Problem with Duty forced into Expansion Content...

The game prioritizes new players in the duty finder to help them get in faster. But I'm not a big fan of level boosting players to the last bit of content like WoW does... It just makes the community overall worse... At level 60 you shouldn't be a "new player" you should have a really good understanding of how the game works by the time you hit max level.

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Originally Posted by Whocareswhatmynameis

The game prioritizes new players to the duty to help them get in faster. But I'm not a big fan of level boosting players to the last bit of content like WoW does... It just makes the community overall worse... At level 60 your shouldn't be a "new player" you should have a really good understanding of how the game works by the time you hit max level.

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No disrespect but that attitude comes off as a little arrogant and somewhat elitist. I prefer communities that are actually more willing to help each other.

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Originally Posted by ddwarbird

No disrespect but that attitude comes off as a little arrogant and somewhat elitist. I prefer communities that are actually more willing to help each other.

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And your attitude is coming off as a special snowflake when you expect people to re-teach basic concepts at the stage of endgame content, when they should have developed it doing the same content everyone else did. designed to teach them the ropes without the undue strain of newer, stricter mechanics and dps, heal, crowd control checks.

Plenty of people are willing to help, the setting in which to learn the ropes, however, is important to develop a well rounded individual.

I think Whocares was more talking about how WoW gives you a free pass to max level without doing anything. The game does encourage you to help out new players through bonus's and the new mentor system. One thing I would point out is you didn't have to buy heavensward before you got to it you could of waited until you were sure you were at the expansion point and thus wouldn't of felt cheated.

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Originally Posted by Avin00

I think Whocares was more talking about how WoW gives you a free pass to max level without doing anything. The game does encourage you to help out new players through bonus's and the new mentor system. One thing I would point out is you didn't have to buy heavensward before you got to it you could of waited until you were sure you were at the expansion point and thus wouldn't of felt cheated.

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Unless you wanted to play as a Au Ra then you were at the expansion point from Level 1 :)

@Bix that would be the most expensive way to get a new race ever and it's quite desperate but to each their own I suppose.

MMOs are meant to be played with guilds. If you wanted to play alone, you should stick to RPGs.
Btw, This locked content was the best thing to limit RMT frenzy.

If you need help with queues you can go ahead and /tell me when I'm in-game
(I won't be on today but I will tomorrow...and if you see me on I'm just attempting to do beast tribes with my crap laptop >.>;;; )

Also, if you really don't care about story, you can skip all cutscenes (I do not recommend first time through, though). I have an alt I'm leveling, and I'm skipping all cutscenes with her and get about half a patch or more even per day... it's going extremely fast. That's with crappy DPS queue times, too.

I'm assuming you're queueing as a DPS, based off your class on your profile. DPS queues have always been very long :( Do you have a friend who's a tank/healer? Queueing with one of those classes usually helped my queues. Right now, I would suggest tank because they seem to be in short supply (at least on my server). Have you asked your FC mates to help you out?

This game is very heavy on main story, to do most of anything, you need to do it/keep up with it. My FC runs new players through the old content all the time. We don't carry, we tell them what's going to happen and we play and have some laughs. A good FC will make this game run so much better. You will always be forced into group content here, great comrades make it better :)

30 min queue isnt exactly long, you can go off and do other things in the mean time. I see no issue here.

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Originally Posted by Slappah

Heavens forbid an mmo make you play with other people

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Right? It's like this was meant to be a multiplayer game or something.

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Originally Posted by MeiUshu

when you have noboy in a DF you really think you have people in PF? you dreaming right ? all my primals without exception were done via DF is not a problem, IF people do them, when they came out there were no problem for those, because they actually were run by peple. Today they are NOT run by people not even in PF, at least when I am around.

So the *never PUG* is a mute point, when even your friends dont do them as it is no fun to run those old content...yeah that point

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Yes. Absolutely. People are in PF for this content rather than DF, or are doing it with FC/LS.

That would be why the DF queues suck for it.

