My Thoughts on Variant & Criterion Dungeons - FFXIV Patch 6.25

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[@natebroadus8474]

I feel like the system, itself, is a huge win, and all that needs to be looked at are the rewards for Criterion & Savage. Variant has been some of the most fun I've had in dungeons for years.

[@sergel02]

I haven’t been able to do Criterion yet but absolutely loved Variants! It’s fun to do solo or with a group, and is a decent enough challenge to do as a solo player. Love the different paths and lore, the secret boss, and I’m excited for the future variant dungeons.

[@kimaclaret]

Tbh, the variant dungeons are a little more challenging than I expected, even with the duty actions, as a 612 dnc solo. Which I actually loved. I thought it would be more of a faceroll, but I actually have to be playing well when on my own. I've also been really enjoying going in with randoms now that I've done all the paths. They've been really great alternative content for me.

[@cailee9820]

@@kimaclaret As a DNC main that's done some savage, I agree. I ended up doing a lot with randoms, and then when I got down to just needing a couple of paths, I ended up switching to GNB to solo it -- it might've taken longer, but since I didn't have the duty actions hot-keyed, it made it a lot more forgiving.

[@mohlol2456]

If Criterion normal doesn't give gear upgrade, it should at least be ilevel sync, so you can go more easily in it with any job and have a chance to beat it. Because, not only you have to have an already decent gear which just an artificial difficulty added for no reason imo but you are also locked in the job you prog savage with in order to be efficient. And sometimes you could just want to play something else, especially since it's should be easier to find 3 others friends to group with and slam some Criterion

[@DeadEye935]

I think its very strange to have criterion savage balanced around essentially being best in slot already so soon after the tier dropped where the only people geared to do it are those in statics that cleared week 1. If you go in with less gear, you also have no way of powering up outside of just more savage raid clears. Its unfortunate that these are so heavily reliant on having done savage, considering mechanically they're more around an extreme trial, maybe some mechanics being a bit above that. These could easily appeal to people that simply can't commit the time to do savage raids. I also feel like people could easily draw comparisons to Bozja and Eureka, and that content also provided ways of getting stronger without being reliant on outside sources. Making future variant/criterion more "self-sufficient". Offering gear would be great for those that don't do savage raids, and for those that do, it could still be worth it for glam or gearing alt jobs thus also fixing the rewards issue. I've already kinda written off being able to do ASS Savage. I'm still progging Abyssos, so that takes up much of my "serious" FFXIV time, so I've been chipping away at criterion normal in PF, meanwhile ASS Savage is nearly nonexistent in party finder and I have to think its either because so few people have gear for it, those that do are doing it with people from their statics, and others probably don't want to bother because the rewards are so paltry. In a way, ASS Savage specifically feels dead on arrival, and I dunno how long even normal ASS will last.

[@DonaldTurner]

so good Mr. Happy. you are a wonderful creator for the FF community. thoughtful, insightful. on point. so, my wife and I loved doing the variant together, solving, ultimately google a guide (lol), learning new mechanics. a group of us are progging criterion siilky. I know, a joke for great players, but whatever, for us, older (60) casuals... a real challenge. blown away watching folks play at your level, but accepting, it's not likely in my wheelhouse. doesn't mean I m not having a blast here. this has been an amazing addition , and psyched for more.

[@gmyza4849]

I like how the reward for clearing Savage is a token that you can turn in for a single materia

[@kanick1983]

yea.. loot rewards are pathetic for this content...

[@LuminateTheWorld]

I'd rather see them release something new that's done well with crap rewards then the same content we have had for years... they can add better rewards as time goes on. Same with island sanctuary.

[@Redcritxx]

1 savage book should be able to be changed for 50 silvers at least

[@katrinkpunkt]

Variant and Criterion surprised me so much - it's probably the most fun I had in Endwalker so far. For someone who has not that much time to prog Savage, Criterion is the perfect length and pacing. The rewards definitely need rework, and I wish they would do something about people requesting an ilvl in pf that you can only have if you cleared savage early (because you don't need). But if this comes out next raid patch I'm not going to do Savage but only this because it feels more rewarding to me with my schedule.

[@OldManInternet]

Going in to this, I was way more hyped for Criterion than I was for Variant. But I ended up having a lot more fun clearing Variant with one of my friends. Trying to figure out the puzzles was great, although we ultimately couldn't figure out one of them. We tried pugging Criterion a few times, but it feels like the kind of thing that would be more fun to work on with a group. So we're going to wait until a few of out friends get sick of Wrath and come back. Great content overall though!

[@car-keys]

I love the concept of the first boss having different attacks depending on the path, but i hope they go further with it im the next variant

[@philippkramer3001]

Since I am not raiding this tier I hoped the tuning wouldn't be with Savage gear in mind. Now seeing that there are no gear/upgrade/side grade rewards I just wish it would sync you to i610 so everybody has the chance to do criterion without having the minilvl-experience. Obviously you could say "git gud scrub" "learn2play kekw" but ultimately its mechanics centered first and dps/survival check second. The unreal trials are synced to a fairly low level also iirc. The ilvl is arbitrary with the new patch anyway, so I feel like SE could've set it lower to begin with so Savage raiders don't have a leg up.

