Thread: patch 7.2 or next expansion

Originally Posted by Jeeqbit

I think the content will be a bit harder (in the sense of the difficulty change between Asphodelos and Abyssos). I think they will be willing to do stuff like "enter a portal to kill adds" or "get transported to a cage" like in Alexander fights (because they mentioned this sort of thing specifically), but nothing widly out of the ordinary from the sort of changes we've seen already like "giant hole in the boss arena that affects uptime", "navigate a maze" or "stop attacking and try to move your character away from the middle or get killed" which were ideas they vetoed in Endwalker to maintain uptime.

Anyone hoping the game will suddenly be what they want in 7.2 is probably going to be disappointed, except the people who wanted another Field Operation.
I agree that being creative isn't always easy. At a certain point, even if they try to avoid it, you're going to be able to reduce their combat mechanics to basic principles like "AoE circle", "AoE cross", "AoE square", "AoE donut". That's why I say they are the bricks, nuts and bolts of the fight and that it's what they do with those bricks, nuts and bolts that matters.

For example, they could build lots of things with lego bricks. But if you just say "but they are the same old lego bricks", then you're never going to be happy with it.

They have actually been pretty creative across the game overall. For example, anyone that remembers how Copperbell Mines used to be, Copperbell HM, Sunken Temple (which is about to be changed, enjoy it while it lasts), old Sohr Khai. But even when they do something creative in the new dungeons, people farm said dungeon 100 times then, because they've done it hundreds of time, they no longer see it as creative.
That's really why a lot of things were removed over time. They ended up just being annoying in practice. For example, many players didn't like being unable to continue their (very inflexible) rotation, so they started to veto all ideas that affected uptime in Endwalker and people weren't happy with that.

Then we have ideas that people want back:

• multiple routes: people pick most efficient
• too many enemy packs: tanks feel pressured to pull them all despite being anxious that it's too many, then they wipe because it's too many (this was very common in ARR dungeons like Snowcloak)
• interruptable casts on enemy packs: 99% of tanks are unaware there are interrupts leaving all the heal burden on the healer
• not telegraphing mechanics: most players don't ever figure out the mechanics
• mechanics explained via status effects: many players (especially those that never played MMOs before) don't know to read status effect tooltips
• mechanics that affect uptime: uptime is affected, rotation flow ruined
• rotations too complicated such that a new player does it all wrong ie. wrong combos or casts.

Tbf, a lot of these simply face a combination of insufficient balancing effort and the old "critical mass threshold" issue (a la installing public transportation, launching any multiplayer game, etc.).

• If one route is just hugely more reward-per-minute-efficient than others, it will be taken. You can solve that with balancing or randomization if the multiple pathways would still add more longevity than that degree of time spent in a whole different dungeon.
• If there's only one dungeon dangerous enough to kill a tank with a full pull, the average tank will try to full pull it, at least until month X since its release, simply because that's always been safe otherwise. Especially if an exact half would feel weirdly weak compared to a typical full pull.
• If interruptibles are rare, it won't seem worth learning how to deal with them. Look at proficiencies back when Chimera/Coil Turn 2 were typical content compared to now.
• Again, untelegraphed mechanics fail to be learned from only once people forgot how to do so. Though admittedly "too short to dodge anyways" indicators still provide a much happier middle ground.
• Tbf, those are crap, especially for controller users, and deserve to stay dead. Happier medium: subtle pop-up messages nonetheless immediately readable without needing any mouse/scroll-over.
• Uptime losses wouldn't feel ruinous if rotations were a bit more modular. (See the differences between the ppgcd penalty of a restarted combo between ARR and now.) That said, forced uptime loss generally just means less engagement unless one is at least sprinting full-tilt at something outside of gap-closer range; difficulty to maintain it, on the other hand, usually feels great.
• That's mostly on the player, as there is ample time to learn a sensible rotation that will garner some 97+% of optimal throughput (the issues really just coming down to awareness, rather than initial knowledge gap over less intuitive but memorizable matters). Though, the support systems in this game are pretty terrible -- clunky out-of-the-way side-content (HoN), obsolete side-content (Guildhests), or nothing.

Originally Posted by Neft

I see a lot of people harping "7.2 is their last chance" "this content is their last chance"

And many patches later they will still be there playing the game.

So, I will probably admittedly stay subscribed regardless, mostly because of friends, rather than the actual content itself. This is reason enough for me, personally. So I know the below may ring hollow for some..

But as far as looking exclusively at the content... 7.2 will really be the last chance for me, where the last sliver of optimism goes away. It's just generally not healthy to keep with the line of thinking "Maybe next expansion will be better". I would just rather treat this as something to hang with friends, whether that's helping them with content, or just having laughs on a mutual game... Rather than an actual game where I come here exclusively for the content.

