As shown in a new Live Letter, Final Fantasy 14 will now implement new indicators for certain mechanics in trials.
From a demonstration utilizing the trial boss Valigarmanda, the new feature will call out particular mechanics that may not have traditional markers, such as those that traditionally showed the golden text on the black background in slow-fade. An “action” noise went off, utilized in instances such as PvP and Active Time Maneuvers, and the text appears as bright yellow over a slightly-dark red text.
The Live Letter demonstration of the trial showed indicators that read something along the lines, in Japanese (thanks to Google Translate), of “Wind gathers around Valigarmanda” and “Valigarmanda grows in power.” These led into particular variants of mechanics, which didn’t have the usual AoE markers; in short, players are expected to know where to go from both the boss’s form activity and the text shown, which isn’t uncommon in FFXIV bosses.
The producers noted on the stream that in playtesting, most didn’t even notice them; indeed, older players often don’t look directly in the center of the screen in many FFXIV fights, as they will look at the boss, the ground, or their own hotbars. However, they hope this will help new players understand the direction of the fight when joining duties in the game’s matchmaking system with strangers.
The new indicators will be limited to Dawntrail bosses for now, but the team hopes to go back and implement it into older bosses in waves.
The first fight of the new raid series, Arcadion, was shown as well, but there were no such indicators present.
We've clipped the demonstration on YouTube for ease of access.
