MSQ Difficulty and Exclusion

[Supersnow845]

It depends on what it is. There's already plenty of info showing on the screen without any extras. Adding more and more becomes detrimental. The most extreme case would be the latest cheat videos that have been making the rounds. There's a point with all these add-ons, where the game is essentially played for you and there's no requirement to think, just go where you're told and never really learn anything. This not only dulls the player but any satisfaction they might get for properly winning an encounter. The fact that people are cheating and still failing says enough.

People who see that video going round and think that makes DSU still not the hardest encounter in the game by a country mile need to get a grip, no add on plays this game for you and DSU specially requires over 17 minutes of perfect coordination, all add ons do is provide information, that one in the video is a bit egregious for how much it provides I’ll give you that but let’s not pretend like cactbot plays the game for you

[BluexBird]

Just because you wipe once during a dungeon boss, doesn't mean the difficulty needs to be adjusted. There's no point in complaining about having to redo a 3-minute fight. Figure out why you died and try doing it again. None of the MSQ dungeons and trials have party-wiping mechanics.

Also for trials, you're in there with 7 other people. Even if you're absolute TRASH and constantly die repeatedly to every single mechanic, if the other 7 people know what they're doing, you'll still clear.

Things like MSQ and normal trials aren't meant to be very difficult. Some people literally don't care about the challenge, and just want to breeze through the story. It doesn't matter if these players are stuck behind a gap, because that's where they want to stay.

Normal raids is where you get prepared to get serious. Extreme is a step up from that. And Savage is for when you're ready to stop bitching about the difficulty and actually learn how to play.

[Conchoidal]

There's something seriously wrong with how the game teaches players if there are healers spamming single-target GCD heals when everyone is above 80%, tanks single-pulling and/or not using their mitigation properly, and DPS unable to do their basic rotations at level 70+ content. Before SE can consider actually giving a level of difficulty progression to content they need to update the Hall of the Novice and prevent bad players from basically being carried throughout the entirety of the MSQ because there isn't a punishment for refusing to do their jobs correctly.

[HyoMinPark]

There's something seriously wrong with how the game teaches players if there are healers spamming single-target GCD heals when everyone is above 80%, tanks single-pulling and/or not using their mitigation properly, and DPS unable to do their basic rotations at level 70+ content. Before SE can consider actually giving a level of difficulty progression to content they need to update the Hall of the Novice and prevent bad players from basically being carried throughout the entirety of the MSQ because there isn't a punishment for refusing to do their jobs correctly.

Sadly, I don’t think upgrading Hall of Novice or even adding a Hall of the Intermediate or Advanced would help. People would simply ignore the advice or skip it entirely. HoN isn’t mandatory, and I doubt they’d make any other Hall mandatory either. Not that I don’t agree more needs to be done to teach proper play. There’s also the disconnect between how the developers think people play versus how they actually play. They think healers stand around waiting for damage, single-target heal people for HP top offs, or DPS “only occasionally” and that tanks “pull small”; and they don’t consider that that’s simply not how the community plays.

SGE offers a tutorial instance after you unlock it, yet I see so many SGEs basically playing the job like a WHM when they aren’t a WHM. Even going so far as to not even put Kardia on the tank (or, my favorite, slap it on themselves and then never press Dosis, thereby making the ability completely useless). There are also just players who blatantly say they only commend healers that mindlessly Cure spam until they’re at 100% and keep HoTs/barrier on the party 100% of the time rather than those who let the HoTs actually do their job and passively heal. Or who don’t immediately heal to full because an oGCD will be off cooldown in 10s and the next raidwide isn’t for another 60s.

With the way things have been dumbed down in the name of “accessibility”, adding any sort of difficulty now will just lead to people complaining about how things are “too hard” or “needlessly complex” because now they can’t watch Netflix on their other monitor and basically AFK an entire fight. I don’t like the direction the game has been going since ShB. There’s making things more accessible, and then there’s making things so easy you can auto-attack your way through.

[vetch]

Giving DPS greater responsibility is fine, though the devs have said they won't due to it being unfair for those playing specific roles. I recall Yoshida specifically mentioning the Gorilla mechanic from A5. Furthermore, the issue with mechanics like that is with how rigid jobs have become nowadays. Take a job like Dragoon. If forced to engage for any long periods, it's rotation is entirely destroyed in terms of damage output. Hence why any DPS mechanic will largely be thrown onto whichever job does the least damage.

Heaven forbid I be responsible for turning into a giant gorilla and punching high explosives across the room. That's so unfair. I'd much rather press the same 25 buttons I've pressed for the last 100 hours to shave off 2% of the boss's health.

The calcifying effects of the design decision to never require any decisions of the players lest endgame raiders indicate a preference for certain classes (which they were going to do anyway) are even crippling DPS gameplay now. Every job gets uptime-friendly 'stand here, then here' mechanics. Every job bursts at 2 minutes. Every job wants the same substats. It's so tedious.

