So, how is Pyros?

[Tsumdere]

So, after doing my Pyros dues, I wrote up quite a few thoughts about it. Overall, Pyros felt good those first few days. I am not sure if it was just Stockholm Syndrome from Pagos or what, but I was genuinely enjoying myself while leveling. However, once you hit max level, the ever familiar Eureka feel hits you right in the face and breaks your nose in the process. I have separated my thoughts into the spoilers below since they are long, and I hope they are coherent enough to read.

Edit : Apologies for strange formatting. Forums hate me today.


The Good

1. Leveling
Compared to Pagos, Pyros’ leveling is so much smoother and better designed. There was nothing more defeating and unengaging than chaining for hours and hours in Pagos and your exp bar barely moves. On the flipside, the exp flows freely everywhere in Pyros and it feels good. I was getting half a million from 0x chained sprites while doing Lamebrix spawn. The NMs give millions and make that bar jump up.

2. Layout
With multiple paths and fewer cliffs, Pyros is much easier to navigate even with increased mob density and choke points. Choke points now consist of a few regular mobs that you can outlevel rather than dragons - the only truly annoying choke point now being the Pyros Hawks right outside of the North Bunny fate.
Aetherytes are in much better places and levels than Pagos as well.

3. Logos System
With a ton of fun and useful abilities, the Logos system has made chaining easier and soloing much more viable. There is a plethora of useful abilities and I would wager is the only place in the game where there is no defined BiS build.
For example, I actually run Raise/Regen on BLM as I spend a good portion of my Pyros time solo spawning the oft forgotten NMs such as Aetolus and Iris. Spirit Dart and
Skirmisher end up being useless for me because BLM nukes them regardless, but the Regen makes it so I do not have to stop killing to wait for health to come back. It has
been working splendidly for me and I can only imagine some of the other builds people have been using to supplement their preferred way of going about Pyros.

Keeping up chains is a joke now with damage buffs out the butt and fun spells like Death solving sticky situations in a split second.

Logos System needs to be put into Pagos and Anemos… now.

The Bad

1. Bunnies
Happy Bunnies are riding this very fine line between fun and annoying. I personally enjoy getting a bunny and finding treasure, especially once you hit max level and nothing bothers you in the southern side of the map. It is the only thing in Eureka that is slightly different than the rest. However…

North Bunnies are far more annoying than South Bunnies. Both have the same item pool, making doing North Bunnies a threat with no real reward. At max level, doing South Bunnies has no threat of death at all with the same rewards as North Bunnies that want to take you into the worst enemies possible. My proposal for this issue is that certain bunny treasure points in the north half of the map guarantee gold.

Not to mention that only 20 or so people actually get the bunny when finishing the fate. Buff the damn bunnies.

2. Lamebrix, Ying-Yang, Skoll... oh my!
NM drops are a good idea in concept. I absolutely support farming certain NMs for certain rare items, the problem comes in when you will literally never see the item. Only
one (or two) people get the drop per instance, and it is not locked so theoretically the same person can get the drop every single time.

That being said, the drops are for a completely optional and honestly borderline useless (at the moment) feature, so that is why this is not so egregious. You can also dish out the gil on the MB for them, so if RNG does not favor you, you have a chance.

For me, it would have been much better if it worked via token system. I know, item bloat is a thing in this game (but if they moved currencies to the currency tab… :thinking. Have the drops be rare, and require like… 10-20 tokens (one per kill) guarantee a trade of the rare item with one of the useless NPCs in base. Or, do like Hakutaku and have a crafted Eureka item guarantee the drop (assuming they would add gathering/crafting/better bunnies).

3. Weather
Again, another good thing in concept. Certain events and monsters being tied to weather is fun and encourages pre-planning and adventure. However, when there is sometimes 6-8 real time hours until you can even attempt to see something, that is when it is NOT fun. Combine that with being unable to zone back into the same instance you were just in, makes for an unhappy instance and unhappy players when you get a situation where certain NMs and certain goals are a literal impossibility for the day.

Another ‘meh’ point, because it clearly works for certain NMs such as Flauros and Askalaphos. These NMs never have problems spawning, where certain ones like Dux and PENNY will take literal hundreds of mobs and still not spawn.

The Ugly

1. Penthesilea Spawn
The above point leads straight into this.

Fix. Penthesilea. Spawn.

This has happened more than once where we pre-prep nearly 200 mobs for double heat waves (because the next heat waves after were 8 hours away )))) ), and she did not spawn. We had nearly the entire instance killing moths, and she took the entirety of two heat waves to spawn.

This was ONLY possible because we were in a nice enough instance to play the Penny game, but if it had been some of the instance I was in earlier, where they could only scrape together 8-16 people, she would have never spawned.

