Current State of End-Game Contents - A Blog Post from A Japanese Player

[Pibz]

You're horribly missing his point here. People enjoy the story. Coil has a story. People should enjoy Coil. Sad thing is, they don't. For various reasons, one of them being they may get instant-killed at every step they attempt.

As i said earlier in this thread, i think they should indeed make a easier version of coil(and in turn give us a harder version of ct too) for those only interested in lore.

First, you don't need a perfect rotation to succeed in coil. You need a basic damage output (basic here is adaptable to the fight, of course it isn't spamming 1-2-3-repeat) and you're good.
Second, the actual choregraphy for each fight does let you perform a high enough dps to do anything you'd want to achieve so hmmm, knowing said dance isn't really more a test of skill then spamming combos. It is indeed harder, but only requires more memory, not more skill.
Lastly, since when having a fight "not relying ONLY on mechanics" is a synonym of "having a dummy fight" ? Stop thinking "black or white". Maybe end game content could just stop spamming one shot mechanics every time and just focus on a few of them ?

1- You probably never did the fights undergeared or with just barely enough gear so you never experienced the difference between barely making the top dps you can and not doing it. This was the reason why, when it was released, some people had more trouble passing the dps checks in T4 than others for example(or in any fight that has dps checks really).

2- LOL so moving away from the boss interrupting your cast or simply putting you out of range or simply busying you with just doing something else doesn't influece dps? mmkay then

3 - Fights don't rely only on mechanics, gear matters and so does individual skill i'm tired of repeating this.

And lastly STOP talking about encounters you haven't even tried ffs.

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Sigh
Answer me this, why do people who have experience in other MMOs and other games, find mechanics like landslide trivial(from the first few times, not after hours upon hours) more often than those that don't have experience?
Please go ahead and twist logic to evade the definition of skill.
Also, since when is being able to execute a set of actions (be they patterned or not) not a skill?

So you finally beat Turn 5 - you never die to divebomb/twisters anymore! - good job!... did you gain any "skills" from doing this that apply to any other game, or even to any other fight in FFXIV itself?

Yes, you've learned how to dodge crap, congrats.
Oh, and if you did it while there was no echo well let's see some examples:
As a healer you might have learned how to time your shield so that it is applied right before a big attack.
As a tank you might've learned how to properly set up a cooldown rotation.
As a dps you might've learned to save your cooldowns for when a burst is really needed.
This is just off the top of my head, sure some might've had those skills before, but then it'd have been easier for them too.

[Dyvid]

Look, I think one key is issue is gearing up doesn't really effect the fight mechanics. No matter how geared you are, if you eat a landslide its game over. If you eat a twister it's game over. The question is then, where is the gear and echo buff that actually increases player movement speed to help compensate "poor" players with lower reaction time?

[AllaganStop]

Look, I think one key is issue is gearing up doesn't really effect the fight mechanics. No matter how geared you are, if you eat a landslide its game over. If you eat a twister it's game over. The question is then, where is the gear and echo buff that actually increases player movement speed to help compensate "poor" players with lower reaction time?

While gear doesn't directly help versus mechanics, it does indirectly by enabling you to push phases or survive a few things because of the HP increase you natural get. It's not meaningless, just not as immediately influential as some people would like. I think being able to push a phase is enough to consider better gear as 'meaningful'. Skipping means you not only don't have to deal with the next up coming or entire set of mechanics and saves valuable time when there is a hard enrage.

[ErnestoGiovanni]

I read the OP twice and I really like the post. I have Dyspraxia and I CANNOT memorize rotations, my brain just doesn't let me, so I work on a reaction time basis. I've cleared t5, not yet attempted second coil, I've cleared all the ex-primals so far as well. I wrote this massive post and deleted it because it was a ramble fest.

I like the concept of people being able to have more bodies to it and have a better chance of win. A brand new FC experiencing titan HM should be able to make a 6-12 man group and try it, 4 elite people should be able to try some harder content too, but not be restricted to only 4! The mechanics will probably still wipe a 12 man group as you see people in their first time will die before heart phase hopefully leaving enough dps alive to kill it or allow more people to see what happens after that. It doesn't mean it should be lol 24 people on a little platform super pushing titan into final phase in 4 minutes.

Mechanics are really ridiculous sometimes, look at the Sunken Temple of Qarn, as a WHM I was getting yelled at for not constantly saving people because of the hornets are doing 3k+ dmg and people, aside from WAR, only have about 2k, but if one person dies before hornets are killed its over, I wouldn't have the MP to finish the battle if I Raise them and there won't be enough dps to kill them off, even if i slept 1. I understand avoidable instant wipe mechanics that a few people can save the raid from or each individual person has to do their part, but never should single target death mean that the group is going to wipe. I find it appalling that you can't even try to learn a fight as a new person because if you die once every AOE after will kill you, and then the group won't have enough dps to beat the enrage timer or heals over damage or someone to pick up adds. Look at Titan EX people die in first 2 phases all the time, and the gaols will cause a wipe since there isn't dps and it will kill 1 healer and try solo healing through Tumults as someone who isn't super over geared. Even if you are over geared if 1 or 2 other people of the same role die it will still be a wipe.

Enrage timers were meant so people wouldn't just Zombie run and throw weakened bodies at it until they beat it, it means now that 1 person's death means that you fail because they spent 2 minutes waiting for a safe time to get up and your dps fell too low and now you haven't a chance.

