Island Sanctuaries - End Game Only

[Anura]

Lol. Lmao even. Square has no reason to keep this behind Endwalker main quest and the location only proves it further. Ridiculous gate for such side content. One would think that getting rid of an Allagan monstrosity, a crazy pope and the emperor's unhinged son would be enough to get you a house or a piece of land in the middle of nowhere, but no. And I was hoping to jump on it on this character. Fuck's sake.

[Shibi]

Lol. Lmao even. Square has no reason to keep this behind Endwalker main quest and the location only proves it further. Ridiculous gate for such side content.

Now the details are out what is telling about the gate is the unlock quest is level 1 available. You just have to unlock it from Old Sharlayan (which is weird for a south of La Noscea Island) and have completed EW.

100% blatant cynical story-unlock fodder.

[Rilifane]

I would've liked to see Island Sanctuary tied to having purchased EW, that would be understandable considering it's side content that's a bit on the bigger side but be available before completing the EW MSQ.
I'm not affected as I've completed it but giving leveling players something to do when taking a break from the MSQ would probably improve the experience. MSQ is several hundreds of hours if you focus on it and even when someone generally enjoys the story, it's quite common that people feel the need to take a break from MSQ to do something else or burn out on it. Story isn't some binary you either love it can do it non-stop or you don't like it and should play another game.
Gold Saucer is a nice little time sink that you unlock fairly early, adding IS to later levels but before EW completion would give some something to look forward to midway.

And "lore reasons" or "but the NPCs!" isn't exactly a valid argument against it because the NPCs are completely arbitrary. Basically anyone involved with any of the impactful story quests could reasonably be the NPC that tells you "Congrats, you can have this little island nobody uses anyway to do some farming". Getting rid of any of the expansion bosses would be reason enough to give the player a little island.
Not to mention the location is south of La Noscea. An ARR area.

[LaylaTsarra]

Now the details are out what is telling about the gate is the unlock quest is level 1 available. You just have to unlock it from Old Sharlayan (which is weird for a south of La Noscea Island) and have completed EW.

100% blatant cynical story-unlock fodder.

It could be because they will allow non Endwalker people to visit the island and putting it in an Endwalker location would rule that out. I haven't read the notes just scanned them so dunno if a visit mechanic has been mentioned yet.

Seems to me there needs to be an entry mechanic/gate for people without an island or non friends to be able to visit your island so this location kind of makes sense if that is the case.

[Shibi]

It could be because they will allow non Endwalker people to visit the island and putting it in an Endwalker location would rule that out. I haven't read the notes just scanned them so dunno if a visit mechanic has been mentioned yet.

Seems to me there needs to be an entry mechanic/gate for people without an island or non friends to be able to visit your island.

This is the visit part

[LaylaTsarra]

This is the visit part

Well is makes sense then for the gate to be in an ARR area because you don't need EW to visit the island. And ty for the info. Doing dailies atm and lot to do before maintenance. i usually read the patch notes carefully during downtime.

Wish there was a gate for alts to visit a mains house :P. Does seem like my alts can visit each others Islands though given many are in the same FC on different servers I'm on.

[ACE135]

I would've liked to see Island Sanctuary tied to having purchased EW, that would be understandable considering it's side content that's a bit on the bigger side but be available before completing the EW MSQ.
I'm not affected as I've completed it but giving leveling players something to do when taking a break from the MSQ would probably improve the experience. MSQ is several hundreds of hours if you focus on it and even when someone generally enjoys the story, it's quite common that people feel the need to take a break from MSQ to do something else or burn out on it. Story isn't some binary you either love it can do it non-stop or you don't like it and should play another game.
Gold Saucer is a nice little time sink that you unlock fairly early, adding IS to later levels but before EW completion would give some something to look forward to midway.

And "lore reasons" or "but the NPCs!" isn't exactly a valid argument against it because the NPCs are completely arbitrary. Basically anyone involved with any of the impactful story quests could reasonably be the NPC that tells you "Congrats, you can have this little island nobody uses anyway to do some farming". Getting rid of any of the expansion bosses would be reason enough to give the player a little island.
Not to mention the location is south of La Noscea. An ARR area.

It reads as if there are next to no activities one can do apart from the MSQ. If that were the case, people should have been complaining for the last 6 years or so that there are no side acitivies to do. But now that a new side activity comes out, new players suddenly don't have anything they can do and need Island Sanctuary that much?

[Rilifane]

It reads as if there are next to no activities one can do apart from the MSQ. If that were the case, people should have been complaining for the last 6 years or so that there are no side acitivies to do. But now that a new side activity comes out, new players suddenly don't have anything they can do and need Island Sanctuary that much?

That's your interpretation of what I said but you missed the mark by a lot.

[LittleArrow]

I'm fine with the level gate. Players are really spoiled in this game lol. Such a massive chunk of early game is straight up free. There's TONS of content to do, and even more to get through. I think Island Sanctuaries at lower levels would be a MAJOR distraction for people to 1. Buy the game, 2. Progress through the game, which would ultimately end up with players 3. Being dissatisfied / having the wrong impression of the game.

I've seen people skip and say comments like, this game is boring. I'll ask well, have you done any of the raids? Most of them don't even know there are 2 categories of raids, or even that trials are different from raids. I'm all about play the game how you want, but that only goes so far. It is still a MMORPG at the end of the day, with a story I'm pretty sure the devs want their players to experience along with all the content that is tied to said story. Again, I know there are some players that literally level only crafters / gatherers / fisher / gold saucer and I see how island sanctuaries could fit into those categories, but as a player I don't think adding more to that section is a positive for the game overall. I also agree with what one poster said before, expansions should have features only tied to those expansions. It's a great selling point for EW to have this really nice feature. Maybe, in like 5yrs from now, they could revisit the level cap.

Let people play the game, earn the right to an island, and not get tunnel-visioned into never purchasing the game / getting to experience one of the best Final Fantasy titles in its series

[Striker44]

That's your interpretation of what I said but you missed the mark by a lot.

I had the same interpretation as the poster you replied to. You said:

I'm not affected as I've completed it but giving leveling players something to do when taking a break from the MSQ would probably improve the experience. MSQ is several hundreds of hours if you focus on it and even when someone generally enjoys the story, it's quite common that people feel the need to take a break from MSQ to do something else or burn out on it. Story isn't some binary you either love it can do it non-stop or you don't like it and should play another game.
Gold Saucer is a nice little time sink that you unlock fairly early, adding IS to later levels but before EW completion would give some something to look forward to midway.

That very much sounds like you're thinking Gold Saucer is the only other available content out there besides MSQ, which is...well, words can't really describe how inaccurate that is. One of the pros of FFXIV compared to other MMO's is the sheer amount of side content available throughout the entire journey. In addition to the entirety of the Gold Saucer (which itself includes many options such as chocobo racing, Vermilion, TT, Mahjong, etc.), there's Crafting and Gathering, Sightseeing, optional Raids and their storylines, optional Dungeons (especially in the earlier expansions), individual class quests from leveling other classes that turn into role quests by ShB, and those are just the things that come to mind because they're side activities I personally enjoy. There's probably other things out there I'm not even thinking of.

Point is, there's a ton of stuff available to people just starting out and making their way through the game. Island Sanctuaries aren't necessary, and may even just tilt the balance more in favor of people being overwhelmed with all the choices.