Is it possible to enjoy FFXIV if I only like endgame content?

[eschatological]

PotD and HoH are interesting in concept, but not in execution. The meta of them has been to not even care about chests except the ones you get on the way to getting the bare minimum of enemies killed to activate the gateway. You rush to the exit, killing everything on the way, and if you still need more mobs, you look in nearby adjoining rooms.

If you start hunting for chests for buffs or something (not really necessary once your aetherial weapon/armor are leveled with the rogue-like mechanic), others will be disapproving. They won't say anything, but they'll also just sit in the exit gateway and not help you at all, silently judging you, since you need every player in the gateway before it activates.

[Wrecktangle]

I do basically nothing in WoW but play for ~3 hours a week and all my gear except the legendary slots are at max level or one ilvl-step below it. (that means way better than heroic raiding gear) and has been for quite a long time as well.
And I didn't even raid this tier.

Since it's not about "gating" gear or anything, as "the only video game you play" means that you invest a lot of *time* in that game, that statement is simply not true.

My experience echo's this as well, granted it's ~6 hours a week for me.

Nobody said anything about things being "mathematically impossible" except you. I don't care what the best 100 people in the world do. It is meaningless. I care how it impacts the average person who does the content. If the average person who regularly does the content cannot complete it without X gear level, then that is the gear wall.

I mean you using gear wall as an absolute sounds functionally identical to "mathematically impossible" but that aside the average savage raider doesn't full clear on week 1 either, hell they take weeks usually to get to floor 3, the real wall to most casual raiders. You know how they get there? They get X gear level, the gear wall as it were. It's literally identical in both games.

Just out of curiosity do you actually raid savage? pug or static, because your takes are just so wildly different than my experiences in FF14.

This is going to vary by group, but the norm for a mythic raider is going to be an expectation to do considerable amounts of M+ and heroic raiding, on top of multiple nights per week progressing. This is on top of the usual chores Blizzard has put in the content for the last few expansions.

I'm not an average mythic raider, I'm a top 100 US player and not once has "considerable amounts of M+ or heroic raiding" been on my menu. Heroic becomes optional for us after usually the first clear, and while a ton of people do M+ a lot, I usually find it's because they enjoy it rather than feel compelled. Me personally I usually do my one key for the week and logoff, because I'm a filthy casual.

You are either lying or mistaken. What you describe is not physically possible. It's certainly possible to GET TO a point where you play ~3 hours per week, but the idea that someone is clearing mythic and getting BiS by consistently playing ~3 hours per week is absurd.

I won't comment on the ~3 hour mark, but I play ~ 6 hours a week when I'm raiding/subbed. I don't have BiS, but I have BiS enough for me and post up solid ~90% logs, 95+% by ilvl. I literally barely play either game and achieve this in both.

Unless something has changed (I haven't played the game in a long time) this is wrong. This is a video I came across a while back regarding new players and how WoW's design philosophy hurts them (it's a short video):



WoW does not respect my time. If I want to take a break for 2 weeks, 4 weeks, 2 months, whatever I am falling further and further behind. If I'm a new player, I have an enormous mountain to climb to be able to do current content. To be clear, this person put in some serious work to try and re-join the game. He spent hours grinding up all of the honor gear for PvP. The problem is that it wasn't enough. He needed to do hours of Torghast for his legendary, to do his covenant, to work on his conduits...so he just quit instead.

WoW expects you to play it and to continue playing it. FFXIV has similar problems in some ways (such as needing to do story to do current content) but WoW is truly on its own level when it comes to shit you need to do to play. I felt punished when I took a break from WoW.

I am usually able to catch up in 1-2 weeks time of playing whenever I come back. I don't PVP regularly so I won't comment on that, but IME that grind is much harder/longer than PVE. I have never found either game to "expect me to continue playing it".

What do you mean... you just run some Mythic+. And I didn't say "BiS". I said way better than heroic raiding gear, which is enough to clear mythic raids if you actually want to as only the very last few bosses actually drop higher ilvl

Honestly, I know you're getting a lot of shit, but my experience is pretty much on par with yours.

That video is super dishonest if you consider the context here in this thread.
You have to do shit to do shit. That's the case in FFXIV as well. You don't just have "gil", you don't have just your gatherer up, you don't just get your gear from PvP. You also do shit there. I clear FFXIV savage every tier and *I* don't have Gil to buy gear. It's *way* too expensive to do so and it takes time and weeks before the prices fall down.

Agreed, you don't just show up one day in FF14 and be fully geared and ready to jump into savage. There's prep work, that while small for an established player, is still prep work and not something to be dismissed.

Im not sure we are talking about the same thing at this point. By the time M+ has paid off that kind of gear, you are way way way way way into the tier. If your argument is that after 3 months of +15 weekly chest rewards you will have good gear for mythic, sure, but I don't know what that has to do with what I said.

How is this different than tomestone gear? By the time tomes have paid off you're weeks into the tier.

The design punishes you very, very hard for falling behind, such as waiting a month to come in and try the new raid or get going in M+. You start off VERY substantially behind everyone else no matter what level you want to raid or do M+ at. None of this is debatable. You guys get so weird about this stuff. There are upsides to this design. It isn't even a value judgement. It's just a fact of how the game works and is designed.

Ok but like, hi I'm a fresh end game character a month into the tier, new to the game and broke, firstly, there's few if any learning parties left, secondly I'm broke and can't afford crafted so I have to wait on weekly drops/caps to get gear to join, if people even take me since my ilvl is low and there are abundant higher ilvl players to pick from.

I don't know why it is so important to people like you to categorically deny basic, clear difference between two games. It's like you have some kind of chip on your shoulder and you can't stand to give even an inch. It honestly starts to feel like a defense mechanism after awhile.

This is just a comical statement coming from you TBH lol.

Let's just say this: I was an average, at best, mythic raider. World 300-500 for most of the last decade. I peaked at U.S. 8 in Cataclysm, which came out in fucking 2010, and that's because most of the top guilds were banned for abusing LFR, which had just come out, for trinket stacking etc.

