When are we as player going to demand from SE a better MSQ experience

[KisaiTenshi]

First off, I am not referring to the story. I am talking about the gameplay. We are now on the 5th expansion and the MSQ formula remains the same; talk to a couple of npcs, do some fetch quest, talk to more npcs, kill one or two mobs every couple of hours, rinse and repeat. It's feels extremely outdated. I think in the span of an expansions MSQ (excluding trails and dungeons) we probably don't get to kill more than 30 mobs.

This is how I want a MMORPG to work:
10 minutes of story
10 minutes of combat
10 minutes of explore

Optional quests unlock "free gear" for that level. MSQ quests reward only EXP. No money.
Money is only earned by completing the dungeon at levelsync+ilevel sync or the first time.
Roulette earns you EXP+money the first time that day (eg sellable to NPC only "allag coins"), EXP+ gear tokens thereafter.

What I want to get away from is 4 hours of unvoiced cutscenes and 1, 20 minute dungeon. Do we need exactly a solo duty every 20 minutes, No. But if a "road is dangerous" why aren't we encountering bandits multiple times? Half the MSQ just seems like "go to X, and then walk all the way across the map to Y" encountering nothing dangerous. You just exchange yapping and then more yapping.

I'm not really hating on the fact there is story here. But even I, someone who enjoys the game's story overall, find it somewhat exhausting to basically do the mcguffin quests, and none of them actually involve a fight. But if you go back to EW, and Shadowbringers, you notice that this distance between each dungeon/trial is nearly the same (20 to the first dungeon, and then 15 to each dungeon/trial thereafter.) So why does DT feel so much longer? Are the quests actually longer? The lack of stakes?

Like would it be so much to ask to give us twice as many trials. Like aside from ARR which you basically did nothing of substance for the first 30 levels, why is it that there aren't "trials" that are of a different variety. Maybe not all the trials have to be high stakes choreographic works of art. Why aren't there 8-man duties that aren't trials/raids. Remember how we had 1-hour long 8-man MSQ dungeons that were like 50% cutscene? Can we maybe get some of those types of things back but without the 20 minute cutscenes? Like that original Livia fight in the white devil magitek armor was interesting, but didn't really work because the armor did no damage to the party. Or taking the magitek armor ourselves into something else that requires blowing up doors.

[CaptainLagbeard]

Well, playing through the MSQ further... It only took them like 6 levels into the expansion for things to actually start happening. Until a very specific point, aside from the first Trial fight, everything's been very slow paced and incredibly low stakes.

[Valkret]

But if a "road is dangerous" why aren't we encountering bandits multiple times? Half the MSQ just seems like "go to X, and then walk all the way across the map to Y" encountering nothing dangerous.

This has always been one of my biggest gripes with he game!! "The road is very dangerous blah blah blah" Then we get on the road and absolutely nothing, or if we are lucky 2 mobs spawn at a predetermined location, but the challenge is so braindead that it takes absolutely no effort at all. Then we are back to the super dangerous road, to talk to several other nps for 3 more hours.

[Themarvin]

It is not our place to demand and get it all the way we players want, it is first of all the Developers and writers and all that get that say.

The idea by it should be the players doing requesting and demanding it all is old and does not work, like thos expansion or not... eg. I hated Heavensward and Alphinaud and Estinien and Haurchefaunt... and alot others thought it was awesome... I like SB better than HW due to could get more areas but hated Zenos and even more so hated Zenos in what was to come in EW where made no sense.


So please just cut it out, no one here is in the position of anything here anyway as it is.

[Valkret]

It is not our place to demand and get it all the way we players want, it is first of all the Developers and writers and all that get that say.

The idea by it should be the players doing requesting and demanding it all is old and does not work, like thos expansion or not... eg. I hated Heavensward and Alphinaud and Estinien and Haurchefaunt... and alot others thought it was awesome... I like SB better than HW due to could get more areas but hated Zenos and even more so hated Zenos in what was to come in EW where made no sense.


So please just cut it out, no one here is in the position of anything here anyway as it is.

You clearly did not read the post. I am not talking about anything story related, just gameplay design. Picture this as an example. Imagine the story did not exist in this game. As you are going through the MSQ, when you speak to someone all you see is a blank box. Can the game survive this way? How many players would actually continue playing the game? Now this is obviously an extreme example, but when you compare it to other MMOS (WOW, GW2, BDO, etc) is not really that implausible, because you can play any of these other games without reading a single line text or watching a single cutscene and still have a decent gameplay experience as you level.

I am not asking for FFXIV to be all gameplay and no story through the MSQ, but instead of being 98% story and 2% gameplay, maybe we can do 70% story and 30% gameplay.

[Malthir]

It is not our place to demand and get it all the way we players want, it is first of all the Developers and writers and all that get that say.

The idea by it should be the players doing requesting and demanding it all is old and does not work, like thos expansion or not... eg. I hated Heavensward and Alphinaud and Estinien and Haurchefaunt... and alot others thought it was awesome... I like SB better than HW due to could get more areas but hated Zenos and even more so hated Zenos in what was to come in EW where made no sense.


So please just cut it out, no one here is in the position of anything here anyway as it is.

Ahhh yes the sit down lick boots and enjoy being fed crap, make sure to keep giving them money while they give you crap.

It is 100% the players say otherwise game dies. First and foremost players way, without us there is no game period.

[Themarvin]

You clearly did not read the post. I am not talking about anything story related, just gameplay design. Picture this as an example. Imagine the story did not exist in this game. As you are going through the MSQ, when you speak to someone all you see is a blank box. Can the game survive this way? How many players would actually continue playing the game? Now this is obviously an extreme example, but when you compare it to other MMOS (WOW, GW2, BDO, etc) is not really that implausible, because you can play any of these other games without reading a single line text or watching a single cutscene and still have a decent gameplay experience as you level.

I am not asking for FFXIV to be all gameplay and no story through the MSQ, but instead of being 98% story and 2% gameplay, maybe we can do 70% story and 30% gameplay.

What do you fear about the current story, it is very spot on what happens in the real world in many aspects as what is happening around... alot of the negative stuff coming from people is due to that they refuse to accept what really is going in the world right now and over the past few years as they lack the imagination to seek information elsewhere other than poluted local media, and that it all is stored in the cloud and forgotten or censored/manipulated away by people in power.

It contradicts peoples way of what they believe in what is going on and what is right instead of knowing what is going and what is right and wrong.

[Themarvin]

Ahhh yes the sit down lick boots and enjoy being fed crap, make sure to keep giving them money while they give you crap.

It is 100% the players say otherwise game dies. First and foremost players way, without us there is no game period.

It is more like that alot of things going on in the game contradicts what is going on in your own little bubble that you might want to consider bursting out of, later parts in the game explains it and it is spoton the problem with the Information Age, is not information anymore, but manipulation instead and alot is victims of it, especially huge countries by all means.

[Reimmi]

I would just like more quests to fight stuff
more gameplay in the MSQ you know

[SDaemon]

I overall really enjoyed the story of Dawntrail. I just wish I had gotten to play the story instead of watch a movie.