A serious discussion about abridging the story quest 1-50 (discouraging new players)

[KisaiTenshi]

There is no formal rules about how to make an MMO

I'll disagree. While every MMO may go about it differently, there are a few fundamental rules that need to be adhered to or you either bomb the launch or your customer base churn is too high.

1. A MMO is a Multiplayer game, all activities in the game must therefor be "better" in multiplayer than the single-player-in-a-multiplayer-world experience. If people only come to play the single player part and then leave, you've failed.
2. A MMO-RPG, must allow the player to create and name their own character within the programming limits of the game. In otherwords you can't have a MMORPG where everyone has to play Fluffy, and the world is populated with only other Fluffy's.
3. A MMO-RPG must have a clear path on why they are in the world. You can't just drop someone into the world, go "here's a spoon, have fun" and not give them an objective. What's the ultimate goal, reach level 50? Kill the bigbad? Craft a nice house?

Final Fantasy XIV hits most of the right notes when compared to other RPG's. I don't expect it to be perfect (everyone is going into trendy minecraft-clones now) but It just wouldn't be a Final Fantasy game if there wasn't deep lore and story behind every character. This is not a "WoW-clone" with a Final Fantasy skin on top. Most of the MMORPG's out there clone WoW's mechanics but offer very little originality, and all the freemium ones want you to spend hundreds of dollars a month on cash shop items to stay ahead. No thanks. The amount of money you might spend on FFXIV (10-15$/mo + 40$ per expansion) is equal to about 2-3 stand-alone games that give you 15-30 hours of play time each. So if you can get 90 hours of play out of FFXIV, you are FAR ahead of a single player game, and you can play with friends.

[odintius]

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Honest answer it was the producer and developers who decided to go this route in game development and that purely there opinion on the matter and probably have data to back it up who knows, heck it could change after another expansion the game is still young in terms for a mmo things change. My opinion is this I think this subject is trifling in all this time moaning about something on the forum as a new player they could have been halfway finish with AAR by know the leveling system is in this game is a joke have friends <BONUS> you probably be in Istgard in no time.

[Atrayl]

If you make things accessible without the story, a part of the reward is removed from the story and it will be less fun for me.

You do realize what you're saying here is that part of the joy you get from the main story quest is the exclusion of a large group of players from the content that it gates, correct? I just wanted to make that clear. Because if the quest requirements are removed from, say, being able to fly, or being able to do the dungeons, that's the only thing that changes: the fact that other people are unable to do it and you are. You're literally taking pleasure in their misfortune.

So, okay. There's one answer to how it negatively affects you, I guess: less sadism.

Nice strawman, implying that anyone has admitted to playing just for the story and not also for the MMO gameplay. Of course it's an invalid argument because you made it up lol. People have, however, admitted to playing a story focused game only for the gameplay, so the question made by the person you responded to is perfectly valid and reasonable. I think it's rather ridiculous to ask for this game to be changed, when what you are looking for (no attunements, optional story, good pve) already exists in other games. A good story told via a game is what we have right here, so there's no need read books. "Why bother playing this game if you want a story? Go play a story focused gam... oh wait."

It's not a strawman. It's literally the reverse of the argument used against me.

I'm actually not against attunements. I enjoyed The Burning Crusade's gateing system. The difference there is that it gated PvE group content behind PvE group content. To do the thing you wanted to do, you had to do other things you wanted to do. That makes sense. This is gating group content behind solo story content. It's a completely different situation.

No. Anyone asking for this is being an entitled brat who wants everything handed to them without working for it.

"Please don't take anything further I have to say on this topic into consideration because I am resorting to childish attacks."

Will do!

[Voltyblast]

Honest answer it was the producer and developers who decided to go this route in game development and that purely there opinion on the matter and probably have data to back it up who knows, heck it could change after another expansion the game is still young in terms for a mmo things change. My opinion is this I think this subject is trifling in all this time moaning about something on the forum as a new player they could have been halfway finish with AAR by know the leveling system is in this game is a joke have friends <BONUS> you probably be in Istgard in no time.

I hope you're fully correct on that! I'm not saying that I'm 100% correct on the matter but still a company is a company and even with all the "data" you can get, their main goal is to make money and that's undeniable.

Still if they are saying the truth, that's more winning power to you: I definitely don't care whether they care or not about a story but rather if the story is good or not and for me, as in my personal and subjective opinion, the story is bad and not worth the time and if we don't agree with each others that's completely fine.

I don't agree however when someone tells me when I'm playing the wrong game when I clearly liked other aspects of it minus the story, and there are RPGs where the story is not really "great" (Pokemon and any of the latest Mario RPGs) and if I don't like one aspect of the game it doesn't simply mean the game is not for me. If the game wasn't for me I wouldn't have played it at all.

And also, not all of us are moaning and in need of doing the MSQ: I have done it long ago and this thread affects me in absolutely no way whatsoever and I could go by on my ways and completely forget about anything without bothering.
However I do know some people (and this thread has quite a few of them) who are struggling because of either boredom or because of the needless amount of unrelated story bits that could be simply removed; I still think that if they removed the dungeon (or making them soloable) would solve all the problems but I digress.

[Madjames]

I have the MSQ complete, it took me a total of 20 HOURS starting from the quest Fireworks and Fish do not mix. That is how long it takes. That to me is utterly stupid and is bad for new players and I am not even one of them, I am past it.

I also think the new jobs should have been given to players and not again, gated for no reason by the expac.

To LUVBUNNY:

I have already expressed to you as to why I am playing this game. Every aspect of this game is awesome except the MSQ crap, sorry but it sucks compared to other FF games plain and simple and should be optional for those who want to fate grind to level or do missions or something. Gating the expansion should have been a hard level cap, not a hard level cap + 40 HOURS of reading a book/watching a movie and doing unrelated crappy quests for people.

