The problem with people complaining that there's no content

[Payotz]

Exactly. There seems to be a lot of entitled people in the community these days thinking Yoshi P can just wave a magic wand and come out with infinite new and fresh content.

He can't, but he can take notes from other video games in how they manage their endgame. A lot of MMOs and MMO-lites have an endgame treadmill that players can engage in, which is more or less just ilvl treadmills where it's a lot harder to grab your BiS.

The problem I see is that the game isn't really built for that. FF14 is a game that's designed in the opposite direction of pretty much every MMO. It's a very simple game where you go in, do the thing you want and unsub, and then resub once there's new content that you're interested in. It's basically the home for the burnt out MMO player, who's just tired of grinding and grinding.

A LOT of the content in the patches are released as if it's a single player game. It's very much so an "enjoy once or twice" and relies on the playerbase to build their own replayability around said content. Raids are only replayable because FFlogs is a thing and speedrunning and leaderboards is a big thing for people. Housing is only "replayable" because RP venues and social events are a thing, and imo there's nothing wrong with that.

Since they don't really want to alienate their core players (yes I know they already did with the job design, but bear with me) the only type of dev supported content that fits the game is content that infinitely scales, but doesn't give player power, PvE modifiers. An expanded Deep Dungeon system, and affixes that gets harder and harder that applies to both Dungeons and Raids (akin to the WoW M+ system) that has an in-game leaderboard, cosmetic rewards and/or titles, but no gear rewards.

PvP players already have a type of repeatable content with the old Feast and new PvP ranked. Crafters/Gatherers technically had this with the old Ishgard Restoration system (even if it is kinda mid, is gone now and doesn't really support Fisher). Social players can pretty much turn anything into something replayable with RP Events, Venues and even just plain hanging out in Limsa. PvE is really the only one area that's lacking, and that imo, is where the devs should focus on.

FF14 shouldn't turn into a gear treadmill type of game because it's simply not that kind of game.

[ReynTime]

How to defend Final Fantasy XIV, Yoshi-P and the developers from unwanted negative criticism:

1. Take their complaint and throw an extreme hypothetical solution back at them:
"You think dungeons are too easy? What, you want them to make everything as difficult as Nioh?????!!"
"Lack of content? Well the developers can't add content 24/7!!!!!!!!"

2. If that fails, try the emotional manipulation approach:
"You want to give more work to the developers???? You want them to do crunch time???!!!!"
"How DARE YOU you not like this piece of music, didn't you know Soken had cancer??????"
"How can you not be satisfied?!? Yoshida cried in the live letter and it's YOUR FAULT! MONSTER!"

3. If all else fails, don't panic! Take a deep breath, stop shaking your hands, and just reassure all witnesses that what you just read or heard is the opinion of a vocal minority.

[Kaurhz]

Not that I disagree with you, as I personally think there is an overabundance of content, which is actually the more overarching issue. They implement a lot of systems that they in reality fail to expand upon or innovate. Plenty of current systems could easily be migrated into a larger, more significant singular system that ultimately has a higher level of replayability than if they were to remain separate.

Besides, you need to keep in mind that some groups of players just simply aren't incentivized beyond self-gratification and instead need in-game systems to justify every single decision being made, as if to micro-manage how they play the game. Personally, I'm driven extensively by achievement hunting. Whether it be on this game or other games. But if I am, to be frank, beyond my own self-satisfaction, some of these systems I do actually see little value or impact in the grand scheme of things.

To put it into perspective. I have nigh on close to 17,000 achievement points, and an additional 10,000 almost on an alt character. Each with approx. 200-320 achievement tokens. Now I posit the question for you or anyone. What is the point of this for many people if they fail to expand on the reward structure? Smaller things like this ultimately create a higher level of replay value for many players, if they aren't in it for self-satisfaction. Imagine the value of achievement tokens if they managed to funnel rewards that expand beyond just a funnel for the previous (now tossed away) veteran reward structure. (You essentially get all the rewards just simply by playing the story)

To summarise; I don't really think the issue people actually have is correlated to lack of content, but rather the substance of existing content, and more importantly the significance of it in the grand scheme of things. Sure, you can get all the achievements, so what? -- Sure you can raid on all classes, so what? -- Sure, you can attain all valor in Bozja, so what? Sure, you can level everything to 90, so what?

