Letter from the Producer LIVE Part XXVI

[Twilight Sky]

We understand that there have been requests for content with a difficulty similar to the Hydra trial or hard mode Garuda and Titan

The hard mode primals ARE NOT HARD.. People wanted EXTREME, not hard...

The Mentor System (Tentative)

This system will allow veteran players to be called “Mentors” for Disciple of War/Magic and also Disciples of the Land and Hand. Once players become a “Mentor” they will be able to use a system which will help new adventurers. This is basically a system where people can help out. Players will be able to use features such as a roulette called the “Mentor Roulette.”

I will be very surprised if this works..

[Silenka]

Is hilarious IMO. Dudes really have forgotten how to just relax and enjoy the game for what it is.

The problem as I see it is they ALWAYS make content easier and dumbed down instead of saying "this is what you asked for so suck it up and git gud". They always cave and make things less challenging, sometimes even before the content is released. The kind of player that mentality breeds is one who doesn't try to improve his gameplay and is content to lazily wait for the inevitable nerf. The kind of development that mentality breeds is what we see here, devs who are more concerned with pandering to the LCD who fail Bismarck story mode than forcing them to take a look at their gameplay.

Shit, even I do it with the raids being too lazy to commit to a static: I'm only doing coil with my friends now unsynced after so long not bothering. But I would be perfectly fine if that content never got echoed and uncapped and it was closed off to me until I decided to put forth the effort to do it. The more the players are handed shit on a silver platter the less of a game it is. There should be challenging elements in a game. I'm not saying there's nothing wrong with Alex Savage as it currently stands, perhaps they did make it overly difficult for even most raid groups. But their general mentality when they change things isn't "redesign it to be better and more of a fun challenge", it's usually more along the lines of "give the player every handicap we can so even the worst players can clear".

[Niiro]

The hard mode primals ARE NOT HARD.. People wanted EXTREME, not hard...

Hey now Titan HM actually was hard back at launch, but for the wrong reasons.

[Destinye]

I agree though - people want a challenge but anyone in their right mind knew that Savage alexander was overtuned. Did some people like it? Obviously. Did it take pushing yourself? Like any content should, but there's a reason so few groups even go through it because most people in this game who actually raided were able to do all 3 coils fine but they never bothered with Savage Coil (whoo a title..?) so what was once optional has become mandatory raiding. That turned people off, not "oh no it's too hard nerf plz nerf plz" as the only people crying for a nerf were the same ones who cried Amdapor Keep normal was too hard.

I liked Savages difficulty, but it went from 0 to fuck your life in a heartbeat, Coil at least lubed you up over the course of 4 turns. This is why I wish they'd stop wasting development time on fluff content and 5 variations of PvP content and just focus on setting up proper raid tiers that way if you're not good enough to get through savage, take it a step down and do that, or if you only want the story..do the story mode that drops NOTHING and if you want gear, do at least "hard mode" that way they don't pretty much burn people out (a big part of why alex was poorly done with the inclusion of story mode) since coil's reward was also the story, whether you care for the story or not, it actually felt like you earned that ending of 1.x and bits of what 2.x involves. Alexander's story is just..eh.

[haroldsaxon]

Meh, I liked the tuning of AS3.

Savage should remain at that difficulty. That said, I do think they should bring in a level of raids similar to Final Coil, and i've given up waiting for SE to actually fund FFXIV with some of its profits.

I just wish we had more than 4 raid boss fights and 2 extreme boss fights every 8 months.

[TheDirtyHobo]

Meh, I liked the tuning of AS3.

Savage should remain at that difficulty. That said, I do think they should bring in a level of raids similar to Final Coil, and i've given up waiting for SE to actually fund FFXIV with some of its profits.

I just wish we had more than 4 raid boss fights and 2 extreme boss fights every 8 months.

From a personal standpoint, I liked A3S. From a raid dynamic, it was a bit much. Having that level of difficulty is a pretty guaranteed way to make raid group tension, so having 2 groups shatter when I went Binding through Final all with 1 group kinda sucked. Which is exasperated by the fact that my server has one of the smallest NA populations.

[Prothescar]

Don't even care about the "difficulty" of relic weapons, but having at least a single piece of original content would've been nice instead of every single part of the quest being a rehash on pre existing things.

[Akiyama]

Don't even care about the "difficulty" of relic weapons, but having at least a single piece of original content would've been nice instead of every single part of the quest being a rehash on pre existing things.

SE?

Original????

[SamanosukeShiva]

Difficulty of A3S was fine.... if there was 8+ bosses, and that can be 2nd to last boss or something, but it ended up being a wall to 50% of already non-existent content

[Shenrien]

Difficulty of AS3 I feel was done right and wrong.

It's not difficult to script a fight where the timer is what pushes the phases and not the DPS, however when that happens it feels less like an encounter where the players are in control of their progression and more like an encounter that is on rails which is never fun and I feel takes away from the difficulty of the fight.

The concept of the mechanics are fair and fun. Involving the entire raid in most of the mechanics really gives the fight something special. Something that is absent from a lot of encounters in the game because it means it doesn't matter if you're a healer, dps, or tank you have a mechanic to do to ensure the raid doesn't have to suffer a consequence of something not being done correctly. Keep in mind the keyword concept however, the concept was great, the execution however was done poor and sloppy because of how the game is setup to run off the grand master of the 3s server tic and the shoddy player collision detection for passing debuffs and picking up tethers.

