Suggestions: Keeping the Game Fun

[Nandina]

Originally I posted this on my tumblr blog, but I decided that this probably would've been the best place to post my thoughts on things as there may be a chance devs respond to feedback or at the very least take things into consideration. Feel free to constructively tweak anything that I've written if you feel the need and/or add your own suggestions.

I want to preface this by first saying, I was an addicted player of Final Fantasy XI from it’s launch until the release of ToAU. The game was challenging, the maps were massive, and I thoroughly enjoyed the community and made plenty of friends both from the US and Japan. However, despite how much I enjoyed the game I’d be lying if I said it was without it’s issues, namely the pacing of it. I’m all for grindy games but the grind was a little too long and a little too tedious, but the good more than made up for the bad.

Fast forward to 2014 I randomly decided one day to invest in A Realm Reborn because of my pleasant experiences on FFXI. Immediately I was hooked. The game seemed to make up for all of FFXI’s short-comings. I didn’t mind the wait in DF too much as anyone who played XI knows that the wait to find a party could be equally as lengthy. Quickly I found myself immersed in crafting, and to this day I still think FFXIV has the best crafting system of any game out there. Along the way I joined a few FCs, made good friendships, and thoroughly enjoyed helping new players out. I’d even eventually started to run an FC of my own, which I found to be a rewarding experience though a little annoying at times.

However, the more and more I progressed in end-game, the more I realized that the game swiftly became redundant and almost unenjoyable. I’d find myself logging on for thirty minute periods daily with little motivation to do anything until the updated patch was released. Here’s why:

Linear Progression - Gathering tomes daily was okay initially, but eventually I got bored with the same tired routine. With each patch, gear from the previous became obsolete rendering all progress made prior pointless. The only reason to bother was essentially to meet the required ilvl for the next dungeon. I didn’t really see much purpose in it and I still don’t as newer dungeons simply could’ve been scaled around the previous base ilvl and instead the developers could’ve focused on vanity gear and game balance. The issue became even worse when Heavensward was released and zeta weaponry and Binding Coil gear became obsolete, which is a massive slap in the face to those who worked so hard to acquire it, and is a reason I haven’t bothered with Alexander.

Dungeon Design - Dungeons follow a simple formula: clear trash and defeat three bosses and collect gear. That’s it. In 2016, hell even way back in 2013, games should be a lot more creative. The level designs of the dungeons are so beautiful and I feel the game could’ve played on that fact some more. Dungeons should have multiple paths to complete resulting in perhaps different enemies and even bosses depending which path you take. Even the environment itself could’ve been an obstacle. There are so many utility skills that rarely get used or are not optimal to use in party situations. It would have been fun and exciting to trigger traps, land mines, run from giant boulders, or even make use of the jump function by doing a little platforming. Remember the ability Libra from FFXII and how it allowed you to see traps in the field? That can be casted like protect at later levels. It can add difficulty to fighting easy trash mobs. Like a player carelessly stepping on a trap and suddenly black smoke bursts out and inflicts everyone with blind or heavy. And having done Castrum and Praetorium I feel 8-man dungeons should be more common, if not the norm, especially for those who have friends but can’t run with as many at once. The developers have become so uncreative that rather than make unique dungeons that really test the limits of each job and the players, they nerf abilities because people burn through trash mobs too easily i.e. flare, holy. Speed runs wouldn’t be an issue if dungeons were less of the same old same old.

Raid Design - Raids follow essentially the same formula as dungeons except there’s 24 people instead of 4 reducing it to nothing more than a large dungeon.

Too Environmentally Safe - The world is annoying more than it is dangerous. Running through a dangerous area? Nothing to worry about except for the occasional heavy status effect. The lore depicts the world as being more dangerous than what it actually is. Most mobs are harmless and don’t engage in any linking behavior and monsters of an equivalent level offer very little challenge. In FFXI surviving the journey from one place to another was a part of the appeal. Monsters tracked players in multiple ways such as sight, sound, and event scent, and the best way to increase survivability was to travel with a partner (or partners).

Small Maps - A Realm Reborn was far too small, though Heavensward did attempt to make up for it with the addition of much larger maps and the ability to fly; but the ability to fly made the larger maps seem small again as mounts in flight are twice as fast as those on the ground. It takes hardly any effort to run from Ul’dah to Gridania.

