Stormblood's missed opportunity.

[Evogolist]

Does anyone feel like the dev team missed the opportunity to reinstate a Hamlet like system or something like FFXI's campaign battles?

I mean sure, it probably would've been hell on the servers, but the areas in Stormblood such as the Fringes, the Lochs, and Yanixa maps seem to lack that feeling of there being a war/liberation effort taking place.

Edit***
One thing that I do want to clarify is that I recognize that XIV has some serious server stability issues and so something like what I mentioned up above would be near impossible with the current server set up. However if the server were or are able to handle this one day then who knows what can happen.

[Brill_]

I would love to see something like beseiged, but reality is, I don't think it can be done in open world. We saw what happened with the ixion fate. However, I think Eureka is the place they could do it since you already have a player capped instance.

[Vidu]

...maybe I'm a bit cynical - and I actually havent played FFXI, so I'm not sure what Hamlet Defense actually was like in that game (even though I heared great things), but... we got Eureka which was supposed to be "FFXI-like" content.
And it didnt/doesnt work - for several reasons. Some of them are actually variations of "this content is just badly designed", BUT lets please not forget that it "worked" in FFXI because that game worked differently in regards to the battle system and gear progression and so on.

I might not know enough about Hamlet to actually make a call on wether or not that could work in FFXIV, but at this point I'd very much like the devs to developed content for this game, playing to the strengths of it. After Eureka I'm very sceptical about FFXI-insipired content - something that was great 10 years ago, might not be so great anymore now.

So, no, I dont feel they've missed a chance there - maybe they've missed a chance to make the maps feel more "alive" or like a battlefield, but I dont believe that asking for FFXI 2.0 is the answer here. They need to come up with ideas that actually fit this game - and I cant tell wether or not a tweaked Hamlet could do that, but I'm pretty sure that open world content that needs a lot of people participating just doesnt work in FFXIV. Sitting around, waiting for something to happen might have been great in FFXI, but not here.

[Reyn]

...maybe I'm a bit cynical - and I actually havent played FFXI, so I'm not sure what Hamlet Defense actually was like in that game (even though I heared great things), but... we got Eureka which was supposed to be "FFXI-like" content.
And it didnt/doesnt work - for several reasons. Some of them are actually variations of "this content is just badly designed", BUT lets please not forget that it "worked" in FFXI because that game worked differently in regards to the battle system and gear progression and so on.

I might not know enough about Hamlet to actually make a call on wether or not that could work in FFXIV, but at this point I'd very much like the devs to developed content for this game, playing to the strengths of it. After Eureka I'm very sceptical about FFXI-insipired content - something that was great 10 years ago, might not be so great anymore now.

So, no, I dont feel they've missed a chance there - maybe they've missed a chance to make the maps feel more "alive" or like a battlefield, but I dont believe that asking for FFXI 2.0 is the answer here. They need to come up with ideas that actually fit this game - and I cant tell wether or not a tweaked Hamlet could do that, but I'm pretty sure that open world content that needs a lot of people participating just doesnt work in FFXIV. Sitting around, waiting for something to happen might have been great in FFXI, but not here.

Hamlet was from FFXIV 1.0.

I love events like these, and this year's The Rising event really got my nostalgic juices flowing. It was disappointing that it was relegated to an instance, though. Everything in this game is instanced, and the world feels very barren as a result.

[Vidu]

Hamlet was from FFXIV 1.0.

I love events like these, and this year's The Rising event really got my nostalgic juices flowing. It was disappointing that it was relegated to an instance, though. Everything in this game is instanced, and the world feels very barren as a result.

Oh, my mistake - doesnt change the fact though that I dont believe open world content like that will really work in this game. And that nostalgia is getting the better of people who want it back.
I might be biased, because I already dislike FATEs so much, but those are actually kinda showing me why this doesnt work. I remember to many times when it was 3 in the morning and Odin or Ixion spawned - and it was only 10 people around. I'm still missing that achievment from the Coeurl-Queen-FATE because is just impossible to get her to spawn and have enough people around.
And sometimes (...or actually quite often) I want to play at 3 am and I want to make progress at 3 am. Or progress on some old stuff - Odin-FATEs are impossible on my server now, because no one cares anymore.
Instances solve this problem - even at 3 am I'm finding enough people for most content. Even Sastasha gets people through roulettes.

I get the whole "the world feels barren"-thing and its a bit sad, granted... but I take it over the alternative every day. Personally, I dont want open world content that really has an impact on ones progression. I dont want to rely on "hopefully are enough people in this area right now".

