/r/ffxivdiscussion: XIV is becoming too big MSQ wise?

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Originally Posted by Asari5

it will become a mess though when new player start on lvl 90 without knowing anything about ff14 combat

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It's a reasonable concern until you think about what the MSQ actually teaches the player or how the MSQ gameplay progresses throughout the story, what it asks of the player.

And you'll find that it's not only so completely toothless but instances of actual combat with your chosen job become less and less in general as you progress through expansions, you could do 100 hours of MSQ and learn pretty much nothing already.

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Originally Posted by Absurdity

It's a reasonable concern until you think about what the MSQ actually teaches the player or how the MSQ gameplay progresses throughout the story, what it asks of the player.

And you'll find that it's not only so completely toothless but instances of actual combat with your chosen job become less and less in general as you progress through expansions, you could do 100 hours of MSQ and learn pretty much nothing already.

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Just to emphasis this more. The Trusts are capable of handling big pulls. Alphinaud can even do the super pull in Mt. Gulg. Not the whole way but where the rock wall breaks. It's far from easy and generally significantly easier with Warrior but doable. Obviously, baby players won't be doing this but it does highlight how absurdly easy dungeons are nowadays when bots can handle them. If you're doing small pulls, it's nearly impossible to wipe.

Furthermore, we already have both a tank (Gunbreaker) and a healer (Sage) starting at higher levels with no restrictions whatsoever when people pick them up. Adding to that, jump potions exist. Suffice it to say, everything exists to already make DF a theatrical mess and yet... it's no difference than it ever was. People who care to learn will seek out information online or ask players. Meanwhile, the others won't give a damn no matter what level they start at. Hence why you still see some players crying how they're "learning!!!!!!" at level 90.

The long and short of it is FFXIV does a terrible job of actually showcasing how classes work and the entire MSQ is designed to be exceptionally easy save a handful of dungeons along the way. For every Holminster Switch, you get 5-6 dungeons that can't so much as bring the tank down to 50% much less kill them. Especially if you're doing smaller pulls.

I believe like so many others that 7.0 is a great place to restart the game for new players. As there is close to 1000 hours of content in the game as of this writing, that would take a player who can put in 2 hours a night 1.25 years of everyday gameplay to catch up to everybody. While it is true that new players can purchase a skip, is that really the only way they want this to go?

The concept mentioned by the OP just wouldn't work the way FFXIV is created. Think about FFXI. Level cap stayed the same for nearly a decade. Starting from the very first expansion, you didn't need to complete the previous base game's content to continue. And that pretty much carried forward. Sure, each expansion required a little more MSQ to open up the next expansion, but it was all fairly reasonable.

I've played some other MMOs, such as LOTRO, where while there is a linear progression, it was possible to in some places to "skip" some of the MSQ if you leveled past one of the expansions. I don't recall details, but I do recall that much of some expansions you could skip if you leveled up. Of course, you'd miss some lore/story, but different strokes for different folks.

That just can't happen here. The entire game has been based on a level cap lasting for about 2 years, with incremental iLvl improvements over that span. Then about 2 years later, level cap goes up again while 6ish new zones are released. It's fairly formulaic.

I'm running thru Msq on an alt right now and it's like 3-4 days per expansion including all the patches. That being said, I'm skipping everything and I know my way around here. I've done this dozens of times. There's definitely some areas of the quests that have those extra steps , or placing the characters in odd spots that are purely meant to waste time and offer nothing to the quality of the story , and that could be trimmed out thru the entire game to make it a lot less painful. And the dragged out solo duties that take nearly as long as a quick dungeon run... Those could be sped up a little. It would be nice to have a way to make my alts skip to what's current , but I'd abuse the hell out of it and have a ton of gathering retainers on every character selling 20 items each ... And that could cause some balance issues if everyone else was able to do the same, just as easily.

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Originally Posted by Remolia

Sure, thats why Story skip always in the top 4-5 selling categories.

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And its mostly likely bored Vets who just made their fifth alt buying those.

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Originally Posted by Asari5

what is so special about the endgame you have to rush til you reach it? the fights may be a little bit more difficult than the lvl 50 or 60 ones nowadays, but thats it.

you wanna make the actual game shorter to do what little endgame ff14 has? and yes there really isnt a lot.

some people may wanna say something else about glam and mounts, but thats just nonsense.
your glam journey starts on 15 and your mount collection on 20.
take a msq break and do lvl 50 primals synch. do the void-arch questline or go to the casino.
you dont have people for that? i guess your friends arent really friends and your fc is a bad one.

well, finding a good fc isnt that easy and also the datacenter travel is the death for party finder on some datacenters. sucks to play mmo nowadays

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Endgame is so legitimacy aweful I decided to move to free trial just so I never hit it XD


Nah but fr. If they took away the msq, then this game would be genuinely barren and would die significantly faster than it should.

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Originally Posted by Iscah

An MSQ skip to Dawntrail is fine, so long as it is made clear to the user that it is a skip, and the story will not hesitate to reference back to past events where appropriate.

My longstanding suggestion has been that since Square Enix likely wishes to continue selling story skips overall, they could give vouchers for ONE free story skip and job skip with purchase of Dawntrail. New players can use it or not use it as they wish; old players either have no use for it or can use it on an alt.

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If you could just skip all of hydealyn ark youde be getting over 400 hours of content done for you. People are not gona be OK with dawntrailers getting it for free and they had to play. They aren't gona do this ever. It was a random idea yoshi p had that realised very fast was a mistake and now he has never said again.

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Originally Posted by sindriiisgaming

If you could just skip all of hydealyn ark youde be getting over 400 hours of content done for you. People are not gona be OK with dawntrailers getting it for free and they had to play. They aren't gona do this ever. It was a random idea yoshi p had that realised very fast was a mistake and now he has never said again.