I can count on one hand the number of mythic bosses where I've hit enrage while everyone does mechanics perfectly. It's never happened on heroic. I think the curve is pretty good in WoW that you have more than enough gear from just normal playing of the game for your skill level such that you can kill it when you get to it. There is no effective gear wall - there's only a skill wall.

Also, those "top 100" mirror the top statics which clear Ultimate. WoW has a much higher, exponential curve of "# of guilds who clear X boss" because the gear nerfs the content, but the beginning of the curves look exactly the same among the top groups. I totally agree with the idea that Ultimate holds its difficulty well past that of mythic in WoW, because it's only "nerfed" in later expansions when the ilvl you're synced to raises to something higher than when it came out. In terms of "endgame hard raiding" WoW is much *better* to the "average" raider. Even scrub guilds can kill 3 or so mythic bosses by the end of the tier.

Well said.

Enrage is not the only indicator of throughput. The tolerance for mistakes gets higher and higher the better your gear is.

How is that different than FF14? This is literally identical.

Generally speaking, the second half of Heroic and the first half of Mythic are not very different from a complexity perspective, but massive numbers of people clear Heroic very early and very, very, very few people clear the first half of Mythic very quickly. Why? Because there is a very steep gear curve. Can you overcome this with skill? Of course, but that doesn't change that it is CLEARLY tuned for gear above what is available day 1 of the raid.

Agreed on the complexity piece, but hard disagree on the reasoning why. Recruiting for mythic because lack of flex is why heroic raiders don't rush into it. It's a pain in the ass. The first few bosses literally roll over to successful heroic guilds, even without a huge ilvl bump. I have not found the gear requirement in early mythic to be ANYTHING meaningful.

[MsSideEye]

1 wow major patch is about the same as 5 FF14 major patches. So no FF14 does not do more.

Last I checked, 14 doesn't flat out just remove entire raids, storylines, and more to end an Expansion early because they decided 'Mmmm, this expansion is a bust, let's get to the next one ASAP'. WoW's done that... what, 3 times now? (Wod, Shadowlands... and I think BFA even has entire cut content like that as well?)

Are you kidding me? There are so many systems in FFXIV where I have no fucking clue how they work until a random person is like "oh hey, what do you think of X?" Like, I remember leveling the Firmament, had no clue what it was for, was leveling my gatherers "normally" and someone is like......"uh, why aren't you leveling in the Firmament?"

There's whole systems which I just didn't know about. I didn't know about desynthesis until I hit 90. I didn't know I could meld my own gear til 90. Etc, etc.

While I won't deny that there are systems in 14 that you aren't aware about for a while and some that have been left behind as the rest of the game has moved forward (Hi Squadrons), there's one major big difference here between 14 and WoW that needs to be established. Unless they changed it in WoW recently, they may have and I wouldn't know, there is nothing in the game that tells you straight out when these a quest that unlocks a feature for you in game. You're expected to grab the quests at the start of an expansion (with a pop up as you open the game even telling you to not forget it!) and after that, they kinda expect you to be aware of it already.

FF14, on the other hand, has anything that unlocks a feature for you within the game itself, be it a new class, a new dungeon,a new side content like Triple Triad or the Artifact weapons, every single one of those has a Blue quest to signify that 'Hey, this is important!'. What's more is that roughly 80% of those have tutorials that goes along side doing those that tell you what you need and will give you a general idea of how to move forward.

Let's not ignore the fact that WoW has put in entire systems into it's game that have been completely scrapped once an expansion is over, leaving a huge swath of it's content that was designed to support it as useless. The Legion Weapons, the Azarite Gear (and Necklace!), and I fully expect Covenants and Torgath to either be deactivated/useless once Shadowlands is officially done with. That's not to say the fact that 14 hasn't also removed stuff either, but it's very rarely something that was expansion defining.

[KrayZ33]

Let's not ignore the fact that WoW has put in entire systems into it's game that have been completely scrapped once an expansion is over, leaving a huge swath of it's content that was designed to support it as useless. The Legion Weapons, the Azarite Gear (and Necklace!), and I fully expect Covenants and Torgath to either be deactivated/useless once Shadowlands is officially done with. That's not to say the fact that 14 hasn't also removed stuff either, but it's very rarely something that was expansion defining.

I don't want to bash in FFXIV because I play it as well every single patch... but what is, in FF14's case, "expansion" defining. Because I don't believe that even exists. There hasn't been a system like Covenants, Legion Weapons, Azerite Gear.... something you spend your expansion interacting with, in this game at all, has there?

What I'm saying is, you can rightfully say that about WoW, but the only reason you can't say that in FFXIV is because it didn't even reach the starting line. The game is essentially the same with no "freshness" added to it in that regard since HW. Most of the time, the legion weapons and such are for classes so that they feel good and fresh and new. FFXIV doesn't have that.

The stuff that comes close to it (like Eureka-ish systems, even though I wouldn't even count that, because you don't interact with it at all in the first place) will be forgotten as well.

[Stormwolf64]

Problem with FFXIV raiding is how absurd the bosses and abilities are. Visual queues basically mean nothing. It has a high "wtf happened" total wipe factor. Maybe you stood on the wrong pixel at the wrong time and the screen just goes black. Either you look to 20 minute videos or use cacpot (ffxiv deadlybossmods) or it'll be a tough time in savage

[MsSideEye]

I don't want to bash in FFXIV because I play it as well every single patch... but what is, in FF14's case, "expansion" defining. Because I don't believe that even exists. There hasn't been a system like Covenants, Legion Weapons, Azerite Gear.... something you spend your expansion interacting with, in this game at all, has there?

What I'm saying is, you can rightfully say that about WoW, but the only reason you can't say that in FFXIV is because it didn't even reach the starting line. The game is essentially the same with no "freshness" added to it in that regard since HW. Most of the time, the legion weapons and such are for classes so that they feel good and fresh and new. FFXIV doesn't have that.

The stuff that comes close to it (like Eureka-ish systems, even though I wouldn't even count that, because you don't interact with it at all in the first place) will be forgotten as well.

