Why can't Dungeons be longer/harder, but more... piecework?

[Shurrikhan]

So, hear me out. As much as most anyone else, I want to be done with my tome-grinding for the week in, well, as little time as it takes now, and I like having content that I can do in under 30 minutes.

But... that greatly restricts what opportunities we have to make our dungeons entertaining for most players if we have to keep them easy and short enough for even the lowest-skilled players to almost always complete in... under 30 minutes.

I'd therefore like to open up what can be done with modern dungeon designs, as to be appealing to more than just a relatively small portion of the casual end of players, without losing the ability to experience them in bite-sized chunks. So here's the spitball idea:

Future dungeons, where likely to take a party of average skill, gear, and seriousness greatly more time to complete than dungeons thus far, may instead meet the requirement for a daily bonus roulette off a single wing (effectively, a boss) of a dungeon. Tome-rewarding weekly challenge logs may request these dungeon's completion, but never will you be required to undertake such lengthy content day-to-day.

Moreover, these dungeons will be scaled to your party size and role allotments (at least as base difficulty, if ever we add on harder reiterative modes), which can vary from 2 to 6 (allowing up to 4 DPS, 3 tanks, and 3 healers, though obviously not all at once). This is largely to allow for continued progress after more time-constrained (or irritable) players leave and to somewhat aid queue times. Finally, tomes (or Key Items, such as the readable books in Gobul Library or notes in Dusk Vigil, which would be automatically converted into tomes upon exit) are now dropped from the trash and bosses themselves, including first-timer bonuses; apart from the weekly challenge logs and perhaps some certain Relic paths among others or the like later on, there are no bonuses for full completion.

That's all. The idea is simply that we could, in the future, start to pull dungeons out of the stale rut they're in now, but still enjoy them as bite-sized content insofar as they affect day-to-day gameplay. Players can take on the content as a 60- to 90-minute run, or just take it a wing at a time.

Assume whatever applications of Echo, or boss prep via farming mobs that drop useful Key Items, or whatever else allows for time to be exchanged for ease so most players can finish the content eventually, but not easily. Think of it being somewhere between pre-nerf Amdapor Keep and pre-nerf Pharos Sirius, but with more ways to break through the hard walls to progress.

[Shurrikhan]

Edit:

While we're at it, if anyone has any fun ideas they'd like to see to augment or even fundamentally reshape the flow of dungeons as useful for midcore-ish content without being necessarily reiterative (for the most part, let's save that for the extent threads promoting something like a less bloated/pressured Mythic+), feel free to post them.

If we end up getting some fun ideas, and this thread somehow expands beyond a page, I'll quote them here for easy viewing and linking.


CONTENTS OF THE THREAD SO FAR:

1. Theoretical discussion on reward models and their impact on how players spend their time, be it in a way that better engages with or overly narrows the variety of content we may typically do.
2. Narrowing the above discussion to dungeons in particular, both insofar as what level of experimentation is desirable and what would be feasible.
3. General and specific gameplay loops people would like to see from more experimental dungeons.
4. Feasibility of more challenging and experimental content in general.
5. Complexities of appealing to the playerbase and of player perception/reception in general.
6. To what extent must the playerbase improve by broadening their views, taking more responsibility, and to an extent conforming to whatever expectations increase variety of playstyles that can be appealed to (such as by becoming more competent, so you can engage with more of the game) before we can really see further variety in content (especially midcore difficulty or a raised difficulty floor for everyone)?

KEY QUOTES:

Give me dungeons that aren't a purely linear ordeal and I'll bother doing them again. The old cliche SE gave us when they started streamlining dungeons back in ARR was "Nobody did the optional stuff", to which I rebut; Of course they didn't, you put literally nothing worth doing behind those optional sections. Naturally players aren't going to bother with a side passage to obtain some worthless gear that's never even relevant, or worse something incredibly lame like an X-potion... A NQ X-potion...Bring back dungeons with optional side paths, puzzles, heck maybe even throw in some optional mini-bosses? Then simply slap worthwhile rewards behind them. Tie them into things like Relic quests, rather than just "Clear this dungeon" as an objective, you can make "Clear this optional boss/puzzle/whatever in this dungeon" as an objective.

[Mansion]

That's all. The idea is simply that we could, in the future, start to pull dungeons out of the stale rut they're in now, but still enjoy them as bite-sized content insofar as they affect day-to-day gameplay. Players can take on the content as a 60- to 90-minute run, or just take it a wing at a time.

