SQE has the Worst boss design in history

[Crasherino]

Why is it that literally every new single boss encounter is a "this boss is insanely hard" until you simply know what the skill does, and then it turns into "this boss is a snooze fest", every single god forsaken boss, there's no skill based mechanics in this game at all, and what's worse is that the hardest content in this game is nothing more than a memory game as well with the difference being you pre-assign everyone to move to pre-determined specific spots to complete mechanics without being 1 shot.

Why I'm making this is because I decided to finally put some effort into Bozja, I'm doing the critical engagements and all I'm introduced to is an absolute cluster**** of dumb as hell boss skills, some of them are fairly easy, but it's the ones that twist the games rules out of nowhere, e.g finding out that Eale has the red eye mechanic in where you usually look away to avoid the eye, but now suddenly you need to look directly at it to avoid room wide AoE that the boss does after it because you're "blind" and can't see it, which is what I mean by "Impossibly hard" until you know what it does, then it's a snoozefest.

What I want to ask for, even though I already know this won't happen, is just for some actual skill based boss design in 7.0, let 7.0 be the "remake" this game needs, so not just an overhaul of the games graphics, but lets go into the boss designs as well, and hell, while I'm at it, why not re-work the classes so they're not just copy+paste designs of each other but with different skill animations, because god forbid 1 class does something better than the other.

I'm sorry, I might be misunderstanding. Are you asking why every boss is hard until you know what to do?

Edit: Because I'm seeing a fair amount of this, let me clarify, when I say bosses on this game are far too easy once you know what to do, I'm going to use Bozja as the example here since I'm still fairly new to it and go back to the Eale boss Critical Engagement, and while I'm at the "Metal Fox Chaos" engagement as well. While I was doing Bozja for a good while, these 2 boss encounters really tripped me up essentially, after both encounters I watched a youtube guide to understand what on earth was going on, after that, when I happened to do them both again, they were a complete cake walk.

So it's not just a matter of "Am I asking why every boss is hard until I know what to do", I'm asking how it's possible for SQE to design bosses that are so simplistic by design in where there is almost no challenge once you know, simply because there is no real skill based mechanics, just a cast bar and a "oh, guess I better walk over here" mechanic, nothing really tests a players skill outside of the memory game, and to use games like Dark souls which others are using, you can watch a youtube guide on Dark Souls and still get smashed in repeatedly by that same boss, you have to practice those bosses over and over till you can understand it, that's not the case with this game even slightly.

second edit to "clarify" my gripe, something I may have failed to get across properly:

Let's say that I decide to play Lion King on SNES or Sega, I could watch a playthrough to see what every enemy and boss does on the Lion King and still get wrecked for a while until I get the muscle memory down my self, yes that game will become a cakewalk as well after many playthroughs.

The issue I was trying to raise is that I can watch 1 single video for a instance on FF14 on youtube (again, not including ex or savage, but almost all other content in game including things like Bozja critical engagements and possibly even the 1v1s, I've only done 1 so can't comment on the rest) and then proceed to do all the mechanics correctly with very little effort required outside of simply remembering a rather limited number of things, yes I get at this point that memory is some form of skill, but lets say that the memory required to do this particular content is very minimal, unless that content is ex or savage stuff.

[Saraide]

This is all very loaded and because of that the first thing I want to ask is what do you consider good boss design? What games do you think nailed good boss design just the way you think it should be?

[Crasherino]

What I personally consider good boss design is when you're able to do a boss for the first time and actually understand what's going on, and simultaneously allow your skill with reactions and general game knowledge to let you survive the encounter, at least to an extent anyway.

What I don't consider good boss design is when SQE decided to throw consistency out of the window entirely by now constantly doing new mechanics with new icons and binning AoE markers in exchange for total mystery until you once again finally know what it does, and thus the encounter from then on is just a no brainer, because the difficulty is only there when you don't understand it (and yes again I understand that doing things like Savage is actually hard, but let's be honest, it's just a harder memory game where player co-operation is heavily key).

One example I can use is Tera Online, that had some of the most fun bosses I'd played to date and it helps that it's an action MMO yeah, one that has an active dodge system with i-frames which this game unfortunately doesn't, and has no mechanics that may have you jump over things with timing being the skill etc or rely on your reactions to matter, similar to GW2 as well, the time I played that I did quite enjoy some of its boss encounters, the dodge system there and traversal skills really helped for player skill to flourish, it's just a darn shame that this game has none of it, and in its current state makes it almost impossible for proper player skill to exist at all when the only skill involved is remembering what the skill does and/or the rotation of skills the boss uses, it kind of confuses me at times that this game actually has some classes with traversal skills like the ninja that lets you move exactly where you want to go, or others like the new reaper and dancer that lets you move a set distance forward, if sqe lowered the cooldowns properly and gave all classes proper traversal skills that I can only bet they could design some much better PvE, same goes with i-frames, it's very possible for them to include it, it's just almost like they don't want to because reasons.

Edit: Just to quickly further my idea of some bit of skill based PvE-

Example of how traversal skills could be used in PvE, there could be mechanics or skills that go off, a simple example being AoEs that can't be i-framed, but go off quickly and take a lot of damage, with one of the only ways to avoid it being reactions of the player to dodge with your traversal out of the way.

