the normal content is too easy

[Sabora_Makingai]

We also have that "In from the Cold" complaint post which reached 57 pages because it was too hard for people. When something like that gets such a reaction, imagine the reaction to other normal content being made slightly hard.

Ok had to comment on this one lol. I've done 2/3 ultimates and do savage raids frequently but even I had a lot of trouble with this quest. Id agree with those that say this quest was a little too difficult.

[TaleraRistain]

Ok had to comment on this one lol. I've done 2/3 ultimates and do savage raids frequently but even I had a lot of trouble with this quest. Id agree with those that say this quest was a little too difficult.

This is actually a really good example of a point that many try to make on these forums: people have different ability and experience levels.

I do not do Ultimate or Savage but I breezed through that quest because my favorite genre is stealth and I've immersed myself in the techniques and tactics that make someone successful at that sort of game. I would definitely not be in the camp who says this quest is too difficult if I just used my own experience.

However, I can empathize with those who had issues because I know not everyone else has the same experience or abilities. Same with any content in this game. People say it's easy and there's nothing wrong with someone saying something is easy for them and offering feedback on what would appeal to them more. I have a few suggestions for that particular quest to integrate stealth ideas better. But then these same people cast judgment on others who have difficulty and claim they're just not trying hard enough or they don't care enough or they don't deserve to play this game because they don't meet some random person's arbitrary standard for what is acceptable in their presence. They cry to the heavens that this is a team based game, but don't actually want to cooperate and work together like a real team does. It's just rude, gatekeepy, and isn't a mentality (not saying your post is, it was just a good example) that we should be encouraging. And frankly threads like this one do exactly that.

[Carin-Eri]

Looking at ffcollect, the desire for difficult/high end content isn't really that high. Even "easy" high end content like Alexander (Savage) right now only have 52% completion and lesser the closer it is to current expansion.

https://ffxivcollect.com/achievements/types/1

I think most ff14 players play for the story. 85% completed endwalker vs 11% completion of current raid tier

https://ffxivcollect.com/titles?q%5B...=shadowbringer
https://ffxivcollect.com/titles?q%5B...t%5D=endwalker

Doubt there will be any real impact on game population health if MSQ/Normal level content difficulty is ramped up or not but the stats show that most ff14 players aren't that about playing a game because its difficult or easy but treating it as another rpg in the ff series.

For now I guess anyone can manipulate the difficulty setting and find like minded people via pf to enjoy the game this way tho

Count me as one of those players who played for the story above all else. And yeah, I found it hard. And that's difficult to admit in a thread full of forumites implying that bad players shouldn't be bad and don't deserve to play the game.
Partly due to my lacking performance at least, I have no intention of going anywhere near anything above 'Normal' level content.

This is actually a really good example of a point that many try to make on these forums: people have different ability and experience levels.

I do not do Ultimate or Savage but I breezed through that quest because my favorite genre is stealth and I've immersed myself in the techniques and tactics that make someone successful at that sort of game. I would definitely not be in the camp who says this quest is too difficult if I just used my own experience.

However, I can empathize with those who had issues because I know not everyone else has the same experience or abilities. Same with any content in this game. People say it's easy and there's nothing wrong with someone saying something is easy for them and offering feedback on what would appeal to them more. I have a few suggestions for that particular quest to integrate stealth ideas better. But then these same people cast judgment on others who have difficulty and claim they're just not trying hard enough or they don't care enough or they don't deserve to play this game because they don't meet some random person's arbitrary standard for what is acceptable in their presence. They cry to the heavens that this is a team based game, but don't actually want to cooperate and work together like a real team does. It's just rude, gatekeepy, and isn't a mentality (not saying your post is, it was just a good example) that we should be encouraging. And frankly threads like this one do exactly that.

QFT.

[OdinelStarrei]

Count me as one of those players who played for the story above all else. And yeah, I found it hard. And that's difficult to admit in a thread full of forumites implying that bad players shouldn't be bad and don't deserve to play the game.
Partly due to my lacking performance at least, I have no intention of going anywhere near anything above 'Normal' level content.

