The Current Status of FFXIV Patch 3.1 and How to Address it Moving Forward

[RiceisNice]

TL;DR
Due to Gordias Savage being (too) hard, Anima weapons were designed to be (too) hard to get. They had to have known this, but released them as they were anyway, and should have expected the reaction they got.

A good handful of players (me included) is less upset about the time it takes (because it's roughly the same as novus, only you're doing more things per day outside of the roulette, and it's less of a indefinite money sink). It's more concerning in the design approach that they're reusing old, 2.x content that does not encourage player interaction (specifically the beast tribes and 2.x hunts, which mind you the latter rewards more than the 3.x contents as far as getting 3.x progression is concerned), rather than keeping EX primals and 3.x content relevant in the 3.x patch cycle.

Hell, they didn't even revitalize 2.x areas which need attention like CT, and we're still waiting on them to fulfill their end of the bargin when they'd said they were looking into ways to make CTing more lively again. I didn't wait for them to drop this piece of content since 3.0 just to go back to do more 2.x content, which hasn't even been retrofitted to be done as a lvl 60 other than the fact it rewards (more) currency for 3.x progression.

While this is essentially true, the Zodiac questline has never been anything but exactly this, and there's no real means for it to be anything different unless they radically change their goals for the content itself. That complaint has been valid for every single step of the Zodiac weapons (except, to some degree, Novus, since it got maybe 15 unique Map fights--they just stuck a horrible Materia grind on it instead). And radically changing the content itself will upset other players (including myself--some of us do in fact enjoy grinding content). So any changes they make need to be done carefully in such a way as to not alienate the group of players that are in fact happy with the questline (and I think there are ways they can do that, as I've discussed elsewhere--but they have to be careful not to throw out the proverbial baby with the bathwater).

Even if you'd look at the zodiac relic, it still has the novelty of being the first relic quest for the game. While it keeps sending you back to do old content, it's not necessarily in the same manner or objectives. The content within it's scope is also current to the expansion, although that has to be a given since this their first reboot since the game. And I can also give it a pass that they'd make it open ended in the approach for some of the steps (lights and tomestone for alexandrites), and to breathe life into previous content so players can more easily catch up. You get none of this if you're targeting areas like beast tribes or 2.x hunts (in which case they'd have the durability of a wet toilet paper in the face of lvl 60s), and at that point it feels like a grind for the sake of it being a grind. Step 2 also feels like this when it sends you to lvl 50 dungeons with the option to unsync it, on top of it really not making sense from a lore perspective (within the realm of FFXIV reasoning anyway), and the quest line in general having some issues and errors, that it feels like it's been unpolished and rushed out despite the delay.

If you were to make broad strokes, you have the old content (3.0) and the old content (2.x). While I don't fully expect them to drop the 2.x areas entirely and that some quest objectives are going to send you back there, it's a different beast entirely when you're putting in things like directly requiring implemented 2.x content for currency (versus the tomestones which are more in general and indirectly rewarded from roulette) It's the things that come with an expansion; they've set standards themselves with 2.0, and those aren't being met if they're going to fall back onto beast tribes or unsynced. With things like LoV and Diadem I could give it a pass (although the heat is going to come from anotehr perspective anyway, such as the implementation and the lack of focus).

[Alahra]

Step 2 also feels like this when it sends you to lvl 50 dungeons with the option to unsync it

I don't know why anyone who knows step three has a Poetics cost would unsynch the level 50 dungeons, to be honest (though of course on day one, it made the most sense to when we weren't aware of the costs later). I actually created two further Awoken weapons for alt jobs to save on Esoterics and get some extra Poetics (and got several new member bonuses along the way--so they are helping people clear content they haven't done before with that step).

I don't know how it is on Famfrit, but Hunts in general were all but dead on Diabolos before 3.15, which makes getting things like the unique Grand Company gear for glamours and the like a rather daunting prospect (though for the life of me I can't figure out why they haven't reduced the cost of those yet). I'm glad they included them, as the carrot of Clan Mark Logs was never enough for me to bother Hunting, and now I'm accomplishing several goals at once through them. It's a good feeling.

And honestly, the inclusion of the Beastmen quests for 2.0...doesn't hurt anyone. It's a bone thrown to players who put in tons of their time to working on all of them, and the additional tokens you can get from them aren't really worth spending the time to get to Rank 3 if you haven't already gotten there. There are enough other options available to gather the tokens that it really shouldn't matter all that much. But the additional carrot might also inspire players who didn't otherwise engage with the Dailies to find some new content to try--and heck, they might even enjoy it to get into the ones for HW (including the new tribe coming in 3.2). The only negative is that it's "old," but as I've mentioned elsewhere, I'd rather the game not entirely forget all of its old content with each expansion. Makes the game feel bigger.

