We have midcore content... just too little too late.

[Minarisweet]

I've noticed more people have been vocal about wanting midcore content in this game like me but I think there's another point most people don't seem to realize... we do get midcore content eventually its just not very repeatable and its very further into the expansion.

In shb we got bozja in 6.35 and people were already dropping it by the week since you didnt need to do much of it to get the relic at the time... its also ridiculously late for what should be content for everyone!

No this is not a covid thing because we are getting manderville weapons for the same patch cycle this expact too.

Relic content tends to feel more complete when its finished and even then when you already got a full relic it is VERY hard to want to do more of it just for the sake of it. So not only is the content very late but it also doesnt inspire much replayability.

I'm not sure myself what is the solution to the lack of rewards since not even gil is that desirable in this game, but I do believe we should be getting relic content and deep dungeons earlier in the expansions.

I appreciate your time reading this.

[Avoidy]

Mid-tier difficulty in this game is weird, because it's difficult for people to come to a consensus of what it is (I know a lot of people who felt like bozja was casual and see midcore content as EX-difficulty stuff) and there's not much incentive to run it repeatedly. Casual content and savage content has weekly incentives to do it, but ... for example, with barbariccia EX, I noticed that interest in it dried up after the first week. Not saying people completely stopped doing it, but there was this weird perception of like, if you didn't get it that first week, all the groups still running it would be awful and nobody else would want to run it. And in my experience that's how it went. For the newest EX, I noticed that getting people to run it was like pulling teeth since unlike barb ex you didn't have the savage raiders running it to get their weapon before the new raids came out, since there weren't new 8man savages. Which just left people who wanted 525 weapons or people who liked the glams. I won't speak for everyone, but I watched people struggle to fill groups in the first week, which was kind of a feelsbad moment. Even I had like, 0 interest in getting it done personally.

idk. I wish devs would experiment with (Unreal) stuff in more than just old trials. Unreal alliance raids would be cool as hell imo. The high difficulty 24-man stuff we have now is all gated behind some of the most tedious grinds in the game and then you basically have to join a discord server just to get a reliable team to go in with you. Imagine if we just had a tweaked harder version of dun scaith that anyone could just go in and do after unlocking it, complete with weekly incentives to get it done. idk dude.

[PredatoryCatgirl]

Mid-tier difficulty in this game is weird, because it's difficult for people to come to a consensus of what it is (I know a lot of people who felt like bozja was casual and see midcore content as EX-difficulty stuff) and there's not much incentive to run it repeatedly. Casual content and savage content has weekly incentives to do it, but ... for example, with barbariccia EX, I noticed that interest in it dried up after the first week. Not saying people completely stopped doing it, but there was this weird perception of like, if you didn't get it that first week, all the groups still running it would be awful and nobody else would want to run it. And in my experience that's how it went. For the newest EX, I noticed that getting people to run it was like pulling teeth since unlike barb ex you didn't have the savage raiders running it to get their weapon before the new raids came out, since there weren't new 8man savages. Which just left people who wanted 525 weapons or people who liked the glams. I won't speak for everyone, but I watched people struggle to fill groups in the first week, which was kind of a feelsbad moment. Even I had like, 0 interest in getting it done personally.

idk. I wish devs would experiment with (Unreal) stuff in more than just old trials. Unreal alliance raids would be cool as hell imo. The high difficulty 24-man stuff we have now is all gated behind some of the most tedious grinds in the game and then you basically have to join a discord server just to get a reliable team to go in with you. Imagine if we just had a tweaked harder version of dun scaith that anyone could just go in and do after unlocking it, complete with weekly incentives to get it done. idk dude.

This is really the opposite of my experience. The main difference may be that I'm on Sargatanas, which is more or less the Mateus to Gilgamesh's Balmung in terms of raiding. If you're interested in doing some tougher content, it might be worth parking your character on Aether for a few days.