Easy Travel - It’s hard to appreciate the level of detail put into the map design because so little time is spent exploring and experiencing it. Aetheryte crystals are too prominent. This is a fantasy based MMO, exploring is supposed to be fun. There is the sightseeing log I suppose, but it still isn’t the same as exploration in the midst of questing and leveling. It’s fun to stumble upon landmarks and areas as opposed to being told to just go to them. Bring back scheduled boat rides such as the one in XI linking Maura and Valkrum, where even the journey was tough. Higher level players were able to fight monsters that may or may not attack the ship while lower level players were able to safely wait out the voyage. It’s also another way to mitigate the above issue regarding the small maps. Too often people teleport en masse to hunt marks or Odin, and en masse they leave in the same way.

Too Casual - I would describe myself as a semi-casual player. I like doing hardcore content just as much as the casual stuff. In fact the abundance of casual activity is a good thing and a bad thing, simply because it’s too much. The game lacks that happy medium. There should be enough content so that both hardcore and casual players are happy. Some casual players never touch hardcore content, yet some would at least like to attempt it. Hardcore players are only stuck with Alexander Savage at this point as Binding Coil was nerfed ridiculously. There should be balance. It’s not fair to those who actually put in effort and strategy, and took the time to learn the game to have the gear they worked so hard for given away in a patch or two; or the content they labored to complete nerfed to the point where those with little understanding of mechanics and their class can simply breeze right through. I propose an optional open world area that address the problems mentioned above.

Duty Finder - Now this one isn’t so cut and dry. I love Duty Finder… at times. My issue with it, is that it really doesn’t encourage one to get to know their fellow server residents and you have zero control over who you’re able to play with. A really good player who learned their class inside and out can be grouped with someone, or multiple someones, who have absolutely no idea what they’re doing and can render the overall experience miserable. And even if everyone knew what they were doing, it forces you to play with rude people at times. Granted you can kick said individual, but that’s only 15 minutes into the dungeon, and once kicked you may or may not get a replacement, and if you leave there’s a 30 minute penalty enacted. I would say though that it does fix the issue in XI of having to wait for a party, but being an MMO, instanced play shouldn’t be too heavily relied on, and it’s not as if FATES and quests provide dungeon level gear and EXP. There should be challenging open-world content that gives the same benefits.

Scripted Fights - I’m all for following mechanics. However, I’m not really fond of being forced to do a dungeon repeatedly for tomes when I know exactly how everything is going to go down. Some randomization is a good thing. The only randomization you get is via the skill level of your party members, which can make a routine run a fail altogether, and there’s nothing more annoying than failing on something you know for sure you can beat or an attack you definitely knew was coming.

No Support Role - All three major roles have support abilities, however many casual players never use them. There’s been so many times I’ve seen healers who don’t use Leeches or Esuna, too many DPS who simply don’t put DoTs on bosses, bards who don’t sing or use raging strikes, ninjas who don’t use goad, etc. I think this is because so many DPS don’t take the time to really read their skills and just press random abilities in the hope of doing damage. Now I do believe that each job should have some degree of buffing and debuffing, but knowing and remembering to apply and reapply said skills while constantly doling damage is too much for a lot of players, which is why a support role dedicated to buffing while providing backup dps and heals would be a benefit e.g. time mage, green mage, dancer, a bard that doesn’t weirdly have archer as a base class.

Inane Quests - I love the way XIV actually lets you know what NPCs offer quests. In XI there was no indicator and one had to essentially talk to every possible NPC and hope something was stumbled upon. But for our characters to be epic heroes with the survival of the realm resting upon them, they’re treated more like servants by the Eorzean locals. Why is someone with the prestigious title of Warrior of Light delegated to picking up vegetables and clearing stables? Quests should be far more challenging and engaging than that. Many people simply click through the quest dialogue, go to the indicated area; and either pick up said items or kill said monsters. There is too much running back and forth, most especially when NPCs have linkpearls and can tell each other something rather than the player doing it in person. There should be lengthy quest lines that encourage people to again socialize with fellow members of their server. This is an MMO after all. Sometimes solo play can’t be helped but social play should be encouraged.

