Expectations for a new player

[Kalmado]

If this is the wrong area I apologize and please move!

Lately I've had the itch to play XI but I'm not going back to retail and I've done darn near everything on a free server so I do not have interest in trying another free server. I've only looked at XIV a little, but it does look interesting, but the monthly fee is a huge turn off. I would like to find out some more information regarding this game as I just haven't found the same interest in other rpg games I've tried and there isn't another MMO that looks interesting to me at this time.

I've read many people say this is similar to WoW in that you don't need groups to get things accomplished. I've never played WoW so I don't know that scenario. I was one of the few that LOVED Bst because I could do things on my own or with a few people and I also thought Abyssea was a good addition. I never experienced being in a solid LS in XI and whether it was an issue with playtime or teaming with player quality I never accomplished what I hoped to in FFXI. What is the amount of people needed to do activities in this game ranging from day to day tasks to endgame?

Is there a Beastmaster-like job?

It goes without saying you get the better gear and rewards from endgame. I have not read any advanced threads here regarding endgame so I do not have any knowledge. Is endgame strictly about gear currently? Are there storylines that coincide with endgame?

Do people feel like they get things accomplished with having only a little bit of time to play here and there? Say hypothetically I had an hour to play. What could I expect to do in that time?

How much is the monthly fee? Do people feel they get their dollars worth? I, like many others, kept my XI sub out of habit and felt it turned into a waste of money. I would like to avoid that.

Thank you in advance to any responses and I appreciate those that took the time to read this!

[BerenTebogo]

There is no solo job and almost nothing worth doing you can solo.

The "not needing groups" is just in reference to the duty finder feature.

[Buffy]

What is the amount of people needed to do activities in this game ranging from day to day tasks to endgame?

Virtually everything can be accomplished via party finder or duty finder. Party finder is similar to the shout system in Jeuno in FFXI, simply imagine the shouts were written down and organized and you could scroll them at your leisure. Duty Finder has no FFXI equivalent, however it be similar to this FFXI scenario. You are a rank six San d'Orian and want to do the rank 7 missions. You click rank seven missions in the duty finder and it teams you with others who want to do it and those willing to help you do it. Having only ever played FFXI before FFXIV and never having played WoW, I think duty finder is amazing and I love it.

Is there a Beastmaster-like job?

There is no current job that resembles BST from FFXI. The closes would be SMN since it is the only pet job, but the jobs have few parallels and are not the same.

Is endgame strictly about gear currently? Are there storylines that coincide with endgame?

The main storyline leads to certain fights that reward gear (like primal weapons) or are part of other gear obtaining methods (like philosophy and mythology tomes). The main storyline is expansive and has SE's typical excellent at this.

Do people feel like they get things accomplished with having only a little bit of time to play here and there? Say hypothetically I had an hour to play. What could I expect to do in that time?

You could complete 1-2 levels and/or 1-2 dungeons via party finder or duty finder. In about a month (if you played every day), you would be entering level 50 dungeons and starting early-end game. In about two months you would have a reasonably geared character.

How much is the monthly fee? Do people feel they get their dollars worth? I, like many others, kept my XI sub out of habit and felt it turned into a waste of money. I would like to avoid that.

The fee scales based on how many months you pay for at a time and how many characters you have. Realistically, it's 14.99 US a month. As for if this is a reasonable cost for you, I have no idea. I never thought FFXI was a waste either. For ME, a subscription is roughly the cost of a movie, which lasts on average two hours. So I felt if I was playing more than 2 hours a month, it was worth the money. But that was just how I thought of it, and not everything thinks of things that way obviously.

Thank you in advance to any responses and I appreciate those that took the time to read this!

I think the game is really excellent. Yes, it has its flaws. But coming from FFXI, there are so many little things that make me enjoy it so much more. Things like the free, near-universal use of my chocobo mount. Things like the duty finder. Ease of transportation. This one is huge, there are no 20 minute runs to beastman held centers. A teleport and a 5 minute chocobo ride gets you everywhere in the game. I've enjoyed my time in Eorzea.

