So, anyone notice the dungeons are too easy now?

[Teirdalin]

Feels like all the old bosses and dungeons, and even MQ Dungeons like Ultima, and hard trials are just a breeze now with no real difficulty, and the phases go by way too fast.

[DrWho2010]

that's what happens with old content and power creep.

you want a challenge? run everything at minimum ilvl.

[Eclipse12187]

Most dungeons have a “minimum ilvl” needed to join the content, a lot of content does not have a maximum ilvl though. Stuff like hard modes, EX, raids, alliance raids, and savage do not have an upper limit on the ilvl you can have when entering, except when gates by your level. So stuff like level 50 dungeons/raids/etc have an upper ilvl cap of i135 as that was what the final raid tier had before level cap increased, 275 for heavensward, 405 for stormblood and 535 for shadowbringers. Compounded on top of that is that if your gear vastly out scales whatever the content you’re running is, IE wearing 530 gear in a raid with 135 cap at sync, your gears substats will actually be maxed for that contents ilvl instead of having a higher and a lower substat. Assume a piece of 130 gear has 100 crit and 80 det natively, a piece of gear from 530 synced down will have 100 crit and 100 det because of how high the native stats are.

Offhand the only content that has an ilvl sync tends to be leveling content via actual level sync and old expert roulette dungeons when they fall out of the queue, you can look at level 80 dungeons as an example because every one except the final 2 have an ilvl sync on them.

So yes, content tuned for ilvl 40 will be easily steamrolled when you are synced to ilvl 135.

[Shurrikhan]

Yes, given potency inflation over the years, the maximum sync item level should probably be reduced. That or our effective maximum potency-per-minute at a given level ought to be reeled back in to better match what it once was, and Shadowbringers content slightly retuned, where necessary, in turn.

As for newer content, that depends on whether the wails from a dungeon's minimum clear time being a bit higher drown out the long-term good sense of framing the game less around a lowest common denominator that only drops further with each attempt to reduce difficulty to meet it.

[ReynTime]

It's not an ilvl issue. "Expert" dungeons are currently also so easy it's dull.

[Eclipse12187]

It's not an ilvl issue. "Expert" dungeons are currently also so easy it's dull.

Then run it at minimum ilvl, the only time expert roulettes ever have some semblance of difficulty is at the start of an expansion prior to raids releasing where people really inflate their item level. Running say.. The Twinning with a mix of your 430 artifact gear and 418 accessories (and a 412 ring because uniques!) is much more difficult than running it at its sync of ilvl 450.

[Mavrias]

Then run it at minimum ilvl, the only time expert roulettes ever have some semblance of difficulty is at the start of an expansion prior to raids releasing where people really inflate their item level. Running say.. The Twinning with a mix of your 430 artifact gear and 418 accessories (and a 412 ring because uniques!) is much more difficult than running it at its sync of ilvl 450.

No. It wasn't.

[Anhra]

running on min ilvl barely makes any differences at all. The only way to actually have a challenging experience on Dungeons, is to limit yourself even further (like, running without healer/tank or tossing away job crystals) and even then, its just like changing skyrim difficulty from easy to normal.

24 Man Raids however, are good fun on min ilvl, especially the ARR and HW ones, provided you got the People for it.

I wish Squeenix would stop listening to all the babies crying for QoL changes in regards to Housing/Endgame content/having more Races and finally improve the Gameplay aspects of the game, such as Dungeons, Jobs and PvP which are clearly outdated, no matter how much you sugarcoat them.

[Olinara]

I'm not arguing, just offering a different perspective.

As a newer player (I started around ShB launch), I think it's at least as much about easier / more familiar boss mechanics. Lower level dungeons assume less experienced players. The difficulty ramps up around level 40, and builds.

As the game has evolved, more mechanics have been added. Then they add mechanics where doing what you usually do will cause a wipe. Avoidance times are shorter at higher levels. There are some AoE attacks that are almost impossible to avoid if you aren't already where you need to be when they happen.

Leveling content and endgame content from each expansion deliberately adds new mechanics as it progresses that will appear later. You can see it clearly if you run the dungeons and raids in the order they were added.

I raced to 80 and hit raids and trials and thought "HOW TF WAS I SUPPOSED TO AVOID THAT?" I spent lots of time floor-tanking.

Later I unlocked content I had raced past, did the fights, and realized "OOOHHH, the thing that keeps killing me, it's from *RAID I SKIPPED* from HW." It was easy to see in the first fight where it appears. It's harder to see when it's one of 4 mechanics from 4 fights.

The level 70 and 80 content has more difficult boss mechanics. A more experienced player base needs new things to be challenged. I like that, and it's part of why I'm here.

Making lower level content harder will frustrate new players. So personally, I like the difficulty progression. It will help me get my friends to start with and stick with the game.