Dungeons need some spice!

[Eli85]

What "people"? This is the oldest excuse in book for any content creator.
Let's be honest. It is more demanding and time consuming to create "interesting" stuff and it doesn't sell nearly as well as new glams on Mogstation.

Look, I like many things about FFXIV, but normal dungeon design is incomparably weaker that what WoW or LotRO had 10+ years ago.

Friggin Scarlet Monastery in WoW or Barrow Downs in LoTRO had more challenge and atmosphere than the lifeless corridors of any FFXIV dungeon past lvl 50.
And those were very low level instances, no need to pull out heavyweights like BRD, Stratholme or some Mines of Moria dungeons.

It is one of the biggest weakspots of FFXIV (the other being atrocious MSQ cutscene direction/presentation in ARR).

Just going to pull this quote out to make my point.

In this game, whenever there is non-savage and non-ultimate content released and it's not faceroll easy, the nerf it complaints come out in droves. S-E has tried time and time again, in different ways and means, to infuse challenge into dungeons and ... a lot of people whined about the difficulty, and when they looked at the analytics of wipes vs clears, whelp, that's when the nerfs came in.

Look, I've been playing MMOs for a long time, and I personally loved LOTRO's dungeons. They were long, not easy, and unique. It was great. But we are in a very, very different era right now. There are so many players who, as surprising as this may seem, do not want challenge. At all. Players today would rather quit the game than overcome the challenge. Sad but true. It's the current gaming landscape that we're in.

[Liam_Harper]

Look, I've been playing MMOs for a long time, and I personally loved LOTRO's dungeons. They were long, not easy, and unique. It was great. But we are in a very, very different era right now. There are so many players who, as surprising as this may seem, do not want challenge. At all. Players today would rather quit the game than overcome the challenge. Sad but true. It's the current gaming landscape that we're in.

This is where we could do with the Mythic+ system from WoW, an optional pre-made harder version of current dungeons with multiple levels of scaling difficulty and additional challenges. Those were hugely popular during their Legion expansion. It also means the base Normal mode can be easy for those who just want story.

[Shurrikhan]

They tried - people said no they don't want it.

And, at least here, as many have said they did and want those more challenging dungeons back.

Which official poll unbeknownst to most are you consulting here?

[DrWho2010]

And, at least here, as many have said they did and want those more challenging dungeons back.

Which official poll unbeknownst to most are you consulting here?

There's always vocal minorities here on the forums for both sides of the argument. But all we have to look at is how the devs have planned things out over the course of the game. They can see from their own data how people want things from what the results look like. We only have ourselves as the playerbase to blame for how things have turned out.

[Rilifane]

There's always vocal minorities here on the forums for both sides of the argument. But all we have to look at is how the devs have planned things out over the course of the game. They can see from their own data how people want things from what the results look like. We only have ourselves as the playerbase to blame for how things have turned out.

It's true that devs have their data but don't assume they know everything just because of that. They are still humans and not perfectly objective machines. They have their own view of how things should be and that may not always be what the majority agrees with.
If they did, things like the signifcant drop in healer mains with ShB wouldn't have happened. It's not just a vocal minority in the forum, it was and still is plain as day because healer queue times have never been shorter and they are often the last slot to fill in PF. No matter the hour.

And it has been critizied ever since they first got rid of somewhat challenging dungeons that this game lacks content that is the middle ground between casual content and endgame content.
A system similiar to M+ from WoW would offer precisely that. And it has pretty insane longevity for much smaller design costs than e.g. a savage tier.
Besides, while the first level would likely barely be more difficult than current dungeon iterations and thus easy enough to pass for random DF groups it's only at higher levels that there is a signifcant risk involved and mistakes get more severly punished the higher you get.
But you don't expect to queue via DF for a M+ 10 dungeon and clear it by rolling your cat over your keyboard. It's a smooth increase in difficulty not some insane jump from faceroll to savage like difficulty you seem to assume.
You could queue for lower levels via DF and likely clear it without much trouble as they are supposed to be your starting point and will switch to PF and mini statics for high levels.

It's not mutually exclusive with our current dungeons.
As Liam said, dungeons don't have to be casual only. Raids have a normal mode, dungeons can get a "savage" mode.
It can offer alternative way of gearing up, it offers challenge outside of ex and beyond and the best part is that you can always decide how far you want to take it in terms of difficulty.

[Payadopa]

They tried - people said no they don't want it.

Honestly, at this point I'd say suck it up, people. lol Sorry.

To me it feels like people got so complacent the moment you change the status quo you'll get flack from the vocal minority anyway. The dumbing down since 5.0 has gotten out of hand. For dungeons that has been the case even longer. I personally don't like doing roulettes for that reason.

[Canadane]

Even the dungeons you mentioned, while good, aren't as interesting as they were back in 1.0.
They were challenging. They had multiple exits, optional bosses, speedrun rewards, gear worth bringing to endgame, you name it!

Dungeons have turned into less and less of a priority. With hunt trains, and various other methods of gaining tomestones you don't need to grind them out like we used to. On top of they we've gone from 3 dungeons a patch to maybe 1.
Honestly, nows a good a time than ever to make them more challenging content again. Sure they'd take up more time, and they probably won't reward us like they used to, but at least they could be engaging.

I realize it'll probably never happen. Cookie cutter dungeons are what we've had for years now and that probably won't change. All we can do is hope for a Baldesion Arsenal 2, it's the closest thing we've had.

[DrWho2010]

they've flat out stated they're not interested in making a mythic+ system in XIV. they're too worried about if the healer dies and there's no way to continue if it's made too harsh for just what's seen for dungeons as "casual" content.

[Liam_Harper]

they've flat out stated they're not interested in making a mythic+ system in XIV. they're too worried about if the healer dies and there's no way to continue if it's made too harsh for just what's seen for dungeons as "casual" content.

Which makes no sense. Just look at the healer forums, it's not a vocal minority there, we're all practically begging for something engaging to heal. I'd spend all day in there healing. It was never an issue in WoW, they have a formula that has been tested for them and proven to work and they just have to take it. But they stubbornly refuse. It's frustrating how little they understand healers this expansion.

Dungeons don't have to be casual only, in the same way casual raids have a Savage mode too.

They have no data because they haven't tried a Savage mode of dungeons separate from the roulette. People complained in the past because the hard dungeons were tied to MSQ or popped up when they queued for their daily tomes. What we're asking for is something separate, where the casual version is untouched.

[AncientCrystal]

Dungeons need to be more interesting, end of the story. No point in wasting all the resources in making the nice graphics in them and just turn them into 20min mob AoE burn fests.

Most "content creators" are just elitist douches who all they care (obsessed) about is endgame crap and wouldn't know good game design if it slapped them in the face.