MSQ Difficulty and Exclusion

[ReynTime]

In general MSQ has always been a bit on the easy side. The problem stems from the optional dungeons being designed just as easy since Stormblood.
And Yoshida hyping the final EW trial difficulty but even in Extreme it's one of the easiest trials in the game...

[Supersnow845]

In general MSQ has always been a bit on the easy side. The problem stems from the optional dungeons being designed just as easy since Stormblood.
And Yoshida hyping the final EW trial difficulty but even in Extreme it's one of the easiest trials in the game...

EW3 extreme just felt totally unfinished, an 11 minute fight that stops introducing mechanics at like the 5 minute mark and one of its 2 big mechanics is just a simplified form of intermediate relativity from E12S part 2

I know that wasn’t the point of your post but I thought I’d chime in since that always bothered me

[Illmaeran]

Otherwise, you get stuff like Final Steps of Faith/Royal Menagrie where those people are calling for nerfs because they're getting hardwalled and simply waiting until they can find a group that can carry them, or they just leave the game entirely.

This describes me. A couple of days before Stormblood released I was diagnosed with a very serious illness and started extremely aggressive treatment. That treatment led to significant reduction in both my physical and mental reflexes, making the solo duty in Azim Steppe undoable, no matter how many times I tried on Very Easy. It was so frustrating to get hard walled on an MSQ point that I left and didn't come back until just before Endwalker. Thankfully, over time my situation's improved, but I'm never going to have the reflexes or processing speed I did pre-treatment. Some of the EW MSQ dungeons/trials were very challenging for me; a couple to the point where I had to put them on the back burner until I could get friends to help me through them.

There are people in my FC who are retired and max out at MSQ/DF difficulty and, like me, at times have needed help getting through fights like the three sisters. People like us absolutely do exist in the player base and absolutely do appreciate the lower difficulty of MSQ compared to things like Savage and Ultimate. No content required by the MSQ should be so difficult that it limits any player's ability to get through it. Likewise, anything that winds up on the general DF/Roulette list should be doable by all players. The exception I grant to this are alliance raids that need to be unlocked. I know my limits and have specifically left things like Eden and Omega locked to keep from getting them in DF. If Ivalice wasn't required for Bozja, I'd have left that locked too.

Increasing challenge should only come as optional content. I firmly believe this game needs this challenging content to meet the desires of the portion of the player base who seek it out; it's only fair that paying customers have that at their disposal. I hope the Criterion dungeons help fill the gap between DF-level challenge and Savage; that's another area the game needs to address.

As one of the previous posters mentioned, MMOs are a massive investment and depend on player retention to remain viable. In order to accomplish this, content needs to be as accessible to as many people as possible. This means they can't reach the difficulty of single player games or those MMOs focused on high-end raiding, ala Wildstar and current WoW without risking losing a significant portion of their player base. The vast majority of people I play with are looking for a fun time playing through casual content with friends in a good social atmosphere. We are the bread and butter of the MMO community that any MMO developer needs to design for in order to maximize their customer base. We're also the group of people a contingent of the people here on the OF call "actively bad". In all my years of playing this game I've never met anyone who's intentionally played poorly. They may only want to play the game at DF difficulty, but none of them have ever actively expressed that they only want to hit a basic combo and forget everything else in their skill kit.

It is a balancing act though. As ramp it up to much and engagement becomes frustration and drives players away just as quickly as setting the bar to low does..

This happened in Heavensward. Players during original ARR asked for more difficulty and SE provided. However, the response from the larger portion of the player base was that it was too difficult so SE tuned it downward. Every adjustment toward being more easy is a response to the majority of input SE receive. They're not doing it in a vacuum and would be foolish to make arbitrary changes without referencing player input to see where the largest portion of their customers lay.

I believe we're now at the point where SE are looking to increase the offerings of optional, more difficult, content while keeping MSQ and general dungeons/trials at the point the majority of the community are seeking.

[DPZ2]

This was my first computer

Oddly enough, that was my third computer, the Apple II+ being the second.

This was my first computer, hand built from a kit, back in my days in the Navy:

[ZedxKayn]

Oh my god not people acting like XIV is a game as demanding as fighting games or FPS. Slower reaction times that come with old age won't affect XIV's gameplay because the game is slow as hell.

If XIV is too fast for you, give up your driving license btw

[Kukra]

Its the great way to kill the growth we had over the last year to be reminded of the toxic gameplay WoW is famous for. Not everyone wants to be stressed for failing gameplay because the new healer cant use it kit right or waste hours in a duty because the tank don't understand it role yet. IF they removed the duties form MSQ and maybe rework them for solo play and maybe it be fine to bump up challenge abit to opt in heroic groups without better gear or whatever.

[Alleo]

Honestly imo it makes no sense that the majority of the playerbase would want a much more difficult MSQ experience when certain encountes and trials get nerfed all the time...That would either mean that SE somehow listen to a tiny minority or that maybe the majority of the playerbase is not hardcore...

Look at games like Wildstar that tried to be a game for a more hardcore group. If that is something that people want why was it not sucessful?
And why are the clear rates for the harder content in this game so low?

No I disagree with you OP. We dont really need a harder MSQ. We need a variety of content beyond the MSQ for different playertypes but the story is just that, the story.

[Axxion]

I would not mind it they made it a bit more challenging even the solo ones, but and i mean BUT make it optional for those that want it. Like how they did the current msq. keep failing the normal then it goes it ask if you want to try it on easy.

[Glandire]

I get the sentiment but I wiped too many times in some of the mentioned 'easy' msq duties. It's honestly a lottery in the DF. One day you will get a team who will destroy the trial the other you will get close to end of instance timer after a wipe fest just cause you got different set of players. Skill level varies a lot in the community.

Look how many people had troubles with certain EW solo duty. In the end I believe they made the easy mode of it even easier to allow everyone to progress msq. Which is good, if you want to enjoy the story you should be able too without stressing about your skill level.

[Ilisidi]

Notice how there weren't as many complaints about the other solo duties? That certain one was just terribly designed.

The others were annoying, but that one was bad. It's also not indicative of player quality or how well they do in other content. This whole thing was not like other content.