Xiv shadbringers

its a shitty instance based game like warframe, masquerading as an MMO

without instances, these big mmos no work. you have to remember that old mmos without instances peaked at 200k players max.

shared fate system?

So at what point do i interact with 100 other players at once in FF14?

join any hunt train or diadem, heck just visit ishgard.

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Decided to level Red Mage for the role story and holy shit this leveling is retarded slow. Any tips to get level quick from 50?

>have a bunch of jobs between 30 and 50
>only choice for most of them is PotD grinding

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afk in one of these
why is ishgard smaller than ff12 cities?

Dungeon spam yields more exp.
If queues are bad just use squadrons.

I miss Stormblood so much bros

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that boss theme..
youtube.com/watch?v=nFqfN-ju1MQ

how do the stories of the last two xpacs compare to stormbringers?

er, to havensward

Can't be the only one who thinks it's funny that everyone knows this game is shit. And even the dedicated fans are starting to realize it's the same warcraft slop retards guzzled up for years. But they can't break away from it. Is it autism? Or something even worse.

Stormblood is okay in parts but overall it's pretty meh
Shadowbringers is great and beats Heavensward storywise
I rate the expansions based on story as ShB>HW>SB

why is it better? I can't imagine anything being better than traveling across the icy wastes with a party of 4

I enjoy the combat a lot, it's the most I've enjoyed a non action JRPG combat system that I can think of.

it's just you nigga

the combat is pretty terrible at low levels, even compared to other games with hotbar combat. You likely enjoy this because its combat is ripped off of a wrpg

Story was great, though the latest patch had some kind of stupid moments

At low levels sure, but once you get high up enough it's pretty fun. I like how some moves combo/chain into each other, it's nice and satisfying when you figure out a good rotation.
And a small thing but I enjoy setting out my own hotbars, especially with the crossbars on a controller; if you get a setup that feels good it's really nice.
I've played other JRPGs with hotbar combat like Xenoblade Chronicles but for whatever reason I've never really enjoyed the combat in them.

As white mage it really drives home the feeling of being a pacifistic tree hippy in the early game because fighting feels like a fucking slog in solo activities when you can only slowly hurl stones and aero at things for a millenia.

The Nier crossover is entirely unnecessary and ruins the game.

Was patch 5.25 delayed? On Tuesday we will be coming up on 6 weeks and there hasn't really been any news in regards to when the update is dropping. They haven't really even mentioned if Corona is delaying game development.

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It's a mystery. I hope not though as a relic grind would be welcome right now.

Tuesday after this coming tuesday would be week 8. Probably don't want another weapon until raid fags are able to get the weap

Too bad people cried so hard about Eureka, we got Eureka in 4.25 and that was content that lasted a hot minute. This first step will just be the initial story and the trial fight. So it will last a few hours rather than the grind of kino Eureka.

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Yeah I really loved Eureka. Such a cool way to do the relics, having their own entirely separate content dedicated to them. So much better than doing roulettes.

5.25 is 4 weeks after patch 5.21
so April 7th

>Heavensward
+ Follows hard on the excellent cliff hangers to ARR
+ Finally get into Ishgard after hearing about it for fucking ages
+ City is awesome medieval stone fortress, really stands out in Eorzea
+ You and your bros (and Ysayle, who is bro in her own way) traversing the deralict kingdoms in the sky is peak XIV comfy
+ Awesome existential threat the dragons provide makes the struggle in the expansion feel like a true life or death situation for everyone
+ Awesome Warriors of Darkness rivalry (even without knowledge of what ShB will involve)
+ Cool new DoW/M jobs
+ Firebird is dope mount
+ Alexander raids are a lot of fun despite the stupid time travel schenanigans
+ Cute Hildy quest
+ Excellent buildup for next expansion

- Huge ass maps filled mostly with nothing that take forever to traverse
- DoH jobs go to shit
- ARR cliff hangers are eventually just waved away
- Ishgard political shit post-war is half-baked
- Worst beast tribes
- Average FATEs difficulty shoots up
- Void Ark raids are the worst raids

Gives proper insight into the setting and overarching plot of the game. Actually develops the Scions and makes them likeable. Has arguably the best main villain in the entire FF franchise and one of the strongest endings ever.

