We want to play the expansions Jobs with the starting character.

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Originally Posted by Valkyrie_Lenneth

Actually, all he had to do was get to 50. You only need to complete the story for the 3.0 jobs.

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Honestly there isn't much difference between those two things. If you're just doing the story while you level you hit 50 very shortly before finishing 2.0.

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Originally Posted by Callinon

Honestly there isn't much difference between those two things. If you're just doing the story while you level you hit 50 very shortly before finishing 2.0.

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There's still 100 quests in the msq after 2.0 to unlock Ishgard. 100 quests is quite a lot, so new players 'will' unlock RDM and SAM before any of the 3 HW jobs.

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Originally Posted by Callinon

I have a friend who explicitly wanted to be a RDM and immediately uninstalled his free trial the instant I told him he had to get to level 50 and finish the 2.0 story first.

This is a thing I called out when the HW jobs were gated behind the entire 2.x line.

I'll restate what I said then: when you advertise a new expansion and put the new jobs front and center (which you should!), people are going to want to play them. That doesn't seem super unreasonable to me. They want to play what you showed them. But then they have an ever-growing mass of content between them and the job they're actually interested in playing. There's no reason for it, let the people play the cool jobs you're dangling in front of them.

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Didnt need to complete 2.0 story to unlock.Also if they were that impatient the game really wasnt going to suit them in the first place was it?

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Originally Posted by Metalwrath

Didnt need to complete 2.0 story to unlock.Also if they were that impatient the game really wasnt going to suit them in the first place was it?

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Yea I agree - all the friend needed to do was get to level 50 and beat Preatorium... then he/she could have gone and unlocked RDM and continued the 2.xx storyline as a fresh level 50 RDM and leave the starter class he/she played up to that point at level 50.

As to the other expansion jobs, this has only really ever been a problem with the HW jobs (DRK, MCH, and AST). They learned their lesson with that by not putting expansion job starter quests in expansion areas.... which is why SAM, RDM, and BLU have their starter jobs outside of Stormblood areas and all three of those jobs only require a level 50 job and completion of Praetorium to unlock. I see no reason not to expect this to continue with Shadowbringers jobs. So really... if DRK, MCH, and AST being the only 3 jobs that are content-gated is that much of a problem.... I don't know what to say really aside from do the content then... not like the HW content is skippable or anything so it needs to be done sooner or later anyway.

And be thankful that this game doesn't handle jobs like FFXI did.... at least our expansion jobs don't drop us back at level 1 for yet another pass through the newbie gardens.

I feel like one of those assholes who thinks this is fine the way it is. Honestly if someone isn't willing to put in some of the work to get to the job that they really want than this game or MMO's in general probably isn't for them. No company should cut lore or make drastic changes just because a handful of people are in the mindset of 'instant gratification'. The MSQ (seeing as how I went through it three times already) isn't even that bad. Sure it takes a while but if you are a new player and don't want to go through the story first to unlock the jobs than again, an MMO isn't for you.

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Originally Posted by NeocronNV

Yea I agree - all the friend needed to do was get to level 50 and beat Preatorium... then he/she could have gone and unlocked RDM and continued the 2.xx storyline as a fresh level 50 RDM and leave the starter class he/she played up to that point at level 50.

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Again, only lv. 50 is needed for RDM and SAM.

You are thinking about BLU who indeed requires lv. 50 and completing the 2.0 MSQ (Praetorium).

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Originally Posted by Ruinfeild

I feel like one of those assholes who thinks this is fine the way it is. Honestly if someone isn't willing to put in some of the work to get to the job that they really want than this game or MMO's in general probably isn't for them. No company should cut lore or make drastic changes just because a handful of people are in the mindset of 'instant gratification'. The MSQ (seeing as how I went through it three times already) isn't even that bad. Sure it takes a while but if you are a new player and don't want to go through the story first to unlock the jobs than again, an MMO isn't for you.

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You're not an asshole for that...but I think you're thinking about this the wrong way. Imagine for a minute that RDM is accessible right at the start. The player would still have to complete the hundreds of quests to finally get our current expansion. The insta-gratification part would be asking to jump all those quests just to get to SB. Ironically, one can cut their workload by a lot buying the story pot but that's not what some of these players, new and old alike want. They don't mind putting in the work, they just want to start the work as the job they want.

Now if RDM was like...an upgrade of sorts to a previous job, I'd agree, as that would be skipping a job upgrade process if it had existed. In any case, as I said before, lore and internal game rework is simply too much at this point. Maybe they can work something out in a much later future.

Tbh the 1 thing they should do is add rogue 2 creation screen lol

It bummed me out too, and I do think people forget how LONG ARR is.

There are solutions if you want but they come at literal and narrative costs.

You can buy story progression or job progression in the mog station. It's like $25. If you want to do red mage or samurai quests, you can buy the level up for one of the other job options then simply accept the quest. Same if you do main scenario progression kinda, you waltz into Ishgard and can pick up Astrologian, Dark Knight, or Machinist. Or you can just buy the Astrologian, Dark Knight, or Machinist quests... at the cost of not playing through those quests.

If you advance a default job that isn't what you mainly want to do, I will say that even on synced levels being so overpowered makes MSQ go faster. It's just less challenging.

You can get the stuff for free by being patient and working hard. You can get the stuff fast by paying real life money. In the end you have a choice.

OP, it seems to me that you're issue is having to go through the MSQ and not necessarily what level expansion jobs start. Even if all the expansion jobs started at level 1, you would still have to go through the MSQ unless you choose to use a jump potion. Even with a jump potion, you will have to progress the MSQ of the current expansion to unlock anything that is relevant. The 8-man and 24-man raids also have a fairly moderate storyline attached to them as well, so you'll be watching/skipping lots of cut scenes just to get the instances to unlock.

In short, there's no avoiding the MSQ and cut scenes in order to progress in this game. Getting to 50 with your first job and getting through Prae is actually the easiest of these grinds, and you'll likely be done with it in less than a week depending on your playtime. 2.1 onward is where the treadmill increases the incline setting. If DRK is the target of you and the people you know, this questline alone is worth the grind to 3.0, but only those who appreciate the story aspect of FFXIV will get anything from it.

This game still offers a lot for those who don't care about story and lore, but nowhere near as much as it does to the players that do. Shadow Bringers is still several months away, giving you a lot of time to get caught up. Thing is though, once you're caught up and if all you care about are the expansion jobs and getting one or more of them to BiS, you're basically pruning about 80% of the game and beelining right towards boredom. I'd definitely try to find other activities in the game that interest you during your road to max level, or it's going to end soon afterwards.

tl;dr? If you like FFXIV, then play FFXIV.