My first 50 lvl and a few complains about game so far.

[Mingqin]

3. Today i unlocked the 50 level and i stuck at story 36 lvl. So im just forced to do it as soon as I can which is more like a job than having fun.

Story driven game, if you feel forced for having to do the story, you're really not gonna last tbh, realistically you should of been doing it as you levelled up, it seems like this is a problem of your own making tbf.

[Venerik]

In most mmorpgs what i played so far you also had to do side quests to unlock main story. So i cleaned like 2 maps of side quests when i was starting game(near of 30 lvl) and from that moment im usualy 10 od 15 lvl higher.

[Vidu]

In most mmorpgs what i played so far you also had to do side quests to unlock main story. So i cleaned like 2 maps of side quests when i was starting game(near of 30 lvl) and from that moment im usualy 10 od 15 lvl higher.

In FFXIV you can ignore sidequests more the most part, if you wish. Every quest that is required for you to progress through the mainstory is part of the mainstory and gets the "meteor"-quest-symbol.

However there are sidequests that have certain content like dungeons or (in the expansions) aether currents that you need to unlock flying in the zones behind them. Each quest that has something locked behind it has a blue quest-icon and you should pay special attention to those!

Now all sidequests that only have the simple yellow/golden icon can be ignored or saved for a secondary job etc.
Quests that get a small picture in the quest-window when you accept the quest usually tell a more involved story and have follow up quests. Often those start off with a blue icon but after unlocking whatever they open a whole questline that tells a story of its own (beyond "Go pick some flowers for me" or "kill that giant pig that stole my pumpkin")

Long story short: Following the mainquest is all you need to do to play the mainquest - but playing through the mainquest is the requirement for pretty much everything else in this game that has a heavy focus on its story. A story that gets better in the expansions! The end of ARR is often a slug for people but I promise you: it gets so much better after that - hang in there!

[snarkomatic]

Story driven game, if you feel forced for having to do the story, you're really not gonna last tbh, realistically you should of been doing it as you levelled up, it seems like this is a problem of your own making tbf.

Story driven game yeah, but so many people even here, and content creators, agree that the story-lock on basically all group content is a little less than ideal. Especially the 2.0-2.5 stretch, which was so painful it took me three times quitting and returning to be invested enough to slog through it. Got WHM from 50-55 on it, while looking longingly at those lilies I couldn't unlock at 52 because I had not gotten to HWD yet. It isn't a fun way to introduce new players to a game. It's a shame they couldn't find a better way to encourage players to enjoy the story aside from literally forcing them into it.

e.g., ESO has a crazy long lore-heavy main quest that I really enjoyed playing out to the end ... but it was optional to do whenever I was ready, it was laden with good rewards (mostly skill points, nom nom), and it never once left me trudging through 20hrs of solid fetch-quest-only lore dumps.