The Sad State of Dungeons

[Jirah]

I can't help but agree with you but I don't really see how you can make them more appealing. Fact is these are 95% thrash pulls with a few AoE to break up your positioning from time to time. Just a chore to get through and get to the actual content that is the story, trials and stuff.

Having extra hazards on the course just makes it annoying. Aurum Vale is kinda an exemple. If there's more chance to wipe then you spend more time in the dungeon and then you don't want to run that dungeon again unless you are forced to.

This is a common and god awful attitude in the community, dungeons are nothing more than tome grinds these days and we need to rethink their role in the game. I still run a few oldies cuz they are fun I can’t name a single one on 80s that I want to run again besides research to gauge how trivial they’ve become. End of the day is they aren’t fun or mechanically interesting and it should be a massive wake up call that most dungeons Min-ilvl’d are 110% more fun than all of the 80s dungeons, I’ve even enjoyed sastasha abit more due to their fluid nature and lack of Gates

[Aurida]

I know I'd really like if dungeons occasionally took a break from being three sets of two mob pulls and a greatsword fight in a shower stall, but I don't know how they'd meaningfully change the paradigm up other than just giving you stuff to stun/silence (like the Twinning) or by actually creating variations on boss mechanics so the fights aren't the same every time.

Castrum Lacus Litore's Adrammalech did that in a way that was pretty engaging, but I guess it's probably tough to come up with variations on that that are meaningfully different but still fit the framework of a fight.

I guess the other part of the equation is... are dungeons where we should focus that kind of creative effort or difficulty tuning? They're basically set in stone as giving you some breaks to spam AoE and chew scenery in between bite-sized boss affairs and for the purpose of both leveling dungeons and level-cap expert roulette dungeons it's a formula that works if you just want the EXP or the 90 tomestones a day for 15-20 minutes of work.

I'd just as soon get some other form of content that fills the niche of 'entertaining light/full party challenge stuff' without having to radically shake up what you might expect from a dungeon after basically 80 levels of the same

[Jirah]

I guess the other part of the equation is... are dungeons where we should focus that kind of creative effort or difficulty tuning? They're basically set in stone as giving you some breaks to spam AoE and chew scenery in between bite-sized boss affairs and for the purpose of both leveling dungeons and level-cap expert roulette dungeons it's a formula that works if you just want the EXP or the 90 tomestones a day for 15-20 minutes of work.

I'd just as soon get some other form of content that fills the niche of 'entertaining light/full party challenge stuff' without having to radically shake up what you might expect from a dungeon after basically 80 levels of the same

Radically?

My suggestions aren’t to redesign them, half the examples I made were from previous dungeons. Again I don’t want 4-man savage or even to rethink the approach.

Dungeons are worth the effort in my eyes, we have had the fewest in any expansion ever in SHB, most content in the game aside from this is platform trials. besides 24 man, dungeons is the only explorative content we got in SHB. And believe it or not a lot of effort was put in the mob design, music, and aesthetic and visuals of the dungeons so it’s not so much “is it worth the effort?” But rather “wasted potential” or “waste of creativity” it’s not rocket science to make trash mobs thought provoking or bosses to be fun. They’ve don’t it before but as our kits get larger dungeons get dummer

[Aurida]

My suggestions aren’t to redesign them, half the examples I made were from previous dungeons. Again I don’t want 4-man savage or even to rethink the approach.

Well yeah I don't think it's a bad idea to include stuff like that, basically the only real things you have to pay attention to in this entire expac is like, what, silencing the fuaths in Dohn Mheg and the centaurs in the Twinning, then Mt. Gulg and Pagl'than had walls you could kill? There's maybe one or two instances of things shooting at you while you're killing trash in Amaurot and Matoya's Relict but that's genuinely about it.

I think the only time you really had to pay attention and prioritize a mob was actually Amaurot with the bombs for DPS and the dark elemental for healers too?

All of those things are concepts I'm not opposed to seeing more of, but at the same time if they're gonna change anything I'd hope it's not just that every mob pack gets one extra mechanic for one person to do, you know?

[Jirah]

All of those things are concepts I'm not opposed to seeing more of, but at the same time if they're gonna change anything I'd hope it's not just that every mob pack gets one extra mechanic for one person to do, you know?

The alternative being the trash mobs do nothing but tickle the tank and stress the healer while the dps spam a few buttons? Which sums up most of 80s runs. And half the time those stuns and interrupts aren’t as vital as banish III or final sting so they are ignorable which makes you wonder what’s the point having any at all if it’s a non-issue? Some twisted facade of cooperation and contribution?

