Anyone else concerned Stormblood will be splitting its attention too much?

[Pintsized]

My main concern is that there'll be more tramlining due to zone access gating which sadly afflicted HW and wasn't there in ARR.

[loreleidiangelo]

I wonder if the idea is to have Kugane or whatever it is be kind of like the end "Idyllshire" hub? Maybe like Idyllshire/Sharlayan it won't actually be that big of a part of the story and will just be where we chill out and show off our glams.

I admit, the story of Stormblood interests me a lot less than the story of Heavensward overall, but story is actually one of the few things I think is consistently good, so I'm not too worried that things will seem off-kilter. I think they learned last time about rushing "certain jaw-dropping ARR MSQ plot threads" to completion.

[Knahli]

I wonder why people readily assume that Doma will get the spotlight. The fact that they are reluctant to show much of Ala Mhigo by comparison could just as easily mean that there's lots that could easily be spoiled too soon. Frankly, it was of my opinion that the Ala Mhigan resistance was doomed to fail without the aid of the residents of Othard to divert the Empire's attention elsewhere and split their resources and reinforcements across two major rebellion pushes. Even if Doma got the majority of the focus in 4.0, the subsequent expansions could just as easily fringe more heavily upon Ala Mhigo storyline. Even aside from that, after a certain point, the two individual rebellions don't necessarily need to be isolated storylines.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

Who's to say the story will even conclude in its entirety by the time 4.0 ends? Maybe we fail to reclaim Ala Mhigo and it's the 4.x series that deals with its liberation. Maybe we can't save it immediately and the aforementioned applies once again. It's far too early to even speculation, though I'll admit, Ala Mhigo has been somewhat overshadowed in the little information we have available.

[LalafellDown]

I skipped the ARR story. It was nothing, but boring text to read. Heavensward thankfully added voice to the main story line that kept my attention. The side quest were all skipped because It was boring to read the forgettable quest and all of them played out the same. They should get ride of side quest all together and do what Guild Wars 2 did. If they plan to keep the side quest at least make them challenging and fun.

[BigRed5392]

snip

no ty, i like some of the side quests. One of my fav side quests is dealing with the garlean with ptsd who just wanted to see his family. He lives in a shack by wine port. You learn more about the soliders, how they just ship men off to war so they can't rise up against them each time they concur a nation.
I also enjoyed the moogle mail quests, like the high bridge guy and his 2 miqo'te companions.

the greatest story never told is also fun/funny. hildy was funny.


@ op I'm not worried, ff14 kinda had 2 versions of the ARR story based on if you kept your 1.0 character or started over.

i liked the 2.0 story and the 2.x story, i get it isn't everyone cup of tea, but i enjoy it.

ff14 beats WoW when I played, all you got was a text box, then told to go do something. Least ff14 added a lil flair to it.

[Yasuhiro]

I skipped the ARR story. It was nothing, but boring text to read. Heavensward thankfully added voice to the main story line that kept my attention. The side quest were all skipped because It was boring to read the forgettable quest and all of them played out the same. They should get ride of side quest all together and do what Guild Wars 2 did. If they plan to keep the side quest at least make them challenging and fun.

There was voice acting in ARR though.
And why would you want to get rid of content in the game that adds stuff? I actually found the side quests better than the lame main story.

[Belhi]

Originally I was worried after seeing the 3rd Fanfest Keynote. However I don't think that will be necessarily the case. One of the key points to consider here is why are we going to Doma. My gut feeling is the answer, and what will tie everything together, is Zenos. We have a Legatus who is the son of the current emperor and uses katanas (Yoshi actually refered to his swords as katanas and the fact his gunweapon is unique in the fact that the sheath is the gun component). I have a feeling Zenos will turn out to be a former governor of Doma and he found something there which has given him power that we need to find a way to counter to take him. Hence we go on the road trip to Othard to try and seek out the origins of his power and what his goals are. I am also betting he compounds this by killing his father and framing it on the WoL.

As a result Ala Mhigo will be our starting point and our final destination in our goal to stop the Garleans and free Ala Mhigo before a Garlemald enraged by the death of their emperor comes crushing down on Eorzea.

