Is this game's content still based on memorization?

[Deleted]

You're telling me raiding NH normal CONSISTENTLY gives your entire raid party 910+ loot? That's a load of shit. I cleared Heroic every single week since the first day and I ended the tier at ilvl like 903 (likely 906-907 if I ever got a fire relic from M+). I had one piece of loot at 910 ilvl over those COUNTLESS weeks. No one else in the raid group had an ilvl above 910 and we all cleared heroic in a little over an hour every week.

Well, lets get some facts and more personal experiences into this


Tomb Normal drops 900, 910 is KJ only.

My Raid is a Normal/HC only raid and some people do Mythic+ weekly - no one does anything in Mythic raids, not with other groups either. (at least not Nighthold - some, like 2-3 people or so did go EN Mythic once or twice but that's itemlevel 880 loot)
Our first Raid in Tomb had an *average* itemlevel of 910+ equipped @ first boss

NH HC is pretty much 890+ gear (there is a boss that is higher, but also 2,5 that are lower - so it's actually a little lower than that)

That means we got about +20 itemlevel above it on average - which is titanforged +1.

[Melsiren]

I wish I did better book keeping of my raid teams average I.L before I quit at the tail end of EN.

What I do remember is about half my read team getting stupidly lucky with Titan-forged gear, and out gearing most the content before we got to it. But sadly I have no idea of the exact I.L any of them were at, at which bosses. It's been far too long and I gave far too few shits near the end.

[Kazgrel]

Reward structure is "perfect"? No sir. Far from it.

1) There's almost no variation in loot between tiers. Look at where we're at right now - you have a choice between 320 Lakshmi or Omega accessories, but that's it. Your 320 weapon is from Susano and your 320 clothes are from Omega turn-ins and you have exactly one option per job. Every single person ends up wearing the same gear

2) and they DO end up wearing the same gear because there's very little randomness in it. People have planned what pieces they want from Deltascape and are running the four turns over and over again on Day 1 until they've looted the correct components for the gear they want this reset. Every single serious raider had their 320 weapon within a day, because it takes a maximum of 10 Susano EX runs if you're unlucky and you can chain them back to back instead of waiting for resets.


The loot in FF14 is BORING. You just look for the single piece on a vendor that says "of Fending/Maiming/Striking/Whatever is appropriate for your job" and that's your ONE piece in that slot for this tier, outside of crafted pieces.

This puzzles me. Do you expect there to be 5 different options to obtain BiS gear as soon as a new xpac drops?

Savage will have BiS as of next week, minus one accessory coming from the new weekly tomestones that debut at the same time. Those who don't raid Savage will mix in 320 stuff from Omega/Lakshmi with tomestone gear over the coming weeks.

Part of me is adverse to saying this (because it's venturing far too close to game vs. game), but I often think people want to simply incorporate WoW's loot system and itemization here. I'd very much like to avoid the pitfalls of those. I don't want to see broken ass trinkets/proc effects/etc. here.

Yes, itemization/gear in this game is generic to the effect of it being "it has more stats". If this game were to steal something from another game in terms of itemization...I'd go for something akin to GW2's runes/runesets. It could be a more interesting use for materia/materia slots. I suppose if you're going to have proc effects, these would be the way to incorporate them, so that they can be moved from item to item upon upgrading.

[Wrecktangle]

My Raid is a Normal/HC only raid and some people do Mythic+ weekly - no one does anything in Mythic raids, not with other groups either. (at least not Nighthold - some, like 2-3 people or so did go EN Mythic once or twice but that's itemlevel 880 loot)
Our first Raid in Tomb had an *average* itemlevel of 910+ equipped @ first boss

Your guild is not a normal raiding guild. You are a heroic raiding guild assuming you full cleared Heroic. Therefore the loot ilvl in normal Tomb is completely irrelevant for comparison purposes. Compare Heroic. Is Heroic ToS dropping upgrades for your raiders? If so then your argument is incorrect. If more than 50% of drops through the entirety of HEROIC ToS are not ilvl upgrades for your entire raid, then I will concede to your point.

Also equipped 910+ actually has your "true" ilvl is a little lower due to the way weapons and the third relic slot function additively rather than as an average.

Part of me is adverse to saying this (because it's venturing far too close to game vs. game), but I often think people want to simply incorporate WoW's loot system and itemization here. I'd very much like to avoid the pitfalls of those. I don't want to see broken ass trinkets/proc effects/etc. here.

