Yo guys, I know the channel isn't yet up to speed but I wanted to post this one off the cuff to share my thoughts after 100+ play sessions. Once agian, this video is as much for me to look back on as it is for you guys! I hope you enjoy my blabbering. See you in the comments and the streams ❤
If I remembered correctly Yoshi-P himself once a WoW player so he might already know what people like about it and what people hate about it. (Not sure about he played WoW but he admid that FFXIV 2.0 is inspired by WoW)
@@bakacdaz Yoshi P forced the entire development team to play WoW and used what they loved and hated and built a game. That's what 2.0 (A Realm Reborn) is.
Yep! I'm definitely in no place to give a full review yet (or even close to it) - but I like to document my thoughts and feelings along the way to look back on when it comes time to make "that vid" that all creators do eventually haha
i replayed the whole 1-100 story for a second time within the last 8 months. There are still characters and their stories i relate more to than others; however, arr and stormblood stories overall are vastly underrated. So much story arcs builds on top each other. I feel the same way with dawntrail. It's beautiful world building.
Heavansward is interesting, because to me it ages like a fine wine. Even ignoring the patches, the parts of the story that hit make up the back bone thematically in a way that just grows as you push through the game. If ARR is where you fall in love with the world, Hevansward ia where you fall in love with the storytelling. The patches help, but so does distance.
I’m also a 20 year wow vet that switched and I absolutely loved a realm reborn and I’m doing the game the same way you are doing it. msq then blues and raids and I’m also at the end of heavensward and I’ve been absolutely loving everything
Its fun, isnt it? I can easily spend hours farming for stuff to sell on the market board. You might want to buy crystal clusters on the market board before dawntrail, they are going to be expensive after that game drops. By the way, you can farm crystal clusters but I recommend doing dungeons or farming something or even fishing to wait until the node or tree spawns while you are keeping busy. The nodes/trees to farm with miner & botanist are in mor dhona at 1 am, 5 am, 3 am eorzean time & the mining nodes spawn every 1 pm, 5 pm, 7 pm at summerford farms in la noscea & then 9 pm in mor dhona Happy hunting. Also try to sell a few things to see if they sale on the market board & go from there if it sells. I also forgot to mention, to see the special nodes you need to activate truth of the mountains/forests after the specified time. I would say wait five eorzean time ingame minutes, it will only take 6 seconds
15000+ hour wow player, played through a ban, private servers, new account, hardcore pvp and tons of raiding in wotlk...just gotten lost with wow over and over again. ff14 feels so inviting and the community of ff14 is so so considerate and thoughtful. You can tell how chill the player base is when a new player pops into the duty que and watches all the cutscenes and not a single complaint.
Hahaha love that you are so on board with ff14 after so many hours in WoW. A lot of WoW players, especially long time ones, really struggle with the whole sunk-cost idea of switching over!
@@JustRuss I think it is a lot to do with what we've grown to be familiar with. I personally hate the movement of characters compared to WoW. Jumping/strafing and casting instant spells and sliding everywhere is just...bad looking. That and the 3 year long GCD....invisible walls EVERYWHERE compared. Just stuff to get used to. For me, that made it very hard to get into. That and no City Raids, Faction Wars/WPVP. Its just a different game altogether. Cant go in thinking WoW replacement, go in thinking youre in a complete new universe and reset what youre used to. Up to WoTLK, WoW is still my favorite. But...FF14 ran STRIDES past wow since.
love the fact that almost every player will get "mad" if someone pull early while someone watch a cutscene xD. it rarely happens too which is really nice !
Aye! In fact, more often than not, people have a habit of "protecting" cutscene watchers, saying stuff like "hey guys, we have a first timer in our alliance. Pls don't pull the boss" and everyone is happy to wait
@@benoitnoel100 thats both a good thing and a bad thing. I believe the cutscenes should be as the dungeon/raid starts and as it ends. never as you pull the boss. personally I do not give a flying ball about the story in the game and there is nothing more annoying than having to wait in dungeons for someone to watch a cutscene. I still do it though because otherwise I would ruin their time but it doesnt make it any less annoying for someone like me who doesnt care. I believe this happens because the playerbase pretty much holds the story as the biggest factor as to why the game is good. it is the same reason why MSQ skips are so looked down upon because "you cant enjoy the game without the story" and I feel like that sentiment is true. the game without the story is quite bland until you get to the main, new content and unfortunately you HAVE to play through 300 hours of story to get to the new content which is a huge pain point for me. I like the game and the abilities are all cool and the fights are so chaotic and look really cool but the story. I dont care about it and its ruining my enjoyment of the game because I HAVE to play through ARR and heavensward and stormblood to get to the stuff I consider to be cool. its both a tragedy and a blessing. I feel like WoW really does do it well with how older expansions are dealt with, pushed to the side and you can just play the shiny new content without having to play 20 years of the game to catch up.
I came from 7 years of ESO. I started trial with AuRa man/Dragoon and ADD, so I kind of tried a bunch of stuff, crafted, fishing, etc. ESO story isn't front and center and actually isn't really required to enjoy the game. So when I finally realized I left the MSQ story sit, I finished all the way to Shadowbringers and waited for Endwalker to drop. I saw the male Viera and instantly bought and subscribed. I made a bunny boy ninja and ran through the game (to date) in one big gulp. It made more sense since I wasn't trying to remember who and what as much. ARR became where I really looked at the Scions since I knew where they would go and do. I felt more a part of the team Heavensward on and felt more of the emotions. I can't imagine trying to do this all with people watching and interacting. Glad you are having fun. One thing I wish I thought of when I started was leveling similar jobs together so I didn't have to hold onto or repurchase a ton of gear. Running Dancer, Machinist and Bard, swapping between to level was a blast and made it less grindy.
The gripe you had about how the 3.0 bossfight felt anticlimatic due to the boss dying so fast even at minimum iLevel is due to how the job kits and stat numbers change every expansion, but they don’t adjust older content to compensate. There's often a power creep which causes current job kits to become overpowered against older content. Even older Ultimate fights (the hardest endgame content) become easier to clear with new expansions because of the changes to the stats and job kits. And not too long ago there was also an issue of the 6.0 final boss dying too fast because it already got powercrept by the latest gear so story newbies going in with endgame-kitted veterans see the boss HP go down unnaturally fast.
It should also be mentioned that Thordan normal was always a bit of a joke, even when it was brand new. It was always undertuned and potency buffs over the years completely trivialized it even further even on min ilvl. Thankfully all the other capstone trials are bangers, so there's that at least.
Once Thordan has done his ultimate attack on normal, he's expended all his power and because he's not a combatant at all, he spends the last 10% just flailing pathetically (he's visibly winded and has a damage down debuff on him). The Thordan EX fight is a different story, you get the challenge you crave there, and is one of my favourite fights in the game.
Haurchefant broke me. He, Aymeric and Estinien are my boys (I'm an Elezen fan to the highest degree). My friends logged on just after i had run the dungeon and watched the cutscene and they could hear the emotion in my voice when I said hi. I actually love the Heavensward expansion, it's right up there for me. But that is mostly because it's all elves and dragons, I'm a very easy lady to please
there is no other game that brought me to tears. this game is the only one that, not once, not twice, but at the VERY least 3 times made me shed tears... i dont know where you are currently, but trust me the story gets even better as the expac goes on. you get more and more invested and every twist and dramatic event play right in your feeling... love that game to death
@@benoitnoel100 I finished the MSQ a few months ago. Bit I completely agree, I've never played a game that makes you feel the way this one does. I was simply relating to what Russ had written as to keep my comment spoiler free 😊
Regarding tab targeting, it is pretty bad if you have left it on default with no changes These changes can be made under Character Configuration and then Control Settings: Target Tab: I recommend changing the tab targeting to Type 2: Cone if you haven't already instead of Type 1: Ignore Depth Filters Tab: Change your target filter settings to aggroing enemies only when weapon is both drawn and sheathed. Hopefully that helps a little bit, I noticed when I changed those settings it brought it closer in line with how WoWs tab targeting feels but it definitely is not perfect
Beat me to the punch! I remember starting up FF14 and going - "wow this tab targeting is a mess" but changing those settings does significant improve it.
Love the fresh opinions, the Haurchefant closure thing is totally valid, and everything in here is totally fine. Always be yourself and honest with the game and the community. Don't feel bad about not liking something you should, and vise versa.
been loving the vods man, keep posting em! its fun to live vicariously through them. and yeah, i think HW gets its reputation of being amazing from the 3.1-3.3 story
Having only found your channel and stream recently im loving how much your actually involved wifh the story vs some other content creators who will enjoy the story but they dont do the kind of discussions you will about things. Thank you for putting yourself out there and taking the chats abuse lol.
Really love your vibe when talking about the game and I think your approach to playing is lovely and way closer to what I experienced on my first playthrough than when a streamer just hyperfocuses the msq and doesn't engage much beyond it. I think both you and viewers will get a lot more out of it that way. Also, love to see a fellow ARR appreciater :3 Only been watching some of the highlight vids but I might check out the stream sometime!
ARR isn't "bad", it's just a side effect of the development where they had to rebuild the game from the ground up and then buy time for the team to make Heavensward. That resulted in the very long patch cycle and quest marathon between ARR and HW. It gets slow at times but the entire thing is packed with very important world building information, some you don't even realize was set up until much farther down the road. I have never played a game with music I enjoyed more than 14. In ARR the cities were the only places with night themes, outside it was just the sound of the wind, bugs, and birds at night. Then in Heavensward Soken went to a light piano version of the day theme. Then later... he learned to weaponize it.
Once you finished ARR "base" there were 100 MSQ quests you had to complete to be ready for Heavensward. 100 quests, already at max level, that felt like a lot of wasted effort. That is what killed it for a lot of people with ARR. I rolled a new character after Heavensward came out and I was already at nearly max level from the pre-Heavensward quests before even starting Heavensward.
The why or how of something is irrelevant to whether or not the result is good or bad. It may grant perspective or create a more sympathetic approach, but understanding the why of something doesn’t make it a more enjoyable experience.
I played 3.0's ARR, and recently played through it again just to have another character. Even back then I liked it, but most of the parts I do remember feeling like a drag were removed. Vishap and Rhitatyn are two of my favorite changes. Those two fights are much more fun.
