GC dissapointment

[Anakhu]

I ran around for 3 hrs as my anima was low to get all the recruit starter quests done for the Grand companies. I finished with the adders because that is who I wanted to join. I accepted my first mission , Emperial Devices ( gridania) , I go to the cave it asked me to travel to.... and bam, roadblock.. I HAVE to be in a party of 2 or 4, I'm like wtf!!! So I try to calm down from the annoyance and find me another person to party in there with.... I tried for 2 hours, 2 frikin hours... and nobody would help me.. hell i ONLY seen 3 people in the entire south section of gridania -_-. Thanks SE for killing solo play, for a minute I actually thought you had improved upon it... but it turns out you can't enjoy much still without being in some elite linkshell or hunting down someone for hours to do a quest. I am dissapointed and really not having high hopes for ARR now and possibly won't return. I like the party and team aspect of gaming but I also enjoy solo work that can be just as fun even if the reward isnt as great

[Breladine]

I ran around for 3 hrs as my anima was low to get all the recruit starter quests done for the Grand companies. I finished with the adders because that is who I wanted to join. I accepted my first mission , Emperial Devices ( gridania) , I go to the cave it asked me to travel to.... and bam, roadblock.. I HAVE to be in a party of 2 or 4, I'm like wtf!!! So I try to calm down from the annoyance and find me another person to party in there with.... I tried for 2 hours, 2 frikin hours... and nobody would help me.. hell i ONLY seen 3 people in the entire south section of gridania -_-. Thanks SE for killing solo play, for a minute I actually thought you had improved upon it... but it turns out you can't enjoy much still without being in some elite linkshell or hunting down someone for hours to do a quest. I am dissapointed and really not having high hopes for ARR now and possibly won't return. I like the party and team aspect of gaming but I also enjoy solo work that can be just as fun even if the reward isnt as great

"Elite" linkshell? You don't have to be in an Elite linkshell, you can be in ANY linkshell with warm bodies who are friendly. My linkshell isn't crazy but someone offered to help me with Imperial Devices right away, it was me (healer) who needed it, one other person who needed it (another CNJ), and a level 30 Archer who offered to help us. We did fine.

If you were on my server, I'd help you, even while you're here whining :P But, you're not on my server, so you'll just have to branch out a bit and find your own help.

Pro-tip: Ul'dah is the central hub on my server, I'm not sure if it's the same on every server, but that seems to be where all the people are. Perhaps you could find assistance and/or a linkshell there.

I've been in the game for a whopping 2.5 weeks and I'm 45 based mostly on solo play -- as a CNJ/White Mage at that. The solo aspects of this game are there and are really great. Just because you need a party to do some of the questing like GC doesn't mean you can't get a lot out of the game with solo play. It just means the game is still, shockingly enough, an MMO!

[Anakhu]

"Elite" linkshell? You don't have to be in an Elite linkshell, you can be in ANY linkshell with warm bodies who are friendly. My linkshell isn't crazy but someone offered to help me with Imperial Devices right away, it was me (healer) who needed it, one other person who needed it (another CNJ), and a level 30 Archer who offered to help us. We did fine.

If you were on my server, I'd help you, even while you're here whining :P But, you're not on my server, so you'll just have to branch out a bit and find your own help.

Pro-tip: Ul'dah is the central hub on my server, I'm not sure if it's the same on every server, but that seems to be where all the people are. Perhaps you could find assistance and/or a linkshell there.

I've been in the game for a whopping 2.5 weeks and I'm 45 based mostly on solo play -- as a CNJ/White Mage at that. The solo aspects of this game are there and are really great. Just because you need a party to do some of the questing like GC doesn't mean you can't get a lot out of the game with solo play. It just means the game is still, shockingly enough, an MMO!

I'm not whining.. this is a legitimate complaint. And I don't care how fast you got your mage up. Congratz , I guess you enjoy exp grind. I enjoy adventure and story content more then when will I get my next level.

And don't try to preach to me about MMO either... I have been online gaming for Years, and have participated in battles alongside over a thousand people at once for the same objective, so it's nothing new to me.. but even then that same game has gave me years of enjoyable solo content aswell while not ever once telling me I had to be in a group or no go for you.

