New Player Experience Sucks! - Impending Expansion Problems

[MsMisato]

Ah yes the Level 50 content patch (i call it the 100 quest bridge to HW). That part needs to be consolidated the most. But Limsa boat to Versper or be lazy and horizon and chocobo porter (I still use them even to this day).

Quest/Expansion walls are not going to go away anytime soon. Right now ARR and HW are for free at this time anyway. They have not invested in one dime in the game. First month is free. This is SE's game in the end, money is money. People are paying for skip msq and level up pots (besides the MSQ pots gives feathers for gear and gil) though i can't justify spending money to skip a game I am paying for thats just me though, but that is what is SE is hoping people will do. Spend that cash on those pots. also it appears both the level up pot and msq skip pot are on sale lol.


Play with your friend. They are here because you want them to be here. Play a job you never played or roll a new character to play with them. it takes roughly a good 3 - 4 weeks to complete MSQ in its entirety. That is still a month left afterwards they can go back and unlock extremes, 24 mans, CT, BCoB, and all that jazz.

[Melorie]

Play with your friend. They are here because you want them to be here. Play a job you never played or roll a new character to play with them. it takes roughly a good 3 - 4 weeks to complete MSQ in its entirety. That is still a month left afterwards they can go back and unlock extremes, 24 mans, CT, BCoB, and all that jazz.

Even doing that, you can't really play with them besides doing a dungeon when it finally pops up or a roulette. In many other MMOS, if I make a new alt, I can just spam dungeons forever with my friend or do whatever to level - and I'm not saying that this should happen with ffxiv, I'm just saying that here you can't "play" with someone. If they made the MSQ duties something you can do in a party, then yes, that would be true, but it's hardly the case. The only thing I can do is stay in discord with them or wait till they unlock something and help them with queue times going as a healer or tank.

I think that they should at least trim ARR quests and make optional content (such as dungeons, trials and such that are not msq-related) level based, which means that once you get that level you can get the quest to unlock x dungeon/trial/raid, instead of needing to finish MSQ to complete it. Also let people buy their gear once they are on the level cap and have the required tomestone. But really, trim ARR would be the most important change atm. The only person that I know that got through ARR slog and got to stormblood only did it because they bought the jump potion, and that shouldn't be a permanent solution or fix for this problem.

[noxen]

Unpopular opinion; Everyone should run through ARR quests at least once as a new player. Yes, it's a grind, yes it's a slog to get through. SE are aware of it and they've hinted at consolidation during a live letter some months ago (I don't recall which one exactly, but I remember distinctly that it was an issue they're aware of and are looking to work on it).

XIV is, as someone else pointed out, a story/character driven game. It's not like WoW where you rush to the finish line and spam the highest level content and forget that a story even exists.

[van_arn]

Unpopular opinion; Everyone should run through ARR quests at least once as a new player. Yes, it's a grind, yes it's a slog to get through. SE are aware of it and they've hinted at consolidation during a live letter some months ago (I don't recall which one exactly, but I remember distinctly that it was an issue they're aware of and are looking to work on it).

XIV is, as someone else pointed out, a story/character driven game. It's not like WoW where you rush to the finish line and spam the highest level content and forget that a story even exists.

By that logic, everyone should start with 1.0 (be it through youtube, etc) so they have a full understanding of how the story and game developed into 2.0. Perhaps open the game with a three hour cutscene gallery detailing essential things, like escorting Sisipu across a featureless copy-pasted terrain to a random point on the map. It would make players *appreciate* ARR more. The story of Louisoix Leveilleur can only be understood with proper context from 1.0, after all -- and as FFXIV is a story-based game it is essential to enjoy 2.0 fully.

We can't expect players to get everything they need to know from 1.0 from the opening trailer and by actually playing the game. Playing 1.0 should be a required rite of passage, and obviously anyone that wants to skip it and its magnificent not-story is a filthy wow refugee.

[DPZ2]

By that logic, everyone should start with 1.0 (be it through youtube, etc) so they have a full understanding of how the story and game developed into 2.0.

ARR is NOT the same MMO as 1.0. Different story line, different combat systems, different play style.

Your suggestion is akin to "You must play Warcraft 3" to be able to have a full understanding of WoW. Absurd.

[van_arn]

ARR is NOT the same MMO as 1.0. Different story line, different combat systems, different play style.

