2.0 VS 3.0 The final verdict and it's lessons for 4.0

Alright my subscription time is running out and I don't know how soon I can get back so let's make it count.
Heavensward only has one major content patch left, and features like the ninja, the gold saucer or the palace of the dead, get advertised months in advance so I'm pretty sure no big surprises are waiting.
Besides, if I were to compare ARR and HW after 3.5 we would be perhaps a month away from Stormblood. Any conclusion would be wasted with development mostly done.
Bear in mind that this is MY oppinion. It is possible that many of you will disagree. Hopefully respectfully disagree. Thankfully you can also post your views as that is how forums work.
Also, when I talk about 2.0, 3.0 and 4.0 I'm talking about the entire lifecycle of that expansion. With all the patches included.
So, without further to do let's jump in:

Visuals
A simpler one to ease us into this whole comparison. Now I'm not talking about graphics quality. That's obviously better in 3.0 with the higher Direct X support and ditching ps3 will likely help 4.0. What I'm talking about is the graphics design. For me this is a tie. Personally it's not enough for the world to look good though. I like to have at least one place that looks really fantasy like. Where IRL conventions are thrown out the window. For ARR this was the Sylphlands (I'm totally spooked by that place but it looks so damned beautiful) and for HW this was Azys Lla. I really hope that Stormblood will have at least one zone like this.

Music
It is always good to talk about music in Final Fantasy because it is alwas good. It is no different in XIV. Although I wouldn't mind more memorable battle themes for regular battles. But can we crown a victor here? Yes, we can. Heavensward wins. No contest. Why? Simple. Not because of the quality of individual tracks but because how the soundtrack is built around the two themes of the expansion. Heavensward and Dragonsong if I remember the titles correctly. In ARR Answers mostly stayed in the Coil. In HW the recurring themes made the soundtrack more cohesive and this is something I definitely want to see returning in 4.0

Main Scenario
Oh, boy another easy win for Heavensward. For the most part the ARR main scenario was: Go kill the next primal while we wait here. While you are out there please pick up groceries for me. And the ending....uhhhh. All that drama about everyone dying yet as of 3.4 only Teledji is dead. Do not do that ever again. In HW Primal fights are integrated better into the greater narrative, NPCs accompany you more often and even try to fight Primals with you (Shiva vs Ravana). If the 3.4 Main Scenario is any indication of what we can expect from the future, I will be very happy with 4.0

Villains
Sort of related to the main scenario, but I wanted to keep this separate. This one goes to ARR. I felt the bad guys in HW were lacking. Thordan was great, but his time as villain was cut short and he was the only bright spot. Lord Lolorito was set up as the greater scope villain behind Teledji only to immediately turn out to be a good guy (sort of). Igeyorhm was a nobody compared to the similarly brief but memorable Nabriales. Elidibus still refuses to actually do anything beside act friendly. The Warriors of Darkness turned out to be good guys and left, before they could become a serious threat. Urianger was a double agent for Hydaelin, Varis just stopped to say hi, before disappearing, Regula van Hydrus is just a pokemon rival who has already done the run away after getting beaten routine three times and Nidhogg is just a huge jerk with no personality a single minded lust for destruction who makes it really hard to sympathise with the dravanians.

Side stories
Another hard decision. In ARR both the Crystal Tower and the Coil filled in parts of the story while in HW the two raids existed in a bubble. Especially Mhach as Alex at least had Cid, Y'shtola and several other MSQ characters show up. On the other hand I am getting sick of everything being related to Allag so the two raid storylines were refreshing in a way. However I really hope the 4.0 raids won't involve a Prime version o a giant primal and the locking up of a friend as both of these showed up twice already. I also like the Warring Triad storyline and how it gives us a glimpse into Meracydian culture all the while adding additional info to the coil and CT story. Another part where ARR is better is the Hildibrand storyline. The one in HW is not only shorter but simply isn't as funny. The overused gazeboo joke and the old people simply do not work as well as the ARR storyline. At least Briardien is back at the Scholasticate with a serious detective story. Granted we can't do much actual detective work, but I still enjoy it a lot.
I'd say ARR wins because both the Relic questline and Hildibrand had their own trials, while nothing like this appears in HW.

