SE. Please. Ilv sync everything.

[Ardeth]

I stopped doing varient dungeons because the bosses take too long to kill, and it bores the absolute crap outta me, and you want to make normal dungeons like that? That's a no for me, dawg.

[Atelier-Bagur]

I stopped doing varient dungeons because the bosses take too long to kill, and it bores the absolute crap outta me, and you want to make normal dungeons like that? That's a no for me, dawg.

Its actually because the combat system in this game kinda sucks. Its too slow, not responsive nor snappy and you really cant do much outside of your rotations. You just go with the motions and resolve a mech and just rinse and repeat.

[Ardeth]

Its actually because the combat system in this game kinda sucks. Its too slow, not responsive nor snappy and you really cant do much outside of your rotations. You just go with the motions and resolve a mech and just rinse and repeat.

It's unbearably boring. I'm still not done with the first one. I've fought all of the boss variants, and I only need like two more paths. I'm just so done with it. It was the opposite of fun and engaging, and it's sad because there's two more of them for me to do... But it's something I had to really push myself to even get 10/12 done. Like I said it's so damn boring.

[Jeeqbit]

I was pointing out that there is an option to provide the intended/original experience already.

Yes and it's annoying that we have to struggle to get a group together when that should just be the authentic experience already like leveling dungeons and leveling trials are.

That unsynced exists doesn't change that and isn't a counter point.

It is because you are saying people who agree with me should just do it in a premade with the MINE settings so it doesn't melt and so mechanics matter. The counterpoint is the opposite, that people who want it to do no damage and die really easily should set Unrestricted instead, so the default experience can feel authentic.

I responded to you because you made it sound like you know what's best for other players, new players specifically.

I do know what's best for new players. An enjoyable experience. Bosses not doing any damage and the mechanics not mattering if you get hit by them isn't a good experience.

What sort of game is it where super mario walks into an enemy and is immune to it and continues on to save the princess?

A lot of new players literally believe "synced" is the authentic experience. They say it when they make a party in Party Finder. They genuinely want an authentic experience clearing content so they put "synced for the challenge" or words to the effect of "so it's authentic". I feel bad for them because I know it is not; item level increases will make many mechanics irrelevant, not threatening, DPS unimportant and phases will be skipped and if not, Echo stacks will build each wipe until the fight is cleared without barely doing a single mechanic correctly.

They are unaware of the MINE settings. We try to teach them, but there are far more new players that believe that than people manage to teach about it.

I only pointed out that you were speaking for other people who aren't here to say that they agree or not.

I literally help new players in the novice network on a daily basis, answer their questions in discord servers and do mentor roulette daily and join PFs to help them clear things and I've done this for many years. They trust that SE is giving them the authentic experience with these duties (even though they are not).

Nobody likes dying to a mechanic, in the moment, but if there are no consequences for failure then your memory of it is not really going to be the intense event that it's being made out to be in the story. If not putting your hands on the keyboard at all for the whole fight still leaves you alive, how can you really feel like a Warrior of Light? There are genuinely fights I can think of where you could AFK in the fight arena and would be alright due to this.

My perspective is that either way this wouldn't be a huge change.

Exactly, that's why this defensiveness doesn't make sense. They already have to go through content that is synced in this way (the ones you get in Leveling roulette).

There is a wide skill range of players in this game though. Some even manage to struggle with content as simple as it is.

Yes, that is true and they just get resurrected. But at least when the fight is over they felt like the mechanics actually mattered and actually kills them if they don't do them.

The drop in difficulty from rising ilvl could be seen as accommodation for them and part of the intended experience.

That is true when the content is current, because you have a mix of first-timers in minimum gear (previous tier tomestone gear or crafted gear) and players in max raid gear, which balances out the average item level of the party somewhere in the middle. To give you an example, the minimum item level of the latest dungeon is 620 and the max item level is 660, so an average party with a mix of raiders and casual players is probably outputting the damage of a full 640 party.

Once the dungeon is "old", all 4 participants sync down to 660, doing far more damage than average parties used to, skipping mechanics and everything hurting less. The experience is significantly reduced.

In other words the original difficulty might have an expiration date on purpose in the eyes of SE.

In the case of the capstone trial, it feels like that has been true for a long time. They made them really devastating on release but then they become nothing. But how do you explain that there are duties they do sync tightly (the ones you get in leveling roulette, as well as leveling trials)?

Tuning the average sync level of content to best accommodate everyone is totally valid, but it's not the only option.

