Main Scenario Restriction Bloodstorm - Very Very Bad idea.

[Mugiawara]

I'm not sure why some people keep saying "The MSQ teaches you things" No, it doesn't...at all.
We have the Novice Hall for that now. The only thing the MSQ does is storytelling and unlocking dungeons.
OP's idea - No.
Idea of trimming the fat off MSQ + boosting EXP? - Yes.

Again, I want more players to have fun and not be bugged by text and going from point A to B for hours.
As for dungeons or old content, SE still makes old things viable thanks to EXP boost for jobs, Roulettes and now, Tails.
I ALSO think, if they hadn't said it now...Anyone who has bought SB should have access to the new jobs.
It'll still give incentive for people to buy the game all while having more fun jobs to play with and get to.
As for story skipping, if people wanna breeze the story 100% and not care, I don't really give a Rat's behind.
As long as they come to dungeons and not be down-right terrible, I'm good to go.
NO INSTANT JUMPS UNLESS THERE ARE PREREQUISITES! Level 60/70 somewhere maybe?
I'm not going to ask everyone in my DF runs do they care for the story. I'm not sure why people care so much about
how others play this game like that.

I just don't want the game to dwindle because of the tedium.
I still can't get my best friend to continue this game, and he's 51 because of sluggy through the story with
going forward and back, and then forward and back AND THEN GO FORWARD AND BACK 60 million times. :/

[CosmicKirby]

If you have a way to skip, or if you streamline the storyline, you gain new players but lose old, followed by new because the game has no depth and is just a better looking WoW clone, like every other MMO in the market anymore. Is it any wonder that some games have gone F2P in the struggle to retain people because they have nothing new to offer?
.

If people actually leave the game because some people could skip story quests, they are the most vain kind of chumps that I wouldn't miss for an instant.

Comparing the situation of 'skipping' to WoW's level boosting. I've honestly noticed no difference in the quality of players in WoW because of it. I've only boosted characters with the two 'free' boosts you got when buying Xpacs, I don't use them, but they have helped bring in two friends who otherwise wouldn't have touched the game. I've tried to sell those same two friends on FF14, but they don't want to sit through 52-4 levels of story before finally getting to 3.0 and playing as the classes they actually want to play as.

[Neophyte]

I want to ask again, because no satisfying answer so far:

I ask again... why do you even care? Can you please make a [*list][*/list]with every aspect affecting you (or me or any other player you currently know) in a negative way, if there were.. let's say.. 5% of the player base in end game, which actually have skipped the ARR MSQ? Aspects which can be unambigious referred to those x% (overall player skill is not such a thing, as you have said by yourself and which got elaborated quite often now).

How many players are out there who would not care for story, not care to get good and still sub FF14?


Why do you think the raid stories and the triad one are actually optional? Why did we not had to complete coil to enter HW?
Why did they gate the most amazing part of ARR behind it's most difficult content and only made Alex now more accesible, but still optional? Same for normal triad fights. I'm not talking bout savage or ex.

If you demand MSQ as mandatory can I demand those side stories to be as mandatory as well?
"Someone not caring for coil's story doesn't belong in that game anyway", to use some of your 'arguments'.

[Khemorex]

do u really think theres gona be a large amount of new players when they trimmed the MSQ? XD i doubt it very much :P

[Talraen]

I ask again... why do you even care? Can you please make a [*list][*/list]with every aspect affecting you (or me or any other player you currently know) in a negative way, if there were.. let's say.. 5% of the player base in end game, which actually have skipped the ARR MSQ? Aspects which can be unambigious referred to those x% (overall player skill is not such a thing, as you have said by yourself and which got elaborated quite often now).

Well here's a few...

• It places inexperienced players in high-level roulettes, meaning players who want to avoid such players by not doing low-level roulettes don't have that option anymore
• It makes it difficult to use previous fights as a shorthand when teaching players about new fights ("in phase 2 it uses Ifrit plumes")
• It implicitly encourages demanding other players skip cutscenes by making it explicitly acceptable to ignore the story outright
• The developers cannot write future story content knowing the player has seen all past story content, and may spend extra time summing past events up (like in a movie sequel) (hopefully they just don't bother, though)
• There will be less players doing low-level content, increasing queue times and reducing FATE participation for players who do want to play through the story
• It creates some weirdness due to the "one character, many jobs" nature of the game. E.g., if this existed for Heavensward, a player could skip to level 50 Bard or Paladin, but would have to unlock Machinist or Dark Knight at 30 as usual. This would inevitably lead to complaining that certain jobs are preferred (and ninjas are just shafted), while letting them skip on a new job would lead to complaining that skip players are getting a head start on players who did not skip.

[Mugiawara]

do u really think theres gona be a large amount of new players when they trimmed the MSQ? XD i doubt it very much :P

Not large amount of brand new people, but it will help returning players come back to the game. .
There's a total of 184 MSQ ARR quests to do, and I think around 30-37ish quest from dungeon/FC/trials to do.
Half the craps just going around and around again and most of should be side quests in all honesty.

[bswpayton]

Not large amount of brand new people, but it will help returning players come back to the game. .
There's a total of 184 MSQ ARR quests to do, and I think around 30-37ish quest from dungeon/FC/trials to do.
Half the craps just going around and around again and most of should be side quests in all honesty.

