(http://i.imgur.com/Y3vDUoF.png)
Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn (and its expansion, Heavensward) is a Subscription-based MMORPG developed by Square Enix, the game hosts a huge variety of classes and jobs, from the nimble ninja to the berserking warrior to the all classic white and black mages unfortunately no red/blue mages yet, sadface.
Unlike most other MMOs of today, it is heavily story-driven, from the beginning of the game all the way to bleeding-edge content, the game simply oozes with story and lore - the ultimate example of this is the sheer fact that you cannot access any of the Heavensward content without having first finished the entire story for A Realm Reborn. It also allows you to effectively experience the entire game with a single character, allowing you to play all classes with the same character - this includes non-combat classes, known as the Disciples of the Land (Miner, Fisher, Botanist) and the Disciples of the Hand (Alchemist, Blacksmith, Carpenter, etc.)
The game also distinguishes itself in having a much shorter wait for content updates than other MMOs - for the most part, it's a 3-month wait between patches - and always having plenty to do regardless. It is also known for regularly having the devs speaking to the players in LIVE Letters, and generally taking both a lot of feedback from players and their suggestions for new content. Oh and you can gamble your sorrows away in the Gold Saucer.
If you are interested in the game at all, you can play a free trial of the game by making an account through steam. The trial stops you at level 20, and does not give you access to many features, but the core of the game is still there, and these 20 levels should be more than enough to see if you want to spend the cash to actually play the game (note: do it it's a great game).
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Alright now that introductions are done, let's talk 3.1.
LIVE Letter 25 Official Translation (http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/267788-Letter-from-the-Producer-LIVE-Part-XXV-Q-A-Update-Thread)
LIVE Letter 25 Unofficial Translation (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1FuAnq1bgWuUrg0bNMFxI97qxeaU07F-M43PZAfYTEag/edit)
Official Trailer for 3.1 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkRTO7co_Yc)
Preliminary 3.1 Patch Notes (http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/cc5b2ba8ffd64cef26cb0e0cdac97104f8e7308e)
Full 3.1 Patch Notes (http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/6707e4bc0ca533c1a2cb12155fc91d884c6b6a84)
Summary:
Patch 3.1 has been confirmed for release on the 10th of November. It will have 2 new dungeons (Pharos Sirius (Hard) and the Saint Mocianne's Arboretum), the new 24-man raid, Void Ark (which will drop either ilvl 200 or 205 gear along with Esoterics Upgrading items), Island Explorations (which will be open-world content that should drop high ilvl items with randomized stats), new story (Krile has been confirmed to make an appearance, along with what people are speculating to be the Warrior of Darkness
), Lord of Verminion (MINION COLISEUM!!!!!!!) and a new Minstrel's Ballad (this time being the final boss of the Heavensward storyline
).
I'm personally extremely excited for 3.1, Void Ark already piques my interest (HOLY SHIT DIABLOS IS BACK
) but what really makes me hyped is the new Minstrel's Ballad. Maybe I can finally stop getting my butt kicked by Jiggly Butt.
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The half-patch 3.15 has been released and includes the new Scholasticate Side Story missions and the new relic (Anima Weapons), patch notes are here. (http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/86c483a5b15766c988ee8db15f4eda117b9d66e4)
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List of MotKers:
Sacchi - Sacchi Hikaru on Cactuar
Garlyle - Alvis Yune on Adamantoise
Arashi Kurobara - Tempest Blackrose on Adamantoise
Jq1970 - Jei Kyu on Adamantoise
Infernal Exuro - Violet Nolansson on Gilgamesh
Ryuu - Lyori Raha on Diabolos
PX - Macaiah Altina on Exodus
YOSHIP DOES INTERVIEWS AND REVEALS A LOT OF NEW INFO ON 3.1
- Patch Note Reading has been scheduled of Nov 9th.
- Preliminary Patch Notes will be released on Nov 6th (tomorrow!) assuming everything goes smoothly.
- Remember that the Nov 10th patch will last 24h.
- The name of the patch ("As Goes Light, So Goes Darkness") refers to three things:
** The grudges, boundary and conflict between man and Dragon.
** The Darkness of the Void Ark VS the bright adventures on the Diadem (Exploratory Missions)
** The Warrior of Light Vs the Warrior of Darkness
.
- Starting in 3.X, they want players to be able to unlock Primal Battles without having to progress through the story. This does not apply to regular dungeons.
- About Krile's
cat-eared hood, they will not be implementing it just yet, thanks to things such as the Miqoo'te ears and so on. Seems like they're working on it though.
- New Minstrel's Ballad will need coordination to clear it - they compared it to T9 (:ohdear:) and will have lots of gimmicks from 2.X EX Primals. The LIVE Letter also said that "A DPS Check is not what will make it hard."
- Void Ark's Difficulty will be similar to World of Darkness (so piss easy).
- Dropped equipment's iLevel will be "very useful for subjobs".
- They learned their lesson with the LotA FATE, Void Ark will be easy and quick to unlock.