They actually have another option: Echo stacks. When there is a wipe far into the fight, old trials and raids grant Echo stacks. Echo is actually even worse than item level increases, because it is like saying the entire party now has 25% of their item level extra. So if you are item level 660, 25% extra of that is 825. That's insane. You are now item level 825. But it is better having this after you wipe, than the first pull also being a joke. At least the first pull should feel like a proper fight.

Maybe we could have a difficulty slider of some kind for roulettes that will raise or lower the sync level and try to make people with similar settings.

I've thought that and I would support that. I believe all games should have an "easy" mode and a "hard" mode, but most likely SE doesn't want to dilute the roulette pool too thin, otherwise I don't understand why they haven't done it.

With Duty Support, there is an opportunity that those wanting an easier experience could get it via this system so the people who do it with players can have something with a little more consequence.

[Menriq]

Yes and it's annoying that we have to struggle to get a group together when that should just be the authentic experience already like leveling dungeons and leveling trials are.

So then are you just referring to raids since it's already that way for dungeons and trials? I will speak for myself, but I have actually enjoyed skipping mechanics after gearing up because it makes it feel like I've actually gotten stronger. Why get better gear if it doesn't change anything?

I do know what's best for new players. An enjoyable experience. Bosses not doing any damage and the mechanics not mattering if you get hit by them isn't a good experience.

This is subjective. Everyone has to decide for themselves what they find enjoyable instead of having others dictate to them what is fun.

Nobody likes dying to a mechanic, in the moment, but if there are no consequences for failure then your memory of it is not really going to be the intense event that it's being made out to be in the story. If not putting your hands on the keyboard at all for the whole fight still leaves you alive, how can you really feel like a Warrior of Light? There are genuinely fights I can think of where you could AFK in the fight arena and would be alright due to this.

Subjective again. To some people, I would imagine if they could do the story without doing a single battle, they would. They just want the story, and the actual fight doesn't do anything for them. I don't skip cutscenes, but I also can't personally say I did a fight that made me say "I really feel like the warrior of light". Flip this around for a second. Imagine you are a sprout today queuing into content with veterans even at MINE. You die 5+ times, but the content is still cleared because the veterans know the content. Do you still feel like a Warrior of Light for getting carried? Please don't tell me you expect the veterans to wipe in order for that sprout to get that "authentic" feeling of learning the fight fresh, because at that point, you might as well just admit you are putting your desires above the rest of the group.

Yes, that is true and they just get resurrected. But at least when the fight is over they felt like the mechanics actually mattered and actually kills them if they don't do them.

See my example above. If they died multiple times, but the content is one shot, would they suddenly know every mechanic and how to deal with it?

Once the dungeon is "old", all 4 participants sync down to 660, doing far more damage than average parties used to, skipping mechanics and everything hurting less. The experience is significantly reduced.

I'll support this idea if you'll support the idea that if there is no first time bonus, we can ignore the ilevel sync and just destroy everything as quickly as possible. If there are 4 people running the expert to cap for the week, why enforce any restriction on them?

I've thought that and I would support that. I believe all games should have an "easy" mode and a "hard" mode, but most likely SE doesn't want to dilute the roulette pool too thin, otherwise I don't understand why they haven't done it.

Isn't that what normal / Extreme (Trials) and normal / Savage (Raids) is?

With Duty Support, there is an opportunity that those wanting an easier experience could get it via this system so the people who do it with players can have something with a little more consequence.

My gut feeling is now that they allow you to do trusts with all the dungeons, and they started it with letting you do the trials with trusts, this will become an option later on to do the trials and such with NPC's. They are already tuned to not be as good as PF, so people should be able to get that "as it was at the time" feeling.

[Stormpeaks]

I do know what's best for new players.

No you dont. That's called your opinion.

[Jeeqbit]

So then are you just referring to raids since it's already that way for dungeons and trials?

No it is only that way for certain ones. That's the problem.

I will speak for myself, but I have actually enjoyed skipping mechanics after gearing up because it makes it feel like I've actually gotten stronger. Why get better gear if it doesn't change anything?

You're right. When the expansion is current. There is no gear progression in previous expansions because we can just immediately get poetic gear.

This is subjective. Everyone has to decide for themselves what they find enjoyable instead of having others dictate to them what is fun.

Except that the game developer decides it unless they give them options (realistic ones that don't involve waiting ages in Party Finder).

To some people, I would imagine if they could do the story without doing a single battle, they would. They just want the story, and the actual fight doesn't do anything for them.

Then they can get a job skip and unsync all of them anyway.

You die 5+ times, but the content is still cleared because the veterans know the content. Do you still feel like a Warrior of Light for getting carried?