Welcome to the game 😊 10 year XIV vet here. Subbed so I can watch your journey through this amazing game. Really excited to see your perspective through this story and raids 😁 Endwalker ties everything in the story together phenomenally, the trials/raids are a blast to play in, the music is gut wrenchingly beautiful, and now is perfect time to start since the new story about to begin 😁 enjoy!!
Thanks for the video, glad to hear your thoughts! I live in California so its challenging to catch your twitch streams, though I try! But its really nice to catch up on vods/hear your thoughts on youtube. I'm glad you like blind raiding - if you form your own static, you can continue to do that throughout your FFXIV raiding career (and play it any way you want, tbh, there will always be 7 other people who like the idea!) My son plays on a blind raid team, they just completed the latest raid tier. It's an extra challenge on top of already challenging content (I like my guides, please and thank you!) but its absolutely there for those who want it!
I haven’t had the opportunity to tune into the streams as much as I would want to Russ, but I am delighted to hear that you are still having a good time with the game, and have fostered a good way to experience more than purely the MSQ. I know raiding isn’t everyone’s jam, I am not usually one for doing blind savage myself, but that’s genuinely really nice to see that you’re having a nice time doing those things with your community. It makes me wish I took my time more myself, but two years ago I really didn’t know much about MMO’s in the first place so that’s just hindsight. I hope you continue your adventures of seeing all the raid tiers and their savage equivalents in the other expansions as well. Cheers
@@JustRuss No worries Russ. And seriously, Godspeed to you guys with Alexander Savage, those are no joke for when they were released. I believe in you!
The etiquette when a new tier of normal raids comes out is that everyone does them blind on the first day and everyone cooks - it's so much fun. With Savage raids, the world first teams will be fighting for a week or two to get through just like WoW, but most of the rank and file will only go into a party finder group blind for the first couple of tries - then we'll start looking at what little bits the guide channels have released if we do get stuck, (they're usually wrong for the first couple of hasty videos, so they've become their own meme.) You should absolutely be able to find others willing to current raid tier content blind in a static in the future. But no rush, take your time! Play the game the way you are having fun.
If you haven't done the Tribes at all, they are frequently a good window into their zones as world building. The Vath in Dravania are my favorite in HW.
It's been a great journey watching you. I've even felt the urge to go back amd experience some content again and even try some I never did because of watching you go through it all. Keep it up and as long as your enjoying yourself... that's all that matters! 🙂
Same here! I left in October and still loving it. I'm apprehensive about the next WoW expac, I feel I wont be as emotionally invested in it as FFxiv but willing to give it a shot at least.....but I can see me sticking with ffxiv for a long time
@@brandoncomer6492what makes you say that? I’ve been off wow about 2/3 years. Was disappointed by pvp balance for shadow loads and same old bgs with just new skins. Idk and even after running the same dungeons and heroics over and over. Raids were meh. Maybe I’m just tired of mmos but I do miss wow combat. But I’m also tired of so many spells and buttons and hotkeys. I like in Diablo or Destiny 2 etc obviously lacking the mmo side aspects, I like less buttons to relax. Not as big on rotation etc. miss wow world tho
@@ganjabear1892 wows combat and scripting engine is far more advanced and performative. FFXIV uses a rudimentary combat engine heavily tied to a server tick cycle and extremely linear design scripting. It's comparatively unresponsive and simplistic. Just as an example consider M+ dungeons in WoW and how involved the various mechanics work in concert that require players to use kicks, CCs, AoE interrupts, etc. Nothing like that exists in FFXIV, and nothing like that can exist in FFXIV because the combat engine simply cannot handle the performative requirements that come along with it. Even encounters in FFXIV follow a strictly time script, the scripting engine doesn't allow for any sort of dynamic mechanics in the way WoW can.
I've been popping in and out of your videos watching your journey. Take your time and enjoy it! I'm hoping in Dawntrail to find a new raid team that wants to go back and do everything from the beginning.
I think WoW players have an easier time getting through ARR (I personally enjoyed it too, but I have only been playing WoW since Cata - I was too young for the internet during Vanilla lol) because we're used to the typical MMO "go kill 10 bears" fetch quest. My friends who hated ARR have not played WoW or any other MMO - for them, ARR was the roadblock they had to skip in order to enjoy the game, and they did end up enjoying HW onward after I bought skips for them. I even paid for a month sub for one of them since they were questioning the monthly cost, and now they pay their sub every month just to stand around in Limsa and look pretty lol. Personally, the FFXIV story is still the best story I've ever read / watched in my life so far. That might be a stretch, but I think one of the reasons I love it so much is the journey. It's not only one expansion and move on (as you've probably already noticed ARR to HW), the story keeps going and evolving and the friends we've made - and lost - along the way are there with us
I can second this, played wow from vanilla to shadowlands and jumped to ffxiv and loved every bit from the start. Then I found out about all the arr hate online lol 😅
@@JustRuss I don't think so! Those were absolutely the story beats that make this game what it is. They're impressive for any RPG, let alone an MMORPG!
Nice, welcome to the community! I did the same back in 2021, came over to check it out and fell in love with the game, I had played WoW since 2006. This community is amazing. ♥
I remember really loving ARR, it was great to just explore the world and do whatever I wanted. I personally think that ARR struggle with pacing becasue some sections just really slowed down the pace to the point that the MSQ wasn't that interesting.
As for tab tageting it's really bad, but there's an option in the game to make it proximity based... The way it works by default is it targets things from left to right on your screen. Look into the settings, see if you like the alternative one more. I just kind of learned to right click on things instead.
Regarding blind raiding, it's absolutely a thing at endgame. There's no PTR for this game, so nobody can test or figure out strats before the content gets released, so everyone is doing it blind for the first weeks anyway. My FC had a few people who wanted to get into high end raiding, but were nervous about jumping in. So we formed a group of 8 and decided to try the newest extreme, which was the 6.4 one (no spoilers for Russ). Little did we know it turned out to be the hardest extreme in years... but we kept at it, only able to raid once a week, and after a couple of months we finally got it down. It was a great experience for us all and led to us dipping our toes into savage as well. I'd definitely recommend giving blind prog a try!
I've been playing since Endwalker released, having never played MMO's before. Two and a half years later, and there is still SO much content I haven't touched. I'm toying with starting the Alexander raids myself soon. Following your experience reminds me so much of my own, and there's so much joy there. I'm glad you're enjoying your experience.
10:40 The whole MINE system needs an overhaul for the more outdated content. It just doesn't make much of a difference anymore with each expansion power creep and job adjustments. Thordan was definitely more engaging, even on normal
Oh my goodness, you have such an amazing adventure ahead of you =) I'm also currently replaying ARR on an alt, doing the entire thing over again =) There is stuff I wish I could do for the first time again, and I know all the people who have played it would be excited for you that you get to live it all for the first time =) Have fun! =)
I love everything FFXIV! I loved ARR because I came from GW2, ESO, & WoW! I still love the other games too, but I only play FFXIV now! I think you will enjoy all of the rest of the content! I am stoked for Dawntrail & am leveling up my Ninja so I will have gear for Viper! Great vid, keep up the good work!
The improvement to ARR in the form of cleaning up the quests def improved it. I played through it back in 2013, and i think why i enjoyed my time then was because it was new, I had to wait for the patches, and i got it in chunks, instead of having to play it straight through. I started playing 2 months after ARR released. I have fond memories of clearing coils back in the day, including my first Bahamut kill. As for Alex, I did it pre nerf to A3S, and was part of the static killer days, so i didnt do any of the savage alex til much later sadly. Reason, my static booted me, then fell apart weeks later due to A3S. Will say this be glad you don't have to deal with TP, and Accuracy rating. That added an extra level of difficulty to the fights that was annoying.
Ahh a fellow ARR enjoyer! ^^ I don't like telling sprouts to "bear with" It because it's so much rich lore being passed out that will shape a good bit of the story to come. I also agree that fantasy Catholics wasn't as peak as folks likely remember, but I don't touch that point unless they try arguing down ARR at me lol. Best of luck moving forward!
I don’t think ARR is bad, it’s just the least good. The least good FF14 expansion is still not bad. The only parts I’d consider bad would be the VERY start where you’re killing squirrels and ladybugs, and the pacing of some of the postgame stuff. In the context of rebuilding the game after the figurative and literal calamity of 1.0, it’s nothing short of exceptional
What really sold me on ARR was the small connections. A lot of the background characters, even ones you couldn't interact with but popped up with char bubbles when you got near them, ended up becoming recurring and eventually graduated into their own stories. We get a couple Scions out of it and a really creepy boss fight. Really won me over early especially since the Scion/Ascian/Hydaelin/WoL thing at first really didn't. It felt like I was just a clean up guy- the only person who could be around Primals without getting turned so it was just on me to do the thing but Lahabrea and subordinates were SO CAMPY at first. All that said, having finished the whole game now, I am completely enamored with my Scion family and really appreciate the Ascian for the characters they are
On the disappointing Thordan fight, that is unfortunately a problem the game severely suffers from for max expansion level content. SE simply does not tighten the ilvl requirement for max level duties and it results it everything falling over MUCH faster than it did when the content was fresh. There are mechanics in many alliance raids that players haven't seen for years for this very reason.
I hate that ARR gets such a bad rap compared to the other expansions, I love the world building of ARR and it's so necessary because all the other stuff in the game hits harder because of ARR and the world building the game did. I love all the expacs but ARR will always hold a special place in my heart.
I think it could be better than this but understandable since it was made in 2 years and make while still fixing original 1.X too. Made 2.0 playable in short time is important than anything at that time that while writting is mid and EN voice acting is so terrible even though some actor are not that new.
The bad rap for ARR usually comes from the filler and the mediocre combat content, even among those that hate it they tend to recognize the world building aspect. The problem is, it's also been fixed up multiple times now, so there's a lot less filler and the combat content (particularly the 47-50 range) has been made significantly better, so people continue to parrot that it's the worst thing ever while what they remember is all the original filler they had to go through. Meanwhile, HW has had no touch-ups, so is much closer to what ARR originally was.
