FFXIV and Risk vs. Reward

[Kurogaea]

Well guess you didn't get the letter this game was made mostly for casuals with some hard core aspect's. Like Krylo said people who play games these days are in their 30's with jobs and families. The way the game is now is what they want it to be. If you want a more hard core game then I guess this isn't the game for you. Because I doubt se is gonna change the direction they want this game to go. Besides alotta people must love the way the game is for this game to be winning awards.

Its winning awards because its final fantasy, and Sony is milking their success because their giant doorstopper actually has a hit seller, mostly by title (same as ff13). Btw, I consider myself a casual who plays for 6+ hours or more and doesn't delve too far into savage mode or raids because theirs barely any tolerance for new players where I am.

The game is going to stay pretty simple with little to no effort in the main story challenge aspect. If SE ever does give the main story or include a mode with a risk factor I'd be really surprised but how the game is built doesn't seem like it would do much right now other than annoy some people who cant play their subscription based game for more than 3 hours... I don't even. just play a cellphone game if its that time consuming for you. Justa suggestion, maybe the new kingdom hearts game.

[Kogasan]

It's not time consuming for me fortunately. I have more then enough time on my hands then I know what to do with. Was just saying to those who want this game to be more hard core doubt it will ever happen.

[Kurogaea]

It's not time consuming for me fortunately. I have more then enough time on my hands then I know what to do with. Was just saying to those who want this game to be more hard core doubt it will ever happen.

I'll have to disagree. In a reddit post, I'll link if I could find it later, there was a statement by Yoshi that if dungeons were to be more complex they'll make more optional raid like dungeons (4-players) just for those hardcore players. Alot of my buddies who have jobs and families of their own with little children and grandkids are casual players (I don't even know what that word means anymore) even said that dungeons were too straight forward with no to little diverse paths and are uninteresting, well except for looks, duh :/. So there's my 2 cents for more innovative content that focuses on core gameplay. Maybe risk factor would be mentioned at some point in the future for some new mode or something.

[Archaell]

The first thing that needs to be fixed is the gear progression. Not talking about how weird it looks, the rewards are too big. If the gear was not so much stuffed with stat points, the monsters would retain their threat level longer.

Basically the skill vs gear ratio should be moved sligthly more towards the skill. Instead of using weekly lockouts and exploiting the stat game to force players to play longer, it would be better if hard content in bad gear was harder... and not impossible like our beloved dps checks love to do.

[Toguro]

First of all, I don't know what is going on with people are talking about when they say "Want stronger more dangerous overworld enemies? Diadem!" No. Diadem is not a dangerous overworld.

Diadem: Diadem is basically a scripted thing as soon as you get in. You can only play it a certain way. You kill monsters to get star ranks and get gear. Or you gather. That's it. Gathering is already broken. You can't use sneak. That's not difficulty, it's stupid. Why not just have sneak unusable? Why not use the enemies that don't use sight as the only ones that can find you? No. Everything can find you. Now, Diadem HM so far, is broken. You go inside and there are no groups. You can be the only 8 out of a map that's supposed to have 72. When this happens, your Diadem was is over before it even starts. You won't be killing any star ranks by the time you retire from your job. You CAN'T go out alone because you CAN'T kill anything alone.There's no in-between. There's no difficulty just death. And then those strong enemies with like 3million HP have no mechanics. Just AoEs that you can easily dodge. And after 5mins of smacking them mindlessly, you get that juicy ilvl150-ilvl180 piece. I'm not going to talk about star ranks. Those have like 90million HP. In HM, with the drop nerf, there is only one way to play. Zerg it. Have 72 people zerg it because lets face it, there's nothing in Diadem. You can't play Diadem with only 8 people. It just doesn't work. It's broken. You find a coffer in a "dangerous" cave, "Woooooo a ilvl150 belt!!!".

You have a map so you know exactly where you're going at all times. I've had the most fun running around panicking in a cave because the team split up and scattered in a place they should NOT be scattered. It is a cave right? Dark, dangerous cave. I had no idea where I was going and those monsters could kill me easily. Diadem does not give that feel ever but it's supposed to be exploration. You EXPLORE. How are you going to explore something if it's already on the DANG map!!?!

