Why are you looking forward to FF14?

[Lucavi]

Blizzard knows what the fuck they're doing, and Aion WoW-clones seriously don't. You ALWAYS stick to your own brand, but you always keep your eyes on what your competitors are doing. Ford and Chevy swap shit all the time, but both are distinctly separate brands.

Nobody likes a clone, but some ideas are simply too good -not- to take, or does someone want to tell me that level synch was developed entirely from SE's own ideas.

[Melisande]

What WoW really got right in terms of dynamics was their original end game system. Original as in Vanilla/1.0. It had the right level of progression while still keeping gear rare enough that upgrades felt like upgrades. Of course even that would've eventually hit mudflation levels if it had been left to run for 5+ years. Still having instanced bosses that just dropped a small amount of loot for many people is better than having world bosses that might drop loot for 1 linkguild while the rest of the server is screwed for the week.

But then again that is my own personal opinion as an ex-ffxi player and now ex-wow player. I really really hate the direction WoW has taken since BC and seeing anything like that near FF14 would be pretty distressing. Again not to say WoW didn't get anything right but what it got right was in its original incarnation not the abomination we have now. Instanced progression is good, hard/easy modes, stupid fast loot acquisition, is not.

So I guess what I would really want out of FF14 is FFXI with instances, while still keeping world bosses more on the lines of Vrtra and Co. rather than Kings. Another thing that has been brought up is the game of the more button mashing of WoW vs the um well at times boring sit and wait of FFXI, which is really something I found to be a good thing. I could relax and actually chat with PT mates in FFXI something that I have never had the luxury to do in other mmos (wow, aion, aoc, war) because of the need to spam 2222223 for my rotation.

[Arvin]

I could relax and actually chat with PT mates in FFXI something that I have never had the luxury to do in other mmos (wow, aion, aoc, war) because of the need to spam 2222223 for my rotation.

I don't necessarily agree with this, because even if you are button mashing and you don't have time to talk, the biggest difference between the FFXI community and WoW community is that in the WoW one people would regularly use ventrilo for communication. Speaking to each other is a lot more personal than typing I'd say.(Not saying all FFXIers don't use ventrilo) It all depends on who play with, though. In my case, I have had some of the best conversations with my guildmates for the last 3 years. Also, I have had my fair share of decent/funny conversations in FFXI but I would say I felt a bit more of a connection to my WoW guild simply because we would be speaking to each other. Again, it all boils down to who you play with. I hope I don't come off as WoWvFFXI, I really like and hate both of the games for different reasons. They have their strengths and weaknesses.

I look forward to FFXIV just because of my childhood passion for FF games + my current passion of MMOs combined once more, into a newer game. FFXI got really tiresome after a while, and I've been through slumps of playing/not playing WoW but I would really just enjoy a brand new game to explore. That feeling of insignificance you feel when you start out in the world as level 1 and you grow your way into being somebody feels good man. The world seems so god damn massive and I just want that fresh feeling again.

[Warudo Ecksu]

I'd have to agree. I used vent even in XI for exp parties and have throughout WoW and Aion.

[Melisande]

I don't necessarily agree with this, because even if you are button mashing and you don't have time to talk, the biggest difference between the FFXI community and WoW community is that in the WoW one people would regularly use ventrilo for communication. Speaking to each other is a lot more personal than typing I'd say.(Not saying all FFXIers don't use ventrilo) It all depends on who play with, though. In my case, I have had some of the best conversations with my guildmates for the last 3 years. Also, I have had my fair share of decent/funny conversations in FFXI but I would say I felt a bit more of a connection to my WoW guild simply because we would be speaking to each other. Again, it all boils down to who you play with. I hope I don't come off as WoWvFFXI, I really like and hate both of the games for different reasons. They have their strengths and weaknesses.

Yeah I guess I am just not the biggest fan of Vent. I really like to listen to music and its hard to just spaz out to whatever when I am also trying to pay attention to what people are saying and replying. It may also be a function of the actual people I played with, as I never really clicked with any of the guilds I was in on WoW as I did with the people I played FFXI with.

