Difficulty of normal content.

[Mobitron]

I am a filthy casual peasant that hardly plays endgame content and the only wipe we had on our very first run of day one raids was on the first fight when half the group fell through the floor. We didn't fall through the floor again. The normal raids are easy, what in the world are you smoking? I get that not everyone can not stand in the fire but that's on you, not the game. You know the trick? Learn the fight. There is a grand total of 0 RNG in the mechanics other than the position of the no-no circles. Just learn to not stand in the no-no circles and who gets the arrows. It may take a couple passes but you'll get it.

Also who on earth expects "chill content" out of RAIDS? Raids used to be notoriously difficult in past MMOs which is why the term has carried over to other MMOs for their harder endgame group content. Raids are meant to be more difficult. Difficult is supposed to be what raids are about as it has always been. Don't try to bring the rest of us down to your level. You don't like it, don't raid. Simple as.

This filthy casual love the direction SE is taking with normal content. I am excited to repeat M2. 10/10 would dodge hearts again.

[Fullmetalnyuu]

I have never progged savage/extreme content once in all my time playing the game, but I found myself honestly being a bit disappointed with Pandaemonium after Eden. Like many people have said, normal raids are bridging the gap between normal and savage content, which means it naturally should be more demanding than any other normal content/trial.

If anything, those overlapping mechanics are meant to give you a taste for what savages are like while still being manageable for the AVERAGE player. I'd argue that a truly casual player is not necessarily an average player. When I think casual, I think of someone who hops back into the game for MSQ, maybe dabbles with crafting or other minor side content and either gposes/rps or waits for more msq to drop. I'd argue that if you can't handle the raids and you consider yourself a casual player, that's by design, and it's okay. You don't have to do them, they aren't vital to understanding the MSQ, they're purely extra content. I'm very pleasantly surprised that this normal raid tier has been asking more from me as a player, to pay attention and understand what happened to me when a mechanic hit me so that I can overcome it. I died several times (playing off tank), and my duty finder parties wiped a couple of times, but that's okay. Dying and wiping a couple times isn't the end of the world, especially if you take it as a learning experience. If you refuse to engage with those very understandable mechanics, I fear that it's just not for you and you should just accept it rather than try to lessen the experience for those that want harder side content that's a few steps below savage.

[Seraphii]

The content in Dawntrail has been refreshing. I could literally do gacha dailies or watch a movie in most content in Endwalker.

Golbez EX is probably the only fight in the entire expansion that I thought was actually difficult and needed practice (aside from obvious ones like Criterion dungeons/ultimates/savages).

You're having difficulty and that's good. It's a challenge but the mechanics in *any* of the content you're required to do such as MSQ dungeons and normal trials are not hard. They're mechanics you've seen before, just stacked together in easily noticeable patterns. Dying a few times sure, being *unable* to progress? No shot. They are not to that level of difficulty.

The actual problem here is that EARLY game content that used to teach easier variants of more difficult content got dumbed down. Things like Thornmarch EX which is actual brain dead content now used to have mechanics that taught sprouts what to expect in harder content.

Also, the new raids are fantastic. The first raid is incredibly easy and almost braindead in difficulty but it's still fun. The second one took me a few tries to not die but the third and fourth one? Chefs kiss. Beautiful fight.

The optional dungeons? First few runs of those were a bit rough, they had some more difficult mechanics. But once you've done them 2 or 3 times, they're cake walks too. Fun ones. Mob packs hit hard again and have actual mechanics. AOE Frontal cleaves, heal checks, etc. Thank god lol.

The content doesn't need to be lowered in difficulty. It needs to possibly increase a bit more. You need more practice.

[LunaCelestiaXIV]

This is not the community I have grown to love, These people don't care about anyone's experience but their own!

Right back at you. You only care about YOUR experience.

What about us that actually enjoy these changes in "casual" content where we actually don't fall asleep facerolling through it. Don't you care about our experience?
It seems like you only care about YOUR experience after all huh?

[Kitkat]

I'm reminded of a philosophy from the training of surgeons: "See one, do one, teach one." See a mechanic played out once. Do the mechanic yourself once. Teach the mechanic to someone else once (or, be prepared to, anyway). This approach has carried me through Dawntrail just fine.

I had to quote this, as this is one of the most important points made in the entire topic so far. In 1.0 and 2.0 this was very important for various fights. I'm reminded of the first boss in the lvl 50 dungeon Amdapor Keep. The demon wall that, believe it or not, many people had trouble getting past simply because they weren't geared well enough, or they weren't paying attention to mechanics and dying too much (which as we all know means weakness or straight out lost due to going in the pit). It was very rare at first to see many get this boss down before it was halfway across the bridge, people struggled with it until better gear was acquired and now it is trivial.


TCoB was also very punishing due to context specific mechanics at times, something many people couldn't do. This was before they came out with Savage fights. The Hard Primal fights, not to be confused with EX, just hard were daunting to some until they learned there was a pattern and could move accordingly. By the time Stormblood was ending, you were starting to see many harder fights in 'normal content' being phased out. Shadowbringers brought in the numerous high raid damage mechanics, which as far as I'm concerned is a cheap difficulty hurdle on the developments end. Seeing them bring in actual mechanics where getting hit too much, or taking too many of a type of mechanic does now affect you causing you to want to learn how to avoid it. If anything, dungeons should be a stepping stone to learning mechanics that will show up in harder fights and make it very clear if you don't learn them, you will die or will adversely affect the rest of the team. This helps people learn if they are fine with just being casual on the game, or if they should desire to really see how punishing mechanics can be and strive to go into EX/Savage without having a crippling difference in difficulty.

[Seraphii]

I agree with you on the MSQ doesn't teach that well (anymore). It used to have more difficult content and the side content used to be harder as well. Somewhere along the line a lot of things got nerfed and "easy" and "very easy" versions of solo instances got added. Those solo duties at normal difficulty provide the tools to learn, but if someone fails and auto selects very easy... they're not going to learn.

The example I used was Thornmarch EX (maybe not the best example because it is still technically an EX). It got nerfed so hard that it no longer really teaches any mechanics. It used to actually teach sprouts some easier versions of harder mechanics they'd experience later.

[Fullmetalnyuu]

One does not choose what bothers oneself, it just does.

Actually, you literally can choose what bothers you. You can choose to sit and stew in it or let it roll off your back. FFS...

[jdtuggey]

Cleared arcadion for the first time tonight, we had two wipes in four bosses, me and 3 of my friends went in completely blind.
This was the most fun I've had in ffxiv in content that isn't story in a very long time, if not forever.
We're also pretty casual, I play a lot but am mostly a crafting/leveling/dungeon person, and my friends have lives and responsibilities, so they have about 4h/day. ;o;
Such high quality fights! And I could deduce most of the mechanics on first try. Like, it's okay if it's too hard for you, but it's perfect for me and my friends.
I'm sorry you few feel excluded by this, but if they cater to you, it won't be as good for me and my friends and I'm not naive enough to think there's a perfect compromise. :P

[ElysiumDragon]

Haven't done Arcadion as of yet, but the difficulty's been a refreshing change from Endwalker.

That being said though, I do think there needs to be an acknowledgement that people can find some mechanics trivially easy, and yet also find other mechanics almost impossible to understand, even in the same encounter. For example, I can't do E7N Portals to save my life, but throw me a Flood Ray or Dominion, and I'll be comfy.

Also, it takes failure to get better as a player, and that's always been the fundamental truth. Every Hardcore Raider will tell you that they've wiped tens of thousands of times, and even caused their own fair share of those wipes.

[PopiPipapo]

get good