[Megathread] Final Fantasy XIV

[Katchii]

Not kind and not advice.

I've been open from the beginning about my anxiety and that FFXIV even requiring group content was a potential deal breaker. The fact that I've been able to do it at all, let alone heal and tank, is miraculous.

I'm glad you stuck with it, I remember your earlier posts voicing your concerns.

I hope you find a way to continue enjoying it.

That said, trials will always be hit or miss, because those have punishing mechanics that should be explained. If you want to be confident in your abilities I'd suggest reading or watching a guide, but there's also nothing wrong with zoning in and saying "first time, what do I need to know to not die or kill us?"

I decided to try both because people said it was on par with Wrath, which is the only time I enjoyed doing either. Stress free AoE fests. It hasn't been until recently after I expressed my difficulties that this caveat of ARR being an exception was added. I would have saved myself a lot of frustration otherwise.

The dungeons in the first part of ARR are an exception to the rule anymore. Because even the first dungeons added after launch, in 2.1, included walls/gates that limited the amount of enemies you could pull at a time.

As stated above though, trials will always be hit or miss.

Some of the trials are nightmares, like Thornmarch Hard. Maybe I got unlucky, but I found it worse than Chrysalis. When I raided, people knew the strategy (never did LFR). Many of these encounters through DF are awful experiences unless they're Cape Westwind level easy.

I can confirm you just got unlucky with Thornmarch (Hard). It's a very easy trial IF people do what they're supposed to. It's no fault of the healer if people don't do the correct kill order and end up take WAAAAY more damage than they're supposed to as a result.

I always assume people don't know the fight and explain it beforehand. I'd rather people get mad at me for taking the time to explain and waste ~30-60 seconds, rather than having the group wipe, wasting that much time PLUS the time it takes to then explain it correctly. Because as irritated as they might be for someone explaining the fight, they're just irritated, not angry or raging or anything else beyond that.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

New interview with Matsuno on Bozja.

According to Matsuno, reception to Eureka seemed to be fiercly negative in the West. "Timesink grind". Japan was split on it but still leaned negative. So the FFXIV team was hesitant to do more grind zone content. The team spent a long time deliberating on it. They didn't decide to do it until after ShB was released. Matsuno wasn't recruited for the project until August, and he didn't finish the story until September.

Matsuno originally thought of making the story about liberating Dalmasca. You would also get to time travel back and witness the destruction of Bozja Citadel. But he found out that the plot of ShB 5.0's MSQ involved time travel and decided not to do that. So the Bozja Citadel part became a dream sequence, an idea reused from a scrapped story for Vagrant Story 2.

When the Bozja story for 5.25 was made, there was no plan for anything further. He wrote 5.25 with no consideration for future patches (sounds like he didn't know how many patches Bozja would even get).

The original idea was to have a fight against Gabranth, not Varis, but Matsuno thought that there was no reason for Cid to fight Gabranth. He realized that Varis was killed off at the end of 5.0 but had never been fought before, so that's when he recommended having Varis be the boss in the dream sequence. (So... after ShB 5.0 released, there were literally no plans to see Varis again until Matsuno suggested it?)

The Varis fight was cooked up by the battle team in 2 weeks.

Matsuno suggested having the trust party members involved. The fight had to take place in a dream sequence or else it wouldn't make sense because at the time the Scions are trapped on the First.

Matsuno's wording seems to suggest that the Werlyt storyline was planned before Bozja (possibly before even ShB 5.0 was released?).

Early on the Odin quests would have been mandatory (to understand the metaphysics behind swords that possess their wielders) but that requirement was dropped because it would've made it too much effort to do the Bozja questline.

Writing Bozja was difficult for Matsuno because he kept finding out he couldn't include elements in his story because they were planned to be included later on in the ShB patch MSQ story.

5.35 story was written at the end of 2019.

Mikoto's sister was going to be involved but Matsuno decided to save her for later (welp, we'll never get to see that story now).

Matsuno didn't write the stories that happen during the FATEs/skirmishes. The battle team created that. He wrote the NPC backstories/field record/codex, though.

Japanese players seem to be more likely to hesitate to kill the darker the character of the enemy."

lolol really? Surprising given how much evildoers are let off the hook in Japanese entertainment.

