Please Reconsider MSQ Changes

[Alleo]

Compare to 2.0, 4.0 has better graphic quality, better CG movies, better story quests.
better music, better sounds, larger maps.
the overall quality of 4.0 is better than 2.0.
The Royal City of Rabanastre is currently the best 24man dungeon.
And I really like the FF5/6 bosses in Deltascape.

The problem is not money, they have more resources than FFXI,FFXIV1.1x-1.2x team

Look at the luxury FFXV,chapter 13 is a mess. FFXIII?meh...
Tales of Berseria,The Legend of Heroes VI series are better RPG IMO
The Nier Automata is more impressive than those costly AAA FPS games.

The problem is the resource allocation,the speed of content consumption,the direction of the game,the lack of longevity,
and the lack of MMO development experience(Yoshida and his team should play some FFXI, not WOW..)

Your first points are nearly all subjective. Yes it might look better from 2.0 but for example still looks bad in some parts (Hiens clothes for example..). CG movies are just there for the trailer and marketing and honestly I dont care if they would get better over time because they dont affect the true game much. And the ingame cutscenes are not that much better. They might show a bit of more reaction but we still nod and punch a lot and the NPCs are still moving weirdly. Story quest is also highly subjective, for most of the time I found the story in HW quite better. The same with music. Yes we have bigger maps but those are so lifeless that I wish that we would have smaller ones that are much more filled with life. The only great map is the Azim steppe for me, all the others dont really hold my interest so again subjective.

The raids feel worse for me too because both of them lean so much on nostalgie and fanservice while at least older raids gave me the sense of being truly part of the world. The worst offender is Omega with it pure FF nostalgie but also the 24 man is not that good imo because I questioned the whole time why the bosses where even there...

Yoshida himself also stated that they need more money and especially a much bigger team. He himself is doing two jobs and would love to step down from one, so yeah their biggest problem is the missing employees. (And a huge amount of their income probably goes back into other games) But I agree with the speed of content consumption and lack of longevity. I would also add that they imo put ressources in the wrong part of the game or try to find complicated solutions or band aid fixes..

They also seem to have a huge problem with getting and using our feedback. Just look at Diadem 1.0 and 2.0. I really hope that Eureka is better than just being 3.0 and hopefully a content that stays alive longer than a couple of months..they really need to make more descisions were they dont need to fix stuff all the time. Instead of having a good housing system from the beginning they have a system that is full of bandaids and even now is far away from perfect. They added a glamour change that barely addressed the problems people have and that need a lot of fixes before its truly good too (and they even said that they have to watch the stabilitiy first so we dont even know if they can fix it everywhere). The MSQ change which should have helped the newer players might hurt them in the long run and annoyed quite some veterans too instead of making it into something that is win win for all players. Perform was released in a bad state and needed a fix right after that which kinda changed the system a lot. We still dont have more egi glamours and Eureka seems to not gather much hype here on the forum either..Content like Diadem (1 and 2) are death, the same with LoV. Such a big amount of ressources wasted on stuff like that..They really need another big hit like PoTD and not another big fail otherwise I will kinda question if they can even create longliving content for this game..

[KaivaC]

snip

Rabanastre the best 24-man? I dunno about that...I personally found more enjoyment in Void Ark...at least in my experience, we don't wipe to the second boss like a ridiculous amount of alliances do in Rabanastre.

At this point in the game, Yoshi P and his team are experienced enough - the 'lack of MMO development experience' is no longer a valid excuse to use given that it's been up for roughly 5 years now. Most MMOs don't survive past their second year because of lack of MMO experience. I won't deny that resource allocation is not a problem, because it is. But we're just theory-crafting...we don't know how much of a budget FFXIV actually gets. There's been hints here and there, some subtle, some obvious.

[Vhailor]

Compare to 2.0, 4.0 has better graphic quality, better CG movies, better story quests.
better music, better sounds, larger maps.
the overall quality of 4.0 is better than 2.0.
The Royal City of Rabanastre is currently the best 24man dungeon.
And I really like the FF5/6 bosses in Deltascape.