- They're thinking about how to prevent players mass leaving in the middle of the content (specifically citing Bards leaving after WoD's 2nd boss only wanting the chestpiece) but it's gonna be hard.
- New Expert Roulette will only have Pharos Sirius(Hard) and Saint Mocianne's Arboretum (this is nothing new, Expert Roulette has always been only the latest dungeons.)
- Neverreap and Fractal Continuum will become part of a new Level 60 Dungeons Roulette.
- High-Level Roulette will be renamed to "Level 50 Dungeons".
- YoshiP comments on how they do final quality checks - by making the staff play on classes they are not at all comfortable with, creating cases of "DPSs that only care about deeps, panicking tanks and casual healers".
- They are wary of implementing hard 4-man dungeons as the burden on healers will be intensive, YoshiP does admit to wanting to do it, even if it's only one.
- Airship Explorations will have an iLvl of 179 minimum (welp).
- If you have a high-ranked Airship, it will be relatively easy to unlock Hard.
- Going from Ishgard requires every person to pay a 700 Gil fee, Players will be matched in the style of 1 Tank 2 Healers 5 DPS. No restrictions imposed on premades.
- YoshiP says that i210 Aetherial Equipment will not be that hard to drop. Hunting continuously for 90 minutes "will probably yield a few."
- Difficulty only affects enemy Strength and Drop Rate (which probably means one can get i210 stuff even on easy mode).
- Grade V Materia can be acquired from Spiritbonding crafted equipment made from Diadem mats.
- Exploratory missions will stay as-is until 3.3. 3.2 will be focused on adjusting current content.
- Afro is exchanged for MGP
- Vanu Vanu Beast Tribe Quests will give the dance and also new dyes.
- Level 50 Dungeons will give experience depending on how long they take to finish.
- Half of active players have cleared Alex Normal by the end of October.
- Savage clear numbers are lower than expected (yeah no shit.)
- They'll keep an eye on clear numbers, will make adjustments if necessary on 3.15
- Alex on 3.2 will probably not use the same normal/savage division.
- YoshiP wants to make a Easy/Medium/Savage difficulty tiers but they don't have the staff necessary for that.
- YoshiP wants to make a cross-world, raid-only PF system, but tihs is just an idea for now.
- PLD's main problem is compatibility with current content.
- No adjustments will be made to PLD DPS, but will be done to their TP costs. They're also aware that Clemency/Divine Veil don't get much use on current content.
- There will be no adjustments to Seal Rock until 3.2, along with the release of Wolve
- They specifically mention that the materia changes in 3.2 will keep raid gear being the strongest.
- They have no plans to implement actual VR to the game.
One main thing is that now we'll have two level 60 roulettes to get our esoterics from, which is fucking awesome, along with the diadem and void ark esoterics grinding should be way less ass now.
@Edit:
Preliminary patch notes are up. (http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/topics/detail/cc5b2ba8ffd64cef26cb0e0cdac97104f8e7308e)
GET HYPE
So uh
If you get bads in Void Ark it's going to suck. The strain on healers' backs is real. I don't just mean in the general "augh this is taking forever" I mean jesus christ the third boss is just constantly damaging everyone everywhere on top of avoidable damage and be ready for a clusterfuck on the last boss if the tank doesn't learn to prevent vuln up stacks because they are eventually going to get oneshot. Also one of the bosses will just straight up enrage if it hits too many people with its AoEs.
The game isn't as demanding of a high-end PC as some other games out there, but yes, if you have a potato, it's not going to run it.
So... patch 3.15 is out, releasing a lot of QoL improvements, bugfixes - the usual stuff. This time around though, the big deals are the new Scholasticate Quests (A new sidestory quest beginning at level 56 and then at 60, probably following Briadien and the crew of Hildibrand
) and the Animea Weapons - the new chain of Relic Quests.
I personally haven't done the Scholasticate yet, but as far as I've seen from the Anima Weapons, it really isn't all that bad. They have learned quite a bit from their original mistakes.
Step 0 involves talking to rowena, then talking to NPCs at Azys Lla.
Step 1 involves talking to a new NPC that tells you about the "new atmas", which can be acquired randomly by doing FATEs in the heavensward area with any job of your choice. Very easy to double-dip and get this done while levelling alts. People are reporting fairly high drop rates too (at least, when compared to the original release atmas). Having a Zodiac Zeta allows you to skip this step entirely.
Step 2 involves doing all of the dungeons from 2.4 forward in order, all the way to The Vault while equipped with your Animated Esoterics weapon (acquired from finishing Step 1), with the exception of the Heavensward dungeons, this can be done unsynced.
Step 3 involves grabbing four different items which can be acquired by either:
1- Trading in tokens from Alexander Normal
2- Randomly through high-level maps
3- Buying them with Poetics/Esoterics/Allied Seals/Literally any sort of currency you can probably think of.
...which means, you can do almost anything in the game with any class and still be making progress towards your relic.
So... good on you enix. Good on you.