Former WoW player: Suggested changes to FFXIV Raiding end-game

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Unfortunately, the FFXIV engine does NOT handle elevation difference in any way that's considered reasonable. They did more fun arenas in early coils, and that ended up with stuff like being able to cheese Twintania's dive bombs. If a boss were to try and do an AoE, it would just not hit people that are a certain distance up/down a ramp.

Although thankfully we're not at the level of spam clicking through "Target is too far above you" errors and praying you don't see "Target is too far below you."

Those errors were so much fun. My favorite was "target not in LoS" because it was behind a pebble on the ground....

[Puremallace]

This FFXIV. Not WoW. It should stay FFXIV and not become your new WoW. I dont want that WoW-players now ruining this game, like they did with WoW before.

What is funny about this entire post is he stopped playing in Cata when they killed off deterministic gearing after that expansion when WoW and FF14 actually did play pretty damn close. Hell that was the entire reason why everyone laughed when you said you could play every character on one job.,

Apparently some people have memory issues but I remember WoW players laughing hard because it was SOOO easy to roll an alt in WoW and gear it so the FF14 system that is LITERALLY being praised now as amazing right now was deemed trash back then. It warped into the current monster of systems to try and keep reiterating on MMO fundamental design and human psychology.

I am not sure why it is mainly raid loggers that come along every 6 months and make this same post about the game being boring and wanting new toys to play with not showing any remote concern for how it affects the rest of the game population.

This simplistic gearing system and abilities is the entire reason why ilvl sync works and makes Ultimates the amazing content that they still are to this day. How would these ideas even work when synced down in Ultimate with stats that would need to scale also?

I started raiding during coil, and coil is still my favorite raid series. No other raid has measured up to it for me. The trash pulls and exploration bits aren't what made coil great. They really only added to the atmosphere, which they have used solo instances and secondary areas for now.

The reason why Coils seems so different to everything we have gotten since is because they were trying to copy WoW raiding. Just piece all of the Coil raids together without the stupid PS3 limitations and it is a WoW raid. Trash packs...boss...trash packs...boss...trash packs...boss.

The reason you do not see trash in FF14 raids is because they do not drop any Bind on equip items so the only purpose they serve is to delay you from getting to the boss you want to in the first place. I cannot count how many times over the year that Blizzard has nerfed then buffed trash alone in raids because people would farm them WHICH COULD BE HEAVILY ABUSED IN FF14 to flood the auction houses and further kill crafting in that MMO.

Any hardcore raider can tell you what would happen if 520 ilvl gear was dropping in FF14 from trash in a raid. It would cost MILLIONS on day one to try and get an advantage over other FCs who would farm the items just to sell. The world first race goes from being an even playing field to some lucky group having nice drops and nuking the boss quicker.

I swear does anyone in the MMO look outside these forums to how these train wreck of ideas have derailed other MMO's?

[Cebo]

What is funny about this entire post is he stopped playing in Cata when they killed off deterministic gearing after that expansion when WoW and FF14 actually did play pretty damn close. Hell that was the entire reason why everyone laughed when you said you could play every character on one job.

I almost feel like you're projecting someone else's arguments onto me. Where did I ever advocate getting rid of deterministic gearing? The token system is great, and I love how FFXIV loosens the tomestone restrictions with each patch as they prepare for a new tier. My suggestion was to introduce more varied materia options, enchants, or trinket slots. NOT RNG to gear stats or drops. You do bring up a good point that this would complicate ilvl sync'd content, but they could also make certain materia/enchants/trinkets level 90 only, and thus disabled on downsync.

As far as trash packs, you're right, no one likes 'em. And I get that that's the main reason every raid encounter has turned into just a battle arena since Stormblood and on. But in exchange, raids have felt more like extended trials, rather than an actual raid dungeon. And it makes me miss experiences like Bahamut's coils. I suggested it before, but they could just make it so the shortcut becomes accessible as soon as you cleared the boss once (or at least cleared the raid in normal mode), so you can skip all trash packs from then on.

