WoW and FFXIV comparison (long)
Spoiler:
- - - Updated - - -
TL;DR
Why you should play FFXIV
- If you want a great, ongoing storyline, look no further than FFXIV (also the Trails series, but that's a singleplayer series of JRPGs. Trails and FFXIV are pretty much the only huge, ongoing RPG storylines with a beginning, a middle, and end in gaming).
- You get a new, major patch every 3 months. No content droughts.
- Very little grind compared to WoW.
- You can lean back in your chair with your controller and play just fine.
- Fantastic music. Almost every track is memorable (whereas in WoW the music is more ambient and there are only a handful of great tracks per expansion).
- Devs actually listen to player feedback, rather than being bullheaded and condescending towards their playerbase and making decisions that alienate said playerbase. Devs don't try to reinvent the wheel every expansion.
Why you should play WoW
- If you like WoW's artstyle and you want a game that looks great on low end hardware
- If your friends are playing WoW and you have more fun playing with your friends
- If you like PvP (because PvP in any MMO besides WoW is shit. FFXIV's PvP is, at best, just "okay"
- If you like how raid content is done in WoW (seriously, WoW's presentation of their raids is fantastic)
- If you like talent trees and different ability builds
- - - Updated - - -
I forgot to add this.
In WoW, you game is balanced around everybody constantly taking damage at a high enough rate that if the healer stops healing for a few seconds, somebody is going to die (unless they pop their cooldowns or run away). Also, healer DPS in WoW is so abysmal you mind as well not even bother trying to deal damage.
In FFXIV, the game is balanced around healers having enough time to top the tank off, and then be able to lean back and DPS for a little bit, and actually contribute a significant amount of DPS, enough that healers are EXPECTED to DPS when they can and the raid will fail a DPS check if the healer doesn't pull their weight. IMO, this makes healers far more fun than in WoW, because you are alternating between healing and dealing damage, and it spruces things up.