Endgame Post from a JP PlayerFollow

Pretty fascinating read here. Translated into English.

A lot of the same complaints we hear on this board.

As the saying went from XI, the devs don't listen until the JP speak up.

I don't entirely agree with all the statments made. But a big point - the overuse of punishment mechanics in the game which have little to no recovery, really does wear on the playerbase.

About its hardcore base being bored, I can't speak for them, and I don't think he's really able to as well. I think we need to let Blue Gartr and the like speak for themselves in that regard.

In the end the larger point, that the OP missed, is that he's blaming a singlar feature - the mechanic based fights, as the core of the problems. When the truth is that the fact that the heavily punishing mechanic based fights is pretty much the only feature in endgame progression that's the problem.

I don't got a problem with fights that force the best execution of predictable mechanics to defeat. I do have a problem with that being the only available endgame to do. And, honestly, there's no singular endgame that can appeal to all three of the listed dynamics, in my opinion. That's why endgame needs to be broader.

Edited, Jun 4th 2014 1:15pm by Hyrist

Pretty spot on...

My gripe is things are either way too easy or a wall where very few can get through and it feels like you are just beating your head against that wall.. One person has lag or a lag spike and forget it.. This game relys way to much on dodge mechanics...

I cant believe how easy they made turn 1 through turn 4.. They went from hard to way, way too easy.. It is too early in the games life to make them that easy... Problem is the difficulty was pretty good to start with.. Turn 4 might have been a little on the hard side but was still doable....
You wanted to get people to experience turn 6 on up remove the wall which is turn 5...

One of the things that made fights in XI very difficult was not just the mechanics or gimicks, but also the sheer amount of HP that individual mobs had.

Jailer of Love took even a good group about 30 minutes to wear down. Didn't matter if a couple dozen people got KO'd in the process. We did that fight with 24 people most of the time - 18 in the main alliance, and an external party of six (usually 4-5 BLMs and a RDM and/or BRD).

JoL dropped a BLM earring that remained #1 for the next couple of expansions, and only got knocked to #2 with Abyssea. Also some really nice weapons and a decent WHM earring. He was a huge pain in the *** to get to, and a huge pain in the *** to kill. But at least you could throw more bodies at him and wear him down and probably not lose your pop set, even if you didn't get your drops.

And the AV would pop and slaughter all but the most elite of elite groups. You got your "hard mode" and your "extreme" all in one massive hour long battle.

As a hardcore player myself, my FC and I are at the point where there isnt much to do. After doing 6-8 and capping soldiery (which we do in one day usually), theres no reason to log in unless we feel like making some gil or helpig other people out. I find myself logging in to do some dailies for the gil reward and thats about it.

Theres a ton of things for casual players to do and work on, but for the hardcore theres really nothing. My FC practises turn 9 a few times per week but well beat it when we feel like putting in the effort. So many people want to be in a static and do. The new coil turns but once you do then you will be at the same point as we are and see how shallow the end game is.

End games longevity is based on its extreme difficulty instead of having many fights. The faster you beat turn 9, the faster theres nothing to do. This is very related to the vertical progression rather than horizontal. Ffxi built horizontally creating many different actiities to do at endgame. Sky never became obsolete and that was one of the first things end gamers did. If we continue to see vertical progression activities wont add up. Coil 1-5 will be bypassed by simply farming tokens and there will be no reason to do it other than to unlock new turns. This will also cause there to only be the one dungeon to do every week like we have currently.

I do like the game and will stick with it...but here needs to be more reasons to log in. From what i see the casual community seems to be happy and thats fine. But he hardcore needs some love too. I would like a reason to play and log in more than once per week.

All this translates to me is, make bosses easier. I don't see why this is a good idea.


Regardless of your feelings about WoW, SE should really take a look at their Flex-Raid system. It's fantastic.


Are they? I find them to be long and boring.

Basically this kid wants to do away with boss mechanics and let huge groups of over geared people carry weak players that put in less effort so that they don't quit the game, lol. The problem with this game isn't that the bosses have mechanics. Mechanics are fun in most games. The problem is that the boss fights are poorly designed and the mechanics aren't interesting.

Edited, Jun 4th 2014 2:37pm by Transmigration

I think it's almost always the case where MMO players take great pains to make fights as straight-line predictable and uneventful as possible. It's a bit bizarre to see this continue in a game where there is no hard-fought "pop item" to make a win high stakes, but i suppose the sin of wasting everyone's time is adequate enough. One only needs to look at the stringent requirements you have to meet to get into a PF to see that it's community that enforces this "no margin for error" mentality and that the only thing standing in its way is the occasional "extreme pit of certain defeat" for the slightest slip-up, accidental or otherwise.

When comparing these kinds of mechanics to what we had in XI, I can think of a few key differences:

1. Insta-kill/remove mechanics in XIV battles happen much more frequently.

2. There's very little chance of recovering from insta-kill mechnics in XIV

3. In XIV, oftentimes seven of eight party members must successfully avoid the insta-kill mechanic.

4. In XIV, there are usually no ways to stop the insta-kill mechanics from happening.

I bolded the last two, because while there were insta-kill mechanics in XI, there were almost always ways for parties to mitigate or stop these mechanics from happening, often involving well-timed stuns, the use of invincible, the use of special items, mob positioning, or sometimes just making sure everyone was topped off before the move happened. Also, proper positioning in XI usually meant that not EVERYONE was in harm's way all the time, hence the value in having frontline and backline jobs.

