Coming from WoW - Questions/Concerns

[Tulzscha]

Hello, I'm a new player trying to figure out if FFXIV is right for me and whether or not it's worth dumping a bunch of money into. I have played WoW for many years but don't like where it's going nowadays, and I've played GW2 on and off but it's really just not for me. My trial is almost over and I tried to do a little of everything to get a feel for the game. Here are my questions and concerns thus far:

Combat: Feels very slow. The GCDs are long no matter the class and there's a very annoying delay on everything. I feel like the delays alone may keep me from playing the game, but is it really as bad as I think it is or do you just get used to it? Does combat speed up at all later on?

This is especially frustrating as a healer or tank. As a healer I'm always worried the delays will cost people their lives in tight situations and the general slowness is very off-putting in a role where things can get scary quickly. I've also read that there's an ability to make a cast instant except due to the animation delays it's anything but instant and only really good for movement which is concerning.

As a tank generating aggro seems a little awkward since my primary threat generator at the moment (Marauder) is a combo ability - it only gets more awkward the more targets there are especially when spread out and spamming my aoe runs me out of tp pretty fast so I'm not entirely sure what I'm supposed to do to pick up adds and keep them consistently - or is it just on the dps if they hit the wrong targets and pull aggro?

Since I can only get to level 20 I'm sure combat gets more interesting in later levels, but does anyone have an opinion on how engaging various classes are in the end game? In particular I'm looking to main a Summoner and dabble in healing (not sure which class, probably White Mage), tanking (probably Dark Knight but not sure since I can't try it), and some other stuff (Bard and Ninja look neat).

Classes: After leveling a few different classes to 20 (the trial cap) I noticed that they all kinda start out the same. Every caster starts with a spammable slow, every melee gets a 2 button combo, almost every class gets an instant dot and it makes me wonder if the classes will become more unique later on and if so by how much.

I like having a variety in play styles and the ability to have every class on a single character is a major selling point for me.

Speaking of which - how difficult would it be to get different classes to a competitive level in PvE compared to say WoW or GW2? (In WoW you have to dedicate a lot of time and a lot of weekly lockouts to get a single spec geared for raiding at a high-ish (Heroic) level whereas in GW2 you can pick up decent gear for any spec instantaneously and whenever you want so long as you have the gold.)

Mobility: Is there much of it for the different classes? It's nice having Sprint available right away for every class, though awkward when it completely drains the resource most classes use for combat. Is there anything else like charges or teleports or what have you? That stuff is fun.

Macros and Binds: I'm very used to my binds in WoW and I'd like to carry over as much of that as possible but I'm not sure I'll be able to. My concern came up when playing the Arcanist - I want to bind my pets' abilities in as consolidated a manner as possible while not messing up my binds for other classes. Right now I can bind a button on the pet bar which will change based on which pet is out but that messes up my other classes' binds.

Is it possible to have a macro for pet abilities that changes based on which pet is active (with the icon and tooltip changing as well)? If not, can you separate keybinds between different classes/jobs?

Gathering and Crafting: Seems much more involved in FFXIV than I'm used to and very confusing at first. For gathering in particular I find it very strange that it's treated as a separate class and I'm unable to fight enemies while gathering (as I have no combat abilities whatsoever).

Is gathering worth it or are you better off buying everything you need?

How useful is crafting throughout leveling and in the end game?

This is a pretty generic question but just what is gathering and crafting like in FFXIV, especially at max level? The whole system right now strikes me as frustrating so I haven't done much of it, but I may just need to spend more time researching, idk.

Storage: I read that when crafting storage is very difficult to come by. It's nice that you start out with lots of bag space but after just playing the trial my bags are almost full and I have no idea what to do with all my stuff. Most of it seems to be crafting materials and there doesn't seem to be any vendor trash (which is nice) but with how confusing crafting already is I'm really at a loss.

Is there some kind of additional storage for crafting stuff somewhere? I read that you can buy some kind of storage with real money (?) but if true that seems really stupid for a sub-based game.

RNG: This is one of the things that's turning me away from WoW, it's just becoming so so excessive. I can't use basic abilities unless RNG favors me, I can't craft gear with the stats I want unless I get lucky, in the next expansion people will be getting the absolute best gear possible from random drops in the world while others may never see it... all that stuff is very frustrating for me. So, how good or bad is the RNG dependancy in FFXIV?