[@omedon666]

At one point, before I played it, I thought to myself "variant is the future of dungeons, scaling to group size HAS TO be more efficient use of dev resources than building more duty support trinity dungeons," and duty support/trusts are literally my condition for playing FFXIV. As hype as I was for variants, I leave FFXIV when Duty Support stops, and here's why: I don't play a ranged DPS class to be a one man show, I do it to hide behind a tank and pewpew. If variants eclipse and replace the traditional trinity dungeon model from 7.0 on, 7.0 I'm out... and I think the devs realize that sentiment. I *could* see variants replacing all "max level" dungeons, but for the leveling grind, and for the sake of people "knowing how to trinity" before they get to the level cap, I truly hope they don't replace all dungeons. Just adding this comment on this particular video because I just finished your state of the realm on this subject and you went straight for "replace all future dungeons with variants," and I was on that train until I played them. They are fun and educational, but they are not a replacement for standard trinity dungeons.

[@overnightsiren]

The issue is that there is no good incentive to do Criterion. The objectively better mount comes from normal, and the savage mount can be bought on the marketboard anyway. Also the bosses for normal take wayyy too long. I think they had trouble balancing their HP since they can be fought using any party makeup and anywhere from 1-4 members. It's also kinda lackluster that all the first bosses look identical and have extremely similar mechanics (those barrels)

[@thorifyer]

I've only done the Variant so far, but the dungeon itself is my favorite reward. The varied nature of it is a wonderful experience.

[@oshaapproved7612]

Honestly one of things i really like about this content is the puzzle aspect. I feel like that's an aspect they could use to make deep dungeon better in the future

[@ValkyrieTiara]

I haven't done it yet, but I'm guessing the secret variant boss is intended to be... y'know. Secret. And they don't want to spoil it for people who rush variant to get to savage and go back to finish variant later. Not that I can imagine anyone ever doing that! It also might be a literal story spoiler for the story of the dungeon itself, I don't know as (again) I haven't done it yet, but that would be another reason it's not in Criterion. Either way, I'm not surprised by it's absence. I am, however, surprised that there's nothing new mechanics-wise between Normal and Savage. That is VERY strange to me. I figured it would be like the difference between normal and savage raids, and that normal would just be variant bosses but beefier, and then savage bosses would be the complete reworks. The fact that it's kindof "inverted" is very interesting to me as a designer, and makes me wonder what their motives are for going this route. Though I can't say I disagree with it. If there IS negative feedback about it, I don't expect them to change it outright. Rather, I expect they'll change savage up in some other way such as adding an extra boss (as you suggested) or adding a second half to the final boss the way 8 man savages do. I agree that armor rewards are... let's call it unlikely. I know a lot of people have been asking for it, and I'm not gonna say it WON'T happen as the team has surprised me many times before with how far they're willing to go to meet player demands (I STILL can't believe they went in on bunny boys and lion ladies), but I will say don't hold your breath. I like the upgrade materials idea though, I think that's very reasonable. I WILL go out on a limb and say they'll never ever give you 25 or 50 materia for a four man savage clear. 😂 MAYBE once a week or as a first time bonus, but even that is doubtful to me. I could go into detail as to why, but suffice to say it's NOT SUPPOSED to be a good reward. It's a consolation prize for after you've run it enough times that you don't anything left to get. I could MAYBE see five. Maybe.

[@ScottALowe]

This variant dungeon thing reminded me a lot more of the 1.x dungeon designs, though obviously with a lot more lore.

[@JJMomoida]

ASS has made me realize that... I don't think fight design in FFXIV will ever jive with me. This is a realization I came to after almost 10 years of playing this game. I feel like I enjoy the combat itself, it's perfectly serviceable. Nothing to write home about. I always thought that I wanted hard 4-man content. Was never truly satisfied with Heaven-on-High and Palace of the Dead. Well... I got what I asked for and what do you know, I don't like it. It really comes down to fight design. I found myself looking at a Silkie guide and realized that I'd spent a good 15 minutes staring at a diagram of move here, stand there, now move over there, and stand here. It's the same song and dance. FFXIV has, for the most part, BEEN this same song and dance. This is nothing new. It's just now that it's actually really sinking in. I'll continue to play the game, btw. Not quitting or anything like that. I've just come to realize that the way this game does its difficult content as an extrapolation of what we already have at base difficulty just isn't for me. This ain't a diss on it. It just ain't for me. I will say, though, the increased difficulty on trash is very much welcome. With regards to Variant Dungeon. I very much liked it. The first boss of every path was a drag but everything else was alright. I really liked the idea of discovering alternative endings through clues in the text and environment. This is something I continue to look forward to.

[@Wolfun1t]

Ye I agree. Fight design has always made it super specific on where exactly you need to stand at all times, but at least in easier content you're given some flexability for how you approach a given fight, which makes it feel more dynamic and fun for me. Whenever I do Savage, it's all just extremely rigid and specific, and it looks so weirdly unnatural if you imagine the fight taking place in real life, like everyone synchronizing with each other and moving to a certain assigned spot at 1:26 into the fight or whatever. It's all just a performance, and it gets really boring after the first time you clear it.

