FFXI is the only numbered FF game I have never played. Is there a recommended private server to jump into? Or is FFXI one of the few mmos that hasn't totally been ruined over time, so retail is a viable option?
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Don't bother, MMORPGs are fricking boring and a waste of time.
Not if you're playing them with a goal in mind, stopping when you're finished. So basically, as long as you're not an amerigolem.
rent free
Nope.
Depends on what you are after. The game has been drastically changed over the years to the point where retail today is nothing like what it used to be. Do you want to experience the struggles and triumphs or just tour the story?
Private servers attempt to emulate the old style the game employed where everything had to be done in a party, everything took oodles of time, and the game was generally very very difficult to progress in. It was fun back then but it has issues today as private servers don't go 100% of the way and cut corners, also the playerbase is not anywhere near as friendly so things are a bit rough around the edges. Main downside is you can't do this solo.
Retail still allows you to experience the story and setting but the difficulty is gone (until the new endgame they setup) and the world is no longer a dangerous place. You can do everything solo with the help of trusts (npc helpers) and travel times are basically gone. Main downside is, well, you can't enjoy the struggle because everything is super easy.
They ruined retail long ago. When you went out in a party to level it was like going into occupied territory. Everything would try to kill you. You had to find some place to camp. In other words you had to find some place enemies wouldn't wander near so you could rest between fights. You had one person run out and pull just one enemy back to the group and you'd all beat it down, then rest while the puller went out to get another. It was fantastic. It was like going out on a hunting trip. You could string your skills together with your party members, firing off one after another to set off effects to do even more damage.
Then they started changing things. They changed the mechanics of the skill combinations so now people just burned through all their shit all at once. All the nuance was gone. Then they started making the enemies easier.
I left before it got any worse. Is like they casualized it to maybe get more players and it ended up killing the whole thing. I hear private servers try and replicate the old experience, what made it originally great.
The sad thing is that retail today is a good way to experience the story because private servers are so... unreliable.
>I left before it got any worse.
Only thing modern XI is good at is letting you solo all of the story content. I went and leveled my mule to 99 awhile back so I can use him for the AMAN Trove/Domain Invasion to get free gil for my main, and the whole process of taking a mule with no gear, to lvl99 (including doing all of the level cap quests), and progressing enough Rhapsody to do Domain Invasion, took a week of casual play.
Obviously it'll take more time for a complete fresh player to do it without decades of progression knowledge already on hand who'll also likely explore/futz around with more of the story shit along the way.
>it was so fun taking a hour to kill 4 enemies for .001 percent exp
Weirdos, the lot of you.
Was it ever really this fricking korean? Horizon its more like
>Take an hour to kill 50+ enemies for close to a full level, more with ring
No, the objective of leveling wasn't really to level, it was to hang out with people.
Only if you were in the most dogshit dunes party. People learned to recognize idiots and bad exp after 30 or so and would stop partying with morons.
You have to understand old mmos were designed so you had to socialize and be together. Nu-mmos are just single player hubs, with game mechanics that are anti-social (can't chat / coordinate during battles without some 3rdparty troony voice apps etc).
It's also the best story in all of FF. They really make you work for it though. Granted, it's straight up stolen from the bible but the way they tell it is fantastic.
God I love RDM.
as someone who has never played rdm past ~15
me too
Was the job system actually good or is my dumb young brain fooling me?
It's the best iteration of the job system ever made.
Nah that's IJS
for the most part it was excellent
one of the main reasons people still play it
I loved rdms and yet never really played one
mostly played thf > bst > rng > nin > sam > war > whm > blm
>Here are your tools
>Figure out how to use them
>Not everything is useful
>Some things are only useful in specific situations
loved it
How long would the main story take for me to complete? Does the story continue in the expansions?
On retail? 2-3 months if you focused on it. The base game and first two expansions are slight continuations of eachother but beyond that the expansions are their own contained storyline.