Why are you so self-defeating? Why is there a need to denigrate people and put words in their mouth? There is no need to strawman and reduce down some fairly valid opinions to "wow basement dwellers trying to gatekeep lmao" No one is saying bad players don't deserve to play the game, many people are blaming SQUARE ENIX for not instating proper tutorials, for having completely lopsided difficulty curves, no incentive for improvement, an atrocious leveling experience in both content and the jobs themselves, the total dissolution of the midcore, and for design decisions that don't seem to benefit ANYONE. If you want to draw the ire of anyone around here or in XIV in general, you have to have a selfish, overinflated ego combined with irrelevant or incorrect information, not "I'm just not very good at pressing buttons." Or be a "toxic raider elitist forumite", I guess.

You know what I'm here for? FFXIV, in it's entirety. I will consume any amount of content this game has to offer, because I love it, and believe most of it has value, even if some of it isn't exactly perfect, because I think the point of a theme park MMO is to have multiple types of content for multiple types of people. There was no problem with having dungeon/MSQ content be tuned the way it is in Heavensward/Stormblood, because every job had a skill ceiling that was actually worth something that gave opportunity for player growth. Every expansion since, they keep removing actions, they remove designs and systems, they dumb down the things that brought identity and uniqueness to each and every job to the point of irrelevance, and now, instead of participating in unengaging content with a engaging job that gives me the opportunity to have fun in even the most casual of content, Square Enix has dropped the ceiling of the entire game on the heads of playerbase, regardless of where you stood on the spectrum. I used to play jobs with mid-40 casts per minute, with variable timers. Now I'm lucky to reach high 30s as I mash my head into the same builder spender, 2 min burst window with zero variations that comprises the entire combat suite. Won't even go into the total lobotomy that has happened to the support role.

I can only play a fleshed-out, long term story experience ONE time every two years, over the course of maybe two weeks. The experience of actually playing XIV long-term compromises of much more of the overall play experience, and that long-term runway of gameplay, with a suitable skill ceiling, should be accommodated for.

This is probably why I've lost almost all my XIV friends from Heavensward. The game is boring to play. I have never played XIV LESS than I do right now.

You can keep your easy dungeons, and your easy MSQ, and your lack of consequences for any mistake or shortcoming or disability you may have, while also having significant developer resources allocated to the expansion of the Trust system. That's the correct way to develop, and I support that 100%. It doesn't affect me, we have different lanes. But I'd like my skill ceiling to return, because proper skill expression makes even the most braindead content fun, and prevents a spiraling dead end in your most dedicated players, the ones who champion the game the most. As long as the floor remains low for accessibility, it gives a solid middle ground for everyone, like it was on the path to becoming in Stormblood before Shadowbringers gutted the entire game. At this rate, every job is going to devolve into the same grey, tasteless mush.

If people being bad is accepted, people should also accept that people are allowed to be good and want more from their play experience even in mandatory content. We don't need to be in permanent conflict 24/7, those are not conflicting ideals, but SE seems determined to make the gameplay experience for one side totally miserable, just like they did in Heavensward.

[Lauront]

That scenario can be tough for people because, 1) it's fairly uncharted territory; 2) you have very limited resources; 3) the goals aren't entirely clear and require you to do a bit of probing in your environment. It's a different style of gameplay to what is typical of the game, so it catches some people off guard. I would dispute that it's that hard, but comparing it to normal content being say at the level of 4.3 or 5.3 trials, to me it is completely non-comparable, not least because you have other players to bail you out in trials and you'd have to ramp up the stakes quite a lot to take it to that level, not just a bit. People mention Shinryu - I can count on a single hand the number of times I've wiped on that since SB was left behind, and even that is exaggerating.

As for allowing an easy trust option for those who want to complete the MSQ? It certainly resolves the issue of the MSQ being too tough for some people if normal content becomes a bit harder, and no, it does not force anyone to be "exiled" from DF content, because you can still do that, if you are willing to accept that there may be a few wipes here and there the first few times. I've always observed players share mechanics that can cause a wipe easily, so it's not something that can't be resolved through a bit of communication... if you genuinely want a more social content mode, communication is part and parcel of that. The impression I am really getting here is some people just want to hit an I-win button and be showered with a loot/praise pinata for that.

