Count me amoung the skeptics ...

[Bled]

I have to say 2 thumbs up OP!!

Your post has very vividly and coherently not only explained exactly how i feel about the current state of this game, but also my same frustration with the game.

[Jibe]

Much like traveling or rebuilding Anima/Favor, there is a lot of waiting involved with crafting. At least with crafting in FFXI the menus are responsive (though admittedly they have gotten better in XIV), and once you started crafted you could make a run for a bathroom break, grab a drink, or stretch your legs. But, while the crafting in XIV seems to have an sense of involvement, it feels more like the developers are trying to keep me in my chair. If I'm sitting at my desk playing a game, I want to have fun. If the developer is going to force me to sit at my chair, then make the crafting strategic instead of luck based. I'm not sure how others feel about this, but I kind of enjoyed the work mini games in Fable 2, and I could see something like that which would provide a certain level of entertainment/challenge. Alternatively, shouldn't it be up to the player whether they want to play a mini game at all? Why not give the option to auto attempt a recipe? Then if this is too easy, make it impossible to receive HQ results or attempt recopies beyond your current rank. A person who has taken the time to master a craft shouldn't be subjected to random chance or monotony; they should be rewarded.

I may be misunderstanding what you're asking for here, but we do have a system that lets you auto-attempt a craft. It's called Hasty Hand. And you learn it at rank 15 I believe. You can't HQ with it, and it will skip the mini-game and allow you to craft something in 2 seconds flat. All crafting classes get it. It scales with rank quite well too. If you attempt a Hasty Hand on a rank 20 synth and you are rank 19, chances are it will fail. If you are rank 50 Hasty Handing a rank 10 synth, you will maybe fail once in a blue moon. It's actually a very useful skill to set when you are grinding out a bunch of mats for whatever reason.

Btw I'm from Olympia. Nice weather we had today huh?

[Augury]

It's a good game underneath alot of crap. What the game needs is to strip the MMORPG conventions from itself, and reapply tasteful troupes of Final Fantasy games, or just open ended RPGs in general, but VERY VERY DISCRETELY, for familiarity's sake. This isn't just a mechanical issue, but more of an actual play issue... Because it feels like playing WoW or another MMORPG, which makes it hard to seem accessible to fans of FF-games, RPG games, and anything other than MMORPGs. This is what makes Monster Hunter so massively huge in the east- it's a difficult game that doesn't lend itself to troupes or familiarities of other games, and if a dev hopes to make it in the world of MMORPGs (where ALOT of money is floating around), they have to be ambitious with GAME ideas, not MMO ideas.

[Shai]

You can't HQ with it, and it will skip the mini-game and allow you to craft something in 2 seconds flat.

Quick note: You can HQ on a Hasty Hand. You have the same chance of HQ as you would any craft under Quality of 100. I do it all the time when breaking crystals into shards. Also, a full "Hasty Hand" (including reloading recipes... the fast way) takes about 45 seconds to complete a cycle. That's pretty brutal. It would be better if it auto-reloaded like Locals or if it would just let you queue up 10 synths at a time or so.

[Preypacer]

It's a good game underneath alot of crap. What the game needs is to strip the MMORPG conventions from itself, and reapply tasteful troupes of Final Fantasy games, or just open ended RPGs in general, but VERY VERY DISCRETELY, for familiarity's sake. This isn't just a mechanical issue, but more of an actual play issue... Because it feels like playing WoW or another MMORPG, which makes it hard to seem accessible to fans of FF-games, RPG games, and anything other than MMORPGs. This is what makes Monster Hunter so massively huge in the east- it's a difficult game that doesn't lend itself to troupes or familiarities of other games, and if a dev hopes to make it in the world of MMORPGs (where ALOT of money is floating around), they have to be ambitious with GAME ideas, not MMO ideas.

That's a very good point, and I think what you're describing was (surprise surprise) reflected very well in XI... at least to me.

One way I would describe XI to people who were trying it and having trouble wrapping their heads around how different its approach was, was to say that FFXI wasn't the FF theme shoe-horned into a typical MMO mold. Rather, it was a FF game - with all that goes with it (massive world, epic storylines, etc) - put online. SE had created their idea of what an online FF game should be like. They didn't follow all the typical conventions that "everyone else was using" (and that, incidentally, contribute to why so many MMOs these days feel "samey"). They chose an approach that best suited the kind of online FF experience they wanted to create.

That's essentially how I would explain it to people. In most cases - as long as they'd played other FF games - it clicked, they suddenly "got it" and their view of and approach to the game changed. A number of them went on to enjoy the game, where they were ready to quit otherwise.

I really do think that was part of XI's brilliance and why it maintained such a strong following for so long (~500k players after 7 years is nothing to sneeze at for a MMO that released when it did). By the same token, I think that in trying to conform to "the MMO standards" followed by other devs lately, XIV loses that almost completely.

With XI, SE seemed to create content and game systems that conformed to and supported the unique vision and identity they had of what an online FF experience should be. This time around, with XIV, SE didn't seem to have a strong vision or core identity while designing it, and seems to be trying to mold the FF theme to fit with typical MMO conventions.

The results each approach has had for them, I think, speak for themselves. XI was a strong and solid MMO that was internally consistent and had a strong core identity. XIV feels a bit wishy-washy and adrift. It seems, to me, to have no core identity or internal consistency at all.

I am concerned that SE has decided to take XIV in a direction to make it more like other MMOs, borrowing pretty much directly from what other devs have done, and seems to be moving away from making it more of its own game.

Time will tell on that, though, I guess. Perhaps they'll find that "spark" again and pull this baby out of the rut it's in. There's a great game hidden somewhere in there.. They just have to find it, pull it out, clean it off and polish it up.

[gifthorse]

Quick note: You can HQ on a Hasty Hand. You have the same chance of HQ as you would any craft under Quality of 100. I do it all the time when breaking crystals into shards. Also, a full "Hasty Hand" (including reloading recipes... the fast way) takes about 45 seconds to complete a cycle. That's pretty brutal. It would be better if it auto-reloaded like Locals or if it would just let you queue up 10 synths at a time or so.

Wrong.

It's like 1/20 with quality between 30-100.

It's like 1/100 when hasty-handing.

But maybe shards are different.

[Eekiki]

Excellent post. +1. Would read again, except it's long. I agree with everything you said, though.

Kroma is the gentleman version of me.

You heard it here first. BelgianRofl is a woman.

Also, this cannot possibly be true, because Kroma plays this game, and you do not.

[Frebaut]

Accomplishment... Its hard to say i have that feeling in FFXIV. Everything is given to you. No maps to buy, Spells you get for free. Yes i know you still need to buy certain items like gear,weapons, and use Guild Marks. SE was right so far this game is really casual.

I hope in the furture you need to do quest to unlock things. Like an airship pass, chocobo's and other items.

[Teknoman]

Well some really special spells should probably be learned, but normal spells should come with leveling imo. Sure some FF games make you buy spells (even the recent old school style 4 heroes of light) but for the most part, you learn standard spells via leveling.

Now if people had to do quests to learn Ultima/Meteor/Holy/etc. then that would be great.

[Black_Rose]

well written, you really put important thoughts into your post that concerns every player.
no matter how much i like this game, i still have back thoughts about things that don't work properly.
i myself have played FFXI for a long time, and was expecting something more from FFXIV, beliving they would have learned from FFXI.

i'm still active ingame every day and i hope that atleast after the 1 year mark of the games release there will be more content and fixed game mechanics.

i'm looking forward to a experience i once had with FFXI for many years.