MSQ dungeon.

[Supersnow845]

There are dozens of examples of content that was a little harder than “average” over the years and none of it spelled death for the game. Like i pointed out brayflox which punished SCH’s who didn’t have leeches and PLD’s that didn’t have shield oath. It’s not a problem now but it was a difficulty spike in its time.

Launch holminster then SGE launch holminster is another.

Like difficulty of mandatory content has always been in flux and DT is no better or worse here. I believe there IS an argument to be made that DT is too visually cluttered (sandoria suffers from this) but that’s a different argument to raw difficulty

[Jeeqbit]

I'd add Igeyorhm & Lahabrea/Ascian Prime to your encounter list, because people still have a lot of trouble with them in my experience and it's an MSQ dungeon.

I would but that dungeon was actually revamped. I excluded all the revamped ones, but many pre-revamp duties are good examples as well.

[Jeeqbit]

It IS what they are doing now. Less time between animation telegraphs and damage. More damage in general. More memory/spatial visualization mechanics. More instant death mechanics.

Don't get me wrong, I don't really need them to make everything super fast. But I can also see why they would conclude that the battle system had been pretty slow-paced in the past, because it was glaringly obvious how much of an outlier the 4th Eden raid was, which still wipes people up to this day.

In any case, I decided to test out this boss that you used as an example to see if I could survive it without any effort (including DPS since the NPCs do the work).

This is the "Free Spirits" mechanic on a tank. I just stood still for it and survived with 4 vulns. A prior pull I survived 6 vulns with no cooldowns:


This is me surviving the Doom mechanic without moving. I just pressed Hallowed Ground and didn't even get Doom:

[Exmo]

What does "overtuned" mean here?

[hydralus]

I avoid extremes and progression raiding in ALL games I play as I neither have the time nor interest to devote hours of my life to a 2nd job

I don't really care about whatever else you just said but if you've delved into crafting, housing, and glamouring, you definitely have the time. There's no need to imply people have less of a life than you do because they enjoy other aspects of the game, simply say "It doesn't interest me".

[Alice_Rivers]

There's nothing especially hard in DT, the most annoying mechanics are Strayborough first boss' gimmick and Yuwe third boss' hole in that order. As for healers abandoning dungeon runs, because they have to heal? They shouldn't play healer then.

[Eluvyel]

Yuweyawata Field Station Boss 2: "Lost Hope"
Four random players need to rely on their ping and spatial relationship ability to line up the spinning hand in multiple directions to navigate through zig zag paths to the outside of the room or they are 1-shot.

Everyone I talk to hates the spinning hand mechanic, but they keep using it. Re: unimaginative + 1-shot.

Yuweyawata Field Station Boss 3: AOE Spirals
Absolute cluster of visually confusing animation effects. Very large AOE spirals fill up whole room rather than alternating rows as implied by the pre-AOE visuals (and every other similar mechanic in the game). Must locate the 1 or 2 small safe spaces instead. Very short duration between AOE circles appearing and damage vs. any MSQ-required 4-man prior to DT.

Could also point to the jump to Raging Claw on Boss 3 during the hole phase where you need to sprint to the tiny area behind him in time to avoid being killed, while avoiding falling in the insta-death hole, WHILE spread markers are dropped on you.

forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/516111-Yuweyawata-Field-Station-is-so-wrong

youtube.com/watch?v=D0mGNw_Ps6Q

Like I said I'm sure raiders and people that enjoy more challenging roulettes love this stuff, but it has no place locking people out of progressing the base game MSQ.

These are some really confusing examples. The spinning hands are quite literally solved by pointing the camera where you want to go and then just holding both mouse buttons when the hand aligns with the camera direction. There is no skill involved here.

The AoE spirals at boss 3 play the same every time and are solved with standing at the very edge of the spiral and the grueling task of...walking forward into the middle blindly once the mechanic starts resolving. You can even get hit twice and not die.

[Gwenkatsu]

The story is not even in the same time zone as past expansions. I am truly sorry for those that can't see the difference between nuanced characters like Emet-Selch and the laughable cartoon TV "villains" we get in DT, never mind the emotionally tone-deaf main character. It isn't setting up anything new (until maybe post 7.1 which I haven't gone through yet, reasons below). It is just bad, by any metric of symbolism, eloquence, emotional impact or intelligent design.

If you have no fun in 7.1 due to story and gameplay issues, here's a hot tip from a fellow casual: don't try any further.
The story absolutely hits rock bottom with 7.3. when you see the sunday morning cartoon villain that gets set up to be the next big evil guy. And the 7.3 dungeon was the first where certain mechanics just went straight above my head. There are guides, there are helpful people around, so I could have figured that out somehow... but the horrible writing was the last nail in the coffin for me. 14 days left, and if 8.0 does not get widely praised, I won't be back. It's sad to leave a game I played nearly every day for 4.5 years, but the current state of FF14 is just... neither worth my time nor my money.