Possible level/story jumps....really?

[Enur]

The one thing that new players back is in my experience the MSQ. Many players simply dont care about it, they want to play the new shiny jobs. This cause them to rush through the msq, hating it even more. Many folks in the fc im in absolutely hates the msq, many even giving up early. Not because the story is bad, but because its restrictive.

A jump potion would fix this, the player who dont want to play the story, but skip to the relevant content can, and those who like to spend a few hundred hours fetch questing to be able to play with fellow fc mates can. Its not that i dont want to help, its that i cant help it go faster. Tanking tam tara can only take so long. All the solo instances to add up.

[Naunet]

A jump potion would fix this, the player who dont want to play the story, but skip to the relevant content can, and those who like to spend a few hundred hours fetch questing to be able to play with fellow fc mates can. Its not that i dont want to help, its that i cant help it go faster. Tanking tam tara can only take so long. All the solo instances to add up.

This is why I hate the jump potion. Not because I'm against people skipping levels (honestly it doesn't bother me - you do you), but because people are going to parade it as some solution to the god-awful ARR MSQ restrictions on things like jobs, as this person just did.

[Enur]

This is why I hate the jump potion. Not because I'm against people skipping levels (honestly it doesn't bother me - you do you), but because people are going to parade it as some solution to the god-awful ARR MSQ restrictions on things like jobs, as this person just did.

I merely advocate for a "skip to the new and shiny expansion you just paid for" potion. Surely you dont expect newcomers to shelf out 60+ dollars for Stormblood and be happy with the amount of work required to reach the part of the game that appealed to them.

I know id be royaly miffed if i bought say WoW Legion and have the game say "nuh uh, the fancy stuff you saw... You can get that in 200 hours. No demon hunter for you lol"

Whether the result is a potion that skips story progress or levels i could not care less about. I am just concerned that Stormblood will fail to draw in as many new players as it potentially could. Seen from a market perspective, the casual player is the most profitable one. SE has at no point tried to hide that FFXIV is a game built around casual, daily, short gameplay sessions. I want the game to succeed, and if this means catering heavily to the player who wants easy and fast access to shiny stuff, so be it.

[Jandor]

I merely advocate for a "skip to the new and shiny expansion you just paid for" potion. Surely you dont expect newcomers to shelf out 60+ dollars for Stormblood and be happy with the amount of work required to reach the part of the game that appealed to them.

Why does it need to be a potion though? Surely removing all the requirements for the first quest of Heavensward bar being level 50, the requirements for Stormblood except level 60, and adding a warning before you accept those quests that you'll skip everything before would work just as well?

Removes all the MSQ gating, just grind levels and skip ahead.

[Moonlite]

Why does it need to be a potion though? Surely removing all the requirements for the first quest of Heavensward bar being level 50, the requirements for Stormblood except level 60, and adding a warning before you accept those quests that you'll skip everything before would work just as well?

Removes all the MSQ gating, just grind levels and skip ahead.

Because half the complainers on the forums think the MSQ/lore is something sacred. If you aren't embracing it you are missing out on Hamlet or some other timeless classic.

The simple fact is SE needs to make a decision and stop gating everything the way they have. One solution like you suggested take the locks off dungeons increase xp. Other choice skip the xp and dungeons. The poorly thought out gating of content needs to stop.

[Daeriion_Aeradiir]

Why does it need to be a potion though? Surely removing all the requirements for the first quest of Heavensward bar being level 50, the requirements for Stormblood except level 60, and adding a warning before you accept those quests that you'll skip everything before would work just as well?

Removes all the MSQ gating, just grind levels and skip ahead.

While I do think this is an interesting idea, I'm going to play devil's advocate and point out the biggest problem it doesn't solve which is a big convenience the potion brings:

Unless Square MASSIVELY boosts exp gained from 1-50 and 50-60 stuff, people will still have to go through a greater portion of the MSQ just to reach the per-requisite levels for your idea. Or they can zerg the Palace of the dead, which they may not even be interested in, or could very well be dead in Stormblood as all the current players move onto the expansion content.

and subjecting new players to massive fate grinds isn't a great way to entrance players into staying either.

Because in reality, dungeons are heavily gated by the MSQ, that by the time they reach 50/60, the most benefit they'll receive is skipping the patch content. Then what if their favorite job they want to play happens to be DRK/AST/MCH? Bam, they now have to spend even more time getting it back to 50 and up to 60 to reach Stormblood's entry level in your idea. I think for your idea to work as well as conveniently a a jump potion would solve, 1-60 would need to take very little time to achieve. Because lets face it. People who buy the jump potion are interested in one major thing: The newest expansion where the massive majority of players are currently doing. and the longer it takes for them to reach it, the less likely they will be to stick around and provide their monthly sub to Square.

