Euphrosyne feels a bit lacking

[Gemina]

I agree with just about everything stated in the OP. The thing is, I don't really care. I had a lot of fun doing that raid the few times I've ran it thus far, and don't need my arse handed to me to have it. I will get plenty of that in the new Unreal and EX trials.

I was disappointed when I found out the twelve were being placed in alliance raids to begin with instead of making them the 8 man raids this expansion. Even NM versions are more difficult than alliance raids, and savage versions of them would have thrown me in that content for the first time.

[DiaDeem]

Ivalice was never hard. Everything just had One Quadrillion HP, so the fights took nine years cause they wouldn't die.

[Deceptus]

Ivalice was never hard. Everything just had One Quadrillion HP, so the fights took nine years cause they wouldn't die.

This, the Ivalice bosses were just HP sponges.

[Midareyukki]

Ivalice was never hard. Everything just had One Quadrillion HP, so the fights took nine years cause they wouldn't die.

It was a bit more reliant on group coordination than other raids. I think that's what people refer to when "the raids were hard".

When to this day you still have people fully believing that you can clear Rofocale by just standing on Dark Geas, you know the raids aren't straightforward. On top of the millions of HP, because it's true, it's not that Yiazmat is hard. It's just chaotic. The real annoyance is his first phase being long because of his HP.

Euphrosyne on the other hand barely has any mechanic where you need to coordinate as a group. Only the adds phase in Halone and that's just people having to split into groups. Everything else is straightforward, and you really only die if you yourself screw up. Ivalice at least relied on group effort and everyone being on the same page.

Otherwise when you reduce mechanics being easy because they're "dodging AoEs" or "standing in places and pressing buttons", then even an Ultimate can be easy with little thought. So rather than "Ivalice was hard", I'd say a better term is "Ivalice was not accessible". Because Alliance Raids in general are pretty easy. The issue comes with how groups react to it and how straightforward\accessible the mechanics are.

Euphrosyne is like... "Oh, that person died. Oh well, nothing of value was lost".

[DiaDeem]

It was a bit more reliant on group coordination than other raids. I think that's what people refer to when "the raids were hard".

When to this day you still have people fully believing that you can clear Rofocale by just standing on Dark Geas, you know the raids aren't straightforward. On top of the millions of HP, because it's true, it's not that Yiazmat is hard. It's just chaotic. The real annoyance is his first phase being long because of his HP.

Euphrosyne on the other hand barely has any mechanic where you need to coordinate as a group. Only the adds phase in Halone and that's just people having to split into groups. Everything else is straightforward, and you really only die if you yourself screw up. Ivalice at least relied on group effort and everyone being on the same page.

Otherwise when you reduce mechanics being easy because they're "dodging AoEs" or "standing in places and pressing buttons" So rather than "Ivalice was hard", I'd say a better term is "Ivalice was not accessible". Because Alliance Raids in general are pretty easy. The issue comes with how groups react to it and how straightforward\accessible the mechanics are.

Euphrosyne is like... "Oh, that person died. Oh well, nothing of value was lost".

I mean... kinda? I get what you're saying but in that case, Crystal Tower is a much better example for A/B/C Alliance Task assignments, and not really Ivalice.

When it was current content, CT had the Atomos Pads, the Thanatos Pots, proper rotation of the Vassagos and killing Napalms, the Behemoth Towers, the Phlegethon pads, and A for Ads, B for Belly and C for Chains for Cerberus. Everything else has mostly just been: "A kills that mini boss, B kills that mini boss, C kills that mini boss" on top of some variation of "Dodge AOE, Hide behind this and watch where you get knocked back by thing" and in that sense all Euphy is just continuing the tradition, though I'm glad the bosses are no HP sponges like they were in Ivalice.

I'd be all down for Alliance Raids to have more of these assigned tasks, but that means going back to ARR design and modernizing that concept, which would be very cool.

I guess it's just strange to me that Euphy gets flack for feeling dull when there's been plenty of that in Alliance Raids for the past ten years, and there's an argument to be made there but it wouldn't be against Euphy but against the entire concept of how Alliance Raids are designed ever since Void Ark, which I found to be so boring I haven't even run Ark of Mhach in years. Ridorana I only ever run when a friend needs it for story for the same reason.

If you ask me, the most creative 24 Player raid they've ever done is actually Delubrum Reginae, but that's just me.

tl;dr - ARs have never been complex. Imho, there's an argument about making them more complex but that's not just for Euphy but for the way they make all of them. DR is cool.

[Midareyukki]

I mean... kinda? I get what you're saying but in that case, Crystal Tower is a much better example for A/B/C Alliance Task assignments, and not really Ivalice.
(...)
tl;dr - ARs have never been complex. Imho, there's an argument about making them more complex but that's not just for Euphy but for the way they make all of them. DR is cool.

:P well of course it's 'kinda'. I'm comparing Euph to Ivalice specifically.

Otherwise, you have other stuff that's "hard" and "easy". A good example is Void Ark being boringly easy (most bosses are tank and spank jobs and the rest is positioning) vs Dun Scaith being challenging (mechanics reliant on group coordination and UTTER CHAOS).

Also potentially more varied mechanics than your average glowy puddle of death. Which, again, is what Euphrosyne is.

