Endgame should be challenging - that's the point (from a casual player)

[SamRF]

I see a lot of posts asking for easier endgame content or complaining that certain fights are too difficult. As someone who spends most of their time playing casually, I think we're missing something important - we already have casual-friendly content. It's called the entire leveling experience, story mode trials, dungeons, and side quests. These teach you your job, let you enjoy the story/worldbuilding, and provide accessible group content.

When I do reach endgame and want to engage with that content, I expect it to challenge me. That's what makes it rewarding. If everything at endgame becomes accessible to the most casual approach, then what's the point of progression at all?

I think the so-called "mid-core" players who want casual content at endgame may be lower in number than it seems. I suspect more players follow irregular cycles like mine - casual most of the time, then occasionally hardcore - and I wouldn't be surprised if SE has the numbers on this. These mid-core voices are probably overrepresented on these forums, while others are underrepresented because they're either busy doing the more "hardcore" content or taking a break from the game, avoiding the huge time sink that is forum discussions.

Some people may misunderstand what "accessibility" means in MMO design. It doesn't mean making all content equally easy - it means having content that matches different time investments and commitment levels. The leveling experience and normal content already serve casual players well. Endgame should remain challenging for those who seek it out, even if that means mid-core players sometimes need to either step up or step back.

If SE embraced this mentality more - keeping endgame genuinely challenging rather than making concessions for broader accessibility - the game would probably feel much less stale. Again, having something truly difficult to work toward gives the entire progression system meaning, even for those who may never actually reach that level.

That's just my perspective as someone who appreciates both sides of the game.

[Asari5]

first time i see someone saying midcore player want more casual content

[AvoSturmfaust]

First of all, generally speaking there are some huge issues the FFXIV has right now

1. "Midcore" is a Term which was created from player which didnt want to call themselfes "casual" so the actually term "midcore" doesnt exist like casual or hardcore, and the first time i heard about it was literally in FFXIV, never heard it before in my 18y MMO experience

2.People here think "Casuals" doesnt raid or if you raid and want challenging content you arent a "Casual" you are a "Hardcoreplayer" which is dumb as hell sorry to tell ya but if you raid or want challening content you can still be a casual, the difference between Casual and Hardcore is just the amount of Time they spend on certain content, take as example one of my best friends, he raids 2h each week still cleared the tier and is in the 95+ log area, and he still says he is not hardcore he is casual

3. People which refuses to join discords or statics or anything and complain then "ohhh that content needs again social interaction" bruhh you are playing a MMO if you dont wanna social interactions its YOUR problem, not SE´s problem or the Community´s Problem is one and only YOUR problem, dont play a MASSIVE MULTIPLAYER ONLINE Game if you dont wanna bother with social interactions

4. People which refuses to do any content which involves learning a fight or playing the class properly and then complaining about "the game is too hard there is nothing to do for casuals" mimimi, like i said previous you arent a casual you are a imbecile,

not once in my 18 years mmo experience was there a MMORPG which didnt had Challening Content as Endgame Activity, only FFXIV has the issue with the crybabys to such a huge extend so yea maybe its really time to start being a true MMORPG with a Endgame and start to even increase the Difficulity of the Content more, Eat or Die, if you dont like it? Leave, after all FFXIV IS A MMORPG

Freaking final bubble with all the crybabys

im absolutly for increasing difficulity and creating even more challening content.

[CNitsah]

3. People which refuses to join discords or statics or anything and complain then "ohhh that content needs again social interaction" bruhh you are playing a MMO if you dont wanna social interactions its YOUR problem, not SE´s problem or the Community´s Problem is one and only YOUR problem, dont play a MASSIVE MULTIPLAYER ONLINE Game if you dont wanna bother with social interactions

This is insanely stupid to me...I've been playing mmos for decades, and in EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM, most of the content could be done on pick up, while still providing some kind of challenge. Only the highest lvl of difficulty asked for organised runs on discords. Pretending the need of a static or a discord server to do anything in a MMO is a blatant proof you have forgotten everything about others MMO than FFXIV. Sure Teamspeak/Mumble/discord always have been there, but it was more "I reunited a team, now let's go there, it'll be more practical to communicate". In FFXIV it's "If you don't have a static, good luck to run the content". It's funny to me that someone with 18 years of mmo experience doesn't seem to see that. I also spend 20 years playing mmo, yet achieved to always have thing to do in each of them despite rarely engaging in high end content. I also did in FFXIV until EW. This whole "you don't understand what a MMO" is so out of touch, especially since the lack of casual content is not compared to other mmo, but to previous iteration of FFXIV. Honestly you just look like an angry little elitist with this post.

It seems you also can't understand what you read. The complaint is not the existence of high end activities, it's the lack of anything else. Check the last weeks of post about Forked Tower : I've seen post saying there should be an easier version, but none that said the hard version should not exists. MMO wise FFXIV content is poor : it's not a problem, because it the proposition of the game, giving a mmo that doesn't ask for every second of your time. But it used to give things to do for people that didn't want to engage into High end content.

