Game needs to be more newcomer friendly, but NOT with level-boosts

[Savagelf]

Video games used help develop skills. some games taught skills like problem solves. gil sellers have give risen to the desire have everything now. Lvl 50 we want now, wow has lvl 90 or 100 before expansion we want for ffxiv. we want thing now. instead think want a mmo can teach us we gain a desire want things now. the generations that came before us where patient lots of people realize that they can't gain everything now. instance gratification isn't good in mmo industry or in really life. people who thing now will grab credit card and use to gain thing now. I wish we see that get thing now isn't going make us better people. my family first pc was commodore 64. pro instance lvl because i think learn patient through grinding and story contents and dungeon help person online gain since of patients. patients is good thing have. instance gratification isn't. I used wow lvl 90 power up 3 or four time. what did i learn that isn't the best way gain lvl or learn anything it teach inpatients.

[Cakekizyy]

Teaching is for educational games.

[Eifahlwyn]

The big mistake SE made with HW was gating the new classes behind the 2.55 story. If they had of not done that and, instead, made those class quests obtainable once reaching level 30 and finding the NPCs in Central Coerthas then there would have been fewer complaints from new players. Hopefully next xpac SE will have learned from this mistake and will place the new class quests in Little Ala Mhigo or some other "old world" location.

Regardless I agree the level skip potion is not an ideal solution to the problem. Instead they should try to remove some of the filler/world building quests from the MSQ and instead make them side quests. Then they can increase the xp gained from the MSQ to compensate and keep the leveling curve smooth. SWTOR essentially did this and it has worked out well for them.

[Amariel34]

I think finding a way to get rid of the level gates in the MSQ would help a lot. A good example is the MSQ after 45. There's a gap where you can't continue until you hit 49. That's just nuts. I hesitate to use the word nerf, but I think they should remove the level gating and nerf the MSQ just enough so that you can do the lvl 49 stuff at 46 or so. So new players don't have to stop and grind out three levels before they are able to continue.

[FoxyAreku]

+1 to removing filler and making everything playable from the get go, or at least at level 30. It'd be great.

I think finding a way to get rid of the level gates in the MSQ would help a lot. A good example is the MSQ after 45. There's a gap where you can't continue until you hit 49. That's just nuts. I hesitate to use the word nerf, but I think they should remove the level gating and nerf the MSQ just enough so that you can do the lvl 49 stuff at 46 or so. So new players don't have to stop and grind out three levels before they are able to continue.

That gap is pretty bad, but to be fair, there's 4 quest hubs that open up at that level (and npcs in the waking sands that tell you to go to said quest hubs), a lot of people miss that though..

[Terin]

Yeah, it's not like the game has massive issues or anything, but some of the content could be tidied up a bit. Like someone else said, no need to REMOVE quests, but maybe make some of them optional. Also, using the linkshell to turn in quests would be excellent, although I've always wondered how exactly it fit into the game's fiction.

Biggest thing, for sure, is just making new Jobs (or Class counterparts) playable for new players who buy the expansions.

[Zaine_Lionheart]

the fact the dungeon exp and the leveling roulette bonus is even a thing on top of the Hunting logs, and Challenge logs ... its not even close to being bad try playing this at 2.0 when most of this didn't exist. that gap is almost non existent now. I dont really understand how people struggle I mean the idea of running dungeons to learn how to play your job is kind of what people should have been doing from the start. As far as this game being new player friendly I hate to say it but if feels as if its far more new player friendly than veteran friendly Im not joking the ability to catch up quickly has always been there. People need to stop asking for a push 1 button be max level. The abundance of players who still dont know how to get out of the bright flashing orange circle is overwhelming. I promise that is far more frustrating than needing to teleport across the world (not walk) talk to said npc and teleport back.

[Fricca]

They shouldn't make it so easy and faceroll to get to where longtime players are right now.

With things as they are now, the system is hardly producing any "skilled" players because they didn't have to learn like 90% of the raid content in the first place. They just get carried through stuff making them expect future content to be as "forgiving" whereas longtime players hardly find anything fresh with the new content.

If you want to get a certain job so bad at the start of the game, or be at the same level as everyone else, you might as well just ask the Devs to get rid of everything before HW and just sit back and enjoy MSQ and its cutscenes. Trust me, its literally the same thing.

[HappyHubris]

Doing extra fetch quests and walking longer will not teach players to stay out of the fire or optimize their skills.

This happens in every MMORPG with a level cap increase or tiers of content. Players who put in 100 hours to get to level 50 think that every new player should do the same, or their recreational gaming "sacrifice" is devalued. But new players will balk at a game that requires the full time to hit cap before even trying new expansion content, so developers do trim the time required. It's inevitable that the 1-50 leveling/story will be eased, so let's discuss how.

[Belhi]

Doing extra fetch quests and walking longer will not teach players to stay out of the fire or optimize their skills.

This happens in every MMORPG with a level cap increase or tiers of content. Players who put in 100 hours to get to level 50 think that every new player should do the same, or their recreational gaming "sacrifice" is devalued. But new players will balk at a game that requires the full time to hit cap before even trying new expansion content, so developers do trim the time required. It's inevitable that the 1-50 leveling/story will be eased, so let's discuss how.

I think they can streamline them somewhat. I mean a hell of a lot of the quests are fetch quests because their quest mechanic system has so far been pretty limited in what options they have. I think its collect something, kill something, or carry something from one spot to another. They are looking to improve the system for 4.0 and got a lot better at using what they had in 3.0 but a lot of the old 2.0 stuff is hard to go back and just remove. Quite a few of those quests work as breadcrumb or introduction quests. I think some can be removed or turned into side quests but I think changing some of them might impact the narrative making sense.

In the short term I think the most likely options, taking into account the potential time it would take to develop and implement the change and the time Yoshi's team has to do something like that, is to make the all jobs available at 30 and make story skippable so you can jump forward through storyline you have out level. That way people can play the jobs they want as soon as they hit the right level and people who aren't interested in trawling through the story can skip it. A more major overhaul of the story content is something I think would need to be worked on over a longer time frame than what they have at the moment.