So, how is Pagos?

[Zsolen]

You have plenty of other content to do, those of us do the relics from ARR to HW ones that want our SB ones have 0 option but do Eureka unlike last two which gave a lot of different content to do in order to complete each step of relic, even the books that people hate were do fates/dungeons & not just grind this single mob hope NM spawns.
If want any gear you've got Raids,Trials,Dungeons,24-mans,Vendors,Crafters.. if want my SB relic I got... .. Pagos.

I can say that once I finish my Pagos Relic "working step 2" I wont be goign back for any others like did with Anemos grinding more than one, Pagos is just tedious in game not design be this tedious.

I'm starting to think some people don't understand the point of relics. They aren't meant to take a short amount of time. Anemos was way too fast. Doing other content to get a relic is not working on a relic, unless it is content you would not otherwise do. If you want ilvl 370 weapons and not want to do Pagos, then run Lighthouse or raid. Suggestions are one thing, but don't try to avoid the grind and still get the relic by complaining to SE.

[InkstainedGwyn]

I'm starting to think some people don't understand the point of relics.

You've been asked several times where you got this supposed "fact" because you keep consistently trying to claim that the relic is supposed to be "a challenge" and no, it's not. The EX and savage weapons are the challenge, the relic is a casual-friendly way to get a decent weapon. You may feel like this is supposed to be some grand "test" to weed out the weak but that's - literally not it, it's supposed to be something you sink some time in here or there. The only people I know who are above 25 in Pagos are the people who spend upwards of 10 hours a day in there. (I'm sure someone's going to speak up and be an exception but I have no in-game proof of that.)

And yet again, I want to point out that whereas you were perfectly happy removing the method we found to be semi-enjoyable, none of us want to take away the ability to chain mobs (and, in fact, is viable still in Anemos, some folks were doing it last night). The fact that you can't find anybody else who wants to shows you just how many people enjoy it. What was that about there being a lot of people who like it?

I don't care how long the relic takes, I just want to not have to repeat the same 10 actions over and over again until my wrist breaks. That may be fun for you, but if I wanted that kind of tedium and repetition I'd clean my spare room or weed my garden. Those at least give me some level of satisfaction. All I want is variety and a way to enjoy myself; I stopped enjoying mindless slogs when video games advanced and improved to start including actual other elements and mechanics.

[Claviusnex]

You've been asked several times where you got this supposed "fact" because you keep consistently trying to claim that the relic is supposed to be "a challenge" and no, it's not. The EX and savage weapons are the challenge, the relic is a casual-friendly way to get a decent weapon. You may feel like this is supposed to be some grand "test" to weed out the weak but that's - literally not it, it's supposed to be something you sink some time in here or there. The only people I know who are above 25 in Pagos are the people who spend upwards of 10 hours a day in there. (I'm sure someone's going to speak up and be an exception but I have no in-game proof of that.)

- snip -

In fact it is the EX and Savage weapons that form the basis of SE's rationale for starting the Relic so late in the patch cycle. It is to allow the higher level players to have and maintain exclusivity of the best gear without being lowered in value by casual players who get similar gear levels via an easier path.

The grind is there not to make things appear harder, that is done with content, but to limit the rate at which people complete the goals. In Pagos the content itself isn't any harder and is likely easier than previous Relic dungeon/raid requirements. The problem is with the gating techniques. Chaining doesn't allow for breaks like you had with Anemos or previous Relic grinds. You can't even let the dog out or change the baby without breaking the chain and wasting the party's time. The spawning of NM's is also a gate however with Pagos they have become so rare you have to wonder if they are worth the reward. Another gate is the rewards that are used to entice people to keep playing. Rewards includes XP along with the tangible stuff like lock boxes, minions, etc. The drop rate is so low on any of it that people get tired of waiting for RNG they quit playing. All of these techniques are broken for all but the hardcore players who have lots of time to spend in Pagos.

Another problem is low levels have no catch up mechanism which has become an unintended gate whereas running instances allowed high level players to directly or indirectly help lower level players due to level sync. If you only have a few hours per week or 30 minutes here or there it is likely you will never be able to finish Pagos, This is due to no one to group with. Much like Anemos before the NM train Pagos is already showing signs of this but has no mechanism, no matter how inefficient, for low level players to compensate and catch up.