Yes since you get rezzed and therefore lived through it.

If there are 4 people running the expert to cap for the week, why enforce any restriction on them?

We are talking about old content (from the previous expansions). Current expansion should not have this because gear progression matters for that. Expert roulette is current expansion.

Isn't that what normal / Extreme (Trials) and normal / Savage (Raids) is?

Yes, but it does not exist for dungeons and it is also way over the top when people just want their roulette content to be exactly as engaging as when it releases, not what it later becomes...

My gut feeling is now that they allow you to do trusts with all the dungeons, and they started it with letting you do the trials with trusts

I thought that, but they did not announce it like I expected and instead said the graphics update will be delivered through the patches, so it seems that is being done instead.

No you dont. That's called your opinion.

Yes, they were putting words in my mouth, so.

[Gemina]

My perspective is that either way this wouldn't be a huge change. It certainly wouldn't make much difference to me....

...If that is the case, then stricter syncing would be a difficulty increase.

You can't say in one breath that syncing the content wouldn't be a huge change, and then in the next say that the it would be an increase to the difficulty. You are implying in one statement that the change isn't significant, and in another statement that it would be significant enough to increase the demand on players.

I had a similar take when players were upset at the beginning of the expansion that in patch 6.1 the trial chosen for Unreal was Sephirot, which was a significant increase in difficulty over the previous Ultimate Weapon Unreal. Yes, this was an increase in difficulty to complete a weekly Unreal for Faux Hallows, but the duty itself was not made to be more difficult. The Sephirot Unreal trial did not introduce new mechanics from the previous Extreme version of the fight. The demand on players to clear this specific duty did not change, and that is what I am talking about.

IOW, what I am saying is that I am full aware that by adding ilv sync to duties that I am requesting an increased demand from players to clear the content, but I am not asking for the content to be more difficult than it was originally intended. And due to updates to jobs such as there no longer being stance dancing for healers and tanks, these duties will never be as tough as they once were, even at min ilv. What I am also saying is that while I understand that I am asking for an increased demand to players, it isn't egregiously unfair. I'm not even asking for the sync to be down to min ilv. Just reasonable enough to where players will experience all the mechanics of the fight.

Tuning the average sync level of content to best accommodate everyone is totally valid, but it's not the only option. Maybe we could have a difficulty slider of some kind for roulettes that will raise or lower the sync level and try to make people with similar settings. With such an addition players would still have to deal with some compromise, but it would at least provide the chance to get ideal an ideal party match every so often. I want to stress again I'm not arguing against your idea, only providing alternatives to consider in whole or in part.

I appreciate you thinking outside the box for viable alternatives. My suggestions don't have to be set in stone, and I am always open for valuable feedback and other methods to address the problem. That's what I hoped to get out of the thread instead of a "my way or the highway" take on things.

A slider option is interesting that would place like-minded players together. It's not a bad idea, but it could increase wait times, but would still be better than trying to accomplish the task in PF. I could even add to this by suggesting that with such a slider, the rewards increase the higher you set your slider, thus incentivizing players to queue for the roulette at a more difficult setting, which may also reduce wait times for players wanting more of a challenge.

Thank you!

[hynaku]

No don't need them to make the game any worse than it is now. Every time ones come up with an idea the game gets worse. Just look at how the housing is now forced to buy a lottery ticket. They take your gil then can't buy any tickets for other open plots. Didn't ones early on complain about the game being too hard then they made it way easier. All they need to add is what they have now for solo duties an easy to very hard setting.

[RitsukoSonoda]

No don't need them to make the game any worse than it is now. Every time ones come up with an idea the game gets worse. Just look at how the housing is now forced to buy a lottery ticket. They take your gil then can't buy any tickets for other open plots. Didn't ones early on complain about the game being too hard then they made it way easier. All they need to add is what they have now for solo duties an easy to very hard setting.

You're missing nuance in those examples.

The actual complaints about housing were the people complaining specifically because they didn't want to camp at a plot clicking. So SE came up with the lotto system.
The people complaining about the game being "too hard" didn't want to learn their job abilities and rotations and/or bother learning duty and boss mechanics. Solo duties also do not have a very hard setting. You play them on the normal intended difficulty and if you fail at that they then give you the easy mode and 1 braincell options.
Or take the Manderville Weapons we got in place of Relics this time around. The product of the people crying they want the relic weapon without doing the relic weapon stuff.

The common thread in all this is that the game has been getting worse because they've been choosing to appease the lazy part of the player base rather than the ones interested in actually playing the game.