Endwalker is the Worst FFXIV Expansion I have played

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[@doctorcis3510]

As a player that finally reached endgame only recently for the first time, I've been having a great time and feeling like I have tons to do. But looking back, very little of what I'm doing is EW post patch. Old Relics, leveling jobs, finishing all yellow quests, collecting. If I had all that done and was dependent on just EW post patch, I'd probably would feel way different.

[@michaelsherwood8239]

finishing all yellow quests youre a gamer. i salute

[@amazingj4173]

I have 3k hours and rarely touched any yellow quests lol

[@carlomen12]

Been feeling the exact same way. I was honestly thinking that maybe i was missing something because i always heard of these big post DLC "events" essentially and didn't see that after endwalker.

[@icebarrage_iwc]

yellow quests? homie i got 9k hours and not touched those shits. you're wasting your time.

[@WickedSensei]

I've done almost every yellow quests :( but im a story guy so I enjoy them lol@@icebarrage_iwc

[@InbetweenGamer]

I’ve played most of this expansion solo, my friends have all dropped it. Also taken the most breaks I have during this expac.

[@Disapointedmellencol]

you could make freinds with active players lord knows there are plenty, heck some of my besties I met in PF

[@kamitorings]

all these people and these guys still choose to be alone.@@Disapointedmellencol

[@k1rzen]

@@Disapointedmellencol its not that easy to make friends, you need to find people that you click with, or cant bother looking for new friends etc

[@ishirutaekakura308]

Probably afking in limsa right now! @@Disapointedmellencol

[@GoatOfWar]

@@Disapointedmellencol Doing what? Afking in your shitty glam together in Limsa?

[@PetroklosZDM]

The new unique thing of post Endwalker are the Criterion Dungeons, and it feels so odd that they're not *the* thing to be doing for your EW Relic.

[@bangbangg8697]

yeah ff14 needs to have more challenges or achievement grinding

[@DawnAfternoon]

@@bangbangg8697 Nah man FF14 has more than enough challenges, what the game's missing is the casual/midcore grind.

[@bangbangg8697]

@@DawnAfternoon hmm yeah what i meant like maybe they could add a super cool mount or outfit if we kill x boss x amount of times, or like reach floor 100 of deep dungeons without dying. Something to strive for. U can count these challenges as grinds. Anything like that or w.e, a goal basically.

[@davidbernardino8109]

I really wish Criterion dungeons actually had decent rewards. An idea I really like that Xeno made, was it should have dropped savage equivalent gear. That way, it helps everyone from casual to hard-core raider and it would potentially get more ppl nto trying new content like said raiding.

[@bangbangg8697]

@@davidbernardino8109hmm maybe ff14 just needs to revamp obtaining gear but thats a long shot. Maybe even revamping how gear works so there are different builds for each class but that will never be the case how definitive stats and skills are in ff14. It's not like Gw2 or anything.

[@khmatrix]

SE needs to mix things up and implement things to promote socializing and grouping up with people. Not just another Bozja but in the regular Overworld too, something that can come and go like beyond just hunt trains. I'm so surprised the "variant/criterion" dungeon isn't something super flexible to promote grouping and get different rewards.

[@shizachan8421]

I feel like they could take notes from WoWs current casual open world content. I mean, it isn't the most social when you basically just join a LFG party and spam down an event, but it is casual open world content tailored to be engaged in with a group and it offers relatively good rewards for that level of content, lfr level equipment that can be transformed into the Raid-Tier as well as lots of mounts, cosmetic transmogs and pets.

[@ojosama]

Even if people don't agree with your assessment I think this is an important discussion to have.

[@jemleith3263]

My FFXIV play rotation is to jump into the new expansion 1 month after release. Finish MSQ. Come back a year or more later, do all the new MSQ and trial quests. Log out until next expansion. I subscribe for 3 to maybe 4 months from expansion release to a new expansion. I was also a 1.0 player, and a die hard FFXI supporter, so my expectations/enjoyment in games is arguably different from others.

[@magus9180]

It is an ongoing discussion in the forums already. But this makes it even more public and that is really important.

[@Cuthawolf]

Agreed, totally.

[@TwodeeTwodimensional]

The framing makes Zepla look like a real life lalafell 😂

[@alder96ontwitch88]

Haha yeah it really does

[@sepsam4556]

LMAO I can't unsee it

[@hitmongg]

It's the lack of bun ears, normally they would fit in the frame lol.

[@WubstahWulf]

thats because she is a real life Lalafel

[@debrucey]

It’s boomer parent using Zoom framing lol

[@Zeales]

Outside of prime time on week days on the EU servers (17 ST to 22 ST) it is essentially impossible to get a Frontlines queue pop.

[@Zephy_Sky]

I think the next round of relic weapons should be tied into a new zone like bozja or eureka, but I think they should do some kind of overhaul to those existing zones so that experienced players could be zoned up with newer players in those areas so the content doesn't die. Similar to how they handle the duty roullettes. But in the case of this, there would be more rewards, gear, and currencies for the experienced players so it would make it worth their time to do activities in content they've already done. I don't know the specifics but i know its possible, it's always a such a shame to see such content fade into obscurity, when they have already solved this problem with old content dungeons and trials.

[@chromedbadger]

"We want you to play other games" is missing " but if you stay away too long we'll destroy your house."

[@LightSummoner84]

Ostrich policy, our game no longer contains enough content that lasts over time go play other game but paid a ff14 subscription, but besides you have 45 days before your land is demolished, frankly given the deplorable state of the patches, and the next extension will be released in a minimum of 9 months after the October 3rd patch they should disable housing demolition as a commercial gesture, FF14 has become a game of emptiness.

[@MrJoy-hn9il]

My friends and I have been very much in this same boat. We're largely more on the casual side, and we basically lived in Bozja during Shadowbringers. We never had a shortage of stuff to do there, and in previous expansions the relics would largely serve as a way for us to get through between patches. This time, however, there's always that awkward moment where someone will ask, "Is there anything else we want to do?" after doing our token roulettes and it's met with ho-hums and polite ways of saying "no, not really", and we all slowly log off. It's happened way more frequently in Endwalker than any other expansion so far, and we've all been playing since Heavensward. I almost lost my house the other day because I lost track of how long it'd been since I'd logged in and went to it, and I'm wondering if I should just relinquish it so I can unsub without worrying, and at least give someone else a chance at owning one. I look at my barren friend list with rows upon rows of offline players, and I can't say I'd be able to show it to anyone anyway. There's just so little to keep players playing, that even the whole 'make your own fun' side like RPing or events are largely not even feasible either, because again.. you look at your friend list and are basically treated to a graveyard. This can't keep going on if we're meant to have "10 MORE YEARS" of this game.

[@pengwinsRus]

You say there's no shortage of stuff to do in Bozja, and I guess I just don't get that. After doing each FATE like 5 times, I was kind of over it.

[@maharaja101]

This is exactly where I'm at. Also put a lot of hours into Bozja but there isn't anything like that in EW. It had a good amount of stuff to grind for and a nice balance where it was more engaging than normal mode stuff but also not so difficult that you needed a static to enjoy it. EW doesn't really have anything interesting going on for it (for me). Island Sanctuary is incredibly low effort, you just check in and do your daily thing that takes 5 minutes. Variant/Criterion doesn't have much longevity either. The relic is just tomes. I'll naturally log back in for Dawntrail when it drops but I really hope they will shake things up then.

[@minakatahizuru]

If it gives you worry and you think about it unsub.

[@-cat-..]

​​​@@maharaja101You go in daily? I'm in like once a week lmao, I just set up the next 5 days of spreadsheet and leave (if you even feel like it, because there's nothing worth buying more than once)

[@arknightsboi2050]

Ive seen multiple videos on this now and everyone referenced zeplas multiple times so finally taking the time to see. First off. EW is fine, yes it lacks long term content….. kinda. If you have been playing non stop for years on years like zepla then yeah there isnt anything to do because you have done it all, but news flash, there is so much freaking content in this game and most of it is pretty darn alive. Eureka still has pretty full instances depending on the time, bozja is pretty full even seeing over 60 people on peek hours. Drn is running groups constantly. Frontlines and casual cc queues pop all the time. Anima light farms, extreme farms, people doing older ultimates and savages in of all the time, unreals still popping. The game is far from dead. Now maybe zepla is having just a uniquely bad experience but for me this has been a catch up expac to calmly go back and do things in the past I havent. So honestly to zepla and the others have they listened to yoshi p like she said? Do you all have every relic done from expansions past? Every job leveled? Every blue mage spell learned? Every mount farmed? If not then go do it, you have content and stop whining. If you do then legit take a break and chill. The achievement list is my solution and if you dont like it then I dont have anything else to say. Now for a few small side notes I want changed but by no means am I doom saying. PVP ranked sucks, the series is fine. Ranked in its current format is boring and not representative of a healthy state nor reflects how ffxiv is. Ranked should honestly be ditched all together and turned into a grindier aspect where you need say…. 100 wins to get all the ranked rewards compared to this BS where only one person per DC can get something. Currently you got until you hit crystal and then stop which causes it to fizzle after a month and no queues after plat. Rank degredation wouldnt work btw for those who think it would as the community is small as is and degradation would just piss people off. Variant is great content and super casual friendly. Yes you can get all 12 routes done fast but my friends spend a good six hours figuring out the puzzles together seeing what we need to do with the clues. Zepla just sounds like she has shitty friends who didnt wait for her tbh…. Criterion has good rewards currently and even though I think it needs gear rewards too I think actual savages need marketboard stuff as well. For real if you dont care for gear like me and it becomes outdated then gear isnt a reward. Its just inventory filler. Give savages things to sell on the marketboard. Give all content something to sell. Gear is a bad reason unless its gonna be a permanent gear solution like how eureka and bozjas gear works with perma stat boosts for those specific areas. Deep dungeons are fun but honestly not my cup of tea but Ill gladly take them. And social aspect wise the game is still doing fine. Not much else to say.

[@arknightsboi2050]

Oh I forgot about island sanctuary. I love island sanctuary personally. Its chill easy content that you get plenty of rewards in. Honestly too many rewards…. I dont need 10 madragora thx se…. But island sanctuary is something that is super welcome if its a once in several expansion thing. Doman reclamation is basically the same thing and its solid but only a solo person thing. Ishgardrian restoration is soooooorta multiple people but… lets be real crafting and gathering is always solo except fishing voyages. WHICH BTW CAN WE GET CRAFTING GATHERING RAID BOSSES PLEASE THANKS (look as osrs)

[@EntityXIII]

I, for one, burnt out on achievement hunting. I reduced my hunt to just doing the relics at whatever pace and collecting the things I want, like mounts and minions. When I quit the achievement hunt. I had about 82% of available achievements, with the remainder requiring some combination of hardcore raiding, grinding things out, pvp (ew), and rng. I looked at that, looked at how most of the socialization aspect had been reduced to Hunt Trains. Also, as for the relic journey this time around, I'd say the journey is doing the Manderville quests. They can be fun, sure, but yeah, there's less engagement than rage quitting the game when Pagos was brand spanking new. Turning in the tomes is more tedious than earning the tomes, and I'm frustrated that, for the second xpac in a row, tanks and healers are without Direct Hit on their relics once custom stats comes along. At this point I feel like grinding out Incarnates in City of Heroes is a far better process than relics in ShB and EW combined. More than that, I would say it is fitting Endwalker's patches are so mid, because that was honestly how I felt with much of IV's story. There is good, but... It's not for me. One last thing: With Island Sanctuary, what ticked me off was that after all the promise of self-containment, we ended up needing materials crafted with EXPERT CRAFTING (mother clucker!) to get one or two good-looking buildings. Yeah, once I'm done with the next update, I'm done with Sanctuary. We can place items... within certain boundaries, and half the places I want to put things are JUST OUTSIDE those boundaries.