Now it's time to discuss actual gameplay:

Leveling
ARR. It might be different for fresh characters that can immediately get more XP once they hit 50 but as someone who jumped into HW at launch with a level 50 character, the leveling experience was terrible. There wasn't nearly enough XP in the main scenario to level your main job. And sometimes the level requirements were mindblowingly wrong. At one point I had to talk to Y'shtola in Idillshire. She explained that we are going to visit Matoya. And that was it. That was one quest. After that I had to spend hours looking for stupid moogles before I could talk to Y'shtola again and actually go into Matoya's cave for more talking and another level requirement. Main Scenario Quests that involve only walking and talking should not have a level requirement. That's just insane. Especially since there are no new guildhests past level 40, class specific hunting logs don't get updated in 3.0, and Levequests are replaced by temple leaves. With less choices for leveling, it became more grindy. Reaching the level cap with your first job shouldn't be grindy. That is for all the others. It's also less rewading as we don't get anything new beside the new job. We had no traits or class abilities, so we didn't strictly speaking gain anything new by leveling up. Everything came from the job quests. Except for the Artifact armor. We had to get those from Rowena.

Dungeons
Something that HW did right. Although 3.0 had quite a few dungeons that aren't that memorable I can't recall one that I actually hate. In ARR I had the thousand snores of toto rak, dzemael darkhold, and my all time least favorite dungeon: cutter's cry. Aurum Vale is also a huge pain but it gives very good XP at the very least. HW dungeons are mostly fun to do. Doing the last boss of Hullbreaker hard is especially good with a ninja as you can shukuchi out of the AoE he casts on you after inflicting heavy. That move never gets old. And I get to beat down Moglin. Also, the two Gubal Libraries. What could use some adjusting in 4.0 is the difficulty. There is no point in making dungeons that are considerably easier than the ones you had to clear to unlock it. Also, we need more dungeons like the Haunting House. Nonlinear, objective based, with flexible party.

Raid bosses and EX primals
This goes to ARR again I'm afraid. HW introduced some very fun and interesting mechanics bur overall I don't think the fights fit my idea of raiding. Now I'm not a hardcore raider. I don't do savage raids. I actualy support the idea of having a not savage and a savage difficulty. But I want the not savage to be pretty freakin hard. WoW has LFR where you can practically clear the hardest encounter of the game with auto attack. Avoid that like the plague. Raids are the pinnacle of group PvE content. And I think it was true for ARR. I remember Twintania blocking my progress for months and Darnus still can't be killed with a random groupe even if you go in unsynched. I'm totally fine with not being able to even set foot into a savage raid. I'm content with only the normal version. But I don't want it to be easy. I want to sweat blood and have several wipes before I clear it. Gordias was quite good in this regard, but the other two Alex wings could use some adjustment. I think I heared that Midas savage was too hard, but that's not something I can comment on. Similarly, Extreme Ravana is actually easier than hard Ravana as you can simply bring him down with superior item level. When I got my first kill (In freakin duty finder no less) some of the harder mechanics didn't even come up. What makes Darnus such a challenge is that you can't skip the meteor phase no matter how hard you hit. As for how to make savage special for hardcore raiders beside making it super hard and giving them an item level tier that will remain the highest till the next savage raid, I'm in favor of giving each raid a savage only bonus boss. A little more story and another chance at loot. That should be a pretty good reward. And yes, I am fine with never ever getting that reward.

Combat
Let's be honest. Stormblood is advertised with a battle system revamp and the reevaluation of useless abilities. This pretty much screams that the changes made in HW did not work out. Or at the very least not as well as intended. I can only comment on ninja. I'm really glad we got Armor Crush as now I don't have to waste ninjutsu on Huton, but poisons still need more interaction with the other abilities. I also feel that ninjutsu should get a bigger focus, but everything with more than one mudra is a risk due to GCD clipping (which is why it is annoying that Fuuma Shuriken has all the one mudra cobminations to itself). Also, Hyoton is a PVP skill. If it wre to be moved to the PVP tab we could have a free mudra combination for any skill that would otherwise occupy hotbar space.


