At Ultimate Fantasy 14 FanFest 2023 North America, attendees got the chance to problem Asura, the upcoming Primal Trial that may seem by means of a brand new content material patch. As one such attendee, I took this chance in hand and fought my means by means of the FanFest on-line queue (which required attendees to uninstall and reinstall the app to get it working correctly) to mark my place in keeping with different potential Warriors of Gentle to sort out this new Trial.
For these unfamiliar with Trials, they’re successfully 8-man boss fights gamers can take part in. These cases are arguably my favourite a part of Ultimate Fantasy 14, so I used to be tremendous desirous to battle Asura and see what she’d convey to the desk by comparability to earlier Trials equivalent to Heavensward’s Nidhogg, Endwalker’s Golbez, or Stormblood’s Susano. Ready in line I ended up pulling collectively a gaggle comprised of James Galizio of RPGSite, and the next Warriors of Gentle: Thallan Gildeford, King Ma, Ishtar Valentine, Worstluck NA, and Kini Solis. The ultimate 4 in that line-up are five-time Legends, which implies they’ve cleared all at the moment out there Final fights — a number of the hardest items of content material within the sport.
Ready in line we mentioned what Job Lessons we’d be taking part in, and I assigned myself the function of White Mage, because it was what I used to be most comfy with and had essentially the most expertise in. Whereas I do take pleasure in taking part in Tank as Gunbreaker and DPS as Summoner, I jumped in as a White Mage as I had for earlier Battle Challenges (notably Thordan and Susano at Gamescom when these fights respectively appeared). After establishing our hotbars, ensuring we had the correct abilities in the correct locations, and chatting amongst ourselves, we have been prepared to leap into the battle and take down Asura.
The particular battle encounter at Fan Competition 2023-2024 might be…
The Gilded Araya! ✨
Attendees could have an opportunity to attempt it early earlier than it is formally carried out into the sport at a later date! pic.twitter.com/Q5ox8YZNKM
— FINAL FANTASY XIV (@FF_XIV_EN) Could 12, 2023
Nonetheless, as soon as we bought into the battle, it was the identical track and dance as earlier trials. Asura was hardly difficult, and regardless of my sub lapsing for upwards of three months, I had no points co-healing alongside our Sage. Possibly it was as a result of he was extraordinarily good on the sport, or as a result of White Mage is straightforward to get again into, or possibly this even speaks about how one can shortly get again into the groove of issues in Ultimate Fantasy 14, however Asura was straightforward. Extraordinarily straightforward.
She featured the entire hallmarks of a normal Ultimate Fantasy 14 battle: Telegraphed assaults, Tank busters (extraordinarily hard-hitting assaults reserved just for the Tanks), and orange AoEs on the bottom that may typically manifest in massive circles or rings. There was additionally a mechanic the place she would channel a bigger model of herself to then spawn orange rings on the bottom that we must run out of earlier than getting hit and receiving a negligible quantity of harm and a vulnerability stack. I can’t communicate on any of the music, as a result of for some purpose the audio wasn’t working for my setup. And earlier than we knew it, the battle was over.
:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/24817744/20230728_134906.jpg)
Picture: Sq. Enix through Kazuma Hashimoto for Polygon
Asura was felled, and we emerged victorious. All of us have been silent, nearly stunned it had ended as shortly because it started, however then we piped as much as congratulate each other. We exchanged data and parted methods. I needed my workforce effectively on their subsequent Final clear, and advised James I’d be heading again to my lodge room to chill down.
A part of me wonders if Asura was straightforward due to the group I used to be in, or if Asura is an indication of Artistic Enterprise Unit 3’s dedication to creating content material extra approachable for all gamers. If the latter, they nailed it. Not like when Nidhogg launched on the tail finish of Heavensward, I can’t see folks getting caught and having to make use of Social gathering Finder to clear the battle. If something, I’m to see what her Excessive battle might be and what different mechanics might be layered on. In the long run, it was a pleasant expertise and an effective way to bond with different gamers, even when it was simply 5 minutes of their time.
