Yes, definitely. But so far it's just the current classes + Arcanist at launch.
Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn - Beta Phase 3 Impression: Phase 4 August
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No more beta
Friday to Saturday schedule is terrible, lol, friday is work for most and some are out on a saturday, then once they come home and play and getting warm up to it, it's over :<
No more beta
wait, you mean no more phase 3? or just no more beta this weekend?
Alexanderon
Neo Member
I wish. I love this game and want to keep playing it. But the progress is all going to be erased for phase 4.
There will likely be one more weekend plus a few days to stress test the servers as well as give us time to play with the duty finder and give them feedback on it before the open beta starts.
I guess you are right, but still, everything was so easy that it kinda felt... unsatisfying? It think it was it's mostly missing from this game. I'm not saying they should have re-used XI model (I like the fact that it's the kind of mmorpg that doesn't require 1 hour to log in and to the most basic things), but I kinda wish things got spiced up a little, even at early levels.
Two days in and i already got the Airship Pass, the Chocobo and saw all the towns... kinda of a bummer. There should be more "in-game" goals to look forward to.
How in the flying fuck? Two full weekends of beta and I barely set foot around the north and east shroud. I usually take my time but come on. My LNC15/LTW9 barely started doing guildlevequests.
BTW: any clue about getting shards for crafting?
Lavalamp1138
Member
So I finished the pirate dungeon, the gridania dungeon, and I'm going to tackle the desert dungeon next weekend. Anyone know how close I am to finishing the main story quests available in the beta? I wants my Chocobo.
EndcatOmega
Unconfirmed Member
Everyone's getting so excited for phase 4, sod's law says they're going to end up having to wipe it.
Wait; does this mean that the discs the game is sold on are identical across regions?
I had preordered the Japanese disc (at just $26) but then canceled it and went for the US version because despite living in Japan, I want to hear English voice acting and am willing to wait for the US game to arrive.
Should I just order the one that will be in my hands on Day One if English voices are on the Japanese disc?
SoraanTribal
Member
Same. I really want to dive into this game a bit more, but I'm hesitant since I think Phase 3 will be over fairly soon. I actually played more this phase than I did in previous ones, but I still haven't done much besides explore the new areas a little (and get to level 10 on a character). Most of my time was actually spent on my legacy character riding around on my chocobo.
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I'm a little concerned about how you are going to level multiple classes since I was plowing through quests pretty quickly and was just doing one class. There are 3 cities, but eventually, you'll run out of starting quests to do if you want to level more than 2-3 classes. In WoW, they get around this by having 1 class per character, so when you make another one, all the quests reset.
I mean, there are levequests, but you can only do those so much before you run out (maybe they should remove the restriction on these). FATEs are nice experience, but it would involve waiting around for them to spawn sometimes. The hunting log is also nice, but again, you run out of those pretty quickly as most just require you to kill 5 of one type of enemy before moving on. Dungeons would be ideal, but I think the first dungeon isn't until level 15. I suppose FATES and the Hunting Log could get you that high with a bit of grinding (if you run out of quests to do).
Is there an option to remove low level quest indicators? Like if I'm on my level 30 Thaumaturge, I really only want to see quests that are relevant to my level.
This does worry me a bit. I hope nothing fucks up, and they end up wiping our data, anyways. D: If they are going to have to do that, they better let us know asap.
LowParry
Member
Maybe I was lucky or not, but within an hour I pulled probably 30k+ exp just off FATEs alone out in Drybone on the eastern side. There was a particular FATEs at the bridge where it went in Acts. The first two gave 4k exp while Act III gave 10k exp. That there alone is close to 20k. Pretty damn fun and I hope FATEs like this are more available at later levels.
Alexanderon
Neo Member
Part of me wished they dangled the carrot a little farther, but another part of me is just glad I don't have to go through elaborate exercises of masochism to get what I want.
Airship travel being accessible is a feature that makes sense in XIV, as classes are city-linked. By making city travel super inaccessible, it really hurts that mechanic.
Yu Narukami
Member
Can someone explain please how Materia works please. I still don't know what class I need to be to affix a Materia to an Armour for instance.
I managed to turn some gear into Materia but that's it.
I managed to turn some gear into Materia but that's it.
You need to be the same class that can craft/repair the piece of gear you want to affix the materia to (ie weaver for robes, armorer for heavy armor etc.).
EndcatOmega
Unconfirmed Member
After you do your level 20ish GC quests, there's a few guys who can level up other jobs (at least for Phase 3) directly to 15. Some guy at the Moraby Drydocks does Marauders, off the top of my head.