The problem is not money, they have more resources than FFXI,FFXIV1.1x-1.2x team

Look at the luxury FFXV,chapter 13 is a mess. FFXIII?meh...
Tales of Berseria,The Legend of Heroes VI series are better RPG IMO
The Nier Automata is more impressive than those costly AAA FPS games.

The problem is the resource allocation,the speed of content consumption,the direction of the game,the lack of longevity,
and the lack of MMO development experience(Yoshida and his team should play some FFXI, not WOW..)

That may very well be. That said, in order:

(1) I haven't seen any appreciable graphics difference myself, particularly from 3.0 to 4.0 (which is where they actually stated, up-front, that they'd be slowing the rate of content production dungeon-wise). Sure, there's a few extra DX11 effects thrown in there, but the textures are still embarrassingly low-resolution, the physics system is still nonexistent, etc.

(2) The CG movies took a step back with 4.x, in my estimation, with 3.x remaining the high water mark. Incidentally, all of the CG videos still pale in comparison to XIV 1.0, because they rely on standard emote actions for manipulating characters within them.

(3) The quality of the storyline quests is sort of a personal preference thing. Again, for me, 3.x is the clear high water mark, with 2.x and 4.x coming in roughly equal at the moment.

(4) The music and sound quality hasn't changed in the slightest, though preference can. For me, some of the best battle themes originated in 2.x; 3.x had the best overall theme; 4.x was solid but forgettable for me.

(5) The map size hasn't changed from Heavensward to Stormblood, so where has the money gone since? Also, the total land mass size went down vs. ARR, because individual maps might be larger, but there are far fewer of them. This isn't a strong argument.

(6) Royal City and the choice of bosses for Deltascape, again, are preference-based choices.

So, what I see is absolutely nothing - except the DX11 graphical bells and whistles - that has improved as a result of funding. I've seen you list style preferences, but that's got nothing to do in the slightest with resource allocation or funding of the team. The outcomes of funding are game systems and amount of content, not direction of storyline, choice of Raid boss origins, or what the music composer drew up for an expansion's overall theme. And in this area, we've seen very uneven and half-arsed efforts since 2.x, despite more revenue streams than ever centered around FFXIV.

I also agree that resource allocation might be a problem, but this also ties back to my central point about wanting SE to fix the underlying architectural limitations they're working around. That is, at the very least, part of the problem we're now facing, even if it's not all of it. I've worked in software development before; having neat ideas dashed on the rocks of reality because of ever-present architectural limitations is one of the most soul-sucking realities a developer can inhabit. Maybe, with time spent on a fix, we'd see a rejuvenated team come out of it, with some fresh ideas content-wise.

Finally, we cannot say for sure that the problem isn't money (and based on previous statements by Yoshi-P, there is some indication that it is, in fact, a problem). We have no clear idea of exactly how large the development team is. All we can say for certain is that more money is flowing into FFXIV now than it was during the 3.x expansion cycle, based on SE's own financial statements. And, despite your arguments, I'd suggest in no way do we have a clear picture (particularly for the 3.x to 4.x time period) of where, exactly, that money has gone. As a consumer, that's very frustrating for me, and likely for others. FFXIV feels a bit like air travel right now; I pay more for a seat each year, but the seat is smaller, the snacks cheaper or nonexistent, and the flight is late more frequently than it was the year beforehand. Unlike air travel, however, FFXIV is optional entertainment rather than an occasionally-required mode of transportation. This isn't a good look for it.

[Mizunoko]

I'll try to keep my response organized, but it's likely to be lengthy.

(1) I'd happily accept multiple entirely missed content cycles in order to have many of FFXIV's long-standing problems and server limitations resolved. I have two lines of reasoning for this.

The first is that I believe FFXIV isn't even close to living up to its potential. Just looking at the MSQ, we can see issues with the Main Scenario Roulette dungeons; we can see issues with the horrific 2.x quest slog; we can see issues arising from the sequential nature of the main storyline (people having to play through ARR and Heavensward before even touching new expansion content, or feeling compelled to purchase an item to fix it). That's not even touching on the catastrophe that is the Glamour system, the badly limited Housing system, the general whiffs on outside-the-box content (Diadem, Diadem 2.0, hopefully not Eureka...), the ongoing and ridiculous limitations like not being able to send /tells in dungeons, etc.