Yes, itemization/gear in this game is generic to the effect of it being "it has more stats". If this game were to steal something from another game in terms of itemization...I'd go for something akin to GW2's runes/runesets. It could be a more interesting use for materia/materia slots. I suppose if you're going to have proc effects, these would be the way to incorporate them, so that they can be moved from item to item upon upgrading.

Speaking strictly for myself as a huge proponent for more in-depth itemization in FF14 I don't really care what they change or how they change it, I just want SOMETHING changed. I'm just SO bored of the itemization in FF14 (and I absolutely abhor how it doesn't tell you what any of your secondary stats are actually doing for you). I don't want to hear the blah blah go play x instead then typical fanboyisms (not from you specifically, from ANYONE). I think this game CRIMINALLY underuses some of its source material and could easily implement more interesting systems based on that alone, let alone any unique developed specifically for ff14 systems.

My honest opinion is that in FF14 you could literally remove all text and stats on gear and it wouldn't change a damn thing in the current game. Give a piece of gear a graphic, name, and an ilvl. Nothing else matters. Get rid of Materia completely and bake the "flat stats" directly into the ilvl calc of the gear. This way they can free up all item data they claim prevents them from creating a functioning wardwobe system while not changing a single thing for anyone actually playing the game.

That said, this is not a solution I want or am interested in, but it would fit.

[Kazgrel]

Speaking strictly for myself as a huge proponent for more in-depth itemization in FF14 I don't really care what they change or how they change it, I just want SOMETHING changed. I'm just SO bored of the itemization in FF14 (and I absolutely abhor how it doesn't tell you what any of your secondary stats are actually doing for you). I don't want to hear the blah blah go play x instead then typical fanboyisms (not from you specifically, from ANYONE). I think this game CRIMINALLY underuses some of its source material and could easily implement more interesting systems based on that alone, let alone any unique developed specifically for ff14 systems.

My honest opinion is that in FF14 you could literally remove all text and stats on gear and it wouldn't change a damn thing in the current game. Give a piece of gear a graphic, name, and an ilvl. Nothing else matters. Get rid of Materia completely and bake the "flat stats" directly into the ilvl calc of the gear. This way they can free up all item data they claim prevents them from creating a functioning wardwobe system while not changing a single thing for anyone actually playing the game.

That said, this is not a solution I want or am interested in, but it would fit.

I am 100% on board with the idea that there can be something added to spice things up with itemization here, because aside from very few fringe cases, it's pretty much "put on whatever has highest ilvl" like you said. Fringe examples including the Alex Savage DRK weapon (with it's horrible secondaries compared to the tomestone weapon back then), BLM craving spell speed to the point that keeping an item that's 10 ilvl lower isn't out of the question if it has a pile of SS on it...I think BRD was like that with crit during HW, but hell, HW itemization was basically "does it have crit? If answer = yes, equip". Now it looks like direct hit is shaping up to be "the stat". Having that replace accuracy was a decent step forward, but far from revolutionary (I snickered when they introduced it because my first thought was "hello Multistrike, fancy seeing you here").

I may disagree with some of the ideas (namely, I just wouldn't want to see them directly import things like the trinket slot/effects or random procs on items), but I'm all for putting ideas on the table. I'm not Yoshi-P here, lul.

[Nikkaszal]

Well, lets get some facts and more personal experiences into this


Tomb Normal drops 900, 910 is KJ only.

My Raid is a Normal/HC only raid and some people do Mythic+ weekly - no one does anything in Mythic raids, not with other groups either. (at least not Nighthold - some, like 2-3 people or so did go EN Mythic once or twice but that's itemlevel 880 loot)
Our first Raid in Tomb had an *average* itemlevel of 910+ equipped @ first boss

NH HC is pretty much 890+ gear (there is a boss that is higher, but also 2,5 that are lower - so it's actually a little lower than that)

That means we got about +20 itemlevel above it on average - which is titanforged +1.

What?

Your guild raids Heroic and some Mythic, and you outgear a new NORMAL raid?!

What madness! Next you'll be telling me you outgear LFR as well

[Deleted]

Your guild raids Heroic and some Mythic, and you outgear a new NORMAL raid?

I think you made a small mistake here. Mythic+ refers to dungeons, not to raids. I admit this can be somewhat confusing to a person who has not played WoW during Legion.

