[XIV] Heavensward Discussion

Well they can't have exactly made heavensward a stand alone with the amount of back story there is that ties into 1.0 and 2.0. If a new person was allowed to jump straight into heavensward w/o doing all the 2.0 storyline they would be really confused.

Let's not forget XI expansions RoZ started once the main vanilla story finished you had to complete it. CoP doesn't need any of the main story nor RoZ completed to start it nor does ToAU or WoTG or Abyssea or SoA. I'd assume XIV will follow this and the next expansion will most likely be the same. Though let's be fair the story isn't hard and a new to 50 could probably be able to get through the story quite quickly.

In fact the 2.1+ story was really quick and only took about half a day to clear each segment. It's only because they were drawn out over a few updates is why it seem like a lot but it really isn't.

this has been a discussion in the past that largely seems to depend on who you ask. in my opinion, your assessment is pretty much spot on.

Why give access to 50+ areas to level 1 characters? The only benefit I see is the experience from exploration, and there are a ton of reasons not to. It honestly sounds like you're just raw about having to complete a storyline you neglected even knowing in advance it would be a requirement for the expansion.

Let's face it getting to the shadow Lord back then was rather difficult and a long drawn out task seeing as there was hardly anything ways to get from A to B. It puts XIVs story difficulty to shame though I suppose not many would play it if it was like old XI.

Why do you keep comparing this game to one that was made over a decade ago? Why does it have to follow the same progression or restrictions? Only thing is that its made by the same company but the teams were completely different.

It's funny SE didn't learn from any early XI mistake lol

I don't mean to be rude, but why are you playing this game you hated so much?

I'm in love with playing drk.
Only thing I don't like is the silly combat stance. What you call that ~a low guard?

I miss my mithra baseball batter stance

Idk why they are comparing both games, they are completely different.

I like it but jumping into tanking suddenly was probably a bad idea. I soloed to 39 so...inexperienced. I'm LOVING MCN though.

Maybe when the DRK job specific armor and weapon is released I'll have a better reason to go full throttle and learn to tank.

Because they did? FFXIV isn't FFXI in all the best and worst ways. Yeah, you could enter those areas as a level 1, for the most part, but even that was heavily gated and they were full of high level mobs. You could even argue that the appearance of true sight/sound enemies and near zero potency of meds and spells for level 1 characters were specifically to discourage it. Think of Ishgard as Sea or Sky, places that were gated by other content. It's not a different storyline, it's a continuation. The same logic applies to single player games, most don't let you jump directly to endgame or DLC content, you have to complete at least a portion of the main storyline.

It's not a unique thing, most MMO's, the other FF MMO, virtually all single player games, etc. They all have the same kind of content gating. If SE feels that it's negatively impacting their bottom line, they may change it. But, for now, you are stuck with it. And if you're angry that you paid 40 or 60 bucks for an expansion you cannot play, why did you buy it knowing this would be the case?

Actually... It's the other way around. They learned a lot after the Tanaka 1.0 /ffxi fiasco. Or else ffxiv wouldn't be so successful to the point that made most ffxi players switch with such quickness to ffxiv.

I didn't find the tanking part too difficult. I think its gonna become mostly to managing mana throughout fight(s).
Can't wait to play more but...unfortunately business trip all this week T.T

They are doing the same thing with main game=> first expansion( you need to be up to date on story for new zone/job).

Also funny enough but a lot of FFXI player quit because of matsui/SOA that wasn't tanaka :p

If the next expansion is somewhere the Garleans haven't been then I don't see them having you do all the storyline up until that point

Since they mentioned "Sky and Sea" (and decided on sky for this one) I'm assuming you'll take a ship somewhere very far away for the next expansion.

Yeah, I'm just used to healing.

They said Zeta users will have a slight advantage for new relics in 3.1

Kinda hoping we might get to do something like a liberation of Doma in a future expansion. Garlean occupied, need to take boats since I'm sure they got all their anti-air stuff setup like they had with CM and Prae, and would serve as a good way to get away from the Scions and Eorzea's problems.

Replace primals with something else, like genetic experiments or elder creatures, and I think we're golden to leave the Eorzean alliance behind.


All SE has said about the new Super Weapon line is that having a Zeta 135 will ease the early parts of the new weapon, and I believe Yoshi-P stated the new line won't be anywhere near as bad as the old line, before he put in RNG dungeon drops and other things to the Zeta line. You know, since XIV doesn't have XI's legal disclaimer of don't neglect your real life due to fantasy game, so he can be a jerk like that to the willing player base.