Sure “stun it or die” isn’t complex but surely a balance can be made to have DPS have some responsibility. Pagl’than 2nd boss for example would’ve made a fun trash pull instead idea or how Puppets bunker last room had lasers and balls flying at you as you headed to the final boss. The reason why I detest SHB dungeon design is the toothless approach and lack of cooperation and achievement or lack of interesting situation granted by dungeons unique design. Having one person do one mech isn’t exactly what I seek, but party cooperation and contribution to dangerous situations. Not W2W and spam a rotation

[Jirah]

I recently thought about that as well, modern dungeons are very much streamlined, there are no items you need to pick up or different paths to take to open a gate or anything, only the bosses got a few more mechanics.

If you think Aurum Vale is a bad dungeon, i think the opposite, while the toxic green yellowish tone is realy off-putting, it is one of the very few dungeons with an "open" area where you have a choice how to aproach it.

Aurum Vale is a fantastic dungeon pre coincounter nerf (seriously?) biggest drawbacks is it’s lv49 and their isn’t a music theme and some mechanical recycle. Sure a helluva lot more fun than majority of 80s

[NobleWinter]

Can we make the last boss in Keeper of the Lake an entire dungeon? The one dungeon run that makes me the saddest is when we ride on the back of Bismarck at the beginning and get forced to fight one weak mob at a time with full level 80 kits and its like animated training dummies. The mobs get smaller and smaller too. First its three, then two, then a final giant jellyfish and each enemy does one tiny easily avoidable aoe with an insanely long cast bar. It feels like an absolute joke. I was excited to queue as a healer the first time and had nothing to heal and only one damage button to spam. I have never been so disappointed by a dungeon. That underwater travel segment made me wanna quit playing altogether. Thankfully you can pull wall to wall afterward for mild amusement but I never wanna go there ever again as a healer. At least tanks can stun the single aoe every 60 seconds and dps have kits that are entertaining in a vaccum. The storytelling is so rich in the dungeons in Shadowbringers but the fights are so easy it makes you doubt the credibility of Ascians being so powerful if 4 fragmented adventures can drunk and high their way to a treasure chest at the end with ease.

[catofsnake]

I will always agree with a dungeon revamp post. My hot take is that Haukke Manor, just conceptually and for the potential it has, is the best dungeon in this game. If you actually do a full runthrough of that instance, there's actually a lot of side rooms and just empty space that could have been used for some cute things like, I don't know, lighting various lanterns around the entire dungeon to unlock a hidden room with a secret boss.
point is, I can not disagree with the developer's design philosophy for dungeons more. If we take a look at the "A Realm Reborn revisited, 5 year anniversary" interview with Yoshi P (https://na.finalfantasy.com/topics/21), you can start to see where and why the design shifted to what we have now.



Sorry if the embeds became obnoxiously big. But yeah, just imagine having Beta Tam Tara in the game now. I've imagined a system where leves were reworked into worthwhile content and dungeons became separate from MSQ so their design wouldn't have to be restricted by the need to simplify them so *all* players can pass them with ease. As it is, dungeons feel like worthless content after the first time doing it, made to crap out number go up for roulettes.. Arguably, a waste of the art and concepts that go into them.

(please give Twinning's tycoon another shot it's such a good design/model but the concept of its core mechanic was wasted and as it is it's just an even more boring version of dodging orange shapes)

[ICountFrom0]

Honestly? If I could trigger that dungeon by going to it and having it become a solo instance, with say, trusts? I'd do it, right now.

[SquigglesMajor]

With the influx of new players I've been getting a lot more low level content in my roulettes. Between replaying older content and watching newer players go through it for the first time it actually makes me a bit sad at the current formula of the game. The game is not bad mind you, there is a lot to love. But the game is definitely a product of the times. FFXIV has two sides to it. The single player MSQ content which has the grand story and exploration, then there is the actual multiplayer content that is very utilitarian. Dungeons are basically track fields that encourage you to sprint to each checkpoint and kill everything at once. AOE keeps getting buffed, tanks get infinite enmity from every little thing they do, and healers are able to sustain a tank just from their instant cast spells alone. Raids can be challenging for sure but I feel like they are very uninspired and boring. Oh let me guess a perfectly circular arena with an instant kill wall that is simply floating in the middle of nowhere.

I hate to say it, because the team clearly does what they can with it. You see sparks of cool ideas and set pieces in the background but it's all just set dressing. And it's very clear that the team is working around these limitations. They can't explore new ideas and complex environments. And I know why that is. The team tried to make a very unique arena in the coils of bahamut by having you fight in one of his claws. This idea is absolutely brilliant and I adore it so much. However the game is clearly not built to accommodate that kind of terrain during combat. It caused a lot of problems. Rather than fixing the problem the team decided to simply avoid it forever and only make generic, flat, perfectly square or circular arenas.

They are kind of trapped. On one hand they tried to make content with trash, and some travel to the raid boss. They tried making a weird arena and a lot of players don't want that. They like the hyper optimized meta. Content that is fast is better than content that is deep and involved. People want to be in and out of content in maybe 20 minutes max. You look at old content and you see all these really cool ideas that are never further explored or refined. I feel like if we aren't careful we're going to quickly devolve into WoW and optimize the fun out of everything.