We lost 70% of our player base half a year in

[Alleluia]

Its because DC travel happened. This is why Gilgamesh became the raiding server btw. Originally every server had a somewhat healthy raid scene, and then Gordias happened so everyone thought you had to go to Gilgamesh in order to clear savage. Raid scenes on other worlds plummted (this was pre cross-world PF).


Now we just have that again. Even though Primal had a healthy PF, not its just "go to Aether"


DC travel was a mistake. Full stop.


There's 144 High-End duties on Aether atm.

Wouldn't say DC travel is a mistake. I'd say not having global/regional party finder is the issue. Being able to travel DCs to run around the open world with my friends there is good.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Wouldn't say DC travel is a mistake. I'd say not having global/regional party finder is the issue. Being able to travel DCs to run around the open world with my friends there is good.

I don't think it would work that way. The DCs are physically separated and not interlinked like servers within the DC are. That's why you have to log out to DC travel, so your char data can be transferred over.



Sure, being able to do open world stuff with friends is great. Most don't use it for that tho, as evidenced by the death of PF on every NA DC but aether.

[IkaraGreydancer]

I don't think it would work that way. The DCs are physically separated and not interlinked like servers within the DC are. That's why you have to log out to DC travel, so your char data can be transferred over.



Sure, being able to do open world stuff with friends is great. Most don't use it for that tho, as evidenced by the death of PF on every NA DC but aether.

Wait I'm confused. What do you mean by PF being dead on every NA server but Aether? Define dead cause there's upward of 100 PFs at peak times where I'm at.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Wait I'm confused. What do you mean by PF being dead on every NA server but Aether? Define dead cause there's upward of 100 PFs at peak times where I'm at.

Midgardsormr is on Aether....

[Renalt]

I don't think I've ever used the PF. Well no...that's a lie. I used it to bribe someone out of an apartment and then another as a joke I would charge people 50K an hour to be topless and do sit-ups at their apartment/home.

Three people answered in 30 minutes.

[Striker44]

Wait I'm confused. What do you mean by PF being dead on every NA server but Aether? Define dead cause there's upward of 100 PFs at peak times where I'm at.

Not server, but Data Center (DC). The server you're on (Midgardsormr) is part of the Aether DC, which has become the "go to" DC for most PF activities. As you noted, it's absolutely hopping with groups at pretty much any time of the day. It's the other DC's that aren't.

[FudoMyoo]

Before EW launch, i'll already predicted it will not be as good as ShB & series which is a finale of the ARR (reborn).

ShB sets the bar too high in terms of lore for the XI/XIV fan base.

EW & series might get better (or worst) down the road, if it isn't good, I wouldn't have sub for 10years since ARR.

[sharknado]

On expansion launch queues in the thousands, two months later no queue. IMHO most people play expansion launches. Get back before launch to finish X.1-X.5, then do Y.0 and quit until Y.55 before Z.0

[Nexxus]

The game is 100% Rinse & Repeat with new visuals.

Adding Haircut, or other graphical stuff, won't make it last longer. The gameplay, new mechanics, new way of playing is what could change the breeze of the game !
I just came back into the game, and I'm already tired of playing it. The Cut-scene are boring, the character animations are stuck in emote motions, they can do better on this.

[Jojoya]

Sure, being able to do open world stuff with friends is great. Most don't use it for that tho, as evidenced by the death of PF on every NA DC but aether.

Friends doing open world content together most likely wouldn't be listing anything in PF so that's not an indicator of how players are using dc travel. They also aren't likely to be using it to run group content since chances are they're doing it unsynced so they don't have to meet normal duty requirements, or they're bringing in friends of friends to fill out their parties rather than using PF.

That the Aether PF is far more busy than the PFs on other data centers just shows that players looking for (or organizing) parties willing to accept random players for group content prefer to go where they know there are a large number of other players doing the same. That is a problem but not indicative of whether friends are playing with friends.

The game is 100% Rinse & Repeat with new visuals.

Adding Haircut, or other graphical stuff, won't make it last longer. The gameplay, new mechanics, new way of playing is what could change the breeze of the game !
I just came back into the game, and I'm already tired of playing it. The Cut-scene are boring, the character animations are stuck in emote motions, they can do better on this.

They are doing better than that. Sounds like you haven't made it past 5.0 on the MSQ, where mo-cap for cutscenes becomes much more common (though the emotes are still used as well).

As for changing up game play, there have been other discussions about that. Once a game is known for delivering a certain content style, deviating from that style is more likely to lose players than retain them or attract new ones. It may be true that you personally are looking for something new and different but not everyone will be.