Why not improve the 3 initial city-states?

[Enkidoh]

Features I'd love to see in the occasion of revapmed cities:

1) Coliseum in Ul'dah with actual fights that you can participate. Something like Bozja's duels, hard fights where you get selected and people can spectate (might improve a bit on that annoying lottery system, though);

2) Aetherytes moved closed to the Market Board areas for Ul'dah and Gridania;

3) Gridania's Amphitheater with timed events where you can see/listen to NPCs performing;

4) More 'non-functional' public buildings that you can enter, especially in Ul'dah;

5) While you're at that - give Martyn the actual BLU guild, not just people hanging by the door. I want to see inside!

6) Make the Airship landings more memorable, with anchored (inactive) airships that you can explore. Same for the docks in Limsa Lominsa.

7) Add in jumping puzzles. Imagine doing that over Ul'dah's rooftops, Limsa's spires or Gridania's towering trees, until you reach the canopy for a nice view.

Playing devil's advocate here but almost all those ideas are not doable:

1) That would only break the game because of the inevitable influx of players languishing in the GLA's Guild that it would attract, which is exactly the reason had PvP in the Wolves' Den in a dedicated instanced area well away from any city - to ensure the servers are stable. Ul'dah's main street on Balmung at least is already a laggy mess, this would just make it worse.

2) No, players just have to stop being so lazy they can't take five to ten seconds to run and zone into the next area for the Market Board (really, I have no idea why SE moved the Limsa aetheryte from it's original 1.0 location in a side room near the Aftcastle in the Upper Decks down to the Lower Decks near the Market Board, but had the ones for the other two cities well away from it).

3) Mhi Khetto's Ampitheater is specifically designed for seasonal and special events, so that would only create more clutter when those events are running.

4) Law of the conservation of detail. Buildings that are accessable will generally only be those needed for gameplay or the plot (this cuts down on development time, while also reducing the amount of server processing required), so I do not see this happening. (Also SE seem to be against the old RPG trope of being able to break into someone's house and rummage through their personal possessions. You're the Warrior of Light, not the Burglar of Light).

5) Considering he's basically made the Job out of whole cloth, the 'Guild' is probably just a corner of a wharehouse with some tattered blue sheets draped over things. Most other Jobs don't even have Guilds so... what makes BLU special? (Sorry, just sour grapes there).

6) The airship docks are tiny for a reason given the usual passenger airships that players use which make up the main fleets of Highwind Skyways are the Bronco class that are equally small and just glorified flying taxis. There's nothing to explore in them really. Larger ships like the Bonanza are actually the exception in Eorzea rather than the norm. So this is completely superflorous.

7) Oh goddess no. There is already enough jumping puzzle nightmares in the game with the Sightseeing Log (especially in the original 3 starting cities) so we don't need more! (And given the amount of complaints I've seen in shout, especially that godforsaken one in Kugane, this is not popular with players at all.).

[Chajii]

2) No, players just have to stop being so lazy they can't take five to ten seconds to run and zone into the next area for the Market Board (really, I have no idea why SE moved the Limsa aetheryte from it's original 1.0 location in a side room near the Aftcastle in the Upper Decks down to the Lower Decks near the Market Board, but had the ones for the other two cities well away from it).

3) Mhi Khetto's Ampitheater is specifically designed for seasonal and special events, so that would only create more clutter when those events are running.

2) Since I haven't played 1.0, this is only based on the footage from others I have watched, but the original side room in Limsa doesn't seem to have the height enough for the 2.0 Aetheryte design (much larger than the ones in 1.0), and since Limsa map are buildings on top of small islands which makes it extremely hard to adjust the interior to fit the Aetheryte.
Also I believe the other reason would be many players didn't like how Limsa's 1.0 Aetheryte was so far from almost everything else.

3) I would say they could have the regular NPC performance be cancelled during seasonal events if the performance thingy were possible in the first place, but who knows, maybe it is a sign that they want players to do performance player event in there instead of in Limsa blocking the passage.

[Raikai]

Playing devil's advocate here but almost all those ideas are not doable:

1) Based on a city update, they can make those 2 areas slightly separate - the GLA guild with the quests and whatnot and the arena moved away from it just a bit to impede a huge influx of people there.

2) Why not? Every modern city is designed with an accessible MB, sometimes even right next to the crystal (Sharlayan). This is just to make it consistent with what they do.

3) Simple as disabling those timed events while seasonal campaigns are running.

4) When I mean 'public' buildings, is literally not somebody's house (which I presume most are into the residential districts). For example, the theater in Kugane would be nice to go into and see something cultural that added to the world. Or the nations' embassies there. This is, of course, not useful to the gameplay, but it's immersive and does world building.

5) Is not about being special or not. They literally say they have a guild, we just can't go into it. If other job storylines also had it, then it should be an actual location as well. Ninjas and Reapers do have a base of operations (although not specifically called 'guild').

6) Superfluous but again, a rework could add a lot more worldbuilding into it. In fact, other than aetheryte placement, all of those points are 'supefluous' too.

7) It seems personal as you don't like them. Do we have data about the approval of jumping puzzles other than forum posts?

Um, by how you answered it doesn't seem like you're "playing" devil's advocate lol, but alright to have your opinions and desires on this.

[AmiableApkallu]

2) Why not? Every modern city is designed with an accessible MB, sometimes even right next to the crystal (Sharlayan). This is just to make it consistent with what they do.

Actually, no. Starting from the main aetheryte:

• Gridania: Run to Rosewood Stalls in Old Gridania.
• Ul'dah: Teleport to Saphire Avenue Exchange.
• Ishgard: Teleport to Jeweled Crozier.
• Kugane: Teleport to Kugane Dori.
• Crystarium: Teleport to Musica Universalis Markets (or just run there).
• Old Sharlayan: Run clear across the plaza.
• Tuliyollal: Teleport to Bayside Bevy, and run down the stairs.

Limsa is the clear outlier, and if we're trying to be consistent, we'd do something like put the main aetheryte at, say, Aftcastle, and make people teleport to Hawker's Round.