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Accessibility changes coming to ARR story with Heavensward
Eldryth
Member UncommonPosts: 18
I've noticed that a recent big topic here is the fact that all Heavensward content requires completion of the ARR storyline, and how it'll be a huge barrier to entry for new players. It's gone overlooked pretty much everywhere, but Yoshida talked about some changes being made to address this in a recent interview with Playstation Access.
All of this info comes from here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fWg1GunhILc
First off, equipment rewards will be added to the Main Scenario quests. He didn't go into too much detail here, but presumably this will help you reach the item level requirements for duties, if not bring you all the way there by itself.
Second, so that you can do the required content without getting stuck in queues for an eternity (especially for dps classes), players new to a given duty will be placed in a priority queue. Basically, you can go straight to the front of the line so you can progress your quests quickly.
Additionally, pre-50 main scenario quests will give double experience so you don't have to do side content, and if you own Heavensward you'll get experience from the 2.1-2.55 quests as well, so you can get a few levels before even entering Ishgard.
And if you have friends or a helpful FC, they're adding the ability to join with a partial group, bypass the duty finder, and not get level synced. (This part is actually from other articles) With this, if you really want to skip ahead even with the inprovements, you can just have a level 60 player rush you through the old content quickly. There are plenty of great FC's out there that would help with this.
So, for all of you who feel that Heavensward's story requirements are too big a barrier to join, do these changes fix your concerns?
Comments
the missing link in a chain of destruction.
All spelling and typographical errors are based soely on the fact that i just dont care. If you must point out my lack of atention to detail, please do it with a smile.
I don't find this to be bad news in the least, although I'm sure the droves of self entitled super hardcore players will be here to whine about how unfair it is. According to the replies you already got OP, people are under some false pretense that "Steps of Fate" was a barrier that was going to keep baddies out. Whether or not this content barrier persists or not, baddies will be coming in droves to annoy those who DO have more than a handful for brain cells. I have always strongly felt that main storyline and endgame should never cross over because its just plain stupid, that's all there is to it. No other MMO these days really forces you to do story to access all features of the game except FFXIV. Hell even a 13 year old MMO like FFXI, the story is FULLY optional, but if you do it you get a timeless and priceless item that is situationally BiS for 10+ years (and most of the story lines DON'T make you want to gouge your eyes out, who woulda thunk?). Thankfully a recent game l'm currently playing like TERA does give you a sweet starter set for completing the story but by no means does it stop you from doing any endgame (and thank god for that because man that games voice acting and lip syncing alone makes FFXIV's story a masterpiece).
In any case those returning now who quit at launch, instead of FORCEFULLY stringing them a long a total snooze fest of a story why not fragment it? Make a each patch do able separately if you want to see all the boring scenes first hand, and do a recap at the start of the main (2.5-2.55) and make them complete "Steps of Fate" either is fine really. In the end I rather them keep story separate, but as far as if it fixes anything "that could be like... your opinion...man". If they manage to make more content and less fluff in this expansion I can definitely see the game finally move forward. In the end from what I gather from the folk on the forums is, they enjoy doing the same 3 dungeons for 6 months. Here I'm doing coil and complaining that I get 1 hour of raid content a week, meanwhile you have people that or totally content with just farming tombstones week to week and collecting minions and stupid frilly vanity crap. Those are the very people the previous posts are talking about. As you fail to realize, when the game you are playing caters to idiots, you will get a lot idiots. This happens when you turn your MMO into another WoW-esque vertical progression raiding game.
Story wasn't optional in XI. You had to beat Shadow Lord at rank 5 at 50 which was the original cap. You needed to still have that requirement for the Zilart expansion.
Everything else though is like, your opinion man.
To be the best, you must help each other become the best.
FFXI Character: Satimasu
FFXI Server: Valefor
FFXIV Character: Tamorae Fonteil
You mention one major requirement that was part of the original expansion that shipped with the NA launch of FFXI, I'm so very sorry that I don't recall something to the exact detail from 13+ years ago. I shall award you with the "damn son" award for going through the extra trouble of trying to be clever regardless. Comparing the Shadow lord fight, hell even completing magicite for the airship pass with the Rank 5 city missions were a drop in the bucket compared to 2.0-2.55. CoP did have the requirement to complete it to a certain point to access SEA also, but I guess I played ToAU forward so It's not something that affected me. Going back and doing Zilart AND CoP (before they nerfed it) was actually enjoyable and challenging. Getting to see the empty zones and experiencing the music/atmosphere vs clicking on NPC's and doing and endless amount of silly tasks, compromised with some of the most bland and uninspiring characters known to man. All the characters, even minor felt more alive and memorable than anything I've seen in other MMO's not just FFXIV.