I think it would help if some of the players quit equating effort (grind) to challenge. Other than the risk of repetitive stress injuries Pagos is not that much of a challenge so fits the casual definition. The problem is the effort required far out weighs the benefit of the rewards and the gap becomes even wider over time for those that cannot dedicate a lot of time to Pagos.

[Vnolan]

Anemos was way too fast.

Probably it. Before Anemos, what was the last relic step that involved a somewhat lengthy grind?

The last step of the previous relic was running hard mode primals. The one before that was a light grind. What was the most efficient method of grinding light? Determining if A1S was on bonus, getting a party together and then proceeding to run it as many times as possible within that two-hour window. A1S had Faust (striking dummy) and The Oppressor. Because of the disparity in ilvls, the only mechanics Oppressor had were a line AoE and puddles that remained on the field. Practicing a rotation over and over, boring content, no chance to take a break without slowing progress. Sound familiar? This step only took about 7 hours, though.

Before the light step was cluster acquisition with a daily and weekly quest for clusters, eliminating any need to grind for tomes unless you wanted the weapon immediately.

However, before the cluster step was the umbrite/crystal sand step. This required a maximum of 24,000 tomes for umbrite, with no alternative to get the umbrite. What was the efficient method for farming umbrite? Aetherochemical Research Facility until the sight of it made you sick. Each run took around 20 minutes. This step involved a lengthy grind, but it was released In June 2016 - over two years ago.

I feel you’ve yet to adequately explain why mashing out a rotation on trash for hours is enjoyable.

The relic requires a grind, but it can't include any difficult (requiring skill, not time) content or it would lock out players. That severely limits options. Which part of 800 Alex runs or waiting on FATEs to spawn for beast tribes or doing FATEs (the majority of which are grinding mobs) over and over for crystals or farming the same dungeons for tomes, light or item drops was enjoyable? Any answer is going to include the ability to do other things while grinding and not the content itself.

Chaining/killing mobs in Pagos is braindead content. Chaining/killing mobs in Anemos (fuel for the train) was and is braindead content. Asking for braindead content to be replaced with braindead content when the only difference between the two is that one allows for more afking shows that it's not the quality of the content people really care about.

Same dance, different year:
you guys went overboard with this new relic

Agreed, I was looking forward to doing this but when I saw the last step, it was enough to tempt me into unsubbing. Just, no. Not enough content to actually give a care about, and this sort of struggle for something that will be outdated soon enough? I haven't even cleared Thordan EX because no one can get past tethered knights and I'd rather be doing that than this.

instead to give us grind, can't they work on true content that are really interesting outside raid for the endgame?

You people white knighting it realize by the time you are done it is next patch cycle first relic to do this, and its not even something to do its cramming mindless grind that serves no purpose but over glorified glamour at this point

"We don't really care about the game anymore, as seen in previous patches, and we have no intentions to make new things for you to play with that are fun or exciting, so just shut up and grind."

And then everyone did, and told people who thought maybe the devs should put a liiiitle more effort into this to go do something else or quit instead. And then they sat in their queues wondering why they were so long and why there wasn't anyone left playing the game with them.

Grind is one thing. Making it soul crushingly boring and rehashing old content that's already expired is not the way to keep people interested and motivated. I also like having a goal to work towards, but at a certain point it's not just 'well this is boring but at least some parts of it are fun' and more 'why should I keep shoving broken glass under my finger nails when I could stare at a wall or watch paint dry instead.'

Basically, I was ready to put my guns on and get myself dat crit scholar book until I saw that last step. I am perfectly fine with grinding out fates and fighting drop rates and the RNG god. But the last step is just SE torturing us because they can.

I don't know how anybody can defend these methods when SE could easily give us ways that are at least some what entertaining. Nobody is asking for things to be handed to them.

We just want them to stop catering to the lowest common denomjnator.

It's a RELIC WEAPON. It should be obtained by completing feats of strength. Slaying epic monsters. Completing an epic quest. Exploring me elands.

Not killing endless a mounts of low level trash

THIS IS WHY WE PLAY RPG GAMES

[Nixxe]

Asking for braindead content to be replaced with braindead content when the only difference between the two is that one allows for more afking shows that it's not the quality of the content people really care about.

