[Megathread] Final Fantasy XIV

[Poppincaps]

Probably super late on this but I've been on a rock climbing trip without internet for the past 2 days, but holy shit those bard changes. They've basically made the job perfect. Like seriously it was already an incredibly solid job and they just fixed all the problems it had. WTF. Also the relic gear is dope af.

[Super Kami Dende]

Are you claiming that every "go go go" player you see is a wow refugee? How do you know that exactly? Even if they're sprouts there's no WoW icon that floats above their head and being a "go go go" DPS doesn't mean you're from WoW. It could just as easily be a DPS who has no clue that he's supposed to wait or an experienced player who simply doesn't care.

No, just that after 14 years of playing WoW, and 3 of playing FFXIV it has become vastly more common since People started leaving BFA.

Many People in my FC that have been long time players in FFXIV have also noticed it recently.

[Graeham II]

I've noticed a bit more aggression in roulettes but I put a lot of it down to the unfortunate talent drain that Crystal has experienced after a lot of serious players up and moved to Aether, Primal and Chaos as a consequence of the server shuffle.

Personally I'll take aggressive players over passive aggressive players any day of the week. I've had fewer issues in FFXIV over the years than in WoW but at the same time what issues I've had in FFXIV have been much more difficult to solve due to the problem players hiding between manipulative, sickly sweet personalities.

[Granyala]

Took a peek at the WHM changes (or rather lack thereof).
Seems like, apart from a few very minor alterations, the class won't change much.

Too bad I don't get to throw stones, we were wondering whether we'd be able to throw a house, considering the animations got bigger and heavier every expansion.

[Kuja]

This is getting sooo annoying.

[Granyala]

Heh, looks like multiboxers.

[bigsuirlife]

This is getting sooo annoying.

we can only report everytime we see some..

[Melsiren]

I can't wait for Shadowbringers for the WAR changes alone.

[Katchii]

This is getting sooo annoying.

While I understand that it's annoying, what impact are they actually having on your game play experience? Aside from being a temporary eye sore?

Not trying to defend them, just saying it's still possible to ignore them and move along with your game play and enjoy your time in game.

- - - Updated - - -

I can't wait for Shadowbringers for the WAR changes alone.

The tank changes are making me very excited. They're basically being turned into DPS classes with a little more responsibility in group content, from a game play perspective anyway. It's already possible for well played tanks to match or even out perform some DPS in terms of damage out put, with these changes maximizing DPS is a core part of the job now (as if it wasn't already important before), alongside additional party utility.

I'm actually having difficulty deciding which class to play first once Shadowbringers launches. After seeing the game play videos of Dancer and Gunbreaker and the class change breakdowns, deciding between my current main Red Mage, my old main Summoner (couldn't stand the Demi-Bahamut mechanic...timing and build up sucked), Gunbreaker, Dancer, Dark Knight, White Mage, Machinist and Astrologian....I'm getting anxious, lol. All the classes look great, but the ones listed are the ones I play most often, not including the new classes of course.

[Wrecktangle]

For one thing, it wouldn't need to be completely separate, but I'd love something like "dungeon sets" that have specific set bonus's that work better, or only, in dungeons and work with what dungeons are, and similar raid sets that do the same.

Raiding heroic it's like... why am I wasting 6 hrs a week dealing with all these people failing when I can get 4 people and spend 3 hrs doing M+ and get 2-3x the gear? I want to raid, I prefer raiding over M+ (specially in it's current form, it's far too "trash" based) but our guild broke up over the lack of separate reward for raiding over M+.

This is only a singular problem with gearing in wow honestly though... the entire gearing path for wow is screwy.

The problem with sets is that they pigeon-holed you and severely limited gear because you couldn't upgrade stuff because bonuses were too strong. I miss set bonuses for sure, but I don't miss sets. Why they didn't just implement old set bonuses as Azerite Powers is beyond me, it's how I would have designed the system. That's why your suggestion is bad. You're fixing a problem (that's hardly a problem IMO) and adding a new problem that the devs agreed wasn't healthy for player agency.

Please don't take offense to this, but if your guild broke up because of M+ it sounds like it had infinitely larger problems. It sounds like most of your roster was playing socially (thus enjoyed the larger parties that raiding employed) and when some of your members who only cared about gear it sounds like switched to M+ it tore your guild apart. That's not the sign of a healthy guild IMO.

