Question for the Devs; will Heavensward include a new STARTER City-State?

[silentwindfr]

it will be stupid of them part to add low level area for an expansion, a good example for people that seems to miss the point are wow (the one they take inspiration) exept pandarie that was a special case... wrath of the lich king: new continent, new city all high level. Burning crusade: new continent, new city, all was high level area..

like the name implies it, it's an expansion of what we have already! not a restart!

[Intaki]

it will be stupid of them part to add low level area for an expansion

Would it though? One of the chief hurdles faced by the game's leveling is a lack of quests and a reliance on leves/fates/dungeons. Would a fresh influx of leveling zones not be well-received?

[Morningstar1337]

I woder thought. Would Heavensward focus exclusively on Ishgard? I see Sharlyalan as a possibility (the devs did say they were including more content then 2.0, and that has 3 city states. There's also the matter of the disappearing scholars)

On the other hand you could argue that the citystates mechanical purpose is for the Grand Companies and that the houses would fulfill a similar role

[Ditto]

Would it though? One of the chief hurdles faced by the game's leveling is a lack of quests and a reliance on leves/fates/dungeons. Would a fresh influx of leveling zones not be well-received?

It would certainly make a lot of zones go unused.

There only needs to be so many zones that have the purpose of guiding you to the exact same place. End game.

[TheRogueX]

Do you really think the new zones would be for low lvl while they increase the level cap? The new zones would be lv 50-60

Not all of the new zones will be for 50-60 content. See below.

You would not have a new character start in Ishgard and then be told they aren't allowed to come back until they reach the 3.0 story.

Why not have a new character start in Ishgard during its lockdown, and play out story up until it meets with 3.0? There's nothing that says that a new character starting in Ishgard has to be chronologically linked to 3.0 immediately upon character creation.

it will be stupid of them part to add low level area for an expansion, a good example for people that seems to miss the point are wow (the one they take inspiration) exept pandarie that was a special case... wrath of the lich king: new continent, new city all high level. Burning crusade: new continent, new city, all was high level area..

Burning Crusade: New races, new cities, NEW LEVELING ZONES... oh, did you forget about that?
Cataclysm: Well, they changed EVERYTHING, but guess what else they added? New races, new cities, NEW LEVELING ZONES. Apparently you forgot about that too.
Mists of Panderia: New race, new city, new leveling zones.

So basically, you're absolutely wrong. 3 of their 5 expansions had new LOW LEVEL zones in which their new races could level up.

[Sylve]

So basically, you're absolutely wrong. 3 of their 5 expansions had new LOW LEVEL zones in which their new races could level up.

Well, your first mistake was comparing XIV to WoW.
The fundamental difference between XIV and WoW is that each time a new class is released, existing players MUST, no exceptions, create a brand new character to play it on.
The new 'leveling zones' you refer to are the 1 - 10/20 tutorial zones. Designed to guide a brand new player through the beginning of the game.
That tutorial is handled by the Active Help system here in XIV.

Whenever WoW releases a new race, that race is forced to have its own starter zones, as WoW has a Race=City system.
Since each race beyond the original vanilla ones needed a "reason" to be part of the Horde or Alliance, they need to also have a 'storyline' which introduces them to their respective factions.

We here in XIV do not discriminate by race. There a plenty of Ishgardians outside of Ishgard.
Our player characters are "From a distant land".
As with the ROG and NIN, the story for them is independent (i will NOT spoil it, but any who has done it will know what i mean by this) to the Main Story, despite the obvious connection with certain characters who appear late in the Main Story.

It's my guess that the DRK will be introduced in such a way that is as independent of the main story as ROG/NIN managed to be. And i can think of a few ways they might accomplish that.

[OranKells]

Not all of the new zones will be for 50-60 content. See below.



Why not have a new character start in Ishgard during its lockdown, and play out story up until it meets with 3.0? There's nothing that says that a new character starting in Ishgard has to be chronologically linked to 3.0 immediately upon character creation.



