Alexander 12N Tuning

[Cinno]

And there is a mode for challenge, it's called savage. Normal mode should be for experiencing the story.

While you never said faceroll content in those words exactly, you have stated this several times, that you believe the fight [in "story mode"] should have no challenge.

It initially started with you saying it was a bit overtuned, but where you really started drawing the attention of everyone is the wording you used throughout the rest of the thread. Trying to shove anyone that wants to be challenged into Savage mode. Things can be challenging without being Savage level challenging. Just because I dont want a super easy fight, doesnt mean that we want savage level difficulty...

And yes, im being dramatic. I've watched whats happened to the fights in this game. I've watched what became of Steps of Faith, which used to be fun and challenging, and got nerfed into oblivion.. I've seen them release content like Hullbreaker Isle (Hard) and Void Ark that had almost no strategy or challenge involved, and then as soon as they start releasing content thats actually challenging, people rally for it to be changed or altered..

It happened with Weeping City
It happened with Nidhogg
It's now happening with Alex

Nerfs didnt happen with weeping city or nidhogg, and i'm praying they dont happen here. So I may be being dramatic.. But I know the outcome of this "little bit of downtuning". square enix wont downtune it a little, they'll downtune it a lot. Because you start a thread asking for a tiny little adjustment, and it gets filled with people whining and complaining that they cant clear it easily when its been out for a week. Those people complaining get louder and louder and eventually we have Steps of Faith v.2

So the ones in favor of keeping it exactly the same have to be loud as well, or we'll get drowned out by all the whining complaints.

You said as a paying customer, you deserve to give your feedback, and i'm giving mine as well. They need to stop lowering the difficulty on things. The playerbase is dropping because everyone is bored and not being challenged. You may not have directly wanted nerfs, but you unintentionally opened the door to it with this thread.

Just wait a little bit for everyone to learn the fight. The challenge will poof, and healers (and everyone else) will breeze through it without any hitches.

[Dyvid]

As a healer my issues usually isn't my ability, but the lack of everyone else getting his by said mechanics that they shouldn't be.

/healerlife

That's the problem though, people don't want to follow the mechanics for whatever reason. In several groups last night, there was maybe two people on the stack up while the rest were just running around like mad men. Then I got the golden group who did the mechanics and we won with no wipes. It's not a hard fight if people do what they are suppose to do.

[Deceptus]

While you never said faceroll content in those words exactly, you have stated this several times, that you believe the fight [in "story mode"] should have no challenge

Again, fueling your own drama, I never said no challenge, and I do think that current content should have some challenge.

Steps was nerfed because it was the gateway to Heavensward. People left when it popped in the DF because there was absolutely no incentive to complete it after the initial completion as it gave no rewards. So they had to nerf it. Otherwise people wouldn't have been able to play their new expansion.

Those people complaining get louder and louder and eventually we have Steps of Faith v.2

If that many people ask for content to be made easier, the developers have a responsibility to their paying customers to respond. Not everything the developers make is golden (Looking at you LoV and Diadem).

Nidhogg is in the same category as Steps, you can't progress the story without it. It should at least have echo if not nerfed. Weeping City I have no complaints about because if 3 dps screw up, there are 11 others to make up the slack. In fact, I'd love for Echo to be used MORE instead of nerfing because you have to at least try before the help comes in.

Not everything has to be on the cutting edge of challenge. Dungeons shouldn't be that hard because they should be something you can complete in less than 30 minutes per day. That's why we no longer have the super long dungeons of 2.0 (Stone Vigil, DD, Aurum Vale). Not many liked them. And if running old content for challenge is your thing, use the minimum ilvl button and do it that way. I would guess you've never done that and will never do that. Rose colored glasses and pining for the past don't get you very far in life.

Finally, according to what I've read, the player base isn't dropping. If anything it's growing, and most of them will never step foot in a Savage. Just like most never set foot in a Coil in 2.0

[vanitaslaughing]

Nidhogg did get Echo, as much as every Primal-tier Trial - iirc Nabriales and SoF don't have Echo.

SoF got nerfed because it gated an entire expansion behind it. That's it. I cleared the darn trial on release day, after 3 hours of constant wiping, I was crushing my Dualshock and grinding my teeth while my sister on the other couch had her hands curled into fists during the clear. To this day my heart rate increases when Vishap gets to the last part of the bridge and the music changes, but that might just be me. It was brutal. I had some DF dude chew me out for being geared like a (back then) casual, they straight up pointed at me after I messed up a mechanic I didn't know (it was release day, the patch had been live for what, 2 hours?, and I wasn't the only one mucking about because the mechs were unknown to most of us and Mr Dreadwyrm DRG didn't explain). They declared me a scourge on this game and that I shouldn't come back until I had beaten and farmed FCoB, so I would be properly geared. I was in perfectly casual-style gear, a full WoD left side other than the body, mostly Ironworks accessories and the body, and the upgraded soldiery bow. Around Ilevel 119, the minimum requirement for that trial was and still is 90. SoF NEEDED that nerf. Maybe not as intense as they eventually did, but it certainly needed downtuning (and admittedly, I still groan when I get it on trial roul).

Alexander is, by any means, side story content. You're not required to do the thing. You want to, but just keep in mind...It's release week. It literally is release week. I didn't get a party that cleared A1 (!) on DF long after release until the very night after which I needed to take a break for about a month becausemy sub ran out and I was overseas for a trip. Midas on release week, I dragged my feet because I'm not a fan of weekly tokens. Weekly caps are okay but tokens, ew. But anyway, eventually my friend lasso'd me and took me through most of it in one sitting. We wiped BILLIONS of times against the robo bros, and we nearly met hard enrage against Vortexer because three dragoons is all fun and games but the 4th dps was gone and we were all average on 200-205ish back then. It was hilarious, because no one yet fully knew what to do, so people died to inane stuff like Single Dril, Height Errors, or by standing too long in a mud puddle.

