Returning Player Kinda Lost...

[Aramyth]

Hey Guys,

I bought the game at launch (first day) and I've barely touched it since then. Last time I played I reached level 12 Archer and did a few of the quests that you get when you start the game.

My server seems like it's filled with mostly afk people or it's dead. I'm on Figaro.

I find the controls with a mouse to be clunky/slow/laggy and moving the camera with IJKL to be rather awkward. Because of this I usually end up finding it rather awkward to engage in combat. :/ The last two times I logged in I ended up wondering around and looking at the world. It's very fun to look at, at least. I'm not really sure what I should be doing in the game to progress forward. I REALLY want to like this game but I find that I just can't in it's current state.

Any suggestions?

[Ruri]

Wait until the end of summer when they (hopefully) put some good patches / updates through.

[Ferth]

I'm in the same boat. I lost interest around last November. My advice is either look on your server's forums and see if any linkshell's are recruiting so you atleast have some people to talk to while you wander, or like Ruri said... try again in a month or so, and see how it is after the next update or two.

[Khalus]

You could also re-roll on a more populated world, if you're only lvl 12 on one class, thats nothing to get back. With the amount of SP you get from the Behest and the starter mobs/leves you could be back at lvl 12 inside two hrs or less.

However, I do concur with what the others already said...there is really not much to look forward too at this point IMO. Sure there is story that I'd love earn the right to watch instead of viewing it on YouTube, but in all honesty, with the current combat system and the incredibly broken and random crafting system, its just not much fun. Unless you like hunting NMs, but even that I'm told is quite a joke, cause they all have such short respawn timers, they're always up and available to kill.

Hopefully Patch 1.18 will launch sooner than later, and that will bring a host of combat changes including auto-attack and new/better animations, a sweeping Guildleves reformat, and tons of additional quests that are claimed to be more engaging. Its also been hinted at by SE, there are quite a few other things being added, but they're being tight-lipped about it and aren't saying until the day it releases.

I'll be sure to check it out as I do with every new patch, but I highly expect the heart and soul will be missing yet again!

[VydarrTyr]

Welcome back, Aramyth.

I don't know how full Figaro is. But it's possible that the game world seems empty because of the city you're in. Right now, most players have migrated to Uldah. Gridania tends to be a ghost town, and Limsa Lominsa is relatively empty. If you want to find more players, head over to Uldah. The streets and camps tend to be busier there, and the market wards are much more full. If it's helpful, here's a link to a post I did giving directions from Gridania to Uldah.

I realize some people are pretty down on the game -- just look at this thread! -- but there are people playing and having a good time. As others have suggested, I'd strongly suggest getting into a Linkshell as soon as possible. Check the Figaro forums and see if any linkshells are advertising there. Or search the New Player forum posts for others from Figaro looking for people to run around with. Or just go to Uldah and /shout that you're looking for a linkshell. The game is much, much more enjoyable if you can play it with others. The community in this game is, in my opinion, the best thing it has going for it. (While the boards tend to be really, really negative, the actual players are a lot of fun.)

If you're looking for things to do, I'd suggest starting with leves. Right now, that's the primary way to level in the game. Find some linkshell mates, and run leves together. You pick them up at the same place as those starter quests. But since you're level 12 now, you can do leves for the level 10 camps (or the level 1 camps). One more level, and you can get leves for the level 20 camps. Other than leves, you can do behest every 30 minutes, or you can do side quests, and when you hit level 20, you can start doing main storyline quests, job quests, and you can pick up even more side quests.

If you got to level 12 shortly after launch, I think you're going to be surprised at how much has changed. It now takes about an hour to get to level 12. You're going to fly through those early levels. (I rerolled a character, ran 1 tutorial leve on 4 stars, and got to level 5 from one leve.) UI lag has significantly improved, and I think the game in general has improved by leaps and bounds. And they're working to improve the amount of content, which has always been my biggest complaint about the game. There's supposed to be a big patch coming in the next few weeks that will add more content, and will lay the groundwork for a new battle system, which they'll be implementing over the summer. So big changes are on the horizon.

As for the control system, I play with mouse/keyboard, but I know several people who totally agree with you that the system is clunky. I have a linkshell mate who started out playing with mouse/keyboard, and then decided that the system was obviously designed for controllers (like the PS3). So he switched over to a controller, and he became almost evangelical, trying to convert everyone he knew to a controller. If you don't like the current set-up, maybe give a controller a try? (The developers have already said they're planning to work to improve the UI for mouse/keyboard. So that's a work in progress, although I wouldn't expect to see it completely redesigned for several months.)

You're certainly free to listen to the naysayers and wait a while before coming back. But if you feel like giving it a shot, please don't let them talk you out of it. It's worth mentioning that along with the other big changes on the horizon, they'll be de-emphasizing leves as a method of leveling up; in the next patch, they're going to try to turn them into primarily solo content that you can enjoy when you're short on time. Apparently, the primary way to level up will be quests and dungeons, and probably some grinding, although we'll have to wait and see what they have in store.

Regardless when you come back, I hope you have fun. If you have any other questions, please feel free to ask.

[Aramyth]

I've considered waiting until the next patch to play, but I figured that it probably won't have the adjustments that will make the UI or controls much better with a mouse/keyboard. I'll probably spend a few minutes trying to get a PS3 controller working with my PC to try that out.

@Vydarr I am already in Uldah and I've tried shouting, never get a response, it seems pretty dead. The people that are moving are just not interested in helping new players it seems. Majority of everyone else appears to be afk.

Perhaps I will try recreating on another server, Besaid? Selbina? Something like that?

[VydarrTyr]

Really sorry to hear that, Aramyth. I guess some servers are more dead than others.

I've heard good things about Besaid and Selbina. And if your highest level is 12, it shouldn't take too long to get back to that level. And if you can find a good LS home, you'll probably have more fun doing it.

Here's another thread where a player joined Selbina, was looking for a linkshell, and someone suggested one.

Here's a LS on Fabul that's accepting new players.

Here's a thread where someone was asking for suggestions on which world to join. Edenarchangel responded, and he's been pretty great about welcoming and helping out new players.

I'm pretty confident that if you search through some of the threads in the New Players forums, you can find some more.

Welcome back, and have fun!

[Aramyth]

It seemed pretty slow, i just assumed it meant people were doing stuff in other cities or other areas.

I got my controller working on my PC and recreated on Selbina. The controller makes things much easier but now the game itself is laggy and I can't pin point why. Playing with the same graphics settings, I even tried lowering them but it didn't help. It's pretty frustrating.

I want to like this game so bad, but it's like everything that can go wrong, will.

[SuMDRGMAN]

i'm back as well just level up all the crafts so when the game gets good u can do every thing yurself lol

[Aramyth]

I got my controller working and lag free. I had to fool around with some settings to get the lag to go away, but in the end it worked out.

I have to say, it makes the game much more enjoyable to play without shitty controls.