Are there any ffxi features ffxiv could take inspiration from?

Much in the way skyrim’s dragonborn dlc whispered “why play little morrowind when the full game is just over there?”, the recent alliance raid and slightly less recent eureka content have piqued my interest in ffxi.

Personally I’ve enjoyed how open the world is. Arr is probably the closest ffxiv offers, where there’s nothing stopping you from wandering out of ul dah and walking back to where you start via gridania and mor dhona. In ffxi, I’ve wandered to rabao, ro’maeve, nearly xarcabard but a bat killed me and delkuft’s tower which isn’t really that impressive but it looks cool. I think it would be possible to have four or five expansion zones accessible from the start, but they do like the sixth being a spectacle so unless there’s trickery - underneath as with BA in hydatos, persistent weather obscuring half the zone as with the tempest etc - it probably would not work that well.

I think the dangerous monsters are necessary for the world to feel worth exploring in a way. Similar to eureka where there’s some higher level mobs guarding a cave and it just inspires curiosity about what could be in there. This does of course fall a little flat when there’s no chance of treasure - I would say that anemos and pagos had pretty reasonable mob drops (strider boots, scorpion harness, emperor hairpin, optical hat, cassie earring etc). Haste is slightly uninspired as an effect, but nms that drop effect gear for non combat or non-level cap content might be interesting. Who does it really hurt if a monk has +6 haste in lota or a dark knight heals from crits in sastasha? I think all roles with all main stats would probably be the way to approach this - no weapons either even if the kraken club would be very funny. Despite their current state, legacy ultimates should probably be spared from effect gear if it were added. I think it would add a touch of depth to synced content and pseudo-horizontal progression while levelling.

Speaking of levelling, I have found it engaging enough so far, but I am aware that exp is thrown at you now compared to how it was. The subjob system has been interesting to play around with, even if /war or /drk for berserk or last resort, or /thf for treasure hunter has seemed to be the answer to everything so far. Limit breaks have been interesting too, I’m not sure they would fit in particularly well with ffxiv, but finally being able to reach 55 after exploring some of crawler’s nest, necropolis and the stronghold one was satisfying. The spread of abilities/traits and weaponskills also feels better than ffxiv in some regards, while overall the combat is too different to really compare fairly.

I understand that the old relics still have their uses, but since gear swapping is forbidden in combat here, I don’t think it would work. Combat very much revolves around damage output, so if the kaiser knuckles zeta had double attack on, it would be difficult to make a new relic with a competitive effect. During 1.x the relics did have effects, I think monks was something to do with shoulder tackle, but presumably this wasn’t brought into 2.x for a reason.

Any thoughts? Sorry if no replies, I’m unsure when forum access will be revoked.

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Originally Posted by fulminating

Sorry if no replies, I’m unsure when forum access will be revoked.

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Is it because you unsubbed? I don’t blame you. By far the open map and exploration aspect of XI is what is missing the most. This game (XIV) feels like a gigantic warehouse with a million 100 sqft rooms. So everything, everything, feels cramped. And you got to have the keys before you can enter any of them.

The game needs to be more open and less self explanatory. It can’t be engaging if everything is spelled out for you and laid out in a linear fashion.

If XIV could take one thing from XI, for me, it would be jobs being unique and offering something specific to a party.

COR being able to bring an EXP buff to a leveling party. WHM being able to teleport a party most of the way towards wherever they were headed. RDM bringing refresh to help people keep their MP up.

The only thing that's even remotely comparable in XIV is RDM being able to chain res for prog.

My dream game would be something that could be a mix of the two games, ironically enough it was probably closer to what Tanaka's original vision was before 1.0 was rushed out. Unfortunately I think Yoshi P. (who stated in the FFXI interviews that he never even tried the game) wants to stay as far away from traditional MMO ideas as possible. That said, I think Blue Mage works really well and it's not that hard to play. Going further I really liked Bozja battle content, and the fact that leveling feels better and not like a worthless menial task that's there just because thats what games do.

Going back to that dream I stated earlier it would be for a mix of those systems. A little unbalancing is fine as long as there is plenty of content for each job to do. The game wants you to play other jobs anyways, might as well make it a selling point. Can't be worse than how they have Pictomancer now can it? lol.

I never thought almost 15 years later players would want what was 1.0...not the lag not terrible UI but the actual open world the danger the beauty of exploration and also players working together out in the world fighting dangerous NM's that needed to be killed a certain way.
The world was filled with danger and it was old school even gritty. The world was there to explore and seeing players in party play out in the world like in FFXI was something I loved. The ferry rides where amazing and running to the ferry to catch it.

I loved 1.0 there are a lot who did not though and when we logged onto ARR it was a massive shock not only had the graphics changed but they had redone everything and it felt tiny in comparison.

