Why are Criterion dungeons so hard?

[Panasync]

Outside of the rewards, the fights are perfect.

The real problem is XIV's regular content is so easy that even casual players seem to want more of a challenge, but just not as much as they gave in Criterion. Which is a problem with the content outside of criterion more than it is inside.

[Arohk]

Outside of the rewards, the fights are perfect.

The real problem is XIV's regular content is so easy that even casual players seem to want more of a challenge, but just not as much as they gave in Criterion. Which is a problem with the content outside of criterion more than it is inside.

I can understand that people who don't raid savage and are not used to that difficulty will struggle, a lot, with criteon dungeon. I mean, some people are so incredibly bad that they die in normal dungeons, but there is a also another factor, do you want to invest the time to learn the bosses? depending on how fast you learn, it can take 2-4 hours or more to learn just one boss, and then there is also an enrage timer.

I am not complaining, but if you don't watch a guide it is really difficult to understand what the bosses do sometimes or how to solve the puzzles.

[Shurrikhan]

People have been requesting difficult content for light parties for quite a while now - this content is supposed to fullfill that request.

Right, but that content can't really mirror or compete with Savage... if it's tuned around already having Savage gear. That makes it an extension of Savage, not an alternative way to experience difficult content for those who can't meet static schedules or dislike the scripted-ness of XIV raids.

If it had been designed as asked for (a Savage-alternative as challenging content nonetheless accessible to anyone), it probably wouldn't use player ilvl at all, instead following only one's secondary stat distribution. That would allow for precise tuning and independence from Savage gearing while also keeping its difficulty relevant across multiple tiers.

[Espon]

Right, but that content can't really mirror or compete with Savage... if it's tuned around already having Savage gear. That makes it an extension of Savage, not an alternative way to experience difficult content for those who can't meet static schedules or dislike the scripted-ness of XIV raids.

If it had been designed as asked for (a Savage-alternative as challenging content nonetheless accessible to anyone), it probably wouldn't use player ilvl at all, instead following only one's secondary stat distribution. That would allow for precise tuning and independence from Savage gearing while also keeping its difficulty relevant across multiple tiers.

You don't need savage gear, it's doable as long as you meet the ilvl requirement and use food. The enrage timers are not that tight, but these mechanics are designed to be as difficult as something you would see in a savage raid and failing them will likely either result in either death or getting a heavy damage down debuff.

I'm not sure what you mean by an alternative for "the scripted-ness of XIV raids." Everything is scripted in this game, from dungeon bosses to raid bosses, random enemies and those found in FATEs. There are no fights that will just throw things at you randomly, they're all designed around timing and patterns. Some fights will use mechanics in a random order or have variations to make sure you're paying attention, but every fight will always follow an AI script.

[Shurrikhan]

You don't need savage gear, it's doable as long as you meet the ilvl requirement and use food.

"Doable" is not the same as "designed around".

I'm not sure what you mean by an alternative for "the scripted-ness of XIV raids." Everything is scripted in this game.

A raid is, essentially, just its script. In criterion dungeons you at least have things breaking that up. It's not just a script per instance.
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Again, my point is merely that if it was meant to be a sort of alternate or independent content of a fixed difficulty, its gearing would likewise be independent and fixed.

[Arohk]

Again, my point is merely that if it was meant to be a sort of alternate or independent content of a fixed difficulty, its gearing would likewise be independent and fixed.

You can clear it with crafted gear, if that is not good enough for you, go do savage and get that fine loot.
There is already a lack of content where your gear matters.
Dungeons scale you down, fates scale you down, your savage gear is only good in savage content, there is only a lack of rewards in Criteon which results in not many people actualyl wanting to clear it.

[Ayche]

You don't even need to do it at ilvl 610, throw on some tome gear for more ilvls.
Or wait till 6.3 where now you can do it at easy 620 ilvl thanks to augmented crafted gear and 24-man raid gear.

[Shurrikhan]

There is already a lack of content where your gear matters.
Dungeons scale you down, fates scale you down, your savage gear is only good in savage content, there is only a lack of rewards in Criteon which results in not many people actualyl wanting to clear it.

Savage gear isn't only useful in Savage, but even if it were, that'd still be fine... because that gear is that second means by which Savage intentionally soft-nerfs itself. There'd be no need, from a development perspective, for the game to drop Savage gear if it didn't see a need for weekly easing for less skilled players the content's throughput checks or near-OHKO mechanics. Unless, of course, one takes the perspective that all content is solely a means to gear and never gear a means to content enjoyably tuned to a given player within that content's focus. But even then, the BiS gap could be miniscule and still offer its "I have the best stuff!" reward.

