I hope 7.0's has a way to skip most of the current story

[MikkoAkure]

It would be nice if they did this. In FFXI, a new player could get up to a certain point in the story and begin the other expansions. The first 2 more or less continued the main story but Treasures of Aht Urghan took us to a whole separate part of the world and was only tangentially related to everything else going on in the main story.

It gets harder each expansion to recommend this game to new players when they have 100+ hours of MSQ to catch up. I'd like if new content could reference past stuff if you've done it, but it was its own thing that had nothing to do with Garlemald (unless there's yet another rogue legion doing their own thing), Ascians, or Ancients.

[Gararr]

FFXI Had both horizontal and vertical progression so this worked.

FFXIV will never pull something like this off because it's a treadmil and nothing else.

[Gararr]

Meant to quote the guy referencing this post sorry.

It would be nice if they did this. In FFXI, a new player could get up to a certain point in the story and begin the other expansions. The first 2 more or less continued the main story but Treasures of Aht Urghan took us to a whole separate part of the world and was only tangentially related to everything else going on in the main story.

It gets harder each expansion to recommend this game to new players when they have 100+ hours of MSQ to catch up. I'd like if new content could reference past stuff if you've done it, but it was its own thing that had nothing to do with Garlemald (unless there's yet another rogue legion doing their own thing), Ascians, or Ancients.

[Supersnow845]

FFXI Had both horizontal and vertical progression so this worked.

FFXIV will never pull something like this off because it's a treadmil and nothing else.

Like I mean eureka shows that horizontal progression can work just fine if they ever care to properly implement it, Cassie earring is still the single most valuable item on the market board despite eureka being what 4 years old at this point

[Midareyukki]

Like I mean eureka shows that horizontal progression can work just fine if they ever care to properly implement it, Cassie earring is still the single most valuable item on the market board despite eureka being what 4 years old at this point

They implemented it on Eureka because, and I paraphrase, they wanted people to experience that good Old RPG gameplay vibe. For better or for worse. But the thing is that it came in a vaccum. With how large the game is and how much would have to be changed and then re-balanced to accomodate it, I doubt they'd focus on changing their design to something like that. Doable, sure, given enough time, effort, money, interest, all that... but it's not really realistic to do.

I don't think there's ever been another MMO that's changed how their progression system was designed this late into the game's lifespan? Not to say "Oh others can't do it, so we won't either", that isn't really an excuse for me (let's face it, ARR was unprecedented the way it worked out, and so much else can be as well). It's just more so that it's probably unheard of for a reason.

[Supersnow845]

They implemented it on Eureka because, and I paraphrase, they wanted people to experience that good Old RPG gameplay vibe. For better or for worse. But the thing is that it came in a vaccum. With how large the game is and how much would have to be changed and then re-balanced to accomodate it, I doubt they'd focus on changing their design to something like that. Doable, sure, given enough time, effort, money, interest, all that... but it's not really realistic to do.

I don't think there's ever been another MMO that's changed how their progression system was designed this late into the game's lifespan? Not to say "Oh others can't do it, so we won't either", that isn't really an excuse for me (let's face it, ARR was unprecedented the way it worked out, and so much else can be as well). It's just more so that it's probably unheard of for a reason.

That’s fair enough but they could always add it going forward and just sync it out in older encounters, like “horizontal progression only applies in duties above level 90”, I think we are all getting tired of the gear treadmill

Like at this point I can tell you the ilvl of the gear dropped by the 12th floor boss in the 18th expansion

[Midareyukki]

That’s fair enough but they could always add it going forward and just sync it out in older encounters, like “horizontal progression only applies in duties above level 90”, I think we are all getting tired of the gear treadmill

Like at this point I can tell you the ilvl of the gear dropped by the 12th floor boss in the 18th expansion

We all can ^^; that's the problem with this system. It's easy to implement and maintain, it's just going to be bland, boring and predictable.