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Originally Posted by ddwarbird

NOBODY ques for Ramuh, Leviathan etc and they are absolutely what you NEED to do in order to access the expansion

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Yea... people do. Its called "Trial Roulette". I actually got Leviathan today for someones MSQ. Its also called Party Finder. People love your noobie bonus.

In fact.. I ALWAYS get Moogle Mog for my trial roulette for someones MSQ... its getting old.

Make a PF shout that you need to clear the ARR primals and that you have bonus. The relic hunters will flock to you like a hot donut out the oven.

As someone has stated earlier there's a story reason behind it. Sadly, nobody cares about stories these days.

When me and my flatmate redid the 2.1-2.4 storylines very recently on a pair of alts (currently working on early 2.5), we didn't have to wait long at all O.o At the most, two minutes or so. Admittedly, this is probably because my alt is a tank, so when we're paired up, she (as dps) is benefiting from that. When we did Levi, I think we had five people who watched the opening cutscene (in other words, who were most likely new).
Also, we're probably on a world with higher population, which helps as well.

There are also "prime time" hours for when the most people are online. This is usually around 6pm-midnight, server time. Too far outside of that, and you'll have fewer people doing stuff, because they've already done it, or because they're busy with school/work or other irl business.

I agree that it's slightly annoying to have to do everything 2.X before getting to 3.0, especially since some parts of those patches tend to be very... "non-essential". Nowhere near as much as the Drybone sequence was back at level 20, or the whole bit around 30-32 in Costa, but it can still be very overwhelming. But once you get to the end of it, around 2.4-2.55, you'll understand why they decided to make people go through the story.

(Though to be honest, it's been very interesting to go through the 2.x story after seeing bits of the 3.x story, because the things they talk about in some of those cutscenes... When I did them the first time, I had to wait for months between each patch, so some things I saw two years ago. I barely remembered half of it. Revisiting it in fairly short succession gave me a lot more appreciation for SE's story building.)

20-30 minute queue times may not be ideal, but that or longer was pretty standard all along for DPS jobs. During 2.0 or 2.1 and on through the ARR patches, any dungeon or trial we got used to run at least 20-30 minutes of wait time before it started, and that's playing during peak hours. It could be significantly longer at other times of day. From what I've seen, the wait times have actually gotten quite a bit shorter for ARR queues since Heavensward came out. I'm not entirely certain why, but it seems they did. What used to be at least 20-30 minutes at a minimum has become typically 10-20 minutes. I've gotten into some level 50 trials in under 5 minutes, and that's on DPS jobs. It may be old content to a lot of the people playing it, but enough incentives are offered that they do still keep playing it.

As to completing the ARR story leading up to Heavensward before starting HW, I've heard it complained about a lot, but can't really see how it could be an issue to anyone with any interest at all in the story. The quests leading up to HW are telling part of the HW story, so you're essentially already on the expansion even before you get to the part that requires purchase of the expansion. Why be so eager to skip one part of the HW story just because you want to do a different part of the HW story?

i really dont see the problem with gated/locked content.. had a friend just start ff14 recently and hes already at HW content in just over 2 weeks and also agree with niwashi the queue times have been shortened drastically for more or less everything and i play as dps in everything no more then a 8-10min wait for anything ecept frontlines

OMG! I have to progress in order to progress!

Trial Roulette exists and a majority of the player base do it daily. Queue times aren't that bad.

Be patient and wait. Maybe work on some crafting while you're waiting on queue, or level an alt with some levequests, or heck alt-tab and watch a movie, there's lots of stuff to do during a queue.

Alternatively: BE SOCIAL. Make a party finder ad or ask in your FC for people to queue with you. If you advertise a poetics bonus you'll fill pretty fast.

Still many of us playing Duty Roulette / Party Finder.

As DPS, Duty - always waiting around 15 - 25 mins
As Healer/ Tank - most of the waiting time is 5 mins.

This is normal. I'm sure you could progress your story fairly easy and fast. Because many experienced players q for Roulette bonuses, they do do Speed Run of most of them.
And you should appreciate them, because while you are watching your Cutscene, you are wasting 7/3 others players times waiting for you to finish. :)

I've played a number of MMOs over the past 17 years. It's been my experience that the Final Fantasy MMOs are fairly unique in that they have a story-based progression. Most MMOs use level as the main factor for whether a player can access an expansion. Some MMOs have a ceiling where you need to segue into group content, but most do not have compulsory group content for completing a set storyline.

