Castrum Fluminis and item level

[HyoMinPark]

Sure, there have been steady increases and “catchups” and time to gear up between story chapters for people who’ve been at Lv70 for a while already. But for someone who just got through Stormblood this week? You’re level 70, and so is every single quest from 4.1 to 4.3. There’s nothing to stop people from doing all that MSQ at a run, and nothing to encourage you to update your ilevel from Skalla until you hit Castrum. The dungeons are optional, and the MSQ isn’t giving you gear upgrades. It’s easy for a new player to be caught out.

In future when they can just buy their i400 (or whatever) gear with poetics the instant they hit Lv70, it won’t be a problem any more. But for now, it is.

It really isn't a problem, though. This game throws tomestones at you. Even with Mendacity being capped, there is still Creation and Rabanastre Coins to give you instant i340 for very little effort. Heck, you can get a few pieces to up your item level to i325, and then hop into Swallow's Compass for i345 gear - the most non-demanding dungeon this game has probably ever seen.


I started this game back at the tail end of 3.0, beginning of 3.1. By the time I made it to endgame (within 1 month of starting), it only took me a couple days to grind out enough old Law tomestones to up my item level enough to progress with the 60 content, and, by then, I'd capped for the first time on Esoterics, and bought an i200 piece with it. I had not been keeping up with roulettes, only doing MSQ up to this point. I was not "months" away from the casual endgame.

It's only a problem for people who don't put in the effort to do it. This game doesn't ask much of its playerbase; item level requirements for story or "casual" level-capped content more than 30 ilvls below the current cap is really not that high of a demand.