They could maybe add it going forward though yeah. Like, vertical up until 7.0, where it caps at 90 and it becomes horizontal. And we do have level synch anyway, it'd just need to be expanded upon. Question is if they're willing. Because even if the team decides "Eh sure", maybe Square won't pay them for the extra thought time needed to design and implement it.

yeah, well. That's their problem.

It is. And that's kind of the purpose of this thread. Because it's their problem, and it will affect how we current players experience the game and how future new players will start their experience.

[hagare]

It is. And that's kind of the purpose of this thread. Because it's their problem, and it will affect how we current players experience the game and how future new players will start their experience.

current players won't be affected because it would affect the entry point of new players.
So asking people who is current and have forgotten how long it took them to reach that point is not advisable.

[Amenara]

It would be nice if they did this. In FFXI, a new player could get up to a certain point in the story and begin the other expansions. The first 2 more or less continued the main story but Treasures of Aht Urghan took us to a whole separate part of the world and was only tangentially related to everything else going on in the main story.

It gets harder each expansion to recommend this game to new players when they have 100+ hours of MSQ to catch up. I'd like if new content could reference past stuff if you've done it, but it was its own thing that had nothing to do with Garlemald (unless there's yet another rogue legion doing their own thing), Ascians, or Ancients.

The other benefit of FFXI's story is you can do the stories more or less in any order. There are some requirements for your level and having to do portions of your cities story quest, but for the most part you can do them in whatever order you want. I think the biggest thing games like WoW and FFXI have storywise "over" FFXIV is that the expansions are pretty compartmentalized in that you don't necessarily need previous expansion's storylines to know what is currently going on. It also lets you jump around and experience what you want to vs being forced to go down the continuous story of FFXIV. I am not saying that one method is better than the other because as a whole I think FFXIV's story is good, but the other methods also have the benefit of introducing some choice in what the player can do.

[EtherialOne]

It gets harder each expansion to recommend this game to new players when they have 100+ hours of MSQ to catch up. I'd like if new content could reference past stuff if you've done it, but it was its own thing that had nothing to do with Garlemald (unless there's yet another rogue legion doing their own thing), Ascians, or Ancients.

There's a saying that if you'd like to catch fish, you should ask advice from a fish, not a fisherman. I came over to play at the recommendation of some friends from another game. They've been playing for a while and are all level 90 in multiple classes and jobs. My 30 days I received for buying the complete edition of the game end on Wednesday. And I've never played before.

I love most things about FFXIV. Great player base. Great roleplay community. Cute moogles. I love the dancer job. I could go on. But there's one problem and all the fun stuff (for me, anyway) is locked behind it. It's the MSQ. I'm part way through Heavensward. I had put in my credit card info to go ahead and prepay for six months when my 30 days end. And then a conversation yesterday prompted me to look ahead and see what I have yet to go. I added up how many quests in the MSQ I have remaining.

I have 562 MSQ quests yet to go. I expect they will take a lot longer than 100 hours, especially if I want to actually pay attention to the story and not skip them.

There is no universe in which I'm going to go through 562 quests just to catch up with my friends. I don't really feel good about buying a story skip either. I've never, not even once skipped the story in any other game. I found this thread while browsing the forums looking for some other idea. I'm pretty sure it doesn't exist, but I just thought I'd try because I think it's an amazing game if not for the MSQ.

If I were to suggest something to Square Enix, it would be this. Unlock most of the content. There are some things where it makes sense to have like a level lock. Advanced dungeons, for example. Or the need to complete earlier quests before the new one But wandering around collecting emotes? Just exploring the world? Roleplaying with others? Just exploring the world?

I cancelled the 6 month subscription that was setup to be paid. When my 30 days expire on Wednesday, I will be telling my friends to come back over to another game we used to play together if they want to see me. And that will be with much regret because there is so much that is so good about this game if it were not all locked away behind the MSQ. And I gotta admit that I'm rather upset that I bought the complete edition not knowing most of it would be locked away. So you can bet I'm recommending to my friends that they not bother trying FFXIV.

When Square Enix does something about the MSQ problem, I will be back with bells on. Because it's otherwise great.

That's what this bonafide newbie thinks.