I do agree with the OP that consideration needs to be put into the system for new expansions. No matter how fast someone may get through content to unlock HW now, the current progression path is still fairly daunting for newer players. And the game needs influxes of new blood to remain competitive in the marketplace.

Ya, I hate that part of the game. While I did complete it, I have many alts in the game. There should be a system in place that shows if you have unlocked it on a character and the rest of your alts have it unlocked. I tend to like lvling different jobs and alts. When I finish everything on my main job I get bored because there is nothing to do. Thats why I just end up lvling on alts with friends. I've only suffered of running MSQ 2x this expac, queue times have been really bad that I gave up playing on the rest of my alts for now.

I will admit. As the MSQ treats the storyline as its just you. I would not be opposed to the MSQ being a Solo experience. Therefore having a Solo mode of all Trials & Dungeons, perhaps for a small reward of Gil, Seals, and 1 piece of gear.
Completion unlocks the group version which grants you access to significantly more gear, mechanically challenging encounters, & etc.

The solo version could per-say be a training mode. Maybe it'd help more people learn mechanics and cool off the tempers over bad players.
Folks who only want story would thus only get their story and not be forced into content they dislike.

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Originally Posted by Defias

I will admit. As the MSQ treats the storyline as its just you. I would not be opposed to the MSQ being a Solo experience. Therefore having a Solo mode of all Trials & Dungeons, perhaps for a small reward of Gil, Seals, and 1 piece of gear.
Completion unlocks the group version which grants you access to significantly more gear, mechanically challenging encounters, & etc.

The solo version could per-say be a training mode. Maybe it'd help more people learn mechanics and cool off the tempers over bad players.
Folks who only want story would thus only get their story and not be forced into content they dislike.

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I agree with you. the MSQs are some of the best I've experienced in modern MMOs, but the sheer wall of things to get to the later parts if you don't have help from an FC or friends can be very frustrating. This is especially true for a DPS who's normal queues while better than 2.1/2.2's nap needing grind are made even worse by these duties.

The people who want gated content simply want it for the sake of their ego, so they can go "look at me, look how good I am". Thats really the only objection I'm hearing. The game treats you like a single player, you are the warrior of light, nobody else in the story so why can't we have a solo mode to make it easier to get the requirements WITHOUT have to do group content.

I understand the model FFXIV is trying to use however most other MMO's have shown that if you gate content from new and returning players, you are only hurting your own profit margin and reducing the popularity of the game as a whole.

What the elitist/arrogant people forget is that the game NEEDS the returning and casual players to actually function so that content is able to be done. You are NOT a special snowflake, its just that simple. The game needs to be more accessible for returning or new players so you can get the expansion (£30 btw) and not feel cheated in content.

Oh and since I've seen the trailer for Heavensward which gives away the STORY btw, since you see it. I don't see why you cannot just skip ahead to the expansion content. Yes, the trailer, that was avaliable from Square Enix to market the game and gives away the main aspects of the story. They need to do that to MARKET the game. Its amazing some people do not understand how marketing works. Profit over story.

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Originally Posted by ddwarbird

The people who want gated content simply want it for the sake of their ego, so they can go "look at me, look how good I am". Thats really the only objection I'm hearing. The game treats you like a single player, you are the warrior of light, nobody else in the story so why can't we have a solo mode to make it easier to get the requirements WITHOUT have to do group content.

I understand the model FFXIV is trying to use however most other MMO's have shown that if you gate content from new and returning players, you are only hurting your own profit margin and reducing the popularity of the game as a whole.

What the elitist/arrogant people forget is that the game NEEDS the returning and casual players to actually function so that content is able to be done. You are NOT a special snowflake, its just that simple. The game needs to be more accessible for returning or new players so you can get the expansion (£30 btw) and not feel cheated in content.

