Castrum Fluminis and item level

[ZJyn]

The biggest problem here, to me, isn't that the item level cap is what it is; it's that it feels inorganic compared to the way that it flowed in Heavensward due to how they decided to pull the dungeons away from the MSQ.

As someone had mentioned before, Swallow's Compass, and other 4.X dungeons, have a required item level that progresses in such a way that you would, if following it, find yourself pretty dang close to Castrum. They just aren't part of the main story. So a player is going to find themselves able to progress everything in the MSQ without touching any of he dungeons, trials, etc, and then suddenly... boom... they hit a brick wall.

It would have likely felt a lot more organic if they had included the dungeons as part of the Main Story, not part of the Four Lords.

[Vaer]

The biggest problem here, to me, isn't that the item level cap is what it is; it's that it feels inorganic compared to the way that it flowed in Heavensward due to how they decided to pull the dungeons away from the MSQ.

As someone had mentioned before, Swallow's Compass, and other 4.X dungeons, have a required item level that progresses in such a way that you would, if following it, find yourself pretty dang close to Castrum. They just aren't part of the main story. So a player is going to find themselves able to progress everything in the MSQ without touching any of he dungeons, trials, etc, and then suddenly... boom... they hit a brick wall.

It would have likely felt a lot more organic if they had included the dungeons as part of the Main Story, not part of the Four Lords.

I think this is a result of people saying the MSQ takes too long, so they pulled the stuff out to shorten it. (When SB is legacy you will be able to skip all this stuff due to the gear boxes they add, shortening the leveling process instead of being forced to do all this stuff to get to the next xpac)

They could put all the stuff back in, but OP would just be locked and still have to grind anyways which is his main complaint. (He wouldn't be able to get into Hell's Lid/Fractal since he would be 3 short.) After he gets those dungeons, he would be locked out of Byakko since it is 325. Then he would need another 5 levels for Swallow's etc. It would be back to ARR 2.x style where the first half of the patch story was just fluff and the second part was the actual story.

Right now you can bypass most of the stuff and you have the choice of acquiring gear the way you want to meet the requirement.

[HyoMinPark]

It is completely irrelevant what the current ilvl cap is. It could be 340 or 12000 - it doesn't matter.
The point is the sudden big jump in ilvl requirement in the MSQ. Not the first time that has happened, but that does not make it any better.

It is not a big problem for those who are doing content as it is released. It will not be a problem when the next expansion comes out and current gear becomes much easier to get.
It is a problem for those who are just now reaching level 70 and who have yet to do any of the optional level 70 dungeons.

This could be easily rectified if they stopped removing at least 1 dungeon from the post-main expansion MSQ. Meeting item level requirements for level 60 post-Heavensward content was never an issue for me when I first started playing, and I did only the MSQ from the day I started to the day I hit level 60—because the dungeons during at least gave me pieces to bump up my item level enough to progress. That, and Law Tomestones were ridiculously easy to come by... much like Creation Tomestones are now.

Like someone has mentioned before, this will stop being an issue in 5.0 when they start handing you gear for level-70 post-Stormblood MSQ. But even still, gear and tomestones are so easy to come across in this game even for newer players, I don’t really find “this big jump in item level” to be that big of a deal unless, again, you’re someone who only does MSQ and nothing else.

Considering that people in i340+ can barely put enough of their skills together to clear Castrum Fluminis NM cleanly since Day 1, I appreciate the item level requirement, and I wouldn’t really call it irrelevant. My talk of the item level cap is to show that this isn’t something new; this was a thing as much in ARR and HW as it is in SB now (Chrysalis, Final Steps—both major MSQ trials, both had item levels ~35 item levels below current cap). At least it can provide an HP cushion; I’d rather not see someone at i307 in there, since the content is the sole piece of challenging MSQ content in Stormblood, save for Royal Menagerie. Again, this game barely asks anything of its playerbase; an i335 item level requirement for a relatively challenging story trial is reasonable enough.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

It is a problem for those who are just now reaching level 70 and who have yet to do any of the optional level 70 dungeons.

There's a simple solution to this problem. Stop blitzing through the MSQ and take a deter to unlock those dungeons so you can obtain Creation or do the 24 man raids. It takes less than a day to have everything unlocked; perhaps a few more if you're only playing a handful of hours a day/week. If that is too much, well, sorry the game doesn't provide even more hand outs than it already does. Come 4.4, should we just start gifting people i380 gear upon release? God forbid you have to do side story content.

[WhiteArchmage]

I think this is a result of people saying the MSQ takes too long, so they pulled the stuff out to shorten it. (When SB is legacy you will be able to skip all this stuff due to the gear boxes they add, shortening the leveling process instead of being forced to do all this stuff to get to the next xpac)

Stuff like this makes me feel like SE is fighting a losing battle trying to please all their players. People complained Coil was too hard and they were missing out on the story: they did Normal and Savage, then people complained they had to do Normal and it was too easy and since they had the same story they had no reson to do Savage; then they complained they wanted to unlock everything at once so we got several sidequests with the Four Lords, Omega, and Ivalice; and now they're complaining that they just want to rush the story without the sidequests and can't because iLvl...

