Originally Posted by
Elexia
Indeed they did, that's what I liked about XI and XIV most, the quests actually had good stories but that's mostly because it wasn't setup in the fashion that was there to level you. When I mention "throwaway stories" it's because in most quest grind MMOs the story is just there to fill the box, not much else, the real purpose as we know is for the exp and reward at the end which is why they all tend to be the exact same quest repeated countless times. The Guildleve system was basically the quest grind of XIV while sidequests were actual lore and stories about the world.
When you need to make more than enough quests to level players the quality usually takes a hit, something SWTOR definitely had happen to it after the early levels and that was a game banking on it's story.