I am leveling my miner by doing nothing but mining. I am not doing any leveqests, I am doing nothing to progress my miner besides the miner quests that are one every 5 levels. Nothing but mining, why? Because its fun and its relaxing. If SE said I had to do some drawn out MSQ crap to level that too, I would quit. I will not be punished nor will I accept another play-style to dictate how I want to play in an mmorpg that I am paying monthly for. Luckly, SE saw the light and give us the choice to level how we want on our gatherers, now all that is needed is that freedom of choice on our combat toons and crafters and we are good to go.

[Treaniebeanie]

As a new player to the game I do have to say that the story is frustratingly long, and very tedious. It's really ridiculous to travel halfway across a country to activate a cutscene just to have to run back to where you were initially to finish the quest. If there was someway to fast travel(aside from teleport which only allows you to travel to the crystals) that brings you back to the initial point at least would be lovely. Honestly it feels like half my playtime is just from me running back and forth trying to finish story quests!!!!

[Luvbunny]

As a new player to the game I do have to say that the story is frustratingly long, and very tedious. It's really ridiculous to travel halfway across a country to activate a cutscene just to have to run back to where you were initially to finish the quest. Honestly it feels like half my playtime is just from me running back and forth trying to finish story quests!!!!

Newsflash!!! Thats Heavensward for you!!! If you hate MSQ 2.0-2.55, Heavenward is just the same thing, bigger, longer, further, more fetching, with a big dash of hide and seek, running back and forth, again and again, and again, and again. The sheer frustration will amplified with aether flow quest, which can take hours to complete doing nothing but running around the map, and getting frustrated cuz you cannot reach the area, unless you really explore... It is absolutely atrocious way forcing players to explore and do all the tedious quests after quests after quests. You cannot even fly until you find all aether flows, on every single zone.

So yeah half your playtime would be doing quests, since aether quests are buried under other chain quests that you must complete before they show up... It makes MSQ 2.0-2.55 pale in comparison on how fast and easy it is to complete.

[Tuathaa]

Newsflash!!! Thats Heavensward for you!!! If you hate MSQ 2.0-2.55,

Actually the MSQ in HW is no where near as tedious as you describe and it actually flows rather well compared to 2.0-2.55. All the optional quests are the tedious ones.

Now if all the optional ones were part of the MSQ then you would have a fair comparison.

[Veji]

I guess i just don't get it. I play FFXIV for the story and everything else. I've yet to see the HW content, even though i bought the CE. I just killed Ramuh, last weekend. I don't have any issues with this. I like the story. I like feeling accomplished with my character. I know everything is "gratification NOW!", but c'mon, really?? Why do people keep seeing a decent story as a grind? Maybe this MMO just isn't for you or your friends. Thats really all i can wager at. I hope SE keeps to their guns on this and doesn't budge. I think going through all the ARR story content is important.

[Reinha]

You do realize what you're saying here is that part of the joy you get from the main story quest is the exclusion of a large group of players from the content that it gates, correct? I just wanted to make that clear. Because if the quest requirements are removed from, say, being able to fly, or being able to do the dungeons, that's the only thing that changes: the fact that other people are unable to do it and you are. You're literally taking pleasure in their misfortune.

So, okay. There's one answer to how it negatively affects you, I guess: less sadism.

. . . I'm actually not against attunements. I enjoyed The Burning Crusade's gateing system. The difference there is that it gated PvE group content behind PvE group content. To do the thing you wanted to do, you had to do other things you wanted to do. That makes sense. This is gating group content behind solo story content. It's a completely different situation.

It's quite hilarious to see you make making a personal attack at me just because I gave you the answer to your question. Sorry to tell you but everyone won't always agree with you. The ironic part is where you call the other poster on their personal attack, and say it takes away their credibility.

The fact that I like being rewarded for my actions with more than just cosmetic things does not make me a sadist. I have no idea how you got to that conclusion. That's like saying raiders are sadists if they prefer that the BiS gear comes from raids. Or that people who enjoy the aether current system must do so because it makes other people unhappy. Do you not see how ridiculous that sounds? I suppose I've never seen an ad hominem that doesn't sound ridiculous.

I'm happy you mentioned The Burning Crusade. I found a chart in wowwiki (link because image doesn't work):

http://wowwiki.wikia.com/Instance_at...attunement.jpg

According to the chart, those attunements required both group and solo content. To me that sounds a lot like what we have in FFXIV, with the exception that here the solo stuff is also gated behind group content in turn. It's how the game is built from level 1 and up, which makes me believe this game is intended for people who like both kinds of activities. For the intended audience the experience is the same as you had in TBC: to you do the things you want to do, you do other things you want to do.

There's nothing wrong with not liking solo questing obviously, but complaining about it being a requirement in FFXIV is kind of like me choosing to play an MMO that mixes PvP and PvE in it's attunements, and complaining about how I'm "forced" to PvP. Realistically I am not forced to play anything I don't want to play and if I willingly chose to play such a PvP/PvE hybrid for it's other good qualities, I would just grit my teeth and get the PvP over with. That's exactly what I did in Mists of Pandaria with the legendary cape and violet proto-drake mount, because those weren't the first occasions in WoW's history when PvP was required for PvE (or vice versa). Neither is this the first time that questing is required for group content in FFXIV.

If the developers cater to one group of players, they will disappoint another group. That's been my point all along and it's what I tried to illustrate with my example on page 17. Disappointing you target audience would be a very stupid move for a game company and I that's why I doubt they will ever make the story completely optional. It deviates way too much from their original vision.