FFXIV Criticisms

[Berkilak]

While I do agree XIV is VERY formulaic I kinda disagree that there’s no variety in their encounter areas.

And FFXIV actually makes usage of the space in meaningful ways. It doesn't matter what shape the room is if the encounter doesn't rely on that shape in any way.

[Yarathir]

On one hand, it is true that XIV boss arenas tend to be the same circle and square simple area over and over.

On the other hand, I always preferred ToGC over Ulduar in WoW, so it's actually fine for me. At some point I just wanna get to the damn fights!

Honestly, the dungeon design in XIV is more worrisome to me. The same linear pattern of "pack, pack, pack, wall, boss" everywhere. Could mix it up a little!

I mean, if you boil the Yogg-Saron fight down, it also takes place in a big circle. You can say this about a lot of WoW and FF14 fights respectively.

[Swnem]

All I get from your post is that you're a bad WoW player, and your weaknesses aren't as exposed in FF as they are in WoW.

Melee isn't as easy in WoW as it is in FF, but I've played all roles at a high level since Legion, and I have never encountered a fight where it was "toxic". Except possibily Sludgefist, where we killed it on Mythic with 10 melee in our raid.

You mean you were carried. Everyone knows ranged are better for WoW raiding.
Love the arrogance to make comments like that. If you thought this was a place where everyone agrees with you, you confused it with a Reddit sub.
What i get from your post is insecurity and need to affirm yourself in order to somehow validate your opinion. Ye failed. Talk about the topic. I don't care about your issues.

[Kittahsmash]

The majority of boss rooms in other games (like WoW) are either circles or squares too...

ToGC all literally take place in the exact same square room of the arena, except the final one which takes place in an underground circle.

All of the trash pulls in WoW dungeons are formulaic as well. (pack, pack, pack, pack, gimmick, pack, boss) From what LITTLE I played GW2 (and I do mean little, I played around launch and hit max level then just kinda drifted away) it seemed to have the same thing going for it too.

Sooo, are you just wanting to specifically call out one game for doing something that all the others do, or what?

[prwraith]

What I'm referring to more specifically is the ARENA LAYOUT.

You cannot be serious. This is the most minor complaint I have ever seen because fighting in a square or a circle vs triangle matters, or a lopsided uphill parallelogram.

SMDH.

[neik]

Boxing ring is where you settle your score with the bad guy. It's a franchise signature since early Final Fantasy games before FFXIV came to be.

I personally wouldn't want playing 3 hour snooze fiesta. Short and sweet is best before concentration starts fading away. Difficulty can also be very challenging if you aren't using weak auras, bigwigs, etc.

[mario710]

Who cares about the arena? Encounter design is on point.

Have fun trying to clear the EX, though I'm sure OP wouldn't be able to do even that. Savages look like they'll be extremely fun.

Also, third boss of the raid has a pretty unique platform design.

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Here's a video as to why comparing WoW dungeons to FF dungeons is both idiotic and unfair to consider.


FFXIV EX, savage, and ultimate raid encounter design is amazingly off the chart well designed. Tend to find that people who criticize FF dungeons have only ever done normal story fights, lol.

I never deigned to insult anyone, so I'm not sure why you're resorting to ad hominem attacks over something as trivial as ARENA/DUNGEON LAYOUT.

ARENA/DUNGEON LAYOUT ≠ ENCOUNTER DESIGN

By the way, that video that you referenced is hyperbole - you can have well-designed dungeons that deviate from traditional layouts and pulls while still being kind to casuals who are there to enjoy the MSQ. ARR dungeons say HELLO. Those dungeons aren't remotely hard, yet they are infinitely more interesting than the Fell Court of Troia - which by the way, is a JOKE of a dungeon. The same old tried and true formula of a few mindless trash pulls with 0 nuance followed by 3 bosses (I do enjoy the boss encounters. Those are always a blast.)

Hopefully, you can take a page out of my book and engage me without insulting me.

If not, I'll kindly ignore you.

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You cannot be serious. This is the most minor complaint I have ever seen because fighting in a square or a circle vs triangle matters, or a lopsided uphill parallelogram.

SMDH.

Correct.

It is a minor complaint - and if the team decided to stick with their current arena design formula, the game would still be massively successful.

Again, this is a criticism (or complaint), and we're all entitled to our own opinions on what we think would push the game forward. You're more than welcome to engage and disagree.

[Irian]

Why does this actually matter? This is like people who complain about dungeons being linear, and then when WoW makes dungeons that aren't linear the entire playerbase just ends up adopting one set path anyway.

