These Relics Aren't Relicing

[VirusOnline]

Yeah, no. These endwalker relics just aren't it. Being a player who's played this game for almost 2 years and tried almost every relic grind, I must say the EW one has been the worst so far. Not only because of how lazy it feels but also because the final stage isn't satisfying to me at all. Firstly, where are the matte/alternative versions? ARR, SB, & SHB all had matte versions. HW had an alternative color version. What went wrong with EW? The 6.45 versions were so damn good in my opinion, and then we went onto the "Beep Boop Omega-Styled Extreme Vibed" final stage relic. I don't get what's the obsession of technological weapons as Relics. They're called 'Relics' for a reason. Grindy, Stages that aren't the same grind all the damn time and pretty unique ones. This just gives omega but at-home vibes. Honestly, I expected much more 'Fantasy' vibes, like the other damn relics. I can see why it's called a Tome Relic as a joke. They better not disappoint for DT, but yet again. This is Square Enix. Gotta listen to all the players and satisfy no one, don't we? Another thing I must question is Why aren't the damn AST cards, SCH & SMN pages, and the MCH box thing never changing. They don't fit the "Technology" vibes at all. I can understand that for a few other weapons but not these. They should've really saved these weapons for the new zone in DT, so that we can have armor that actually looks good with it. Make it make sense.

While I agree it's not fun and it's lazy, the real question is why did SE do this ?
They don't just do this to be intentionally lazy.
From ARR to EW the population has changed drastically.

I think what they're looking at is at least a few things:

• Amount of jobs and the increasing amount of jobs
  
  
• Ease of access
  
  
• Ease of final relic completion
  
  
• Understanding of target demographic

And the relics of the past did have problems:

• ARR's relic was long, at the time expensive, had A LOT of steps and phases.
  
  
• HW's relic was just as long if not longer, especially grindy, and required midcore full parties in some phases. The big draw was that they included the overworld in the grind.
  
  
• SB Eureka, imo the best relic system yet, was an exploratory zone that required group work to complete the relic. While it was fun and a new feature, SE failed to rennovate and rework these zones leaving them now lifeless and as a result largely unable to complete the relic.
  
  
• ShB Bozja is just an uninspired Eureka and the result was the same. A large majority of players will not return to its raids, including BA. Again, good ideas and features. But they fail to maintain and reuse. They waste so much resources.

And here we are, EW. The monkey paw:

• We don't rely on anyone as the DF is always there and always populated and anyone can access it.
  
  
• The currency is a single mode at all steps of the relic phases.
  
  
• We don't have to spend money on anything, which let's be honest when we spend money on relic currency that is controlled by the player base it is often taken advantage of (supply and demand, inflation, etc).
  
  
• We can easily gear most if not all of our classes at a leisurely pace.
  
  
• In future expansions, we don't have to go through the hassle of deserted worlds like Eureka to get relics (this is the biggest thing keeping me from Eureka).

The biggest issue SE has had whenever it comes to all their great ideas like Eureka and Baldesion Annex is that THEY DO NOT REUSE THESE CONTENT. And since HW relic, they have never used the overworld as a source of relic content again. Hello, SE? It's your biggest content.

But, I get it. SE has deemed access and ease much greater in this instance considering the past and their habitat of letting good content depreciate.

[4clubbedace]

snip snip.

i loved doing erueka and bozja but bozja has one nightmare portion right in the middle: DR

The 10 minute wait for a single party kills momentum, and the only alternative being fuuggin PALACE OF THE DEAD (at 100+) is just as bad

it shoudl have had an alertnative that you got in zadnor, dear god

[ty_taurus]

I don’t really know why DR wasn’t added to the alliance roulette. Yes it’s a very different experience from regular alliance raids, but the difficulty isn’t much different. It’s technically more punishing because you are instant KOed if you get hit twice, but the mechanics aren’t that difficult and it’s very easy to revive players.

[Eastwall]

What's wrong with the tomestone weapons?

Because You can only get 450 tomestone a week. The gate keeping sucks.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

I don’t really know why DR wasn’t added to the alliance roulette. Yes it’s a very different experience from regular alliance raids, but the difficulty isn’t much different. It’s technically more punishing because you are instant KOed if you get hit twice, but the mechanics aren’t that difficult and it’s very easy to revive players.

I have a mixed feeling about adding DR into the roulette. They would probably knock out the Lost Action system which was a huge selling point of the StQ content.

[Caesius]

They obviously did not design this relic grind "for" the current veteran players who have already knocked out Eureka and Bozja. They designed it for today's sprouts and our future selves, I think.

I don't like it at this moment, but I'll be happy to go into Dawntrail having actually fully finished one expansion pack's relic grind and not worry about yet another old expac's Field Operations zones.

