Why does everyone complain about STORY based MMO's?

[Kazhar]

Not if you are a new player.

I haven't played WoW, but I have looked into the new player experience quite a while back.

Now my memory is foggy, so anyone more familiar can speak up, but WoW does not care about it's legacy content at all. It's there to be blasted through to get to new content to the point once you were ready for the current expansion it would put you at the expansion start.

Like, could you imagine FF just dropping you at the start of Endwalker as soon as you hit 80? It seems absurd currently because the game loves its legacy content so much.

FF definitely does not rush the new player to max level.

Isn't their entire point about the fact WoW is not the only other MMO? And yet you're comparing it to WoW again.

[Irenia]

I was responding to a post saying WoW and FF both rush players to the endgame. The games have their differences, and that is one of many.

EDIT: If their point is that WoW is not the only MMO to compare to, then that post kind of fails at it.

[vetch]

Not if you are a new player.

I haven't played WoW, but I have looked into the new player experience quite a while back.

Now my memory is foggy, so anyone more familiar can speak up, but WoW does not care about it's legacy content at all. It's there to be blasted through to get to new content to the point once you were ready for the current expansion it would put you at the expansion start.

Like, could you imagine FF just dropping you at the start of Endwalker as soon as you hit 80? It seems absurd currently because the game loves its legacy content so much.

FF definitely does not rush the new player to max level.

WoW was always designed so you could abandon quests if you weren't interested in them and move to a new zone, as long as you had the minimum level for it. That is not new; that is how WoW works. I was doing it all the way back in TBC. All that has changed is the pacing; in early WoW it would have been unheard of for a mid-level character to gain 5 levels in a day. Now it's quite easy to do it in either WoW or FF14 if you have a day off to play.

FF14 is just as irreverent toward its legacy content, unless you think for example that smashing through Labyrinth of the Ancients with a whole raid that's 70 item levels above the release sync is somehow respecting the fight design. It absolutely discourages you from legacy side content since there's no point taking up craftskills or (re)running optional dungeons to keep your armor updated when the combat is easy and the MSQ is going to give you free gear before you ever hit a serious pain point.

You are trying to compare dissimilar design philosophies to make points about pacing instead of simply looking at the pacing. I am a new player, I started in patch 5.3, and FF14 maintains the same rushed pacing, it's just obfuscated because it's running on the parallel track of being an MSQ-driven game instead of a story-optional quest-hub game.

Sure, if you drop quests in WoW as soon as you qualify for a new xpac, then it seems like you're speeding through the game. But the FF14 equivalent would be skipping cutscenes and mashing through dialogue, and that goes through the game just as fast. In both cases you're refusing to take an interest in the plotlines, exploration, worldbuilding, NPCs, etc. that the quests offer.

Both communities rush people to endgame, too, albeit for different reasons and by different ways. Do you really think the common mantra told to new players that they should "stick it out through the early game story because it's going to get really good in ShB" somehow isn't encouraging them to skip on experiencing legacy content?

[Striker44]

You are trying to compare dissimilar design philosophies to make points about pacing instead of simply looking at the pacing. I am a new player, I started in patch 5.3, and FF14 maintains the same rushed pacing, it's just obfuscated because it's running on the parallel track of being an MSQ-driven game instead of a story-optional quest-hub game.

But that's exactly the point about how their different at their very core...

Sure, if you drop quests in WoW as soon as you qualify for a new xpac, then it seems like you're speeding through the game. But the FF14 equivalent would be skipping cutscenes and mashing through dialogue, and that goes through the game just as fast. In both cases you're refusing to take an interest in the plotlines, exploration, worldbuilding, NPCs, etc. that the quests offer.

But the effects are different when you don't care about the story in a game that doesn't really care about the story vs. when you don't care about the story when the story itself is the central theme.

Both communities rush people to endgame, too, albeit for different reasons and by different ways. Do you really think the common mantra told to new players that they should "stick it out through the early game story because it's going to get really good in ShB" somehow isn't encouraging them to skip on experiencing legacy content?

Say what? The earliest I typically see people say it really picks up is HW, which is the very first expansion. And even that's quieted down a bit (not completely, but a bit) since they finally streamlined the post-ARR pre-HW sequence. I'm not sure I've ever seen anyone say the game doesn't get really good until ShB...

[Irenia]

So it's a pacing thing. Got it. Understandable.

And you note that WoW is quest hub and FFXIV is an MSQ game. Which is true.

My argument is that because FF is an MSQ game, it cannot rush you to endgame because it is so focused on the MSQ. The overgearing that happens is not in order for you to get to max level, it's in order to show you the next cutscene or setpiece. You are right that the level 50 alliance raids are... broken, to put it lightly, but FF is so excited about its story content that it does not care - make the MSQ longer and shove the raid series in anyway.

As far as what I recall from my research of WoW, I recall the person saying that they were experiencing old storylines on their new character (Chrombie Time, I think?) and when they got to the starting level for the current expansion the game just kicked them out. It left an impression on me because that is the game actively saying "Don't worry about that old stuff, here's the new hotness".

Whatever you can say about FFXIV, it *wants* to show you the old cutscenes and the like.

[AmiableApkallu]

You are trying to compare dissimilar design philosophies to make points about pacing instead of simply looking at the pacing. I am a new player, I started in patch 5.3, and FF14 maintains the same rushed pacing, it's just obfuscated because it's running on the parallel track of being an MSQ-driven game instead of a story-optional quest-hub game.

Sure, if you drop quests in WoW as soon as you qualify for a new xpac, then it seems like you're speeding through the game. But the FF14 equivalent would be skipping cutscenes and mashing through dialogue, and that goes through the game just as fast. In both cases you're refusing to take an interest in the plotlines, exploration, worldbuilding, NPCs, etc. that the quests offer.

Both communities rush people to endgame, too, albeit for different reasons and by different ways.

I, too, started when Patch 5.something was current. Really, what you're saying is that players rush themselves and other players to the end game.

There's nothing in the game itself that makes or requires you to speed through it; there's nothing in the game that prevents you from stopping to smell the proverbial roses. I cleared maps of every little side quest marker as soon as they popped up. I made it a point to do all the optional x0 dungeons before moving on to the next expac. I was still working my way through post-ShB when Endwalker dropped, and I was at peace with that.

The only thing you miss out on is going into a dungeon or trial with a full party of first-timers who know nothing of what to expect, but that's unavoidable short of organizing your life around when patches drop.