In the end SE did away with that nonsense after ToAU and trying to do such a thing in this day and age is just dumb. Although I wouldn't mind a more discussion-like response vs. a one lining jab of "Actually because of this small detail long ago in this one situation, IT IS ALL FALSE!" just to sound clever
.
Though I must say I am surprised, for one I recall that sig from many many many many years ago in glory days of FFXI. And other the other hand I'm surprised to see you, of all people that made the downgrade to FFXIV; being the invested player I recall you being in FFXI. It's a bit hazy as far as concrete details I do recall the back and forth banter or just stalking FFXI threads on here. I guess I am just really curious of your thoughts on the game and what made you finally call it quits with FFXI. Seeing as your FC was founded in the early days of FFXIV I can say you have been gone quite a while, or did just just hop straight to FFXIV when it launched and just roughed it out?
I ask you, as a previous player of FFXI because no matter how much I ask I never can get a discussion related response. I have been noticing a recurring theme with the fanboys of FFXIV (I find nothing wrong with being a fanboy, just throwing that out there) in a few small details. More often than not when talking about the game I manage to list the strong points, and the weak points of the game as a player that has been actively playing it since 1.0. Others manage to just say "It's the Best MMO in the past 10 years" and "Its got so much content I can't keep up, and I'm a HARDCORE player" and the list goes on. When asked why and where I get this fake left dodge right response or the lack of an real response past the initial robotic and poster slogan. When you mention a series of weaknesses in game design that FFXIV like other WoW-esque games suffer from my convo with foom i get the "I don't do battle content because the game has great RP elements/fluff" e.t.c.
Even foom was nice enough to at least try to make me see from another perspective. Other fanboys can't even manage to add to the discussion, they just pick at a past tense statement because it just so happens to be temporarily changed and run off. The other theme I notice in responses is "Different strokes" and I find it funny you mention it as well. As foom has mentioned, I already have my opinion of the game and it may as well never change but to at least get a response as why this game garnishes so much praise. It does nothing different from anything that's come before it, in fact its more of the same with a shinier wrapper with much less content. Its almost like the whole apple logo situation, its just a teapot but when you slap an apple logo on it the HOLY CRAP BEST TEAPOT NA~!
In the end SE being unable to pull a million subs between 3 MMO's can be viewed as a failure or as a success. I don't personally care about sub numbers, I have just never seen such a consistently blindly devoted and positive fanbase as FFXIV. People can just be free to like what they enjoy, but It feels like there is no yin to the yang. There will always be the good and the bad and what can be done better, but I never get that feeling with most FFXIV players. I'm almost convinced they are playing a different version of the game, or have ever played POST WoW MMO's previous to this one. I can't possibly be the only person that feels this way, I just want to find one person that can give me some counter points and reason to the madness.
We're cool. I don't have beef with anyone. I had only played XI and XIV before GW2 came out, so my MMO list isn't very robust.
I'm still subbed to XI, I'm just more casual with it than XIV, I log in almost every day still. I've been there since the NA launch, so I know everything you speak of. Thing is, XI had all the requirements XIV had, even more so. People talking about wanting to be a specific job out of the gate? With Zilart, people wanted to be the new jobs, well, if you weren't in the JP launch, you were level 1. Plus, you had to be only one of the six jobs. You only had to get to 30 though to start the quests, but... At 18 you had to do the subjob quests, Chocobo at 20, Kazham keys at 25, then you could finally unlock a job. Sure, you only had to do it once, but that could take a person months. That was only a small piece of the expansion.
I love XI like I love XIV. They are different games, from different times. I love the time I've spent with both (yes, even 1.0). Heck, I met my wife in XI. Just like how people say XIV is a WoW clone, XI was a EQ clone. SE makes no bones about copying EQ when making XI. But they did do their own thing with the new expansions after that. Something to call their own. I don't fault them for that. What I fault the XI team for was not making a specific PC client instead of a port of the PS2. That sealed the fate of the game from the start, and I hate that a simple decision like that crippled the game down the line.
I think the XI fans were just as rabid, even more so. It was just them trying so hard to convince people to play (I know I did). I do not agree with how as soon as some one has a teeny tiny complaint with XIV, they need to "go back to WoW", or "maybe this isn't the game/genre for you." I honestly used to scoff at people praising how awesome WoW was and all that when I played XI, like a fanboy in the console wars. It wasn't until XIV that I took a step back and saw that people like different things, and that's okay. They don't have to like what I do, even if I don't understand it. People find fun in different ways. Just like how some think the story in XIV sucks. I think it's great. The final cut scenes show how doing all the fetch quests, and helping the little guy shows what gaining the people's trust helps the hero in the end.