Regarding the gearing path in WoW, it's not screwy. It's open ended by design. FF14's is structured by design. We can argue which we think better all day long, but both have their merits and weaknesses, doesn't make either approach "screwy" though.

No, just that after 14 years of playing WoW, and 3 of playing FFXIV it has become vastly more common since People started leaving BFA.

Many People in my FC that have been long time players in FFXIV have also noticed it recently.

Sounds like confirmation bias to me and not actual analysis. Since we're using anecdotes I'll give mine. 14 years of Wow and roughly 6 years of FF14 I can say with certainty that I have more bad experiences playing FF14 than I do WoW.

Bad defined as stuff like people causing problems, pulling ahead of me, being ungodly awful, trolling etc. I can also say with absolute certainty that I see nothing worse now than I did years ago. It's still the same old shit as it was back in ARR. DPS who can't AOE, Tanks who wait a full 15s between pulling trash packs, and Healers who sit idle ~80% of an instance. Trolls "ahem I mean mentors" are still out in full force and "you don't pay my sub" is more prevalent than ever, not even as a meme, like a legit "hey leave me alone it's ok if I ruin your experience."

Be realistic and fair please. If you want to criticize WoW by all means, but come correct with genuine examples and insight. You don't see me criticize FF14 based on bias alone.

And just to offer a personal example I had last night. I had to leave an Orbonne Monastery run where I had a full alliance (who I can only assume was intentionally trolling based on their ilvl), a second alliance who had a new healer who didn't speak up and died to every single thing possible, and some of the most abysmal DPS I'd ever seen. I didn't have ACT up (just came back and haven't bothered to update it), but we saw 4 analysis'. I can imagine 1/3 of the raid were doing ARR level DPS, which should be reportable, because simply mashing your 1 key (fast blade, true thrust, fire 1) does more DPS than that...

I somehow overtook the main tank in threat (who was wearing full crafted gear fully melded) who was in Shield Oath full time and didn't die. I have an i375 weapon and am min ilvl for that instance (I quit after clearing Sigmascape Savage, so ~363 ilvl) and in Sword Oath.

How is that even possible?! I wish I had ACT running...

I've noticed a bit more aggression in roulettes but I put a lot of it down to the unfortunate talent drain that Crystal has experienced after a lot of serious players up and moved to Aether, Primal and Chaos as a consequence of the server shuffle.

Personally I'll take aggressive players over passive aggressive players any day of the week. I've had fewer issues in FFXIV over the years than in WoW but at the same time what issues I've had in FFXIV have been much more difficult to solve due to the problem players hiding between manipulative, sickly sweet personalities.

I haven't seen any aggression yet. I ran a few dungeons that I didn't know and told people ahead of time. People offered me constructive tips (don't pull this one mob with the rest, pull to wall (I wasn't sure where the walls were, etc.). I had people in the Orbonne I mentioned above begging me to MT because the other 2 tanks were somehow the worst players I've ever seen.

The tank changes are making me very excited. They're basically being turned into DPS classes with a little more responsibility in group content, from a game play perspective anyway. It's already possible for well played tanks to match or even out perform some DPS in terms of damage out put, with these changes maximizing DPS is a core part of the job now (as if it wasn't already important before), alongside additional party utility.

I'm really happy with PLD. I get to be an FFT boy which was my wish/dream. I even crafted my Meliadoul glamour!

[Gibblewink]

It is not entirely possible to ignore the bots whenever they are at a kill something stage as they teleport around underground and nuke everything.

As for the far more cheerful question of what to play in Shadowbringers I'll be sticking to my preferred role of ranged physical - choosing one of the jobs looks damnably hard so I guess it will be down to which one feels the best (barring ridiculous underperformance).

[Onikaroshi]

The problem with sets is that they pigeon-holed you and severely limited gear because you couldn't upgrade stuff because bonuses were too strong. I miss set bonuses for sure, but I don't miss sets. Why they didn't just implement old set bonuses as Azerite Powers is beyond me, it's how I would have designed the system. That's why your suggestion is bad. You're fixing a problem (that's hardly a problem IMO) and adding a new problem that the devs agreed wasn't healthy for player agency.

Please don't take offense to this, but if your guild broke up because of M+ it sounds like it had infinitely larger problems. It sounds like most of your roster was playing socially (thus enjoyed the larger parties that raiding employed) and when some of your members who only cared about gear it sounds like switched to M+ it tore your guild apart. That's not the sign of a healthy guild IMO.