I want to see SE fix all of this.

The second reason I'd accept missed content cycles is that, really, 75% of each update cycle is a one or two new dungeons that simply change scenery for the Expert Roulette, a new Raid of some sort, some Glamours, and an iLevel increase. There isn't much actually there, generally. I mean, has anyone really felt like 4.2 added much? A few new instances, sure, but once the mechanics are mastered, doesn't it drop down to the same old grind as before, only aiming for Mendacity instead of Creation?

It's worth the sacrifice, in my mind.

(2) Having said all that, I'm also of the mind that SE should be expanding the development team, and should absorb the costs of doing so.

Let's consider: SE has put in a cash shop alongside a P2P model, so that they could milk more profit from the title. They've charged $40 for expansions instead of the more standard $30. They charge monthly fee additions for Retainers and extra characters, something no other MMO does to my knowledge. Despite all of this, they've actually cut down on the content typically offered in each patch cycle; Raids barely have trash monsters anymore, they're just a series of bosses. The Relic weapon is still not here, roughly 8 months after the release of Stormblood.

So, where is the money going, exactly? SE is opening up more revenue streams on the back of their flagship MMO than they've ever had before, while cutting back (or at best holding roughly steady) on content. Unless the development team was chronically underpaid and is now being generously compensated for their sacrifice, I fail to see much excuse for this.

I don't feel this way, incidentally, because I feel 'owed' something by SE. FFXIV is still tremendously good value for the money. However, increased revenue streams should translate to improved content. Look at Netflix as an example; they upped their rates a bit, and all of a sudden started churning out huge numbers of in-house films and TV shows, many of which are quite good. As a consumer, I see a benefit to paying more money for their service. That helps justify the fee increase to me. What I see from SE is the opposite, and giving a company more money for worse, or equivalent, content, just grates on me the wrong way.


I'm not sure, honestly. If the queue times worsen to the point where it's no longer a tenable situation, I'd rather see the change reverted than the rewards increased again. Bribing people to do brutally tedious content is likely to help queue times, but these dungeons right now generate a very real sense of annoyance at the game, and that's not a healthy feeling to be instilling in the player base.

More than anything, I think this change was, in addition to everything else, very poorly timed. We're 8 months into an expansion cycle, and therefore the influx of new players is almost certainly less than it was even six months ago. To me, this solution would have been a lot more acceptable if it was a temporary measure introduced for, say, the first two patch cycles of each expansion, maybe preceding an expansion by a month. At that point, it's unpleasant for veterans in some sense, but the queue timers are (in theory) manageable because of the large number of incoming new players.

Alright, I think that's it. I appreciate your thoughts on the matter, too!

You sir just hit the nail on the head. Couldn't have said it better myself.

[Krotoan]

I'll try to keep my response organized, but it's likely to be lengthy.

(1) I'd happily accept multiple entirely missed content cycles in order to have many of FFXIV's long-standing problems and server limitations resolved. I have two lines of reasoning for this.

The first is that I believe FFXIV isn't even close to living up to its potential. Just looking at the MSQ, we can see issues with the Main Scenario Roulette dungeons; we can see issues with the horrific 2.x quest slog; we can see issues arising from the sequential nature of the main storyline (people having to play through ARR and Heavensward before even touching new expansion content, or feeling compelled to purchase an item to fix it). That's not even touching on the catastrophe that is the Glamour system, the badly limited Housing system, the general whiffs on outside-the-box content (Diadem, Diadem 2.0, hopefully not Eureka...), the ongoing and ridiculous limitations like not being able to send /tells in dungeons, etc.

I want to see SE fix all of this.

The second reason I'd accept missed content cycles is that, really, 75% of each update cycle is a one or two new dungeons that simply change scenery for the Expert Roulette, a new Raid of some sort, some Glamours, and an iLevel increase. There isn't much actually there, generally. I mean, has anyone really felt like 4.2 added much? A few new instances, sure, but once the mechanics are mastered, doesn't it drop down to the same old grind as before, only aiming for Mendacity instead of Creation?