Another gem:

The handling of Yoshida characters is very annoying. If I draw a war, I don't like the fact that an unnamed soldier dies without being told the origin, but the main characters hold hands unharmed, which is too unrealistic. Unless all of them are behind as commanders, they are at the forefront ... even heroes can die with a single shot of Nagaredama.

　On the other hand, if the development is too enthusiastic, it will be difficult to create content this time, and it will not be possible to take bold movements .... Some staff are too concerned about the reaction of customers, and I still think that this is really difficult.

When Matsuno wrote the Blades being tempered, he didn't know that a cure for tempering was going to be invented in the very next MSQ patch. When Matsuno found out, he insisted that the Blades would not be saved (except for Lovro).

Matsuno was worried that fighting Garlean soldiers and magitek robots would quickly become repetive, so that's why he diversified the IVth Legion with magicians, demonic summoners, and beast tamers.

Matsuno and Yoshida quite liked Lyon.

Matsuno wasn't satisfied by how Fordola was handled so he created Misija as a sorta rehash of it, with Basjalien playing the role of Raubahn.

Yoshida and Matsuno seem to think that some players don't want to participate in the Garlean War storyline and just want to go adventure. So for Bozja they gave the player the option to be indifferent to the Misija decision and just let Basjalien decide what to do with her.

Hien was supposed to appear in the Bozja storyline but it was cut (either due to development time constraints or how long the storyline was already becoming, hard to tell this is google translate).

Matsuno asked to include Oboro (the Ninja job NPC).

No plans for future Dalmasca story right now. Matsuno seems to think we might not get more war stories. Yoshida says he wants to make more adventure stories. Yoshida says he'd like to see Lyon again. Matsuno hopes that Beastmaster will one day become a playable job.

- - - Updated - - -

Maybe we'll get a 6.X patch storyline where we go romping around with Lyon or something.

[Lahkesis]

a scrapped story for Vagrant Story 2.

My heart hurts. I loved Vagrant Story.

I know they don't have plans for Dalmasca and I'm okay with that, but I would absolutely love 24 man raids set in Lea Monde from Vagrant Story instead if I'm never going to get a Vagrant Story remaster or sequel.

That was an interesting article, thanks for the translation <3.

[Granyala]

Not kind and not advice.

I've been open from the beginning about my anxiety and that FFXIV even requiring group content was a potential deal breaker. The fact that I've been able to do it at all, let alone heal and tank, is miraculous.

Some of the trials are nightmares, like Thornmarch Hard. Maybe I got unlucky, but I found it worse than Chrysalis. When I raided, people knew the strategy (never did LFR). Many of these encounters through DF are awful experiences unless they're Cape Westwind level easy.

I don't read every post in this thread and I don't know you personally, so forgive me for not being up to speed about any and all possible mental issues of every poster in here.

Fact is: there is nothing to fear or be anxious about in this game. The worst anyone can do is throw ASCII signs in your direction and you can always just hide the chat window. :'D
If you managed WoW dungeons, especially pre LFD, where you actually had to interact with .. you know: people... you will be fine in FFs dungeons as well.
99% of the runs are <greeting emote> -> silently smashing content -> <parting emote>. You get the occasional idiot but well.. that's the Internet for you.
Just shrug and move on.

Personally I think people are way too easily offended and quickly label everything the disagree with as "toxic". Even in WoW, touted to be one of the most toxic communities there is, 95% of my dungeon runs were dead silent. Even when the occasional wipe happened.


Thornmarch got it's balls cut off in a nerf. Is it even possible to wipe in there anymore?
Yeah Chrysalis can be a wee bit mean if the tanks don't know what to do in the white meteor phase and the Limit Break gets wasted.

Some of these story trials are ancient and most people doing them nowadays never bothered to learn the proper way of doing them b/c they had someone along who carried them trough it, so yes they can result in a few wipes. Shit happens. You get back up and try again.

- - - Updated - - -

there's also nothing wrong with zoning in and saying "first time, what do I need to know to not die or kill us?"

I always assume people don't know the fight and explain it beforehand.