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Could make an optional bundle that comes with the expansion, one level 90 skip book and one free MSQ skip to the start of DT.

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Originally Posted by Remolia

Sure, thats why Story skip always in the top 4-5 selling categories.

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People tend to favour the easy way out, and at the moment there are a lot of things that could be done to make MSQ truly valuable as content in its own right (for example, making it easier to group during the narration; or upgrading low-level content). So I doubt that these purchases are really indicative. In any case, let's not kid ourselves: if leaving the msq as it is can bring in money because it encourages people to go and look in the shop, then the SE committee will push for it to stay as it is, despite all the changes that would be necessary (a restart at DT as many people are proposing, or an overhaul to make the MSQ valid as content in its own right, a solution I'd much prefer).

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Originally Posted by Merrigan

People tend to favour the easy way out, and at the moment there are a lot of things that could be done to make MSQ truly valuable as content in its own right (for example, making it easier to group during the narration; or upgrading low-level content). So I doubt that these purchases are really indicative. In any case, let's not kid ourselves: if leaving the msq as it is can bring in money because it encourages people to go and look in the shop, then the SE committee will push for it to stay as it is, despite all the changes that would be necessary (a restart at DT as many people are proposing, or an overhaul to make the MSQ valid as content in its own right, a solution I'd much prefer).

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I know a guy that made a bunch of alts then just story skip So he can play 5v5 right away. The story will be a deterrence to someone that's not in this game for pvp. Yes, l ran into a new player that plays this game for pvp. So he can enjoy the game and be in arr forever. He has become a quite formidable dragoon over the month.

I think after this expansion a real discussion is going to be had, XIV is well past the point a new starting point should be considered, hell so many people skip ARR as it is you could argue making HW as a starting point could be an idea.

I dont really have an answer here, but I think its clear from that even Yoshi P sees this problem.

People make valid points about the whole fact that MSQ slowly teaches combat as you play it I think for that for any new starting point you would be required to do a mandatory tutorial that would teach the game, it would not be able to be skippable.

One way or another this WILL be an issue they are going to have to address and its not going to please everyone on how they do it, Personally I love the MSQ (well outside of the 6.X patch MSQ which..was ugh imo) I would have kicked myself if i skipped any of it, but I get that if this game is to survive in 10 years from now thats going to take some restructuring

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Originally Posted by Carin-Eri

Totally agree. I don't understand getting to Endgame being.... well, the endgame.

Whether some like it or not, the game is - first and foremost - the MSQ.

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Because the "journey" to endgame through MSQ deviates very little from 400 hours of:
Talk to NPC, go there, talk to NPC, go back, talk to NPC, go there, kill monsters that die in 3 seconds, go talk to another NPC, rinse and repeat. And that's nowhere near as engaging as endgame duties.

If you are a new player and want to play with your friends/fc mates, its a hell of a slog. Unless you happen to join with (a) friend(s), that can go through the story with you, or are just happy to go solo.

The MSQ is the focus, sure. But it's still massive for someone coming in new. Especially if they want to be part of an FC and join us on "current" activity. No easy answer. Other than push MSQ.

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Originally Posted by ChrysOCE

If you are a new player and want to play with your friends/fc mates, its a hell of a slog. Unless you happen to join with (a) friend(s), that can go through the story with you, or are just happy to go solo.

The MSQ is the focus, sure. But it's still massive for someone coming in new. Especially if they want to be part of an FC and join us on "current" activity. No easy answer. Other than push MSQ.

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And even if you have a friend that wants to go through the MSQ with you, it is the most multiplayer unfriendly aspect of this game, making you constantly leave your party for solo instances.

Ngl this entire thead is kinda moot because they're already trying to deal with the fact that the MSQ is too big, Yoshida has since the start of Endwalker talked baout doing something about this soon.

Adding to what I have already said here of the rabbit already being out of the hat due to boosts..

If they actually addressed and looked at their older content, in addition for incentive to doing older content, then the MSQ drought wouldn't be so bad for most people, honestly. The amount of content they just eventually throw to the wayside and stop supporting is a much bigger issue than the length of the MSQ - As if length were the sole issue then we would perpetually be trying to address it.

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Originally Posted by Absurdity

And even if you have a friend that wants to go through the MSQ with you, it is the most multiplayer unfriendly aspect of this game, making you constantly leave your party for solo instances.

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I can attest to that. I played the entirety of EW MSQ "with" a friend and the experience was legitimately less fun than what we did with other expansions where we each did the MSQ alone and only joined up when we unlocked a duty. The fact that you're doing solo content alongside eachother somehow makes the experience feel more lonely.

IMHO: No.

FFXIV has always been a story driven MMO and you shouldn't expect to come in 10 years after the fact and jump into endgame within a few weeks.

I can definitely see the benefits of pruning the MSQ down a bit and reduce or eliminate some of the more tedious quests. There's room for that and I think it could be done without messing up the story overall.

But having a new starting point? No. Have everyone experience the (streamlined) story.

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Originally Posted by Tahbitha

I can definitely see the benefits of pruning the MSQ down a bit and reduce or eliminate some of the more tedious quests. There's room for that and I think it could be done without messing up the story overall.

But having a new starting point? No. Have everyone experience the (streamlined) story.

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Why though? For players who do simply want to reach endgame to play with friends or whatever reason they might have, all they're going to do is press escape a bazillion times. They aren't "experiencing" any story but skipping through it entirely. There's no harm in having a new starting point, and in fact, a necessary addition. One of the main criticisms FFXIV gets is the sheer length of required MSQ, specifically the slog that is ARR and post-ARR.