Final Fantasy 14's patch 7.31 releases today—and while you can usually set your watch to these updates (we've known there'd be a new relic weapon step and a new cosmic exploration planet for a while), it's always nice when Square actually does something surprising.
Tucked away in the patch notes, Creative Studio 3 has majorly improved the rate at which players earn Aetherpool Equipment in Palace of the Dead—a bit of content that was released way back in 2016.
For the uninitiated, Palace of the Dead is a 100-floor roguelike mode. Instead of gear, you have Aetherpool Equipment that persists between runs. This can be levelled to +99, but you can also exchange levels for "grips", which will let you take the glowy appearance of your aetherpool weapon outside of Palace of the Dead, if you so choose.
This was previously a bit of a grind, but patch 7.31 has massively eased up on it. When you opened a coffer before, you'd get a minimum of one Aetherpool level—now you'll always get at least five, and the overall rate of Aetherpool level-ups has been increased. Similarly, when you beat a boss, you'll always get at least 10.
In other words, completing 10 floors and a boss will always get you 10 levels—realistically, if you open a few silver coffers on the way, you'll be averaging 20-30 minimum, which is a major increase.
I've always coveted the cool, glowy glamour of these aetherpool weapons, but I don't have a surplus of free time. Seeing Square revisit older stuff to ease up on the grind feels like a positive sign. I also wonder if it has something to do with the studio's re-assessment of content difficulty, overall.
In multiple interviews, director Naoki Yoshida (Yoshi-P) has gone on record as wanting to design future patches for all players, which I think is genuinely the smartest play. It's not that there isn't anything to do in FF14—it's that content is either strictly split up in a casual/hardcore divide, or it's one-and-done stuff that 'wastes' development time.
Making older grinds a smidge more accessible tracks with that mission statement, and heck—I might even go and rinse out some glowsticks, now. Once I'm done kicking Arkveld's butt, that is.
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