The Aurum Vale requires the Darkhold quest is a bad idea.

[MicahZerrshia]

From my MMO experiences, attunement quests have done the following things.
[LIST][*]Create a barrier for vertical advancement.

Barriers are fun to break! Creates more excitement and feeling that you are actually doing something other than spamming silly quests all day.

[*]Create a scarcity of players at the upper level.

How would pre-reqs create a scarcity of upper lvl players? This confuses me.

[*]Encourage newer players to ignore existing content.

Actually it does not. Using xi as an example how many ppl would have completely ignored all the pre-reqs CoP or ToAU had to get access to areas, rewards and what not. There would have been tons of content that would have fallen into oblivion if you could just walk into sea or sky. It actually makes it so new players do not ignore content.

[*]Encourage newer players to quit the game due to the problems with finding a group/passing the quest.

If you dont wanna spend time to find ppl to play an mmo just play a standard console game. Very few players quit due to lack of groups and if they do they simply didnt want to put effort into it and if they werent even up for putting effort into finding a group they wouldnt be any help to a group since they have very little initiative. Again this goes back to play a single person game if you cant take the time to meet ppl

[*]Create a sense of accomplishment and progression.

Exactly. How much more thrilling was it to enter sea simply cause you had to work for it. Did you feel the same way when you first entered the dunes? And in xiv how much more thrilling is it to wield an ifrit/moogle weapon over something like Elmlord's Tusk which is a drop from an easily soloable nm. Frankly I would be BORED AS HELL if I didnt have to work for something and getting groups for content can make the game alot more pleasurable and give you insight to the game you never before had

[*]Causes irritation to some.

Yes some, a few, those need to go offline to play. They simply dont understand what MMO means I guess, even a solo-friendly game like WoW had group required content