New Player Experience Sucks! - Impending Expansion Problems

[Emmanellain]

To be completely honest all would be solved if ARR got cut heavily and condensed, with an exp increase to make up for the cuts.
It would make for a better experience without all the meaningless quests, and those who would not care for story can skip through everything at their leisure.

I played WoW the majority of my teen years, the only reason why I got the story of the overworld was due to me having played the Warcraft games previously.
Unless you sat there and read every quest description you would literally not be immersed in the story, you'd just be a roaming character going from zone to zone leveling up via dungeons and sidequests - because that was your purpose, to level so you could raid - I still got 7 great years out of that MMO regardless but in terms of telling a story FFXIV is superior.

This changed later on, I left the MMO before Pandaria came out, mind you. So I am not gonna comment on the current state of storytelling in WoW, but from what I experienced back then telling the story via huge block text (basically - optional) is more or less bad design IMO.

FFXIV due to limitations has the same text, however, it's cut up in chunks and serves it to you with cutscenes, options to answer and traveling. You are, after all, an adventurer - so your exploits and rewards have to feel earned, that's why you earn everything in this game. Everything such as additional dungeons, dyeing your clothes, etc. are all locked when you start the base game, you go out and earn it by design.

if you remove the work before you unlock certain things they won't feel earned, if all I had to do to get to endgame was to walk into area, unlock dungeon rinse repeat I wouldn't care half as much, now if I had to enter an area in search of an NPC I've traveled with for many expansions or due to something else that made me care I've suddenly gotten way more immersed and invested in the game, there's a reason why a lot of people have strong feelings when entering the Vault and when they leave it, and that's not entirely due to the battle with Charibert but the story around it.

This is an MMO by SE, SE has always had bloated grand stories and this one isn't any different, in fact, it has better storytelling from HW onwards than most of the recent numbered FF titles. So even though some may play this for a different purpose, detaching the MSQ from your progression would imo hurt the game more than make it more accessible, what we need is cutting the unneeded bloat in ARR.

[van_arn]

To be completely honest all would be solved if ARR got cut heavily and condensed, with an exp increase to make up for the cuts.
It would make for a better experience without all the meaningless quests, and those who would not care for story can skip through everything at their leisure.

I played WoW the majority of my teen years, the only reason why I got the story of the overworld was due to me having played the Warcraft games previously.
Unless you sat there and read every quest description you would literally not be immersed in the story, you'd just be a roaming character going from zone to zone leveling up via dungeons and sidequests - because that was your purpose, to level so you could raid - I still got 7 great years out of that MMO regardless but in terms of telling a story FFXIV is superior.

This changed later on, I left the MMO before Pandaria came out, mind you. So I am not gonna comment on the current state of storytelling in WoW, but from what I experienced back then telling the story via huge block text (basically - optional) is more or less bad design IMO.

FFXIV due to limitations has the same text, however, it's cut up in chunks and serves it to you with cutscenes, options to answer and traveling. You are, after all, an adventurer - so your exploits and rewards have to feel earned, that's why you earn everything in this game. Everything such as additional dungeons, dyeing your clothes, etc. are all locked when you start the base game, you go out and earn it by design.

if you remove the work before you unlock certain things they won't feel earned, if all I had to do to get to endgame was to walk into area, unlock dungeon rinse repeat I wouldn't care half as much, now if I had to enter an area in search of an NPC I've traveled with for many expansions or due to something else that made me care I've suddenly gotten way more immersed and invested in the game, there's a reason why a lot of people have strong feelings when entering the Vault and when they leave it, and that's not entirely due to the battle with Charibert but the story around it.

This is an MMO by SE, SE has always had bloated grand stories and this one isn't any different, in fact, it has better storytelling from HW onwards than most of the recent numbered FF titles. So even though some may play this for a different purpose, detaching the MSQ from your progression would imo hurt the game more than make it more accessible, what we need is cutting the unneeded bloat in ARR.

I don't disagree in principle, I disagree in execution.

