As a dungeon runner...

[Melichoir]

Those alternate designs don't work in practice when players are primarily entering as a random group formed through a Duty Finder roulette.

Why wouldnt it work? Are we assuming the player base is so inept they cant move through one corridor compared to another? Or that they cant complete jump puzzles? Or that objective based completion would be beyond them? Im not saying make the player scale mount everest, but rather they manage to walk up a short hill at the worst.

Most players simply want to get in and out as fast as possible with their tomestones and whatever loot they manage to get. They aren't interested in exploring or taking the path less efficient. They're going to abandon duty the moment they find they need to complete a jump puzzle to progress then complain loudly to SE that it was stupid to add in jump puzzles when people who like jump puzzles already have Leap of Faith and the sightseeing logs.

See, I disagree. I think the opposite is gonna end up being true. Players who were vocal about it being to hard are a minority and that the player base would honestly appreciate more complexity from their dungeons. Where dungeons are a thing you have fun doing, and not a chore you fill out on a checklist. This is the problem with things being casual. There is such a thing as being too casual, to easy, to simple, to straight forward. If there's no reason to explore, nothing worth seeing, nothing fun to do, why would I even bother going over to those side routes. Way dungeons are designed now, they're just time sinks that if it were not for the daily tomestones, most people would ever bother with them simply because they are not fun to play.

Since loot is useless from dungeons, its more important to get Tomestones, and alternate paths just offer you pure trash, why would anyone spend any time in that dungeon. They turned it into a speed run by minimizing player interest, which I dont believe is what players overall wanted. Trash your own attraction, and then wonder why people dont bother visiting it.

Creating such dungeons as you suggest ends up a waste of developer time and resources when so few players end up fully utilizing them.

I know that this is the point some people would go "but Savage and Ultimate!". Those are mostly reused assets with a few graphics tweaks and new mechanics added in, something that takes relatively little time to accomplish compared to creating a complex dungeon from scratch.

Most hard modes in of earlier dungeons were just reused assets. And since they were cranking out two dungeons per patch and dialing it back to one, it leaves us to wonder what exactly are they doing with that extra time? So if its a time constraint that's worth while, that seems a bit odd since they should have more time now unless theyre using that time to create F/M Hrothgar/Viera. As for 'content' for players, since the broad bulk fo hte player base doesnt do savage, wouldnt it make more sense to dump time and complexity into content most players have access too. What good is grinding out tomestones in a boring dungeon if you never plan on doing savage. Even if the gear is better than what you have, most players arent so stupid that they cant see it's pointless if they can clear current dungeons without issue by being I lvl 440.

People keep saying "Give me more to do" but then we keep saying "Nah, more complex dungeons and things, no one will want that?" That seems stupid. I used to remember people cleared all of Brayflox in ARR for exp and items. They dont do it anymore cause all would be rewards are useless, and if the only incentive is "You want to kill more monsters just cause", of course people are just gonna make a straight line to the end. Why wouldnt they?

[Granyala]

See, I disagree. I think the opposite is gonna end up being true.

No, it won't
World of Warcraft tried non linear dungeons with optional bosses in multiple expansions and the result was always the same: group drama. Some want them, some are already sick to death of grinding said dungeon for currency and don't want them... flame, diss, tanks refusing to pull, group drops, abandoned runs... you name it.

It just didn't work.

Why? Beacuse exploring is a one time thing. We farm (are made to farm) dungeons for 6 months almost on a daily basis. After 3 months, no one wants to "explore" and "take their time". They want to get it over with and move on.

I wish they could just add mythic dungeon style content to FFXIV, we need harder small form content anwyays.

Bleargh.
Stupid against the clock zergfests are not things I miss from that game.
I like the concept of mobs hitting harder / getting cool abilities but the whole speed rush thing is such a turn off.

Give me brutal dungeons with the slow, tactical approach... and a guild to run them with.

[Awha]

Bleargh.
Stupid against the clock zergfests are not things I miss from that game.
I like the concept of mobs hitting harder / getting cool abilities but the whole speed rush thing is such a turn off.

Give me brutal dungeons with the slow, tactical approach... and a guild to run them with.

They do not have to make the speed run aspect a primary part of it, granted that is the aspect I enjoyed most, even if they did not tie anything in regards to finishing it quickly I would still try to speed clear it. I just wish we had harder small form content idc what form it takes be it deep dungeons, mythic dunegons, or simply ultimate difficulty dungeons that vomits mechanics at you.

[Granyala]

Teven if they did not tie anything in regards to finishing it quickly I would still try to speed clear it.

Sure but I can do that w/o a clock pressuring me.
I'm allergic to timed stuff in any game, it's a personal thing. It just completely nukes any enjoyment for me.

[Awha]

Sure but I can do that w/o a clock pressuring me.
I'm allergic to timed stuff in any game, it's a personal thing. It just completely nukes any enjoyment for me.

Understandable I could live without the in game timer, I could always just time myself or even use fflogs if people wanted to make an outside leaderboard.

[Silverquick]

Bleargh.
Stupid against the clock zergfests are not things I miss from that game.
I like the concept of mobs hitting harder / getting cool abilities but the whole speed rush thing is such a turn off.