[@NotTheWheel]

I've been having sooooo much fun. It's been a decent challenge. I'm more of a solo player (not by choice mostly) I've always been an expansion behind since heavensward so when I got to HW endgame dungeons and so on nobody would want to play them with me and queues were normally very long so I opted to soloing them. They were still hard even if I was 10 levels higher than what the dungeon content was. VC dungeons reminded me of that. I've completed all 12 routes it was fun uncovering all the secrets and reading the lore made me feel like a REAL adventurer :) and got my mount so I'm happy. I think they could even make solo content a bit more challenging like the group content appears to be. Still trying to get the minions and other things too, plus it's a good tomestone grind. I love it.

[@WaveEchos]

Maybe they will add manderville relic progression items in various amounts based on difficulty

[@throwaway5012]

As someone who doesn't (generally) raid savage, I was kinda miffed at the difficulty of Criterion. The min item level was set at 610, but good freaking luck beating enrage timers with that. And without any gear as rewards throughout, smashing your head against it just feels like: If you want this to be easier, then just gear up in savage. And what I wanted was an alternative to savage with fewer players to coordinate. If they were going to do this whole - challenging 4 man content with no rewards thing, the least they could have done is scale up/scale down item levels to a fixed value. That way everyone is at least on a level playing field. Having this one sync at 635 just gives me the impression this was only for those who were already raiding Abyssos and nobody else. Which sucks tbh.

[@DrakeWurrum]

Keep in mind that syncing to 635 is for future patches. Current Savage loot item level is 630.

[@Masterherocard]

I know its unrealistic to expect this, but I'd honestly love to see them take some cues from variant dungeon for regular dungeons. Maybe not as in depth as we've seen from this debut, but seeing dungeons where boss mechanics or routes to the bosses can change would be interesting, and a good way to shake up how dungeons progress.

[@StregaKyto]

Criterion was pretty hard - it took longer to prog than the first 3 fights of savage - hours wise. It def felt harder than first 2 fights of any savage tier. The difficulty felt somewhere in between boss 3-4 of a savage tier.

[@scytale6267]

Yeah, i went in thinking "theres a savage version above, this can at worst be as hard as a mythic+0 dungeon from WoW, right?". Ho boy was i wrong :D

[@StregaKyto]

@@scytale6267 my famous last words were..... how hard can 4 man content be? Lol reclears pretty easy tho

[@kpenn100]

agreed every dungeon should be variant i like the paths and secrets

[@eihples]

This might be silly and copium but I think they were also reluctant to go over board with rewards on content that is brand new so that if it turns out everyone hates it, people are not locked out of reward behind crap duties. Which is also why I think they are available on the market board. So they might increase the rewards when they see it’s worth investing in more and people like it in general

[@DrakeWurrum]

I feel like this new system is a good foundation, but they desperately need to iterate. The rewards aren't enough for the effort it takes. I think Criterion Savage needs to have its own set of gear at item level equivalent to the Savage raids. It would then be a good alternative option to Savage raids. Right now, once we get all the rewards from Variant and normal Criterion, nobody will really touch it. It's a tiny little island of content with not much replayability to it.

[@PaladinChase]

I really liked the variants! Excited to try the harder versions later.

[@zankies8735]

Variant and Criterion are both fun dungeons! Just beware to any healers out there, while you do get a 2nd dot to manage in Variant, the overall gameplay may be much slower compared to DPS or tanks. It's something I don't hear too much about but I do think the scaling for a healer is a bit too high considering the lack of powerful DPS tools. But it shouldn't really discourage people from going in as any role

[@pikaluz454]

Ah honestly? I had a much better time doing all 12 routes as healer in solo than say DPS, I don't think the difference between clear times is that high between roles, is more or less about the same if you know how to keep your dps and dots uptime correctly while also not having to stop ever to heal yourself since you can just correct every single mistake you make, wich makes fights in solo a lot more manageable since death means a reset of the fight The problem is mostly that bosses in *general* take a bit long, regardless of the role you have and even the amount of people you have, all bosses have a bit more HP than they really should have, making them feel more like damage sponges at times

[@zankies8735]

@@pikaluz454 After doing them with each role, (WAR, AST, SMN), the discrepancy was definitely there. I do agree the bosses generally have a bit too much HP it seems but it's not as bad as something like the nier raids. Noticable but not too bad to deal with

[@pikaluz454]

@@zankies8735 I did it as WHM and SGE both having more personal DPS than Astro so that's another factor to consider, but yeah my personal position is that I don't think healers are in that bad of a position when soloing this content, but they should probably look into the general scaling for future dungeons

[@danielhenderson9719]

MrHappy recounting the mechanics of the third criterion savage boss: Me: Those certainly are words that I recognize

[@stobiepiel2585]

I'd like a hard mode for solo (which I don't THINK we can do, though I ... didn't actually check.) And I'd like better rewards. But I am really loving these. I've gotten the squeaky cleaning bizarre hamster on 3 characters, in an obsessive burst of 'must have.' I like the length, the random variety of mechanics, & just everything. I feel like they can take this idea a lot farther with the story tucked in there very nicely. I deeply hope this is the start to a lot more of the same. FAR more fun than the PotD & HoH, and less 'well, better put something on in the background' that is my Bozja experience.

