Can we please stop locking content out of DF?

[Ashkendor]

The anonymity of the DF encourages people to participate. Once you participate, you learn and get better which then rubs off on others who are learning. Nobody benefits from limiting the number of people participating in content.

Er. In my experience it's completely the opposite. The anonymity of the DF encourages people to scream at everyone, act like assholes, and basically be ragequitting douchebags. PF groups tend to stay together longer when attempting difficult content.

[Kaurie]

Er. In my experience it's completely the opposite. The anonymity of the DF encourages people to scream at everyone, act like assholes, and basically be ragequitting douchebags. PF groups tend to stay together longer when attempting difficult content.

We all have our own experiences

For me, the people to people to scream at everyone, act like assholes, and basically be ragequitting douchebags have been on Party Finder. Duty Finder is generally pretty silent except for 1-2 people who are trying to explain things while everyone else ignores them. After a few wipes, vote abandon pops up or 1 person leaves.

[Alahra]

As far I remember, the ex versions were premade right at that start. Solo queue got introduced at a later time together with echo buff.

The original three EX primals were initially available via the DF. It wasn't until Leviathan EX that EX primals were kept outside of the DF for a period of time. Yoshi-P talked about the reasoning for the change a bit in an interview (I thought it was in a Live Letter, but I just looked through the ones around that time and didn't find the reference).

You can essentially confirm this in the Patch 2.2 notes. Echo was added to the duties at this time, but there was no change mentioned about being able to solo queue for them because you could already do so.

[Dante_V]

I am completely impartial to this either way. I would make a PF regardless but I can understand wanting to run it on DF. Thing is if your hours are awkward enough that a PF won't fill then it's also likely a df queue won't either in any reasonable amount of time. (Supposing you've actually tried putting up a PF of course)

[KarstenS]

some mechanics that still require lots and lots and lots of attempts

We had not more than 3 or 4 wipes. Odin was very easy compared to real Ex Primae.

[Dante_V]

We had not more than 3 or 4 wipes. Odin was very easy compared to real Ex Primae.

Agreed. I would consider Odin more like a HM primal than an EX primal. My initial group beat it in one shot, we had a couple of mistakes but everything was straight forward and recoverable if a mistake was made. It basically a DPS/HPS check with a few mechanics.

[Ashkendor]

We had not more than 3 or 4 wipes. Odin was very easy compared to real Ex Primae.

That's because Odin wasn't an EX primal. A lot of us kept hoping for an EX version of that fight. :/

I went in a premade with my static and we one-shotted Odin lol.

[FeliAiko]

So people should have to jump through a couple extra hoops to enter it, and there should be no practice outside statics?

As if Party Finder doesn't exist... and what do you know, there's server communities that use PF for that very purpose (and even for straight clears) for the benefit of those unable (or unwilling) to commit to a static.

And what about the EX primals?

What about them? They don't end up in DF on launch, and those are tiered below 8 man raids in difficulty.

Odin was in the DF from the start, and it was about on par with the ex primals in 2.x.

No it wasn't. At best it was Titan HM difficulty, and even then I'm probably giving it too much credit.

[StouterTaru]

What about them? They don't end up in DF on launch, and those are tiered below 8 man raids in difficulty.

That's exactly my point. EX Primals don't require elaborate explaining of mechanics and coordination of who is doing what, so why are they left out of the DF at launch? The mechanics are blow up adds, dodge telegraphed attacks, and occasionally don't fall off. What part of that requires a premade party?

Odin had a dps/healer/tank check that was higher than any other post-PF straight to DF content by quite a bit. Titan difficulty was 80% hardware/ping check.

The funny thing about content is that it's easier to beat the first couple weeks than it is 3-6 months later. Steps of Faith was a whole lot easier to get through in the first week than it was the last week before the nerf. The same goes for all content that isn't a unforgiving gear check.

[jssanderson747]

tl;dr- gear checks are significantly above the item level norms upon release (norm for savage release was about il 182-190 while AS3 comfortably requires il 200-210)

I believe across the board (maybe excluding Shiva ex), at the time these fights have released, the gear checks have been such that while highly organized or geared statics/pugs can succeed in the fights, they wouldn't function in a df setting on release. I guess as a recent example, Turns 10-13 of the binding coil came out when the gear norm was il 110. Once they were released into the df, the minimum gear requirement for T13 was il 123. To put this into perspective, most players were unable to obtain il 130 gear until patch 2.5, 4 months after release of 2.4. The point of these fights being 'locked out' of the duty finder, is to challenge players who will actually take it seriously and work together for extended periods of time.