FFXIV: The State Of Raiding

[Kaurie]

I said this earlier in the thread, but I think it's worth repeating. The state of raiding in this game would be better overall if raiding weren't the dominant form of progression-related endgame.

Even before Alexander, the participation rate of coil was very low. The result is the bulk of players sweeping through the easier content of each patch and then unsubscribing until the next big content dump... and that cycle continues. The result is far fewer people participating in endgame activities simply because the game's only available endgame progression content isn't that interesting. It's not engaging.

I may be wrong, but I don't think this is due to people not wanting to raid, I think it is due to the jarring skill gap in progression. In WoW, the % of players who raid is a lot higher, and I think that is because there is a much more natural sense of progression. Fights get progressively harder, starting with fairly easy to easy, to easy-ish, to medium, to challenging, to hard, quite hard. This is made easier with having many more bosses to fight as well. Conversely, in FFXIV, it goes from very easy to easy to quite hard.

[Velhart]

I said this earlier in the thread, but I think it's worth repeating. The state of raiding in this game would be better overall if raiding weren't the dominant form of progression-related endgame.

Or you know, structure it better? The best stuff in the game needs to be behind the most difficult content in the game.

Or we can continue the direction they are going and dumbing down each content to meet the needs of players who only press one button. Just ask the relic quest. Hey remember that time when there were interesting quests and fights in the relic quest? Well casuals didn't like putting effort beyond smashing their head on their keyboard. So SE dumbed it down to meet those needs.

There only needs to be more midcore to solve most of the game's issues. There was a time when there was a lot of midcore content to tackle. Primarily the relic quest in 2.0. Had Chimera and Hydra, which at the time were decently challenging fights. Reasons to visit previous primals. No we can't have that anymore, its just too hard for one button players.

I can understand to an extent that developers can only put but so much per patch. But seriously, did anyone ask for Lords of Verminion? SE needs to get their priorities straight big time.

[Moomba33]

I said this earlier in the thread, but I think it's worth repeating. The state of raiding in this game would be better overall if raiding weren't the dominant form of progression-related endgame....

I've got to agree with this. I've personally got no interest in spending hours learning one fight. I did try to push myself through Coil back in the day for the story before becoming stuck at t9 and it was a really frustrating experience. I was really happy when Heavensward gave us Alex normal so I could experience the story without doing the real raid.

From my perspective XIV would be better off if the developers focused on fixing Diadem to be more fun and relevant and adding more forms of endgame progression other than raiding. Raids themselves shouldn't be removed or anything since there are people that enjoy that level of challenge but I think adding variety to the endgame is more important than incentivizing raiding.

[Velhart]

I've got to agree with this. I've personally got no interest in spending hours learning one fight. I did try to push myself through Coil back in the day for the story before becoming stuck at t9 and it was a really frustrating experience. I was really happy when Heavensward gave us Alex normal so I could experience the story without doing the real raid.

From my perspective XIV would be better off if the developers focused on fixing Diadem to be more fun and relevant and adding more forms of endgame progression other than raiding. Raids themselves shouldn't be removed or anything since there are people that enjoy that level of challenge but I think adding variety to the endgame is more important than incentivizing raiding.

I know this might be hard to believe, but Diadem is end game content and works the way you say it. People will get bored of that faster than raiding. Also while some may not enjoy raiding, there are lots of other players who do. In games in general, there will always be a small group of players willing to take the hardest content in. This is no different from MMO's.

[Moomba33]

I know this might be hard to believe, but Diadem is end game content and works the way you say it. People will get bored of that faster than raiding. Also while some may not enjoy raiding, there are lots of other players who do. In games in general, there will always be a small group of players willing to take the hardest content in. This is no different from MMO's.

I liked Diadem when it first came out honestly. Myself and 4 FC friends would go to Easy mode as a five person party and do the objectives for some eso before joining other parties in clearing monsters out of the caves and stuff. What killed it for me was when the meta became camping dino island in normal mode and SE nerfed the tome rewards for the lower modes so it wasn't worthwhile to go as a small party anymore.

I think if it were to be restructured to be more objective based I'd like it again.

Sure, Final Fantasy games have frequently had fights that are significantly more challenging than anything found in the game's story, but they generally rewarded you with nothing more than a shiny trophy and were almost always divorced from any actual story content.