I'm not a big advocate of FFXIV lately as I'm pretty burnt out on it myself, but the shape of the boss arenas is not really what I'd choose to focus on as far as game flaws go. The game is formulaic to a fault so pointing at the shape of boss arenas as an example is a big "seeing the forest for the trees" moment.

[Cthulhu 2020]

I never deigned to insult anyone, so I'm not sure why you're resorting to ad hominem attacks over something as trivial as ARENA/DUNGEON LAYOUT.

ARENA/DUNGEON LAYOUT ≠ ENCOUNTER DESIGN

By the way, that video that you referenced is hyperbole - you can have well-designed dungeons that deviate from traditional layouts and pulls while still being kind to casuals who are there to enjoy the MSQ. ARR dungeons say HELLO. Those dungeons aren't remotely hard, yet they are infinitely more interesting than the Fell Court of Troia - which by the way, is a JOKE of a dungeon. The same old tried and true formula of a few mindless trash pulls with 0 nuance followed by 3 bosses (I do enjoy the boss encounters. Those are always a blast.)

Hopefully, you can take a page out of my book and engage me without insulting me.

If not, I'll kindly ignore you.

Never attacked you, simply stated that if you think arenas or encounter design are boring, you haven't done the harder content. And has already been said by plenty of others in this thread, WoW boss boss arenas may look slightly more "natural" but they're always very plain. Most boss arenas are still just a confined space, but instead of a circle or a square it's a slightly bowed out oblong circle, or a square with some rocks thrown around to make it not look like a square.

But another thing is, the boss arenas are specifically designed to help you identify mechanics in the fights themselves, which is incredible design in a game that's designed to be played without addons. Matoya's Relict has 3 amazing boss encounters that all make use of the environment. Mechanics are baked into the arena itself. The mud boss making you aim the balls at the holes, the water boss requiring you to look out for bursts of water, and the pig snorting up books and stuff that will stagger you if you get hit by them. It's probably one of the better examples, as there are others that don't have such inspired mechanics.

Ultimately, the arenas all being circles or squares doesn't matter so long as encounter design and use of arena continues to be good.

Video isn't hyperbole at all, and if you think it's hyperbole I suggest you look up the meaning of the word because you're using it wildly incorrectly. (Hint: It means wildly exaggerated, and there's no exaggeration in the video) The video makes incredible points.

Here's something for you to chew on: FFXIV continues to gain subscribers year on year, and as I posted in another thread the global concurrent subscriber numbers have passed 2m. A point that no other sub MMO other than WoW has ever passed. Though as we know now, WoW has a hard time passing that except during expansion launches.

Point is, if the model works and most players are happy with it, why change things?

Your posts in the past very much indicates that you want FFXIV to have more design choices like WoW, and most of them are pretty bad takes simply by virtue of wanting the game to be something it's not. So again, why change what works and people like?

[Myradin]

I think the circle/square thing for FFXIV is actually an extension of how raids/trials work in FF.

WoW dungeons/raids feel more like actual environments, and you usually have to clear some trash and go down a hallway. Raids also have a presence in the physical world, often before they're even released.

Whereas alot of FFXIV fights feel like you're on a circle or square floating in space. You just spawn on it, do the fight, and leave.

Alexander feels a bit more wowlike since you can see him from the outside world, and his raids actually have trash often. Both Stormblood and Shadowbringer's normal raids however, take place in effectively digital simulations. Pandaemonium is a bit of a breath of fresh air since you're somewhat in a real place at least.

I'm not really sure what the difference is between a normal raid and a trial is, other than Trials tend to be tied to the MSQ while raids are optional.

Yeah, Denathrius is a series of circular rooms, but to get to them you also traversed all over his castle, and when when fighting him you crash down through it. There's a sense of space and physicality to it.

[zealo]

Regarding gauntlets in dungeons, since the other part about boss arenas has been covered extensively already in response, there isn't actually such a thing as dungeons that are not linear even if the devs make the path to the boss feature wide open spaces etc, once they come into contact with the player base.

Players will figure out what the most optimal path through is and what packs they can skip anyway, establish it as an informal meta, and then proceed to give anyone that tries to deviate from that meta ever so slightly a complete hell with getting booted out of groups etc. It's all pointless even trying to become "creative" with it even though some players cry out for it, because player desire to optimise their time inside of them will ruin any attempt at having more open sprawling dungeons and encourage toxic behaviour to boot.

Thankfully enough FFXIV is blessed with a dev team that understands this and makes dungeons with a single narrower route through them where there's no way to skip mobs.

[Talrath]

I think you are confusing the "kill raid trash and run all the way to the boss" with "oh look WoW has really good boss arenas". If you boil it down, both have circle or square arena`s, but what you should rather look for are the tactics and boss abilities which do make a difference, unlike the arena thing you are saying.

