Put back Extreme trial on raid finder again...please

[Vidu]

You seem to be pretty informed on the game and I would really like to know why the primals started going with these raid heavy mechanics instead of just more individual effort fights. Before sep there was nothing I recalled that required nearly as much coordination before it with the tethers and the towers or the blue puddle. And I would say sep is def not harder than say even ramuh extreme which yea had its dps checks but wasnt something you had to have voice chat for.

Even if certain mechanics are more an individual effort there were mechanics way before Seph Ex that required the whole party to pay attention - and if one person messed up, it could mean a wipe.

Garuda EX - Kill spiny to early - the whole raid is dead. One person (or even one Egi, always lovely) was enough to mess that up. (Also: stack in the bubble to avoid damage - not so different from stacking to share damage, right?)
Titan EX - people used to bait the puddles, specially the doppel-ones in the last phase. Proper stacking and simutaionsly dodging was required to dodge them.
Ifrit EX - Nails were killed in a specific order, to make sure that they all died while no one was to close to the healer that had this bomb-thing. Theter out two people together, who had to stay clsoe to each other. Ifrit charges required the whole group - except the one bomb-healer, careful! - to move together.
King Mog EX - aaaah, beautiful! No one kills a moggle early, please! Watch out - is there someone else attacking the moggle your chewing on? Is someone interrupting that BLM - or do you risk it to give it a slap and eventually mess it up for everyone? Also: Did you make sure that there was at least one dps close to the paladin, to avoid both healers getting confused? (That mechanic targets the three people closest to the paladin and puts this moggle-confuse on them - one will hopefully be the tank tanking the paladin, the two others shouldnt be both healers...)
Leviathan EX - Whos getting the shield-thingie? Is everyone attacking the adds? And who the hell is pushing Levi down when he really shouldnt take anymore damage?! (Granted, this one most likely requires not a lot of effort when it comes to coordination)
Ramuh EX - KING of coordination! Do tanks need orbs? Should the party clear them? Is it safe to break the theter - or do we have to let tanks them first because thats more important? Is someone getting the charmed people? Did both of them made it to A or not? (And why is that dragoon standing next to me? Aaaaaah, ramuh will kil... ah, yeah, dragoon dead, cool)
Shiva EX - Stack behind her to share sword, dont stack for staff and ice puddles. Everyone make sure they got their safespot for that. Stack behind her to bait avalanche, BUT! make sure you move out of that if you dont have the blue mark!

For HW-primals...

I cant really think about mechanics like that for Bismarck and Ravana - Bismarck because it probably has non and Ravana, because its been ages since I've done the fight properly... and I dont have it down as much as the ARR-primals. However:

Thordan EX - Get your towers! Stack infront of the healer! Stack with the marker - on the tank, please, but dont stack when you have the other marker! Granted, they said they overdid it with Thordan...

...I can go through the other HW-primals, if you like? But let me tell you this: All fights are pretty scripted. You can learn them by heart and if everyone knows whats happening, no team coordination is required, because everyone know what they have to do and where they have to be at any given time. Stacking in Sephirot? Easly an individual effort - you just have to know where you have to stand. Can one person mess that up easly for the whole group and wipe them? Sure - but that was already the case with the very first EX-primal, Garuda. Now, that everyone is either doing ARR-primals unsyched or way overgeared you dont see a lot of mechanics anymore. No surprise that it seems that there are non and that those primals never required coordination - when they did, infact. A year from now, the towers and stacking in Seph wont matter anymore either. Healers will be able to heal through the damage and he will be dead before the blue puddles even have a chance to mess with you.
Primals are simply not a solo-challenge. If you want a solo-challenge playing an MMO is probably a bad idea.

I do not recall such a stacking mechanic in arr anywhere, and you may not need a voice chat for sophia but it is punishing if the stacking mechanics arent done properly. In sep if one person screws up tethers its pretty much a reset, in zurvan if one person screws up soar or two then its a done deal. I dont see this anywhere in the other primals , there are things you have to do in shiva extreme like spreading etc but three people could die and you can still recover. Leviathan there is no such group activity at all, not even in titan extreme its all on individual effort, but when you put in mechanics where one person can ruin the whole run you will get many parties with the no bonus or dont join us mentality.