[ForteNightshade]

Mid-tier difficulty in this game is weird, because it's difficult for people to come to a consensus of what it is (I know a lot of people who felt like bozja was casual and see midcore content as EX-difficulty stuff) and there's not much incentive to run it repeatedly. Casual content and savage content has weekly incentives to do it, but ... for example, with barbariccia EX, I noticed that interest in it dried up after the first week. Not saying people completely stopped doing it, but there was this weird perception of like, if you didn't get it that first week, all the groups still running it would be awful and nobody else would want to run it. And in my experience that's how it went. For the newest EX, I noticed that getting people to run it was like pulling teeth since unlike barb ex you didn't have the savage raiders running it to get their weapon before the new raids came out, since there weren't new 8man savages. Which just left people who wanted 525 weapons or people who liked the glams. I won't speak for everyone, but I watched people struggle to fill groups in the first week, which was kind of a feelsbad moment. Even I had like, 0 interest in getting it done personally.

idk. I wish devs would experiment with (Unreal) stuff in more than just old trials. Unreal alliance raids would be cool as hell imo. The high difficulty 24-man stuff we have now is all gated behind some of the most tedious grinds in the game and then you basically have to join a discord server just to get a reliable team to go in with you. Imagine if we just had a tweaked harder version of dun scaith that anyone could just go in and do after unlocking it, complete with weekly incentives to get it done. idk dude.

This is partially the side-effect of drip feeding content the way they do. People are so starved for new things to do they dogpile on whatever releases immediately. It will happen again once Deep Dungeon drops. At least with the accompanying relic there will be more meat on that bone.

As for Unreal. That remains one of the most underutilized ideas and it completely baffles me why. We've had a wealth of new players who have likely never experienced any of the older content at launch and all they've utilized it for is one EX every four months. I imagine it takes time to rescale everything up to our current level but I still think it's a wasted opportunity. Although, adding proper rewards is another problem. Criterion all but died a slow death because the reward were abysmal relative to the effect required. Especially the Savage version. So making any potential Unreal content worthwhile may be tricky.

This is a problem on both ends. Rewards did not used to be such a need. Remember older JRPGs where the reward was literally just bragging rights (like "Proof of Omega" from FF8)? Now everything needs a functional reward for some reason, you even see it in the FF mainline series (e.g., FF12's Wyrmhero Blade, which you get way too late to actually make any practical use of, but apparently, Yiazmat and Omega needed REWARDS!).

Single player games differ in that regard because both their challenge and progression are entirely at the individual player's desire. Omega can be completely curb stomped or cheesed if you know the proper setup. You're also not reliant on other players. Criterion didn't die because nobody did it. Those same players had no reason to go back, thus making it harder for newer players to find groups interested. You wouldn't have that issue with a super boss like Ruby Weapon or Omega.

It should also be noted people did complain about that "Proof of Omega" certificate being incredibly lame.

[Thi]

For the newest EX, I noticed that getting people to run it was like pulling teeth since unlike barb ex you didn't have the savage raiders running it to get their weapon before the new raids came out, since there weren't new 8man savages. Which just left people who wanted 525 weapons or people who liked the glams. I won't speak for everyone, but I watched people struggle to fill groups in the first week, which was kind of a feelsbad moment. Even I had like, 0 interest in getting it done personally.

This is honestly a major problem the dev team has with XIV. Many times the rewards for doing the content are not worth doing said content for.

The new EX is a great example, oh a weapon worse than what I have even on my alt jobs because I do savage content. I'm not even going to bother unlocking it unless the skin looks nice, which in general the EX weapons are meh. Plus next expansion they will release a nicer looking crafted version I can just buy on the market board.

Same issue happened with the criterion dungeons. Not going to be arsed to do something for absolute shit tier rewards.

Meanwhile, as an exception as a player I have no interest in Island Sanctuary style content, but the rewards for it are worth the time investment to get it up and running nearly automated, so I pushed through and got my island setup to farm the currency with minimal input and collect rewards.

Basically the content needs to have rewards equivalent to the time spent and relevant for the patch cycle if they have stats attached.

[Raoabolic]

This is honestly a major problem the dev team has with XIV. Many times the rewards for doing the content are not worth doing said content for.

The new EX is a great example, oh a weapon worse than what I have even on my alt jobs because I do savage content. I'm not even going to bother unlocking it unless the skin looks nice, which in general the EX weapons are meh. Plus next expansion they will release a nicer looking crafted version I can just buy on the market board.

Same issue happened with the criterion dungeons. Not going to be arsed to do something for absolute shit tier rewards.

