why i quit before reaching endgame (feedback from a new player)

[SerLuke]

75 levels was the cap for years, you only had to level once. But why are we talking about leveling? point is ffxi told a lot of story, without needing 700 quests to get to any specific content you were aiming for.

and in ffxiv, that 700 quests is soon likely to be 850-900 quests in a month. They can easily change experience gain to adapt, but story is not easily made faster for newer players.

Oh no, no you didn't just have to level, once, I remember my first job to 75 was a PLD, a lot of times people loved my PLD leveling up over a Ninja tank though some would prefer NIN, then I hit 75, all of a sudden for merit points people didn't want PLD tanks anymore, they always wanted NINs! So I leveled up RDM and SAM just so I would be able to freaking get merit points. Then I level'd up monk cause that was one of the only damage deals people wanted for salvage

[SilverObi]

Frankly if you got only half a level after 3 hours of partying in XI, something was grossly wrong. Even at a suboptimal side camp in a crowded zone three hours would get you at least one or two levels, more if it was during ToAU or WotG. That aside, while you did have to complete chunks of story to access endgame in XI, the quest levels were so spread out and some were even put in popular leveling regions that you leveled into the next quest or were already there in the zone to run to once you had an exp buffer. And the storylines themselves were divided to be standalone stories with their own level caps and side content (yes there was stuff to do at 30 50 60 70) that you could pick and choose to focus on depending on what content you wanted to get access to. And a lot of the repeatable endgame content wasn't just Sea and Sky but other modes that only required token progress in some stories.

That being said, I have no problem with XIV's story structure and don't feel it's "forced" but that's probably due to people having different mindsets and expectations of what they feel is worth doing and focusing on. Should XIV change? Big Maybe, but I hope not.

[SerLuke]

Frankly if you got only half a level after 3 hours of partying in XI, something was grossly wrong. Even at a suboptimal side camp in a crowded zone three hours would get you at least one or two levels, more if it was during ToAU or WotG. That aside, while you did have to complete chunks of story to access endgame in XI, the quest levels were so spread out and some were even put in popular leveling regions that you leveled into the next quest or were already there in the zone to run to once you had an exp buffer. And the storylines themselves were divided to be standalone stories with their own level caps and side content (yes there was stuff to do at 30 50 60 70) that you could pick and choose to focus on depending on what content you wanted to get access to. And a lot of the repeatable endgame content wasn't just Sea and Sky but other modes that only required token progress in some stories.

I can't tell you the number of times people would either come and try to take over a camp, or a healer/tank would leave and we'd have to spend freaking 30 minutes not only trying to find a replacement but waiting for them to get to said camp, not to mention stuff like people MPKing others by dragging mobs like goblins to the Kazham zone.

[Physic]

It really didn't though, to progress in FFXI's story you were FORCED to not only group with other players but actually manually find the help yourself in order to get items/drops you needed to progress in the freaking story itself, I remember having to have help to get key drops to go to Kazham just to level up because no one wanted to party anywhere else in FFXI at that level, whereas in FFXIV you unlock the dungeons you need to exp at as you go through the story, much, much better system than having to rely on RNG drops just to get to an area of the game where you wanted to go.

what you are talking about is not story elements, but gameplay elements. Ffxi was meant to be a more immersive, less solo focused game. the point of something like kazham keys, limit breaks, etc was to create experiences that players had together to achieve certain goals, it was sometimes rough, i was the guy who needed to hunt limit break items for days while other people got their loot and left, but it did the job of creating shared multi player world content.

but thats a totally different discussion. You are focused on how difficult it was to see the story, but im not saying to make ffxiv as difficult as ffxi, i'm saying allow people to get to what content they are most interested in.

you know how you hated all that multi player group stuff getting in the way of story in ffxi? well here, there are many players annoyed that all that story stuff is getting in the way of their multi playet group stuff.

all i am saying, make both player types happy, and the ones in the grey area.

[SilverObi]

I can't tell you the number of times people would either come and try to take over a camp, or a healer/tank would leave and we'd have to spend freaking 30 minutes not only trying to find a replacement but waiting for them to get to said camp, not to mention stuff like people MPKing others by dragging mobs like goblins to the Kazham zone.

MPK would usually happen by accident (remember Garlaige entrance camps?) and if you include the LFP process into that three hours then I could see your point particularly if you were a less desired job like thf or drg. While it was annoying when things happened, it usually encouraged communication within the party. Unless they were an ass someone would let the party know if they were leaving within 30-60 minutes. Man I miss talking in parties lol but I digress. XI was/is very much a product of its era but for each thing it did wrong or poorly, it did a lot more right. Same could be said for XIV honestly. I don't understand the sheer outrage and extreme takes in so many of these threads.

[SerLuke]

what you are talking about is not story elements, but gameplay elements. Ffxi was meant to be a more immersive, less solo focused game. the point of something like kazham keys, limit breaks, etc was to create experiences that players had together to achieve certain goals, it was sometimes rough, i was the guy who needed to hunt limit break items for days while other people got their loot and left, but it did the job of creating shared multi player world content.

but thats a totally different discussion. You are focused on how difficult it was to see the story, but im not saying to make ffxiv as difficult as ffxi, i'm saying allow people to get to what content they are most interested in.

you know how you hated all that multi player group stuff getting in the way of story in ffxi? well here, there are many players annoyed that all that story stuff is getting in the way of their multi playet group stuff.

all i am saying, make both player types happy, and the ones in the grey area.