Give me brutal dungeons with the slow, tactical approach... and a guild to run them with.

They can't go back to the old 3 mob spreads anymore, they just don't work anymore in the context of the story.

Back in ARR and Heavensward they fit. You're still a fairly new adventurer and still human by most standards... But by the time you get to Stormblood the powers and abilities you wield are just god like. And now you're an extra dimensional traveler in Shadowbringers... and far too strong to have 3 minions being some kind of threat the way they were when you were still a newbie adventurer in ARR.

It's like it was in AD&D once you got past 12th level. And later in 3rd Edition level 20. You weren't some weak normal adventurer slaying goblins and orcs anymore... you were traversing the Planes of existence and fighting demons, devils, and demi gods.

That's where this game is now.

You quite literally would need to be facing an Army of Minions going into these dungeons just like you did in NWN Online.

That's why these dungeons make no sense anymore even though they do when you are lower level.

So it literally needs to be mass mob spam.

Sure there are other things you can throw in there. But in the context of how powerful the Warrior of Light as become over the expansions... and people and their characters in general... well it really has to be that way now, and the power level of the characters themselves shows it in their abilities and how over the top they really are these days.

I mean when I started in ARR, as Arcanist way back when you really were just a weak starting adventurer. Heck I felt pretty god like at the end of Heavensward due to the Dreadwyrm Trance.

Then along came the Stormblood expansion and they tried to shoe horn it back into the old newbie days when it just didn't fit anymore.

You really just have to be running something on the level of Castle Never now or it doesn't make sense in the context of the story anymore.

[linay]

They can't go back to the old 3 mob spreads anymore, they just don't work anymore in the context of the story.

Back in ARR and Heavensward they fit. You're still a fairly new adventurer and still human by most standards... But by the time you get to Stormblood the powers and abilities you wield are just god like. And now you're an extra dimensional traveler in Shadowbringers... and far too strong to have 3 minions being some kind of threat the way they were when you were still a newbie adventurer in ARR.

It's like it was in AD&D once you got past 12th level. And later in 3rd Edition level 20. You weren't some weak normal adventurer slaying goblins and orcs anymore... you were traversing the Planes of existence and fighting demons, devils, and demi gods.

That's where this game is now.

You quite literally would need to be facing an Army of Minions going into these dungeons just like you did in NWN Online.

That's why these dungeons make no sense anymore even though they do when you are lower level.

So it literally needs to be mass mob spam.

Sure there are other things you can throw in there. But in the context of how powerful the Warrior of Light as become over the expansions... and people and their characters in general... well it really has to be that way now, and the power level of the characters themselves shows it in their abilities and how over the top they really are these days.

I mean when I started in ARR, as Arcanist way back when you really were just a weak starting adventurer. Heck I felt pretty god like at the end of Heavensward due to the Dreadwyrm Trance.

Then along came the Stormblood expansion and they tried to shoe horn it back into the old newbie days when it just didn't fit anymore.

You really just have to be running something on the level of Castle Never now or it doesn't make sense in the context of the story anymore.

The number of enemies have nothing to do with your power in the story. You go to a dungeon and kill whatever gets in your way. If you want, you can think that the rest ran away after seeing you kill their friends.

[Silverquick]

The number of enemies have nothing to do with your power in the story. You go to a dungeon and kill whatever gets in your way. If you want, you can think that the rest ran away after seeing you kill their friends.

You are trying to tell me that after fighting near god like beings, you can come back down and get beat up by a couple of ogres.

No man, its the same thing as it was in Dungeons and Dragons. There's a point to where you have to accept that the only way normal monsters will be able to beat you is if there's a ton of them... and then only maybe.

You can either be Human... or super human... you cannot be both and expect it to be believable.

Ironically this is also why the standard 8 man raids/trials don't make sense anymore because they just poof you to the end boss without ever having to fight his legions. At least in the old Alexander raids, they tried to simulate this somewhat in the run up which made it feel like you were traversing a long running metal hulk to get there and one of the Boss fights is actually just hordes of minions attacking you.

But the bottom line is... you are not human anymore, you passed that back in ending days of Heavensward.

[linay]

You are trying to tell me that after fighting near god like beings, you can come back down and get beat up by a couple of ogres.

You don't get beat up by a couple of ogres. The story has never had you fail a dungeon yet.

None of what you said has any relevance to the story.

[Silverquick]

You don't get beat up by a couple of ogres. The story has never had you fail a dungeon yet.

None of what you said has any relevance to the story.

Not the point I was making.

I said... in order to provide a realistic scenario that fits the context of how powerful the characters really are at this point you are going to need the mass mob spam.

I know you WANT it to be otherwise, but the latest Dungeon really shows why it is not and cannot be.

Its a joke and why it failed to really grab anyone even though the coolness factor is there.

The characters are just too powerful for that kind of thing anymore. And ramping up the power of the Trash mobs only makes them just another boss mob fight and not very credulous.

In the other prior dungeons not only are the trash mobs a threat due to numbers... but they are a believable threat too.