Unless a game is almost entirely grind-based and the game is actively trying to polarize its playerbase into those who had the ability to acquire grind-acceleration vs. the rest (in which case, most MMOs usually convert challenge-walls to pay-walls anyways)... the point of gear progression is just to soft-nerf content, making it more accessible over time (that is, if one's community doesn't jack ilvl requirements up so needlessly high that you'd need to dedicate weekly acquisitions all to a single job and partake in Savage from the start).

It serves no other function. It exists only to make things increasingly less challenging and pad /played hours via obliged maintenance (though that latter purpose only even works half the time, due to highly affordable crafted sets) that would slightly linearize content paths to add a bit of content longevity / gating to rarely-subbed players (again, largely defeated by crafted sets).

That may as a byproduct feel like a form of progression, but one already had "progression" in/via getting better at a given piece of content and its workings (optimizing one's job and composition, etc.), so it ends up just partly replacing one form of progression with another (conflating 'playing better' with 'being better geared'). That then lasts until one reaches BiS and is finally allowed again to fully vie for the original form of progression. It just replaces "get good" in fair part with "get geared" so that challenge can be replaced with prior grind.

That ability to replace challenge with grind may be iconic to many RPGs, but the game's content itself would function just fine without it or with any of various other ways of soft-nerfing content over time (see Echo mechanic, weekly minute aura nerfs, etc.).

Savage and weekly tome gear ease Savage, making a Week 5 Savage tier clear that much easier than a Week 1 Savage tier clear. It's not really meant, though, to accelerate anything and everything such that weekly grinds and especially Savage become largely non-choices. Else you'd never have seen ilvl caps on other content to begin with.


Tl;dr:

• Not everything has to be gated by/through a single content variety. It'd be as fine for Savage (or generally tier-max-ilvl) gear to be just for Savage as it was for PvP gear to have been just for PvP.
  
  
• Especially given that this was meant to be something of equivalent difficulty to Savage from the start and does not give any competing rewards, I'd slightly rather have seen Criterion dungeons scale with player ilvl or, ideally, use an independent means of progression. We don't normally have other options of gear acquisition atop weekly currency other than Savage nor anything quite of equivalent difficulty level (which, once Savage-geared, this isn't anyways), so it would make more sense for there to be a degree of redundant parity (e.g., both drop Pages, but still only one of each kind per week), really flesh this out, and later time CrDs releases to Savage tier releases... or to truly split the two apart. In the meantime, it at least needs further rewards, even if just of the cosmetic variety.

[Colt47]

As someone who has hit their limit on what difficult content they can manage to take on while also having a full-time job like anyone else I totally get where the OP is coming from. The issue you run into with the savage content is that you can't take a break when you need it because you are obligated to several other people to show up. Savage sometimes feels like hardcore PvP vs others just because of how crazy some people get when they don't progress as quickly as they expect.

As the years roll on with FFXIV I feel that there is a big gap forming in the middle for proper mid-tier content. We have things that present some challenge at the start of each major patch, but then I look back at all the content that was challenging at one point and was then nerfed into obscurity. Now it feels like everything is just "easy stuff", or "one or two EX fights for middle tier", and then this huge time sink in savage that doesn't really get matched by anything else outside of maybe relic.

[PangTong]

Personally I would rather they tuned up Normal mode a smidge, since running roulettes is mind numbingly easy. But yes for me personally I had hoped that Criterion would fill a gap between normal and extreme. I think it's a bit off that the game's difficulty curve goes from 0 wipe content, stuff that even an actual corpse could be carried through and which typically gets 1-shot by a group of 100% blind randoms, straight to 50+ wipe content that requires dedicated practice parties and multiple hours of progression unless you are in an elite static.

There is a middle ground here somewhere. Something that a typical player could go into with a matchmade party and expect to learn comfortably within a lockout or two. You might say that DF randoms couldn't handle it but I disagree, most roulette groups I enter completely smoke the normal mode content with zero trouble at all. They can handle more and HAVE in the past. Raids like Weeping City and Orbonne and trials like Shinryu were actually reasonable challenges for a casual player on release. Even just taking normal mode mechanics and cranking up the damage to be actually threatening would go a long way to making it feel less effortless.

I was hoping Criterion would be that, but it's not, oh well. It's not like they said that's what it'd be, so I can't complain too hard.