It's worth the sacrifice, in my mind.

(2) Having said all that, I'm also of the mind that SE should be expanding the development team, and should absorb the costs of doing so.

Let's consider: SE has put in a cash shop alongside a P2P model, so that they could milk more profit from the title. They've charged $40 for expansions instead of the more standard $30. They charge monthly fee additions for Retainers and extra characters, something no other MMO does to my knowledge. Despite all of this, they've actually cut down on the content typically offered in each patch cycle; Raids barely have trash monsters anymore, they're just a series of bosses. The Relic weapon is still not here, roughly 8 months after the release of Stormblood.

So, where is the money going, exactly? SE is opening up more revenue streams on the back of their flagship MMO than they've ever had before, while cutting back (or at best holding roughly steady) on content. Unless the development team was chronically underpaid and is now being generously compensated for their sacrifice, I fail to see much excuse for this.

I don't feel this way, incidentally, because I feel 'owed' something by SE. FFXIV is still tremendously good value for the money. However, increased revenue streams should translate to improved content. Look at Netflix as an example; they upped their rates a bit, and all of a sudden started churning out huge numbers of in-house films and TV shows, many of which are quite good. As a consumer, I see a benefit to paying more money for their service. That helps justify the fee increase to me. What I see from SE is the opposite, and giving a company more money for worse, or equivalent, content, just grates on me the wrong way.

First: Thank you for a well thought out and well explained reply that refrains from personal attacks =].

I have strong feelings and opinions on the glamour system but I'll keep them out of this thread since I'm participating in so many other threads about it.
I have no opposition for asking for SE as a company to invest more in the game, and yes I can see the lack of correlation between their incoming flow and the output we're actually getting. What can we do about that though? Aside from requesting in forums or letters directly to the parent company I don't think the negativity that gets thrown around in this forum helps. Criticism is one thing but I see so much posting about how the company is "greedy" or that the Devs are "clueless" both of which likely immediately would cause whatever community monitoring team SE has in place to skip over it as flaming and pessimistic garbage posting. I personally try to encourage critical thought or at least non-emotional criticism but usually get labeled as a white knight or SE shill. I can't read japanese fluently so I can't substantiate what I suspect, but I do think the japanese forums likely don't have the same sort of "SE IS THE DUMBEST EVER" kind of posts we have here which would explain why their suggestions get listened to more often. This may be a sign of a poor community management team if they can't glean meaning out of all responses, but if we have evidence they don't listen to bile, then it would benefit all of us to rethink our approach.

I'm not sure, honestly. If the queue times worsen to the point where it's no longer a tenable situation, I'd rather see the change reverted than the rewards increased again. Bribing people to do brutally tedious content is likely to help queue times, but these dungeons right now generate a very real sense of annoyance at the game, and that's not a healthy feeling to be instilling in the player base.

More than anything, I think this change was, in addition to everything else, very poorly timed. We're 8 months into an expansion cycle, and therefore the influx of new players is almost certainly less than it was even six months ago. To me, this solution would have been a lot more acceptable if it was a temporary measure introduced for, say, the first two patch cycles of each expansion, maybe preceding an expansion by a month. At that point, it's unpleasant for veterans in some sense, but the queue timers are (in theory) manageable because of the large number of incoming new players.

Alright, I think that's it. I appreciate your thoughts on the matter, too!

Poorly timed I can see, and yes I also believe we should wait to see since as of right now the queues are still of a reasonable time (I've run a few since the patch and continue to run a couple a week just for data points sake as well as the nearly mindless xp run it is for my leveling). I do think we needed a permanent solution for new players though since there are always people coming in even if the surges always come with expansions. In my opinion making the game more welcoming for new people is always a better idea for the health of the game and I cannot seem to find the amount of distress expressed by some at the changes to be anything more than vets bellyaching about a minor inconvenience VS removing an experience breaking introduction that would sour an early perception and understanding of the remaining story. I see that running the dungeon is annoying for people, but it's not the giant boulder in the path of leveling alts that some seem to claim. It's skippable as a vet, and an investment of 2-4 hours at worst for an alt. One of the people's biggest complaints was the rewards weren't worth it, and if we can address that then why would that not be a solution for a majority? If we can reach a point where vets feel it's worth it and sprouts get their experience then I think the minority that are left complaining about something they are choosing to bring upon themselves aren't worth the cost of the earlier issue we had.