Ironically, A5 gorilla would be a perfect mechanic for modern FF14 healers. They do the least DPS, their burst doesn't suffer from not building up resources if they disengage, you have to bring two of them, and there's never so much outgoing damage that the tanks can't get along fine without them for 15 seconds.

[Bobby66]

Maybe SE could slowly tighten up enrage timers and or healing requirements in content so it is not ao obvious as to what is going on and it is not so jarring for the general player base. SE should be progessivly push the required threshold requirements for clearing normal mode content.

SE should give people a reason to try, cause without one content becomes a snore fest for everyone.

[HyoMinPark]

Maybe SE could slowly tighten up enrage timers and or healing requirements in content so it is not ao obvious as to what is going on and it is not so jarring for the general player base. SE should be progessivly push the required threshold requirements for clearing normal mode content.

SE should give people a reason to try, cause without one content becomes a snore fest for everyone.

I don’t disagree; but regarding the healing requirements specifically, they have already gone on record saying they will not increase them. It’s the main reason healer mains now ask for more DPS options, since we won’t get the increased healing we had been asking for before.

Funny enough, normal mode raids used to have enrages. They phased them out with Sigmascape’s release. Occasionally one will have a soft enrage (O12N and the Laser Shower spam if you kill one of the Omegas before the other one), but they’re quite rare. Ultima, the High Seraph has one. After 14-15 mins, she will start quickly alternating between her tankbuster and another mechanic. Tanks are unable to keep up with the cooldown requirements to live, and she will eventually tear through a party if not killed. But you would never see that now. Not even in the worst alliances.

[Bobby66]

I don’t disagree; but regarding the healing requirements specifically, they have already gone on record saying they will not increase them. It’s the main reason healer mains now ask for more DPS options, since we won’t get the increased healing we had been asking for before.

Funny enough, normal mode raids used to have enrages. They phased them out with Sigmascape’s release. Occasionally one will have a soft enrage (O12N and the Laser Shower spam if you kill one of the Omegas before the other one), but they’re quite rare. Ultima, the High Seraph has one. After 14-15 mins, she will start quickly alternating between her tankbuster and another mechanic. Tanks are unable to keep up with the cooldown requirements to live, and she will eventually tear through a party if not killed. But you would never see that now. Not even in the worst alliances.

That is true, but also haven’t they hinted at not wanting to give healers more dps options either. So at this point are they left flapping in the wind? I would personally love old cleric stance to come back at least on one class, but that is a major pipe dream.

[vetch]

I don’t disagree; but regarding the healing requirements specifically, they have already gone on record saying they will not increase them. It’s the main reason healer mains now ask for more DPS options, since we won’t get the increased healing we had been asking for before.

They've also said they won't increase DPS options. There's no need to be at pains to respect one decision but not the other.

And personally, I'd much rather ask for something I enjoy than something I'm ambivalent about.

[HyoMinPark]

That is true, but also haven’t they hinted at not wanting to give healers more dps options either. So at this point are they left flapping in the wind? I would personally love old cleric stance to come back at least on one class, but that is a major pipe dream.

I believe the hope is to put pressure on them to make changes or risk more players leaving the role. It has been an effective measure in the past, since people abandoning NIN in ShB led to the 6.1 changes and players complaining about MNK for 6+ years the overhaul in EW. I just think it would be extremely hard to achieve a mass exodus from an entire role versus a single job. AST’s myriad of complaints since its inception did prompt radical changes in both ShB and EW—and now there are plans to change it in 7.0 again. My only fear is how much more will be stripped away from a job who has completely lost its original identity.

I’d prefer for healers to actually feel like a healer and not just a gimped damage dealer, despite enjoying DPSing on one. But I went several years not seeing that change when developers were asked and instead watching the opposite happen; so now I’m with the healers that ask for more DPS options. Unfortunately, I don’t believe they’ll ever be added because the modus operandi now is to strip jobs down to the bare basics and until they play the same as opposed to giving them nuance and actual identity. But one can dream.

They've also said they won't increase DPS options. There's no need to be at pains to respect one decision but not the other.

And personally, I'd much rather ask for something I enjoy than something I'm ambivalent about.

You are mistaken—I don’t respect that healers basically don’t heal in this game. I spent years asking for healing requirements to be increased. I still think they should be because the majority of a healer’s toolkit is overkill for 99% of the content in this game. Reading threads on the healer forums would show you I’m not alone in this opinion.

I’m not asking for things I’m ambivalent about. I’m asking for things I desire. I desired increased healing. I still do; but after asking for 4+ years, it’s clear we won’t get it. Now I desire more damage options since, if I’m going to be spending 80% or more of the fight pressing damage buttons, at least make it interesting and not 111111111111111 until my controller button wears out. I also desire for each healer to feel different and not identical to play.

Don’t mistake people saying “the devs have already said they won’t do x” as being at peace with the decision.