My problem with leveling up in FFXIV.

[linay]

I was not saying FFXIV has too much reading and traveling. I was just asking if anyone else feels like they spend most their time reading and traveling and not interacting with what little time they may have.

when I don't have a lot of time and I have been working all day I want game time that I'm more involved in.

That's essentially saying the same thing. You have time you've allocated to play FFXIV, and you think the amount of reading and traveling there is to do is not giving you room to do things you'd rather be doing.

There's nothing wrong with that, but I don't take that view as I think reading and traveling is part of engaging with the content and thus being involved in it (at least for the first playthrough).

Again, you're in control of how you spend your time, but the game is what it is.

[Makeda]

I really think a lot of people are missing what I'm saying. I was not saying FFXIV has too much reading and traveling. I was just asking if anyone else feels like they spend most their time reading and traveling and not interacting with what little time they may have. I understand lore and reading text and story is part of an RPG. I'm not new to this as I have played a ton of MMOs and single player RPGs. Again the point was when I don't have a lot of time and I have been working all day I want game time that I'm more involved in. It's not a dig at the game, it's more about my situation really. I will admit that ffxiv has more reading than I think it needs but it's no deal breaker.

FFXIV straddles an odd point between single-player RPG, super casual-MMO, and extreme-hardcore-MMO.

Until Stormblood it hadn't quite found the right balance for all of that. It got good with Heavensward, but not perfectly so.

The 2.0 stuff is rough. It was passable in 2013 as a good MMO, but it wasn't the top MMO back then for good reason. It was just, good enough to be saved from destruction.

In the 2.0 content (level 1-50) you will see some odd pacing, a lack of purpose for many sidequests (this was actually patched in later as leveling was originally requiring too many side quests), and a whole lot of pointless going-here-and-there... A lot of things have tedious levels of grind to them, masked as MSQ quests. Such as all of the quests with the 'company of heroes' to unlock a primal fight. They didn't quite have an ideal grasp of pacing and they were more focused on making sure the game could regain, if not the love, at least the acceptance of Final Fantasy hardcore fandom.

With the expansions they realized they had a viable game, and they started getting bigger budgets to make things better done.

But the game does keep a LOT of elements that are more typical of a solo-RPG, all the intense focus on the main quest. Something even Elder Scrolls Online doesn't do (and that game is from a company even more known for RPGs, but they subcontracted the MMO and maybe that's what sets it apart).

At times and up to a certain point in progress this is a super casual MMO. Basically 'win' is force-fed to you until the day you queue up for max-level extreme primal and savage raiding.

And then you find this to be arguably one of the most hardcore MMOs on the market (from what I have been told, Guild Wars 2 raiding has the same issue only more extreme) - raiding here is absurdly elitist, petty, hostile, meter-tracking, and hardcore... I see things like adverts for raids calling themselves 'midcore' because they only raid 8-hours a day / 3-4 days a week... and compared to some, they're correct...

(midcore is a term I have only seen here, and basically in games like WoW the same community would be called 'hardcore').

You're in the lull... and sadly this thread has let you see the game does have it's share of elitist jerks. And unlike in WoW where that term is an internal lovingly noted joke for a set of friendly folks, here it is actually a description for one of the sub-communities.

BUT, they're not the majority here...

I suggest stepping back from your thread and the argument you've landed in, because that's not typical of what you'll usually see here. And even once you hit the 'extreme' and 'savage' level of things, friendly casual folks exist - but they are not as easy to find here as in WoW...

(in the pre-raid community WoW is toxic, while WoW raiders are extremely nice and accepting of newbies. The exact opposite is usually true here...)

[Jojoya]

I really think a lot of people are missing what I'm saying. I was not saying FFXIV has too much reading and traveling. I was just asking if anyone else feels like they spend most their time reading and traveling and not interacting with what little time they may have. I understand lore and reading text and story is part of an RPG. I'm not new to this as I have played a ton of MMOs and single player RPGs. Again the point was when I don't have a lot of time and I have been working all day I want game time that I'm more involved in. It's not a dig at the game, it's more about my situation really. I will admit that ffxiv has more reading than I think it needs but it's no deal breaker.

When you're working on the story quests, there's absolutely a lot of time reading (or watching cutscenes) because that's how you learn the story. You're free to skip the reading if you feel it takes too much time and just follow the quest objectives listed in your objective tracker. I know a few players who have done it (though most of them regretted it later when they realized it was a story worth following and they had no clue what had been happening).

Travel time isn't as bad as it seems. It's an important part of the world building and story telling. Things would be boring if everything was happening in the same small location.

It's your situation and what you want to get out of your limited game time that makes some of the posters wonder if this is the right game for you. The MSQ format is what it is, an immersive storytelling experience that isn't likely to appeal to players who want less story and a lot more action. SE is unlikely to change it.

