Artificial Difficulty

[Allyrion]

Just because people (mis)use the term in ridiculous ways that doesn't mean it doesn't exist and have a meaning, or that it's purely subjective. It's another word for 'bad' difficulty or 'punishing' vs 'challenging'.

I'm contradicting it because there is an objective way to use the term.
It's just misused.

Even you are conflating punishing difficulty with artificial difficulty, and even bad difficulty (which is obviously the most subjective category).
Those are all different type if you look at them objectively.
Grouping together different terminology in some general negative category, lends to the same subjective misuse of the term.

Your biggest example is not artificial difficulty.
Tuned up parameters still take the personal performance mechanics into account, where the difficulty comes from the mechanics of your character/group rather than the boss.
That is objectively designed difficulty unless it's completely gear-gated which is almost never the case.

Once the potential to clear is within the player(s), then it's not artificial.
Tuning things tightly might be Punishing difficulty, just like stuff like Titan extreme as well (with twitch mechanics).
But it's not Artificial.

Things outside of your control are Artificial difficulty.
Like RNG, which can test adaptability in some cases but can be considered artificial when you had a more difficult run because RNG wasn't on your side.
Or when it's used to gate rewards, so it's not about earning but you wait for the system to randomly be nice to you.
Gating in general is artificial. Such as weekly lockouts.
The system restricts your growth to sustain tuning difficulty.

But the tuning itself is not artificial.
Increasing numbers instead of specific fight mechanics, just means you have to work with your own personal Jobs' mechanics.
But that should be expected.
Just because they gave you damage mechanics to work with when you started the game/levelled up (personal abilities and traits) instead of when you entered the instance (Dive-bombs, meteors, etc.) doesn't make it less valid.
Ideally the game should be testing your ability to juggle fight mechanics while also doing your personal skills extremely optimally.

The main error in assumption (while true in some other games) is when people believe that number tuning isn't based with the players abilities/resources in mind.
At least in this game, it obviously is. They don't just up numbers and HP without taking into account what Jobs are able to achieve with how their Job mechanics work..

Hence tight tuning is still usually still designed with the player's control to clear.
It is designed difficulty as well, because you have rotations that are designed to be optimized.
That's the whole point of your skill set, to use it in the fight.

Like I said above, things should be tuned to test your optimization instead of just how well you can jump through the fight specific hoops.
All your Job mechanics are meant to be part of the difficulty of mastering your Job, and how well you've mastered your Job should be relevant to the clearing content (not just the fight gimmicks).
That is in your control. It is not artificial.

Bad camera controls, RNG, system gating, these are things that are really outside your control.
These are artificial.
Some, like the gating and some level of RNG, are acceptable forms of artificial difficulty.
They are still designed difficulty, but it's not designed with the player being relevant at all.
The difficulty is there no matter how good you are because the system decides everything, hence it's completely artificial.

If we're being objective, it's not about good or bad.
So grouping up everything negative is making the term itself meaningless.

There can be good and bad artificial difficulty, or good and bad punishing difficulty.
When you're talking about good or bad though, then you're talking about subjectively.
The categories themselves can be a priori, while people are free to judge what they like or don't like within each category.