I'm kinda' rambling as always. But what I think is key, is that like with any MMO, friends are what make it truly fun. That's why we put up with the grinds of old. We had friends to share the burden. Well, just like now, even if grinds aren't in that way, we still have friends to do things with. Also, 2.0 was designed for a person that never played an MMO. For those people it's their first love like XI was for me. So, you'll love almost everything about it and can't explain why. Maybe that's why you don't understand. Just like they wouldn't understand us trying to say why we love XI so much.
To be the best, you must help each other become the best.
FFXI Character: Satimasu
FFXI Server: Valefor
FFXIV Character: Tamorae Fonteil
???? What the hell are you talking about?
Did you even actually read the OP and you own response and see how completely ridiculous it is what you are writing, before hitting the Post Message button?
/Facepalm
I see that you are also very snappy in your replies.
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
It only took several discussions out of several sources, but thank you for actually giving a sound response. I suppose in situations like this the most obvious reason is the thing one can always forget. I agree that friends can take any game and make it at least a lot more playable than playing alone. Ill be honest in saying I've had a love/hate relationship with FFXI over the years because if chose to fall in love with the worst job and the most underrated job for many years; PUP and BLU. I never respected nor intended to follow the ideal of "play X OP/SUPPORT job to get gear for your real job" because I watched people run in a endless circle. In the end their favorite job was geared, but if you weren't allowed to take to any other content and use it what was the point? I played some during CoP, but I didn't really get serious until ToAU when PUP and BLU got added.
I always watched from the sidelines, but unlike WoW and many post WoW blunders FFXI favored sideways progression along with vertical which made content last longer and made more gear useful. This allowed me to partake in lower man activities and still was able to enjoy myself while actually getting good gear. Making FFXI on a PS2 development kit was a terrible move I agree, and I'm glad to see that SE learned from that. I was a bit worried when I saw how the game ran on PS3, but after the relaunch on PS4 I can definitely say the game has future proofed itself. What FFXI has managed to do from just PS2 dev kits is amazing, but watching it flounder about since SoA was pretty pathetic. In the 7+ years I played FFXI on and off I can say in just the past year and a half I can finally say I'm happy with the game. Many tedious aspects and 8+ year old content walls finally got removed and I've gotten more job buffs on PUP in the past year than more than half of the jobs in the past 10 years.
SoA launch was pretty bad, they just kept clinging to the same "specific setup" gimmick fights and forced 18 man content (delve). When ilvl got added and delve became lowman things finally started to fall into place. I disliked delve for the same reason I dislike coil, so much production time wasted for a event that less than 1% of the player base actually gets to fully clear. I generally liked play with 3 of my old RL friends so when FFXI started doing 3+ party size events (one could call it "Flex raiding" from WoW) we were able to do most if not all the content lowman and make it more challenging. I tried FFXIV 2.0 and I've been playing on and off all the way to 2.55. The game made me feel like its harder to find people that are intelligent/patient higher attention span that it is to actually do the coil fights. More on that point in the next paragraph, but for now I will say the game caters far to much to casuals and promotes generally bad player choices/decisions. To be brutally honest I think 8 man groups are crap and I feel coil would do better with 6, and duty finder dungeons really need another DD slot for a multitude of reasons.
Yoshi P has such a hardon for 2 healers/tanks and its dumb, because tank swap mechanics are just overdone and needs a different direction. The closest we got to raiding was us 4 +2 really reliable/patient/intelligent players, only to struggle for weeks with flakes and baddies for the last 2 slots made me close shop. And yes Fivo, I'm a bit snappy and yes I am playing other games that pass the time for now. If I had to give a reason to my snappy nature is quite plainly I'm a bit salty with FFXIV. If it was just another MMO that was released side by side with FFXI and launched AS ARR and not 1.0 I wouldn't really care. FFXIV however was a MMO worth saving, but watching what it became made me revert that statement very quickly. 1.0 had a lot of problems, but I actively played for the last year before the servers went down and I was quite happy with 1.9 patch. That several gig patch was a miracle patch and finally put the game where it needed to be. Sure there was limited content, but the variety of things to do was uncanny.