[Kalmado]

I think the game is really excellent. Yes, it has its flaws. But coming from FFXI, there are so many little things that make me enjoy it so much more. Things like the free, near-universal use of my chocobo mount. Things like the duty finder. Ease of transportation. This one is huge, there are no 20 minute runs to beastman held centers. A teleport and a 5 minute chocobo ride gets you everywhere in the game. I've enjoyed my time in Eorzea.

I don't have time for a full reply, but this is huge to me as well. Taking 20+ minutes to travel and the time waiting on other people really killed things for me in XI. Duty Finder sounds very interesting as well.

Thanks for the replies so far. Keep them coming!

[The Stig]

Kalmado, I recommend you to get a free WoW account that lets you level to level 20. Pick a class like Warrior or Paladin and off you go.
Alternatively, although vastly different gameplay, get a free TERA account and mess around up to level 25~

From the tools accessible within the trials/TERA (I recommend WoW), you'll be able to get a feel on the questing/levelling and "pace" of such games, including this duty finder thing. In simple terms, Duty Finder is like a lobby like thing, you queue up. When requirements are met (1 tank, 1 healer and 2 DDs as standard) a notification pops up asking you to commence, and once pushed, you're zoned into the dungeon (no matter where you are). When it ends, you're zoned out where you zoned in from.

In terms of FFXI to FFXIV conversion, gameplay wise switches from your usual "engage, wait for 100 TP, watch TV/touch yourself/do something else, use X ability, WS" to "hit a button every 3 seconds and pay attention to the mob (see below)". Your autoattack, but alone it's simply not enough, you need to use your abilities every 3 seconds to chip the mob down.

Your character position is also important, some moves work best behind mob, some on the side. On top of this, special moves from mobs are broadcasted in like target warning fashion or a pre-animation somewhere on the floor (i.e. sparks might appear before an actual bolt) and you have to dodge (move out the way) or suffer damage/death.

On top of this, assuming the infrastructure is entirely in place now and we won't be shitting connection errors out left and right, and if you got a PS4, go play the PS4 beta and see if you enjoy it. A good opportunity to try the game for free.

It goes without saying you get the better gear and rewards from endgame.

As I explained to Kuno recently (who started in FFXIV) you can compare endgame to FFXI's Limbus (go in, go via a route, kill stuff, recieve loot and tokens) - it's all literally "lobbified" via Duty Finder. With the exception of the hardest endgame dungeon and 2 fights (although this will be lobbied too), all current endgame and previous dungeons can be queued in the Duty Finder tool.

Current endgame dungeons rewards tokens. Specifically, imagine there is 2 types of ancient beastcoins (except everyone gets the same amount, it's not split). One is more common and you get more of it, the latter you don't get as much, which can be used to purchase 2 tiers of gear. Also, bosses drop their own loot to supplement token loot.

On top of this, it is entirely possible to be "just as geared" (but not optimal) as an endgame player without touching the "final" (so far) endgame instance in the current patch. It just takes a bit of time as you need to gather the tokens to buy the gear, whereas the endgamer would get the equivalent loot in the instance.

Ignoring optimal setup, compare this:

http://xivdb.com/?item/6050/Valor-Surcoat [buyable with tokens, collected over time]

to

http://xivdb.com/?item/3266/Heavy-Allagan-Armor [drops off first boss in the current endgame instance]

The base stats are the same, one has accuracy and parry, the other has determination and parry. No other special properties (besides sexiness) are present.

EDIT: because Accuracy is important for the final endgame instance (a certain number needs to be achieved), in this case the armor that drops off first boss may be integral to a PLD over the Surcoat.

That covers a bit, feel free to pick apart some points if you have further questions.