Utility in Group PvE: Is there any? In WoW for example there are times where adds need to be interrupted or stunned or slowed or knocked back, or when a damage mechanic needs soaking, or when the group needs a speed buff or something. I really enjoy those moments where my class gets to shine for something other than damage - and being able to switch jobs on the fly for those kinds of situations would be my dream come true. :3

End Game: For PvE. How is it? Is there plenty of fun stuff to do? Is it at least better than World of Garrisoncraft or GW2's mindless zerging of all the things? How about class balance? As mentioned earlier I'm looking to main a Summoner - would I be able to jump into groups as any job easily or do I need to play whatever's considered OP at any given time to get invites? (Black Mage seems to be considered better than Summoner but I really don't like how turrety and fixed BMs seem to be.)

*****

Thanks for any/all help. ^^

[Jaik]

The GCDs are not really much of an issue as you progress in the game, you will pick up various skills which can be used to speed things up a bit depending upon the class/job (especially for healer roles).

All the classes have their own unique skills and these can be "borrowed" by other classes as you progress - cross class skills. Once you hit level 30 you can move over to specialist jobs and thats when the really big skills/abilities kick in.

Movement - the ninja (the specialist job of rogue) has the ability to "teleport" over short distances. The dragoon (the specialist job of lancer) has the ability to jump great distances. I'm pretty sure the marauder gets a charge also.

As for macros - you cant have any "intelligent" macros. So nothing which can check to see what you pet you have and then adjust what it does in reaction. The macro abilities are really quite cut down and thats a good thing - this allows for a level playing field as macros are not essential in this game (they just help a little).

End game really depends greatly upon what you mean - as there is so much to do with ALL those classes you have to level getting to the real end will take a hell of a long time. The duty finder will keep you busy and if you are in a Free Company then you could get involved in regular raids (or you can use the duty finder for that also).

In closing I'd say that the wealth of things to do over all the classes and the immense volume of the content will keep you very, very busy. This is a different game to WoW and GW2 and you need to play it differently. It will not be for everyone but it is superb game in my opinion and one that I greatly enjoy.

[Nutz]

Hopefully other people can cover the things I miss, but I'll try to handle what i can:

Combat feels very slow at low levels (below 30 or so) because you don't have many, if any, off GCD abilities to use between skills and your skill/spell speed is negligible (though for most classes it never amounts to a lot). Once you have more to do it feels much faster paced. Not having played WoW myself, but with some experience in GW2 I'd say it doesn't feel that fast, but it does feel a lot more controlled and calculated. I never could get the hang of GW2 combat as I felt it mostly wanted me to smash every button all the time.

Tanks are a bit wonky at early levels. A tank's ability to generate threat doesn't scale in a linear fashion just based on their DPS. That does happen, but more importantly they gain a 'tank stance' at level 30 for WAR (after finishing the quest as a MRD) and I think 40 for PLD (GLD class). Not having access to level 21+ you might be unaware that to change to a job you need to have multiple classes leveled and complete specific quests. For instance, to become a WAR you need to have MRD at 30, GLD at 15, and complete all the MRD class quests to be able to accept the quest to become a WAR. All jobs work in a similar fashion, except for the jobs released with Heavensward (they are classless and unlocked form a single quest In Ishgard -- unfortunately you need to complete all of the storyline from 2.0 - 2.55 to access the city).

Classes will feel more different from each other as you acquire job crystals and progress to the level cap. At 60 there are definitely similarities between jobs within the same role, and of course being subject to the same rules all classes feel somewhat similar -- more like if you know how to play one class it's not hard to pick up another. You'd have to learn all the abilities and such, but the 'rules' mostly stay the same. That said, many jobs do have mechanics specific to them. For instance, at 60 BLM has to juggle a 2 refreshable buffs at most times to deal decent damage. MNK/PGL doesn't perform combos the way other melee classes do, but instead has stances that cycle based on the previous attack used (more or less). WAR accumulates wrath (or another resource -- I haven't played WAR since 50) that can be used at 5 stacks to unleash one of a handful of attacks (or buffs).
TL;DR: yes they feel different as you level up further and it becomes much more pronounced at the previous level cap of 50 (and playstyle changes significantly from 50-60)

Mobility is mostly what you see at the beginning. Every class can teleport/ return. You get mounts at around 25 (I think), and flying mounts can be used eventually in Heavensward areas (there's some unlocking to do in each area). Class specific mobility differences are slim. NIN gets some sort of speed boost (though I haven't actually played that class), BLM has a rather odd short distance teleport (to the location of a party member) that I almost never use, MNK gets a nearly useless speed boost (I think about 5% -- can't be active with more useful damage buff), BRD gets a useful party wide speed boost, and there might be others.

