My problem with FF 14

[lolnotacat]

It's funny, with holiday events, once you have something pretty good made, most players are fine with repeating it every year if you just add a couple new items to it. Especially when compared to "talk to 3 NPCs".

I'm genuinely looking forward to Shadow of the Mad King (Halloween) and Wintersday (Christmas) in Guild Wars 2 and I don't even play the game that much. I still haven't bough Janthir Wilds. There are plenty of different events on relatively short timers, all of which give rewards. That way it's easy to skip one thing you don't like and focus on something else. Or if you're going for achievements/weeklies, just do that thing a few times then focus on other stuff.

[DiaDeem]

1. Holiday events

Man.. if you knew about the festive bells

[Gaddes]

I do wish they'd have a bit more consistent charm with the holiday events. They've had them now and then, but there are clearly some years where I guess they don't have the resources and it's just a basic quest, which is a shame. I still fondly remember the year the christmas quest was about getting a choir good enough to play for this little elezen kid, and it was the same rhythm minigame as the one from Ishgard restoration but super funny if you failed it. I really liked that one. I wouldn't mind if they reused some of those older minigames but with new stories, just not to the point over overuse obviously.

I'm also probably in the minority, but I was really sad when they super-simplified/streamlined a lot of the older ARR dungeons for one of the post 6.0 patches. The older dungeons may have been annoying to some because they didn't all flow the same, but that's exactly why I liked them; they weren't all just the same tunnel-vision experience that current ones always are now. Some of them actually branched around to other things to see/do or had mechanics that you had to think about and not just faceroll.

[Jeeqbit]

I don't think an unchanging formula has much to do with new player retention...

Consistency (such as same markers, etc) makes it smooth for new players to get through the MSQ. After the MSQ, many of them will break until the next patch or expansion and SE knows that. Obviously, it's always going to be a minority that want to play the game hardcore / do raids and social content and stuff like that.

The reason for 2 packs of trash always is because there used to be more, but it was deeply unsettling for everyone and still is in some ARR dungeons. You can literally pull like 10? 20? packs in Amdapor Keep! They die really fast now, but they can still potentially wipe everyone if all 4 people are not good players and well-geared and that was much worse in the past before battle system changes.

As a tank there is an anxiety of how many to pull and a pressure to pull them all because most parties want that. Yet doing so carries a huge risk. So SE started enforcing a wall every 2-3 packs and it's been smooth ever since. This makes it better for the whole party and reduces anxiety, but as a cost, it's less exciting.

Especially when even Yoshida said it was not likely to change specifically because it's a matter of chain productivity to be able to churn more in less time than anything else?

It has a lot of benefits, including for chain productivity. The consistency of 3 bosses mixed with 2 sets of 2 packs of trash before them makes it consistent and smooth and easy for them to plan ahead. It makes it consistent for players, who know what to expect and know how long a dungeon will take. It reduces anxiety of "how much should I pull" that ARR dungeons still create.

[KurenXIV]

It has a lot of benefits, including for chain productivity. The consistency of 3 bosses mixed with 2 sets of 2 packs of trash before them makes it consistent and smooth and easy for them to plan ahead. It makes it consistent for players, who know what to expect and know how long a dungeon will take. It reduces anxiety of "how much should I pull" that ARR dungeons still create.

To play devils advocate, why even bother having trash mobs then?

Part of the problem with streamlining everything and removing every little hard edge that someone could hurt themselves on is that you get a super boring end product.

If there's no threat to dying to trash and we know it'll always be two pulls before the boss then truly, what is the point?

Additionally, given that all dungeons are largely the same format now (ie: hallway with 2 pulls, boss fight, hallway with 2 pulls boss....) we should at the very least get more dungeons.

I pointed this out in another thread but we got more in a shorter period of time in earlier expansions when the game had less resources/income vs now. The influx of players, which should result in more revenue and should result in more content for the game has simply not happened.

It's one of my biggest frustration points as a long term player.

Why does the field exploration content take so long to implement (when its the only grindy aspect left for current content outside of tomes/savage drops), why do we only get one dungeon per patch (is it even one per patch now? is it every other? I forget...), why isn't there more smaller scale events put into the game so these long droughts for the main content doesn't feel so long? Why are holidays so quick and boring now when they used to have more substance?

Honestly this all comes back to them being lazy and getting comfortable with the status quo for how they do things.

They really felt like they gave a damn back when they were trying to revive the game from its death in 1.0 but now it seems they are just happy to let things continue as is, player satisfaction be damned.

Oh and lastly .. . they put a TON of effort and resources into dumbing down all the old content to make it soloable with NPCs; why not have that be the way for people scared of tanking/healing content to clear it without having to have anxiety and make full party player dungeons (and other content) more challenging?

Not saying I have all the answers but yeah the games boring and stale and the DT story didn't do that fact any favors.

[Jeeqbit]

To play devils advocate, why even bother having trash mobs then?

The trash does sometimes have interesting mechanics, SE just goes back and forth on it. For example, in Shadowbringers they added a lot of interruptable casts that, if interrupted, made it easier for the healers. This can also be the case occasionally in ARR, HW and Stormblood. For example, the mobs in Sirensong Sea, the bees in Neverreap, the petrify mobs in Haukke Manor, various Morbols, swings from Cyclops and the many casts of Chimeras. There are also a lot of proper interactions with the trash there such as placing them on stones in Qarn, dragging mobs to chains in Halitali HM or the vents in Sohm Al HM or ignoring treasure coffers that might be mimicks etc.