REM in XI existed as long term goals that typically were the best of their weapon types, usually, and were meant to be steady progress. These weapons were always "the one benefits from the effort of the group" mentality, with statics and other things requiring dedication from multiple people to craft a super weapon for one player to improve the group overall.

R in XIV seem more tailored for the people that just don't realize you can do things besides play XIV 4+ hours a day, and outside of 2.0 and 2.55, were never the best of their weapon types. These are designed so players can solo them at their leisure.

The grind exists as an achievement accomplishment for modern games to tackle, so they deserve what they get. Even Dreadwyrm weapons are outclassed in Heavensward with white gear starting at level 53 if I recall correctly, and Zeta outclassed by weapons you get at 55 from quests, and everyone knew this was coming due to all the expansion talk. It did not persuade people from working towards Coil and Relic gear, so I expect the same people to sink countless hours into the game. Grinding lights or tossing maybe 200ish materia into a new weapon, or more XI style RNG doesn't affect these players, so these challenges are scaled based on metrics to keep them engaged.

Too much bitching about doing quests to do quests in this thread.

Anyhoot... as for BLM

Predictions from a Lv58 BLM ~
Think Thunder may be getting put on the bench when you have Enochian up and it is fully possible to keep Enochian up 100%. Thunder will be replaced by Blizzard IV.

Blizzard IV refreshing Enochian to 25 for the first refresh then 5 less for each one after so 30>25>20>15>10>5.

At most that would mean 99 seconds of Enochian and you only need 60 to keep it up full time so at most you will have 1 phase where it may not be up depending on spell speed, movement, and such.

Also spell speed seems to not effect thundercloud proc damage. I can't even tell if spell speed is even effecting the DoT damage either. Might be a bug or might be worthless.

As for Spell Speed -vs- Crit Rating, spell speed will be ahead till you can hit certain peaks it seems. If you can managed to get to Blizzard IV in a rotation within 19/20 seconds you can go full on Crit from there as the goal may be to keep Enochian up full time while also being able to do a full fire cycle.

Once again these are just guesses will figure this out once I hit 60.

If you arent keeping Thunder up with the SpS buff youre prolly doing BLM completely wrong. :<

Rotation should be the same, but instead of doing nothing when thunder is still up during ice phase you can do a Blizzard IV before going back into fire. Being that enochain is a 5% damage increase you can almost perpetually keep up a 5% better thunder II/III DoT being up is definitely an increase, more if you can get thunderclouds off without *** you.

Problem with casting thunder during the Umbral phase is that it lengthens the time you spend in it when you could be doing more Fire IVs instead and w/o that final Blizzard 1 before going back into Fire you risk missing a mana tick and going into fire lacking mana and thunder may cost too much in that case as well.

And like I said I've seen little if any difference in thunder damage or dot ticks regardless of spell speed. Thundercloud procs pretty much become a forbidden thing during Enochian as well due to having to balance refreshing Astral Fires while getting out Fire IVs without dropping Enochian.

Mind you like I said this is just me guessing as I'm not 60 yet.

The way you handled applying Thunder was at the start of the ice phase while the ice ticks were going on as the thunder would then be "Free" Per se. So while you COULD definitely be in ice phase waiting for MP Again, it doesnt seem to have changed much as you will still go into fire after getting full MP. The only thing that would seem to have changed rotationally is when to use fire IV and Blizzard IV while in those phases (Because in fire youd still want firestarter procs while under raging strikes/enochian [unless you can get firestarters with Fire IV?]).

You should only Cast Fire once or twice in an Enochian Astral phase. If the first Fire procs a Firestarter you would use the Fire III instead of Fire when you need to refresh astral fire.

Remember Fire IV and Blizzard IV do NOT give stacks.

Anyhow back to getting to 60 to make a clear judgement.

Okay, so during Enochain you just ignore the Fire til you need to refresh a stack. That makes it more clear lol. I still say you would do Thunder II(or III [depending on SpS]) during your initial Blizz 3 into umbral and if you already have a thunder up when you enter into umbral hit a Blizz IV to refresh enochian (If needed) and then go back into Fire III -> IV -> IV -> IV -> Etc (Wouldnt this hit diminishing returns on enochian duration though?).

That just seems more logical then not having thunderclouds tbh :<