Crafting & Gathering is handled very differently in FFXIV than pretty much anywhere else. I rather like it, though it's practically another game in itself! Gathering is definitely the simpler of the two. As you've seen these are full on classes with their own equipment, stats, and abilities. They're pretty basic though. Gathering (stat) affects the gathering % along with the level difference between you and the item you're trying to gather (same level items can't exceed 95% rate without buffs). Perception increases HQ chance (normally can't exceed 15% without buffs -- buffs don't work unless HQ% is at least 1%). GP is a naturally regenerating resource (5 every 3 seconds) that's used for gathering abilities.

Metal, ore, logs, branches, and many other likely things can be gathered. If you plan to craft it's a very good idea to level gathering classes (MIN and BOT -- FSH is less necessary/ useful). Gathering by itself can be profitable, even at lower levels as some items are needed in high quantities even at high levels (silver for example is in the mid 20's and sells pretty well as it's still needed for high level crafting). I find it relaxing as well sometimes. If you're not interested in it though, it's not needed.

Crafting is a bit more complex. All crafting classes share many basic skills and then they all get a few unique skills (which can and must be shared between classes to progress to endgame crafting). To successfully craft at endgame you more or less need to level all crafting classes. Currently I find it a bit much to do for little reward. To me the biggest reward for leveling crafting classes is that you can repair your own gear (even while in a dungeon or raid where you can't change classes) and you can meld materia yourself (which as of recently is allowed on endgame equipment -- it wasn't until the most recent patch). Aside from those things crafting is largely it's own game. You can make combat gear, of course, but it's not very heavily sought after and getting to that point requires that you enjoy crafting itself -- it's too much grind to do it just for the rewards if you don't like the activity by itself. Gil is so plentiful that if you don't craft or gather you will probably have no issue with money anyway. If you do craft and gather you might have gil problems, ironically, as crafting especially can be very gil hungry if you're not careful.

Storage is eased up a bit at 25 or so when you gain access to retainers. With a subscription you get 2 reatiners that can sell things on the market board for you (you can't do this directly) and each have an inventory of...I want to say 125 slots, but maybe just 100. In any case it's a decent chunk of added space, though you can run through it quickly, especially if you play several classes, particularly crafting and gathering classes. Several additional retainers can be bought (or rented really) for $2/month ea. Retainers can also be trained as classes (and now jobs) provided that you yourself have leveled the same class (they can't outlevel you). Using a proprietary currency they can be sent out to acquire various things for you (combat classes can collect nearly anything that enemies drop and gathering classes can gather most of their respective items).

RNG is not too bad in this game. Others may tell you otherwise and often cite some anecdote proving their irrational conspiracy theory, but mostly it's a nonissue. There are some exceptions though. Relic weapons (endgame upgradable weapons with quests released periodically) often require a massive grind that is supported by very low drop rates (~5% for items that you need several of). It's optional content for people who want a grind/ shiny weapon. In crafting, completion is digital -- you will know whether you will succeed or fail based on progress (99% progress at the end of a craft is fail) and HQ% is accurately displayed for you (and adjustable up to 100% through the crafting process). Gathering similarly displays accurate gathering and HQ rates for you. In combat, accuracy is almost a nonissue. Leveling up you might miss here or there, but at endgame you pretty much cannot miss outside of the highest end raids and still the accuracy cap (which is 100% in this game) is easily reached. Healers, lacking accuracy on endgame gear, do have some issues though.

Most of what you stated about utility applies here, but not in very heavy doses. Some classes have almost no PvE utility -- for instance BLM has sleep, but almost everything is immune after the leveling dungeons. Various classes have stuns, slows, and heavy effects that can and should be used at certain points, and some enemies require you to soak (or avoid soaking) damage at times.

Endgame has never been in a great place. I think currently people are disliking the scene because the rewards just don't amount to much. The content is just a hard mode of an easily accessible raid with gear that's statistically better, but visually identical and of course the exact same story. There is a good challenge from what I understand, but I haven't actually played it myself. Endgame raiding requires a bit more organization, dedication, and coordination than I can currently dedicate to this game.

Overall FFXIV suffers a lot from fast gear progression making old content obsolete. By and large only the newest dungeons, trials, and raids are worth running as equipment is significantly updated every 6 months (every other patch). Combined with XIV's very static and unoriginal stats and there's no reason outside of glamour (transmog) to obtain older gear.

Lastly I just wanted to say that one of the more unique things about this game is that it's heavily story driven. You are required to play through the story to continue progressing. I think it's done very well and enjoy the story, but if you don't want anything to do with it then it's going to be an incredible nuisance. As I stated before, for example, even if you buy Heavensward all it will do is unlock the level cap and new race until you complete all of the story line from A Realm Reborn. Until you complete all of that considerable amount of story you can't enter Ishgard or any new area and you can't unlock any of the new jobs. I don't personally think this is a bad thing, but different strokes.