[ShanXiv]

We all know that newbies who want to watch story cutscenes in the castrums have been struggling a long time, usually being answered with "just rewatch it at the inn/ on youtube." I myself have experienced this, and a majority of current players also probably have. But...

Making the cut scenes unskippable, and then locking what will be more than likely a sizable reward behind it is not the answer. Additionally, even though they may no longer be skippable, the bosses will still be burned down in a matter of moments because of the high ilevel sync, leaving the new player with a feeling of lack of accomplishment and defeating the point of this change.

My suggestion is to just remove it from duty roulette entirely and change it into a personal instance, allowing the player better interaction with the duty. Or, you know, just revert it back.

I'm sure people also have plenty of other solutions and ideas which should be posted, but I think we can all agree that changing the cut scenes to be unskippable is not the answer. All this will do is drastically increase the queue times for those dungeons and make it harder for new players to get in and progress to other parts of the game(and the queue times for those dungeons can already be quite long).

Edit: I want to point out this suggestion I've been seen being made in a few places; It might be possible to implement a "skip cutscene" vote, based on a majority victory, which will allow players to skip cutscenes.; Those who want to watch still can, but for those that don't can charge ahead.

Second Edit

Back to the topic, now you know how SE treats their old XIV players...
Yoshida may know the current theme park formula has a very short life cycle,
got bored of it? ok maybe you should take a break? or, bye? here we get another new customer, welcome!....

[Xandos]

While i definitely didn't read all 90+ pages I feel like I got the idea of the thread I'll toss in my own anecdotal evidence and thoughts.

I played 1.0 when it launched and then quite for a long time before coming back to 2.0 after HW had launched. When I finally got to these two dungeons they had already been around for a long time. Up till that point I had happily watched all the cutscenes and read most of the dialogs that came up through the MSQ. When I queued for the first dungeon and was met with all of the speed runners and scene skippers I did not like it. Being that I played a healer I felt it was necessary for me to skip the scenes and keep up with the group. I really had no idea what was going on in the run. People were mass pulling everything, ignoring mechanics, and standing in AoE. It was just a mess.

The next dungeon was even worse. People skipped all sorts of mobs in front of transporters, didn't wait for others to get on elevators, and again ignored mechanics. I was expecting some of this due to my last run but it was still very frustrating. After that run was over I went to an inn and watched all of the scenes. Watching them in the inn was not nearly as enjoyable as seeing them in person and in context but it got the job done.

Fast forward to when I hit 60 and started running the MSQ daily and I found my self resorting to the same things that I disliked. I skip cutscenes, ignore mechanics, and sometimes stand in AoE. I do at least wait for people to get on elevators and help explain things if someone asks a question.

With the recent change to the MSQ Roulette I won't say that I will never run it again, but I will say that it will be at the bottom of my list of priorities. Having to take that long to complete a run I have done hundreds of times before is not my idea of fun. Having fun is the reason why I play this game. I really do hope they come up with a better solution soon.

[Anarnee]

Has anyone else noticed an uprise of newbies begging for help in their NN for queues with CM and Prae lately? I still won't touch the roulette, but I've noticed some of my other roulettes have had longer queues over the last few days and I'm wondering if other anyone has noticed anything new of significance to this conversation, since I've seen a lot more people asking for help with these to dungeons lately.

[LeoLupinos]

This is an incentive to run bad content.
4.3 reward changes will incentive players to run it, even if there's no new players.
The time wasted doing old content could have been rewarded with todays content.
MSQ is the best roullete now, and it should not be it. It does not feel optional.
Revert it back, revamp it, delete it, turn, srink, anything but something that's not fun.

[BillyKaplan]

It does not feel optional.

And yet it still is. You can get that many tomes in other ways in the game, and people who can't put in the time investment for queue + unskipable cutscenes still won't run it. The correct response to the award changes isn't to be angry with it, but to laugh at it because they're that desperate to get people running that roulette again.