Ok so without a story driven game and how long will people stay honestly , if you skip everything if people have such a short attention span want they just eventually burn out anyway , like i mention before I thought mmos where suppose to be years worth of content the story plays a big part in that , if you come in with a short term mindset your not gona stay for long anyway

[Blood-Aki]

Not large amount of brand new people, but it will help returning players come back to the game. .
There's a total of 184 MSQ ARR quests to do, and I think around 30-37ish quest from dungeon/FC/trials to do.
Half the craps just going around and around again and most of should be side quests in all honesty.

Then they will leave again shortly after, and 5-6 months later will come back and complain bout the story being to much work. You see the pattern?

[Neophyte]

Well here's a few...

And not a single one screaming "See, msq skip will ruin the game"... so, not that bad it seems.

• It places inexperienced players in high-level roulettes, meaning players who want to avoid such players by not doing low-level roulettes don't have that option anymore
• It makes it difficult to use previous fights as a shorthand when teaching players about new fights ("in phase 2 it uses Ifrit plumes")

I consider those as not game-breaking.
And why should they have access to end lvl content right away, if you let them start HW or SW beginning with no access to ARR content, unless they unlock it. So it's an 52 dungeon first, after leveling 2 lvls and doing MSQ of HW. Also ilvl restriction.

So no, they won't bother you in any lvl 60 roulette before finishing HW or lvl 50 roulette, which is ARR.

• It implicitly encourages demanding other players skip cutscenes by making it explicitly acceptable to ignore the story outright

Like the praetorium and ultima quests at the end of ARR?
That's why there is almost no cutscenes within dungeons anymore. Catering to no-story player?
There is no 'demand' to force to skip anything.

• The developers cannot write future story content knowing the player has seen all past story content, and may spend extra time summing past events up (like in a movie sequel) (hopefully they just don't bother, though)

They can. People do the same with movies or books.
Some have "what has happened", some don't.
But you're allowed to watch Star Wars 7 if you have not seen Star Wars 4-6 or 1-3.. and they didn't made SW7 worse, cause there are those people out there, didn't they?

• There will be less players doing low-level content, increasing queue times and reducing FATE participation
  for players who do want to play through the story.

Like I said, I only expect a small fracture to actually use that skip. Most of your side do that to: Because how many people want to play a FF game just to skip the story? Only few.

• It creates some weirdness due to the "one character, many jobs" nature of the game. E.g., if this existed for Heavensward, a player could skip to level 50 Bard or Paladin, but would have to unlock Machinist or Dark Knight at 30 as usual. This would inevitably lead to complaining that certain jobs are preferred (and ninjas are just shafted), while letting them skip on a new job would lead to complaining that skip players are getting a head start on players who did not skip.

Balances out with complaints about having to do complete ARR to access some jobs (which then had to be leveled for 20 lvls, before you even could continue HW story on your chosen job).

[Violyre]

If people actually leave the game because some people could skip story quests, they are the most vain kind of chumps that I wouldn't miss for an instant.

Comparing the situation of 'skipping' to WoW's level boosting. I've honestly noticed no difference in the quality of players in WoW because of it. I've only boosted characters with the two 'free' boosts you got when buying Xpacs, I don't use them, but they have helped bring in two friends who otherwise wouldn't have touched the game. I've tried to sell those same two friends on FF14, but they don't want to sit through 52-4 levels of story before finally getting to 3.0 and playing as the classes they actually want to play as.

Every addition or subtraction has a chance to lose people. While many people may only claim they will quit at any stupid change, there are still people who stay true to their word. I am one of the people who quit and refuse to touch WoW because of that level boost.

Am I vain? Possibly, Carly Simon did write a song about me. Now that a much-needed joke happened, let me play devil's advocate against myself.

WoW had a decent excuse to add their skip. They were getting ready to launch their sixth expansion (I'm discounting any that were given out prior to the addition on cash shop, though I'd like to add the earliest ones didn't come with the training hall.). Despite the fact that they already did have a major trim with Cataclysm, they still had a big chunk of exp to get through to get new players up with their friends.

Were there alternative ways? Yes. They could've significantly boosted exp from quests, while lowering total exp to level. They always did for expansions anyways, so why not just go insane on it?

FFXIV is going into its second expansion. As it is now, if you do your daily roulettes and MSQ, it's very easy to get to 60 before hitting Heavensward. I did that with an alt I made post-HW. And you get enough gil that you can buy the white colored gear closest to 60 easily. I struggled through Heavensward at release. My alt finished quite quickly.

Right now is honestly way too early to add a way to skip.

Now, let's switch to another topic: the cash shop.

When FFXIV added this, there was a huge uproar in the community. People considered the initial mount and minions as P2W. You still see dissidents of that addition today.

Should I also note that this opens up a new avenue for RMT? They're not afraid to invest some money already. Now you've given them a pass to new places so they can screw the prices of new stuff like newer mats. Until SE puts in an effective method of eliminating illegal RMT, I'm against the idea. WoW at least added a method to legalize it.

You can already skip cutscenes, which speeds things up. WoW didn't do cutscenes often.

Can the story use some trimming? Yes. Why do I have to help a paranoid ex-Garlean kill bugs and tigers? Why not lower the amount of items needed collecting and merge quests? Have him make you kill two swarms to lower the buzzing, and gather two tiger hides to help him make up for lost time? Why do we have to keep pointlessly going back to the Waking Sands when we're wearing a perfectly good linkpearl? Why is melding part of the storyline?

I think I lost my train of thought somewhere. My major point is that there are ways to do this without a skip potion, people are idiots, and blah blah blah.