Honestly? I'll take good game balance and regular updates from my developers over 'Oooh, shiny' any day. I could care less that we're getting similar content every expansion, because you know what? I actually KNOW what I'm getting from 14. Shadowlands was sold as this massive, world changing expansion... and remind me just how much of it was cut? Probably one full raid tier MINIMUM if not more? Was the Covenants and Torgast REALLY worth it, knowing that in 6 months time they're going to be absolutely dead content?

And here's the thing, there ARE still 'Expansion defining' aspects for their content. Heavensward introduced Flying and established the system to unlock it that is used today. Even if you don't count it, Eureka is still a massive thing that was new to the game that didn't exist before that got added in Stormblood. And we got an arguably better version in Shadowbringers with Bozja, so an update to something that was established an expansion before.

Shadowbringers also introduced the Bi-colored Gems/Fate system, giving more actual reasons to do fates in the world and carried on in Endwalker, and the Trust system, which turned out to be so popular and useful to players that in effort to make the story more accessible to players they're going back and adding it to all the old story dungeons in the game.

And that's not even mentioning the upcoming Island Sanctuary OR the Criterion dungeons that are upcoming and we're going to be learning about this next live letter. Oh, and let's not forget the Adventurer Plate which, while a relatively simple thing, has probably sparked more creativity and fun I've seen in a long time that isn't related to player housing.

Now, does all this have the same impact as 'HEY, EVERYONE, HERE's THIS COMPLETELY NEW SYSTEM THAT WE DESIGNED SPECIFICLY FOR THIS EXPANSION'? No. But I frankly think smaller features, things that are constantly used, updated, or new versions of the same idea (In the case of Eureka/Bozja) are flat out the better option and have more long lasting appeal.

[Wrecktangle]

Honestly? I'll take good game balance and regular updates from my developers over 'Oooh, shiny' any day. I could care less that we're getting similar content every expansion, because you know what? I actually KNOW what I'm getting from 14. Shadowlands was sold as this massive, world changing expansion... and remind me just how much of it was cut? Probably one full raid tier MINIMUM if not more? Was the Covenants and Torgast REALLY worth it, knowing that in 6 months time they're going to be absolutely dead content?

I've kinda had this discussion before, cited a bunch of data and examples and frankly FF14's balance isn't as great as people think it is. Yes it's definitively better than WoWs, but it also has about 10% of the total knobs and borderline offensive homogenization. To be abundantly clear, this is not me saying this is a bad thing, but I think it's important to mention. With how their game is designed, their balance really should be pretty much spot on, and frankly it isn't.

WoWs balance on the other hand is surprisingly decent the last time I did the exercise, but generally is skewed by a few small outliers (one useless spec, like comically poor performing for no reason), and like 2 specs that have no business being 10%+ over the 3rd place spec, but the entire middle section is usually very competitive against each other. Given how many performance tuning knobs their are I'm usually surprised how good the balance is discounting the outliers.

Before people jump on me and say blah blah blah, FF14 has had occasions of their own outliers over the years too. Sometimes not fixing them for entire expansions (WoW syndrome as it were).

And here's the thing, there ARE still 'Expansion defining' aspects for their content. Heavensward introduced Flying and established the system to unlock it that is used today. Even if you don't count it, Eureka is still a massive thing that was new to the game that didn't exist before that got added in Stormblood. And we got an arguably better version in Shadowbringers with Bozja, so an update to something that was established an expansion before.

Shadowbringers also introduced the Bi-colored Gems/Fate system, giving more actual reasons to do fates in the world and carried on in Endwalker, and the Trust system, which turned out to be so popular and useful to players that in effort to make the story more accessible to players they're going back and adding it to all the old story dungeons in the game.

And that's not even mentioning the upcoming Island Sanctuary OR the Criterion dungeons that are upcoming and we're going to be learning about this next live letter. Oh, and let's not forget the Adventurer Plate which, while a relatively simple thing, has probably sparked more creativity and fun I've seen in a long time that isn't related to player housing.

Now, does all this have the same impact as 'HEY, EVERYONE, HERE's THIS COMPLETELY NEW SYSTEM THAT WE DESIGNED SPECIFICLY FOR THIS EXPANSION'? No. But I frankly think smaller features, things that are constantly used, updated, or new versions of the same idea (In the case of Eureka/Bozja) are flat out the better option and have more long lasting appeal.

Eh, out of your examples the only thing that really qualifies IMO is Trusts. They've done a great job with them at growing and supporting the system.

[Ghost of Cow]

I've kinda had this discussion before, cited a bunch of data and examples and frankly FF14's balance isn't as great as people think it is. Yes it's definitively better than WoWs, but it also has about 10% of the total knobs and borderline offensive homogenization. To be abundantly clear, this is not me saying this is a bad thing, but I think it's important to mention. With how their game is designed, their balance really should be pretty much spot on, and frankly it isn't.

WoWs balance on the other hand is surprisingly decent the last time I did the exercise, but generally is skewed by a few small outliers (one useless spec, like comically poor performing for no reason), and like 2 specs that have no business being 10%+ over the 3rd place spec, but the entire middle section is usually very competitive against each other. Given how many performance tuning knobs their are I'm usually surprised how good the balance is discounting the outliers.

Before people jump on me and say blah blah blah, FF14 has had occasions of their own outliers over the years too. Sometimes not fixing them for entire expansions (WoW syndrome as it were).

Yeah, the balance thing is one of those topics that gets repeated so much that everyone just starts taking it as gospel, but the data just doesn't bear it out - at least not to the extent that people claim.

And at the risk of just repeating you - of course XIV's balance should be great, their job and encounter design is such that there really shouldn't be any surprises or unexpected outliers. It's so rigid that people in the parsing community had a small freak-out over P3S because people might be "padding" with DPS on adds or something!

[A Chozo]

People who think FFXIV has no timegating / FOMO here are delusional.

-Special material nodes only available X times per day, can't farm;
-Gotta sub and enter your house every 2 months or Yoshi-P demolishes it;
-Can't farm Aglaia because it's only 1 piece of gear per week;
-Can't farm more tomestones because of weekly cap;
-Can't chain roulettes because the bonus is daily;
-Lots of stuff shown at launch like the Island Sanctuary are still missing, postponed to fill content gaps into later patches.
-Gotta log in for every event otherwise you don't get the special emotes and gear, which go to the cash shop;

Both WoW, FFXIV and even Guild Wars suffer from shitty timegating. I won't be disingenuous and pretend FFXIV has no timegating like y'all are doing. It has. As much as WoW and other mmorpgs. It doesn't stop the game for being fun for me, but it's there.

