I’ve played FF14 for years but I can’t quite stick with it, constantly taking breaks. There are so many terrible design choices that keep it from being the top MMO.
I have raided every difficulty and currently have a Dark knight, Paladin, black mage, red mage, white mage and dragoon at level cap.
I keep seeing people talk about how good FF14 is compared to wow but they never talk about all the terrible design choices only the select few things the game does right.
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The raids are so boring. Imagine if instead of doing 10 bosses like in wow there were 4 but each was 14 minutes long. Also, most people don’t know this but you get unlimited rez’s in FF14. You can literally have red (or rez) mage chain casting resurrection. Super fun design… most fights are just a dance with no dps check whatsoever assuming the other 7 players have a pulse. Also, once you enter there is a time limit.
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Leveling alt jobs is terrible. Think the MSQ was bad? Oh baby just wait till you try to level a second job where you don’t get all that juicy XP. Hope you enjoy the daily roulette.
For those that don’t know FF14 has permanent time walking (which is the best source of xp in game by far) but instead of just syncing your level and ilvl it also removes all your abilities learned past the level of the dungeon you join. And you will be spending 90% of your time in level 10-30 dungeons. Nothing feels better then joining a dungeon only to find out you have one or if your lucky two ability’s you can press…
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No Mythic +
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Gearing feels terrible. Hit 80? Go to market board and buy a full set (very cheap) and you pretty much out gear everything now. Most gear does not bind on you once equipped so people are constantly selling old gear on the market board.
Imagine if in wow you cleared heroic then got a mythic piece as an upgrade. Instead of vendoring the heroic piece, you just go to the AH and sell your old heroic piece. It may sound cool to some but it actually feels terrible as it devalues every other form of gearing.
- Real money cash shop… dear god. For a game that you pay a sub to this is unacceptable. It makes wow look like the golden child. The amount of items on this thing. Want the best looking dye? Get that wallet out every time you want to dye a new piece. Mounts? Cosmetic Gear? Weird services…
It’s really sad…
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Transmog… how did they mess it up so bad? For those that don’t know glamour or transmog requires you to still own the item in your bag. There is a glamour chest but you have to basically transfer the item to a prism to then put it in a limited inventory chest… what year is this? Also there is no way to see all the transmogs in game or that you have. You literally have to find third party websites that show you them…this is a subscription based game… how is it this bad?
“But but there are dyes!” Yes, but the only good looking ones cost real money and are consumed when used… $$$ -
No PvP… well there is but nobody does it as it is not balanced in the slightest nor is it fun. There is also no world pvp.
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The maps… what were they smoking? How is it this bad? Just copy wow or any other game. Why did they think this was a better idea? It’s so bad.
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Teleportation…You can teleport anywhere that has a crystal, which is pretty much everywhere. You never learn any zones cuz you do a quest, then teleport.
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Invisible walls… I didn’t think this would be such a big thing for me but it still drives me insane. In wow you can pretty much jump off or get to any location. In FF14 there are a million invisible walls. Can’t jump in water. Can’t jump off cliffs. It makes the game feel very on rails.
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The GCD, and game response. There is no reason for such a long gcd. I get it’s so players using controllers are not left behind but it feels bad for anyone who actually wants to play competitively. The game also doesn’t feel as smooth and responsive as wow does.
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The community…People keep saying the FF14 community is great and there is no toxicity. This is so far from the truth. The lack of a trade chat anywhere makes it feel that way but you will find very very toxic players once you start doing “harder” content. Just turn off trade chat in wow and it feels the same.
FF14 is a fun game, it could be a great game. But right now it has so many more issues than retail wow currently does.
***update
Thought of a few more while I was playing last night.
- While leveling you are stuck in one job/spec the entire time. Which means for those who don’t play. If you were say an arcane mage in wow but you wanted to play as frost well you better be ready to level to 60/70 all over again…
Yes, one of the big selling points of this game is one character can do every job but believe me it’s not as great as it sounds. In wow you level a class but can choose from 3 specs. In FF14 you level each spec independently. This leads to a much less interesting leveling experience as you can’t ever swap roles when you are getting bored. Also no talent points or talent tree so no customization.
- No add on support (other than Logs). This leads to raid encounters all kind of feeling the same. You can’t have as insanely punishing mechanics as wow because their is no third party support to help with timers or anything of that nature. Also, a lack of a dps meter can be nice while leveling as you don’t have someone linking the meter every trash pull, but it is really hard to see how you are performing compared to others outside of raid…
