Opinions on Crystal Tower: Labyrinth of the Ancients and Syrcus Tower

[FasaiLeFaye]

My problem with CT isn't damage level or mechanics.

Rather, it's that we end up with a severely gimped rotation that adds up to 15-25 minutes of pure tedium. They give us these buttons and abilities to press at max level but when it comes to Alliance raid, 99 out of 100 times, more than half those buttons become utterly useless. BLM is the worst offender because it turns the rotation into a DNC-like proc system that plays absolutely nothing like the rotation at every other level. RPR and VPR are right up, turning into 4 button wonders.

I would literally never complain about CT again if I had the option to do the max level rotation.

[Infindox]

I would rather people not be locked out of MSQ or an entire roulette because they don't want to run a glorified crossover event that still has timegates that also only exists because Yoko Taro will put his characters in any franchise that gives him money.

The raids themselves don't have time gates, we'd be better off if everyone was forced to do each 8 man and 24 man in a expansion before they move on. There's enough people to do them and allows them to use those characters.

[PyurBlue]

Why should you be allowed to run a roulette if you being in that roulette is actively making it harder for that roulette to fulfil its purpose of helping someone queuing directly for nier

The roulette fail their purpose if people don't enjoy the content. If the one and only purpose of roulettes is to fill queues, doesn't that make them something akin to a job and not part of a game?

I don't think it's helpful to pit the utility of roulettes against the entertainment value. They're both important. Entertainment is the reason there are players at all.

The raids themselves don't have time gates, we'd be better off if everyone was forced to do each 8 man and 24 man in a expansion before they move on. There's enough people to do them and allows them to use those characters.

Trying to force ilvl compliance in the alliance roulette has already caused problems, and just forcing people into queueing doesn't do anything to improve content. It's not a solution in my eyes, it's just a low effort attempt at a bandaid. It also didn't work - the data we have suggests that the change to alliance raid queues didn't do anything to reduce the frequency of CT raids.

If we're going to address the problem, why not look for the best solution and not any solution?

[Supersnow845]

The roulette fail their purpose if people don't enjoy the content. If the one and only purpose of roulettes is to fill queues, doesn't that make them something akin to a job and not part of a game?

I don't think it's helpful to pit the utility of roulettes against the entertainment value. They're both important. Entertainment is the reason there are players at all.

If anything that just makes my argument stronger.

By not unlocking all raids you both starve the roulettes of their intended utility function and rob the fun from their intended diversity function. So people who queue directly wanting particular raids have less fun with longer queues, people who queue for the roulette have less fun getting more of the same raids AND the roulette is failing the queue function as well

[Atreus]

My problem with CT isn't damage level or mechanics.

Rather, it's that we end up with a severely gimped rotation that adds up to 15-25 minutes of pure tedium. They give us these buttons and abilities to press at max level but when it comes to Alliance raid, 99 out of 100 times, more than half those buttons become utterly useless. BLM is the worst offender because it turns the rotation into a DNC-like proc system that plays absolutely nothing like the rotation at every other level. RPR and VPR are right up, turning into 4 button wonders.

I would literally never complain about CT again if I had the option to do the max level rotation.

This. A combination of changing up level sync and lowering item level caps across many different duties would go a long way for this game.

[PyurBlue]

By not unlocking all raids you both starve the roulettes of their intended utility function and rob the fun from their intended diversity function

This is only the case if all the instances within are considered fun. There is a big divide on the level 50 raids, some people love them for low effort high reward content. Some people hate them because of the tedium of level 50 classes and inflated ilvl. Forcing raid unlock isn't a fix for this. If it was, then we could take the change to its logical end and make mentor roulette the only roulette and open it to everyone. I don't think that would be a positive change. It's OK if people have preferences in content and a good game should let people stick to what they enjoy, in my opinion.

[Jaltaer]

Why should you be allowed to run a roulette if you being in that roulette is actively making it harder for that roulette to fulfil its purpose of helping someone queuing directly for nier

Inconveniencing more people from getting that godawful 2B gear is a public service as far as I'm concerned.

And to be 100% clear, if the lv80 alliance raids were actually relevant to the game's story and lore, I would have no problem with making them required. But no, I don't think people should be forced to engage with a tedious slog of, again, a glorified crossover event that only exists because Yoko Taro loves licensing money. It'd be like requiring people to clear Rathalos to use Trial roulette or continue MSQ, except worse, because at least Rathalos didn't come at the cost of an entire expansion's alliance raid series.

[Striker44]

The roulette fail their purpose if people don't enjoy the content. If the one and only purpose of roulettes is to fill queues, doesn't that make them something akin to a job and not part of a game?

If the rewards are still sufficient enough that people are willing to do the content even if it doesn't maximize their immediate enjoyment, then it's serving its purpose entirely. I'd say maybe you're new to MMO's, but your join date is back in 2015, so maybe not. For better or worse, it's a baked-in aspect of the MMO genre that certain aspects feel more like a "job" than anything else. Heck, over the years that's become significantly *less* a thing, especially with FFXIV. Still, some things by their nature are just going to be "grindy," and not every moment of that grind is going to be doing the specific content you personally find most enjoyable. Just ask yourself if you're having enough fun or if you feel the reward (exp, tomestones, etc.) is enough for you to say "yeah, I'll do that." If it is, great. If not, choose a different way. FFXIV at least is great at providing lots of different ways to achieve the same goals, so pick what floats your boat the most.

[Raikai]

My problem with CT isn't damage level or mechanics.

Rather, it's that we end up with a severely gimped rotation that adds up to 15-25 minutes of pure tedium. They give us these buttons and abilities to press at max level but when it comes to Alliance raid, 99 out of 100 times, more than half those buttons become utterly useless. BLM is the worst offender because it turns the rotation into a DNC-like proc system that plays absolutely nothing like the rotation at every other level. RPR and VPR are right up, turning into 4 button wonders.

I would literally never complain about CT again if I had the option to do the max level rotation.

It's both of them really... Bland jobs plus boring fights that you barely need to do anything.

I would also love max level rotations scaled down in damage to balance out with leveling folks... People say that would hurt sprouts seeing other people do a lot, but honestly? Do them really? Do we have actual data from other games? If I was a lv30 BLM looking at what a lv100 is doing, I'd only feel good to have something to actually look forward to and is not like someone is stuck at such low levels forever.

All they need to do here is give everyone a basic AoE tool by the level you get your first dungeon. But that should've been done regardless of this idea. It's horrible that some jobs don't even have an aoe action at level 25 while others do.

[Atreus]

It's both of them really... Bland jobs plus boring fights that you barely need to do anything.

I would also love max level rotations scaled down in damage to balance out with leveling folks... People say that would hurt sprouts seeing other people do a lot, but honestly? Do them really? Do we have actual data from other games? All they need to do here is give everyone a basic AoE tool by the level you get your first dungeon. But that should've been done regardless of this idea. It's horrible that some jobs don't even have an aoe action at level 25 while others do.

When I'm new at games, I love seeing what higher levels are able to do. Gives me something to look forward to.