Expansion Ideas: Systems, Features, and Content Types - What would you add?

[Enkidoh]

The problem is, they can't introduce such world-changing content into the existing base game because it has to be kept static for new players just joining (and would be too complex to have phase the environment on a large scale if trying to work around that by having such content only available for high level players).

SE showed that they are not willing to do this back in FFXI where such large scale dynamic content was only limited to either entirely new continents (Besieged and Assault in Treasures of Aht Urhgan, Pioneer ventures in Seekers of Adoulin), or by taking it completely out of the existing game world and placing it in another time period (Allied Campaign in Wings of the Goddess) or a parallel world (pretty much everything in the three Abyssea add-ons).

I'm all for adding open-world content, but the sad fact is you are not going to see the likes of the Seventh-Umbral events again in the Eorzean zones in FFXIV because they were added specifically with the intention the game was going to be shut down and so they could afford to tear up the world with no regard for the future. It's the price that has to be paid for wanting to keep the world consistent for both existing players and for new players continuing to join as the game evolves and progresses.

Hence it's pretty clear any new large scale changeable open-world content will be limited to new areas I'm afraid (and SE have already stated this in the past - it's the explanation why Ishgard's Foundation isn't repaired but will remain ruined forever, it's too difficult to phase and they want to keep it consistent for new players joining in the future).

[Shurrikhan]

The problem is, they can't introduce such world-changing content into the existing base game because it has to be kept static for new players just joining (and would be too complex to have phase the environment on a large scale if trying to work around that by having such content only available for high level players).

I don't mean to be merely contentious, but multiple MMOs have made such large-scale phased environments just fine. Whether it's worth the effort is another story, but if such has become impossible in any way, it's only due to the code XIV contents itself with, not an actual theoretical or even practical limitation.

SE showed that they are not willing to do this back in FFXI where such large scale dynamic content was only limited to either entirely new continents (Besieged and Assault in Treasures of Aht Urhgan, Pioneer ventures in Seekers of Adoulin), or by taking it completely out of the existing game world and placing it in another time period (Allied Campaign in Wings of the Goddess) or a parallel world (pretty much everything in the three Abyssea add-ons).

Likewise, there's little that's "SE" alone in the consistencies or differences between the XIV and XI teams. It's mostly... the team and their specific overseers rather than any monolithic form of supervision. What applied to one does not necessarily apply to the other.

I'm all for adding open-world content, but the sad fact is you are not going to see the likes of the Seventh-Umbral events again in the Eorzean zones in FFXIV because they were added specifically with the intention the game was going to be shut down and so they could afford to tear up the world with no regard for the future. It's the price that has to be paid for wanting to keep the world consistent for both existing players and for new players continuing to join as the game evolves and progresses.

At what point do we draw the line between similarity and difference here? A gradually growing object visible from all areas of the Eorzea will almost certainly never happen again, but unique weather patterns easily could make a return, as could event-specific patrolling mobs in previously basically unpopulated areas -- if you simply include adds on a given mob, that's already bumping shoulders with exactly what Hunts did.