Criterion savage rewards still suck

[Iselion]

Well since there's no gear, and there for sure isn't gonna be any more gear released this expac that isn't a tome relic, here's how to at least show goodwill:

1. Admit you messed up in locking gear behind content that is more difficult than actual savage and selling it as a way of "raising itemlevel" in content that already requires BiS to reliably clear. That is just next level out-of-touch behavior.

2. Have the 665 weapon (not the upgrade item, THE WEAPON, or a trade-in token) drop from criterion normal. Criterion normal is plenty hard enough and there is no meaningful difference between crit normal and savage other than artificial difficulty. Otherwise this weapon is dead on arrival because it is aimed at people who already have a savage-tier weapon, and for casuals to mid-cores, the final Relic step will render this obsolete come January.

3. Announce what the hell you are actually planning to do with Savage if you're going to keep it around. If you're gonna require savage-tier gear to clear it, it is not an alternative way to gear for people who don't do savage. If you insist on locking gear behind it, enable ilvl sync, but honestly just scrap savage all together, it's pointless. There is no differences in crit normal and savage like in regular 8-man savage content, why act like it does? It is laughably half-assed.

Again and again you refuse to release any content this expac that is aimed at the center of the bell-curve of players with any meaningful rewards other than extremes. Please consider asking ACTUALLY LISTENING to feedback when you ask players.

[Genbe197]

I just don't understand why they didnt just follow the bozja formula. 5.3 current high tiertomestone was 490 latest dungeon 475 5.35 bozja added 495 5.4 Crafted armor was introduced at ilvl 510. tomestone at 520 5.45 Bozja armor at ilvl510 5.55 bozja armor at 520
ALL OF THESE give an alternative to the lower tier tomestone gear and the FINAL one gives an alternative to the higher tomestone tier. This should be in normal criterian or even VARIENT. Criterion savage can then give upgrades for the final tier to make it equal to the raid tier in ILVL and a final weapon. Why is this so hard? They already had these gear stages in place in SHB

[Rolder50]

I wonder what kind of rewards they could put in here that would actually be enticing.

Can't do gear because they will never shake up their current gear formula. Mounts people will get once and then never again. Materia is relatively worthless with all the other ways to get it. Best I can think of is twine/coatings, but even that would run counter to their gear formula.

[CaedemSanguis]

I wonder what kind of rewards they could put in here that would actually be enticing.

Can't do gear because they will never shake up their current gear formula. Mounts people will get once and then never again. Materia is relatively worthless with all the other ways to get it. Best I can think of is twine/coatings, but even that would run counter to their gear formula.

Criterion needs to be catch-up gear/horizontal progression
Criterion savage, as its intended for BIS people that "cleared very early the raid tier" should drop the best gear, yet it have to remain a fun content (they need to add mech/boss/tight dps check)

To my mind it needs to look like this :

6.4 :
- P9s-P12s, drops i660 gear & i665 weap, can upgrade tomes from i650 to i660

2 months after 6.4 :
- Criterion drop i660 criterion gear & upgrades from p10s/p11s (catch-up + horizontal progression)
- Criterion Savage drops i665 armor & accessories (in order to prepare for the upcoming ultimate)

6.5 (4 months after 6.4) :
- Ultimate is made for i665 people

Criterion needs to be around up-savage difficulty
Criterion savage needs to be very hard and adjusted for BIS people + new mech + new bosses + no rez but check points and harder trash/bosses

[MitsukiKimura]

It pains me to see how out of touch with the game they've become of late. I don't wish to call their work lazy or etc. However, anyone that wishes to increase their item level knows the only way to upgrade tome weapon from 650 to 660 is to clear P11S and you cannot upgrade the tome weapon to 665 with this new criterion without clearing 3/4 of the raid tier beforehand. The better option would of been to put upgrade mats in the Criterion normal and put it on a weekly lockout. Have the weapon upgrade mat given to trade for the 665 weapons from the final boss. There has to be more ways for gear progression available to players. Having the tome currency cap at 450 this late in the expansion is just to brick wall players long enough to slow the progression of gearing alt jobs. The raid tier has been out long enough that they shouldn't be concerned or cautious with releasing new ways to increase item level. As it stands there is no reason to complete the normal version of Criterion since there is nothing mechanically different from normal and the savage version. You're better off progging the savage version/ watching a guide to complete it than wasting time for little to no rewards. I'd like to think the dev team plays their own game but some choices make me question just how much time they actually spend playing and testing things before they release it.

[Hyperia]

It pains me to see how out of touch with the game they've become of late. I don't wish to call their work lazy or etc. However, anyone that wishes to increase their item level knows the only way to upgrade tome weapon from 650 to 660 is to clear P11S and you cannot upgrade the tome weapon to 665 with this new criterion without clearing 3/4 of the raid tier beforehand. The better option would of been to put upgrade mats in the Criterion normal and put it on a weekly lockout. Have the weapon upgrade mat given to trade for the 665 weapons from the final boss. There has to be more ways for gear progression available to players. Having the tome currency cap at 450 this late in the expansion is just to brick wall players long enough to slow the progression of gearing alt jobs. The raid tier has been out long enough that they shouldn't be concerned or cautious with releasing new ways to increase item level. As it stands there is no reason to complete the normal version of Criterion since there is nothing mechanically different from normal and the savage version. You're better off progging the savage version/ watching a guide to complete it than wasting time for little to no rewards. I'd like to think the dev team plays their own game but some choices make me question just how much time they actually spend playing and testing things before they release it.

We are on the 2nd if not 3rd generation of developers on the team as the original team has either been promoted to supervisors / managers or have moved on to other games such as 16 (which is still in development for DLCs). They already said that 6.1 to 6.55 were being made by the junior devs for training and testing of their ideas. To see how things turn out with what they have learned, we have to wait for July 2024.

[TomsYoungerBro]

3. Announce what the hell you are actually planning to do with Savage if you're going to keep it around. If you're gonna require savage-tier gear to clear it, it is not an alternative way to gear for people who don't do savage. If you insist on locking gear behind it, enable ilvl sync, but honestly just scrap savage all together, it's pointless. There is no differences in crit normal and savage like in regular 8-man savage content, why act like it does? It is laughably half-assed.

Again and again you refuse to release any content this expac that is aimed at the center of the bell-curve of players with any meaningful rewards other than extremes. Please consider asking ACTUALLY LISTENING to feedback when you ask players.

Honestly if they want a Criterion (savage), they should just take the secret boss and make it its own savage fight with upgrade mechs .

[Boblawblah]

They already said that 6.1 to 6.55 were being made by the junior devs for training and testing of their ideas.

Could I get a source on that?

[VerdeLuck]

Honestly if they want a Criterion (savage), they should just take the secret boss and make it its own savage fight with upgrade mechs .

Wouldn't that defeat the whole purpose of this content though? The feedback that led to the creation was people asking for harder 4 man content and harder raid content that wasn't just loading into the boss room.

[TomsYoungerBro]

Wouldn't that defeat the whole purpose of this content though? The feedback that led to the creation was people asking for harder 4 man content and harder raid content that wasn't just loading into the boss room.

Sure and that is a good point. Just a suggestion on what they can do without touching the normal Criterion. Criterion Savage with the same bosses and harder mechs doesn't seem like the play to me (unless they nerf the normal version and replace savage with the current normal version). The best idea may just be to scrap crit savage all together.