Do I think they should have included the CT series in the quest somehow? Yeah. They actually would have fit right in with Stage 2, to be honest (especially since three of the included HW dungeons just feel kind of awkward to go through again Lore-wise, as you mention--but to be fair, so do the CT dungeons). But putting in further incentive for folks to do HW leveling content is good for the game's health generally, so I can't really fault them much here (though it personally bothers me sort of...structurally that Great Gubal and Research Facility weren't included).

[RiceisNice]

I don't know why anyone who knows step three has a Poetics cost would unsynch the level 50 dungeons, to be honest (though of course on day one, it made the most sense to when we weren't aware of the costs later). I actually created two further Awoken weapons for alt jobs to save on Esoterics and get some extra Poetics (and got several new member bonuses along the way--so they are helping people clear content they haven't done before with that step).

Depends on the person; if they're spamming Alexander to get it done, they have no reason to touch poetic, especially when poetic itself is in a vacuum (your only source of this is 50 roulettes and 50 dungeons) compared to law tomes.

I don't know how it is on Famfrit, but Hunts in general were all but dead on Diabolos before 3.15, which makes getting things like the unique Grand Company gear for glamours and the like a rather daunting prospect (though for the life of me I can't figure out why they haven't reduced the cost of those yet). I'm glad they included them, as the carrot of Clan Mark Logs was never enough for me to bother Hunting, and now I'm accomplishing several goals at once through them. It's a good feeling.

I never liked the hunts, but I specifically do not like the idea of hunts being the more optimal way of getting progression in current content (which has been reoccurring since...well hunting's implementation). It doesn't make any sense for 2.x to be rewarding both allied and centarou seals, while 3.x hunts only rewards centarou seals, on top of the anima items being allied seals only. Hunts always come bck to life because they keep making it relevant (and usually the best/fastest) for getting current gear.

Despite that, you could always get by with 2-4 manning the 2.x A ranks anyway if you went out to look for them. Putting more incentive in the rear end of the content cycle is giving me the vibe that they're running out of ideas for the forefront (which supposedly they have everything mapped out). That's how it was on Famfrit anyway. Now we just have more people killing the hunts without ever calling it out, and the times that it does get called out is usually the off chance.

And honestly, the inclusion of the Beastmen quests for 2.0...doesn't hurt anyone. It's a bone thrown to players who put in tons of their time to working on all of them, and the additional tokens you can get from them aren't really worth spending the time to get to Rank 3 if you haven't already gotten there. There are enough other options available to gather the tokens that it really shouldn't matter all that much.

It hurts the perspective of players who are expecting play 3.x content in a 3.x patch cycle. If redoing content like this is passable (versus things like daily clan hunt bills, large temple guildleves, or even red scrips and eso), then would it be passable if future steps required us to tackle 2.x treasure maps or 2.x guildleves? It significantly downplays my hopes for the game if they can get by with reusing old content to this severity.

Do I think they should have included the CT series in the quest somehow? Yeah. They actually would have fit right in with Stage 2, to be honest (especially since three of the included HW dungeons just feel kind of awkward to go through again Lore-wise, as you mention--but to be fair, so do the CT dungeons).

At least the CT weekly hand weaves it as a "journey through your mind" and "reliving the experiences". Step 2 only does that with The vault, while everything else, apparently the tonberries are still being harassed (by the amaa'jja no less), Madpoor keep is still under void influence, and you're still fighting Midgardsomr,when he's already traveling with you at this point.

[Alahra]

Depends on the person; if they're spamming Alexander to get it done, they have no reason to touch poetic, especially when poetic itself is in a vacuum (your only source of this is 50 roulettes and 50 dungeons) compared to law tomes.

Sure, I mean, you can do it without ever touching Poetics. But the 6 level 50 dungeons you do provide 510 Poetics, which is like 2/3s of an Unidentified item, which means you just need a couple High Levels (most of which can be blown through in 15 minutes or so) to save yourself 10 Alexander runs.

It hurts the perspective of players who are expecting play 3.x content in a 3.x patch cycle.

I get that you want to do 3.x content, but...the inclusion of the beast tribes isn't taking your ability to do that away. If you don't want to do 2.x content for the Anima, you don't have to, outside of the Stage 2 dungeon runs (which is something we're likely to see more of since they need to keep those dungeons relevant for players that are just starting the game, especially since 2.x MSQ is required for HW access).

I'm quite positive we'll see HW Levequests (especially the Temple ones, which were pretty much dead on arrival) and Clan Hunts factor into future stages. But since we have (presumably) at least 4 more major stages for the questline before 4.0, they can't throw all their eggs in one basket, which means dipping into 2.xx content some (I'd hardly describe the inclusion of Beast Tribe quests and Hunts as "severe") so that there's still 3.xx content left for them to use as time goes on.

At least the CT weekly hand weaves it as a "journey through your mind" and "reliving the experiences".

