Stop Gating The MSQ By A GOd-Aweful Dungeon Grind :(

[Pintsized]

So having come back to the game last November I finally got a character through the 5.0 MSQ and proceeded to hit a brick wall: the first 5.1 dungeon with it's asinine iLevel gate of 430!

The last 5.0 dungeon's gate was 410 and wasn't a problem since the MSQ chain had gradually provided gear sufficient to be able to enter Amaurot.

But even after getting the 430 gear from the Role quest completion the bling levels are still terrible, meaning my Bard's iLevel was less than 420. The only way to unlock the 430 gate for the Grand Cosmos was to grind umpteen Amaurots, etc. to get enough bling or else buy 450 crafted gear; I did this, it cost me nigh on 1m gil simply for the bling and a waist item to reach 430.

What the hell is a new player supposed to do here? I have a few million gil from playing since 2010, without that I'd have packed in the game as I have zero intention of spending weeks in dungeons grinding gear or tokens to unlock STORY CONTENT!

Of course, 5.2 no doubt will increase the gate to 440, or God forbid 450, putting the MSQ even more out of reach for those who don't want to spend all their time in dungeons!

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Run some roulettes at max level, get tomes, buy gear with tomes. Gearing in this game is incredibly easy.

[SamSmoot]

It may be an issue with running through the whole MSQ in one run. For players who started from the beginning, you'd get a new expansion or patch with a new set of dungeons and raid, then nothing for many months. Everyone just geared up running the existing content until the next patch, and by that time you were geared enough to run the 430 dungeon.

If you just blow through the whole MSQ, you don't have the gearing up mid-patch phases. The gear you get from the MSQ just equips you for that patch's content, and not the next one.

[SturmChurro]

I don't remember ever being locked out of a dungeon in ShadowBringers. Odd.

Oh wait, you are rushing through the story for the patch right? A new player needs to get the gear like everyone else did. By doing the dungeons, expert, and everything in-between.

[TheMightyMollusk]

Level 80 job gear is at 430 (and completing a role quest and meeting the vendor is required as part of the main story, so you have no excuse at all to skip it), as are the accessories dropped in Amaurot, Akademia Annyder, and the Twinning. Between that and the Goetia tomes earned from those three dungeons (which can be traded in Eulmore for Ronkan gear at 440), you should be easily be able to pass a 430 item level.

[Packetdancer]

What the hell is a new player supposed to do here?

For 5.1? Ronkan gear. You buy it in Eulmore with tomestones of Goetia, and those are thick on the ground and lack a weekly cap. Buy a full set and you're at i440. Buy just the right-side accessories—which is considerably less than the 2000 tomestone cap on Goetia—and combine them with the left-side i430 role gear and you'll still beat the i430 level requirement.

When 5.2 lands, Phantasmagoria will have the weekly cap removed (like Goetia is now), and the Deepshadow gear will presumably become as easily attained as Ronkan is now. Even with i450 as an ilevel requirement, just plain unaugmented Deepshadow gear will get you to a more-than-sufficient i460. Augmenting it would get you to i470, which is on-par with the current Edengrace savage raid gear in terms of ilevel.

I mean, I do get that the ilevel requirements can feel obnoxious when you slam into them unexpectedly. But even if you need to replace everything and only do your daily roulettes (once each) and general whatever-you-do-in-game, I feel like you could have the necessary Goetia for Ronkan gear in 5.1 (and presumably Phantasmagoria for Deepshadow in 5.2) within two days, three at most, even as just a casual player and without any grind whatsoever.

Now, if you wanted to skip Ronkan entirely and go right to Deepshadow in 5.1... yeah, that would be a multi-week process and involve at least a little grind. But the plain i460 Deepshadow gear—much less the i470 Augmented Deepshadow—is way more than was needed for the Grand Cosmos' i430 requirement; if you don't raid, i470 is just massive overkill in 5.1.

[Frizze]

Or unlock the Eden raids. Take a belt or accessory from each of the first two floors. The last two floors you can try to get both halves of the hat gloves or boots. Thats running 4 new pieces of content once each, getting potentially 3 pieces of gear upgraded, and also having the prerequisite done to start the new raid tier when the new patch happens. Then when you finish those plus cosmos, unlock and run the alliance raid once. If you get lucky a piece for your class will drop(each run drops 10 random pieces, there are 7 gear sets to pick between - so the odds arent horrible but no guarantees) and you can have a straight i460 upgrade to help in the process of getting ready for the new 5.2 dungeon. Plus the first time bonuses for all these runs should have given you enough Goatia to upgrade at least one more piece of jewelry to 440.

[Vidu]

Please try this perspective: Gear is the main progression after reaching max-level and people want to see their progress - so dungeons cant synch your gear down to much or else it would invalidate our gear-progression. That means that dungeons need to be balanced around an ilvl that isnt max-ilvl but always a bit higher than that of the previous patch. At least I'd feel "betrayed" if I went into the 5.2 to be synched down back to an 5.0 ilvl - why the hell did I grind better gear then, if it doesnt even matter in the end? So the minimum ilvl for dungeons need to increase along side the overall maximum ilvl.
However I wouldnt want to slug through the next storydungeon with someone who barely has an ilvl of 430 - which is gonna be about 60 ilvls below the max ilvl of 5.2, I assume

That doesnt mean that you have to spend "weeks" grinding or millions of gil, though.

Here are a few easy ways to get better gear:
1) Tomestones - yes, they are an option that doesnt require weeks of grinding. Ilvl440 accessories are currently 180 goetia-tomes; one run of Amarout will give you 80, an expert roulette 60 - so 4 expert roulettes will get you 3 accessories, which should be all you need to push your ilvl.
2) Gear drops from the dungeons themself - you gotta be very unlucky to NOT collect a few pieces here and there to help you catch up
3) Eden NM - the ilvl for the NM-raid might actually be lower than the one for the storydungeon, as is currently the case (425 vs. 430). Accessories and belt only need one drop for turning in, other pieces need a few more - either way: quick and easy 450 gear, provided you dont have bad luck with your rolls. The raid also provides a story, so if its mainly the stroy experience you seek, you're not wasting your time by unlocking it.
4) 24-man-raid: Currently needs an ilvl of 435, but drops 460 gear. Following some of the 1-3 steps should provide you with the needed ilvl.
5) Join a newbie/retuner friendly FC with crafters who are willing to craft the odd piece for free for you - personally I do that all the time for people in our FC who dont have much time to play or are returning from a longer break. Alternativly you can find a crafter whos willing to craft some gear for you as long as you provide the mats, which might be cheaper than buying the piece itself.

Also: at least on my server the crafted gear is dirt cheap by now - if its rather expensive on your server, server-hoping within your datacenter might help to find you some better deals.

[ElazulHP]

The only thing more obnoxious would be to run a dungeon with an undergeared tank or healer that can't perform their role due to being severely undergeared for the content. The ilvl requirement is there for a reason.

[Stepjam]

Gear up through Eden, then Nier, snd all the while you are gaining tomestones for gear.

You'll be caught up before you know it