[@RisqueBisquetz]

People seek to have big group activities in an MMO, and being lacking in that can be fatal to the overall player base. Hopefully Dawntrail will provide more in that aspect.

[@hatemeister]

There are many mmos that are played almost entirely solo, even ffxiv is a solo game with multi-player elements all the, way through the story. I don't think that's the problem.

[@shakeweller]

Is it, that's the main reason people play that genre. @@hatemeister

[@halfbakedn00b]

Agreed. One of the big things is that mmos are played for social interactions and engaging with others. Sure, ffxiv has always been a story driven game, but I've always felt this sort of engagement factor with others. People willing to talk and interact with each other, do crazy content, and joke around or simply be social. Might be a me thing, but despite more people being around, no one really does much with anyone or talk to you, unless they absolutely have to. Not even saying a simple hello. They want you to be a voiceless npc or be stoic themselves. I feel a bit more alone now than when my server was a small pop server everyone dunked on. I like that more people are engaged with ffxiv, but it also seems like more people want to loose the mm part of mmos these days.

[@DongsMBM]

I personally feel its the lack of game contents. it can either be group or solo activities, you just need something to do. theres not much that you can do at this point of the game. I never bothered with moogle treasure hunts as I usually dont give a shit about the rewards. I never did any of them. but now? I thank the twelve that theres finally something to actually play! Thats how desperate I am right now, craving for anything at all from the game

[@ElZamo92]

Sure, but that’s a literal year away, in the meantime we will get one more 24 man raid, one dungeon and one trial…

[@Sazandora635]

This is honestly the first expansion where I've felt so burned out and at a loss as to what do that I've just...not logged in for a week or more at a time. I've done basically everything significant except for the ultimates (Which are fundamentally unappealing to me due to the effort/reward ratio involved), so the only thing that's really left at this point is...relic/achievement grinds, except EW didn't add anything of substance in that regard like Eureka/Bozja did. The fact that the 2.0-6.0 story arc is over and the current filler arc is failing to hold my interest in any significant capacity really isn't helping with my investment in the game, either.

[@DoppelgangerTH]

I think you summarized it quite well. We have an ARR situation with building new story arc, story is quite bland (and its ok), while also getting subpar side content...

[@Keldiur]

@@DoppelgangerTH this is not building, we might be tying up a thread started in ARR with the 13th. There is very little build up for the groundwork and I feel it will be left for Dawntrail. The 13th will be solved or severely delayed into another expansion. Both outcomes will feel rushed and incomplete with very little connectivity to the next expansion and hardly any influence on the reflections ark they are trying to set up.

[@DawnAfternoon]

In SB and ShB, you stop playing the game because to stop yourself from burning out of the game. In EW, you stop playing the game because there's nothing to do in the game. Those two are very different reasoning and people love to conflate them. Taking a break because there's too much things to do is a good sign. Taking a break because there's nothing to do is something else entirely.

[@stormdrain23]

I know this is an older video but I have thought a lot about this and I realized what it was for me. I call it the “Post-Endgame Effect”. After Avengers Endgame, my interest in the MCU waned almost completely. I have been apathetic about what came out after Endgame. For me the story ended and I was satisfied. I’ve had a similar sort of mentality after 6.0. For me, the story ended with the end of Endwalker. I was happy with where we landed. It’s taken me until the 6.3/6.4 story to start feeling a sense of excitement again. Before that I was like “I’m done; I’m content” so I took a LONG break. BUT I had not even really thought about how the archfiends should have been a side story series and that they were shoehorned into the MSQ in exchange for a side series. Then I realized I was looking for the trial series but not finding anything. When you mentioned that I was like “omg”

[@goataku1154]

I been feeling the same way I wanna collect all the trial mounts but I just don’t feel like logging in endgame is super boring this time around :(

[@SORROWCODE]

To me it really seems like they could've used the 13th shard as Endwalkers Bozja as a setup for us going into the 13th full on fixing it like we did the 1st in an expansion after Dawntrail

[@cr4sher7]

Exactly, that's a great idea! We definitely more Eureka/Bozja type of content in FF XIV. That's what would make me come back :D

[@brycemoose7026]

13th instanced zone would be awesome lol

[@brevebe]

This woulda been awesome. Imagine a fate with cloud of darkness again? But its EX and there's however many people get into the fate. That would be so fun. Can do a doggo unchained fate. Could even incorporate bosses from the tower into fates. That would be so fun.

[@SaveMeXenu]

@@cr4sher7 As a Triple Triad collector, if they add more Eureka/Bozja and put cards in it, I will unsub.

[@GhostAeonWolf]

@@brevebe no... you know who likes to recycle all the old bosses from story and raids? ActiBliz. And then they screw them up. Just to farm people who want to see them again.

[@Jubanni1998]

I feel the same i think shadowbringer was so gripping and had such a huge stand alone character that everything after is gonna have a hard time. I wasnt as hyped for endwalker and felt more like okay lets see where it ends and after 6.0 i feel theres nothing really grasping me anymore. i can look for new things to do but its more i need to look to have fun than having fun exploring a whole new world and its story or waiting for the next nier raid

[@Ciruya]

I stopped playing sometime in 6.1. I've kept telling myself since 6.2 came out that I'm excited to get back into the new content... eventually. Even now, I think about it a lot. But logging in every week or two just to lose another housing lottery isn't very motivating. I haven't seen any new glam or hairstyle I am particularly interested in trying to get. Your point on Bozja and the current relic grind really hit a chord with me too. And finally the fact that I 'hear' that my datacenter's queues are basically dead and I'd have to travel to do any content sounds disheartening. So I can't speak too much on actual content, but I do feel very similarly regardless.

[@beegibbs]

Yes, party finder has absolutely suffered. My husband and I recently logged back in to do the most recent patch content with a friend, and our PF is damn near empty. It didn't take long to fill once we put one up ourselves, but no one is putting up groups because there simply aren't any being started anyway.

[@LemonCreature]

Just a quick post on Bozja, yeah I totally agree on really REALLY missing a zone or two like that this time around. Now, while I started playing the game shortly before ShB came out (like a month before?), I like to think that despite the backlog of stuff to go through and unlock, Bozja helped keep me around and excited to play more than if we did not have it. There was just something really enjoyable about running around the zone, leveling alt jobs, working on a relic, or simply grinding Mettle and joining up with random people doing CEs and Skirmishes (mostly CEs). On top of that, there was the excitement of Castrum or Dalriada spawning, and then all the hours I sunk into DR with different classes. We just don't have anything like that here in Endwalker. The World itself isn't even interesting to engage with. It feels very empty and unengaging outside in the Zones when all you have to do out there is Maps, Hunt Trains, Fates, and Gathering, all of which just are not very difficult at all in regards to how much I feel like I am being challenged or having to think beyond mashing 1 2 3 or whatever. It's very depressing seeing the game in this very "Mid" state and having people defend it like their lives depend on it. Speaking of engagement and difficulty, one thing that made Bozja so much fun for me personally was the difficulty. The Raids and the CEs all felt like they were at a nice place for how tough they were, it was a nice middle ground between MSQ content (which should be harder btw, you've played 80 to 90 lvls worth of content :v git gud) and EX/Savage. Where is that this expansion? There's just nothing to do if you want battle content that doesn't feel like Baby Mode, or Hyper Focused Hardcore. On top of Dungeon difficulty, this isn't even getting into the fear I have for how they keep homogenizing a lot of classes or over simplifying things. I am truly afraid for DRG in Dawn...whatever it's called. It's my 2nd fav melee next to MNK, and I swear if they butcher it like SMN's current state I will be salty. Also stop making all AOEs circles, why do you hate cones and lines? You Shapeist or something :v ? SPEAKING of Relics by the way, as I briefly mention up above that working on a Relic is something that kept me engaged... I REALLY don't want to do Hildebrand :v like... I really don't. I just don't care about it, and hate that I have to go through all of that just to pick up a weapon that I don't even think will be BiS until Raiding is done with/if one of them looks nice enough for me to actually want to "grind" for it. Maybe I'd do it if I had some fun content to run through, but seeing as it's all just Tomestones, I just ask why would I ever want to do this if I am really not feeling the Relics fashion? Yeah Bozja wasn't perfect with how it handled Relics, especially those one off quests that made you grind out a bunch of stupid drops from Old Raids or Fates for optimal drop rates (that was stupid by the way... making the most efficient method of grinding drops be outside of your new zone/raids, but okay SE), but damnit :v Bozja was a good time if you were looking for something fun to just do with a bunch of random people. I probably didn't illustrate my points as well as I could have or as in depth as I could have, but I don't want to ramble on too much for fear of making a super ultra mega essay length post... and I should get back to important IRL junk and to keep watching the video (just 12 mins in so far).

[@mana-azir6808]

you know on the "MSQ content (which should be harder btw, you've played 80 to 90 lvls worth of content :v git gud)" bit you mentioned. They kept nerfing things because people couldnt do the bare minimum, even going so far as to add the very easy modes for "accessibilty's sake". So um dont get your hopes up in raising the difficulty cos we already got that lvl 83 instance in garlemald nerfed shortly after the expansion released...

[@EhhmmmNo]

I can't believe anyone on the Bozja thing because when that content existed, my takeaway was that everyone thought it was terrible. I still have the chatlogs of some Delubrum runs where people are actively sharing media of things they're doing while enduring the content. To this day I have flashbacks to 8 hours of Delubrum for a single relic. From what I've been told in Heavensward, it is hundreds of raids to get the light for a single Anima weapon. Every piece of feedback just seems to lead to "we don't want this" and when it's not there, now the feedback is "let's do it again"

[@mana-azir6808]

@@EhhmmmNo i still remember the complaints people had during Eureka as well while i painstakingly did the light farms there, how god awful it was with pagos and even anemos to a degree. Only after all the feed back and changes its now better and you can see they tried to improve it on ShB with Bozja but it had its own fair share of problems like the lack of a downtime and how monotonous & mentally draining the setting got cos its war torn land. Not forgetting your relic steps were faster to do OUTSIDE of bozja back then as well. That shit turned away many people from exploratory zones as a whole. Not saying i dont like zone content, i miss it cos of the adventure but i DO NOT like how some of the steps were.