[Ghost of Cow]

Regarding gauntlets in dungeons, since the other part about boss arenas has been covered extensively already in response, there isn't actually such a thing as dungeons that are not linear even if the devs make the path to the boss feature wide open spaces etc, once they come into contact with the player base.

Players will figure out what the most optimal path through is and what packs they can skip anyway, establish it as an informal meta, and then proceed to give anyone that tries to deviate from that meta ever so slightly a complete hell with getting booted out of groups etc. It's all pointless even trying to become "creative" with it even though some players cry out for it, because player desire to optimise their time inside of them will ruin any attempt at having more open sprawling dungeons and encourage toxic behaviour to boot.

Thankfully enough FFXIV is blessed with a dev team that understands this and makes dungeons with a single narrower route through them where there's no way to skip mobs.

It's less that dungeons are "linear" but more that it's almost the EXACT same thing every time.

There are a lot of cases where even if I'm tanking I don't even really need to know which dungeon I'm in. Just run until I can't run anymore, kill the boss, do it two more times.

That's not 100% of dungeons of course, but it's pretty darn close.

[Maljinwo]

I'm not really sure what the difference is between a normal raid and a trial is, other than Trials tend to be tied to the MSQ while raids are optional.

Trials are a one and done fight that is mostly related to the MSQ or is a bonus boss fight

Raids usually share a storyline between them, such as Pandemonium, Omega, Eden, etc

Alliance Raids are the ones that take 24 players to do

[Myradin]

Trials are a one and done fight that is mostly related to the MSQ or is a bonus boss fight

Raids usually share a storyline between them, such as Pandemonium, Omega, Eden, etc

Alliance Raids are the ones that take 24 players to do

While yes, I find trials and non-alliance raids are mostly the same. They're both 8 person 1 fight experiences. They also both have their own hard mode.

For some reason normal raids drop gear tokens but normal trials normally don't, even though I feel like most trials are roughly on part with normal raids difficulty wise.

It's less that dungeons are "linear" but more that it's almost the EXACT same thing every time.

There are a lot of cases where even if I'm tanking I don't even really need to know which dungeon I'm in. Just run until I can't run anymore, kill the boss, do it two more times.

That's not 100% of dungeons of course, but it's pretty darn close.

This seems especially true in Endwalker dungeons. They're all 3 bosses seperated by 4 pack of mobs that the game lets you pull 2 packs at most at a time.

[mario710]

Thankfully enough FFXIV is blessed with a dev team that understands this and makes dungeons with a single narrower route through them where there's no way to skip mobs.

That - sir/ma'am - is what we refer to as BORING and LAZY design.

Let's take Mechagon Junkyard in WoW: I've done +20-23s with various tanks who take different paths, and we'll still time the dungeon depending on the group's performance.

Let's take Iron Docks in WoW - a fairly linear dungeon, but it's massive and not mired with wall-to-wall corridors.

There is no comparison - Square Enix needs to up the ante on dungeon & arena design.

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There are also other things that I would simply like for them to add to FFXIV, for example incorporating the logos actions from Eureka/Bozja.

I'll try to keep this from being long-winded (I'm not trying to appear as shifting the goalpost): FFXIV jobs lack virtually any utility abilities that give identity to their jobs. A warlock in World of Warcraft can place a gateway for quick group movement (Carapace of N'zoth Mythic), a druid can cast a cyclone to incapacitate enemies. In contrast, a rogue can cast group-wide stealth to move past packs of mobs - those, in my opinion, are class-defining and makes what you bring to the table feel unique.

I would love it if some of the logos actions we've seen in Bozja/Eureka made their way into the actual toolkits of jobs because, as it stands, most of them feel awfully homogenized save for a select few.

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I think you are confusing the "kill raid trash and run all the way to the boss" with "oh look WoW has really good boss arenas". If you boil it down, both have circle or square arena`s, but what you should rather look for are the tactics and boss abilities which do make a difference, unlike the arena thing you are saying.

You're mistaken and likely haven't read any of my posts. I've already acknowledged that the encounter design in FFXIV is unmatched. Mechanically, I always have a blast participating in the encounters.

My critique/suggestion is that they make more creative use of their real estate in those arenas. The fights in the latest 24-man raids are an amazing example of that (not to mention coils & Alexander!).

What is it that's keeping them from taking more creative liberties? I mean hell, look at the overall raid design in Delubrum Reginae normal & savage - that in my opinion is freaking amazingly designed environmentally! Why don't they work off of that blueprint?

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Point is, if the model works and most players are happy with it, why change things?

Your question is flawed. The model that works now is not indicative of how players will perceive it five years from now.