Crafting gear with materia stood its ground to other gear, open world dungeons, open world events, open world EXP parties with really nice exp chain bonuses. I really felt like the game needed a game world rebuild, zones could be a bit smaller with more depth without the copy pasta crap and more content overall. Animations felt great and felt like they had weight, class customization was pretty nice and you actually got to change classes on the fly, and those lighting and textures mmm mmmm. I really hated the armoury system back than and even more so now >.> though. What I got in 2.0 was downgraded engine/graphics (the reason has been stated but regardless)/class limitations/role limitations/garbage crafting/gross animations(but we did have more at the least)/EXP chain nerfs and removal of open world exp parties and replacing them with.....FATES "Shudder"/ and the worst offender and the biggest hate I have of FFXIV and the cause of most problems; Duty finder. Everything is in some instance or platform, while the game world gets no real use what so ever, making a very stale and soulless game world. Vertical progression prevents most content for having an significant purpose and content walls the small amount of content that is worthwhile.
So in end you get 3 dungeons to repeat over and over, coil if you manage to find 7 other people you can raid with (for a whopping 1 hour of raid content a week) and probably the worst leveling experience of many games to date. Taking your first/partially second class to 50 pacing is fine, but if you don't play healer/tank then I hope you like FATES bro is all I'm going to say. The fact is I really hate quest grinding, and using leves for battle jobs is just terrible so FATES were fine at first. Although when stuck behind 30+ min wait timers FATE grinding is just overall more efficient and just gets so boring... The only way to level something without burnout is doing daily dungeon/hest roulette's, but I hope you like spending 90% of your characters leveling process level synced to the first 3 dungeons and never able to use your new abilities (I hear this changes in the expansion, thank god).
So yes, im a bit salty because of how ARR turned out because they truly could of made something different to make it the "best mmo I've played in 10 years". And the whole "First Love" you mentioned Satimasu, I played EQ before FFXi and yes it was a clone of many aspects but I didn't grip me like FFXI. I dabbled in DAoC too and I can safely say the first MMO you truly play seriously isn't always "the one". I know FFXIV could very well adapt to some of my liking, but the core concept the the game being duty finder and the current armoury system I feel is always going to limit it. The fact that Yoshi wants each class to have the same amount of abilities and the fact he hasn't mentioned the word "Hybrid" since 2.0 throws out the idea of me ever getting BLU or PUP in FFXIV. And even if we get it, the class roles will be so quickly gutted and limited by what i call "Yoshi P barance" that watching his idea of those two jobs would be painful to watch. Of all the true tanks from the FF universe Yoshi decides Dark knight is actually going to be a tank in this game for gods sake, what is wrong with that guy?
People like you are why MMOs die.
Would it affect you if I did not have to play the story to get to the end game?
Not quite sure if I understand the question :P.
Would it affect you if I told you that you have to clear the story to get to the end game? No really, that's not going to change so no point in generating tears of woe.
These changes will only make it easier for new players to get the needed content done. Thats a good thing. They also didnt make a easy skip all the content option. You will still have to do it and if you dont then FFXIV is not the game for you. So while making things easier over time for new players for old content they do not make current content jokingly easy so you are bored.
So none of this is bad.
It was said that getting into the story will be much easier when the game is released from the start. I don't know why people were making such a big deal out of it; the post that started it all even mentioned they didn't keep up with the news, and so they quoted old information without further investigating and people called him out on it (not to mention a simple post of "I heard this, what is being done to make it easier" would've been more suitable rather than something that seemed to be a thread to spread fear rather than a PSA). This relates to the "I have to rush to the newest and shiniest" mentality of games today that just doesn't fit with FFXIV. They don't implement these features right now simply because there are those who want to finish it the old way before being able to rush through everything or be a part of the "easy mode". It's the same way with other games and nerfing raid bosses; some guilds want to finish the harder version before the nerfed content is released to be proud of an accomplishment.
Granted, I applaud anyone trying to make threads further revealing the truth of the matter. People read something and jump on it without conducting investigations; even a column thread was made on this without really mentioning what was known for months that the "barrier" will be weakened come the expansion's launch.
I just don't get why you would want to skip the content. I could understand dreading the story mode dungeons and such because of wait times. Looks like they are addressing that though.
The main story feels very final fantasy and is quite entertaining, don't skip it.
