[Megathread] Final Fantasy XIV

[Kaelwryn]

I'll be honest - I've never been 100% certain on what that particular mechanic actually does. Other fights suggest it's a wipe style (like Syrcus Tower meteors against Xande), but I've also heard the attack does increased damage the longer you take to kill them.

That might be it as well, the longer you take to kill them the more damage you take. but I know for sure, that you won't wipe if you have 1-2 up (not sure about any more than that).

[Aurimas]

Kaelwryn is correct. It does more damage based on how many are up. I don't know if he ever had 2 still up though, I think that would be a wipe. I also know from experience that one is survivable.

I'd love to hear suggestions for mechanics. I know it's not our jobs, but to come up with mechanics that are hard but doable in a pug... And most "mechanics or die" type of fights immediately become "trivial and easy" once they are widely known.

Dungeons are very easy. By design I think.

Alex was somewhat easy.

Savage may or may not be hard based on being gated behind currently unattainable dps or hp checks. I haven't done it. I kind of think that savage would be going down by now if we had the kind of world first competition that they have on the dark side.

I'm ok with most content being somewhat easy. My only problem is that it encourages people to think they are better than they really are. I'm of the opinion that the big brew-ha-ha we had in this very thread about 4 or 5 weeks ago (when everyone should have been equal in gear) was based on this... and people trying to assign blame on someone else. [reworded to not start up the argument again]

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--update or new post depending on how fast I type--

And whomever said that all dungeons are gather up and AoE down, is correct... but that's on the players. It's barely even any faster. People just want to see their e-peens raise by doing 1K damage against a large group of mobs (for 5 min), then to do 500 single target against a small group for 2.5 min. [numbers exaggerated to make for easy math].

I remember when this first started for FFXIV. Brayflox HM was the first dungeon I remember people trying to speed clear. I remember that on average the difference between e-peen and normal was about 5 min, with no wipes. It would take about 25 min on average to clear normally, and about 20 to clear with massive pulls.

Of course good groups with high AoE could do it in 15min and occasionally it would take a little over 30 to clear with poor players and normal pulls.... but on average.

So to save a few min? I think AoE is more about e-peen then efficiency.... and it's on the players not the devs. Even if they made it so hard that it was only doable as single pulls, players would AoE the first time they got a little higher gear...

[Kaelwryn]

Alex was certainly a design choice. They wanted it to be more accessible to the general player base since many people didn't get to see all of Coil.

[Aurimas]

Back to "The Rise and Fall of Gentlemen" from yesterday real fast.

I'm pretty sure that's the "Hildabrad" quest line everyone raves about? I know "opinions"... but is it really that amazing? I still have not done it, but I see that quest every time I stop at my GC.

Maybe today I'll give it a look-see.

[Graeham]

It's pretty overrated in my opinion. It's 'funny' if you like over the top slapstick comedy, don't get me wrong - but it certainly isn't for everyone.

[Kaelwryn]

Back to "The Rise and Fall of Gentlemen" from yesterday real fast.

I'm pretty sure that's the "Hildabrad" quest line everyone raves about? I know "opinions"... but is it really that amazing? I still have not done it, but I see that quest every time I stop at my GC.

Maybe today I'll give it a look-see.

Yes, The Rise and Fall of Gentlemen" is the Hildebrand questline start. If you need a break from the serious, or just want something fun and that will probably get you to laugh, you should do it. The Hildebrand quests are a change of pace, but very good story.

[Granyala]

That mechanic is one of my cardinal complaints about encounter design in FFXIV because it seems like EVERY FIGHT HAS IT. ><

Yeah they sure love the "KILL DEM ADDS QUICK!!111" mechanic.

[Cattleya]

"Kill these adds quickly or the boss one-shots you" is just FFXIV's general version of enrage. To be honest, I prefer it over "kill the boss in 10 minutes or he randomly does 1000% more damage". The add phase tends to be around halfway through the fight, so DPS check wipes go faster. Plus it makes a little more sense.

[Granyala]

True. In WoW it always felt like the dude was toying with you for 10 minutes until he got fed up and went into "serious business" mode.

[Deleted]

Back to "The Rise and Fall of Gentlemen" from yesterday real fast.

I'm pretty sure that's the "Hildabrad" quest line everyone raves about? I know "opinions"... but is it really that amazing? I still have not done it, but I see that quest every time I stop at my GC.

Maybe today I'll give it a look-see.

Continue this storyline was the first thing I did after new patch. Oh man I can't wait for season 2, let's hope for 3.1 (alongside the Vanu Vanu dance)

[babalou1]

Savage may or may not be hard based on being gated behind currently unattainable dps or hp checks.

Savage 1-3 is very doable. 1 and 2 are designed around what? 180ish ilvl, with 3 being 190? Yes, all fights have DPS checks, but A3 is also a very mechanical fight.