Crafting and gathering
I cannot personally comment as none of my crafting and gathering skills are high enough, but I have yet to hear anyone say anything positive regarding the changes that came with 3.0


PVP
Well we have more pvp content and options in HW so it obviously wins, but this is still the least impressive part on FFXIV. It would be nice to get more creative frontlines. Like a siege. Or Blitzball. Speaking of Blitzball....

Side stuff
I thought long and hard about this one as I really really like the Palace of the Dead and both Squadrons and Woundrous Tails provide incentive to do activities that you don't normally do, but neither Lords of Verminion nor Exploratory missions lived up to their potential (especially exporatory missions). ARR on the other hand dropped the Gold Saucer on us. And while I don't do as many chocobo races and triple triad matches like I did months ago (I still do quite a lot) I always visit the saucer every day at least to buy a mini cactpot if nothing else. It is a huge part of the game and because I'm sure more mini games will be introduced there, it will continue to be a big part in the future.

Yikes. Most of the wins went to 2.0 When I decided to do this I figured the end result would be closer than this. Well all the more reason to compare the two I guess.

Leave a comment if you agree, disagree, or promise to take into account when developing Stormblood.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Balipu

Bare in mind that this is MY oppinion.

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That's what forums are for, so people give their opinion, people don't have to like your opinion or you have to like theirs, but to me seems like it's a common thing in these forums: Someone speaks, people take it personally or consider as if other people are stating a fact.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Balipu

Visuals
That's obviously better in 3.0 with the higher Direct X support and ditching ps3 will likely help 4.0.

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The biggest issue i see with the PS3 is that it only had 256MB RAM and another 256MB as VRAM, this limits the quality of Textures that can be loaded, more RAM = more and higher Quality textures, more VRAM = Higher Resolutions, for example.

Also, PS4 doesn't support DirectX, it's not a matter if a PS4 doesn't have enough power to render DirectX, it's actually that DirectX is made by Microsoft, and from here i think you know what that means.

Also, now that Xbox allows cross platform play, i assume SE is busy trying to port it to the XB1, in this case the console supports DirectX, including DirectX 12.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Balipu

Music
Heavensward wins. No contest.

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I always saw Nobuo as a god-like composer, but Soken surprised me to astounding levels, Nobuo whill always be special, but Soken has gained his place too.

PS: Please SE, change ADS mount music, it's driving me nuts, ty.

Also while we're talking about music.

Give us portable FF music, so we can listen to a portable Orchestrion wherever we are.

I never understood what was the point of the Orchestrion at all, i'm forced to be inside my home, in the same room, to be able to listen to it.

Wouldn't it be much better just to create something like a Radio or a portable Orchestrion?

Visuals:
Heavensward wins, all the dungeons had glaringly different environments, colors and visuals and they were all amazing, ARR kept close to what it had up until around 2.3 where it started flourishing aesthetically.

Music:
I'd say it's a tie, music was good all around ARR and HW. Sophia's theme is my favorite from HW, and the Calamity Unbound theme from Coil is my favorite from ARR.

Main Scenario:
ARR was really good post-2.3, but HW was good all through, so HW hands down.

Villains:
ARR really did this well, but too late for it to really matter, I suppose? HW was consistent in that there is always someone who is a polar opposite to what you're doing. So for me, HW wins this one.

Side stories:
I honestly really didn't care for side stories for the most part, but ARR definitely had more fleshed out sidestories, let alone having more in general.

Leveling:
Honestly, ARR was a lot better at this, due to the varying amount of dungeons and options you could do for leveling. So it's ARR for me, HW just had too little dungeons but I did prefer Vault+Gubal over Aurum+ Dzemael anyday.

Dungeons:
Heavensward. They're just more fun, and better designed.