[KrayZ33]

Is the island Sanctuary actually a housing 2.0 thing where I need crafter stuff to actually enjoy it?
Did they say anything regarding that?
Since it's been mentioned right now, I thought I'd ask.

[A Chozo]

Is the island Sanctuary actually a housing 2.0 thing where I need crafter stuff to actually enjoy it?
Did they say anything regarding that?
Since it's been mentioned right now, I thought I'd ask.

We don't know. We expect more news on the next live letter but right now it's an unknown expansion feature. People want a garden that is separated to their housing system.

[MsSideEye]

I've kinda had this discussion before, cited a bunch of data and examples and frankly FF14's balance isn't as great as people think it is. Yes it's definitively better than WoWs, but it also has about 10% of the total knobs and borderline offensive homogenization. To be abundantly clear, this is not me saying this is a bad thing, but I think it's important to mention. With how their game is designed, their balance really should be pretty much spot on, and frankly it isn't.

WoWs balance on the other hand is surprisingly decent the last time I did the exercise, but generally is skewed by a few small outliers (one useless spec, like comically poor performing for no reason), and like 2 specs that have no business being 10%+ over the 3rd place spec, but the entire middle section is usually very competitive against each other. Given how many performance tuning knobs their are I'm usually surprised how good the balance is discounting the outliers.

Before people jump on me and say blah blah blah, FF14 has had occasions of their own outliers over the years too. Sometimes not fixing them for entire expansions (WoW syndrome as it were).

Except the difference here is also community and expectations. Now this might no longer be true in the modern Era of WoW, I don't know since I've not touch the game since Mid-BFA, but I clearly remember times where a nerf happened or a new expansion released and you were flat out considered a DEAD class that NO ONE would bring no matter what. I should know, the Great Beast Master Nerf of Later Wrath killed that style of hunter until.... I think mid Wod? And that was more because at that point, people were just trying to GET players who were still playing an expansion that had nothing to it.

Now I'm not going to say that the jobs or balance in FF14 is perfect. But I can still go into any content in the game with character and not get laughed out of the room because of her class. It's only at the cutting edge Savage/Ultimate Classes that I've really seen people care THAT much about class and even then, it's more for world first stuff that a very small section of people care about.

I'll also liked to point out that you took just one word I said about balance and entirely ignored the rest of the paragraph pointing out Wow's set up for designing content that's dead after the expansion it premiers.

People who think FFXIV has no timegating / FOMO here are delusional.

Don't think I've ever said there was no timegating/Fomo in 14 at all... just the fact that WoW's was always a great deal worse about it and a lot of things that you'd see as limited time and it's gone in WoW is evergreen content in 14. And personally, when I say time gating, I'm going back to the days of Mists of Pandaria, where if you wanted raiding level gear at the time you had to go through and grind up your reps, some of the gear which were reps BEHIND other reps. (Hi Klaxxi/Lotus)

And to each of your points:

-Special material nodes only available X times per day, can't farm;

Nodes that are on a specific timer you can set to the second, meaning that you can plan out when you're wanting to grab these nodes. Not only that, these nodes are usually only for if you're wanting to do the cutting edge stuff. Considering this content is also meant to be an 'end game' for crafters, it makes sense to have it a tad more limited.

-Gotta sub and enter your house every 2 months or Yoshi-P demolishes it;

Do you really think it's fair for you to keep a house in a game with limited housing if you're not going to be playing it? And that's not even considering the fact that if you're in an FC house, I think those stand as long as you've got one person logging in.

-Can't farm Aglaia because it's only 1 piece of gear per week;

Aglaia is meant for catch up for the players who can't/won't do Savage content and is there to help out players with getting that last little bit of a boost to round out their own gear. Not only that, unlike WoW, once Aglaia stops being the most recent content, it becomes farmable as many times as you want to go in there, VS WoW where even Vanilla gear is set to a week timer for raids once you've finished it. This has also been applied to FF14 at least since Heavensward.

-Can't farm more tomestones because of weekly cap;

Speaking of someone whose experienced the burn out of hitting every single Mists Daily to make gold back when they removed the Daily limit in WoW, honestly, I think it's better to hit a cap. It doesn't lock you into the expectation of 'If I just farm tomestones for hours on end, I'll be in the best raiding gear possible in days!'. A cap is a good thing sometimes.

-Can't chain roulettes because the bonus is daily;

See above. Caps are a good thing and prevent players from going balls to the walls crazy because there is a constant bonus. You CAN chain roulettes if you really want to, you just get the bonus for the first one. And considering there are... what, 8 roulettes currently in the game? That's a good couple of hours per day you can spend in Ff14 if you really wanted too.

-Lots of stuff shown at launch like the Island Sanctuary are still missing, postponed to fill content gaps into later patches.

Not only has this always been FF14's design, to show us stuff they've got planned and roll it out in later patches, but as I've said before, I much rather have content coming out more regularly then getting one or two major patches in an expansion before the expansion is considered over. And then there's also the communication about it, where every single time they've got a live letter, they tell us what the expected time frame for these are.

-Gotta log in for every event otherwise you don't get the special emotes and gear, which go to the cash shop;

Now I'm not sure about this, but last I checked, isn't most things that were limited time like that in WoW gone for good? Things like the armor from the Mist Challange Modes, the Anniversary mount from the time they made Molten Core a WoD level raid, and more?

And as far as logging in for every event, cool, I'm expected maybe an hour or two of my time to unlock a silly little emote or moderately unique gear that's entire use for glam. And if I miss out on it, I can expect it on the store in a year for, like, 2 to 7 bucks or so? VS the 10 to 20 bucks for something in the WoW store that I can ONLY get from the WoW store.

And that's not even mentioning how much farming I'd have to do in WoW now if I'd want to get ALL the rewards for it's holidays in a single go through, which I think for some holidays is actually impossible to do with how much stuff they put in now.

