How do you keep playing?

[Aerlana]

There is great part of content which wont speak to many people : treasure maps, hunt, tribal quests.
Then soon eureka, maybe they will manage, maybe this diadem 3.0 will have the same end. Deepdongeon can do some interest, for some time.

The core content (HL PvE) is quite short. If you focus mainly on this, i would say FFXIV is not your game. simply

Glamour, housing and other thing like are not made (in anygame) to be main reason to stay. It is side content, MMORPG are all about grind, and more grind, timesink here or here. Without this, no MMORPG. And the housing / glamour is kind of timesink/grind easy to add, without being "real content"

[Riko_Futatabi]

Many people have listed all the things you can do outside of raiding. And sure, there's a lot to do in this game, but -and this is subjective, of course- there are too few activities that offer genuine satisfaction and worth after doing.

[Rinuko]

I'm biased, I've been playing 8+ years. Honestly imho, if you can't find anything yoiu enjoy about the game outside of the weekly dungeon grinds then maybe this isn't your type of game.

Same here. I actually enjoyed the leveling and MSQ progression. I made an alt just before Lou was put of preffered server list so I still got to keep the 'Road to 60' buff. I spent all weekend leveling up and finished 2.0 MSQ - having a blast (minus Castrum adjustments, it was hell).

I'm also a endgame crafter so I do enjoy crafting a bunch.
I also raid and do ex primals on a daily/weekly basis.

There is so much that keeps me logging in - content but primary reason is ...... my awesome FC

[Eeshen]

Same here. I actually enjoyed the leveling and MSQ progression. I made an alt just before Lou was put of preffered server list so I still got to keep the 'Road to 60' buff. I spent all weekend leveling up and finished 2.0 MSQ - having a blast (minus Castrum adjustments, it was hell).

I'm also a endgame crafter so I do enjoy crafting a bunch.
I also raid and do ex primals on a daily/weekly basis.

There is so much that keeps me logging in - content but primary reason is ...... my awesome FC

Maybe that is also something, my FC has very nice people in it, but we don’t seem to do anything more than a roulette here and there. Guess I need to find a more active group...but how?

[BillyKaplan]

Maybe that is also something, my FC has very nice people in it, but we don’t seem to do anything more than a roulette here and there. Guess I need to find a more active group...but how?

You're on the forums, you can try opening a post on your server's subforum (I think that's a thing anyway). My advice is also to lurk in Limsa or Ul'dah, at least on Balmung they spam FC recruitments. Check the PF, there're some of those there as well. And if you have friends outside your own FC (static mates? Linkshell buddies?) ask them if the FCs they're in are recruiting and if they'd be more to your liking.

[Vidu]

Maybe that is also something, my FC has very nice people in it, but we don’t seem to do anything more than a roulette here and there. Guess I need to find a more active group...but how?

As I said earlier: First you need to ask yourself what you want to do.
What sort of content are you intrested in? Do you want to challenge yourself with more difficult content? Or would you prefer doing more casual content so that you have more time to socialise?

Before you jump ship and leave nice people or even friends behind, I'd try to suggest whatever content you'd like to do to your FC and see if that intrest is shared. Most of the times it needs someone to make a suggestion on what to do - be that someone!
Wanna do maps/treasure hunts? Have everyone in the FC dig up their daily map (if they can) and agree on one evening to go through them! Can make that a weekly thing!
Are people (still) intrested in finishing their Khloe WT-books? Make that a weekly thing too! One evening in the week you'll party up and go through all EX-primals and raids that you need - syched or unsyched.
See if anyone wants to do PotD!

And, a bit less flexible: you can always organise or suggest weekly EX-primal farms!

If you're intrested in PvP: 4.2 brought us the new team-feature! You can always form a real PvP-team and focus on tournaments and such (to be honest: I havent looked into that myself, so I'm not 100% what you can do with it excatly, but maybe it could be intresting for you?)

My best advice: Dont wait for other people to do that kind of stuff for you. Be pro-active and see if the people in your FC share your intrestes (once you've established those) - if it turns out they dont, you can still go and look for a new FC. Personally I would do that by first finding like minded people, for example people from my raid-group (if thats not an all-FC-one - which would speak to shared intrests though...) or people I met during EX-primal farms. You can always follow shouts or shout yourself - or set up a PF, stating what it is you're looking for.

[AnimaAnimus]

A combination of "been here since original beta" and good for mindless play for me. Honestly if I want to have a good time running content or chatting with other people I boot up ESO or FFXI, but if I want something to do with my hands that takes no real thought as I watch Netflix I play FFXIV.

I cant see myself playing this much longer, I mean its been 8 years and frankly nothing has changed since the reboot. Even the main antagonists are the same, 8 long years later. If Ashes of Creation or Pantheon Rise of the Fallen are even remotely interesting they will get my sub. I cancelled my alt account years ago, the alts I have on this account haven't been touched since 3.1 or 3.2 maybe. Even now I boot up, run expert, take down a hunt or two and sit and ponder why I still bother to pay for a game that is so unrewarding.

[Infindox]

I keep playing simply because I enjoy being on. Right now I only log in to do dailies for tomes, I do the weekly things, do a few hunts, then I get on when my friends do to help them craft stuff for their houses they just got or do FC things. To me it's a nice break from irl and from work.

[SerLuke]

Friends mostly and I run a FC otherwise I’d just be logging in for new content patches

[Gemina]

Well, I'm not even close to being caught up, and still swimming in HW, and I've been playing for two years. Basically, I can play this game and find enjoyment completely outside the MSQ. Being Max level and Max ilv really isn't that important to me until it locks me out of goals I wish to achieve.

One day I'll get back to it, but I'm always finding something to do, and always have a long term goal set with something that keeps me busy. It could be raising another job, getting another relic, farming/crafting glamours, it's almost endless what you can do, especially if you can get into crafting and gathering.