Variance in player skill is hurting FFXIV's itemization design.

[Granyala]

Give me 3 good reasons why people who don't raid should have raid stat bonus gear? If you raid you have earned it. I could go on all night about why they shouldn't have it without giving effort, but before anyone ask me or want them to give them reasons, I'd like to have you give me 3 reasons.

I don't have to.

Raiders already get a higher item level to boot, so they are more powerful.
I simply see no reason at all to further INCREASE the already existing gap.

You don't? From my point of view everything besides end-game raiding (and props to SE for Weeping City) is exactly that, but to each their own.

*chuckles* It's kinda awkward, but reading your posts reminds me of myself when I was a mythic raider.
Ofc everything else seems mindless from our raiding Ivory towers. (excluding high end PvP, which is actually A LOT harder than raiding)

I also do agree with you that the difficulty of the current 4mans is rather underwhelming. It's barely possible to wipe in there anymore. :/

Still, once you leave the raiding scene, yet still like the game as such, you will begin to understand where we "dirty casuals" are coming from.

[RobbieH]

Ofc everything else seems mindless from our raiding Ivory towers. (excluding high end PvP, which is actually A LOT harder than raiding)

I like the PvP in this game now that you bring it up, however everytime they release a new mode it kills the previous ones, this has been happening since the very first content patch, and that's something they still they didn't realize, which is: everytime they release something they kill pretty much everything that exists.

This is a big flaw in design in my opinion, and to make things worse they removed the ilvl restriction that PvP gear had, they killed rank grinding, once again casuals are at it.

I just wish they would stop "casualising" everything because that's what's been happening, i'm seriously suffering from an huge burnout, sadly i can't take GW2 anymore either, same for Black Desert, Blade & Soul and others, this is the game i love and want to keep playing, but it's been very disappointing what they have been doing, i could write more flaws than the ones i wrote here: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...=1#post3749119

There's been very few design changes that were good since 2.0, i'm glad they introduced tokens to Savage, the first SIX weeks i didn't get anything out of A5S thank god i got the tokens for the damn belt, on top of that to get i230 Lore it would require 7 weeks, SEVEN, unless i got the item from Savage.

Two things i'll never understand about raids in this game and it's drops:

- Savage still locked on content, why only lift the restriction when new Savage tier comes? Pretty much nobody is going to bother with it because they will be busy with the new ilvl.
- 24 Man Raid gear is 10 ilvls bellow the cap, and has a weekly limit, can't be upgraded or dyed. What.

^For the 24 man raid they should just add the stats that are not a combination of what already exists in Lore and Savage, for example, let's say Savage chest is Crit+SS, and Lore is Acc+DET, there's still more possible combination of stats, why not make the 24 Man raid item i240 and the stats CRIT+DET for example?

Yes it would probably be bis, so what? It's still one per week. The next content update will make it obsolete, why make it i230, not dyable and not upgradeable? I don't get it.

._.

[Granyala]

The next content update will make it obsolete, why make it i230, not dyable and not upgradeable? I don't get it.
._.

I think they view Mhach gear as a catch-up measure to speed people along until they get either lore 230s which they can upgrade or until they get savage raid loot.
Same is probably true with the Nidhogg weapons, though these are in a bit of an awkward position, considering you have to clear extreme mode to get them.

There is no gap, By the time most raiders are close to being 240, welfare city comes out and everyone can be 240 in a matter of weeks. There is only an illusion of any gap and it's at the raider's expense.

But that is not a problem with the rewards themselves.
It's a problem with horrible raid loot RNG and lockouts.

This can easily be fixed by increasing the speed at which raiders gain loot, so they they are 240 by the time "welfare city" hits the streets.
BTW, at one piece of gear a week it takes 3 months to upgrade to 240.

[zosia]

I think they view Mhach gear as a catch-up measure to speed people along until they get either lore 230s which they can upgrade or until they get savage raid loot.
Same is probably true with the Nidhogg weapons, though these are in a bit of an awkward position, considering you have to clear extreme mode to get them.

But that is not a problem with the rewards themselves.
It's a problem with horrible raid loot RNG and lockouts.

This can easily be fixed by increasing the speed at which raiders gain loot, so they they are 240 by the time "welfare city" hits the streets.
BTW, at one piece of gear a week it takes 3 months to upgrade to 240.

You do know hunts are still a thing right? It does not take long to accumulate a bunch of seals, esp if hunts are unpopular on your server. It's quite common for A's just to be roaming around on my sever.

[Granyala]

You do know hunts are still a thing right?

Never cared about them.
Found them to be as ridiculously boring as Diadem.

I do chuckle about chat outrage when s/o pulls early though.

I am not against catch up gear. I am against catch up gear while the raid tier is current.