Look at Omega and Shinryu, Ruby and Emerald Weapons, Omega and Ultima Weapon, Ozma, the later bosses of the Monster Arena, or Yiazmat. A couple of them rewarded useful items, but by and large they were there for the challenge alone.

For someone coming at it from that perspective, of course it makes sense that they should be able to see the whole story without having to do difficult raiding content, and you're going to have a hard time getting them to disagree just because FFXIV is also an MMO.

This sums up my feelings on story in raids well. Offhand the closest thing to story being locked by tough content I can think of in the single player games is XIII's missions unlocking a couple of datalog entries.

[Thayos]

Yet it was filled and gave people something to do. I stepped on it on release but looking back now that its gone I want it back.

You mean it was spammed for drops by the raid community and abandoned by everyone else within two weeks.

Also, it wasn't endgame. It was just a big open area where you zerged things for drops -- basically a giant, ongoing FATE with drops. Zero strategy, zero long-term objectives, zero reasons to work toward any goals as a FC, zero things to need to learn (other than finding Dino Island), zero sense of accomplishment, zero things to even really accomplish.

Long term, Diadem's only real use was for gathering.

Seriously, what a waste.

If anything, the complete failure of the Diadem is proof that the "casuals" are more than just facerolling one-button pushers. Most casual/midcore players are simply yesterday's hardcore players who are now busier and have less time. Casual/midcore players deserve content that's engaging, not the brainless pile of scrap we got in the Diadem.

But maybe the Diadem was never meant to be endgame? As I said above, I honestly can't tell you. No clue what SE was thinking. It's like trying to find meaning from a 2-year-old's finger painting.

[Thayos]

I may be wrong, but I don't think this is due to people not wanting to raid, I think it is due to the jarring skill gap in progression.

That's partially true, but many people want progression that doesn't require hours of practice per fight -- which many players would refer to as "beating your head against a wall."

I think back to the glory days of FFXI, and never did anyone spend so many hours wiping in rapid succession to single bosses. That kind of challenge appeals to a limited scope of gamers... to others, that's just not fun. There's a lot more competition nowadays for people's time... over the past decade, the average age of MMO players has risen from the mid 20s to the mid 30s. That's why SE built XIV the way they did, to be more accommodating for casual and midcore players. But the endgame scene wasn't built to match.

Raiding shouldn't be XIV's core progression endgame. It should be the most elite form of endgame, but it should be treated as something that only appeals to a small fraction of the playerbase. The core of endgame should be based on engaging a larger portion of players. Everyone would win from that, including those in the raid community, who'd have a more engaged and skilled playerbase to recruit from.

[Ibi]

It is sad that SE believes that a story mode for casual players was much more important than making balanced content for midcore/hardcore players in the -one- piece of content in the game that is actually challenging.

It was a case of the squeaky wheels getting the grease.

On the one hand, we had an 81-page thread on the forums about people wanting a story mode.

On the other hand, we had people that SE apparently interviewed wanting even harder raids, along with reactions like the ones at Fanfest, consisting of a chorus of booing, in response to them even contemplating reducing Coil's difficulty.

Meanwhile, the people who enjoyed raiding at the difficulty of Coil mostly just went about that without complaint.

That's what got us the normal/Savage split we had in Gordias, which resulted in the two groups that were making the noise before being satisfied (or at least more than they were in Coil), and the people who were satisfied before, but aren't now, speaking up.

It's clear (comparing Midas to Gordias, and their willingness to adjust A6S so quickly) that SE are listening to an extent, but they're generally glacially slow and overly cautious to react to anything that wasn't overwhelming breaking their intention on how players should be consuming content.

I think you would live if you have to wait for an echo buff to beat the content for the story. You dealt with it before, you can now.

That's all well and good in principle, but echo buff (and between 20 and 50 additional item levels of gear) didn't allow casual players to beat the content for the story in Coil.

That's why we ended up with story mode in the first place.

Of course I will get the incoming, "Casuals have the right to get all the story the game has." I will argue that you shouldn't get everything handed to you on a silver platter, even if it is story content.

Because you tend to view XIV as an MMO first-and-foremost, and a Final Fantasy title second. Other people look at it the other way around, and it's hard to make a case against the stories having always been a significant aspect of what made the series as popular as it is.

