Discussion of Main Scenario Roulette

[sharknado]

1. The MSQ Roulette exists to get people into the three end-of-ARR dungeons, giving high EXP as a reward to those willing to put up with their length. If the roulette was different then those 3 duties would be otherwise destitute, making it difficult for sprouts to progress. Also, we already have a queue for X0 duties.
2. The cutscenes are unskippable so as to allow sprouts to watch them. If they were skippable, sprouts who wanted to watch them would be left far, far behind while others skipped them and finished the dungeon(s), ruining the experience.

And rarely have first-time sprouts in them. It could use voice acting too It's a daily tomes dump at best. There is way more instances gating first-timers from MSQ progression and maybe we need a universal queue and not just a few ARR instances.

[lolnotacat]

MSQ roulette needs more variety, but the other problem is how boring level 50 gameplay is now. Because of button bloat and needing capstone skills every 10 levels starting at 50, anything under level 60/70 (or lvl 90 in the case of VPR) is arguably pretty boring. Yoshi-P has even touched on this a bit, saying that they're hitting a point where design because of the capstone skills and button bloat, designing jobs is becoming cumbersome. To be honest, I think the design ethos for the game probably needs to change, and not just for that reason. We're seeing stupidly big numbers again which rival what caused the last stat squish in 2021. Content and jobs also need to be constantly rebalanced because of the additional skills, which always leave some jobs/roles in horrible states for years. Personally, I think the simplest solution would be changing the game to have more of a horizontal system, but because people like to see numbers constantly go up, I doubt that would ever happen.

[genuine_stranger]

Anything under level 60/70 (or lvl 90 in the case of VPR) is arguably pretty boring.

This. This is the exact reason I refuse to participate in any roulette beside expert and PVP.

[Toutatis]

It's 100% optional. Don't like it, don't do it. I pick about 2-3 roulettes max per day depending on how much time I have and what I need. MSQ is practical when extra tomes are needed, for levelling and, once in a while, for late night mogtomes when the event is on. I just sit back and relax.

[Rueby]

I find Main Scenario Roulette very long and lack the fun to play. If I have to do this as part of my roulette, I think the only reason I would do is because of its EXP bonus. And even when I'm doing that for EXP, I don't think I actually learn to play a job, because all the skills are locked up to Lv 50. I believe I'm not the only one feel this way.

Sure enough, I do understand the need of keeping the first-time experience of these Lv 50 duties by making the cutscene unskippable. But now that the game has made its progress to Lv 100 cap, isn't it weird to refer a roulette locked at Lv 50 as the "Main Scenario"?

I have two suggestions proposed:

1. Add more (actual) Main Scenario duties to the roulette, e.g., the last Lv x0 duties of each Patch with MSQ content.
2. Remove the limit of unskippable cutscenes, or make them as single-player duties

The game is constantly having new players regardless of the level cap, it's not weird at all.

You have issue with a roulette that is basically a quarantine for 3 unskippable cutscene duties? You know, if the rewards aren't great, don't queue for them.
Want to learn your rotations? Expert Roul, A rank, S/SS rank hunts of current expansion(if they don't melt yet- it's how I got comfy with some openers), target dummy, extremes (if you want to test what you learned).

50/60/70/etc have their own roulette, they don't fit the criteria of MSQ roulette which is unskippable cutscenes. If they mix dungeons with unskippable with skippable I think you'll likely see more people leave.

Unskippable cutscenes in any kind of content that involves players is a horrible design and luckily a relic of the past. They don't NEED to add anything to it because if they do it'd have to fit the criteria of unskippable cutscenes and I think they learned their lesson.

I think it's fine where it is, the MSQ roulette. If I really want the exp/tomes, I queue for it. If I don't want to suffer through it? I don't. There's simply waaaaaaay more things to do to level and gain tomes than thinking doing msq roul is mandatory.

I think the only people who may get 'surprise MSQ roul' is probably mentors in mentor roulette, but they can also get off-expansion extremes iirc.

[Avatre]

As others have mentioned, those cutscenes were made unskippable for a reason. Too many sprouts were feeling forced to skip the cutscenes just to be able to join in on the fights, because of the mentality of "gotta go fast, who cares if someone else's experience is ruined". Be glad that it's only that one roulette, and that anything that actually has story elements in a cutscene - whether it be side content or not - you are still able to skip. One day, if there are enough complaints about it, they could potentially make it so that all those cutscenes can't be skipped as well.

If you don't like having to sit through those scenes, then don't do the 100% optional roulette. If they changed it, the EXP would be nerfed to, quite likely, 30% of what it currently is. Tomestones would probably be cut down as well.

[Shibi]

I think I am weird, after all these years I still like running these. Especially at the peak times of new players.

What I would like though is for SE to start sliding the skills down so they open up earlier (one new spell per ding after 15) and the damage in these up a little (new players are in Ironworks blues or in >50 endgame whites now by the time they hit it). There are a lot ofspells that would be nice to have lower down. But the damage needs ramping up quite a bit.

One almost wishes they could do form of math to look at the iLevel of healer and tank, and shift the outgoing mob damage (reverse echo) to suit. While looking at the iLevel of the DPS and toning their numbers down a little more until out-geared mobs (690 vs 110~) were a little more even.

I'd love to have all the dungeons in the game come back to being a bit tougher when synched. I want the long corridor runs in Vault to be a wooohooo death wish again.

But Prae, don't like it, don't run it. The seals bonus is your reward, the price of a ticket is watching and memeing on Gaius.

[SalamanderIX]

There's no difference between MSQ and Leveling, both are 4 player dungeons done in the story (MSQ). The only difference is not being able to skip cutscenes.

However not skipping cutscenes is hardly ever proven useful, but a burden endured only for the leveling bonus. Most of the time this roulette will have 0 players who actually had not completed it on that character.

Honestly I'd love for them to remove it by whatever means, it just seems like something to endure for leveling as part of a routine rather than content of interest at all, all the renovations made just made them more boring, but they always were.

[Toutatis]

Honestly I'd love for them to remove it by whatever means, it just seems like something to endure for leveling as part of a routine rather than content of interest at all, all the renovations made just made them more boring, but they always were.

You don’t have to “endure it”. It’s optional. Just don’t do it.

Why do you want to remove it? Because you can’t stop yourself from clicking on it and rather not have the option? Some people don’t mind the cutscenes and are happy with the extra tomes and xp.

[Archeron]

I would rather we take all of the ARR dungeons, and shove them into the MSQ Roulette so I never have to do them again.

No, I don't feel sympathy for the sprouts. Duty support exists for a reason, and I ain't spending 20 minutes running any of those trash duties. 90% of the time I queue for any roulette I get Dzemael Darkhold or Aurum Vale. No Thanks. Give me the 30min penalties.