A12 savage World first 3 days after patch

[Jynx]

Yeah, I remember that interview. I disagree that he doesn't have the manpower to provide 3+ difficulties though.

Eh even if they re-allocated staff to make 3 difficulty levels do we really want the same content in 3 different flavors?

I'd rather have two tiers and the content be totally separate things, but then the casual "but muh story" people would complain.

[Atoli]

So today Angered from Ragnarok server got world first A12s 3 days after patch [...] share your feeling about this.

Ew, Angered again >.>

[Felsea83]

I agree. The wider community are not hard core. I'm on a break for the next year and can't wait to come back and grind a full normal Alex set and the rush savage. I think some might take this game a little to seriously. Playing for "16 hours" it a total waste of a God given life. This way people can get it out of there system and love a little real life. But seriously itching to try this and the next two patches out...when I get back X)

[KarstenS]

A8S was beat 6 days after the patch was out

Lol. No. A8S was beaten on the first day of the 4th week after the patch (Day 29).

This was the day they were able to buy tome weapons (and upgrade them). From what I have read, they should had at least 6 upgraded weapons and alot other gear on this day.

[Rita1989]

Lol. No. A8S was beaten on the first day of the 4th week after the patch (Day 29).

This was the day they were able to buy tome weapons (and upgrade them). From what I have read, they should had at least 6 upgraded weapons and alot other gear on this day.

A8S savage was cleared in 17 days, its A4S that took around 30 days

[Mature]

With a static and time everything is possible. Practice makes better

[Duelle]

Well I don't mind if the savage is easier to clear, because it will encourage casual-tier to do savage and that could increase the clear rate statistics

This is a key part of this discussion that people like the OP don't take into account. Gordias and Midas did a number on the raiding community in this game. That's not a good thing in the long run. That the top 1% of raiders cleared Creator as fast as they did should encourage the midcore people that shied away from raiding this expansion back into it seeing that it's not soul-crushingly difficult.

even if they re-allocated staff to make 3 difficulty levels do we really want the same content in 3 different flavors?

If it means people get the see the content they paid for, sure.

I'd rather have two tiers and the content be totally separate things, but then the casual "but muh story" people would complain.

It's a valid complain. Else you get things like the Isle of Quel Danas that was basically Blizzard's way of saying "not good enough to raid/don't have a raiding guild? Here's a bunch of dailies for you to do while the true heroes are running Sunwell Plateau. Have fun trolololol".

[Bourne_Endeavor]

Yeah, I remember that interview. I disagree that he doesn't have the manpower to provide 3+ difficulties though. They already have a lot of the work done (setting, animations, graphics etc.). Then, they also spend a lot of resources on content which feels less important (at least to me). For example, Aquariums seem entirely too complex for what should be a simple housing item. Things like LoV, PotD and Diadem are convoluted, unloved and likely took a lot of dev resources. Take those resources and re-allocate. Finally, I'd say that they waste a lot of resources re-inventing the wheel so-to-speak every patch. Each patch the difficulty is off, people complain, the analyze and re-design and put out something new - this is likely resulting in a lot of wasted time.

They also could probably implement a middle tier pretty easily. Design a hard gordias-style savage and then just lower some outgoing damage, lower dps checks and maybe remove a mechanic or two. You don't need to design anything new, just trim some of the stuff that makes it as hard as it is.

To be fair, the difficulty in coding fight mechanics and aesthetics are substantially higher than Aquariums. It isn't really a fair comparison as the latter requires no balance tuning, situational awareness and just the sheer complexity that goes into even a single fight. I actually doubt PotD or Diadem did take significant resources due to their reuse of assets. Diadem is essentially a zone map with your typical trash mob and occasional hunt-esque bosses. PotD is largely similar corridors in a small cavern setting. None have much intricacy to them. Regardless, they can't just cater to the battle side of content. While LoV and Diadem were disasters, PotD has largely been well-received despite it still needing improvements. People in this game like fluff. Frankly, I don't necessarily think three difficulties is even needed. Alexander is a side story. It doesn't need to be faceroll nor should it. At the same time, it doesn't need to be extremely challenging. Just much more than it is currently.

