Online Store is Getting Worse!

[SturmChurro]

agreed, the only thing I think is truly predatory is the retainers, but players have accepted it, so it is what it is.

Right. Retainers. I don't really use them so they weren't on my mind, but I do recall complaints about them in the past. I think it really depends. People were more accepting of the cash shop in the past, or things like retainers, but things can change very quickly.

I'm not saying SDS Fenrir is predatory, but the little speed boost sure is nice.

I don't think I'd personally label it "predatory" either, but yeah, I'm sure that speed boost is nice. I don't have that mount.

[Skivvy]

I think it's safe to say a lot of the items wouldn't exist without the cash shop.

I agree with this. However, I don't think FFXIV's cash shop is really predatory yet, people can argue the pricing, but that's not really predatory, in my opinion. Predatory would be if they were doing "limited time" sales, items on rotation, premium battlepass, lootboxes, pay for convenience, etc..

One of my bigger annoyances, which I just discovered recently, is the fact that they sell retainer level skips on the cash shop. I've always hated how your retainer reverts back to level one when you switch jobs, even when switching to jobs you previously had at max level. Instead of fixing this in-game, they've gone the simple route of just selling you a quick solution.

And then there's the selling of retainers in general. Before that was a thing, there had been several quotes floating around how they couldn't add extra storage because of <reasons>, but then that went away once they could charge you for them. And we can't forget the extra retainer if you pay for the companion app. I would have liked to have seen them focus more on reducing item bloat and creating better storage systems (glamour logs, material banks, etc), but at this point, are they really going to want to get rid of all that extra retainer profit? Only SE knows the answer to that one. :X

These definitely fall more into the predatory category for me since the in-game options are optimized poorly. I realize those are incredibly mild compared to what you can find in other games, but I don't think that gives SE a pass. Then there's the issue of them just being greedy AF as a whole with their pricing models, lack of account-wide items, sheer number of paid options in a subscription game, etc....

[Catwho]

Retainers are just the XIV version of XI's mules. FFXI charged you an extra dollar for each character on the same account. However, most of us just used them as storage and extra market board slots.

So XIV gave you actual extra characters for free, and made it very difficult to use those extra characters as storage, but added retainers that are easily accessible on the main account for that same purpose, instead.

(I still have an extra character for pure storage, but that's because I am in charge of the FC and the friggin chest was full of airship junk nobody was using.)

[Rolder50]

I think that rising costs of store items will only drive more and more people to mod the game

can only imagine where this ends up leading us

Yep, no point in buying fancy outfits off the store when you can download a huge variety of high quality outfits online for free.

[Atelier-Bagur]

Yep, no point in buying fancy outfits off the store when you can download a huge variety of high quality outfits online for free.

Probably by then it gets so out of hand that it forces SE's hand to implement anti-cheat or whatever

[Rolder50]

Probably by then it gets so out of hand that it forces SE's hand to implement anti-cheat or whatever

Kind of already is that far. Looking at a certain illicit website and it has 18000+ mods with the top ones having 300k+ downloads

[Silverbane]

Yep, no point in buying fancy outfits off the store when you can download a huge variety of high quality outfits online for free.

Except no one can see you're mod-based outfits but you.
Limsa Lominsa Aetheryte Plaza demonstrates why that's an issue:
for many people, glams are for others to see, as well as oneself.

Add to that the risk that a popular mod may eventually be hijacked to serve as a cyberattack vector, and it seems likely that there will always be a large market for authentic glams.

[Atelier-Bagur]

Kind of already is that far. Looking at a certain illicit website and it has 18000+ mods with the top ones having 300k+ downloads

By that I mean if people start making a lot of noise that the devs or mods start catching them often ( which lately that seems to be the case with a lot of streamers) where they realize the actual epidemic.

Right now, I'm assuming a lot in the team actively go out of their way to not look up the sites otherwise they'd be implementing the ban hammer so hard. They're in that awkward middle of acknowledging that it exists but not knowing HOW HARD are these mods existing for the game.

Which again goes back to my issue about people downloading mods that fix or add much requested features into the game when doing so makes it very less likely that the actual dev team will pay attention to these requests, when it does garner a lot of traction. Which is why a lot of official QoL stuff tends to take so long to implement I imagine.

Keep complaining to have them add these features, don't get lazy and complacent and have the playerbase do it. Get SE, it's their job to improve this game.

[Rolder50]

Except no one can see you're mod-based outfits but you.
Limsa Lominsa Aetheryte Plaza demonstrates why that's an issue:
for many people, glams are for others to see, as well as oneself.

Add to that the risk that a popular mod may eventually be hijacked to serve as a cyberattack vector, and it seems likely that there will always be a large market for authentic glams.

Ah ha so you already know about the plugin that lets you share appearances, but also show you don't know how it works by implying that. Good to know.

[Midareyukki]

Keep complaining to have them add these features, don't get lazy and complacent and have the playerbase do it got SE, it's their job to improve this game.

...wait, but when we point out that Hrothgar and Viera are getting fixes with such things and ask the devs to improve on it, people go haywire :x