Like I said, I don’t hate the game. I rather enjoy it. But I will say that I get burnt out quickly and take months long hiatuses. Heavensward was the main reason I came back, but the expansion felt more like a giant patch than anything else. It’s just the same old same old with different areas and three new classes, not to mention a few newer abilities thrown in. I appreciate the friends I’ve made and the hilarious experiences. Will I be around come 4.0? Only if the above problems are fixed. For a game that generates so much revenue from it’s subscribers there should be more than enough funds to keep both casual and hardcore players happy while also diversifying gameplay. To be honest, I no longer see it as being worth the subsciption. Hell, Second Life for the PC is free to play and there’s so much to do and so many ways to enjoy your experience. I’d rather for the developers to take their time between each patch and release something of quality rather than release something every three to four months without innovating, that is after all what we’re all paying for.

To fix these issues I propose in either a large patch like Heavensward was or a true expansion, that a large continent is made that adequately meets the above criteria. Casual players would able to enjoy it as well, but if not, they could also stick to the same formula they’re used to via other new instanced dungeons and tome grinding. Majority of my friends list is full of people who never log in anymore. Same goes for my FC, that I had to kick people who hadn’t logged in for nearly a year, people who were new to the game when I’d met them. My fiancé, who plays less than I do, always tells me that if the maps were larger, the game more open-world, and the monsters more difficult he’d be hooked. He played the game before me, but now he only plays to play with me because I enjoy it at times.

Final Fantasy XI was an extremely successful MMO, and not many people seem to realize that. Now XIV does not need to be exactly like that, but I don’t feel the developers really paid attention to what worked with that game moreso they focused on what didn’t, and didn’t really use that experience in making XIV. XIV, to me, might as well not be a Final Fantasy game. Sure there are familiar things like chocobos and moogles, but despite all the fan service it often times doesn’t feel like Final Fantasy and many of the reasons above are why.

I think the game could be improved by fixing the above issues and implementing the following:

Race Questlines - They implemented beast quests and have given them a story, but why not tell the players more about who they have chosen to be. There is already some minor lore from 1.0, but there are so many unanswered questions. How do the races feel about each other? Where do they come from? What were their native languages? How did each clan diverge? Is there intermixing between the clans? Is there more intermixing between races besides that one Hyur/Elezen NPC in Heavensward? What do they think of that? How do the races and clans express their sexuality? Etc.

City Missions/Grand Company Missions - Sort of like how the main story initially was depending on which city you started in. There is so much more to know about the cities, and each city faces their own issues independent of what takes place in the main story. That should be illustrated further.

Questlines - By questlines I mean something lengthy that actually sends the player on a journey rather than repeatedly sending them back and forth with fluff assignments and dialogue. Something that can be done as a group. For example, children go missing and you stumble upon their half eaten corpses and you overhear tales of a demon that preys upon youth and you and your group venture into a cave to kill it, after of course a lengthy journey, solving puzzles, finding clues, and defeating enemies that require at minimum 4-5 people to complete before facing your target which is as strong as a typical dungeon boss. Then we go back to town to turn in the quest. Not 4 times in between each task.

Quest Sharing - Allow players to share quests with one another, with difficulty and rewards scaling based on the number and average ilvl of party members. Quests should also be made repeatable provided they are grouped with someone who has not yet completed the quest, thus encouraging vets to help newbies and able to level sync. This is also a good way to level other classes after having done every quest in an area previously. Repeatable quests can be marked blue instead of yellow. Rather than each person turn in the quest separately, the leader of the party can do so for everyone.

Hardcore Open-World Areas - Above I mentioned an entire continent geared towards those who prefer a challenge with tough enemies, difficult travel, and larger maps. This could also be done via adding additional zones attached to the ones presently in game. For example, the Sil’Dih Ruins or Qarn ruins in Thanalan or Amdapor in the Black Shroud. This would also make use of the pointless green party flag staus if people were actually looking for groups to explore said areas and setting up camps. The environment could also come into play. Imagine your tank smashing in walls to reveal different areas, your black mage freezing a small body of water for crossing, a ninja traveling across a plank bridge, a dragoon jumping to an otherwise unreachable height to lower a rope, etc. These ideas could be implemented in the casual world as well. If any of you ever played Dragon Age: Inquisition multiplayer, it can sort of be like the indicators indicating which role is required to enter a certain area. We have a jump button that gets no use. Imagine jumping on a ledge and hanging on and pulling yourself up. There’s so much that can be done.

