New Player experience and concerns

Hi Dev Team!

I have friends that are new players to the game. One, in particular, is a healer and has feedback on the new player experience.

There is a lot of slogging and back and forth with main story questing. Can we hopefully address that at some point?

Can dungeons be fixed that new players can choose to play with new players preferentially in the duty finder? Can we hopefully make chocobo companions or trusts part of the duty finder for new players? My friend has faced harassment by experienced players while playing solo in duty finder. Moreover, more experienced players tend to run through dungeons so you don't get to enjoy every nook and unexplored area.

Thank you very much for taking the time to read this!

Tell your friends Welcome to Eorzea for us!

First off; Yes, we all know the main quest is a slog. They're actually slimming it down in the 5.3 update and making the ARR story smoother in general, so if they hold out another month or so it will get better! (Depending on the release date, of course.)

Your second comment... well, that one's a lot harder to address. Many of the early dungeons were meant to be explored and not just sped through, and it's easy to forget for a lot of veterans. I do have a solution to that one, though it's not ideal; when you hit level 50 (or at least 20 levels above the level of the dungeon) you can make yourself an "unsynched" party using the settings button at the top of the duty finder. Then you can run dungeons solo. You won't get XP for individual enemies, but it's a nice chill way to explore every nook and cranny at your own pace.

I'm not a dev, so outside of what's been announced in the live-letters I can't say much. I don't think they were planning to make Trusts for anything outside the Shadowbringers dungeons, simply because there's no 'story' precedent or characters that would make reasonable consistent trusts. Unless you use the Grand Company squads you can lead. oooh, Hmmm..... *train of thought derails*

The core complaint-that Veterans aren't making accomodations for new/inexperienced players- is a common one. And it's a difficult one to tackle because there's no way to police 'nice' without ruining the mood of the playerbase. At the very least I suggest dropping a "new to this dungeon, smaller pulls please" in the chat as the dungeon is starting. A vocal request for help or advice could go a long way to making the process smoother. While a fully 'sprout' finder sounds good in theory, it could be harmful in the long run if no one in the party can figure out a tricky boss mechanic (Or fail to communicate)

While I fully support healers as a class, (WHM FTW) they do tend to get a lot of flak as everyone has an expectation of what healers are supposed to do that don't line up with the class' mechanics. As long as the party doesn't die you're good. If another member has some positive advice or constructive criticism, give it a listen. If they go "Healers don't DPS" or "Why I die? U no Heal!" After aggroing half the dungeon... you can ignore them.

Are they taking advantage of the Hall of the Novice and the Guildhests? Those are great resources for learning the basics of the game, without running a full dungeon.

Best of luck on their adventures!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ragnell

There is a lot of slogging and back and forth with main story questing. Can we hopefully address that at some point?

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The ARR 2.x MSQ is being slimmed down come 5.3. 2.1 is really bad with a lot of unnecessary things but you have to remember people originally had to just play thru patch by patch as it was released. But rest assured it is finally nearing fruition and being revised.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ragnell

Can dungeons be fixed that new players can choose to play with new players preferentially in the duty finder? Can we hopefully make chocobo companions or trusts part of the duty finder for new players? My friend has faced harassment by experienced players while playing solo in duty finder. Moreover, more experienced players tend to run through dungeons so you don't get to enjoy every nook and unexplored area.

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Unfortunately the duty finder does not discriminate when it matches people together for content. If you want to your friend can use party finder to find more like minded people. Once you get to a certain rank in your GC you can unlock squadrons, but by that point they will have out done most things. Chocobos aren't designed to go into duty finder content and will never be.

If you experience harassment from other players, that is unfortunate and I'm sorry you had to deal with people like that. You do have the option of reporting people for bad behavior/harassment. You can also blacklist people from the contacts list in the menu. And also once a dungeon is complete you do have some time to do with what you like, so you can go back and explore for yourself and not take up other people's time during the actual dungeon run.