So how is everyone feeling about Occult Crescent now that it’s been a few days?

[Valence]

Also gotta say that regular FATEs should be as complex as FATEs in Occult Crescent.

They're budget CEs with the same painful DDR and rote memorization bullcrap. There is nothing intellectually engaging in those.
I honestly don't even know what's better between a resident sleeper fiesta or those.

Relic is always mostly about glam as they're only BiS at the final stage/end of patch. And there's the worry that if you end up liking the later stage's look, you will have to do massive grind as you need to start from the very beginning.

It's a bit of a shame though. With the amount of effort people put into those relics, they could at least provide an alternative to unaugmented tome weapons. It's not like they'd actually be threatening the savage weapons...

Regarding new jobs and battles with them, they've maybe felt more fun than the basic game classes or dungeon running.

In normal dungeons, I might not notice what class others players have, as every class simply does damage, with different moves / animations, and the runs are generally easy.

On the new crescent isle, it might've been a bit refreshing and fun, when classes are more different or have more noticeable impact in fights. Perhaps more so, if fights are challenging (7-8 levels higher) and not too easy. For example, when Cannoneer can blind enemies, it's a noticeable and even tide changing effect. Same could be with TM using slow on enemies, and maybe in fewer cases, if Geomancer uses floating ability. I definitely had a thought, that would like to bring cannoneer to some other instances.

My biggest gripe is there's no way to get any Haste. Even on Phantom Time Mage you only get a 10s buff every 120s. I want to play dumb crap like 1.0s GCD Monk or 1.5s GCD Summoner, this is the kind of content where I should be able to do so.

I like this usually. It's the only thing they add in every Field Exploration content every time that actually tries to cater to what made XIV, an actual FF RPG, and... XIV originally. Feels that it's not being exploited even half as it should though even in gold farm parties (that have just turned into tank fiestas).

Edit: it's like the devs are afraid of anything rewarding even a modicum of intellectual effort with anything they add those days. No exotic builds and combinations, no customization, no RPG systems. Are we trying to only satisfy a specific audience that's all about twitchy brainless gameplay?

[Infindox]

Despite my misgivings about the appalling Atma drop-rate, I returned to OC with the mindset of "forget Atma, just grind Silver pieces".

And I'm STILL disappointed; because I favor playing healer, particularly Sage. To quote something I read in the comments on Reddit:
Moreso than any exploration content beforehand, Tanks just end up as kings. Phantom actions devalue dps by giving huge damage buttons to everyone; healers are devalued by chemists spamming out infinite raises. Survivability is the thing most limited both by the mastery buff and by phantom actions, so tanks end up being kings of the zone. Phantom jobs have shrunk the player space, not expanded it.

And this is evidenced - from my experience at least - by the sheer number of Tanks in every CE or OC-FATE I enter.

The thing is, I never really finished fully levelling any tank job as I just don't enjoy tank gameplay. Which means I generally play OC as Sage, and it feels really unrewarding and redundant.

I actually am happy when I see healers in parties. There's a few CEs that are annoying without one. Also, admittedly, if I have one I can start using the Starfall strat and not have to Vercure myself lol.

[Mawlzy]

They're budget CEs with the same painful DDR and rote memorization bullcrap. There is nothing intellectually engaging in those.
I honestly don't even know what's better between a resident sleeper fiesta or those.

Edit: it's like the devs are afraid of anything rewarding even a modicum of intellectual effort with anything they add those days. No exotic builds and combinations, no customization, no RPG systems. Are we trying to only satisfy a specific audience that's all about twitchy brainless gameplay?

With respect, Valence, this question hasn't needed asking for months. The answer is clearly "yes."

The long awaited "new" content of CE and OC is thematically identical, the only difference being that, in the former, you don't have to play dodgeball.

[Mecia]

Im a little bummed theres no accessories and that gear is just damage go up. Haste felt more like i was progressing.

[KageTokage]

I honestly didn't like the haste gear because while it felt nice on casters like BLM it screwed up the CD alignment of certain jobs and actively made them feel worse to play.

The main stat increase is boring but practical comparatively.

[ThaCa]

I was dissapointed, ran around and got all the quest locations and teleports at level 1, then did bunch of fates and CEs. Not sure if I'm even going to bother maxing out my knowledge level since the whole place seems to be just beelining around with next to no though.

[Iskra]

It's aggressively mid. Or maybe below that, honestly. Never did Eureka, but I LOVED Bozja/Zadnor soo much. Absolutely loved all three raids and played them probably a million times each (DR was my favorite), loved the music, the duels, the fact you could level alt jobs. Lost actions+potions made for some interesting and fun combos no matter the job you played. The only thing I wasn't a fan of was the dull brown world. But it did add to the atmosphere, so it didn't really bother me that much.

Anyway, OC looks nicer? It was fun for a few hours, and then I found out the raid was... well. A mess. Kinda wonder who it was even made for. It broke my heart a little, as I was so looking forward to a normal raid, like the other ones. Why not have a normal and a savage version? Such a weird choice, what they ended up doing. So for me now it's like, why even grind for the gear? There's no point as I wont do the raid, and I don't really like it as glam pieces anyway. I can farm the Demiatma doing fates and at least get bicolor gemstones and make some gil. Unlike in OC where all loot is useless now. Phantom jobs are okay I guess, but a huge step down from Lost Actions and potions for sure. If you're solo and want to be immortal just go WAR, that's it.

I re-subbed for this, and idk. I guess I was expecting more. I don't mind the CE+Fate grinding at all, but I wish there was a fun raid to break it up every now and then.

