Okay, may take awhile, if I remember correctly, the alt I was leveling is still in ARR somewhere, it’s been awhile since I logged in.
But I bought an FF14 subscription and I’m worried that I may not be enjoying it and it’s making me feel guilty that I wasted my money on it. That’s why I still hang around here and make ‘FF14 is a better game’ threads because I’m a loser and I need the self-esteem boost that I did the right thing. 
I mean, I would have recommended going the free trial route before you bought it. The Free trial of FFXIV gets you all A Realm Reborn (The base game even though it is 2.0) and all of Heavensward, for free for an unlimited amount of time. Basically 60 levels worth of content, and more than enough time to figure out if it’s for you or not.
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My impression is that the post you replied to was meant as a troll insulting those that talk about FF14 on these forums. It’s probably intended to be read sarcastically.
You do have a good point though and it is helpful to do the trial if someone is undecided about whether to try FF14.
yes and no, i just posted this cause all the quitters were saying that and no i dont want to try FF14
I see what you’re saying; I wasn’t referring to your post.
The post I was referring to is actually the one that replied to your post, which Dawnspirit quoted.
There’s always Cyberpunk 2077 if you wanna play something unfinished and relatively broken.
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You’re probably right, but it was an excuse to point out the FFXIV free trial to undecided player.
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I played FFXIV from day one of the original, and then from day one of
the remade version until 2017. It is a great game, but one thing killed
it for me.
I like to quest in the open world. In order to move on to the next
area of open world questing. As many know, you had to do the
entire storyline, instances included, of each zone.
When I wanted to quest in the open world. I found myself just doing
one instance after another, after another, after another.
Having the option to do them is one thing. Doing all of them
being the only way to move on in questing is what killed it.
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Real life graphics are not so real life when graphics gets better, but cartoon style has much more longevity.
Disagree, I love real life graphics in Cyberpunk…its mindblowing. We need more of it.
It’s great especially with RTX, but make no mistake in 10 years, breath of the wild will have aged better than CP2077.
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I’ve seen some people head to ESO. It seems like ESO, FFXIV and WoW are the three “big” games at the moment, with GW2 being somewhere in between.
From my experience FFXIV does casual content really well. It has a big focus on aesthetics, which is what people keep asking for in WoW. More customization and more side-stuff to work on are attractive features.
They revamp holidays every year I hear. I can’t tell you the last time I was excited for a holiday in WoW. They have player housing (which, I think WoW is the only MMO on the market that doesn’t), and there was a period of time when WoW and FFXIV had a bunch of back and forths on social media, which were really fun.
But IDK. FFXIV is gaining attention because of how quickly the devs respond to player issues, and because of how player toxicity is a punishable offense in the game. It’s getting a big name for itself lately in response to the two biggest issues that people are leaving WoW for, the lack of communication from the devs and how absolutely toxic and unchecked the remaining player base is.
Also it doesn’t hurt that they’re also getting a name for also having challenging/fulfilling end game content for more progression-minded folks. Haven’t really heard a lot about ESO’s end game and I know SWTOR has really lousy end game content. IDK about Runescape’s end game content.
I also haven’t heard much about ESO or SWTOR’s player base being great or their dev team being responsive.
Just feels like FFXIV checks a lot of boxes and has really good PR from its players. The only gripe I’ve heard so far is that content is slow to arrive, but what MMO doesn’t have that problem?
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Regarding endgame content:
If you like dungeons for character progression, 14 isn’t for you. 14 has nothing like M+ and all dungeons are completely irrelevant besides for story.
If you like 4 highly scripted and static arena boss fights with no trash for character progression every 4 months, 14 is for you. They do not have meaningful raids like there are in WoW, the closest being Alliance Raids which are fun but also irrelevant from a character progression standpoint.
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That’s good to know. Thank you. I’ll still have to have a peek at it.
So what’s the deal with savage level stuff?
This was where I got the basis of my endgame comparison. I haven’t quite made it there, as I’m only around level 43 in the MSQ.
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comments/clo8eg/wow_endgame_vs_ffxiv_endgame/
It’s just full featured difficulty on the raid bosses. Which are teleport to arena to fight a single boss and then leave when done.
There are extreme trials, which are basically the same as above but less difficult and less rewarding.