(bold mine)
For me, that's the problem preventing dungeons to be anything more than a tome-grinding instance. I think the devs want to keep them as straightforward as possible so that they would not be a chore to grind everyday. Now, we have less of them but they tend to look better (Swallow Compass, The Burn, Ghimlyt are great examples of dungeons doing a bit more on the immersion side). But immersion ends up conflicting with daily roulettes.

So if I'm being a bit creative, I would either keep the current pattern (5 leveling dungeons, and perhaps one level cap dungeon per patch or one every two patches). And then, we could have different dungeons that could be some kind of "mid-core" content, say something in between normal raids and EXT primals for instance? This could provide another "catch up" range of level cap gear for more casual players. And of course, this would be the occasion to re-think the dungeon concept, layout, utility and so on. I like your idea to break the traditional Light Party for instance.
Baldesion is a good example of how things could be worked around. Having one big instance that needs several sub groups to progress at the same time in different places... Writing this I realize that this is more "raid" than what we call Raids in FFXIV...

The only thing is that... well you have to consider gameplay there. Looking back at Eureka for instance, this content tried to change gameplay a bit but job kits simply did not match that idea. I'm not sure obnoxious amounts of tougher trash mobs would be interesting when AoE rotations for most jobs are bland and not engaging. Or focused GCD healing on a tank in a middle of a pack.
FFXIV needs something changed somehow somewhere to get out of its comfort zone IMO.

[Nalien]

While we're at it, if anyone has any fun ideas they'd like to see to augment or even fundamentally reshape the flow of dungeons as useful for midcore-ish, but not necessarily reiterative (for the most part, let's save that for the Mythic-like threads), content, feel free to post them.

Give me dungeons that aren't a purely linear ordeal and I'll bother doing them again. The old cliche SE gave us when they started streamlining dungeons back in ARR was "Nobody did the optional stuff", to which I rebut; Of course they didn't, you put literally nothing worth doing behind those optional sections. Naturally players aren't going to bother with a side passage to obtain some worthless gear that's never even relevant, or worse something incredibly lame like an X-potion... A NQ X-potion...

Bring back dungeons with optional side paths, puzzles, heck maybe even throw in some optional mini-bosses? Then simply slap worthwhile rewards behind them. Tie them into things like Relic quests, rather than just "Clear this dungeon" as an objective, you can make "Clear this optional boss/puzzle/whatever in this dungeon" as an objective. Slap some new Treasure Map style content into dungeons, so a person can get the party some additional rewards for a quick detour. Get creative with it, rather than just copy/pasting literally the same layout of trash to boss every. single. dungeon. Just something to break up the monotony of these linear snorefests. Average Duty Finder group not going to do that stuff? Honestly I don't care. That's not an argument against adding something, IMHO. The average Duty Finder Black Mage exclusively uses Ice spells, should we remove Fire spells based on that?

Heck, with something like puzzles you don't even need a party... Just extend the amount of time we can remain in a dungeon after clearing. Everyone who hates fun can then leave, and the rest of us can stay and go clear the puzzles for additional rewards. Something like how the Nier Raid handled its content perhaps? Just with a bit more meat to it. So you run through the dungeon, clear it, then you get to explore it afterwards, with additional challenges/rewards/lore/whatever behind that.

[Rufalus]

I'm going to spitball some dungeon ideas.

> You're chased by a demonwall or some kind of boss the entire run. Various adds along the way. Doesn't have 3 boss structure.

> Vehicle sections in a dungeon like the magitek armor in praetorium. Could involve flight or underwater travel, such as mounting a submersible and firing torpedoes at obstacles.

> Dungeon where the floor collapses and you dodge things during the fall, like the byakko skydive fight.

> You set minimum item level, the tome and gil reward is increased. Gives a reason to do harder instead of faster.

Btw the Expert roulette could be reserved for dungeons that are actually harder than normal difficulty. For dungeons that are just new, they could go straight into a lv80 roulette. Make expert mean expert.

[Gula]

The reason we can't have a lot of innovative things is because,
1. Path of least resistance. This was explained with a dungeon that had multiple paths for multiple rewards and people went in the straight line to the finish.
2. Accessibility. People will complain if story or rewards are locked behind a wall they can't overcome. See Neo ExDeath. Yes it is supposed to be hard, but the fact remained that there was extra story behind it, and people were not happy.

I, personally, would like to see something like Eureka or Diadem, but not grindy or a one shot kill fest. A dungeon zone, but survivable. Give me open world chests, NPCs to find, sights to see and lore to be learned. I unsynced Coils just to see what the hubbub was about and I had that kind of feeling. This massive place with multiple paths, things to see and lore to be learned.