[@Chamira]

yea i miss having the trial series like the weapons or four lords. For myself i think it is partially the lifecycle of my playthrough. I started playing heavily in stormblood, so had alot to do in SHB even with the droughts. But having no exploration zone like bozja and eureka and no grindy relic certainly hasnt helped (and i was looking forward to another restoration event too).

[@FireHam]

the post-expansion msq IS what was supposed to be the trial series. Seriously. Yeah.

[@Jade-nn3bn]

I started in late shadowbringers and it still is a content drought. I've done all the relics for ninja, machinist, and gubreaker (mostly separate for different expansions), I've done all the endwalker patch content as it came out, I've done all the previous expansion raids, I've even fully leveled blue mage, and i don't engage with current tier raiding because I hate the lockout system. For me there is nothing left to do but glam and gpose. The game is severely dry on content right now and the only thing currently engaging is the 10th anniversary tomestones event.

[@Adrian42451]

One of the things that stood out for me was the lack of things to do in the endgame of EndWalker. If you have already done savage and gotten your gear/done the extremes for your totem/mount trade then it feels like nothing left to do aside from what anyone would do like lvl a class up. Mind you I already do the stuff I said above along with having my combat classes all to 90 (including BLU at 80) and I have most of the crafters done already. But lvling is just something you can passively through dailies/weekly stuff. I really wish we have something like Eureka or the Bozjna Southern front like we did in Stormblood and Shadowerbringers to keep me busy doing something. At least the relics had me doing something. But dont get me wrong, I guess its nice that they arent as insane to grind out for this time but man it really leaves you with nothing to do. So I kinda feel bad for other players who only play casually too since if they dont do savage or extremes its even less stuff to work with. Not saying EndWalker is "bad" but I can see Zepla argument on it being kinda the "worst" expansion so far with the lack of things to do. Overall still loved the story for EndWalker and im still playing the game everyday still, But I wont deny that this expansion has been a little bit of a snore but maybe that was due to Covid and such which did affect a lot of things. Hopefully DawnTrail gives more stuff to do.

[@Keldiur]

Even if they went back to ARR/HW relic grinds, or make fates or world content like Hunts more rewarding could be a replacement. Just something that takes time to do for those who lack skill or want to play the game as an MMO. All we can do is voice our opinion. If the game continues to only offer hard group content or just dailies and time gated activities, Imma head out and find another MMO again. Good while it lasted.

[@itsspookie]

FFXIV is in the state it's in because the community refuses to criticize or hear any criticism towards the game.

[@dixiebellau]

I complete EX grinds on release, i raid savage on release, I level all my jobs to max (including crafters) in the first month of an expansion. After 10 years of XIV (as of 5 days ago), i finally have no reason to continue playing the game. There is no reason to log in and do things, because it feels like a complete waste of time as there is no progression for my character. Where is all the in-between content? Are we expected to run the same 2 dungeons in roulette every single day for 8+ months? XIV has become an MMO that caters to NON-MMO players. People that play XIV are to blame, as they do not want to interact with other people. These people need to go play other games, and let XIV be an MMO.

[@enderfawx3063]

​@@dixiebellauI see where you're coming from but I don't think that's a healthy mindset. I think there just needs to be more reasons to interact with others and the only content that really does that is Ultimates due to the need to be consistent. I've gone through making a new character about 5 times now for different data centers/being too broke for server transfers and recently the queues have been awful for trying to actually get into content as a new player. When you do, you're usually playing with people doing roulettes. This is because the game pushes the solo duty support option in front of your face before you ever get a chance to queue up with other people. There should be no reason that there's duty support for the most accessible dungeon, sastasha. They are training new players to be antisocial. The duty support feature should be a toggleable feature that is off by default to incentivize new players to interact with others.

[@dixiebellau]

@@enderfawx3063 but then you run into the other issue. What reason is there for somebody like myself, who actually plays the game and is up to date with all content and has maxed jobs, to even participate in roulettes? I don't need tombstones, I don't need gil (been sitting at a gil cap since shb) and I certainly do not need experience. There are a lot of people in the same situation, where the games core gameplay loop is 'just go help others' and none of the content matters to us. We get literally nothing out of playing the game regularly, other than extreme disappointment that a multibillion company cannot invest another 500k or so into developing more endgame content for the game that is literally carrying their annual profits. It's just the sad state of gaming, you can get away with giving players the bare minimum and milk the player base for profits. There has been more new content added to the mog station this expansion than actual earnable rewards in game.

[@Chaos338]

Eureka Orthos was super fun for me. I actually met a lot of people doing it. For people who say (or think) they want hardcode content, this is it!! its hardcore as fuck, getting the mount is a genuinely impressive feat, i know people who sort of got carried through it, but they dont have the mount. I have the mount and I really like the boss design, its really interesting. I will say though, I genuinely do not enjoy savage raiding. Maybe it was because Abyssos was the first tier i raided, who knows. Other than that it is hard to meet people in game these days i feel like unless you are doing something like Eureka or Hunt Trains maybe. But hunt train rewards suck so hard. Going back to Orthos, I really wonder why the aetherpool weapons from Eureka Orthos were not 635, raid equivalent. It is difficult to farm silver chests and extremely time consuming, but its equivalent weapon to an extreme which the relic weapon (which was given away basically for free) is a ilvl 630 weapon. They're new content is DOA and theyre the ones killing it lol

[@gildedgrimoire7733]

I appreciate critical perspectives like this, been on an 8 month break so i don't have an opinion but coming back after so long it doesn't even feel like i have a big backlog to do, can't imagine staying current up until now. I hope that endwalker was meant to be a break point in preparation for dawntrail and i'll get hooked again when it comes out.

[@NZGamester]

Considering for a lot of people Endwalker is their first expansion (after a big influx of players just before it) there are a lot of players who are having a ball myself included with doing all of the content from previous expansions in between savage tiers. The problem is that the long term players have already done a lot of this so are the ones who suffer, doesn't matter what product you make, keeping your long term customers is 100% the most important thing and they've really dropped the ball there

[@SpydersByte]

Im a longterm player (since 1.0) and to be fair to Square how fast can they realistically pump stuff out and still maintain quality? Considering the amount of content they have a faster update schedule than most of the other mmos I play and Im fine with those too. Longterm players are always going to take breaks, I dont think the devs can really control when that happens very much. Nor do I think whose online and whose offline should figure into how good an expansion is, thats pretty ridiculous, there's nothing they can do about that and the content is the content whether 100 people are running it or 100 thousand.

[@timbrady1176]

@@SpydersByte In reality, Endwalker actually has MORE content than previous expansions. The problem is the content delivered has low playability and replayability. The difference between the previous 2 expansions is that those had tons of replayable MMO group content. Endwalker is the boring solo expansion

[@custardpup6385]

@@SpydersByteThey are making more money from this game now than they ever have from it in the past and they have plenty more people on the team developing this game than they have previously. FFXIV is the most profitable FF ever. There is literally no excusing their laziness and money-grubbing. They put all their resources and time into poorly designed content that doesn’t keep the players around. You don’t need to lick their boots, they know exactly what they are doing.

[@Keldiur]

@@timbrady1176 I would even kill for new Company ranks or ARR/HW relic grind. Something for any kind of rando group content. Maps and Hunts were blown through faster this expansion as well. Eureka and Bozja have had a revival because of the people who missed it as current content. The MMO enjoyer are there and not anywhere in Endwalker.

[@SpydersByte]

@@custardpup6385 thats completely ridiculous. It's a cash cow and thats all theyre after and therefore theyre deliberately trying to sandbag their own success by being lazy and poorly designing content? Yea, makes total sense dude. The game's massive success is because its bad and the devs are bad. Ok.

[@Tamipriest]

Its the first expansion for me where im feeling like im not in a hurry, i would do latest raids and farm out the gear there ( im not doing extreme raiding ) but this time i take much more time with it

[@umngyr]

Personally, i think it's nice to feel like i have time to catch up with all the ton of stuff i haven't done yet :)

[@Tamipriest]

@@umngyr to be honest the content im doing is not that super hard, but i still like it, im mostly fashion hunting or fishing and i discovered the crafting for me recently too, something like EX or Ultimate content is something that does not interest me mostly, i do the older EX trials with some friends sometimes when we want to do some mount farming

[@Skyverb]

Same. Just doing much more casual stuff the times I do log in. And I used to raid heavily (Savage,and Ultimates). But haven't had desire to start the grind all over in EW. Kinda wanted different things to look forward too. But for me it was very early EW that kinda lost me tbh (like after I beat the story and stuff).

[@casualcarvalhogaming3249]

For me, I found it very convenient, taking my time doing stuff without feeling any pressure. Actually, I feel that the content completes in a very natural way.

[@Keldiur]

Its great everyone here likes how casual the game has become. Yet to me, my casual gaming was playing the game when I could to work towards something. You just need to open up PF to realize that there is no one doing group world activities. At least on my server Malboro, there are not fates, maps or any group activities outside of Extreme or higher farm groups. There is very little except to grind the old content for the social/grinder gamers. And to be frank, we do stay subbed longer and interact with the shop more than most groups. I hope, even if relic grinds go back to ARR/HW style, that there is something to be rewarded for the time put into the game. The EW Relics are getting thrown into a pile on my main. I already have 6 maxed with all classes base one. Its just not fun to me.

[@Mokoodo]

You actually described how I've been feeling about the game for some time but was too afraid to acknowledge it. I agree with you in every single point you've brought in this video. The only other thing I'd like to add is Blue Mage content. It really is in the same spot as many other types of content in regarding to life span, as it dies as soon as you collect the new spells and do the ONE single stage they add to Masked Carnivale (which I always find to be very fun). Sure, you can do the old Savage raids with it, but because it's such a niche content and the incentive to do it is so negligible, it doesn't even compensate the amount of effort you need to do to get a group together for them. I really wish they made more content tailored to it, preferably something you could tackle with many other people.

[@patrikbatemanx]

ye, when you're really in love with the game and you feel emotional attached to it, you always try to make stuff fun or you convince yourself that stuff is fun. now im at a point, i dont wanna do party finder stuff anymore bcs i dont enjoy the jobs i play, pretty boring to press those buttons. would love if they switch up the battle system formular and the formular how content is done in general.

[@rimouks]

6.0-6.4 raiding burnt me out. Putting TOP in 6.3 was a mistake, I feel a lot of raiders needed those months off to recuperate after 6.0/DSR/6.2 yet we went back into TOP and then 6.4 shortly after. No Forays is also severely missed, I've barely been logging in because I don't want to raid but I would gladly spend hours goofing off in Bozja/Eureka content with friends if it was available.

[@HGRezende]

Adding that aside from Bozja/Zadnor there was also the Firmament which was bustling with people and full of great community moments. And also, even if people were out doing Heavensward fates, or Ivalice raids for the relic weapon it was a community moment, you would see activity in party finder related to it, the chat during alliance raids would be discussing their progress to get the relic, it is a community experience, it is a moment you have a story to tell. Grinding tomes is just boring and is isolating, everyone already does it every day, and the max you'll get is a "o/" and a "gg", and you'll move on. Endwalker patches, after 6.1, really just felt a little sad.

