MSQ Difficulty and Exclusion

[Raikai]

I do think that nowadays the difficulty of the MSQ has been significantly reduced due to a number of factors, but this hasn’t always been to the benefit of the player experience. Fundamentally, video games should provide logical and increasing challenges as time goes on in the main campaign. In single player titles these challenges can be reduced via difficulty options, which in FFXIV’s case would be the use of Duty Support/Trusts whose AI behavior provides clues about how to handle certain boss mechanics, or the difficulty options that appear after one fails an instanced battle.

Lately however it feels that main story content just isn’t really at the level where it used to be, and there are very little ways in which the player’s combat skill is checked and assessed in ways not reliant on team gameplay. This has the effect of widening the gap between players who are ready for more difficult content like EX or Savages and those who are not. At the end of the day I think it would be more beneficial to increase the difficulty of MSQ battle content (dungeons, trials, instanced battles) in order to provide an experience that leans less toward the easy side and more of a well-rounded approach. While some players may feel left behind by such a decision, I do think it would be in the interest of the majority to try and find a better balance than what we’ve been seeing nowadays.


If I had to provide specific examples, I think the difficulty and mechanics of the following fights are good examples of what we should see in the main story:

• Titania
• All 3 NieR raids
• All 3 Ivalice raids
• Delubrum Reginae


And these are ones whose difficulty I do not feel was appropriate for the level at which the encounters take place:

• Tower of Babil
• The level 87 and 89 dungeons
• The level 83 Trial
• The level 90 Trial

By the difficulty progression logic, the level 81-90 content should be fine with the difficulty curve, unless we take in consideration that a new player boosts to get straight into the expansion.

That's the reason why I'm fine with more streamlined ARR dungeons, because that would reflect a more progressive difficult curve along the expansions. A good example is the redesign of the level 50 MSQ dungeons/trial... They are still easy, but all of them have interesting mechanics that won't require a lot of thinking but are pushishing if the player decides to ignore.

[Atelier-Bagur]

Also literally we're getting more midcore harder dungeon content in up coming patches.

[Eraden]

Wonderful. Another attempt by someone with an elitist mindset to make the game more difficult for everyone. I thought savage level content was good enough for those who wanted a greater challenge. You DO realize, I hope, that some of us might be elderly or disabled or both and would likely be excluded by your elitist vision of what the game should be like. As some have already mentioned here, it is most likely that you would cause significant reductions in the player base if you got your way and turned the game into an elitist sandbox. A sandbox that would start to dwindle away as the few remaining players would not be sufficient to support the game. Be careful what you wish for.

[Supersnow845]

Wonderful. Another attempt by someone with an elitist mindset to make the game more difficult for everyone. I thought savage level content was good enough for those who wanted a greater challenge. You DO realize, I hope, that some of us might be elderly or disabled or both and would likely be excluded by your elitist vision of what the game should be like. As some have already mentioned here, it is most likely that you would cause significant reductions in the player base if you got your way and turned the game into an elitist sandbox. A sandbox that would start to dwindle away as the few remaining players would not be sufficient to support the game. Be careful what you wish for.

I don’t agree with what this person is proposing but god damn do people on the OF need to stop construing anything and everything as elitist, elitist in this sense would be “you need to do the current savage tier before unlocking the next patch” not “dungeons aren’t really challenging and don’t punish failure enough”

[Eraden]

I don’t agree with what this person is proposing but god damn do people on the OF need to stop construing anything and everything as elitist, elitist in this sense would be “you need to do the current savage tier before unlocking the next patch” not “dungeons aren’t really challenging and don’t punish failure enough”

The OP is demonstrating a classic elitist mindset. MSQs are too easy for the OP so ramp up the difficulty of the MSQs regardless of whether or not others are adversely affected and/or even excluded. This is classic elitism at its finest. Making the game harder so that only the OP and fewer and fewer people can participate. You don't have to be at the top of the game charts to be elitist. You only need to be willing to exclude others below you.

[ForteNightshade]

The OP is demonstrating a classic elitist mindset. MSQs are too easy for the OP so ramp up the difficulty of the MSQs regardless of whether or not others are adversely affected and/or even excluded. This is classic elitism at its finest. Making the game harder so that only the OP and fewer and fewer people can participate. You don't have to be at the top of the game charts to be elitist. You only need to be willing to exclude others below you.

