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

[Raenryong]

Which fights were difficult aside from the obviously broken AV/PW? Abyssea gets bashed a lot (mainly because it went crazy with 3x Atma) but the enemies in there were actually mechanical. Briareus/Cuelebre/Micua... Serpentes Gloves NM for instance from the first three Abyssea zones all had interesting mechanics, especially done lowman. Lowman RDM on things like Cuelebre/Mict without Atma was a very refreshing challenge for XI. Abyssea only became easy when they overdid the Atma/buff thing.

[RentisB]

Which fights were difficult aside from the obviously broken AV/PW? Abyssea gets bashed a lot (mainly because it went crazy with 3x Atma) but the enemies in there were actually mechanical. Briareus/Cuelebre/Micua... Serpentes Gloves NM for instance from the first three Abyssea zones all had interesting mechanics, especially done lowman. Lowman RDM on things like Cuelebre/Mict without Atma was a very refreshing challenge for XI. Abyssea only became easy when they overdid the Atma/buff thing.

From what I remember mostly I'd say it was mostly the BCNM/instanced stuff before everything was zerged. Zergs suck -_- Dynamis Lord uh, Omega/Ultima, even some of the story fights were difficult till newer gear came out. The kings were hard for a time. The dragons of CoP were really hard, and they all had "mechanics" that you couldn't just tank and spank. I do agree with lowmanning Abyssea stuff too.

I dunno, nothing in 14 so far has given me that "rush" I got from some of the stuff in 11 did. Could be my nostalgia, who knows.