So, I’ve been grinding away at Final Fantasy XIV lately, specifically trying to get my hands on those sweet, sweet Nightmare mounts. You know, the ones that drop from the Extreme trials? Yeah, those. I’ve heard all sorts of things about the drop rates, like how they’re super low, or how they’ve been changed over time. Honestly, it’s a bit of a mess trying to figure out what’s what. So, I decided to take matters into my own hands and start tracking my own runs to see what the deal really is.
First off, I hit up a bunch of different trials. We’re talking Garuda, Titan, Ifrit – the whole gang. I rounded up some friends, and we started farming those bad boys like there’s no tomorrow. Every time one of those whistles dropped, you bet I was noting it down. I kept track of how many runs we did for each trial, and how many times the mount actually decided to show up.

- Garuda EX: Man, this one felt like it took forever. We must have done, like, 50 runs? And you know how many whistles we saw? Three. Just three. That’s some rough luck right there.
- Titan EX: This one was a little better. We did around 40 runs, and we actually saw the whistle drop four times. Still not amazing, but hey, I’ll take it.
- Ifrit EX: This was the real pain in the butt. We did a whopping 60 runs, and we only saw two whistles. Two! I was starting to think the darn thing was a myth.
I also tried mixing things up a bit. Sometimes I’d go in with a full party, other times just a few of us. Sometimes we’d unsync it, other times we’d try it synced. I wanted to see if any of that made a difference. And you know what? It’s hard to say for sure. It really felt like pure luck most of the time.
After all that grinding, I did manage to snag a couple of the mounts. It wasn’t easy, and it definitely took way longer than I hoped. My little experiment didn’t really give me any definitive answers about the drop rates. But hey, at least I’ve got some cool new rides to show for it, right?
The grind never stops.
The main takeaway from all this? These mounts are a pain to get. If you’re going after them, be prepared to spend a lot of time farming. And don’t expect to get them on your first try, or even your tenth. It’s all about that RNG, baby. Good luck to anyone else out there trying to get their Nightmare mounts. You’re gonna need it.