Standing There Syndrome

[Hallarem]

It could be made even simpler if the WoL were to raise weapons and run off screen to deal with whatever needs to be attacked and the scene cut to the result without showing exactly what happened. There would be no need to account for class or future proof, and while it might not be as satisfying as seeing the action, it would be better than watching everyone stand idle for no reason.

SE: Gritting teeth and fist clench + stare combo and nod is best we can give you

[EchoingPulse]

SE: Gritting teeth and fist clench + stare combo and nod is best we can give you

I believe that they did a lot of that in Yawntrail.

[Vhana]

This can easily be worked around. Instead of making an animation per class, just make one per role.

I don’t like that dynamis exists, but since this is the world we live in, let’s use it: Limit Break 1 is a level 15 cross role ability fuelled by dynamis and the animations could use an update.

[FuwafuwaMii]

Is it budget though?
I'd like the MSQ to be way less simple dialogue cutscene and more telling the story through action. When things happen off-screen, show us the consequences, and then we find out via a dialogue or another gameplay sequence what went on. SE came up with a bunch of nice ideas over the years (and sometimes overdid it, like the escort quests where people kept following you around for 3 quests within a 10 quest timespan, and people started to hate it), I'm pretty sure they could do a lot more of that.
Maybe cut down on cutscenes, make those that remain higher quality (ie voiced) and shuffle more of the storytelling to gameplay that's a bit more advanced than "kill 3 antelopes" or "find 3 dudes we tried to hide behind house walls".
Not everything has to be a solo duty, either.

I'd love to see one zone in the next expac where there's nobody to talk to, where we go through the story through exploration. Like the dart shooting in StB, the murals in ShB, or design it like a scavenger hunt where we stumble over a problem, pick up the scent, collect clues and pursue an enemy - which could then culminate in a voiced cutscene.

Nothing is as boring as "Talk to Minfilia/Alfinaud/Wuk Lamat" over and over.

[CaptainLagbeard]

Sometimes things just need to happen for the sake of the plot, but it can be rather annoying to just sit there and watch it happen...

Kind of a spoiler but

The biggest such moment I can think of was in Endwalker with Ahewann, as he gets grabbed by one of the monsters and eaten, while the WoL takes like half a minute to run a few meters just to be dramatically too late.

[EchoingPulse]

Sometimes things just need to happen for the sake of the plot, but it can be rather annoying to just sit there and watch it happen...

Kind of a spoiler but

The biggest such moment I can think of was in Endwalker with Ahewann, as he gets grabbed by one of the monsters and eaten, while the WoL takes like half a minute to run a few meters just to be dramatically too late.

The vein in my neck popped out at that moment.
We can hull ass and save the day in a body that's not even ours after tanking an explosion and monsters/magicteck everywhere, but saving some guy that's 10 paces away is too much...

[Gwenkatsu]

I still remember my first steps in FF14 years ago together with my wife. We take the fight back to the Garleans, and finally end up in the praetorium... to be met with Nero's 3 minute monologue "when I was little, Cid stole my cookie, wah wah" and Gaius' 4 minute monologue "me am the bestestest of the world".
At one point we looked at each other and asked "why are we even listening to this drivel, why don't we just kick this fool's butt?"
And that's the point. Nobody in their right mind would listen to the bad guy going on and on and on and on... - they would just attack. Remember Guardians of the Galaxy 1? Nebula starting trash talking her sister, only to get shot down by Drax "noboy talks to my friends like that". This is the sort of dialog FF14 needs desperately, no more villains holding endless monologues everybody just quietly listens to.

And there are countless examples of this bad anime trope throughout the MSQ. Ilberd, anyone? We find out he's about to summon a primal, so we go there, kick his sorry behind, and it's over - we could just put his head on a pike atop his very own Ala Mighan dungheap, and call it a day. But no, WoL goes into 10 minute standby, while Ilberd does the exact thing we came to stop. Oh my.

Personally I just accepted this sort of nonsense constantly happening to me. But man did it rub me the wrong way when they finished off Gulool Ja Ja while EVERYBODY was just watching. He desperately tried to fend of his son's magical infused attack for 20+ seconds, and NOBODY came to the rescue - all the saviors of the star just standing there, gaping mouth, drooling from the chin.
I liked the character of Gulool Ja Ja a lot, and seeing him getting killed this super cheap way really p*ssed me off. They did the old lizard wrong, and I'm not going to forget this.

[Coratanni]

I still remember my first steps in FF14 years ago together with my wife. We take the fight back to the Garleans, and finally end up in the praetorium... to be met with Nero's 3 minute monologue "when I was little, Cid stole my cookie, wah wah" and Gaius' 4 minute monologue "me am the bestestest of the world".
At one point we looked at each other and asked "why are we even listening to this drivel, why don't we just kick this fool's butt?"
And that's the point. Nobody in their right mind would listen to the bad guy going on and on and on and on... - they would just attack. Remember Guardians of the Galaxy 1? Nebula starting trash talking her sister, only to get shot down by Drax "noboy talks to my friends like that". This is the sort of dialog FF14 needs desperately, no more villains holding endless monologues everybody just quietly listens to.

And there are countless examples of this bad anime trope throughout the MSQ. Ilberd, anyone? We find out he's about to summon a primal, so we go there, kick his sorry behind, and it's over - we could just put his head on a pike atop his very own Ala Mighan dungheap, and call it a day. But no, WoL goes into 10 minute standby, while Ilberd does the exact thing we came to stop. Oh my.

Personally I just accepted this sort of nonsense constantly happening to me. But man did it rub me the wrong way when they finished off Gulool Ja Ja while EVERYBODY was just watching. He desperately tried to fend of his son's magical infused attack for 20+ seconds, and NOBODY came to the rescue - all the saviors of the star just standing there, gaping mouth, drooling from the chin.
I liked the character of Gulool Ja Ja a lot, and seeing him getting killed this super cheap way really p*ssed me off. They did the old lizard wrong, and I'm not going to forget this.

It's never been shown to be in our nature, to attack someone else first. We've also let people talk, in the hopes that there might be some diplomacy had. Sure it usually fails, but we're not Zenos blood crazy.

[Cenobia]

It's never been shown to be in our nature, to attack someone else first. We've also let people talk, in the hopes that there might be some diplomacy had. Sure it usually fails, but we're not Zenos blood crazy.

There is a large difference between not immediately launching into an attack and stopping someone who is very obviously trying to do something that you're supposed to stop. Your WoL might be a mouthbreather, but I'd like to think mine isn't, and as such those cutscenes are just absurd. It also doesn't excuse Alisaie often also just standing there.

Someone give that girl a gun already, we'd have been spared so much idiocy.

[MsQi]

It's never been shown to be in our nature, to attack someone else first. We've also let people talk, in the hopes that there might be some diplomacy had. Sure it usually fails, but we're not Zenos blood crazy.

That should be a choice. We are not playing a premade charter. We are not Cloud, or Squall or Lightning. We should have some say in how our characters react. I think the biggest problem with the new MSQ is the same it's always been: The story assumes we like these people. Half the time I saw Zenos I wanted to shoot him in the face, but when he wanted the final showdown I wanted to just walk away and leave him crying. Every dialogs choice is pointless, most don't even have a witty retort. So much "Sorry, no you can't do that", or "that's probably not a good idea right now"