Honestly, what I think would help people seeking a challenge is if they implemented a ilvl scale mechanic that premade groups could set. Think of it like sliders. You set it to whatever ilvl you desire (in increments of five) and your gear is scaled accordingly. None of this DF nonsense where even scaled gear laughs at low level content. If you said it to ilvl 210, it'll be as those any gear above that level were now the exact equivalent. From there, put challenges for players to accomplish. Beat Gordias/Midas/Creator at x ilvl, attempt it underleveled and so forth. They could build a reward structure around that. Maybe the harder you make the content, the highest chance pigeons or ponies drop.

[KarstenS]

A8S savage was cleared in 17 days, its A4S that took around 30 days

Still more than 6 days and way more than 2 days.

But just to remember what Yoshi P did say some time ago about the difficulty of creator savage:

Y. Firstly, the DPS checks for Gordias were too high so we shifted the difficulty of Midas by "making the players dance" and we overdid that too. Regarding Midas, Let's just say the level cap was still 50 and you could use the level 50 rotations. I think the clear rates would have been way way higher. After checking the data and logs, we noticed "Understanding the mechanics,judging,dodging and maintaining the level 60 rotations on top of that" is what created the enormous gap between players. There are a lot of buffs you need to manage and maintain and not only that, but the phase transitions or enemy mechanics disturb that rotation. This led to requiring players to flexibly judging in certain situations. Back in binding coil of Bahamut, there were some harsh mechanics, but the difference in rotations directly slashed the gap in difficulty. It's too late to change the rotations during the 3.x series so we'll lower the difficulty of the final tier of Alexander instead.

Source

In a later Interview he also clarified, that "Savage" is content for the 1 digit percentrange and not for everyone.

The balance of creator savage is more like a band aid fix because of the rotation issues, they cant fix before the expansion. From what he did say, they don't have plans to repeat this in 4.0.

[Belhi]

Yeah, I remember that interview. I disagree that he doesn't have the manpower to provide 3+ difficulties though. They already have a lot of the work done (setting, animations, graphics etc.). Then, they also spend a lot of resources on content which feels less important (at least to me). For example, Aquariums seem entirely too complex for what should be a simple housing item. Things like LoV, PotD and Diadem are convoluted, unloved and likely took a lot of dev resources. Take those resources and re-allocate. Finally, I'd say that they waste a lot of resources re-inventing the wheel so-to-speak every patch. Each patch the difficulty is off, people complain, the analyze and re-design and put out something new - this is likely resulting in a lot of wasted time.

They also could probably implement a middle tier pretty easily. Design a hard gordias-style savage and then just lower some outgoing damage, lower dps checks and maybe remove a mechanic or two. You don't need to design anything new, just trim some of the stuff that makes it as hard as it is.

Firstly its possible that the skillset required doesn't simply translate across.

More to the point all the content you mentioned is new things they have been trying and the playerbase as been very frequently asking them to try new things. Whenever you try something new there is always a chance it will flop. Diadem and LoV did. I suspect LoV is why they haven't added anything else to the Gold saucer since. I would argue that PotD is quite popular, at least from my corner of the community. Quite a lot of my FC do it, particularly when levelling alt classes/jobs.

Unless we are assuming that YoshiP is outright lying, I would say that the situation isn't that easy to fix. I am no game developer but from hearing IT friends talk there is a hell of a lot more that goes on behind the scenes.

We need to remember that players operate from a limited perspective and have little to judge the overall community attitude to content released or how used it is. SE has actual metric data as well as multiple sources of feedback. They would have staff who's whole job is to analyse this data and help draw an impression of the usage of content among the playerbase and the over all playerbases attitude toward such content.