LowParry
Member
The Wandering Minstrel. Found outside of any Grand Company stations in any major city. This is probably only for beta use and will not be an option to use come Phase 4.
Well yeah, but I don't think cities are that inaccessible.
I mean, I went to the desert city on my own on foot and i would have reached Limsa if it wasn't for the boat price. It was actually pretty funny (it reminded me of that long first trip to Jeuno or the Dunes), I saw a lot of the world (the areas with the big bridge and the one with the Molboros are pretty good, and the ability to jump around adds a lot of the exploration) and not too hard, with the ability to Teleport everywhere you don't lose progresses like in XI even if you get agroed.
So I kinda wished they saved the airship for later and let you walk to the other cities on your own.
Okay, you're going to jumps through hooopps to meld your materia. You need a BMS level 25 to actually meld materia to your gear and you also need a catalyst which you can only find in the beta by level BOT or MIN to lv16.
Seriously Square, at least give me some directions.
Yu Narukami
Member
You need a catalyst called Carbonized Matter. Miners and Botanists can harvest them. Your crafting class also needs to be the right level for materia melding as indicated here:
Edit: If you want in-depth explanation of the Materia system in ARR, look at this post on the Lodestone.
Only registration codes are region specific I believe.
Yu Narukami
Member
So it's like I said, you have to level up pretty much every class just for Materia.
If you want to do everything yourself, yes. Keep in mind any crafter can affix materia to your gear for you.
You can also put up a request for materia melding and any player who has the right class can click you and do the melding. (Likewise, if you get a crafting class to 50 you can fill other players melding requests and receive gil).
Yu Narukami
Member
Is that NPC or a friend?
May I ask how can you do that exactly? Since I plan to spend sometime crafting myself.
dakkumauji
Member
You will have to become a Botanist (maybe Miners can get them too) and find the shards out in the wild.
Alexanderon
Neo Member
I guess.
I also wanted to add that Chocobos are definitely not that easy to get. You have to do a very large chunk of the story, several missions of which are pretty challenging (at least for a Conjurer), completing three dungeons and "defeating" Ifrit in the process. I don't know how much of what we played was dumbed down for the beta just so we could mess with Chocobo combat mechanics, but it definitely didn't feel trivial. I felt like it was an achievement when I was given mine, especially since it costs 1000 tokens to buy a license even after you're granted access to it by plot progression. And it's not like it's just a mount. You can personalize its look, name it, and even fight alongside it. It adds a lot of depth to the soloing experience, and I think it would be wrong for them to artificially increase the number of levels one would have to reach to unlock it.
It will be hard going through phase 4 without Chocopoe to start. That was the moment I really was sold on the game.
Players only. No NPC can affix materia.
I'm not sure of the specifics in ARR as I haven't tested it myself yet, but during V1.x you could flag a public melding request and there would be a materia icon after your name. Or you could just trade everything to a crafter and let them do it for you. I imagine it's not very different.
I can't say if there were any quests left out in the main story line, but I believe this is the current set of quests for the story path up to the point where you join the GC.
However, the difficulty of some of the missions, like the ones prior to getting the Airship pass and before joining the GC, will be reduced, because many people complaining in the Beta forums that the difficulty is too high. It might be the case, but I found them very fun due to that.
Also, the dungeon lv32 Brayflox's Longstop will also have its difficulty lowered, supposedly it was set as it currently is, for all the legacy players to try out something challenging during this beta, even tho it's only lv32.
So it seems like for release it will be even easier to get a Chocobo.
LowParry
Member
Japan times. Ya know. We're suppose to have extended times here soon.
Pai Pai Master
Banned
They need time to work on the game. It's not done.
Alexanderon
Neo Member
Wow, really? That's disappointing. To Guard A Guardian (Gridiania) was very hard when you didn't know what you were doing. But once you used the proper combat techniques, it really was pretty easy. You just have to do the right things.
I felt the class quests were designed similarly. The first time I did a Conjurer quest, I made a point to heal the NPCs but also tried to slot in some Stones and Aeros too. I ran out of MP and failed. The second time I did it, I just focused on healing the NPCs, and it was a breeze.
The game is surprisingly balanced. Like fine-tuned. The dungeons especially feel that way, where if you're doing it wrong it will punish you severely. But once you understand the mechanics, it doesn't throw a wrench at you. It doesn't use cheap mechanics that intentionally frustrate you. Some may say that adds "challenge," but there's a reason Dark Souls has such great replayability. It's nontrivial, but it's not unfair.