[Evogolist]

Oh, my mistake - doesnt change the fact though that I dont believe open world content like that will really work in this game. And that nostalgia is getting the better of people who want it back.

I used both 1.0's Hamlet defense and XI's campaign battles as an example, but even with them I wondered why something like that wasn't added. It definitely helps add to the immersion/illusion that we're in the middle of fighting with the Garlean's to liberate Doma and Ala Mhigo. My biggest worry would be like you stated, player's needing incentive to continue doing the content. Players would need something so that the content doesn't run dry after everyone has gotten what they need from it. Something like area buffs such as increased exp from normal mobs/fates, increased exp for crafters and gathers, stat buffs and so forth. The only way to keep that up would be for players to continue participating in the content.

[Genz]

we got Eureka which was supposed to be "FFXI-like" content.

Any serious discussion about Eureka/open world/etc. begins by forgetting the imposture from Yoshida that Eureka is supposedly inspired from FFXI.

Also, the excuse of "it was in FFXI so it can't work now" needs to stop. FFXI wasn't that special. It was "just" common RPG features pushed on a persistent online world, and it tried to make use of this persistent world. The problem isn't with FFXI, but with FFXIV who pretends to be a "mmorpg" but doesn't make good use of its persistent world. We just login in a pretty chat room and the true game only happens in instances.

[Soge01]

^
Sounds to me like the developers should create less content for the outside world based around FATEs and more functional content that can work without it. But would something like that work in this game though? For them to make something like Eureka be basically FATE dependent in order to grind through its content it seems like it's either impossible for them to do it or that they just don't want to waste time implementing such content.

Personally, if a Hamlet system were introduced into Stormsblood I would actually have liked it that way. Without the FATEs, I mean.

[Evogolist]

^
Sounds to me like the developers should create less content for the outside world based around FATEs and more functional content that can work without it. But would something like that work in this game though? For them to make something like Eureka be basically FATE dependent in order to grind through its content it seems like it's either impossible for them to do it or that they just don't want to waste time implementing such content.

Personally, if a Hamlet system were introduced into Stormsblood I would actually have liked it that way. Without the FATEs, I mean.

I think the biggest issue with Open World content is that SE doesn't give players an incentive to participate in whatever content exists. No one cares about Fates outside of Eureka anymore because there's a bunch of alternative ways to earn xp now. I enjoy bringing up topics like this, because it makes you wonder what this game could or could've been. Sadly, it's also a reminder of how much the dev team has backed themselves into a corner with the game's current design.

[JunseiKei]

I think the biggest issue with Open World content is that SE doesn't give players an incentive to participate in whatever content exists. No one cares about Fates outside of Eureka anymore because there's a bunch of alternative ways to earn xp now. I enjoy bringing up topics like this, because it makes you wonder what this game could or could've been. Sadly, it's also a reminder of how much the dev team has backed themselves into a corner with the game's current design.

I'd not really say it's the devs that backed themselves into a corner so much as the players will always take the more effective route. 2.x saw F.A.T.E.s as the absolute best way to gain EXP outside of the MSQ. Back when you could farm the adds in that one F.A.T.E. in Northern Thanalan and get a chain bonus of 400+ easy. F.A.T.E.s worked back then. However, since those days, more story quests have come out, as well as dungeons, with a need to always have players fill them for the newer players. This by default shifts the focus away from open world to instances. Just like now, as much as I hate Eureka, I feel it's the most effective to farm tomestones for the amount of work required (would normally say this goes to the two newest dungeons because of 50 tomestones a run, but some parties really cause me to work).

The F.A.T.E. system isn't bad (let me clarify this; having a system that has an indicator of a spontaneous open world event on the map where everyone can participate because of level syncing), but that's not to say people have grown to despise them because of the sheer RNG behind the relic's atma and crystal grinds in ARR and HW. Players don't generally bother with content if there is no incentive behind it and F.A.T.E.s have always been a way to grind for EXP (which has since been shifted to other sources), tied to relic (again, shifted to other sources) and otherwise simply have no incentive. Even with the special enemies that pop up that reward increased EXP.

We just login in a pretty chat room and the true game only happens in instances.

The 'true game' being what?

A lot of MMOs are mostly dungeons being the content. Open world gets used for open world PvP (does not exist in FFXIV), gathering for crafting, crafting and quests. That's how it is for theme park MMOs, which FFXIV is.