Regarding the gearing path in WoW, it's not screwy. It's open ended by design. FF14's is structured by design. We can argue which we think better all day long, but both have their merits and weaknesses, doesn't make either approach "screwy" though.

I miss sets as a whole, but they could do the same thing with Azerite powers yes, and they started to, they had a good idea with Uldir traits that just needed to be worked on but instead they just went "fuck it, delete it"

And our guild didn't break up specifically because of M+, I missworded that, we stopped raiding as a mutual decision because it just wasn't as rewarding as it used to be and we decided we just didn't enjoy doing the raids in BFA (and people not being able to find a fun class to play anymore because of the gutted classes was part of it too), BfA raiding just isn't that fun.

And honestly, I'm going to continue to say the gearing is screwy because it is, they took a structured gearing path that has existed in the game since it's inception and changed it to something it was never meant to be, they changed a core part of the game almost on a whim because for some reason people who never even do content that requires X ilvl gear want X ilvl gear and Blizzard caved in on it in the easiest way possible.

I don't really care if joe schmoe gets X ilvl gear but you should have to actually put some effort in for it, not queing up for an AFKfront and getting free gear.

Mythic week caches, timewalking week caches, currencies that you work for, all these are far better systems then RNG hope that we have now in wow. They could have went the deterministic route of gearing, a la FFXIV, but instead they went like 100% RNG with 0 effort required.

[Melsiren]

The tank changes are making me very excited. They're basically being turned into DPS classes with a little more responsibility in group content, from a game play perspective anyway. It's already possible for well played tanks to match or even out perform some DPS in terms of damage out put, with these changes maximizing DPS is a core part of the job now (as if it wasn't already important before), alongside additional party utility.

I can't go into all the details I want, on my phone right now.

Overall almost all the changes are looking great, not the biggest fan of removing the impact of tank stances. However the reason for the removal is absolutely solid.

I just like stances because they can enable impactful decisions. I have always been a fan of Risk vs Reward when it comes down to tanking, and I always felt lowering my threat, or lowering my mitigation in exchange for a meaningful damage increase made the tank role more fulfilling/impactful

My personal tank philosophy aside, I am actually in the same boat. Every Job I have looked into looks refined in a good way, trimmed fat and developed class fantasy/playstyle.

I am now at a very serious crossroads between focusing on classic or Shadowbringers.

[Onikaroshi]

I just like stances because they can enable impactful decisions. I have always been a fan of Risk vs Reward when it comes down to tanking, and I always felt lowering my threat, or lowering my mitigation in exchange for a meaningful damage increase made the tank role more fulfilling/impactful

If the choice was actually meaningful I'd agree, but it's really not. It's basically pull in tank stance, establish aggro, drop tank stance/switch to dps stance, there's very little decision or risk/reward.

[Melsiren]

If the choice was actually meaningful I'd agree, but it's really not. It's basically pull in tank stance, establish aggro, drop tank stance/switch to dps stance, there's very little decision or risk/reward.

I put it in italics for that reason.

Tank damage done could have impactful choices around it.

A tank could have meaningful consequences for messing up these choices.

However what could be, should be, and what is are not often the same thing. I was merely speaking about my own personal design philosophy around tanking. Which I know is not a popular opinion.

I could elaborate more on the specifics later, there are many elements from past MMOs and expansions I would like to see tried together. If you wish I could provide those mechanics and examples.

I owe Wreck a long discussion on tank philosophy and Risk vs Reward anyways.

[Onikaroshi]

I put it in italics for that reason.

Tank damage done could have impactful choices around it.

A tank could have meaningful consequences for messing up these choices.

However what could be, should be, and what is are not often the same thing. I was nearly speaking about my own personal design philosophy around tanking. Which I know is not a popular opinion.

I could elaborate more on the specifics later, there are many elements from past MMOs and expansions I would like to see tried together. If you wish I could provide those mechanics and examples.

I owe Wreck a long discussion on tank philosophy and Risk vs Reward anyways.

I know where you're coming from. It's just one of those unfortunate things where, because we have to deal with everyone across every skill level tanking (and there's STILL some horribad tanks out there even though its a pretty easy role... you should have seen the tank I had for The Vault last night...) instead of trying to balance it for both ends they took the easy to balance way and just removed any choice.