It took me a month of every day sitting for 2 hours and bashing my head into Titan EX, I could live well into final phase on my first tries but i would need 7 others to do their job and live too if one person died we wiped, and not by choice. This has nothing to do with individual skill, join an EX primal fight now and you will see some awesome new people who learn the fight so fast and you will see 2 people who aren't learning as fast and they will die before the hardest phase but that causes a wipe, every time. I did a Garuda ex to help some new people if the other healer would die, sure i can solo heal it, but if 1 tank wasn't 100% on the ball we'd wipe because of spiny mechanic. This is even with 25% echo maybe 2-4 people would live but then the dps checks would mean we would wipe.

The system as it is now means 6/8 people need to be hardcore and one needs to be a tank and one a healer with amazing gear just to help 2 friends.

[zPanda]

Agree with a lot of points in this post - it was a good read. Also, I laugh whenever i hear people use the word "skill" to refer to this game. This game is not about "skill" - it's about memorization and repetition , let's be real. The "hardcore" pass content earlier because they have 8 people who can dedicate a set time for a static party - the vast majority of the population doesn't fall into this category. Whenever I was able to beat a turn in coil or a ex-primal , it never felt like I increased in "skill". It simply felt like I had repeated the content enough to finally remember all the mechanics. If I took a random group of 8 people considered "mainstream" with the correct distribution of jobs - told them they would not have to worry about work/school/family/etc. for 2 weeks - and for 2 weeks they would dedicate 10 hours a day to clearing ScoB and nothing else, they would clear it.

Compare this to some other gaming genres that actually require real skill. A few come to mind for me - Fighting, RTS, FPS, Rhythm/Music. What you'll notice in this other gaming genres is that someone who is already skillful at one specific game in the genre can quickly pick up on another game in that same category. People who are pros at Street Fighter can very quickly pick up on another game like MvC or BlazBlue/GG - the skills carry over. People who were pro at Warcraft could quickly pick up on Starcraft - the skills carry over. People who are pros at Counterstrike could quickly pick up on Battlefront - the skills carry over. People who are pros at Beatmania could quicly pick up on Pop-n-music/etc. - the skills carry over. The rules and "mechanics" to these games to these games are actually quite rudimentary - you can very quickly learn how to do all the moves for a character in a fighting game, for example. It doesn't in any way make you "skilled" however.

Another good comparison is sports. Take basketball for example - the rules are pretty simple. However, only people with real skill ever make it to the highest levels of college and pro. While it obviously takes practice, even practice and repetition doesn't guarantee someone has the actual skill to make it to the top levels. Someone could practice basketball daily from a young age - doesn't mean they'll make it to the NBA, you gotta be born with the skills.

Take music as another example - you could have practiced guitar vigorously daily from a young age - doesn't mean you're gonna be the next Clapton either. Some people are born with inherent musical talent/skills.

Now look at FFXIV. So you finally beat Titan-EX ... did you gain any "skills" from doing this that apply to any other game, or even to any other fight in FFXIV itself? No, you just repeated it until you memorized the order of the patterns. So you finally beat Turn 5 - you never die to divebomb/twisters anymore! - good job!... did you gain any "skills" from doing this that apply to any other game, or even to any other fight in FFXIV itself?

Also, how many people (including the so called "hard-core") - used an external app (e.g. Twintania tracker) to beat T5 for the first time? Again - this is "skill" ?

[silentwindfr]

no skill involved into this... only to have 7 people with you that know the step of the dance of T5... if you play with a static, you will always pass it and no difficulty into this. the team play into this game is not.... well developped.

[zPanda]

no skill involved into this... only to have 7 people with you that know the step of the dance of T5... if you play with a static, you will always pass it and no difficulty into this. the team play into this game is not.... well developped.

Yup - 100% agree. One of the reasons you see so much rage in pugs and PF/DF groups when people step outside of their static parties.

[Raenryong]

If there was no skill component to this game, there would be little variation in DPS/HPS/tanking ability. On the PvP front, the better geared team would always win, guaranteed. Nobody would have trouble with mechanics.

But that's simply not the case. And if you think the only differentiating factor is time invested, you can't play with a lot of people. You will see exceptional DPS who destroy everyone else despite never having done the fight before. You'll see people who have done a fight fifty times still screw up on the mechanics. And no, it's not just about memorisation. You need to know how a mechanic functions in some cases, but you can deal with almost all mechanics purely by reflex. Twintania divebombs were basically the only mechanic which annoyed me as you had to actually memorise a specific movement pattern.

Also, your transferable skills idea is underdeveloped. Warcraft and Starcraft for instance play very differently and while some skills carry over, being good in one doesn't guarantee you'll be good in another. It helps though.

And yeah, people who are experienced with other MMOs tend to find the mechanics in this one easy - mechanics teach you to adapt, maintain dps/hps while moving etc.

And finally, if there is no skill, post a parse of your highest geared job on a dummy (3mins+) - if there is no skill component, you should maximise your dps no problem, especially with no mechanics to worry about.

[Pibz]

snip

No, no no. Being able to do something others can not is not a skill cant you SEE?! Screw dictionaries, logic, and everyone else, they are right god damn it, and that's the end of that!