Pretty much the above. I always say when I am in there for the first time. I explain only as necessary though. Most mechanics are not worth mentioning and as a veteran healer I just push through. I could see where a fledgling would be overburdened though.

[Sensa1]

decided to give Final Fantasy a try...disclaimer - I'm old - Actually grew up in a time before WASD controls and never got used to it (on WoW on my Mac use the 4 arrow keys to move). So logging in and seeing that was a bummer for me. Found the quest text and mini map size really annoyingly small font...this old guy would need to wear glasses while playing...not a fan of the lengthy chats between toon and npc's as opposed to quest text in WoW...without reading game play guide just found getting around the main city not to be intuitive (small map didn't help). Was able to accept a bunch of quests only actually completed one...seems like a lot of systems to get used to...absolutely HATE the constant loading screens in different areas of the main city...remember that being in other Asian MMO's I've tried and simply can't stand it.

Seems like a lot of barriers to entry...will say this about WoW...back in 2005 it was the first MMO I ever played with very limited gaming experience...2 things they do great is the openness of the World (no loading screens going to different sections of Org for example) and much easier to grasp basic systems and concepts of the game.

I only play Classic now and am getting pretty bored of it since I don't have the time to commit to raiding...was very much hopping FF would be appealing...but not my cup of tea.

[Katchii]

Pretty much the above. I always say when I am in there for the first time. I explain only as necessary though. Most mechanics are not worth mentioning and as a veteran healer I just push through. I could see where a fledgling would be overburdened though.

I should have put a caveat: only on fights where there's fail mechanics that instantly wipe the group if people don't follow them. Which most of the more current trials have.

[Granyala]

decided to give Final Fantasy a try...disclaimer - I'm old - Actually grew up in a time before WASD controls and never got used to it (on WoW on my Mac use the 4 arrow keys to move). So logging in and seeing that was a bummer for me. Found the quest text and mini map size really annoyingly small font...this old guy would need to wear glasses while playing...not a fan of the lengthy chats between toon and npc's as opposed to quest text in WoW...without reading game play guide just found getting around the main city not to be intuitive (small map didn't help). Was able to accept a bunch of quests only actually completed one...seems like a lot of systems to get used to...absolutely HATE the constant loading screens in different areas of the main city...remember that being in other Asian MMO's I've tried and simply can't stand it.

Yeah, city quests can be annoying. Thankfully, they are a one time thing. I do agree that the constant loading times are jarring if you are used to WoW.
Over time, you don't notice them anymore. Also having a fast SSD helps.

Not sure whether you can increase the font size, probably via UI scaling?

[blackpink]

I have a question that's probably hard to realistically answer but here goes anyways....How is the raiding scene on Primal? Originally I was on Aether and xferred to Crystal to raid with a friend after I looked through some stuff and got opinions. They said Crystal is fine for raiding....yea no it wasn't. It was terrible. I xferred off it soon as I could when I re-subbed but Aether was closed so I went to primal. Seems Aether is back open now and idk if I really wanna transfer to Aether again.

I'm not looking for a hardcore static or anything. Just...I want to be able to easily find a group that's not braindead and can clear the raid in a month or 2 at most.

[Leyre]

Does anyone knows what UI is rogerbrown using? god it looks good

[Wrecktangle]

I have a question that's probably hard to realistically answer but here goes anyways....How is the raiding scene on Primal? Originally I was on Aether and xferred to Crystal to raid with a friend after I looked through some stuff and got opinions. They said Crystal is fine for raiding....yea no it wasn't. It was terrible. I xferred off it soon as I could when I re-subbed but Aether was closed so I went to primal. Seems Aether is back open now and idk if I really wanna transfer to Aether again.

I'm not looking for a hardcore static or anything. Just...I want to be able to easily find a group that's not braindead and can clear the raid in a month or 2 at most.

It's good, but not Aether, but it's also not Crystal. I generally can clear first 3 fights first week with the pugs, but there's some riff raff if you don't get early clears.

[Tenjen]

from what I can tell of the discussions about bozja, the different teams handling side content and the team handling the MSQ and MSQ patches need to communicate better, but i also see how sensitive and difficult this can be to handle.

[blackpink]

It's good, but not Aether, but it's also not Crystal. I generally can clear first 3 fights first week with the pugs, but there's some riff raff if you don't get early clears.