For as much as people like to hate on it, WoW is king when it comes to this accessibility. I could go out and purchase a copy of Legion and be at the same expansion as everyone else, whether I choose to level normally or use the skip, doing the same content the massive majority of the playerbase is also doing with very minimal effort. If Square wants new player retention to be high, it'll either have to make compromises in how it designs its MSQ, or they create a jump potion.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

My perspective is one who enjoys the leveling process. I have no desire to purchase a potion that skips 50 or 60 levels. What I want is a way to access things like the HW jobs without having to level an alt 50 levels (really more like 54, which is what you end up being by the time you're done with the ARR MSQ) on a class I did not want to play first. So I'm annoyed that the level jump potion is likely going to be used by both players and by SE as their excuse for why they won't fix the ARR block.

Anyway, I think we agree in theory. I'm just frustrated.

Unfortunately, that potential fix comes with a cost. Whatever changes they make to ARR means less money for new content in Stormblood. Given the choice, would you really prefer less stuff for us current players because they had to tweak stuff we'll never even see again unless we level an alt? Excuse or not, a skip potion is the best solution for everyone.

Why does it need to be a potion though? Surely removing all the requirements for the first quest of Heavensward bar being level 50, the requirements for Stormblood except level 60, and adding a warning before you accept those quests that you'll skip everything before would work just as well?

Removes all the MSQ gating, just grind levels and skip ahead.

Because the developers have outright said it isn't possible. The current code follows a strictly linear path, where each quest flags unlocks another. Such has been the reason they haven't allowed us to repeat old story quests. Doing so would delete all the progress thereafter. Abruptly changing this formula would require a complete overhaul of their infrastructure, none of which comes cheap.

From a business perspective. It makes no sense whatsoever to change everything when they could make a massive profit on people who want to skip the story. Likewise, having a quest essentially skip you allows RMTs and bots a fast track into expansion content, whereas the mogstation comes at a hefty price tag they aren't going to pay.

[Welsper59]

I merely advocate for a "skip to the new and shiny expansion you just paid for" potion. Surely you dont expect newcomers to shelf out 60+ dollars for Stormblood and be happy with the amount of work required to reach the part of the game that appealed to them.

Assuming they were to follow WoW's footsteps on the matter, that's exactly what they'll do. For the majority of the expansions life, it'd be a up to the entry point of said content (e.g. Heavensward would be lv50 and MSQ up to the end of ARR). Near the end, they'd likely at least bump it up to lv60 but keep MSQ how it was (or maybe even skip to the end, since it'd be in prep for SB).

This whole thing really isn't a big deal these days. The mentality of players universally has changed from what it was in the past, including the folks vehemently against the idea. While the concept could have spelled destruction in the early 2000's, when players and expectations were different, but now we're so accustomed to the idea of convenience that a level boost just won't do any significant harm in the long term. It just won't, be it through the perspective of statistics and simple logic.

Initially there will be a wave of stupid washing over the DF, but when you think about it, isn't that already what most people complain about now? It being "worse" is merely temporary.

[Naunet]

Whether the result is a potion that skips story progress or levels i could not care less about. I am just concerned that Stormblood will fail to draw in as many new players as it potentially could. Seen from a market perspective, the casual player is the most profitable one.

My perspective is one who enjoys the leveling process. I have no desire to purchase a potion that skips 50 or 60 levels. What I want is a way to access things like the HW jobs without having to level an alt 50 levels (really more like 54, which is what you end up being by the time you're done with the ARR MSQ) on a class I did not want to play first. So I'm annoyed that the level jump potion is likely going to be used by both players and by SE as their excuse for why they won't fix the ARR block.

Anyway, I think we agree in theory. I'm just frustrated.

Why does it need to be a potion though? Surely removing all the requirements for the first quest of Heavensward bar being level 50, the requirements for Stormblood except level 60, and adding a warning before you accept those quests that you'll skip everything before would work just as well?

Removes all the MSQ gating, just grind levels and skip ahead.

This, please!

[Gravton]

I'm all for a "story skip" potion.(well I'm in favor of SE unlocking the story requirement, but someone has to make that Gil.) Level jump? Nah, it takes a week to get to max level in PotD. If you enjoy the story then that's great for you. I followed the story and think it's dumb. The community shouldn't dictate how others should enjoy the game. Maybe they just want to PLAY, not read lines of text or watch a movie.