First MMO

Edit: thank you all so so much for your help! Feel free to post info for future readers but I now feel that my questions have been answered! :)

Hey there!

So I have never ever played an MMO before, I have watched a few ffxiv live streams and such, so I know that you usually group up at some point with healers and tanks and dps(?) characters, but the actual mechanics are all new to me.

I've gotten to grips with the game and been doing alright on my own so far, but I'm a bit unsure about getting involved with the community stuff, any tips for a first timer?

Info about free companies, parties and general player communication (I do know about emotes and the little speech thing in the bottom right where you type stuff) would be very much appreciated!

Thanks :)

In a dungeon or raid always get out of danger zone. Reaction is key be it DPS or healing or tanking. But don't worry you'll learn as you do the dungeons in order. Also do Guildhest because it's sort of an FAQ that introduces basic dungeon/raid mechanics in chapters. Take it slow, FFXIV will not leave anyone behind. Eventually you will get to experience everything

Thank you so much for the advice! :) The danger zone is the target thing on the floor right? Also, am I right in thinking that Arcanists are dps? And what is Guildquest? Sorry for being so noobish!

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Originally Posted by Zuri_54

Thank you so much for the advice! :) The danger zone is the target thing on the floor right? Also, am I right in thinking that Arcanists are dps? And what is Guildquest? Sorry for being so noobish!

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Yup, step out of lighted ground. And yes Arcanists are dps. It's guildhest, you will find it in the duty finder window once you unlocked it at lvl 10 (i think). Finish every single one of it if you can, because later on the main story quest makes players revisit some of them as quest requirements.

During the early levels, it may seem anti social, as the duty finder limits the chance of teaming up with ppl on more than one occasion. Join a Fc, if the fc doesn't seem right for you, leave and join another. When I first start a mmo and have entered a guild. I typically volunteer myself whenever someone needed help. Its a good Ice breaker to interact with one another. Once you begin participating in party finder duties you ll start to see allot of the same ppl over and over and eventually perhaps get invited to a linkshell, then rince repeat with volunteering to interact. Don't be afraid to ask question s if your unsure of certain boss fights, you'll run into some rotten people dont let them get to you

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Originally Posted by Madsamurai

Yup, step out of lighted ground. And yes Arcanists are dps. It's guildhest, you will find it in the duty finder window once you unlocked it at lvl 10 (i think). Finish every single one of it if you can, because later on the main story quest makes players revisit some of them as quest requirements.

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Sweet, I just reached level 10 so I'll check that out! Thank you so very much :)

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Originally Posted by repoe

During the early levels, it may seem anti social, as the duty finder limits the chance of teaming up with ppl on more than one occasion. Join a Fc, if the fc doesn't seem right for you, leave and join another. When I first start a mmo and have entered a guild. I typically volunteer myself whenever someone needed help. Its a good Ice breaker to interact with one another. Once you begin participating in party finder you ll start to see skit if the sand ppl over and over abd actually get invited to a linkshell, then rince repeat with volunteering to interact. Dint be afraid to ask question s, you'll run into some rotten people dint key then get to you

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Thanks for the advice, I have had several free company invites but been too nervous to accept them ^^;

Don't power-level to try to race to new content, in fact it may behoove you to take in the scenery until 3.0 kicks in so that you don't have to FATE grind between lv47-50 (Quests 49 and under will give more experience to players once the expansion drops). On that note, you have to finish the story line quests in order to even access Heavensward content. Once you hit level 15 you'll be able to queue for Dungeons and you should be able to access Guildhests which are great sources of experience and puts you in situations where you'll learn the in and outs of group pulls and combat. You can access this and any other instanced "multiplayer" content through the Duty Finder which should be in your main menu.

I would also recommend that you join a new player friendly Free Company, which there should at least be a few who are ready and accommodating since the new expansion is hitting and there will be a flood of new & returning players. If you have a friend in real life who is playing then you should add them to your friend's list so you can shoot him questions when you need to.

