Yuweyawata Field Station is so wrong

[Mawlzy]

Okay, so I'm curious, you keep going on about this "two track difficulty" thing that doesn't fix the content design problems in any way shape or form, but how do you see it working functionally in the first place? Are there two Duty Finders? Is it a skill based matchmaking system? Is there an option in the DF that says "I think I'm good at the game, make it harder"?

Sure content design and dual-track are completely separate issues. We seem largely in agreement on the former.

As to the practical implementation, it's two-thirds as complicated as the tri-track offered in solo duties, except it could be chosen from the start.

[Alice_Rivers]

except it could be chosen from the start.

At the start of the game? At character creation? When you queue? After you drop into the duty? Do we end up with damage/speed/AoE on-off on a per character basis? Wouldn't it also have an adverse effect on already struggling queue times? It sounds like a logistical and processing nightmare.

[ThurinTurambar]

I guess the 'dual-track' solution could be viable with trusts. It would be easy to make dungeon bosses do 20% of their normal damage when doing it with npcs. Casual players would get through dungeons without issues, while others who value speed would not choose trusts in first place.

[Mawlzy]

I guess the 'dual-track' solution could be viable with trusts. It would be easy to make dungeon bosses do 20% of their normal damage when doing it with npcs. Casual players would get through dungeons without issues, while others who value speed would not choose trusts in first place.

Right, and it's hardly a revolutionary idea. Other MMOs have incorporated difficulty sliders for years.

Just found this video that points out the advantages and drawbacks of such a system:

https://youtu.be/KlVANL0r3jM?si=Tn-h5-NeR8_-W7I-

[Mawlzy]

I think I may just have had a moment of clarity.

It has always confused me that a part of the player base in FFXIV is so insistent that everyone should meet the same threshold of PvE competence. It's absent in most games I've played, where skilled players actually seem to be pleased they are good at something, rather than developing this peculiar rage towards less-skilled players. The devs of most games also accept skill variations as a matter of course, and accommodate all players through in-game options.

This is doubly confusing to me in FFXIV because - and maybe this is just an assumption on my part - everyone accepts the PvE is crap. [Source: this forum.]

So I asked myself, why do people with 84 clears of CAR, or those who grind leveling roulette, get so infuriated with those who limit their PvE engagement as much as possible?

And it occurred to me that, somewhere buried in their highly-skilled, yet insecure gaming minds, they are aware that spending 20 hours/week in FFXIV PvE is a colossal waste of time.

And had the devs of this game preferred Iron Chef over Takeshi's Castle, we wouldn't be in this mess in the first place.

[Eesh]

I'm sorry but I can't imagine how you can send stuff like that and not have me assume anything but vitriol. I came into this asking you what you liked about the game, you gave it to me and I interpolated from that. If misgivings were made then they were incidental and accidental. But the intent was at the core to understand.

All I've seen in this conversation is how fed up with this game you are. That it doesn't make you feel like it does for other people. And as much as I'd like to see you elevated to a position where you can enjoy it like I do, I don't see it with the current mindset you have.

This conversation has been mentally draining on both ends it seems. There's no real need to continue it I think.

Hopefully you can enjoy your little slice of the game that doesn't piss you off to no end. And even more hopefully there's some reprieve in future that allows less of it to do so.

o/

[Mawlzy]

I'm sorry but I can't imagine how you can send stuff like that and not have me assume anything but vitriol. I came into this asking you what you liked about the game, you gave it to me and I interpolated from that. If misgivings were made then they were incidental and accidental. But the intent was at the core to understand.

All I've seen in this conversation is how fed up with this game you are. That it doesn't make you feel like it does for other people. And as much as I'd like to see you elevated to a position where you can enjoy it like I do, I don't see it with the current mindset you have.

This conversation has been mentally draining on both ends it seems. There's no real need to continue it I think.

Hopefully you can enjoy your little slice of the game that doesn't piss you off to no end. And even more hopefully there's some reprieve in future that allows less of it to do so.

o/

Yes, as I indicated, I am angry. Vitriol confirmed.

Prefacing your broadsides aimed at me personally with "I'm sorry..." doesn't actually excuse the rudeness. Apology not accepted, even if you are British and use that frontal adverbial reflexively.

Here is the situation as I see it:

Those who are good at PvE are frustrated with those who are not. They do not wish to see the game made "ever easier" because less-skilled players are struggling and would like to progress the MSQ.