Boss Man
Member
There are also elementals for each shard I believe. "Wind Spirit" and whatnot, just like in FFXI.
Seemed a lot easier to grab them using Botany though. Haven't tried Mining yet.
Yu Narukami
Member
Is it possible to craft unique gear? I still don't understand the point of crafting since you can buy everything.
I tried the THM lv15 quest on my legacy character, so I had some cross-class abilities set, and it was rather hard trying to go through it without getting killed, also while wearing good lv50 gear which probably level synced better than the random npc gear from the beta. I also did the MRD one but on a fresh character and it took me a few tries. As you say it's mostly a learning curve of try and fail, but I guess many people can find that annoying or frustrating.
edgefusion
Member
People are complaining its too difficult? That's certainly not been my experience. The only to I had trouble was with the Masked Mage, and even then it was just simple trial and error. I'll be very disappointed if they reduced the difficulty because of some whiners.
Oh definitely. I just figured they would do build phases similar to what the DCUO beta was like on PS3.
Naoki Yoshida said this on his Design Concepts for Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn post (you need access to the Beta forums to see the post):
Pai Pai Master
Banned
I hope the next session is a full week before they wipe. Gonna be gone for the 4th weekend.
I'm 3k seals away from my damn chocobo too.
devious.one
Member
Once you're to that point, it's time to utilize the power of Chain 5.
That's terrible. Brayflox certainly didn't seem difficult... If this is true and they end up nerfing it, that's really disappointing.
I know it's a bit late so this might get overlooked by those who were asking but...
RE: AA settings--I used NVIDIA Inspector to create a settings profile for ARR. You can't alter those AA settings in-game.
RE: Loading screen times on an SSDon PC--when first logging in, I usually count about 22 letters flying out of the moogle's bag. I think that animation is faster than 1 second, so I think it's more like 15 seconds. Black zone-change loading screens are 2-4 seconds for me (depends on the zone).
I did Brayflox twice this weekend. It's really easy. Not as easy as the level 15 dungeons, I guess, but it's still really easy. I tanked it on my GLD and our WHM was bored so I took off my armor and tanked in an Onion Doublet for the last boss. Still easy. We died more in Halatali (2 wipes lol) our first time than in Brayflox (0 wipes).
RE: AA settings--I used NVIDIA Inspector to create a settings profile for ARR. You can't alter those AA settings in-game.
RE: Loading screen times on an SSDon PC--when first logging in, I usually count about 22 letters flying out of the moogle's bag. I think that animation is faster than 1 second, so I think it's more like 15 seconds. Black zone-change loading screens are 2-4 seconds for me (depends on the zone).
I did Brayflox twice this weekend. It's really easy. Not as easy as the level 15 dungeons, I guess, but it's still really easy. I tanked it on my GLD and our WHM was bored so I took off my armor and tanked in an Onion Doublet for the last boss. Still easy. We died more in Halatali (2 wipes lol) our first time than in Brayflox (0 wipes).
SoraanTribal
Member
xDI personally think the restriction on levequests should stay. It makes he decision on using them important (do I use them for batleleves or save them for crafting/gathering?) As for leveling other classes? Grind those chain 5s. Its really not hard to get a new class to at least 15 to start up dungeons for xp in addition to everything else. Throw in Guildhests too so you can play with others and gain xp.
Plenty of other ways to level outside of quests. Its just not going to be as easy as it was when you started out. Nor should it be.
Yes but I have no idea what the difference is, I've never tried it on a mechanical hard drive on my ps3.
Relaxed Muscle
Member
The lvl 15 quest was poorly balanced. People were dying all over the place and even some people traveled to grid to unlock CNJ and use cure.
Even with Antidote you had to rely on luck/kitting or sleep if you were a THM. It was more artificial difficulty than anything.
I need to do more dungeons past the first 3 (prettty hard on a legacy server) but people were getting wiped on the Ifrit fight...on a legacy server.
I think difficulty is fine for a MMO who aims to cater all kind of players. Even if they aren't too hard, they manage to be a good learning process for all new players.
Even with Antidote you had to rely on luck/kitting or sleep if you were a THM. It was more artificial difficulty than anything.
I need to do more dungeons past the first 3 (prettty hard on a legacy server) but people were getting wiped on the Ifrit fight...on a legacy server.
I think difficulty is fine for a MMO who aims to cater all kind of players. Even if they aren't too hard, they manage to be a good learning process for all new players.
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