Wouldn't Warring Triads also need to be completed for Stormblood access?

If not, you'd have to imagine at some point? I'm referring to the new areas in Stormblood.

You may recall that with a realm reborn all of the trials, quests and most of the dungeons were tied to the MSQ. With Heavensward, they realized that some players want to immediately jump into the trials upon a patch release as opposed to churn through quests. So they separated the trials from the MSQ with the Warring Triad's questline. However, the Warring Triad's questline contains some major MSQ players (Eldibus, Garleans, etc.).

You'd have to imagine that "eventually" Eldibus or one of these other characters is going to either die or turn good. Correct me if I'm wrong, but FFXIV has avoided all (or at least the vast majority) of continuity issues? This would be a big one if you played Warring Triad's after the death of one of the major characters included in Warring Triads.

I think not eventually making Warring Triads, Crystal Towers, Alexander, Coil, etc. mandatory kind of diminishes the story. The list of characters that seemingly can never die is continuing to grow which kind of kills the suspense of future stories (Cid can't die in Stormblood because he's a big part of Crystal tower, etc.).

Thus if SE is so serious about continuity to the point where new players have to pay $25 or churn through all of the MSQ, I think they need to also start including certain side quests as pre-requisites.

Thoughts?

I think we are free to go into spoilers here, right?

Anyways, Unukalhai is a Scion now, so at some point it will be need o.o

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

(Cid can't die in Stormblood because he's a big part of Crystal tower, etc.).

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Not entirely true actually. He could get killed off and it wouldn't be a problem just like Estinien getting hijacked by Nidhogg wasn't a problem for anyone who had not yet leveled Dragoon to 50.
If side stuff brings in main story characters it can be assumed that, even if the player is getting there late, it happened at a certain point along the main story you may have already passed.

Any discrepancies in the story's timeline can just be waved off by saying "Something something crystals..."

Well look at people who skipped crystal tower, that's alot of story they missed especially once you get to 3.5 and don't understand Cid's reactions

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Originally Posted by Derio

Well look at people who skipped crystal tower, that's alot of story they missed especially once you get to 3.5 and don't understand Cid's reactions

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Cid mentions their time at some imperial academy. He'll only mention the whole Crystal Tower incident if you have actually completed it.

Wouldn't that be sort of difficult to fill spots?

I'm interested in CT and Coil and what not, but I missed the timeframe where people were actively doing it, no? Surely it would be hard to find 24 people for it nowadays, let alone when SB is out. I get that story-wise, it'd probably make sense (can't say since I've only really done MSQ and a bit of Alexander) but I'm sure it'd be difficult to find people to do that content with.

They're always trying to drag us back into old raids - ARR 24 man raids gave you ather oil, an item that was needed for the progression of your HW-relic.
Khloe is asking us each week to go back into one of the 3 ARR 24mans and 2 turns of Coil...

Coil can also be done unsyched, so you dont need the full 8 people anymore.

Lore in this game is contained in time bubbles, whatever happens in the warring triad questline will not be happening in the "present" of the stormblood main story.

Same thing if you do CUL quests while Nanamo is gone, same thing if you do DRG quests while Estinien is gone, same thing if you do NIN quests when we reach that portion of the Revolutions trailer with Oboro.

However, if they ever feel like it would break continuity they can easily make the quest required, like they did with hard mode garuda, ifrit and titan, but there's no need to make it required unless they really really have to, as long as people understand how the lore in a MMO works.

Honestly no. The raids and Expert primals, while good story, aren't necessary to following the main MSQ. Estinien was a major player in the early lancer Job quests but people shouldn't need to level Lancer to play HW. In most cases the interactions with such characters is peripheral to involvement in the main story, not core to them. Likewise, most characters who fall in side stories or get development there will probably only have references to them in the MSQ if the play has done the side content or such references will be in a vague way. This already happens in the MSQ including Job specific dialog and comments from characters you have met previously (such as Estinien).

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Originally Posted by kattzkitti

Any discrepancies in the story's timeline can just be waved off by saying "Something something crystals..."

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Actually it's, "Something something echo..."

As it stands, the following people have "plot immunity":

CT: Cid, Biggs, Wedge, Nero(!)
Alex: Y'shtola, Cid, Biggs, Wedge
Coil: Alisaie, Alphinaud, Urianger
Warring Triad: Krile, Y'shtola, Urianger

This is not counting npcs whose only involvement in the story thus far is in those particular instances.

It was widely assumed that Estinien died in the lv50 drg quest aftermath, or so I was led to believe (I did the quest after completing HW, personally). That was handwaved with "no body, no death", but it's pretty clear from what happens within the drg questline (the way estinien reacts to you, the crock of bull alberich spouts at you around lv40 about their history, etc) that this quest is meant chronologically (whatever that means within the great time bubble) to take place before HW.