Raid bosses:
I hated Gordias and Midas... a lot. Creator is a lot of fun, I have more positive experiences from Creator than I do the other two. Hated A7S so much as a SCH... But all of the coil bosses were fun when I did them, so ARR wins this one.

EX primals:
Heavensward gets this one. The thematic styles and the mechanics of Heavenswards primals (or eikons for the Warring Triad) were a lot more fun and more intuitive twists to those we saw in ARR, but ARR had very basic primals, they weren't as interestingly designed as the HW ones.

Combat:
Mixed bag, some HW changes I liked, some I didn't. ARR was standard entry-level combat, so as far as I'm concerned, this is more on a job-by-job basis:

• PLD - 50 was fun, but obviously a few things were missing, so 60 was a lot better: HW.
• MNK - Not much changed here, it has a lot more to do in HW, but the HW changes made it better: HW.
• WAR - Don't think there's a question about it here: HW.
• BRD - Majority says Wanderer's Minuet was a bad choice, I say it was a good choice, otherwise we wouldn't have Iron Jaws: HW.
• NIN - The aggro debuffs and buffs were necessary, along with the Huton utility: HW.
• BLM - BLM felt more clunky and enforced once Enochian got added, so ARR's BLM felt more fluid: ARR.
• WHM - WHM got some much needed love with Assize, as well as Asylum: HW.
• SMN - Definitely a DPS powerhouse after HW: HW.
• SCH - OP as hell after HW, but it was already vital: HW.
• AST - At 50, it was fine, but it got better with the HW skills: HW.
• MCH - Gauss Barrel is nice, but not much changed in the way with the HW skills, so I'd say this is a tie between ARR and HW.
• DRK - The kit felt more fuller after HW: HW.

End verdict is HW.

Crafting and gathering
In my honest opinion, HW is almost there, but the specialist system is superfluous, and because of the scrip system, there was a higher flood in the market. I preferred 2.0's system of actually crafting HQ tokens to obtain books, it actually meant you'd earned the right to craft these items. The specialist system could've been a lot more, as well as the scrip system, but it just feels tacked on. So ARR wins this one.

PVP
I liked HW's PvP content more, so HW wins this one.

Side stuff
I would say ARR, only because LoV and Diadem failing so badly. PotD, as far as I'm concerned, is a success, because a lot of people are piled up in South Shroud.

So I felt HW did do a positive impact to XIV, but there were some weak spots.

I'll come back to this, but I can quickly comment on gathering/crafting:
-The specialist system flopped. Most of the skills are RNG heavy and crafters always try to limit RNG. I think only one skill is really used and then, not commonly. Most rotations I've seen completely ignore specialist actions.
-Scripts... nice way to get XP, but for gathering they were a bit of a train wreck. My biggest gripe is folklore nodes on top of specialist recipes; you need mats from nodes locked behind 99 tokens (4950 scripts each, 6 are important as fish is really only for CUL) AND need a specialist to craft.
-Overall crafting/gathering felt a lot more... grindy. I had to make a set for someone and needing like 30 hides compared to ARR's 10 maybe? Some of the recipes were overkill in my opinion.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by RobbieH

That's what forums are for, so people give their opinion, people don't have to like your opinion or you have to like theirs, but to me seems like it's a common thing in these forums: Someone speaks, people take it personally or consider as if other people are stating a fact.

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Yeah. That's why I figured I will include this part. These aren't facts. This is just one of the ways to look at at game. Although I tried to do my best to make it as objective as possible.

Really nice list ErryK. The great thing is that I can totally understand the parts where you disagreed with me. This thread will be a really good source of info.

I would give the Chronicles of a New Era win solidly to A Realm Reborn. Alexander's story was a huge disappointment IMO. It redeemed itself a bit in the end but the story throughout Gordias and Midas was such a snooze fest. I couldn't bring myself to care about any of the characters, especially "Touch Scar Receive Flashback" Mide. At least the Gobbiespeak was enjoyable.

Nice idea for a topic.