[richardd]

i love vent, but thats only because im an entertainer and im a goofy ass guy lol. i always feel like i need people to feel relaxed and calm and make people laugh, because they always end up playing better that way. they handle pressure from low man situations and criticism so much better when im being cool and funny about it, but my peers were people who were mostly 24+. lol

but it has its downs. during the 1st couple AV kill sprees, before anyone thought it was possible to zerg it, and we saw the 1st treasure pool from that mob in like 2 years, i felt like i wanted to throw a baby out the window. my eardrums were kicking my brain's ass from all the high pitch screams i never though a grown man could make (looking at you Rama). either way, im all for it

[Arvin]

I think the community difference is that the FF fan base isn't necessarily small, but it's pretty tight knit because it's a passion that a lot of us have had since we've grown up. We've been tied to this franchise and because we have that in common, most of us get along.

In WoW, it USED to be a lot better than it was. The community really has become utter shit compared to a few years back simply because the amount of subscribers has gone up so immensely. Now anybody with half of a brain can accomplish 'achievements' and they have too much casual content that the typical household could get into it and not just the Warcraft die-hards who love the story. It used to be full of wonderful people to talk to and raid with, but now with content being so easy on some servers that you can pug them you deal with assholes, ninja's, douchebags and complete retards. The fact that they are watering old content down after a new patch comes down welcomes bad people and players.

[Alderaan]

I get the impression, and correct me if i'm wrong, that you don't really know anyone on your server outside of your guild in WoW. That's one of the aspects that i really enjoyed in XI, knowing almost everyone on my server. I'm not saying that was always a good thing but it just seems more RPG like.

[Kaylia]

I get the impression, and correct me if i'm wrong, that you don't really know anyone on your server outside of your guild in WoW. That's one of the aspects that i really enjoyed in XI, knowing almost everyone on my server. I'm not saying that was always a good thing but it just seems more RPG like.

Replace "you don't know anyone" with "you don't really need to know anyone".

In WoW, content is easily accessible to anyone, eliminating the need of "friends". In FFXI, you need to group with people for xp, and you need solid group that will last month for endgame. It's probably the most important factor.

Other stuff like "pvp", larger population (more anonymity mean your reputation won't follow you) and overall mood of the game amplify the effects.

[Lucavi]

^ That's kind of true. With frustrating content like farming for keys back in the day, you needed help a lot. This was the same with vanilla WoW's end-game scene, where you had to spend lots and lots of time farming for resist gear and attunements.

The community that we all praise in FFXI came into existence because the game could be played no other way. You couldn't XP alone (save for bst, which pined to get into parties anyway, and could switch jobs at the drop of a hat), couldn't quest alone, and certainly couldn't engage in anything resembling content over level 50 alone.

In WoW, someone -always- has the option to go solo on something, although usually for things like PVP, its far more fun with a friend.

I noticed that the "tight knit community" dropped to a "tight knit group of friends" for me during my WoW time. I had one stomping buddy for PVP, and a small group of friends for instances and general questing, but with the ability to progress so quickly alone, it was easy to hit up half an entire questing zone in a day, and thus, edge farther ahead of someone else. FFXI's only equivalent to that was getting a few levels over someone when you had a great day of 6k an hour in xp parties back in the day.

Again, simply different systems.

[Yoli]

Maybe it's just me, but I always thought some of ffxi's community came from people being on fixed servers, back when you couldn't switch. Some of the community aspect seemed to vanish in my eyes, when people began jumping around.

I loved parties when I started playing, and even through to when I'd finished meriting and just needed them to recap xp. Overcrowding of spots was an issue, as was "endless bird syndrome", but i enjoyed doing stuff with random people, and then getting to see them again and again as we ran into each other leveling up. That built more community than you get solo xping in other games. I understand complaints about it being hard to find a party at times... I think setting things up so you could work well with 3 or 4 people instead of six would have done a lot to fix that though. A slightly better LFGing system could help too.

WoW's "new" cross-server instancing is handy, but it opens up the instance to so many people each time, and you're not really likely to ever run into someone from outside your server again.

As far as Vent goes, I disliked it because voices seemed so disembodied. It's a fairly stupid reason, probably, but I liked seeing my mithras as mithras, and elvaan as elvaan. I was never a roleplayer or anything, but it just felt odd hearing some deep husky southerner's voice coming out of a female taru. What a poster said above about listening to music is a point too. ... vent is neat, and it totally has its uses if you want to enjoy it. Fine by me. But in WoW it became so much more of a requirement than an optional service with raiding, and pvp. I didn't like that attitude.