I agree. The most creative AR is Delubrum. And even then, the crocodile boss is literally the easiest out there in terms of fight design because he's just literally "don't get hit" rather than the mechanics feeling engaging and having you actually do things.

For example, when I say "stuff is easy because it's position-based", I mean stuff that you can very clearly dodge by simply moving out of the way or baiting very obvious AoEs away from other people. What I like about Delubrum Reginae's position-based mechanics is that either they go by fast, have a specific pattern that you need to pay attention to, or mechanics that require you to understand the mechanic as a whole to know what to dodge and even what to get hit by. Which is why mechanics like Halone's Tetrapagos, Nymeia's four moon circles or Nophica's Simon Says thing are interesting; Halone's is even Trinity Seeker's four slashes, just in a different format.

The issue Euphrosyne has is that all the rest is very, very bland. And even by that standard, those mechanics can be bland as well. Nophica's Simon Says? Easy as pie, Ivalice at least had you do maths while you went into those circles. Nymeia's four moons? There are only two kinds of moon. The moment you figure that out, the mechanic becomes no different than Ra La's jumps. So even when it's interesting, it's lacking.

ARs have never been complex, no, but there definitely was a bit more effort from our part while playing in different ones than others. All of them are easy, they're casual content. But some are a bit more demanding from you than others, asking for a bit more effort or coordination.

CT is easy. WoD is a bit more reliant on coordination.
VA is easy. Dun Scaith requires your group to be coordinated or it becomes chaos.

Even Aglaia was a bit more demanding. You had to be careful with positioning in Rhalgr. You needed to figure out the hammer thing and some people struggle with it on Byregot. Naldthal wants you to coordinate with the raid to avoid a wipe. Azeyma had her clone mechanic for a good position-based thing and her fight was fast-paced. You definitely got hit by her stuff your first run, whereas my first run of Euphrosyne only had me get hit by mechanics during Halone.

So the key takeaway is that even by casual standards, Euphrosyne is really, really easy.
Compared to other raids it's on the easy side.
Compared to Ivalice, it isn't demanding of anything, no effort nor coordination, apart from one or two mechanics where you just need to wake up.
Compared to its previous raid, Aglaia, there's nothing that really trips up people or makes you think. All the mechanics are straightforward and easier to spot.

[DiaDeem]

Sorry for chopping quote, trying to save characters. Lemme know if you feel I missed anything

Also potentially more varied mechanics than your average glowy puddle of death. Which, again, is what Euphrosyne is.

This is true, actually. I guess the issue is how basic the "dodge the AoE" variant tends to be a lot of the time here. Point blanks, donuts and half the arena.

I agree. The most creative AR is Delubrum. What I like about Delubrum Reginae's position-based mechanics is that either they go by fast, have a specific pattern that you need to pay attention to, or mechanics that require you to understand the mechanic as a whole to know what to dodge and even what to get hit by.

Phantom running, fire and ice, keep track of the queen, etc. Yeah, it's just a fun place generally imho.

ARs have never been complex, no, but there definitely was a bit more effort from our part while playing in different ones than others. All of them are easy, they're casual content. But some are a bit more demanding from you than others, asking for a bit more effort or coordination.

Even Aglaia was a bit more demanding. You had to be careful with positioning in Rhalgr. You needed to figure out the hammer thing and some people struggle with it on Byregot.

So the key takeaway is that even by casual standards, Euphrosyne is really, really easy.
Compared to other raids it's on the easy side.

My take away, from seeing your perspective, is that this isn't so much about how many "Dodge the AoE" mechanics there are, but how creatively they are presented. More stuff like Fire and Ice in DR, and more "Chose the right finger to get knocked into" rather than just "Run close for knockback" and I think this is fair enough. Again, I'm no game dev, so I can only express how I feel from a player's perspective. I really enjoyed Euphy for what it is, but you make a ton of fair points, and I can respect that. In this case, I hope the last raid of the set will be a bit more wild even if the mechanics remain what we know.

[PangTong]

Ivalice was never hard. Everything just had One Quadrillion HP, so the fights took nine years cause they wouldn't die.

To be perfectly clear, Alliance Raids were never "hard". But to suggest they were never any less easy on their release patch than they are now is just objectively false. What is the point of claiming otherwise? To imply that you're such an elite player that you can't even distinguish the difference between "easy" and "ridiculously easy"? I was there, I remember it, you can't gaslight me about it lol. I remember the raids being abandoned because groups just couldn't manage Ozma, Hashmal, TG Cid. The repeated wipes to Construct 7, Deathgaze. Nothing in Aglaia or Euphrosyne even comes close. Even if you're a god at the game, as just one player of 24 you would inevitably have experienced this too.

[Tehmon]

To be perfectly clear, Alliance Raids were never "hard". But to suggest they were never any less easy on their release patch than they are now is just objectively false. What is the point of claiming otherwise? To imply that you're such an elite player that you can't even distinguish the difference between "easy" and "ridiculously easy"? I was there, I remember it, you can't gaslight me about it lol. I remember the raids being abandoned because groups just couldn't manage Ozma, Hashmal, TG Cid. The repeated wipes to Construct 7, Deathgaze. Nothing in Aglaia or Euphrosyne even comes close. Even if you're a god at the game, as just one player of 24 you would inevitably have experienced this too.

Though probably not what the devs or the players want for their casual content, this amount of frustration.