And my point is you can't make everyone happy, by doing the things proposed here it will make people that are happy with how the game currently is very unhappy, it comes to a point where demanding these changes is unreasonable and would require rebooting the game again like they did from 1.0 -> 2.0 if people don't like how this game does they story they have options, they can either skip the cut scenes. pay for jump potions to skip to Stormblood/level 60 though this will probably be skipping to Shadowbringers/70 soon, they can skip the cut scenes, of they can go play something else.

MPK would usually happen by accident (remember Garlaige entrance camps?) and if you include the LFP process into that three hours then I could see your point particularly if you were a less desired job like thf or drg. While it was annoying when things happened, it usually encouraged communication within the party. Unless they were an ass someone would let the party know if they were leaving within 30-60 minutes. Man I miss talking in parties lol but I digress. XI was/is very much a product of its era but for each thing it did wrong or poorly, it did a lot more right. Same could be said for XIV honestly. I don't understand the sheer outrage and extreme takes in so many of these threads.

Sometimes they would say in advance and I would be able to find someone, sometimes even if they say in advance it wasn't possible to find someone in time, ,many other times someone would just leave.

[Physic]

I can't tell you the number of times people would either come and try to take over a camp, or a healer/tank would leave and we'd have to spend freaking 30 minutes not only trying to find a replacement but waiting for them to get to said camp, not to mention stuff like people MPKing others by dragging mobs like goblins to the Kazham zone.

this is a side discussion, but you know what, every person i know who played ffxi at that time understands and relates to the same stories you are talking about. The infamous goblin smithy wiping people. The time you were struggling hunting X item, and someone, or group helped you. The time you made the dangerous journey as a low level to jueno for the first time.

yeah it was rough, but its goal was to create this shared and compelling experience. For some that experience was nightmares, for others it was glory, for others, comedy. But it achieved its goal.

ffxiv is definitely a different beast, it focuses more on being accessible, and being able to be consumed in smaller blocks, but the story locks are blocking that accesibility for some players.

And my point is you can't make everyone happy, by doing the things proposed here it will make people that are happy with how the game currently is very unhappy, it comes to a point where demanding these changes is unreasonable and would require rebooting the game again like they did from 1.0 -> 2.0 if people don't like how this game does they story they have options, they can either skip the cut scenes. pay for jump potions to skip to Stormblood/level 60 though this will probably be skipping to Shadowbringers/70 soon, they can skip the cut scenes, of they can go play something else.



Sometimes they would say in advance and I would be able to find someone, sometimes even if they say in advance it wasn't possible to find someone in time, ,many other times someone would just leave.

they can satisfy both by having an optional way to unlock content.

they can even break the unlocks into smaller chunks, and require some extra adventuring.

like an optional boss in satasha after you kill main boss, who gets you access to up to level 20 content, something at 20 that unlocks up to level 30 content etc.

[TarynH]

Anything that starts off mentioning "rose-tinted glasses" is bound to be great. I still sub to XI off and on (status: currently subbed), so it's not just nostalgia talking as your comment would imply. You removed the rather vital part of my complaint - the 100% forced completion.

The rose-tinted glasses were for me. You can't remember FFXI "right" unless you wear them. =P

But to your point, you said "They didn't force full MSQ completion on you." And I gave you many places where they did. It's hard to compare the two, because they're different monsters. That's why I said it depends on how you look at it.

XI at initial release didn't even have the Shadow Lord fight, and there was no reason to even finish the story. However, when they added Dynamis, (basically the first endgame content) you needed full MSQ completion of the original content to access it. That would be the equivalent of needing to finish patch 2.0 MSQ to access Binding Coil or Crystal Tower. Which was the case. You didn't need 2.1 story for Tower, but you did need the 2.0 full story. Technically it was 100% completion of the base MSQ + 5-1 and 5-2 (added later) to access Dynamis.

When the endgame content for Zilart was added (Sky), you were required to go through the entire Rise of the Zilart story line to get to Sky. The only thing not required was the very last mission, which took place in Sky. They probably assumed people would finish it off. But here's where XI differed from XIV. There was no additional story added, other than a few CSs later when CoP's ending was combined with Zilart's. So it basically was all of 3.0 without the rest of 3.X. 95% completion of MSQ to access Sky.

When CoP was added, the endgame content of it was exactly like Zilart's. You had to complete all but the final mission to get access to the area (Sea), as well as Limbus. 95% completion of MSQ to access Sea/Limbus.

Around this time is when they decided to add content differently, and began separating things in patches. They actually started doing this during CoP, where they added 6-4 through 8-4 in patches.

ToAU to unlock Salvage, the first endgame content for it, you had to complete up to mission 17 of the MSQ. At initial release, the story only went to mission 8. They added 9-18 later, and then 19-25 before releasing Salvage in an even later patch. If you want to get technical, you had to complete the original ToAU MSQ to access Salvage. Since you had to have the first two patches of MSQ done. The rest of the story came in later patches. So again, 95% completion of original MSQ to access Salvage.