You would be hard pressed to find anyone who says the game has no faults. Inventory is abysmal. The inability to transfer items to your alts is infuriating. Housing districts are poorly thought out and the limitations of Large houses is insulting. The armory system has serious flaws and makes me wonder what they were thinking. Attunements and gating is out of this world ridiculous -- but at the same time you get that sigh of relief when you accomplish something that has left the genre for some time (but at the same time some may claim there is no content because they simply don't know about them or can't be arsed). Class design does not make sense with come classes; Paladin is boring to play due to the GDC and lack of off cooldown abilities that matter (though I like the GDC with Dragoon, Monk and Ninja), I despise seeing "FATE JOINED" when running past an area and enjoying the scenery. Housing prices were a problem in the past; they were stupid enough not to allow house transfers, so now people get conned into double paying and potentially getting nothing. The beginning of the game is horrible and they gave no effort differentiating starting guild quests; they could've made them more interesting as a whole. Linking some dungeons to the story had cases where it was bad (in particular when Ninja was released and DPS had 200 minute queues; this is supposedly fixed in 3.0), having alts punishes you, unlocking new roulette systems is a pain as it forces you to do otherwise optional content, Linkshell player limit is too small, personal housing isn't as good as Free company and you can't expand, the game (2.0) started off weak, had problems with such things as gil acquisition and content (mainly for those with WoW mindsets); it was just a core that I despised and quit for a time. I boycotted playing this game for at time after the prices for housing were shown off. When joining a Fate or a dungeon, it really sucks not having access to skills. This ruins your rotation reflexes, causing you to rearrange skills that are suddenly useful again, using new poisons that are stronger, and overall being a pain in the rear. My hope is they change this, especially if they're lifting the level sync for old dungeons in the expansion. Leveling a chocobo is a pain in the posterior and the new Chocobo Stables feature barely did anything to help (or maybe I just don't understand it; I don't understand a lot of the game and haven't played half of the content it offers despite it being my current main). The group composition is horrid. They went for an old-school "four player adventurer" party, without considering that it is an MMO (or perhaps in spite of). One tank, one healer, two DPS has caused as much problems as releasing a DPS mid-game. Two Healers, Two tanks, four DPS as well. Though they changed that to one tank, two healers and five DPS with later raids starting with, I think, 2.3 or 2.4 as a whole. In addition to them having some fates be requirements for a couple quests -- which they kind've limited thereafter in seeing how many people disliked this. Also, tanking (to me) is boring in this game (hoping Dark Knight will be more entertaining) mainly because of a lack of off the global abilities and locking such things as stuns to a 2.5 cool down (in the case of a paladin).
The list goes on and on. But as a whole, it also has a lot going for it. Some of which I already posted up top, in addition to an overall nice community, difficult game play, amazing music, graphics, updates, fun, etc. In truth, it's becoming more of a unique entity with each patch. The crafting and gathering are amazing as well, coming from someone who focused on making Ninja Tools in FFXI and became a Grand Master Blacksmith / miner back in UO before power hours and such. In essence -- and this may be difficult to believe -- this game reminds me of what I would think when Old School MMOs meet newschool Themeparks with the amount of trouble it offers, while at the same time having an okay amount of accessibility and knowing when to make that aspect even better (such as an expansion release). Not to mention systems in place to encourage good behavior (and learning from the whole "speed run" fiasco of speed vs. story at the start of the game). The overall feeling that it's a Final Fantasy game, as well as the direction that it seems to be going with patches and the newest Expansion whereby they are implementing things that players and veterans have been requesting. for some time.
The game is in constant flux and learning. Frequently updating with a lot of content, and beginning to differentiate itself as a whole from the core product -- which I agree was not good. The above team composition was actually changed a few patches ago to a one tank, two healer, five DPS build. The GDC is being reworked in the expansion. The way storyline dungeons work, as well. In addition to the size of zones, among other things. They're even in discussions about adding Snowboarding and Blitzball as fun side activities (which is content, and new systems, even if it doesn't add to ilvl progression). With the end of 2.55 we are really starting to see the direction they're moving in. One of story, and where that story is actually somewhat interesting. It is truly becoming a sort of never ending Final Fantasy RPG game... which is something I've wanted since picking up a JRPG and enjoying it so much that I didn't want to beat the game and have it end.
With Direct X11 there will be significant changes to lighting -- not that 2.0 is bad at all, as you can see the effects of weather, and certain lights as you move closer and back away. The role limitations -- that is, having more restrictions on what can be used as a whole -- is a 1.0 nostalgia problem. I had it as well. Though new players would not care one bit other than saying "that sounds cool, I guess." -- Actual response once. The character models may look slightly different, but the environment as a whole looks much better, mostly due to design and not being copy pasted. Animations are a matter of taste; I enjoy most of them, save the paladin and Black Mage. The crafting is 10x better than 1.0 (crafting was my thing in 1.0), mainly because I don't have to wait 15 seconds between each command or standing up / sitting down to craft. What is kind've disappointing is the fact you can powerlevel yourself with leves, whereas you only got minor experience and a lot of materials for doing leves in the first. But as a whole the meta for crafting is hard to learn and master, as manipulating the economy is part of it. At present, I make about 1-3 million a night. Perhaps, then, being a part of the meta makes me enjoy it simply because I make the gil. There's something definitely "feel good" about making more gil in a night than others have ever had.
