Make relics the best weapons 100% time

[Katsaria]

Why should the best weapon come from a quest that offers little substance and low challenge?

[Windklinge]

well the current questline is coming to an end in 2.51. we will see on 3.0 if they have learend from thier mistakes or not when a new quest chain begins during the 3.0 lifespans duration. anyone who thinks current quest will still be needed to get lvl 60 relic is just blinding themselfs. it wont happen because its no longer practial to make and the new players needs a way to catch up this is done for raids aswell as t13 or coil wont be needed anymore for any unlock on 3.0 aswell. a lvl cap raise is always A CUT in endgame content. you can also bet on all current tombstones to leave the game when 3.0 hits so you cannot farm any lvl 60 gear in advance by bunkering em or anything. none of the lvl 50 stuff is going to be NEEDED to unlock anything on heavensward except the story quest. and i bet even all the new storyquests that were added after lvl 50 storyquest endet on 2.0 wont be needed aswell as they dont grant exp. you can still do em but you wont NEED em.

[Deathscythe343]

well the current questline is coming to an end in 2.51. we will see on 3.0 if they have learend from thier mistakes or not when a new quest chain begins during the 3.0 lifespans duration. anyone who thinks current quest will still be needed to get lvl 60 relic is just blinding themselfs. it wont happen because its no longer practial to make and the new players needs a way to catch up this is done for raids aswell as t13 or coil wont be needed anymore for any unlock on 3.0 aswell. a lvl cap raise is always A CUT in endgame content. you can also bet on all current tombstones to leave the game when 3.0 hits so you cannot farm any lvl 60 gear in advance by bunkering em or anything. none of the lvl 50 stuff is going to be NEEDED to unlock anything on heavensward except the story quest.and i bet even all the new storyquests that were added after lvl 50 storyquest endet on 2.0 wont be needed aswell as they dont grant exp. you can still do em but you wont NEED em

I agree. If they remove the look lockout for WoD in patch 2.55, then I honestly see no reason why they would not remove the weekly cap on poetics at that point either. Something like this would likely give all players a good month of grinding prior to the expansion to outfit as many jobs as they would like prior to the expansion going live.

[Magis]

Something...less grindy? Obviously. Casuals do not care / do not have the time for grinding. They want to have fun in the amount of time they play, they want to progress with things. The initial quests that lead up to actually getting the relic were great: challenging, not at all easy, but actually doable without losing sleep (or all your savings) on it. I understand the need to keep old content alive, but bugger me with a broadsword, when I'm the Warrior of Light who defeated primals and got rid of the imperials, don't send me out to massacre mandragoras - only for a random chance to obtain what I need, for what's supposedly my job's legendary powerful weapon. Let those raiders who always complain about being bored and not having anything to do because of weekly lockouts anyway do that.

It's just backwards logic, the way it is now, as I see it. Problem is, the relic is the single most integral part of your job (and the most straightforward thing too, something pretty much a default for casuals, imo), so I think everyone would want to care about it, at least considering one's main job. The way it is now, it's nigh' on impossible without way too much time investment to solely focus on this one thing - in this sense, it's not any different than the current endgame raid, you spend just as much time on this as you would on that. If not more. Same thing as with Coil, it's pretty much the most integral part to ARR's storyline, and having it locked behind the "hardcore" endgame raid was what quite a lot of people really had the problem with, in my experience.


PLEASE REMOVE CHARACTER LIMIT, IT'S ANNOYING AND USELESS.

However, "casuals" don't play in a vacuum. This is an MMO and every change to the game causes a change across the board. The relic system is suppose to take a long time to get, because they are 2nd BIS. This isn't some glamour item, this is the second best item in that slot for the whole patch. Reminder that dungeon and primal weapons are also a thing, and SE doesn't want to kill those items. Need I remind you the abysmal failure Ramuh (killed by his own patch) was until his rings were buffed?

This currently can be done two ways: put a requirement behind hard bosses (the coil way), or put a requirement behind items that take a long time to acquire (the current relic system). Square tried the first way in 2.0 and people constantly complain about Titan being "too hard", which is the same reason people complain about Coil. To counter that, they instead focus on long item gathering grinds which while are boring, don't have some skill barrier that you must overcome, and can be done by everyone. This is why people call it "not hardcore" though I guess that depends if you consider determination different from skill (I think both are required and can be hardcore).

The relic isn't really integral, it just has good stats. A primal weapon or a Coil weapon can swap it out, +/- a few stats. Lorewise maybe, but in terms of the actual job and it's mechanics, not much (since the stat system is so simple).

A lot of people will not be able to give you a direct answer other than, "Something that isn't a mindless grind."

While I do understand that grinding is considered hardcore, it is by nature of MMOs to have large grinds that requires a lot of time to achieve - and this is what the relic quest chain has you do. It is there so you can work towards it. By removing the grind, you are essentially demolishing the effort and time required to obtain such a weapon and turn it into a mindless point-run-and-click fetch quest. If otherwise, asking for it to be a kill quest is essentially the same thing. People will complain about the trials just as they have with Titan HM on release. It's not a very good alternative as people will sell runs - thus effectively dumbing down the weapon's worth.