[Resiak]

Speaking strictly for myself as a huge proponent for more in-depth itemization in FF14 I don't really care what they change or how they change it, I just want SOMETHING changed. I'm just SO bored of the itemization in FF14 (and I absolutely abhor how it doesn't tell you what any of your secondary stats are actually doing for you). I don't want to hear the blah blah go play x instead then typical fanboyisms (not from you specifically, from ANYONE). I think this game CRIMINALLY underuses some of its source material and could easily implement more interesting systems based on that alone, let alone any unique developed specifically for ff14 systems.

My honest opinion is that in FF14 you could literally remove all text and stats on gear and it wouldn't change a damn thing in the current game. Give a piece of gear a graphic, name, and an ilvl. Nothing else matters. Get rid of Materia completely and bake the "flat stats" directly into the ilvl calc of the gear. This way they can free up all item data they claim prevents them from creating a functioning wardwobe system while not changing a single thing for anyone actually playing the game.

That said, this is not a solution I want or am interested in, but it would fit.

As someone who can be a little defensive of the game, this is something I can get behind. The gear in this game looks amazing, outside of some sets here and there. And thats why people go out of their way to collect it. But stat wise, it's amazingly boring. And materia only adds to the problem, as it's just more stat increases.

But my biggest gripe with itemization is the relic weapons. If FF14 copied one thing from wow it would be a system more like the artifact weapons. More interesting upgrades, and tie the quest line to job stories, instead of a generic we're creating a sentient weapon story line. Make me care about the weapon, not just want it because of a million particle effects.

[Wrecktangle]

As someone who can be a little defensive of the game, this is something I can get behind. The gear in this game looks amazing, outside of some sets here and there. And thats why people go out of their way to collect it. But stat wise, it's amazingly boring. And materia only adds to the problem, as it's just more stat increases.

But my biggest gripe with itemization is the relic weapons. If FF14 copied one thing from wow it would be a system more like the artifact weapons. More interesting upgrades, and tie the quest line to job stories, instead of a generic we're creating a sentient weapon story line. Make me care about the weapon, not just want it because of a million particle effects.

I will be SO disappointed if the new relic weapon is literally a copy paste of the old one with a new graphic. They're already a step forward because it's not coming from bullshit fucking FATEs, and from the new "content" they're creating so that's a plus.

WoW did a few things wrong with the artifact system, but overall it's an incredibly robust and fun system. FF14 could certainly learn a few lessons from it. Even something as small as changing an animation of a key skill would be a step in the right direction. Me personally if I was wishlisting it I'd want it to actually alter gameplay, but that'd make it mandatory and make all other weapons useless unless they too had effects (which I once posited would be an exciting system for FF14).

[Resiak]

I will be SO disappointed if the new relic weapon is literally a copy paste of the old one with a new graphic. They're already a step forward because it's not coming from bullshit fucking FATEs, and from the new "content" they're creating so that's a plus.

WoW did a few things wrong with the artifact system, but overall it's an incredibly robust and fun system. FF14 could certainly learn a few lessons from it. Even something as small as changing an animation of a key skill would be a step in the right direction. Me personally if I was wishlisting it I'd want it to actually alter gameplay, but that'd make it mandatory and make all other weapons useless unless they too had effects (which I once posited would be an exciting system for FF14).

Interesting thought, what if we got rid of the glamour system altogether. Base gear was cosmetic only, and materia let you stat it the way you want. As you leveled up, you unlocked materia slots on all your gear, and unlocked stronger materia. Certain materia slots, depending on your role, where dedicated to armor, one slot dedicated to your jobs primary stat, the rest of your slots where open to secondary stats, such as haste, mp, hp, and such. Hopefully the dev team could come up with some more interesting stat types. Chest pieces have one extra slot at max level to slot some kind of materia with an interesting defensive or utility proc ability. Weapons would have a similar slot, but the materia for it would offer some kind of fun offensive proc. Black mage and summoner can slot a materia that gives them a chance to proc duel cast? Melee can proc an attack that dashes between all enemies on their enmity list. Tanks can proc a chance to take all the damage that would have went to the next dps. The skies the limit on these ones, and i'm sure the devs could come up with some more interesting ideas here.