This is where I don't know where you're getting your thoughts or numbers from. Though I'd have to learn more of your mindset; if you view the "most efficient" to be the only "content" worthwhile. That said, there are many ways to level. Level with friends doing dungeons / guild mates. Daily roulettes give a full level. Hunting logs. Weekly logs. SIght seeing. FATES. Leves. Chocobo grinding. Farming. Etc. What is available in other games? In WoW, it's just dungeon grinding period, at the moment. 2-3 levels per dungeon 1-60. Which some would say is work, as it takes no effort at all now. It's not impressive to see a level 90 when they can be bought or leveled in an couple hours. But it's also several expansions in, whereas FFXIV is only just now start to make old content easier to get past. In addition, leveling other classes is optional. Some things such as Blood for Blood might be good for other classes, but as you said, a second or third class leveling isn't that bad. Maxing it all takes a lot of hard work. Many people are allergic to hard work in a MMO these days. But they do give you a 50% experience boost.
It was a decision between Samurai and Dark Knight for tanks. Tactical moreso than anything, as Dark Knight and Samurai are popular classes, and we "need" popular classes in positions that are rare. Mainly because Tanking is so damn boring in the game due to the GDC (which, again, I enjoy the GDC as a DPS). My "first love" was Ultima Online. It then became FFXI and then World of Warcraft thereafter. Tried most other games that released after WoW, but pretty much stuck with it until FFXIV in 2010 and dabbled with them both on an off. Personally, I don't think BLU or PUP are that far off. Though PUP has a higher chance of making it in the rooster, in my opinion. Red Mage will likely get in as well, as it's a really popular class. My main gripe is that they're introducing classes that few people know about (if they didn't play tactics) as opposed to ones of nostalgia that many would pick up the game just to play them.
Though that leads into the whole "they should let me play everything at level one" debate that's been going on. No arguments with the logic, but at the same time it reeks of "give me everything now because I want it" mentality when that's not what FFXIV has been about int he past. Especially not when it first came out, but I think that was moreso an issue of the game's engine.
In closing, I'd like to think that I'm supporting the team more so than I am the game. They've been open, honest, willing to admit mistakes and constantly updating their game with massive amounts of content and system updates. I feel like a valued customer when I play their game, when I read their decisions, when I look at the systems they added or updated. But I'm also an RPer that appreciates the direction they are going, as well. Adding in little touches like idle animation permanent stances, sleeping in beds, housing, marriage (amazing detail, by the way) etc. Not to mention the way it promotes good will in the community. I genuinely feel like I'm a part of something when that hasn't been the case in a long time. They are doing everything I would want WoW to do, and more. They actually require me to work to get the things. Not holding my hand or having a large screen come up saying "NEW IN THIS PATCH: BUGGER ALL." like in WoW; you have to go out and find it. The myriad of new things, systems, updates to systems, saying "oh, wow... that didn't do that before." Plus the way they're adding new things -- and the rate they are -- with most companies dangling such behind another expansion paywall. How it's differentiating itself from other games in these updates. The refinement of things in Heavensward (of what was talked about) and graphical updates using directX 11 with new lighting and graphics. In essence, a lot of people are trying to find a new home, and FFXIV is hitting a lot of the right notes, and people have seen precedence of them willing to keep on supporting the game through thick and thin... changing what is a popular suggestion or what needs to be changed. There's hope. There's a future here. Other games may be great as well, perhaps better? But in a world of B2P or F2P where content revolves around cash shop, this being the only proven P2P game with a history of actual support... Well, there is little else to say to a specific crowd of people (that also enjoy storyline and or Final Fantasy) other than: "Welcome home."