You dont recall those mechanics because you didnt do those fights when they were current content, as you have stated a few times in threads regarding this issue. Today you can recover from three dead people in Shiva EX - but did you know that she has an enragetimer? Actually, she has two - adds have to die fast enough and she gets stacks of her damage up buff (goes up to 16, at 12 you're pretty much fucked - and even if you consider Shiva attractive you dont want that...). To mayn people die - thats about it for the raid.
I've seen Zurvan parties recover from people dying to soar or messing up theters. Two people messing up theters is nasty, but you can still clear the fight.

[bswpayton]

Even if certain mechanics are more an individual effort there were mechanics way before Seph Ex that required the whole party to pay attention - and if one person messed up, it could mean a wipe.

Ill give you some of those trials with maybe ramuh being the most team focused , but the others had very few one mistake everythings over mechanics. I have seen lots of people kill spiny but its still not as bad as the towers in sep, nor the stacks in sophia and def not soar. But I get both sides I understand where people who farm dont want others in their party I totally get it because some people can perfectly do these trails so with such tight mechanics sometimes you cant afford to have someone in your group who makes a mistake. But at this point the content is basicly two months from going unsync and everyone will deem the content is dead so I see no reason why at this point its not ok with op for them to be in df.

Let people who want to get their clears before unsync have them, with the ability to buy birds with totems it will be far more easy to get the birds in hw as opposed to the still rng base horses in Arr primals. So the op really doesnt have an argument there I think a two month window last chance for sync clears is pretty fair. But to the others complaining here I have to say Vidu you were right people join learning groups very fast Ive seen it with almost everyone of mine. The thing I worry about is closing that gap how do you go from learning, to farming I dont know that answer and settle with my clear alone, but I think think thats the bigger question. Because most people will join a learning party from what Ive seen , I just wish it was a way to make it more anonymous I think thats another thing that people like about df , who wants to plaster their name on their whole data center every time they wana do some content.

[Sida]

So, you two are arguing about two different use scenarios. Rongways suggestion of visible duty completion in DF has been, since beginning, for full parties only. This clearly includes first forming the said full party, most propably through PF. In this use scenario, it is reasonable to say that the RF doesn't add anything else to the table.

However, the use scenario Dzian is going after is one where solo player can queue into random party finder with the comfort of knowing they get into a party of those who have completed it. This approach would skip the forming of the farm party outside of the finder. In that use case scenario the suggested feature to DF would not give any results.

[Vaer]

Before RF, you couldn't queue for extremes in the DF unless you had a premade full party anyway when the EX trial just came out. They only allowed solo queueing a couple months later. So it being in the RF was somewhat of an improvement for solo queuers, maybe they kept some of them in there too long though.

3.1 (Thordan): The quests "The Limitless Blue (Extreme)" and "Thok ast Thok (Extreme)" have been adjusted as follows:
Players may now queue solo via the Duty Finder. (Ravana, Bis)

3.2(Sephirot): Players can queue solo for The Minstrel's Ballad: Thordan's Reign via the Duty Finder.

3.3(Nidhogg): Players may now queue solo for Containment Bay S1T7 (Extreme) via the Duty Finder. (Sephirot)

3.4(Sophia): RF (Sophia EX), Thordan+ moved.

Starting with Sophia EX in RF, you could queue as solo as soon as patch day. Before that the policy they settled on was they wouldn't even add a solo queue until they added echo.

[seekified]

I don't see what the problem is here. People who can farm trials don't want to play with people who haven't cleared the trial. I think that's fair - it'd mean potentially wasting seven other people's time because one person has questionable skill or knowledge of the fight in question.

On the other hand, PF learning parties definitely work, and they don't just magically disappear from existence a few hours after a fight is released. It was only recently that I cleared Thordan EX and Zurvan EX, but the learning and clear parties that I created filled up within minutes.

Long-term, I would like to see a merge of the RF functionality into DF so that everything is in one place. There are so many people wondering how to even queue for the things that used to be in the RF because they don't know it exists.

[Feidam]

I think another issue here is the attitude that new players just want a free easy clear. Which is a blanket generalization that is of course true for some but not others. I find it interesting that folks are telling the players with no clears to go to the party finder because of "X" then get all flustered when the that is said to them. The simple fact is both sides want smoother easier access to the content. The problem as it is now is those with the clear have the easier access whether or not they are skilled players. Meanwhile, those without the clear are struggling to find groups to clear. There has to be middle ground somewhere but this community has become so against the bonus unless they happen to be farming said resource. I'd wager most new players who want to do the primals and raids want to do so to enjoy the content. They might be more casual but that does not equate to them being less skillful.