This concern is reasonable, and why I personally never lobby for easier content as a straight replacement. I do not wish to take away content that others enjoy. The only solution I can think of is this dual-track idea. If you have a better one, please feel to share it so the devs can ignore it too.

My "little slice" of the game includes PvP, Gold Saucer, hunts, FATEs, deep dungeons, exploratory zones, most of the MSQ, crafting, gathering, decorating my house, and hanging out with my friends. The lack of new content in every area other than raiding has been an irritant, but apparently it will eventually be "my turn" as Thancred might say.

And despite your characterization of my stunning incompetence at PvE, I have somehow managed to level every job to cap. But I'm just fine with 710 gear. Watching "the number go up" is as interesting as drying paint to me.

On balance. I'm happier with the game than the players. Which does create issues in an MMO.

[shiftweave]

I fundamentally disagree with this dual-track difficulty idea.

Firstly, Square is already struggling to put out enough content for everyone. Increasing the dungeon load would make this worse.

Secondly, no one would queue for the harder difficulty unless it had significantly higher rewards, and I don't think Square would ever do that.

The actual issue here is that dungeons are incredibly boring for a significant part of the playerbase, and yet they are mandatory. You can say "just do Extreme", but the MSQ is required to unlock the next trial. You can say "just do Savage", but the tomestones are required to keep up with the gear grind. You can say "just do Ultimate", but current ultimates require even more tomestone farming and old ultimates require target farming dungeons like lunar subterranne. And if you ever want to bring a new job into an ultimate, get ready to spend ten hours wasting your time again.

I don't care that people can't do the dungeons. I care that yoshi-p is forcing me to do dungeons, and then also forcing me to queue with people who find dungeons challenging. It's an irritant on top of the core problem. And don't say "just queue with your friends" because my friends also find the dungeons boring as sin. If I could press a button that would ban me from duty finder but cap my tomestones for the rest of time, I would.

[Mawlzy]

I fundamentally disagree with this dual-track difficulty idea.

Firstly, Square is already struggling to put out enough content for everyone. Increasing the dungeon load would make this worse.

Secondly, no one would queue for the harder difficulty unless it had significantly higher rewards, and I don't think Square would ever do that.

The actual issue here is that dungeons are incredibly boring for a significant part of the playerbase, and yet they are mandatory. You can say "just do Extreme", but the MSQ is required to unlock the next trial. You can say "just do Savage", but the tomestones are required to keep up with the gear grind. You can say "just do Ultimate", but current ultimates require even more tomestone farming and old ultimates require target farming dungeons like lunar subterranne. And if you ever want to bring a new job into an ultimate, get ready to spend ten hours wasting your time again.

I don't care that people can't do the dungeons. I care that yoshi-p is forcing me to do dungeons, and then also forcing me to queue with people who find dungeons challenging. It's an irritant on top of the core problem. And don't say "just queue with your friends" because my friends also find the dungeons boring as sin. If I could press a button that would ban me from duty finder but cap my tomestones for the rest of time, I would.

Interesting. If good players find the MSQ dungeons boring, would they not find harder ones interesting and thus queue for them? Or is your point more that dungeon design is boring in itself, but you feel compelled to queue for them to grind tomes?

I'd certainly like to see more interesting dungeons.

[shiftweave]

I think you're underestimating how hard a good player team outperforms current dungeon design. Our characters are tuned to be able to take on and complete Ultimates, which require you to bring your classes to the edge of their capabilities. If you bring those same capabilities to bear against a dungeon, you are never under any point in danger.

A harder dungeon will never be interesting enough to queue for its own sake until it reaches Criterion level, and those take significantly more resources - they won't make Crit versions of all the MSQ dungeons. If they did I would certainly give them a shot. Those wouldn't solve the tomestone issue though, since I wouldn't want to do them 5 times a week like Expert roulette asks.

Even if they did that, though, I would do the easy version to progress story. There's competing motivations here. I want the story done because it's generally required to continue moving onwards with the game. I've lost interest with the visual novel contained with FFXIV and I just want to continue down the excellent raiding track. At least personally, content loses a lot of points when it's required for me to do it. A brutal recent example is that they released an excellent new content type - CAR - which I should have loved, but then they released it on Christmas eve for god knows what reason and also gave it pieces that significantly outperformed the healer 730 which had mandatory piety beforehand.