Returning player (first month lvl 50 Monk)...important questions!

[xxAtticusxx]

I'll make this straight! I'm interested in giving FFXIV some subscription money, despite being turned off after my first free month, but I had some important questions to ask before reactivating.

1. The biggest reason I quit was the economy was a giant vacuum. There was no reasonable way to earn gold aside from auction house abuse and I have never been really good at that. Alternatively, you could specialize in a crafting profession, but I saw that as a huge con to the game because I absolutely loath crafting. Once I ran out of money from repairs by attempting heroic mode bosses and teleporting, I instantly became demotivated to continue playing because there was basically no way for me to earn money without resorting to methods that I found boring or a bit cop-out-ish (for a premium triple A MMORPG), which is not why I play games.

Can you reasonably farm gold through killing or running dungeons now? Repeatable/daily quests? Anything similar to this would be fine by me. This is single-handedly the largest detractor for me, if this hasn't been changed...I instantly lose interest.

2. There's PvP now?! Is that...a humorous joke or does it actually present some pretty in-depth gameplay worth taking time to learn? For the record I love PvP, especially in MMOs, but FFXIV gameplay didn't exactly strike me as having the right kind of potential for that.

3. Is leveling up alternate classes more..intuitive? As far as I remember once you finished the game, you have only events all over the map to level up on...making leveling alternate classes feel like a bit of chore compared to your original first picked class going through the story. This isn't a dealbreaker but it felt a bit awkwardly un-intuitive.

That's all! In any case I really enjoyed the game leveling to 50, and I was super impressed by the combat and the experience as a whole really, so if the #1 issue has been fixed and the answers to #2 & #3 seem positive it's likely I'll be throwing money at SE soon.

Thanks!

1. Yes! You can now (still not quite as fast as crafting and playing the economy) effectively farm gold through end-game dungeons. Each mob will drop somewhere in the region of 50 - 70 gil, and I can end up making at least 5,000 gil per run.

2. While I'm not a PvPer (and haven't even unlocked any of the PvP in this game :S) people seem to be really loving Frontlines, 24 vs 24 vs 24. Then there's also the Wolves Den, which I think is similar to arena PvP? As I said, I'm not a PvPer so I can't really confirm any of the info :P

3. There are some more ways to level up alternate classes now. Duty Roulettes give bonus gil, EXP, seals etc. once per day (which in my experience can be half or more of a level) and also offer a role bonus, for those playing a role-in-need (usually tank). There's also the challenge log, which gives you gil and EXP for completing certain "challenges" once per week. An example is: "Run 5 dungeons" etc. They're not particularly "challenging" if you will, but they're a good source of some EXP and gil per week.

There's been a TON of content since 2.0 (assuming this is when you quit) so I'd definitely look into trying it all out and reading into what's been released.

Edit:

4. Least relevant but none-the-less important to me...have any customization options been added to character aesthetics? More hairstyles? Redesigned character creation? Character change tickets to take advantage of said new options? I wasn't super happy with the character creation at first, most notably a lack of good hairstyles (and a barbershop...).

4. There have been more hairstyles added to each race, as well as an Aesthetician (barber-shop type thing). Character creation remains relatively the same, and these new hairstyles are not available upon character creation. However, the Aesthetician is unlocked once you're able to travel to all three city-states, so it's pretty early on in the game. And each visit (regardless of what you change) costs only 2000gil. The things you can change with the Aesthetician are: Hairstyle, Hair Colour, Eyebrows, Tattoos, Tattoo Colour, Face Paint, Face Paint Colour, and Facial Options (beards, earrings etc.). To fully change your character like back in character creation, you'll need a Vial of Fantasia, which you get free for subscribing for 1 month, or you can buy more on the Mogstation website for real cash. Each Fantasia is good for 1 recustomisation (Note: Does not include a name change), and when you buy Fantasia, it's mailed to every character on your account (same goes for the freebie from Veteran Rewards).