Both WoW, FFXIV and even Guild Wars suffer from shitty timegating. I won't be disingenuous and pretend FFXIV has no timegating like y'all are doing. It has. As much as WoW and other mmorpgs. It doesn't stop the game for being fun for me, but it's there.

Timegating is bad if it's the only reason you can't do content. While FF14 still does have it, it's never been as harsh as WoW's been in the past and they've almost always had a reason for it. Raids are timegated at the start of an Expansion, for example, because they want players to enjoy the story the expansion gives, which draws more of the player base to 14 in the first place.

Is the island Sanctuary actually a housing 2.0 thing where I need crafter stuff to actually enjoy it?
Did they say anything regarding that?
Since it's been mentioned right now, I thought I'd ask.

We don't know anything about Island Sanctuary at all other than we're likely to have minons walking around and stuff to do with our mounts. Some people have got it into their heads that we're going to get some animal crossing set up or housing 2.0, but the main point is we don't know and they've been VERY quiet about it. This upcoming Live Letter is going to be telling us just what is going to be going into it, so we'll see just how it turns out. I'm personally keeping my expectations low so I don't get disappointed by something that I built up in my head that doesn't match what they're offering.

[Wrecktangle]

Except the difference here is also community and expectations. Now this might no longer be true in the modern Era of WoW, I don't know since I've not touch the game since Mid-BFA, but I clearly remember times where a nerf happened or a new expansion released and you were flat out considered a DEAD class that NO ONE would bring no matter what. I should know, the Great Beast Master Nerf of Later Wrath killed that style of hunter until.... I think mid Wod?.

Not dead class, but rather spec and I already acknowledged that. I vilify WoW for that all the time, as a literal career Ret Paladin since Vanilla. This is why I mentioned homogenization being a key piece of balance. It's not hard for the community to be on the same page, when everyone's decisions are the same.

We could argue all day long whether one approach is better than the other, but I suspect it's highly subjective and I think that's ok. Speaking personally I love being able to really differentiate my play style and look from others and am ok with accepting slightly worse balance as a result. I've gone on record detailing a more complex materia system in FF14 to try and get there without really affecting the core itemization fundamentals that a lot of players like.

Now I'm not going to say that the jobs or balance in FF14 is perfect. But I can still go into any content in the game with character and not get laughed out of the room because of her class. It's only at the cutting edge Savage/Ultimate Classes that I've really seen people care THAT much about class and even then, it's more for world first stuff that a very small section of people care about.

To be fair though, no spec in WoW gets excluded from matchmade or low difficulty content either.

I'll also liked to point out that you took just one word I said about balance and entirely ignored the rest of the paragraph pointing out Wow's set up for designing content that's dead after the expansion it premiers.

I apologize, I didn't ignore it intentionally. I mostly agree with you on that piece. I disagree on how "evergreen" FF14 is because my definition of reusing/improving systems is likely MUCH more strict than yours, but for the most part I agree.

On the WoW piece though - I actually enjoyed Torghast. It scratched diablo itch that was really fun content to do with my IRL buddy. Covenants should never have been power oriented, but thematically they were cool.

At the end of the day, I personally enjoy the rotating systems every expansion, it keeps things from getting stale. However, I do firmly believe they drop the ball consistently in keeping core functions/powers in tact in a way that feels good/fun.

[MsSideEye]

Not dead class, but rather spec and I already acknowledged that. I vilify WoW for that all the time, as a literal career Ret Paladin since Vanilla. This is why I mentioned homogenization being a key piece of balance. It's not hard for the community to be on the same page, when everyone's decisions are the same.

We could argue all day long whether one approach is better than the other, but I suspect it's highly subjective and I think that's ok. Speaking personally I love being able to really differentiate my play style and look from others and am ok with accepting slightly worse balance as a result. I've gone on record detailing a more complex materia system in FF14 to try and get there without really affecting the core itemization fundamentals that a lot of players like.

Yeah, I agree. When it comes to balance and what's preferred, it is subjective. You like the ability to switch up your playstyle a bit more, I'm fine with just be given a base class and be expected to play it. I will say, though, that the death of BM Hunter during that era of WoW did encourage me to try Death Knight and Paladin, in which I then discovered I have a love of tanking that I still do in FF14 this day, so something good came out of it at least!

To be fair though, no spec in WoW gets excluded from matchmade or low difficulty content either.

Yeah, when it came to dungeons, outside out of the occasional 'Well, actually' kind of player, I was able to do whatever and not get grumped at. But I also Heroic raided a lot in Wrath/Mists. I remember it being bad enough that when BM was good? I had to bring a Wolf pet because of their buff and NOTHING else. After the BM nerf? I was benched because I wasn't willing to switch the Marksman, even when my DPS was higher regularly then the other Marksman Hunter in the group.

It was only after I became the groups tank did I regularly got into raid runs again... and then everything imploded guild wise and I couldn't get a steady group as either class.

I apologize, I didn't ignore it intentionally. I mostly agree with you on that piece. I disagree on how "evergreen" FF14 is because my definition of reusing/improving systems is likely MUCH more strict than yours, but for the most part I agree.

On the WoW piece though - I actually enjoyed Torghast. It scratched diablo itch that was really fun content to do with my IRL buddy. Covenants should never have been power oriented, but thematically they were cool.

At the end of the day, I personally enjoy the rotating systems every expansion, it keeps things from getting stale. However, I do firmly believe they drop the ball consistently in keeping core functions/powers in tact in a way that feels good/fun.

Eh, no worries. Out of most of the folks that I've discussed things on here, Wreck, you by far one of the most reasonable/open minded of the bunch. I was more ribbing ya over the fact that anything :B

I will say though that yeah, you're definition is likely stricter than mine. For me, things like the Artifact Weapons in 14 remind me of the old Legendaries in WoW like Ragnaros's hammer.... except that once I complete making them, I can use them as glam, something WoW didn't allow (Not sure if that's changed in Shadowlands). Not only that, but unlike some of the later legendaries (Mists/WoD), every single one of those are still obtainable, content I can still do, and is for every single class in the game that was around at that point.