Obviously, I'm a big fan of ARR, but perhaps the biggest thing that bothers me about the game is how winning the most difficult battles seems to rely less on strategy and more on reacting. In XI, I always enjoyed taking a clump of jobs into a battlefield and figuring out how to make those jobs win. In XIV, there seems to be much less opportunity to be creative in battle.

The article has a bit of a good read, but I can't honestly take someone serious that heralds Sky/Sea/Dynamis era as a pinnacle of endgame design -- that was the most boring era of FFXI. You didn't need to play perfectly, or even mostly decently, because you could bring enough healers to recover from anything.

I don't have a problem with the mechanics style system used in FFXIV. There are, however, good and bad mechanics. Titan's is incredibly punishing (removal from fight), yet while Leviathan also has a removal from fight it's nowhere near as huge of an issue due to the knockback not being so bad and controlling Hysteria is part of the fight.

Turn 7's actually my favorite fight so far and as far as mechanics go yes there are "one-shot" mechanics but it's built around everything being under your control. There isn't a single thing in Turn 7 you don't have control over at all. If you stone someone it's your fault for aiming incorrectly (not paying attention) or their fault for mis-timing Shriek placement (not paying attention). If they die to the floor lighting up (you have close to 15 seconds notice before BOOM) that's their fault alone. There's nothing in the fight that you don't control from phase transitions, to not petrifying people, to add handling. Plus, there's the actual fact that Turn 7 starts off simple and slowly adds the layers of the fight across the phases. You aren't overwhelmed at once and can get acclimated with each new mechanic. It's probably the best overall designed fight they've made so far.

My main problem with the Coils so far? There simply aren't enough fights and they try to cram too much into some of the them. Twintania and Darnus are the two prime culprits, and Twintania isn't anywhere *near* as bad as Darnus. Darnus has you dealing with over seven mechanics right from the get-go and it doesn't let up as the fight goes on. It's as if they brainstormed ideas for two or three bosses and since it's the final boss of this set of turns they just decided to cram it all together.

Some of the older fights of WoW remind me of ways to deal with mistakes without being overly harsh. Instead of a mechanic one-shotting or leaving you near deal make it deal a DoT that starts small/medium and climbs to harsh values at the end. You actually end up taking *more* damage versus an intial burst but it's manageable and recoverable from. A tank getting slammed and someone else derping into a mechanic and being reduced to triple/double digit health is a disaster almost every time.

Plus there's also the fact that for the lower mainstream/casual base there's no in-between. Either you step into Crystal Tower to faceroll everything and deal with trolls.... or you go play in Coil which is equivalent difficulty of endgame heroic raiding content.

Just out of curiosity, what else would you consider difficult if the 'reactions' were removed from the equation?

As for the bolded, getting the hell out of the way is also a viable option to avoid one-shot mechanics. Press your stun macro or press your movement key to get away safely. There's really no difference.

While I tend to make some of my grander XIV debates from the perspective of alternative progression for the casual folk or those disenfranchised with the endgame status quo of MMOs, there's also a side of it that would actually be beneficial to the hardcores, as well.

Now, I know you want to feel there's more to this game than chasing carrots, but part of the endgame ennui lies in the fact they're limited on things to chase. The combination of time gating from weekly tomes and coil is a detriment to the hardcores, as it effectively says you will only be gearing up 1-3 classes per major patch cycle, in part if RNG favors you on drops. Now, you've seen my 3 reasons for why people do things in MMOs, yes? #2 is a problem at present: If you do Coil, you can't help anyone else for the rest of the week. This effectively makes any LS or FC above or below 8 people questionable. You're either fishing for PUGs or leaving people out. It can be and is difficult to promote a long term community with this system because all it takes is one shake-up in a static to ruin it for good. Lose your tank at T9? Good luck finding another T9 tank that also needs a group without their own demands, like bringing a friend.

Broadening content depth and loosening the grip on acquisition rates will give everyone, including the hardcores, things to do. Think back to FFXI and the days of Assault. Did you ever see someone shouting for one of the more obscure ones, but you didn't volunteer yourself because you needed to keep your tags for Salvage or Nyzul access due to said tags (and not ******** your static)? This is the same kind of artificial barrier keeping players from helping one another here. Of course, I'm appealing to their sense of greed alongside chivalry. They CAN work hand in hand.

I don't think all of the reactions should be removed... but they should be toned down.

The way these battles are now, it's like a 10-minute stress test in which players must remain 100 percent locked in the entire time. It's just too much, and, above all, it's not fun. There's no real strategy involved and no room for improvisation.

You could cut the frequency of insta-kill mechanics by 50 percent (and insert other moves that the party must account for), and you'd still have to dodge enough stuff throughout the fight that the battle would still retain plenty of difficulty. It just wouldn't be OMGWTFGOEFFYOURSELF pointlessly difficult.

I also think there's a lot of merit to what Catwho says about giving bosses more HP. A big reason why the current method of insta-kill mechanics is difficult is that people make mistakes. Even when people know a fight inside and out, they may still make mistakes. You force a fight to go on long enough, and someone will ***** something up, and the party will need to scramble and rebound from that. Back in XI, some of my most memorable battles were with groups that had to overcome mistakes in order to eek out a win by the time the clock expired.

For that matter, SE could maintain a high degree of difficulty and pressure by loosening the insta-kill mechanics, increasing boss HP and clamping down on the time limits for certain content (not dungeons, but for things like coil). Reducing the time limit is a great way to punish parties for mistakes while still giving them the chance to overcome those mistakes.

"Spawn Conditions" exist even to this day in XIV so it would be no different. Certain FATEs are triggered as per spawn conditions, e.g killing all of x in area over a period of time (like the Boar FATE) or some with chain (which are also a spawn condition.)