Visuals: I'll give this one a tie. Both ARR and Heavensward have some really impressive locations and battle effects. I'd say ARR has more varied locations in the world although that's mostly due to it having more zones.

Music: I'll tie this one as well. The recurring themes in Heavensward songs are great and help unify the OST but ARR has a lot of singular tracks that stand out to me more (for example I like the regular dungeon boss theme more in ARR).

Main Scenario: Heavensward. Although I am one of the few people not put out by the hundreds of menial quests in ARR I have to admit that the writing in Heavenward is a lot tighter. The increase in voice acting is great as well (although I do miss a lot of the ARR voices).

Villains: Villains tend to not stand out to me in stories to be honest. I'll give it to Heavensward since I find the confrontation with Nidhogg in 2.3 to be one of the most memorable moments in the game.

Sidestories: ARR. I really miss all the smaller stories we got with the Post Moogle quests and the Doman adventurer's guild. I probably would care about the Scholasticate in Heavensward more if there hadn't been such a huge gap between the quests. I personally found the latest Hildebrand with the old people to be one of the funniest but I do miss getting trials with these quests.

Leveling: Heavensward. I found leveling my first character at ARR launch to be a slow experience culminating in a dreadful FATE grind from 47-49. Leveling in ARR improved after the addition of Daily Roulettes but Heavenward has those too and has now added Palace of the Dead to the mix. I find the Clan Centurio Daily Hunts to be better than the ARR Hunting Log. Heavensward Beast Tribes give crazy high exp compared to ARR ones as well.

Dungeons: ARR. I actually like Toto-Rak for being one of the only dungeons in the game with an actual second path through. In general I prefer the low level ARR dungeons for having more side rooms.

Raid Bosses & Ex Primals: Heavensward for making things more accessible. I always dreamed of a DF friendly version of Coil when it was relevant and Alex Normal fulfilled that dream. I also like how after Bismark Ex and Ravana Ex they stopped gating Ex-Primals behind each other. I like the Raid Finder allowing queuing for current content (although I hope the move the older Ex primals back to DF since the queues are pretty dead).

Combat: ARR. Mostly because I'm a salty BRD that hates Wanderer's Minuet.

Crafting and Gathering: Hmm...tie I guess. I like having scrip stuff as an alternative to melded gear but I feel like things got more grindy overall. I especially disliked the increase in the amount of basic materials needed to craft anything and the increased reliance on timed nodes for mats even for leveling crafts.

PVP: Not much of a PVPer but I'll give it Heavensward since it seems like more PVP content was added overall.

Side Stuff: Heavensward. I love Palace of the Dead and the Aquapolis. Diadem and Verminion failed but I appreciated the attempts.
Gold Saucer is ok but it's more something I focus on when my friends aren't online than something I look forward to playing like Palace.

Visuals
To me, this one clearly goes to 2.0. I need to feel that "wow"-effect upon entering a new zone. A "that is so pretty" feeling, or finding a special place and then see that special place wrapped into the story/a sidequest that gives it meaning. When you first stumble into Eastern Thanalan and see that giant crystal formation on the horizon, and then realize you can actually go there..<3 Or when you slip through the hole in South Shroud and suddenly everything is spooky and aetherical and mossy - and it's not just "there" for the sake of it either, that place has a meaning, it is tied to the Odin storyline. Even just normal areas like Central La Noscea have so much detail that they feel almost life-like, I just want to roll around in the fresh fragrant grass and listen to little sheeps meeping :o
HW was just one disappointment after another. Every area is just this giant, same-y mesh. White mesh Coerthas, brown mesh Churning Mists, etc. And don't get me wrong - I totally had some "wow, this is amazing"-moments upon entering a zone, like in the Sea of Clouds! You see cool things in the distance and can't wait to learn flying so you can go there! Only...once you learn flying, you realize you can't go there at all, because invisible walls. Azys Lla has really interesting structures, and you can even reach them - but there is no meaning attached to them, they are just there to fill the map.