Overall, I think all my points just come down to wanting one thing: More varied content. Dungeon experience is all the same with wall-to-wall pulls. Raids have turned into glorified trials / battle arenas. Gear has become mundane with just slight stat improvements, and pointless materia slots. I get that people will eventually map the best linear path to speedrun a dungeon, and math out the best materia to use anyway...but taking away these options makes the end-game experience very stale and monotonous. Case-in-point, Stormblood and Shadowbringers introduced nearly 30 dungeons between them, but only Bardem's Mettle really stands out in my memory. Because it was different and fun. The only other ones that stand out were because of their amazing aesthetic like Amaurot.

[VirusOnline]

Disclaimer - I actually quit WoW back in Cataclysm, and have been playing FFXIV since day 1 of ARR 2.0. Sorry for the clickbait title! I absolutely love this game for its story, its world, and much prefer the gameplay over WoW's combat system.

But I wanted to give my thoughts as someone who was part of a semi-hardcore raiding guild in WoW, and where I feel FFXIV's end-game raiding falls short. My static cleared all of Coils pre-nerf, but with each successive expansion, we usually get bored after clearing the first raid tier, drop off from the game, only to come back prior to the next expansion's release. I know Yoshi-P has stated he doesn't mind if people take breaks like this, but it's a detriment when end-game content droughts can create such quick burnouts like this. I think the reasons for this are as follows:


1) Dungeon design has become more boring with each successive expansion. I am not talking about the aesthetic or music, which has improved tenfold. I am strictly talking about the design. Whereas in ARR we had unique dungeons like Haukke Manor and Qarn, with multiple side/secret paths and mobs that had to be interrupted or prioritized quickly (ie. bees), SB and ShB dungeons have become incredibly linear with wall-to-wall pulls to each boss. While I understand that over time people would speed run dungeons in the most efficient way, the current formulaic dungeon design leads to a stale experience.

The mechanics of old. The early dungeons were what I like to call an infodump. You learned your utility, your class, how to dodge, basic spells and combos.
After 6 years and all classes maxed out, I want to demolish. I am the godsdamned warrior of darkness.
But fine, imagine we did make a max level Haukke or Qarn. Better players would have to carry lesser/inexperienced players. Dungeon roulettes, which are supposed to be a quick daily, are turned into an 1hr+ pepemode.
Even in ESO, people have the ability to explore but most do not.
Roulette are baseline activities and should stay that way.

2) Raid design too has simply turned into boss arenas, with no dungeon to actually explore. The boss encounters themselves are great, but I have not felt the same sense of wonder exploring a raid, as I did in Coils. It's sad that after 8 years playing this game, nothing has topped the experience of first venturing into Icecrown Citadel in WoW.

Yeah, that wonder wanes.
As someone who did raid ICC, Cata, MoP, the RP experience of killing mobs became an annoyance each weekly clear.
Especially ICC. What a nightmare. It wasn't fun after the third month. I just wanted to kill the boss so I could weep at another week of no gear and no mount.

3) 4-man dungeons and Savage raids need scaling difficulty. Savage is challenging, but since they are now designed to be cleared in initial crafting gear, they are completed rather quickly in a patch cycle, leaving very little to do for months on end. SE can take a page from Blizzard's book and introduce a scaling + system; ie. if you clear a dungeon/raid, you can then attempt a +1 version that scales enemy health/damage (eg. reverse echo), and then +2, and so on. Rewards for these challenges could include additional tomestones, titles, minions, and mounts.

Yes, they do. But SE tends the wounds of those who are easily traumatized. Also, how dare you try to exclude people an induce more trauma.
On a serious note, SE typically does not like the idea of rewarding highly sought after items for higher levels of play (read as skill). It's why the only thing Ultimate gives is a shiny weapon.
While I do like a moderate amount of exclusivity, that is a WoW thing and should stay and die with WoW.

4) Gear stats are very boring. Besides glamour, there is no excitement to end-game gear when it's only a slight stat improvement, and every materia meld is prioritized for Crit. I would love for more interesting materia options (new competitive sub-stats or enchant procs), set bonuses, or even a trinket slot. I understand balance is an issue. But I also don't think that should excuse SE from not even attempting to make more interesting gear options. They definitely have the creativity in them, as Bozjan has shown. We lack that carrot on a stick to keep playing end-game.