This is a ridiculous exaggeration.

While I disagree with aspect of the OP's post, your comparison to Savage is jumping to the opposite extreme. We could see an uptick in the MSQ content difficulty, or casual content in general, without it being anywhere close to Savage. Right now, the MSQ and most dungeon content is borderline fail-proof. There's a decently large middle ground between so comically easy it takes effort to fail and Savage. Whether you agree with the OP or not, their stance is moving closer to that middle ground where dungeons can actually hurt you compared to now where a single pulling tank is quite literally useless. None of that is elitism either because the OP gives examples of content casual players have already cleared en masse. The only players "excluded" would be those who want to put in almost no effort yet still expect a clear.

[VelKallor]

None of that is elitism either because the OP gives examples of content casual players have already cleared en masse. The only players "excluded" would be those who want to put in almost no effort yet still expect a clear.

Reread his post...OP wanted to exclude people over a certain age group.

While I admittedly haven't had the time to read each post in this thread, I just wanted to chime in and say that I'm not sure that making MSQ content easier in order to not exclude older players is a good thing. Why would someone in their late teens or early 20s want to play a game that was also designed to accommodate for the reaction times of someone significantly older? I do think that having a set target demographic in terms of age is a good thing, especially in terms of difficulty level.

Wanting to exclude people because they dont meet his "standards" isnt elitist...?

Yes..yes it is.

There was also another commenter in another thread that bluntly said disabled people shouldnt even play.

[Eraden]

This is a ridiculous exaggeration.

While I disagree with aspect of the OP's post, your comparison to Savage is jumping to the opposite extreme. We could see an uptick in the MSQ content difficulty, or casual content in general, without it being anywhere close to Savage. Right now, the MSQ and most dungeon content is borderline fail-proof. There's a decently large middle ground between so comically easy it takes effort to fail and Savage. Whether you agree with the OP or not, their stance is moving closer to that middle ground where dungeons can actually hurt you compared to now where a single pulling tank is quite literally useless. None of that is elitism either because the OP gives examples of content casual players have already cleared en masse. The only players "excluded" would be those who want to put in almost no effort yet still expect a clear.

There is a considerable amount of content that bridges the gap between the MSQs and Savage tier content. There is no need to force the MSQs to be harder if you are looking for any other sort of challenge. It already exists. MSQs, more specifically the trials, are NOT easy for me to do. Titania was quite difficult for me to get done. Does that mean that in your eyes I should be excluded because I don't want to put in any effort? Well newsflash: by the time I got finished doing Titania I was shaking like a leaf. I was trying my damnedest to do everything right and barely got it done. I have a few friends who also have difficulty getting the trials done. But in your eyes we are people "who want to put in almost no effort yet still expect a clear". I am going to chalk this up to you being grossly ignorant of what people like myself go through when playing this game, rather than you trying to outright libel me. I am hoping that you are not that malicious. The simple fact is there will be people who will be excluded from this game if the MSQs are made harder and not all of those people are lazy like you seem to suggest.

[Mosha]

Wonderful. Another attempt by someone with an elitist mindset to make the game more difficult for everyone. I thought savage level content was good enough for those who wanted a greater challenge. You DO realize, I hope, that some of us might be elderly or disabled or both and would likely be excluded by your elitist vision of what the game should be like. As some have already mentioned here, it is most likely that you would cause significant reductions in the player base if you got your way and turned the game into an elitist sandbox. A sandbox that would start to dwindle away as the few remaining players would not be sufficient to support the game. Be careful what you wish for.

Have only one working hand, cleared all of savage this tier. I don't think it's really fair to lump all people who have a disability into your argument of not wanting content to get more difficult.

[Eraden]

Have only one working hand, cleared all of savage this tier. I don't think it's really fair to lump all people who have a disability into your argument of not wanting content to get more difficult.

Fine strawman argument you are making there. I said nothing of what other people who may be elderly or disabled, want. I said that some who are elderly and/or disabled would be excluded. Primarily because some of them would not be able to physically do the harder content. If you want an example of one such person, that would be me. I am elderly and have Parkinson's disease.