Hi friends o/ This is my response/thoughts on the forum post “difficulty of normal mode content.” I have absolutely loved the direction Dawntrail has taken with battle content, and I hope it continues. That said, I don’t think it’s okay to shame people for being bad at the game. I do think they’re likely a vocal minority, but there’s always the possibility that too many players unsubbing could change the course of the game back to how it was before — after all, FFXIV exists to make money off of us.
Original forum post: https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/505739-Difficulty-of-normal-content.
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Chapters:
0:00 – 0:23 Intro
0:23 – 3:04 Reading the original post
3:04 – 4:02 WHY this post exists
4:02 – 5:12 My opinion on DT’s difficulty
5:12 – 5:51 “Non-standard telegraphs”
5:52 – 6:21 Mechanic overlap
6:22 – 7:34 Mechs resolve too quickly to process
7:34 – 8:33 Catch this/”random patterns”
8:33 -9:35 “It’s not about learning the fight”
9:35 – 11:00 “hardcore” players have enough content
11:01 – 13:43 “get good” comments are unnecessary
13:44 – 15:17 It’s OK to fail
15:17 – 16:46 Lvl 100 doesn’t mean sh!t
16:46 – 20:15 Stop forcing your playstyle on others
20:15 – 21:17 Let’s encourage, not tear down
21:17 – 22:06 How are you liking Dawntrail’s battle content?
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I felt like this tier was the easiest in a while, is this not a meme? I'm dumbfounded.
the basics is do it with trust, don't dps and focus on looking at the mechanics u need to avoid and not die, for example look atvwhere the trust npcs run to. the trust would kill everything for you if u wait long enough. if taking out your responsibility to press button to avoid damage is still not enough to help you clear, i dunno what else will help you.
the game has to evolve, otherwise each expansion is gona be same fights and telegraphs as the previous, the healer strike was beyond stupid, and people keep saying they want more to do.. then moan when they are given it. i think they are just crying about it for the sake of it because they just want content they can no brain.
personally i think they made this expansions battle content fresh and exciting, which the game sorely needed.
If you look through the official forum posts while there are folks who are being dismissive about “bad” players there were also a LOT of people who were encouraging these people as well. At the same time the casual players who are saying it’s too hard are also dismissive to OTHER CASUAL PLAYERS who don’t agree with them. The respect for each level or type of player should be respected across the board.
Yes, you are absolutely correct that even somewhat casual players like me feel threatened by these people cause we HAVE precedence that the devs listen to this bs. And the problem is that these people literally are too stupid to learn. I mean, we are at lvl 100 with I don't know how many duties done till you reach that and I STILL see people standing next to a proximity aoe or standing still while having a chase aoe on them and then being surprised that they died. A few days ago I had a MCH that died to almost every mechanic on every boss in Aetherfont. Yes, the Aetherfont dungeon bosses. The only way to cater to these people would be to go back to ARR leveling dungeon levels of mechanics. So yeah, I don't care about their opinions and no one else should.
Looooong time player here (since closed beta in 2013). Every Time there is an expansion the Overall Difficulty Rises… and people complain.
if this long time 70 year old player with arthritic hands can learn and adapt then a 20-something player should have no problem at all once they learn how to think things through.
— The Healers complained because the tanks didn't need them and they were heard and now they are needed. The tanks and melee complained because the dungeons were too easy, guess what… now there is a challenge. So Yoshi P and the development team raised the difficulty to appease the demand that people do their job and not just slop through.
— There are also complaints in the beginning of every expansion about the mechanics, but avoiding those is a learned skill, that causes the player to think in different ways.
— your suggestions about the trust are very good, hopefully Yoshi P. see's that.
I'm gonna be honest.
A1: went smooth, people (me, the tank included), fell into holes, got rezzes and finished the fight in one go.
A2: two wipes, lots of memes, everyone had fun.
A3: three wipes, lots of rezzes, still memes and fun
A4: Clear one shot, i think two people died.
The difference is, how you tackle the problem. You either throw in some advace, mark yourself, or wait for the last person to learn the fight.
Overall, i think the new raid tier is pretty funny, and I am the most basic of basic players. All I do is roulette, help a friend of mine through the MSQ and GPose for most of the time. Still, i find great joy in the new raid!
"it is exactly about learning the fight" – exactly!
As a casual player with over 3000 hours in ff14 i enjoy the new gameplay in dawntrail fx the new raid they added i had a blast playing them cuz. Yes i died alot hell i still do. But everytime the party had to wipe it didn't made me wanna leave no.. It made me wanna be better cuz the fights are fun and engagement
I just want them to slow down the quick mechanics
The solution for this is pretty simple: have all normal content doable with trusts, and make trusts have a res (Phoenix Down) and not just wipe when the player dies. If it is a matter of "but then the trusts could clear the thing without the player", than make the trusts damage so somall that the player should account for most, if not all, the damage needed to kill the boss. Is the player a healer/tank? Than make the thrusts just stop hitting the boss when the player is dead and focus on raising the player.
