"Tips/Hint" Display for Duties and Whatnot

[Eorzean_username]

A pop-up on screen like the Sephirot Battle challenge flashcards would help so much with jumping into old fights I've forgotten, or players entering new fights without researching / watching videos first.

For such a rule-based combat system with a lot of binary "right" and "wrong" reactions to make, it would help a lot to just give players a basic fighting chance before entering a battle — one that doesn't rely on a party member volunteering to type it all out in chat every single run.

[Nyghtmarerobu]

snip.

While making something like this would help people learn faster, it also breaks away from the fun of actually figuring out the mechanics yourself in the early stages of a contents release. Like I said previously, these things are good for some players, but not for others. I personally don't want the game to turn this route. I don't need or want this type of handholding. I'm not gonna say the game is super easy, but if you have the patience and can understand and grasp whats going on around you, you can clear anything.

[Eorzean_username]

I guess you weigh what is more important to you. There's a large number of players that perform a lot better once they're given instructions and guided through the basic mechanics, but without some intervention, will just burn out or shut down even after multiple pulls because their mind just isn't oriented toward a deductive response to figuring out a fight.

In those situations, you can either stubbornly remain silent and watch the group burn, or sigh inside and start typing and bring the run a lot closer to success (or actually succeed). It's basically doing the exact same thing as the flashcard system, but putting a great deal more burden on a volunteer individual every time.

It may be that your pride at figuring everything out yourself is more important to you than more players feeling comfortable with a fight, more clears without excessive burden on the volunteer tutors and video-makers, etc. And that's fine, that's as legitimate a perspective as any other.

Personally, though, it would be a great relief to me to be able to call up a flashcard set for new or inexperienced or struggling players the same way I can call up an official readycheck and countdown. That way, at least I know everyone is on the same basic starting page when we begin assigning roles, marker positions, etc.

[Nyghtmarerobu]

It may be that your pride at figuring everything out yourself is more important to you than more players feeling comfortable with a fight, more clears without excessive burden on the volunteer tutors and video-makers, etc. And that's fine, that's as legitimate a perspective as any other.

But that's the thing, no one is making them make the content to help people clear the content. Why should it fall to the developers to TELL the player how to clear their content. Just imagine if you were playing your favorite Final Fantasy title, and w/e boss battle you just happen to be on, an on screen prompt pops up and tells you "Hey, this guy is weak to lightning, and absorbs Fire, so make sure to use high dmg thunder spells and weapons, also beware his zombie move, having your whole party zombied could give you a game over!!", before you can even do anything in the fight. I don't want this. If they want to add this type of thing after it becomes the "not new" thing, I'd be okay for that to help speed the process of clearing older content faster, but on newer content, it should still be blind, and the player should learn how to do these things for themselves.

[Eorzean_username]

In a single-player game, no one else is affected if you decide to stubbornly wipe 10 times instead of looking up a video or strategy guide. Social environments, and coordinating time constraints among multiple individuals, bring a completely different set of considerations.

If you're concerned about 'spoiling' brand-new fights:

• Require the feature to be unlocked per-player, per-fight, by first clearing the fight at least once. (ie, a player can't initiate Flashcards unless that player has already cleared the fight once)
• Or unlock the feature on a per-fight basis only once the content becomes outdated ('next patch' system).
• Or allow each individual to opt-out of the display (similar to refusing to participate in a Ready Check). "Jophia Krownlege has initiated Flashcards for Akh Afah Amphitheatre (Extreme). View them? Yes | No"
• Or don't join parties that want everyone to know what's going on before pulling.

I don't understand how a Flashcard system is practically any different — or worse — than "Watch a video", or having 4-5 sentences of explanations typed out before the pull. Similar to how the in-game Countdown feature is just a streamlined improvement over the historical macro hack.

[jmanfrw]

I like the idea for general advice, maybe hint at the necessity to cc provoke or the importance of swift cast but please no actually boss or raid advice just tips like

"Don't forget you defensive cool-downs, a properly timed cool-down could mean the difference between life and death"
or
"Accumulated Damage over time (DOT) abilities can provide a significant amount of damage"

Things that players new to FF14 or even MMO's in general might not realize at first until someone gets rude about it in DF.