At the end of the day I agree with the choice as it would take far too many resources to make it work on both ends, but there is some sadness to losing certain things and always will be.

[Katchii]

Regarding the gearing path in WoW, it's not screwy. It's open ended by design. FF14's is structured by design. We can argue which we think better all day long, but both have their merits and weaknesses, doesn't make either approach "screwy" though.

And honestly, I'm going to continue to say the gearing is screwy because it is, they took a structured gearing path that has existed in the game since it's inception and changed it to something it was never meant to be, they changed a core part of the game almost on a whim because for some reason people who never even do content that requires X ilvl gear want X ilvl gear and Blizzard caved in on it in the easiest way possible.

I have to somewhat agree with Oni here. While the term "screwy" may not be appropriate, it's also more than just open ended, IMO. To boil it down, there's no structure, it's far too RNG based, and just really makes it difficult to hone in on anything but the easiest, fastest, most efficient gearing method because that's where the players you need to work with will be.

That's not inherently a bad thing, as it does allow for alternate progression paths, but it also scatters the player base and devalues some of the more traditionally used high end content.

With the way things are now, as a super casual player who's really only looking to experience the story and see the content/ assets, I've never set foot in a Mythic+ or a raid above LFR level and have Heroic+ level gear from just doing World Quests, Warfronts and LFR. And I'm really only targetting WQ's that provide reputation in the faction I'm trying to max out for the Allied Races.

I can't stand Azerite gear and the Heart of Azeroth level requirement to fully utilize it and I don't give a shit about gear in general because it's raining on me. I don't even have to try that hard to get it. It doesn't feel like a reward, it's a foregone conclusion.

I can't really say, objectively, if that's good or bad, but it's certainly devalued the game to me. Rewards don't feel rewarding, the only thing I have to look forward to is new content. I'm fine with that as a gamer who's just trying to enjoy the content, but as someone who used to log into WoW everyday to play and earn rewards, it's a bit disappointing that it can't give me that same level of enjoyment anymore.

FFXIV structured approach has a similar end result honestly, it just takes longer to get there. But there's so many other things to do in the meantime that it still feels fun and enjoyable while doing it. IMO anyway, YMMV of course.

Sounds like confirmation bias to me and not actual analysis. Since we're using anecdotes I'll give mine. 14 years of Wow and roughly 6 years of FF14 I can say with certainty that I have more bad experiences playing FF14 than I do WoW.

I agree here. As far as experience in FFXIV. I've had more overtly bad experiences in FFXIV than in WoW, however in my experience the overall vibe of the game is much more positive in FFXIV than in WoW. What I mean by that is, in FFXIV, I've had more negative experiences with specific individuals in group content, but in WoW the overall feeling in game is more negative in general but dungeon and raid experiences haven't been "bad."

The best simile I can come up with would be that, to me, WoW is like walking through a bad neighborhood that gives you a "bad" vibe, but getting harassed very little, if at all, by people and overall the people are good...they're just rough around the edges. You really only get harassed when you're directly affecting and genuinely upsetting someone. FFXIV is like a nice neighborhood where you get a generally good vibe and the people are pretty nice in passing and seem overly positive, but when interacting with them directly, they're pretty entitled assholes who get triggered over extremely minor and stupid shit.

Bad defined as stuff like people causing problems, pulling ahead of me, being ungodly awful, trolling etc. I can also say with absolute certainty that I see nothing worse now than I did years ago. It's still the same old shit as it was back in ARR. DPS who can't AOE, Tanks who wait a full 15s between pulling trash packs, and Healers who sit idle ~80% of an instance. Trolls "ahem I mean mentors" are still out in full force and "you don't pay my sub" is more prevalent than ever, not even as a meme, like a legit "hey leave me alone it's ok if I ruin your experience."

Yup, agreed. I see this almost exclusively in FFXIV, I've never seen this in WoW.

And just to offer a personal example I had last night. I had to leave an Orbonne Monastery run where I had a full alliance (who I can only assume was intentionally trolling based on their ilvl), a second alliance who had a new healer who didn't speak up and died to every single thing possible, and some of the most abysmal DPS I'd ever seen. I didn't have ACT up (just came back and haven't bothered to update it), but we saw 4 analysis'. I can imagine 1/3 of the raid were doing ARR level DPS, which should be reportable, because simply mashing your 1 key (fast blade, true thrust, fire 1) does more DPS than that...