Public Transportation - Like I said above. There could be instanced ships and airships taking people from one place to another at scheduled times with optional battles taking place.

Elemental Damage - This may require a rewrite of the game, or it can simply be applied only to content in a new expansion. The fundamental flaw with the classes is giving a black mage’s elemental attack spells to a white mage. White mage can still use the elements to heal but in a different way. Like the bar-spells from previous spells that could work sort of like how protect does, or that can even be given to a support role. Black mages should have every elemental attack spell that comes in three varieties: single attack, DoT, and AoE. White Mages should have spells like Dia and Banish to replace Stone and Aero. Attack spells should all have the same potency, unless used on a monster that either resist or outright absorbs the damage. A support class could give en-spells to DPS to imbue weaponry with elemental damage. Even melee should have elemental attacks. In Tactics for example, even Dragoons had elemental breath attacks, and monks currently have different stances. Piercing, slashing, and blunt damage can also fall under this. This would just add another layer to combat. This of course would be a little too much to pull off though entirely possible, but I’d understand if this was never done.

FC Event Tab/Notice Board - I would love to be able to schedule events with my FC. There are days we all like to level some jobs, other days where we like to do Raids, and others where we focus solely on doing Extreme Primals. It would be nice to schedule it and allow people to mark whether or not they’d be participating. A lengthier noticeboard would also be nice.

Request Repair - Similar to the way the request meld feature is. If you’re in a dungeon or far from a mender, why not get someone else to do it? It makes crafting even more useful. All the person wanting the repair will need is the requisite dark matter.
Interactive Emotes - There are emotes which look awkward when used on another player such as hug/embrace. If using an emote on said person, why not initiate a tiny menu with the option to accept or decline? If accepted, allow characters to automatically move in position and engage in an authentic looking embrace, provided they’re in appropriate range to do so. It’d be cool to see our characters dance with each other or cuddle. I know there are players who like to roleplay and this would be more immersive for them.

Camera Mode - I’m a PS4 player and I love taking screenshots. The issue I, and others, have is that the camera is always centered on your character, and depending on where you’re positioned in a shot, it can be hard to center the frame appropriately. Adding filters would be nice as well, maybe even little sticker emojis.

Swimming - If new areas are created, this would be nice to have, also in addition to some we currently have. Open waters can have a level of danger to them. Certain waters can contain deadly monsters, so you wouldn’t want to swim in them. Swim to far out and you may be attacked by something. This would be nice for like a watery zone where there are many islands, sorta like Hawaii or something. Then of course there can always be water mounts. This can potentially result in either further development of gathering classes by giving them an ability which allows them to hold their breath under water for a longer period of time than non-gathering classes, or another gathering class itself. There can either be a swimming questline that teaches you to swim (which there undoubtedly would’ve been if implemented) and also give you different stroke animations or the ability to swim on your back. Being that fighting probs wouldn’t work with this, it can automatically switch your combat hotbar while in water to one geared towards swimming.

Adjusted Potions - There have been times while leveling a non-healing class, where I really could’ve used those potions. If I want to use three potions in quick succession, let me. Potions can also heal a percentage of your max HP rather than a paltry amount which becomes useless at higher levels. This will give the alchemist class more relevance, and enable it to make money. If potions were actually more viable prices are sure to increase. Potions should never be able to replace a healer, but there are times in a fight when the healer dies, and the boss is almost dead but so are you. I do understand putting a timer on certain potions such as those which increase primary stats. Allow those to last from 25-30 seconds with a three minute cool down. All potions shouldn’t share a cool down.

New To Dungeon Icon - A player may be new to the dungeon, but not new to the game. Yes, there’s a message that there may be new players who haven’t completed the duty, but I know personally my friends and I fail to notice this or forget quite a bit. This is really minor though.

Storage Benefits to Housing - Besides having a personal space to decorate any way you see fit, that’s really all housing is. It’d be nice if houses included extra spaces to store gear, like a closet or something. Given the way this game handles gear, players acquire too much of it and fast. There isn’t adequate space in neither the retainers, the inventory, nor the armory chest.

