The recent Final Fantasy XIV Live Letter From the Producer announced two new types of dungeons that will be available to players for FFXIV Patch 6.25. The dungeons are called, Variant Dungeons and Criterion Dungeons. In addition to this, the Criterion Dungeons have two difficulties a savage and a non savage version. We’ll go through the differences between the dungeons.
Variant Dungeons
Variant Dungeons are designed for Level 90 casual play for 1-4 players. Players can queue solo, as a pre-made group and as matched group. Matched groups will be 4 players.The name comes from the variable difficulty of the dungeon. The strength of the enemies will be determined by the size of the party. This would mean that if you go in the dungeon as a single player, you will face easier enemies compared to going in with four players.
There will be no role restrictions inside the Variant Dungeon and players can change jobs while inside. The route of the progression will branch of based on player actions. A hint was given that we will be exploring the first dungeon (The Sil’dihn Subterrane) with a yet to be named NPC.
The branching nature of this mode will mean that in order to experience the different variations, multiple playthroughs will be required.
Criterion Dungeons
Criterion dungeons will be visually similar to the Variant Dungeons. They are identified with the prefix of ‘Another’. For example ‘Another Sil’dihn Subterrane’. Unlike Variant Dungeons this is a high-difficulty challenge for 4-player parties. Roles types are also restricted to one tank, one healer and two DPS. Yoshi-P mentioned in the Live Letter that you can think of these as the ‘Extreme’ version of the dungeon.
In this mode, normal modes of resurrection are prohibited, however each player is granted a limited number of revival actions. This will mean that the resurrection ability of for example the Red Mages or Scholars will not work. However all players will have a limited revival action which would mean that Tanks and other DPS will also be able to revive other players. Also in this mode, if a group is KO’d (wiped) enemies that have previously been defeated will not be revived.
In this mode, players of a group less than four will be supplemented via match making.
There will be a higher difficulty (Savage) version of the Criterion Dungeon which will provide additional challenges to players.
In the savage version, it is only possible to enter on a premade group of four. In addition, there will be no resurrection methods provided. If the party is KO’d or wiped, then all previously defeated enemies will be resurrected. There is also a ‘soft enrage’ where enemies become stronger if they are not defeated within a certain time limit.
This is definitely an exciting addition to the game which has varying difficulties for all types of players. We should know more about it in the future closer to the release date.