Then I got to Twintania and that was the end of that wonder.

[Nandrolone]

The reason we can't have a lot of innovative things is because,
1. Path of least resistance. This was explained with a dungeon that had multiple paths for multiple rewards and people went in the straight line to the finish.
2. Accessibility. People will complain if story or rewards are locked behind a wall they can't overcome. See Neo ExDeath. Yes it is supposed to be hard, but the fact remained that there was extra story behind it, and people were not happy.

I, personally, would like to see something like Eureka or Diadem, but not grindy or a one shot kill fest. A dungeon zone, but survivable. Give me open world chests, NPCs to find, sights to see and lore to be learned. I unsynced Coils just to see what the hubbub was about and I had that kind of feeling. This massive place with multiple paths, things to see and lore to be learned.

Then I got to Twintania and that was the end of that wonder.

I’ve always wondered this. The FFXIV community seems to complain a lot when content is locked behind grindy effort or something that requires a lot of time and energy. But other communities ive seen, they don’t seem to complain as much. I’m not trying to start any fighting, I just never really understood why that was.

[Omymy]

Well, when the game becomes more of a Tinder fused with The Sims than an MMO you get this.

[Tsalmaveth]

The 'community' has a 'set way of doing things' and wooooe-be-it-to-you if you dare to deviate from that. You mass pull, you burn it down, and if you don't do that you are bad and deserve to be kicked. You waste everyone's time otherwise. Git gud.

The 'community' doesn't want new things that require straight shot 'pull it all and burn' because that isn't fast-efficient-rewards-out that is the 'way it is'. Winding dungeons that you explore with side content and extra 'goodies aren't desired or wanted and will be complained about. Vets don't even let sprouts get full map completion on maps these days from what I have seen. When they tried something new like Eureka the backlash was immediate. The complaining was at an all-time-high, at least in this part of the forum.

Gaming has shifted a lot over the years and exploration dungeon-crawling is not as popular as fast-play instant gratification. Fast-paced gaming quick-play seems to be what everyone 'expects' and pushes everyone else to do, whether they want it or not. Don't get me wrong, personally I would absolutely LOVE to see longer more involved dungeons again... with time spent in them with purpose and story and exploration again. But being stuck in there with people who talk like a lot of PUGs do to each other? Not sure it is worth it.

[Lastelli]

The 'community' has a 'set way of doing things' and wooooe-be-it-to-you if you dare to deviate from that. You mass pull, you burn it down, and if you don't do that you are bad and deserve to be kicked. You waste everyone's time otherwise. Git gud.

The 'community' doesn't want new things that require straight shot 'pull it all and burn' because that isn't fast-efficient-rewards-out that is the 'way it is'. Winding dungeons that you explore with side content and extra 'goodies aren't desired or wanted and will be complained about. Vets don't even let sprouts get full map completion on maps these days from what I have seen. When they tried something new like Eureka the backlash was immediate. The complaining was at an all-time-high, at least in this part of the forum.

Gaming has shifted a lot over the years and exploration dungeon-crawling is not as popular as fast-play instant gratification. Fast-paced gaming quick-play seems to be what everyone 'expects' and pushes everyone else to do, whether they want it or not. Don't get me wrong, personally I would absolutely LOVE to see longer more involved dungeons again... with time spent in them with purpose and story and exploration again. But being stuck in there with people who talk like a lot of PUGs do to each other? Not sure it is worth it.

1. Players will do the optional stuff it the reward is worth it. The reason why nobody bothered with the optional sections of arr dungeons was because whatever could be obtained there was junk, plain and simple.

2. "New" does not equate "good". The first 2 Eureka zones were just bad content, that's why people complained (while giving a lot of suggestions to improve the formula). Pyros and Hydatos were much better, but at that point a good chunk of the community had already given up.

There are a lot of things they could do to make dungeons more interesting. One thing I'd love to see is optional zones where you can spawn optional (hard) bosses by meeting some conditions that reward you extra tomestones/gil/rare materials/rare minions. Of course, the reward must be proportionate to the time and effort required to kill it. 5 minutes boss=50 weekly capped tomestones + other random goodies.

What the devs should definitely avoid is creating a new kind of content that resets your level and requires you to mindlessly kill mobs with no mechanics until you reach a predetermined level. This is no longer acceptable and is just a worrisome lack of creativity on their part.