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

[Asra]

Let's see here.

Mechanics/gimmick driven fights where single players can hold an entire group back, regardless of gear/echo - check
Toxicity in the playerbase from preferences to hang around other players that can actually handle aforementioned mechanics - check (guilty as charged, by the way.)
Lack of meaningful "current" content that players of any playstyle can enjoy - big check
The inevitability that, due to party size limits and weekly lockouts, friends and FC mates get left out - check
A large portion of the largest segment of the playerbase (casuals) not logging in anymore due to frustration from all of the above - big check

Sounds like a pretty accurate assessment of the game to me.

[Jacost]

Yeah, the high level content in this game (Primals in particular) are like school exams: you study for them, you take mocks and eventually pass, and then the knowledge needed becomes irrelevant for the rest of your life. You didn't learn to play the game, you learned to win that one fight.

Now, randomness in fights has the chance to go horribly wrong or let players just blaze through, on blind luck on both counts. So it's not good as a skill check either way. Implementing a smart AI for the Primals rather than a rotation would be an interesting solution, but all we really need are fights that can and will go in unexpected directions, not to the point where they are impossible, but so that skilled players can adapt to the changing situation and pull off a win.

I think the thing is that coming up with gimmicks and programming set rotations of abilities is just easier. They have to churn something out every three months, so they're on a tight schedule.

[kukurumei]

Yeah, the high level content in this game (Primals in particular) are like school exams: you study for them, you take mocks and eventually pass, and then the knowledge needed becomes irrelevant for the rest of your life. You didn't learn to play the game, you learned to win that one fight.

Now, randomness in fights has the chance to go horribly wrong or let players just blaze through, on blind luck on both counts. So it's not good as a skill check either way. Implementing a smart AI for the Primals rather than a rotation would be an interesting solution, but all we really need are fights that can and will go in unexpected directions, not to the point where they are impossible, but so that skilled players can adapt to the changing situation and pull off a win.

I think the thing is that coming up with gimmicks and programming set rotations of abilities is just easier. They have to churn something out every three months, so they're on a tight schedule.

In that you are completely wrong. Fights in one will directly ease the process or rather "higher learning" the later fights.

Much of what people learn in "omg this is insane" fights and master it go on to realize similar mechanics in later fights that are harder.

Primal in particular I have never seen someone who fails hard at them magically gets better on later mechanics. You may not have to perfect one primal to beat another primal, but all mechanics are basically stepping stones, and tactics stepping stones.

Titan EX the bane, if you can't beat that. Dear, mercy, I don't want you in some later mechanics. It's basically something you learn, and micro manage that has you doing in later fights.

The shear fact of it is. if you suck you will continue to suck. It's no single fight, you just suck in general, just like not learning algebra is never going to allow you to tackle geometry, and so on all the way up to college.

With that said, Heavily mechanics fight are a bad thing, as they are basically "perfect rinse and repeat". But at the same time, it's also how you divide the "work hard for it".

Again I'll use the most basic example of skills. "Focus target". Until twintaina, players just don't use focus target and not skilled at focus target. You can not and never will have someone like that in 2nd coil. It's a learned and perfected skill that seems trivial to anyone post-twin

[Anyssa]

The point here is that there are plenty of people who don't suck, but can't progress because at least one person in the group sucks. Is is poor design when required bosses to advance important quest lines cannot be completed because of overtuned fights that are barring advancement for X amount of people? I think it is.

I can't progress to Ifrit Ex or Whorl Ex until I clear this boss. I can't clear this boss because I'm constantly running with people who make mistakes. I make them occasionally too.

To me, this is poor design and it's frustrating. I've mastered movement, there's nothing complicated about that. At this point I'm just repeating the same fight time and time again ad naseum hoping the seven other people I'm with know what they're doing.

[kukurumei]

The point here is that there are plenty of people who don't suck, but can't progress because at least one person in the group sucks. Is is poor design when required bosses to advance important quest lines cannot be completed because of overtuned fights that are barring advancement for X amount of people? I think it is.

I can't progress to Ifrit Ex or Whorl Ex until I clear this boss. I can't clear this boss because I'm constantly running with people who make mistakes. I make them occasionally too.

To me, this is poor design and it's frustrating. I've mastered movement, there's nothing complicated about that. At this point I'm just repeating the same fight time and time again ad naseum hoping the seven other people I'm with know what they're doing.

That's the point of hard mode, CT, 4man dungeons, which are not as penalize as EX/coil.

What ARR does do badly is rigged numbers of 4/8 members. You can't have 7 or 9 or 10.

Your argument is flawed of that "it's one person". Well duh it's suppose to be like that. There's easier content for "not that bad" content. That's MMO.

What does need improving is the "instance" of a content walls people. Instead of echo, they should have it scale with members of the PT. though their DF and party system sadly does not allow it as such.

What FF11 did well was that while there are super hard content that required a perfect team of 6/18....most of FF11 was monster hunter style, "as many people as it takes". AKA the open world sandbox feel.

[Gardes]

Titan EX the bane, if you can't beat that. Dear, mercy, I don't want you in some later mechanics. It's basically something you learn, and micro manage that has you doing in later fights.

The shear fact of it is. if you suck you will continue to suck. It's no single fight, you just suck in general, just like not learning algebra is never going to allow you to tackle geometry, and so on all the way up to college.