[Kyrj]

I stopped having faith that the game would get harder when they added visuals to the second boss in Aurum Vale. I actually liked that fight; it was awesome to see people get hit by a mechanic and then find out which ones learned from it and which ones didn't.

[SilverObi]

Easy for me is not easy for someone else. Difficult for you is not difficult for someone else. The normal content is balanced around the average skill of the majority of the playerbase and whether or not that's undertuned will depend on individual perspectives and frankly that's all there is to it. We have people who used to call Extremes difficult and now say they're easy based on any number of variables while that easy content stomps others who may not be as skilled.

You don't have to agree with it and you're very welcome to rail against it but that's the path the devs have chosen for the content that the majority of players will interact with. Personally I'd like to see lower iLvl caps on older content so they regain/retain some of their teeth but that's just my singular want in a sea of others, and I'm okay with that in the end. If I wasn't I'd probably find another game to meet that personal demand (no this isn't a "leave then" statement).

Also amazingly spicy topic to post from a sockpuppet alt.

[nick124]

Easy for me is not easy for someone else. Difficult for you is not difficult for someone else. The normal content is balanced around the average skill of the majority of the playerbase and whether or not that's undertuned will depend on individual perspectives and frankly that's all there is to it. We have people who used to call Extremes difficult and now say they're easy based on any number of variables while that easy content stomps others who may not be as skilled.

You don't have to agree with it and you're very welcome to rail against it but that's the path the devs have chosen for the content that the majority of players will interact with. Personally I'd like to see lower iLvl caps on older content so they regain/retain some of their teeth but that's just my singular want in a sea of others, and I'm okay with that in the end. If I wasn't I'd probably find another game to meet that personal demand (no this isn't a "leave then" statement).

Also amazingly spicy topic to post from a sockpuppet alt.

I call bs. The game is balanced to the skill level of someone who doesn't know how to play. You can literally clear anything with very little effort or practice.

[Krotoan]

I call bs. The game is balanced to the skill level of someone who doesn't know how to play. You can literally clear anything with very little effort or practice.

You can't just say others experiences aren't. Other people have different skill levels than you in many things. I'm gonna bet that you are absolutely horrible at a bunch of things others find laughably easy, just like everyone in the world is.

[Jojoya]

I call bs. The game is balanced to the skill level of someone who doesn't know how to play. You can literally clear anything with very little effort or practice.

Then why do we see so many wipes in current expansion trial content if it's easy enough even for those that have no idea how to play?

Think I need to call bs back at you. I'm not claiming the content is hard but it's also not nearly as easy as you want to think for those without experience and skill. If players without skill and experience are getting through the content, it's because they're being carried by those who do have it.

If Elden Ring has proven anything is that you don’t need snooze fest difficulty levels to be a successful and popular game. People enjoy and will rise up to challenge.

For the people that dodge or cheese to get easier dungeons what is needed is more aggressive consequences to their actions not the dumbing down of content for everyone.

You're not talking about a MMORPG. You're talking about a single player ARPG with a multiplayer (not massively multiplayer) mode. There's a big difference between the genres. Some people enjoy it. Some don't.

If you're looking for Elden Ring level of difficulty, that is the game you want to be playing.

Well ff14 is affectively a dress up game that got some rpg element to it. By the point I get to where I can do the harder content I lose interest from the brain dead things. But it what "people want". Not lot of people do the harder things . But not because they don't want but because the it's go from 1 to 10 no in between.

So then play the other games that keep you interested.

SE has their vision of what they want for this game. If their vision is not what you're looking for, then why stick around?

It's not up to game developers to change their games for the sake of individual players. It's up to individual players to seek out the game developers who are making the games they want.

Certainly they listen to player feedback but when they have an essentially satisfied player base they're usually not going to risk upending their game design and alienating those who were happy. The only reason 1.0 got scrapped and remade into ARR was because almost no one was satisfied with the newly released game.