Part of the problem with streamlining everything and removing every little hard edge that someone could hurt themselves on is that you get a super boring end product.

I agree and SE acknowledged this mistake shortly before Dawntrail so their intention is to change that through Dawntrail. Whether that is or becomes a success I'll leave for you to judge.

If there's no threat to dying to trash and we know it'll always be two pulls

I disagree that there's "no threat". Definitely still seen people wipe to trash. Of course, it's usually fine with good players, but if you actually just queue with random players instead of 3 veteran friends, you can find yourself having a whole lot more fun precisely because of the varying skill and experience levels.

we should at the very least get more dungeons.

Well the reason we had more dungeons made before was because we didn't have many compared to WoW. We have somewhere close to (or abouts) 100 now, so SE decided we have plenty now and to focus development on other things. I don't mind the development shift, but I would like Expert roulette to have more variety - so I would like Expert and Level 100 roulette to just be merged so we aren't getting 2 dungeons for most of the expansion.

It's worth pointing out that they did start making more dungeons, called Variant and Criterion. They may not be exactly what you're wanting and maybe they need feedback to steer them in the direction you want, but they are still a form of dungeon.

I pointed this out in another thread but we got more in a shorter period of time in earlier expansions when the game had less resources/income vs now. The influx of players, which should result in more revenue and should result in more content for the game has simply not happened.

I feel like I disagree with this. Just because the content isn't what you're into doesn't mean it's less content. We didn't used to get Variant, Criterion, Ultimate, Chaos Raids, Cosmic Exploration and Shades' Triangle in ARR! We didn't actually even get the normal modes of the 8-person raids in ARR since they were just the high-end content as they were.

Why does the field exploration content take so long to implement (when its the only grindy aspect left for current content outside of tomes/savage drops)

It just does? And there's plenty of stuff to grind such as Extremes for the mount, FATEs, hunts, leveling all jobs, TT cards etc. if you're into grinds.

Honestly this all comes back to them being lazy and getting comfortable with the status quo

I don't agree with the lazy part. But comfortable with the status quo is absolutely their intention. It makes it consistent for both them and players. Wouldn't be fun if some patches were 1 month apart and others were 11 months apart at complete random like I heard WoW used to be before they bought out a company with 100 spare developers. Knowing what I'm getting months in advance makes it easy to just get a 6 month subscription.

Oh and lastly .. . they put a TON of effort and resources into dumbing down all the old content to make it soloable with NPCs; why not have that be the way for people scared of tanking/healing content to clear it without having to have anxiety and make full party player dungeons (and other content) more challenging?

I do agree that it presents an opportunity to make the version done by players more challenging. To a degree, it's more likely that they will do single pulls with Duty Support though, so it's already less challenging, but they could make other changes with players or allow players to vote on making it harder in exchange for more rewards.

[CuteBucket]

Why do we even have an open world if it’s nothing but a pretty backdrop for an MSQ that barely uses a 10th of it

It's to gpose in, of course!

...

...

Yeah, that's about it. Wish I had more to do.

[caffe_macchiato]

Strange how I've heard the opposite about normal dungeons from content creators that play both FFXIV and WoW. They find normal WoW dungeons excessively easy compared to FFXIV. It's only once they reach the middle keys in M+ that they start finding the WoW dungeons more challenging. And by the time you get to those, you're done leveling and focused on the end game gear grind.

Anything can happen was true of many of the original Vanilla WoW dungeons but they're just a memory now. Blizzard ended up streamlining them and later dungeons (unless they changed dungeon design since I quit at the end of Legion). Even when I was still playing, you knew what was going to happen for boss mechanics and players had figured out a most efficient route (including what trash had to be pulled and what could be skipped). They weren't anymore engaging than FFXIV dungeons by the time I quit.

WoW really isn't any better when it comes to the amount of content available in open world zones, they just do it differently.

Translation: WoW did this thing a decade ago, so we made it worse and you're supposed to like it because...come on, who likes WoW, am I right fellas? FFXIV might be lacking in a certain area, but...look at WoW!

the game appears to be mostly meeting expectations in the JP player base. It is a JP game, not a western game after all.

Translation: You see, in the Land of the Rising Sun, the mysterious Japanese do things differently. Learn the ways of the samurai, baka gaijin.

[Supersnow845]

If 75% of the playerbase is non Japanese and we pay the same subscription as they do calling it a Japanese game is just a cop out for ignoring your playerbase

[ovIm]

I don't think an unchanging formula has much to do with new player retention... Especially when even Yoshida said it was not likely to change specifically because it's a matter of chain productivity to be able to churn more in less time than anything else?

I would stop arguing with that person, really. They are as apologetic to CBU3 as Striker44 is to the point where I wonder if they are being paid by Square Enix.

The thing is - you are right here. Yoshi-P himself admitted that the reason we are so formulaic is that it helps keep the game running with little to no input from the producer. If nothing changes and the devs grind out the same content as always, there is nothing to control or to innovate, leaving the producer free to do other things (like direct FF16, go to board meetings, etc etc).

At this point, its painfully obvious that most people don't criticize the ever unchanging flow of expected content, but are bemoaning the fact that there is nothing new added to that. A solid combination of traditionally working content, new, exciting innovations, and gameplay content with a long shelf life would make for banger content drops.

Unfortunately, CBU3 are so trapped in their almost robotic schedule that there is no way to inject new things and ideas into the mix. One would need to upheave and redesign their approach if we wanted things to improve.