At this point will FFXIV collapse if all mods and third party tools disappear?

[Absurdity]

If you want a judgement from me however, here is one. I find it depressing that being a limsa chatter is probably the most satisfying way to play the game at this point, because they are always happy with what they get, just like RPers they make their own content.

Meanwhile I'm sitting here, watching XIV's gameplay become increasingly dogwater for 2 expansions now and questioning why on earth I ever invested this much time into a game that thinks we're all too stupid and we need the devs to reduce the game down to "our level".

[Xaruko_Nexume]

If you want a judgement from me however, here is one. I find it depressing that being a limsa chatter is probably the most satisfying way to play the game at this point, because they are always happy with what they get, just like RPers they make their own content.

Meanwhile I'm sitting here, watching XIV's gameplay become increasingly dogwater for 2 expansions now and questioning why on earth I ever invested this much time into a game that thinks we're all too stupid and we need the devs to reduce the game down to "our level".

I appreciate your sincerity. I haven't been around long enough to doubt that the gameplay has been "dumbed down" but isn't savage still a thing and ultimates? If there is an argument by raiders/elite players or whatever they are called, that they would like MORE difficult content in the game for them, I think that is completely valid. I want this game to be large and healthy, even if a good chunk of that is folks doing content that I have zero interest in.

But those "depressed that others find joy chatting in Limssa and playing dressup" I just dont get that attitude. Do we think Yoshi P is going to stop developing hard content because they throw RPers a bone like dance floors, while most of the "RP stuff" is on the mog station? I just don't understand the need for animosity between the two communities. We should clamor for content that we can ALL enjoy.

[Absurdity]

I appreciate your sincerity. I haven't been around long enough to doubt that the gameplay has been "dumbed down" but isn't savage still a thing and ultimates? If there is an argument by raiders/elite players or whatever they are called, that they would like MORE difficult content in the game for them, I think that is completely valid. I want this game to be large and healthy, even if a good chunk of that is folks doing content that I have zero interest in.

This isn't even about hard content for me, although the fact that everything below extreme is bafflingly easy plays a part in it. Gameplay is the simple act of playing your class/job, the content is actually irrelevant in this case because if I have fun playing my job then I'll have fun in even the most braindead of dungeons.
But no matter how difficult they make the savage "mechanics song and dance", I am still bored out of my mind spamming 1-2-3 once the initial process of learning mechanics is done and it's an optimistic estimate that it will even last throughout progress. Just because you make me run zigzag across the arena every 30 seconds it doesn't suddenly become engaging or satisfying.


They are still making difficult fights but those will never be able to last for 8 months between raid tiers, so even if I still enjoyed doing those fights it would never be able to stave off the boredom.

But those "depressed that others find joy chatting in Limssa and playing dressup" I just dont get that attitude. Do we think Yoshi P is going to stop developing hard content because they throw RPers a bone like dance floors, while most of the "RP stuff" is on the mog station? I just don't understand the need for animosity between the two communities. We should clamor for content that we can ALL enjoy.

Read it again, I find it depressing that sitting in limsa and chatting is probably more satisfying than actually playing the game's content. This isn't a criticism of the limsa chatters, it is a criticism of how bland doing anything else in the game has become.

[Raikai]

This isn't even about hard content for me. Gameplay is the simple act of playing your class/job, the content is actually irrelevant in this case because if I have fun playing my job then I'll have fun in even the most braindead of dungeons.
But no matter how difficult they make the savage "mechanics song and dance", I am still bored out of my mind spamming 1-2-3. Just because you make me run zigzag across the arena every 30 seconds it doesn't suddenly become engaging or satisfying.


Read it again, I find it depressing that sitting in limsa and chatting is probably more satisfying than actually playing the game's content. This isn't a criticism of the limsa chatters, it is a criticism of how bland doing anything else in the game has become.

And even, both things - in theory - could co-exist peacefully.

They could amplify the job design, making them truly engaging with accessible skill floors and high skill ceilings, while still giving glamours, fluff items and features, because people interested on those can get them regardless if they play their BLM completely messed up or not - big portion of the game's rewards are gated behind casual content... In the 'hard to play' spectrum, what we get every even patch? Dyable armor sets, a savage weapon, an EX weapon, a savage mount and an EX mount. Everything else is accessible to the 'limsa chatters', and the investment to get them is not related to playing well a job, but grinding something. Heck, even farming latest dungeon sets for glam can be done peacefully with the Trusts, they even tell you how to do fight mechs.

They want to have more of the 'limsa chatters' attempting Savage raids, but if that's not the content they want to do, they won't do it regardless of how braindead the jobs become.

