Relic being tomestone step AGAIN is incredibly depressing

[Dranari]

The DT relic grind started off okay. I don't think Demi-Atmas are great, since a 100% RNG-oriented grind is honestly terrible game design—but at least doing the new content gives you some progress toward them.

Then I saw the next step… and all the following steps were tomestone grinds. I was devastated. They really just pulled out the exact same grind as Endwalker. As usual, the daily grind ends up being by far the most efficient way to obtain the relics.

It's criminal how little reward the new content gives toward the relic. I played Occult Crescent to death when it released—14 to 16 hours every day—because I love grinding. I got all the Demi-Atma on day 2 and picked up my first relic that same day.

The next day, I went into Occult Crescent with 80 tomestones and did another 14-hour grind. When I came out, I had a whopping… 1,140 tomestones.

Why did they even advertise OC as being “attached to the relic grind” when it's quite literally the worst possible way to grind it?

I pray—I hope—they don’t make this mistake for all the relic steps. These tomestone stages are some of the laziest, most boring, and uninspired design choices I’ve ever seen in any game.

[aZenZhen]

I mean, we're still in the early stages of the relic weapons. There is every chance more of the later steps get focused into OC content, much like StB amd ShB relics had with their respective field ops. While I can understand the tome grind is annoying, there is still opportunity for it not to repeat what EW relics were.

[ServerCollaps]

As usual, the daily grind ends up being by far the most efficient way to obtain the relics.

actually its hunt trains and s ranks xd

[VeyaAkemi]

On one hand, it objectively is tied to the Occult Crescent, the tome stage literally cannot be reached without engaging with it, as you need to do at least the opening bits for Gerolt to show up, and the Atma stage is most efficiently done within OC.

On the other, I completely agree that OC should've been the most efficient way to gain the repeated Relics, I understand them being concerned about giving us *too much* Heliometry, but perhaps they could've allowed us to repeat the Atma stages, with fewer constrictions, as an alternate way to gain Arcanite.

actually its hunt trains and s ranks xd

Let me put it like this, if I wanted to, I could do a run of Underkeep with Trusts, and it would take just slightly over 20 minutes, I did quite a few to get the Royal Hound minion when the dungeon first launched, and I know it takes me 21-22 minutes per run, that's 80 Helios per run, and in the same timeframe I could get maybe 2 CEs done, which is to say, literally just running Dungeons with Trusts, which are infamously slow, is an objectively better way to gain the Helios for your relic than doing OC is, it's honestly pretty bad, so independent of what the objectively best way to gain Helios is, the complaint that OC, the Relic content, is bad for it, stands.

[Stasya]

I mean, we're still in the early stages of the relic weapons. There is every chance more of the later steps get focused into OC content, much like StB amd ShB relics had with their respective field ops. While I can understand the tome grind is annoying, there is still opportunity for it not to repeat what EW relics were.

Sorry bud but we are getting yet another tomestone relic.

If game designer, who was in charge of making quest for relic, had above room temperature IQ, there would be AN OPTION either to grind atmas then exchange for metal -> relics or to just buy metal with tomes.

We literally got tomestone relics again, they did not even think about "what if people got more atmas than needed for first relic" part ....... What do i do with them? Beg SE to hire C++ intern to make a proper repeatable relic quest?

I can't wait for yoshida to be on a high horse on next live letter and troll people with "OC was very well received content".

[Saraide]

I'm still not past the atma step.

[mallleable]

While I like the prospect of grindy one time first steps to unlock easy repeats, I'm a little torn on it being just tomes again. It would be much better if Arcanite, and future relic mats could also be bought with Occult Crescent currencies, and Bicolor Gemstones as well, and not just tomes.

[TaleraRistain]

I wish we had the option on the second step to keep going with atmas. Let us trade atmas or tomes for the items. Then there's a path for everyone. I feel a lot more like I'm earning it that way.

[xbahax92]

They don't know how to do engaging quest designs or adding different layers to stretch grindy phases. This team has no interest in investing into new structures within their own game. They're hard focusing on the next expansion instead, which I have no hope left.

[Fawkes]

I assume it'll be like this step every time, one relic grind type activity to unlock the ability to buy the weapons with tomes. I think it's a good middle ground for people who want to get all the weapons vs people who want a grind.