As far as content, I think ffxi was going in the right direction with having some big ground hnms that you wouldn't camp (... until people did start camping them in parties, which I don't think was intended), and adding instanced stuff with worthwhile drops like salvage and limbus. Both of those were neat, because you could run them with really small groups, or with full alliances, and you could get still get stuff done. A lot of stuff in ffxi just fell victim to people doing things the devs didn't expect (and hopefully, now they know better). I thought Bahamut was a fun fight until I started kraken zerging it. And then other people found out that you could dd zerg it without krakens almost just as well. It's kind of sad that a fight like that ended up being a 10 second encounter.

Anyways, I'm looking forward to ff14 because I think they'll fix some of the worse things from eleven, while keeping its identity and what made it enjoyable.

[Lucavi]

Cross-server instancing is the best thing since ever. FFXI had a zone for every single area in the game, complete with loading times. They could have introduced cross-server xp parties on a zone-by-zone basis. The amount of lulz from MPKing people from other servers at valkurm dunes with trains back in 05 would have been hilarious.

[Alderaan]

Maybe it's just me, but I always thought some of ffxi's community came from people being on fixed servers, back when you couldn't switch. Some of the community aspect seemed to vanish in my eyes, when people began jumping around.

Bingo. There used to be consequences for being prick/thief or overall fuckwad. The top shells wouldn't take you and you were pretty much screwed. Having said that, i'm still in favor of giving the player as many options as possible.

[Vacht]

Blizzard knows what the fuck they're doing, and Aion WoW-clones seriously don't. You ALWAYS stick to your own brand, but you always keep your eyes on what your competitors are doing. Ford and Chevy swap shit all the time, but both are distinctly separate brands.

Nobody likes a clone, but some ideas are simply too good -not- to take, or does someone want to tell me that level synch was developed entirely from SE's own ideas.

WoW is pretty clone-like of DAoC.

But yeah a mixture would be nice. XIV could do good with a mixture. IN DAoC the instancing dungeons would be tasks given to you by an npc, youd clear the dungeon, return and get xp and money. Was nice.

[Melisande]

Cross-server instancing is the best thing since ever. FFXI had a zone for every single area in the game, complete with loading times. They could have introduced cross-server xp parties on a zone-by-zone basis. The amount of lulz from MPKing people from other servers at valkurm dunes with trains back in 05 would have been hilarious.

I would say that while it is convenient it is by far one of the /worst/ changes to WoW they have made since WotLK. While it is fast, and it is good for farming badges, that is all it is good for. It turns every instance into a faster and faster rush to the end so you can go grind it again, which granted they had already been doing but the x-server thing really accelerated it. I have such fond memories of the vanilla instances and some of the TBC ones, that seeing their idea for Heroics in Wrath was bad enough but now that there is so much complaining about an easy instance like Occulus or a marginally interesting one like Halls of Reflection, and having to remember that those complainers are now Blizzard's customer base....

I mean I hate it for alot of reasons, the teleport, but the absolute destruction of server identity is by far the worst, as 5 mans were really the last remaining relic of having to actually interact with your server and the LFD tool destroyed that.

Good, bad, the "terrible" game play at times of FFXI is really why I ended up loving it so damn much. I certainly wouldn't have become such close friends with so many different people if not for the enforced grouping and the restrictions on leaving server and such.

[Talragan]

Got in. Played ffxi for ages, didnt play for last year, reactivated month ago.

lawl.

[Talragan]

woops wrong thread.

[Kaylia]

Another thing that suck about WoW is the multiple character. Your friendlist and guild don't even follow you to another character...so you're pretty much a new person everytime you log in on a different class.


I'm sure little thing like that helped ffxi community grow stronger.

As far as Vent goes, I disliked it because voices seemed so disembodied. It's a fairly stupid reason, probably, but I liked seeing my mithras as mithras, and elvaan as elvaan. I was never a roleplayer or anything, but it just felt odd hearing some deep husky southerner's voice coming out of a female taru. What a poster said above about listening to music is a point too. ... vent is neat, and it totally has its uses if you want to enjoy it. Fine by me. But in WoW it became so much more of a requirement than an optional service with raiding, and pvp. I didn't like that attitude.

Personally, i think vent help more than it hurts. Sure, it's harder to manthra your way through the game, but I think it helps a group stick together more than chat only.

[Vacht]

I wish I knew more about WoW... i just dont know how anyone could play with those crappy graphics. /twiddles thumbs

[Eaglestrike]

I wish I knew more about WoW... i just dont know how anyone could play with those crappy graphics. /twiddles thumbs

Fluid, quick-paced gameplay. I go back to FFXI and wonder how anyone can play with the 1-2s delay with every ability/ws/cast/armor change.