Quests seem to have a timeline that basically follows level progression, and that's the only thing we can be reasonably sure of.

However!

A lot of NPCs will change their dialogue based on what optional content you've done. I hope that Varis is at least minorly involved in SB, given the nature of the (apparent) main antagonist, but likely what will happen is that he'll get a throwaway line of dialogue based on whether or not you've witnessed the death you mention. Kinda sad to see such an important relationship reduced to that, but that's what everything else has been reduced to so far, no?

I feel like you can really tell, where the triad is concerned, both that they wanted it to be part of the msq and that they weren't given enough space to develop it fully - Zurvan and the quests surrounding him are all incredibly disappointing for a number of different reasons, not just the way one particular npc was handled.

As for Unuk, adorable murderchild that he is, given he lives in the Solar which is an instanced instance, I doubt his presence will cause any issues unless Minfilia teleports back in and yells "SYKE" in Thancred's face.

I sort of went all over the shop there, but it tl'dr's down to this:

1. Quests have an approximate timeline within the story,
2. If you don't do them within the expected timeline, nobody acts like it did happen,
3. Because they can be done whenever, key NPCs have to stay alive at all times, regardless of whatever 'expected' chronology was mapped out by the writers,
4. Optional content can never include anything meaningful that can't be distilled to one line or so of dialogue, unless any references to said content is entirely non-voiced, in which case maybe they'll get two whole lines.

The time bubble is a problem. But it exists for a reason, that being "the dragonsong war can't be over for new players", or some other bs that can't be easily solved by a story-based timeline, evolving instances client-side (see: Alex) or other things that they could implement, but choose not to.

I'm by no means an expert, most of what I know I learned from Anonymoose in the lore forums, but basically you're SOL if you want Unuk or Regula to mean anything in SB, or for optional content to ever have an ACTUAL impact. (Or be made mandatory.)

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

Thoughts?

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I don't see why this is an issue. If folk get confused about who an NPC is or whatever, they can ask for an explanation, look it up online, or go back and do the appropriate content... just like any other MMO. xD

I think making MORE content required to progress to the next expac is the exact opposite of what they should be doing.

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Originally Posted by Mirateski

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Your understand about how the time bubbles and plot immunity work is flawed.

Time is bubbled such that all content same level happens concurrently and patch/expansion happens within that patch/expansion's timebubble. All content the same level happens roughly at the same time no matter what level it is and what order you complete content in.

The current time bubbles are the following (each set of () marks a bubble):
(2.0 1 to 50)(2.0 endgame)(2.1)(2.2)(2.3)(2.4)(2.5)(3.0 Drk/Ast/Mch 30 to 50)(3.0 51 to 60)(3.0 endgame)(3.1)(3.2)(3.3)(3.4)(3.5)

When 4.0 is released, The RDM and SAM unlock quests will be added to the 2.0 endgame bubble and their 51 to 60 quests will be added to the 3.0 51 to 60 bubble.

Only the npcs needed to start the sidequests have plot armor. All others can be killed as the previous sidequests they were part of have been bubbled. Urianger and Unukalhai both have plot armor as they are the npcs who start various questlines.

Unukalhai can appear in any possible 4.0+ content. The only thing will be the existence of a variable cutscene to introduce him to the main story, same as how Estinien was introduced in HW.

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Originally Posted by Naunet

I don't see why this is an issue. If folk get confused about who an NPC is or whatever, they can ask for an explanation, look it up online, or go back and do the appropriate content... just like any other MMO. xD

I think making MORE content required to progress to the next expac is the exact opposite of what they should be doing.

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this and keep in mind palace of the dead is a good one to show they already bypassed conflict. Basically something you can do sooner (level 17) happens after you do something at level 50 and that something is not even in the MSQ.

I don't see it being required. When HW came out there were actually a few quests that would be contradicted by the events (Most notably the DRG and CUL questlines). Canonically, all ARR stuff occurs before HW, and the same will likely hold true for SB.

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Originally Posted by Malzian

Actually it's, "Something something echo..."

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Where do you think the Echo comes from...?

I think for storyline purposes, they should have made the Warring Triad sidequests mandatory in a similar fashion they made Ifrit, Garuda, and Titan Hard mandatory to progress through the story.

In 3.0, King Thordan siphoned some of the Warring Triad's power to use Ultimate End. As a result, it weakened the seal on the triad.

In 3.1, Elidibus mentioned in the main story about the triad not being able to change the course of events to come.

