People are already speedrunning Sohm Al (Hard)

[Zampp]

It's not a speedrun anymore. It's just how you do things. Sohm Al (hard) is very deliberately designed for you to be pulling to the wall every time. SE is not dumb. They know how people play dungeons now, and they design around it. So if you're not doing that, you're just bad. It's not elitism, it's literally you not playing the game as effectively as you're expected to.

The design is on purpose...But that does not mean its not shit design and really bad direction for the game to go.

[Callinon]

The design is on purpose...But that does not mean its not shit design and really bad direction for the game to go.

Why is that?

If your group can pull to the wall you pull to the wall. If they can't you don't, it's that simple. In the 3ish days the dungeon has been available I've done it both ways and it's been fine. I agree that a design encouraging people to pull the entire dungeon (like some of the early ARR HMs) doesn't feel great especially if your group can't manage that. But why isn't this a good compromise?

[SeriousxSarcasm]

Not gonna lie, I love speed runs (assuming the party can handle it lol), way more fun! There is nothing worse than a SMN getting stuck with small mobs, because 3 enemies, or 20, they'll all die at around the same speed. XD

Although I'm sad to hear you got kicked as a newbie. That's not ok. If rest of party isn't ok pulling big it's not a major hardship to slow it down.

[seekified]

It's not a speedrun anymore. It's just how you do things.

This. If you play an MMO for long enough, or do anything with repetitive tasks, really, eventually you'll end up wanting to do those things as efficiently as possible.

All jobs at 60 are capable of high AoE DPS. The tanks are capable of surviving 15 mobs hitting them, because the healers are capable of healing them through it while still finding time to DPS. Basically, dungeons are so easy that the only thing that limits how much we can pull are the gates imposed on us by the game's level designers. I'm not saying I don't enjoy dungeon runs (I do), but I don't want to spend longer than necessary in them because I could be doing other stuff that's actually challenging.

I don't think me pulling door-to-door is a speedrun, and I don't think it's a detriment to the experience of first-timers. They still get to see the dungeon and watch all the cutscenes, since SE realized they were being stupid with CM and Prae back in 2013.

[Vhailor]

This. If you play an MMO for long enough, or do anything with repetitive tasks, really, eventually you'll end up wanting to do those things as efficiently as possible.

All jobs at 60 are capable of high AoE DPS. The tanks are capable of surviving 15 mobs hitting them, because the healers are capable of healing them through it while still finding time to DPS. Basically, dungeons are so easy that the only thing that limits how much we can pull are the gates imposed on us by the game's level designers. I'm not saying I don't enjoy dungeon runs (I do), but I don't want to spend longer than necessary in them because I could be doing other stuff that's actually challenging.

I don't think me pulling door-to-door is a speedrun, and I don't think it's a detriment to the experience of first-timers. They still get to see the dungeon and watch all the cutscenes, since SE realized they were being stupid with CM and Prae back in 2013.

I agree with your point about people wanting to do things efficiently, but I couldn't disagree more with your last statement. Speed runs alter the dungeon experience, they don't provide as much of a learning experience, and they sort of suck the soul out of the dungeon, in my opinion at least.

There are two core design decisions here that have contributed to the rise of speed runs (and yes, those are a thing; saying it's just what you do is playing games with semantics).

1.) SE makes easy dungeons. If they don't start off that way, they eventually become that way as everyone becomes more powerful (i.e. the next version update). SE could easily change this if they wanted to; they could, for instance, make the iLevel cap stricter, so that over-gearing didn't break actual dungeon mechanics. They could also implement a tweak to specifically discourage the pulling of multiple groups; something like a 'damage multiplier' that triggers when multiple groups are pulled. Say, if two groups are engaged at once, they each do double damage; three groups engaged at once, everything does triple damage. Regardless, there are options, if SE ever wants to discourage speed-runs.

2.) SE designs dungeons with high levels of repetition in mind. Especially when dungeons are first released, people are running them several times a week. This results in boredom and a desire to finish the experience as quickly as possible. There are also plenty of alternatives here, if SE were ever inclined to revisit the issue.

So for anyone disliking speed-runs (and I count myself in that group), these are the two root causes to attack. It's pointless to ask for different DF options, or complain about speed-runners in general; speed-runs are a product of their environment.

[seekified]

It's pointless to ask for different DF options, or complain about speed-runners in general; speed-runs are a product of their environment.

On that, I completely agree. Essentially, people will find the optimal ways of doing everything in the game, to the extent that the game allows them to do so. It's why Diadem went to shit from optimal farming, it's why people farm A1S and finish their i270 relics in a couple of days, it's why everyone does the Wondrous Tails trials unsynced, and it's why we get door-to-door pulls in dungeons. The game allows them to do it, so they do it because they can.

I've been an advocate of harder dungeons for a long time, but it'd have to be an option, not something that is mandated for all new dungeons. If Hard Modes were actually hard and gave slightly better tome rewards but required higher iLvls, maybe that'd help. It's a tough problem to solve, and they'd have to be very careful with how they do it. To be fair, considering how limited their devtime already appears to be, I don't think much will change in the near term.

[kensatsu]

Faceroll content is faceroll content, players will speedruns them till the end.
Because there is not any special reason to not do it. Players is new to this dungeon ? Maybe you din't see how all dgn is the same ? pack of trash mobs/boss/pack of trash mobs/boss/ pack of trash mobs/boss and it's done. There is nothing special but linear and simple dungeon. at some point there is nothing to discovery exept background and background musics...

[Yonanja]

Speed runs alter the dungeon experience, they don't provide as much of a learning experience, and they sort of suck the soul out of the dungeon, in my opinion at least.

First, "learning experience" from normal trashmobs? In the latest lvl 60 dungeon? You've got to be joking, there's nothing new anyone could learn from fighting these mobs, be it 1 or 2 groups at a time.

Second, about that soul of the dungeon... these two dungeons are probably some of the worst designed dungeons I've seen in this game. One is a cave, with some waterpuddles and some lava, very original stuff... The other is a rampart with graphics and objects we've seen several times before.

Not even one of the bosses brought anything new to the table. So unless these are the among the first dungeons anyone does (which is impossible), there is really nothing that anyone could learn from these dungeons. They simply only exist for getting tomestones, and could just as well be replaced with an instanced room that you parked your char in for 15-20 minutes and got tomestones for doing so.

[Trine]

It's not a very challenging dungeon.

I think that if the party's up to snuff, we're level 60 ilvl 250 at LEAST... we should be speedrunning when possible.

[ExiaQuanta]

Well square did try to prevent mass pulls in some of the 2.3-2.5 dungeons via doors, keys and switches (and so people will pull up to those dungeon mechanics). But the community did not take kindly to that. Especially those that had mid-dungeon cutscenes (Praetorium and Castrum). So now we have dungeons that at most hav 2-3 doors/keys/switches/revealing path(s) and very very short cutscenes in dungeons. Or dungeons that play cutscenes upon exiting dungeons.