Less Grindy Relic Quest - The grind is quite frankly dull which is why I personally never went beyond animus in 2.0. There should be more trials, nothing too easy. This is after all a relic quest. Pretty much like how people struggled, but not too bad, with Titan HM. There can also be a certain level of open world exploration required or even soloable or group duties that really test your knowledge of the class you’ve chosen. Repeating the same dungeons thirty million times is a crazy requirement. A so-so amount of grind, more trials, and medium difficulty quest based objectives would be nice.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

I see the BLM thing a lot, but traditionally, BLM has only had ice, fire, and bolt.

As for the rest, a lot of that wouldnt work in a mmo, theres balancing that needs to take place that prevents a lot of interesting or different things.

[Caitlinzulu]

Less Grindy Relic Quest - There should be more trials, nothing too easy. This is after all a relic quest. Pretty much like how people struggled, but not too bad, with Titan HM. There can also be a certain level of open world exploration required or even soloable or group duties that really test your knowledge of the class you’ve chosen.

This has been mentioned before on the forum, relic quest has never been about difficult content, but only about a grind.
Back when i started the relic on my whm, Titan HM was an utter disaster, with countless wipes, and me just about allways getting landslided. Only because i was with fc mates did we stick it out.
If you want difficult content and not a grind go do alex savage.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

This has been mentioned before on the forum, relic quest has never been about difficult content, but only about a grind.
Back when i started the relic on my whm, Titan HM was an utter disaster, with countless wipes, and me just about allways getting landslided. Only because i was with fc mates did we stick it out.
If you want difficult content and not a grind go do alex savage.

The other problem was people were just buying their wins, essentially negating any effort it took to do the fights.

[Zeonx]

Add unique weapons armor or gear in general with a low drop rate.

Something that only few people can get by notorious monsters, give people a reason to go out and wait for them to spawn.
This gives a reason to stay on the game and have something to do, also it gives a market value.

on top of adding notorious monsters add achievements for defeating them so many times.

add a system where if you collect pieces of armor, glove, helm, boots, pants you can restore them make it apart of crafting.

Make something like walk of echoes in FFXI where people can get together in the same server and do something together instead of duty up.

[Hayward]

Add unique weapons armor or gear in general with a low drop rate.

Something that only few people can get by notorious monsters, give people a reason to go out and wait for them to spawn.
This gives a reason to stay on the game and have something to do, also it gives a market value.

on top of adding notorious monsters add achievements for defeating them so many times.

add a system where if you collect pieces of armor, glove, helm, boots, pants you can restore them make it apart of crafting.

Make something like walk of echoes in FFXI where people can get together in the same server and do something together instead of duty up.

You must not have played XI for very long, otherwise you'd have thought about the bot LS charging outrageous amounts of gil just to get what they're looking for. That kind of rarity is an MMO killer these days and should not even be considered.

[Zeonx]

You must not have played XI for very long, otherwise you'd have thought about the bot LS charging outrageous amounts of gil just to get what they're looking for. That kind of rarity is an MMO killer these days and should not even be considered.

Actually my cousin said it was people like you who actually ruined FFXI because you couldn't stop saying stuff like what you're doing now.

He said SE punished the legit players who were actually using the items and selling them when they needed the extra cash but that's not a problem here people have the cash.
It ripped the fun right out of the game and soon after he noticed tons of his friends leaving and most LS's who used to do a lot of the sky runs and other things just vanish because no more LS bank nobody was making much money and was hard enough to make Gil in that game.


In FFXI you struggled to make ends meat here its different.

I remember my cousin used to say he had fun going up against people trying to claim and getting a sword nobody else had like the kraken club that everyone wanted.
When everything became rare/ex because people could not stop huffing and puffing about RMT SE destroyed that for legit players, most all left and trust me a lot left.


Made no sense they ruined it also, because when they made walk of echoes RMT could do the same thing go into your run and lot your stuff and then sell it at high price so what is your point?

I might of not played very long but my cousin did from twinkling treants to 2013 where he decided to come here.

I'll say this everytime I see someone come up with a idea that just might help out the game, someone like you comes and shoots it down, I have no idea why people would be against having fun I see it all the time. aka allakazam I believe those forums where they rate you down for everything reason why those forums croaked so quick and went to BG or FFXIAH.



