New Jobs Gated Behind Completion of 2.0 Story?

[Zplinter]

You can dig up whatever definition of expansion you like. The fact remains that if an easily tapped customer base isn't being reached, then the expansion isn't reaching its potential. If there are players who are JUSTIFIABLY not buying the expansion on release because it offers them nothing, who then play the game a while and decide it'snot for them, then they never buy the expansion at all. If the expansion DOES offer them something, though, then they may buy the set regardless of whether they stick with the game or not. Right now, SE has offered nothing I can see to entice players who don't ALREADY PLAY the game to buy the expansion.

For new players they are offering a base game plus expansion combo pack for a much greater price than the cost of just the base game - but no new player with an ounce of sense would buy such a thing when they can get just the vanilla game for cheap, try it out, and buy the expansion later if they enjoy it. On the other hand, if the expansion were to offer things that are NOT locked behind base game progress, the temptation to buy the expansion along with the base game will be much greater.
I will admit that I'm not an advertising executive, but is the math really that difficult to understand? Expansion offers nothing to newbies = less newbies buy the product. Less newbies buy the product = less money. Less money = less money to spend making the game awesome for current players.

Thank you for understanding the business model of the online gaming world.
Expansions serve THREE primary purposes:
1. Generate new content to keep your currently subscribing player base (gated content of new zones, new gear, new raids, flying mounts, etc).
2. Attract NEW players (new races, new classes (term used in standard gaming terms NOT how this game calls them).
3. Create something to bring back the players that have left for various reasons.

WE the veteran players that like/love/enjoy this game want and need SE to attract new players to the game to fill in for those that leave for any number of reasons. If SE can not attract new players both to replace the natural erosion of the player base as well as expand it then this could very easily be the only expansion. Seriously you all need to look at the business model and player retention numbers in the industry.

[StouterTaru]

You don't seem to understand the scale of time. In XI, as has been pointed out, it took a lot longer to get things accomplished. Reaching level 30 on your first job took you longer to do in XI than reaching level 50 on one Job + completing all of the story content that is currently available in XIV.

If you skip all the reading and cutscenes, play as a tank or healer for faster queue times, and have gear waiting at level 50 that's unreasonable to expect a non gil-buying noob to have, then the time through the end of the MSQ would still be longer than going 1-30 in XI ignoring everything but leveling.

[Aeyis]

a. New gamers that have arrives on the scene since launch.
b. Gamers that are tired of game x.
c. Gamers that see that the game has an expansion and think well they must be doing something right, maybe I should check it out.

How in the world can you take the position that if you are not plahying a game you are not "remotely interested?" Are you really going to take apposition that SE (or any other game company) makes an expansion ONLY for the current player base? Really?

How? Because you yourself said that there is nothing at all for new players if you take away the expansions content. That means the new players you are talking about are not interested in the current game. Why would they suddenly become really interested?


Are you trying to make a list just for the sake of it? Because your points 1 and 2 have nothing to do with players looking to get the game just for the expansion.



But you missed the point entirely, I see. Expansions are not for new players, they are for those that already played the base game.

[Gralna]

If you skip all the reading and cutscenes, play as a tank or healer for faster queue times, and have gear waiting at level 50 that's unreasonable to expect a non gil-buying noob to have, then the time through the end of the MSQ would still be longer than going 1-30 in XI ignoring everything but leveling.

yea, I'm not buying that, took me 25 days (arguably less since most of early access the servers were offline), to lvl my first lvl 50 job and beat the 2.0 Main Scenario, add another day on top of that for each major patches story and that's 30 days to get to all caught up and get into Ishgard. This was also with watching all the cutscenes.

XI by comparison took about a month to reach lvl 30 if you grinded for lvls relentlessly, while ignoring the sub job system. If you did try to keep your sub job lvl'd too, and were more casual in your lvling or didn't have a party to help you grind, you were looking at 2-3 months.

[Zplinter]

How? Because you yourself said that there is nothing at all for new players if you take away the expansions content. That means the new players you are talking about are not interested in the current game. Why would they suddenly become really interested?


Are you trying to make a list just for the sake of it? Because your points 1 and 2 have nothing to do with players looking to get the game just for the expansion.



But you missed the point entirely, I see. Expansions are not for new players, they are for those that already played the base game.

If you believe that then you have not studied the gaming industry. Expansion have two primary goals: retain your player base and attract new players.

[Bluevann]

You also could not play the new Jobs in XI right from the get go, though they were available as long as you met the requirements. Correct subjobs were needed for unlock, and at a specific level (again this took a long time to level up).

Nope. I've been playing FFXI since 2006 and I was able to unlock all jobs with any of the first six jobs at 30. Subjobs were required to min-max and play a job at its best, that is no different than XIV's cross-abilities. Go take a look at FFXI wiki if your memory is foggy and you'll see for yourself. Long as you had sneak and invisible (and permits where needed, obtained from side-quests or expansion quest which were still obtainable at any level), you could go unlock any job you wanted soon as you were lv30.

[StouterTaru]

snip

So it's roughly the same if you magically have the level 50 gear waiting for you? What if the XI player magically has a healer following them around as a powerlevel?

With the amount of time per day that would get you through the MSQ in 30 days, in 2002 XI you could have been:
at level 12 in under 2 days, ready to party up at valk
at level 20 in under a week, getting exp at qufim
at level 25 in a week and a half, moving out to kazham
at level 30 in 2 weeks, unlocking the advanced jobs

The extreme slow down didn't happen until 50 in XI, when the tnl jumped through the roof each level.

[Verdan]

Y'all really arguing in here that it's Good Buisness Sense to have the got dang Dark Knight Edgelord and The Guy With a Gun behind 50+ content? Is that what you're all doing? Because christ, guys. Jesus Christ.

[Aeyis]

If you believe that then you have not studied the gaming industry. Expansion have two primary goals: retain your player base and attract new players.

Then I believe you havent actually studied what the developers of this game said on the matter.

''But muh research!''

[Jandor]

Y'all really arguing in here that it's Good Buisness Sense to have the got dang Dark Knight Edgelord and The Guy With a Gun behind 50+ content? Is that what you're all doing? Because christ, guys. Jesus Christ.

Yes, people are arguing that new players should have to play the whole of the main story, hours and hours and hours of main story, as a class they don't really want to play just so that they can actually play as the class they really want to play. Screw newbs, I had to do it (over the course of a year) so they should have to as well!