There are no higher level difficulty dungeons and other than the currency you get from doing them (or anything else such as PVP) there’s really no point ever doing them again except for fun.
Raiding experience IMO in WoW is more fun than 14 because the “teleport to arena boss” totally breaks immersion and doesn’t feel like “raiding”. It feels like an arena boss fight.
What you think of as a “raid” from WoW is an Alliance Raid in 14 - which is just for transmog and story, no more. Gear from there is usually irrelevant from a gameplay perspective on the first day it releases.
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That’s really interesting. I’ll have to see if that matters or not. Coming from WoW, gear is really the entire reward structure of the game, with cosmetics being something of a side feature. But FFXIV seems to focus more on cosmetics with gear being their side feature.
I wager it’ll feel weird at first, not getting item upgrades from the event. But I also really like collecting cosmetics. Lately I’ve been wondering if gear is something I even care about in WoW, or if I only want it because it’s all there really is to get for the efforts.
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Another thing to consider is that there is absolutely no player customization in regards to gameplay.
People will say WoW doesn’t either due to min/max, which I call BS (F the meta imo) on due to the fact that you still literally get choices to change how you play. And you may in fact perform better with a numerically inferior build if you are just bad at that build but good at the B tier build. You get choices.
In 14, every single Ninja must play like every other Ninja. There’s no talents, no covenants, no legendaries, etc. to differentiate you from another Ninja. There’s the right way to play, and the wrong way to play.
On top of that, there are zero options for gear. It’s all static from drops, and there are no trinkets that alter your gameplay strategies. It’s static and linear. At most you can choose different materia (think sockets) but that’s just passive stats and aside from having enough skillspeed for some jobs, it won’t change anything in the end.
People like to praise 14 for being more balanced than WoW. These two factors are a big reason why. It’s a tradeoff. Balance, or choice? You can’t have both, not realistically. I’d rather have choice.
If you like character gameplay customization and personal power progression (at your own pace), WoW is faaaaaar superior.
But don’t get me wrong, 14 is still fun. It has the best story in any MMO I’ve ever played.
Shadowbringers alone is a better numbered FF story than anything since FFX. It’s worth playing through if just for that, and then cancel when you’re done.
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I’m kinda digging the standardization of the jobs. WoW does seem to have more options, but as you said, it’s more of an illusion of choice than anything.
It’s certainly an interesting give or take scenario. On one hand, I do like feeling like I have options in WoW, but on the other, I really don’t, because they can’t balance them well, and I wind up feeling more like I have these interesting things I can’t do, more than I wind up feeling like I have more interesting choices to make.
I’ll likely bounce between these two games. WoW has failed me as a casual game to play, but as you said, it does have compelling progression gameplay. FFXIV has some amazing casual content, but perhaps it’ll start feeling empty when I go seeking challenges.
Thank you for the insight.
I’m playing on Famfrit btw. Character’s name is Shield Baby if anyone needs a healer. 
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As someone who started playing RPGs and MMOs that were much more sand-boxy (Asheron’s Call, Classic WoW, Balder’s Gate, Neverwinter Nights, etc.), I had a hard time “liking” the static nature of jobs and gear in 14.
I LOVE being able to build my character the way I want to. I personally don’t care about absolute performance. Hypothetically, if say Demonology was 15% behind Affliction but I just loved Demonology, I’d play Demonology every time. The game is about role playing as well as just “getting gud”.
Now, we can talk about the community breaking this dynamic due to the meta, but that’s another discussion. It’s still possible to play every class/spec in this game the way you want to, you just gotta have the dedication to do it.
Another thing to consider - skill floors and ceilings. In WoW, let’s take Shadow Priest for example. You could have been a S2M player, which offers the highest reward for the highest difficulty, or you could be a Legacy of the Void player, which is safer and easier, but less rewarding. That’s your choice.
In 14 - there is no option. You could have a high skill floor job, say the Monk, but if enough people aren’t skilled enough to play it…guess what happens (happened!)? They nerf the skill floor of the class to make it easier to play.
So that may be good for people who like easier job content, but for those who want the challenge, that door is now closed to them without any option to go back.
This effect is more common as we move along. It has happened to many jobs including Astrologian, Dark Knight, Dragoon, etc.
Jobs in 14 are much, much more homogenous than they are in WoW.
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