Sure, Final Fantasy games have frequently had fights that are significantly more challenging than anything found in the game's story, but they generally rewarded you with nothing more than a shiny trophy and were almost always divorced from any actual story content.

Look at Omega and Shinryu, Ruby and Emerald Weapons, Omega and Ultima Weapon, Ozma, the later bosses of the Monster Arena, or Yiazmat. A couple of them rewarded useful items, but by and large they were there for the challenge alone.

For someone coming at it from that perspective, of course it makes sense that they should be able to see the whole story without having to do difficult raiding content, and you're going to have a hard time getting them to disagree just because FFXIV is also an MMO.

Even more so if they're familiar with FFXI, which really didn't put any of it's story behind difficult end game fights (certainly nothing as tough as any of Coil). Even Chains of Promathia's missions, which were the toughest road block for any part of the story, could mostly be trivialized if you were willing to take a little time farming up anima/yellow liquid/shu'meyo salt/etc.

Can reward things like mounts, minions, titles, etc. Something to show bragging rights. Oh wait never mind, can't reward those things or you will make the casuals angry. Well scrap that idea, because if the casuals are not happy about it, it is a no go.

I've not personally seen any complaints about things like the gobwalker mount, faustlet, only equipment from savage being dyable, Savage SCoB rewarding titles, etc.

If they're there, the volume is miniscule compared to people who cared only about the story.

tl;dr - The balance of casual, midcore, and hardcore content in this game is horrible.

All the above said, I can't argue with this statement at all.

Raiding shouldn't be XIV's core progression endgame. It should be the most elite form of endgame, but it should be treated as something that only appeals to a small fraction of the playerbase. The core of endgame should be based on engaging a larger portion of players. Everyone would win from that, including those in the raid community, who'd have a more engaged and skilled playerbase to recruit from.

Absolutely.

[Velhart]

It was a case of the squeaky wheels getting the grease.

On the one hand, we had an 81-page thread on the forums about people wanting a story mode.

On the other hand, we had people that SE apparently interviewed wanting even harder raids, along with reactions like the ones at Fanfest, consisting of a chorus of booing, in response to them even contemplating reducing Coil's difficulty.

Meanwhile, the people who enjoyed raiding at the difficulty of Coil mostly just went about that without complaint.

That's what got us the normal/Savage split we had in Gordias, which resulted in the two groups that were making the noise before being satisfied (or at least more than they were in Coil), and the people who were satisfied before, but aren't now, speaking up.

It's clear (comparing Midas to Gordias, and their willingness to adjust A6S so quickly) that SE are listening to an extent, but they're generally glacially slow and overly cautious to react to anything that wasn't overwhelming breaking their intention on how players should be consuming content.

Which more goes back to the notion that they tried to please both extremes in the raid, at least for Gordias and a lesser extent Midas. Its true they are trying to bring Midas down to please more midcore, but it is still not the proper balance they should be working with. We already heard from them they can only do two of the three difficulty modes. So they went with story and Savage. What is upsetting about it is if we do not include the story (and I will get to the story in a moment), that they decided to add a mode that was in cost of the audience raiding is intended for, midcore/hardcore. Again, Midas kind of fixing things, but ultimately it should be how 2nd Coil was set up that should be the way to go. Don't have to agree with me, but that is when raiding was set up at it's best, at least the structure, not the execution (not including better items in Savage).

That's all well and good in principle, but echo buff (and between 20 and 50 additional item levels of gear) didn't allow casual players to beat the content for the story in Coil.

That's why we ended up with story mode in the first place.

Which goes back to an idea I had which was keeping an ilvl on Savage so it is always difficult and earning things from there still means something, even years from now. Make the Normal Coils level difficulty the one they dumb down and add echo buff to give the more casual side what they want. The argument here lies basically in if casual players deserve the story now or later, which goes to the next thing....

Because you tend to view XIV as an MMO first-and-foremost, and a Final Fantasy title second. Other people look at it the other way around, and it's hard to make a case against the stories having always been a significant aspect of what made the series as popular as it is.

Sure, Final Fantasy games have frequently had fights that are significantly more challenging than anything found in the game's story, but they generally rewarded you with nothing more than a shiny trophy and were almost always divorced from any actual story content.