[Deleted]

Your guild is not a normal raiding guild. You are a heroic raiding guild assuming you full cleared Heroic. Therefore the loot ilvl in normal Tomb is completely irrelevant for comparison purposes. Compare Heroic. Is Heroic ToS dropping upgrades for your raiders? If so then your argument is incorrect. If more than 50% of drops through the entirety of HEROIC ToS are not ilvl upgrades for your entire raid, then I will concede to your point.

It's not completely irrelevant. The same rules apply to HC raids.
910 avg. on first week, means every boss but one in HC is only like 5 ilvl ahead.
And 910 equipped means people have another 5-10 itemlevel in their inventory. (like me for example and about everyone else.)

So yeah, more than 50% of the drops are probably not upgrades. If Tier Sets wouldn't exist, there would be nearly no itemlevel upgrades at all, unless the item procs.
Fuck Tier sets btw...

[Kazgrel]

I will be SO disappointed if the new relic weapon is literally a copy paste of the old one with a new graphic. They're already a step forward because it's not coming from bullshit fucking FATEs, and from the new "content" they're creating so that's a plus.

WoW did a few things wrong with the artifact system, but overall it's an incredibly robust and fun system. FF14 could certainly learn a few lessons from it. Even something as small as changing an animation of a key skill would be a step in the right direction. Me personally if I was wishlisting it I'd want it to actually alter gameplay, but that'd make it mandatory and make all other weapons useless unless they too had effects (which I once posited would be an exciting system for FF14).

I'm almost willing to bet at least 1 step of the next relic/anima weapon will involve FATEs...but given how they've attempted to incentivise them primarily for players looking to level, maybe, just maybe, they've come to the realization that people only "want" to clear FATEs for leveling alt jobs and not so they can get the atma/crystal that has a 1% chance of dropping (based off of numbers they had when respective weapons were released). Here's hoping my optimism isn't misplaced.

I do think they could get away with having the relic/anima/whatever weapon be more than a pretty stat stick that comes out months after raid content has been cleared due to that very reason (those weapons pretty much never reach current ilvl until a raid tier is pretty much over with). If they had some sort of proc effect or whatever that a BiS savage weapon didn't have, BUT it didn't drop until after the tier is over (and this may only really apply to the final raid tier of the xpac)...it could be doable. Course, one argument that I can think of is that it would make said weapon "required" for speed running and/or leveling in the following xpac...both of which I find laughable reasons to not entertain such an itemization idea. I don't expect anything fancy to happen with the new relic/anima; I simply hope it isn't the same exact formula as the anima weapon, where it was boiled down to "farm tens of thousands of tomestones for stuff" for about 70% of it.

[leviathonlx]

I'm almost willing to bet at least 1 step of the next relic/anima weapon will involve FATEs...but given how they've attempted to incentivise them primarily for players looking to level, maybe, just maybe, they've come to the realization that people only "want" to clear FATEs for leveling alt jobs and not so they can get the atma/crystal that has a 1% chance of dropping (based off of numbers they had when respective weapons were released). Here's hoping my optimism isn't misplaced.

I do think they could get away with having the relic/anima/whatever weapon be more than a pretty stat stick that comes out months after raid content has been cleared due to that very reason (those weapons pretty much never reach current ilvl until a raid tier is pretty much over with). If they had some sort of proc effect or whatever that a BiS savage weapon didn't have, BUT it didn't drop until after the tier is over (and this may only really apply to the final raid tier of the xpac)...it could be doable. Course, one argument that I can think of is that it would make said weapon "required" for speed running and/or leveling in the following xpac...both of which I find laughable reasons to not entertain such an itemization idea. I don't expect anything fancy to happen with the new relic/anima; I simply hope it isn't the same exact formula as the anima weapon, where it was boiled down to "farm tens of thousands of tomestones for stuff" for about 70% of it.

Yea I really hope they don't just make the new relic another long ass grind for a stat stick. Though given Square has been nothing but predictable with Stormblood so far I don't have high hopes.

[Wrecktangle]

It's not completely irrelevant. The same rules apply to HC raids.
910 avg. on first week, means every boss but one in HC is only like 5 ilvl ahead.
And 910 equipped means people have another 5-10 itemlevel in their inventory. (like me for example and about everyone else.)

So yeah, more than 50% of the drops are probably not upgrades. If Tier Sets wouldn't exist, there would be nearly no itemlevel upgrades at all, unless the item procs.
Fuck Tier sets btw...