[Lyall]

On the slightly less-endgame realm of things, there's also some decent time-sinks you can go after aside from leveling a combat class and grinding dungeons. SE recently added two different factions to run Daily Quests for; Think of them like repeatable quests in a specific hub that refresh every day, with little bits of story and rewards being given at set quotas. They help expand on the lore presented during the main storyline and have some vanity rewards that stand out, and they don't take terribly long. There's also a set of Treasure Maps that gathering classes can find (and sell) that feels similar to Chocobo Digging from FFIX. You get a fragment of a map and set out into the world to find the precise location, whereupon you find a treasure chest and get ambushed by monsters. This is available in both solo content and 8-man group content, and both offer more vanity rewards that are unique. They're good filler content to work on while waiting for a dungeon queue or if you're just trying to accomplish something in game without having to push terribly hard for it.

I found Gathering/Crafting to be some fun, too, even if they aren't especially useful outside of being self-reliant on repairs and manufacturing lower-quality things than can be found in the endgame grind. Gathering has you running around to nodes similar to FFXI did only you can target specific items to gather which is handy for when you're looking to work on a craft without needing to throw away 60% of your collected items. Crafting plays out like a sort-of minigame where you have a variety of abilities to increase HQ rate and Completion without draining a Durability gauge, which blows up similar to XI when emptied. Crafts are like Voltron since you can crossclass abilities between them and ultimately end up as a perfect-synthing, 100%HQing, never-in-danger genius craftsman able to create or repair anything with a mere thought.

It's satisfying, and you can actually works towards it without spending hours looking for a 0.1 increase. Gathering and Crafting both use conventional EXP, gained from collecting/creating. It's magnificent compared to XI.

[Kalmado]

Wow all of this information makes the game sound much more relaxed and you can still get things done. I tried watching some videos, but for the last six weeks Comcast has been terrible where I'm at in Michigan. I noticed there is a lot of menus on the screen while playing. It seems like a lot to take in from a brief glance. I'm sure nothing unusual once you get used to it.

@TheStig: I appreciate the suggestion to try WoW, but I cannot get past the graphics as they are too cartoon like for my taste. Tera didn't seem much better, but again, I'm having trouble watching videos currently. Great explanations regarding combat though!

I may bite on this. I feel bad because I just bought Dark Souls again...lol.

[Ksandra]

I think you get like 30 days free right? Just gotta actually buy the game.

I would definitely say it's worth a shot if you are itching for something new.

Just do remember it isn't ffxi 1.0 and that includes getting rid of some of the bad, but also some of the good, too. (experiences on what you consider good/bad may vary)

If anything it's good training for any other mmo you'll ever play since they basically all follow similar formats now.

[SamanosukeShiva]

a lot of FFXI-only players have hard time when playing FFXIV for the first time since they're not used to dodging and stuff, but the game basically trains you from lv1-50, and if you have somewhat of a brain activity while leveling, you should be fine at lv50.

[Halion]

@TheStig: I appreciate the suggestion to try WoW, but I cannot get past the graphics as they are too cartoon like for my taste. Tera didn't seem much better, but again, I'm having trouble watching videos currently. Great explanations regarding combat though!

He was suggesting that as a previously FFXI only player you use these free versions of similar games to get a feel for how it plays since you don't want to pay first for FF14. Regardless of if you find them visually appealing this is actually really good advice if you insist on making a final decision before buying in, because the non-visual style and pacing of 14 is heavily borrowed from WoW. If you play WoW (or TERA if you absolutely refuse to play a cartoon character) for a week and can stand 20 levels of fetch quests, easy dungeons, staring at your hotbar and facerolling your keys, and can imagine yourself enjoying it in a classic SE setting while the difficulty and involvement of your class slowly scales up, then buying 14 will be a no-brainer.

[Kalmado]

He was suggesting that as a previously FFXI only player you use these free versions of similar games to get a feel for how it plays since you don't want to pay first for FF14. Regardless of if you find them visually appealing this is actually really good advice if you insist on making a final decision before buying in, because the non-visual style and pacing of 14 is heavily borrowed from WoW. If you play WoW (or TERA if you absolutely refuse to play a cartoon character) for a week and can stand 20 levels of fetch quests, easy dungeons, staring at your hotbar and facerolling your keys, and can imagine yourself enjoying it in a classic SE setting while the difficulty and involvement of your class slowly scales up, then buying 14 will be a no-brainer.

i see. Thank you for the reply. I may do that this week.