[Ephremjlm]

(Part 1)

Overall, Occult Crescent is fun for now and for the first time in a while, I might actually keep my subscription active for a few months. But truthfully that feels like a low bar, because the core gameplay loop of FFXIV right now, outside of OC, just isn’t very engaging. That said, now that I’ve had some time with the content, I’ve come to a few realizations that helped me see through the rose-tinted glasses that the “new and exciting” factor initially gave me. Everything I’m about to say ties into player participation and player-driven content, both areas where FFXIV already struggles. And I don’t mean random "say" or "shout" chats looking for parties. I mean actual communication, exploration, and taking your time with content instead of just rushing through it. And its frustrating to some degree because solo players already get everything else in this game. Give something to the MMO players who want to party and engage with others. So keep that thought in mind.

(1) The biggest and most fundamental issue is that leveling feels like an arbitrary grind added because "that's just what you do" and to gatekeep the Forked Tower. When I first went in blind with some FC mates, we were so excited. We thought we’d actually have to level by killing regular mobs. It didn’t feel bad either, and some of them even had mechanics like tankbusters. My buddy and I joked, “When was the last time we had to kill lizards to level? FFXI?” That could have been a great system, encouraging players to form parties to explore the map, search for treasure, or find campsites making strats on how to kill the type of mob in that area. But that isn’t how it works once you realize that FATEs and Critical Engagements spawn one after another and that knowledge level doesn’t really matter much for them.

(2) This leads to another related issue. FATEs and Critical Engagements feel repetitive and lack value. Fates should have worked like they did in Eureka, where killing regular mobs was needed to spawn them. CEs should have been tied to progression by killing enough FATEs. The dev team clearly noticed something was off, since they added gold drops to regular mobs to make them feel more worthwhile. But that just results in another grind, and only high-level mobs feel rewarding after you’ve maxed your knowledge level making the others once again worthless set pieces.

A better system would have been to have regular mobs drop some silver, with special spawn mobs like goblins dropping gold. FATEs could give more silver and a bit of gold, and CEs should be the best source for gold. On top of that, they should have added RNG gear drops to CEs or random NMs to make the grind more engaging. Also, more weekly challenge log bonuses would help. The solo mob grind wouldn’t be so bad if there were more challenges to keep people motivated. It would help maintain that sense of progress.

[Ephremjlm]

(Part 2)

(3) The rewards are frustrating and they domino from the last point. It feels like they are gutting Bozja and Eureka and crashing the market on a bunch of old minions and mounts without any real reason. I’m tired of hearing the same excuse from the dev team about limitations on resources. Yoshi P. falls back on it every time. They need to do better. Other games offer so much more in terms of rewards, and we shouldn’t keep giving FFXIV a pass here.

For example, tying gear to OC stats through multiple pieces that unlock at different knowledge or phantom levels would have been great. If leveling felt smoother and more meaningful by making regular mobs more killable, that gear would also feel more impactful. And they could just reskin old gear. It’s not like they don’t already do that. On top of that, the glam sets once again look bad. They’re overly flamboyant for no reason. Saying they’re based on FFV doesn’t change the fact that they don’t look good. And others can argue with me on that idc.

(4) I really like the idea of phantom jobs (sub-jobs), but they feel underdeveloped. The skills, buffs, and abilities are cool in theory, but it’s obvious the team wasn’t sure how to fully implement them. Some phantom jobs should come with automatic buffs like they did in FFXI. Things like Holy Cannon don’t feel great to use because damage types still don’t really matter in this content.

Yes, there are some niche uses, but take Knight for instance. It gives defense buffs and minor heals, which ends up feeling like a watered-down PLD. Berserker gives a solid damage buff, but it still doesn’t feel great to play. I want more usable abilities. Each phantom job should offer at least one damage skill, one utility skill, and one healing or mitigation skill that relate to the sub class. Then they could build out the rest creatively. I’m hoping future updates will expand on this.

(5) This content absolutely should give experience points, just like Bozja. Eureka should too. We have Trusts now, so the game no longer needs to force veteran players into dailies to level newer players. Let people gain experience from the content they enjoy playing.

(6) This part is anecdotal, but the Demiatma drop rate inside OC has been terrible for me. That or I'm getting trolled. I’ve mastered multiple jobs, reached max level, and still only have four Demiatma. Meanwhile, people farming FATEs outside the content already have multiple relics. That feels completely off. It needs to be fixed.

(7) It’s a real shame we’re only getting two zones, and the next one probably won’t come for a year. The way this content is structured, it’s just not going to last that long. Deep Dungeon doesn’t really compare either. Back in Eureka, we were getting new zones fairly regularly along with deep dungeons, raids, and more. Yes, the game supports more content types now, like Cosmic Exploration, but I still think we should have gotten at least three zones.

[Underscore]

I'm glad we finally have something to do besides Savage raids for the first time in years - though due to the insane chest drop tables and their damage to the economy and other content I can't say Occult Crescent's addition has been entirely positive for the game.

Aside from that matter, I like it. It's not quite as good as either Eureka or Bozja, but it's decent. I prefer Eureka's implementation of FATE spawning which required players to farm specific mobs together and coordinate the spawns. In OC there's pretty much always a FATE or CE active and all your time is spent rushing between them with no downtime to relax or fight normal enemies.

The implementation of entering Forked Tower is baffling and makes me wonder whether they thought it through at all. I haven't tried it yet but even getting inside seems like a massive undertaking for all the wrong reasons.