Having Urianger coming to camp Horizon to warn us of Dalamud and also the Cat girl who did the news used to come and chat along with other npc's that where devs or gm's I am unsure but it was something else. The game was highly flawed but after each patch it was amazing and very FFXI like. I remember Darkhold was so tough it was the savage back then probably and we had server lag to deal with. Cutters cry Aurum vale all where difficult and also the Ifrit fight all the bodies piled up outside after he obliterated players.

I have a love of 1.0 they changed so much and this was like FFXI but at the time the game was broken and I guess instead of switching off (which we begged not too) we got ARR but it is far from the game it was meant to be. So here we are and if any of those things could be brought back I would love them I am not really a fan of the dancing round the circle all the time with fights and the world as lovely as it is to look at holds no danger or secrets.

There are a few things that come to mind.

Open world dungeons would be a great comeback, they had them in 1.0 too, but its nice when everything isn't instanced. Openworld anything would be a blessing at this point though. This world is one of the most pointless overworlds in gaming. After the MSQ there is barely a reason to go back, so just giving us a reason to go out would be fantastic. Esp if it was dangerous if you are underleveled for an area instead of just needing to take 3 steps to the left to lose aggro. I want to have to sneak around dangerous areas. Being able to fly over everything kind of killed this idea off though.

Endgame systems that were a lil different. Dynamis, Assault, Beseiged, Campaign, all these sorts of endgame activities would be a breath of fresh air if done with modern engines. Some would get us out into the overworld with battles there would change the world and not just be glorified fates, some would shake up the formula by making an alliance sized combat area more than a hallway or just a series of bosses with some pointless trash in between. Have the trash mean something and be dangerous like in Dynamis or add interesting twists like the armor/stat lock in salvage that required you to find certain items to unlock them. Give us overworld endgame too, like hunting the sky gods for drops to then unlock a world boss.

Buffs and debuffs is something I miss the most. Having a bard that was actually a bard and not a ranger that hums to themselves as they pewpew, having a red mage that was a buff/debuff machine or a corsair with its roles just made combat so much more interesting than 1 1 1 2 1 1 2 1 3 1 1. Being able to train a mob around a map and kill it slowly with dots on your buffed rdm was an amazing time.

Blue Mage. omg did they absolutely perfect blu in FFXI. It was a powerhouse that took somed dedication, but could cover all 3 roles if needed and had one of the best job storylines of them all. Not the UwU circus side show that is locked to its own content we got here. Just more interesting jobs in general. There is no reason we can't have jobs that range from simple to difficult to play. Some that excel in certain types of content over others, let us being able to actually unlock all jobs on 1 character be worthwhile, and some that are present more for what they provide the party than their actual numbers. As someone who loves support, true support job, not one that just gives 10% damage buff for 30 seconds, would just be amazing.

Pet jobs. No idea why they can't get pet jobs right in FFXIV, when they were so much fun in XI. Give us a decent pet job already, pup preferably, with customizable pets. Pup with its attachments, bst with its pet types, smn with summons that do something. I am already cringing at what we learned in 7.1 and how it feels they are planning on destroying bst in this game.

Gearing could be a lot more interesting too. Give us gear that buffs certain abilities, not just base stats. I want haste gear, m.att gear, acc gear, eva gear, cure spell casting time reduction, more powerful shields, etc. Anything that is more than just, "this one has a higher ilvl".

Make relic weapons be actually powerful weapons that we can continue to build on and not just cosmetic items that we put in storage in the new expansion. The fact that I have been able to use the same swords and daggers for nearly 20 years because I have been able to power them up with each new power increase makes them feel truly like ultimate weapons.

Mostly I just want the devs to stop thinking we are lazy, idiots who lack the ability to understand more than "str makes numbers big big big!"

Spicy hot take but I loved the idea of subclassing in XI. It’s a shame they removed all trace of it, but idk it felt very ‘final fantasy’ to be able to combine job capabilities in such a way (putting aside obvious balancing issues lol).

Honestly I kinda liked some aspects of how ‘NMs’ worked with like, getting drops and using them in a specific location to spawn one in the overworld. That’s kinda what I expected hunts to be - a smaller scale ‘NM’ style spawning content that was consistent rather than the ‘random stuff 100+ zerg in nanoseconds’ lol.

As the above poster said buffing and debuffing / support classes in XI were extremely fun and satisfying. I’d love to have a Bard job in XIV like the XI one that’s focused on songs buffing/debuffing allies/enemies and not just ‘you sing and it makes you shoot harder’. Red Mage controlling the battlefield with buff and debuff magic, Scholar tactically switching between white/black magic to best suit the situation, managing buff/debuff spreading and even assisting with skill chains (or solo magic bursting!)