Performance that terrible in group content, really should be a reportable offense. You and I are on the same page here: If you're going to join up and do group content, pull your weight, or at the very least, be honest about your inability to do so and be willing to learn how to improve. It's an unwillingness to learn or contribute that is reportable, IMO.

I haven't seen any aggression yet. I ran a few dungeons that I didn't know and told people ahead of time. People offered me constructive tips (don't pull this one mob with the rest, pull to wall (I wasn't sure where the walls were, etc.). I had people in the Orbonne I mentioned above begging me to MT because the other 2 tanks were somehow the worst players I've ever seen.

I've always offered, or tried to offer, constructive tips when seeing people struggle in dungeons or raids. Saying things like "you'll hold threat better in Shield Oath/ Tank Stance," "remember that some of your moves have positional requirements for improved DPS" or asking healers who afk through the dungeon to please fill the down time with damage spells, as it would be an overall efficiency gain.

I've been reacted to negatively in both games, but overwhelmingly positive in both too. However, the responses I've gotten in FFXIV are FAR more entitled, negative and toxic than the ones in WoW. I can't even remember the negative ones in WoW, I just remember them not taking kindly to my attempt to help, but it was more aggravating than hurtful. In FFXIV, it's downright toxic, with the meme worthy you do'nt pay my sub, stfu and do your job and I'll do mine, and my personal favorite...you're a X job wtf would you know about Y or Z job/role? Piss off, we're doing fine (as they lay dead on the ground).

I'm really happy with PLD. I get to be an FFT boy which was my wish/dream. I even crafted my Meliadoul glamour!

I've never clicked with Warrior, but I've always enjoyed both DRK and PLD with DRK pulling ahead just a bit because of their overall aesthetic, though I do love the holy warrior sword and shield vibe too. Gunblade just looks fun to play and the effects are cool. Rule of cool can't be overlooked, lol.

I've quite excited about Shadowbringers, can't wait to get my hands on it.

[Onikaroshi]

I can't stand Azerite gear and the Heart of Azeroth level requirement to fully utilize it and I don't give a shit about gear in general because it's raining on me. I don't even have to try that hard to get it. It doesn't feel like a reward, it's a foregone conclusion.

I can't really say, objectively, if that's good or bad, but it's certainly devalued the game to me. Rewards don't feel rewarding, the only thing I have to look forward to is new content. I'm fine with that as a gamer who's just trying to enjoy the content, but as someone who used to log into WoW everyday to play and earn rewards, it's a bit disappointing that it can't give me that same level of enjoyment anymore.

That's another thing... there's SO much gear being thrust down your throat it's hard to actually give a shit about it. Back in the day you knew things by name, Barman's Shanker, UVLS, Deathbringer's Will, etc. You knew what you wanted. Now though.... with ilvl being king and gear raining from the heavens it gets muddied... you don't know anything you're wearing really unless it has something interesting tied to it, like the 2h sword from King's Rest.

[RohanV]

That's another thing... there's SO much gear being thrust down your throat it's hard to actually give a shit about it. Back in the day you knew things by name, Barman's Shanker, UVLS, Deathbringer's Will, etc. You knew what you wanted. Now though.... with ilvl being king and gear raining from the heavens it gets muddied... you don't know anything you're wearing really unless it has something interesting tied to it, like the 2h sword from King's Rest.

To be fair, Blizzard did this with Legion Legendaries. You certainly knew the name of the Legendaries. But everyone complained about Legendaries, and not having the "best" one. So they made it a lot easier with Azerite to target the specific traits you want/need. It might be hard to get the perfect 6 six traits, but you can usually nail 4 of 6 easily, and have the last 2 be decent, just not BiS.

In my opinion, a lot of Blizzard's design is in reaction to the problems of the previous expansion.

[Onikaroshi]

To be fair, Blizzard did this with Legion Legendaries. You certainly knew the name of the Legendaries. But everyone complained about Legendaries, and not having the "best" one. So they made it a lot easier with Azerite to target the specific traits you want/need. It might be hard to get the perfect 6 six traits, but you can usually nail 4 of 6 easily, and have the last 2 be decent, just not BiS.

In my opinion, a lot of Blizzard's design is in reaction to the problems of the previous expansion.

Problem is they tend to overreact. Mop had Dailies hid behind dailies, solution? Remove dailies.

People want gear?Ok, everything gives gear. Wouldn't be surprised if next expansion nothing gives gear lol