please give us something to stay in the game! (and keep keep the subscriptions up)

[Chiami]

Something to add here I realized after talking with someone about this issue is the difference in players and player motivation.

You can read about it here:
http://gamedevelopment.tutsplus.com/...--gamedev-4173
and here
http://www.nickyee.com/daedalus/motivations.pdf
and here
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/featur...a_.php?print=1

tl;dnr: There are 4 types, based on their motivation -- 1) the killer who at best loves to kill mobs, at worst loves to harrass, troll, smash, destroy things for other players ; 2) the achiever who wants to, well, achieve things ; 3) the socializer who loves to interact with other players or characters in the game world ; 4) the explorer who wants to explore the world, find out about the lore, mechanics, yadda

Killers probably love some of the raiding, and if they get bored and are less friendly have endless fun harassing other players, crashing parts of the Market Board, things like that. They don't need a lot of content as long as there is things (or people) to smash. Yay PvP as well. So I assume they are fine with the game as it is, for the most part. (Unless things get boring smashing the same-looking, same-feeling things over and over? Not that type myself.)

Achievers probably can have a blast going through MSQ and instances and then gear up to the eyebrows and get great drops. But I suspect in the LONG run even for them the eternal grind for always-same-style tomes and now relic 2.0 clone can get a bit boring (again, not much of that type myself).

So for these two types, it will take a very long time 'til this game gets boring, I guess.

Socializers who RP don't need content, they have the game world and have fun with the content they create. Same for folks who just hang out and chat. But how many of the player base in addition to killers and achievers are that? Idk. Socializers though who want to interact with the game world and the characters in it? They have a blast through the content of ARR and HW and then... nothing. the patches give so little of "socializer food"...

The same is true for Explorers. So much to discover, explore, research while you go through ARR and HW! (I fall in the area of Socializer and Explorer, so I can speak for them somewhat.)

FFXIV is doing an AMAZING job hooking Socializers and Explorers though the content up to the expansion (3.0).

But look at it: every patch 2.xx gave us at least a dozen if not two dozen MSQs. Lots of story there! Lots of characters to interact with. And lots of things got added together with those MSQs -- recipes, trials, additional quests yadda yadda.

What has been given to us since 3.0? A whooping 8 (!!!) MSQs, a few bits here and there in addition like Alexander, Diadem, Vanu, a handful of recipes for the crafters ... but for Socializers and Explorers hooked to the game world that is NOTHING over the long stretch since the expansion! All the more given a lot of this stuff was not exactly well executed (Diadem, Specialists...).

I think FF is doing an AMAZING job in hooking the explorers and in-game socializers through the content of ARR and HW. And then there was little left for these two types to do for over half a year now.

The devs need to decide what target groups they want to cater to. All four (including the mixed types of course)? Then we NEED quality content that is immersive, creative, new --for the latter two types to stay interested. Otherwise FFXIV will become little more than Final Fantasy Halo (catering mainly to killers and achievers). But... MMORPGs actually target mainly achievers (check, even if increasingly low-quality), socializers and explorers (and those two types were left with a pretty empty bag for quite a while now...).

If you want to keep the explorers, give us fresh, creative things to REALLY explore, if you want to keep the socializers (RPers aside) give us a game world we can actually interact with through story and characters that keep us hooked emotionally and mentally.

8 MSQ in such a long stretch of time and a handful of mostly-cloned content won't keep a considerable part of your player base interested.

Are the killers and achievers alone enough to pay for the upkeep of this game?

[CarnivalNights]

I don't know why I drunkenly resubbed last week thinking it was a good idea.

Nothing really changed in the three months I was gone.

[wolly]

First, they state they screwed up on Alexander Gordias Savage difficulty(welp fix it asap and saying oh we will make Midas Savage easier because people want to defeat the first one first). Second, parsers, make a parsing unit for ps4 users or do not allow pc users to have them at all. Make a crafter/gather's chest to put crafting and gathering stuff in and leave the armory chest for battle classes. When you brought out HW you should have gave all players 1 or 2 extra retainers for free for inventory space. Fix classes/jobs so you keep people playing them instead of losing them(I was bard and felt it was weak, stupid to be a caster"bow mage", and lack of mobility, but that's my opinion. Make the fights where you deal with mechanics and not a dps check. If you want to keep subscrptions, make new stuff(not repeating old), less grindy, make it where you get 18 beast tribe things and you can get 3 or 5 bones/shells/ores/seeds, and more enjoyable.

[Chessala]

You seem to be under the assumption that nobody does content because there's no reward.
Even though you listed a lot of content that all has rewards.

I see people playing LoV, racing chocobos, PVPing, and forming Diadem alliances all the time. Do you even look for this, or do you pass it off as non-content when perusing your party finder?
There are people actually enjoying this content. But people who get fun out of a game aren't as vocal as those that don't.

No one was saying there is a lack of content in general. What people say is that there is a lack of content that makes you want to stay.
For me, I have tried a lot of content and found only a few things that I enjoy:

- Battle content (I do not like melees so all classes I want are done)
- Gathering
- Crafting

I don't like PvP (I can stand it if it is at the right time in the right place but that's it), the gold saucer disappointed me deeply (chocobo racing feels too clunky, LoV is nothing but a convoluted mess, TT gets boring with all the retarded rules) so what good is that content to me? Why would content I don't enjoy makes me stay? People wanted a free-time minion battle to do casually...e.g. you see someone with a minion out and challenge them for a short fight....I did not see people ask for a convoluted mess.

Anyway, they group-force too much content. The things you can truly do without having to go with people are so little. Oh I hear the voices..."why do you play an MMO if you want to be alone?". That's not it. I like group content but I also like to do things on my own sometimes. I like finding new challenges for myself. This game has no challenges, all it has is grinding, even in the casual content presented at the gold saucer : grind until you have an amazing chocobo...etc.

I did not play FFXI and I am not intending to but I played many other MMOs and most of them had one thing in common: offering content for groups and solo alike. Why can't we enter dungeons AT LEVEL alone or with 2 people? In most MMOs, dungeons scale according to party size, why don't dungeons do the same here? Why is there nothing to explore after we finish uncovering the maps?

You see, this game lacks versatility. It has a lot of different things to do but in the end, all these things are only half thought through and based on the same system: grinding.

What are chocobo races and LoV other than yet another type queue that forces you to play with other people because SE is not capable of making flexible party sizes? It's so sad.....This game has so much potential but all SE and Yoshi do is build on the same formula over and over and over and over. A big part of the community is bored already and if they are not yet, they will eventually.

How often can you run a crappy raid like Alexander Savage before you had enough? And look at the new patch, what else is coming than more pointless grind? "Lets introduce another tomestone with a 450 cap/week and 2 new dungeons that you soon can't stand anymore due to the said grind".

I have so much to say about this but I better shut up or I ramble until tomorrow.

TL;DR: SE ... bring more versatility and flexibility into the game. Don't just build on the same formula over and over again. STOP LOOKING AT WOW and look at other MMOS as well (DDO, Ragnarok Online, Cabal Online, Rift). Just because this is a P2P game doesn't mean you can't get inspiration from F2P games.