Forcing us to the entire story quest to unlock the new classes is just bad business

[Adire]

I love when people who cling to lore and story want everyone else to leave if they detect even a hint of "I'm more interested in other things" coming from someone. They forget people are here for other reasons too. Besides, there are ways to allow you into some aspects of HW in a lore friendly way without forcing you to complete the main story.

I really don't think everything in HW should be gated behind main story completion. Particularly the new jobs and crafting/gathering content. But that's how SE chose to do it this time around. Best to go with it and, as you are now, suggest that they not do it in the future.

[Avin00]

Vicus my advice is to report people who are unwilling to co operate yell out orders or are just general ass hats. SE does ban players for bad play all the time. A friend of mine who has a particularly colourful mouth sometimes was banned for some choice words he used in a CT recently so its not fruitless. He did accept his ban with grace and has since been a model player. I don't want you to leave but I do believe the gating is a good thing for now. That may change in a few months or maybe less.

[nuyu11]

I have few games that I can recommend for you OP...

About the speed run is another problems... that's player attitude...

[SuzakuCMX]

I have few games that I can recommend for you OP...

You are adding nothing to this thread but flames to the fire. Please stop trolling; you're not making this enjoyable for anyone and are completely missing any points.

[Juz10y0]

Both sides of this argument are one-sided.

What entitles you to the expansion without doing the story? Because you spent money on it? The product was presented with all details needed with a simple google search, and stated many times. Not hidden what so ever, if people don't like that they would move on it's that simple. (This isn't a insult, just a question.)

Then you have the other argument, if it wasn't gated you think people would flood into the game and try the new classes and it'll be a happy story.

Either side of the argument is voided by the simple logic of this; Yoshida wanted it, so it's in the game.

You get exp and some catch up gear. On my note on this argument, i had two friends not wanna come back because of it and three that trucked through the story and finished off their level 50s who didn't like the game before. I helped them with every fight, and encouraged it. Now they are experiencing Ishgard, and what Heavensward has to offer and are loving it. Those other two miss out? Sure they did, but because of the gated content? or was it their disgust for gated content?

Who's to blame? The gated content? Or the opinions? It's both.

I see it as Yoshida had a vision, he is following it and for saying it doesn't work he has stated multiple times he doesn't want his game to be the next "big thing" but a unique thing that people will enjoy it for what it is.

[Quixotica]

Personally, the new classes are pretty much the only thing in the expansion I have any interest in. The fact that all the expansion content is locked behind a weeks worth of story quests - half of which are mmo busy work (seriously? I'm making soup now for my story quest? what purpose does this serve if not mindless filler?) is the reason I didn't bother buying it.

There's literally no reason for someone without a pre-existing level 50 to own heavensward. Even the new race, if you like it (I personally think it looks lazy and uninspired. The women look like reskinned mithra and men look like slightly edited human/elvaan with scales glued to them), isn't an incentive since you can just race change.

[nuyu11]

You are adding nothing to this thread but flames to the fire. Please stop trolling; you're not making this enjoyable for anyone and are completely missing any points.

Hmmm... I'm just trying to be nice dude...
Because all the anger I see from her post, I just think better she find another stuff that fit her style.
Feel free to report me if you think I'm behave badly or break any rules here.

[Alekxander]

While I understand the rationale behind gating Ishgard and the new classes with the MSQ, it sort of surprises me that the developers didn't include something that wasn't gated.

For instance, a smallish new zone with no MSQ gate. Some part of Thanalan or Gridania that was recently rediscovered. Or that one of the cities decided to try to tame in order to have somewhere to send those darned refugees. Nothing huge like the new Ishgard areas. Maybe include a smallish dungeon.

Some playable content available more easily than that behind the MSQ gate. That could have been done in a way that maintained the story integrity and offered something to new players.

[AlphaFox]

Personally, even if it does break the story, I wouldn't argue with the pre-req being at least level 50 (without story) but having access to Ishgard in some way, shape or form eventually so people can play the new job. Now how it would be done I do not know but I can understand the frustration. After all the new classes are probably what enticed a lot of people, not the new area or flying mounts. Maybe in a few months they will find a way to allow it (just for jobs, no side quests) least I wouldn't argue about it myself.

[Raist]

Thats why I think there has to be a better way. They did it fine with Ninja...then why all of the sudden the new drastic change? There was a big influx of players that came back to try out ninja and you had to level rogue and pug to try it. Why not something like Muar and rogue to unlock DK or Ranger 30 and 15 weaponsmith for Mach? There was a ton of ways to make a better choice then just telling everyone who was interested in spending 50 bucks on their game "no touchy". Bad Business model.

IDK why it is so hard for some people to grasp the importance of the flow of the story line....

Wonder if you either haven't gotten to the point in the story, or you skimmed through it and missed it...but the lore for NIN and ROG were introduced into main story well before the jobs were actually added. You've been working with a Rogue since the very early stages of the game (nearly from the start if you were from Ul'dah). The foundation for NIN was introduced later in the story track---but they were both established in the story well before those jobs were added. That is why they were much more accessible.

These jobs however are being introduced in the scope of the Ishgardian realm...a realm that has been repeatedly mentioned as being isolated and off limits for the entirety of the game until this brand new chapter started. It isn't until you get run out of town and have basically nowhere left to turn and the alliance you built with House Fortemps basically gets you into Ishgard. THEN you finally get exposed to their new jobs once you get there.

For a comparison, you can look again at XI. NIN was introduced to you early on in the game. Long before the job was made available to you, there were quests and missions in Bastok that dropped details on NIN left and right. It was a simple thing for you to get a quest and go unlock it--the back story was woven into your experience very early on. But jobs like Dancer and Runefencer were not introduced to you until you went to the realms where you unlocked those jobs. Their lore was not in the core of the main story---they were bound entirely to the story arcs of their expansions, and you had to meet the criteria bound to those expansions to unlock them. You didn't unlock them in your starter nation. You had to do the quests to gain access to the area (which also required you had advanced to some degree in the original content in order to do so), and then do a series of quests that started in those new areas to gain access.

The same basic principle applies here. The lore is introduced in Ishgard, not the starting nations. The jobs are unlocked in Ishgard, not the starting nations. You can't go to Ishgard immediately because it is isolated and no one will let you in until a specific chain of events occur in the main story. Then and only then are the gates open to you so that you can be properly introduced to those new jobs. There is no big reveal on the jobs until you get into the Ishgardian story arc, so there isn't a proper opportunity to introduce them prior to the events surrounding the Before the Fall chapter (2.5x).

And another thing....I keep seeing people state how it will hurt the game, run players off, etc. Then explain why there are sooo many threads complaining about the congestion? Lobby servers clogging? Too many people sitting AFK? If this is hurting the game so much, then why are there so many more people joining/returning? There are notices left and right telling people they must progress main story to access the new content...yet people bought it up like chocolate, swarmed the forums for a week in a panic because they hadn't gotten their codes, swarmed again in EA because of congestion issues (which for the most part weren't there during 2.5x).

SE has ramped up resources "10-fold" (so to speak) since 2.0 release...they've implemented countermeasure after countermeasure to try to stave off the expected congestion (anticipated something like around 450k concurrent logins during EA, nearly a 30% increase over the then current figures)--and it STILL wasn't enough. They retweaked again this week, and there are still threads popping up complaining about it.

Sure doesn't sound like they are bleeding customers over it... quite the contrary.