I say as long as SE adds them to heavensward area's I see no issue because I haven't seen any bot or RMT there yet and if they do they aren't there long enough to hunt them before they are banned.

Also I do believe him, I remember coming over and most of the people in LS left, he said because there was no other way to make GIL and mining and other stuff was exhausted while crafting took millions of gil to get there and hunting NM"s was a source to level it up and the ones who did have high craft ruined the AH by setting prices so far up nobody could get the new gear so most of them left. So if anything I believe the ones who complained about it ruined the fun for everyone and caused tons to leave the game.

If I remember right FFXI was the worst at making GIL, here in FFXIV I can make money easy, nobody is happy when they struggle in a game to make ends meat who cannot get stuff they want and hunting NM's was not the problem it was the crafters.

Instead of shooting things down why not add to the thread and give a idea to help out or something this is way off topic.

[Nandina]

This has been mentioned before on the forum, relic quest has never been about difficult content, but only about a grind.
Back when i started the relic on my whm, Titan HM was an utter disaster, with countless wipes, and me just about allways getting landslided. Only because i was with fc mates did we stick it out.
If you want difficult content and not a grind go do alex savage.

I don't think the relic should be as hard as raid content, and above I said I didn't bother gathering a team together again because the way the game is set up around linear progression. By the time the new expansion drops, all that effort is moot.

[Belhi]

Rather than answer each point individually I'll give a general point reponse.

There are basically 3 reasons which probably answer why they don't or haven't don't the stuff on your list:

1. Workload.
Simply put the amount of work required to implement the thing is either not practical (for technical reason) or requires too much investment in time to create and release within a reasonable timeframe. To implement the thing would require either longer breaks between patches or require other content to be cut. Swimming for example is something I think they would love to add and apparently in HW it was a choice between flying or swimming. Its just it takes a lot of work to implement it and then develop content for it.

2. Design choice.
There is a very clear design direction in FF14 revolving around a casual vertical progression. This system was chosen probably because it is a very popular system. FF14 is designed to appeal to the biggest playerbase possible. While multipath dungeons, Hardcore zones and limited transportation can provide deeper emersion, the large part of the player base these days (and therefore the bulk of SE's patrons) find such things too time consuming and too unrewarding. If someone can only play for an hour and a half a day they don't want to spend the 80% of that time traveling.

3. Balance.
People will often twist a implemented system to their advantage to game the system to get things as fast as possible even at the cost of fun. Its a strange dynamic but it happens all the time. People who hated grinding the same mobs on the same island for hours and hours on end for 210 gear still did it.

Making certain high level or special gear easier to get will cause people to flood to that source and ignore all others. If they handed out raid gear in dungeons, there would be a lot less people bothering with raids.

This applies to the use of things like consumables too. Changes to things like CDs can quickly throw of balance and create a situation where content is trivialised or people become required to load up on large quantities of consumables to be able to do the content.

Conclusion

There are some points you make which are actually being addressed. Its quite possible Swimming will come in the next expansion and they have said they have plans for making the GC more than just a vendor source(which is one of the reasons they still haven't raised the GC rank any further). In addition to that Yoshi P stated they are upgrading the system they use for quest mechanics to give the designers a greater choice of activities they can use in quest as the current system is very limiting on the designers. Likely we won't see much on these things though till next expac next year.

As for the rest, the game is what it is. They have designed it this way on purpose. I don't want to sound like a jerk but this isn't FF11 or even a more up to date FF11 clone. Its not going to become one either. The shift would frankly require a massive reworking that is probably just not financially feasible and would probably alienate as many people as it appealed too if not more.

On a side note though I would love an in game noticeboard for the FC. It was a feature back when I played Rift and I've always been mystified why such a simple system hasn't made it's way into other MMOs cause its so useful.

[Nandina]

I see the BLM thing a lot, but traditionally, BLM has only had ice, fire, and bolt.

As for the rest, a lot of that wouldnt work in a mmo, theres balancing that needs to take place that prevents a lot of interesting or different things.

Black Magic included Water and Aero in IX, X, XI, XII. Except I'm pretty sure there wasn't an air based spell in IX and X. I think IV had Tornado. And I think Stone was called Quake in some past games, and I know XI had Stone. But like I said, I'd understand if that was never implemented because it is a lot of work.