Question for Beta playersFollow

In phase 3, the main storyline was cut off at level 20. We can't judge the rest of the game's difficulty until we get access to all of the content. I will say that getting to 20 is pretty easy, though. It's essentially an extended tutorial as a good chunk of the game's content is gated behind the level 20 story quests. It will, however, take you quite a bit longer than 3 hours to get there.

I'm sure there will be some players out there who level to 50 within a day or two on new servers... it won't be the norm however. I played at a pretty moderate pace, and I'd say 1-20 took me roughly 15 hours or so. I wasn't incredibly efficient, as I was still learning controls, fine tuning UI, etc. I think for the casual to moderate gamer, it's paced really well.

Edited, Jul 29th 2013 3:21pm by BartelX

I disagree. I solo'd to cap in Phase 2 and 3 (aside from a few dungeon runs), and I had a lot of fun doing it. I thought chasing FATEs around the map was particularly fun once I got my chocobo.

According to Yoshida, the experience we have had so far in Beta Phase 3 was just a big tutorial that shows players the mechanics of both solo and party play. It has been said before that even the dungeons from 15-35 (those we were able to try) are designed to show players the basics of partying as well as basic dungeon gameplay. Not to mention that quests from 1-15 are just part of a big tutorial.

That being said, I think that the experience taken from Phase 3 is not enough to determine the final gameplay outcome. It could be said though that the game does have a really long tutorial, and thus, an easy gameplay. However, "easy" is relative, since there are players that have long MMORPG experience and most of them found this last beta phase rather easy. On the other hand, new players found some quests and fights really hard, and some have said they are "impossible" to accomplish.

So, in other words, if you alreaady havd MMORPG experience, the first levels of this game perhaps wont be as challenging as you might think. However, note this is only for the 35 first levels, and everything from 35-50 is just speculation and will only be determined after release. If this is your first MMORPG, I think the difficuly is ok.



If you expect to have a challenging experience with "field mobs," this is not your game. It has been said that the core of the game fights are not the fiends found in the fields or outside cities, but those from dungeones and instanced battles. So yes, that is why you are supposed to Flee at lv 10 from lv 50 mobs. Moreover, I found this game to be really "soloable" compared to others (FFXI player talking here).


Edited, Jul 29th 2013 4:06pm by PavetlXIV

Combat doesn't start to complicated for melee until you get near the 30s in parties. (PGL have it much sooner.) If you never party or do FATEs that have one big boss instead of a swarm of weenies, you don't get to exploit the extra complications for better DPS, and your overall progress is slower.

Combat starts getting a little complicated for THM when there's a big benefit to weaving in Thunder (for the insta-proc), but is still simple overall because there's little point to care about it when everything dies so fast.

Combat for CNJ is totally reliant on how good the rest of your party is (i.e. is your party LNC an idiot and trying to off-tank things he's not supposed to). Generally, it's only complicated if you're grouped with morons, and it's meh if you're solo.

Combat for ARC doesn't seem to get complicated ever -- they don't care about positioning from what I can tell, so it's just a priority system.

It's called a lack of empathy. You don't relate to how others might view what you say as offensive. For example, calling someone else a douche because he was offended by what you were saying is both offensive and demonstrates a lack of willingness to take responsibility for your own actions. An example of a non-offensive way to put what you just said is you "lost your temper."

I would say leveling is quick and easy. Several people were getting to 35 in a weekend that I saw. Does it really matter? Every game is designed for you to cap out in a month anymore it seems, so Im not concerned.

Actually the douche I was referring to was you. Instead of answering my query in a mature way, you choose to be a troll. You definitely lost your temper by not being able to answer appropriately and proceeded to let it drag on wasting both of our time. Someone attacked me first by saying I was a xenophobe. Where is the empathy for my feelings? Oh wait, it's ok to others to say whatever they want. Take your liberal PC crap and stfu.

The combat system itself is very simple. It doesn't matter the level of the player. You replace 2 old abilities with 2 new abilities that basically do the same thing. Occasionally you'll stun, heal yourself, or use a DoT, but the meat and potatoes of combat is rehashed spamming of combos over and over again. I wasn't lv35, but I've looked into the abilities and read enough to see what is offered. There is very little to differentiate the abilities beyond upgrading to new weapons skills. I included the majority of MAR abilities and most of them are situational. Foresight isn't always necessary and it's recast is long. Tomahawk is really only good for pulling a target. The majority of the time spamming the highest damage tier combo(2 buttons over and over again) is where you do the most damage. Most of the abilities server no purpose the majority of the time. Stun is useful sometimes, but what about DoT when you kill faster with spamming 2 button combos. Drain is good if you need HP, but not if you're not taking damage. Now tanking is a different animal and that's why I said party mechanics is much more involved.

I'll use MAR in my example.

Heavy Swing >> Skull Sunder >> #2 combo

Foresight(buff every 120sec)

Fracture(Dot)

Bloodbath(drain)

Brutal Swing(Stun)

Tomahawk(ranged)

Maim >> Heavy swing>> #2 combo

Butchers Block >> Skull Sunder >> combo #3

Lv50 combo Storm's eye >> Maim >> combo again....



You took it personally for no good reason. I guess you have anger management issues, I don't really care. Let's just drop it, ok. I'll be the bigger person and let it go.

Edited, Jul 29th 2013 4:13pm by ShadowedgeFFXI

You kinda do that... but... you combo the combo for the extra damage, then combo the original combo, with berserk, and 2 other critical abilities that I can't really remember their names... then you booyahhh!!! for super high criticals... your way is ok... but... I'm gonna hit harderrrrr~~ STUn!!!!

It's a forum, how about you relax and not get so defensive about everything. And actually, I'm the one who called you a xenophobe in that other thread, so I have every right to comment since I'm one of the (several) people you offended with your comments. Your posts seemed very aggressive and anti-jp even if that wasn't your intention, but my comment wasn't meant as an insult, merely an observation. I apologize if it did offend you. Seriously though, let's just drop it and move on.



I guess it really depends. I actually see a lot more use out of certain abilities (like stuns, bloodbath, cross-class skills) while soloing, whereas I see other skills more suited to party play (overpower, foresight, etc). I like that aspect of MRD. It feels a little less one-dimensional that way, like I can really vary up my playstyle with just a few quick cross-class abilities changes and a different rotation.

Edited, Jul 29th 2013 5:49pm by BartelX