That said I only actually started playing XI when XIV’s 1.0 went down for the big 2.0 maintenance. So it was around I think Seekers of Adoulin coming out and thus a very different game to what many think of when they think of ‘FFXI’.

I miss the danger of FFXI.
Needing to sneak and invis to go to random sections of the map to do a huge battle, that dread of being low level and feeling my controller shake as I realize that I'm near the NM Bloodtear Baldurf, going to the Temple of Uggalepih without clearing my Tonberry hate and getting one shot by Everyone's Grudge, beastmen zones having puzzles that you have to navigate, like having to mute yourself so you don't get cursed by the Quadav artifacts. Part of that is what made exploring maps so much fun, never knowing what could kill you.

You're not even always safe as a "higher" level!
I was in the Palbourough Mines once and accidentally aggro'd an EP from that was behind a gate on the strong side of the zone and next thing I know, it linked up with every quadav as it ran to where I was and suddenly a bunch of low level quadavs surrounded me and murdered me. It was surreal and hilarious.

I miss Besieged, even though the height of that was when I still played on PS2 and that was rough lol. Just a bunch of high leveled heroes fighting off an onslaught of varied strength enemies as they attack a hub city.

I really enjoyed how fun and interesting the jobs were and the cool combinations you could get with subjobs. I miss the FFXI Dancer and dual wielding daggers and throwing up NIN shades while drain sambaing the life out of mobs. COR support was so fun, I loved the gamble of if you roll the correct numbers for the skill proc. I loved as a SAM memorizing the skill chain chart so that no matter who I was in a party with, I could do a skill chain with their weapon of choice and seeing the insane numbers that came from that + the magic burst from the caster. I loved PUP being able to have them be tank/DD/healer/Caster all the while punching baddies alongside it. I even miss 2hrs.

That being said, the struggle of the game was fun because of the company I had, otherwise, I may not have had the patience to fall head over heals for that game.

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Originally Posted by Keumjo

I miss Besieged, even though the height of that was when I still played on PS2 and that was rough lol. Just a bunch of high leveled heroes fighting off an onslaught of varied strength enemies as they attack a hub city.

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They just started redoing beseiged to make it viable again at i119. It still goes down fast, but they are making adjustments to bring it back to life and make it worthwhile again so its slowly getting more difficult. They are also doing Limbus and are going to go down the line it seems to make 75 era endgame more relevant again.

It's funny/sad that they are putting more thought and care into FFXI right now than they are FFXIV.

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Originally Posted by AnimaAnimus

They just started redoing beseiged to make it viable again at i119. It still goes down fast, but they are making adjustments to bring it back to life and make it worthwhile again so its slowly getting more difficult. They are also doing Limbus and are going to go down the line it seems to make 75 era endgame more relevant again.

It's funny/sad that they are putting more thought and care into FFXI right now than they are FFXIV.

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I saw that! Was trying to decide which streaming service to halt so I can jump back in. I need to find FFXI friends, all my friends quit many years ago.

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Originally Posted by Keumjo

I saw that! Was trying to decide which streaming service to halt so I can jump back in. I need to find FFXI friends, all my friends quit many years ago.

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There are a ton of new and returning players running around right now with linkshells that do a lot to help them out and with the fan made graphical enhancements that have come out over the past few years its truly fantastic. I just rerolled for fun and its still a good time.

So, jump back in. I am sure you will find ppl to play with easily. Esp on Bahamut.

Whole can of worms this question. The answer is yes, lots of features from FF11 would be desirable in this game, but they won't be because this game is designed to be casual in comparison. Many of the FF14 developers worked on or played FF11, so it's not as if they are unaware of the differences. The differences are intentional, especially since trying to copy FF11 resulted in 1.0 which was a commercial failure.

I would personally like the victory pose/sound to play upon defeating regular enemies, not just bosses. And unfortunately, I have to disable cutscenes for duties otherwise the other two cutscenes play prior to beating the last boss. There should be an option to only display the last one when you defeat the boss. But even this is troublesome in, say, a farm party.

As much as people would probably disagree with me, I enjoy the idea of leveling by killing enemies which was possible in Eureka (so I actually leveled that way) and also is possible with Blue Mages.

I like that things in FF11 would have more systems depth generally - but among other reasons, FF14 wants to keep everything simple so that it's easy to understand for the average casual player. The other reason, quite frankly, is they seem to struggle to add depth to this game - the most depth we get is with Eureka, Bozja, Island Sanctuary and Palace of the Dead (specifically all these special actions and unique UIs).

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Originally Posted by fulminating

Personally I’ve enjoyed how open the world is. Arr is probably the closest ffxiv offers, where there’s nothing stopping you from wandering out of ul dah and walking back to where you start via gridania and mor dhona.

