As I am done praising Endwalker and easily give it a 9/10 I do think feedback is needed on changes in the direction of FF14 that do worry me. If it is not mentioned below I put it at basically a 10.
- My main criticism is the role quest. In Shadowbringers I could be convinced these were required and made narrative sense. There is no timeline or reality that exist where you could convince me to care about the tank role quest involving Kan-e-sana. I gave it a fair shot and jesus christ it was boring. At no point did any Paladin explain why I can rain down a storm of blade death on an opponent. You put more time into rabbit lore than job lore.
- Pacing of Endwalker. Doubt much needs to be said here but 87 to 88 I basically spammed through most of the quest where rabbits wasted a ton of time talking to me about Sharlyan. The WORLD IS LITERALLY ending maybe just maybe send us to a different zone where the WORLD IS LITERALLY ending to clear some doomsday level monsters.
- Endgame for FF14 is pretty repetitive which is not really that bad. Island Sanctuaries should have been included on launch. Some type of Mythic difficulty leaderboards not even needing rewards but we need something else to change up the current formula to occupy our time. NO MANDATORY grinds just some side fun thing.
That is really about it. I have severe concerns about the move away from RPG based job quest to role quest. I got from being a Paladin to generic Tank role #1 on a site that measures the most popular X job. Take my word this story does not end well for any MMO that has had players lose the connection to their character.
My endwalker feedbac
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01-08-2022, 07:48 AMPuremallaceMy endwalker feedbac
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01-08-2022, 08:07 AMQuintessa
My biggest gripe was the "Final Days" only happened in two areas. By that I mean where we were actually part of it and seeing its affects.
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01-08-2022, 08:31 AMPuremallaceI think that was the point of the role quest but not having mandatory stops on the MSQ to finish X part of the role quest before continuing made it feel strange. That is sort of the issue with narratively abusing the idea of role quest because what happens if you do them after you finish the MSQ or level tank vs the other 4?Quote:
Originally Posted by Quintessa
It is all just out of order and makes zero sense. Like why was any of this needed when I defeated you know at you know where? Doing tat should have made all of these role quest literally pointless. -
01-08-2022, 09:24 AMConnor
Honestly I totally agree about the whole role quests thing. Not that I don’t think they were bad or anything, but it didn’t feel like they actually had anything to do with the role or job. It’s less ‘choose the mission appropriate for your role’ and more ‘choose which waifu you want to spend time with’.
I think they’d have been much more enjoyable as like a side story chain of quests. But then they’d have needed to develop a second set of quests for roles, and no company has infinite amounts of time and resources lol (unfortunately).
I know it’s not possible now because too many jobs but I thought a level 90 quest for each job would have been really nice, even if it was just a short one to explore more about the jobs and the characters related to them.
While many of those characters did appear in one way or another, it felt more like an afterthought or cameo than a development/progression of whatever narratives had been constructed in the job quests.
About the only thing of significance I can remember in any way is Sanson mentioning that the Twin Adders had given the go-ahead to form a Bard squadron. Except there’s only one Bard in the world that’s not you or retired, and Bard lore specifically states that they literally cannot work in a military regiment (hence why Gridania yeeted them out of the military in the first place lol), so it doesn’t really make a whole lot of sense.
I also remember Alka Zolka being there (somewhere lol), with absolutely nothing to tell us about the Tonberries and whether they’ve made any further progress into removing the Nymian Scourge, because pffft, who cares about those guys? -
01-08-2022, 09:31 AMDriavnaFrom a MMO stand point that decision make sense, like when you end ARR and you can still go back to Ul'dah or similar. Not everyone rush the MSQ (I know a few that do a little bit of questing and then whatever they feel like doing), so adding the whole effect to all areas and the only way to remove it is to progress... well, will sucks. Was already bad enough that certain areas at certain points of the MSQ get an annoying music loop like Kholusia or Labyrinthos.Quote:
Originally Posted by Quintessa
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01-08-2022, 10:18 AMTaleraRistainThey acknowledge that you averted the Final Days but the effects are still being felt.Quote:
Originally Posted by Puremallace
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01-08-2022, 10:43 AMlinayarI don't know how any player can go through the base game and 3 expansions (4 if counting .0 of Endwalker) and still think their connection to their character in the story is via any individual job.Quote:
Originally Posted by Puremallace
The player character has never been strictly limited in being defined as any individual job, but as the adventurer/hero/champion/warrior of light/etc.