Having veteran players queue for duty roulettes instead of ducking off to Eureka or Bozja is good for the sprout player base since their duties will pop faster and have players who know what they're doing. That will keep them in the game going into Dawntrail, and when they eventually unlock Endwalker relics they'll be able to earn them passively with poetics instead of going to a dead field op or grinding out fates.

It's better in the long run that they did it this way since otherwise the players grinding for old relics would have been spread out across three field ops instead of just two. As for fates, shb and ew have shared fates/bicolor gemstones to grind, so there's no need to add a relic grind as a motivator.

There's no denying that the current relic grind isn't going to keep vets engaged though. I'll definitely be finished with these relics on my main within like a month, so I'll either need to find something else to do or spend my time in another game.

[Alleluia]

Maybe they should just allow the explorable zone to let you grind stages and take time to get the relics in DT, while ALSO allowing us to turn in tomes for 3 items and complete the stages that way.

People who want to have fun grinding can do so while still accomplishing their relic. And the rest of us can, you know, do other things.

[Supersnow845]

They obviously did not design this relic grind "for" the current veteran players who have already knocked out Eureka and Bozja. They designed it for today's sprouts and our future selves, I think.

I don't like it at this moment, but I'll be happy to go into Dawntrail having actually fully finished one expansion pack's relic grind and not worry about yet another old expac's Field Operations zones.

Having veteran players queue for duty roulettes instead of ducking off to Eureka or Bozja is good for the sprout player base since their duties will pop faster and have players who know what they're doing. That will keep them in the game going into Dawntrail, and when they eventually unlock Endwalker relics they'll be able to earn them passively with poetics instead of going to a dead field op or grinding out fates.

It's better in the long run that they did it this way since otherwise the players grinding for old relics would have been spread out across three field ops instead of just two. As for fates, shb and ew have shared fates/bicolor gemstones to grind, so there's no need to add a relic grind as a motivator.

There's no denying that the current relic grind isn't going to keep vets engaged though. I'll definitely be finished with these relics on my main within like a month, so I'll either need to find something else to do or spend my time in another game.

Yeah it’s so much better designed that I; a paying customer; am doing horribly designed content to better fill the free trial players queues

Honestly stuff the free trial, it’s already overwhelmingly generous, leave something for those of us who actually pay please

[Caesius]

I did not claim that it's "better designed" or even a better relic grind compared to previous expacs. All I'm saying is that it's good for newer players that it was done this way, even if I acknowledge that it's very lacking for the veterans itching to grind out another field op zone or 100 fates or 30 alliance raids or 50 eden levis.

Also it's not just the free trial players who benefit but also sprouts in free companies. My FC has some newer players, so myself and other FC vets are actually queuing for roulettes with them now instead of doing our own thing in Bozja/Eureka and leaving the sprouts to just catch up on their own. If a sprout joins an FC but nobody is available to queue into duties with them then it's not going to matter much if that's because everyone is stuck in Zadnor or if they unsubbed due to the lack of a relic grind.

And no, I'm not interested in hearing anyone proudly proclaim that they are in an "ultimate raiders only" FC and therefore couldn't care less about sprout players -- I personally am more than happy to queue roulettes with our sprouts and suffer through Halatali (Hard) together

[Remember_The_Name]

i loved doing erueka and bozja but bozja has one nightmare portion right in the middle: DR

The 10 minute wait for a single party kills momentum, and the only alternative being fuuggin PALACE OF THE DEAD (at 100+) is just as bad

it shoudl have had an alertnative that you got in zadnor, dear god

Just to remind everyone here - the 10 minute forced queue was deliberately installed by SE when Endwalker was released. As a safequard for new players to "not wait for a long period of time". Echo buff was supposed to compensate for the lack of players.

And this was one of the worst F-ing change EVER!

Explanations:

For new player:

• After 10 minutes, you get thrown into the DR with a 2-3 poor saps at best (because Bozja raids are kinda dead, amazing future-proofing right here, SE). And if someone will, understandably, nope-out - here goes ~20-50% of your DPS, lmao
• The Echo buffs scaling gets extremely wonky when it comes to party less than 8 players.
• Twice Comes Ruin makes obscene HP from Echo quite pointless. And dying causes damage penalty that, combined with general lack of proper essences, turns the raid into a two hour SLOG! Worst experience ever.

For old player:

• As a smart cookie, they all resorted to using Party Finder (again, good job with future-proofing, SE). But the 10 minute forced timer was taking its toll on a relatively quick 15-20 minute DR speedrun.

In summary:
With one simple change SE managed to ruin the DR both for old and new players. Hell, let them wait for longer amount of time but get a decent 8 player party or get dragged along with a passing-by Party Finder group.

SE really needs to learn how to keep older content relevant (and it applies to Duty Roulette too, by the way). Bozja would not be half as bad if they were peoperly addressing its issues.

And, for Endwalker, SE overcorrected everything and threw relic grind out of the game. Like they often do.