@@cassiusbright1062 I've recently been doing a ng+ I'm currently in stormblood which is by far my least favorite expac, and so far I've found Heavensward to be more grindy than ARR now. I was like I don't remember this...😂
A Realm Reborn isn't bad, its just the first book in a seven book long series(ARR is like The Way of Kings to the Stormlight Archives if you want an actual book comparison, though lol) Its the set up for the rest of the game, and yea it can be a drag to get through sometimes but a good story itself needs a good foundation to get going. Both ARR and Heavensward were expansions where the dev team were still trying to get their feet under them and you can really see that, especially playing later expansions. In Heavensward you can definitely see this within the savage raids, they were 100% trying to figure themselves out and the first tier nearly killed savage raiding for the rest of the game. (Living Liquid misses you) Stormblood is also a bit controversial because its not a bad expansion, its just not my favorite, and tends to be ehh to a number of people as well. It has some incredibly good parts to the main MSQ, the dungeons are also pretty good and IMO some of the best PATCH content in the game, but there are definitely sections that drag(really hard depending on if you like certain characters or not) and the BBEG of Stormblood is incredibly polarizing. You either like 'em or hate 'em and there's no real in between. Either way its been entertaining to watch your journey and hear your thoughts! Its always fun for us veterans to watch our little sprouts grow and journey through the game we all fell in love with so long ago. -And sometimes we just want to share the pain- (:
Loving your content and journey! So, I think the combat bits stem from how jobs and fight design were then versus now. Jobs were far more technical and harder to execute properly, while the fights weren’t designed to be too difficult or as flashy. Stormblood and onward, it’s the opposite. Although Yoshi-P did say Dawntrail plans to kick it up a notch since some fights in Endwalker got a little too boring for lots of folks.
Definitely do another post expansion vid on your thoughts of Stormblood. A lot of contention is tossed at the next expansion on the list and would love to hear your thoughts on the topic. Many would argue that if Heavensward was the peak of storytelling, then Stormblood would be the valley. For context, think of HW compared to Wrath of the Lich King and Stormblood to Pandaria or BfA.
If you have enjoyed all the lore about the Dragonsong War and everything that led up to it, then you should do the Scholasticate quest line if you haven't already. I also have to wonder when you mentioned how you like the zone music, how many people out there thought "Do you know Lahee?" ... wait until ShB, you'll know it and love it.
They NEED to update the balancing in thordan like they did with ultima weapon. Ultima weapon used to die in less than 60 seconds after endwalker came out due to the balancing and i feel like now thordan is in that position and it really ruins the feeling of the fight, which in terms of presentation is so epic and cool. I hope when dawntrail comes out they give him a lot more health or something
Yeah the Ultima weapon is still one of my favourite trials, probably my favourite base (non extreme) trial actually! I hope they update thordan to something similar :D
As a FF player from launch who has played most MMOs, I’m so glad you found Ff Russ! Welcome, take it at your own pace, find what you enjoy, and I hope you stay for a long long time!
If you didn't get closure fighting Thordan, you might consider going back and doing it on Savage or Extreme level! It might give you a more hefty fight that would give you more oomf for your emotional investment. (Late to reply, I know. Y_Y RUclips hasn't been recommending your stuff to me for a while. >.< ) As far as enjoying ARR vs Heavensward, the first time you do it, it's really very good, like you said. It's when you've done it multiple times for alt characters or redoing it for content or nostalgia that it tends to drag a bit. Heavensward it renowned for its gut punch story beats which most of the player base loves experiencing. I hope that the patches change your overall thoughts on the expansion. It's still my favorite, even after finishing Endwalker.
You can't expect a MSQ trial to be overly challenging; all players need to be able to clear it; not just the raiders. I believe you'll be much happier when you get to the extreme version of Thordan, especially if you do it blind and min I-level.
I was playing pvp the other day and was trying to tab target an Astro that was the second closest enemy to me. after 10 tabs i gave up and manually clicked on them...the tab targeting really is atrocious in FF14
Aloo! Glad to hear you've been enjoying yourself! As others have said, try not to let viewers set your expectations for the MSQ. Some folks may get a little weird if you don't react/feel the same way they do about characters and story beats, but I'd hate for them to tarnish your experience. It's much better to just be honest and enjoy yourself. I also strongly agree about FFXIV's tab-targetting, it's pretty crap compared to WoW. My workaround was to change [tab] to target nearest enemy, then [ctrl-tab] to cycle through nearby targets. That's what got me through frontlines.
Churning Mists night theme is so underappreciated! It's more low-key than a lot of highly-regarded tracks. It became a favorite of mine upon first hearing it, and I've included it in all of my orchestrion playlists for years now. Zone themes with the same kind of vibe in later expansions: - Stormblood: The Lochs night theme, "Old Wounds" - Shadowbringers: Lakeland night theme, "Unchanging, Everchanging" - Endwalker: the song title is "Neath Dark Waters (Scions & Sinners)" but saying anything else about it would be spoilers ;) These are honestly my favorite pieces of music in the entire game.
On the toxic positivity side There are some rare toxic moments where certain players say stuff like “you pull you tank” etc but that is more of an issue with those players than the game itself(they’d be the same in any other mmo) to the point where doing that is actually against the games terms of service, and is reportable, the game itself is heavily critical of toxicity and intentional team killing(ofc if your in a small group of friends and just doing it to meme around it’s not really an issue) there’s no actual penalty in place via the game automatically, but if you report them they can get in trouble for that behaviour
I once had a pretty rough experience in a duty roulette as a new healer. The tank kept pulling way more mobs than I could handle, so I politely asked him to slow down. Instead of adjusting, he got super rude. By the time we reached the final boss, I was dying repeatedly and asked for someone to explain the mechanics. I had already mentioned at the start that it was my first time in the dungeon, but the tank just got even more annoyed. Frustrated, I finally said, "If you’re going to keep acting like this, I won’t heal you." Guess who ended up with a 24-hour ban? Me. After years of playing, that’s still the only time I’ve run into such a toxic player.
Yeah thordan in the msq is incredibly undertuned, but I hope you do the minstrels ballad! It's a great extreme battle and much more satisfying defeat for thordan.
I enjoyed base ARR myself. The patch content did drag on for me, but only because I was really excited to get to Ishgard in order to unlock the 3 jobs there. (This was before SB came free for the free trial peeps giving you access to jobs that unlocked in the major cities.) I may make a new character who purely tanks to play the story again and practice tanking, which is easily my least favorite role. I'm betting I glossed over some important lore in my haste.
Heavensward was literally my lock on moment. Came back because a buddy basically bullied me into getting my account back up and running. The end of ARR was a shock to me, but the end of HW was literally the moment where I said, outloud in my discord chat, "I gotta leave comms, I wasn't ready for this moment." A certain cutscene before unlocking an instance hit different and I learned who Soken is.
Alooo! As always really enjoyed your thoughts and progress on FFXIV. Thanks for sharing and looking forward to more of your progress and journey in FFXIV!
One thing you have to remember too. A while back they reworked a lot of the earlier fights/dungeons to accomodate the trust systm. For example, you mentioned acian prime. That fight was a lot different before the rework. A lot more stuff involved. Mechanics not so simple. That’s just one example. A lot of the story fights they did that way because the trust system is very calculated. Almost dumbed down. A lot.
Yep makes sense. I heard the Cape Westwind and Ultima duties were also worse before so hopefully they continue to rework them over time as they get outdated!
o/ i had played wow like 5 years ago, got to level 20 and quit cause i didn't like the game enough to pay that kinda money on a subscription basis and the player base just weren't nice to exist around. since then i haven't touched many of the larger mmorpgs cause i thought they'd all be the same as wow, until about 4 months ago when my friend gave me the sales pitch of ffxiv, initially i declined thinking it was really expensive and the free trial was gonna be too short to make me want to buy it. she then told me that you have access to pretty much the entire game for free save the most recent expansion and a few features, so i bit the bullet and checked it out....within a week i was hooked, since then i haven't gone more than a day without playing it. just got to the end of SB and the beginning of post-SB (i am doing side content too dw i'm not trying to hyperfocus msq completion) and i can only think of a couple complaints that are DWARFED by the positives, the fact that i now pay the subscription and even bought it for 180 days should speak for itself really. i've only met one asshole and he was a very new player that had just came from wow so i really wasn't surprised there xD. i'm now in a fairly large fc and i have some new friends, my depression is almost vanished and the friend that got me into the game in the first place has recently become my girlfriend which made me quite possibly the happiest girl alive for at least a few days :3, we are due to get 'married' in game on Friday which i'm pleasantly surprised is an actual feature in the game haha. all in all it may seem like an over-exaggeration to some of you but final fantasy 14 changed my life for the better and i've never been so happy in my entire life. 💜 a game that spreads positivity and has a pleasant player base and atmosphere has more place in the world than a game that does the opposite in my opinion edit: sorry for the autobiography i just made you read but i just felt like i should say it all, it felt right and i couldn't stop once i started typing ^_^ have a great week
@@JustRuss thank you so much :D great video by the way, i do agree that the Thordan fight was quite underwhelming given the death of Haurchefant, i was hoping for a bit more of a satisfying end as his death almost made me cry ngl. i'm glad to see i wasn't the only one who didn't hate ARR like so many seem to
Oh man I hope the character tier list becomes a recurring thing, I'd love to see how your opinions of the characters evolve after each expac and/or the patch content
I've played WoW forever and still do. I stopped during shadowlands along with everyone else and played FF14. I loved it. The classes feel great, the story was amazing, and your character IS a protagonist. In WoW you are "hero" but one of millions. In FF14 you are the warrior of light, a scion, and the driving force of the story. You know there are others, but you make your choice (despite it not being impactful) and it felt good. In WoW, the main characters talk at you, but FF the main characters have to talk WITH you. The vibe of players in FF is far better than most players bases. WoW does a few things I like, multi spec classes, choices in style of gameplay, and personally I like m+. The combat feels way better in WoW. I love them both so much and they have what the other misses
You may want to reach out to Grinding Gear's Kyle & Garrett. They have a weekly podcast and they've invited other streamers on to talk. They are about to finish Endwalker this week. Both play (Garrett) and played (Kyle) WoW. Garrett has a famous clip about FFXIV😊 You may enjoy talking to others that have traveled the same path.