[AvoSturmfaust]

This is insanely stupid to me...I've been playing mmos for decades, and in EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM, most of the content could be done on pick up, while still providing some kind of challenge. Only the highest lvl of difficulty asked for organised runs on discords. Pretending the need of a static or a discord server to do anything in a MMO is a blatant proof you have forgotten everything about others MMO than FFXIV. Sure Teamspeak/Mumble/discord always have been there, but it was more "I reunited a team, now let's go there, it'll be more usefull to communicate". In FFXIV it's "If you don't have a static, good luck to run the content". It's funny to me that someone with 18 years of mmo experience doesn't seem to see that. I also spend 20 years playing mmo, yet achieved to always have thing to do in each of them despite rarely engaging in high end content. I also did in FFXIV until EW. This whole "you don't understand what a MMO is so out of touch", especially since the lack of casual content is not compared to other mmo, but to previous iteration of FFXIV. Honestly you just look like an angry little elitist with this post.

It seems you also can't understand what you read. The complaint is not the existence of high end activities, it's the lack of anything else. Check the last weeks of post about Forked Tower : I've seen post saying there should be an easier version, but none that said the hard version should not exists. MMO wise FFXIV content is poor : it's not a problem, because it the proposition of the game, giving a mmo that doesn't ask for every second of your time. But it used to give things to do for people that didn't want to engage into High end content.

You can do everything in FFXIV without Discord or a Static it was a example, i cleared Ultimates with PF, i cleared Savage Tiers with the PF, Criterion the higher Difficulity even a PotD 200 Run, its about that there are so many people which refuses any kind of social interaction, you cant believe how many times i asked someone in a PF group something if he understood the mech, if someone has a question or anything, what do you think how often someone answered ? 1% thats it and that is my point its a MMORPG if you not even be able to answer in the chat ingame or anything because you really want zero social interaction a MMORPG it not for you

and i read it, but i need to say that game dont need anything other then high end activities, give me a few example a few MMORPGS which has Endgame based on everything which wasnt high end or has content which is only for "the super casuals"

[Ephremjlm]

This is insanely stupid to me...

I feel like this post basically sums up the watering down of the MMO and I agree with you.

In the past there was never a need for the term "midcore" because MOST content was that. People who only crafted and gathered, who barley scraped by but didn't care and were just there for only the story, those who just RP'ed, or those who just to use the game as a chatroom (remember those things?) were called "casuals". Hardcore players were the ones who did everything, or who simply "rushed to endgame" (oh look THAT term) and did the hardest content likely optimizing their gameplay to create a meta.

To confuse midcore players with casual players is literally what devs have been pushing for so long to get the weight of players wanting more off their back. It is so much easier to make braindead content across the board for casuals, and then single instanced fights that require little to no conditions to get into with little to no consequences on death, in a circular arena, with dodge mechanics and a rotation of a simplified job that must be done perfectly for hardcore players as opposed to making content that meets players in the middle (oh that term "midcore"), creates multiple uses for open world, has combat that makes you think, adds variability, has gear that makes you choose, makes you customize your character to your own liking but while having to figure out how to make it work, and most importantly, that feels fulfilling. FFXI used to be the embodiment of that, and those aspect are still there, they just choose to not take the good things and instead label it all bad so they don't have to do extra work. (Yoshi P partially admitted this when he explained their process for making dungeons). Now a days, you can 100% tell they don't even know how to execute it anymore. Occult Crescent should have been the easiest slam dunk of a content win, but instead it has turned into a big L in a streak of L's that they have been accumulation since the post patches of Endwalker, except for those who have been wanting midcore and have been holding out hope for the past 4+ years that this would be good, it's a heavy and low blow that tells us that even when content is geared towards us, it still has to be geared towards the casuals. And forked tower, idk what happened there, it seems like they didn't even play test it properly lol. Hardcore players even got screwed. But the message is still there the once again the midcore players matter less than the hardcores in that instance. Its 80/20 with casuals and hardcore players. Midcore players simply get left out.

Its so beyond annoying

[Jangles]

This is insanely stupid to me...I've been playing mmos for decades, and in EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM, most of the content could be done on pick up, while still providing some kind of challenge. Only the highest lvl of difficulty asked for organised runs on discords. Pretending the need of a static or a discord server to do anything in a MMO is a blatant proof you have forgotten everything about others MMO than FFXIV. Sure Teamspeak/Mumble/discord always have been there, but it was more "I reunited a team, now let's go there, it'll be more practical to communicate". In FFXIV it's "If you don't have a static, good luck to run the content". It's funny to me that someone with 18 years of mmo experience doesn't seem to see that. I also spend 20 years playing mmo, yet achieved to always have thing to do in each of them despite rarely engaging in high end content. I also did in FFXIV until EW. This whole "you don't understand what a MMO" is so out of touch, especially since the lack of casual content is not compared to other mmo, but to previous iteration of FFXIV. Honestly you just look like an angry little elitist with this post.