This is why I asked. It seems many people just think about their perspective (trying to say this as nice as possible) and don't look at the big picture. Yeah, getting a relic while only playing 30m 3 days a week would be nice, but then you break the game for everyone else. People need to understand that MMOs are grindy by their vary nature. They were never meant to be quick 30m games.

[BreathlessTao]

// lots of (valid) points //

Problems with that though...

a) No idea about Ramuh drops, because I've not even touched that yet; I know it's not a hard requirement anymore (if I'm right), but Titan Ex is still impossible for me and that kinda drowns my motivation to go further (see frustration and no fun) - I assume I'm not alone with this, meaning primal weapons are supposedly also out of the question for at least some people; as for dungeon weapons...which ones exactly? Last I remember are the darklight ones that drop from the first lv50 dungeons...
b) "Only" 2nd BIS, yet they require just about as much time as (if not more than) the Coil way... don't really think it's rightly balanced. See, the hard bosses perfectly translate to time investment as well, and then we're facing time investment vs time investment... Do we have two options? Certainly. Is there difference between them, in this regard? None whatsoever. If one can't find the huge chunk of time to learn hard boss fights, what would make them find the same huge chunk of time for soulless grindfests?
c) Titan HM was hard indeed, but it could be done - it perfectly crossed the T and dotted the Is on the "determination" aspect as well, if you ask me.
d) Okay, fine, gate stuff behind long grinds that require no skill at all - it's so much better to have people do endgame dungeons and such without even being able to properly play their roles? Putting aside the swarm of overgeared characters and the thusly easy carries, everyone knows it's not right, everyone experiences the bad players and the toxic atmosphere that more often than not is generated around them, with name-calling and ragequits and such. Ultimately, it's not good for those without the time, and not good for others when they get grouped with such players. And then you have the PF full of LFs that only want people who know the fight by heart, blindfolded, backwards, at thrice its normal speed - like, how? (Re: extreme primals with weapon drops not really being an alternative...)

Yes, obviously, games need their time investments. The problem here, in my opinion, is that it's just not necessarily in proportion with the reward. And in case of the relic progression past Zenith, it doesn't provide any additional perks (ie. learning to properly use different skills in different scenarios) either, which is obviously already a problem anyway. Sure, okay, make us work for it. But when that work is long AND also boring af, without contributing to anything (because a bunch of numbers does not mean actually getting better), while there are so many other things to do as well (as much as certain elements seem to discourage multiclassing, it's still the core of the game, just to mention the most prominent one)... there's just no appeal to it.

I've said this in other posts already, but feel it's relevant again: why is it that the only two options seem to be "AFK123" and "impossible-even-a-year-later"? The gap between the two is so damn wide an ocean could fit in there, why is it so hard to create something that doesn't make you fall asleep but doesn't make you leave angry af after twelve dozen tries either? For example Pharos Sirius (as it was originally) - was great, angry impatient complaints aside. Sure, there were lots of wipes, and there was a good chance it required two or three different parties if you went via DF to get it right, might not be able to do it on the first day either, but eventually it could be completed (see determination). Would have been the perfect difficulty for a "legendary" weapon upgrade. Instead we were ... idek what we were doing at that time with our relic, to be honest, probably getting turned into zombies in low-level FATEs for twelve pieces of rainbow candy for a new lick of paint.

And yeah, I meant lore-wise. Unless you're one of those guys who only sees numbers everywhere, you choose your starting class because you're attracted to it at the very least, at which level I think you'd want to get the "legendary" weapon for that class(/job) when you get there later on.

[Deathscythe343]

The problem here, in my opinion, is that it's just not necessarily in proportion with the reward.

I think this is a very good point. Probably one of the key reasons why "casuals" may find the relic quest frustrating. Players are putting forth more work to upgrade their relic and yet upgraded weapon is not worth all of the effort that they put into it.

For instance look at the atma portion of the Animus upgrade; yes I know it has been adjusted. Initially players farmed fates for hours on end, some times days to get the atmas they needed. Sometimes it took that long to gather just one atma. But the reward they got when they turned them all in was the same weapon, just increased in ilvl.

[Magis]

Problems with that though...