During 3.2-3.4, Regula tried to find methods to harness the power of the Triad using the Allagan technology he could find at ARF. Keep in mind that Regula was also a main story character in 3.0 and significant figure representing the empire in this storyline.

In 3.5, Zurvan killed off Regula. There might be consequences resulting from Regula's death, especially with how close Regula is to the current emperor of Garlemald.

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

If not, you'd have to imagine at some point? I'm referring to the new areas in Stormblood.

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Why do you feel compelled to the idea that Stormblood needs further barred entry to keep people out? Seems selfish.

Same thing during before the fall when Nanamo dies but you could still interact with her during the culinarian quest.

Also as a new player if I were to complete a major chunk of the msq and a new side quest popped up next me we could already assume they are related.

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Originally Posted by EusisLandale

Not entirely true actually. He could get killed off and it wouldn't be a problem just like Estinien getting hijacked by Nidhogg wasn't a problem for anyone who had not yet leveled Dragoon to 50.
If side stuff brings in main story characters it can be assumed that, even if the player is getting there late, it happened at a certain point along the main story you may have already passed.

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Don't forget about Nanamo being in the Cul level 50 quest

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Originally Posted by MasamuneBranford

Thoughts?

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Basically, I feel you're asking the impossible. The game as is will always have some form of continuity errors. The first being its an MMO. Some people maybe interested in doing something now, some not at all and some may do it three years from now. Second is I seriously doubt SE has this entire games story fleshed out from beginning to end. The end could be meaning ten years from now or whatever. So even the most minor NPC today could be a major MSQ later on. With that all in mind from your post I feel you're asking every player to get to points in the MSQ and complete every raid, every class quest and every sub quest in the game at certain times just for the sake of getting through the MSQ. Which already has a great number of complaints due to story gating. Not to mention some of that content just flat out doesn't strike some peoples fancy. Like, what if the grand rebellion hero in 7.0 for the sake of argument just happened to be the NPC that handed you thread in the level 40 weaver quest or whatever. Would we be required to level weaver then to learn of their origins? Since you mentioned the $25 skip potion that is enough to sum up that enough honestly don't care about the past story and just want to beat up stuff in the new expansion where everyone will be. If someone skips the story I really don't think they're going to really care about any future story anyway. So why add more story locks? Not to mention in this case buying a story skip potion would auto level those particular classes to whatever level was needed to meet the NPC that was a major person in an expansion that 10 to 1 the person buying the potion never really cared about in the first place.

It's an MMORPG, the story happens without you.

Alternatively, would you blame a Book for being 'out of order' if you skipped chapters, only to come back to them later?

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Originally Posted by CosmicKirby

It's an MMORPG, the story happens without you.

Alternatively, would you blame a Book for being 'out of order' if you skipped chapters, only to come back to them later?

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/Thread over.

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Originally Posted by kattzkitti

Where do you think the Echo comes from...?

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The Echo is not a power bestowed by crystals but rather an innate ability of a person to engage in resonance with the aether of another being or object. We do not actually receive the Echo from Hydaelyn, either, but rather our ability to resonate allows us to enter her presence and receive her blessing. Remember that (mild spoiler) when the blessing of Hydaelyn is sealed from us, we are still able to receive echo visions. Also, on top of this, if the Echo were granted by crystals then a larger portion of the population would have it, most especially the Craft guildleaders who have been exposed to extreme amounts of crystals over time. The Echo is something you are born with or not (though the Ascians seem to be able to bestow it on others temporarily) and is not obtained via interactions with crystals.

There's already discontinuity with the Warring Triad quests. For those who did not complete the content when it was new, it's possible to complete the Warring Triad quests where Unukalhai's identity is revealed and he joins the Scions before completing the Ravana/Bismarck extreme fights where his identity is still a secret. You end up with cut-scenes where everyone is still suspicious of him as an outsider despite him already becoming a Scion in a previous cut-scene. Personal experience.

Consider its a sidequest i dont see why they would. It was weird to see the kid join the scions though

The Warring Triad felt like such side story, it'll probably just get a mention like the Alisiae dialogue if you completed Final Coils.

Yeah, as some people mentioned, the Coils content was also optional despite involving Alisae. I see either two ways about it. Either the game will act as though the quests were done, or put in separate dialogue if you have done it.

No, it isn't needed. They'll most likely have these characters in the MSQ, and give them different dialogue, depending one what content you completed or didn't.

I remember wheb Alisaie was first brought back into the story and she said something like "I haven't seen you since our adventures against Bahamut" and I hadn't done coils at all. Likely won't be a huge deal, mostly because the characters in this game talk so much you pretty much get the gist of anything you might have forgotten (or in this case missed).