Bozjan gear is born purely out of Eureka's idea of "well if they're gonna be here for the long haul, guess we'll make a sonic belt". I'd hardly call it interesting and more of a hard pass.
Were it me, I'd remove materia. It has no standing anymore. Ever since Stormblood, materia has just taken this downward dive of uselessness both in the market and the gear. All for the sake of - join me now - inclusiveness.
This inclusiveness includes no advantage over the other at end game. This is a balance game, not a pvp game.

People who often burn out at end game, imo, find there's nothing else to do because
1) they rush it because of fomo (fear of missing out)
2) they play with only the same good players. If you want a challenge, PF is right there
3) end game means ONLY savage/ultimate. PotD ? HoH ? Bozja notes ? Cards ? Mahjong ? there are many challenging carrots, but many savage raiders think it beneath them
5) literally spend every single day in raid tier until all bosses are dead and then complain there's nothing now to do.

Every raid has an end. Every raid will come to bore you. No game can continue to entertain you with an endless supply of savage content. If they did, god how boring and dreadful would that be.
The 14 boss raids of WoW Siege of Orgrimmar will never be missed.

[Jeeqbit]

1) Shadowbringers dungeons introduced interruptable casts to a lot of mobs which make big pulls a lot harder to heal if the tank doesn't identify the right enemy from the crowd and interrupt it. There is one situation in The Twinning where two adds can be interrupted so your only option is to interrupt one and stun the other. This makes it a lot easier to heal, especially when it released and people were not as well geared. Both as a tank and a healer in that dungeon I can say that pull can be tricky and wipe sometimes. So saying there are not mobs you could prioritize quickly is not true. The dungeons are linear because everyone just picks the most efficient path like they do in Sastasha and Haukke.

2) Raids turned into arenas because going through a dungeon every time you run out of time or want to repair gear is annoying. Trash was removed from the hard versions in Heavensward because they know that serious raiders are not going to have trouble with trash, so why waste their time?

3) Harder versions of dungeons without telegraphs I wouldn't mind just for fun. I don't know if there is a point to harder savage raid scaling, because you could just do it minimum item level or scale your gear below the minimum item level to achieve the same result. A title may be nice for that but it would be just as easy to boast about it in other ways like your search info.

4) I don't agree about gear stats only being a slight improvement. As you said yourself fights are tuned to the minimum item level. Just a 5 item level increase to each party member makes a massive difference to DPS checks and survivability so the gear upgrades are very impactful.

Materia melds prioritize crit not because they need to but because in an MMO everyone maths out what is best. Some people do prioritize tenacity and I even prioritize skill speed. The fact you think you have to prioritize crit when you don't proves my point that the community maths out the best no matter how many "options" the developers create for you.

Set bonuses happened with Grand Company gear and I don't see the point in it personally.

Interesting things get done in Bozja because Yoshi-P doesn't want to change the formula outside of it but wants to create places where those rules can be broken. Perhaps the success of Eureka and Bozja will give them confidence to do these things outside of it but you may have to settle for getting this excitement from content like Bozja itself.

[Vyrerus]

1) Shadowbringers dungeons introduced interruptable casts to a lot of mobs which make big pulls a lot harder

No, it didn't. These have always been in the game, they were just harder to notice before, and far harder to notice in the current state of the game due to being overgeared/leveled/potencied.

In the very first dungeon in the game, Sastasha, there is an Orobon monster inbetween the clams/crabs/firelights. It buffs monster attack unless stunned repeatedly and killed. However, the effect is so low, and not many newbies are mega pulling, that it isn't a real threat. It's still there, though.

In Copperbell Mines the first boss has a tank cooldown which can be interrupted. Again, it's not much of a boss, especially these days, but it's there.

Skipping a lot of the early dungeons, because the same stuff that applied to the Orobon in Sastasha will apply in a lot of cases.

