Pie and I haven't really been focused on endgame progression for quite some time. We always liked the concept, but in practice, it's just not something that ended up gelling well with the way that we liked to play. As I've mentioned before, we are naturally more leisurely and take our time enjoying the content, so we usually just kinda plod along at a snail's pace to get to where we want to go, merrily traipsing around wherever our meandering hearts take us. It's worked for us in the fact that we like to be able to take in all the details, but sometimes the allure of seeing the hardest content that a game can throw at us becomes too strong because we are both hopelessly masochistic.

In FFXIV, Pie and I have been slowly working toward the *idea* of possibly doing end game progression in the fact that we wanted to make sure that we could join our friends for the content they were enjoying by improving our gear. Brie, for instance, is at the very edge of content and it's often been frustrating to feel like we're missing out when we do desire to see what friends are raving about. We decided to finally get around to doing Void Ark and Weeping City, which kinda served as the appetizers for much bigger meals. Before we knew it, we were clearing all of Alexander Normal (which was a really great raid with an awesome story, btw) and, just recently, attempting to clear Sophia EX.

Pie and I have had a history of being able to take on the harder content when the stars align and we have the gumption to push forward, but naturally we aren't as seasoned as other raiders who are well practiced and have been battle hardened over time. Even though it can be frustrating to fail, through it we've been learning the hurdles that have been previously unknown to us and it's been rather exciting for both of us to puzzle out what we need to do in order to be better players and more efficient at our jobs. On top of that, it's started rekindling the guild leader spirit in me that really enjoys coordinating a group of people to do hard content, so I've been working on getting a static group together to really buckled down on progression because I desperately want to enjoy fights while they are fresh, and preferably, before people start relying on video guides. My ultimate goal would be to learn the fight fresh with a team of people so it gives that satisfaction that we were able to actually figure out the fight under our own ability.

It feels really great actually being able to sink some serious time into a game again and not feel overwhelmed by dysphoria. It certainly feels like I'm getting back on track and finding some good work/play balance...we'll see~