Make it so the Current Expac MSQ doesn't level you

[ForteNightshade]

I would argue that people want to be engaged in the world, not necessarily with a single story. Take Tam-Tara Deepcroft Quest chain and subsequent hard mode quest chain, did you not find that engaging when you first did it. I agree being forced to repeat dungeons and grind them is not fun, I remember the Aurem Vale runs back to back to hit 50 back in ARR . Again, that's not what I'm suggesting. Have you everyplayer GW2? Each part of the map has it's own little storyline where you do objectives to fill hearts once filled they are fiinished. ESO does something similar with self contained story lines in points of interest that you go through, this would be a huge boost and a way of breaking up the MSQ which by it's nature is always going to be more cutscenes than it isn't, you can balance the exp so players don't have to grind them, they have the option of what path they want as opposed to being functionally railroaded by the MSQ. So have the MSQ be more to the point, with only the pertinent information dumped on the players for the plot and storyline, and then have the world tell the players the rest of the story of that country region etc etc.

No, actually. I found the Tam-tara quests boring but was far more forgiving of them because it's the very beginning of the game. I expected things to be slow since MMOs usually are. Now the hard mode was good but that's more due to the story surrounding Edda being a massive surprise. Very few dungeon unlocks have anywhere near that level of storytelling. Regardless, what you're suggesting remains arbitrary. It won't suddenly make Dawntrail a better MSQ if we're constantly getting side trailed or level lock. It'd feel worse for the reason I initially cited: I'm doing busywork to then return to a boring story. And if said busywork wound up being more interesting than I'm all the more annoyed at the poor writing from the MSQ. Case in point, it actively bugged me how the Leatherwork Wachumeqimeqi managed to tell forklore stories for all the races in both a concise and interesting manner yet the MSQ felt like a boring slog with the exact same races.

Both Shadowbringers and Endwalker had issues with a lack of gameplay. The difference is they kept you engaged through good storytelling. Granted, Endwalker does drag in the early quests too--Thavnair in particular. Just nowhere near as much as Dawntrail. That tells me the bigger issue is bad writing. While I'd like more actual gameplay, the main reason I was so bored going through the MSQ was because Dawntrail couldn't keep me engaged so I noticed the lack of it far more than I did previously.

[Malthir]

No, actually. I found the Tam-tara quests boring but was far more forgiving of them because it's the very beginning of the game. I expected things to be slow since MMOs usually are. Now the hard mode was good but that's more due to the story surrounding Edda being a massive surprise. Very few dungeon unlocks have anywhere near that level of storytelling. Regardless, what you're suggesting remains arbitrary. It won't suddenly make Dawntrail a better MSQ if we're constantly getting side trailed or level lock. It'd feel worse for the reason I initially cited: I'm doing busywork to then return to a boring story. And if said busywork wound up being more interesting than I'm all the more annoyed at the poor writing from the MSQ. Case in point, it actively bugged me how the Leatherwork Wachumeqimeqi managed to tell forklore stories for all the races in both a concise and interesting manner yet the MSQ felt like a boring slog with the exact same races.

Both Shadowbringers and Endwalker had issues with a lack of gameplay. The difference is they kept you engaged through good storytelling. Granted, Endwalker does drag in the early quests too--Thavnair in particular. Just nowhere near as much as Dawntrail. That tells me the bigger issue is bad writing. While I'd like more actual gameplay, the main reason I was so bored going through the MSQ was because Dawntrail couldn't keep me engaged so I noticed the lack of it far more than I did previously.

Right almost as if the other part I suggested, take most of the lore out of the cutscene heavy MSQ and make it part of side content. Ultimately I'm asking for 2 things, a reduction of scope for the MSQ and an increased focus on gameplay. I cannot see anyway of them being able to do this without bringing in a reduction of MSQ exp. I'm all ears to other ways they can make changes, but just saying, write a better story is not really useful nor viable, while DT is objectively poor from a creative writing perspective, there will be other Expac that are not poorly written but just not something a player may enjoy, tying the games future on this is dangerous.

[ForteNightshade]

Right almost as if the other part I suggested, take most of the lore out of the cutscene heavy MSQ and make it part of side content. Ultimately I'm asking for 2 things, a reduction of scope for the MSQ and an increased focus on gameplay. I cannot see anyway of them being able to do this without bringing in a reduction of MSQ exp. I'm all ears to other ways they can make changes, but just saying, write a better story is not really useful nor viable, while DT is objectively poor from a creative writing perspective, there will be other Expac that are not poorly written but just not something a player may enjoy, tying the games future on this is dangerous.

Off the top of my head:

- Add a second 91 dungeon, possibly in the 90-91 split. Not only does this accomplish adding gameplay without arbitrarily forcing you away from the MSQ itself, it'd be a huge surprise since they'd be breaking away from the otherwise very stale formula.
- Expand on the whole opposing sides aspect with Thancred and Uriganger. Give us an instance fighting them if only for the hell of it
- We're supposed to be Wuk Lamat's mentor, yes? Have us fight her. If they really wanted to be bold and creative, make it a wacky Rocky Montage. We pummel her but she keeps coming back, getting up, rising to the occasion and all that silly jazz.

Stuff like this while trimming the fat from a needlessly bloated, "filler-y" narrative would do wonders for Dawntrail without any need of level locking. Like Talera said, it's the poor writing and pacing that's most of the problem.

[TaleraRistain]

Right almost as if the other part I suggested, take most of the lore out of the cutscene heavy MSQ and make it part of side content. Ultimately I'm asking for 2 things, a reduction of scope for the MSQ and an increased focus on gameplay. I cannot see anyway of them being able to do this without bringing in a reduction of MSQ exp. I'm all ears to other ways they can make changes, but just saying, write a better story is not really useful nor viable, while DT is objectively poor from a creative writing perspective, there will be other Expac that are not poorly written but just not something a player may enjoy, tying the games future on this is dangerous.

People in this thread have given other ways. They can have more instances in the MSQ of us actually doing things like solo instances or just going to see something for ourselves. Like that train cutscene? 100% should have been a solo duty instance. It was criminal that it was just a cutscene. And someone suggested possibly integrating FATEs as someone suggested, though they'd have to be careful with that because we sees that in crossover events and it can be difficult to participate in the FATE when everyone is zerging it.

As others have also mentioned, we had a hard stop at 47 back in ARR and we had to go grind FATEs in Northern Thanalan and that was far from engaging. It was jarring and interrupted the story we were trying to follow, so they improved that in later expansions so the MSQ gives you everything you need to get at least one max level class.