Can we go back to using tomes to get relics?

[Daralii]

And I don't understand why anyone wants them tied to Field Operations. I find doing those far worse then grinding poetics, and that's including ARR and HW relics (which are practically "tomestone weapons" themselves).

You're right, the other level cap activities really fall short of field ops when it comes to rewards and incentives.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

And I don't understand why anyone wants them tied to Field Operations. I find doing those far worse then grinding poetics, and that's including ARR and HW relics (which are practically "tomestone weapons" themselves).

For me personally? Doing them in Field Operations means I get to have fun with my Lost/Logos Actions

(I ran DRN 255+ times to get all 17 relics updated on patch, do I need any other proof of just how much I love the grind? lol)

;and to a lesser degree, the Phantom Cooldowns Actions. I already do roulette by almost daily basis, why do I want to keep doing what I'm already doing to earn a 'relic'?

Also a bit of correction: ARR and HW relics were NOT 'tomestone' weapons on patch. I personally don't quite care if relics turns into a pseudo tomestone after their respective expacs, but this was not the case for Mandervilles, and arguably today's Phantom weapons except the demiatmas. Even ARR and HW still provides plenty "not tomestone"-steps past their inception periods it's honestly damning to see how EW/DT counterparts has turned into.

[Valence]

Some older relics still had at least partially or half tome steps, like the pneumite step or the unidentified bone/shell/etc. It's nothing new. The latest novelty when it comes to relic came with eureka. Acting like the EW tome grind was a first low in the series is just ignorant.

All of those methods suck to varying degrees, the difference is that some will be less painful for some while they'll be a lot more tedious for others.

[Shistar]

Acting like the EW tome grind was a first low in the series is just ignorant.

I'd say the dislike of EW relics comes from two facts:
It forced you to do Manderville quests, all the way from ARR to EW to even be able to get any relics. This is kind of an insane requirements if you had been ignoring these quests because it's such a long questline, the contents are very hit or miss depending on your sense of humor.
After completing the quest, it was only tomestone steps. It was not just "some" tomestone steps. It was quest -> tomestone -> quest -> tomestone -> quest -> tomestone -> relic done. If we had some other steps like light gathering, FATEs, a questline that is actually involved with the relic itself (!?) or literally anything except just tomestone steps and a forcing the entirety of the Manderville questline down your throat, people would have been way less upset about it.


There were also no new or special ways to get our hands on the tomestones either, so it really felt like we were doing nothing out of the ordinary and every now and then a relic would drop on our laps.


And I say it as someone who had the Manderville quests done ahead of time, out of my own volition because I generally like them. But after EW, I'm burnt out on this guy because I had to play catch-up on my alt...


In general, EW felt very "oh no, we gotta add relics, quick! Here have this thing we cooked up in 3 minutes. Entertain yourself" which sucks coming from quests that had you bonding with your weapon's spirit like in the case of Anima or figuring out how to remake ancient Bozjan weapons to get the edge we need to win the conflict. The Anima minion is so cute too, so I will be forever biased.

[TeresaFortell]

Snip

My fallacy aside, there seems to be no way to even get a balance to get to a point where the sweet spot is.

[Valence]

I'd say the dislike of EW relics comes from two facts:
It forced you to do Manderville quests, all the way from ARR to EW to even be able to get any relics. This is kind of an insane requirements if you had been ignoring these quests because it's such a long questline, the contents are very hit or miss depending on your sense of humor.
After completing the quest, it was only tomestone steps. It was not just "some" tomestone steps. It was quest -> tomestone -> quest -> tomestone -> quest -> tomestone -> relic done. If we had some other steps like light gathering, FATEs, a questline that is actually involved with the relic itself (!?) or literally anything except just tomestone steps and a forcing the entirety of the Manderville questline down your throat, people would have been way less upset about it.


There were also no new or special ways to get our hands on the tomestones either, so it really felt like we were doing nothing out of the ordinary and every now and then a relic would drop on our laps.


And I say it as someone who had the Manderville quests done ahead of time, out of my own volition because I generally like them. But after EW, I'm burnt out on this guy because I had to play catch-up on my alt...


In general, EW felt very "oh no, we gotta add relics, quick! Here have this thing we cooked up in 3 minutes. Entertain yourself" which sucks coming from quests that had you bonding with your weapon's spirit like in the case of Anima or figuring out how to remake ancient Bozjan weapons to get the edge we need to win the conflict. The Anima minion is so cute too, so I will be forever biased.

I mean sure, if the complaint is that there was no variety, I'm not gonna disagree here.

But saying that any of the relic steps weren't undercooked seems like pushing it to me. It doesn't exactly take a lot of effort to tell players to run bazillions of fates and have an item drop, or to tell them to run a lot of duties for the next item in line, or to play anything that's already been there in the game anyway. Relics aren't creating new content, they're just recycling old content to make sure people grind it until they cry tears of blood and start bickering with each other about which of those steps is the least miserable.

[Shistar]

I mean sure, if the complaint is that there was no variety, I'm not gonna disagree here.

But saying that any of the relic steps weren't undercooked seems like pushing it to me. It doesn't exactly take a lot of effort to tell players to run bazillions of fates and have an item drop, or to tell them to run a lot of duties for the next item in line, or to play anything that's already been there in the game anyway. Relics aren't creating new content, they're just recycling old content to make sure people grind it until they cry tears of blood and start bickering with each other about which of those steps is the least miserable.

Yeah, I never said the rest weren't undercooked, but I'd say a good storyline does carry a good bit of it. I didn't mind doing a lot of that work for Anima, because then I'd be rewarded by watching it get stronger, becoming able to communicate, wishing to travel with us, etc.
I'd say the key lies in allowing us to choose which kind of grindy grind we wanna do? Since in the end, this thread is a lot of "FATEs suck!" "but you're wrong, I love doing FATEs!" and so on and so forth with every type of content to ever exist. If we can at least choose between a handful of grinds, wouldn't most of us be happier?

[Mouthbone]

My fallacy aside, there seems to be no way to even get a balance to get to a point where the sweet spot is.

It's not possible to satisfy everyone, there will always be people complaining that something is not made with their hyper specific vision in mind
I think as long as they are not converting content that drives engagement with the overworld/field ops/crafting into glorified log in bonuses, most people will be happy

[Burningskull]

So update:

I did finally get all my Demiatma, thank the good Lord. I would say I don't mind the Light step as much because there is a set ending and you get a set amount of light per roulette you do. Maybe the Demiatma step just needed a gauge that you slowly fill that resets when you get a Demiatma but if you fill it before you get one then you automatically get one. That way there's no wondering and no taking 10 whole levels of a job to get it done.

[Hanayumi]

Still think they should have 2 entirely separate options; tome only variation for catch up gear, and heavily grind variation as an alternative to raid weapons.