FF14 Occult Crescent changes now coming before 7.3, thanks to emergency update

Some of the Occult Crescent changes previously planned for FF14 patch 7.3 in August will now arrive this week, producer and director Naoki Yoshida announces. The adjustments, designed to make the MMORPG's new Forked Tower raid easier to access, will instead be implemented with emergency maintenance in order to more immediately improve the experience of tackling it.

The changes coming to Final Fantasy 14's Occult Crescent are certainly much needed. The new 48-player raid introduced with patch 7.25 is a particularly challenging duty requiring careful team coordination. Getting everyone from your group into the same instance to start it, however, is currently an awkward and random process, putting a dampener on what might otherwise be a highlight of one of our best MMORPGs.

To combat this, Yoshida confirmed a sweeping set of changes during Live Letter 87, which were planned to arrive as part of FF14 patch 7.3 in early August. Now, however, two of the most important adjustments are instead being implemented early via emergency maintenance that's currently planned for Thursday July 3. Yoshida explains that these have been prioritized because of their "outsized impact" on the experience of running Forked Tower attempts.

The two inclusions are the ability to enter an Occult Crescent instance with a preformed alliance of up to 48 players (instead of having to queue in smaller groups), and the potential for Auroral Mirages (the weather condition required to enter the raid) to generate sooner after the instance has loaded. This should allow parties to get into the Forked Tower much faster and more consistently.

The other two previously announced improvements, an enhanced cipher offering UI and a mechanic that ensures Auroral Mirages won't appear midway through an active Critical Encounter, will be implemented with patch 7.3. Additionally, an instance created by a preformed alliance will now enable exclusive access for a set time, and Yoshida says the team plans on further expanding the system.

"When evaluating our development and QA capacity to release a potential emergency maintenance update, it became apparent we would be able to do so with minimal effect to our schedule," Yoshida explains. He notes that "fundamental implementation for patch 7.3 is complete, and we have entered the adjustment and refinement phase for graphical elements, systems, and battle mechanics."

The emergency maintenance for these Occult Crescent changes is scheduled for Wednesday July 2 at 11pm PT [Thursday July 3 at 2am ET / 7am BST / 8am CEST] and will last until Thursday July 3 at 3am PT / 6am ET / 11am BST / 12pm CEST. Yoshida notes that, while there is a risk of technical issues, the team "determined that the benefits of implementing these changes in a timely manner outweigh the minor risks involved and will do our utmost to ensure the update is released in a stable state."

Keep an eye on our FF14 server status and maintenance guide to stay up to date with future downtime, or perhaps try another of the best anime games on PC.

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