Events need a massive overhaul

[sindriiisgaming]

Events in ffxiv have been underwhelming ever since I can remember as a player. Occasionally there was 1 (like that infamous Halloween event in january) that was giving a full glamour, in an instance duty and could even be done with multiple players. Latley some events have been suffering enormously due to stagnation

A few examples include
- little ladies day ( no new dresses or emotes just some headgear that's underwhelming)
Valentinos - a quest about gender acceptance with genderlocked rewards (...?) And cutscenes thar are a complete chore I wouldnt even be shocked if people auto played them and went afk. A barding that costs my entire cash stack stack and can't be purchased on mog store.
Christmas- best we go was a good choir minigame 4 years ago glamour also has went to die ever since. A mount that is completely underwhelming and nobody uses
Hatching tide- last really enjoyable event was the chicken catching a good few years ago now. Good glamour died with the spriggan event (mount+ cute coat)
Heavens turn - 1 good reward since 4 years ago at least. Last fun even was mochi pounding and tbh it wasn't very interactive
Moonrise faire - while the jump puzzle is a nice return to an old favourite, defaulting on it every year has really been comming off as an excuse to avoid new content, no really good glam since the hawaiian set 3 years ago

In the middle of content luls these events are supposed to breathe life into the game. They don't get treated half as well as the collabs do (armour weapons mounts and titles to farm) and this results in many people saying "nothing for me" this time.

We have had some really good creative events with a lot of love in them.. but those were all ages ago now and we desperately need fun and innovation back. This year we even saw 2 events squished together to avoid having to put in development work.. and I fear soon we'll be seeing more and more events squished or skipped

If you wish you can leave some creative ideas below for future event ideas

[Sacae]

The Valentine's event last year was nice, the two-player instance.
The Rising is usually pretty good.

Not much else to say about the others. Mostly it comes down to if you like the rewards or not. I've kinda been interested in the Papa Gruff storyline over the past few years for All Saints' Wake.

[LyraShu]

I started playing in November of this last year, and events just haven't been fun to me in the game overall. I think there was only 1 (maybe 2) original event during this 6 month cycle...the rest have all been reuploaded content from years prior. While it DOES give me a chance to "catch up" with the player base that has been active for awhile with these events...I can't help but to feel just let down.

I guess it is the feeling of, "Oh, the dev's don't care enough to try for a new event" more then anything. That and, I want to be able to play with friends with things but when events pop it is always "oh I did that years ago" and then I am just stuck being alone. Sure, there are other players catching up with me, but I just feel like I am basically being told "we don't have time to/care for these events" which just seems strange and stupid to me as an idea for a game development studio to adopt but that is just me.

[Sjol]

The only reason I do the events at this point is to avoid needing to pay money for locked glams.

Most of the ones I've experienced aren't well written and are frequently lacking in drama and/or feels.

The one good point with then being bad is that at least they're fast and the story isn't required for anything else.

[Khryseis_Astra]

Other than the crossover events, most of the “story” is just “slice of Eorzean life,” and that’s fine. I’m also fine with the gameplay being fast and easy. But the rewards could be better…

Ideally I’d like to see an outfit for each event, and for them to get more creative! We didn’t need yet another Santa suit for Starlight, and we already have reindeer and snowman costumes. So how about a nice casual winter outfit? Or a fancy holiday party outfit? We have witches, werewolves and pumpkin heads galore for All Saints Wake, but that would also be a good place for some more goth-looking outfits. Even though I didn’t personally care for the Wake Doctor’s outfit, at least it was something different! Moonfire has probably been the best for summer outfits, other than the Phoenix Riser suit I will literally never wear! If they’re running out of ideas, throw a fashion design contest. I’m sure everyone has at least a few ideas of things they’d love to wear!

The emotes in some of the recent events have been really good… I loved the magic wand, and the Valentiones heart emote. As far as mounts go, I loved the Phoenix, but didn’t really care for the pink Goobbue.

Personally I’d want an outfit and a housing item each event. There’s a backlog of furnishing contest winners a mile long! (And failing that, there’s still seasonal decor in the event areas that’s never been made available as housing items.) The emotes and mounts can be less frequent, I’m sure those take a lot more work to put in-game.

[Tyintheron]

Just as a counterpoint: I think some of the issues you raise are a matter of preference. "No good glams in x years for event x" is a pretty subjective take - though I agree that whenever a seasonal event comes up without a new outfit or mount it can feel like a bit of a bummer.

That said, I much prefer FFXIV's "quick and easy" seasonal events where there's at least some changes to it from previous years. Having to run the exact same event 70 times in a week for a 0.1% chance at the reward you want for 20 years and NEVER GETTING THE REWARD in certain other MMOs has given me a pretty strong and favourable opinion of FFXIV's events by way of that comparison alone.

[Kranel_San]

WoW events: At least one event each week + Sometimes introducing time-limited events that are entire playmodes
GW2 events: Full-fledged seasonal events with recurring rewards and multiple minigames to participate in
ESO events: Do X activity daily to earn tickets and get yourself a nice reward

FFXIV events: A side quest that is mostly: "Blah blah blah blah blah" and only one or two rewards are given at its end. And it can be done in less than 5 minutes.