[Jeeqbit]

The problem I see is that the game isn't really built for that. FF14 is a game that's designed in the opposite direction of pretty much every MMO. It's a very simple game where you go in, do the thing you want and unsub, and then resub once there's new content that you're interested in. It's basically the home for the burnt out MMO player, who's just tired of grinding and grinding.

A LOT of the content in the patches are released as if it's a single player game. It's very much so an "enjoy once or twice" and relies on the playerbase to build their own replayability around said content.

PvE is really the only one area that's lacking, and that imo, is where the devs should focus on.

FF14 shouldn't turn into a gear treadmill type of game because it's simply not that kind of game.

There is a treadmill for pve, but it's optional. Yoshi-P knows that people like to collect mounts, so he makes mounts a reward for grinding the way you do in other MMOs. That means grinding is not required for the gear treadmill and people do not feel pressured to grind, but can if they want to. Doing it with mounts instead is clever.

[Payotz]

There is a treadmill for pve, but it's optional. Yoshi-P knows that people like to collect mounts, so he makes mounts a reward for grinding the way you do in other MMOs. But he makes it so that grinding that much is not required for the gear treadmill like other MMOs so that people do not feel pressured to grind if that isn't what they really want to do. Doing it with mounts instead is clever.

Yeah! I 100% agree with you, but I think this should expand into Dungeons and 4-man content simply because a lot of people don't like raiding.
4-man content has the capacity to be more variable during the run, so it's a lot less guide reading and more "oh shit let me salvage this pull" which is what's missing in the game imho.

EDIT:

And unfortunately, this is also only in Extremes. I think mount farms are a good step in the right direction, but it needs a little bit more and needs to be expanded towards Savage raids.

Simply put, the game needs content where skill expression is a thing in game that doesn't rely on FFLogs. Cosmetics for clearing a raid under a specific time, or even just a leaderboard for fastest clear times etc... could be a good step in the right direction.

[Lauront]

Right back to you, hater.

Well, you know, if the shoe fits... and in this case the shoe Anhaato mentioned does seem rather comfy on you.

[Jeeqbit]

And unfortunately, this is also only in Extremes. I think mount farms are a good step in the right direction, but it needs a little bit more and needs to be expanded towards Savage raids.

Actually, the reason extremes are easier is so that they can be farmed. Savage can be a lot less forgiving and sometimes you are glad to be done with it for the week, whereas if Extreme gave you this feeling then you wouldn't feel like doing it 99 times.

[Absurdity]

Actually, the reason extremes are easier is so that they can be farmed. Savage can be a lot less forgiving and sometimes you are glad to be done with it for the week, whereas if Extreme gave you this feeling then you wouldn't feel like doing it 99 times.

Doesn't mean that people wouldn't do it, people run a savage fight 100 times for a fancy number on a site that isn't even officially acknowledged. Hell, people run PotD solo simply for a spot on the leaderboards and that is arguably more of a time investment and frustrating experience than any savage fight.

What? The only people that go apeshit when grind is mentioned are the ones new to MMORPG. Even WoW vanilla was grindy as hell, and it was basically a light version of Everquest. Grind has been a thing in RPGs since forever, and that includes MMORPGs.

Those grinds usually led to some tangible rewards beyond a rectangular piece of text that says "Yay, you did it, conglaturations!". Unless you're really big into achievement hunting a lot of these grinds are pointless busy work that reward nothing and that nobody cares about.

[Payotz]

Doesn't mean that people wouldn't do it, people run a savage fight 100 times for a fancy number on a site that isn't even officially acknowledged. Hell, people run PotD solo simply for a spot on the leaderboards and that is arguably more of a time investment and frustrating experience than any savage fight.

Pretty much yeah. People farm Ultimates over and over again for more totems and weapons, and those fights are harder than Savage. Hell, there are people who have hundreds of totems just because they keep reprogging and clearing them.

Expanding the system to Savage fights won't interfere with the folks who don't care about leaderboards and just want to clear. It's just added optional replayability for people who want to raid more than once a week, without relying on a 3rd party website, and also rewards something that can be viewed in-game, like cosmetics or titles.

[Zanarkand-Ronso]

Did you need to make another post whining about people complaining about the game?

I mean, there is no Shortage of Threads about People Complaining about the game.
So Why not more threads about people complaining about people Complaining?

Fair is Fair, equality and all that Smooth Jazz