Final Fantasy XIV: Stormblood - June 20 2017

[Ophannus]

Never compare FFXI relics to FFXIV relics.

FFXIV relics are usually BiS marginally, that maybe gives you a ~1-2% edge against the next best build with final raid tier weapon builds. FFXIV relics are a timesink but slowly but surely reward you with an awesoe weapon, as compared to a final raid tier weapon which could be achieved in less or comparably less time if you practice raiding every day.

FFXI relics/mythics were HUGELY powerful, sometimes exponentially increasing the damage output of the job, fundamentally changed its gameplay/build entirely around it (SAM, DRG, WHM mythics; THF, DRK, BRD, PLD (shield) relics; BRD, BLU. NIN, MNK empyrean (before when those empy WS were locked to the weapons). FFXI relics had no parallel or sidegrade comparable to FFXIV sidegrades of similar ilvl final weapons (Dreadwyrm, Augmented Ironworks, Alexandrian Metal, Augmented Shire). Maybe Hagun was sort of better/worse than Amano, but mythic shat all over both, hugely.

FFXIV 1.0 relics were similar to FFXI relics, but those unique stats were eliminated in ARR, sadly.


[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/IzMayxp.png[IMG]

[Shaano]

Doing all 3.0 relics feels like 1 ffxi relic, its a grind, it never stops and probably won't see the light at the end of the tunnel till past 4.0

[Sho]

Literally everything in the game is a time sink, with varying degrees of worth. The game exists to waste time.
And from what I hear raiders saying lately, the raid isn't all that difficult either. Probably takes less time overall to clear for a weapon too, than building a relic (moreso when relic was at a stage when the quests were not nerfed). Guess it depends how lucky/efficient you are.

Everything is a time sink indeed. However, this doesn't really account for the lack of casuals getting into raid. If everyone seemingly knows that Creator isn't as difficult as Gordias/Midas, why aren't there more people clearing A11/12S? There is still a level of difficulty there that will keep people from raiding over all.

Does not equal "Absolutely no work".

/filthycasual

I'll walk back from saying "absolutely no work," my bad on that one. However, no one should fool themselves into believing relic is some sort of grand achievement, especially with all of the nerfs SE handed out. The entire quest post i240 is one large victory lap to i275.

I was honestly expecting the anima questline to force players to at least beat 3.0 EX primal fights once towards the end of the questline, but I assume they shot down the idea at some point during development.

What do you guys think if they just outright removed relics from the game?

It's an interesting question you're asking.

Part of the reason why anima is continually tied old 2.X/3.X content is in part to try and keep said older content relevant (i170 -> i200 step, Aether Oil, i230 -> i240 step) for newbies, even as the game moves into 4.0. In that, they succeeded in a big way since it revived 2.0 dungeons as well as the entire Crystal Tower raid.

If they removed relics from the game at this point, it would negatively effect the playerbase. We are at the point now where some form of "relic" will now be expected in each and every expansion, so they can't just remove the concept at this point without catching some major backlash.

With 4.0, it looks like they are completely separating the relic quest line from previous in-game systems. We'll have to see.

[octopus]

3.0 relic was already less grindy than 2.0 one imo. At this rate the 4.0 relic would be even easier to get!

[Eldelphia]

Everything is a time sink indeed. However, this doesn't really account for the lack of casuals getting into raid. If everyone seemingly knows that Creator isn't as difficult as Gordias/Midas, why aren't there more people clearing A11/12S?

Trying to answer this part seriously, there's no reason to that trumps for me, the hassle of finding and keeping a static together. The gear doesn't last long enough. The only challenging content I've really wanted to do recently is the highest levels of Palace. We've made it to floor 196 so far and I'm having problems keeping people going back. Interestingly, I did like Coil. Alexander doesn't do it for me.

Some of my issues spring from being an EU player on a NA server though.

[Hellfury]

They should make a 1 ilvl difference based on if you did everything pre-nerf or not!
(no, I am not serious)

[Carth]

The gear doesn't last long enough.

This is the reason for most people. To clarify, the reward for doing savage is very poor. While there are some things Alexander did better, Coil is by far the more interesting and better designed of the two. And to top it all off, it has story content that wasn't spoonfed to you in an easy mode version of the raid. If you don't care about the challenge, there's seriously no reason to ever do savage.

[Sho]

Trying to answer this part seriously, there's no reason to that trumps for me, the hassle of finding and keeping a static together. The gear doesn't last long enough. The only challenging content I've really wanted to do recently is the highest levels of Palace. We've made it to floor 196 so far and I'm having problems keeping people going back. Interestingly, I did like Coil. Alexander doesn't do it for me.

Some of my issues spring from being an EU player on a NA server though.

Keeping a static together is also a large part of the challenge of beating any raid level content. When statics break up, it's almost always a social problem between members and keeping nerves under control vs dealing with any particular mechanic in any particular fight (A3S included).

I have to agree about the gear drops as well. The rewards are just plain bad, and the Midas portion was almost invalidated right out of the gate. It's an interesting situation that may never correct itself until they add a version of raids that's above "Savage Mode" -- the reason why raid rewards are so bland is because there's literally no reason for exceptionally strong item drops that go over +10 iLvLs per patch cycle.