There's simply too much for a player to unlock now, with all features, expansions, and patches taken together. It prevents players from playing, and randomly teleporting hither and yon is not playing beyond a technicality.

This is why I want more sprouts past ARR, even if it requires the starting point of the storyline (not the storyline itself) to change. I've seen too many give up on the "hard work" of ARR and 2.x. Incidentally, ARR and 2.x isn't hard work at all-- it's just a rat's nest of hodgepodge unlocks that may or may not lead to anything interesting except for the very end.

That very end is covered by the Heavensward trailer well enough.

[DavidIven]

i just want SE to stop making everything locked behind MSQ

[Squigley]

IMHO SE should stop making extensions and switch to expansions. As it is, Heavensward and Stormblood just continued the story, extended it. All of the previous MSQ stuff was required for the new stuff. With the current business model and content/patch cycle, FFXIV is an MMO first and a "story game" second. Every sprout in our FC has complained that it takes far too much time and effort to be able to do content together which is meaningful and relevant for everyone. This will get worse as more extensions to the story are added. Unl€$$ mon€y and $kip potion.

I personally stopped following the story around the time clergy in robes started doing backflips to rooftops. I rolled my eyes, went "yyeaaahhhh..." and started abusing the skip option. I might watch some scenes here and there to have some idea what's happening and why. But usually the line-emote-line-emote presentation is so poor that I won't watch the whole scene. Why do I play this game then? Because the gameplay is solid and enjoyable for a tab-target MMO. I'd actually argue that this game is not much of an MMORPG, more like a coop-RPG a la Guild Wars 1, but that's a topic for another thread.

What purpose does a mandatory and heavily gating storyline serve if the end results are either a) people like the story and continue playing or b) people NOPE out of the game? Making the story optional would remove outcome b. I see only negative aspects in a story that blocks things and restricts players freedom (compared to an optional one). When I rolled my BLM alt I bought a story skip potion but no level skip and WHOA, that was the right combination for me. I had much more freedom to proceed as I wanted because the story wasn't restricting my options.

[Penthea]

if you remove the work before you unlock certain things they won't feel earned, if all I had to do to get to endgame was to walk into area, unlock dungeon rinse repeat I wouldn't care half as much

I strongly think this is partially why top-tier raiding is on such a high pedestal compared to the rest of the game in WoW. It's among the small handful of content that requires actual work to earn something from it.

I remember in Vanilla WoW even getting to lvl 60 was an achievement. It took such a long time and the dungeons didn't mess around. You really had to work together to get through them right from the first one you could enter. It's nothing like this now. Since long before I quit the game it didn't become remotely challenging until you were within 10 lvls of max lvl. With each expansion the lvling experience got worse. Not just because there was more of it to do, but also because of class balance and stat squishes rendering the old content even easier than before. By the time I quit a huge chunk of lvling consisted of two-shotting mobs in the open world (even without heirlooms), and watching tanks pull eight packs at once in dungeons because anything less was excessively boring and easy to do. To make matters worse, if you want to try a new class in WoW...you have to go through all that drivel again because you have to make a new character -_- At least in FFXIV if you don't like doing the msq, well you don't have to do it again if you want to try a new class.

[Lersayil]

IMHO SE should stop making extensions and switch to expansions. As it is, Heavensward and Stormblood just continued the story, extended it. All of the previous MSQ stuff was required for the new stuff. With the current business model and content/patch cycle, FFXIV is an MMO first and a "story game" second. Every sprout in our FC has complained that it takes far too much time and effort to be able to do content together which is meaningful and relevant for everyone. This will get worse as more extensions to the story are added. Unl€$$ mon€y and $kip potion.

I personally stopped following the story around the time clergy in robes started doing backflips to rooftops. I rolled my eyes, went "yyeaaahhhh..." and started abusing the skip option. I might watch some scenes here and there to have some idea what's happening and why. But usually the line-emote-line-emote presentation is so poor that I won't watch the whole scene. Why do I play this game then? Because the gameplay is solid and enjoyable for a tab-target MMO. I'd actually argue that this game is not much of an MMORPG, more like a coop-RPG a la Guild Wars 1, but that's a topic for another thread.