If you can't manage to get 4 bosses on farmstatus after 3 MONTHS, it is NOT the casuals problem and you probably need the Lore 240s in order to down the remaining bosses at all.

If you downed the bosses and don't get the loot, the problem is not the item level, the problem is retarded loot RNG.
I'd expect my raid of 8 people to be decently geared after raiding a place for 3 months.

BTW: if it were up to me, Mythic and Savage rewards would be unique cosmetic stuff only in order to curb the power creep a bit.

[zosia]

Never cared about them.
Found them to be as ridiculously boring as Diadem.

I do chuckle about chat outrage when s/o pulls early though.

If you can't manage to get 4 bosses on farmstatus after 3 MONTHS, it is NOT the casuals problem and you probably need the Lore 240s in order to down the remaining bosses at all.

Yes, for the world first and server first statics. But are you going to argue that every raid static should have all four floors down within three months to be properly rewarded? Any static stuck on a8s, a fight many consider to be harder than a4s, should have their rewards invalidated before they can even manage to get a kill? Please, between irl stuff, scheduling, and replacements, the average raid team is lucky to have reached A8S. You seem to be speaking from ignorance.

[Granyala]

Yes, for the world first and server first statics. But are you going to argue that every raid static should have all four floors down within three months to be properly rewarded?

If you can't down 4 bosses in 3 months, I have to break the news to you: Your raiders aren't savage material.
In WoW a Tier with 10+ bosses typically lasts 6 months and Mythic is pretty much the same difficulty as savage.

Please, between irl stuff, scheduling, and replacements, the average raid team is lucky to have reach A8S. You seem to be speaking from ignorance.

I raided 3 nights a week @ 3hrs in a guild that did NOT manage to clear mythic in time to the next patch (we got around 1/3rd to half way trough). I know what it feels like.

We weren't mythic material.
Simple, objective truth and we had to accept that the patches and reward cycle moved faster than we could.

Edit:
Come to think of it: you are actually LUCKY. In WoW, when a new patch and Raid Tier is deployed, the old one gets abandoned immediately, because it is rendered irrelevant.
Thus I have not seen many a mythic boss, because guilds immediately get busy in the new raid.
Here you have the luxury of getting a leg up on those missing 240 slots (essentially a mild encounter nerf over time by increasing your raids item level) and getting 3 additional months to shoot for a clear.

Ofc if you only raid for "them bluez" I can see how you may lose interest. To me, gear was always mainly a tool. The actual reward was to make that bastard eat dust.

[zosia]

I don't have to.

Raiders already get a higher item level to boot, so they are more powerful.
I simply see no reason at all to further INCREASE the already existing gap.
*chuckles* It's kinda awkward, but reading your posts reminds me of myself when I was a mythic raider.Ofc everything else seems mindless from our raiding Ivory towers. (excluding high end PvP, which is actually A LOT harder than raiding)

I also do agree with you that the difficulty of the current 4mans is rather underwhelming. It's barely possible to wipe in there anymore. :/

Still, once you leave the raiding scene, yet still like the game as such, you will begin to understand where we "dirty casuals" are coming from.

There is no gap, By the time most raiders are close to being 240, welfare city comes out and everyone can be 240 in a matter of weeks. There is only an illusion of any gap and it's at the raider's expense.

You know this game has a problem with raid rewards when other game developers call Yoshida out mid interview (looking at you Level-5 interview) on how bad the rewards are for savage difficulty. Keep sticking your head in the sand though, this game is so close to LoTRO status that it will go over the edge any patch now.

I don't even need to make an argument anymore, other game companies will do it for me every time the trash reward system for savage comes up in an interview.

[Hayward]

There is no gap, By the time most raiders are close to being 240, welfare city comes out and everyone can be 240 in a matter of weeks. There is only an illusion of any gap and it's at the raider's expense.

This attitude right here is the very reason people are put off by raiders. How in the world does allowing everyone else to get caught up become synonymous with "welfare"? Should they just be happy with i210 gear until the next expansion? My guess is i220 crafted gear wouldn't even be available in a raider-approved version of XIV. Should those commoners simply be allowed to struggle through the new content unless they are accepted in the high-and-mighty raid FCs?

I'd be quite interested in your answers.

[loreleidiangelo]

This attitude right here is the very reason people are put off by raiders. How in the world does allowing everyone else to get caught up become synonymous with "welfare"? Should they just be happy with i210 gear until the next expansion? My guess is i220 crafted gear wouldn't even be available in a raider-approved version of XIV. Should those commoners simply be allowed to struggle through the new content unless they are accepted in the high-and-mighty raid FCs?

I'd be quite interested in your answers.

The commonly-argued point is usually that you don't "need" top-end gear to do anything at the casual level.