Thread: The game is more dead than it was pre-3.1

Originally Posted by Starkbeaumont

void ark is for catch up or gearing secondary jobs. it's a very well designed large scale raid, which some might find a bit too easy.

Did you actually play through the Crystal Tower series? The Void Ark isn't a well designed raid, The Crystal Tower raids were, they actually had mechanics, and group mechanics, Alliance A does this B does that etc. Void Ark is basically just a zerg with Guild-heist level mechanics, kill the adds when they spawn, don't stand in AOE's. Facing away for Petrification is like the only slight mechanic in there and even then if you mess it up you are petrified for like 5 seconds, hardly impactful on a 24 man raid. I was excited for Diadem and Void Ark, but they were just mindless zergs, no real substance.

My problem with the game is it's just more of the same, my playtime has reduced to raid logging now while we clear up the last phase of A4S, I enjoyed A3S progression, it was a fun fight, nowadays I feel like on raid days i'm finishing work to go to another job in A4S because I'm committed to clearing Savage. I used to love this game, I made a lot of friends, built a successful Free Company that even in this period is still active with three raid teams about to close to clearing Savage.

But everything in this game feels so watered down now, the Dungeons are gated so you can't speed run them any more, Bismark wasn't even a good design in the first place, Ravana got out-geared so fast (the Primals used to have a much longer life span than this), Thordan was a step in the right direction (yeah one aspect of all of 3.1 that I enjoyed, one primal since 3.0 that I enjoyed) the 24 man raid is so basic I can't even write drinking game rules for it (there aren't enough mechanics to mess up) Weren't we meant to explore the Diadem? We just stand there and kill bland mobs with big hp bars, the games lost any real challenge outside of Savage and outside of A3S that challenge isn't even fun. This was a game I used to live by, now I'm debating about wether I should throw in the towel once I've finished up this raid, this game doesn't feel like it's going anywhere fast and the time investment to be raid ready (capping every week etc) just doesn't seem worth the reward anymore.

Originally Posted by Mwynn

Even then, the Feature called "Limited Inventory/Armoury Space" comes then if you level up everything to 60.

The Game limits the whole Community on every Feature, want to get a Item? Fine, do this and then this, oh wait, you also have to do this! and don't forget you have to do it the other Week while you have to wait still 3 more Days ...

You have 25 Slots in Armory and 23 jobs. Means you can actually organizes all jobs through your Armory. Well at least if you use one armor per job and not 2 or 3 or 4.

Originally Posted by Laerune

There is something very wrong with the system of this game, older online games let you queue for different type of content at once, they let you group up and summon a battle pet when using their version of the duty finder. SE has many times said that their staff is to small, but you see alot of news where SE made alot of money, because of FFXIV. So my question is, why wont they hire a more developers?

Actually the playerbase is estimated around 400k Subs. Means FF XIV is currently the number three MMO after WoW and SWTOR. With a very, very lose sum, SE earns ~53 Mio.$ with FF XIV each year minus taxes, sallery, service, development and other costs. That actually isn't much to be honest.

FF XIV is number 3 MMO with Subs but it is currently the number 1 MMO with delivering Content Patches. Think a second about this!

Originally Posted by Zojha

So, let's brainstorm: Fun content.
Content that has replayability beyond any possibly offered rewards, because it offers the intrinsic reward of enjoyment.

Any ideas?

few exemple from FF11

savage :
if i recal properly, it was a group of instance, where a group of players entered naked (youlooo),
and had to kill mob with bare hand, to get potion that allowed them to fit back theire equipement

besiege

well beastmen raid the city to recover some artefact (in our case we have ishgard and dragon, could do something right ?)
every player come into a HUGE battle (huge like HUGE !! maybe 300 players or even more !,
i do remember that the number of ppl was so high during besiege that i couldnt even see half of them !)

dynamis

best raid ever for those who know bout this

i do remember in ath urghan expansion,
there was a kind of monster arena, you go outside capture the soul of a monster,
then fight other player ( monster) in an arena, and actually win reward when you win !


here is some idea, that would be completly different to what we have now, but i can guess already, why most of those "raid" wont come

Originally Posted by Renault

I really hope this week will bring a fun, interesting relic quest to spark interest back into the game for myself and my friends, but the history of it's nature doesn't give me much hope.