[Rongway]

I don't see what the problem is here. People who can farm trials don't want to play with people who haven't cleared the trial. I think that's fair - it'd mean potentially wasting seven other people's time because one person has questionable skill or knowledge of the fight in question.

...

Long-term, I would like to see a merge of the RF functionality into DF so that everything is in one place. There are so many people wondering how to even queue for the things that used to be in the RF because they don't know it exists.

Thank you, that's what I've been trying to express here. I'm not trying to change anyone's mind about social constructs or conventions. I don't care that farmers want to farm, and I'm not shaking a "shame on you" finger at anybody. None of that is relevant to anything I've said here.


What I am interested in is interfaces.

The Raid Finder is (1) a Duty Finder (2) with a "no new people" option. This is exactly what it is. The different phase settings for "have not completed yet" are not enforced, and so the only option that offers any guarantees is the "no new people" option.

party finder and premades are completely irrelevant at this point... the raid finder exists to help indiviuals not premade parties find players that fit there skills and abilities....

And yet, whenever someone starts a "put EX back in RF" thread, there are people who want this specifically so that they can use the "no new people" button when they queue with their premade farm party, to ensure that no new people can sneak in.


Any features of the raid finder that were novel or necessary at the time of its implementation have since been introduced in the form of a data center -wide party finder. The only feature that isn't available in the party finder is an enforced "no new people" option.


So, rather than having two entry interfaces -- a duty finder and a duty finder MkII with a "no new people" option -- and a party finder for forming premade parties, we should just consolidate all duty entrances into the duty finder. Then give the premade parties (a) the ability to self-enforce a "no new people" option by giving them a bonus indicator in party finder and/or (b) the option to have Party Finder enforce a "no new people" option for them.


How people want to spend their time is not in question. But we don't need three interfaces that do the work of two. Just remove the raid finder and move its "no new people" function to one of the other interfaces.

[Dzian]

So, rather than having two entry interfaces -- a duty finder and a duty finder MkII with a "no new people" option -- and a party finder for forming premade parties, we should just consolidate all duty entrances into the duty finder. Then give the premade parties (a) the ability to self-enforce a "no new people" option by giving them a bonus indicator in party finder and/or (b) the option to have Party Finder enforce a "no new people" option for them.


How people want to spend their time is not in question. But we don't need three interfaces that do the work of two. Just remove the raid finder and move its "no new people" function to one of the other interfaces.

What about people in NON PREMADE parties....

with the raid finder people could queue solo. they could queue as a part group 2-3 people if they wanted to or a full group.....? are you going to give players not in full parties the same options in duty finder that they have in the raid finder..

could be pretty bad if you did that to the duty finder cos might find a lot of people checking that option even for 24 man raids and daily roulettes....

[Vidu]

could be pretty bad if you did that to the duty finder cos might find a lot of people checking that option even for 24 man raids and daily roulettes....

They could just not make it an option for anything except Savage and EX-primals. Its really about the function, not the interface.

[Rongway]

What about people in NON PREMADE parties....

with the raid finder people could queue solo. they could queue as a part group 2-3 people if they wanted to or a full group.....? are you going to give players not in full parties the same options in duty finder that they have in the raid finder..

If you want to be picky about the people you play with, there's already an interface for that. It's the party finder. That people want to queue as an incomplete party is unimportant, because no matter what interface we use, it comes down to waiting for the party to fill. Functionally, there is no difference between waiting for a randomly matched party to fill and waiting for a party finder party to fill. It's all cross-world at this point, and using the party finder gives you the added benefit of deciding before the duty starts if you don't like any of the people in your party so you can drop party without whining about a 30 minute penalty. So "I want to be picky about the people I play with, but I don't want to form a full party" isn't a serious argument.

Whether or not people want to use the party finder in its present form is irrelevant. If it included the cleared-only option, there would be no compelling reason to use the raid finder anymore which would lead to more interest in using the party finder.

could be pretty bad if you did that to the duty finder cos might find a lot of people checking that option even for 24 man raids and daily roulettes....

This doesn't even apply to anything I said, because everything I've said about DF functionality has been about self-enforcement in a pre-made party, not applicable to roulettes or alliance raids.