Ok so your raid is 910 avg and every single boss drops greater than 910 gear, I don't see a problem? Sure it's not a "massive" increase, but does the number really matter to you? The whole ilvl in bags is only because of legendaries. Take those out (due to massive ilvl inflation of them) and your actual bag ilvl is like 1-2 MAYBE 3 tops, not 5-10.

I'm not sure how you think a 915 base that can WF/TF up isn't going to on average be an upgrade. That's a very silly premise.

I understand your frustration IF and only IF it's based on the power increase not being enough to you personally. For me, I never cared about what arbitrary number is assigned to gear, as long as it is in fact an upgrade.

Interesting thought, what if we got rid of the glamour system altogether. Base gear was cosmetic only, and materia let you stat it the way you want. As you leveled up, you unlocked materia slots on all your gear, and unlocked stronger materia. Certain materia slots, depending on your role, where dedicated to armor, one slot dedicated to your jobs primary stat, the rest of your slots where open to secondary stats, such as haste, mp, hp, and such. Hopefully the dev team could come up with some more interesting stat types. Chest pieces have one extra slot at max level to slot some kind of materia with an interesting defensive or utility proc ability. Weapons would have a similar slot, but the materia for it would offer some kind of fun offensive proc. Black mage and summoner can slot a materia that gives them a chance to proc duel cast? Melee can proc an attack that dashes between all enemies on their enmity list. Tanks can proc a chance to take all the damage that would have went to the next dps. The skies the limit on these ones, and i'm sure the devs could come up with some more interesting ideas here.

This system is similar to what BNS employs and it's ok. Far from perfect, but mildly interesting at first. I'm personally not opposed to your suggestions and see interesting itemization could certainly arise from it. I'm still heavily of the camp that Materia should be some kind of horizontal talent like based system though. Where you can take effects from gear and crystallize it into Materia to slot in new gear to build a set of effects you like and that increase your power. Something other than ilvl to influence growth. Just my .02 though.

I do think they could get away with having the relic/anima/whatever weapon be more than a pretty stat stick that comes out months after raid content has been cleared due to that very reason (those weapons pretty much never reach current ilvl until a raid tier is pretty much over with). If they had some sort of proc effect or whatever that a BiS savage weapon didn't have, BUT it didn't drop until after the tier is over (and this may only really apply to the final raid tier of the xpac)...it could be doable. Course, one argument that I can think of is that it would make said weapon "required" for speed running and/or leveling in the following xpac...both of which I find laughable reasons to not entertain such an itemization idea. I don't expect anything fancy to happen with the new relic/anima; I simply hope it isn't the same exact formula as the anima weapon, where it was boiled down to "farm tens of thousands of tomestones for stuff" for about 70% of it.

Agreed. I think stifling discussion because of insert arbitrary existing constraint is stupid. If we're changing a whole system around, there's no reason an accompanying system couldn't be tuned to accommodate this.

[Deleted]

Ok so your raid is 910 avg and every single boss drops greater than 910 gear, I don't see a problem? Sure it's not a "massive" increase, but does the number really matter to you? The whole ilvl in bags is only because of legendaries. Take those out (due to massive ilvl inflation of them) and your actual bag ilvl is like 1-2 MAYBE 3 tops, not 5-10.

I'm not sure how you think a 915 base that can WF/TF up isn't going to on average be an upgrade. That's a very silly premise.

I understand your frustration IF and only IF it's based on the power increase not being enough to you personally. For me, I never cared about what arbitrary number is assigned to gear, as long as it is in fact an upgrade.

Seems like you have forgotten why this part of the discussion has even started....

and lol @

The whole ilvl in bags is only because of legendaries. Take those out (due to massive ilvl inflation of them) and your actual bag ilvl is like 1-2 MAYBE 3 tops, not 5-10.

Do I really have to make screenshots? Legendaries in bags do not apply btw. the game only counts 2, which are the ones I'm wearing. This was changed in 7.2 or something.

We discussed this because we/a dude believe/s Blizzard doesn't know at what itemlevel the raid is @ when they tackle a boss.
Which means some groups, that go in without months of warforge/titanforge farming, might have immense trouble, while others - that raid each week and thus have several titanforge/warforge pieces, will have an easy time.