Praise be to you for going through Alexander! Worth the time. If you want more insights into the story, I would like to recommend a portion of the story called "The Coils." It's about Bahamut. However, I would recommend you to do it UNSYNCHED. "Story mode" as it were. It was the dev's first try in making raid content, and they accidentally made it Savage Mode as the "normal". So... yeah. Get someone high level to carry you, and enjoy the story.
Russ I’ve loved watching your stuff since you reacted to my friend Scien’s video! I totally get the Haurchefant closure piece, and I’m sorry your overall expectations + thoughts of ARR were lowered based on community interaction. It is only getting better though, and I’m so excited to see your impressions and feedback of the game moving forward!!
The normal-mode trials are intentionally eassier that you might expect because they're required for MSQ. Just makes it easier for more casual players to progress MSQ without major blockers. Have you run it extreme yet?
I also want to say I love how FF treats keeping older content valid. It sucks that with WoW the old stuff essentially goes away. I really like how FF keeps it going. Just wish we kept our full kit when leveled down 😂
love to hear it, love to see wow player enjoy another mmorpg the same way most of them did back in the early days of wow, been playing ffxiv since the launch of 2.0 and hope to see some of yall in game !
I would say that we as a community need to not tell people "you just gotta get through ARR to get to HW", cause what a lot people remember on both accounts just isn't what's there anymore, and you shouldn't tell someone that the first 40 hours or so kinda suck and THEN it gets good. It's all good. Just chill everyone
ALOO wenz MSQ? I'm joking. Happy to watch your journey through my favourite game. Take your time and enjoy everything at your pace, you'll only can enjoy every first time once. Waiting for the crying :)
Re: Enjoying A Realm Reborn over Heavensward, this was a pretty common opinion back in the day. I remember getting hyped for Heavensward but being relatively disappointed for a long period of time. The general sentiment with a lot of friends and myself is that we missed our normal cast of characters, the dungeons felt less inspired (felt like every dungeon was just hallways to a boss), and the zones were both annoyingly difficult and too large. I didn't think about it much because it picked up and became enjoyable throughout the expansion but looking back on it with the first WoW Exodus, it felt funny hearing the idea of "it gets good in Heavensward" I do really miss the remixed dungeons that ARR did, though.
I'm one of those weirdos who loved ARR and Stormblood. And only LIKED Heavensward. That said, I've loved every single minute of my Eozean journey, and I hope you do to!
i just wish the MSQ wasnt so socially isolating...I like playing with other players. My highlights were joining dungeons with other players during the MSQ.
So even with min ilv no echo. The power increase of even filler skills is why things drop dead so fast. For example back in ARR release Ruin the lv 1 arcanist spam spell was 120 potency, today it is 240 potency. This is just an example, but most skills at this point have twice the potency they did back when ARR and HW released. So you are still doing twice the damage even with min ilv no echo. It is noticeable in some fights more than others. Thordan is a fight where instead of a script like they are doing with more modern fights, a lot of things happen based on enemy hp.
as someone who played ARR on release and have played thru the story again on xbox, i have to say the story still holds up. its a slow start with a lot of world building and character development but like a good book it gets better the more you read and the gameplay is the same... they have extremely tuned up the early game with changes to quests ang dungeons that were previously problematic for new players and there are reviewable tutorial pop ups for everything. this game is an experience worth having
@@JustRuss Listening back to the ARR voices as a British person you can catch the American-isms and the hokey British accents by American voice actors all over the place.
There should be some things you can try to improve the tab targeting by shifting a few settings. Maybe you've tried already but if you haven't there are some guides that go through some ways you can tweak it.
At 9:50 you mention Thordan falling over even at min-ilvl, That will stay prevalent throughout the MSQ - the EX Trials, Raids, etc will provide a fun challenge, but anything tied to the story they want to be experienced by even the worst of gamers, and as such they make the MSQ incredibly, dumbfoundingly easy.
I agree with managing expectation. I was told constantly how great heavensward is, and my expectation went through the roof so much that I thought it was just ok. I read books too, so that's that.
The whole Thordan getting killed too easily is a really valid comment. Unfortunately I don't think the devs can ever really do much to fix that kind of thing simply due to the vast difference in skills that jobs have nowadays including new jobs being added etc. It is honestly an amazing fight and I assume you might have tried the ex version blind at some point? First video I've watched of yours (but have subscribed and would love to check your stream out if I catch it at some point). I think that version of the fight might be able to give you a better 'epic' feeling. I think a combination of the new skills and the stat squish that the game got semi recently has probably impacted the old content a lot in general and unfortunately that might even carry over to some of the stormblood trials / raids in the future when you get to that part of the MSQ. I am genuinely glad you are loving the game though and I wish you the best in your journey through the MSQ and raids ^^
I also don't think k he realizes that King Thordan is a reconstruction of the Final Fantasy summing Knights of the Round Table and that's why there isn't that feel of revenge.
All perfectly valid points. I personally love heavensward, and I remember it being the area of the story that really got me hooked (I had finished 2.0 a few years prior and then stopped.) While watching this I was trying to reflect on what exactly I liked about it and I remember thinking at the time “yeah that was good, I liked that, what else does the game have?”. I think to me, The lengths they took to make the narrative a bit more cohesive was what got me really interested in the game. But I can’t put my finger on if I really loved 3.0 at that point, or that was just what got me invested in the game. To me, WoW still had far superior gameplay to 2.0, so it wasn’t until mid-way through 3.0 that I really decided “ok I definitely want more of this” Regardless, people are bound to have different opinions on any given content, and I think that’s a good thing. And I’m really glad that you feel comfortable sharing your thoughts on 3.0, whether people will agree or disagree. Because of the point you made about expectations, I don’t want to say anything about the later 3.X stuff, or anything beyond. But hopefully you’ll continue enjoying the game, and you’ll kick butt at Alexander, and hopefully they will make tab targeting work if the boss is more than 4 feet tall…
I played back in the start, skipped a lot of the story (arr, heavensward, stormblood). Came back in 2022 and did Shadowbringers and Endwalker back to back. Its really good, i had to force myself to take breaks. The story is really unpredictable and epic.
I really like this format of video 👌 It’s interesting how you talk about the honeymoon period, I always thought the honeymoon period was until the end of the MSQ. I guess it’s because you take the time to branch out onto other things and you go more into a daily routine.
Glad you enjoyed it! Yep I suppose for a lot of players who run through the MSQ more quickly, they will probably feel that honeymoon period end afterwards. I suppose I think of it like a time period, which we will all hit eventually. Some may finish the MSQ within 6 months, but I've been playing about 20-30 hours a week so I'm starting to learn a lot about the game over time from my chat or videos I watch, to the point that everything isn't feeling as new and sparkly now. Not to say it's less fun or enjoyable though!
![I.N "HALLUCINATION" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/n5B5q1Hwt_U/mqdefault.jpg)
Yo guys, I know the channel isn't yet up to speed but I wanted to post this one off the cuff to share my thoughts after 100+ play sessions.
Once agian, this video is as much for me to look back on as it is for you guys!
I hope you enjoy my blabbering. See you in the comments and the streams ❤
wow to FF to variety streamer pipeline is real.
FF being treated like the rehab center for wow streamers to get into whatever they want is a mood
Rehab center 😂😂😂😂 for what? Copium?
@@k.vn.k considering how I’ve seen WoW players describe things, it’s 100% a rehab to fix the copium addiction for that game.
If I remembered correctly Yoshi-P himself once a WoW player so he might already know what people like about it and what people hate about it.
(Not sure about he played WoW but he admid that FFXIV 2.0 is inspired by WoW)
@@bakacdaz Yoshi P forced the entire development team to play WoW and used what they loved and hated and built a game. That's what 2.0 (A Realm Reborn) is.
Always nice to see the perspective of a really seasoned WoW player especially after really giving XIV such a thorough dive.
Yep! I'm definitely in no place to give a full review yet (or even close to it) - but I like to document my thoughts and feelings along the way to look back on when it comes time to make "that vid" that all creators do eventually haha
You are doing the exact right thing: having fun your own way.
Immerse, experience, hear, feel, think.
shut up.
@@EbefrenRevo the f is ur problem bro XD
@@TeusBael people like you are my problem.
i replayed the whole 1-100 story for a second time within the last 8 months. There are still characters and their stories i relate more to than others; however, arr and stormblood stories overall are vastly underrated. So much story arcs builds on top each other. I feel the same way with dawntrail. It's beautiful world building.
Heavansward is interesting, because to me it ages like a fine wine. Even ignoring the patches, the parts of the story that hit make up the back bone thematically in a way that just grows as you push through the game. If ARR is where you fall in love with the world, Hevansward ia where you fall in love with the storytelling. The patches help, but so does distance.
This is a really nice way to put it!
With Heavensward you now get loads more talking cut scenes which really help with the story telling for me.
As someone who likes ARR more than most and about to start heavensward your comment has me very excited
I’m also a 20 year wow vet that switched and I absolutely loved a realm reborn and I’m doing the game the same way you are doing it. msq then blues and raids and I’m also at the end of heavensward and I’ve been absolutely loving everything
That's awesome! Love to hear it!
Its fun, isnt it? I can easily spend hours farming for stuff to sell on the market board.
You might want to buy crystal clusters on the market board before dawntrail, they are going to be expensive after that game drops.
By the way, you can farm crystal clusters but I recommend doing dungeons or farming something or even fishing to wait until the node or tree spawns while you are keeping busy.
The nodes/trees to farm with miner & botanist are in mor dhona at 1 am, 5 am, 3 am eorzean time & the mining nodes spawn every 1 pm, 5 pm, 7 pm at summerford farms in la noscea & then 9 pm in mor dhona
Happy hunting.
Also try to sell a few things to see if they sale on the market board & go from there if it sells.
I also forgot to mention, to see the special nodes you need to activate truth of the mountains/forests after the specified time. I would say wait five eorzean time ingame minutes, it will only take 6 seconds
Do the raids at the end of each expansion for best experience imho, maybe thats what you meant but wasn't clear 😊
15000+ hour wow player, played through a ban, private servers, new account, hardcore pvp and tons of raiding in wotlk...just gotten lost with wow over and over again. ff14 feels so inviting and the community of ff14 is so so considerate and thoughtful. You can tell how chill the player base is when a new player pops into the duty que and watches all the cutscenes and not a single complaint.