[@CWFDSmokeEater]

Hmmm the day they removed Kaiten is the day it started going downhill, who would have thought

[@MrJoy-hn9il]

I'm glad you brought up the Firmament, because that was another type of content I feel was sorely missing from Endwalker, and not a lot of people bring it up in these discussions.

[@ThaPinkGuy]

​@@MrJoy-hn9il I was one of those people that said "They'll bring it back" and as the patches rolled on by... The copium I was huffing wasn't strong enough anymore and I gave up in 6.3 for any interesting crafting content. Literally as I type this I'm doing Grade 4 expert recipes I thought I'd have to rush before the "firmament update."

[@MrProg-ey3tl]

@@CWFDSmokeEater Kaiten is the key to all of this 😳

[@yanipheonu]

​@@CWFDSmokeEaterit really says a lot that a) they haven't done anything at all to improve SAM save some bug fixes and range changes since then and b) people still miss that move

[@adognamedsally]

Yeah, the post patch stuff was pretty mild after 6.1. It started off pretty strong but it kinda evaporated towards the end. I get the sense that the devs want to move on to a new storyline where they can build up tension again coming off of the conclusion to the previous story. I've been playing a lot of solo deep dungeon and doing ultimates and that has kept me pretty busy so I don't feel like there's nothing for me to do. But I've literally never set foot in island sanctuary. Criterion is fun and so is Orthos, but the lack of player engagement with those things does make it less exciting to do unless you have a group for it.

[@Orynae]

I really hear what you're saying, and I too thought it was just me. I've only been logging on for raid the past several months, a bit more for a week or two after each patch... I chalked it up to me moving to a different timezone but staying on my old server, which makes the game feel dead during my gaming times, but you know what, I actually moved during shadowbringers and it didn't feel that way then. Of course in shb I had to adapt to most players being on a different rhythm than me, but it's only in the last year-ish, in endwalker, that I've felt like not logging on all week, at all, except for raid times.

[@llamatoddtv]

I've been feeling this since 6.0, I haven't been very inspired to play aside from a few collabs or folks asking me to help them out. Could be a me problem or just burnout, but I'm not too interested in the MSQ or much else, while the ff4 fanservice is neat, it hasn't captivated me like Shadowbringers did. I'm not saying there isn't stuff to do, I'm just not excited about doing anything, so a break playing other games will do a lot of people some good.

[@marcuscorvin9998]

Yeah but she hates it when people suggest to play other games because "she's afraid players will get addicted to them and not come back". So yeah, she'll condemn other people playing other games, then go play Classic Hardcore WoW on her alt channel. 😂

[@temperedglass1130]

You probs are enjoying more time being a furry.

[@mooserocka522]

I felt like this since end of storm blood

[@Naoto-kun1085]

I agree, why should you stick to playing only one MMO all the time? That'll just burn you out quickly. It's better that they left out the relic grind to give everyone a chance to avoid being burned out before the new story saga

[@siritachi31]

To me it makes literally 0 sense that they say "We don't want people to feel they have to stay in the game" But I literally have to or my personal house will be destroyed.... And they are removing content and phoning in parts like Relic where personally I thrive doing relics. Also thank you so much for mentioning the trial storyline!!! I keep telling people that we literally are missing an entire side story we could be having, we literally have less content than before and no one seems to even notice

[@Eversoul12]

ive noticed them slowly remove features every single expansion since stormblood. Its getting really barebones now. There are way too many people defending this practice too.

[@557deadpool]

​@@Eversoul12at least Bungie is honest about it and why they do it, like wtf

[@christopherbelisle6658]

Preach! You hit all the marks. Agreed 100% and it's so sad cuz I love this game but have no reason to play right now. Very disappointed in the rewards, the way you get the rewards, and lack of (fill in the blank).

[@chun1324]

They could have extend the eureka or bozja for people farming weapon rather than a deadend dungeon

[@Niblss]

28:26 THANK YOU. I'm so tired of the "it's so you can have a break" as an excuse for underdeveloped content 28:48 YES

[@hennyzhi2261]

I've slowly started to feel the same way as I've started to log into FF14 for the social aspect more and less for the content itself (and the former is still dying as people leave the game due to the state of it). It's okay to want more from the franchises you love, and I really do think despite the challenges of development it would go a long way to reach that middle ground between try-hard engagement and Laissez-faire events if they just broaden the scope of what it means to play an MMO. Incentives are dying? Worried about changing the balance of the game mechanics? Then give unique customizable options for completing objectives that can only be gotten from these regularly occurring new events. We've seen small bits of this like the umbrella fashion item, so why not just go all in and bring back belts - bring any number of small, yet extremely personable items. Do you as a player want more Bozja, Zadnor, Eureka etc. content vibes where everyone is in a massive instance doing stuff together? Why not make instanced events you can optionally join in any of the old areas of the game where you complete various party-game esc challenges by working with strangers? And you get a little bit of gil + the small potential for unique mounts tied to each zone? It's like a gold saucer vibe but it can be spontaneous and something you pick up along your journey in FF14 rather than be the meme where the world is ending but you gotta stop to do a triple triade tournament because you want to rub it in your friends face that your better than them at a children's card game. There are ways to use low resource and pre-built resources to create content that is novel. I hope they find and nourish that type of thing in-between the droughts where I have no doubt they are putting in the effort to make "the next big thing"... but sometimes it's enough if comfort food is on the table - especially when you want to keep people subbed and anticipating the real meal.

[@joshuapaige5728]

I definitely agree for the most part that the recent patches haven’t done enough to keep me interested, and that’s why I’ve been doing a lot of old content that I probably missed or never made time for in the past. Like I recently cleared Baldesion Arsenal for the first time and it was a blast. We definitely need more large scale content that brings multiple players together because I think that’s the most fun you can have in this game

[@LeonStarcrest]

This, 1000%. I also did Eureka and BA for the first time ever during this dry period and WOW was it a pleasant surprise! Super fun for sure and a real treat for a casual andy like myself. :3

[@joshuapaige5728]

@@LeonStarcrest yeah I cleared Eureka a while ago but only recently went out of my way to do BA because I heard you needed to set a good amount of time aside to do it. I’m glad I finally made the time for it because it was a lot of fun and I wanna see more things like that in the future

[@kat8506]

Felt the lonelyness too... my whole friendslist is offline. People are running dailies like bots with no communication at all or afking in towns. I just pick up my map and then log off again...

[@dolmapacket]

For one thing, I really appreciate how the devs experimented with different kinds of content this expansion, most of which I think turned out pretty well. The problem is, there's very little reason for me to keep logging in. This is especially so if I can't play consistently soon after patch drops and all the hype around VC dies down pretty much instantly. I have to DC travel to even have the chance of forming a group (which can STILL take more than an hour in some cases). I'm not saying PF was perfect in ShB, but I wasn't wasting nearly this much time. If I wanted to prog an extreme/savage, I could do so without fretting over what time of day it was and, more importantly, on my OWN DC. Now the amount of time it takes to prog anything is so much worse, that I hardly bother. The one thing keeping me playing semi-consistently is deep dungeon because I can actually get groups due to the replaybility. This game feels so much lonelier, even my friends list is dead most of the time. However, I also feel like some people are being a bit over dramatic and exclaiming that the game is on it's way to dying for good, or already dead, or even that they need to make a new mmo. Tbh the game has gone through significantly worse and I don't think this is a death sentence.

[@Lupostehgreat]

This all seems to be more of a negative side-effect downwind of the data center travel. While it was overall a good thing (I think the splitting of servers is an antiquated thing and just seperates friends or forces you to pay money to transfer your character), we are presently in the growing pains of this change where all people who like a specific kind of content migrate to specific data centers and servers. It will adjust, probably around the time all these people flood back into the game for Dawntrail to run their 2 months of content. I can't wait to not be able to log in for several days!!! The joys of online gaming.

[@dolmapacket]

Oh for sure it's an issue with DC travel being in its early stages, but even after traveling DCs, forming groups for anything other than deep dungeon still takes forever for me. On my own DC, Primal, I feel like I'm basically forced to travel to get anything done in pf. In ShB, I'd have some shitty pf experiences every now and then, but at least it didn't take an entire afternoon to gather 7 other people.

[@Lupostehgreat]

@@dolmapacket I am certain that this will change again once Dawntrail comes out, but I feel you. FF XIV now seems to follow the same high/low cycle of every other online game. This is kinda something you just have to shrug your shoulders for. Sadly, the only real solution is ultimately to convince IRL friends to join up and drop in. At least, for now. Obviously if you want to do things unsynced, it takes seconds to find 2 level 90's just grooving and vibing. The difficulty is doing lower level content while synced. Obviously, FF XIV is nowhere NEAR the only game where this problem exists. However, I think this game may be on the boom/bust cycle that everything else is. It will get better again, we're in a low patch.

[@aaronstewart3352]

Honestly, this patch stretch comes across to me the same way the economy generally works: it takes about 2 years for a major event to affect it. In this case, Covid. I was surprised at how efficient 14 rolled out during the height of the pandemic. There was only the slight delay, but overall, it was a far better launch than Stormblood. I think the chickens are coming home to roost now-problems compound. Between a smaller work force, to hybrid work, to continued sickness, to in tandem work on 16, the shoe had to drop eventually. I think that’s where we’re at now. Just be patient-I’m honestly hopeful that Dawntrail will be the point that they iron some of these problems out.

[@thoma9410]

This actually makes a lot of sense and is something I hadn't thought of.

[@tylorhobbs8920]

That makes a lot of sense, and honestly, given that there's always tradeoffs, I expect this is also a spot that got hit by that a lot too. Namely, they'd had to focus a lot on 6.0 itself, and 7.0 needs a lot of focus because that start for a new plotline needs to be polished. Meanwhile, while I won't call this filler, it is basically a standalone plotline. We'll probably get something new to flow from it later, or other callbacks, but for the most part it really has a feel that it's its own thing.

[@karelposedi]

Tell me this if it was only covid how come they made ff16?? Why should we be fine with our ffxiv content be cut in short because of another game that we have to purchase separately aswell as a new device ps5 to play it??? How come content that was skipped in Shb (DSR, EUREKA ORTHOS,HILDY) and pushed into EW and its felt even more droought then Shb?- btw all those above were indented for Shb. Why coudnt relics be something similiar to hw or arr systems- as conclusion to 10 years farm the overwotld of ffxiv????? So bozja/eureka effect of playing mmo would be fullfilled?

[@aaronstewart3352]

@@karelposedi did I say anything about it being only Covid? Did I mention anywhere in my post that you “had to be fine” with the situation? Please dial it back a few notches, hun. I was giving my opinion, not telling anyone else how to feel, kthx ☺️

[@saemitatsuya8419]

There was also FFXVI which was under the Creative Business Unit 3, which means they had to split their resources.

