My Alt is an Idiot

[Jojoya]

Literally joke's on me for having an itch to play a Miqo'te, I guess. Seriously, I'm an idiot for trying to make an alt, that's the whole point of the thread.

Again, not an idiot. Telling me that you want to see what it felt like to play as a Miqo'te without using a Fantasia on your main makes a lot more sense to me than saying you wanted the alt to play with friends. Race choice does make a difference in how the game feels as you play. Not unusual for me to feel a weird sense of needing to adjust mentally as I switch from one of my lalafell characters to one of my Roegadyns even though the game is otherwise the same.

Auriele... I don't have a problem with how the aether currents work, nor do I go around sequence breaking when I first went through any of this. My issue is specifically about having no alternatives for my alt. Nothing in your argument addresses that.

But you haven't given a reason for why there need to be alternatives for something that's a simple task compared to most game play. All you've told us is that you don't want to do something you've already done before.

Repeating things you've done before is the MMORPG life. Just about every player could come up with things they don't want to do again but feel the rewards should still be given to their alts. If everyone got their wish, alts wouldn't have anything to do.

Since alts aren't needed to experience everything in the game, the developers haven't found a need to have account-wide content completion or rewards. The few things that are account wide are either additional real money purchases not included in the subscription, or the items earned through the old veterans rewards program. We can't even get them to make a personal house account wide for alts despite the one per server per account restriction.

I'm never even asked for instant flight, just... something to make life easier on an alt. I truly feel like an idiot for making an alt. Square offers no quality of life assistance of any kind (even though it wouldn't hurt anyone), and some of the sentiment I'm getting from the thread is "deal with it" so yeah, lesson learned: I'm not making any more alts.

Don't feel like an idiot. You tried something. You've decided it's not right for you. There's no shame in that.

There's also no shame in making a suggestion for change but you also have to be willing to deal with dissenting opinions if you make those suggestions in a public forum. The public forum is a great place if you want others to review your ideas and discuss pros/cons.

If you just want to submit a suggestion without the additional discussion, I would suggest submitting it through the in-game Help Desk. If I'm being honest, I suspect that it's more likely to be forwarded to the development team if you submit it there than by submitting it in the forums. Any of us would be lucky to have one of the moderators or Community Team members find our genuine suggestions in the middle of all the non-constructive trash that gets posted here let alone forward them to the developers.

[DiaDeem]

Again, not an idiot. Telling me that you want to see what it felt like to play as a Miqo'te without using a Fantasia on your main makes a lot more sense to me than saying you wanted the alt to play with friends. Race choice does make a difference in how the game feels as you play.

But you haven't given a reason for why there need to be alternatives for something that's a simple task compared to most game play. All you've told us is that you don't want to do something you've already done before.

Since alts aren't needed to experience everything in the game, the developers haven't found a need to have account-wide content completion or rewards. The few things that are account wide are either additional real money purchases not included in the subscription, or the items earned through the old veterans rewards program. We can't even get them to make a personal house account wide for alts despite the one per server per account restriction.

Don't feel like an idiot. You tried something. You've decided it's not right for you. There's no shame in that.

There's also no shame in making a suggestion for change but you also have to be willing to deal with dissenting opinions if you make those suggestions in a public forum. The public forum is a great place if you want others to review your ideas and discuss pros/cons.

You know what? Thank you. This was a really reasonable take, and I appreciate you took the time to write it.

And no, you're absolutely right. I did mention catch up mechanics but I didn't really suggest anything, which is in fact the usual complain, and suggest nothing issue that we often have here, and that's on me.

Writing this at the top of my head... having something for the currents like Azys Lla does it, entirely tied to MSQ progression with no world currents could be nice? Then maybe once you finish 4.5 all (base) Raids/Extra Dungeons unlock automatically or something? Maybe you get one free Job boost to use on whatever you want...?

When you put it like this, it sounds more like this would need an entire comprehensive rework, and that would take some time.

To be fair, last time I had properly caught up alts was during Stormblood, and I also had a lot more free time back then. I wasn't expecting it to be this grindy for Endwalker, and I got really frustrated. I also just have fun making needlessly complex posts with images and whatnot, but I guess that's besides the point lol.