Phew, I actually managed to read about 90% of that and holy crap man SPACEBAR AND PARAGRAPHS....DO YOU KNOW WHAT THEY ARE????!!!!!!?!?!?!?!?!? Though I am glad you acknowledge the games faults, it seems to be quite the rare case these days. I don't think I ever considered the idea that I'm "comparing" FFXIV to WoW, if anything I'm just explaining the faults of pure vertical progression as a whole. Content can exist for the pure reason of enjoyment, but when you design in a way that it provides a varied experience. Fighting things in FFXI can be done for pure enjoyment for me (opinion) because monsters feel like they are alive, the don't do a short moveset or 40 move pre determined set of moves in a set order. Monsters in FFXI have a list of TP moves/magic/abilites they use at random and generally the list gets larger and deadlier at different HP %. Having things to consider like the specific job the monster can be/elemental/debuff immunities/monster family and other traits like Cockatrice = herd you liek getting stoned e.t.c.Outside of Savage modes (a small portion of content) such a thing does not exist in FFXIV making each fight fun for the first time until you figure out the dance routine, and make it dead in the water afterwards.
Large portions of FFXIV content function in the way mentioned above, and the lack of sidegrades and alternate items further stagnate the overall longevity of content. Other games at least try to make it OPTIONAL with rewards that can be used for other specific purposes, but SE enjoys taking the extra step and FORCING certain content upon you to access parts of the game. The reason why I don't call WoW out so heavily on stagnation of content (but still heavily suffers from it) is that it allows alternatives in the form of there being more options and chances to get that gear slot upgraded each week if said boss doesn't drop it. The extreme content gating in FFXIV is what heavily deters me from enjoying the game. On another note, while content gating was a popular thing in FFXI, it wasn't a MMO that chucked its content as quickly as current MMO trends. There is nothing more true than the average fanbase of FFXI being 100x more hostile and biased than the average FFXIV white knight. The thing is when I'm comparing FFXIV vs FFXI and vice versa, FFXI is not immune to criticism just because I am currently playing and enjoying the game.
The level cap increase and the addition of ilvl in FFXI has been met with lots of hostility but as years went by and the ilvl of content increased, the current ilvl of gear remains at 119. This brought back the diversity of gear and the birth of situational/augmentable gear options (except it wasn't terribad like evoliths and synergy "shudder") in ToAU. Gear augmentations essentially allow you to spin a wheel and hope for a specific stat at a mid/max roll. Re augmenting is possible by doing a series of 3 diverse forms of skirmish content that can be adjusted by difficulty/length/rewards with various different floor layouts. The addition of a boss floors changes the pace quickly and effectively makes it different enough to not get boring quickly. The older versions of this content are still relevant because the previous sets have a augmentable stat that was NOT put on the new sets and some of the mage gear still has more offensive power IF you don't need to worry about accuracy e.t.c. And this is just one event of many to do! Most importantly the gear level remains the same, preventing ilvl inflation syndrome (pure ilvl will always beat secondary stats when acc isn't concerned) like in FFXIV. Does augmenting feel like a very cheap way to prolong content? Of course it does, but having the ability to keep making my character stronger by having more time to do it is better than dancing around content walls. Class diversity and job points have brought a very nice way to bring exp parties back and create a way to increase the strength of your specific job further.
Every game has their own flaws, and I wouldn't be here complaining about the way FFXIV does things if I didn't want it to become more successful. So that I can stand behind it with the white knights and be glad to part of something that is taking a step forward in this stagnant market, not two steps back.If this game was beyond saving I wouldn't be here wasting time writing paragraphs. The game has a solid foundation, but I want people to do more that accept everything blindly, dare to make it better.Something that people fail to admit nor understand is the person that complains the most, cares the most about said games success. Because you care to sit down and voice your concerns and list the strengths with the faults, because you don't just "settle" since its not just about how amazing it is; its about how much more amazing it can be. This of course requires your concerns to be genuine and not troll bait and 100% bias, but if you can manage to exhume that from a persons opinion then its good feedback.
In closing the storyline is not something that' hard to do at all, its just something that should be separate from the core game. There will be changes to lower the "difficulty" but still forcing players to string along old and done content is just stupid. If the storyline consisted of small battles that were soloable, instead of forcing boring group instances then I would say just do it. Making a one time GROUP instance that will only be done once in many parts of the story is bad design.This goes back on the idea of the duty finder system, go and start a new toon and get it the the part of the main story where you do "Cape westwind" and tell me if it takes you less than 2 hours to get a pop, I dare you. "Get a FC to help you out" isn't the answer, its a personal storyline that is centered around YOU and just you so poor game design should not be promoted in this case. The most interesting part in all of this is that Yoshi has stated so many times "2.0 is done, this is a WHOLE NEW CHAPTER in FFXIV" so why do i still need to give bobby those lentils and chestnuts? If that chapter is said and DONE then at least fragment the story. Give the returning players the recap and make them do 2.5-2.55 and call it done. If they want to do the boring fedex quests and watch as the games "slow cooked" story slowly moves along then let them. The meat of the story and buildup is in 2.5 onward and the 1-50 main story does enough to let players know what purpose and role each character plays in the main story + recap = good to go!
