Thread: Suggestion for 5.0 launch

I don't really think that it's so much the lack of things to do, it's more that there's a longer gap between patches from the initial expansion release up until the first patch. Surely everyone remembers the 5 month gap between 3.0 and 3.1 which pretty much killed all momentum the expansion launch had? 4.0 to 4.1 feels pretty long too, even though in reality it's only 4 months, slightly longer than the usual gap between patches. But it only feels longer because the amount of things to do at Lv. 70 is currently pretty barebones, and thinking everyone wants to go level every job and pointing to that as 'SEE? THERE'S LOTS MORE TO DO' is a dangerous thing to assume from a community and a design standpoint. (For one, if people ACTUALLY did that, have fun with the DPS queues being even worse in theory.)

Probably the biggest irony is that while there's more content for raiders in theory, the way vertical progression works in this game is that raiders actually have less incentive to stay subbed late during the usual 6-7 month gearing cycle (since they'll gear up at an astronomically faster rate than non-raiders do), especially if they happen to clear the raid tier earlier. I'm not hardcore by any means (I still haven't cleared O4S), but I'm already item level 339 - and I spent half of the patch without a static. This is contrasted to the fact that I spent much of 3.x avoiding Savage up until 3.4, where I pretty much never finished gearing up until the next gearing cycle was released. And no, arguing that such people should gear alternate classes is arguing for content that doesn't exist, and encouraging bloat for no real reason at all.

To me personally, my biggest criticism of the 4.0 launch was that it was released without Alliance roulette. I enjoy the 24-man raids more than anything else in this game, but now we're in a 3 month lull where nobody is running them because at this point, the only reward in doing so is glamour. Even if you want to run them now, they pretty much never pop. I'm also a bit miffed that their sole reason for existing even when they're the hot new content of the patch is only to act as catch-up content for gearing.

Originally Posted by Blindheart

That's one timeline.... I've had plenty to do, I haven't even finished the story and I've been playing for months. Stop rushing through the game maybe? Go out and play other games? Or do everything this game has to offer?

If you want to be able to play the game 24/7 you can't expect to be doing endgame things the whole time. The content is there, go level all the jobs. Collect all the cards, minions, mounts. Become a master crafter, go get every achievement in the game. There is lots to do. Just because the content that you want to do is not released yet does not mean there is nothing in game to do.

Wait, then what are you doing when you log in? My boyfriend has full time university and part time jobs and still managed to finish all of SB in a week or so. He has full raid gear and leveled everything to 70. Is he just way good at time management or what? I am seriously asking btw, not trying to be sarcastic..I am legitimately curious what people are doing when he has so little time yet finished everything so quickly. o.O He also read every single quest and does not skip anything either.

In no way, shape or form did he rush ANYTHING. He took his time, reading everything, paying attention to detail and played through stormblood with me, it was a blast. We also play other games, travel and do tons of stuff IRL so..I don't think its very good for an MMO to follow the same formula and run out of things to do so quickly, delay the relic quests and they need to produce content with longevity.

I agree with OP, there needs to be more to do then the SAME old formula for YEARS now.

Originally Posted by Iromi

Wait, then what are you doing when you log in? My boyfriend has full time university and part time jobs and still managed to finish all of SB in a week or so. He has full raid gear and leveled everything to 70. Is he just way good at time management or what? I am seriously asking btw, not trying to be sarcastic..I am legitimately curious what people are doing when he has so little time yet finished everything so quickly. o.O He also read every single quest and does not skip anything either.

In no way, shape or form did he rush ANYTHING. He took his time, reading everything, paying attention to detail and played through stormblood with me, it was a blast. We also play other games, travel and do tons of stuff IRL so..I don't think its very good for an MMO to follow the same formula and run out of things to do so quickly, delay the relic quests and they need to produce content with longevity.

I only do story content one day a week, I'm to tired after work to enjoy the story if I log in at all. I do roulettes to level up other classes, I will have 5 or 6 jobs at 70 when I finish the story.

If you think I'm weird for that, go ahead, I'm sure everyone else does as well. Back in ARR I leveled every class to lvl 30 before I continued the story. I had completely stopped playing for 6 months before storm blood launched as well, because Final Fantasy 15, World of Final Fantasy, and Zelds Breath of the Wild needed to be played. And because of the cluster F that was the stormblood launch I didn't even start playing story for a while and finished those games.

I've no idea how anyone can get through the story in a few days or even a week, unless all they do is play 14 non stop every single day. I should be caught up with everything by the time 4.1 is out, I will do all the fancy new stuff along with everyone else... But I won't feel like I've run out of things to do.

If all I wanted to do was play this game everyday I will max out every class, get every single relic, minion, mount, card, housing item, achievement that can be had. If this game is my life there is plenty to do. it's not tho, I have other interests, I'm glad I don't have to sacrifice my soul to play this game. If all you want to play is the endgame, play what's available, then go live your life... What did you do before his game existed? Go do that!

I don't think the game needs more mindlessly grindy content either. You want relic in the game, but unless it's created differently, all it will be is go replay the same content until your sick of it. I wish it could have more unique and original content, but I know game development takes time. So I can wait and do other things or play what is here now and be thankful I have that.

Threads like this have existed since mmorpgs were a thing to begin with, probably before that even. Even if you became the richest person on the planet and had your own personal development team on hand to make content specifically for you they wouldn't be able to churn out content as quick as you would be able to get through it. Sure, your wait might only be a few days instead of a few weeks but it's impossible for a developer to keep up with how quickly players get through things. People say that while there are things to do that they haven't, those very things aren't enjoyable. That is totally understandable and I feel the same about a few of the things listed (like mounts, I pretty much stick to my chocobo/susano wolf) but as others have said that content still exists as something to do even if it isn't your first choice. There is no way for you to purely play ffxiv for any amount of time and have "new" content enough to keep up with how you go through it, especially if you only like to do certain things. The only way that this would possibly work would be for them to make content that is otherwise literally impossible to complete unless a certain amount of time has passed and nobody really likes content that's hard gated like that.

"Play another game" may leave a bad taste in people's mouths but that's the only realistic way to keep yourself busy if you eat through content too quickly and don't desire to do any alt classes or the number of other things you can do in the game. The devs can't keep up with you in particular no matter how much we wish it was the case. This stuff doesn't manifest out of thin air, it takes multiple teams working on different parts of it to turn each piece of content out. At best, in terms of getting content out quicker they could opt for quantity over quality but then people would complain about that instead of having to wait. There's no real way to please everyone and people who zoom in on one area of content can't hope to have something new to do every time they finish something.