New Direction in Content

[Xairos]

As many have stated, this claim to make balanced, always fun, adventurous content is really really tricky: SE is working within the scale of ilevel and how that relates to "power" in this game (i.e. the only power in this game is ilvl), as such the player base as a whole will rate content in terms of that scale:

"Does this help me get stronger or not?"

What SE has to do is pull our attention away from that objective and do it in a manor that doesnt feel like a band aid being ripped off. To the point of challenging content: remember Steps of Faith, before that Pharos Sirius, before that the nerfs to Amdapor Keep and trash gating? Remember the time when we as a community fought to have the trash mobs become relevant for killing? If the challenge is too much, we will fight to have it "re-tuned" to a more repeatable level.

Anytime content is introduced the player base will find the most efficient way to get their reward. There is a very fine line that must be found to make content repeatable, challenging, worth-it, and fun. It seems like at best, we can pick two or three right now.

My gripe is mostly at ilvl and how it has changed the way we as a community approach content. Coil, CT, old lvl 50 gear like AF is completely left behind. So much content is not worth-it that Pony Farm parties that players would once have to pay to clear sit empty in the Party Finder. To me this comes down to a very static and immutable gear<>power system; There is no pay off for players to run this content anymore and Mounts and Minions aren't gonna cut it.

[Havenae]

The problem, basically, is that they're using content models that are extremely outdated.

This is an opportunity for SE to stop playing it safe and perhaps become a little more inventive .Their entire problem is they only seem to want to engage in design concepts that have worked in the past for other games, mainly World of Warcraft. This would be fine if it were not for the problem that many gamers are tired of this same dynamic of, "raid raid raid, get gear, wait three months, raid raid raid. get gear. wait thee months... " We've done it all before, I've done it before. I know many people who have no interest in it anymore. I do not have any interest in it anymore either.

Now I know there'll be people pop in and say how I'm playing the wrong genre of games. (I've been playing MMOs for about 20 years, I dont think so.) or how this isn't going to change so anyone who agrees might as well quit.

Yeah, it won't change if we dont force SE to step back and take a perspective check. There's nothing wrong with questioning why this genre won't evolve, in fact it should be expected. SE is using the same content model WoW has used for 11 years. That's over a decade ago. It's time for a change.

[Kailok]

Yeah, it won't change if we dont force SE to step back and take a perspective check. There's nothing wrong with questioning why this genre won't evolve, in fact it should be expected. SE is using the same content model WoW has used for 11 years. That's over a decade ago. It's time for a change.

Definitely, that is the entire point of this post - I'm hopeful that they will at least consider changing things up so that the content we have to work on lasts longer. It's upsetting that Heavensward only just released a few short months ago and a bunch of players are dropping off. Something has to be figured out.

[Kailok]

Then SE should have done two version of void ark, normal and hardmode. Just scale up the damage and healing required to clear the instance. Make failed mechanics actually wipe the group. Bamn, hardmode without a huge amount of dev time required. Put normal in DF and make savage only enter-able by a premade group. The hardmode versions of the reward could be 210 (nothing special in the current meta) and the gear could be dyable. The rest of the rewards would be the same.

Casual players can have their snooze fest and players that want content with teeth could have it. This solutions literally takes nothing away from any player. It might take, what? Another month to retune void ark for hardmode? If that?

Honestly, I'd be very much up for this. I'm really itching for a progressive endgame raid. They could even make it an 8-man version or something that provides a lot of challenge for a single group. But that's just an idea.

[Yukiko]

Square Enix should design some "Dungeon Crawler" content...
What about some Zelda Style without Lifepoints but with insta kill of Boss Parts?
Can we PLEASE have some Adventure, open world is dead, where is roaming URIANGER with his garlean invasion we had in 1.x?
Why so less GM interaction? Where are the reporters? Can we have some answers to our ingame prayings?
Open World PvP, attack while flying or riding, diving and space travel? After 2 years they still are way too slow compared to other games!
What about more riddles and try&error mechanics instead of DPS-racing and pure RNG?

[Sylkis]

Square Enix should design some "Dungeon Crawler" content...

Would like to see a 99 floor semi-random dungeon

[OoglieBooglie]

Would like to see a 99 floor semi-random dungeon

I too would like to see a randomly generated dungeon, of semi-variable length. 99 floors is probably a bit much.

[Kailok]

I too would like to see a randomly generated dungeon, of semi-variable length. 99 floors is probably a bit much.

FFXI was able to achieve 100 floors with Nyzul Isle, but you wouldn't handle them all at the same time. Basically every 20 levels there was a big boss to fight that dropped gear (Floors 20 & 40 could either be Adamantoise, Behemoth, or Fafnir so even the bosses were semi-random) and you went up 5 floors at a time, if I remember correctly. The areas were random and there were different objectives for each floor. It was pretty fun content and it lasted for a good while.

(Again, I don't want FFXIV to become FFXI, I'm just saying this kind of content is doable. Especially if FFXI was able to pull it off years ago.)

[Elky]

Of course they should do most of this, but they won't. The most common reason I here is "muh data limits". Which is lame for a subscription based game.