Not true. What kills people in Titan EX is the latency check required to dodge everything in the fight. Some of the 2nd coil's turn mechanic might seem complicated as a whole but each player would only have to deal with a portion of it and have way less latency requirement to pass them, even if just tripping on a little rock would instantly wipe the whole party. I'm still working on T9 but from T6-T8, the only attack that requires fast reflexes is circle blade (I have 280ms and I have to stand at maximum melee range to ATTEMPT to dodge it). Titan EX on the other hand, almost everyone has to deal with the same dodge-a-thon and latency and reflex combo requirement is simply killer for some people. I have a handful of wins ever since my first titan ex win, usually from assisting FC members for their first titan ex kill but I still can't dodge all the plumes at a 99.99% rate despite knowing every single move that titan does by heart by now.

Telling people to get better internet isn't a full solution by the way. The game was marketed as an international game and most players who havent been keeping up up to the release of the game didn't even know that there's only 2 data centers for the whole world. I have a train of thought: yoship wants to start cheap and only have 2 data centers, but then he goes to design a fight that requires very decent and stable latency, but then the fight becomes a lot harder for a lot of people, so he says he knew about this and that's why he designed the fight so that you can predict every single move the boss does, but for decent players that doesnt even have to think about latency, the fight becomes very easy, so this fight is supposed to be extreme for...who?

It's just odd to have a primal of earth requiring speed on the player's part way more than a primal of wind, by the way.

[Rosy]

Thank you so much for the translation, it's a brilliant OP. I've read a LOT of the posts in this thread, but not all, to get a feeling of what players are feeling. There are quite a few "I like it as it is and to hell with the casuals" but there are a lot who agree with the OP.

What the former "to hell with the casuals" people still can't get through their heads is that without the casuals you will have NO GAME.

I love FFXIV, was totally enthralled with it when first entering the world, loved the levelling experience, enjoy raiding (have raided in many, many games since UO). I don't enjoy raiding in this game as I can't do it with ALL of my FC as we could in other games. This game relies too much on "statics" and the Free Company (guild) is pointless, except to those of us who have come with a bunch of our old guildies from other games, who are now left out in the cold because "raids" are 8 people. EIGHT PEOPLE FOR A RAID???? puhlease.

Anyway, back to the point in hand, and the overall end point of the OP was that unless something changes, "non hardcore" people will leave, subs will dry up and there will be no more FFXIV...which by the way will take quite a while I should imagine, it doesn't all happen in a day, but it is inevitable nontheless...or the game will become FTP.

I have to admit to looking at other games at the moment (especially the "new" UO *drool at sandbox*) whereas a few months ago (before getting stuck on T5 and Titan Ex) I was determined to persevere and stay in this game. But....there is a vast difference between persevering and improving to banging your head on a brick wall, because my improvement doesn't help me at all unless I can find 7 other people (statics...pfft) who have also "improved".

[kukurumei]

Not true. What kills people in Titan EX is the latency check required to dodge everything in the fight. Some of the 2nd coil's turn mechanic might seem complicated as a whole but each player would only have to deal with a portion of it and have way less latency requirement to pass them, even if just tripping on a little rock would instantly wipe the whole party. I'm still working on T9 but from T6-T8, the only attack that requires fast reflexes is circle blade (I have 280ms and I have to stand at maximum melee range to ATTEMPT to dodge it). Titan EX on the other hand, almost everyone has to deal with the same dodge-a-thon and latency and reflex combo requirement is simply killer for some people. I have a handful of wins ever since my first titan ex win, usually from assisting FC members for their first titan ex kill but I still can't dodge all the plumes at a 99.99% rate despite knowing every single move that titan does by heart by now.

Somewhat right. Mostly wrong. The fact that you blame it on your latency proves one thing. You will fail with a clutch as with not. Latency hurts, lag spike hurts. They hurt a lot in titan, that is true, but they hurt pretty much in any content and game, and it's basically your own short coming in the end.

It's your fault for trying to beat titan ex on reaction if you can't react.

Titan is fully scripted. If you are using your own reaction to pit yourself against something that's highly proactive. You failure at titan will be as much as failing at later content.

While one can't completely control basic problems on twitch timing, there is a large amount of simple experiance that is purely personal skills inherent or aquired (btw what you said is wrong, you obviously haven't learn titan enough)


And this is why ARR has this double good/bad situation. A person is rewarded for "effort" put into content. Natural skills and good machines only go so far. Most of it is hard work of 8 individuals. It is both a wall of frustration rage quit and a pride of self praise.

Again. Learn.to.dodge. Is really LEARN. And it's both beautiful and ugly about ARR

[GalkaBikini]

You know, I see so many people complaining that "I can do my part in the fight, dodge, etc, but I get in groups with other people that can't." Are there really that many people that aren't in FCs and are having to pug so much content? That aren't in FCs that will help their FC mates with content? When I formed my FC, I built it on the foundation that we WILL help each other. I don't want people in my FC that are just going to only do content that they themselves need or want. I use a google spreadsheet to track each members progress and so I have a list of players that need Titan X. Each week I try to get at least 1 or 2 people thru it by taking them in a group of 6 or 7 of us that have beaten the fight before.
Are there really so few FCs out there that do things this way? I mean, this is pretty much the whole point of the game for me personally...

[Litre]

Ya I agree, balancing a monster that has random attacks is much harder than creating scripted fights, that can simply be insta-kill.

But to those that say, "if players can't handle scripted mechanics what chance do they have against random skill based dodging/reflex attacks", the main difference is that you'd be able to eat/recover from a few of these attacks. This also makes gear more important and allows for the possibility in the future, with better gear beat it even if you can't dodge as well as the hardcore players.

But too bad, creating such fights would take more time balancing, of course we should have some scripted mechanices/phases, there just needs to be balance.