Please allow us to update the game without active subscription

[Maeka]

So I know a friend who commented that they wanted to buy 30 days of subscription to try out ShB, but they lamented that they are going to lose out on 2-3 days of subscription time just trying to download the simply massive update (they've been away for awhile).

And that brought me to an idea -- why is it we cannot update the game and then sub up so we're not wasting a lot of our subscription on days we can't even play because we're still downloading?

[MiniTofu]

You can copy the FFXIV files to a USB and ship it or transfer it for your friend.

You know to ship a 500GB data on hard drive by airplane is faster than Internet. This is true...

[Maeka]

You can copy the FFXIV files to a USB and ship it or transfer it for your friend.

You know to ship a 500GB data on hard drive by airplane is faster than Internet. This is true...

Unless of course they live "across the pond" and then that comes into being... quite an expensive and time-wasting ordeal even to ship a USB drive overseas.

But really, this is such a basic thing, that expecting someone to sub up before they can begin downloading 12 GB of data is just....

... yeah. It's kinda ridiculous.

[CazzT]

You can copy the FFXIV files to a USB and ship it or transfer it for your friend.

You know to ship a 500GB data on hard drive by airplane is faster than Internet. This is true...

How slow is your internet speed?!
500g would take me less than a day (assuming the sender isn't throttling their upload)

[Caitlinzulu]

eum, even downloading 12 GB of data only takes like an hour or two.
My laptop got hit by the framerate bug introduced in shadowbringers and trying to fix it i reinstalled the game all 42 Gb of it. Took 5 hours.
Your friend must really have very extremely bad internet connection for it to take 3 days to download.
So to be honest i dont quite see the problem here?

[Warlyx]

hmmm a possible solution is creating a trial account ,log using trial account download and then log in with regular account

[LalaRu]

afaik trial accounts will update the full game anyway

[Nora_of_Mira]

why is it we cannot update the game and then sub up so we're not wasting a lot of our subscription on days we can't even play because we're still downloading?

probably the SE perspective: your sub only pays for access to the game, and the data is literally what you get once you have obtained access. I think your friend just needs to bite the bullet as 2-3 days lost of a 2 year expansion isn't a huge loss.

[Macleod]

I never really understood this about FFXIV either, because all the other MMOs I've ever played update the game without having to log in with an active sub. I remember when I first bought the game a few years ago, and installed the launcher etc. thinking I'd get the game downloaded and updated before setting up my sub so I didn't waste a day of my sub downloading and patching, then was abruptly halted by being required to log in to the launcher with an active sub, I was like WTF...

[SamSmoot]

hmmm a possible solution is creating a trial account ,log using trial account download and then log in with regular account

Unless he has existing character, which the trial account won't see. Still, this is a good idea if you can install the trial to a different folder, then after it's downloaded and updated, copy the updated files into the active game folder. (Assuming you can find out which files to copy.)
One the updated game with original characters is up and running, close and uninstall the trial.