I can't say too much on Torghast, having jumped ship before Shadowlands was even announced, but I've been told by folks that it would probably have been better content had it not been tied to player power with things like Legendaries being a thing from it. Probably something that wouldn't have appealed to me that much anyway, though, since i've always kinda found Diablo dull.

And I get it that the rotating systems keeping things from getting stale bit. I think it's more just how completely useless or flat out removed those things become once that content isn't around anymore is the thing that gets me the most. Like... for example, I played Warlock a bit during Legion. I LOVED their weapon, because I thought it was so cool that when I killed an enemy, they left a wandering soul nearby that I could suck up for a power boost. I'd often go into a dungeon of lower levels and just murder the entire dungeon in one pull because it was fun to see every mob turned into a wandering ghost, just waiting for me to capture them for a strength boost. Once legion was over, that ability pretty much vanished entirely.

Thematically? It makes sense, we're giving up our weapons to get rid of the Sword in the planet (That still there by the way?). But feel wise? I never played my Warlock after that, because at that point the thing that interested me so much was gone. Even if I hadn't left Blizzard completely with the whole Blitzchung fiasco, I don't think I would have lasted much longer within the ame anyway.

[Wrecktangle]

Eh, no worries. Out of most of the folks that I've discussed things on here, Wreck, you by far one of the most reasonable/open minded of the bunch. I was more ribbing ya over the fact that anything :B

Appreciate the kind words.

I will say though that yeah, you're definition is likely stricter than mine. For me, things like the Artifact Weapons in 14 remind me of the old Legendaries in WoW like Ragnaros's hammer.... except that once I complete making them, I can use them as glam, something WoW didn't allow (Not sure if that's changed in Shadowlands). Not only that, but unlike some of the later legendaries (Mists/WoD), every single one of those are still obtainable, content I can still do, and is for every single class in the game that was around at that point.

I don't know how true this is for OTHER legendaries, but as of some time ago, you can certainly can, at least I can with my Shadowmourne.

[Izthak]

To answer the original question, anything's possible.

If you only like endgame content, and enjoy the repetitiveness that comes with it in all of these MMOs, why wouldn't you in FF?

[Miriamel105]

Sorry, but FF14 is way less an RPG than WoW.

You meanwhil got literael NO influence at all on your character.

The game is designed around having one character, having more is a mess. This one characters is only the chosen one and the absolute uber Mary Sue - beside all the time in which the game forces you to become some peasant who can do shit and you simply have to ignore all that if you actually want to RP, since it would make no sense at all, because every other player is the Uber Sue chosen one, too.

The only difference in gear is item level.

There is no difference in class left, every member of a class will always be exactly the same, you got no skill to choose from, no traits, not even a special item (it was a bit better at start, but they cut away all of it). So by game design FF14 is no RPG at all anymore, since you got nothing like stats and skills and not even items and alike to build your character around.

And the roleplay with other people force you to ignore the story and just make your character a completely different person - what you can do in just every game you want or without any game at all.

Not starting to talk about, how awful the story is in general, where all the bad guys simply never do anything of worth and are so stupid, that you litearlly just walk up to them and punch them to death without any preperation or anything.

How do you for example want to roleplay around the whole Garlemald thing? The guys who are a continent sized empire, but never do anything and then just fall apart? I really don't know how to work with something like that, because it makes no sense.

And by the way: forcing people through cutscenes and filler quests does not makes something an RPG. They have to cut that away sooner or later anyway. Imagine Wow would do that, to force people through the whole story since start, people would go nuts about it.

And when you look back from today to the start of FF14, it just makes clear, that they got no clue where go go with at this time and sad enough just cut away so many things until a very boring: the invincible good guys just obliterate the stupid baddies remained, without any build up, without any conflict, just by plot armor.

What is not RPG level, that's action adventure level and I know many action adventures which still have a better story than that - obviously, since it's not hard to be better than having antagonists who are forced to be lethargic and braindead, just so the writers don't have to write an actually interesting story about challenges and struggles.

The bad quality of FF14 story is not a question of taste. It's simply a lack of engagement on the developer side. They switched the main writers and since then the story went completely bland in a just ridiculous way.

It does not matter from which side you look at it: FF14 isn't really an RPG anymore. The game itself gives you ZERO freedom regarding your character.

I know that very well, because the game made me hate my character by forcing it to be bland, stupid it simply just evil (and you are evil, when you solve problems with blind mass murder of everyone you don't see as your guys without questioning your own position for a single second).

And gameplay, as said: I got zero influence on my character. No choice of skills, no special equipment, nothing, not even the illusion. Just job level and item level.

[MsSideEye]

Sorry, but FF14 is way less an RPG than WoW.

You meanwhil got literael NO influence at all on your character.

The game is designed around having one character, having more is a mess. This one characters is only the chosen one and the absolute uber Mary Sue - beside all the time in which the game forces you to become some peasant who can do shit and you simply have to ignore all that if you actually want to RP, since it would make no sense at all, because every other player is the Uber Sue chosen one, too.

The only difference in gear is item level.

There is no difference in class left, every member of a class will always be exactly the same, you got no skill to choose from, no traits, not even a special item (it was a bit better at start, but they cut away all of it). So by game design FF14 is no RPG at all anymore, since you got nothing like stats and skills and not even items and alike to build your character around.

And the roleplay with other people force you to ignore the story and just make your character a completely different person - what you can do in just every game you want or without any game at all.

Not starting to talk about, how awful the story is in general, where all the bad guys simply never do anything of worth and are so stupid, that you litearlly just walk up to them and punch them to death without any preperation or anything.

How do you for example want to roleplay around the whole Garlemald thing? The guys who are a continent sized empire, but never do anything and then just fall apart? I really don't know how to work with something like that, because it makes no sense.

And by the way: forcing people through cutscenes and filler quests does not makes something an RPG. They have to cut that away sooner or later anyway. Imagine Wow would do that, to force people through the whole story since start, people would go nuts about it.

And when you look back from today to the start of FF14, it just makes clear, that they got no clue where go go with at this time and sad enough just cut away so many things until a very boring: the invincible good guys just obliterate the stupid baddies remained, without any build up, without any conflict, just by plot armor.