[Kazgrel]

With the time one spent complaining about the non-issue, people who really wanted to do the MSQ would’ve gotten to 335 by now. How do I know this? My FC has a couple of brand new players who just made it to level 70 last week who were running Ridorana Lighthouse last night. Myself nor any o our other crafters made them a single piece of gear; they hit up hunts and ran dungeons/roulettes for a few days and are well on their way.

Is it a fairly large ilvl jump? Yes. Is it this insumountable wall of grind that will take up to next patch (4.4) to clear? Goodness no.

[MistakeNot]

There's a simple solution to this problem. Stop blitzing through the MSQ and take a deter to unlock those dungeons so you can obtain Creation or do the 24 man raids. It takes less than a day to have everything unlocked; perhaps a few more if you're only playing a handful of hours a day/week. If that is too much, well, sorry the game doesn't provide even more hand outs than it already does. Come 4.4, should we just start gifting people i380 gear upon release? God forbid you have to do side story content.

The problem is not the ilvl requirement, nor the need to do side content. The problem is the big jump in ilvl requirement which necessitates breaking off the MSQ and doing a lot of side content in a big chunk.

There should have been 2-3 more mandatory dungeons and/or trials between Drowned City of Skalla and Castrum Fluminis, each with a smaller increase of ilvl requirement. Then the progression would feel far more natural, and the grinding more spread out.

[HyoMinPark]

The problem is not the ilvl requirement, nor the need to do side content. The problem is the big jump in ilvl requirement which necessitates breaking off the MSQ and doing a lot of side content in a big chunk.

There should have been 2-3 more mandatory dungeons and/or trials between Drowned City of Skalla and Castrum Fluminis, each with a smaller increase of ilvl requirement. Then the progression would feel far more natural, and the grinding more spread out.

I’m guessing the answer to the removal of this was a combination of both trimming the MSQ, and Eureka. Anemos gives you upgraded Antiquated gear to fill in the gaps that dungeons normally would. However, as has been proven, it’s even more of a grind than doing the sidequest content—most of the quests for unlocking the sidequests dungeons are laughable short, though. So they don’t take that long to unlock. At most, you travel once or twice to talk to two different NPCs.

My original advice to the OP still stands—do daily roulettes for Creation (most give 100; 50/60 gives 120, and Expert gives 60, on top of whatever you would get from the dungeon; there are also bonus Creation tomes for first times, which the OP would receive if he hasn’t done them yet), do a few Rabanastre (for coins and more Creation), and get the i340 gear. He can also try going through Delta and Sigmascape NM for each i350 gear (Sigmascape). It would take him less than a week to get i335 if he just kept up with roulettes; it definitely would not take “weeks” as previously claimed.

[Iscah]

The problem (to me) isn’t exactly how long it takes to get the upgrade, it’s that you are allowed to reach that very climactic pre-battle cutscene and then can’t progress into the battle itself. Instead you have to walk away, at very least go shopping for gear, and possibly go through entire other storylines before you can get back to that urgent moment where you were about to fight Tsukuyomi, and you’ve lost the flow of the story. “Less than a week” is not a small amount of time in this context!

Yes, people will prioritise the MSQ and come back for ‘sidequests’ later. The game doesn’t point out that you should be pursuing them because you need the tones/gear. There’s no halt between patch stories - you just get the next quest icon straight away, and you’ve usually just been left on a cliffhanger. Of course people are going to do it first and come back for side stories later.

[HyoMinPark]

The problem (to me) isn’t exactly how long it takes to get the upgrade, it’s that you are allowed to reach that very climactic pre-battle cutscene and then can’t progress into the battle itself. Instead you have to walk away, at very least go shopping for gear, and possibly go through entire other storylines before you can get back to that urgent moment where you were about to fight Tsukuyomi, and you’ve lost the flow of the story. “Less than a week” is not a small amount of time in this context!

Compared to the claim that it would take “weeks” to get the gear needed, less than a week is nothing. I would have no problem if they decided to give item level locks on actual patch MSQs (i.e., Patch 4.3 MSQ requires i335 to even start it), but then you would have the same complaints.

Yes, people will prioritise the MSQ and come back for ‘sidequests’ later. The game doesn’t point out that you should be pursuing them because you need the tones/gear. There’s no halt between patch stories - you just get the next quest icon straight away, and you’ve usually just been left on a cliffhanger. Of course people are going to do it first and come back for side stories later.

I believe the developers changed important sidequest icons to the Blue Quest Marker with the Plus Sign to try and signify “You should do this”. Before, they were just regular sidequest markers.