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

[Tuathaa]

But it IS part of the Final Fantasy franchise....which establishes Square's pattern for the gating (go back and look at their old Sqaresoft games and such---these approaches are nothing new for them.

The same argument can be made for any franchise not just FF. One of the benefits of creating a new game in a franchise is to correct the things you did wrong in the previous ones. As all the FFXI references have pointed out.

[Raist]

The same argument can be made for any franchise not just FF. One of the benefits of creating a new game in a franchise is to correct the things you did wrong in the previous ones. As all the FFXI references have pointed out.

umm... they are repeating the same approaches as they did in XI. Though, they may be tweaked a bit, but at their core....it is the same principles in play. That is why it keeps being brought up---it establishes the precedent for what they are doing now.

[Hyrist]

We can argue the means all we want. This was a set-in-stone design decision by the developers and venting about it won't do anything substantial.

Point of the matter is, Astrologian, Machinist, and Dark Knight all require fairly considerable investments in other classes for cross class skills to begin with. So there is advantage in gating content to them that requires a person to take another class to 50 first, as the player saves time on one of these required sub-classes.

This is no different than so many other games that have long prerequisites to unlocking special classes or features in said game, and griping about it will not change this long-held tradition. Disapprove if you must but this one you won't win on. Yoshida and crew have bit the bullet and accepted the inevitable losses by this decision. It is ups to the players to decide if they are to adapt or be one of those losses.

I will say, however, you're missing out on quite a good game in A Realm Reborn - and that's before even touching Heavensward, which takes it to a whole new level.

[Tuathaa]

We can argue the means all we want. This was a set-in-stone design decision by the developers and venting about it won't do anything substantial.

Point of the matter is, Astrologian, Machinist, and Dark Knight all require fairly considerable investments in other classes for cross class skills to begin with. So there is advantage in gating content to them that requires a person to take another class to 50 first, as the player saves time on one of these required sub-classes.

There is nothing set in stone in the world of mmo game design.
Other than grinding to 50 and completing the msq because the devs say so there is no reason what so ever to take another class to 50. There is no cross class dependency or any real lore.
Do I support the idea of having level 50 character before you are given basically a "hero class" yes I do. But the completion of the msq (which is already bloated with fluff and filler) is imo unneeded.

[LineageRazor]

Sure, they could change the job's story. Does anyone really want that? I sure don't. I quite like the existing job stories. I certainly don't want them to retroactively change the main story just to allow people to unlock the new jobs as soon as possible.

I doubt there are many here who actually believe there's any chance that SE will "retroactively change" ANYTHING here, job access or otherwise. What we have is what we have, and it's not going to change - if not never, at least not for a good, long while.

I believe the main point of this thread is to discuss:

"Has SE made a mistake by gating jobs behind so much content?"
"If so, will they realize that it was a mistake and take proper measure in the future when adding similar content?"

If this game is making a profit for SE, what makes it's current form bad for business?

Anyone who doubts SE is making money hand-over-fist is a fool. The question isn't "Is SE making money?" it is, "Could SE be making MORE money?" We all know that SE has plenty of room to invest more money in this game. They are FREQUENTLY responding to player requests on these forums with excuses like server limitations and whatnot - problems that can be solved with more money.

umm... they are repeating the same approaches as they did in XI. Though, they may be tweaked a bit, but at their core....it is the same principles in play. That is why it keeps being brought up---it establishes the precedent for what they are doing now.

The problem is, FFXI does NOT set a precedent for how things are in FFXIV. Yes, things were gated in FFXI - but EVERY expansion provided a ton of content that was NOT gated, or gated extremely minimally (like the airship ticket to Khazam, or the quest to access Aht Urhgan). This was especially true for jobs added with an expansion level 30 was the magic number to access any job in any expansion.

The one time that SE gated any content behind the base set Main Scenario was for Rise of the Zilart - and even there, the new jobs were not gated by Main Scenario. Additionally, in terms of the effort to do things in FFXI (and in FFXI, EVERYTHING required a TON more effort than in FFXIV, and a full party of six was the expectation when it came to doing anything corresponding to your current level), completing up to defeat of the Shadowlord was proportionally equivalent to the effort it takes in this game to beat Ifrit the first time. Main Scenario in FFXI was a cakewalk compared to the other things in that game, and for most things it was completely optional.

