Echoes of Vana'diel Expectations? Hopes?

[Fawkes]

I hope the unlock quests for the raids are more involved like the Ivalice quests were. Make players collect Magicked Skulls!

I want lots of gear and orchestrion rolls, but there's too much to choose from and not a lot that I realistically expect them to add. As long as they don't make it drop new gear that doesn't look like FFXI gear I'll try to be happy.

Since they've shown us art with the Shadow Lord I have to expect he's going to be the boss of the first raid. They usually like to try and surprise us with the final raid, so that'll probably be something weird.

[LilimoLimomo]

As an old FFXI player and fan of the concept of alliance raids (even if the past 2 have been a bit disappointing), I'm trying to get my hopes up for the Echoes of Vana'diel raid in Dawntrail.

Wait, why would you do that? By no means should you in any way get your hopes up if you can avoid it. If your hopes are down, that's awesome, because either its a dud just like you expected, or you get the positive experience of being pleasantly surprised. Trying to get your hopes up is something I would avoid at all costs.

As for what I'd like to see, my most positive memories of characters from FFXI are the Star Onion Brigade, so I hope they show up. And maybe Maat.

[Equitable_Remedy]

My expectation is that there will be a lot of complaining about the raid on the forum both before the raid drops and after.

My hope is that the raids are fun.

[Skivvy]

Things I want.

- More FFXI gear sets. I've always been surprised how ew gear sets have been ported over to FFXIV. Alzadaal's Legacy not having FFXI gear drops was kind of a let down.
- Have Naja show up. I would also love for this raid series to tie into the DT relic line so Naja and Rowena can team up.
- Playonline - Dolphin needs to be a music roll.

Love me some Naja! Maybe she can be the one to send us off on one of the missions or something. Definitely need some threatening mace slamming action!

The only thing I truly don't want to see is that hideous Tartarus platemail. :X I hate those wings SO much. lol.

[mallleable]

Hope it's better tuned in terms of boss HP, outgoing damage, and mechanics than the Myths raids.

[CidHeiral]

I just hope it isn't an incredibly boring glorified Trial like the EW raids. I'm very excited for the FFXI theme but if it's another "half the room is about to be cleaved you have thirty minutes to comply" batch of bosses that's really gonna kill it for me.

[Roda]

As someone who hasn't played any FF game outside of XIV, it's more important for me that they prioritize the story and content standing on its own and being grounded within the world of XIV over any kind of excessive nostalgia milking and fanservice.

I think the Crystal Tower Saga did it the best where you had callbacks in names aesthetics and themes to its original source material, but things were different enough that they still felt like they fit within the worldbuilding they were doing for XIV.
Meanwhile, while I liked the fights of the raid series, I didn't get much from the Ivalice raids because we were basically teleported to a completely separate world with a LOT going on that we got very little of outside of the gauntlet of recognizable characters. Like everything up to the white auracite lore was a bit overwhelming for me? It really just felt like there's this whole other fantasy setting that is supposed to exist off screen and that doesn't really matter unless we're in The Ivalice Zone. :x
And while I WAS the target audience for the Nier fanservice, I could tell that if I didn't give a shit about Nier/Automata/Drakengard, then I would've been fully confused for the entire duration of the Nier raids.

Also bring back mechanics that make cowards quit when they get it in roulettes!!!

[Rokke]

only thing I want is for one aiming set to be xi's flamenco flavored dancer gear ;-;

[Boblawblah]

As someone who hasn't played any FF game outside of XIV, it's more important for me that they prioritize the story and content standing on its own and being grounded within the world of XIV over any kind of excessive nostalgia milking and fanservice.

I think the Crystal Tower Saga did it the best where you had callbacks in names aesthetics and themes to its original source material, but things were different enough that they still felt like they fit within the worldbuilding they were doing for XIV.
Meanwhile, while I liked the fights of the raid series, I didn't get much from the Ivalice raids because we were basically teleported to a completely separate world with a LOT going on that we got very little of outside of the gauntlet of recognizable characters. Like everything up to the white auracite lore was a bit overwhelming for me? It really just felt like there's this whole other fantasy setting that is supposed to exist off screen and that doesn't really matter unless we're in The Ivalice Zone. :x
And while I WAS the target audience for the Nier fanservice, I could tell that if I didn't give a shit about Nier/Automata/Drakengard, then I would've been fully confused for the entire duration of the Nier raids.

Also bring back mechanics that make cowards quit when they get it in roulettes!!!

This is all I care about. I want to be able to play it without having played FFXI and understand the story completely.

[AnimaAnimus]

It would be nice to have bosses you actually had to pay atttention to, maybe lose the strict order of attacks and make things more spontanious and fun again. I would love the raids to be wide open areas with dangerous trash mobs that dropped things you can actually use, making them worthwhile, like Dynamis, instead of just hallways with pointless mobs just standing around. I would love poppable NMs that had great drops like salvage. I would love objectives like Nyzyl or any other assaults.

I just want content with the kind of flavor FFXI had instead of corradors with slow, predictable bosses that require no real attention after your first or second run.