Today was a bad choice for NA maintenance.

[PharisHanasaki]

I mean, you can announce you're having a 24 hour down time spanning December 23-24, and you'd probably be considered dumb for doing it then instead of the 16-17th.

Thats pretty much the point of this entire thread.

That's subjective. I think it's dumb to come here when maintenance has almost ended to complain, rather than raising your voice 'back in December'.

[Gula]

That's subjective. I think it's dumb to come here when maintenance has almost ended to complain, rather than raising your voice 'back in December'.

Not to worry. It'll all be over when people can get their unhealthy addiction fix and suckle on the pacifier that is XIV.

[Mijorious]

I'm annoyed because the announcement was confusing. My wife and I just started playing a short while ago and had a goal before maintenance. We were going to get all the requirements to get a home in-game. We busted our butts the last couple days because the last updated announcement was this:
-----------
In order to reflect data of the North American data center expansion as well as to accompany Patch 4.57, we will be performing maintenance on all Worlds at the time below, during which FINAL FANTASY XIV will be unavailable.

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause, and we thank you for your understanding.

[Date & Time]
Apr. 22, 2019 6:00 p.m. to Apr. 23, 2019 3:00 a.m. (PDT)
* Completion time is subject to change.

[Affected Worlds]
All Worlds
---------------

The last thing we needed to do was get one more rank, which we planned on doing this morning before the servers go down at 6:00pm. So WHY did the servers go down at 3:00am this morning???? That was an OLD announcement! The newest one was above. Why did they start early?

[Andevom]

I didn't know the day after Easter was considered a holiday in NA. I've never gotten it off, and businesses around me are all open.

[Kurando]

I didn't know the day after Easter was considered a holiday in NA. I've never gotten it off, and businesses around me are all open.

Not everywhere in NA and this is where the confusion is coming in to the thread. Essentially some players in other countries do have it has a public holiday, and some just happen to be on an NA datacentre.

[Jojoya]

I'm annoyed because the announcement was confusing. My wife and I just started playing a short while ago and had a goal before maintenance. We were going to get all the requirements to get a home in-game. We busted our butts the last couple days because the last updated announcement was this:
-----------
In order to reflect data of the North American data center expansion as well as to accompany Patch 4.57, we will be performing maintenance on all Worlds at the time below, during which FINAL FANTASY XIV will be unavailable.

We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause, and we thank you for your understanding.

[Date & Time]
Apr. 22, 2019 6:00 p.m. to Apr. 23, 2019 3:00 a.m. (PDT)
* Completion time is subject to change.

[Affected Worlds]
All Worlds
---------------

The last thing we needed to do was get one more rank, which we planned on doing this morning before the servers go down at 6:00pm. So WHY did the servers go down at 3:00am this morning???? That was an OLD announcement! The newest one was above. Why did they start early?

They didn't start early. There are two separate maintenances going on which overlap.

The NA data center maintenance, which was announced as 3am Mon to 3am Tues PDT. SE had warned us well in advance that it was going to be a 24 hour maintenance.

The patch 4.57 maintenance for all worlds to implement World Visit, which is the time you listed. SE for whatever reason decided to have this maintenance at the same time as the NA data center maintenance (probably to minimize overall down time for the servers).

I'd absolutely agree that they should have been combined into a single announced instead of posting 2 separate announcements if that's your complaint. I spent a lot of time yesterday trying to remind players in my FC and linkshells about the extended maintenance for NA and some of them were confused just as you are.

[Aramina]

I didn't know the day after Easter was considered a holiday in NA. I've never gotten it off, and businesses around me are all open.

It's not in most places is NA. It is in Canada (apparently?) and a few places in the US (though it is still not considered an observed holiday).

[Mijorious]

They didn't start early. There are two separate maintenances going on which overlap.

The NA data center maintenance, which was announced as 3am Mon to 3am Tues PDT. SE had warned us well in advance that it was going to be a 24 hour maintenance.

The patch 4.57 maintenance for all worlds to implement World Visit, which is the time you listed. SE for whatever reason decided to have this maintenance at the same time as the NA data center maintenance (probably to minimize overall down time for the servers).

I'd absolutely agree that they should have been combined into a single announced instead of posting 2 separate announcements if that's your complaint. I spent a lot of time yesterday trying to remind players in my FC and linkshells about the extended maintenance for NA and some of them were confused just as you are.

As I said it was confusing. I always thought that the newest announcement was the correct one. I guess it's not that way in other countries. I'm not the only one that was screwed up by this. The newest announcement was 6:00am, the old one was 3:00am. I, and others, thought it was an amendment.

[Krotoan]

As I said it was confusing. I always thought that the newest announcement was the correct one. I guess it's not that way in other countries. I'm not the only one that was screwed up by this. The newest announcement was 6:00am, the old one was 3:00am. I, and others, thought it was an amendment.

Generally announcements are static unless a later post specifically says "Correction" or mentions a change. One referred to the NA servers, the other says all servers. I understand the possible confusion but that's been a standard for a while (I also acknowledge you say you're relatively new so maybe that wouldn't have been apparent).

[Ekinoxe]

As I said it was confusing. I always thought that the newest announcement was the correct one. I guess it's not that way in other countries. I'm not the only one that was screwed up by this. The newest announcement was 6:00am, the old one was 3:00am. I, and others, thought it was an amendment.

The problem is that it wasn't clear that they weren't an old and a new announcement. They were both different announcements. One for the patch maintenance and one of the data center split. It could've been clearer for sure but at the same time, both announcements did have different titles.