Look at Omega and Shinryu, Ruby and Emerald Weapons, Omega and Ultima Weapon, Ozma, the later bosses of the Monster Arena, or Yiazmat. A couple of them rewarded useful items, but by and large they were there for the challenge alone.

For someone coming at it from that perspective, of course it makes sense that they should be able to see the whole story without having to do difficult raiding content, and you're going to have a hard time getting them to disagree just because FFXIV is also an MMO.

The question is, where do we draw the line in if the story gets in the way of proper raid structure too much? Alex to me drew the line here. Yes, Final Fantasy is a story driven game and done well for an MMO. However, that does not give it the excuse to be a poorly structured MMO in the process. You have to remember you have to make the content last, people get the story at the beginning and things like story mode Alex only become a chore at that point, and people don't care about it after a few weeks. The raid structure is in a poor state right now because people apparently need that story any way they can. We can argue FF is a story driven game, but that gives it no excuse to be a poor MMO for it.

I say this as someone who is a very big fan of the Final Fantasy series and a lore nut for both FFXI and FFXIV. It felt better to achieve parts of the Coils story working for it than basically having it handed to me like 95% of the game already does. Sure not everyone thinks like that, but ask yourself, did it not feel good to overcome a very hard turn in Coil and get a satisfying cutscene for it? Just saying, we did not have to expense midcore/hardcore play just so people can get their fill immediately. People can feel free to disagree with me, but I believe in earning things through hard work.

Even more so if they're familiar with FFXI, which really didn't put any of it's story behind difficult end game fights (certainly nothing as tough as any of Coil). Even Chains of Promathia's missions, which were the toughest road block for any part of the story, could mostly be trivialized if you were willing to take a little time farming up anima/yellow liquid/shu'meyo salt/etc.

FFXI gated it's story in it's own way. It was very difficult finding groups to take on content and took a lot of preparation and preferred jobs to take things down. I remember being stuck on Ouryu for a good while in CoP and it felt satisfying finally beating him and getting the CS for it. Same with the 3 Mithra fight, Omega/Ultima Weapon, etc. I definitely don't believe FFXI handed the content to you, it was something you did need to earn. Despite being outdated concepts somewhat, they did a good job wanting you to strive for more.

I've not personally seen any complaints about things like the gobwalker mount, faustlet, only equipment from savage being dyable, Savage SCoB rewarding titles, etc.

If they're there, the volume is miniscule compared to people who cared only about the story.

It was mostly a joke. I was just giving an extreme example.

All the above said, I can't argue with this statement at all.

Which goes back to my saying. FFXIV developers need to know when to make a proper Final Fantasy game and a proper MMO. People can say it is subjective on what makes a proper MMO, but looking at this year, it is very much a thing that SE does not want to cater to all three as much as one or the other. Relics were dumbed down, Savage has scared away a lot of midcore groups, hardcore players are bored with the game. SE needs to know what content is made for which audience. 95% of the game can be casual which is fine, but where it really matters in challenging content like raids, they need to make sure the intended audience for the group is taken care of before diving into things like Story mode. WoW did bring an easy mode to raids, but they did not take away Normal/Heroic mode in the process. They did not sacrifice one, but added. Again I don't entirely agree with an easy mode, but I know it is a thing. WoW at least made it work, or at least when I played it a few years ago.

The only thing I see SE doing at this point is making Savage easier and easier per tier till more midcore groups want to come back. Midas is that first step. Which in turn will cause an imbalance on hardcore players. Not saying Midas is easy, in fact it is quite challenging, but it is easy to see that SE is willing to make it easier just to get more numbers in instead of making proper midcore/hardcore tiers similar to WoW. Ohh yea, shouldn't compare too much to WoW before someone goes "Why don't you just go back?"

[Lacus-Clyne]

yea, i really unsatisfied with the way of the savage present to players. not all ppl can do it.. even if there is peoples can do it or really WANTS to clear it but if the team performance is bad like player pc crash, lagging, other player dead half ways, dc, late, leadership issues etc n wipe the team then to solve it we change team but problem repeats, ended up other player can't have good experience in FFXIV. some more the highest ilvl is ONLY from savage. it is creative if there is more variety to get same quality i240 rather then just 8 peoples. my FC is big, we got alternative communication, a call im sure peeps willing to come to get the highest ilvl contents.