There is plenty of content that is more combat focused that you could be doing, but ultimately it's going to hinder progressing your character if you neglect the MSQ since MSQ blocks access to new locations and new content. The game should feel better once you get caught up to the end of the current MSQ but there's a lot of content you need to get done before you're there - and that's going to mean spending a lot of your time reading and travelling.

Ultimately it's up to you to decide if the game is giving you what you want for your leisure time. MMORPGs can be very difficult to get into when your leisure time for the week is broken up into multiple small blocks of time instead of a few large blocks of time. It's something you need to take into consideration.

[MuseTraveller]

Hello, OP!
Welcome to FF14! As everyone said, early on the game is a bit of a lull. However, I can suggest making a party finder and state you are doing MSQ and would like company. Maybe having someone to chat with will break the monotone? Have you considered joining an FC? However beware of spoilers!

Other than that, do take breaks, try othr jobs, try gathering too. Sadly, yes a lot of the fun content is story gated so you do need to push through. Story gets much better and better paced after ARR.
Good luck!

[Orablast]

Wife and I felt exactly like you, OP. A friend got us started about 3 months ago. We spent the first few weeks following our friend around and leveling quickly and soon realized we were far behind on the MSQ, so we spent week after week only working on the MSQ and felt like we were missing a huge chunk of the game, but at the same time, we wanted to catch up to our friend and play in Shadowbringer.

The best decision we made was boosting our characters to be current in Shadowbringer. We had a blast taking our time, running through all the content & unlocking everything in the expansion. And now it's more fun than ever to play our low level roles, taking our time, not feeling rushed, because we can always switch to our main role now to play with our friend.

[Tanama]

I’m a pretty new player so take this from my point of view but I have had some issues with leveling in the game.

Until you get to the final expansion there seems to be no reason at all to do any questing other than the msq. And yeah FFXIV seems to do a great job for story but the problem for me has been that you do very little gameplay or experiencing the world and spend most your time traveling and reading all the story text. So when I get home at night and have an hour or two to play, the last thing I want to do is read and travel around a map so I end up just playing a low lvl job and doing levees so that I can relax and get some game action.

Am I alone here?

Welcome to Final Fantasy XIV!

As we speak, the developers are at work easing some of the A Realm Reborn content to streamline the pace for new players. Sadly, there is quite a wait for this change as it is currently scheduled for patch 5.3.

[Nedkel]

Wife and I felt exactly like you, OP. A friend got us started about 3 months ago. We spent the first few weeks following our friend around and leveling quickly and soon realized we were far behind on the MSQ, so we spent week after week only working on the MSQ and felt like we were missing a huge chunk of the game, but at the same time, we wanted to catch up to our friend and play in Shadowbringer.

The best decision we made was boosting our characters to be current in Shadowbringer. We had a blast taking our time, running through all the content & unlocking everything in the expansion. And now it's more fun than ever to play our low level roles, taking our time, not feeling rushed, because we can always switch to our main role now to play with our friend.

I just hope you have not bought 70 lvl potion for your job. :f

[Orablast]

I just hope you have not bought 70 lvl potion for your job. :f

No, we haven't bought any potions My wife plays as a WHM and she usually keeps me alive, unless she gets distracted by shinies

For those interested. We had to buy the level boost first, and then a story boost. This gave us some cool minions & various land & flying mounts. It unlocked flying automatically for the previous expansions, which was a welcomed bonus! This allowed us to start a quest that took us to the shadowbringers expansion.

[Ronduwil]

Am I alone here?

I think you are. I've been level 50 for over a month now and just got around to doing the MSQ because I was busy with:

* Beast Tribe Quests/Maxing all my Beast Tribe reps
* Leveling my crafting
* Leveling my gathering
* Bringing all of my jobs up to 50 so that I can desynthesize/convert my old gear without worries
* Clearing my hunt logs on all my classes
* Maxing my Grand Company rank
* Doing the hunt bills for alliance seals that I'm using to buy increased mount speed in all the areas

I admit that there is too much MSQ at level 50 and that it can get tiring, but there is certainly plenty to do.

[Rufalus]

Until you get to the final expansion there seems to be no reason at all to do any questing other than the msq.

This is another kind of design which I feel should be coming to the end of an era - the era of questing type of leveling progression in mmos which peppers maps with quest icons. I've come across so many people who dislike questing and only reluctantly do the ones that are necessary to unlock content. The majority of people on my friend list are like that.

I think an alternative should be an expanded in-game content guide tool which directs you to areas of interest and things you've not yet completed, but not in an overbearing way. You can opt in/out of tracking for certain content like world bosses, npcs who need help, temporary events. Quest chains should be focused on quality over quantity; no filler ones existing only for exp purposes. Instead the content that rewards exp should be focused on longevity / replayability imo. Deep dungeon is the best example in xiv of something that diverges from linear scripted design; I think that design principle should be more of a norm than an exception.