New Player Experience Sucks! - Impending Expansion Problems

[GrindShack]

"play" is the proper way of writing "grind through 150+ hours of crappy fedexing to catch up to my friend, with an occasional brainless overnerfed dungeon/trial on the way"

That is the new player experience. That needs to be improved.

Its as if no one has played an mmo before... I dont even think buying a skip should be a thing, earn what you have, play the game... If you dont enjoy it just un-sub, cut losses play another kind of game. there are things I dont like about this game either, but it mostly comes down to negative community brought to light by people on the forums who just dont actually wanna play the game.

[FoxyAreku]

"play" is the proper way of writing "grind through 150+ hours of crappy fedexing to catch up to my friend, with an occasional brainless overnerfed dungeon/trial on the way"

That is the new player experience. That needs to be improved.

If you consider playing through the plot of this game to be that much of a chore, then I really think this game just isn't for you as I stated above. Either buy a skip potion or play one of the other dozen MMOs that actually are endgame focused.

Though I do think that all the filler pre-heavensward should be trimmed down quite a lot, and it is a shame that all the forum crying over the years has caused so many nerfs, there's not much to be done about it, and if you jumped straight over heavensward or stormblood you'd miss a ton of character introductions and context so it would actually hurt the experience for people who care about the plot and would hurt what the developers want the player to experience.

You really aren't missing much by having to play through the story anyway, everything important that content offers like the classes and races will be available without having to actually be at that level just like before, why people want to skip over everything so they can sit at max with nothing to do like I have been for months is beyond me.

[van_arn]

Its as if no one has played an mmo before... I dont even think buying a skip should be a thing, earn what you have, play the game... If you dont enjoy it just un-sub, cut losses play another kind of game. there are things I dont like about this game either, but it mostly comes down to negative community brought to light by people on the forums who just dont actually wanna play the game.

I know right? Those players drive me nuts. You see them in duty finder all the time; the sorts that refuse to learn how to push buttons, the sorts that don't know what diversion is, the sorts that don't know that AOE should be used on groups of mobs. Or you get the healers that REFUSE to deal damage, or the tanks that only pull ONE MOB AT A TIME OR YOU TANK IT FLASH IS TOO HARD.

Heck, I saw someone with 3 level 70s in full 380 gear that had never completed Heavensward. They just kept doing roulettes and potd forever, getting jobs to 70 they didn't have any content to do anything with. It's like the biggest collection of "doesn't count" 70s I've ever seen.

Why do these people even buy Stormblood if they're not going to play it?

[van_arn]

If you consider playing through the plot of this game to be that much of a chore, then I really think this game just isn't for you as I stated above. Either buy a skip potion or play one of the other dozen MMOs that actually are endgame focused.

Though I do think that all the filler pre-heavensward should be trimmed down quite a lot, and it is a shame that all the forum crying over the years has caused so many nerfs, there's not much to be done about it, and if you jumped straight over heavensward or stormblood you'd miss a ton of character introductions and context so it would actually hurt the experience for people who care about the plot and would hurt what the developers want the player to experience.

You really aren't missing much by having to play through the story anyway, everything important that content offers like the classes and races will be available without having to actually be at that level just like before, why people want to skip over everything so they can sit at max with nothing to do like I have been for months is beyond me.

Honey, I'm the one that decides if I play this game or not-- not you. The same goes for any player that decides they aren't interested in the crappy fedexing through six phases to get to the present day.

If Square feels so passionately that everyone needs to do every quest, then they can make them worth doing. Until then, those players are well within their right to call a crappy series of quests a crappy series of quests.

If you want cutscenes, replace with youtube.

[SerLuke]

Anti MSQ people: the story in this game SUCKS I skip all the cut scenes
Final Fantasy fans: how do you know it sucks if you skip the cut scenes?
Anti MSQ people: it makes it too hard for newbies to get into the game!
Final Fantasy fans: how does that make the MSQ suck?
Anti MSQ people: these guys are so unreasonable I give up!

[Awha]

If you consider playing through the plot of this game to be that much of a chore, then I really think this game just isn't for you as I stated above. Either buy a skip potion or play one of the other dozen MMOs that actually are endgame focused.

Though I do think that all the filler pre-heavensward should be trimmed down quite a lot, and it is a shame that all the forum crying over the years has caused so many nerfs, there's not much to be done about it, and if you jumped straight over heavensward or stormblood you'd miss a ton of character introductions and context so it would actually hurt the experience for people who care about the plot and would hurt what the developers want the player to experience.

You really aren't missing much by having to play through the story anyway, everything important that content offers like the classes and races will be available without having to actually be at that level just like before, why people want to skip over everything so they can sit at max with nothing to do like I have been for months is beyond me.

If I may ask how does having the MSQ be optional impact you negatively?

[SerLuke]

If I may ask how does having the MSQ be optional impact you negatively?

You mean besides changing the entire structure of the game which is heavily story based which people would know if they weren’t skipping cut scenes?

[Skivvy]

You mean besides changing the entire structure of the game which is heavily story based which people would know if they weren’t skipping cut scenes?

XI didn't force you to do the full MSQ. As others pointed out, those story lines didn't overlap much, but there are a lot of clever people working at SE. I'm sure they could strike a good balance with not forcing 100% completion while also keeping the story congruent.

[SerLuke]

XI didn't force you to do the full MSQ. As others pointed out, those story lines didn't overlap much, but there are a lot of clever people working at SE. I'm sure they could strike a good balance for their modern game.

As I stated in a previous post that is one reason why I prefer XIV’s story over XI’s XIV feels like one continuous adventure where XI branched off in different directions with each expansion I love XIV because of the way it does MSQ and how it ties into everything and I don’t want that to change.

[Skivvy]

As I stated in a previous post that is one reason why I prefer XIV’s story over XI’s XIV feels like one continuous adventure where XI branched off in different directions with each expansion I love XIV because of the way it does MSQ and how it ties into everything and I don’t want that to change.

Ah, I see, you caught me before the edit. I did switch it up a bit.

Also, I will admit that even I prefer a story line that doesn't branch off into 6 various plot lines. When I made a new character in XI a few years back I completed all the story lines as I never had a chance to do that on my original characters. It was amusing to me how everyone completely forgot who you are when you started a new expansion. So i get that point, completely.

But with that said, I still think SE could find a way to incorporate a solid story line while also not forcing everyone to do a 100% clear (especially for the old content) if that's not what floats their boat.