This is not about bosses dropping upgrades or not - it's about how they are designed to reward ilvl X - which means the next raid must/should be beatable with ilvl X - which means warforge/titanforge groups are 20+ over the required ilvl to beat the next raid-tier @ HC/Normal even though they are raiding the same difficulty.

[Wrecktangle]

Seems like you have forgotten why this part of the discussion has even started....

Possible, refresh my memory. I merely responded to your statement about the ilvl rewards being not upgrades, to which I provided evidence proving to the contrary.

Do I really have to make screenshots? Legendaries in bags do not apply btw. the game only counts 2, which are the ones I'm wearing. This was changed in 7.2 or something.

I quit the day the mage tower went up and got my appearance I needed. So I wasn't aware of the change. Thanks for pointing it out though.

We discussed this because we/a dude believe/s Blizzard doesn't know at what itemlevel the raid is @ when they tackle a boss.
Which means some groups, that go in without months of warforge/titanforge farming, might have immense trouble, while others - that raid each week and thus have several titanforge/warforge pieces, will have an easy time.

100% they know the ilvl (most likely based off a lopsided bell curve) of the players entering each raid.

This is not about bosses dropping upgrades or not - it's about how they are designed to reward ilvl X - which means the next raid must/should be beatable with ilvl X - which means warforge/titanforge groups are 20+ over the required ilvl to beat the next raid-tier @ HC/Normal even though they are raiding the same difficulty.

Let's use H NH and H ToS as examples:

H NH drops avg 889 ilvl not counting WF/TF. By your assessment you're saying H ToS is 100% without a doubt tuned for ilvl 889 correct?

I think it's exceptionally safe to say that is not accurate as a catchall. I'm willing to bet that their formula takes into account artifact weapons (i.e. an ilvl 889 player likely has a 905+ weapon) as well Mythic+ Cache's providing very high ilvl gear, and some degree of WF/TF and base the minimum off of that. I'd be willing to concede that the first few bosses likely are tuned for low ilvl (say 889 like you say), but past that they're tuned for an expected ilvl that is likely pretty close to accurate, barring outliers in both directions.

[Deleted]

I honestly quit FFXIV due to the raids.

That and the attitude of FFXIV raiders, holy toxic wasteland batman.

I greatly enjoyed the 24-mans, well some of it. Mostly because the tactics was clear, tightly tuned and still challanging.

Savage mode raids, once cleared, wasnt something I ever wanted to touch again. Alexander was a nightmare.... With only 8 people, you need to make sure that everyone does their part of this group wide dance dance mania perfectly, or you're basically back to square one. Add in one of the worst DPS parsers I've ever seen and a horribly shitty attitude that basically equates to "We didnt have enough DPS to skip this phase/ability, you guys suck /leave".

Statics are abit better, but even there you usally have 1-2 players who just cant get the timing down or are on a potatointernet and as such crash and burn every time. The thing is, getting hit by a mechanic in FFXIV is nearly always = you're dead. In WoW it might lead to a debuff and a stressed out healer, and with some mechanics death, but there are countermeasures. FFXIV does none of that, and honestly... it's not fun. It's a very asian perspective to the fights, "perform perfectly or die". The fact that Yoshi-P is a very clear cut oldschool MMO fan has shown time and time again, I mean for crying out loud he greatly dislikes that healers are capable of doing any form of respectable damage. Enjoy lvling that class....

FFXIV to me is such a waste, great game, great story (tho told through a horrible medium, fucking text boxes?), interesting gameplay and lovely classes. But the raids are more frustration than the hardest of Dark souls games, the alt-leveling is the most mind numbingly boring shit I've ever tried to do. And making another character? Enjoy the mandatory delivery quests and textbox spam of doom Mainstory again, because you cant access the latest shit by just leveling up, no you need to grind that story.

And then they have the balls to release a potion to skip content that by all rights is obsolete? For crying out loud, make a cutscene that briefly sums up what happens at the end of ARR and HW and then move it along. The number of people I know, myself included who gave up on this lovely game because of shit like this....

The game is great, if you have an extremely relaxed FC and static raid group, and you're 70 with your favorite class. If you're anywhere else, its going to turn into a nightmare of boredom before you get there.

- - - Updated - - -

Possible, refresh my memory. I merely responded to your statement about the ilvl rewards being not upgrades, to which I provided evidence proving to the contrary.



I quit the day the mage tower went up and got my appearance I needed. So I wasn't aware of the change. Thanks for pointing it out though.