If they take anything from how the community has viewed, commented, and stressed their concerns of the future of the raiding content is that they stray away from a forced hard enrage that you cannot avoid where you will flat out die.

I'd much rather see them move to a progressive enrage where you will eventually die but you can ride out the progressive enrage leading up to your inevitable deaths because that would allow players to avoid the pressure of having the top DPS in the game to beat the encounters that they push out. It would also help stray away from "PALADIN SUCKS NEED DARK FOR MORE DPS!" or whatever the vague arguement between that discussion is would become less of a real topic that happens and become more of two idiots yelling at eachother in a bar.

Yes that makes the "didney wurl furs" race a little less meaningful but it would also be more inviting to people to want to participate and attempt the content knowing that they don't have to be the best players in the game to have a shot at potentially clearing it and thus keeping more people around, more people would be happier and the top 1% can move on to playing whatever they want after their 8,10,12,16+ weeks of constant clearing to get enough tokens to cap the group out on whatever they want for their mains/alts.

Maybe if they move to that kind of structure for enrage and is widely accepted by a vast majority of the community they can start to push away from tome gear being on par with raid gear ilvl wise and the best gear in the game can actually for once come from a raid that isn't just weapon specific being best.

[haroldsaxon]

From a personal standpoint, I liked A3S. From a raid dynamic, it was a bit much. Having that level of difficulty is a pretty guaranteed way to make raid group tension, so having 2 groups shatter when I went Binding through Final all with 1 group kinda sucked. Which is exasperated by the fact that my server has one of the smallest NA populations.

We've had to replace people constantly in my group and are still replacing someone. But the issue wasn't with AS3, which we downed and had on farm, nor was it as4 (hadn't really gone into it). It was with the people that were recruited - either having a horrible attitude that made raiding with them painful, poor performance or no dedication (and in some cases, a combination of these).

[BaneTheBrawler]

that still happens if you don't dogleg or jump or use an action. anything to make the server update your new position.

[Kaisha]

I'd much rather see them move to a progressive enrage where you will eventually die but you can ride out the progressive enrage leading up to your inevitable deaths because that would allow players to avoid the pressure of having the top DPS in the game to beat the encounters that they push out.

I wouldn't mind if we'd be able to trade a melee LB for a tank LB to survive what would otherwise be a hard enrage, just to buy another 30 seconds of DPS and dealing with mechanics, which would net you more overall than a melee LB3 would.

Pessimist in me says if they did gradual soft enrages though, they'd be tuned as such where the above would either pretty much be mandatory during progression until you overgear the encounter, or it'd be a wipe regardless and may as well have been a hard enrage to start. Delicate subject to balance I suppose. A dickmove otherwise that I'd probably revel in is stacking an extra mechanic on top of everything else each cycle of the last phase just to make the act of dealing damage more difficult, rather than pissing the healers off like they did already with A4S' sheer raid damage.

[Patriarch]

Man i'm glad I quit 9 months ago

this all just looks like shit

[Cichy]

Man i'm glad I quit 9 months ago

this all just looks like shit

Yeah I finally completely uninstalled the game after anima weapons update. I used to cling on to some thread of hope they will do something that's gonna pull me back in but again and again they prove that they will only rehash the same shit over and over again till the game dies.

[Alkimi]

Meh, I liked the tuning of AS3.

Savage should remain at that difficulty. That said, I do think they should bring in a level of raids similar to Final Coil, and i've given up waiting for SE to actually fund FFXIV with some of its profits.

I just wish we had more than 4 raid boss fights and 2 extreme boss fights every 8 months.

They should just give the new "hard mode" or w/e it will be called 2 optional bosses with savage difficulty which unlock once you've beaten A5-8. Have them drop an elite version of the alex gear that has extra materia slots and/or 5 ilvls higher.

If lack of resources is a problem then leave the gold saucer to rot, nobody will care.

[Thiefami]

Yeah I finally completely uninstalled the game after anima weapons update. I used to cling on to some thread of hope they will do something that's gonna pull me back in but again and again they prove that they will only rehash the same shit over and over again till the game dies.

same. Unfortunate, but oh well.

[Destinye]

They should just give the new "hard mode" or w/e it will be called 2 optional bosses with savage difficulty which unlock once you've beaten A5-8. Have them drop an elite version of the alex gear that has extra materia slots and/or 5 ilvls higher.

If lack of resources is a problem then leave the gold saucer to rot, nobody will care.

Incorrect.

"It may not be important to you but it's important to me. Raiders and hardcore players need to realize this game isn't designed for you."

But yeah, if they truly are hurting for resources, learn from the XI team on how to reuse assets into numerous "new" content.

[Edelweiss]

Incorrect.

"It may not be important to you but it's important to me. Raiders and hardcore players need to realize this game isn't designed for you."

But yeah, if they truly are hurting for resources, learn from the XI team on how to reuse assets into numerous "new" content.

Just give us a Primal gangbang battle. Call it "Primal Rage" or some shit and just have us face an onslaught of every Primal to date, working together with their signature attacks (individually and interacting in neat-o new ways) on a battlefield.

Also I guess Bismarck can just fly around the arena launching attacks or something, who cares, he's a disappointment.

[Fiye]

I always thought of Thordan as that boss rush experience. Bunch of guys doing their thing to fuck with you while you take on the big guy.