Music
This is probably unfair because I didn't like the HW title song off the bat, so seeing it repeated again and again and again for EVERYTHING was just really, really annoying. Other than that, lots of amazing songs in both ARR and HW, so that one is a tie for me.

Main Scenario
I don't think this one can be rated in a fair way until we see the final patch for 3.x, because that will probably once again be a really big deal. Personally, I liked the theme and characters of the ARR scenario more, but how the story was executed was done so much better in HW. Like the OP said, the NPCs around you became travel compagnions, brothers in arms and friends. It made the story feel a lot more personal than the typical "I'm everyone's errand boy" that was most of ARR. So, point goes to 3.x^^

Villains
This one goes to 1.x :p Because with Nael and Gaius, it had two of the best villains out there.
Even in 2.x, Gaius was still there. Nero, Teledji, Lahabrea, they all were interesting characters, and they all got their full arc, it never felt cut short, it was building up to the final confrontation over a long time, which made it all the more satisfying when it finally did happen. HW had a big problem with this: it introduced tons of villains, but none of them got the time and build-up to become proper characters too (or even evoke any sort of emotion in the player). Varis popped in and was gone again right away. Regula is probably the most laughable and un-rememberable Garlean I have ever seen, I literally had to look him up when he returned for the Warring Triad because I had forgotten his existance. Thordan only openly became a villain 5 minutes before he already got beaten (and, since to the very end, only had the best interest of his people in mind, arguably isn't even a bad guy..). The Ascians since Lahabrea are just nobodies that get defeated upon entering the story, except for Elidibus, who MIGHT become interesting in the future. Lolorito is a good guy, Urianger is a good guy, but the Warriors of Darkness take the crown on that one for also being just good guys as soon as you actually get to confront them for once, and happily return to their own world, neatly wrapping up and throwing anything that could have become interesting in the trash.
Nidhogg was the only one with a proper arc, but he never felt interesting as a character. There were no hidden motives that could be uncovered, no ties with other characters that mattered, he didn't feel relateable at all and didn't show any traces of actual characters traits beyond "I angry dragon need vengance". 100% vote goes to ARR for the significantly better villains.

Side stories
Coil wins over Alex by 5 billion points :rolleyes:
Crystal Tower had me feeling significantly more involved compared to the whole Mhach thing.
ARR Hildibrand is by far my favorite over the current storyline and side characters.
On the other hand, I really enjoy some of the other new sidestories, because they adress areas we kind of finished and now return to to see what our playing-hero led to (Scholastic Quests, Mor Dhona children, etc.) as opposed to the cute, but fairly pointless moogle mail ones.
Still, point goes to ARR because there are a lot more side stories I enjoyed in ARR.

Leveling
Can't compare these since I already had all classes at 50 from 1.x. That said, I really did not enjoy my HW leveling experience. Since lvl 50 dungeons gave literally NO experience whatsoever, leveling was only possible through the handful of new dungeons we had at launch, FATEs (which had absolutely horrible exp rewards the first few weeks after launch) and..questing. Questing that nearly made me slit open my plush moogle because I started to hate those little critters with a vengeance. Just..don't ever do something like that again, SE >.>
(yes that is a point for ARR just for how horrible HW leveling was)

Dungeons
*shug* This one is a tie for me. While ARR does have the occasional "urgh, I don't wanna" dungeon, just the sheer amount of the dungeons in general assure there is something enjoyable for everyone. Lots of fun and interesting ideas too.
HW dungeons are nice too, but just the fact that there are so much less of them makes it a lot more easy to get bored or annoyed of them. Also, Hard Modes in ARR usually took you on a different route right away, so it never felt really copy&paste. In HW, I can't put into words just how disappointed I was with Pharos Sirius HM and Hullbreaker Isle HM which are literally the same dungeons as normal mode except for 5 meters before the bossroom =.=

Raid bosses and EX primals
I will reluctantly call it a tie. I loved ARR raiding and primals, and can't say the same about HW raiding, but the pimals have tons of fun and interesting mechanics, and after the bullshit that was Gordias, Midas and Creator went back to the roots and are about mechanics again, not stupid epeens. First and Second Coil had "meh" turns too, so yeah..a tie.