Oh and since I've seen the trailer for Heavensward which gives away the STORY btw, since you see it. I don't see why you cannot just skip ahead to the expansion content. Yes, the trailer, that was avaliable from Square Enix to market the game and gives away the main aspects of the story. They need to do that to MARKET the game. Its amazing some people do not understand how marketing works. Profit over story.

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Since no great skill is needed to get through all the content needed to open up the 3.0 content I do not see how it can be a question of ego - you don't need to be all that good to do it and it gives no special bragging rights.

There is lots, and lots, of gated content in this game. I'd say that something like 98+% of the quests and other content in the game are gated in some way.
With that in mind there is nothing noteworthy about the 3.0 content being gated behind certain other quests.

With the various rewards in place for the Duty roulettes it is usually not all that hard to find a group even for older content. If you can join a good FC/LS it is even easier.

Like it or not, this game is built around much of the content requiring a group to get through, so if you do not like doing group content, then I am afraid this is simply not the right game for you.

waaaaaaaa why am i forced to play with other people in a massively multiplayer online role playing game??? waaaaaaaaa

I just wanted to say I perfectly reflect the OP's frustration in this. While I've cleared the content now, initially when I bought HW after a years abscence from the game I took another three months leave from it after first logging in and realizing the amount of quests I had to go through to get to the content I paid for.

Other than that, it wasn't that I feared duties would be spoiled in any way, it's the fact that JUST the MSQs themselves took me ages to do throwing gil on countless TPs, grinding through text and cutscenes which I skipped because of the shakespearian anime stereotypes.

Only thing I ever looked forward to were the end rewards of any quest that had those. I love good stories, the side stories can be engaging while the background lore is absolutely wonderful - the main story itself however, was quite awful. But here I am, still playing the game because I love it despite it's flaw. It can only get better from here, if they take heed to all your feedback.

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Originally Posted by Slappah

Heavens forbid an mmo make you play with other people

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Its the fact that you have no option to choose is the problem, and that's the whole point of RPGS. Whats the point of being an MMO RPG if your missing a major part of it?

LOL what is this thread??? OP?!

First of all, the primals, people que for daily roulettes, and I get the most random of primals every day. Moogleking, Leviathan, and even HYDRA. And then I help people clearing it for the first time.
Second of all, this is an MMO and you will have to team up with players. Too bad this game is multiplayer, right?!
And thirdly, I couldn't help but laugh when you mention WoW. There is nothing you can do gear-wise without a group. Not even leveling wise. Unless you want to spend 2 months doing quests, but that is perfectly fine.

I personally see nothing wrong with the game or the progression or the main story (and Heavensward) for that matter. I took leveling slowly and I managed to get into and through Heavensward rather quickly, in a week or two. And I consider myself a casual. Your last sentence killed the entire credibility of your post, sorry.

EDIT I as a healer get 15-20 min ques since the new patch hit, but I like to think it is the lack of tanks which is a whole different issue

The HW content was an overwhelming mass of questing in general for anyone who's taken a long break, who might not even have done all the lvl 50 quests and primals before quitting in the first place. I doubt it's the queueing time explicitly that frustrated the OP. Just the amount of grinding-content might or might not make you (depending on countless of variables to each and every individual person) feel like you need to rush to catch up, being a returnee. Even more so if you find yourself, in my specific situation though, to be weary of the story. Also, missing out on the initial feeling of novelty and challenge of an update is a good enough reason to be frustrated over. Can't really tell someone "they should've been faster in coming back to take part of the content" either. :P

Edit: Just wanted to add that by novelty and challenge, I mean, playing without being spoiled on what to do. Learning together with others, having fun in your own pace. Not being carried.

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Originally Posted by lolipuncher

waaaaaaaa why am i forced to play with other people in a massively multiplayer online role playing game??? waaaaaaaaa

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My apologies, but I wasn't aware sitting in a 40+ minute queue just to get to another hour-long queue was a good way to spend time. Considering most other world mmos don't have this same issue with the same severity, it is something of a concern.