With regards to my writings, what may have happened is that I intended each section to originally be smaller. Though as it was a singular response written in retort to very specific sections, there was no immediate thought that it was needed. This was clearly not the case.
That said, I'll respond to the later portions, as most of what was said was personal opinions or wishes.
The foundation of the game -- its core -- has been something I've been skeptical of from day one. Though the director has seen massive updates to the game in both the past and present. There is no doubt they're building on it with each patch. The best kind of fan is one that find criticism in a game and presents ample ideas on how they think it should be fixed. They can be put off by people defending a game, but those who defend it are equally thusly by the many trolls who unjustly attack games they have little knowledge of. Soon it's a cycle of flames where there is no victor as a whole.
In terms of the grouping content, they made changes to allow priority for those who need the storyline. In addition, there are many systems such as the group finder, talking in chat, linkshells, free companies and making friends. In truth, I've leveled 15+ characters on my legacy accounts (I've been quoted in saying this many times before and I'm not just bringing it up now in response to you -- it's also the only way to be able to transfer between alt characters by yourself). Most of them have finished the storyline up to 2.1. So I do have experience in using the dungeon queue via storylines (perhaps moreso than anyone in the entire world), and honestly, it has never been beyond a 20-25 minute wait (excluding Ninja release). The latest one was about three weeks ago. As for the boring quests, I will agree with you only with any that exist with the 2.1-2.5 questlines. If you're a level twenty something, I fully expect -- realistically and as a Role player -- you to still be proving yourself. To come across scenes whereby someone is in distress and you, being a small time (potentially just lucky) hero are just fit for the job. Building your reputation as the primal's bane up until what happens to The Waking Sands after the level 34 quests and you're on the run. If you're reading the quest, the context, etc. and have an interest in it. It makes sense; you're a part of that world. The only thing that needs to be removed are how boring the starting quests are, while maintaining the prospect that you're a level 1 nobody. Switch out rats with training dummies for that level one guild quest. While it serves as a tutorial on how to exit the town as well, that can be done in other ways and training dummies will allow for the guild master to watch your form without running a long distance and giving players a bad taste in their mouth of an instant kill quest when the game is focused around context and story.
Part of the story in 2.0 is the building of your character up from a nobody. Of character development for your fellow Scions, as well as the leaders of the nations (and even villains). If things are cut in the initial story, we have no idea how it will effect the feeling of getting to level 50 with only have the context available. What kind've emotions or story or feelings one might have by the time you reach 2.55. Indeed, they already mentioned doubling the experience gained for quests in the old content. This in itself elements the need to do fates at around level 42 to keep up with the storyline. The parts that aren't related to the storyline are then cut out. No more hours of grinding; you should be at the correct level at all times when starting a new character in the game. Add to that the priority queue system and the ability to enter dungeons with any number of people and beat it. To me, this is focusing on the story and making it easier to get to level 50 content both without just irresponsibly taking out content to unknown effects (thus taking more development time as a whole trying to piece it all together).
All this work when they could have just made access to the new jobs a short quest like it should be.
Putting new content behind a 2 Month content wall is just a bad decision. Even with these changes a casual player will spend at least a month catching up before he can play the new classes. This will certainly not help increasing the already dwindling sub numbers.
The problem here is Yoshi. He has a "vision" and a massive hard on for his way of doing things, like tank swapping, dual healers, repetitive boss phases and endless token grind. Either do it his way or get lost. When people start to do bosses any other way than he wants them to do it, he nerfs the classes or abilities like he did with Titan tanking Ramuh.
This game is going to hit a brick wall soon with this joker on the wheel.
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if anyone in the internet what does wall of text means, I will link them this thread.
sorry but it had to be said XD
What do you mean by a "2 month content wall" ?
A normal person who skip cutscenes can go from 0 to 2.5 on 2 weeks, and a hardcore player on a single week maybe less. And if you like to watch cutscenes and read dialog then dunno why are you crying about the content wall. There is not a 2 month content wall, there is just people who don't want to play the game to reach the endgame
The only bad thing about the expansion (from a new player perspective) is the way to unlock the new classes, but it actually makes sense because of how classes work (you need somebody to teach you and train you and there is not even a single master of those classes outside of ishgard)