Example with i-frames could be the same thing but with either massive AoEs, big swipe skills that you couldn't use a traversal to avoid maybe, just spitballing ideas, but basically the idea is that it would be nice if SQE actually introduced more skill based PvE with things like this, just so when I'm doing these end-game dungeons and such for tokens to get gear, it doesn't feel like a boring slog because you know exactly what every skill does and how to casually walk out of it.

[Divinemights]

They are hiring English game designers. Since you thinks you know better than current SE developed team, why don’t you apply?

[Saraide]

Just dodging isnt the entirety of difficulty in ff14 though, always part of that is doing your rotation correctly. Games that I have played with a more active combat system that employ direct dodge abilities usually offer much less in the way of executing your own attacks.
I have only started savage raiding with e9s so I dont have any real experience on how it was before that but there are usually things that you have to react to. You can learn attack patterns and a timeline but in the end you still need to react correctly at what you specifically need to do and at the same time still keep your rotation rolling as good as possible.

[Jeeqbit]

Why is it that literally every new single boss encounter is a "this boss is insanely hard" until you simply know what the skill does, and then it turns into "this boss is a snooze fest"

FFXIV fights are a dance, and once you learn that dance and it becomes muscle memory, it's "easy" to you. Just like how dances in real life are.

Some of them do have RNG or require you to use your brain, but the majority of it is just a dance. It feels good to master that dance. It feels even better when you executed that dance flawlessly lots of times to get what you're after (such as a mount or gear).

A fight that you can never become good at because it always changes wouldn't be fun, at least for me.

[SilverObi]

Why is it that literally every new single boss encounter is a "this boss is insanely hard" until you simply know what the skill does, and then it turns into "this boss is a snooze fest".

Welcome to video games! Welcome also by extension to most anything in life that is new and difficult but gets easier over time as your personal skill increases.

It sounds like you're a fan of action games with reactive combat and that's just not what this game is for the most part. To each their own but come on now "the worst boss design in history"? Even Dark Souls becomes routine once you learn the patterns and the dance just like I'm sure all the games you enjoy do.

[Bacent]

What I personally consider good boss design is when you're able to do a boss for the first time and actually understand what's going on, and simultaneously allow your skill with reactions and general game knowledge to let you survive the encounter, at least to an extent anyway.

What I don't consider good boss design is when SQE decided to throw consistency out of the window entirely by now constantly doing new mechanics with new icons and binning AoE markers in exchange for total mystery until you once again finally know what it does, and thus the encounter from then on is just a no brainer, because the difficulty is only there when you don't understand it (and yes again I understand that doing things like Savage is actually hard, but let's be honest, it's just a harder memory game where player co-operation is heavily key).

Man, that's pretty opiniated. But everyone has one, right?

You've probably played other games where a brand new mechanic was brought in, murdered you, then still struggled with in other attempts before finally finishing it, right?

Too bad people aren't just copy-paste with skill levels in everything.

Also because you want to complain...

Why I'm making this is because I decided to finally put some effort into Bozja, I'm doing the critical engagements and all I'm introduced to is an absolute cluster**** of dumb as hell boss skills, some of them are fairly easy, but it's the ones that twist the games rules out of nowhere, e.g finding out that Eale has the red eye mechanic in where you usually look away to avoid the eye, but now suddenly you need to look directly at it to avoid room wide AoE that the boss does after it because you're "blind" and can't see it, which is what I mean by "Impossibly hard" until you know what it does, then it's a snoozefest..

GOOD NEWS FOR YOU! THIS IS NOT THE FIRST TIME IT IS IN THE GAME!!!

It's been implemented differently, yes, but it's still the same mechanic. Look at Halatali HM. Catoblepas - you need to get one of the orbs to get a 45 second blind debuff that you do not want healers to Esuna so you don't get nerked by Demon Eye.

It's a mechanic that you need to be blinded for to avoid the big bad attack coming after.

Be wary of any past mechanics, you'll never know when they're gonna show up out of nowhere.

[Raven2014]

- Tera is an action game. It's more or less a water-down MMO Ninja Gaiden. Comparing something like to a game like FF14 is like complain why an arcade fly game is not as hard as a fly simulation game.

- The only reason GW2 "feel" challenge is because it has no trinity, so there is no role specific mechanic. Difficulty wise it's even more shallow than FF14 'cause since every attack is "mild", you just have to remember more of them.

- Also it seems you're a fan of i-frame ... which is a completely different design system than the one in this game. It's like saying I love boating so much can I use the boat motor to drive my car?

Why is it that literally every new single boss encounter is a "this boss is insanely hard" until you simply know what the skill does, and then it turns into "this boss is a snooze fest".

Because it's called progression. And while you may not like it from the sound of it, most people do want to feel they had progressed as the months went by. You also sound like someone living inside a static bubble. I have 1 static main and 3 pug alts. Sure, my static can currently kill every fights 2 mechanic ahead of enrage, but PF is still a struggle depending on the week and time of the week. FF14 is not a game designed around the convenience of the elite few.

Frankly, while I do get part of what you said, you're using way too many out of context comparison and hyperbolic that whatever little points there are got washed away in the wave of unreasonable statements.

[TheMightyMollusk]

You think these bosses are badly designed, you should see some of the creatures I worked for back at Target.

*badum-tsh!*