Make FFXIV more like FFXI and less like WoW!

[Bourne_Endeavor]

At least there you got to choose from any job what you wanted to sub and got traits from it to enhance your subjob. The inability to equip certain weapons was a design choice, one that could be easily rectified if it was wanted. ESO allows you to equip anything you want. There was all the room in the world to explore, that whole game was about exploration from the world, to the crafting, to everything else. So much so that you had to go to website to learn all the intricacies of most systems. You might be shunned from parties for less than optimal subs or builds, but in that world there were tons of things to do in the open world or with friends who would experiment along with you.

Your choice was merely an illusion. As Enkidoh summarized, the community long determined what sub-jobs were viable and laughed aside anyone who even considered something unique. The equivalent would be attempt to raid in FFXIV with a vitality geared Dragoon. While the choice may be readily available, I wish you all the best finding a group willing to accept your choice. Those open world explorations still exist. They were simply streamlined into sidequests and more structured content for the ever time conscious gaming community. Frankly, I find the necessity of third-party websites to navigate a game poor design. I shouldn't be reliant on a guide to discover content.

That is called Emergent Gameplay and it is one of the best and most likely the future of most open world videogames. You see it in the new MGS, GTA, FFXI, etc.

No. That is poor game design. Unlike FFXI, the titles you listed expressly intended to give players free reign largely, and were not the product of players finding an exploit in the mechanics and abusing it. Furthermore, single player games do not have to account for balance because the experience will always been individualist. Multi-player games cannot afford this luxury as proven when NIN overtook other jobs and WAR made PLD near obsolete in FFXIV.

Imagine if GTA V released a bonus DLC where you could play as Tommy Vercetti, who came with a slew of benefits that put him above Franklin, Michael and Trevor. Maybe he had money perks or something. Once players exhausted the story content with those three, most would never bother with them again because Tommy is better.

So the future of Open World Massive RPG Games is to remove world identity, complexity from the AI and environment, and global unique enemy tendencies? I understand no one wants other players messing up their instanced dungeons or raids, but in open world? What genius would want more people to group up as easy as possible then turn around and make a majority of relevant content locked behind instances in tiny groups. Isn't the major fad now Open World with Dynamic events and realistic world systems?

I am not sugar coating the game and saying XI was superior than every other game or didn't have faults. But with a design team as big and talented as Square. I am sure with the experience in their elder mmo, they could create or bring over things from the other one and fix all the complaints that arose there.

I don't want to go back to the grind from 2002, but if the future or what we call Modern Mmos are designed to be on rails with no intention of re-visiting and re-iterating what made old games great, then I don't want to be a part of the modern mmo movement.

Instanced content allows for structured environments which the devs can then utilize to design around specifically. Pure open world leads to zerg fests like what became of hunts. Without knowing the exact amount of players, no developer can plan how difficult that content will be. You see this issue crop up in many F2P games that attempt open world. A large portion of content will forever remain untouched if rewards are deemed lackluster and others will become a chaotic mess. Merri even spoofs this mentality in one of his shorts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfG8qY0dINY

Take Black Desert. There is no strategy or sense of wonderment to their world bosses. Players literally kamikaze en masse because loot drops are determined by how much DPS you can inflict.

Unfortunately, if you feel that way, you will likely be left behind. Gamers nowadays consume content at such an alarmingly high rate, developers cannot keep up. People generally want to experience exciting new features, not re-visit old ones.

[Lambadelta]

At least there you got to choose from any job what you wanted to sub and got traits from it to enhance your subjob. The inability to equip certain weapons was a design choice, one that could be easily rectified if it was wanted. ESO allows you to equip anything you want. There was all the room in the world to explore, that whole game was about exploration from the world, to the crafting, to everything else. So much so that you had to go to website to learn all the intricacies of most systems. You might be shunned from parties for less than optimal subs or builds, but in that world there were tons of things to do in the open world or with friends who would experiment along with you.

and ESO was so mega successful as an MMORPG right?

[Eul]

Prepare for 10 pages of bullcheese

Congratulations your prediction is right. Here's cookie for you o-o)/*

[Warlyx]

what wow did with the new "artifact" weapons is awesome , specific weapon quests with lore , and to boost the weapon, u do quests (while leveling) , dungeons , openworld quests , and open new designs doing the class quests , and what not... the weapons have traits and bring new skills...

Some artifact quests look awesome (Ashbringer , Dk frost , the guardian proving worth to ursoc ect) ,quests ask for class specific skills even , u need to control a demon in warlock one , the rogue sub ask u to stealth some book (is a archmage book and protected with magic lasers )

[KitingGenbu]

what wow did with the new "artifact" weapons is awesome , specific weapon quests with lore , and to boost the weapon, u do quests (while leveling) , dungeons , openworld quests , and open new designs doing the class quests , and what not... the weapons have traits and bring new skills...

Some artifact quests look awesome (Ashbringer , Dk frost , the guardian proving worth to ursoc ect) ,quests ask for class specific skills even , u need to control a demon in warlock one , the rogue sub ask u to stealth some book (is a archmage book and protected with magic lasers )

I'm happy that you're enjoying the idea of it, but the development team has already confirmed that nothing from the artifact system will be persistent in the following expansion.

[Cakekizyy]

You mean remove 99% of boss mechanics in the game, and make the game 1000x easier than it already is?

There would be more consistent damage and healers would be kept busy.

[Teraluna]

Well the next Warcraft expansion, Legion is out on the 30th of this month, so we'll see how many do in fact like that format and go off to play it.

[loreleidiangelo]

There would be more consistent damage and healers would be kept busy.

Healers won't be "kept busy" unless they get an across-the-board potency nerf. A WHM can brunt-force a group from near-dead HP to full in two globals. As long as they have scaling like that in place, it won't matter what kind of mechanics you throw in.

Note that I'm not really against untelevised moves in general, I just think that using "healers will have actual stuff to heal" as your crutch is erroneous. I prefer moves with "organic" telegraphs like rings of fire spreading out slowly from a boss, boss animations indicating that they're about to do a certain move, or environmental hazards like gusts of wind or boulders. The above-the-head markers, pulsing meteor indicators and bright orange geometrical shapes are really out-of-place to me compared to boss moves in WoW, pre-expansion TERA, etc.

[Duelle]

Some artifact quests look awesome (Ashbringer , Dk frost , the guardian proving worth to ursoc ect) ,quests ask for class specific skills even , u need to control a demon in warlock one , the rogue sub ask u to stealth some book (is a archmage book and protected with magic lasers )

The problem is that places a ridiculous amount of....weight (for lack of better terms) on the player character. Not to mention Blizzard has basically shit on a ton of lore weapons because we know those artifacts are not going to carry into the next expansion. You could argue that we have the same thing with relics, except our relics don't have much in the way of in-game representation. Excalibur was not prominently featured in story content for years before being given to the player along with a trillion copies for every PLD in the game (which is what's happening to Ashbringer and the Scythe of Elune).

[Cakekizyy]

If groups are losing health fast enough to unavoidable damage they would.

When I say remove telegraphs, I mean remove those attacks and replace with bigger auto attack; not just remove the warning.