a) No idea about Ramuh drops, because I've not even touched that yet; I know it's not a hard requirement anymore (if I'm right), but Titan Ex is still impossible for me and that kinda drowns my motivation to go further (see frustration and no fun) - I assume I'm not alone with this, meaning primal weapons are supposedly also out of the question for at least some people; as for dungeon weapons...which ones exactly? Last I remember are the darklight ones that drop from the first lv50 dungeons...
b) "Only" 2nd BIS, yet they require just about as much time as (if not more than) the Coil way... don't really think it's rightly balanced. See, the hard bosses perfectly translate to time investment as well, and then we're facing time investment vs time investment... Do we have two options? Certainly. Is there difference between them, in this regard? None whatsoever. If one can't find the huge chunk of time to learn hard boss fights, what would make them find the same huge chunk of time for soulless grindfests?
c) Titan HM was hard indeed, but it could be done - it perfectly crossed the T and dotted the Is on the "determination" aspect as well, if you ask me.
d) Okay, fine, gate stuff behind long grinds that require no skill at all - it's so much better to have people do endgame dungeons and such without even being able to properly play their roles? Putting aside the swarm of overgeared characters and the thusly easy carries, everyone knows it's not right, everyone experiences the bad players and the toxic atmosphere that more often than not is generated around them, with name-calling and ragequits and such. Ultimately, it's not good for those without the time, and not good for others when they get grouped with such players. And then you have the PF full of LFs that only want people who know the fight by heart, blindfolded, backwards, at thrice its normal speed - like, how? (Re: extreme primals with weapon drops not really being an alternative...)

Yes, obviously, games need their time investments. The problem here, in my opinion, is that it's just not necessarily in proportion with the reward. And in case of the relic progression past Zenith, it doesn't provide any additional perks (ie. learning to properly use different skills in different scenarios) either, which is obviously already a problem anyway. Sure, okay, make us work for it. But when that work is long AND also boring af, without contributing to anything (because a bunch of numbers does not mean actually getting better), while there are so many other things to do as well (as much as certain elements seem to discourage multiclassing, it's still the core of the game, just to mention the most prominent one)... there's just no appeal to it.

I've said this in other posts already, but feel it's relevant again: why is it that the only two options seem to be "AFK123" and "impossible-even-a-year-later"? The gap between the two is so damn wide an ocean could fit in there, why is it so hard to create something that doesn't make you fall asleep but doesn't make you leave angry af after twelve dozen tries either? For example Pharos Sirius (as it was originally) - was great, angry impatient complaints aside. Sure, there were lots of wipes, and there was a good chance it required two or three different parties if you went via DF to get it right, might not be able to do it on the first day either, but eventually it could be completed (see determination). Would have been the perfect difficulty for a "legendary" weapon upgrade. Instead we were ... idek what we were doing at that time with our relic, to be honest, probably getting turned into zombies in low-level FATEs for twelve pieces of rainbow candy for a new lick of paint.

And yeah, I meant lore-wise. Unless you're one of those guys who only sees numbers everywhere, you choose your starting class because you're attracted to it at the very least, at which level I think you'd want to get the "legendary" weapon for that class(/job) when you get there later on.

a) When Ramuh first came out, even though he was new content, no one ran him because the hunt gear was easier to get and higher level. There was no reason to go into a hard fight because the stuff you got wasn't BIS. This is why content difficulty is bound to the strength or value of an item. In 2.4 (or the last 2.3X patch) they buffed the rings he dropped to fix the issue.

b) This is more of an issue with SE's terrible itemization. Since the beginning I've argued for a horizontal progression style itemization where you can pick and choose different items to build your character for different fights (ie: FFXI minus the gearswapping macros). More "extra stats" instead of just a generic ilvl. Right now items are just rated by ilvl and either they are the best, or somewhere down the line to best. SE only releases 3 types of content each patch... Dungeons, Trials, and Raids (yes, there is the side stuff, but we are talking about progression), with items usually following that linear itemization path (and which get deprecated in each patch cycle). So for relics, SE had to throw them somewhere in those three, settling between Trial and Raid. This is how mindnumbingly simple and dull "items" are, though I'm going to stop my rant before it get's into more horizontal progression ranting.

c) Yet while you seemed to not have a problem with it, there were of course those that did, and oh was the bitching and gnashing of teeth here on the forums annoying. TBH at the time I didn't find the relic line hard at all and after knowing FFXIs, I thought it wasn't hard enough! But at least there was a skill check going on.

d) Again, this is caused by a mixture of problems. The simple itemization puts it into a 2nd BIS item. The division of content being "boring easy" to "extremely hard" (depending on who you ask) gives you only two options. The fact that content is deprecated the second a major patch drops means SE has to create a new grind every patch, instead of also relying on older content to keep the game interesting. This leads to what we have and blocks off a lot of options SE could have had if things were more complex. People tell me that the 1.0 relic and artifact quest line was difficult, difficult in the way you want it. You had to do hard fights to get the items and it felt like an achievement when you did.

I think you see my point already with your last paragraph. I agree with a lot of what you are saying there.

[ECHOxLegend]

Id like a variety of options purely for the glamour if anything, I vote for selfishly having a Monk questline involving world fighting tournaments and cliche training montages, mixed with a splash of drama. also, combining primal weapons into a super weapon should be a thing, lots of fun weapons and goals, thats what i want to see.

[SirTaint]

The only way Relics should be the best is if there is an optional path that requires the highest raid either be cleared or the like item be obtained:

i135Excalibur+i135DW Blade = i135 Weapon with +20 to all secondaries. (DMG and Main stats stay the same)


The relic grind is real but the highest gear is locked behind Raids to keep people Raiding.

[HaelseMikiro]

Sir Taint has it. Asking for relics to be best weapons is akin to asking them to be locked behind difficult raid content