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Originally Posted by ddwarbird

The people who want gated content simply want it for the sake of their ego, so they can go "look at me, look how good I am". Thats really the only objection I\\'m hearing.

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Stop using selective hearing.

I'm someone who came to the game 3 weeks after the 3.0 expansion. I work 70 hours a week. And I got from 50 to 60 in one week. And my friend who started fresh. Got to 50 in ine week unlocked DRK and got that to 60 in about a week and a half.

If you think people want to feel powerful over you with gates content well they aren't making enough threads asking for more gates.

The fights increase story appeal for MANY. And let's also think of the possibility of someone gettin to 60 on just MSQ and fates without doing a fight and tryin to que for A5.

The "gates" you complain about are so minor its hard to relate.

Like it felt infact Too easy to catch up to everyone to me.

I doubt anyone mean to actually point any fingers here, just saying... lets try to get less personal. :< I don't want to see anyone hurt.

Edit: A reminder that the world does not revolve around one person, no matter if it's the main character of your story.

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Originally Posted by ZerokoRival

My apologies, but I wasn't aware sitting in a 40+ minute queue just to get to another hour-long queue was a good way to spend time. Considering most other world mmos don't have this same issue with the same severity, it is something of a concern.

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This is a seperate problem that won't be solved by removing or reducing the amount of group content throughout your main story.

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Originally Posted by ZerokoRival

My apologies, but I wasn't aware sitting in a 40+ minute queue just to get to another hour-long queue was a good way to spend time. Considering most other world mmos don't have this same issue with the same severity, it is something of a concern.

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What dungeon or story primal give you a 1.5h queue time? If it was also during your datacentre prime time, then maybe you should just transfer to another datacentre.

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Originally Posted by ZerokoRival

My apologies, but I wasn't aware sitting in a 40+ minute queue just to get to another hour-long queue was a good way to spend time. Considering most other world mmos don't have this same issue with the same severity, it is something of a concern.

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How exactly do you think people managed in MMOs before the idea of "duty finders" was established? Oh that's right, they asked for help from the community instead of pretending an MMO is supposed to be completed solo.

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Originally Posted by ddwarbird

As a returning player, it was nice to read all the extra content added to the game after Heavensward was released. However this was short lived after I saw that you are required to complete ALL the story content FIRST before being able to venture into the new city.

Normally, this would not bother me but what is the point of making people do Duty's as part of that, NOBODY ques for Ramuh, Leviathan etc and they are absolutely what you NEED to do in order to access the expansion

Queue times currently exceeding 20 minutes is completely unacceptable as it creates a wall that does not allow returning players to experience anything new and thats if I get a queue at all, I can't advanced the story and actually get to the content that I paid for.

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Make new friends to do the content w/ you? Can't really blame the devs on the long que times cause they've tried, it's gonna fall back on the community in the end cause they aren't doing it.

I'm fairly new myself and I had no problem doing those trials to get to the next stage in the story. Admittedly at first I was pretty annoyed as I queued for 2 hours for one of them, but it turned out I had actually queued for Leviathan Extreme rather than Titan Hard so that was my own fault. :|

I don't think 20 minute queues is a big ask. You keep referring to WoW, and WoW has long queues too, especially if you queue for raid finder during the day on a monday or something. Also, WoW does force group content. You can't complete the last two expansions legendary quests without doing group content. You can't finish the main story without going into a raid and killing the big bad at the end of it. Even some of the daily quests required a party as you needed multiple people to summon the elites on isle of thunder for example. Speaking of the isle of thunder, you unlocked each portion as a server, so once again you were relying on others so you could see the content. Completing your class quests to get a new bit of gear involves doing dungeons...i'm not sure how you came to the conclusion that WoW doesn't force group content.

Lastly, an MMO is meant to be multiplayer. It seems you keep making threads lamenting FFXIV for what it isn't supposed to be instead of what it is.

The OP posted just after a fairly major patch day. While I too get into those mentioned trials often enough on trial roulette, on these last days I siply have had not time to do all roulettes I usually do due all the new stuff. As suggested earlier in the thread, in few days people get back to the old roulette chains and leveling content fills right up.