Whats FFXI about 'cos i cant seem to find anything except grinding?

monkeytroll

After about 6hours into play i started to wonder "whats FFXI about all ive done is grind , shop & explore" and asking around players that seems to be all there is to the game so please tell me this isnt true and there are like huge qeust series , bosses and so on .....

Monkeytroll

no disrespect to the game i love it jus wondering if theres anything else to do?

Telaki

First, FFXI is a VERY time consuming game. On average it takes a New person about 1 Year to reach the max lvl on 1 Job (lvl 75). Some people can do it sooner, some take longer (Like Me, 2 Years in my highest job is 70 I hate the Level grind ~.~ So boring... But that shows you there're still things to do other than lvl =P)  After the first time, when you have the money, the knowledge and a bunch of quests/missions Completed that had stoped your lvling the first time, 1-75 Can be done in a few months. But that depends on what job you play, Mage jobs Generally get invited to parties sooner, And some Melee Can sit around for days without a party. And this leads to my next point, FFXI is VERY party dependant, A few jobs can solo  effeciently at certain lvl ranges, Beastmasters are the only ones who can solo 1-75. Roughtly, If you don't have a party You CANNOT exp, If you don't like that then go play WoW, Seriouslly.

Okay, there are literally thousands of quests, Some are small, some arnt. Some give you info about the game's Lore, others just give you items.  Some are stepping stones to other questions and so on. Then you have the Ranks, 1-10 I forget how many Rank missions there are, but as you do them you learn about the Nation your in. (Windurst, San d'oria, & Bastok) Each nation has 10 Ranks, They're a series of missions that your home Nation issues. Basically, After rank 6 (You need to be Rank 6 to start the ZM missions (First expansion)) You'll just learn about the story, and be given access to new Conqeust items and such. Then you've got ZM missions there are 17 I belive, I've done 12. Umm You do ZM's to get access to Sky (You may join a few exp parties there, but its mostly for endgame people who form alliances and go fight the sky Gods). If you complete the ZM's you get a choice of some very nice rare/exclusive earrings. Then theres CoP (2nd expasion, You DO NOT have to beat the expansions in order, They give missions/items/quests/new area's without having to beat a prior expansions) Missions on this one too, There are a few new regions that you have to unlock (Do CoP missions) Again new items, exp spots, more endgame stuff. And recently theres the ToAU expasion, Don't have much info on this one, There are missions, its for a lot of endgame people. New cities, umm theres besieged (The beastmen there can attack the Cities, And you.. along with a few hundred other people, and Some NPC's fight them off protecting the city. If you lose they can kidnap NPC's and you have to go get them back, or do without....)

So in conclusions, there is an enormous amout of content in this game. But a lot of it depends on your level. (Meaning you're going to have to level grind, if you want to get to the fun stuff <.<) , except a lot of the CoP missions are level caped (Meaning when you do them it'll temperally lower you lvl to do a battle or through an Area) Like the Promyvion that start you into CoP are caped at lvl 30. Theres also crafting, and your money making schemes, playign with the Auction houses to make a few bucks. And of course the Social aspect. Like I said its party dependant, So you will have to meet people, And unless you pay, You're going to need help with a lot of things. So make friends, Join a Linkshell, Have fun. Its a game afterall.