Summary
I’m not a particularly skilledFinal Fantasy 14player, so I fully understand the pressures that come with endgame content that requires you to act like you know what you’re doing.
Raiding is one of those things that many people dismiss as not for them because it’s hard, both to learn and to accomplish successfully without eating dirt every few minutes. I was one of those people, but I’m here to tell you that youcanraid, and if you are on the fence about trying The Arcadion, there is no better time than right now to take the plunge.
At the moment, everyone and their moogle is trying The Acardion. It’s a brand new raid, people want to check it out, they want that coveted new gear, and they want to do it all while it’s still shiny and new. This means that queues are at an all time low. I’ve found that even as a DPS, I haven’t been queuing for more than a few minutes. I promise you the wait times won’t ever get better than this.
“But I suck at raids!” I hear you cry. Fear not! That’s the other great thing about The Arcadion being new, no one knows how to effectively beat it yet. Even the best raiders are learning the mechanics and getting to grips with each tier, so you’re going to be one of many learning the hard way and dying in the process. Right now, everyone is far more forgiving because it’s new and unknown. I didn’t encounter a single player angry about deaths, and I dieda lot.For the second fight, our whole party wiped, and no one got mad. We picked ourselves up and tried again and, eventually, we got there.
Right now you may blend in with the crowd of others unfamiliar with the content. No one even needs to know you don’t normally raid, just try it and see how you feel. I’m certainly not a normal raider but I had a lot of fun diving into The Arcadion this week so I encourage others to do the same. I always drop a “first time” message in party chat for new content as a heads up that I may completely suck, but with the way the mechanics work in these fights, I feel like I needed a few “first time” get out of jail cards per duty type, as it was impossible for me to fully grasp it all from one run.
Don’t let the mechanics of the raid put you off, though. The raids are mechanic-heavy—not all, but most— but they’re also really fun. By the time you may unlock The Arcadion, you’ll have gotten used to this from Dawntrail. It pushes your buttons and keeps you on your toes by throwing mechanic after mechanic at you, but that just makes it all the more exciting. The latest raid series is very much in the same vein.
I saw a post online that said for the second fight, you’ll either love it or you’ll hate it. As someone who hates it, I don’t know how anyone can love it, but it’s certainly different. Have fun with that one.
The longer you leave it to dive into The Arcadion, the more expectations you will be putting on yourself. While I don’t believe that players should go into Duty Finder having pre-researched the battle, you’ll certainly encounter players who have less patience with you the longer the content has been around. Dive in and enjoy it alongside everyone else. It’ll be extremely chaotic, you’re going to die a lot, but it’ll be fun.