[littlehobbit13]

Ideally I’d like to see an outfit for each event, and for them to get more creative! We didn’t need yet another Santa suit for Starlight, and we already have reindeer and snowman costumes. So how about a nice casual winter outfit? Or a fancy holiday party outfit? We have witches, werewolves and pumpkin heads galore for All Saints Wake, but that would also be a good place for some more goth-looking outfits. Even though I didn’t personally care for the Wake Doctor’s outfit, at least it was something different! Moonfire has probably been the best for summer outfits, other than the Phoenix Riser suit I will literally never wear! If they’re running out of ideas, throw a fashion design contest. I’m sure everyone has at least a few ideas of things they’d love to wear!

The emotes in some of the recent events have been really good… I loved the magic wand, and the Valentiones heart emote. As far as mounts go, I loved the Phoenix, but didn’t really care for the pink Goobbue.

But that's the thing: the quality of rewards is a bit subjective to the player. You didn't like the Pheonix Riser suit, but plenty of other players LOVE that thing. And you think Moonfire has the best summer outfits, but personally I can't stand a lot of them because female versions always end as glorified lingerie which I'd never wear. Everyone's tastes will differ, and the very fact that not every reward will please every player is why they vary them.

Personally I’d want an outfit and a housing item each event. There’s a backlog of furnishing contest winners a mile long! (And failing that, there’s still seasonal decor in the event areas that’s never been made available as housing items.) The emotes and mounts can be less frequent, I’m sure those take a lot more work to put in-game.

The problem with housing items is that they breed resentment for any player without a house. If an event gives outdoor items, you're screwed if you don't have a house. It goes into storage to satisfy the "maybe someday" itch (so you don't get stuck having to buy them off the store if you want them later), but then every time you look at it you feel resentful that "someday" is not today. Resentful that you were "rewarded" with an item you legit can't use. You've pitched the idea that emotes and mounts can be less frequent, but those are the rewards any player can use.

The overall problem with providing a whole outfit for every event is how much work that is. There are quite a few events through every year. If you offered outfits for all of them, you'd run the well dry really quickly. That's not even touching on the amount of work it takes to create the glam in the system: designing the look in the game physics, fitting it to each race, styling it for each gender, determining how it will interact with dye colors, etc. That's quite a lot of work to take on in order to do an outfit for every event.

[Jeeqbit]

The best events I remember have been the Valentione's event, where we entered a duty with 1 other player. There is something altogether different about doing a duty with only 1 other person. It's just more personal and feels like it's proof of a missed opportunity when you actually do it.

Another good event was the Halloween event which has involved games in a haunted house that can actually be failed, and make the players work together to overcome the traps. It was actually somewhat challenging - literally more challenging than any actual dungeon lol. There's nothing quite like this in the game, especially when it comes to casual content, yet right there they proved they are capable of it and doing it well. It was fun, too.

There was a good easter event that involved finding eggs and getting an egg mount. I liked that because it's simple yet it's what easter is about.

The jump puzzles for the Moonfire Faire are probably the most consistently good thing but not personally my favorite thing. It also just seemed to repeat lately.

The times they did the choir thing was good. I think that predated bard instruments? It was a bit of a preview.

But mostly, the events are usually just tedious. I like that they are there, I like the stories, but for whatever reason, I just find them a bit of a chore and put them off in many cases. But you've got to have them in an MMORPG because it provides an additional way to shake things up from the norm occasionally, and celebrate an event you're probably not going to in real life (ie. middle-aged gamers probably aren't going out trick-or-treating like they are still kids).

But the examples I gave are more exciting than just this quick story quest and then 10 different letters or interactions with "mystery" people aka all the grand company leaders, retired scions and significant people you met on your journey, who you find out how they are doing.

[Luluya]

WoW events: At least one event each week + Sometimes introducing time-limited events that are entire playmodes
GW2 events: Full-fledged seasonal events with recurring rewards and multiple minigames to participate in
ESO events: Do X activity daily to earn tickets and get yourself a nice reward

FFXIV events: A side quest that is mostly: "Blah blah blah blah blah" and only one or two rewards are given at its end. And it can be done in less than 5 minutes.

Not sure if they still do them as I quit in Shadowlands, but I liked the "brawls" that appeared in the PvP section every couple weeks(?) that were a modified silly version of another pvp map/mode. Like the one where both teams had to compete to make the best chili by dragging ingredients to the pot while also attacking/being attacked by opposing team.

Other than that I don't think WoW events are that comparable as the events had the same old stuff for years other than a hearthstone with a slightly different animation/vfx. The weekly events were also stuff that granted bonus rewards to content like an extra drop at the end of the dungeon or Timewalking, which is something that FFXIV essentially has on all the time due to replayable level sync dungeons and roulettes.

Also the micro-holidays were intentionally designed to be reward-less fluff so that players would not be concerned with missing out on them.

All that said, I think FFXIV events would benefit from a vendor that sold more of the past event rewards, because as it stands now its almost just a 'free' Online Store item one year in advance.