Can any WoW refugees explain the exodus to XIV to me?

[TheMightyMollusk]

Blizzard's always talked a bigger game than they could deliver. I've still got the physical box for Wrath of the Lich King that promised aerial PVP combat in Wintergrasp. It's just become more obvious in later expansions, starting with the total clusterfuck that was the launch of Warlords of Draenor.

[Edax]

Blizzard's always talked a bigger game than they could deliver. I've still got the physical box for Wrath of the Lich King that promised aerial PVP combat in Wintergrasp. It's just become more obvious in later expansions, starting with the total clusterfuck that was the launch of Warlords of Draenor.

I remember they promised new dances in the WotLK trailer and never saw any implementation of new dances in that expansion. It's such a small thing to promise and they still failed at it. I remember that bugging me at the time.

[SDaemon]

What Blizzard essentially did with BfA though was release it both unfinished and unpolished. And it showed. Still shows, actually.

I may not like a handful of the class design and story choices, to the point I chose to unsub, but I could never get behind the whole "unfinished and unpolished" forum angst movement as the game seems no more or less unfinished and unpolished than it has been for the last 9+ years. Still can't.

[MonsiuerGeneral]

I played WoW from vanilla up through Legion. At some point during that time I gave FFXIV a shot and really enjoyed it... but shortly after finally hitting 50 and getting my Gae Bolg my co-workers stopped playing so I went back to WoW.

Why I left WoW:
-getting difficult to justify subscription cost
-wife's MAC could no longer run the game
-didn't want to part with the artifact weapon I spent so long improving

Why I came to FFXIV:
-wife's MAC could run the game
-I've long loved the FF franchise since FF (NES)
-we could play up to lv35 in every class for as long we wanted for free
-wife wasn't interested in: SW:TOR, GW, or DCU

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Since crossing over to FFXIV from WoW with my wife, she has pretty much stopped playing due to lack of interest and a busy schedule keeping up with a Master's class...meanwhile I ditched my dummy trial account and re-subscribed my old account
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What keeps me playing FFXIV:
-being able to play every class/job on one character
-a MSQ exists (and I'm only, like, halfway through Heavensward at the moment)
-the squadron mechanic thing where I can run a dungeon with my 3 recruit AI NPCs
-the "fantasy" around recruiting your followers and training them up
-gorgeous animations/graphics
-customizable HUD
-having a hero in the world of Final Fantasy
-all of the classes feel super cool
-driving around a majitek suit blaring the FF3/6 overworld theme
-crafting is involved and is mechanically the best in any MMO I've tried
-player housing
-You can retire to an "inn" and sleeping on the bed logs you out

What I miss from WoW:
-short GCDs
-Map aesthetic/UI
-standard names of things (dungeon instead of duty, etc)
-group sizes (5man, 10man, etc)

What I miss from SW:TOR
-player character has a voice and dialogue
-dialogue options which can lead your character down a "good" or "evil" or "neutral" path

[Korgo_Bowman]

In short: WoW feels like: "ok, what do I have to go do right now?" whereas FFXIV is: "What do I want to go do today?".

[Vahlnir]

I may not like a handful of the class design and story choices, to the point I chose to unsub, but I could never get behind the whole "unfinished and unpolished" forum angst movement as the game seems no more or less unfinished and unpolished than it has been for the last 9+ years. Still can't.

My opinion has nothing to do with the forums. It is my observation and recollection of how past expansions have started.

[Sorvaine]

Poor decision making by the Blizzard team.
One thing that stands out to me is travel in wow is terrible. it takes forever to get anywhere and the last thing i wanted to do was spend 20 minutes traveling somewhere to do a world quest that took 5 minutes. Comparatively i really like travel in this game, just transport anywhere and your 30 seconds to a minute from where your trying to get.

also as said before rng. I am the type of person who likes gear currency, i like being able to work towards that sweet 390 chest or shoes not pray that my lootbox contains a piece i can use this week. There are not words to describe how badly i hate wow's
slot machine/time waster/no goals/unfun system

After that poor content, not lack of, just poor. There is a bunch of things like island expeditions that if weren't tied to azerite power wouldn't get done very often by people.

and lastly for me class balance. I started off BfA as a shaman, if you played wow i wouldn't have to say more. Shaman just.... get neglected maybe, and its sad cause i like shaman.

[RyuuSkyez]

Wow is a shell of a game that it once was. It's old, and not fun. People have to move on at some point in time.

[Rumbartus]

WoW refugee here (quit WoW a month and a half ago, after 13 years of playing it). Had enough of the Rng upon rng upon rng, the time gating after time gating after time gating just to force you to play/suscribe longer. WoW actually seems lost, lore badly written, bad decisions one after another, etc. It has no soul anymore. I am sad for the situation, really.
P.s: meanwhile, spending a fantastic time here in FFXIV!

[Shurrikhan]

In short: WoW feels like: "ok, what do I have to go do right now?" whereas FFXIV is: "What do I want to go do today?".

It's weird; I see no reason why that should be more true of WoW's dailies and weeklies than XIV's dailies and weeklies, yet I do get the same impression, if to a lesser degree.

I think the biggest not-easily-quantifiable slap to the face for me is the sheer amount of waste loot. Expert dungeons of course have a ton, but that goes unnoticed. When an Azerite Armor or Equipment Chest repeatedly gives you, week after week, the same belt you got the two weeks, on the other hand, it feels pretty bad. When week after week of raids drop nothing but runes, it feels bad. Even when loot acquisition was just as slow in much of WotLK or the like, it never felt quite that much like a flurry of blows by wet noodles. They're not individually hard blows of "well, that wasted my time." It's just the sheer concept and frequency of them all...