Squadron Expanded?

[GeminiReed]

I can't believe the prototype is better designed than the complete product!

Trust AI is definitely superior to squadrons but they were intentionally detuned (no AoE) to make running instances with live humans more attractive.

[Allegor]

Add Hroth and Viera squadron members, please and thank you uwu

[Brightamethyst]

They're good enough for leveling at your own pace, and way faster/more efficient than trusts too.

Only sort of. There's a reason you can only use squadrons in specific dungeons. Trusts are hand crafted for each dungeon, which is why they can do mechanics and such. Squadrons are just generic NPCs. Some dungeons would be much harder, or even impossible with only the brain dead squadron AI. Can you imagine a squadron doing Qarn, or Cutter's Cry? How about the turtle boss in Stone Vigil hard? Even Brayflox is kind of terrible having to micromanage positioning on the last boss. Squadrons are great for the dungeons with no mechanics beyond "kill everything" but relatively few dungeons fall into that category.

[XabyTimberwolf]

This is where being a new player gets super confusing. You guys going on about squadrons and I have visions of buzzing the towers despite being denied a fly by and instead it's about some kinda AI thing....

[ReynTime]

Trust AI is definitely superior to squadrons but they were intentionally detuned (no AoE) to make running instances with live humans more attractive.

Trust AI stops doing absolutely anything to avoid AoEs and mechanics.
Squadron don't even need to dodge majority of the mechanics.

Trusts only have 1 glamour option, which isn't even great.
Squadron can glamour anything in your dresser.

Trusts take an eternity to kill trash and even with Y'shtola around they rarely AoE at all.
Squadron also don't aoe properly unless they're ACN, who contribute a lot more to AoEing trashes than any Trust, but not only kill faster by default but also let you configure their damage vs survivality output.

Trusts take no orders from you. You have to hope they don't let you take too much damage from the coming pack because "tank" sometimes reacts slowly. A certain trust is crazy about wasting LB.
Squadron will use LB, engage and disengage in advance/anytime you order them to. Also their LB increases the target's vulnerability for a short time afterwards.

Trusts can't be customized at all beyond the crappy 2 choices glamour, no matter how much you use them.
Squadron unlocks higher levels for their tactics so you can increase their resistance or damage even further.

The only things Trusts are efficient at:
-Help you learn boss mechanics... but it's only MSQ dungeons, which are the easiest duties of the game.
-Fanservice.
-Make dungeon design significantly more shallow.

[technole]

Squadrons also introduced an exploit with people taking their LB into other content, where people got banned. Alas that alone made squadrons OP. Squads came before trusts, and so they can likely take what they learned from trusts into the next upgrades for squadrons.

Nonetheless, you know we'll get more to do with the squadrons over time as they continue to increase GC ranking. I too would like the cap raised soon too because come 6.0, those yellow scripts are going to be even more worthless. You can stock up on yellow script manuals now at-least so leveling your own crafters/gathers to 90 will be less painful.

[Brightamethyst]

This is where being a new player gets super confusing. You guys going on about squadrons and I have visions of buzzing the towers despite being denied a fly by and instead it's about some kinda AI thing....

Once you get high enough rank with your grand company you can start recruiting NPCs into a squadron. You can send the squadron on missions, similar to retainers ventures, but you can also run dungeons using them as artificial party members.

[TaleraRistain]

Would anyone else have interest in the Gambit system making a return in XIV? I feel like it would really enhance the solo player experience

Yes. I loved that system in XII. People complained that it played the game for you, but all it really did was streamline random encounters and save your hands/wrists a bit on the harder fights that still required a lot of manual input. Plus they ignored the strategy required to figure out how to set things up to get that type of play experience. Most griping about that I later found out had just grabbed the "right" Gambit set-ups from some walkthrough, so of course you're going to feel like it's too easy and simplifying the game too much if you don't do any of that trial and error work.

They would have to give XIV a more intuitive interface, though. That was my one gripe with XII's system.

[ReynTime]

Yes. I loved that system in XII. People complained that it played the game for you, but all it really did was streamline random encounters and save your hands/wrists a bit on the harder fights that still required a lot of manual input. Plus they ignored the strategy required to figure out how to set things up to get that type of play experience. Most griping about that I later found out had just grabbed the "right" Gambit set-ups from some walkthrough, so of course you're going to feel like it's too easy and simplifying the game too much if you don't do any of that trial and error work.

They would have to give XIV a more intuitive interface, though. That was my one gripe with XII's system.

It did play every encounter for you, aside from some optional bosses. However it would be very welcome in XIV given playing as a non tank with Squadrons you can basically clear dungeons while only using the controller to move and DPS with Trusts is the same thing. I'd very much prefer a customizable AI as complete as the gambit.

[TaleraRistain]

It did play every encounter for you, aside from some optional bosses. However it would be very welcome in XIV given playing as a non tank with Squadrons you can basically clear dungeons while only using the controller to move and DPS with Trusts is the same thing. I'd very much prefer a customizable AI as complete as the gambit.

It did do the actions but people act like you just turned it on and off you went. You had to organize your Gambits in the right order under the right conditions. So it wasn't just like flip a switch and win. And there was strategy involved in figuring that out and trying out different combinations. I would welcome a system like that in XIV that had some flexibility and let me think outside the box.