>Stormbringers
+ Hype beginning
+ Steppe is a cool setting, with good characters, and provides good reasons for the usual trival MSQ tasks
+ Doma is decent thanks to its good characters (though Yugiri is still boring)
+ DoH jobs are less retarded than in HW
+ More Nero, and Alpha is cute
+ Namazu are best beast tribe
+ Ivalice raids are a lot of fun (even if the story is kinda dumb) with some great FFT gear and characters
+ Maps are slightly less annoyingly fuck-huge than HWs
+ Red Mage and Samurai are nice additions

- Despite Ala Mhigo being so central to much of XIV prior to this point it gets sidelined in its own expansion
- New settings are either cliche (not-Japan) or indistinct (Ala Mhigo)
- Lyse is a horrid. Gives us back Yda
- Eureka is failure
- Omega raids are boring despite nice cameos from other FF games
- Zenos is a lame one-note villain
- Zenos dies and comes back
- Yotsuyu's death is fake and she comes back, but only to die (again)
- Hildy quest feels a little stale this time
- Expansion ends with yet more tedious Empire bullshit

>Shadowbringers
+ Hype beginning in a new world, full of new possibilities, new threats and everything judy fucking NEW after all these years
+ Old characters get refreshed thanks to time skip and new world
+ Nice parrallels of Thancred/Minfilia vs Thancred/Ryne and development of Thancred's character (maybe shoulda died, though)
+ Final dungeon is impossibly hype
+ Little in the way of Empire shit to deal with
+ No beast tribe summonings to slog through
+ Excellent main villain who is both sympathetic and reprehensible
+ Conflict versus the Sin Eaters feels like an apocalyptic battle for the fact of the entire world. Stakes feel much higher than in StB
+ Cool new lore that gets to the very heart of the game's universe and possble ultimate conflict
+ Maps are the best since ARR
+ Welcome and unexpected use of the Crystal Tower
+ Revisiting the Warriors of Darkness from HW is even more dope
+ New OST is top tier
+ Ishgard restoration gives crafters and gatherings something to do
+ Nier outfits
+ Ruby + other weapon raids seem to be going full Evangelion

- Expansion sags in the middle as the action becomes repetitive
- Ran'jit is a shit mid-boss whose motivations and characterization should have been developed a lot earlier
- Zenos is still back and being a boring shitter
- This time is shitty little poodle is back too
- New jobs are a mixed bag
- Patches have been pretty mediocre so far
- Nier raid is average, with bosses mostly just damage sponges

I'm a decent chunk of the way through Heavensward on my first time playing this game and my only overt gripe is how it felt like the Ul'Dah conspiracy wrapped itself up a little too conveniently given Lolorito just shows up to say "It was just a prank bro, sorry about the arm she's not dead lol"

best expac so far

Probably the worst thing about HW. I don't know what the writers were thinking, unless they really were just devoid of ideas (and couldn't pull a GRRM and dither for years).

Orbonne was so fucking soulful in every single aspect
I still get depressed every time I remember we have two more Nier raids to go before we can move on

What does overmelding gatherers actually get you?
I get perception gives you a higher chance of IA2 procs, but if you're in that gear, you aren't gathering collectibles for Scrips, so is it just Aethersand chances and Pick clean breakpoints?

Even More Further Hildibrand Adventures WHEN?!?!

What's in the next patch anyway? Do we get the 24 man or is that 5.3? Are relic weapons? I've never done one, will ShB start a new quest line or do you have to have done the ARR/HW/SB steps?

next alliance raid is 5.3

5.25 will be the relic weapon zone, bozja citadel, all you need to complete is the ivalice raids

Relics take place in a certain area? I thought they involved going all over the world doing fates and dungeons and shit

Please tell me it's not some shit like Eureka

No one really knows. Yoshida has been weird about his messaging regarding a new "Eureka" often saying they plan for one but it's more solo focused... so basically it feels like they're gonna strip out the only thing that made Eureka tolerable and that's talking to other people while doing it.

Ugh I hate it when healers don't do their job...

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Is this worth picking up if I'm late to the show? I enjoyed ESO a lot and this game looks fun. Not trolling, legit asking.

New player here. Can you explain what hunt trains are? And Challenge runs?

Also, should I buy the expansions immediately, or wait til I get to that content?

Yeah. Most of the content is pretty static so there's nothing really you'll have missed out on.

Hunts are (easy) overworld bosses that respawn on timers. Hunt trains are when huge groups get together and steamroll all the hunts in a set of zones all at once.

PotD (Palace of the Dead) and HoH (Heaven on High) are randomized tower dungeons which get harder as you progress through the floors. A "challenge run" is just a run where you attempt to get to the highest floor, either solo or in a 4-player party.

You only need to buy Shadowbringers and that comes with all the previous expansions. But unless you want to play as one of the expansion races, there's no real need to buy the expansions until you get to level 50.

I'm not sure if Riddle of Wind and Greased Lightning 4 was worth it for MNK.

Red mage AOE is one of the most depressing things I've ever played

What were they thinking

Red Mages must always be 1/2 ~ 2/3 as good as a Black Mage.

In Stormblood it was literally just Scatter > Scatter > Scatter > Scatter > Scatter until you had enough mana to Moulinet.

Enjoy your resurrection tax