[@SlugmaChops]

I just started playing again since AAR came out. Started a new character and leveling has been fun. It's rare to run into people in the wild. All the fates I've done have been solo and have only really gotten social interaction in the public areas. And I'm on leviathan which always has a queue when I log in. I'm still enjoying myself and glad I don't really need pressure to level (though I want some of those minions from the event)

[@RyuSaarva]

That is not an actual que, it's some kinda protection system from ddos attack so the servers won´t crash, but yea after ARR there has not been many reasons to do level 1-70 fates since square buffed dungeon EXP multiple times but did not do that for fates or combat leves.

[@SlugmaChops]

@RyuSaarva I stopped even doing fates I wound up leveling like 10 higher than I need for msq so now I'm just running through that. Gets lonely until I do a dungeon but even then out of the 6 dungeons I've done I've only had a talkative group once. Hopefully they start getting their shit together and bring the open world back. Right now the game feels like warlords of draenor but at least with a good story and good leveling experience (could be because I'm playing bard for the first time) I've always really liked ffxiv but I'm seeing a lot of the problems people have with it and I'm only level 39

[@RyuSaarva]

@@SlugmaChops People do not talk with randoms in videogames anymore, they use discord for that and ignore all ingame social features. The only way you would get social parties regularly is if you join some special groups and do content with premades who care about socialising.

[@robertgeorge4200]

I have definitely noticed a huge lack of things to keep people going. I have very little interest logging in to do content. No relic grind, no casual content worth anything. Most of my friends I used to play with also don't log in often, so its even harder for me to find a reason to log in. I would have really loved for them to incorporate something akin to the early Chains of Promathia parts of FFXI, where you go into instances with small parties, progress through a few floors, and fight a challenging boss at the end, and have some sort of item drop that is used for relic weapons. When I saw they were using mobs from that part of FFXI as mobs on the moon, I was really hoping for that sort of thing. But alas, all it is, is a tomestone "grind", which can easily be done in 2 days or so.

[@ArmoredPandaa]

I told people that the endgame will be lacking without Eureka/ Bozja. It was the main thing I did besides Raiding in the last two expansion and having nothing to replace it this expansion was really painful.

[@loomingdeath1758]

Yeah too bad people were complaining about Eureka and Bozja =_=

[@cooliod00d]

I think it's okay to be honest. Some people will like Criterion, some won't, but at least SE is trying different things with every expansion. Something I'd really like to see them add is more "overworld" content though. Give me a reason to return to old zones aside from just doing an ARR relic or getting those old zone Hunt achievements.

[@loomingdeath1758]

@@cooliod00d Thats a legit fair way to look at it. Im not big on how xeno or zelph explains there views but I can straight say thats just how we all view the game. :3

[@NguyenNguyen-ve4gg]

Yeh these filthy casual asked for easy relic. Well that's what they get. A lazy af relic sidequest.

[@OldManInternet]

I feel like Endwalker was a combination of CBU3 and YoshiP playing it too safe, and the devs being pulled to do FF16. Hopefully they notice the lukewarm reception to EW and take some chances, since coasting on the success of Shadowbringers can only take them so far.

[@riahka1357]

I was happy but also disappointed that devs didn't have a courage to kill some of the main characters. Anyways, Estininen is still alive and that is the most important part :D

[@ningen6392]

Zep, it is definitely not just your group, most of my friends are also not logging in daily unless if they were doing ultimates. For me personally, I started a new account and started leveling up jobs on the new account, yep, that’s how bored I am.

[@ningen6392]

If I’m being honestly I criticise all the lazy stuff they did in 6.0 and 6.x quite a lot. And people are always like “oh if you don’t like the game then don’t play it” or “if you hate YoshiP then don’t play it”. And I’m just like that’s not the point, the game was good until it was ruined? And I’m making suggestions because I like the game but also all my OCs are stored inside this hame

[@anteprs7908]

it a minority of hardcore to midcore players it not a big group at tops 5% of player. making unreasonable suggestion isnt HELPING the game and expecting the game ot cater to pp who arent causal or sol oplayer (those are the 90% of the playerbase) is simple stupid .

[@holschermarc]

I have taken a break now for a 1-2 Month and planning on returning soon. I still wanna do these Tiers Savage Raids. But i think we are currently just in a transition phase. We finished the big ass story that everything previous was leading up to. This is the calm before the storm. I already thought of the entire Fiend-Story line as "They put it here to brigde the time until 7.0 when the next big story starts". So i didnt expected much except a nice tidy little story line - and thats what i got.

[@IAmDaedem]

Apathy is the enemy of engagement. Anger and frustration are extreme emotions that you can flip to the other end with the right actions. If someone becomes apathetic and lose interest and investment, it can be a lot harder to recapture that interest.

[@TheShadyElf]

Playing since 2016 and my interest in the game fell of a cliff after I finished Endwalker MSQ (which was fantastic). If it's burnout, it's not like what I've experienced before where I'd recover in a month or two. That burnout was also due to trying to do too much all at once. Evaluating whether or not I want to continue with FFXIV going forward, we'll see if there's anything interesting in the remaining fanfests. But if it's going to follow the exact same formats as what has come before, I may have to strongly consider dropping this (and honestly live service games in general may have to be given the boot from my gaming). I appreciate you making this though. I know how much you like this game, and it helps to have the bigger voices expressing concerns/criticisms like this because like you said many in the community cannot accept criticism of the game at all.

[@Nox4ever00]

I see people want "big content to do together" You guys complained about Bozja and this is the result. Its like you don't know what you guys want.

[@LuminateTheWorld]

Same thing with the 2 min meta. People complained about burst windows not aligning up with other classes and thus, they started going towards the 2 min window. Now everyone hates it. Sometimes, I wish yoshi and team would take a page out of blizzard and NOT listen to the feedback.

[@firefox30570]

​@@seof13 i dont think thats correct. The people complaining about bozja or raiding are the people who want that kind of content but arent satisfied with the way its done. Someone who doesnt do raiding wont complain about raids. Someone who doesnt do bozja wont complain about it. Those who are complaining are generally those who care but want it to be better.

[@finnthedoctor]

lol nope, I hated Eureka and Bozja, and am so glad we haven’t had an equivalent this expansion.

[@lunacryst5368]

Sorry you didn’t enjoy Eureka and Bozja, but that doesn’t mean everyone’s glad they’re gone, personally I had a great time with Bozja… if you don’t enjoy a certain piece of content then don’t engage with it, not all content in the game is going to be everyone’s cup of tea after all 🤷‍♂️

[@mey2mey]

Yep as someone who enjoys ffxiv because of eureka and bozja - I’m sad this content isn’t in the expansion

[@marcw6875]

I'll agree since I've been in a bit of a lull playing FFXIV lately too. I think part of it is just having been through so many expansions that I have a good feel for how much work I need to do to at least get my main job geared up for the next expansion. The rest of my max level jobs that I keep up with will just get the lesser gear that comes somewhat naturally through crafting and or clearing things like normal raids, etc. I do wonder if them making such a clear ending of the storyline we've been in for so long may turn out to be the beginning of the end for the game. I figure they have Dawntrail and MAYBE the next expansion to get players interested in what is coming next, but if they don't sufficiently do so, then we might be on a slow downward slide. The MCU and Star Wars have taught us that you can't assume people will still be invested once storylines end but the franchise has the audacity to keep going. ;)

[@reelo5672]

being a slow player and always been on catching ups, i've never felt these kind of emotions. The pace i'm playing has always had me disconnected from the fan base, which i guess is a blessing in this case.

[@rjhick1]

The thing is you have a life. People no life this game and get burnt out because its all they play

[@socram3254]

My problem with it is that the content of EW is fine, but the issue is that there's very little replayability. When a new patch launches I'm done with the content in 2 weeks which is not good enough for a subscription MMO (and I can't unsub btw because I have a house). I started playing in Stormblood and in both SB and ShB I didn't feel this way.

[@Dharengo]

See, this is something I can somewhat get behind. Although it doesn't bother me as much since that's not how I engage with content, I can easily see that the content is there, but people for some reason or other lack the drive to engage with it. I think this is the problem that needs to be discussed more, rather than some alleged lack of content.

[@DoppelgangerTH]

@@Dharengo more cool mounts, more glam, more exploratory zones. Boom, you got high retention and high engagement rating.

[@Dharengo]

@@DoppelgangerTH How? How does boring ass grindy content that people only complain about make the game better?

[@paolocereda2070]

Frankly, between the recent patches of FFXIV (effortless relics, lack of adequate rewards for criterions, no eureka/bojza content) and FFXVI (no secrets, no superbosses or any kind of challenges), I can't help but wonder if YoshiP and the CBIII team have forgotten the importance of *gratification* in a videogame.

[@AzureRoxe]

That would explain XVI.

[@umngyr]

personally, i feel that's a rather detrimental way of thinking of it. If you do an activity for what it gives you, that's basically just work. While getting nice stuff is nice, i feel the primary reason to do anything in a game should be because you enjoy doing it. Now, there is certainly some satisfaction in working towards a big goal, or something really shiny, but at its core, i think the focus should be on having fun while doing so. As they say, it is the journey, and not the destination that matters most.

[@ErrantMinds]

@@umngyr You know the phrase life is meaningless without death....The journey is meaningless with no destination.

[@umngyr]

@@ErrantMinds i know there are people who disagree with that. Not all who wander are lost. Some of them are drunk.

[@ErrantMinds]

@@umngyr Not all who wander are lost, they are just in an unnatural state of mind that is unhealthy. Got it. (I get what you're trying to say but the drunk thing is not part of that quote)

[@LucyPyre]

you're right and u should say it. i think ffxiv players are huffing mad copium rn and it's sad to watch. i think it's fine to expect and want better from a game we've dedicated so much of our time and love towards. the endwalker patches have done literally nothing to make me want to log in, and it's the first time i've ever felt this way about xiv and it's sad

[@Slipfish]

Its kinda funny to watch both extremes in fan bases play out in real time right now. XIV has arguably its worst expansion (IMO, anyway, Shadowbringers was peak shit) while WoW has its best xpac since at least Wrath, maybe ever. And on one hand, the XIV community is so toxicly positive they baby-rage at Zepla for bringing up a fairly measured critique of it. Meanwhile, the WoW playerbase is so toxic and negative, all they do is doom post. MMO players are just incapable of a healthy, reasonable middle option where they give credit for things their game does well and, in a mature and responsible way, let the devs know when they aren't happy. And that makes me sad. You aren't toxic, or mean, or unreasonable if you say 'Hey, I don't think this xpac is up to your usual standards and I would like you to do better in Dawntrail.' Yoshi-P is the man who did the impossible and brought a dead MMO back to life; I promise he will understand.

[@temperedglass1130]

You mad Bint

[@xbon1]

But endwalker itself was amazing

[@Slipfish]

@@xbon1 I, to put it kindly, was not impressed. But I'm happy for you that you enjoyed it.

[@xbon1]

@@Slipfish then u ain't the target audience. it was a massive critical success on launch even if the subsequent patches didn't add as much as people wanted.

[@serphv6531]

I think for the Relics they could have mixed both tomes and tie them to the Variants Dungeons aswell, like non-sparkling Relic=Tomes, Sparkling Relic=Variant Dungeons, that way people have a reason to go back even after getting the mount and stuff. As for an exploration area ala Bozja/Eureka, maybe something in the Ancient world coulda been the next area for that, or a new hidden area in Labyrinthos.