Your suggestion is akin to "You must play Warcraft 3" to be able to have a full understanding of WoW. Absurd.

1.0 and 2.0 are very much continuations of the same story, and the reason I mentioned Louisoix specifically. We're a story-based game, after all, and it is essential we require every single person to play every single main scenario quest to fully appreciate that story, from Tanaka to Yoshida.
If story is as important as everyone seems to claim it is, then you must play warcraft 3 to appreciate wow. Heck, best to start with Warcraft 1. You also need to read the novels before stepping into any raids.

That'll weed out the people that don't want waste their time experiencing irrelevant content; gatekeeping is fun.

[Melichoir]

1.0 and 2.0 are very much continuations of the same story, and the reason I mentioned Louisoix specifically. We're a story-based game, after all, and it is essential we require every single person to play every single main scenario quest to fully appreciate that story, from Tanaka to Yoshida.
If story is as important as everyone seems to claim it is, then you must play warcraft 3 to appreciate wow. Heck, best to start with Warcraft 1. You also need to read the novels before stepping into any raids.

That'll weed out the people that don't want waste their time experiencing irrelevant content; gatekeeping is fun.

By that logic, everyone should start with 1.0 (be it through youtube, etc) so they have a full understanding of how the story and game developed into 2.0. Perhaps open the game with a three hour cutscene gallery detailing essential things, like escorting Sisipu across a featureless copy-pasted terrain to a random point on the map. It would make players *appreciate* ARR more. The story of Louisoix Leveilleur can only be understood with proper context from 1.0, after all -- and as FFXIV is a story-based game it is essential to enjoy 2.0 fully.

After all, we can't expect players to get everything they need to know from 1.0 from the opening trailer and by actually playing the game. Playing 1.0 should be a required rite of passage, and obviously anyone that wants to skip it and its magnificent not-story is a filthy wow refugee.

This is almost reductio ad absurdum. Youre going to an extreme to try and disprove a general point.

2.0 actually addresses most of the events in 1.0 through the 2.0 storyline, and most of 1.0 is downplayed because of it being a flop and being a semi-separate game. For all intensive purposes, 2.0 and up and pretty much a new game. The problem with your criticism is youre trying to discredit the idea of playing 2.x and gating by seeing everything as a zero sum game. You either have to do every single lore thing and part of the game, or nothing at all and everyone should skip it. This purposefully looks past nuance of the issue. Youll notice that a lot of people here do recognize 2.1-2.55 is kinda long and maybe could use some careful and considered streamlining. Because that seems like a reasonable solution to the problems people have. What some of us dont approve of is the notion that gating content that relates directly to the core of the game is a problem, and that the devs shouldnt just have people skip 2.0 all together for free if they want to. Particularly since, you know, the entirety of the game is established in 2.x content.

This isnt like WoW, where Vanilla doesnt have that much connecting it to BC. Its like youre doing some stuff in Vanilla, then a semi unrelated event occurs and now you go address that. And once you address that, a new villain lines up for you to address. The overarching storyline thats going on? Thats being resolved by the real heroes, you know Thrall, or varian, or Jaina, or Sylvanus, etc. Youre there to help, as the soldier you are, but you dont directly resolve a lot of it. As I said earlier, in WoW, youre a hero, not The Hero. In FFXIV, youre THE Hero. You change the course of events, have a direct impact. Ala Mhigo doesnt happen if you dont resolve the events of HW, and that doesnt resolve unless you take care of events in ARR. Meaning, the world doesnt progress unless you progress it, unlike WoW.

You dont want to do the MSQ, then buy that jump potion. It's there for that purpose. Otherwise, you should understand the game isnt set up like WoW or other MMOs. There's an order to the game thats dictated by a story. If you dont honestly like that, and the only content that matters to you is the max level content and nothing else, then maybe you should choose another MMO. This one maybe isnt for you.

[Melorie]

Unpopular opinion; Everyone should run through ARR quests at least once as a new player.

Lmao that is easily the worst suggestion/opinion I've seen on this thread. Thank god it's unpopular just like you said.

[Mavrias]

ARR is NOT the same MMO as 1.0. Different story line, different combat systems, different play style.

Your suggestion is akin to "You must play Warcraft 3" to be able to have a full understanding of WoW. Absurd.

not the same combat system sure, but events of 1.0 are directly referenced in 2.0 and beyond so thats just flat out not true.