Suggestion: Burn Gridania and the Black Shroud Down and Start Over

[Cairdeas]

I'll be the first to say, I love the appearance and atmosphere of Gridania, but it and the Black Shroud are way too maze like and repetitious.

The Poem given to us by Yoshida seems to hint that some things will be destroyed in the future and a time of turmoil will start. I know I'm not the only one hoping that means someone sets a forest fire.

I wish it was a little bit more like San d'Oria then Crawlers nest to be honest :/

[Calandra]

I did (do) love the forest areas outside of San d'Oria, but I think the maze-like layout of the city gives it a different flavor than the others. (not that any of the cites have straight streets.)

The cut/paste does get a bit old, but isn't nearly as bad when you're walking through it as it looks on the map.

[Harle]

Originally I began in Gridania but after observing the map of the Black Shroud... well it just intimidated me. So I ended up deleting my character and switched to Limsa Lominsa. The city itself was confusing to traverse but it wasn't as complex as the Shroud.

[Shneibel]

the shroud isnt that complex, it is much easy now as you can drag the map

[Dargoth_Draconia]

Personally I love the Black Shroud. It is a really unique design and a great place to level up because the mobs are always real close together and spawn quick. I just personally love the atmosphere of the area, but I guess I am one of the few that do.

[Corrderio]

Why stop there? Do it to all zones.

[Demacia]

Why stop there? Do it to all zones.

This. XIV has the most boring and poorly designed world I've ever seen in an MMO.

[Lunar_Wind]

Why stop there? Do it to all zones.

Not to play too much of a devil's advocate, but you do realize how much time/money/effort is needed to actually remodel or recreate an entire zone? :x Even if they built it out of a set of prefabs/pre-created set pieces this is still far too much of a serious effort for anything less than a catastrophically bad zone I would assume.

Addendum: I actually rather like most of the zones in the game, though that wasn't really my point.

[Sonic_the_Hedgehog]

Why stop there? Do it to all zones.

There's no need to completely revamp every zone in this game. Maybe a few tweaks, that's it.

[SilvertearRen]

Not possible. That would entail another 3-4 years of development work to rebuild the worlds themselves. Square Enix would be run into the ground by then.

You'll have to put up with the world's current state, but gameplay and content additions are on the way.