How 360 controller friendly is this? I only used kb before, but I use a 50" tv for gaming

[Kelenae]

i see. Thank you for the reply. I may do that this week.

How 360 controller friendly is this? I only used kb before, but I use a 50" tv for gaming

Very friendly.. but i play bard end game and bard is easy to play o.o

[datkoops]

I play endgame dragoon (fairly intricate move rotation) on my PS4 controller, and I love it. They've done a really great job at making the game a breeze to play with controller.

The game is 1/2 off ($15) right now on Amazon. I'd say check it out, you'll know whether you like it or not well within the free 30-day trial period.

[Lyall]

Echoing the sentiments for the controller scheme. It plays fantastically with a gamepad, far far better than XI's attempt at it due to how the crossbar works. The advice on throwing 15 bucks at it on Amazon is solid, too. There are certainly worse things to spend the money on.

boring controller details: Left trigger/Right trigger/ L+R Trigger activate your crossbar, which is made up of A/B/X/Y(Circle Square Triangle X) and dpad Left/Right/Up/Down. Holding down one trigger gives you access to 8 skills at once and you can toggle an option to allow Left Trigger-Then Right Trigger and vice versa to enable two more slots of 8. Plus you can toggle through multiple palettes with a shortcut enabled to toggle through 7 different sets of 16 buttons. It's a little muscle-memory heavy to get used to but the difficulty slope is gentle as all hell and once you're used to it, you're flying through options and hitting skills with pretty great accuracy. It gives you full camera control, zoom, adjustment with a bumper and the right stick. I think the only thing you can't do by default with a controller is Focus Target.

[Francisco]

a lot of FFXI-only players have hard time when playing FFXIV for the first time since they're not used to dodging and stuff, but the game basically trains you from lv1-50, and if you have somewhat of a brain activity while leveling, you should be fine at lv50.

If you're previously FFXI-only - I would definitely try to shy away from trying to level up your first job on quests/FATES only, and try to get a bunch of dungeons, etc mixed in as well.

I leveled up MNK on basically quests alone, and was like "wow, this is easy!" - but then when the dungeons started getting harder, reality kind of kicked in.

The word I chose to describe easy-mode Titan was "intense".

[Spider-Dan]

If you plan on playing with a controller and using a chat client, I strongly recommend picking up a Dual Shock 4. It's plug-and-play with a micro-USB cable, and you can map Push-To-Talk to the touchpad "button," instead of having to map it to another button (all of which are already used for somewhat important functions).

When I was using a Dual Shock 2, I had my Push-To-Talk mapped to L1 (auto-run), but this game is not as responsive as XI when it comes to pushing the opposite direction to cancel auto-run (you frequently end up tracing wide circles with autorun still on). In a game where dodging is important, this got me killed.

[Kalmado]

It's great to hear people like to use the controller. I didn't consider chat when thinking of playing so that may push me back to using the keyboard. I'd definitely need a new monitor as I'm using a basic Dell. I really appreciate everyone taking the time to share their opinion. I'm extremely intrigued that's for sure. Regarding the monthly fee, I can easily afford it, I just don't want to pay it!

[SamanosukeShiva]

also I see your FFXI server was Shiva, come to Hyperion, it's the new Shiva! at least 50-70 old school shivan players are here.

[Natallon]

also I see your FFXI server was Shiva, come to Hyperion, it's the new Shiva! at least 50-70 old school shivan players are here.

This!
To contribute, I played FFXI since NA release and was able to transition into XIV just fine. Like what was said previously, the game does a very good job of teaching you the ropes along the way to 50.

[Limlight]

i see. Thank you for the reply. I may do that this week.

How 360 controller friendly is this? I only used kb before, but I use a 50" tv for gaming

I play war (tank) and Mnk on 360 controller on my pc and it works like a dream. I'll never go back to keyboard ever again.