The following is a spoiler-free look at the four new Normal-tier raid fights added to Final Fantasy XIV in Patch 7.01.
During the Fanfest Japan event this year, the Final Fantasy XIV fanbase was given its first look at the new Dawntrail-era eight-player raid series, and to say it’s a departure from what we’re used to is a bit of an understatement. What we got to see was a shiny purple arena with spectators in stands surrounding the battlefield, the exterior of the building (looking like a 1:1 scale representation of NVIDIA’s next maxed-out GPU), and the name “the Arcadion”. At the final Live Letter presentation before launch, we even got a look at the first fight, and an accidental glimpse at the name of the encounter, tipping us off for what we were in for – where previous raid tiers had been grand, save-the-world-from-strange-forces affairs, what Dawntrail was giving the player was much more in-line with its animeque tone – a good, old-fashioned tournament arc.
Patch 6.01, coming two weeks after the official launch of Dawntrail, gave players access to the first four bouts in the series as per usual. These battles have been around for a week now, so, with this being the last bit of “normal”-tier content we’re going to get for a while, I’m here to present my own thoughts.
Starting with the overall vibe, I have to say that The Arcadion is running hard on the rule of cool, giving players the vibe of a real-life combat sport event. The item level 710 armor sets introduced for this tier are even reminiscent of WWE wrestler gear, with gloriously-bared chests and everything, and I’m very glad to see that they look great on the game’s bulkier player characters. (I was honestly considering Fantasia-ing out of being a Hrothgar until I saw these glamours, so I’d like to thank them for saving the life of my large cat man.)
As usual, until Patch 7.1 releases, these fights cannot be farmed for resources, with players able to obtain a token from each fight (and a weapon token from the fourth bout) once per week, redeemable in Solution Nine at a special vendor once you’ve gained enough of a certain token. This means that it will take at least a month to get a full set of the gear, but the Savage-difficulty versions of the raids coming in Patch 7.05 will reward the same gear with an even higher level.
Fight one is an exciting warm-up that will re-acquaint players with the arena-based mechanics that often show up in 8-player raids. It’s simple enough to get through on your first go if you’ve been able to finish all the normal-tier raids that came before this, but I liked the mechanic of the arena itself getting variably smashed up and the positioning mechanic that tasks the targeted player with not falling through broken light-glass.
The second bout is the one you’ve heard all about already, pitting the players against a pop star whose primary unique mechanic is magically infatuating the combatants into taking massive damage. While this fight is reminiscent of the controversial first boss from the Strayborough Deadwalk expert dungeon, the larger arena and more obvious hitboxes present here make it much less frustrating, though my original week-one blind party did wipe a few times to it. My week two party, thankfully, got through with no issues.
Match three is what really drives in the pro-wrestling vibe that the Arcadion is currently going for, with the opponent being a big, beefy heel-type character who taunts the player and even punches a referee after he gets caught using performance enhancers mid-match. It’s a neat little bit of combat theater that makes the fight that much more fun, and its primary mechanics push hard on the real nature of the difficulty curve in Dawntrail – you should be able to do this with a party of randoms, and the fight can be learned easily, but the player is given a tighter window to dodge mechanics and will be in trouble if they don’t pay attention.
The final round gives the player a fabled archnemesis that challenges them to their most difficult fight yet. This last opponent also smashes up most of the arena, and fires off a laser barrage with very tight margins for error. My blind party in week one made it through this on the first pull, but it was definitely a bumpy road, and the fight ends with a breathless soft-enrage that can be seriously touchy if the party (or the healer) gets distracted.
Out of all of them, I think that round one is my least favorite, but not by much, and it’s only because it’s the easiest. One of the best parts of Dawntrail has been its thoroughline of providing a worthy challenge to a player that’s seen hundreds of these fights, and I think that the second round is the best demonstration of that. Some of the mechanics it uses appear as early as Level 32, but keeping the player moving while also making it clear what is and is not hitting them strikes the best balance in terms of feeling fair.
The first set of Arcadion fights really establishes both the intention of these fights – to push the skills of players who were feeling let-down by the lesser difficulty of Endwalker‘s Pandaemonium raids – and the beginning of an exciting story full of colorful characters. Like much of Dawntrail, it’s a refreshingly upbeat take on a game well known for inflicting emotional damage, and though Patch 7.2 may be far off, we can only hope it delivers on what’s been set up here.
For more on Final Fantasy XIV‘s recent expansion, check out our review of Dawntrail itself, or for something more personal, have a look at my new monthly series chronicling my journey to finally graduate from “casual” to “expert” in this notoriously vast game.
