Aloalo Criterion is DEAD

[Zairava]

If it's not popular then wonder if they will not add any in 7.0.

As Caro said before me, they have already stated they will be in Dawntrail.

The content itself sees widespread praise, it just the rewards are lackluster as all hell. Which they have repeatedly asked for feedback on, and that the test they put in for Aloalo would determine how they implement it in the future. (whether that'll be good or bad we have yet to see).

As what has been repeated a quintillion times by now, if they were to allow us to augment tome gear (armor/accessories AND weapon) in criterion normal with weekly lockouts the noise would die down by a fair margin.

[Zairava]

Man, this ain't even in response to me but this is such a strawman argument. They never said they had no issues with the current Criterion reward system, they said that the content being fun is also important and they are, in fact, correct. Ideally we want both, not one or the other. Choosing between "fun" and "good rewards" is a battle where everyone loses in the end.

...Where did I say it shouldn't be fun? Yes it should be fun, and it is widely acclaimed to be. You aren't going to keep retention with a mass of people just by making it fun. If you're trying to make it sound like I meant it should be one or the other then you're just putting words in my mouth.

[Eraden]

Mao finds Aloaha much funs. List of goodies can buy with potsherds kinda crappy though.

[Caro178]

As Caro said before me, they have already stated they will be in Dawntrail.

The content itself sees widespread praise, it just the rewards are lackluster as all hell. Which they have repeatedly asked for feedback on, and that the test they put in for Aloalo would determine how they implement it in the future. (whether that'll be good or bad we have yet to see).

As what has been repeated a quintillion times by now, if they were to allow us to augment tome gear (armor/accessories AND weapon) in criterion normal with weekly lockouts the noise would die down by a fair margin.

I don't know how much you've engaged with the "Another" dungeon modes, but someone who can't clear a third turn of savage will never be able to make a dent in them. I really mean that sincerely. If they are ever going to make this an alternative gearing option to savage for catch-up it is going to require re-designing the difficulty curve as well as the min/max ilevel restriction. Another Aloalo is unironically harder than P10S and P11S which drop augment materials, not to mention it came out not that long after the alliance raid/hunt train update which provide the most casual gear catch up. This is why I haven't been very supportive of the opinion that just slapping tome augment materials into these dungeons will fix them. It's a weak solution provided by people who haven't actually touched the content that won't see interaction long-term when the devs clearly want these dungeons to be evergreen challenge mode difficulty stuff similar to ultimates for bored raiders between tiers.

[Zairava]

I don't know how much you've engaged with the "Another" dungeon modes, but someone who can't clear a third turn of savage will never be able to make a dent in them. I really mean that sincerely. If they are ever going to make this an alternative gearing option to savage for catch-up it is going to require re-designing the difficulty curve as well as the min/max ilevel restriction. Another Aloalo is unironically harder than P10S and P11S which drop augment materials, not to mention it came out not that long after the alliance raid/hunt train update which provide the most casual gear catch up. This is why I haven't been very supportive of the opinion that just slapping tome augment materials into these dungeons will fix them. It's a weak solution provided by people who haven't actually touched the content that won't see interaction long-term when the devs clearly want these dungeons to be evergreen challenge mode difficulty stuff similar to ultimates for bored raiders between tiers.

That's kinda part of the problem, though.

A lot of players, myself included, were hoping we would be able to have an alternate gearing source to savage via these dungeons when they were announced, but it instead adhered to the entire opposite.

I was looking forward to having hard[er] dungeons, but the content's purpose completely missed the mark for me. If it mandates retuning criterion normal, then fine by me. There's still Savage criterion if they want to put the crushing difficulty in.

[Caseal]

huh aloalo savage i rewards a special upgrade item that gives a glow on the weapon design contest winner weapons introduced as 6.4 tome weapons
that should be pretty enticing rewards for anyone to do it
I'm currently attempting savage only because I want 6 of those glowing weapons
they are much better than ult glows because they are unique models for each job and feel like relic glows rather than generic pixelated glows

[george357]

have done sil bhen rokkon and aloha island am close to completing rokkon just 1 and 6 need more runs for the rest.

[Caro178]

That's kinda part of the problem, though.

A lot of players, myself included, were hoping we would be able to have an alternate gearing source to savage via these dungeons when they were announced, but it instead adhered to the entire opposite.

I was looking forward to having hard[er] dungeons, but the content's purpose completely missed the mark for me. If it mandates retuning criterion normal, then fine by me. There's still Savage criterion if they want to put the crushing difficulty in.

The thing is none of these problems exists in a vacuum. Change one thing and you'll be impacting the life cycle of other content. They are very cautious about anything directly interfering with the early savage gearing system because, like it or not, loot lockouts do keep people engaging with particular content longer, and augments are among the rarest items that remain valuable the longest. All of these problems are connected to each other and at the end of the day nothing changes the fact that they did not create the Criterions to be a gear catch up system. There are already tons of gear catch up systems in the game and flipping this to be just another one of those will fix none of the inherent issues. Quite frankly I do not believe 99% of the people saying they would do this content if it gave them tome augments because why would they do savage difficulty combat instances that take hours to prog when they can already just brain off in an alliance raid or hunt train for exactly the same reward?

[Hyperia]

That's kinda part of the problem, though.

A lot of players, myself included, were hoping we would be able to have an alternate gearing source to savage via these dungeons when they were announced, but it instead adhered to the entire opposite.

I was looking forward to having hard[er] dungeons, but the content's purpose completely missed the mark for me. If it mandates retuning criterion normal, then fine by me. There's still Savage criterion if they want to put the crushing difficulty in.

Their idea of savage in these is harder than savage raids. The only people I see clearing these have ultimate titles.

Yes, we wanted harder dungeons but not a dungeon version of Gordias.

[Zairava]

The thing is none of these problems exists in a vacuum. Change one thing and you'll be impacting the life cycle of other content. They are very cautious about anything directly interfering with the early savage gearing system because, like it or not, loot lockouts do keep people engaging with particular content longer, and augments are among the rarest items that remain valuable the longest. All of these problems are connected to each other and at the end of the day nothing changes the fact that they did not create the Criterions to be a gear catch up system. There are already tons of gear catch up systems in the game and flipping this to be just another one of those will fix none of the inherent issues.

How would it not be fixing any issues if they were to make Criterion normal have a weekly lockout and rebalance that difficulty? This entire expansion has either had mindless steamroll content and High-end content with nothing in the middle except what we were already guaranteed to get this expansion. Gearing every job continues to take longer and longer (mostly regarding weapons) and somehow it's an issue if they were to make criterion normal accessible as middle-of-the-road content (whether it's for people looking to get into high-end (EX->Savage) or people who want it to be high end but not borderline if not actually harder than Savage itself).

What do you mean early savage? Odd numbered patches don't come out until months after the current savage tier so so long as they release them in odd numbered major patches it hardly even matters.

Quite frankly I do not believe 99% of the people saying they would do this content if it gave them tome augments because why would they do savage difficulty combat instances that take hours to prog when they can already just brain off in an alliance raid or hunt train for exactly the same reward?

It quite literally would be for catch-up whether it's your main job or an alt job as already established. If it gave the augments I and many others would actually have a reason to run it in the first place. Obviously not every single person is going to participate in it, but not everyone participates in hunt trains nor likes them, either.

Their idea of savage in these is harder than savage raids. The only people I see clearing these have ultimate titles.

Yes, we wanted harder dungeons but not a dungeon version of Gordias.

This, essentially. It was a tremendous let-down.