[@CrispBaker]

Guessing that Zepla's dead-on in saying that they saw relics as a burdensome expectation this time around, when their actual development priority was rebuilding all the old dungeons to allow for single-player Duty Support. They probably poured a ton of work into trying to make single-player trials, too, even if they ultimately had to walk away from it because it's just plain unfeasible.

[@johankarlsson1776]

Honestly, I kinda hate that they introduced the trust system, there's no way that it's not limiting what they can do with dungeon mechanics 😕 which could explain why the dungeons are very lackluster in 5.X and 6.X... earlier dungeons had some pretty unique and interesting mechanics, but the last two expansions they've been very formulaic and most bosses does the exact same things with a different coat of paint 😮‍💨

[@rynfiaryn]

I would be more invested in the patch story if it involved Cylva and Unukalhai. Zero is fine, I guess, but I'm more invested in Vrtra and Azdaja... And Golbez? I hope there's some kind of amazing twist in 6.5 cause he's currently extremely boring.

[@Kango234]

YES, THANK YOU! The void quest in ShB was my favorite storyline in the game and when I heard they were investigating the void I thought they would be involved. I understand that you have to do the role quests to experience that story, but I think they should just change that. I don't know if that means putting that into a separate questline that combines all of them so that people can play through it easily, or they just roll those characters into the MSQ and you get their story through flashbacks or whatever. Pretending they don't exist is just a stupid idea and they already set a precedent by making the Crystal Tower so integral to the MSQ.

[@tomanadawnstar5078]

​@@Kango234I was initially happy when the post-EW MSQ started to be about the 13th. I thought 7.0 would be about it, too. But apparently, nope...

[@yanipheonu]

The worst part is original Golbez actually was kinda interesting. Interesting origin, with a more cunning plan. He tricks you many times. XIV Golbez sits in a chair and acts like a generic bad guy.

[@droppedcombofiend2707]

I'd be more hopeful, but we got what I think as supposed to be the big twist last patch. When we see Golbez isn't actually Golbez.

[@Reshapable]

@@yanipheonu As a massive ff4 fan... what? Golbez was none of that. I won't go so far as to call him boring but he's just a bad man doing bad things and eventually you discover for pretty bad reasons. You don't even "meet" him until the end of the game and his only traits are guilt and anger, the basics of basics. The vader twist wasn't interesting because it lacked all of the necessary material to make it a twist, so it was just a weird reveal. What little characterization he has beyond that came well after 4 and... suffice to say it wasn't any better than what came before. And 14's Golbez tricks us too. Or at least plays us. In a much more interesting way than "I stole your gf" and "I re-mind controlled your best friend". And he does it for legitimately "good" reasons too. He is WAY more interesting in 14. But admittedly less cool. In 4 he had several displays of raw power, in 14... he summons minions. So... no not perfect.

[@iamed.]

Honestly yeah, I basically pop in a few times a month mostly on patch days, and that's basically it for EW. The lack of things like bozja, ishgard restoration, "long form" content, etc have definitely left a hole that hasn't been filled. I'm kinda hoping its in part because they've been going back through the game and old content, refreshing it, adding QoL changes, standardizing markers, working on graphics updates, etc. Stuff that is *also* important and in my opinion absolutely needed for the game to do, but doesn't really give me a reason to log back in more. That may just be a cope, but whether that's the case or not, I can survive with that justification for post EW content. However if that continues on into Dawntrail and it's patch content, it will feel like that has become the new standard, and I think that would be a massive mistake for the game. I hate to say it, but if this is the new standard going forward I'd probably be likely to just preorder whatever the next expansion is, catch up on patch content in the month before, play the expansion launch, then unsub until the next expansion launch, repeat. I know people already do that and always some will, but if the game winds up encouraging more people percentage wise to take this approach, I worry about the impact it will have on the game.

[@115Lexis]

theres also the fact that they extended the patch cycles from ~3 months to ~4 months, it makes the lack of content even more noticeable and painful

[@kennys6288]

Hmm… More time between patches, less content. Makes sense lol

[@mrscorpion1829]

I just hope they creat more content thats for more dedicated players. Stuff like island sanctuary and the Mandeville weapons are fun and i quite enjoy both of them. They don't require hours of grinding or loosing yourself in the game world

[@nauscakes1868]

They need a 'maps' type content where you can level up characters. Or make fates better. Just something social you can level 1+ at, that's not limited to end-game.

[@RaddyC]

There’s no good reason for FATEs and side quests to not reward way more exp. And tomestones if you do them on a level capped job

[@Keldiur]

@@RaddyC all their "world" content need better incentives to do. Heck, the best way for Sages and Reapers to level was Bozja. Not map fates, or quests. Not even hunts. Doubly so now since no new relic has the option to be grinded in the world like that.

[@BazzFreeman]

For me, a huge SF/F reader, it's the story in FFXIV that's most important for me. These post patches felt like the classic "breath before the storm"... lets, just hope Dawntrail isn't another Stormblood. As far as I'm concerned, Shadowbringers was the finest piece of content in any game, closely followed by Heavenward.

[@Spritus3241]

honestly, this is my only hope/gambele for 7.0. if the rule proves true of great expansion > bad expansion, > great expansion > etc. then 7.0 should deliver on being the heads to this massive tails. I hold no other expectatioms, so if it fails that's it i feel.

[@DeusGamez]

i have some bad knews for you.. if you dont keep up with fanfest an what the devs say basically its all but confirmed that Dawntrail will be no different from endwalker in terms of content. its all still going to be the same boring shit they've been feeding us for 11 years now so my advice to you is dont waste your money wait until dawntrail is done like completely dont even let anyone try to pressure you to return until 7,5 cause chances are you will get bored and start asking yourself why you even login or bother to keep a sub

[@XKT633]

I have noticed that a lot of plots on my homeworld are up for sale. I have noticed this on a lot of other servers too. I'm experiencing that a lot of people have stopped doing this current savage tier as well. A lot of people have stopped progging Ultimates. There has been a lot of competition in games this year but still is kinda concerning for FFXIV.

[@Forest_Pixie]

Yes, I noticed this as well. There’s about 5 or so plots open on just 1 ward. I never looked at any of the others, could imagine there was more

[@cammokyle]

Happens in every single mmo at the end of a patch cycle. People will stop playing for about 6 months. Always been this way

[@ac04project]

Zepla took off her bun ears? Her villian arc has started.

[@lastdayer101]

Remember when getting all classes to 90 gave you a hat when Shadowbringers gave you an awesome mount? That sums up the disparity between expansions.

[@DoppelgangerTH]

i levelled all classes to 90 TWICE, i dont remember the hat. but i sure do remember amaro lol

[@idaret.]

do you remember only expansion that didn't give you mount for doing msq and instead hid it behind giant grind? Yeah, that's so great /s

[@CUTS3R]

Not only that, remember when we had a real relic quest ? I do.

[@Verd254]

@@idaret. I don't use any of those mounts, but I use my Amaro. So yeah, it's great.

[@markup6394]

A hat you cant even dye...

[@Tonsofcraft]

Biggest pain point for me is the lack of Bozja-like experience

[@Magnius159]

I never really got into Bozja but I knew that it was good content. I don't understand why they got rid of it. Makes no sense.

[@ramenjd6239]

@@Magnius159dev team wanted to focus on solo experience thus most of the time & resource went into revamping older content (dungeons and msq instances). Even for post patch content, island sanctuary/variant dungeons are both solo intended content

[@Crowens]

Focus was moved to Island Sanctuary and Criterion dungeons along with Trusts yeah. It's really hard to know if there's no bozja/eureka this time due to shit like resources being put elsewhere and it's just unfortunate timing that the two big side things in this expansion are solo/small group focused or if they're genuinely trying to move away from social content and wanting to make it as isolated as possible to make it have a bigger appeal.@@Magnius159

[@magus9180]

@@ramenjd6239 SE could hire more people for FFXIV, so that one team can revamp older stuff and another can do the current stuff. FFXIV is a cash cow and SE isn't a small indie company. They should just stop developing trash games like Babylons Fall instead and put more money and ressources into their Flagship.

[@christsatali9139]

i mainly play wow but i find your video really good and informative. Its nice that you say the negative things so the company can have feedback and try to make better content. btw, have you tried wow dragon flight at all and if so what your opinion?

[@dustinhatfield8373]

Where the hell are the bunny ears ive never seen zepla without them

[@bendonatier]

For me the frustrating thing about EW's patches have been how little incentive there is to do content again. Island sanctuary is done after a few hours of hitting rocks, or days of doing nothing. Variants are one and done, unless you're using them for tome grinding.

[@nx6448]

Did you clear TOP, king?

[@bendonatier]

@@nx6448 not for lack of will, but my static is struggling to keep a critical mass of players.

[@Keldiur]

@@bendonatier you are finding less people because the gateway to high end content was actually the exploratory maps. There is now a gap of MMO content between ARs and Extremes, something that takes dedication and a social aspect to get people to form bonds to go towards harder content. Even if they made the zone maps more appealing to grind would work towards this goal. Its either hard content or solo content in EW. The group content is done in a month if that, and if it even exists in the first place.

[@bendonatier]

@@Keldiur no I'm struggling to find people because my friends are depressed adults with a dozen commitments each. We have the people in theory, and many of them under the assumption we will do it together but none of us have schedules as conducive to raiding, and many of them are burnt out, leaving me "the friend that isn't burnt out who logs in sees no friends online". I've thankfully been sinking my teeth into bozja, but I just got my bike. At least I've still got some relics I want and maybe a duel for one of the titles.

[@albertoiordanov5972]

I've been using the time to kind of catch up on the game.I only started in SHB and i still had a ton of older stuff to do.Maxed my squadron,got all jobs to 90,got an ARR relic.I'm also mid NG+ and want to rewatch/read all the raids stories too.I admit it's not the most exciting though and i end up taking long breaks.

[@vrahnkeneisenbach9148]

My issue with the game's development philosophy for a while now is that they introduce a lot of cool, unique ideas, but they introduce them as dead-end pieces of content that entertain you for a short amount of time and then you're forever done with them, instead of integrating them directly into the core gameplay loop. To an extent, I think it's good to have branching paths for how to approach the game, as I think that's partially where ff14 has found its success in the first place: there's something for everyone, but it's definitely possible to spread too thin. I can only hope they're simply testing ideas out and will integrate some of the more successful ideas down the road.

[@Pers0n97]

A bunch of branching paths that all lead to a dead end after a very short walk is a good way to describe FF14 tbh. I haven't played that much of it, but I remember getting very into Chocobo racing even as a low level player. I very, VERY quickly managed to get the perfect breed for my chocobo, got the pimped chocobo gear and... that's it. I was rather sad to see how shallow the system was, and how abandonned it felt. Very few race track, mechanics that could easily be refined into something way more interesting but are still left as they are. There is nothing worst than getting investing into something and realizing that it was just a mirage all along. I did the same with fishing too. Having alternative activities is great, but if you don't do anything with it it's just going to occupy you for a bit and that's all.