Beware of RMT (Real Money Transaction) scammers, who will try to send tells, shouts, or yells trying to advertise something. Buying from them is not only against the Terms of Service, but it's a good way to get your personal information stolen.

Ok I will bear all of that in mind, thank you very much :) unfortunately I'm the only one of my irl friends who plays but hopefully I will be able to recruit at least one of them at some point lol. How do I find free companies that are new player friendly? Should I go on the forums or is there a way to tell in game?

Depending on your server a free company will find you before I hit level 20 I had 5+ invites but if you'd like to look on forums under the gameplay section there's a companies sub section with people recruiting so you might be able to find one there

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Originally Posted by shiraxyuki

Depending on your server a free company will find you before I hit level 20 I had 5+ invites but if you'd like to look on forums under the gameplay section there's a companies sub section with people recruiting so you might be able to find one there

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Ok cool thanks :)

I can offer some help with questions about partying!
There are certain things that, for party content as a DPS, are things you should start learning/getting used to now:

1. Learn your skills. DPS may generally have 'less' responsibility, but the worse you are at playing your class, the harder your allies have to work for fights to end. You certainly don't have to be top end, but good DPS make things so much easier, and that starts with understanding what your skills are. As an Arcanist, for instance, your standard strategy is to apply your DoT (Damage Over Time) effects - Bio, Miasma, and Bio II - and then use Ruin while they deal damage, refreshing those spells when they wear off. Look at new abilities as you get them and read the tooltips, and try to think about how this fits into this strategy and where you can use it.

2. Do your class quests at every fifth level. When you hit 30, do your Job quest as well, as soon as you can. It will require some off-class levelling, but it's well worth it. Your class/job quests will grant you gear, stats, and most importantly new skills that will enable you to do all sorts of awesome things.

3. Staying alive is the biggest DPS boost, because you're not doing damage when you're dead. It also makes your healer's job much easier. Early on, accidentally getting enemy attention from the tank, or standing in AoE attacks won't hurt much. Later, these things could do so much damage you die immediately. Learn to dodge and react now.

4. Speaking of staying alive, never stand next to the tank. Bosses especially tend to have 'cleave' attacks - attacks that just hit everything right in front of them for high damage. Later on some of these cleaves could one shot you, being the squishy mage you are.

5. When you're in party content, pay attention to the aggro list as you fight. The aggro list is the list of all enemies that you're currently 'in combat' with, because they saw you first, or you damaged them, etc. It displays enemy HP bars, and also displays an icon that changes color. That icon's color indicates whether you have an enemy's attention, or if their main attention is elsewhere. Red means you are their primary target. Orange means you're close to becoming their target; yellow is safer; green means you're fairly safe. Enemies in party content tend to hurt a lot more than the random enemies you've met wandering around the world, and you really do not want them coming after you. Try to target the same thing as the tank with your damage, and if you see you're about to accidentally get aggro, you can stop for a few moments, or swap to another target! A DPS that holds off so they don't steal from a tank is generally doing their job better than someone who gets their face wrecked because they couldn't hold back for half a second!
(Disclaimer: This mostly isn't going to be a problem for Arcanist, because their damage is split between themselves and their pet to begin with; but you should be careful with what enemies you target, especially when you do things like put your DoT spells on multiple enemies)

6. Kill adds. "Adds" are enemies that appear in the middle of fights with bosses, to harass players and add extra damage. If left alone, adds can oftentimes be really dangerous, and stack up a lot of extra damage on the tank or cause problems in other ways. There are times where you have to not kill them because of specific fight mechanics (The slime boss in the level 17 dungeon, for instance, has an add you have to not kill), but generally, you should be on the lookout for and kill any reinforcements the boss summons!

7. If you don't know, ask! People would rather you say you're new, and ask questions, so they can explain - rather than you stay quiet and only tell them "I didn't know about the important thing" after you're all face down on the floor. It becomes more and more important the further you get in the game, because there are a number of mechanics that you may not understand immediately that could prove very important to a fight.

