Future dungeon design and trash mobs

[DeaconMoore]

So let's be real here. Trash mobs are just that, trash. They only provide a challenge if your healer is too engrossed in their Netflix to toss you a heal, and then really only if you wall to wall pull.

So what's the point? You know other than contention between players that want to pull everything to get to the bosses asap and those that just want to do a pack at a time? I think we can agree that party strife is not a good thing, so I propose a solution:

Cutscenes. Yep, you heard me right, cutscenes. That's the place the trash mobs should only exist, in a brief cutscene showing their demise at the players hands and introducing the boss that the party then gets to fight. Rinse and repeat 'till dungeon end.

This will end strife between those that want to rush and not by removing any need for such in the first place as well as cut down dungeon design to just some cinematic renders and boss room layouts potentially allowing for more to be added to the game for the same amount of time.

[Shurrikhan]

In case this somehow isn't mere parody...

"Trash" doesn't have to be "just trash" though. In other MMOs, I've had certain pulls of "trash" mobs that were more engaging that any XIV dungeon boss fight (granted, not a high bar) or even the majority of its normal raids.

The issue is that XIV trash mobs in particular will almost never have anything but auto-attacks, the occasional auto-attack-but-slightly-stronger-and-given-a-name, and well-marked delayed AoEs.

...At that point, yes, of course they're going to be uninteresting, just as would a boss that does nothing but autos and the occasional telegraphed AoE with plenty of time to avoid.

The simple solution then, is to give them more to work with. Beyond that, though, they also need to adjust player behavior over the fight in some way, such as by forcing out prepositioning, target-focusing, specific counter-events (such as interrupts, stuns, or movement skills), etc.

[Kleeya]

This will end strife between those that want to rush and not

In a game where some people don't wait for first timers looking at their cutscenes before engaging the boss, and are even using bug exploits to skip unskippable cutscenes in the MSQ roulette ? It would be a more realistic idea to remove completely trashmobs from dungeons, like 8 players raids are now all a 20 meters wide square/round arena with a boss in the middle.

[Lexis]

Just because something is a potential 'point of contention' doesn't mean it should be removed entirely. Cutscenes can also be a point of contention with some people wanting to watch their story cutscenes and some people not wanting to wait for them to finish. Bosses could also cause strife if people keep messing up mechanics and wiping the group. Should we then remove dungeons altogether?

I'd love for trash to be a bit more engaging beyond 'gather everything and spam all your AoE buttons until it dies', but I wouldn't want it to disappear altogether. There's honestly something satisfying about going through said trash in a timely manner, especially with a well-coordinated group. Plus, it gives you a breather between bosses.

[Asari5]

we could remove trashmobs in the name of streamlining and getting rid of illusional content. actually that would fit pretty well to the way ff14 took for years

[Jirah]

Highly suggest you contribute your concerns to the many other threads about dungeon design. As I really don’t wanna see the current design be stagnate in 7.0 as 6.0 media tour dungeon has been well documented about being undertuned and could be intentional for the initial release

[Frizze]

6.0 media tour dungeon has been well documented about being undertuned

It is possible(i have no idea how likely) that they purposefully included an undertuned dungeon for the media tour because they knew that many groups attempting the content would be using a Sage healer with less then an hours experience and possibly two Reaper dps with the same. Even the tank theoretically playing a class they know would be dealing with new class changes. So yeah, they could have decided to turn down the dungeon for the media knowing that on release these issues wont be the same. We wont know for another month.

[Tavieon]

Considering end-of-expansion era, trashes are nothing but nuisance due to catch up systems. This has been all the same in 'WoW' as well... which has similar 'power inflation' system.



It is highly doubtful new expansion dungeons will be as easy as depicted by streamers. Also, stat squish could render old dungeon trashes challenging again, considering how it turned out in WoW after stat squish in some old expansion dungeons even with 'timewalking' adjustments.


Fundamental problem is, this game seems to be allowing multiple jobs on a single character, but in reality, it's not really exciting to level any secondary jobs at all. Spamming dungeon is all but grindy and tedious. I hated leveling THM to get WHM function properly back in ARR. But then it was just level 15, if I remember correctly.



If you really feel dungeon spamming is too boring, leave the game for a moment, just as the game director said. Pushing someone who wants to experience dungeon their own pace or not even grasping what is happening in the dungeon is not a good idea: you are not paying his/her subscription fee, thus, you have no obligation how they play the game at all. It's YOUR problem, NOT theirs.



In fact, you shouldn't be pulling multiple groups in low level dungeons (say < 40 level) either. Real sprouts on their job roles occationally come in (out of 5/10, I find new player in their roles, especially tank/heals, in the Roulette. If you ask them to pull wall-to-wall style, go figure) and functions far less than optimal since they are struggling to even understand basic. Not to mention DPS lacking spammable AOE skills.

[ItMe]

as 6.0 media tour dungeon has been well documented about being undertuned

Can you point me to some of this documentation?

I remember Yoshi P saying that for 5.0's media tour they had to patch in materia and food to the media build because (with their limited time, and many of the players being games journalists with limited FF14 experience) no one could beat Titania Normal.

I'd be interested to see what they had to do for 6.0's media build.

[RinaB]

Instead of trash mobs I would like new things. Obstacles if you will. How bout we have to mount up and fly or ride through a gauntlet of obstacles like in battle toads to get to the next section. If anyone played chrono trigger there is a race you need to complete in the future zone. This could easily be implemented in a garlean dungeon.