Is there no medium difficulty content or am I just too stupid?

[monokura]

kugane jump puzzle

[Reinha]

Variant dungeons, alliance raids and normal 8 man raids could fill that void but people with various problems would complain that it's unfair they can't complete the story mode.

[Gullis]

There really isn't sadly. I was searching too.

[caffe_macchiato]

Final Fantasy XIV is a story-driven, laid-back JRPG with endgame multiplayer as a bonus feature. There’s 1% of the North American playerbase that grinds hard on that bonus mode. The rest just play to follow the story and chat with friends. As many posters have said, and as the devs seem to indicate, Final Fantasy XIV is not supposed to cater to mid-core gamers.

There was an old misjudgment made by Square Enix in 2013 that people wanted an MMO like WoW with plenty of low, medium, and hardcore content for all types of gamers. So they hired Yoshida (a former WoW player himself) to have a go at the genre. It failed. Sub counts were low, revenue was slim, and people weren’t attracted to the game. Over the next nine years, Square Enix re-invented the game to cater to its other fans: those who liked playing single-player, story-driven JRPGs. They made new story content easier and playable with NPCs. They simplified older, harder content and drastically reduced the game’s complexity. People LOVED it. The player count expanded exponentially and Square Enix now considers FFXIV to be its top money-maker.

Suffice to say, I do not think we will have a return of the old “mid-core” game style anytime soon.

[angienessyo]

I always felt EX trials were the medium difficulty. While they have an enrage the dps checks are usually very lenient even with deaths. Of course it wouldn't hurt to have more than just EX trials. The way I see it is normal raids/alliance raids/dungeons are the easy/very casual content, EX trials are medium, savage is hard and ultimate is extra hard.

[Renalt]

The difficulty curve isn't much a curve as it's a steep incline. It's very odd the leaps and bounds it does. I would say the most mid-tier difficulty would be Eureka/Bozja. Most the difficulty is figuring out how to work the mechanics in your favor. Once you figure it out or have the tools at your disposal it's easier.

[Tiramu]

Just to add to this, the people I (and I'm sure others) complain about here are those that put zero thought or effort into playing the game. They're not the people like OP who are actually concerned about performing well in the higher tiers. They'll just show up and expect to be carried.

One example that's still fresh in my mind is a Duty Complete party where we were bamboozled into attempting to carry a DRK through Barb EX. I flat out said, "we're giving this just one try" and 3 minutes later, we disbanded.

Sure, I agree with this. But some people here and on places like gamefaqs can cause a lot of anxiety for new players looking to try stuff thats more challenging. Its those people I was referring to, not people complaining about time wasters and people just arsing about.

[Aniya_Estlihn]

Suffice to say, I do not think we will have a return of the old “mid-core” game style anytime soon.

Midcore has never existed in this game in any capacity, friend. Every attempt to do so since Heavensward has fallen flat because they either make it too hard or too easy. The rest of what you've said is just... strange? As someone playing since the beta, none of that reflects what the game has gone through at all. You're acting as if 1.0 and 2.0+ are the same game, but they categorically are not and that was the re-invention of the game. Since then the changes have been iterative but not far sweeping enough to the point of its demographic changing. That's nonsense. As the game has always and will continue to cater to players of all types and kinds.

Yoshida has also played a lot more than WoW and his inspirations for XIV come from those other MMO experiences as well, not just WoW.

[Seger]

Extreme Trials are medium content.

[Bukachu]

I think unreals are easier than savage and extremes, so could try that