[@anthonydelfino6171]

So here's my thought when you were talking about the secret boss being missing from criterion. You, probably like some of the other hard core players, skipped some of the variant story and paths. And, like you mentioned, the method of finding that boss is a little more hidden than some of the other endings. So in order to still keep there being something fun to find and new to experience for players in a situation like yours, it is kind of a nice thing that they didn't spoil that boss for you in the harder versions of the dungeon. Plus it also means that if anyone is watching someone stream criterion dungeons, they don't get spoiled on that secret ending either since they have no reason to know to go looking. That said.... it's really hard to keep ANY secret with the internet being a thing. But still, props to them for at least trying.

[@Froggsroxx]

I'm enjoying the variant dungeon, I like the lore. My only real "issues" are that the bosses take so long (solo, tank main), the first boss is always the same, and the rewards are very light. As a viera I was shocked I can't wear the hat....

[@Overdoseplus]

Why a Viera is shocked they can't wear hats? That's the norm by now.

[@Froggsroxx]

@@Overdoseplus I realize that, however they promised gear coming after 6.0 would all be compatible.

[@TheDaxter11]

@@Overdoseplus Nah that shouldn't be a problem anymore, while I don't agree with the excuses they have for gear prior to Shadowbringers and the existence of Viera, its an excuse that _kind of_ makes sense on the surface. But Shadowbringers gear and beyond has no excuse since Viera _do_ exist from that point on, they are a race in the game and should be taken into account.

[@VioletShinobi]

My head cannon is that Geryon the seer (1st boss) is hiding in the walls scooby doo style trying to see which path you take and then sprinting there when he sees which one XD.

[@mewfangirl1052]

So the proc for the right path's first boss was when you kill the Molboro..... I knew there was a proc, but that's not what I thought it was. I thought it was how fast you picked the path.

[@hellfrozenphoenix13]

i strongly agree with these takes. Variant, Criterion, and Crit Savage have ALL been exceptional as content. But the rewards are slightly lacking. Variant only needs the addition of a continuous reward to earn, like Materia 9, glam prisms, dispellers,etc. a reason to keep going after getting enough Potsherds for all the current rewards. OTHERWISE, Variant's reward system kicked it out of the park. Criterion needs more to earn. I wouldnt mind gear that looks the same as the raid 620 gear, with the stats being different. in fact, could be a nice alternative for people to farm those looks and reusing those assets makes it easier for the devs. And while Materia isnt the best continous reward, given the content it is, its something. Crit Savage rewards feel like an afterthought. i think having it drop Silver and perhaps giving just a few extra rewards could do a lot for it. Even jsut the silver would do it: Crit Savage doesnt feel nearly as repeatable reward wise, and that will hurt its popularity in the long run. overall, my opinion of these is similar as my opinion with island Sancuary. amazing for the first draft, room for improvement, has an insane amount of currently untapped potential.

[@jessem.4214]

For Variant, I’m not sure if you’re accounting for this or not, but a lot of the items are actually tradeable. I guess the prices might stay so low that it’s not worth it, but since the gear pieces take a few runs each I kinda expect they’ll still end up being more worth it to sell than materia would be. Similarly for Criterion you can sell the mount or, more reasonably, the orchestrion. (I do think they should have more appealing rewards than that for the higher difficulties, though!)

[@hellfrozenphoenix13]

@@jessem.4214 to be fair, i did forget to account for the tradability. So thats a fair point.

[@Golden910]

I haven't played in a while but it definitely sounds like variant dungeons are really close to what I would consider traditional D&D or what tabletop role playing is. And to have that in final fantasy 14 is amazing especially if it also can be done solo.

[@GaleGrim]

I've been saying they should add alternate paths to dungeons that still lead to the end for ages now, I'm gald they are testing that out in variant.

[@gabegonzalez5553]

They could also adjust bozja and eureka to work like these dungeons with Baldesion arsenal and Dulbrum Reginae

[@jessem.4214]

I’ve really been enjoying going through Variant. I did look up a guide for paths but next time around I’d like to try to figure it out myself, now that I have context for how the hints might work. My main issue with V&C is just that, as someone who doesn’t do Savage, I feel like Criterion is much more severe of a jump in difficulty (and possibly ilvl) than I was hoping for. I’ll be trying it with friends later tonight and I expect that we’ll eventually do ok with Silkie (though that might just mean seeing enrage), but not be up for clearing the other 2 fights anytime soon. Maybe it’s too much to ask for but it would be nice to see another difficulty that bridges the gap more, staying at an Extreme-ish level of difficulty rather than escalating to later floor Savage. I know people really enjoyed Criterion’s difficulty so I don’t want that to go away, but it’s unfortunate that there’s nothing between casual and Savage. Especially as the 635 sync means there’s no way for us to artificially make it much easier later. As for Criterion/Savage rewards, well, I don’t feel like I’m in a position to complain if I can’t get it to begin with, hah. I do think making a lot of the stuff tradable was a good idea but the items on offer are pretty lackluster. And honestly they probably shouldn’t have had any materia in the Savage shop at all; I think people reacted more harshly to that than they would have from their currency being outright worthless?