Hahaha love that you are so on board with ff14 after so many hours in WoW. A lot of WoW players, especially long time ones, really struggle with the whole sunk-cost idea of switching over!
@@JustRuss I think it is a lot to do with what we've grown to be familiar with. I personally hate the movement of characters compared to WoW. Jumping/strafing and casting instant spells and sliding everywhere is just...bad looking. That and the 3 year long GCD....invisible walls EVERYWHERE compared. Just stuff to get used to. For me, that made it very hard to get into. That and no City Raids, Faction Wars/WPVP. Its just a different game altogether. Cant go in thinking WoW replacement, go in thinking youre in a complete new universe and reset what youre used to. Up to WoTLK, WoW is still my favorite. But...FF14 ran STRIDES past wow since.
love the fact that almost every player will get "mad" if someone pull early while someone watch a cutscene xD. it rarely happens too which is really nice !
Aye! In fact, more often than not, people have a habit of "protecting" cutscene watchers, saying stuff like "hey guys, we have a first timer in our alliance. Pls don't pull the boss" and everyone is happy to wait
@@benoitnoel100 thats both a good thing and a bad thing. I believe the cutscenes should be as the dungeon/raid starts and as it ends. never as you pull the boss. personally I do not give a flying ball about the story in the game and there is nothing more annoying than having to wait in dungeons for someone to watch a cutscene. I still do it though because otherwise I would ruin their time but it doesnt make it any less annoying for someone like me who doesnt care. I believe this happens because the playerbase pretty much holds the story as the biggest factor as to why the game is good. it is the same reason why MSQ skips are so looked down upon because "you cant enjoy the game without the story" and I feel like that sentiment is true. the game without the story is quite bland until you get to the main, new content and unfortunately you HAVE to play through 300 hours of story to get to the new content which is a huge pain point for me. I like the game and the abilities are all cool and the fights are so chaotic and look really cool but the story. I dont care about it and its ruining my enjoyment of the game because I HAVE to play through ARR and heavensward and stormblood to get to the stuff I consider to be cool. its both a tragedy and a blessing. I feel like WoW really does do it well with how older expansions are dealt with, pushed to the side and you can just play the shiny new content without having to play 20 years of the game to catch up.
I came from 7 years of ESO. I started trial with AuRa man/Dragoon and ADD, so I kind of tried a bunch of stuff, crafted, fishing, etc. ESO story isn't front and center and actually isn't really required to enjoy the game. So when I finally realized I left the MSQ story sit, I finished all the way to Shadowbringers and waited for Endwalker to drop.
I saw the male Viera and instantly bought and subscribed. I made a bunny boy ninja and ran through the game (to date) in one big gulp. It made more sense since I wasn't trying to remember who and what as much. ARR became where I really looked at the Scions since I knew where they would go and do. I felt more a part of the team Heavensward on and felt more of the emotions.
I can't imagine trying to do this all with people watching and interacting. Glad you are having fun.
One thing I wish I thought of when I started was leveling similar jobs together so I didn't have to hold onto or repurchase a ton of gear. Running Dancer, Machinist and Bard, swapping between to level was a blast and made it less grindy.
The gripe you had about how the 3.0 bossfight felt anticlimatic due to the boss dying so fast even at minimum iLevel is due to how the job kits and stat numbers change every expansion, but they don’t adjust older content to compensate. There's often a power creep which causes current job kits to become overpowered against older content.
Even older Ultimate fights (the hardest endgame content) become easier to clear with new expansions because of the changes to the stats and job kits. And not too long ago there was also an issue of the 6.0 final boss dying too fast because it already got powercrept by the latest gear so story newbies going in with endgame-kitted veterans see the boss HP go down unnaturally fast.
That makes a lot of sense actually, thanks!
I mean the original EX's from ARR are so precise that they get nerfed when brought to Unreal.
It should also be mentioned that Thordan normal was always a bit of a joke, even when it was brand new. It was always undertuned and potency buffs over the years completely trivialized it even further even on min ilvl. Thankfully all the other capstone trials are bangers, so there's that at least.
Once Thordan has done his ultimate attack on normal, he's expended all his power and because he's not a combatant at all, he spends the last 10% just flailing pathetically (he's visibly winded and has a damage down debuff on him). The Thordan EX fight is a different story, you get the challenge you crave there, and is one of my favourite fights in the game.
Haurchefant broke me. He, Aymeric and Estinien are my boys (I'm an Elezen fan to the highest degree). My friends logged on just after i had run the dungeon and watched the cutscene and they could hear the emotion in my voice when I said hi. I actually love the Heavensward expansion, it's right up there for me. But that is mostly because it's all elves and dragons, I'm a very easy lady to please
there is no other game that brought me to tears. this game is the only one that, not once, not twice, but at the VERY least 3 times made me shed tears... i dont know where you are currently, but trust me the story gets even better as the expac goes on. you get more and more invested and every twist and dramatic event play right in your feeling... love that game to death
@@benoitnoel100 I finished the MSQ a few months ago. Bit I completely agree, I've never played a game that makes you feel the way this one does. I was simply relating to what Russ had written as to keep my comment spoiler free 😊
Regarding tab targeting, it is pretty bad if you have left it on default with no changes
These changes can be made under Character Configuration and then Control Settings:
Target Tab: I recommend changing the tab targeting to Type 2: Cone if you haven't already instead of Type 1: Ignore Depth
Filters Tab: Change your target filter settings to aggroing enemies only when weapon is both drawn and sheathed.
Hopefully that helps a little bit, I noticed when I changed those settings it brought it closer in line with how WoWs tab targeting feels but it definitely is not perfect
Beat me to the punch! I remember starting up FF14 and going - "wow this tab targeting is a mess" but changing those settings does significant improve it.
Love the fresh opinions, the Haurchefant closure thing is totally valid, and everything in here is totally fine.
Always be yourself and honest with the game and the community. Don't feel bad about not liking something you should, and vise versa.
Thanks for the advice :D I try to stay true to myself the best I can
been loving the vods man, keep posting em! its fun to live vicariously through them. and yeah, i think HW gets its reputation of being amazing from the 3.1-3.3 story
I will do! Trying to keep that as up to date as I can!
Yea, I have a feeling when he actually truly finishes the HW storyline he will like it a lot more. 3.0 really is just a breath before the dive
Having only found your channel and stream recently im loving how much your actually involved wifh the story vs some other content creators who will enjoy the story but they dont do the kind of discussions you will about things. Thank you for putting yourself out there and taking the chats abuse lol.
Hahah a knight lives to serve o7
Really love your vibe when talking about the game and I think your approach to playing is lovely and way closer to what I experienced on my first playthrough than when a streamer just hyperfocuses the msq and doesn't engage much beyond it. I think both you and viewers will get a lot more out of it that way.
Also, love to see a fellow ARR appreciater :3
Only been watching some of the highlight vids but I might check out the stream sometime!
Love to hear that! Swing by the stream some time for sure! Lots of friendly faces over there
ARR isn't "bad", it's just a side effect of the development where they had to rebuild the game from the ground up and then buy time for the team to make Heavensward. That resulted in the very long patch cycle and quest marathon between ARR and HW. It gets slow at times but the entire thing is packed with very important world building information, some you don't even realize was set up until much farther down the road.
I have never played a game with music I enjoyed more than 14. In ARR the cities were the only places with night themes, outside it was just the sound of the wind, bugs, and birds at night. Then in Heavensward Soken went to a light piano version of the day theme. Then later... he learned to weaponize it.
Once you finished ARR "base" there were 100 MSQ quests you had to complete to be ready for Heavensward. 100 quests, already at max level, that felt like a lot of wasted effort. That is what killed it for a lot of people with ARR. I rolled a new character after Heavensward came out and I was already at nearly max level from the pre-Heavensward quests before even starting Heavensward.
The why or how of something is irrelevant to whether or not the result is good or bad. It may grant perspective or create a more sympathetic approach, but understanding the why of something doesn’t make it a more enjoyable experience.
thats also all subjective. I like ARR and I play the game for 10 years :)
I played 3.0's ARR, and recently played through it again just to have another character. Even back then I liked it, but most of the parts I do remember feeling like a drag were removed.
Vishap and Rhitatyn are two of my favorite changes. Those two fights are much more fun.
ARR is pretty bad, some of yall are in deep denial.
Welcome to the game 😊 10 year XIV vet here. Subbed so I can watch your journey through this amazing game. Really excited to see your perspective through this story and raids 😁 Endwalker ties everything in the story together phenomenally, the trials/raids are a blast to play in, the music is gut wrenchingly beautiful, and now is perfect time to start since the new story about to begin 😁 enjoy!!
Thanks!
Thanks for the video, glad to hear your thoughts! I live in California so its challenging to catch your twitch streams, though I try! But its really nice to catch up on vods/hear your thoughts on youtube. I'm glad you like blind raiding - if you form your own static, you can continue to do that throughout your FFXIV raiding career (and play it any way you want, tbh, there will always be 7 other people who like the idea!) My son plays on a blind raid team, they just completed the latest raid tier. It's an extra challenge on top of already challenging content (I like my guides, please and thank you!) but its absolutely there for those who want it!
I haven’t had the opportunity to tune into the streams as much as I would want to Russ, but I am delighted to hear that you are still having a good time with the game, and have fostered a good way to experience more than purely the MSQ. I know raiding isn’t everyone’s jam, I am not usually one for doing blind savage myself, but that’s genuinely really nice to see that you’re having a nice time doing those things with your community. It makes me wish I took my time more myself, but two years ago I really didn’t know much about MMO’s in the first place so that’s just hindsight. I hope you continue your adventures of seeing all the raid tiers and their savage equivalents in the other expansions as well. Cheers
Thanks for the lovely comment and glad you have enjoyed the game in your own way too
@@JustRuss No worries Russ. And seriously, Godspeed to you guys with Alexander Savage, those are no joke for when they were released. I believe in you!