[MistyMew]

combat feels clunky and slow allllllllll the way through including endgame op. its nowhere near the speed nor matches the fluidity of wow, rift, or even ffxi Oo. nope it doesn't improve.

[tENAxc]

combat feels clunky and slow allllllllll the way through including endgame op. its nowhere near the speed nor matches the fluidity of wow, rift, or even ffxi Oo. nope it doesn't improve.

Are you joking? o_o

I think the best word for the combat is... satisfying. It's really cathartic to get all my DOTS going, switching stances to suit the situation best and more. It's slow at the start, yes, but it does get better towards endgame.

Nutz' mention of the story is really spot-on IMO.

[Cerux]

Here are the differences:

1. Combat feels slow always, unless you are playing job like ninja which has skill speed boost attacks. (Exception is high mobility fights, like Titan extreme, you don't feel slow at all when you have to dodge/ keep your buffs up for attacks & its exciting.)

2. As a Tank/Healer you'll get used to keeping others alive, it might seem slow but you'll learn the fights & know when to use some pre-healing/shielding on your targets. Most of jobs have some cross-class self healing abilities like second wind.Every tank gets Tanking stance at 30, PLD & War also get "dps" stance. (You'll get useful abilities like Provoke from leveling gladiator, this for example can be used by War/Drk)

3. Classes become more unique when they get their job crystals on lvl 30. All keep getting some unique abilities till 60 & so on in the future expansions. + cross class skills help making each stronger, all jobs can't have same cross class skills. example. smn & blm can use some of archers skills, but warrior can't use those.

4. Mobility, some jobs like ninja have short distance teleport, dragoon have their jump attacks & blackmage has "hug" ability to your close enough party member

5. Macros & binds, i don't really have anything to say about binds, but as for macros i have used them alot in the past, usually most used ones for me are swift cast+raise on someone who died during combat (yes you can combat raise people.) you can have for examble: Party Chat: Raising xx -> Uses Swift cast raise on target-> xx( you can add delays/ say 1st or after instant action, see below)
/micon Raise
/ac raise <t> <wait.1>
/p Raising <t>

6. Gathering, crafting is its own world, can be fun/pain, best way to preserve inventory space is to sell anything you don't really need at that time & Get some later if you need it, especially 1st crafting items in game, they are really cheap/some can be bought from vendors.

7. Storage is really limited if you are person to hoard all this along the way, best way is to sell everything you don't need, either for vendor or ah <- better if you get more gil for the item

8. RNG can be bad, it depens on person, i've always had bad rng on here & wow

9. Utility PVE/PVP, there is always some mobs you can silence/Stun/interrupt, but here some bosses are unstunnable/Silenceable, its annoying as hell, but not really needed. (Lots of mobs can have large aoes that can be stunned/ or those effects that give debuff to someone on your party)

10. Endgame can be fun, it just depens what you like, Crystal tower/Void ark was ok, i can't really say anything about savage(hard) raids, since i haven't done any of them. but i have done those normal mode 8 man raids (savage on normal difficulty) They were interesting, but Binding coil of bahamut was better than alexander in my opinion.

If anyone has something to add, please do

[KarstenS]

combat feels clunky and slow allllllllll the way through including endgame op.

Are you joking? o_o

Would tell it more, he don't know what he is talking about.

After a quick look into his profile and logs, he is not doing the "endgame" at all and his playstyle is far away from being able to do the andgame.

@OP: The GCD will not feel that slow anymore at max level, when you are trying to get the best out of your class.

[Enkidoh]

combat feels clunky and slow allllllllll the way through including endgame op. its nowhere near the speed nor matches the fluidity of wow, rift, or even ffxi Oo. nope it doesn't improve.

I'm sorry, but seriously? FFXI? Did we even play the same game? FFXI's combat is deeeeeaaaaadddddd ssssssslllllllooooooooowwwwwwww... and basically amounted to the player putting themselves in autoattack and trading blows with the enemy without any input from the player at all, slowly building up enough TP to let rip with a weapon skill, using an occasional ability while waiting for it's cooldown to reset (which were much longer than anything we have here in FFXIV).

Of course in a party situation things improved a little by throwing skillchains into the mix and also if you could cast spells it made things more faster, but combat still was a major drag in FFXI, not helped by the ridiculously overpowered enemies that the game was filled with.

I don't mean to attack you Misty (and I'm really sorry if it seems that way), but your statement just does not hold any water I'm afraid.

[Yasuhiro]

Of course in a party situation things improved a little by throwing skillchains into the mix and also if you could cast spells it made things more faster, but combat still was a major drag in FFXI, not helped by the ridiculously overpowered enemies that the game was filled with.