Meanwhile, as an exception as a player I have no interest in Island Sanctuary style content, but the rewards for it are worth the time investment to get it up and running nearly automated, so I pushed through and got my island setup to farm the currency with minimal input and collect rewards.

Basically the content needs to have rewards equivalent to the time spent and relevant for the patch cycle if they have stats attached.

So it's about the destination rather than the journey. I guess I shouldn't be that shocked, that has been a trend since early WoW, lol.
At this point it seems more like a community issue than a dev issue. There should always be a carrot at the end of the hamster wheel we call xiv but you have to admit that the mixmax mentality killed a lot of content in the game. Why should you help with X when Y drops something that is 5 ilvls higher? lol

[Azuri]

So it's about the destination rather than the journey. I guess I shouldn't be that shocked, that has been a trend since early WoW, lol.
At this point it seems more like a community issue than a dev issue. There should always be a carrot at the end of the hamster wheel we call xiv but you have to admit that the mixmax mentality killed a lot of content in the game. Why should you help with X when Y drops something that is 5 ilvls higher? lol

Yes, the devs being unable to design content where the "journey" is enough to keep players coming back to it is definitely a community issue. Sure thing.

XIV has a very unique and weird style of FOMO. Every piece of content that comes out is a flash in a pan that is over a few weeks after its release and from that point on you will struggle finding groups to even run it. Sitting in half-filled PFs for the entire evening isn't enjoyable gameplay.

There is no "journey", just "stagnation".

[Minarisweet]

Yes, the devs being unable to design content where the "journey" is enough to keep players coming back to it is definitely a community issue. Sure thing.

XIV has a very unique and weird style of FOMO. Every piece of content that comes out is a flash in a pan that is over a few weeks after its release and from that point on you will struggle finding groups to even run it. Sitting in half-filled PFs for the entire evening isn't enjoyable gameplay.

There is no "journey", just "stagnation".

I always considered myself impatient for not wanting to put up with waiting for so long in pf just to disband in one pull but I guess someone else shares the same feeling!

[Deveryn]

I always considered myself impatient for not wanting to put up with waiting for so long in pf just to disband in one pull but I guess someone else shares the same feeling!

PF is a big part of that community problem with the content. You have people that are going in half-hearted to get this stuff done and it takes away from the fun that could be had either from learning or getting clears.

I always talk about this with frontline. Too many people aren't invested in the idea of making the effort to get a win. They just want a carrot, even if it's not the best one. The faster they eat those carrots, the sooner they get to the big prizes and yet they're left feeling stuffed and miserable about it. Others then try to say things like Rival Wings need more carrots. I disagree because of what I just described in FL.

[Absurdity]

This is honestly a major problem the dev team has with XIV. Many times the rewards for doing the content are not worth doing said content for.

The new EX is a great example, oh a weapon worse than what I have even on my alt jobs because I do savage content. I'm not even going to bother unlocking it unless the skin looks nice, which in general the EX weapons are meh. Plus next expansion they will release a nicer looking crafted version I can just buy on the market board.

Same issue happened with the criterion dungeons. Not going to be arsed to do something for absolute shit tier rewards.

Meanwhile, as an exception as a player I have no interest in Island Sanctuary style content, but the rewards for it are worth the time investment to get it up and running nearly automated, so I pushed through and got my island setup to farm the currency with minimal input and collect rewards.

Basically the content needs to have rewards equivalent to the time spent and relevant for the patch cycle if they have stats attached.

I would add that for midcore content it would need rewards that are both worth doing and require a reasonable time investment.


Let's take Criterion/Variant dungeons as an example again.

Variant had most of the interesting rewards, but because it was so incredibly easy I managed to get the achievement mount and all the rewards I wanted from it within 2 days. I understand that variant dungeons are not supposed to be midcore content, it's the easy mode, but 2 days isn't exactly a lot of mileage to get out of patch content that's supposed to keep you playing for the next 4 months.

Criterion on the other hand only has 1 reward we really need to talk about, the mount, if you're unlucky you will need to run Criterion 25 times to get this mount. Considering the average completion time of Criterion that's something few people can be bothered to do, which means people cleared Criterion once and then never touched it again.