If anyone wants content to be dead easy, than let them have it, but it doesn't need to be the same content as we do on duty finder with other players.
If the devs listen this is gonna kill creativity and make them even more hesitant to try new things. These people are already the reason we had barely any instanced stuff in the MQ that wasn't 1v1 stuff.
I consider myself to be extremely average and the only things I have problems with is that Carnivale dungeons first boss lala grab spam shit and the second bosses teacup stuff when it starts using two of them. That and M2's heart spam but that's because I play melee and when I'm in melee range they hit me almost right away before I even realise they're there.
Ok, so I'm gonna play devils advocate for a moment, because you mentioned this being a matter of respect, and I completely agree, but that respect needs to go both ways.
First off, I don't remember if it was this post or a similar one, but either op or people agreeing with them attack the "non casuals" as well, telling them to touch grass and stop taking things so seriously. That's disrespect.
But my main point is that you need to respect other peoples time in a multi player game. Dungeons and normal mode trials are fine because you can do them with trusts (at least some trials), but when you start doing things like normal mode raids and alliance raids, you NEED to go in with at least a modicum of an idea of how to play your job and how to play the game. Because, as you said, these people are the VAST minority of the player base, so that one person is holding up 7 other people, wasting their time and making things harder for them. And I'm sorry, but I don't agree with the "just leave the duty and don't play with that person" mentality. So because YOU refuse (not talking about you, Aitherea, love your content) to get better at the game, you expect ME to have to eat a half hour penalty, AFTER already dealing with you for however long it took me to get to the point where I call it quits. That's selfish, rude, and disrespectful of other people. If these people want to do content that involves other people, they NEED to be able to do more than stand in one place and press 1, 2, 3.
Solid take. Just started playing FF recently and while the mechanics can be incredibly complicated sometimes, I don't think they're beyond learning. As a casual player I don't really pay any mind to how my dps is or dying at all during fights. There's probably a misconception that players consider themselves more casual when they're actually kinda like "softcore" players who stress enough about certain aspects that it frustrates them. A semi-competitive perspective if you will. I found myself dying to a lot of Dawntrail's mechanics or getting hit because I was staring at my buttons to make sure I was pressing them and I stopped getting hit so often when I started looking at the boss and worrying less about my buttons.
TLDR: Samurai seems to have a lot of buttons. Please send help.
Casuals, in my experience, don't care about difficulty that much. Some players just mistake themselves for casuals and want instant gratification.
I think it is hard because we are still min ilvl. Doing the raid at 685 on SAM where you can be at 700 when doing it. So the mechanics are feel punishing if I make a mistake.
Here's the thing. If it's a minority of players are saying it's too difficult that's fine, they can get over it. If it's a majority of your casual player base it is an issue. Look at WOW they gave their casual player base the middle finger with disastrous results. Either way if you cater to the minority of your community that's what you will be left with.
I agree somewhat. SE seems to have an unhealthy fixation on harder content ( savage/ultimates ), despite the majority of their player base not even playing it. I haven't gone through dawntrail yet due to CPU incompatibility unreal instructions in towns? So I'm basing this on Endwalker. Also the savage/ultimate raiders were pretty self entitled, claiming there was nothing to do, when there was a massive amount of stuff to do… they even got way more high end difficulty content than any other expansion. The elitism is pretty high among these groups, and they do actually feel and act superior to every other player who hasn't spent 4+ months on a single raid.
Meanwhile, they usually have no gil, haven't completed anything else in the expansion of note. I make 700mil gil a year, I have several houses, every shoppable mount, minion, music roll, I've completed all quests and jobs and still have a lot to do… Do I feel superior to some savage raider with no gil? Nope o.O My point is, you can be a hardcore player and not even touch savage/ultimate or even extremes. FFXIV should not revolve around this content.
I think a good challenge is healthy for both casuals and veterans. A game that is too easy tends to bore even the most casual in the long run while the veterans get bored after week 1
Man, lots of hard DLCs this year, huh? We masochists eating good.
People are afraid of not being able to do something first try. People are afraid of failing. People often times don't care enough to improve. The only reason why this person is saying they don't have the mental capacity to process these mechanics is because they don't care enough to improve in any capacity. Telling the devs the game is too hard make it easier is just a double edge sword towards casuals and the people who are slightly less casual, and I mean just barely; those who enjoy the chaos and like a bit of a new challenge. If normal raids, dungeons, or alliance raids are too much for you then maybe this game is as well. As dismissive as that sounds, this game isn't all about them and those who share the same mindset.