[@Kalletenz]

I really like criterion although I do think trash mobs come a bit short. Coming from wow I might be a bit biased here since alot of wows m+ difficulty comes from managing trash pack pulls but in criterion they just feel like an artificial barrier to prevent it from feeling like doing 3 EX trials in one go (which kinda doesn't work imo). I would like to have more optional trash packs which requires you to plan your route so you can avoid trash mobs and potentially save time (maybe even require you to do so because mobs get stronger the longer you take) We basically only have 2 non existent trash packs at the start + a few more stronger mobs you almost cannot multipull (or 2 at once maximum with good healing and dps) and between 2nd and 3rd boss there even is no trash at all which is very disappointing. It almost doesn't feel like a dungeon to me which is very sad because I really like the boss fights individually. tl'dr: pls more meaningful trash and optional routes for a better dungeon feeling so it doesn't feel like 3 subsequent EX trials

[@Judiacator]

I normally agree with Haps on most things. But he minimizes how much people care about time efficiency. No matter your best intention, the majority will always want to do the optimal route after thier first couple times through

[@formy52]

As a new player I really liked Variant, really fun content. Chill vibes, exploring beautiful scenery, I almost have no notes. Went into Criterion, thinking it would be like a kind of lower end Extreme tier dungeon, couldn't even get past boss 1. It's clearly savage, which is confusing because Criterion Savage exists, so I don't really understand who this content is for. Casual players won't even bother, players like me that want to start doing medium spicy content can't even clear it, and Savage raiders are doing their own content and won't bother with this past the first few clears. I'm all for learning, I recently completed P4S which was my first on-expansion Savage, but like, I don't want to memorise raid plans and dance routines for all my content. I'd like more content that's pressuring but could feasibly be cleared in a lockout, maybe two, and leave Criterion Savage to be the brutal content no-one ends up doing.

[@tamarak.8800]

There need to be really good rewards so people will be able to run those later still. Without good rewards and a reason for people to do them more than once in case of savage, it's going to be hard finding groups in the future. Could be simply more unique glamor, unique glamor is enough for ultimates to still be consistently run.

[@zarakitube]

Criterion dungeon normal mode is really hard, SE should change it to make variant actions available in that mode while 1 action rez in savage

[@DonaldTurner]

for an older irl person, casual but with high playtime, ya, folks like Mr Happy get this, but man, progging siilki criterion has been a real, and very fun challenge! not beaten yet by my group, either. hard for us, but a blast!

[@davood123]

just add chance for any of the current raid tier books to drop from it. limit the books to one a week and let us do it solo :P

[@hortehighwind8651]

Pretty good video, good overview and i like that copium humor haha.

[@truemasterage]

To me, Criterion Normal was Savage, and I'm legit confused about how in the hell they thought 610 was an okay min ilvl unless you play *absolutely perfectly* for a very extended amount of time. I think the team forgets that they have actual top-tier players internally doing the playtesting, and this has been a recurring issue for them (I'm certain their internal MCH player is an actual god at the class and thats why it languishes for everybody else). Step one Relic and this tier's *awful* 620 tome gear is not enough if you even have that much unless you're *very* good at your role, moreso than usual. Criterion (Savage) *should* demand ilvl-appropriate gear, I'm not arguing that. And its very likely that the base extreme for this takes into account the buffs, more common 630 gear from future raids/dungeon, and eventual Echo its going to get. Just, damn it was painful now and not in a good way.

[@throwaway5012]

Yea, me and 3 friends spent about 8 hours between 2 days on the first boss (we're all at around 613 or so - some tome gear, but never got into savage this tier) - and our first enrage was at around 20%. Eventually got it down to 3% on enrage, and we probably could have polished it up and gotten a kill - but why at that point? The next bosses would probably be harder, and we'd likely struggle every week to meet that enrage timer since we weren't getting any gear upgrades since none of us do savage abyssos. It just really made us feel like this content was only for those who were doing savages already. And there really doesn't seem like there's a good *reason* for that to be the case. They could have had everyone sync to the same item level... but they chose not to do that and I feel leaving players like us out was intentional. Doesn't feel great.

[@xeronixxy7845]

reward wise at the bare minimum i think criterion normal should reward a 620 piece of armour like alliance raids do and then savage could give an upgrade item to that. In terms of them not doing gear sets for extra content, this expansion has no Bozja which rewarded Bozja, Judges and then Blades gear sets (the 1st 2 both upgradable) so SE making extra gearsets is not impossible

[@benoitrousseau4137]

This isn't quite what I'd replace the dated dungeon model with but this is very close. In Endwalker I really wish I could take different paths in dungeons like Babel, Ktisis, Smileton or The Dead Ends and see what else going on there, and this would get me that. (That was also the idea behind "Hard" dungeons too which we don't get anymore.) The ideal model for me would be to have a story path that is part of MSQ and can optionally be done solo with trusts, and then other explorable paths that open at level cap and require a actual party. Of course nerds will argue 2 minutes over picking the path that saves 9 seconds so yeah DF should fix the path, but you have your FC and failing that PF for exploration.