Combat
Hands down a win for HW (and yes I don't care that the devs consider the HW rotations to be too hard). ARR rotations were...okay. Basic, a bit boring, but okay. Since HW, combat itsself is fun. It feels rewarding to keep all the stacks, timers, self-buffs and DoTs and whatever up and for that be allowed to throw in extra strong hits. It is also nice how some classes got streamlined, like the DoT Timer+ skill for BRD or Huton Timer+ skill for NIN.

Crafting and gathering
I like specialists. Gathering feels more involved now.

PVP
In ARR, you could just ignore that annoying, horrible little toxic pit on the edge of the duty finder.
Now all kinds of rewards are tied to it and even PvE content requires you to do PvP >.>
(still salty half of the squadron recruits I want are locked behind doing PvP log...)
I wish I could go back to ARR times when PvP stayed in PvP.

Side stuff
HW wins, just for the sheer amount of side stuff. Also, I loved Deep Dungeon to death (at least until the 3.45 additions...>.>).
Since I do not particulary enjoy any of the Gold Saucer minigames, this one is kind of lost on me. Aquapolis, PotD, Diadem, airships, squadrons, etc. are all at least to some degree fun to do (although I hate the crazy amount of RNG involved).
So..yeah. HW.

Overall:
Time to tally up! Counting ties as half a point for both.
6.5 points for ARR, 5.5 for HW. Surprisingly, that sounds kind of right :)
HW definitely has it's strong points, but it does feel kind of lacking in some departments, and more than ARR was lacking in others.

BEAR with you? Sure. I'll BEAR with you. No problemo.

I'm sure this wall of text appeals to someone. (Who? I have NO idea.) In my opinion it's a pointless comparison.
When the shine is off something it's rather useless to rank it for thrills. Ah...but when it was new....

...then, you wouldn't have the new version to compare it to.

Apples and oranges.

I'll avoid commenting on things like visual and music given they have more or less remained consistently good throughout.

Main Scenario
Heavensward without question. Although, I did enjoy A Realm Reborn, it struggles with stereotypical MMO tropes that eventually became grating. Too often the bulk of questing devolved into fetching an arbitrary item to pad out the length. From a narrative perspective, I much preferred the split focus on character development as it allowing for a greater sense of progression. I felt better connected to the plights and turmoils of Estinien, aymeric, Ysayle and even the Scions later on simply because the story could properly devote time to their individual character in lieu of attempting an ensemble cast while still having to build the world around them.

Dungeons
A bit of a toss up, but I lean towards A Realm Reborn solely based on difficulty. Outside the few leveling dungeons, Heavensward dungeons increasingly became a complete joke. Just the other day, the group I ran with pushed the boss in The Great Gubal Library (Hard) so fast, we nearly skipped the Behemoth portion of the fight entirely. A Realm Reborn dungeon may not have ever been too challenging, but I can't say they were ever pushed to that extreme so early in their release. Frankly, Stormblood seriously needs to address this as neither of its predecessor boast much of a challenge.

Trial/Raids
Unfortunately, Alexander gives this to A Real Reborn. Savage proved far too unforgiving; destroying the entire raid scene for the better portion of a year. The story itself gave across somewhat flat and isolated despite having a great conclusion. If we're to use the old adage, "it's not the destination, but the journey." This journey wasn't all that interesting. Trails, on the other hand, were fantastic-- enough I'm tempted to give Heavensward the edge. Mechanic focused fights became more the norm, and I'd like to see that continued.

Crafting
The additions offered in Heavensward were a complete flop. Red Scrips only served to gate new crafters despite the devs initial claims otherwise. And Specialists offer nothing except enormous RNG, therefore still making it a requirement to have all your craft leveled to 50 if you wanted any real chance at endgame crafting. Considering the whole intent in Heavensward was to limit Omni-crafters and make it easier to only have one or two crafts leveled, Heavensward didn't just miss the mark here. It jumped across the whole ocean.