I used to play exclusively for the content, regardless of what friends I may have made, but these days I am almost playing exclusively because of friends. It's just a state of... Not a very good game, but an OK social simulator (if you manage to make friends).

Originally Posted by Kaurhz

So, I will probably admittedly stay subscribed regardless, mostly because of friends, rather than the actual content itself. This is reason enough for me, personally. So I know the below may ring hollow for some..

But as far as looking exclusively at the content... 7.2 will really be the last chance for me, where the last sliver of optimism goes away. It's just generally not healthy to keep with the line of thinking "Maybe next expansion will be better". I would just rather treat this as something to hang with friends, whether that's helping them with content, or just having laughs on a mutual game... Rather than an actual game where I come here exclusively for the content.

I used to play exclusively for the content, regardless of what friends I may have made, but these days I am almost playing exclusively because of friends. It's just a state of... Not a very good game, but an OK social simulator (if you manage to make friends).

I think that's fair, if you don't enjoy the gameplay, just the social aspects of it, then it's not really worth the money for you. I think a lot of people need to ask themselves did they ever like the gameplay of FFXIV or we're they only playing because they liked the story and the social aspects. If it's the latter, it doesn't matter what content sqex puts in the game, they'll never really be happy content wise because it's not fun for them.

Originally Posted by Xapapetsu

I think that's fair, if you don't enjoy the gameplay, just the social aspects of it, then it's not really worth the money for you. I think a lot of people need to ask themselves did they ever like the gameplay of FFXIV or we're they only playing because they liked the story and the social aspects. If it's the latter, it doesn't matter what content sqex puts in the game, they'll never really be happy content wise because it's not fun for them.

I think I am able to make a reasonable decision on what is worth the money, frankly. But setting that aside...

There are plenty of people who enjoyed the gameplay of this game, far far more than they did the social aspect. This is the situation I was in for the better part of 6-7 years. I remember way back getting this game precisely because of how fun doing Coils looked when watching. The enjoyability of actually doing them myself, when I got the game, levelled everything up (albeit on another long-gone character). Then getting completely hooked on crafting, where it was not treated like a subsystem as a gameplay quota, but something with an engaging, immersive and frankly unique experience among other games that I've done crafting on. For them to slowly turn it into the most mundane experience ever, from removing ingenuity, to tossing WWYW down the drain, despite it actually being one of the most advanced and interactive systems this game had. Just for them to go back and make changes under the most inane logic ever such as "We want people to explore this a little more, rather than looking up other peoples' macros, etc.,", whilst simultaneously neglecting the very fundamental aspect that people are and will watch guides, no matter how simplified the system.

Story was secondary to me for a very long time, then as everything else just got reduced to a hollow existence, of only being because of gameplay quota, rather than any actual depth or meaning with it.. Then I started to appreciate the story more, when I wasn't, for example rushing crafters... Then we eventually met the story of this expansion, where at every avenue it feels like the writers are trying to insult the intelligence of people consuming the story at every passing opportunity, because apparently we need the story reiterated to us several times within 6 cutscenes, despite the very fact they pulled this off well with the Endwalker recap at the start. Then story took a back seat and I just appreciated the social element more.

Originally Posted by Neft

some of yall need to sit down and think of something that YOU think would be innovating as in a unique never before done idea in X genre or in general (yeah, it's not easy).

The hell I do!? I am the consumer, I buy the stuff if it's fun and I go buy something else if it's not. Subs are not shares.

Originally Posted by Neft

I see a lot of people harping "7.2 is their last chance" "this content is their last chance"

but it's not just the content that needs to be fun and enjoyable, even if it's not inovated on fully, it still needs to be fun and enjoyable and honestly some of yall need to sit down and think of something that YOU think would be innovating as in a unique never before done idea in X genre or in general (yeah, it's not easy).

from an indie dev perspective everytime i have an idea that i havent seen in a game i've personally played i look it up and i find the idea in some game that flew under my radar and then i get to go and playtest that idea and usually i learn why its not used, because it makes a bad player experience.

so while the devs could literally add whatever they want, they have to question "is this a good idea" "will the players enjoy it"

The thing is... They literally don't need to do something never heard before, never seen before. They just need to look at what features they have in the game and how they can be expanded to other spaces of content as opposed to keeping them as insular features. This is actually one of the biggest issues, and one of the biggest spaces where innovation can come from.

Biggest example is applying the Logos/Lost Action & Essences system to future deep dungeons. You've suddenly added a layer of complexity, or another layer of design that the developers can work around. Transforms the gameplay element of deep dungeons quite a bit... Using already existing features in the game.

Asking a question whether players will enjoy it is crucial, but it's also a pointless thing to hypothesize about in this situation given there are plenty of unhappy people, so they aren't even asking the question to begin with - and even if they are, they are using it as a crutch rather than something to help catapult the game.. Which if you are asking that question it should always be with the latter in mind.