Its also worth pointing out that development wasn't as far along when they were showing off Ala Mhigo so there was less to show. Yoshi P also said there was structures and terrain there weren't ready to show off since they felt it would be spoilery. As far was we know Rhalgr's Reach is still going to be the new hamlet of SB.

I skipped the ARR story. It was nothing, but boring text to read. Heavensward thankfully added voice to the main story line that kept my attention. The side quest were all skipped because It was boring to read the forgettable quest and all of them played out the same. They should get ride of side quest all together and do what Guild Wars 2 did. If they plan to keep the side quest at least make them challenging and fun.

No they shouldn't. Just because you cant be bothered reading and want everything streamlined doesn't mean other people don't appreciate the world building and lore development that often happens in side quests in FF14. More over, if you skip everything and read nothing who would you know if it was boring or forgettable? That's like going to a movie with your headphones on the whole time, looking at facebook on you iphone and then saying the movie had a boring story.

[RaijinSupreme]

To be fair, If Ala Mhigo was the only place that we were getting in this expansion, it would have been a very boring expansion. Ala Mhigo is not that big, and neither is Gyr Abania. How many open world areas or dungeons could we possibly get there? most likely just one of each, the same way we got one of each in Heavensward that was directly connected to Ishgard, Coerthas Western, and Dusk Vigil.

We've already traveled to every other location on Aldenard, so the only way we would have gotten the same number of large, explorable areas as we did in Heavensward is if we went to another Continent. Since Islabard is pretty much completely controlled by the Garlean Empire, it would have been nearly impossible to safely travel, and freely roam in that area. Othard was the only possible choice, and there would have been no point in going to Othard if we didn't go to the most prominent city-states that are flourishing there, especially since Doma played a significant part in the MSQ, giving us such a good character as Yugiri. It just makes sense for us to be going there.

While I can understand the concern for Ala Mhigo to be not as developed as one would like it to be, I think its a bit unfair. Ala Mhigo has been the main focus point in the MSQ since 3.1. Literally everything we have done in the actual game has been about Ala Mhigo since 3.1, and the MSQ is actively leading us there. We already know the main Job for the expansion is Monk, and its entire lore is based in Ala Mhigo. We already know that Yda is going to be a huge, huge role in the expansion, and we know Ala Mhigo is her hometown.

The only reason the concern is even existing is because some people feel that Yoshi-P has been discussing Othard more than Ala Mhigo, but... wouldn't that be the proper thing to do? especially since we practically know nothing of Kugane, or the entire Continent of Othard in general?

I think the worrying just needs to be quelled. I am keeping faith that the Dev team made the right decision by bringing us to Othard, and that Ala Mhigo won't fall short because of it.

[Enur]

All the arguments about gyr abania being too small are really odd in my opinion.

The area in which the entire expansion of heavensward took place was quite small really, only encompassing Dravania, Coerthas and the sea of clouds. Even then i dont feel those areas where fleshed out enough. The farreach? The northern coast? The frozen expanse? The rest of coerthas? Dawn vigil?

I dare make the claim those areas wont be put in the game in the near future as open world maps. At best they will get the "become an instanced map" treatment. Yafaem saltmoor and xelphatol got that treatment.

The devs could have easily made a full expansion out of the last third part of aldenard. If not for the xelphatol dungeon that is, which did feel shoehorned in at the last moment. Currently they have quickly tried to make every region a quick instance, most likely just to say "we went there no reason to make a map".

I fear Othard will feel unfinished. We arent getting more zones, nor larger ones. And now the goal is to make one and a thirds worth of continent? When HW barely (and failed imo) to fill but one third?

Ever since i started playing the game has teased the glorious reclamation of Ala Mhigo.

And now that it is on the horizon my dreams are being overshadowed by Othard. The budget is rumoured to be tripled, but i doubt it will be reflected in launch content. We know we will get the same tomes/dungeons/deep dungeon reskins to keep us busy at launch, only promising "new" stuff at 4.2

Edit:

Truth be told, i dont want to reclaim Ala Mhigo in a successful battle. I want to enter the city, retake it temporarily.

And then have the full might of the garlean empire come, bringing all its might down upon me. Crumbling the walls, razing the city to the ground.

I want a reason to fear the empire. Having them remove Mhigo from the map would suffice.