Here's a thread one the Gamefaq complaining about the same thing.

http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/67805...eborn/72944093

[Gaddes]

Now, Diadem HM so far, is broken. You go inside and there are no groups. You can be the only 8 out of a map that's supposed to have 72. When this happens, your Diadem was is over before it even starts. You won't be killing any star ranks by the time you retire from your job. You CAN'T go out alone because you CAN'T kill anything alone.There's no in-between. There's no difficulty just death. And then those strong enemies with like 3million HP have no mechanics. Just AoEs that you can easily dodge. And after 5mins of smacking them mindlessly, you get that juicy ilvl150-ilvl180 piece. I'm not going to talk about star ranks. Those have like 90million HP. In HM, with the drop nerf, there is only one way to play. Zerg it. Have 72 people zerg it because lets face it, there's nothing in Diadem. You can't play Diadem with only 8 people. It just doesn't work. It's broken. You find a coffer in a "dangerous" cave, "Woooooo a ilvl150 belt!!!".

Yeah, For HM they really need to put something in place where the game makes sure your party is placed in an instance where there's at least one full party in there as well. It's incredibly frustrating to spend the time and resources gathering people up for Diadem Hm and enter just to find the instance completely empty, or with a handful of gatherers.

Also, yeah killing star ranks in there as a single party is practically impossible, if you're unlucky and get a Wisent or one of those Brontosauruses or anything that doesn't have incredibly basic mechanics. How awful it is to smash your head against hp-sponge mobs in a single party for a chance to spawn a mob you have no chance of beating. Maybe they should handle it like FATEs, where if there's only one party in the instance, the mob's HP is scaled accordingly.

[Sekki]

XIV is a glorified sims game.
The playstyle is not dynamic, compare it to blade and soul, tera online (granted I hate this game, the combat was fun).
There is no risk/reward because we cannot further our own ability to play. There is no specific skill tree, where somone could be more proficient in a certain element etc. There is no dodging, there is no tactical play at all in reality. There is maybe one or two set in stone ways to complete a duty and that's that - the only difference is how many numbers are being put out and the occasional luck with RNG.

Think about it, has there ever been a time where you've been told to dps harder? Or to survive something longer?
XIV is heavily based on math, not actual skill or intelligent plays. You simply CANNOT dps any harder than the game allows you to. The same could be said for any other game, but XIV is even more restricted to it.

Even a simple game like League of Legends offers a more dynamic playstyle, even the weakest champion can overcome the greatest opponent if they outplay them. You CANNOT outplay anything in XIV because everything is linear. EVERYTHING, including the rotation and phases of a boss.

[Vivi_Bushido]

I want more content over housing. They could go forever without adding new housing for all I care as long as they released better content.

[DenebPunkin]

Casual players, by their nature of being casually interested, will come and go. But the hardcore player subs and subs and subs. Unless they're no longer happy with the way the game is developing, and I worry that that is beginning to be the case here.

Anyway, the TL;DR is that FFXIV needs to provide risk and reward in the open world, needs to gate max-level content behind ability checks, and needs to do this in order to remain a healthy community, regardless of what players currently think about casual vs. hardcore. It's not really about that, it's about creating a difficulty curve game-wide that increases both risk and reward so that reaching the 'endgame' community content puts players in the strongest position to forge powerful positive memories of overcoming challenges and draws them to come back to the game again and again. And this demands that the endgame content not be a faceroll.

Say what? Last time I checked.. the Hardcores gorge on new content within the week, spend the next week complaining about a lack of content... cap something for the next 2 weeks... and then dont resub for the next few months till the next patch.

Also, endgame content was never face roll easy. On release, the content was quite difficult even for the truely avid hardcores, Ultima HM, Titan HM/EX, Ramuh EX, Coil 1, Coil 2, Coil 3 and currently AS3 which has most of the hardcore raiders still stumped and the most recent with Thor EX.

[Vivi_Bushido]

Say what? Last time I checked.. the Hardcores gorge on new content within the week, spend the next week complaining about a lack of content... cap something for the next 2 weeks... and then dont resub for the next few months till the next patch.

Some do, some don't. Same can be said about casuals to. That isn't just a hardcore thing.