I kind of think that savage would be going down by now if we had the kind of world first competition that they have on the dark side.

Savage 3 took Elysium 680? attempts before they killed it. The mentality is there, but we dont have the EU vs US mmo-tailgaters/fanboys. Screaming about whos the best.

[Deleted]

In fairness, the reason why you don't see any full on EU FCs/guilds going for the world first race is because of the server locations, as long as the JPs have an advantage due to their server network in general, theres no point without having a level playing field.

EU people are competitive but going into a race with a unfair advantage is just pointless in our eyes, heck even the fact the server location for EU players is either NA or JP put off a lot of my friends from wow that won't even touch the game.

Takes a lot of get a competitive PVEr from EU side to play FF14 in its current state, the new EU located servers may change that though, but there is a competitive race between the JP and NA groups for world first though, a few groups actually do take part in it but its very few.

[Kaelwryn]

I mean there certainly is a world first competition, its just not as heavily advertised I guess. Iirc Lucrezia (a jap. FC) got world first on Savage A3 didn't they? But it was close.

[Cattleya]

It's not enrage though, it's usually midway through a fight.

Not to mention that FFXIV bosses also have their own hard/soft enrage timers on top of that. (Gigaflare, wut up! Late-fight Tumults on Titan, etc.)

Some bosses have hard enrages (Ultimate Ballad is one that comes to mind, but note that fight doesn't have a kill-the-adds-or-die phase), most either don't or they're so easy to avoid that I've never seen them. I don't count soft-enrages like Titan just slowly doing more and more damage.

And being halfway through a fight doesn't stop it from having the same purpose as an enrage, it checks your DPS and if you fail to do enough, you die.

[Anzaman]

It's pretty overrated in my opinion. It's 'funny' if you like over the top slapstick comedy, don't get me wrong - but it certainly isn't for everyone.

Did the Hildibrand -quests while waiting for expansion release.. it sure was a bit odd.

(Spoiler) http://i.imgur.com/G58pwkQ.png.

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But yeeah, think I'll start leveling-up my Paladin and might race change (again) tomorrow. Poor wallet, asked FC-member to take it away, but for some reason it's still on my PC-table.

[Tazila]

I like the hildebrand quests mainly because there's a lot of early FF nostalgia thrown in. It's more so meant to be slapstick comical than a legit story line, it feels very very japanese which will def be a turn on for a lot of people. Over all though, I enjoyed it as a break from doing other things. =]

[Scufflegrit]

Hmm, I haven't been fishing at all this week, but my challenge log shows a few fish caught. The only thing I can figure is that retainers bringing you fish actually counts for the challenge log.
Either that or my account is hacked... and the hacker didn't steal anything from me but... went and caught 5 fish?

As for Hildebrand, I kinda actually like Nashu more than Hildy. Especially in that first quest where she holds up the pair of [redacted] and smiles at Hildy. XD

[Tazila]

Don't be surprised at hackers being friendly.

My fiance stopped playing GW2 at around level 30 and when he logged back on a year or so later he discovered he was level 60 with a SHIT TON of gathering mats. Someone had hacked him, leveled his chara via gathering, and then... never sold the mats. Lol.

Hackers are weird.

[Kelimbror]

*snip*

See, this is what always happens when you ask someone to provide 'evidence' for lack of a better word. You cherry pick the most simple fights, ignore the most complex, and then pick the most complex from your game. You've also ignored the surrounding information about game design, like mechanics not even possible in current development of FFXIV like special interactions and movement abilities, and then you've acted like it's not bothering you.

Well, it clearly is because you don't want to be objective. Are there simple fights in other MMOs? Yes. Are there vastly more complex fights in a lot of other MMOs than FFXIV? Yes. Is this bad, NO NO NO NO NO. How many times do I need to say this? You are passive aggressively trying to defend something not being attacked.

Uggh...I'm starting to see so many similarities between 'fans' of every MMO which colors the playerbase negatively. I'll just stick to my ignorance and not ask honest questions anymore and just enjoy the game without anyone else's input. It's perfectly ok for games to be designed differently.

I also laughed at people who said SWTOR raiding was difficult. Color me irritated now.

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Ramuh EX says hi. Turn 5 says hi. Yeah... people still wipe on those two even when outdated by 4 patches.

Yeah but that doesn't say too much about the game and says more about the players. I'd probably do both of those and think they were similarly limited by FFXIV's overall design, but still fun! I'm sure there are stand out encounters, but if you put top tier raiders from other MMOs into these encounters they would probably one shot them. Just different design, no big deal really.

[Graeham]

Have...you actually done the end game encounters for yourself? Just curious.

It's not a competition as to which MMO has the 'hardest' raiding...especially when what is 'difficult' is completely subjective and differs from player to player.