Also - you don't speak for most players. I wish people would stop using empirical data on sub counts to gauge player happiness.

Change is INEVITABLE. Whatever formula they're using now is bound to see revision because player retention isn't something that's achieved by sticking to the same philosophy indefinitely.

Name me a subscription-based MMO that achieved sustainable organic growth using a stagnant design philosophy - there is none. The FFXIV that we see now is not the same FFXIV from ARR. I could not possibly state to you with any confidence what number of variables is driving FFXIV's growth, but what I can say is that they can stand to gain from taking creative risks when designing the game.

[KrayZ33]

I'd refrain from calling the dungeons "lazy design". It's about the goal, I'm sure that a lot of people actually expect and want the dungeons to be that way.
It's boring af for lots of people as well... but the dungeons just aren't meant for these people.

Who knows, maybe the hardmodes are actually a bit different, but I doubt it.

[Cthulhu 2020]

Your question is flawed. The model that works now is not indicative of how players will perceive it five years from now.

Also - you don't speak for most players. I wish people would stop using empirical data on sub counts to gauge player happiness.

There was a thread about this same subject on reddit awhile back. Someone complaining about all of the arenas being squares or circles. Perhaps it was you. The first reply was basically to the tune of "The arenas are fine, they set up a cool environment and play to cool mechanics. Not a big reason to change."

The response got more upvotes than the initial post by a huge margin.

Change is INEVITABLE. Whatever formula they're using now is bound to see revision because player retention isn't something that's achieved by sticking to the same philosophy indefinitely.

Name me a subscription-based MMO that achieved sustainable organic growth using a stagnant design philosophy - there is none. The FFXIV that we see now is not the same FFXIV from ARR. I could not possibly state to you with any confidence what number of variables is driving FFXIV's growth, but what I can say is that they can stand to gain from taking creative risks when designing the game.

FFXIV saw a big player spike for ARR, obviously, but saw their sub numbers drop to their lowest in Heavensward. Ever since Heavensward, FFXIV has been on a steady upward trend every single year, with obvious fluctuations for patches and expansions, but they have been gaining players for almost 7 years now. Sounds like sustainable organic growth to me. It's not been very explosive, and when there was that one great migration, most of the people stayed.

Of course FFXIV keeps changing. In fact, in HW they had trash for raids. Now they don't and it seems to be more popular than ever. Of course they're going to not only add things, but iterate on current designs. Thing is, changing the way they design bosses is not one of those things that needs to change. Players obviously love it. Savage participation is at an all time high as well. There's more people on fflogs runs than ever before. There are more people clearing ultimates than ever before.

Things will change about the game. Arena shape isn't one, nor is it important as you seem to believe.

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I'd refrain from calling the dungeons "lazy design". It's about the goal, I'm sure that a lot of people actually expect and want the dungeons to be that way.
It's boring af for lots of people as well... but the dungeons just aren't meant for these people.

Who knows, maybe the hardmodes are actually a bit different, but I doubt it.

"Hard modes" of dungeons were just the ARR and HW version of revisiting the location but making an entirely new path through the same area to fight different bosses and trash mobs, for different objectives. They're not meant to be challenging, just higher level.








One thing I've noticed is that the people who complain about encounter design, whether it's arena, mechanics, theme, or what have you, they're always complaining only about story mode stuff. Can't tell you the number of people who complain that trials and raids are too easy, then I ask them if they've done savage or ultimate and they tell me they don't want to. Like, that's just dumb. Don't complain that one part of the game is easy, when another part can offer you challenge and you turn it down. The base story experience is meant to be highly accessible. If you want challenging, well designed, interesting fights that will test your skills as a player, do savage/ultimate.

Once you've done those, I'll hear out your complaints about difficulty or arena design.

[KrayZ33]

"Hard modes" of dungeons were just the ARR and HW version of revisiting the location but making an entirely new path through the same area to fight different bosses and trash mobs, for different objectives. They're not meant to be challenging, just higher level.

Didn't they specifically announce dungeon-savage mode recently, basically? I'm not talking about the dungeons we have right now.
The dungeons you are talking about are not "hard modes". They are just different normal mode dungeons.

[Rageonit]

Here's a video as to why comparing WoW dungeons to FF dungeons is both idiotic and unfair to consider.

This video is weird, because the guy keeps arguing FFXIV dungeons serve different purpose and need to be accessible and easy for the story sake, and WoW dungeons aren't because m+ this and m+ that - like he's unaware that WoW has also normal and heroic dungeons that can serve the exact same purpose. Every argument he makes about needing to know which packs to pull together, which abilities to interrupt etc. are invalidated by the mere existence of normal and heroic, where it literally doesn't matter at all.