I'll be honest. I've soured on Aether quite a lot in my last few years there. With how many top end raiders that appeared, so many people flocked there and as a result that data center has been filled with quite a lot of bad players too. So while there are quite a lot of good players, there's probably 5x more bad players. As for Crystal...well...there only seemed to be bad players lol. I am hoping Primal could be a good balance in between.

[Lane]

Managed my goal of getting every combat job to at least 50 in a month. It took a good 2 weeks just to go from 40-50 on most of them, the EXP gains just went off a cliff in that range. I can't imagine how horrific it would've been without the Road to 70.

I'm not sure I would've made it had I not unlocked squadron command missions. Mixed feelings on those. Love the Withered Training feel of them, don't love the limited choice in dungeons or that the squad levels so slowly I haven't been able to do anything above Toto-Rak.

[Ashleyxoxo]

Managed my goal of getting every combat job to at least 50 in a month. It took a good 2 weeks just to go from 40-50 on most of them, the EXP gains just went off a cliff in that range. I can't imagine how horrific it would've been without the Road to 70.

I'm not sure I would've made it had I not unlocked squadron command missions. Mixed feelings on those. Love the Withered Training feel of them, don't love the limited choice in dungeons or that the squad levels so slowly I haven't been able to do anything above Toto-Rak.

I have all tanks and heals on 50 ez. With dps, the real boss is queue times.

[Poppincaps]

Spent the last few weeks going through all of Eureka. I'm currently finished with it other than doing the Baldesion Arsenal and finishing a weapon (I just did a +1 armor set). Don't plan on making any of the weapons because they all look absolutely horrid.

That being said, I thought it was an overall enjoyable experience. There are a lot of familiar faces that you'll see. Kinda gave me that similar feeling in Vanilla WoW where you'd quest with some people in like Westfall or something and then a few weeks later you'd see them again in Stranglethorn Vale. A few people I did NMs with in Anemos I ended up seeing in the other zones so that was cool. I remember people saying that Pagos was the worst zone, but I actually kinda enjoyed it. The zone I disliked was Pyros. That shit was annoying. I did get the Eldthur mount on my second bunny fate though, so that was super sweet.

So yeah, got some shiny armor, got a rare and expensive mount, and made a few million gil in the process. Time well spent I'd say. If you've been hesitating on doing Eureka because of it's reputation, I'd say try it out. It's a lot better than it was in Stormblood. I briefly tried to do Anemos at the end of Stormblood and it was terrible.

[neik]

I wonder if endwalker brings viera hats anytime in future, the devs didn't quite denied the possibility of having hats for vieras. While viera will still remain a goddess regardless hat or no, I would love to have a hat since I will also be rolling a boy alt as well.

[Lane]

I forgot to mention about squadron DPS. Everything I'd seen said 2 archers is the way to go. I only have one so I toyed around with the other DPS and arcanist feels like it's better than archer? She does AoEs quite often, the archer does not, and groups seemed to go down a lot faster once I added her. Bonus points that she also off-heals.

Is the archer info outdated or is it because they improve a lot at higher levels? Most of my group is around level 30 now.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Archer is still the best. At rank 5 offensive tactics, they burn down targets so fast it doesn't matter if they don't AoE. Also they don't need to stand still to cast which is a lifesaver if you're tanking because you can sprint through the dungeon pulling stuff and the archers will still be burning them down, reducing the damage your taking. Whereas with a caster they won't do that and you'll be dying as you go along.

[Poppincaps]

Got some leaks for some of the new job actions if you all are interested: https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxivdiscus..._action_leaks/

The source is kinda random, but they look so realistic that I think they're real.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

Got some leaks for some of the new job actions if you all are interested: https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxivdiscus..._action_leaks/

The source is kinda random, but they look so realistic that I think they're real.

Lol Sage's rotation is marginally more interesting than White Mage's. Like White Mage, you'll place a DoT on your target and then pretty much just spam either your single target damage spell or your AoE spell. Only difference is that you mark the tank to heal them over time as you do damage, and you have a gauge that builds up a resource over time that you can use to occasionally use a damage CD. You have 20 different healing spells you'll never use outside of endgame raid content.