They could have done something like that for the dungeons in 2.x, too--some sort of structure narratively where you're recounting your adventures to your Anima. I rather liked that concept for CT, as I'm too much of a nerd to be completely happy running content that I should have no reason to run "in lore." But I get that the game needs us to run things more than once, so I try not to let it bother me too much. I appreciate that they made some effort to at least explain it in the quest log (compared to say, Animus or Zodiac part 1, which just sort of had us redoing things with no real context), though.

[RiceisNice]

SI get that you want to do 3.x content, but...the inclusion of the beast tribes isn't taking your ability to do that away. If you don't want to do 2.x content for the Anima, you don't have to, outside of the Stage 2 dungeon runs (which is something we're likely to see more of since they need to keep those dungeons relevant for players that are just starting the game, especially since 2.x MSQ is required for HW access).

At the same time, it's not giving me "more" content to do (which is problematic given the circumstance and timing of the game, esp if it's been delayed for so long and the content and lack of polish doesn't show it). If that's how they're going to handle future updates, I'm probably not going to stick around past 3.2 because not only am I expecting content that's been given a new coat of paint, but content that hasn't been painted over at all.

And this is just semantics, but by their own admission, they're doing less of the "main" content such as MSQ, primals and dungeons to put more onto other side content, such as the side quests, diadem and LoV. Not to mention their constant mention of resources which makes it seem like they're already tight on what they can design and allocated what goes where.

[Alahra]

At the same time, it's not giving me "more" content to do (which is problematic given the circumstance and timing of the game, esp if it's been delayed for so long and the content and lack of polish doesn't show it). If that's how they're going to handle future updates, I'm probably not going to stick around past 3.2 because not only am I expecting content that's been given a new coat of paint, but content that hasn't been painted over at all.

Honestly (and I promise I don't mean this dismissively), that would probably be best for you. This is, like WoW, a game that's constantly offering the same basic content models, retooled to be relevant for new raid tiers. That model isn't likely to change anytime soon, as it's the most stable structure for securing regular subscriptions in a market that's largely gone F2P.

We'll probably get one or two major new types of content each expansion (Maps and Hunts, for ARR, and so far, Exploratory Missions for HW), and that's likely going to be it. They won't be reinventing the wheel at all, I don't think, since the game still has a fairly dedicated subscriber base (which does seem to be growing, at least for now, although not at any rate like WoW's original meteoric rise). Massive shakeups to content structure are one of the biggest ways to cause player bleed (the other big one being an overall lack of content, which WoW's been dealing with for the last few years)--and this is something that SE probably knows all too well from how badly they mangled FFXI's final expansion launch back in 2013. Given that there was crossover between the two teams back then (I'm not sure how much there is now), they are likely pretty wary of doing anything drastic so long as the model they have is keeping people subscribed.

Looking to the weapon questline in particular for new content is only going to breed disappointment, as it's never given new content outside of the very first step, which they've said time and time again they don't intend to replicate.

And yes, the team and its resources are rather limited. That we get regular major patches every three months or so (with the exception of the recent delay of 3.1) is pretty amazing to me. I love the game enough that it's enough to satisfy me--most especially because the Zodiac/Anima questlines are the way they are. They are absolutely my favorite part of the game and while I think they can improve on the structure, I am largely happy with them the way they are. But if you're a player that wants more steady new content, this probably isn't going to be the game for you.

[RiceisNice]

Honestly (and I promise I don't mean this dismissively), that would probably be best for you. This is, like WoW, a game that's constantly offering the same basic content models, retooled to be relevant for new raid tiers. That model isn't likely to change anytime soon, as it's the most stable structure for securing regular subscriptions in a market that's largely gone F2P.

Even WoW (at least up until WoD) doesn't follow the basic model this poorly. Each expansion (again with the exception of WoD in regards to the classes) came with new groundwork that would set the frame for future content. Heavensward lacks that and they're trying to said those new groundworks during the 3.x patch cycles (which makes it much more demanding as far as time constraints is concerned).

Looking to the weapon questline in particular for new content is only going to breed disappointment, as it's never given new content outside of the very first step, which they've said time and time again they don't intend to replicate.

I'm not even asking for totally new content (LoV and Diadem for example) from something like relic but for them to straight up not use old content that dates way back to 2.x. I mean I could be happy with it if it wasn't in a content slump beforehand, but at the same time I'd be disappointed that they didn't put more into it, and even moreso if they decide to do 2.x content again for 3.25's relic steps. Again, the expansion itself comes with a new set of expectations and standards that I honestly feel they don't fufill in alot of areas, and they're certainly not doing that by sticking to 2.x content. I would have been fine with them doing that for zodiac (using 2.x content), but not with anima (again, using 2.x content), if that makes sense to you. It's using the same house without a repaint versus the same house with a repaint.