8. In any party of 4 or more people, the Limit Break becomes available. This is an action that anyone in the party can perform, once the party's limit break gauge has at least one segment full (the number of segments depends on party size and what you're doing). For you, as an Arcanist, you have the "Caster" limit break - which is a large AoE that does huge damage. If there's a melee DPS, they generally have priority with limit breaks to do massive damage to bosses; but if there isn't, feel free to use it when it fills up; especially if you can damage a boss and their adds at the same time!

Ok! Wow that's of info, it all makes sense though and the more I read the more common sense these things seem to become. I feel pretty confident about trying some party stuff now, thank you so very much :)

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Originally Posted by Zuri_54

Ok! Wow that's of info, it all makes sense though and the more I read the more common sense these things seem to become. I feel pretty confident about trying some party stuff now, thank you so very much :)

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No problem! A lot of playing the game does seem like 'common sense' when you actually think about it, but it's the part where you have to stop, think, and realise that most people miss, so it's not quite as common as some would like.

If there's any questions you have, about your abilities or other roles or anything, I'll be happy to answer them!

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Originally Posted by Garlyle

No problem! A lot of playing the game does seem like 'common sense' when you actually think about it, but it's the part where you have to stop, think, and realise that most people miss, so it's not quite as common as some would like.

If there's any questions you have, about your abilities or other roles or anything, I'll be happy to answer them!

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Heh yeah I think I got a bit overwhelmed with the scale of everything ^^; aw thanks!

also for arcanist if you what to stay damage you'll need your second class to be Thaumaturge so you can get the Summoner job

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Originally Posted by shiraxyuki

also for arcanist if you what to stay damage you'll need your second class to be Thaumaturge so you can get the Summoner job

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Ok, I was torn between arcanist and thaumaturge anyway lol :) what impact does the summoner job make on this though?

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Originally Posted by Zuri_54

Ok, I was torn between arcanist and thaumaturge anyway lol :) what impact does the summoner job make on this though?

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A huge one.

The "Jobs" are like the full versions of the classes. In exchange for a couple completely minor restrictions(*), upgrading to your Job nets you additional gear access, increased stats, and most importantly a number of powerful actions that you can't get any other way. You still continue to level as Arcanist to boot, so you lose absolutely 0 progress - it's a straight up upgrade. You should absolutely pick up your Job at level 30, or as soon after as you can manage; the stats and skills are way too valueable to pass up. All jobs have a requirement of level 15 in a specific other class in order to unlock them, but that's fine; you will also eventually want to level other classes for the cross-class abilities you can equip anyway.

Summoner in particular grants you the ability to summon Egis, which are like upgraded Carbuncles with additional capabilities and much stronger power. It also grants you powerful spells like Fester (Does damage for each DoT you have ticking) and Enkindle (Causes your Egi to perform a powerful attack), and with Heavensward will even allow you to channel the power of Bahamut.

Arcanist is also a special case in that it has two jobs; and it can swap between them outside of combat/duties as simply as switching a single piece of equipment. They're both Jobs based on Arcanist, so they share a majority of actions and even share an EXP bar! While Summoner gets much stronger pets and focuses on the DPS capabilities, the other option, Scholar, is a healer. Your Carbuncles will be replaced with two types of healing fairies, who will heal allies instead of attacking enemies; you'll also get unique actions that allow you to heal allies and simultaneously prevent future damage to them in one cast.

(*) - The restriction is that Jobs are only able to borrow cross-class skills from two other specific classes, and have only half as many slots to equip them. This sounds kind of unfortunate, but in almost all cases, Jobs can still cross-class all the skills that are particularly valueable to them anyway (For instance, you'll be able to still equip Swiftcast from Thaumaturge once you learn it). The job-specific abilities and stat boost are way more powerful and important than anything you lose out on.

Oh wow ok, thank you! I'm sure I'll understand that once I get further into the game, it sort of makes sense and sounds like it will be bery helpful if I can master it :)