It seems you also can't understand what you read. The complaint is not the existence of high end activities, it's the lack of anything else. Check the last weeks of post about Forked Tower : I've seen post saying there should be an easier version, but none that said the hard version should not exists. MMO wise FFXIV content is poor : it's not a problem, because it the proposition of the game, giving a mmo that doesn't ask for every second of your time. But it used to give things to do for people that didn't want to engage into High end content.

Agree with you immensely, challenge doesn't mean discord content. CLL was "challenging" you needed to organize an communicate but didn't need to be premade, Dalriada was the same way. Delubrum Reginae normal was also challenging but didn't need you to take to outside sources to gather people to do it. Yes I know savage can be completed without discord through party finder and I like savage, but if you pretend like you don't understand what people mean by content requiring discord you are just being disingenuous for the sake of arguing.

[Bubblesong]

First of all, generally speaking there are some huge issues the FFXIV has right now

1. "Midcore" is a Term which was created from player which didnt want to call themselfes "casual" so the actually term "midcore" doesnt exist like casual or hardcore, and the first time i heard about it was literally in FFXIV, never heard it before in my 18y MMO experience

2.People here think "Casuals" doesnt raid or if you raid and want challenging content you arent a "Casual" you are a "Hardcoreplayer" which is dumb as hell sorry to tell ya but if you raid or want challening content you can still be a casual, the difference between Casual and Hardcore is just the amount of Time they spend on certain content, take as example one of my best friends, he raids 2h each week still cleared the tier and is in the 95+ log area, and he still says he is not hardcore he is casual

3. People which refuses to join discords or statics or anything and complain then "ohhh that content needs again social interaction" bruhh you are playing a MMO if you dont wanna social interactions its YOUR problem, not SE´s problem or the Community´s Problem is one and only YOUR problem, dont play a MASSIVE MULTIPLAYER ONLINE Game if you dont wanna bother with social interactions

4. People which refuses to do any content which involves learning a fight or playing the class properly and then complaining about "the game is too hard there is nothing to do for casuals" mimimi, like i said previous you arent a casual you are a imbecile,

not once in my 18 years mmo experience was there a MMORPG which didnt had Challening Content as Endgame Activity, only FFXIV has the issue with the crybabys to such a huge extend so yea maybe its really time to start being a true MMORPG with a Endgame and start to even increase the Difficulity of the Content more, Eat or Die, if you dont like it? Leave, after all FFXIV IS A MMORPG

Freaking final bubble with all the crybabys

im absolutly for increasing difficulity and creating even more challening content.

Midcole term has always exist way before ffxiv even exist ot was a term however its always a term that everyone choice to ignore.

In essence midsole are typically players who do put extreme amount of time in the games, do enjoy a challenge and harder content however they do not do a set schedule and try to the extreme level of hard-core. I'd say the vast majority people in 14 are midcole we want challenges and all that we just don't want those challenges to be extremely social, I want to challenge myself but I don't want to deal with that many people that the "harder" content requires

Now with vc I can get that but it's sad that's the only harder content with at max 4 players.. I'm srry but I don't want to do something with 8 or 24 people

[PercibelTheren]

Midcore player here. My kind of content is Extremes and the easier Savage floors. I have never seen a player call themselves midcore and ask for easier content. What people do ask for is an actual level of difficulty between Normal and Savage. I, too, was incredibly disappointed by Chaotic - not only is it a Savage fight, it became so gatekept that I gave up on it.

My issue with "challenging" fights in this game is that they rely on two methods - speed and memory tests. I don't particularly enjoy either of those. Arcady Nights Encore was a nightmare for me in prog because it's really damn fast and I have issues processing information at that kind of speed. I still fail the mech about 30% of the time if I get a cursed pattern. Having to remember what a boss stored for later is also just...lame? I would rather have the mechanics be slightly easier and the jobs more challenging, so the real skill expression would be optimizing your job for the particular fight. Unfortunately, this is the opposite of the direction this game is going. We are making jobs braindead and fights DDR.

[Infindox]

The problem is not "casuals want easier content". It's "people want content that doesn't force them to play this game like its a second job".
All the content recently (becides the normal EX and Savage) is either laughably easy, or forces you to find people to run it with you on Discord.

3. People which refuses to join discords or statics or anything and complain then "ohhh that content needs again social interaction" bruhh you are playing a MMO if you dont wanna social interactions its YOUR problem, not SE´s problem or the Community´s Problem is one and only YOUR problem, dont play a MASSIVE MULTIPLAYER ONLINE Game if you dont wanna bother with social interactions

Literally every other game I play that involves social interactions I don't have to go on Discord just to play parts of it. I love meeting people in game and partying up, and working together to meet a goal. Using Discord for its intended purpose (using it as a way to communicate for statics/harder content with random people) is fine, and it's also fine for trying to hunt down people to run older content. But when fresh new content comes out that you're immediately forced to use it just to find a way to get a party... Something wrong happened.