The etiquette when a new tier of normal raids comes out is that everyone does them blind on the first day and everyone cooks - it's so much fun. With Savage raids, the world first teams will be fighting for a week or two to get through just like WoW, but most of the rank and file will only go into a party finder group blind for the first couple of tries - then we'll start looking at what little bits the guide channels have released if we do get stuck, (they're usually wrong for the first couple of hasty videos, so they've become their own meme.) You should absolutely be able to find others willing to current raid tier content blind in a static in the future.
But no rush, take your time! Play the game the way you are having fun.
Awesome! thanks for the comment
If you haven't done the Tribes at all, they are frequently a good window into their zones as world building. The Vath in Dravania are my favorite in HW.
Ooooh i love the Vath so far but i've not done any tribe stuff
@@JustRuss You should, its good exp, like a quarter of your exp bar for just doing daily tribe quests that are in range of your jobs level.
It's been a great journey watching you. I've even felt the urge to go back amd experience some content again and even try some I never did because of watching you go through it all. Keep it up and as long as your enjoying yourself... that's all that matters! 🙂
Awesome! Glad I could inspire going back to some of those things
I left WoW after 19 years to play FF14, best decision of my life in mmo-gaming.
Definitely not the first, nor the last person I'll hear say that! I'm glad!
Same here! I left in October and still loving it. I'm apprehensive about the next WoW expac, I feel I wont be as emotionally invested in it as FFxiv but willing to give it a shot at least.....but I can see me sticking with ffxiv for a long time
interesting take. I play both and while I enjoy FFXIV it is a mechanically inferior game to a rather large degree
@@brandoncomer6492what makes you say that? I’ve been off wow about 2/3 years. Was disappointed by pvp balance for shadow loads and same old bgs with just new skins. Idk and even after running the same dungeons and heroics over and over. Raids were meh. Maybe I’m just tired of mmos but I do miss wow combat. But I’m also tired of so many spells and buttons and hotkeys. I like in Diablo or Destiny 2 etc obviously lacking the mmo side aspects, I like less buttons to relax. Not as big on rotation etc. miss wow world tho
@@ganjabear1892 wows combat and scripting engine is far more advanced and performative. FFXIV uses a rudimentary combat engine heavily tied to a server tick cycle and extremely linear design scripting. It's comparatively unresponsive and simplistic.
Just as an example consider M+ dungeons in WoW and how involved the various mechanics work in concert that require players to use kicks, CCs, AoE interrupts, etc. Nothing like that exists in FFXIV, and nothing like that can exist in FFXIV because the combat engine simply cannot handle the performative requirements that come along with it.
Even encounters in FFXIV follow a strictly time script, the scripting engine doesn't allow for any sort of dynamic mechanics in the way WoW can.
I've been popping in and out of your videos watching your journey. Take your time and enjoy it!
I'm hoping in Dawntrail to find a new raid team that wants to go back and do everything from the beginning.
Thank you I am! Good luck with your new team - it's definitely worth it!
I think WoW players have an easier time getting through ARR (I personally enjoyed it too, but I have only been playing WoW since Cata - I was too young for the internet during Vanilla lol) because we're used to the typical MMO "go kill 10 bears" fetch quest. My friends who hated ARR have not played WoW or any other MMO - for them, ARR was the roadblock they had to skip in order to enjoy the game, and they did end up enjoying HW onward after I bought skips for them. I even paid for a month sub for one of them since they were questioning the monthly cost, and now they pay their sub every month just to stand around in Limsa and look pretty lol.
Personally, the FFXIV story is still the best story I've ever read / watched in my life so far. That might be a stretch, but I think one of the reasons I love it so much is the journey. It's not only one expansion and move on (as you've probably already noticed ARR to HW), the story keeps going and evolving and the friends we've made - and lost - along the way are there with us
I can second this, played wow from vanilla to shadowlands and jumped to ffxiv and loved every bit from the start. Then I found out about all the arr hate online lol 😅
And yes, definitely the best journey I've ever been on, and I've travelled the (real) world quite a bit 😊
Can't wait for him to reach the start of Stormblood and we get the 300 days video
LMAO
Stormblood took me almost a month to beat playing casually. About to start shadowbringers now.
@vinh1360 shadowbringers is awsome
@@rambogodofwar9158 yea it was! I just finished endwalker and now about to start dawntrail.
@vinh1360 I need to get back on haven't been on for about a year life's bin busy as we get older 🤣
Oh your videos on the Bloody Banquet and The Vault are gonna be something alright!
Haha yep! Is it weird that I'm looking forward to watching those back myself? :P
@@JustRuss I don't think so! Those were absolutely the story beats that make this game what it is. They're impressive for any RPG, let alone an MMORPG!
@@JustRuss sounds like you are on your way to becoming an emotional vampire too. 😂
Great video and im happy you have been enjoying the game
Nice, welcome to the community! I did the same back in 2021, came over to check it out and fell in love with the game, I had played WoW since 2006. This community is amazing. ♥
Yep the community is ab absolute gamechanger with this game
That tier list is going to be spicy
I hope you do one after every expansion
That's the plan! :D
I remember really loving ARR, it was great to just explore the world and do whatever I wanted. I personally think that ARR struggle with pacing becasue some sections just really slowed down the pace to the point that the MSQ wasn't that interesting.
Coerthas Western Highlands is my go-to for Heavensward vibes. Shit slaps.
Take your time and enjoy the journey
As for tab tageting it's really bad, but there's an option in the game to make it proximity based... The way it works by default is it targets things from left to right on your screen.
Look into the settings, see if you like the alternative one more. I just kind of learned to right click on things instead.
Regarding blind raiding, it's absolutely a thing at endgame. There's no PTR for this game, so nobody can test or figure out strats before the content gets released, so everyone is doing it blind for the first weeks anyway.
My FC had a few people who wanted to get into high end raiding, but were nervous about jumping in. So we formed a group of 8 and decided to try the newest extreme, which was the 6.4 one (no spoilers for Russ). Little did we know it turned out to be the hardest extreme in years... but we kept at it, only able to raid once a week, and after a couple of months we finally got it down. It was a great experience for us all and led to us dipping our toes into savage as well. I'd definitely recommend giving blind prog a try!
I've been playing since Endwalker released, having never played MMO's before. Two and a half years later, and there is still SO much content I haven't touched. I'm toying with starting the Alexander raids myself soon. Following your experience reminds me so much of my own, and there's so much joy there. I'm glad you're enjoying your experience.
Awesome to hear! I love how much there is to do :D
10:40 The whole MINE system needs an overhaul for the more outdated content. It just doesn't make much of a difference anymore with each expansion power creep and job adjustments.
Thordan was definitely more engaging, even on normal
Oh my goodness, you have such an amazing adventure ahead of you =) I'm also currently replaying ARR on an alt, doing the entire thing over again =) There is stuff I wish I could do for the first time again, and I know all the people who have played it would be excited for you that you get to live it all for the first time =) Have fun! =)
I love everything FFXIV! I loved ARR because I came from GW2, ESO, & WoW! I still love the other games too, but I only play FFXIV now! I think you will enjoy all of the rest of the content! I am stoked for Dawntrail & am leveling up my Ninja so I will have gear for Viper! Great vid, keep up the good work!
Thanks for the lovely comment! glad you are enjoying the game :D
The improvement to ARR in the form of cleaning up the quests def improved it. I played through it back in 2013, and i think why i enjoyed my time then was because it was new, I had to wait for the patches, and i got it in chunks, instead of having to play it straight through. I started playing 2 months after ARR released. I have fond memories of clearing coils back in the day, including my first Bahamut kill. As for Alex, I did it pre nerf to A3S, and was part of the static killer days, so i didnt do any of the savage alex til much later sadly. Reason, my static booted me, then fell apart weeks later due to A3S.
Will say this be glad you don't have to deal with TP, and Accuracy rating. That added an extra level of difficulty to the fights that was annoying.
Ahh a fellow ARR enjoyer! ^^
I don't like telling sprouts to "bear with" It because it's so much rich lore being passed out that will shape a good bit of the story to come. I also agree that fantasy Catholics wasn't as peak as folks likely remember, but I don't touch that point unless they try arguing down ARR at me lol.
Best of luck moving forward!
I agree. ARR gets such a bad rap for being a slog when this is where most of the world and character building/establishing takes place.
@@Alissandre_Iskander It picks up once you get to the Primal fights
I don’t think ARR is bad, it’s just the least good. The least good FF14 expansion is still not bad. The only parts I’d consider bad would be the VERY start where you’re killing squirrels and ladybugs, and the pacing of some of the postgame stuff.
In the context of rebuilding the game after the figurative and literal calamity of 1.0, it’s nothing short of exceptional
What really sold me on ARR was the small connections. A lot of the background characters, even ones you couldn't interact with but popped up with char bubbles when you got near them, ended up becoming recurring and eventually graduated into their own stories. We get a couple Scions out of it and a really creepy boss fight.
Really won me over early especially since the Scion/Ascian/Hydaelin/WoL thing at first really didn't. It felt like I was just a clean up guy- the only person who could be around Primals without getting turned so it was just on me to do the thing but Lahabrea and subordinates were SO CAMPY at first.
All that said, having finished the whole game now, I am completely enamored with my Scion family and really appreciate the Ascian for the characters they are
On the disappointing Thordan fight, that is unfortunately a problem the game severely suffers from for max expansion level content. SE simply does not tighten the ilvl requirement for max level duties and it results it everything falling over MUCH faster than it did when the content was fresh. There are mechanics in many alliance raids that players haven't seen for years for this very reason.
Been enjoying your journey bro!
Love to hear it!
I hate that ARR gets such a bad rap compared to the other expansions, I love the world building of ARR and it's so necessary because all the other stuff in the game hits harder because of ARR and the world building the game did. I love all the expacs but ARR will always hold a special place in my heart.
I think it could be better than this but understandable since it was made in 2 years and make while still fixing original 1.X too.
Made 2.0 playable in short time is important than anything at that time that while writting is mid and EN voice acting is so terrible even though some actor are not that new.