[DragonReborn]

I quit during 3.1 so i have zero idea how much people are farming Creator, but would you say that people saw how gearing up in 3.0 went from dreadwyrm gear. And turn killed people drive to farm gear prior to 4.0?

[Shenrien]

Well whatever class you are going to take from 60 to 70 is going to get a bunch of gear that can be used from quests, beyond that your other classes are going to be sol and stuck grinding dungeons in hopes for side grades.

That being said it wasn't until Lv.56 that i130 gear was out right replaced. the i136 gear you got from Sohm Al was worse than the i130 gear you got from coil, it was only at the vault that things got better. so 6 levels of not having to give a fuck about your gear is pretty good.

[Carth]

I quit during 3.1 so i have zero idea how much people are farming Creator, but would you say that people saw how gearing up in 3.0 went from dreadwyrm gear. And turn killed people drive to farm gear prior to 4.0?

Yeah, no one really cares to "prepare" for the expansion unless they're farming gear for the new jobs due to how quick gear gets invalidated. The best I've seen as prep work is capping Scripture tomestones for the inevitable conversion for when the 4.0 tomestones come out.

The only people that are really gunning for BiS are speedrunners and people that have nothing else to do. I fall into the latter category.

[solracht]

The best I've seen as prep work is capping Scripture tomestones for the inevitable conversion for when the 4.0 tomestones come out.

This isn't how final tomestones work. Look at Poetics. Scripture isn't going to roll over to whatever the new tomestone is.

---

Also I don't know what some of you guys are on about. Given the low difficulty of the raid, the token system, and the upcoming expansion, this is the one tier where it's definitely worth it to farm the raid. Learning the fights doesn't take long and they've been PUGable for a while.

The raids that were problematic were the first and second tiers which not only had much bigger time/effort requirements, they saw their rewards invalidated on day 1 of the next raid because of normal/crafted gear.

Aside from my MSQ job and with the exception of whatever items I won in leveling dungeons, all of the jobs I took from 50-60 just used dreadwyrm/2.55 BIS. I imagine it'll be the same for Stormblood.

[The Stig]

Aside from my MSQ job and with the exception of whatever items I won in leveling dungeons, all of the jobs I took from 50-60 just used dreadwyrm/2.55 BIS.

That's what I did, and I believe a group somewhere proved it was possible to beat A1 in 130 gear too:



Basically, if you knew what you were doing, ilvl130 was enough until then :D



edit:

In 4.0, the Adventurer in Need bonus for Roulettes will be increased to encourage players to play tanks/healers.

WHY NOT NOWWWWWW
Just go in and just that low level trial script from 5 to 50 and 100 lore to 300 lore and DONE

[octopus]

lol I was like waaat and then I see it's for story mode. That's pretty cool.

[Silenka]

What do you guys think if they just outright removed relics from the game?

Little to no impact. Relics are already...well, by nature of being inferior to the top weapon in the game, the "legendary" aspect of them is already invalidated. The fact that everyone can do them also invalidates the notion that it's a rare piece of gear that makes its wielder special somehow. So basically everyone knows they are questing for a 2nd best weapon that maybe just looks pretty cool.

Although many people spend a lot of time working on relic, I don't think it's ultimately a thing that keeps people playing. If you're ONLY playing to get your relic, it's the same as wasting your time or questing for any other achievement (like the garo sets, or completing 3k fates or whatever) because once you're rewarded with that relic, you're done. If you're not actively using it for anything, its purpose becomes lost.

If they had never introduced a relic to the 3.0 series, we'd be getting a lot of "where's the relic?" whining from players, but aside from SE simply having 0 updates for certain in-between patches, the absence of the relic quest likely wouldn't have affected players much at all. The one big thing the relic questline does is makes people participate in content and queue more often, thereby helping new players, which I imagine was SE's bottom line all along.

[octopus]

I'd argue for healers, the relic is actually the best in slot simply because of the accuracy it brings, even though it was 5 ilevels behind.

[Fiye]

I want to say the Relic exists as a mechanic to retain casual subscribers and a way to obtain higher ilv weapons a month after the latest primal release without raiding.

[Carth]

Isn't there a limit to how much you can cater to the lowest common denominator though? Honestly, if one isn't at the very least trying to do bird farms, I have no idea why one would play this game.

[Silenka]

I'd argue for healers, the relic is actually the best in slot simply because of the accuracy it brings, even though it was 5 ilevels behind.

There was an argument for putting acc on gear and other stats on relic weapon which is what I ended up doing. Even though I don't raid so I don't strictly need the accuracy, but it's a just in case scenario (I might pick it up or get dragged in or whatever, who knows)

Isn't there a limit to how much you can cater to the lowest common denominator though?

hahahaha no

[Edelweiss]

You know, the fact we got more information of relevance out of an obscure Live Letter for a regional version that's way behind the global one (and has no attachments to it either), than any of the Fanfests really reflects well on the dev team.