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I agree, but unfortunately this is a trend with a lot of games. They only create things if they will be used. Which takes away from how big games feel when developers design them without knowing what will be used. In FFXIV, every square inch of the map is used for something, even if it's a single sidequest.

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I think the dangerous monsters are necessary for the world to feel worth exploring in a way. Similar to eureka where there’s some higher level mobs guarding a cave and it just inspires curiosity about what could be in there.

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This is a good point. This is what I enjoyed about Eureka. That I had to navigate dangerous enemies and dragons. Those who failed were the bodies you walked over to get places - literally I walked over dead players regularly on my way to NMs. I can understand if they don't want to do this with the open world, but there's no reason to hold back in the upcoming Field Operation.

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This does of course fall a little flat when there’s no chance of treasure - I would say that anemos and pagos had pretty reasonable mob drops (strider boots, scorpion harness, emperor hairpin, optical hat, cassie earring etc).

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My only real issue with this was the drop rate. I quite liked the fixed cluster grinds for things in Bozja which meant I wasn't wasting years trying to get a rare drop.

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I’m unsure when forum access will be revoked.

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2 weeks after your last character login. This is true even if you have been logged into your character for 2 weeks. That's right, if you have been logged into the game for 2 weeks, you have to logout or it revokes forum access despite that you are actively talking in the game. For that reason only, the regular DDoS can be a blessing.

I would add Monstrosity.

After a quest involving PoTD and pomanders, you get a Beast Pomander that allows you to turn into a monster in the overworld. At first you got three monster families (beast-, wave-, vilekin) and a base form for each (opo-opo, pugil, bee), each with their own abilities and strengths.
From here you can fight other overworld monsters to get exp for the monster family along with currency. Getting a certain level in a monster family lets you unlock new forms through quests, and you unlock new monster families. Currency lets you buy certain unique traits, abilities or weapon skills.

You build your monster using a point system, letting you remove or add traits, abilities and weapon skills. Some forms have inherent traits, like flans having higher magic power, hydra having cost reduction for each subsequent breath attack, or chimera boosting breath attacks, but cost more points.

Endgame would be Halatali. You can fight other players in the arena, or npcs. Victories give new currency that can unlock very special powers and other rewards like glamour.

And this is something that's possible to make, even with the systems we have in FFXIV right now.

Main Story Design.
FFXIV's MSQ is a straight up VN with as much gameplay removed as possible. FFXI's MSQ was a dungeon crawler that encouraged you to venture out into dangerous areas as a group. On top of this, it wasn't so focused on fetch quests that boil down to "run here and talk to NPC X" 50 times.

It would probably be quicker to list what features from XIV that I would like to see in XI. Allow me to parrot previous posts.

Overworld -- I love the vast, dangerous, interconnected zones of XI. I always felt like Vana'diel could be a real place. There is no sense of scale or distance in the world of XIV, especially since story NPCs just can just show up wherever, whenever, they're needed and act like you're late even though you just teleported there four seconds ago. Fast travel is convenient, but does little for immersion.

Dungeons -- Open, non-instanced dungeons are cool. As much as I disliked some of these places when I was leveling a job (there's a reason why we called Garlaige Citadel "Garbage Sh*tadel"), there is something to be said for mazes, traps, and dangerous enemies. It's just so... adventurous. Plus, there's the comedy of the shout of "Train to the zone!" and everyone scrambles to the exit and BLMs are casting Escape. Good times.

Combat/gearing/stats -- These go hand-in-hand. XI was just so much more robust. Gearing was a lot more detailed than grinding the highest item level and melding Crit. Buffs/debuffs, crowd control, enmity management, differing types of monster aggression, stats that had actual weight; all things that made for a richer combat experience. A successful battle was more about having the right tools and skills, rather than memorizing all the dance steps. Challenges could be handled in different ways based on party composition. Also, subjobs kick ass.

The player character -- I never felt like my little Taru black mage was some unstoppable god-killing machine. He got stronger as he leveled, but there were always equivalent mobs and NPCs to keep things in check. The running gag was, "there is always a rabbit that can kill you." Story-wise, my character was always the right guy at the right time, instead of the only guy that could do it.

Nostalgia is a hell of a drug. There are certainly plenty of things I dislike about FFXI. I do think there can be happy medium between these two games, though. XIV could do with a lot less hand-holding, but it doesn't need to be quite as obtuse as XI. Unfortunately, what I think XIV needs would require scrapping the entire system and making a new game.

FFXI is a product of a different time. I actually think a modernized version could be successful, but not in same way that FFXIV has been.

I like the sense of danger in leveling in XI. I also feel like NPCs tend to have a bit more personality in XI.