The bad rap for ARR usually comes from the filler and the mediocre combat content, even among those that hate it they tend to recognize the world building aspect. The problem is, it's also been fixed up multiple times now, so there's a lot less filler and the combat content (particularly the 47-50 range) has been made significantly better, so people continue to parrot that it's the worst thing ever while what they remember is all the original filler they had to go through. Meanwhile, HW has had no touch-ups, so is much closer to what ARR originally was.
@@cassiusbright1062 I've recently been doing a ng+ I'm currently in stormblood which is by far my least favorite expac, and so far I've found Heavensward to be more grindy than ARR now. I was like I don't remember this...😂
A Realm Reborn isn't bad, its just the first book in a seven book long series(ARR is like The Way of Kings to the Stormlight Archives if you want an actual book comparison, though lol) Its the set up for the rest of the game, and yea it can be a drag to get through sometimes but a good story itself needs a good foundation to get going. Both ARR and Heavensward were expansions where the dev team were still trying to get their feet under them and you can really see that, especially playing later expansions. In Heavensward you can definitely see this within the savage raids, they were 100% trying to figure themselves out and the first tier nearly killed savage raiding for the rest of the game. (Living Liquid misses you)
Stormblood is also a bit controversial because its not a bad expansion, its just not my favorite, and tends to be ehh to a number of people as well. It has some incredibly good parts to the main MSQ, the dungeons are also pretty good and IMO some of the best PATCH content in the game, but there are definitely sections that drag(really hard depending on if you like certain characters or not) and the BBEG of Stormblood is incredibly polarizing. You either like 'em or hate 'em and there's no real in between.
Either way its been entertaining to watch your journey and hear your thoughts! Its always fun for us veterans to watch our little sprouts grow and journey through the game we all fell in love with so long ago. -And sometimes we just want to share the pain- (:
yeah. Thordan's fight has been effectively a cutscene since its inception. Hopefully they do something with it
Loving your content and journey! So, I think the combat bits stem from how jobs and fight design were then versus now. Jobs were far more technical and harder to execute properly, while the fights weren’t designed to be too difficult or as flashy. Stormblood and onward, it’s the opposite. Although Yoshi-P did say Dawntrail plans to kick it up a notch since some fights in Endwalker got a little too boring for lots of folks.
6:30 FFXIV: Challenge Accepted.
Here's some advice to get ya ready for when you reach Shadowringers...........You will never be ready for Shadowbringers. (no one ever is.)
Hahaha yeah :)
Definitely do another post expansion vid on your thoughts of Stormblood. A lot of contention is tossed at the next expansion on the list and would love to hear your thoughts on the topic. Many would argue that if Heavensward was the peak of storytelling, then Stormblood would be the valley. For context, think of HW compared to Wrath of the Lich King and Stormblood to Pandaria or BfA.
If you have enjoyed all the lore about the Dragonsong War and everything that led up to it, then you should do the Scholasticate quest line if you haven't already.
I also have to wonder when you mentioned how you like the zone music, how many people out there thought "Do you know Lahee?" ... wait until ShB, you'll know it and love it.
I have heard about that but I will wait to find out in ShB!
They NEED to update the balancing in thordan like they did with ultima weapon. Ultima weapon used to die in less than 60 seconds after endwalker came out due to the balancing and i feel like now thordan is in that position and it really ruins the feeling of the fight, which in terms of presentation is so epic and cool. I hope when dawntrail comes out they give him a lot more health or something
Yeah the Ultima weapon is still one of my favourite trials, probably my favourite base (non extreme) trial actually! I hope they update thordan to something similar :D
As a FF player from launch who has played most MMOs, I’m so glad you found Ff Russ! Welcome, take it at your own pace, find what you enjoy, and I hope you stay for a long long time!
If you didn't get closure fighting Thordan, you might consider going back and doing it on Savage or Extreme level! It might give you a more hefty fight that would give you more oomf for your emotional investment. (Late to reply, I know. Y_Y RUclips hasn't been recommending your stuff to me for a while. >.< )
As far as enjoying ARR vs Heavensward, the first time you do it, it's really very good, like you said. It's when you've done it multiple times for alt characters or redoing it for content or nostalgia that it tends to drag a bit. Heavensward it renowned for its gut punch story beats which most of the player base loves experiencing. I hope that the patches change your overall thoughts on the expansion. It's still my favorite, even after finishing Endwalker.
You can't expect a MSQ trial to be overly challenging; all players need to be able to clear it; not just the raiders.
I believe you'll be much happier when you get to the extreme version of Thordan, especially if you do it blind and min I-level.
Yep Thordan extreme is the one!
I was playing pvp the other day and was trying to tab target an Astro that was the second closest enemy to me. after 10 tabs i gave up and manually clicked on them...the tab targeting really is atrocious in FF14
Aloo! Glad to hear you've been enjoying yourself!
As others have said, try not to let viewers set your expectations for the MSQ. Some folks may get a little weird if you don't react/feel the same way they do about characters and story beats, but I'd hate for them to tarnish your experience. It's much better to just be honest and enjoy yourself.
I also strongly agree about FFXIV's tab-targetting, it's pretty crap compared to WoW. My workaround was to change [tab] to target nearest enemy, then [ctrl-tab] to cycle through nearby targets. That's what got me through frontlines.
Churning Mists night theme is so underappreciated! It's more low-key than a lot of highly-regarded tracks. It became a favorite of mine upon first hearing it, and I've included it in all of my orchestrion playlists for years now. Zone themes with the same kind of vibe in later expansions:
- Stormblood: The Lochs night theme, "Old Wounds"
- Shadowbringers: Lakeland night theme, "Unchanging, Everchanging"
- Endwalker: the song title is "Neath Dark Waters (Scions & Sinners)" but saying anything else about it would be spoilers ;)
These are honestly my favorite pieces of music in the entire game.
Another Churning mists enjoyer!
On the toxic positivity side There are some rare toxic moments where certain players say stuff like “you pull you tank” etc but that is more of an issue with those players than the game itself(they’d be the same in any other mmo) to the point where doing that is actually against the games terms of service, and is reportable, the game itself is heavily critical of toxicity and intentional team killing(ofc if your in a small group of friends and just doing it to meme around it’s not really an issue) there’s no actual penalty in place via the game automatically, but if you report them they can get in trouble for that behaviour
I once had a pretty rough experience in a duty roulette as a new healer. The tank kept pulling way more mobs than I could handle, so I politely asked him to slow down. Instead of adjusting, he got super rude. By the time we reached the final boss, I was dying repeatedly and asked for someone to explain the mechanics. I had already mentioned at the start that it was my first time in the dungeon, but the tank just got even more annoyed. Frustrated, I finally said, "If you’re going to keep acting like this, I won’t heal you." Guess who ended up with a 24-hour ban? Me. After years of playing, that’s still the only time I’ve run into such a toxic player.
Yeah thordan in the msq is incredibly undertuned, but I hope you do the minstrels ballad! It's a great extreme battle and much more satisfying defeat for thordan.
I enjoyed base ARR myself. The patch content did drag on for me, but only because I was really excited to get to Ishgard in order to unlock the 3 jobs there. (This was before SB came free for the free trial peeps giving you access to jobs that unlocked in the major cities.)
I may make a new character who purely tanks to play the story again and practice tanking, which is easily my least favorite role. I'm betting I glossed over some important lore in my haste.
Heavensward was literally my lock on moment. Came back because a buddy basically bullied me into getting my account back up and running. The end of ARR was a shock to me, but the end of HW was literally the moment where I said, outloud in my discord chat, "I gotta leave comms, I wasn't ready for this moment." A certain cutscene before unlocking an instance hit different and I learned who Soken is.
You don't cry for arr, or heavensward. You cry for endwalker. >_>
Shadowbringers destroyed me multiple times
tbf, each one makes you cry if you played it while it was current with time to wind down and collect your thoughts each time.
took you that long, huh?
Endwalker was the finale. the best one was shadowbringer
Honestly, I found the EW storyline to be a bit of a letdown, the pacing was off for me. ShB was by far the best, with HW a close second for me.
Alooo! As always really enjoyed your thoughts and progress on FFXIV. Thanks for sharing and looking forward to more of your progress and journey in FFXIV!
Thanks, will do!
One thing you have to remember too. A while back they reworked a lot of the earlier fights/dungeons to accomodate the trust systm. For example, you mentioned acian prime. That fight was a lot different before the rework. A lot more stuff involved. Mechanics not so simple. That’s just one example. A lot of the story fights they did that way because the trust system is very calculated. Almost dumbed down. A lot.
Yep makes sense. I heard the Cape Westwind and Ultima duties were also worse before so hopefully they continue to rework them over time as they get outdated!
o/ i had played wow like 5 years ago, got to level 20 and quit cause i didn't like the game enough to pay that kinda money on a subscription basis and the player base just weren't nice to exist around. since then i haven't touched many of the larger mmorpgs cause i thought they'd all be the same as wow, until about 4 months ago when my friend gave me the sales pitch of ffxiv, initially i declined thinking it was really expensive and the free trial was gonna be too short to make me want to buy it. she then told me that you have access to pretty much the entire game for free save the most recent expansion and a few features, so i bit the bullet and checked it out....within a week i was hooked, since then i haven't gone more than a day without playing it. just got to the end of SB and the beginning of post-SB (i am doing side content too dw i'm not trying to hyperfocus msq completion) and i can only think of a couple complaints that are DWARFED by the positives, the fact that i now pay the subscription and even bought it for 180 days should speak for itself really. i've only met one asshole and he was a very new player that had just came from wow so i really wasn't surprised there xD. i'm now in a fairly large fc and i have some new friends, my depression is almost vanished and the friend that got me into the game in the first place has recently become my girlfriend which made me quite possibly the happiest girl alive for at least a few days :3, we are due to get 'married' in game on Friday which i'm pleasantly surprised is an actual feature in the game haha. all in all it may seem like an over-exaggeration to some of you but final fantasy 14 changed my life for the better and i've never been so happy in my entire life. 💜 a game that spreads positivity and has a pleasant player base and atmosphere has more place in the world than a game that does the opposite in my opinion
edit: sorry for the autobiography i just made you read but i just felt like i should say it all, it felt right and i couldn't stop once i started typing ^_^ have a great week
Glad you're enjoying the game and grats on the gf! haha
@@JustRuss thank you so much :D great video by the way, i do agree that the Thordan fight was quite underwhelming given the death of Haurchefant, i was hoping for a bit more of a satisfying end as his death almost made me cry ngl. i'm glad to see i wasn't the only one who didn't hate ARR like so many seem to
Oh man I hope the character tier list becomes a recurring thing, I'd love to see how your opinions of the characters evolve after each expac and/or the patch content
That’s my plan yep!