That's not the only difference between the two though. The other differences have been discussed at length in this very thread.

[Fawkes]

Probably it. Before Anemos, what was the last relic step that involved a somewhat lengthy grind?

The last step of the previous relic was running hard mode primals. The one before that was a light grind. What was the most efficient method of grinding light? Determining if A1S was on bonus, getting a party together and then proceeding to run it as many times as possible within that two-hour window. A1S had Faust (striking dummy) and The Oppressor. Because of the disparity in ilvls, the only mechanics Oppressor had were a line AoE and puddles that remained on the field. Practicing a rotation over and over, boring content, no chance to take a break without slowing progress. Sound familiar? This step only took about 7 hours, though.

Before the light step was cluster acquisition with a daily and weekly quest for clusters, eliminating any need to grind for tomes unless you wanted the weapon immediately.

However, before the cluster step was the umbrite/crystal sand step. This required a maximum of 24,000 tomes for umbrite, with no alternative to get the umbrite. What was the efficient method for farming umbrite? Aetherochemical Research Facility until the sight of it made you sick. Each run took around 20 minutes. This step involved a lengthy grind, but it was released In June 2016 - over two years ago.

While those were the most common ways, when I did those I did not run A1S a single time, and maybe ran ARF once. You had the option to grind the same thing over and over like a maniac, but you could also do plenty of other things. And maybe people spamming A1S with a static couldn't take a break, but I could stop whenever I wanted and do everything at my own pace.

[InkstainedGwyn]

While those were the most common ways, when I did those I did not run A1S a single time, and maybe ran ARF once. You had the option to grind the same thing over and over like a maniac, but you could also do plenty of other things. And maybe people spamming A1S with a static couldn't take a break, but I could stop whenever I wanted and do everything at my own pace.

Same. I've solely farmed light in PVP and dungeons, which I took at my own pace, did when I wanted, and which didn't require people to be at the same step of the relic I was on - and if they weren't the same level I was, got sync'd down to meet me (or vice versa).

[Rokke]

Probably it. Before Anemos, what was the last relic step that involved a somewhat lengthy grind?
...
The relic requires a grind, but it can't include any difficult (requiring skill, not time) content or it would lock out players. That severely limits options. Which part of 800 Alex runs or waiting on FATEs to spawn for beast tribes or doing FATEs (the majority of which are grinding mobs) over and over for crystals or farming the same dungeons for tomes, light or item drops was enjoyable? Any answer is going to include the ability to do other things while grinding and not the content itself.

You didn't need to spam A1S for 7 hours, didn't need to run ARF till you were sick of it. Being able to pick your poison and deal with your choice on your own time made the grind bearable- Not enjoyable, per say, but bearable. The grind was as bad as you made it with the options you used to progress.

Chaining/killing mobs in Pagos is braindead content. Chaining/killing mobs in Anemos (fuel for the train) was and is braindead content. Asking for braindead content to be replaced with braindead content when the only difference between the two is that one allows for more afking shows that it's not the quality of the content people really care about.

The issue with Eureka is that regardless of train or chain the only way to progress is to kill large amounts of X to spawn a bigger X and then go back to killing large amounts of X. Even amongst all the NMs I've fought they're all essentially the exact same fate (kill the big X) with some monster mechanics swapped out. Leves, hamlet defense, hunts, wandering bosses, beast tribes, escort missions, maps, optional quests - theres so many things that could have been alternative means to earning progress in Eureka. The chain could have stayed the "best" way of earning exp/crystals for the people who wanted to throw themselves at it for efficiency's sake and others could have done whatever they fancied and progressed at their own pace. It didn't need to be one monotonous braindead slog.

[Vnolan]

Leves, hamlet defense, hunts, wandering bosses, beast tribes, escort missions, maps, optional quests

All valid requests, but they're being overshadowed by "give me back the train".

[InkstainedGwyn]

All valid requests, but they're being overshadowed by "give me back the train".

Because everybody is well aware that SE isn't going to redesign anything. We'll be lucky if there's any extra changes made at all. The train is the easiest thing they can do that will at least make it bearable.

If we're talking an ideal situation, yeah. I'd love to have the whole thing expanded, exploration reasons added, variety, optional quests, etc. I've just looked at SE's track record and decided to ask for the bare minimum.