You care about Gridania (or anyone and anything else) because you're just that caring of a person (generally speaking). You wouldn't do the quest for anything you don't care for, and the role quest is optional.
That has nothing to do with abusing the role quest, but simply about having optional quests that you can do in the order that you choose.Quote:
Originally Posted by Puremallace
It's actually worse in Shadowbringers where you go to the last zone and then suddenly have to backtrack because the role quest was mandatory.
Then you have past job quests where certain abilities were locked, which I think is the worst.
Nevertheless, once you've accepted that not everything is in the MSQ, it's not a big deal. It's nice having optional quests.
It's not about having a choice since the game doesn't tell you beforehand what each quest will be about beyond having a shared problem with people turning into monsters.Quote:
Originally Posted by Connor
And you can't choose the mission since they're the ones who are choosing, not you. -
01-08-2022, 10:45 AMhynaku
My feedback
My only complaint is there is not enough content to it. Best thing I liked about the expansion is the story about Zodiark is finally over and won't have to hear about him being the true god anymore. -
01-08-2022, 04:46 PMSilver-Strider
My criticism is that they should've made the 2 expansions as originally planned vs merging everything into a single expansion because it really killed the story for me.
The whole threat of the Towers is dealt with within the first quarter of the expansion, with nary a mention of more Lunar Primals at all and considering they threw Lunar Odin at us, one would think that they would put that into some form of context for us that would've like to know more. Then we have Anima, who was one of the biggest teases of EW, only to be relegated to a lackluster dungeon boss and it leaves me wondering if that was always the plan. The cutscene at the end of the Tower of Zot, with Y'shtola being a little freaked out by the fact there's a severed hand in the tower's core, gets completely swept under the rug. It felt like it was going to be its own story but then Garlemald happens and it just like, we just had this revelation and you're going to just end it like that? If anything, it felt like the towers were supposed to be the narrative focus of 6.0 with us going around and stopping towers and Lunar Primals in much the same way we did with Lightwardens, and Anima would've been the 89 Trial with Zodiarc as the end boss of the expansion, with 6.1 onward being the whole Hydaelyn story part, with the Loporrits, Elpis story and the final 6.3 element being the Hydaelyn fight with 6.4 leading into confronting Meteion as part of the 7.0 expansion.
Then there's the issue with Thavnair as a zone. The entire zone just felt tacked on. The most significant thing that happened there was the creation of the Warding Talisman but I'm left questioning the entire narrative. This place, with no history of Primals whatsoever, is the 1st to discover a shielding method to their influence, and with Dragon Scales no less. One would THINK that Ishgard, a place that was at war with Dragons for a thousand years, would have had someone in that time frame look into the Aetheric Density of Dragon Scales and considering that Ishgard would have some minor concern for Primals due to the Ixal's close proximity and tendency to summon Garuda, that they would be a more likely candidate to have made this discovery. Now, you could argue that you'd need the scales of one of the 1st brood to have achieved this but then I ask you, WTF was Nidhogg? A dragon of the 1st brood and if they could nick him of his eyes, a dragon scale or 2 over 1000 years should not have been all that difficult to get. Personal gripe aside, there's also the characters of Thavnair, namely Vytra and Ahewann. They get introduced fairly early and while you can excuse that because Estienen was so quick to call them out, it felt like this might not have been the original take on their story. I feel like we were supposed to meet with Ahewann and get to know him as a person and earn his trust before Vytra would be introduced. The reason I say this is because they made Ahewann's death seem like something important when in actuality, he had so little screen time or character development that we really didn't get to feel a huge emotional impact when he died. Yeah, it forced Vytra to reveal his role as the true Satrap of Thavnair but it just felt very rushed. One final minor gripe about Thavnair. According to the DNC questline, the job originated in Thavnair. The entire point of DNC is to soothe the negative emotions people feel and fight off the Totentanz that is summoned as a result. So you're telling me that Thavnair, whom already know about negative emotions and has an entire combat style in place specifically to stave off something akin to the events of the Final Days, is the 1st location affected by the Final Days. Doubt.
I know I'm overthinking this stuff but I was just kind of disappointed in the 6.0 storyline and needed to vent a little about my frustration in both the story and lore of the game since they seemed to have dropped the ball in that regard.