I've played WoW forever and still do. I stopped during shadowlands along with everyone else and played FF14. I loved it. The classes feel great, the story was amazing, and your character IS a protagonist. In WoW you are "hero" but one of millions. In FF14 you are the warrior of light, a scion, and the driving force of the story. You know there are others, but you make your choice (despite it not being impactful) and it felt good. In WoW, the main characters talk at you, but FF the main characters have to talk WITH you. The vibe of players in FF is far better than most players bases.
WoW does a few things I like, multi spec classes, choices in style of gameplay, and personally I like m+. The combat feels way better in WoW.
I love them both so much and they have what the other misses
Great explanation on the FF14 differences! And fair points about WoW too!
I am glad you are enjoying the game!
You may want to reach out to Grinding Gear's Kyle & Garrett. They have a weekly podcast and they've invited other streamers on to talk.
They are about to finish Endwalker this week. Both play (Garrett) and played (Kyle) WoW. Garrett has a famous clip about FFXIV😊
You may enjoy talking to others that have traveled the same path.
Thanks for the heads up! I'm always down to meet and chat with other creators who have similar experiences to me!
Praise be to you for going through Alexander! Worth the time.
If you want more insights into the story, I would like to recommend a portion of the story called "The Coils." It's about Bahamut.
However, I would recommend you to do it UNSYNCHED. "Story mode" as it were. It was the dev's first try in making raid content, and they accidentally made it Savage Mode as the "normal".
So... yeah. Get someone high level to carry you, and enjoy the story.
Russ did that, MINE unsync and blind, it was an awesome prog to watch!
Great vid. Currently going through MSQ for the first time and it's a great experience.
WoW is like an old jumper, it's old and full of holes, but it's still nice to put it on every now and then. Atleast for me that's what it's like.
Hell yea
glad to know you're still enjoying the game! knowing that you like ARR, cant wait to hear your thoughts on the rest of the journey
Russ I’ve loved watching your stuff since you reacted to my friend Scien’s video! I totally get the Haurchefant closure piece, and I’m sorry your overall expectations + thoughts of ARR were lowered based on community interaction. It is only getting better though, and I’m so excited to see your impressions and feedback of the game moving forward!!
The normal-mode trials are intentionally eassier that you might expect because they're required for MSQ. Just makes it easier for more casual players to progress MSQ without major blockers.
Have you run it extreme yet?
Yep. Old man's got hands D:
Good video, bro. Interesting insights.
Thank you, glad you enjoyed!
I also want to say I love how FF treats keeping older content valid. It sucks that with WoW the old stuff essentially goes away. I really like how FF keeps it going. Just wish we kept our full kit when leveled down 😂
Yeah some classes are not fun to play synced
@@BREAKocean Black Mage gets it bad.
love to hear it, love to see wow player enjoy another mmorpg the same way most of them did back in the early days of wow, been playing ffxiv since the launch of 2.0 and hope to see some of yall in game !
I would say that we as a community need to not tell people "you just gotta get through ARR to get to HW", cause what a lot people remember on both accounts just isn't what's there anymore, and you shouldn't tell someone that the first 40 hours or so kinda suck and THEN it gets good. It's all good. Just chill everyone
Yea thst might put people off from starting entirely. My advice would be to just say go in with no expectations whatsoever and see what you make of it
ALOO
wenz MSQ?
I'm joking. Happy to watch your journey through my favourite game. Take your time and enjoy everything at your pace, you'll only can enjoy every first time once. Waiting for the crying :)
Re: Enjoying A Realm Reborn over Heavensward, this was a pretty common opinion back in the day. I remember getting hyped for Heavensward but being relatively disappointed for a long period of time. The general sentiment with a lot of friends and myself is that we missed our normal cast of characters, the dungeons felt less inspired (felt like every dungeon was just hallways to a boss), and the zones were both annoyingly difficult and too large. I didn't think about it much because it picked up and became enjoyable throughout the expansion but looking back on it with the first WoW Exodus, it felt funny hearing the idea of "it gets good in Heavensward"
I do really miss the remixed dungeons that ARR did, though.
Yeah those ARR hard mode dungeons (reworked) were some of my best memories so far
I'm one of those weirdos who loved ARR and Stormblood. And only LIKED Heavensward. That said, I've loved every single minute of my Eozean journey, and I hope you do to!
The Heavensward aesthetic depressed my after a while. Only so much snow and grey castles I can handle.
“I haven’t cried yet… the game needs to try harder”
Ishikawa smirking in the corner, “Hold my Saki” 😈
i just wish the MSQ wasnt so socially isolating...I like playing with other players. My highlights were joining dungeons with other players during the MSQ.
So even with min ilv no echo. The power increase of even filler skills is why things drop dead so fast. For example back in ARR release Ruin the lv 1 arcanist spam spell was 120 potency, today it is 240 potency. This is just an example, but most skills at this point have twice the potency they did back when ARR and HW released. So you are still doing twice the damage even with min ilv no echo. It is noticeable in some fights more than others. Thordan is a fight where instead of a script like they are doing with more modern fights, a lot of things happen based on enemy hp.
as someone who played ARR on release and have played thru the story again on xbox, i have to say the story still holds up. its a slow start with a lot of world building and character development but like a good book it gets better the more you read and the gameplay is the same... they have extremely tuned up the early game with changes to quests ang dungeons that were previously problematic for new players and there are reviewable tutorial pop ups for everything. this game is an experience worth having
Absolutely agree with everything you said, And I'm only in chapter 2 of the book!
what did you think of the voice acting change going from ARR > heavensward
I didn't hate the ARR voice acting except maybe Minfilia and Kan E, but it definitely got WAY better in HW
@@JustRuss Listening back to the ARR voices as a British person you can catch the American-isms and the hokey British accents by American voice actors all over the place.
There should be some things you can try to improve the tab targeting by shifting a few settings. Maybe you've tried already but if you haven't there are some guides that go through some ways you can tweak it.
I've definitely tried a few things! There might be a couple more sneaky changes I can make though :D
At 9:50 you mention Thordan falling over even at min-ilvl,
That will stay prevalent throughout the MSQ - the EX Trials, Raids, etc will provide a fun challenge, but anything tied to the story they want to be experienced by even the worst of gamers, and as such they make the MSQ incredibly, dumbfoundingly easy.
They all end up that easy, none of them started out that easy.
I agree with managing expectation. I was told constantly how great heavensward is, and my expectation went through the roof so much that I thought it was just ok. I read books too, so that's that.
Yep it definitely got a ton better with the patches and full conclusion of the story!
As part of the revamp and duty support additions, the final 3.0 dungeon had its content adjusted, particularly Lahabread/ Ascian Prime.
Yeah the ascian prime was fun in my opinion, i just think thordan needs a little more health i suppose to make the ending feel more grand!
@@JustRuss Agreed, though I think the only trial they adjusted as part of this revamp was Good King Moogle Mog, of all things.
The whole Thordan getting killed too easily is a really valid comment. Unfortunately I don't think the devs can ever really do much to fix that kind of thing simply due to the vast difference in skills that jobs have nowadays including new jobs being added etc. It is honestly an amazing fight and I assume you might have tried the ex version blind at some point? First video I've watched of yours (but have subscribed and would love to check your stream out if I catch it at some point). I think that version of the fight might be able to give you a better 'epic' feeling. I think a combination of the new skills and the stat squish that the game got semi recently has probably impacted the old content a lot in general and unfortunately that might even carry over to some of the stormblood trials / raids in the future when you get to that part of the MSQ.
I am genuinely glad you are loving the game though and I wish you the best in your journey through the MSQ and raids ^^
I also don't think k he realizes that King Thordan is a reconstruction of the Final Fantasy summing Knights of the Round Table and that's why there isn't that feel of revenge.
All perfectly valid points. I personally love heavensward, and I remember it being the area of the story that really got me hooked (I had finished 2.0 a few years prior and then stopped.)
While watching this I was trying to reflect on what exactly I liked about it and I remember thinking at the time “yeah that was good, I liked that, what else does the game have?”. I think to me, The lengths they took to make the narrative a bit more cohesive was what got me really interested in the game. But I can’t put my finger on if I really loved 3.0 at that point, or that was just what got me invested in the game.
To me, WoW still had far superior gameplay to 2.0, so it wasn’t until mid-way through 3.0 that I really decided “ok I definitely want more of this”
Regardless, people are bound to have different opinions on any given content, and I think that’s a good thing. And I’m really glad that you feel comfortable sharing your thoughts on 3.0, whether people will agree or disagree.
Because of the point you made about expectations, I don’t want to say anything about the later 3.X stuff, or anything beyond. But hopefully you’ll continue enjoying the game, and you’ll kick butt at Alexander, and hopefully they will make tab targeting work if the boss is more than 4 feet tall…
Thanks for this comment and sharing your experience. It gave me a video idea actually :D
Might want to do the extreme version of Thordan if you are itching for something a bit more involved
I played back in the start, skipped a lot of the story (arr, heavensward, stormblood). Came back in 2022 and did Shadowbringers and Endwalker back to back. Its really good, i had to force myself to take breaks. The story is really unpredictable and epic.
I really like this format of video 👌 It’s interesting how you talk about the honeymoon period, I always thought the honeymoon period was until the end of the MSQ. I guess it’s because you take the time to branch out onto other things and you go more into a daily routine.
Glad you enjoyed it! Yep I suppose for a lot of players who run through the MSQ more quickly, they will probably feel that honeymoon period end afterwards. I suppose I think of it like a time period, which we will all hit eventually. Some may finish the MSQ within 6 months, but I've been playing about 20-30 hours a week so I'm starting to learn a lot about the game over time from my chat or videos I watch, to the point that everything isn't feeling as new and sparkly now. Not to say it's less fun or enjoyable though!
The 3.X patches address most of your concerns with HW.