Once again though, thanks for this post! I must not forget to also propose solutions and not just do the complaining part next time.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

Your list is one of the reason why I only have 1 half baked alt in this game. I wish the game isn't so altagonistic.

[DiaDeem]

I wish the game isn't so altagonistic.

[DiaDeem]

Yes, my argument does address that.

You offered no solution. Playing as if I was new isn't a solution, it only reafirms the problem.

No, you do not have "no alternative" but to sequence-break to collect items that are 100% useless to you at this stage

You're missing the point. The currents have to get collected to fly, and I have no idea why it bothers you that I wanna do that first.

You can just play an alt like any new character. Go where the MSQ directs you, collect currents as you go

Yes, this is exactly what I'm saying. That's EXACTLY the problem. The fact that an alt is treated as if the player behind it is new IS the problem.

You do not need all the currents now. You cannot collect all the currents now because they are locked behind sidequests that won't be available until the whole zone is open to you at level 88

Still missing the point. I don't intend to fly early, I'm just getting busywork out of the way.

You have a choice and you are choosing the option that artificially inflates how much work you have to do, against the design intentions of the game.

I've tried both approaches. Getting the currents early has always worked better for me. Even if the zone is split, I always get all the currents I can on one side and then follow MSQ. I in fact just did that with Elpis. If that bothers you, deal with it. Not everyone plays like you do.

You keep thinking I'm annoyed at the currents specifically. I've explained quite clearly what the problem actually is, but here it is for you, one more time...

- I don't have a problem with the currents or how they work with the zone divisions
- My issue is having no mechanic to help my alt do what my main already did.
- This doesn't apply to only currents but to EVERYTHING that needs re-unlocking as an alt.

Clearly, getting an itch to play a Miqo'te and making an alt for it was a terrible mistake, not because I have to get aether currents in whatever order but because there are no catching up mechanics to help alts get everything set. So yeah, joke's on me Square. I won't make any more alts in the future.

Guess I'm not only an idiot for playing an alt, but also for trying to have fun with the post. Leave it to the forums to get obsessed with the wrong thing and miss the point entirely.

Gonna go back to only posting dinosaurs attacking Japanese people and men throwing chairs at skeletons.

[Zeastria]

Account shared features i wish existed:
✩Make Glam from the store - shared.
✩Make all+owned mounts/minions/music scrolls/emotes..ect - shared.
✩Aether currents / shared fate progress - shared
✩Titel/Achivements - shared
✩Housing - shared

[Gordita]

This was a nice post to see, to change it up for a moment. Nice break from the complaining and bickering that happens here

[Astrus]

The "issue" as I understand it stems from the fact that XIV doesn't expect or really want you to have more than the one character per server.
A majority of the underlying systems seem to be built with the expectation that alts are not something people do.
Seding mail? Not to your alts, unless you managed to bug them onto your friendslist or something you need a middle man.
(Past) Seasonal events? Do these on each character or sink money into replica items from the shop.
Sharing the one private house you can get per world per account? Nope.
A good portion of the cash shop items? Single-character with no option to pay more for an account-wide option.
Community contest rewards like the Cloud hair? Single. Character. Go win more contests on your alts.
Creating an alt character on a congested world you already have characters on? Wait for the lock to lift like everyone else. We can't have you bypass the lock if you already have a character on that world. You might break the time-space continuum and log both in simultaneously or something.

The way the MSQ-lock interacts with alts (which is to say it doesn't) is just another point in that list.
There simply is no consideration of "this is an alt, different rules apply here" - it's a concept that doesn't exist as far as the game is concerned.

Their "solution" to this is Fantasias and since those are printing money they really have no incentive to make this game any less alt-unfriendly.
It's like they looked at their competitors, saw them charging money for character renames and race changes and figured they'd copy that, without considering that those competitors encourage alts so nobody has to race-change their one character just to look at something different every now and then.

Short of putting up with the limitations or dropping the prospect of alts there's really no solution to be offered. The problem is baked into the game if you will.

[Jojoya]

Short of putting up with the limitations or dropping the prospect of alts there's really no solution to be offered. The problem is baked into the game if you will.

Not necessarily. But coming up with solutions would be dependent on analyzing the reasons why players create alts. Are those reasons due to game design (can think of a couple situations where alts become an actual need, not just a want) or if it's because it's just an optional form of play they enjoy.