Burning Crusade: New races, new cities, NEW LEVELING ZONES... oh, did you forget about that?
Cataclysm: Well, they changed EVERYTHING, but guess what else they added? New races, new cities, NEW LEVELING ZONES. Apparently you forgot about that too.
Mists of Panderia: New race, new city, new leveling zones.

So basically, you're absolutely wrong. 3 of their 5 expansions had new LOW LEVEL zones in which their new races could level up.

Blizzard =/= square enix

lets look at ff11
Rise of Zilart: level cap went from 50 to 75, new zones and areas and endgame content for that level along with several new jobs
Chains of Promathia: some new low level areas, although mainly for the story, only a handful of crazy people went to exp in promyvion;
Aht Uhrgan: whole new continent almost exclusively geared towards level 70+ end game content
Wings of the goddess: honestly this is where things started to get weird, the new allied fronts were nice alternatives to old fashion exp grind but it wasn't exactly for low levels either.

any race can start in any city in this game so you don't need to introduce a new starting city for them here like the elves or the werewolves. Also they've said that whatever Yugiri is will be the next playable race. Pretty sure she didn't come from ishgard. Not to mention that starting in Ishgard COMPLETELY contradicts all the events of the main scenario, Its a safe bet we won't even be able to enter Ishgard till we reach a certain point in the story at which they open their borders and let adventurers in

will there be new lower level areas? maybe. another area of coerthas but i'm not expecting a new starting area, something in the 40s kinda like how coerthas is already, the majority of it will probably be 50+

[Terin]

people that seems to miss the point are wow (the one they take inspiration) exept pandarie that was a special case... wrath of the lich king: new continent, new city all high level. Burning crusade: new continent, new city, all was high level area..

Completely, 100% wrong; EVERY expansion for WoW, up until now, has included new low-level content, as well. In TBC, it was 1-20 starter-areas, in Wrath it was the new Death Knight starter-area, Cataclysm completely revamped the world and questing-experience, and Pandaria added a brand new starter-area, as well.

Everyone already gets the Main Scenario quest to visit all three cities, that could simply be the point that you're told that Ishgard is no longer safe for adventurers, or that the southern nations need aid. It wouldn't really affect much of anything, other than needing a zone or two dedicated to lower-level questing, before sending you back to the 2.0 content.

[Morningstar1337]

Completely, 100% wrong; EVERY expansion for WoW, up until now, has included new low-level content, as well. In TBC, it was 1-20 starter-areas, in Wrath it was the new Death Knight starter-area, Cataclysm completely revamped the world and questing-experience, and Pandaria added a brand new starter-area, as well.

Everyone already gets the Main Scenario quest to visit all three cities, that could simply be the point that you're told that Ishgard is no longer safe for adventurers, or that the southern nations need aid. It wouldn't really affect much of anything, other than needing a zone or two dedicated to lower-level questing, before sending you back to the 2.0 content.

I'm pretty sure that the new zones will have low, mid and High level mobs, somethign ain to Central Shroud and the areas where the beast tribes are

The lone exceptions will probably the the Coerthas central highlands, ironically

[Tiggy]

Completely, 100% wrong; EVERY expansion for WoW, up until now, has included new low-level content, as well. In TBC, it was 1-20 starter-areas, in Wrath it was the new Death Knight starter-area, Cataclysm completely revamped the world and questing-experience, and Pandaria added a brand new starter-area, as well.

FFXIV has a much tighter story line experience from level 1 to 50. Specifically Ishgard is blocked off and the main story for each town has to introduce you to the Scions. Even if they did add a new starting area they would somehow have to reconcile that it didn't exist during that story. This isn't WoW where story elements were practically plug and play. Square strives for good lore and continuity. That must be taken into account.

*edit* saw this on reddit and thought it was relevant. An interview with Yoshi-p by Massively. http://massively.joystiq.com/2014/11...rs-and-post-f/

In it they say...

Is there a reason why new players cannot start as a Rogue? Will this restriction be changed in the future as new classes and jobs become available?

Final Fantasy XIV places a heavy emphasis on the story, and with the addition of new elements such as this, we would've had to change a lot of the introduction sequences, so we decided that it would not be available right from the start.

So for the same reason I don't think a new starter city will happen.