[@Ixidor13]

This. FF tried many things but is a master of none.

[@Kaiyuni]

To be fair I kind of appreciate that a lot of features are just cool little things to do because if you integrate new systems into the core gameplay loop over and over you suffer from what's called "feature creep". You see this in games like path of exile for example where there are so many things to do and understand in the game that it is borderline impenetrable by a new player. Again using PoE as an example I actually played PoE a decent bit when the game first came out and a few years following it. I came back in the past year as part of the diablo 4 hype (just to scratch that ARPG itch) and the moment I hit the end-game systems I was utterly floored. I had no idea what I was doing and it would take me literal hours upon hours of dedicated research just to discover the correct *direction* to go.

[@Pers0n97]

@Kaiyuni you don't need to make them core feature, just come back from time to time to add new content to them and do a rework once in a while. Chocobo racing is the perfect example of that. It could have been so much more, just with a new track every expansions and a proper update to the mechanic would have gone a long way to make it a real game inside the game rather that a half form thing you can clean fast and never look back.

[@Ixidor13]

Exactly this. You do not need to over engineer everything. Example: Everyone knows how Island sanctuary works at the moment. How do u make it better? - Remove the crap 1-1-1 gathering, make things more fun, add a social aspect to it, etc etc. We have housing? Make it slightly more social! add little games that make people visit you, smaller customizations for quality of life, improve farming. Gold saucer? - Improve the rewards of ur machines for christ sakes. I dont wanna gamble for 10-20 MGP or whatever.

[@nhazul5928]

The gameplay should be a priority. Jobs are feeling all the same and that needs to be adressed in 7.0 imo. Tanks and Healers especially and as an RPG fan the lack of complexity is boring me out

[@Thessalin]

Heavens I agree. Tanking and healing is very same.

[@drummermg131]

hmm. Maybe I'm just still too new at both tanking and healing, but I don't feel that at all. I'll take your word for it, though.

[@jtabox]

@@drummermg131 Yeah, if you just play normally, and maybe once in a blue moon read some guide about a class ability or mechanic, you get quite comfortable with tanking and healing pretty fast. And then it kinda becomes obvious after a while, that every tank and every healer play almost exactly like every other tank/healer, with slight variations. Tanks especially, at this point my tanks' keybinds do the exact same things: mitigation on short cd at around 25 sec with heal/shield, job specific super-mitigation at 30% every 2 mins, role actions every 2 mins, 1-2-3 combo and a spender for ST or 1-2 and a spender for AoE, and a high damage ogcd. Tbh the devs have already said this is their deliberate choice for the job design going forward, simplify and homogenize. It's their game and their vision of course, but I can't help but feel they'll need to backtrack a bit at some point, because I can't see this continuing for a long time. Either that or they'll have to follow WoW's paradigm of borrowed power, where every job gets new abilities to play with every expansion, but loses them when the next one comes.

[@Crowens]

You'll notice it soon enough, especially tanks, they all have a 90 second cooldown, a 120 second cooldown, tankbuster mit, invuln, raidwide mit, and role actions, sometimes you'll get something unique like DRK not having a 90 second and instead having a 60 second magic mitigation along with oblation and Paladin having cover and wings but that's really about it, once you learn to mitigate with one tank you can pretty much play the others no issue. @@drummermg131

[@twneon1]

A problem for me which kind of turns me off is there isnt really any agency in terms of RPG elements. Like there's not talent trees to pick and choose and there really isnt a noticeable difference in performance when it comes to gear and stats like ok the number is bigger but it doesn't feel tangible. Like me playing my class is identical to anyone else playing the same class, in WoW my talent choices really reflect my play style there is no expression in FFXIV when it comes to gameplay.

[@jeffbezos3200]

I think Endwalker’s real problem was that it was an ending. Most other expansions wrap up with plenty of loose threads…Endwalker doesn’t have that. I love this game and play it every day, but the post content feels meaningless because it’s a completely separate story from the one we just did and it looks like it’s going to wrap up and leave Dawntrail as its own thing. Since Dawntrail is the official beginning of a new era, I think the content will better set up cause it can just lead into the next expansion and thus take more liberties. Putting all the trials in the post EW MSQ was also a mistake…and Zero sucks as a character. We’re ten years into this game, I don’t need to see someone learn how to trust for the first time, it’s a watered down version of Thancred’s arc in Shadowbringers. The story for the expansion was phenomenal but the post stuff had nowhere to go and feels insignificant, tl;dr

[@ChipotleKanetsu]

Because, as Zepla said, it's side-story crammed into MSQ for less effort. If it was a regular trial series it would be on the interesting side. Same with Hildi merged with relics. Hildi was good BECAUSE it was optional content.

[@mosley3485]

Endwalker's problems have little to do with the story. There's just nothing to do. Shb gave us relic weapons to work towards, Bozja and the firmament. Endwalker gave us relics that are completed automatically in the background if you play the game for a few weeks between major patches and island sanctuary which plays itself in the background if you log in for 10 minutes per week. Sure, you can parrot the "Yoshi-P said it's ok to unsub" rhetoric, but that doesn't make the game more fun and people mass unsubbing actively makes the game worse for the few people left who do still want to play. The game is just completely and utterly devoid of meaningful content at the minute.

[@DeusGamez]

no loose ends? i think you're forgetting not all ascians are gone lmao just the main ones disappeared oh and zodiark's aether can still be used as a threat too XD

[@fredy2041]

Wrong, the problem of Endwalker is not the MSQ

[@ChipotleKanetsu]

@@fredy2041 yeah, the problem is you guys defending the subpar MSQ and content

[@youtubuzr]

Oh, I really *really* like the variant dungeons. Super fun to play, and nice that you can do w/1 friend or 3 friends, or even solo.

[@kairesu5847]

good leave thank you

[@TheYoMandude]

I had to put this down a bit thanks to life and caught up to Golbez fight. I sat in que for almost 45 mins on a Friday at 4pm Central to finally get through it. I don't think I've ever had a main story fight take sooooo long. I figured it'd be a bit because I was behind but damn. Same thing happened when I moved during Shadowbringer's era and still had that pop in 5-10 mins

[@Disapointedmellencol]

you may have been on the wrong server remember different servers have different amounts of folks doing stuff at any one time and if an EVENT like the summer one the rising or Moogle tomes was happening then that effects MSQ times by ALOT, pro time, use PF over DF during events to get MSQ done)

[@RyuSaarva]

Sounds like you tried to get a que searching for french players only, because that fight will not take a long time to pop, those are extreme fight pop times with a single dps.

[@TheYoMandude]

I was on PLD and Im on Siren. I dunno what to tell ya lol maybe 4pm Friday is just a bad time to msq lol

[@RyuSaarva]

@@TheYoMandude Being a tank does not really help you to get a duty pop when we have low amount of healers.

[@timbrady1176]

@@TheYoMandude they are just coping lmao

[@coqui86]

I would also like to add to this list that (as a fellow glam lover) it was very discouraging how throughout EW, almost every new dungeon had just recolored versions of older gear - so even for the tome grind of running expert, there was no incentive at all :( During ShB, running Paglth'an for the tribe-looking outfits made it bearable... now, i run the expert dungeon for the MSQ clear while going through the story and don't bother again

[@CrispBaker]

Guessing that keeping FFXVI on time and under budget bled off more resources than they're admitting, and artist resources would be one of the things that got moved over.

[@KansaiNoRyu]

saw this earlier ""We don't want you to feel forced to log in" mutated into "There's no reason to log in, you can safely sit on Twitter and Discord"" facts

[@AltimaMantoid]

I log in frequently but have had no drive to do the MSQ. Been on 6.3 for months and months now. All i do are random dungeons and Gold Saucer gates

[@boogz1725]

TOTALLY AGREE!!! I want to see a mad crowd when I play MMOs. Thats the worst past of WoW is that sharding has made it a solo experience when you arent in the city and its depressing. Same is happening in FF. You nailed it. MMOs are social games for people who arent social IRL.

[@numenos3218]

I’m glad Zepla is speaking out and wish the other FFXIV content creators would speak up. The game is heading down a concerning path

[@RyuSaarva]

Pretty sure I remember her defending the simplification of the game during shadobringers when she did reaction videos from people who hated the new path.

[@numenos3218]

@@RyuSaarva she was probably still drinking the 14 can do nothing wrong koolaid. I bet now she’s seeing what are the outcomes of that direction. And that’s what I believe is what the root of the issue with the game, the people who vehemently defend this game and the devs and drown out the criticism. 14 is a great game, but Im concerned for it’s future

[@jaysea838]

@@numenos3218 the devs simply need to give players more reasons to participate in certain content. No one wants to wait forever in queues so even if it “was” good most don’t bother now so it just gets worse over time. If they hadn’t made EW in a semi solo manner they probably would have lost a large portion of players. I mean, it would have been fine around the time EW dropped but it ultimately locks out newer players in the future when no one is doing the group content but is needed for a new player to push the MSQ. I think it’s a hard balancing act to get right for a game that is 10 years old. If they make DT more group focused it will be amazing for “us” but the future players will suffer when everyone stops queuing for it outside of it popping in dailys. I finished EW in the last couple of months and there were a few mind numbing moments when I would have to wait seemingly forever just to progress because no one was doing the instance. (Which always blows my mind for a game with a user base in the millions)

[@anteprs7908]

most of them speak out too but most of them who dont simple DONT AGREE WITH THAT TAKE LIKE MOST FXIV PLAYER DISAGREES WITH ZEPLA.

[@anteprs7908]

@@jaysea838 the game hasnt lost many players because it solo freindly it ppl fall off after patches like they always do in all mmorpgs.

[@matthiassneyers2627]

I am a casual player and I would say that I do feel alone more all the time, and I think it's because we aren't forced to do content anymore in group. It's easier to just solo it, because well the NPC's are not gonna berate you for bad tanking. XD (not that that always happens) but the fear of it and having a choice to do it solo can contribute to that factor.

[@rhael42]

players aren't gonna berate you for bad tanking either, unless you're a jerk about it

[@davidbernardino8109]

I'm surprised ppl actually even use npcs. This game is hugely forgiving of "bad" players already so if ppl still have fear as you say, then they have some issues.

[@Svabby]

​@rhael42 I tried playing the game, and there are some nice players, but most players I partied up with would just troll me over and over again. I don't have any friends that play the game so it's mainly solo play for me.. which sucks.

[@matthiassneyers2627]

@@Svabby I'm so sorry to hear that. I too have trouble making friends or finding some people I can play with. 🤲 I hope you'll find some people you can feel good with. And if you by any chance are on the chaos data center, you can always add me. I'm open to new potential friends ~Setti Galaxy@saggitarius

[@matthiassneyers2627]

​@@rhael42 I have to disagree with you, I have seen friends and myself being confronted with people who can't accept you die even if you are new to the dungeon. It doesn't happen all the time, but it does happen.