What purpose does a mandatory and heavily gating storyline serve if the end results are either a) people like the story and continue playing or b) people NOPE out of the game? Making the story optional would remove outcome b. I see only negative aspects in a story that blocks things and restricts players freedom (compared to an optional one). When I rolled my BLM alt I bought a story skip potion but no level skip and WHOA, that was the right combination for me. I had much more freedom to proceed as I wanted because the story wasn't restricting my options.

Anecdotal evidence is anecdotal. We've also had some complainers in-FC, but most our sprouts actually liked the MSQ and some regularly comment on awesome story moments when they get to them. But then we have no numbers, so who knows what the actual attrition rate is, or what kind of people it filters out.

Personally I like the "restrictive" MSQ the first time around. The whole experience feels a lot more strict, controlled, measured and personalized to the WoL. I guess it's also easier to write an actual script for gated content, without writing extremely generic dialogues.

Now if you run alts, I can see the point, but very few of the people that I know actually stuck around after the MSQ if they didn't like / care for it after completion.

[Physic]

Do you gatekeep a singleplayer game through the story? I think most games are kept in check through story. Heck, even dark souls is.


Saying because it's an mmo with 3 expansions worth of content means you shouldn't have to play the game is rather silly. You say they have to do a bunch of meaningless stuff to get to the game, however they are playing what basically amounts to 3 games. Thats not worthless, its content they haven't done yet.

Sure, the post ARR story could be shortened, that's about it. ARR sets you up as a hero. You are a nobody before the end of it.

did you play the game today?

were you doing main story?


your implying the only thing that matters in this game is main story.

also, why is the person who skipped every piece of cutscene and dialog ok, but a newb opting out bad?

what exactly is the downside of people skipping msq?

[Squigley]

Anecdotal evidence is anecdotal. We've also had some complainers in-FC, but most our sprouts actually liked the MSQ and some regularly comment on awesome story moments when they get to them. But then we have no numbers, so who knows what the actual attrition rate is, or what kind of people it filters out.

But does the mandatory story bring in any players or make people stay who would have otherwise quit? We know for a fact that it makes people quit, it would be very interesting to have some data about possible positive effects on player retention.

[Physic]

See, you are just bitter at the game. Your very calling the entirety of the base game and 2 expansions "banal fedexing fetch quests" is ridiculous. Thats like saying getting to the final episode of Game of Thrones is sitting through "hours of meaningless, utter crap to get to the finale" They may as well just start releasing everything as one quest, one episode, one hour of content, so we can bypass all the "getting through the crap" to get to the end and see the resolution.


Its not keeping people who have played the game away from people who want to start, its allowing players to enjoy their time through the game and expansions. If not every player wants to go through the story, they can either skip all the cutscenes or get a skip potion. Cutting the game up into an incoherent mess by destroying the story is not the way to go.

what are you even talking about, no one is suggesting getting rid of MSQ. no one.

the suggestion is a way for players who dont want to do main story, or want to do it on thier own terms, to have a method of doing that. This would be totally OPTIONAL. The player would have to choose to do it.

These players dont want to do msq, they dont need you protecting them from themselves.

[Physic]

Ultimately I think it's a design choice and would require time and money to revamp it to reflect something like WoW's quest/expansion design. SE doesn't seem keen on injecting funds into this game any more than they have to, nor have they shown many signs of revamping the MSQ other than to trim unnecessary travel/fetch quests.

all they need is an npc newbs can choose to ask, who basically does

story unlock =jump potiom
then new game+ set at start.

BAM story unlocked, with optional main story, when they feel like

the technology and development is there/being done already.

i would hope new game+ allows you to choose start point, essentially making it perfect for people who want to redo/start a certain expansion.

this is an easy fix using existing tech/programing