[@Kasaaz]

Based on the lack of real difference and the reward structures for the Criterion Normal and Criterion Savage, they were a bit overambitious thinking they needed essentially three tiers of the dungeon. I'd rather have them split the difference between the Criterions for difficulty and combine the rewards.

[@RavingNutter]

My OCD self cringes every time I see that fully soulbound gear. Please get that materia out Happy, if for nothing else but my sanity.

[@DW-fl3ee]

My reward would be a 5 piece gear set i620. Each piece would have a set bonus adding a materia slot. Have it be a non raid BiS set.

[@bastianwitt4545]

hearing that you also needed help to see all 12 endings makes me feel much better about using help myself, lol

[@SmartBatto]

I only have two issues with This Variant Dungeon (And one is fine because Solo Tax). 1. The first and second pages are hard to get to if you don't do another path first. I spent all day hugging the wall and examining the paths to try and find it changing up everything on route 1 that I could. Even tried it with friends and random players- eventually I looked up a guide cause I like to do these in order so I can go "Okay, route 1 clear! On to route 2!" and not a lot of Randoms knew about it either. (The code is in Route 2 for those that wanna know which route.) So I feel like that's something they can not do for future Variant dungeons. 2. Bosses are attack sponges. This is the one where I think it's okay from a Solo player thing because it "Feels" Like it takes forever and that's where the underwhelming rewards come in. for such small and finite pool of rewards right now, the amount of time put in for 1 person to do it definitely makes the reward feel like it's not enough, but you can always party up with friends and I've noticed that it definitely goes by faster with other players (At least from a solo player experience). I do think that everything else is okay and fun to do. I just found it annoying when I found out that the "Hint" for P1 and P2 in Route 1 was in fact hidden in route 2. Like for me I like reading everything *After* I do it so I wasn't looking in the pages to begin with and that one is fully on me but to make the hint to something in one route hidden in another (Especially for people like me who like to confirm a route is finished before moving on) Is just cruel. You have a bot in your comments using your pfp Mr. Happy.

[@LuminateTheWorld]

Not complaints at all except for rewards which I assume will be changed in the coming paths.

[@zavi3rz]

All MSQ dungeon moving forward should all be variant dungeons. This has such potential to be a great story telling tool, while allowing small groups of friends to play together regardless of party size it’s a no brainer really. I agree that they should really look back at the old dungeons and make a variant… variant for it, at least for the solo instances. Having to quit the party halfway doing MSQ together with friends feels extremely crappy…

[@TheMexRAGE]

Maybe not all of them be turn into variant (a lot of dungeons in ff14 are really action set piece after all), but they being part of MSQ would be really cool and very FF like

[@TumblingD1C3]

The rewards (minus the silkie mount) bum me out, but this is my favorite dungeon content in the game already I think. Learning the different options and bosses day 1 was a ton of fun, and the variety of paths helps it from getting stale. I'd love to see them do more with this in the future, and maybe even add some gearing rewards (not necessarily highest ilvl, but at least a small boost) to give an alternate to the usual savage raiding and tombstone cycle.

[@Fishingishard]

Rewards need work. After finishing them once and getting the small rewards you can get, there's little reason to keep doing it.

[@Lynsis92]

i found the variant bosses a little bit to easy, i was kinda hoping it would be a bit harder.

[@Abundanceplayer]

i think Criterion dungeons are a good step towards them doing more horizontal progression. which at this point for the game it needs some badly, gearing by only tombstones and savage raids with the occasional alliance raids is not that fun as its so tedious to get gear with 8 other ppl. face it ppl who have been gone from the game have a better chance of just farming tombs to gear and its more guarantee than doing A.raids. they can have it drop in the even .x5 patches but a bit later to give raiders time to finish savage raids and have it just drop gear thats 10 IL lower than savage raids or drop it on odd .x5 patches that give the same IL as savage raids of the previous tier, since its 4 man content itll be abit quicker to grind the IL than the previous savage but since the savage raid has already been out for a while its just an alternative for players who waited or dont who missed out on clearing.

[@qamarqammar7629]

Well that depends on whether or not you think the game has a gearing problem. Not all of us think that it does.

[@Abundanceplayer]

@@qamarqammar7629 it does tho, it has poor alt gearing support in the game. for returners or alt jobs you rarely use or keep the A.Raid gear on as you start pushing savage gear or tombstone gear for your alts as the A.raid gear becomes meaningless only for you to use for glam. if you come back on a odd patch and you just want to gear up just quick just to do to be able to join higher content with friends (thats not savage) you have a better chance of just grinding tombstone as its much more guarantee to get gear from the previous patch. and use crafted gear filler for pieces you dont have. the fact when the next even patch comes out if you didnt get full set of tomb gear. the tombs can carry over to help gear for the next gear set or (just buy the new crafted gear).even if you dont have friends to craft you gear its still not a complete problem. A.raid gear becomes obsolete, plus the older tomb and upgraded crafting gear is higher IL. if your just trying to get into current content you dont even need the higher lvl crafted gear the base gear on top of some tomb gear is fine enough to run content. as the min IL requirement isnt that severe. running A.raids solely for gearing for returners or Alts is mind numbing and not fun esp when your running against multiple ppl compared to crafted and tomb. and they showed that in SB when they changed the need,greed system for A.raids at the time. These new Crit dungeons is a good way to mix things up for more solo or small group players. Crit dungeon EX can drop gear thats enough to do content and Crit dungeon Sav can drop gear for the HC raiders who want something to do besides only savage raids. but leave A.raids and Sav Raids for the more social aspec. we just need more OPTIONS. why ppl complain about how bad gearing more than one job is recently. which everyone has talked about. more options isnt a bad thing and saying there isnt a problem is a neglect on your part to see it. just cuz you dont run all the content and stick to one thing. ofc the game wont have issues if your ONE thing is the only thing you do and its to your liking.

