Confirmed: ARR campaign will be pruned

[linay]

Additionally, those less than important quests like that could easily be turned into sidequests

That, I think, would be the best solution. You could make it a branching point in the story.

Like, hey, let's go fight Titan, but you know, you might die, so if you want, talk to this guy to help prepare a feast for you to enjoy before your fight, or let me know if you just want to do it now. (Of course, this particular example might have changed the story more than necessary, so the writer might do it differently to keep the story the same while separating the quests.)

[MsQi]

There are some kill quests that are just that, but I seem to remember some being part of the story.

IIRC The materia quest is placed at a bad point. You are working up to facing Ifrit I believe and then you suddenly have to head back to the waking sands, do the quest and then get back on track. It could be earlier or later. They could create "required" side quests. Like a quest you are given as part of the MSQ, you can't drop them but you can do them whenever you like. They might have to exist outside the quest limit. There might then be certain content you are blocked from later down the line if you haven't completed them. For instance you wouldn't want people entering current high end raids without understanding materia.

[Catwho]

There are some kill quests that are just that, but I seem to remember some being part of the story.

IIRC The materia quest is placed at a bad point. You are working up to facing Ifrit I believe and then you suddenly have to head back to the waking sands, do the quest and then get back on track. It could be earlier or later. They could create "required" side quests. Like a quest you are given as part of the MSQ, you can't drop them but you can do them whenever you like. They might have to exist outside the quest limit. There might then be certain content you are blocked from later down the line if you haven't completed them. For instance you wouldn't want people entering current high end raids without understanding materia.

I like that idea. It could hang out in the same place as the job quests - you're not blocked from continuing MSQ yet, but you probably want to pick it up the next time you visit that NPC or you're in town. And you can't progress to 2.1 content until you're done with them.

[Zanarkand-Ronso]

I wonder....will we get Main Scenario Dungeon - Castrum & Praetorium - Skips back?
Hmm, but if we do, what if that extra EXP we get will get adjusted as well?....Hmm, I both want the skips back so they are Fast again..... but dont want the skips back if it hurts the EXP boost...
X_X;

[Enla]

I wonder....will we get Main Scenario Dungeon - Castrum & Praetorium - Skips back?
Hmm, but if we do, what if that extra EXP we get will get adjusted as well?....Hmm, I both want the skips back so they are Fast again..... but dont want the skips back if it hurts the EXP boost...
X_X;

Doubtful. If the skips are back there's no reason for the exp boost to remain, as it's only there to entice people to do it. It was doubled when the skips were removed then doubled /AGAIN/ to get more people into the roulette after the fact due to a lot of community push back. If they remove the reason for the carrot to exist, basically ensuring newbies get to watch the story unhindered, the carrot is going to disappear. Which means this roulette is just gonna be dead again.

That said pruning the MSQ doesn't really require them touching these dungeons. It's all the miscellaneous fluff in between a lot of the dungeons and especially the 100 quest grind between 2.1-2.55 that needs to be cut down. With the sad fact being that you could cut out half of the grind and not lose a single story element relevant to the main story. A good friend put it best the other day, most of the ARR MSQ was a thinly veiled attempt to get the player to visit various places around the world - and often had no deeper meaning or need beyond 'oh hey, this place exists and we want you to see it' before sending you off to the next location. Which is all well and good... If the job quests didn't fill that niche on their own.

You could cut down the pre-Titan grind to like two quests and call it a day for example. The quest to get into Brayflox, and then rewrite the whole gathering slog into the adventurers getting off their booties themselves and bringing the ingredients for the feast. Which sadly does need to be kept since Brayflox's existence as a mandatory dungeon makes it impossible to write the actual feast out entirely. The grind up to Ifrit is another example, as someone else pointed out. As are the needless fetch quests that send you out of the Waking Sands for something only to drag you right back soon after. Don't even get me started on the Crystal Brave stuff... We'd be here all day. A few dialogue snips here, a few cut and pastes there, and all the relevant information can be summed up neatly while pruning out those quests with no one ultimately being the wiser. ARR did a lot to set the world up but in terms of overall quality it's basically the equivalent of a first draft that could be easily cut down to tell a more concise narrative.

[Seraphor]

No, because there is very little there that I would consider "filler quests". No more so than the leveling dungeons are "filler dungeons" - which most of them could be considered as since they don't advance the story even less than the average quest.

No, the real "filler" stuff is the endgame gear grind. That is pure time filler.

I struggle to call anything that can be skipped 'filler' and once endgame gear becomes obsolete, that stage can be skipped, which is why 50, 60 and 70 top tier tomestone gear can basically be bought up for peanuts now.
While it's not obsolete, it forms the basis for endgame progression, without it you wouldn't have a game to play.

'Filler' is stuff that doesn't advance the plot, and I can recall many times where I thought 'what is the point of this quest?'

[Driavna]

...

Personally, transforming those two dungeons to solo duties (accompanied by NPCs) will be a better experience for new players (will also finally solve the eternal problem with that roulette). Right now thanks to gear the difficulty is so low become anti-climatic, however, is not only a problem with ARR. Something similar happens with "The Singularity reactor", "The Royal Menagerie" and at some point "The Dying Gasp".

I mean, the trials before the final boss are harder.

[Cemil]

Quests that can be optional:
-all Tataru Quests(Miner,Arcanist)
-Titan,Sylph Quests
-sniff the chocobo(Doma Refugees)

Then give new Players max Mountspeed in all ARR zones
with getting the first Chocobo.
This Snailspeed on a Mount is crap.

[Enla]

Personally, transforming those two dungeons to solo duties (accompanied by NPCs) will be a better experience for new players (will also finally solve the eternal problem with that roulette). Right now thanks to gear the difficulty is so low become anti-climatic, however, is not only a problem with ARR. Something similar happens with "The Singularity reactor", "The Royal Menagerie" and at some point "The Dying Gasp".

I mean, the trials before the final boss are harder.

Oh I don't disagree, but this is SE we're talking about. We're lucky they're even pruning ARR at all, never mind the MSQ roulette - and to be fair it's likely only because enough potential players have complained about the grind turning them away from the game that they took that step to begin with. If they do end up turning those two dungeons into solo duties I'll be pleasantly surprised however.

Quests that can be optional:
-all Tataru Quests(Miner,Arcanist)
-Titan,Sylph Quests
-sniff the chocobo(Doma Refugees)

Then give new Players max Mountspeed in all ARR zones
with getting the first Chocobo.
This Snailspeed on a Mount is crap.

Tataru and Titan can't be optional sadly because they tie into later story content. The stuff with Gabu doesn't hit quite as hard if a player hasn't done Titan yet, for example, and without being given a reason to care about Tataru her increased presence in HW and growth going forward come off as flat. Same with the Refugees, because again it ties into later story elements. All those stories can def be cut down however by a /lot/, retaining their narrative necessity while taking away the slog.

[linay]

Then give new Players max Mountspeed in all ARR zones
with getting the first Chocobo.
This Snailspeed on a Mount is crap.

Eh? I don't see any issue with mount speed in ARR zones, though I'll still take any speed increase.