That's why you get a party to help kill those enemies and slow combat doesn't necessarily mean bad infact the entirety of XI is pretty slow but heck I still like it. Very comfy game.

[Atoli]

I know most of this has been answered already, just adding a second opinion which might reinforce some things others said or make you question them :3

Combat: You do get more used to it, but it also does get a lot better. Unless you are MNK or NIN, the GCD will stay the same, but every class gets enough off-GCD abilities as you level up that you have plenty to do even during the cooldown.
And that's not even taking into account all the dodging and mechanics you'll have to do when fights get harder

As a healer, you'll get several instant cast abilities that can be used to quickly save someone from dying, but generally the thrill of the role IS to learn how to keep everyone alive without being able to always instantly save them with one button press

For tanking, if the monsters are too spread out, walk a few steps and they will follow you, moving closer together in the process. The threat meter also tells you how close your other party members are to pulling threat off you, so you don't have to keep on spamming AoEs when no one is dangerously close on taking hate away from you. You can mark monsters too, btw, to make your dps players focus on a certain monster so you don't have to make such an effort to keep all of them on you.

Classes:Yes, the classes get more unique. You have to keep in mind that SE considers FFXIV a "beginners MMO" which REALLY eases the players into the whole MMO deal, so it all starts very basic and uncomplicated.
Playstyles for most classes change over the course of leveling, with several of them having their biggest changes past Level 50.

As for gearing up - you can get an unlimited amount of decent gear (as long as you have time/money) in which you can do endgame raiding just fine (currently ilvl 220). The BEST gear however is behind a weekly limit/lockout (230 and 240), but it is no requirement to participate in anything, it just makes things easier. Also, as my friend from WoW would like you to know, the weekly stuff is by FAR not on par with what WoW requires you to do, and you can easily finish it all in a day if you want to.

Mobility: You get small movement skills for some classes (DRG jumps, NIN teleport) but they don't really matter outside of combat. You get access to mounts in the early 20s, so there really is no need for sprint anymore outside of PvP. With the aetherytes as well, you have most players just teleporting to the nearest one and then riding to a specific location.
As for TP usage, DRG has a TP regeneration skill that can be cross-classed by all other melees, so spending some TP on running doesn't hurt as bad with that skill either

Macros and Binds: Don't the keybinds automatically differ for every class? o.Ô I was pretty sure about that. For macros, they are shared between all classes, but you can just write 2 different macros and use the one you want with the pet you want.

Gathering and Crafting: Both are very useful and worth it. The best way to make money is through these, and especially crafting comes with a lot of useful additional things (like being able to make your own stuff which can get pretty expensive in endgame (100k+ per food item and so on), you can repair your own gear mid-dungeon, insert materia into gear, and so on.
As I myself am not that much into crafting though, I can not tell you much about how it is in endgame (more complicated, I can say that much xD), but it IS worth it, especially if you end up having fun with it anyway.

Storage: Barely any of the Lvl 1-20 crafting ingredients are worth spending inventory space on. Soon after level 20, you get 2 free retainers with a combined 200 additional item slots. If that isn't enough for you, you can hire more retainers (which do cost monthly though, and yes, it's been a complaint of FFXIV players for the longest time that that's even a thing in a P2P MMO). In general, those nearly 300 item slots are enough for quite a while, as you do not need to keep cheap mats around.

RNG: Stats on gear are only random on pink, non-endgame gear. And even then, it's just the secondary stats, main stats are fixed on everything.
Once you get to 50 (pre-expansion endgame) and 60 (current endgame), most content has a token system in place; meaning even if you have the worst of luck and never get the item you want as a drop, after 10 or 20 runs you can just buy whatever you wanted with said tokens. So in general, it's not all that bad on the RNG-side

Utility in Group PvE: Simple answer - yes. There is a lot of that the higher your level gets. Some classes have more utility than others, of course.

End Game: Class balance may change from patch to patch, but at least during this one, it's pretty well-balanced, actually. There are some classes that are OP in dmgdealing, but without a lot of utility which other classes that deal a bit less dmg bring to the table instead, so no matter what you pick, you'll have no trouble finding a group.
About plenty of fun stuff to do...well, that really depends on who you ask. Some feel it's not enough, others think it's just right, some feel overwhelmed. It greatly depends on how good of a player you are and how much time you play every week.
In general, there is A LOT to do if you don't just stick to running the same raid/dungeon over and over.

Lastly, if you edit your post, the 1000 char limit can be bypassed
So just post one sentence first and then edit the post and add the entire text.