Pharos Sirius has several problem monsters that used to need interrupts, and are still problematic if they don't get them/don't die fast. The Elbsts in the first waterway will eventually splash everyone with vulnerability up that is unavoidable unless they are killed quickly/stunned repeatedly.
The Zombie Barbers will heal monsters in the pull unless killed quickly/stunned repeatedly.
The Corrupted Sprites cast Banishga III. It's an AOE spell that deals upwards of 3000~3500 damage to your whole party unless it's interrupted. It's not much when you're rocking 6k+ HP on everyone, but when the dungeon was new, HP levels ranged from 3~4.5k for DPS/Heals and 5~8k for tanks(Thanks Defiance). Letting that spell go off was often a death sentence for somebody.
The Bhoots cast Paralyze III, AOE paralysis that's quite potent.
The Flans cast Divide or whatever, that spawns more flans onto the pull, intermingled at the same time with Corrupted Sprites.

This was the apex dungeon of 2.1, and it drew so many complaints from the playerbase, because it also had hard bosses that also had interruptible/stunnable skills, that they nerfed it into the ground.

But even disregarding it, I could go on forever into detail about every dungeon and the "problem" monsters in each pull. It's just more noticeable in Shadowbringers, for you, for some reason.

[Warlyx]

what not make dungeons more OPEN? u know like braflox before hellbender boss , isnt huge but its doesnt feel like a corridor at all

savage expert dungeon + system , SE has said NO ...and still dont know why , its a cheap and easy way to keep midcore players entertained , and a better way to farm tomes or gearing, it works on others mmorpgs , u can keep tomes on DR system for the ppl that want to stay the "classic" way , but give me a reason to runs dungeons again with some handicaps or something (M+ is one the best thing on wow )


bosses , they have improved mechanics overtime , hoping they keep that direction , more mechanics and less aoe dance is always good.

[TaleraRistain]

You're going to hit a hard ceiling on #4 so long as there is a MSQ for the devs to consider. Raid gear cannot go above a certain strength because the gear gap would get far too wide from that obtained in casual content and would trivialize the MSQ for raiders, so those in that gear would come and complain it was too easy. In other games where this happened, the developers listened to those who said it was too easy and put even the casual/solo content out of the realm of those who only interacted with that content.

SE needs to maintain that balance so raid gear can be better for a time, but then catch up gear will come out to put everyone back on a more even footing for the next leg of the MSQ. This is one way that XIV varies very much from other MMOs and one thing that a lot of us like about it since we have seen the way it goes bad in other games.

[ItMe]

1) Shadowbringers dungeons introduced interruptable casts to a lot of mobs which make big pulls a lot harder to heal if the tank doesn't identify the right enemy from the crowd and interrupt it. There is one situation in The Twinning where two adds can be interrupted so your only option is to interrupt one and stun the other. This makes it a lot easier to heal, especially when it released and people were not as well geared. Both as a tank and a healer in that dungeon I can say that pull can be tricky and wipe sometimes. So saying there are not mobs you could prioritize quickly is not true.

I like the frogmen in Don Mheg that try and buff the trees, and the White Mages of Light in The Heroes Gauntlet that try and cast protect, or those sneaky adds in Mt Gulg that try and hit you with those interruptable heavy hitting AoEs and punish you for trying to autopilot a wall to wall pull.
You're right, there are a lot of nifty examples of this in Shadow Bringers and I hope they play around with it more going forward.

[TaleraRistain]

I like the frogmen in Don Mheg that try and buff the trees, and the White Mages of Light in The Heroes Gauntlet that try and cast protect, or those sneaky adds in Mt Gulg that try and hit you with those interruptable heavy hitting AoEs and punish you for trying to autopilot a wall to wall pull.
You're right, there are a lot of nifty examples of this in Shadow Bringers and I hope they play around with it more going forward.

I both love these and hate them. Because some are like that one tether mob in Amaurot who severely gimps a healer's ability to heal. Groups just wall to wall pull and don't focus it down, which puts a significant amount of stress on the healer. And they get blamed when they can't keep up because their heals are gimped.

I think unfortunately the speedrun mentality is going to ruin a lot of those nifty additions for us.