Taking breaks doesnt work for me.

[Rolder50]

Get into extreme and savage for the fun of clearing it and you'll have content for years.

How so? They only release 4 savage bosses every 8 months, that's hardly anything.

[ZephyrMenodora]

I feel like the "it's time to move on" argument is silly defensiveness of the game. When the story focus is done with, the glaring issues of the game reveal themselves easily. Let's be honest, unless you make the game your life/job by submitting to the raiding paradigm the combat of the game is pretty bland at this point. As someone into crafting and gathering (and by extension housing) as well as access to social things even I can ackowledge those are bandaids for meh gameplay.

Or....life is short and there are many other games or things to experience than just FFXIV. I take breaks when I'm bored and done with the game's content, sometimes for over a year and let the patches pile up. I don't create a list of all of the game's content and explain how I don't like any of it and then just hope for ???????? (I don't even know what OP wants out of a game) so I can keep playing.

Other games, some of which I spent 5 to 10 years on and spent $15K+ IRL on, just ran their course and I moved on permanently. Other games I bought and only played a few hours before deciding it's not for me. Not really about feeling the need to white knight this or any game.

[Saraide]

How so? They only release 4 savage bosses every 8 months, that's hardly anything.

Presumably OP has a massive backlog of extreme, savage and ultimate fights to go through. That is going to take anyone who isnt going hardcore at it a very long time.

[Padudu]

Or....life is short

Man, how the recent years have been, feels like life is way too goddang long lol.

[RyuDragnier]

Man, how the recent years have been, feels like life is way too goddang long lol.

I'll say, how long have we been stuck in the year 2020?

[Jeeqbit]

How so? They only release 4 savage bosses every 8 months, that's hardly anything.

Those 4 bosses take time to progress for most people. Even for the relative minority that hardcore prog and clear it all week 1, they have reclears for weeks. This tier a lot of people were stuck at various points for weeks, whether it's devour, harvests or P8S which I've met plenty of people stuck on for months.

Then there are 2 extremes released in that time, which although easier are meant to be farmed for the mount unlike savage which is meant for that one reclear a week. Being easier is more conducive to farming.

And now we get criterion dungeons in this time and we have had 2 ultimates, one for each tier, so far.

You could even argue that Eureka Orthos 31-99 is high-end content just because unless someone in the group is actually good enough to solo you're all going to wipe to something, if not the enemies then some of the bosses.

As far as raid-level content goes we have had lots of it this expansion.

[caffe_macchiato]

Or....life is short and there are many other games or things to experience than just FFXIV. I take breaks when I'm bored and done with the game's content, sometimes for over a year and let the patches pile up. I don't create a list of all of the game's content and explain how I don't like any of it and then just hope for ???????? (I don't even know what OP wants out of a game) so I can keep playing.

Well, for some people (not us), they expect Square Enix to provide a service for the duration of the subscription period, much like Netflix provides new content each month. They expect $65 ($13 x 5 months) worth of content per patch cycle. And obviously Square Enix isn’t capable of that. They’re not Blizzard or HoYoverse after all.

Now, it goes without saying, but a few people (like us) pay our $13 for something besides gameplay. Me? I wish I could be playing VRChat, but I can’t wear headsets. And don’t get me started on Second Life. So it’s FFXIV for me. Having a 3D avatar with your friends is well sought-after these days. If we only had the gameplay, this game would be dead. Playing FFXIV for the gameplay is like watching porn for the story.

[Turtledeluxe]

Well, for some people (not us), they expect Square Enix to provide a service for the duration of the subscription period, much like Netflix provides new content each month. They expect $65 ($13 x 5 months) worth of content per patch cycle. And obviously Square Enix isn’t capable of that. They’re not Blizzard or HoYoverse after all.

Now, it goes without saying, but a few people (like us) pay our $13 for something besides gameplay. Me? I wish I could be playing VRChat, but I can’t wear headsets. And don’t get me started on Second Life. So it’s FFXIV for me. Having a 3D avatar with your friends is well sought-after these days. If we only had the gameplay, this game would be dead. Playing FFXIV for the gameplay is like watching porn for the story.

Yep and I can't hate on your perspective at all. I think FFXIV is a premium option for this kind of consumer in fact.

[Turtledeluxe]

Or....life is short and there are many other games or things to experience than just FFXIV. I take breaks when I'm bored and done with the game's content, sometimes for over a year and let the patches pile up. I don't create a list of all of the game's content and explain how I don't like any of it and then just hope for ???????? (I don't even know what OP wants out of a game) so I can keep playing.

Other games, some of which I spent 5 to 10 years on and spent $15K+ IRL on, just ran their course and I moved on permanently. Other games I bought and only played a few hours before deciding it's not for me. Not really about feeling the need to white knight this or any game.

I think your mileage varies depending on if you're an older player or not. I haven't leveled a second or third job until recently and I have just found (perhaps bc I was coming from a year of BLM) jobs feel samey and safe and the majority of content is too easy.

The real truth is that XIV is a game for story, RP, or very high end content for limit periods. Everything else feels pretty safe. It's kind of weird too because their storytelling actually does take risks and is very satisfying (imo).

[ZephyrMenodora]

I think your mileage varies depending on if you're an older player or not. I haven't leveled a second or third job until recently and I have just found (perhaps bc I was coming from a year of BLM) jobs feel samey and safe and the majority of content is too easy.

The real truth is that XIV is a game for story, RP, or very high end content for limit periods. Everything else feels pretty safe. It's kind of weird too because their storytelling actually does take risks and is very satisfying (imo).

I only just got around in 2023 (starting in 2014 with many breaks) to levelling more than my typical 2 jobs per expansion and while there is some overlap, there is enough little nuances to keep things interesting to me. It's way better than my other MMO (Elder Scrolls Online) where every dps character plays almost exaclty same (Buff, Buff, dot, dot, dot, spammable, repeat) and often with cross-class skills that are actually the same.

Content that I choose to do is easy but just challenging enough that I'm engaged, aside from most of the early ARR dungeons and Crystal Tower.