[@qamarqammar7629]

@@Abundanceplayer Ok lot of text there. However, easy enough to buy crafted on alts, jump into the Raids and start getting your raid gear. As for content you do not know what kind of content I may or may not enjoy in the game.

[@Abundanceplayer]

@@qamarqammar7629 if your talking about Normal raids/savage raids yea to gear up but if you mean A.raids then theres no point in doing them like you said just buy the crafted gear, the crafted gear is already better than the A.raids cuz you can penta meld it and even if you dont its only 10 ILs lower than the raid gear, you can do any current content with the crafted gear. so you can just start farming tombs and go for the max IL gear instead of getting weaker IL A.raid gear. obv not all of the content otherwise you wouldve known how flawed A.raids are for alt leveling esp when you said it yourself you can get crafted gear, no need to even set foot in A.raids unless for glam runs or token runs. theres better alternatives.

[@qamarqammar7629]

@@Abundanceplayer I guess it depends on your specific goals. Many people enjoy Alliance raids for their own sake. And the gear is free.

[@Vesperwow]

One materia is so embarrassing it's almost something you would think they did as a joke

[@christopherdaly5356]

Rewards need to be better. Gear sets would be nice. An alternative way to gear over savage raiding would be cool

[@tciddados]

Variant is great, my only beef with it is that the fun of the discovery aspect seems kind of nerfed when you may have to go through a 15 min run to find out that the thing you just scienced was wrong. It'd be neat if they could somehow implement a system (at least for solo, it wouldn't work well for groups probably) to let you skip to certain parts of paths you've been to before, kinda like the zero escape series' flowchart (except 999, which I don't think had the flowchart UI). But I realize that also kills part of the timesink aspect of it, so oh well.

[@selay333]

I don't like the idea of savage raid loot from these as others have asked for. I say this because I already know some groups are gonna make running this mandatory for the static, though only way I could see it added is if they allowed it after the alliance raid comes out unlocking the ability to get the upgrade items.

[@jotunn30]

Bro unless you’re in a WF static get out if they make anything mandatory lol

[@bophadesknutz7798]

These come out on a .5 patch, thats like 2 months after a savage patch. Who would care at that point? You're basing your opinion on a Non-issue. Any Static that cares already cleared the tier or is close to. Any statics that would care would probably be casual statics, in which case, theyre casual, they wouldnt want to do anything extra. And if you mean for Ult gearing. Anyone who cares will already be doing the content if they would need the gear.

[@sadmiqoxiv]

Can we just get eureka 3.0

[@MushadX]

Materia XX like max your stats

[@TheAuron32]

honestly, Variant is so good i loved the ability to solo them, really made it feel personal, i suggest swapping roles and variant skills out too, that adds so much fun to it too. but Criterion and Savage.... the rewards need work, i know its early days but already on my server group its drying up. i dont know how long this will last if they dont do something. EDIT: Some people in my FC have pointed out that as we get more dungeons the rewards store will likely go up too, much like Unreal Trials.

[@jessem.4214]

I was thinking the same thing about the shop, but the currencies are actually specific to this dungeon, not for Varianr/Criterions as a whole. So the next dungeon could get better rewards in its own shop, but this one won’t get anything new.

[@TheAuron32]

@@jessem.4214 oh jeez, this is going to die real fast…

[@TheAuron32]

@@jessem.4214 oh jeez, this is going to die real fast…

[@TheAuron32]

Honestly Murder Mouse surprised my team a lot, we had it in our heads it would be easy... HA HA HA!!!!! no....

[@ilmalefico8431]

The only thing I would like to have for criterion normal are the checkpoints for every boss and leave one direct run for the savage

[@bladerunner4546]

Basically no real rewards for doing them? Guess I'll check out dragonflight and do M+ instead then. Damn, that's really disappointing to hear FF14 finally added hard 4 man content similar to WoW's M+ just to find out you get nothing competitive for doing them and are still forced to do the 8 man content to be competitive gear wise. If the rewards ever become competitive with savage raids then I'll 100% be playing that instead of WoW. Until then WoW is still the best game to play for non raiding PvE content imo.

[@7his7le7ea]

Extract your materia

[@MushadX]

What was that? Copeieum? O2? Huffing? I’m curious ? What’s that ?!?!?

