4.1 - The emptiest patch yet.

[Rufalus]

There isn't less stuff than ever, some is just deliberately splintered off to the minor patches for a more even spread but overall it's at least as much as we've always been getting....

4.1 through 4.15 is...
> Alliance raid
> Light-Party Dungeon
> Main Scenario quests
> New PvP mode and map
> New housing area and updates
> First ever Ultimate raid
> Extreme trial
> Squadron dungeon content
> Hildibrand sidequests
> Beast Tribe quests
> Perform music feature
> Custom Delivery content
> Deeper treasure map dungeon with new mechanics
> Many major UI improvements
> Cross-world friend list, tells
> Raid roulette + adjustments to Labyrinth
> and the usual job fixes, new mounts, etc

Yeah I guess the whiners are right, the dev team have just been sitting on their butts. They are barely producing the most content of any dev team in the industry any more. It's not like we are getting more raid content than any previous patch series with the addition of the Ultimate series on odd-number patches. It's not like they took the effort to create an entirely new pvp concept with piloting machina and destroying enemy towers. For these new kinds of content we lost a hard-mode dungeon which everyone was telling them we don't want any more because it's a boring hallway of trash pulls. But it's gone, therefore weakest patch ever? {/sarcasm}

It's gonna be a huge patch for the little things like... use chocobo and minion at the same time; see chocobo remaining time in party list; set status bar to multi lines to separate buff, debuff, other; new moving house service; new storeroom for furnishings; detach and salvage materia melds system added; the list goes on, it's going to be a big set of patch notes. You can go through the list of content and say that none of it interests you personally, but saying the devs are doing less work every year is a false claim. If you don't skip things you can see that there is still a lot of stuff, it's just gradually shifting to new kinds of content and breaking from the old formula.

[Elkanah]

snip

Gonna remind you, like the other people, that's all coming in short term time periods. Most of that structure you mentioned? Guess what? Same stuff we got with ARR and HW. And you're defending it, which is incredibly laughable.

4.1 through 4.15 is...
> Alliance raid ----------- This was in ARR
> Light-Party Dungeon ----------- This was in ARR
> Main Scenario quests ----------- this is all of FFXIV online
> New PvP mode and map ------------- we had new pvp modes since ARR. Sad part? DEVS. DONT. PAY. ATTENTION. TO. CHEATING. Know what else we got? Win trading! Your point is invalid here. Also botting. Just FYI.
> New housing area and updates ------------ We got this in ARR.
> First ever Ultimate raid --------- We called it coil back in my day. Again, one piece of endgame raid content.
> Extreme trial ------------ also ARR content.
> Squadron dungeon content ------------- something new to HW but capitalizing. Oh, but it's less XP for doing it and older content, not newer stuff. That makes total sense. I'm gonna take my level 60-70 jobs and grind through older content 15-49/50 for LESS XP than POTD and/or relevant dungeons. Smart idea!
> Hildibrand sidequests -------------- since ARR.
> Beast Tribe quests ---------- also arr content we had.
> Perform music feature ------------ something new and interesting, but defeats 4.1, which was pushed back to 4.2 cause of packet delay. So this was thrown out for 4.1 content.
> Custom Delivery content ---------------- re-hashing already established content from HW.
> Deeper treasure map dungeon with new mechanics ---------------- This doesn't do anything if there's no current gear and/or weapons (both preferred) at the same time, and below tome level gear. Also invalid argument.
> Many major UI improvements ------------ happening and improving since ARR.
> Cross-world friend list, tells ------------- new, and should have been in the game since forever ago back in ARR. Only now being implemented.
> Raid roulette + adjustments to Labyrinth ------------ also something they should have added when raids came out. Something we'd been asking for years. And only now did they decide to do it.
> and the usual job fixes, new mounts, etc ------------ again, since ARR.

Most of what you described, has been un-compelling content. It's the same content we had since ARR. Again, the structure hasn't changed.

-New dungeons for tomes to grind at 30 tomes a run
-new primal
-new ex primal
-new 24 man raid

Out of all that, you only named two things that will be relevant. the 24 man raid at gear at or below ilvl current, and ultimate bahamut, which, if it has gear equivalent to Omega Savage right now, then we got some horizontal progression content. Squads are nice, but if i get less xp for running an instance solo, while good for down town because I can control the npc's behaviour, it's not gonna make me want to run it if it's old content. But they need guinea pigs to test it in newer dungeon content.

But, as I've learned from world of warcraft forums from someone:
"basically every MMO is about redoing the same content over and over again. Liking that or not is personal taste."

[Vahlnir]

Gonna remind you, like the other people, that's all coming in short term time periods. Most of that structure you mentioned? Guess what? Same stuff we got with ARR and HW. And you're defending it, which is incredibly laughable.

What's laughable is this, mostly because they told everyone in advance...months and months before SB even, that they were sticking to the same formula (mostly). And..you're still here. Just because the formula hasn't changed much, doesn't mean we aren't getting new content. New content = content that has just released and relevant. A few things did get pushed back though, so we'll have to see how that pans out. While it might not be relevant to YOU, it's relevant to others. You seem unhappy with any content in the game period, so...yeah, they're never going to please you.

[Elkanah]

What's laughable is this, mostly because they told everyone in advance...months and months before SB even, that they were sticking to the same formula (mostly). And..you're still here.