(I'll point out here that I was wrong about Einherjar. It really had no requirements other than level.)

WotG again, had no real "endgame" content, unless you count WoE. Nothing really seemed significant. SoA was so spread out that I find it hard to determine what really was "endgame" content. The entire expansion seemed like a last ditch effort to give players something to do; bringing with it an arbitrary ilvl annoyance factor. However, in both cases there were MSQ requirements.

Land Kings, HNMs, VNMS, ZNMs, BCNMs, etc. were considered endgame, but they're really more like FATEs, trials and hunts in XIV.

So pretending like FFXI isn't a "story driven" game, or didn't require a huge part of the MSQ to access major parts of endgame content, is quite naive. I personally find it hard to compare the two, as they are quite different. But I'm also not denying (hence this post and the other) that XI required participation in the MSQ to access things. Yes, maybe it wasn't "full MSQ" but it was either 95% of an expansion, or a large portion of the original release of each expansion.

However, where XIV differed overall, (and I pointed this out) they decided to do a larger continuous arcing story line that carried over into the new expansion. So therefore finishing the post stories became a requirement to continue through to the expansion stories. Maybe they'll switch things up when/if this story line ends, but it's not the worst thing, and the CSs can be skipped.

Is XIV perfect? Absolutely not. It's lacking major endgame content variety. You can either repeat an 8-man raid for gear, repeat a 24-man raid for gear, or the latest trial for gear. Or you can repeat a rather dull, slightly changing dungeon (HoH/PotD). Eureka (despite being FATEs) was vastly different, and felt a lot like XI's Abyssea (of all things); where you had to kill a certain amount of monsters to spawn a NM. So I enjoyed it, but I also hated aspects of it. The light grinds alone felt forced. I wish they'd just kept the crystal system from Anemos through the whole thing. Other than those things, the endgame content just isn't varied enough.

XI isn't perfect either. In fact, I talk frequently with a friend that plays/played both games with me. And I frequently say I would love to replay about 80% of XI but with XIV's mechanics. Duty Finder to help with MSQ fights. Faster streamlined traveling, faster gameplay overall, etc. etc. The list goes on. XI is very hard to get back into and catch up. XIV has a ton of catch up mechanics built in. XI is very slow. When you I go back to it, I sometimes wonder how I ever sat through things. (Probably because I felt invested in it.) Just changing jobs through the menu system, and equipping gear seems so annoying compared to XIV.

As for XIV game content, if you truly feel there isn't a lot to do outside of the story, what exactly do you do once you've put in your few hours to complete the latest story patches?

Basically I level everything at a leisurely pace. I like doing daily/weekly hunts, beast tribes. Crafting, and working on some of the achievements they've been adding (like the ones for crafting/gathering tools). Eureka took up a huge portion of my time in this expansion. And it's not like I don't do raids, but they do get tiring pretty quickly. 24-man are more fun than 8-man imo. Other than that, I play other games or invest time in other hobbies. I usually look forward to new MSQ, and Hildy quests. I honestly wish they'd add more side quest things like the Scholasticate quests. I feel I'm the only one sometimes that's disappointed the MSQ has been cut way back due to ARR backlash.

[Lemuel81]

If FFXIV didn't have much of a story and cutscenes, I would probably lose interest very quickly. It can be a little overwhelming for new players, but the game was meant to be done over time. There is an option to skip it but you do it at a cost. Whenever a friend has an interest in this game, I make it clear that this is a story driven game that unlike most mmos, it is harder to plow through it. If that is what someone desires, FFXIV is not the game for them.

[TarynH]

If FFXIV didn't have much of a story and cutscenes, I would probably lose interest very quickly. It can be a little overwhelming for new players, but there is an option to skip it but you do it at a cost. Whenever a friend has an interest in this game, I make it clear that this is a story driven game that unlike most mmos, it is harder to plow through it. If that is what someone desires, FFXIV is not the game for them.

The thing is, is that the story in XIV is basically the game. Like, it is the content. Other than repeated dungeons and raids, there is very little to do at the "end." The content side of the game is rather shallow and doesn't require a large investment in time. Mainly because the gear can be replaced in a matter of months by simply waiting for the next patch. The biggest time investment is relic weapons, and even that is optional and replaceable. People joke about glamour being the true endgame, and they're not far off.

This is why I don't understand why anyone new would want to skip the story. I get it for someone doing alt characters, but I don't understand new players wanting to skip it all. It's like buying a game where you can just click "skip to end" at the start menu, and fight the final boss to see the credits. No context. No journey. No story. Just skip to the last/latest fight, and repeat it.

That said, I can agree to the OP's complaint to some degree. There are a lot of unnecessary CSs in the game. For instance, I tend to skip the dungeon flyover CSs. I'd rather just see the dungeons as I'm going through them. Almost everything can be skipped though, so it's not a huge deal. And there is an option to never see them again after the initial first time. I don't get wanting to skip them all, but to each their own.