100% they know the ilvl (most likely based off a lopsided bell curve) of the players entering each raid.



Let's use H NH and H ToS as examples:

H NH drops avg 889 ilvl not counting WF/TF. By your assessment you're saying H ToS is 100% without a doubt tuned for ilvl 889 correct?

I think it's exceptionally safe to say that is not accurate as a catchall. I'm willing to bet that their formula takes into account artifact weapons (i.e. an ilvl 889 player likely has a 905+ weapon) as well Mythic+ Cache's providing very high ilvl gear, and some degree of WF/TF and base the minimum off of that. I'd be willing to concede that the first few bosses likely are tuned for low ilvl (say 889 like you say), but past that they're tuned for an expected ilvl that is likely pretty close to accurate, barring outliers in both directions.

Tbh, they have stated that ToS normal is tuned for 890.

[Deleted]

Tbh, they have stated that ToS normal is tuned for 890.

They stated many things. Good luck killing KJ NM with everyone at 890.

[Advent]

They stated many things. Good luck killing KJ NM with everyone at 890.

Let'stry not to be obtuse here. It's been said by the devs at one point that they tune raids on something g of an upward ilvl curve. Meaning that no one is expecting you to be clearing KJ on normal with an item level needed to beat the first boss. They fully expect you to have picked up some upgrades along the way, so your raid will likely have around a 7-9ish higher ilvl than "890" when/if you beat KJ on normal.

[Wrecktangle]

I honestly quit FFXIV due to the raids.

That and the attitude of FFXIV raiders, holy toxic wasteland batman.

I greatly enjoyed the 24-mans, well some of it. Mostly because the tactics was clear, tightly tuned and still challanging.

Savage mode raids, once cleared, wasnt something I ever wanted to touch again. Alexander was a nightmare.... With only 8 people, you need to make sure that everyone does their part of this group wide dance dance mania perfectly, or you're basically back to square one. Add in one of the worst DPS parsers I've ever seen and a horribly shitty attitude that basically equates to "We didnt have enough DPS to skip this phase/ability, you guys suck /leave".

Statics are abit better, but even there you usally have 1-2 players who just cant get the timing down or are on a potatointernet and as such crash and burn every time. The thing is, getting hit by a mechanic in FFXIV is nearly always = you're dead. In WoW it might lead to a debuff and a stressed out healer, and with some mechanics death, but there are countermeasures. FFXIV does none of that, and honestly... it's not fun. It's a very asian perspective to the fights, "perform perfectly or die". The fact that Yoshi-P is a very clear cut oldschool MMO fan has shown time and time again, I mean for crying out loud he greatly dislikes that healers are capable of doing any form of respectable damage. Enjoy lvling that class....

FFXIV to me is such a waste, great game, great story (tho told through a horrible medium, fucking text boxes?), interesting gameplay and lovely classes. But the raids are more frustration than the hardest of Dark souls games, the alt-leveling is the most mind numbingly boring shit I've ever tried to do. And making another character? Enjoy the mandatory delivery quests and textbox spam of doom Mainstory again, because you cant access the latest shit by just leveling up, no you need to grind that story.

And then they have the balls to release a potion to skip content that by all rights is obsolete? For crying out loud, make a cutscene that briefly sums up what happens at the end of ARR and HW and then move it along. The number of people I know, myself included who gave up on this lovely game because of shit like this....

The game is great, if you have an extremely relaxed FC and static raid group, and you're 70 with your favorite class. If you're anywhere else, its going to turn into a nightmare of boredom before you get there.

I can echo your frustration. I've seen and agree for the most part with every single statement. I do love the game though.

Tbh, they have stated that ToS normal is tuned for 890.

Did they state the entirety of ToS normal is tuned for 890, or is the entry to the raid tuned for 890? I've covered the logistics of why and how and it seems to fit my analysis almost to a T. I doubt that KJ is tuned for 890.

They stated many things. Good luck killing KJ NM with everyone at 890.

See my above statement.

Let'stry not to be obtuse here. It's been said by the devs at one point that they tune raids on something g of an upward ilvl curve. Meaning that no one is expecting you to be clearing KJ on normal with an item level needed to beat the first boss. They fully expect you to have picked up some upgrades along the way, so your raid will likely have around a 7-9ish higher ilvl than "890" when/if you beat KJ on normal.

This pretty much.