Wouldn't have even bothered to say anything had they at LEAST shown us Eureka, even with the push back to advise us what we can expect. Yes, I'm aware that some of that content or that there had been interviews that they will be deciding to stay with a consistent formula. But, as I've learned from world of warcraft forums from someone: "basically every MMO is about redoing the same content over and over again. Liking that or not is personal taste". But hey, I guess having many people quit the game, not keeping people and bringing in new people and those people becoming veterans to run into the same issue and also quitting, repeating the cycle must be okay for you.

[Remedi]

Wouldn't have even bothered to say anything had they at LEAST shown us Eureka, even with the push back to advise us what we can expect. Yes, I'm aware that some of that content or that there had been interviews that they will be deciding to stay with a consistent formula. But, as I've learned from world of warcraft forums from someone: "basically every MMO is about redoing the same content over and over again. Liking that or not is personal taste". But hey, I guess having many people quit the game, not keeping people and bringing in new people and those people becoming veterans to run into the same issue and also quitting, repeating the cycle must be okay for you.

Ye but sticking to a game that you clearly don't like anymore and just complaining on the forum while dissing any content that you don't like as useless it's not makiing you any good

[Theodric]

Ye but sticking to a game that you clearly don't like anymore and just complaining on the forum while dissing any content that you don't like as useless it's not makiing you any good

This.

FFXIV isn't designed to keep people entertained 24/7 and it's never going to be able to do that. At the same time, it also isn't going to be able to appease everybody and not every bit of content is going to be custom tailored to any given individual's personal tastes.

I adore the inclusion of swimming as it makes the game world feel more immersive and it's a great addition for role-players. It also sets the stage for more engaging underwater content in the future.

[Coatl]

I adore the inclusion of swimming as it makes the game world feel more immersive and it's a great addition for role-players. It also sets the stage for more engaging underwater content in the future.

The addition of underwater swimming is actually a good parallel to most of the new content in FFXIV. Neat and flashy feature added with stormblood, during the MSQ I was like "woah!" Exploring the depths of different cities was fun.

Then you beat the MSQ and they never give you a reason to go back underwater ever again.

[Pence]

FFXIV isn't designed to keep people entertained 24/7 and it's never going to be able to do that.

I adore the inclusion of swimming as it makes the game world feel more immersive and it's a great addition for role-players. It also sets the stage for more engaging underwater content in the future.

It makes the game more immersive? Except that you can't swim certain areas. You just RP that there is sharks? And please elaborate how underwater will become more engaging. There's never going to be underwater combat (Which is the backbone of any game).

Also, ATM XIV keeps people entertained 3/168 hours per week if you're up-to-date with content. It'll go up for 4-5 weeks then RIP again until 4.2.

Raiders WANT to play the game, we love it. We just hate that it's so empty for our skill level.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

If you don't like to just play the game, no ammount of content will help you anyway.

Someone in this thread said: "mh, patchday will be log in, buy a house, do story, run new dungeon +24, do shinryu with static and done

1 day of content \o/"

Soooo.. 3 dungeons, 2x 24 man, 3 ex trials and 50 MSQ will last you 3 days then.

Doesn't sound that reasonable to invest three times the money in a patch just to keep the quickly bored people 1-2 days longer out of the forums.

They are being purposely hyperbolic. Tripling the content as you purposed would better pace people's activities. Yes, I can have everything done in a day or two, but it retains greater longevity because I have additional options. Three dungeons means Expert Roulette has six potential options, three 24-mans keeps each fresh for longer. Now I certainly don't anticipate them ever being able to afford the immense cost and development time for such a task. It does, however, make things feel... emptier. I'm still taking the "wait and see" approach with Eureka and PotD 2.0. If neither prove interesting...

This.

FFXIV isn't designed to keep people entertained 24/7 and it's never going to be able to do that. At the same time, it also isn't going to be able to appease everybody and not every bit of content is going to be custom tailored to any given individual's personal tastes.

I adore the inclusion of swimming as it makes the game world feel more immersive and it's a great addition for role-players. It also sets the stage for more engaging underwater content in the future.

The issue becomes as FFXIV ages, new players replacing veterans will decline. Many players posting do not even take umbrage with occasional lulls, but the current patch offers very little long term content. There's a stark difference between demanding a constant flow of new content and expecting things to last throughout a patch cycle. Right now, the devs are clinging to Ultimate, Ivalice and PvP to hold player attention for fourteen additional weeks. Ultimate appeals to a small portion of the playerbase while PvP has been notoriously underpopulated-- made only worse by piss poor moderation and adjustments that have rendered it a bot riddled mess. On the subject of swimming, people aren't upset with its inclusion, but the fact nothing has been done with it. They sold swimming as a feature and it's little more than aesthetic. I like it for the same reasons you do, however I had hoped they might expand on it further. And no, that does not mean Blitzball.

Put another way, a friend of mine has repeated groaned they've spent so much time on Squadron AI and Perform. Why couldn't those be used for actual content? I can't exactly blame her either, especially seeing just how complex the Squadron stuff looks. Personally, I don't see running around with three bots as "new" and "innovative," even if it does have potential.

[SpiritMuse]

Gonna remind you, like the other people, that's all coming in short term time periods. Most of that structure you mentioned? Guess what? Same stuff we got with ARR and HW. And you're defending it, which is incredibly laughable.

[...]

But, as I've learned from world of warcraft forums from someone:
"basically every MMO is about redoing the same content over and over again. Liking that or not is personal taste."

I liked all of the stuff we got in ARR and HW. So I have no objections to getting more of the same. At all. I'll continue to enjoy it, because it's exactly to my taste. Clearly it's not to yours, though. I'm sorry for that. But that doesn't automatically mean it's bad. Maybe, according to your quote at the end, MMOs are, ultimately, just not the type of game for you.