2. Mounts
This is an all of Eureka problem, but is applicable to Pyros too. Why does my wolf forget how to run in Eureka? Flying, I can pass off but… running? Removing mounts is literally just there to be tedious. It’s not fun or engaging, especially when it is obvious that it is one of the things they did to make it “more dangerous”. It’s not more dangerous, it’s just slower. The only thing that I am in danger of when I’m mountless is falling asleep as I auto-run across the map.

3. Awful Story
It sucks. There really isn’t much to say about this.

Many players were curious about the Isle of Val and the fall of the Students of Baldesion, and Eureka is that story, but it’s bad. Really bad. Possibly the worst side story in the game imo. It’s so bad and uneventful, that it could be removed and even hard lore junkies would barely blink an eye.

3. Logos Farming
This could have been an okay feature if the logos dropped from anything other than sprites. Is there a reason that an item we need in abundance are so rare and only come from certain mobs at certain times at certain levels?
It is absolutely ridiculous that once you are max level, you have to either delevel 8 times or Grafficane cheese to farm mitigative because the other lvl 53 fire sprites only drop conceptual.
It’s absolutely ridiculous that you have to compete… for THREE max level spawn points
across a possible 144 people, especially when people can solo sprites with Reflect now.

Logos should drop from normal mobs as well. Fire aspected enemies dropping Offensive, Water dropping Curative, etc etc. Even if they limited those drops to less than sprites or weather locked like sprites, it would open up a lot of farming spots and put less reliance on bunny golds.

In the end, I suppose this sprite issue could be somewhat solved with a...

4. ELEMENTAL. LEVEL. SYNC.
Why is this not a thing!?

I have spent hours being a flash bot for my friend as she does her challenge logs since she cannot play with me in normal parties and she does not have so much time to sit on the train.

This is an incredibly basic thing that should have been there from day one. The tech is there, we know it is because it is used in FATES and dungeons all the time. The only reason it isn’t is because of the sheer incompetence of seeing what the player base
needs or stubbornness (or both).

5. Lack of Level Cap Weeklies
Challenge logs are useless once you are max level. At least have them give a little light or crystals of the instance you are in once you are 50.

6. Useless Mobs and NMs
Amarok and Lamashtu.
Eye of Horus and Arch Angra Mainyu.
Finally, Glaukopis and (sorta) Lumber Jack.

What do all of these NMs have in common? They are useless.

There are hundreds of mobs in every version of Eureka that are just there. They have absolutely no use and aren’t even in the way sometimes. The NMs especially, have those aforementioned outliers that are just too high level to be a good use of people’s time (if they are farming crystals) and have no drops associated. Eureka in general has this trend of shoving a ton of mobs and NMs into the zone with only a handful ever being useful. They have squandered the opportunity to give NMs different spawn requirements, the relic more depth, and max level spawn parties more
incentive to spread out and spawn and kill EVERYTHING.

How cool would it be if there was gathering in Eureka and Lumber Jack spawned via chopping down trees? He would be spawned just by process of people doing their gathering there. What if Lamashtu spawned from people dying anywhere in the map?

7. Still Too Much Mob Grinding, Not Enough Variety
Daily quests, gathering, and crafting. I think almost everyone can agree that these things would be a boon to Eureka and ease the annoyance of the only goal of Eureka being mass murder.

Imagine having Eureka unique materials you can gather, using them to craft logos or materials for relic weapons, and being able to sell or trade with people. It adds another path for players to earn their relic. Imagine having daily quests from the many NPCs in base that give a little bit more lore and substance to the island while giving you a handful of crystals or light. Don’t feel like chaining? Grab the daily quest and travel to certain spots on the map and use /lookout for like 10 crystals or a quarter of a bar of light. It would definitely be a pittance of light or crystals to someone who chains or actively spawns NMs, but it’s an alternative to those who just cannot (or don’t want to) spend a lot of time in Eureka that day.

[ThysGuy]

I was still one of those poor souls stuck in Pagos when Pyros released. I had gotten just one level into the relic before I stopped playing. Not just eureka, but all of final fantasy 14. That's how bad Pagos was to me. Spent my time playing other single player RPG games in my stead. When I heard they had sped up the process in Pagos, I figured I'd give it another shot to move into pyros.

Not so fast forward to earlier today, when I finally get my Pagos weapon maxed and step into pyros.......and there's not enough level 37ish( I actually gained two extra levels just finishing Pagos) people to make even a light party. I spent almost an hour of my 3 hour time in the instance shouting for a group while trying to kill mobs just outside camp, and was met mostly by entitled level 50s saying either solo or GTFO. Eureka has done nothing positive to the community. If anything, it has made it ever more spiteful and hateful of others, who dare ask for a little help from strangers, that they should sacrifice THIER time and effort for the little guys who have just gotten started.

This is the worst relic questline the game has ever had! It's worse then the diadem ever was! And is NOTHING like what FF 11 was at the end. It's missed every mark it's gone for, and has worsened the community as a whole. I sincerely hope that the team behind this content is proud of how they've poisoned the community and killed our kindness to each other. Living breathing kefkas on staff behind eureka.