[Andrien]

That is one problem indeed. Not a fan of force grouping, so maybe they'll have some compromise to fix the long hours searching for members like content finder etc.

[Seig345]

Sargatanas, right? I'm on the same world, and I love going into the Thousand Maws of Toto-rak :3

Your complaint is indeed legitimate, 'cause I'd practically live in there just for the atmosphere if it let you go in solo...

I have an hour and a half if you have the time to go right now?

EDIT: I haven't actually done the quests related to the dungeon in quite a long time, but an LS mate and I go in there a lot just for the GC seals. But I don't mind tagging along to help you get through it

[Guevara]

While I agree with OP that having to shout hours (yeah I did try using "search" feature but it is useless right now) in order to do a quest is not too much fun, I also think that some content MUST be done for groups.

Let's take Job quests or new GC quests as example. There's some where you can go through alone, but some of them ar indeed good to be group ones. Having a mob you can solo as final boss in a job storyline would look so lame.... instead they are challenging even for parties.... well not THAT challenging no more lol

[Elexia]

I'm not whining.. this is a legitimate complaint. And I don't care how fast you got your mage up. Congratz , I guess you enjoy exp grind. I enjoy adventure and story content more then when will I get my next level.

And SE's MMOs are generally group based adventures (you know, Final Fantasy for example was always an adventure about x amount of people trying to do y?)

However:

And I don't care how fast you got your mage up.

If this is your attitude, I'm guessing there's a reason you prefer solo play.

[Saieno]

I am dissapointed and really not having high hopes for ARR now and possibly won't return.

Don't compare the current iteration of FFXIV to a completely different game entirely that you or anyone else have yet to experience. You may be frustrated now (and its understandable) but they will be two very different experiences.

[yoshikwalla]

Here's some food for thought: Most of the quests in the game are solo. Just because one quest in the event questline requires people doesn't mean that solo play is completely destroyed. In fact, there was too much solo play before the GC quests were introduced.

And if all you want to do is solo, then why are you playing an MMORPG? There are plenty of alternatives - mostly Bethesda games on my list.

I'm in it for the adventure too. Hell, I beat the GC storyline and the adventure is amazing. Me and a few friends would go do 5 or 6 of the quests together, traveling by chocobo from one place to the other, laughing, joking, and killing NMs along the way.

And for solo questing, I did the Hilldibrand storyline, the Maurader and Pugilist storylines, and most of the Monk storyline. Don't expect everything to be give to you. It's just about 5000 gold to take an airship to Ul'Dah and spam shout for a relatively small party.

In fact, if you want there to be people constantly, join my server. It's incredibly active with north american players. I'd help you myself because I beat the game and have nothing else to do minus gear obtaining, events, and other side things.

[Breladine]

I'm not whining.. this is a legitimate complaint.

You may be issuing a complaint you feel is valid, and I'd never poo-poo on that, but you did so in the most whiniest of manners, so yes you are in fact whining. You're freaking out over next to nothing.

And don't try to preach to me about MMO either... I have been online gaming for Years, and have participated in battles alongside over a thousand people at once for the same objective, so it's nothing new to me.. but even then that same game has gave me years of enjoyable solo content aswell while not ever once telling me I had to be in a group or no go for you.

inb4 "Not another WoW clone" (Edit: and I've been in the MMO system on various games for a decade now, as an adult)

Final Fantasy MMO has always been a different beast and FFXI proved that by having a system where people essentially "had" to party but still holding a large enough customer base to make it successful. I had a great time in FFXI despite having to party basically constantly to get where I needed to go and complete what we all needed to complete. Was I looking forward to perhaps being able to level solo in FFXIV? Sure.. and SE delivered. But the fact that there is still content that "forces" us to find other people to get together with is actually a part of the game I'm glad stuck around.. every MMO is different and you just have to suck it up.

I don't even think an MMO storyline should necessarily be able to be completed 100% solo. If you want a game where you can go through storyline aspects without ever talking to another human being, there's this thing out there called a PS3 and an XBox that I'm told have an entire library of items requiring absolutely no human interaction whatsoever.

Sorry but I don't sympathize at all.