That is what I'm waiting for. It was kind of hard in 3.0 to say goodbye to your previous relics. I mean you did a lot of work but in the end had to grab a crafter to make you a new one. But I guess the point of being able to glamour is to feel like you've kept your weapon of choice. When you compare handing a crafter a mythrite ore vs walking out of a dungeon with the head of a hydra..

I agree though things seem a lot more died down than they did before. Maybe I'm crazy but I think it's a mixture of content being released too fast, the content being released is hard in the wrong way, and the progression makes anything else obsolete. I remember when alexander came out, I walked out of a server room after working and was told that it's already been completed.

I think also what makes people sort of slack off and walk away is that after you beat the story and get some gear there's no incentive to stay. You know in a few months or maybe weeks that there's going to be a jump in iLV so get where you can be comfortable and come back later. I realize now what makes me jump from job to job. Besides the absolute beauty of this game, I don't have a huge love for any of these jobs. They're fun to play the gear looks great but if I am busy, I don't feel bad if I get behind a bit and then a new patch comes out. Because all that older stuff is now right there for me

Originally Posted by Miscreant

But everything in this game feels so watered down now, the Dungeons are gated so you can't speed run them any more, Bismark wasn't even a good design in the first place, Ravana got out-geared so fast (the Primals used to have a much longer life span than this), Thordan was a step in the right direction (yeah one aspect of all of 3.1 that I enjoyed, one primal since 3.0 that I enjoyed) the 24 man raid is so basic I can't even write drinking game rules for it (there aren't enough mechanics to mess up) Weren't we meant to explore the Diadem? We just stand there and kill bland mobs with big hp bars, the games lost any real challenge outside of Savage and outside of A3S that challenge isn't even fun. This was a game I used to live by, now I'm debating about wether I should throw in the towel once I've finished up this raid, this game doesn't feel like it's going anywhere fast and the time investment to be raid ready (capping every week etc) just doesn't seem worth the reward anymore.

Aye. Even has a newer player, I find the game increasingly easier. And I am by no means a veteran with either my jobs. Unfortunately, this is almost becoming an industry trend. When I hung around BioWare's forums, people complained fairly often about how easy Mass Effect 3 was. Companies seem afraid to actually challenge their player base. While I appreciate their rationale, what they fail to realize in turn is eventually those casual players will improve. Sure, some will stubbornly cling to their broken 'rotations', but as others seek to better themselves, they pull further away from the difficulty threshold. The devs need to establish a midcore, even if only through recycling content as I mentioned previously.

Personally, I really want a trial run where we have to fight Garuda, Titan and Ifrit all at once. Not sure how to properly balance it, but the sheer potential of mechanics at play would make it last even long after people have beaten it. Of course, only if they actually hard. Thordan EX should be the benchmark for midcore content going forward. Release easier variations for story/those who aren't interested in raiding. The rest of us can enjoy a challenge that isn't quite A3S's grind.

Originally Posted by Mature

The game provides you with a lot of content. If you decide not to do certain aspects of it , it's their your choice and not the games fault.

Would you offer this excuse if FFVII Remake came out padded to the hilt with mini-games, boring dungeon grinds and other 'features' all designed so they could justify splitting it into multiple discs? Take Dragon Age: Origins. The vast majority of its fanbase utterly despises Deep roads due to its boring design and sheer length (you'll be there for 5+ hours on higher difficulties.) So much so, modders removed it from the game entirely.

You can shove hundreds of hours worth of 'content' into a game. If no one likes it, then all you've accomplished is wasting your time. And that is the game's fault.