Valkayree wrote:
My favorite times are where you can pick up group or do a half pug and take it down. Where the gear is enough to give you a challenge, but echo hasn't been applied just yet. Imo that's how the game is supposed to be played. I'll leave the ridiculous dps checks to the rich kids.
Funnily enough, this is the poor design of the game shining through. The game functions, but they spent so much time making sure every job is homogonized and in terms of vertical progression that there's no room for horizontal growth, the only way to really add difficulty is DPS check and shovel damage down your throat ala T13 and Savage Alexander. This is why I think as of now the only actual difficult encounter in this game is Savage alexander 3, purely because it's not just DPS check..it has mechanics that takes party coordination beyond team jump rope. In the same light I find Cutters Cry 1.0 harder than Cutters Cry 2.0 simply because not only did you have the boss to worry about, but you had adds and environmental hazards to deal with, which can also benefit you as well.
Over all, I think XIV does have a lot of interest dropping but it's still one of the only good MMOs out in the market at present time that's mainstream, so it's very easy to drop it and come back to it as you didn't end up dedicating yourself to another MMO. After maxing out my crafting and doing Alchemist Specialization..I still honestly prefer XI and GW2's crafting, yeah XI has a lot of "hidden factors" to it and RNG, but it's straight to the point. XIV's is more interactive..but it kind of feels it's simply the left over system Tanaka envisioned, since 1.0 you legitimately could go through the whole game as ONLY a DoL or DoH up until the ending, but in ARR that's virtually impossible.
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However, when the new 24 man raid hits, the gear is usually better by then to the point where I don't have to use x-pots and poison to win games, otherwise micromanaging my button presses to bleed every little bit of damage I can muster. If I have to factor a poison or an xpot in my rotation in order to win, or buy a ridiculous ilvl 150 piece of jewelry and spend 5 million melding it to get an extra 10 dps, I am simply not interested.
This is why I still prefer XI's overall design. Things were "unbalanced" yet that is exactly what FF has always been about. No matter how much you try to overpower relevant content, it relies very heavily on YOUR ability to play the job and meshing with players, more so than "LOLOLOL YOU BETTER DO 7.2 MILLION DAMAGE IN THIRTY SECONDS OR ITS A WIIIIIIIIPE~"
This is why as much as I enjoy raiding..the design is just...needless when they can go about in such a better way. It's why I despise the alliance content, because it's a good design..but they undertune it so it can be done by everyone. Which isn't bad..but..alliance content should honestly be harder given it takes 24 people to do which sadly, is because of "Group A/B/C needs to be on a panel!" type of mechanic.
Edited, Aug 31st 2015 3:43pm by Theonehio