Why are NPC parties so bad?

[tsuchii]

Theyre not designed for massive pulls or wall to wall. They're not necessarily bad, just not as efficient.
I do all of my new dungeons with Trust and get no issues. You just really have to choose between speed/efficiency (real players) and immersion (NPCs). I tend to enjoy the extra dialogue for my first time runs.

[Thangil]

Theyre not designed for massive pulls or wall to wall.

Massive pulls? I don't think you can pull more than 2 groups of mobs at a time for this dungeon, since you'll have to defeat mobs to open doors.

[CuteBucket]

I do wish they hit a bit harder or were willing to use more AOE attacks on mobs, because I want the NPCs to semi-replicate playing with another human to help new players get used to it and demostrate what the roles are expected to do, but I'm also okay with the NPCs being a more slow and relaxed experience to clear a dungeon with. I personally feel like the Trust NPCs operate better than the old Squadron NPCs, or at least that's been my experience getting two characters to the highest Grand Company rating for the emotes and gear. I had a lot more wipes with the Squadron NPCs than I have had with the Trust NPCs, but I can see if you got used to the Squadron NPCs and how they operate first, maybe it would be different. Thing is, I don't really ever choose to run with the NPCs to level stuff. They just take too long. I use the Trust NPCs the first time a new dungeon opens so that I can take my time exploring it and admiring the scenery, stopping to take a quick gpose, listen to the characters talk to each other, keep all the gear dropped to myself...that kind of thing. But once I do it the first time, with rare exception, I never go back in and do it again with the bots, because I know the dungeon and the fights now and want power through it with other players as fast as we can. There are the rare occasions I would take the bots over a particularly rude and/or incompetent party of players, but thankfully that has not been a common experience I've had.

[Arkdra]

Massive pulls? I don't think you can pull more than 2 groups of mobs at a time for this dungeon, since you'll have to defeat mobs to open doors.

This is normal but isn't constant. There are a few large pulls scattered around out there. There's a couple of pulls in amdapor keep where you can pull 4 or 5 groups at a time for example. The very opening of brayflox hm is like 20 mobs if you're brave enough.

[Eastwall]

Because squadrons aren't meant for helping you clear dungeons. They are meant as a mini-game to command a squadron with only a limited few dungeons part of it.

Man, it was fun to command my squadron. I wish it is not on maintenance mode...

[Ravenblade1979]

So I'm whining when I'm telling what happened, and I'm a bad player. You know absolutely nothing about me.

I'm fully aware of the mechanics, I always google it before doing a dungeon/trial/raid the first time. I may not be a superb player, but I'm certainly NOT among the worst.

You are a very rude person and I hope I never meet you ingame.

I sincerely hope not either. You can't seem to take criticism at all. I've run the trust system and know that running those means you need to be way more attentive.

You are basically doing it single player with support npc. So need to rewire how you do anything. I also don't want to envision what you would cry about on the forums if you run with players and wipes happen lol.

End of it. If trust system that bad for ya. Queue normally. Run with actual players. Otherwise, learn how to run them way differently.

[follydragon]

Trusts actually seem to end up doing more damage with a scale based on how long it takes you to get through the dungeon.
Their goal is to keep the same pace no matter how bad the player is. Thus, if you notice them doing piddle amounts of damage, you must be a good player!

This may be, but Ill take dumb Trusts on first runs over players every time. Many players tend to assume you know the encounter unless right off the get go you say something. NPCs expect nothing and surely do not whine when you make mistakes.

[follydragon]

30 minutes to run Sastasha with NPC party is extremely rude and disrespectful to the entire playerbase. Duty support is worse than squadrons. Hell, I went to run Copperbell and my tank ran all the way back to the start of the dungeon, chasing the mobs that had leashed back to the start. There's no option, like with squadrons, that you can use when this artificial "intelligence" does the dumbest shite imaginable. It's horrendous.

I mean no disrespect, but when its your first playthrough and you do not feel like waiting 30 minutes + for Duty Finder to get your style in a group, its rude not to have another option. A better option would have likely been to scale down to single player, but then folks would be mad because less groups would be doing content. I am not sure I would compare a person to AI, I have seen some players that well, the AI looks genius compared too, leaving it at that.

[KisaiTenshi]

Hi

The option to use a NPC party for dungeons during MSQs is great, so we don't have to wait for a party. In theory...

The main problem is, Aphinaud is the worst healer in gaming history! He doesn't heal me at all until I have less than 20% health. And the tank isn't much better.

I've been trying to do the Grand Cosmos dungeon for the MSQ with NPCs, and everything went somewhat ok until the last boss, the flame-something dude. Alphinaud keeps getting one-shotted, and Tancred (tank) can't control the boss at all. It's completely un-doable with NPCs.

And why is NPCs doing almost no damage at all? During trash mob fights, I'm the one to take them down. Tested several times, by AFKing and simply watching, and the rest of the group barely made a dent in any mob.

FIX IT.

Doing dungeons with my squadron is COMPLETELY different. Everything runs smoothly, like it's a group of real players, good players, and everyone is doing their job perfectly. The only issue is that they doesn't seem to take much damage if they don't move away from red areas, which is ridiculous.

It's a double-edge-sword problem.

They exist because the skill gap between new/returning players and people who have been playing for 14 years is massive. Part of this is because long time players don't play the content correctly and just face-roll through the mechanics if it's not Extreme raiding. The other side of this because they changed how the game works over 14 years, from having "clearly defined roles" to "everyone just wants to DPS", and as a consequence, there are not enough people who play tanks or healers correctly for new players to do the ARR content in a fun way. I'm sure you've all had a party with a dungeon rushing roulette wall-to-wall tank and newbie green-dps healer who just wipes every time there's more than 3 mobs.

Expecting the NPC's to have the skill level of these players is just simply wrong. When you play with the NPC party, you should be getting the minimum-ilevel experience. The NPC's, particularly characters that fit the healing slot, are actually overpowered to anticipate DPS human players missing the mechanics. The Squad's aren't "job" characters, so they're actually somewhat stronger to anticipate not having the full skill set of a job character. But the squads actually play the content as-intended (they'll stand in bad if you don't tell them to move,) where as the NPC trusts play the content in a scripted way.

[sindriiisgaming]

I have ABSOLUTELY NOTHING against playing with other people. The issue here is not about that. The ONLY reason I wanna do dungeons with NPCs, is to eliminate the wait time, nothing else at all.

Que as a tank or healer