[@lorangemagnifique3001]

I haven't really played in about a year and a half. Haven't been able to articulate why. But I've resubbed several times during Endwalker, and log in frequently, and I have not once seen more than three people on my friend list online. I've never seen this before.

[@DontGiveUp_Skeleton]

It's says something that for me the most memorable part of the post story content was the easily missable side quest about the back stories of the bosses you just killed. The early patches painted so much potential but as you said it's predicable, mcguffin chasing now.

[@TrollFaceLaunch0]

What side quest?

[@DontGiveUp_Skeleton]

@@TrollFaceLaunch0 Shadowed Pasts Radz-at-Han X: 4.8 Y: 11.9

[@jtabox]

@@DontGiveUp_Skeleton Yeah that questline should've been at least blue quests if not msq. It was pretty easy to miss and was one of the highlights (if not THE highlight) of the void characters' story.

[@Crowens]

I was so damn excited for the start of the storyline, I still had faith even when people felt it was filler content and it won't matter, like no that's ridiculous. How can a storyline based around the void be filler? That's an area tied heavily into many key players of FFXIV, the Ascians, the Allagans, the voidsent, the First Brood, they're going to use it to tie up the final loose ends we have or setup the next big expansion, there's no way it'll be lackluster. Then 6.4 came out and absolutely nothing happened and then the setup for 7.0 is in an entirely separate storyline, what a damn letdown.

[@jtabox]

@@Crowens Lol ikr? When i finished 6.0 i was very satisfied and at the same time very sad because the story felt so good i didn't want it to end. As if I had been in an amazing party and now it was time to go home. Then, in 6.1, when it became apparent that we'd be dealing with the void and the whole 13th, I got super hyped again. There's so much material and potential that at first, I thought we'd only be dealing with the void intro in 6.x patches, and then have 7.0 deal with the void (or some consequence of us going to the 13th). Then as the story progressed, and we were like dispatching every obstacle in our way with breakneck speed, I was like "ah shit, this is going to be a Garlemald, isn't it...". And then 6.4 MSQ came and snuffed out every hope I had that this isn't filler content after all. We got the "oh, Zodiark left a void fart before he died, and it's much more powerful than he was, so much danger!!!"-villain that will cease to exist before 6.5 ends, together with the whole void story arc. With Garlemald and the 13th (and the void), ShB and EW could've easily been a trilogy of expansions (and their patches) that deals with literally everything in FFXIV so far. Instead, we get Dawntrail, which personally didn't exactly hype me up. I know it's way too early for any kind of judgement regarding DT, and I know that at some point we would need to conclude this whole 2.0 story arc. It's just that there's so many things that could've come out from both Garlemald and (especially) the 13th/void story arcs, so many stories to be told, and now that train is gone.

[@MrChiefjc]

Relic Weapons in previous expansions required a good bit of grouping up to complete and were a large bit of content.

[@denshaotoko42]

And also painfully grindy, I'm really enjoying a relic that doesn't require weeks for each progression step. I'm not a hardcore player, I can play maybe 3-4 hours a week (real life is hard), so this, especially tied in with Hildibrand, has really made it very enjoyable for me to get a relic.

[@RyuSaarva]

@@denshaotoko42 mmos are not for you if you only play 3-4 hours a week and neither are most single player games either.

[@wyred]

@@RyuSaarva Feel free to play some Korean super grinder MMO if you want to waste all your life on a game. ;)

[@Henurisongs]

@@RyuSaarva are you really gatekeeping a fucking game that is targetted towards casual play?

[@jaysea838]

@@denshaotoko42 I do think prior relics were painfully tedious and a glow was hardly worth the effort. The EW relic (for me) was the polar opposite (as in dead simple) which also made the acquisition lacklustre. But I do understand your point entirely and at least super casual players have the option that won’t take them months to complete.

[@SakuraWulf]

This was an interesting perspective from my pov. I've tried to play WoW and FFXIV a few times over the past decade and neither really stuck. I recently decided to try crafting in FFXIV and this is the most i've ever felt like playing either game. I've never really seriously tried to get a relic weapon and there's so much to learn. I can't relate to most of the things you're saying here but i've heard other content creators like Asmongold say the same thing about devs being unwilling or unable to innovate within their genre of game, leading to a stale gameplay experience. I do agree with that and realize circumstances are different for different games and target audiences.

[@zullie9614]

Unironically ive been having way more fun getting the Splendorous Tools for crafters / gatherers than doing relic weapons.

[@Cetaey]

This is the first expansion where Ive actually have had no interest in coming back for patches, wanted to do the relic but turned out that became a joke this expansion so didnt come back for that class design to me has also gotten more boring so I dont really know what to do anymore

[@santhkun856]

@ZeplaHQ Being a long-term player as well, I feel collectively people are looking at things through rose-covered glasses when thinking about prior expansions. The post-EW story has been lacking for sure but it's also the end of an era (no pun intended). We also knew going in that there would not be a large-scale area akin to Bozja/Eureka, etc., and that SE was going to supplement that with other content. Doing a quick review of Shadowbringers vs. Endwalker literally the only difference in content is not having a Bozja area and getting numerous other additions in its stead. I also don't see any significant player drop outside of the norm that happens every patch/expansion. Party Finder is as robust as ever (including for 'High End' Raiding), you can travel to another DC if you're struggling to find a group for a particular piece of content, and queue times are the same as they have been in every prior expansion. I understand/agree that large-scale content helps build a sense of community, but it's certainly not required to keep the health of an MMO strong. I will end with I am a more casual player and still play WoW and other games so nothing wrong with differing perspectives. ( Kell Rikun - Leviathan -- na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/character/6887276 ) Shadowbringers - 5.1 - Alliance Raid 1, Beast Tribe, Dungeon, Trial, Blue Mage Updates, Craft/Gather Updates 5.11 - Alexander (Ultimate), Ishgardian Restoration 1 5.15 - Blue Mage Updates 5.2 - Raid Set 2, Chronicles 1 (Trial), Dungeon, Beast Tribe, Relic Weapon 1 [Bozja], Craft/Gather Updates 5.21 - Ishgardian Restoration 2 5.25 - Crafter/Gather Tools 1 5.3 - Alliance Raid 2, Beast Tribe, Fuax Hollows (Unreal) 5.31 - Ishgardian Restoration 3 5.35 - Relic Weapon 2 [Bozja], Crafter/Gather Tools 2 5.4 - Raid Set 3, Dungeon, Chronicles 2 (Trial) 5.41 - Ishgardian Restoration 3 5.45 - Relic Weapon 3 [Bozja], Delubrum Reginae 5.5 - Alliance Raid 3 5.55 - Relic Weapon 4 [Bozja] Endwalker - 6.1 - Alliance Raid 1, Duty Support 6.11 - Dragonsong (Ultimate) 6.15 - Beast Tribe, Hildebrand 1 6.18 - Data Center Travel 6.2 - Raid Set 2, Trial, Dungeon, Taturu 1, Island Sanctuary 6.25 - Hildebrand/Relic Weapon 1, Beast Tribe, Variant/Criterion Dungeon 1 6.3 - Alliance Raid 2, Dungeon, Trial 6.31 - Omega (Ultimate) 6.35 - Deep Dungeon, Crafter/Gather Tools 1, Beast Tribe, Hildebrand/Relic Weapon 2 6.4 - Raid Set 3, Dungeon, Trial 6.45 - Blue Mage Updates, Variant/Criterion Dungeon 2, Crafter/Gather Tools 1, Hildebrand/Relic Weapon 3

[@flavoredcement3584]

Also we are talking about the same team that just got done doing FFXVI and with DLC on the way. I think there are plenty of things they dropped the ball on, and I hope we can all come back for dawntrail and get back to the golden times. I also don't think it's wrong to just take a break from the game everyone needs a break, and all of our friends and allies will be there ready to welcome us again.

[@julesb1447]

I might be super late, but midcore content for me is Blue Mage quests, missed raid content and leveling other jobs I didn't level up yet. This is what I do when I want to take a break from the main MSQ and I don't have energy for higher difficulty dungeons and raids.

[@MarcoMeatball]

Ya I’ve found post endwalker content insanely boring. I think it’s also the come down from Endwalker msq - such a big moment in the game. I totally share your perspective.

[@TheKitsuneproduction]

This is the first expansion, for me as well, that I actually got burnt out, which is a surprise. I'm the only person in my friend group that still plays remotely regularly during the patches, so all of my time is by myself. I love the MSQ, more so on a personal level, I just, have a soft spot for Zero and all of her growth I am eager to see. But the patch content itself is, not really too engaging? I'm also a relic grinder so, I won't get into how much I hate tomestone grinds for relics lol. It makes it all the more *boring*. I think we needed another Bozja, or something akin to it. Another comment said clearing the 13th! And that would've been a cool stage to set that. Though, it would've made optional content required, so then it becomes a problem but. idk. I'm glad it's not just me. When I hit burn out, I was really worried that I'd hit a full plataeu before the next expansion.

[@DiomedesTididax]

I feel that is a little bit late now...but I really hope they listen to this for Dawntrail.

[@kiyani2337]

Another layer to add to this too, it would be nice to be able to take a break for a month or two, but I don't want to lose my house so now I'm stuck paying every month for a game I haven't been playing

[@mokvinsamv921]

At the end of the video, don't worry. Get your feelings out there, I hope things work out for the new expansion. But I've missed having a relic to work towards, the tomestone grind just isn't it, seeing Hildy again was great at least. But I definitely feel the difference between ShB and now :( hope you're having a good one Zepla. Also I'm loving Baldur's Gate III, hope you are too :)

[@Killinshots]

getting 1500 tomes every step > suffering through bozja. Seriously, doing DR was fucking mind-numbing, at least you can get your tomes doing a few different things

[@nKe.]

Endgame is very boring when the only thing to do is savage/ultimate

[@professorbean5791]

Maybe copium, but I'd *prefer* not to think it's "Laziness". Part of me does struggle to believe Yoshi's insistence that FFXVI's development had no impact on FFXIV's patches. Either way, The 6.0 post patch content has just felt so empty and "Going through the motions." A new dungeon and a few new boss fights in the form of Raids or 24 mans every 5-6 months just isn't doing it anymore. Deep dungeons and Criterion/Variant dungeons aren't really it in the long term either. Also... Sorry, but the extended patch cycle time suuuuuucks. It made sense when Covid hit, but I honestly thought we'd have gone back to shorter cycles by now. I'm still incredibly excited for the new Expansion, but I really, really hope 7.X patches are a lot juicer then what we've had in Endwalker.

[@nexjagg]

Completely agree, I've been saying the same things! I don't have anything to do except for Ultimates or big commitments, which I already tried to do DSR and had my static die out at double dragons. I need other stuff to do. FFXIV is severely lacking in overworld content or content to do with the community, outside of stuff like hunts and social events which isn't for everyone.

[@purplepineapple7893]

I guess Im confused. Isnt this normal? Ppl take breaks and come back. The difference here is that ALOT of good games are out and we are playing those as well. We arent QUITTING ff14, just taking healthy breaks. But I won't lie. I do want some interesting things for the game to shake up the formula of patches.