What is not RPG level, that's action adventure level and I know many action adventures which still have a better story than that - obviously, since it's not hard to be better than having antagonists who are forced to be lethargic and braindead, just so the writers don't have to write an actually interesting story about challenges and struggles.

The bad quality of FF14 story is not a question of taste. It's simply a lack of engagement on the developer side. They switched the main writers and since then the story went completely bland in a just ridiculous way.

It does not matter from which side you look at it: FF14 isn't really an RPG anymore. The game itself gives you ZERO freedom regarding your character.

I know that very well, because the game made me hate my character by forcing it to be bland, stupid it simply just evil (and you are evil, when you solve problems with blind mass murder of everyone you don't see as your guys without questioning your own position for a single second).

And gameplay, as said: I got zero influence on my character. No choice of skills, no special equipment, nothing, not even the illusion. Just job level and item level.

So, let's go through the bad choices in this particular post by number fashion, shall we?

1) The topic of the thread as a whole isn't about the game being an RPG, it's if the person who primarily enjoys Endgame content like WoW has would enjoy FF14. While the subject of an RPG has come up before, it's not the main focus, and thus something shouldn't really be used as your starting post point.

2) The way you phrase your first statement also already sets a precedent. We know you're going to support WoW and crap on 14, and frankly, while you're going to get some supporters here since this is a WoW dominated forum (And Val will agree with you anyway because he hates everything), you're still going to get ignored by any 14 fans and anyone whose legitimately wanting to talk about 14 here will likely just be told to ignore you (as we do with Val).

3) In response to the 'Mary Sue' aspect, how is this any different from ANY other video game, much less World of Warcraft? Last I checked, it's the players who are still responsible for killing at least 3 Old Gods, The Lich King, a corrupt leader of one of the two major factions POWERED by an Old Gold, An Ancient Dragon also corrupted by the old gods, and a Titan beings (And his planet) that created one of the most deadly and violent forces in the Warcraft universe.

4) For the RP aspect, you CLEARLY have never been in the roleplay part of things. One of the key aspects of roleplay is that it's all set up by the people actually PLAYING in the rp. If you want to roleplay, say, as Jaina Proudmore for the extent of what you're doing and other people are alright with it, then guess what? You're Jaina Proudmore. Will other people from outside of the roleplay accept it? Probably not, but they don't matter for the game YOU and your roleplay partners are playing, do they?

5) Let's be entirely honest here: Roughly 80% of anyone interested in a game that has any kind of talent tree, multiple choice, or what not is always go look up a guide or get suggestions for how to play optimally. Doesn't matter if it's World of Warcraft, Binding of Isaac, Oxygen Not Included, or what have you, if there's an optimal way to play people are going to favor towards that, especially if the game in question is a multiplayer game or a competitive one. And as those games with talent trees have shown us, balance is always THAT much harder to work out the further you break it down, again, as WoW has shown having 3 specs for most of their classes that people EXPECT to play differently now.

6) Saying that there's no difference in how people play just because they've got limited options is a freaking laugh. Take someone whose mastered Super Mario Brothers by playing Kaizo and put them along side a kid who just started playing it. The difference between them is insane with what the Master can do when it comes to knowing all the little mechanics in the game to get through some of the toughest courses imaginable. That same skill expression is the same in ANY game, be it FF14, WoW, League of Legends or what have you. There's visible difference between someone who knows how to play their job well vs someone who just plays in their off time.

7) Have you ever seen a major government try to do anything, especially when in fighting is involved? As much as I'm loathe to bring up actual real life politics, look at the war in Ukraine. Russia is supposed to be this big bad nation with all the power in the world, and yet for all the death and destruction they've caused, Ukraine's actually come out AHEAD in nearly every respect. This is almost entirely because the amount of people behind/supporting the current leaders of Russia is small compared to everyone else and the amount of corruption/infighting has been screwing them over. And that's kinda been the major problem with Garlemald in 14, because every time the current leader bites the dust, there's a fight over WHO will take the throne.

8) WoW was never designed to put people through all the quests for the get go, but honestly? I think they SHOULD do have their own major story that they ask people to go through from start to finish. Because otherwise you get what we get now: Us going up to fight some bald, shirtless man whose said to rule a part of the land of the dead with out any connection, importance to you, or any reason for you to fight other than the game telling us 'he did a bad thing!'. Oh, except he didn't, since he was doing this out of to stop some yet unnamed other bigger, eviler force that we don't even know. Compare this to FF14, where I could tell you everything you need to know from any expansion because I played through their stories from start to finish, allowing me connect, grow to love, and even CRY over some of theses characters. Cutting the content in 14 also came from the fact that they had overfilled the earlier parts of the game when they made that (10 years ago!) in an attempt to give players something to DO while they were making their first expansion.

9) "the invincible good guys just obliterate the stupid baddies remained, without any build up, without any conflict, just by plot armor." Soooo, basically, the fight with the Lich King, considering that we got resurrected to kill him off? A mechanic that, need I remind you, doesn't exist as far as the actual lore of Warcraft? It's pretty sad then that WoW is guilty of this in one of the best expansions of its lifetime, where as 14 is mostly guilty of this back in it's early days.

10) You say this isn't a thing of taste, and yet Shadowbringers is still the gangbuster that kinda really pushed 14 over the tipping point, and a lot of people will swear by THAT being the best that 14 ever produced. This came from a change of Writer so, surprise surprise, sometimes getting a fresh mind and fresh hands into a story can actually produce something that people generally like, especially if they're willing to pull their heads out of the sand.

11) Except the freedom to grind any of the legendary weapons from the previous expansions if you're wanting to, the freedom to do your own content as far as crafting and gathering that are support with new content every expansion, the freedom to dress yourself in your own looks at all times to the point where it doesn't even cost in game currency to do so, the freedom to get your own house/apartment to decorate as you please, the freedom to play the game in DUNGEONS without having to be with another player, the freedom of not having to do brain dead 'collect ten bear butts' quests in every zone just to finish it to completion. There's surely more I'm missing, but that's just what I can recall off the top my head that's stuff I've done.