[@turntapeover5749]

Nice concept, poorly executed on criterion and savage. The raise thing is unnecessary artificial difficulty that kinda makes me think they prefer that vs designing and calibrate punishing mechanics for 4 people and I think its lazy design because the mechs themselves arent that difficult or damaging but dying to it makes it slow down and pad out the prog/reclears time for no reason and its annoying. And the rewards are wildly underwhelming. Was looking forwars to it as its hard for me to get an 8 people static vs a 4 people at the hours i play but I thought it was overall a disappointing expericence. Annoying to prog but then overly easy to clear and no rewards worth talking about. Ill give that to them the variant version with the lore is interesting. Thats about it.

[@toychristopher]

People clamour for harder more challenging content but then also want more rewards for that content specifically because they are afraid people won't want to do the content otherwise. That makes it sound like people don't actually want to do harder more challenging content.

[@cousinrolf871]

There are various motivations for wanting to do anything. Some people want to be rewarded for their hard work, some people don't care. In that case, though, it seems to make more sense to better reward everyone as it would make the most people happy, since the people who don't care will probably still be happy with more rewards.

[@meitomiyazaki9848]

I think they could at least provide similar reward to things of the same caliber at the very least such as tomestone upgrade items or a token to exchange for one. People want to feel like they got stronger after having overcame something challenging not end up with nothing.

[@ich3730]

People like getting stuff for doing stuff. It feels good. Now, considering that the whole point of games is to make you feel good, i hope you can put the pieces together yourself :P

[@jotunn30]

It’s gonna sound mean but there’s no way you concocted this take and think you did something other than come off like you are riding the devs lol

[@SmartBatto]

BEGONE THOT BOT!

[@markup6394]

All dungeons being Variant dungeons?? - No, thank you. I understand where that desire comes from, but if you just want to grind out your rouletts for xp or tomestones or whatever... Variant would be a nightmare. Though they should make more Variants. There is a clientil for that after all. Question is: do you prefer another Ultimate or a Variant? I dont like the idea of savage-only bosses. Additional mechanics, yes, more phases, yes, but not an entire new boss. We have that already in savage raids.

[@neobahumuth6]

don't wander arount it too much just say it. It requires some glowy glamour, be it weapons or armors

[@James-kv3ll]

We only got 1 of each. No matter how good they are, that’s still not good. I don’t know why they’re so cautious with new systems. It’s gonna be a long while till the next release of dungeons like this, and delays are always possible. Tbh I’m still upset they haven’t added to the new PvP system more after releasing it. Just feels wrong to once again praise them for releasing the minimum amount of content to get people to come back for a patch. It’s exhausting. This is the most popular mmo on the planet Rn, allegedly. They have loads of resources, so it’s not wrong for someone who loves this game to expect more. The dungeons are great, but not enough to be satisfying considering the hype and long wait.

[@jotunn30]

Yeah ngl this (and how fing hard it is to find a static to do hard content if you get to it even a week late) is the reason why FF for me became the game i go back when i got nothing to play like twice a year maybe..i genuinely see it as an RPG with MMO elements at this point lol

[@TheDoddler]

I'll never get tired of seeing people call what is one of the most consistent and aggressive content release schedules amongst all mmorpg's as the bare minimum.

[@James-kv3ll]

@@TheDoddler Nearly every patch we get the same shit. New quest, new dungeon, new 4 boss raid or alliance raid. Been the same way for years now. Occasionally they throw in a new side feature or new Weapon grind but that’s usually it. It’s safe, but stale. That’s called doing the bare minimum.

[@rjmercer042]

I am pretty disappointed with the paucity of rewards for both criterion and variant. The overall format is far too repetitive and the boss mob health pools are far too large, leading to tedious fights when less than a full group. The story is interesting--but the reality is that the story (and seeing its various iterations) is the only thing that keeps me interested. Once the story is done I am done with the dungeon. They take too long and are too tedious (and too poorly rewarding) for regular play. I would rather see a better version of the PotD or HoH, at this point. It takes me longer to solo or duo one of these than it does to run a L 90 dungeon--and the rewards are less. More time/work for less "pay." I can do a CT run in less time than this takes, with less effort and get more. I can solo a dungeon with Trust in less time. I have only done Variant and do not plan to do Criterion because I do not have a static. I like the variability in the bosses--I wish it was greater. I wish the variability in paths was greater. I wish the content had more repeatability. I wish it was more difficult rather than tedious because of outsized health pools. It is an interesting idea/approach. I hope that they continue forward with it and make it more interesting and variable to live up to its name. I understand that content (especially new content) is part of the experience (the playing and seeing simply for the playing and seeing of it)--but you have to have something more than just the story unless the story is VERY VERY good and engaging--and this story is interesting, but it isn't MSQ level. It doesn't help that I am not really a Nanamo fan... lalafells kind of creep me out ;)

[@바보Queen]

this is stupid... they should have just copied mythic+

[@NooTryBee]

Da first

[@TheDraco175]

INB4 all the trash in the variant dungeons are placed to make every path equally as 10 mins longer than a dungeon should be.

[@godless1014]

Variant dungeons are abdolutely fantastic... BUT ...They don't have a lot of replayability after you've unlocked all the paths. 1 or 2 per expansion would be great.

[@Mrhappy1227]

They get replayability when we get Variant roulette :)))))))