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

[Litre]

gear should help but it should be a secondary factor not a primary one

Turn 4 is a moot point, but this quote is exactly the problem! See GEAR SHOULD HELP, that's the problem, it doesn't - it barely even matters! Most of the most frustrating fights are won and lost because someone else made a mistake and the unforgiving mechanics wiped the party. So right now, as long as you have basic gear, gear is not even a factor, let alone a secondary factor. The OP is complaining that this game is 90% mechanics, 10% gear, when really it should be 60/40 or maybe 70/30 at higher levels/end-game top-tier raids etc.



So turn 4:

The fight [turn 4] is pure tank and spank gear check no more, no less. Of course it helps if you know your role(rotations, when to use cooldowns etc) but the same happens in every single fight in this game.

Why was it mentioned as a good balance? Well I saw you initially write "this game is too easy" before you edited it, but regardless it's subjective right. I know many people who struggled in Turn 4, there are some mechanics not a lot, phases too, but also a good DPS check. And yes the same happens in every single fight (like many other bosses), but when people screw up the mechanics you could compensate and still pull through...

If the OT screwed up and couldn't grab a soldier, a black mage could even pull a hero and manawall kite it a bit! How was that not awesome, nothing mechanics based really insta-killed you. I've even tanked 2 dreads with 1 healer for 30s once with perfect buff rotation and won, or as OT if a healer died Hallow Ground and backup SS the MT for 10s while DPS finish off the 2nd dread.

Ask yourself this, people find Turn 4 easier than Titan EX, even though Turn 4 is meant to be further in the game, is that right? Why? Because when things go wrong in Turn 4, the better skilled players can compensate, in Titan EX they can't do anything except watch helplessly.

[Pibz]

Turn 4 is a moot point, but this quote is exactly the problem! See GEAR SHOULD HELP, that's the problem, it doesn't - it barely even matters! Most of the most frustrating fights are won and lost because someone else made a mistake and the unforgiving mechanics wiped the party. So right now, as long as you have basic gear, gear is not even a factor, let alone a secondary factor. The OP is complaining that this game is 90% mechanics, 10% gear, when really it should be 60/40 or maybe 70/30 at higher levels/end-game top-tier raids etc.

Gear does matter, if you don't think so you're not playing the same game as me. Whole mechanics can be completely skipped by having better gear. So no it isn't 90% mechanics, it's way lower. And the more reliant it is on mechanics over gear- the better.

So turn 4:
snip

Please don't use quotation marks if you are not going to quote me, what i had written before i edited it was that the game already has enough easy fights as is, and what i wanted to say(and therefore edited to avoid this crap) is what it says now - that we don't need any fight to get easier.

Also you need to read better, i didn't say that the fight is always the same i said that ofc knowing your role helps as it does in every single fight in the game..
As for the scenario you painted here it is reversed:
The OT in Titan EX doesn't manage to grab aggro, it goes for the blm he uses manawall. Yay crisis averted.

In T4, someone messes up and brings the bugs that are stuck on him to 2 dreadnoughts(not at the same time, doesn't matter who lets assume stupid OT) feeding them, the poor main tank gets to tank a 4 stack dread and a 2 stack one, he doesnt manage to, no one else is able to do anything but watch helplessly. OMG such unforgiveness needs to be less punishing and moar random please.(this example is a joke of course but this is how some people in this thread sound to me)

Other notes:
1. You can carry 1-2 people through titan EX(same for garuda, leviathan,t1-t5) at the moment, and its not even that hard to do it.
2. Having content that you can carry people through at its release is not something that we really need. If you can carry 2 through an encounter and you're not totally over gearing it, it means that those 2 are not needed, and that the tuning is not right.

[Litre]

Gear does matter, if you don't think so you're not playing the same game as me. Whole mechanics can be completely skipped by having better gear. So no it isn't 90% mechanics, it's way lower. And the more reliant it is on mechanics over gear- the better.

Yes, gear does matter, it varies from fight to fight, we're just saying more often than not it matters too little. Like you said gear is secondary to mechanics, I see nothing wrong with that, what's your number at? I think the game should be 60/40 mechanics to gear, and in harder fights end-game etc closer to 70-80/20-30 etc...


But the sad reality is for many PUGs running Titan EX mechanics is 100/0! Why? It only takes 2 people, to die to mechanics and only if the other 6 players were maxed perhaps they can salvage it

1. You can carry 1-2 people through titan EX(same for garuda, leviathan,t1-t5) at the moment, and its not even that hard to do it.

yes of course, if I wanted to help 2 LS mates clear I can find 5 top geared players and do it sure, but I'd say it's more the exception than the norm. And as the OP said, how is that fun for them? Here's roadblock content, you suck so just find someone to carry you, really? I could just quote the OP's words all day to your arguments.

2. Having content that you can carry people through at its release is not something that we really need. If you can carry 2 through an encounter and you're not totally over gearing it, it means that those 2 are not needed, and that the tuning is not right.

To which I said previously:

all these challenges can be surmounted with good enough gear, but only months after the content is released. This way the hardcore get a chance to beat it at the start and when they get better gear, they can help their guildmates through it later. This gives me an incentive to obtain that gear, which is also absent from the game due to the heavy reliance on insta-kill mechanics.

You're definitely a veteran player, but I feel you're not understanding me either, we (FFXI players such as the OP) don't mind 90/10 split or even if it's 80/20 or 70/30 as you say it is, it doesn't matter, as long as at the end of the day, if one day I can foresee a group of similarly skilled people (not carried) have an easier time clearing something. With stuff like Titan EX I don't foresee that, if nothing is changed even with 25% echo buff they still die, that's too harsh, they shouldn't need to be carried, gear should just naturally progress and if a fight is balanced properly even a fight that is 90% mechanics can be one day handled by overgeared players, as bad as they may be.

Thing is like the OP said:

Once again, this is not a post about making arguments like "well I think the game is fun because I can clear the contents" or "you just don't think it's fun because you can't clear the contents" .

To make such an argument is like having someone say to you "I have practiced, reviewed and studied hard to learn English and now I can read and write English at the top-university level and have no problems with daily English conversations so it's fun for me. A ton of people in the world also speak English, so if you work hard at it you can be just like us too!" (You'd think "what a snob!")

.....

[*]As for all those "but it's really not that hard, just do this and this and I could do this with my eyes closed, people cry too much" comments. That's the problem the OP tried to point out that the beginning of his/her article (the "learning English" part). It may be easy for you (more power to you), but it's not easy and not fun for many others, that's the whole point.

I feel that's addresses your comments pretty decently. You like your mechanics based content, great, lots already for you, that doesn't go the same for casual/mainstream players. Regardless people will vote with their time, when FFXIV is on the decline, it'll be because of the issues addressed by the OP.