Thread: Where's Patch 4.35

While it might be a valid enough reason, and it might have some sense to it, it's still also a bit of a cover for the excuse of spreading new content out over time to retain subs. Because obviously that's not a reason they're ever going to acknowledge. I'm not saying it's definitely been a consideration in their scheduling decisions. But color me surprised if it hasn't at least been one facet of the process.

Originally Posted by Hasrat

My guess is the logic is they've realized the whole "You don't have to play non stop, feel free to take breaks" strategy doesn't actually help them any. Dump new content all at once, everyone subs for a month to play and try it out, and then they're gone until the next patch. Trickle the patch content out and players may remain subbed throughout as they nibble on each new bit.

I understand that logic, to an extent, but it seems backwards to me when the content they're holding back is Deep Dungeon. Palace of the Dead seems to have been the dev team's greatest success in hooking the average player into consistent hours over the months. Whether it was trying to get a floor 200 clear or just spamming the early floors for exp, PotD was in constant use for months and months, and while it's finally died down, people still play it to this day.

It seems to me that if the goal is to get people to stay subbed longer, they'd be better off releasing Heaven on High sooner, rather than later. Delaying it just gives people a chance to drop their subs before they get hooked on the new Deep Dungeon.

To the point of sounding like a broken disk, if you expect SE to do something different from the current market of MMOs you are going to be disappointed

Originally Posted by Bourne_Endeavor

.5 patches have usually been five weeks after the initial main patch. That would put 4.35 at June 26th. I believe 4.25 was delayed an extra week, so it may be July 3rd.

Ultimately, I agree. There isn't nearly enough content to justify such a lengthily delay. If you're not doing Ultimate, you basically have nothing to do right now.

Nothing except achievement grinding or saying "Sod it, I'll be back next patch at the earliest," with the latter quite possibly not be seen again until late this expac or early the next... for about two or three weeks.

But yeah, five or six weeks after the main of the patch is about right. So we're getting Heaven on High on the 26th or 2nd, and then probably Pagos some point after that, be it right before or right after the Monster Hunter event begins. Then Moonfire Faire after that.

Originally Posted by Kurando

Well I thought there was enough content, players are catching up for Eureka (especially since the challenge log additions), Ridorana raid, taking part in the new ex trial and/or Ultima's Refrain, plus there was the added beast tribe quests as well. Ok for the hardcore FFXIV player it might not seem like a lot but for the casuals it's giving them chance to catch up and do quite a few things. I'm kinda dying for the the next Omega tier more than anything, but it'll come in time. Though Heaven On High isn't going to be your typical content release and no doubt it could potentially have a life quite similar to Palace of the Dead, so whether it comes now or later it seems to have longitivity potential.

Even at a gradual pace, the content released with 4.3 can easily be completed within less than a week. Eureka has been out for over three months now. I don't think it's unreasonable for people to complain they're essentially being told to wait an additional five weeks because they have to have more than an hour a day to play the game. I don't expect games to cater towards my very flexible schedule. I do expect stuff to keep my occupied for longer than a week. Granted, I have Ultimate. For the vast majority of players though, this isn't an option they are interested in.

Originally Posted by Beckett

I understand that logic, to an extent, but it seems backwards to me when the content they're holding back is Deep Dungeon. Palace of the Dead seems to have been the dev team's greatest success in hooking the average player into consistent hours over the months.

It won't be like that. PotD basically gave players a way to level 15-60 without having to play any of the other content. This mistake will now cost them because everyone who decided to use it to level all their DPS jobs that they otherwise had to wait 2 hours in a queue for to play, will not be doing this to level them to 70 because they already leveled them to 70. It may have taken the queue time down, but the consequences of that is that players don't play any of the other content. When I mention that the command missions actually are faster to level on, people are like "what are command missions?"

Deep Dungeon II will have an exceptionally short life span. There are achievements for PotD by getting all the weapons which meant that you had to play it over (15 jobs x 90 aetherpool levels = 1350) times assuming you got at least one gear level per 10 floors. That is an insane grind just for an achievement and a weapon that isn't BiS. HoH will not drive players to play it another 1350 times. Most players who grinded on PotD already have their jobs to 70, and thus if they're not after the achievements, it will hold no reason to play it after completing it once.

We see this with Eureka, it's painfully grindy, and the strategy that players decided on was not the intended way the developers wanted the content solved, so players managed to cheese the progression on it faster than intended. Don't expect a "train" for the next part of Eureka. It would be insane for the developers to not rectify this. I'd expect them to dial back the grind a notch so that solo fights aren't punishing and that drops are consistent. There should be no reason why a player playing that content doesn't get the crystal drops at all in 2 hours while the party train gets them every 10 seconds.

Originally Posted by Lambdafish

It was brought up in a recent interview (Mr Happys I think), where the dev team gave a direct response along the lines of your comment. Imagine if Tsukuyomi and Pagos were released at the same time with the same ilvl weapons, people would flock to one and leave the other as dead (or at the very least lesser of the two pieces of content), so spreading them out makes sense so that people feel the urge to do both.


Edit: It was actually the live letter Q+A. Mr Happys notes on it read as follows:

We have a deliberate reason why we release updates in a staggered fashion after major patches. They simply want to make sure players have enough time to consume content at a comfortable pace. To achieve this, we spread out the content releases so players can focus on each new pieces of content when it is released.

For example, if we release Eureka and the 4.3 Story Primal EX at the same time and they both reward weapons, people may choose to skip one or the other instead of enjoying both of these contents because they don’t have the time to do both or can just get the weapon from one without doing the other.

Correction, They want to make sure you keep subbing to the game even longer for the same amount of content. Cause if they release it all at once, people would sub for the patch month, complete all the content, then unsub till the next patch. This way, you are subbing constantly to experience the new content that they know will be stale by the end of the week its released.