Creator just released. Of course people will die to inane things. I died because I forgot about hiding behind a meteor. I died because I got myself impaled on ice needles one too many times and got crushed by spiky balls at least four times before I realised when and where they would drop. I've died a dozen times due to getting stuck on something, or being way too slow (good old 'I can get this cast off before I gotta move!'). I've gotten completely compromised by nearly every attack, I've gotten tankbusted even. Astrologians don't make good tanks, spoiler alert. I've seen the same happen to other people, but people learn and you can really see that. It's fun to see groups improve and I'd never abandon a group that's making visible progress. Actually, I've onla abandoned twice in there out of the 7 times I've been in; once because someone got impatient and left, and the second time because we weren't meeting the DPS check, and it was 1am and I needed to be up early.

Good, all right, I'm not what you'd consider "casual" in this game. Hell, I've been in Midas Savage - as a melee DPS, mind, and never further than Vortexer. So while I'm used to healing dungeons and the like, I'm not completely used to healing in heavy damage environments. But see, that 1am abandoning run. Eventually the WHM I had been paired with flipped on Cleric Stance for the first and the adds phases. That was the ultimate compliment I could've received in there; they trusted me to keep the show going and they could squeeze out some more numbers for our low average.
Now, on the other hand, my friend who was new in there and can still be considered pretty casual; she was having a blast. She took her time learning everything, and she's been to a hard enrage now, so she theoretically knows the entire fight. After about 20 minutes.

That's not... hurling yourself against content for hours and hours on end. You just need to be patient. Patient, or have as stupid luck as my friend and WAR of choice; we downed that thing when its Enrage countdown was below 1. It was starting the animation for the Enrage Wipe, but it died. I screamed into Discord and clapped my hands so hard they went numb and then just started laughing loudly. That was the most fun I had in ages.
Literally everyone I talk to, from casual to hardcore, says the fights are fun. They don't need a nerf, or even too much fo an adjustment.

[HungryHippo]

Dont blame the story mode, blame the players.

[Werhusky]

All those cries for nerfs make me very sad. You want to know my reasons?
If they nerf the fight noone can experience it's original beauty anymore...
It happened to SoF that was turned into faceroll content from something that required some callouts ("snares up") - I beat it on day one with few friends in 3-4 pulls. We helped a lot people through afterwards and 50% of the df groups could beat it if people didn't rq after one pull. The only thing they should have changed imho is a way to wipe it faster.
The nerfs in T7 and A3S destroyed a lot of fun. Saying that you can consider me hardcore but my playstyle in progression is midcore at best. But I like a challenge here and there.
I can understand the nerf on SoF as it is part of the story as they back then nerfed Mog HM, still they overdid there... that they nerf raidconent until it's dead shall be another topic.
Alex NM is a baby raid and that includes the word raid. So a bit of a challenge should be left shouldn't it?

[Thunda_Cat_SMASH]

Speaking as a casual non-raider, A12N is pretty easy really. It's honestly pretty easy to SwO or Deliv tank if you have a decent grasp of cooldown usage and rotations. About the only time I stay in tank stance is if I see the healers starting to fall behind.

[Fawkes]

I've cleared A12 at least 13 times now trying to get that darn shaft, and it hasn't been too difficult. The only problems are from people still learning the fight. Once everyone can dodge Sacrament and Gravitational Anomaly, or properly stack for things, it should be pretty easy.

Also keep in mind that everyone's ilvl is going to go up from new tome gear and gear from other Creator tiers, so it's basically already in the process of being nerfed by that.

[HyoMinPark]

Please don't nerf A12N. I like it how it is.

I do not raid. I am a super casual player (like I have done 2 of the HW EX primals--Ravana and Sophia--because I'm just too lazy to do the others atm, or I end up going on a crafting/gathering spree for 3-4 weeks rather than trying to clear EX primals). I did Gordias like once or twice all the way through, and really only focused on A1 and A2 back when I needed precision items for my anima. I found Creator to be not that difficult when I got my clears--went in on DRK and OT'd most of it, even though I had to MT A9 because my friend was having latency issues (he was MT on his PLD).

I have OT'd and MT'd A12N. It is not that difficult, and there was only one time I actually panicked and popped Living Dead, but that was more from the healer hard-cast raising the other healer, who had died to people stacking on him when they shouldn't have (prey marker). As long as you follow the mechanics (which I didn't find to be that hard, and they essentially just repeat themselves as the fight progresses), it's relatively simple. I am only ilvl 233, and only partially melded, and I welcomed Creator. I thought it was fun, and I look forward to tanking it again.

[ADVSS]

original sof was less a gear check and more a mechanics thing, i guess higher gear would help but thats where the difference in that fight and most others were at. It was a challenge but after a day or so i got it downed via pugging, same for nidhogg which is kind of a gear check and dps tight fight in some parts, a12 i feel like is good difficulty and 11 too i feel like theyre good on normal, i dont feel like theyre bad the mechanics are easuy so grasp after a few wipes. Then again i loved the relic from 2.0 where you had to get past old man tidus which also was tequired directly to unlock the raid, as a side quest, i would like more midcore approaches like this either as an optional gearing prog or something.