[OdinelStarrei]

I appreciate your sincerity. I haven't been around long enough to doubt that the gameplay has been "dumbed down" but isn't savage still a thing and ultimates? If there is an argument by raiders/elite players or whatever they are called, that they would like MORE difficult content in the game for them, I think that is completely valid. I want this game to be large and healthy, even if a good chunk of that is folks doing content that I have zero interest in.

But those "depressed that others find joy chatting in Limssa and playing dressup" I just dont get that attitude. Do we think Yoshi P is going to stop developing hard content because they throw RPers a bone like dance floors, while most of the "RP stuff" is on the mog station? I just don't understand the need for animosity between the two communities. We should clamor for content that we can ALL enjoy.

No no no, their point is that the BASIC gameplay experience of the game is so watered down compared to what we were used to, that's it's become kind of a mess even when you're willing to engage in the top tier combat suite. And even once you ARE there, the difficulty does not come inherent to the gameplay, but rather the DESIGN of the encounter. Some people just don't have the time or schedule for 1K pulls in TOP.

For a surface level example, after a certain skill threshold, due to the common denominator approach to job design, everything has become stale, because the core components of every job are now builder-spender-dump into 2 mins. If EVERY job, regardless of role does this, it breaks the diversity of the jobs at a core level.

So if your counter is to "Go do Savage and Ultimate" it doesn't actually address the problem, at all. Compare the difficulty of something like A12S or O4S to P8S. The relationship between JOB engagement and ENCOUNTER engagement is lopsided HEAVILY in the encounter's favor. But for those people who cannot memorize 8 individual permutations (limit cuts this tier, i guess Idfk) or deal with the honestly INSANE design of things like DSR P6 where you feel like the game is actively punishing you for not inserting the exact non-euclidian shape into it's corresponding slot, they are screwed. There's ironically a basement tier skill ceiling for many jobs, and an absolutely sky-high ceiling for encounter complexity. I'm not sure if I'm making exact sense here, but gameplay is not just the encounters. How you engage with content through action is meaningful in and of it self.

There's no MIDCORE content, in jobs or in encounters. Either you, your encounter, and your job are meaningless fluff with minimal skill expression, or you better be willing to enjoy your suffering if you were stupid enough to not play the game when we had incremental difficulty in both jobs and design.

I would rather do one task infinitely with a wide variety of interesting and unique tools, than an infinite amount of tasks with a spoon.

RPers are lucky, because at least they can make their own content. Raiders are beholden to whatever SE designs for them. It's also just easier for developers to make stuff for RPers than to design engaging combat from the player TO the enemy, rather than the enemy to the player.

[Theodric]

Well, on that note it depends very much on what you mean by 'roleplayers'. A lot of the roleplayers who genuinely invested in the game's lore ended up being driven away between the sheer amount of people obsessed with ERP and the strange policing of anyone inclined to play anything even remotely antagonistic. Roleplay is about much more than attending 'venues' and it's telling that there's been all sorts of major server wide campaigns in WoW over the years but very little of the equivalent here in FFXIV.

[Metool42]

FFXIV: the most popular it has ever been

Doomsayers for some reason: wIlL tHiS gAmE cOlLaPsE??

[RitsukoSonoda]

FFXIV: the most popular it has ever been

Doomsayers for some reason: wIlL tHiS gAmE cOlLaPsE??

Well to be fair success has caused things to collapse in the past.

[Raikai]

Well, on that note it depends very much on what you mean by 'roleplayers'. A lot of the roleplayers who genuinely invested in the game's lore ended up being driven away between the sheer amount of people obsessed with ERP and the strange policing of anyone inclined to play anything even remotely antagonistic. Roleplay is about much more than attending 'venues' and it's telling that there's been all sorts of major server wide campaigns in WoW over the years but very little of the equivalent here in FFXIV.

In XIV, at least to my experience, there's a lot of campaign based RP and stuff beyond the 'venue attending' but that's more in the FC (or standalone organized groups, more uncommonly) territory. It's only a bit time consuming to actually find the group that suits your roleplaying needs, but they're there.

Ironically, the best way to find those groups is actually going to venues and discovering people there. I tend to find more 'engaged RPers' casually enjoying those areas, and was precisely how I found all of my previous RPing FCs, all with their own unique campaigns that kept us busy for months.

[Ivtrix]

In XIV, at least to my experience, there's a lot of campaign based RP and stuff beyond the 'venue attending' but that's more in the FC (or standalone organized groups, more uncommonly) territory. It's only a bit time consuming to actually find the group that suits your roleplaying needs, but they're there.

Ironically, the best way to find those groups is actually going to venues and discovering people there. I tend to find more 'engaged RPers' casually enjoying those areas, and was precisely how I found all of my previous RPing FCs, all with their own unique campaigns that kept us busy for months.

Nice to know it’s not too too hard to find. I’ve heard a lot of complaints about more casual RP like above is the dominant choice and wasn’t sure exactly how hard it would be to find more high fantasy oriented players