12) Again, you're talking about every game there, considering how many people apposing your opinions you've killed in WoW, much less other games? Hell, this is real life too. If you're branding the actions of the WoL as Evil for doing something like this, then you probably shouldn't be playing games at all... or associating with anyone in the Navy/Army/Air Force.

13) And yet, I can express myself by showing off the Relic weapons I've farmed, the Savage gear gathered (and colored!), and the Ultimate Weapons I've collected. Those go further than anything else in representing my skill as a player compared to 'oh, I got rank 15 in M+ for going really fast as an Affliction Warlock!'.

14) As I've said before and I'll say again, if you don't like 14? Fine. If you prefer WoW? Also Fine. But if you start crap just because you don't like it, expect me to clap back. And I know this isn't really anything refuting or responding to the above post, but I found it hilarious that I was all the way at point 13 by the time I had finished my response and just had to go for the meme for the 14th one.

I will say, though, thank you for giving me something the waste an hour on while I waited for food.

[Ghost of Cow]

Sorry, but FF14 is way less an RPG than WoW.

You meanwhil got literael NO influence at all on your character.

The game is designed around having one character, having more is a mess. This one characters is only the chosen one and the absolute uber Mary Sue - beside all the time in which the game forces you to become some peasant who can do shit and you simply have to ignore all that if you actually want to RP, since it would make no sense at all, because every other player is the Uber Sue chosen one, too.

The only difference in gear is item level.

There is no difference in class left, every member of a class will always be exactly the same, you got no skill to choose from, no traits, not even a special item (it was a bit better at start, but they cut away all of it). So by game design FF14 is no RPG at all anymore, since you got nothing like stats and skills and not even items and alike to build your character around.

And the roleplay with other people force you to ignore the story and just make your character a completely different person - what you can do in just every game you want or without any game at all.

Not starting to talk about, how awful the story is in general, where all the bad guys simply never do anything of worth and are so stupid, that you litearlly just walk up to them and punch them to death without any preperation or anything.

How do you for example want to roleplay around the whole Garlemald thing? The guys who are a continent sized empire, but never do anything and then just fall apart? I really don't know how to work with something like that, because it makes no sense.

And by the way: forcing people through cutscenes and filler quests does not makes something an RPG. They have to cut that away sooner or later anyway. Imagine Wow would do that, to force people through the whole story since start, people would go nuts about it.

And when you look back from today to the start of FF14, it just makes clear, that they got no clue where go go with at this time and sad enough just cut away so many things until a very boring: the invincible good guys just obliterate the stupid baddies remained, without any build up, without any conflict, just by plot armor.

What is not RPG level, that's action adventure level and I know many action adventures which still have a better story than that - obviously, since it's not hard to be better than having antagonists who are forced to be lethargic and braindead, just so the writers don't have to write an actually interesting story about challenges and struggles.

The bad quality of FF14 story is not a question of taste. It's simply a lack of engagement on the developer side. They switched the main writers and since then the story went completely bland in a just ridiculous way.

It does not matter from which side you look at it: FF14 isn't really an RPG anymore. The game itself gives you ZERO freedom regarding your character.

I know that very well, because the game made me hate my character by forcing it to be bland, stupid it simply just evil (and you are evil, when you solve problems with blind mass murder of everyone you don't see as your guys without questioning your own position for a single second).

And gameplay, as said: I got zero influence on my character. No choice of skills, no special equipment, nothing, not even the illusion. Just job level and item level.

The simplest reply to this wall of text (ignoring the subjective story opinions) is: This is only true if your definition of "RPG" revolves solely around gear and stats.

[NineSpine]

Sorry, but FF14 is way less an RPG than WoW.

You meanwhil got literael NO influence at all on your character.

The game is designed around having one character, having more is a mess. This one characters is only the chosen one and the absolute uber Mary Sue - beside all the time in which the game forces you to become some peasant who can do shit and you simply have to ignore all that if you actually want to RP, since it would make no sense at all, because every other player is the Uber Sue chosen one, too.

The only difference in gear is item level.

There is no difference in class left, every member of a class will always be exactly the same, you got no skill to choose from, no traits, not even a special item (it was a bit better at start, but they cut away all of it). So by game design FF14 is no RPG at all anymore, since you got nothing like stats and skills and not even items and alike to build your character around.

And the roleplay with other people force you to ignore the story and just make your character a completely different person - what you can do in just every game you want or without any game at all.

Not starting to talk about, how awful the story is in general, where all the bad guys simply never do anything of worth and are so stupid, that you litearlly just walk up to them and punch them to death without any preperation or anything.

How do you for example want to roleplay around the whole Garlemald thing? The guys who are a continent sized empire, but never do anything and then just fall apart? I really don't know how to work with something like that, because it makes no sense.

And by the way: forcing people through cutscenes and filler quests does not makes something an RPG. They have to cut that away sooner or later anyway. Imagine Wow would do that, to force people through the whole story since start, people would go nuts about it.

And when you look back from today to the start of FF14, it just makes clear, that they got no clue where go go with at this time and sad enough just cut away so many things until a very boring: the invincible good guys just obliterate the stupid baddies remained, without any build up, without any conflict, just by plot armor.

What is not RPG level, that's action adventure level and I know many action adventures which still have a better story than that - obviously, since it's not hard to be better than having antagonists who are forced to be lethargic and braindead, just so the writers don't have to write an actually interesting story about challenges and struggles.

The bad quality of FF14 story is not a question of taste. It's simply a lack of engagement on the developer side. They switched the main writers and since then the story went completely bland in a just ridiculous way.

It does not matter from which side you look at it: FF14 isn't really an RPG anymore. The game itself gives you ZERO freedom regarding your character.

I know that very well, because the game made me hate my character by forcing it to be bland, stupid it simply just evil (and you are evil, when you solve problems with blind mass murder of everyone you don't see as your guys without questioning your own position for a single second).

And gameplay, as said: I got zero influence on my character. No choice of skills, no special equipment, nothing, not even the illusion. Just job level and item level.

FF14 gives you the ultimate choice: the choice of which content to do without being punished for it. Let me know when wow figures that one out.