Someone mentioned Abyssea "making no sense" if you never finished Chains of Promathia. That may or may not be true (someone who didn't do CoP would get to the end of Abyssea and learn that they attempted something awesome in another dimension and failed - that's easy enough to grasp), but regardless of whether it was or not, completion of CoP was NOT required to access Abyssea.

[Kuroneko_Jutah]

"I don't want to play the game to unlock content" thread number 5280

[Asierid]

What we have is what we have, and it's not going to change - if not never, at least not for a good, long while.

Glad we finally got that out of the way...on page 25.

Do I support the idea of having max level character before you are given basically a "hero class" yes I do. But the completion of the msq (which is already bloated with fluff and filler) is imo unneeded.

I see. So we should have to get to 60 (Max level now) instead before we are able to play the new Jobs instead of "finishing" (loose use of the word) the story at 50. Got it. Dat phrasing.

Skip all the cut scenes if you care that much, you can burn through the story and re-watch them later anyway. It isn't changing anytime soon with all of the other broken stuff that needs to be fixed. I fail to see why we keep bringing it up.

[Hyrist]

There is nothing set in stone in the world of mmo game design.
Other than grinding to 50 and completing the msq because the devs say so there is no reason what so ever to take another class to 50. There is no cross class dependency or any real lore.
Do I support the idea of having max level character before you are given basically a "hero class" yes I do. But the completion of the msq (which is already bloated with fluff and filler) is imo unneeded.

"Bloated with Fluff and Filler" Is subjective, there's nothing I can do to argue with you there because your mind is set.

But arguing the likelihood of you getting them to change a hard set stance on a major design of the game is about as likely to take root as you being struck by lightning, and lightning may have a bit of a headstart on that.

Sorry, but feasibly, you're not getting rid of the gating as this is a story-centrist game. What we may see is some of the fetch-quests trimmed down out of the necessary content at best, which would be my suggestion for it. Otherwise, no. Story IS the 'levels' in this game. Whatever idea you have an idea for level-requirement is ok, you can take that expectation and shift it right into the story section. Same for the amount of work involved.

[Raist]

...

Heavenward is XIV's Zilart, with a touch of CoP though. And no, Shadow lord was not the equivalent of Ifrit...it is the equivalent of the Empress's a... Oops almost spoiled it. Hitting Rank 6 was the equivalent of completing 2.55...it was completing the then current main story arc in place at the time the FIRST expansion was released.

And yes, it is a valid example and comparison to use for a precedent. XIV has obscenely close ties to XI...in design, form, function...on down to who created it, who runs/supports updates it (our community team is even the same crew)--as well as a vast number of players.

And thanks for acknowledging the difference in effort/commitment between the two. Even though on paper the path looks shorter in XI, it demanded more of the player than XIV...something that seems to not be considered in these debates. Completing MSQ ARR to 2.55 really doesn't require much effort with all tweaks in place now. It wasn't too complicated before either, but now the XP and gear progression are both fast-tracked and with the existing 50+ incentivised to run roulettes (made 1.2 mill exp with minimal effort and <5 or at worst 10 minute queues...on BLM), story progression is enhanced as well.

[Madjames]

Heavenward is XIV's Zilart, with a touch of CoP though.

And that is for acknowledging the difference in effort/commitment between the two. Even though on paper the path looks shorter in XI, it demanded more of the player than XIV...something that seems to not be considered in these debates. Completing MSQ ARR to 2.55 really doesn't require much effort with all tweaks in place now. It wasn't too complicated before either, but now the XP and gear progression are both fast-tracked and with the existing 50+ incentivised to run roulettes (made 1.2 mill exp with minimal effort and <5 or at worst 10 minute queues...on BLM), story progression is enhanced as well.

It does not matter how fast one levels. The issue is having to do 20 Hours of IRL time from the quest Fireworks and Fish do not mix to get to the quest Into Ishgard or whatever its called. In that 20 hours and countless ecs mashing I got 490k EXP. That is how much I got from all of the quests up to the ishgard opening quest that I had but didnt finish.


Sorry but the +xp and such is not worth it. Getting 4,800xp per MSQ quest is worthless when I could have been in ishgard at level 50 getting 48k per quest and leveling with friends.

This whole issue is stupid and the MSQ needs to be optional. It will be there for those who love it and able to be skipped by someone such as myself that would rather grind fates then do the stupid MSQ.