MSQ Needs Further Condensing

[Rilifane]

For new players, CT is now required at its intended point in the story in post-ARR.

And the requirement couldn't have been placed more poorly in my opinion.
At the point where new players notice they need to complete the full CT series, they are a few quests away from Ishgard. Although they condensed the post-ARR story quite a bit, the players clicked their way through over 70 quests only to be stopped last second by a mandatory three part alliance raid.
I would bet my last shirt that most of them will happily skip through all the cut scenes because they just want to start with the HW story. The CT series doesn't start with anything that makes it seem particulary important in the grand scheme of things either. By the time they reach ShB, most will have already forgotten what happened, if they even watched the cutscenes and paid attention to what this is about.

[Iscah]

I would bet my last shirt that most of them will happily skip through all the cut scenes because they just want to start with the HW story. The CT series doesn't start with anything that makes it seem particulary important in the grand scheme of things either. By the time they reach ShB, most will have already forgotten what happened, if they even watched the cutscenes and paid attention to what this is about.

And I would bet that the people who skip through all of CT because the first cutscene seemed boring will also skip through a lot of other cutscenes. And they'd probably skip through it no matter where you put it in the narrative.

The sheer fact that you're required to do it should be enough to make people realise it's probably important to pay attention - and even if they skip the first few bits, they well may have had their interest piqued by the point we're opening up voidgates and fighting the Cloud of Darkness. If they haven't, they probably don't care by the time they hit Shadowbringers either.

CT happens at Lv50. That is just how the story is supposed to go. It also first gets called back to much earlier than Shadowbringers, specifically with Nero's reappearance in post-Heavensward. While the scene is written to work whether the player encountered him in CT or last saw him at the Praetorium, the intent is that you have been through CT already and it better explains why we're willing to trust him at that point.


Edit to add: If it's a concern that "even if they paid attention they will have forgotten by Shadowbringers", that would cause problems in numerous other situations as well - and probably with media in general. Characters and plot points do get brought back later, and while it's understandable that someone who played ARR five years ago might have forgotten a side story, I think I would be concerned for the memory of someone who played the whole game through in a couple of months while paying attention to the story, yet couldn't remember the events of CT at least well enough for things to become clear at the reveal.

[Rilifane]

And I would bet that the people who skip through all of CT because the first cutscene seemed boring will also skip through a lot of other cutscenes. And they'd probably skip through it no matter where you put it in the narrative.

The sheer fact that you're required to do it should be enough to make people realise it's probably important to pay attention - and even if they skip the first few bits, they well may have had their interest piqued by the point we're opening up voidgates and fighting the Cloud of Darkness. If they haven't, they probably don't care by the time they hit Shadowbringers either.

CT happens at Lv50. That is just how the story is supposed to go. It also first gets called back to much earlier than Shadowbringers, specifically with Nero's reappearance in post-Heavensward. While the scene is written to work whether the player encountered him in CT or last saw him at the Praetorium, the intent is that you have been through CT already and it better explains why we're willing to trust him at that point.


Edit to add: If it's a concern that "even if they paid attention they will have forgotten by Shadowbringers", that would cause problems in numerous other situations as well - and probably with media in general. Characters and plot points do get brought back later, and while it's understandable that someone who played ARR five years ago might have forgotten a side story, I think I would be concerned for the memory of someone who played the whole game through in a couple of months while paying attention to the story, yet couldn't remember the events of CT at least well enough for things to become clear at the reveal.

You're going from the perspective of an experienced player who knows how the game works for years now and, from what I've read from you, is generally immensly interested in story and lore and wishes to explore everything there is to it.
However, not every new player has the same perspective and you're wrong if you think people are either lore fans from the get go or skip everything anyway and might be playing the wrong game. Most of the new players we got in NN (actual new players, not alt chars mind you) are generally interested in the story and don't skip it but they have a limit and there comes a point when they want to progress aswell. Plus a lot of them thought CT series is mandatory because you simply have to finish more or less all 50 content before you can progress to HW.
They thought it would be same at 60, that the alliance raid series is mandatory again.
Most do watch the cutscenes and generally enjoy it but ARR is still rather lenghty, CT series takes a lot of time aswell. So in the end, many powered through it because as I said... there is a limit. And that's fine, it's human. Not everyone is an absolute story nerd, most seem generally interested in it but they don't put it above all and want to do other things aswell.
This is not something I make up because I secretly hate story and questing, it's something I've observed for many weeks now and we had to remind people day after day that yes, CT cutscenes should be watched even if they don't find it too interesting on it's own or don't see the signifcance yet.

The game doesn't force you to complete side content in order because normal raids and alliance raids are optional side content nobody has to do. Also a lot of side content cross references to other side content and it would make more sense story-wise to everything exactly in order and complete all ARR content before progressing to HW and so on, but they don't force you to. If you're fine with not doing it in order or even not doing something at all, it's your choice. Since CT is tied to ShB, I think it would've been fine to make it a requirement to start ShB. That way people have more time to unlock it at their own leisure and it would make it a little easier for new players because they don't get bombarded with everything at once and have the option to split it.

[Iscah]

You're going from the perspective of an experienced player who knows how the game works for years now and, from what I've read from you, is generally immensly interested in story and lore and wishes to explore everything there is to it.

That's true to a point - I was always interested in pursuing the whole story that was being presented and paying attention to it in case it tied into other things, but I'm not arguing for it to be included at Lv50 "from the perspective of an experienced player" but because I think it needs to be in that place for the sake of a new, story-interested player.

As I previously wrote, it's the intended place in the story and it's an intermediate step in other characters' stories where the next step takes place well before Shadowbringers, particularly for Nero at Lv60. And while it's true that optional stories aren't all forced to be undertaken at their intended points in the story, by essentially promoting CT to be a thread of MSQ, it seems more important to keep it in the correct sequence.

If people are going to assume it unimportant and rush through, they're as likely to do that in their eagerness to get to Shadowbringers as they were to get to Heavensward - with the added frustration that the gameplay is 20 levels below their current point in the story.

But on top of that, for the sake of people who do care about the story, I just think it's necessary for CT to have that breathing space.

It would seem rather rushed for G'raha to make his sacrifice of being shut in the tower just to immediately reappear in the story and be let out not that long after. It seems right for it to be a longer wait.

And I don't think it's critical for the player to work out it's him right away so long as they remember him once they see his face, and I have a hard time believing that people would forget him completely if they paid attention to the story when they first played it.

I would imagine at least part of the problem is due to veteran players telling newbies that post-ARR is awful and they should rush through it to get to Heavensward. I see people advising new players to skip cutscenes because there's nothing of value in them. The mindset is encouraged to dismiss that part of the game, when really the MSQ does a lot of important stuff there. It's just unfortunate that it's padded out.