Friends of mine, new to the game, becoming discouraged by STORY QUESTS

[ohmRICE]

And, you do realize this is an MMO right, not a single player game? God forbid some people came for the multiplayer part and don't look forward to hours and hours of single player grind in order to unlock it. You'd think mothers were being insulted with the knee-jerk reactions this thread has provoked.

The multiplayer aspect isn't locked until you complete the story though. You can actually play along side your friends while going through the story together, you can still chat with other players (though you'll not be able to join in when they start talking about the most recent story addition), and partake in your normal multiplayer activities.

In fact, you can't progress through the story without playing with other people! There's no soloing Sastasha!

[Snugglebutt]

Not to single you out. But i have stumbled across the same amount of bots in HW as ARR. They are underground and teleporting it is pure luck to target one. The pure amount of timers keeps some market stability then gated HW.

Also them getting through 2.0 storyline is less of an issue for bots then regular players. They don't obey basic game conventions. They simply teleport from npc to npc. They don't need tanks for dungeons either since they can't be hit. I was afk at sylphs when groups of 8 do the story mode it got me curious. So i sat and watched the screen you can see them teleporting and dancing for the sylph. Why would they have to stop specially since the biggest gate was probably nerfed in steps if that was even a real issue to begin with.

Prove it, if is as many as you claim you should have a screenshot of it. I was more than capable of taking screenshots of underground bots and teleporting bot armies in ARR by waiting by the NPC's they teleport to and away from the NPC's even if they are underground they would still be fighting the monsters which allows you to select the mob and then click on the character name the mob is targeting to highlight the location of the bot. I have not seen a single RMT bot in HW zones to date and there is no evidence of any given by anyone to my knowledge. I would be the first in line to complain to SE if it was the case of HW zones infested with RMT bots like ARR is but I am not because it is not.

Your claim is a work of pure fiction from what I have seen, also if you were 'afk' how do you know there was groups of eight at sylphs? Sorry but to me it seems your making up things to try and give your argument fictional weight. Fact is the gating to HW zones via story including all the more difficult level 50 trials and dungeons does keep RMT and their bot armies out of HW zones and there is no evidence shown to claim otherwise. Now it is possible an individual player could use a bot after legitimately working their way through the gating but RMT has not yet been able to do this for their bot armies. Any claim that there is as many bots in HW as in ARR is also a fabricated lie, if it were true there would be vastly more people complaining about bots in HW on here.

[Starlord]

It sort of does if you can only play for two hours (example) a day.

To be honest, I feel like people should be happy that there is an abundance of content to do... I understand that X person wants to play with x friend... but at the end of the day it's still a game that has content for people to play, and there is a lot of content. People just need to take it slow and enjoy what the game has to offer.

If X person skips the main story and all other content. That person will be missing out on 90% of what's there. Feels like a waste.

However, people are feel to think and do however they please ^^.

[Jermz]

This thread took off like crazy! Thanks for the input. I want to make clear that none of my friends are WHINING about the story quests, and the comments about HOPE TO GOD YOU LEAVE, BUCK UP, BLAH BLAH were completely uncalled for. I was merely pointing out a major part of the game that i view as flawed, and is kinda standing in the way of doing things.They enjoy the game, they know what Final Fantasy is, they know what MMOs are and they aren't expecting WOW 2.0, but after 2 months or so of playing, and they don't even have the expansion unlocked, and theres a new patch around the corner for MORE unlocks, its tedious and they feel a little demotivated to do the filler stuff to Heavensward. A buddy of mine really wants to be a Dark Knight, his warrior is almost 53 at this point and he still hasn't unlocked Heavensward, doing story quests diligently. Another friend who is WHM is 56 and still trudging through, they many have unlocked HS at this point. My buddies have been doing dungeons as needed and story quests, i run with them every time I can. I'm stalled at 60 doing story quests still and even I'm kinda tired of it.

Lots of good ideas in here for handling this in the future, hopefully something is done that will appeal to everyone.

[CodingSquirrel]

You can do multiplayer beginning with Satasha Baby at story level 15. You don't need to be in Heavensward to do it.

The multiplayer aspect isn't locked until you complete the story though. You can actually play along side your friends while going through the story together, you can still chat with other players (though you'll not be able to join in when they start talking about the most recent story addition), and partake in your normal multiplayer activities.

In fact, you can't progress through the story without playing with other people! There's no soloing Sastasha!

After I unlock that first dungeon, no matter how much I play it or how far I level I can't do anything but that single dungeon unless I do hours more of the story.

[Niwashi]

Speaking of Archeage - I loved the game. And I hate PvP. CRAZY I KNOW! But I found other things that I absolutely loved, like farming, and raising mounts, making music, and just exploring the beautiful world. But with the logic in this thread, I had absolutely no business playing the game since I hate PvP, which is the core of the game. MMOs have to be diverse since their players are diverse.

But would you go to an Archage forum and create threads asking for PvP to be removed? It's fine to play a game where you don't like a core aspect of it but can accept that aspect for the sake of other things that you do like. It's a different thing to say that a core aspect of a game should be removed because you came to the game despite not liking that core aspect.

This thread (and several others) are saying that a core aspect of FFXIV should be removed from the game because they personally don't like it or some of their friends don't. The fact that access to areas, trials, dungeons, and so on are based on the story of how and why you get there is a core aspect of Final Fantasy. That shouldn't change just because a few players prefer a different style of game.

[Lexia]

... but after 2 months or so of playing, and they don't even have the expansion unlocked,...

How often do your friends play? 2 months seems like quite a long time. I was talking in one of the ls I am in about maybe leveling up a alt and talk about how long it would take to get through the ARR content and most said if person really hammers though could most likely do in less then a week otherwise take couple weeks to do maybe a month at most.

[CodingSquirrel]

This thread (and several others) are saying that a core aspect of FFXIV should be removed from the game because they personally don't like it or some of their friends don't.

Can we at least debate with some honesty? Instead of misrepresenting other people's opinions.

To your point of there being lore reasons as to why you're in such and such a dungeon. There may be a lore reason that the character is there, but that does not necessitate that area being locked down except as a game mechanics choice. If we wanted to bring lore into this then why are you able to go back and replay those zones once you've beaten them. Based on lore, those enemies should be defeated. You can either handwave it or assume the player (not the character) is time traveling. Gaining access to places you shouldn't yet is effectively the same thing, but in the other direction.

[LaylaTsarra]

After I unlock that first dungeon, no matter how much I play it or how far I level I can't do anything but that single dungeon unless I do hours more of the story.

Tam-Tara Deepcroft is Level 16 and unlocked a couple story quests (not hours) after the Satasha. Copperbell Mines is level 17 and is also just a few story quests after Tam-Tara. You should know that so why try and exaggerate in order to try and make a point. You can also play those dungeons to get plenty of experience to unlock the next dungeons series.

Can we at least debate with some honesty?

Pot calling the kettle black I would say.

[ohmRICE]

After I unlock that first dungeon, no matter how much I play it or how far I level I can't do anything but that single dungeon unless I do hours more of the story.

Unfortunately video games typically require certain requirements to be met before certain content is unlocked. You can't go to the Pokemon League without getting all your badges, kiddo.

Still have access to the multiplayer content though, just not all of it.