Also yes, it's worth it, 100% agree with
on retail or a high exp rate private server, a couple of months if you focused on it.
on a 1x exp rate 75cap server, a year or two.
my recommendation
>do nation rank missions for your starting nation from rank 1-6
>only go to rank 10 for that nation i you REALLY like the story
>1/3rd nation missions are more-or-less identical regardless of faction
>zilart can be completed in a couple of days, just need to be max lvl
>chains of promathia is what everyone's talking about when everyone says XI has the best FF story
>90% of what made CoP so legendary though is, at lv75cap its hands-down the hardest Final Fantasy content ever made
>if you do it at lv75 cap expect CoP alone to take a few months, unless you have a skilled static group, then you could probably speedrun it in 2-3 sweaty weeks
>you can start CoP fairly early on, as soon as you hit lvl 30, level caps for boss fights are higher the further you progress
>level caps on fights are removed in retail now, so if you go that route just yeet to lv99 and you can solo the whole lot, doing this removes the difficulty and reward aspect of doing CoP though
however you do CoP, this is the main reason you'd want to take up FFXI at all.
good characters, good story, great boss fights, end makes me cry like a b***h every time
>Aht Urghan is ok, my advice is to play it on retail or on a high rate pserver that has the "wait until JP midnight" shit removed, cuz you'll spend half of the expansion getting a 2min cutscene then waiting a full real life day to get the next one
>WotG is a waste of time, dont bother unless you REALLY get into the game's lore and want to see what happened 20 years ago
I never did Seeker's or Rhapsodies, so cant speak for those.
if you played 14 or Dissidia or those and saw lots of Shantotto prepare to be disappointed cuz she only actually shows up as a side character in like 3 minor side-quests in the entire game, she's not a main character at all, just Final Fantasy Tom Bombadil
>Seeker's
You date the President King's Daughter
>Rhapsodies
The Book of Revelation
can be completed in a couple of days, just need to be max lvl
On retail? Max level being 99? With trusts? Don't be daft. It was designed for parties of level 60-70. Even 75 is overlevelled for Zilart content.
i cleared all of it in 2 afternoons on 75cap
honestly the only part that takes time is ZM6 where you go fricking everywhere to click the stones or w/e it was
>Granted, it's straight up stolen from the bible
Ah so every fricking JRPG and Eva
No, those are more inspired in gnostic stuff. Chains of Promathia is about the problem of evil, and the apocalypse in Rhapsodies of Vanadiel compliments that quite nicely. Very unique kind of story.
Also, I recommend retail too. You have trusts to help with the leveling process but gearing for post-99 content with other people (which, you are required to) is just as fun, if not more.
>but gearing for post-99 content with other people (which, you are required to) is just as fun, if not more.
Yes, I agree. I started out with the intention of just going through the story, but then I got to 99 and started doing some entry level 99 stuff and it went from there. Though it definitely helped that I found several other players in similar positions to play and grow together with.
It's fun once you get to the point where you actually get to do content. When I played a few years ago I just used WHM for all party content like ambuscade, omen, etc. because I was able to get into parties and didn't need to build an ultimate weapon or have the top of the line best gear in slot to heal / debuff people. Got pretty good at it too and was clearing like VH Ambuscade stuff over and over again with groups of more advanced players without any issues, but it still is an intense job since you have to do so much fricking debuffing these days since it feels like every hard monster is spamming paralyze or silence or any other AoE debuffs to the point I needed a script to auto-use echo drops and carry stacks of them.
Man I want to get back into this game again but I feel like I'd have to re-learn so much information since it's been a while since I played, and not only that it's just incredibly time consuming to play even to this day. I've never built an ultimate weapon in FFXI because of that, I just never had the time to farm hundreds of millions of gil, or tens of thousands of alexandrite or whatever other mats you need to upgrade shit, especially the heavy metal plates for empy weapons, holy frick that shit was insufferable.
Actually I remember trying to farm HMP in one of those events where voidwatch rewards were better, and just sitting at this one voidwatch spot all day long, for like 3-4 days just spamming the monster over and over again and in the end I only had like barely over 100 HMP after all that fricking effort, and you needed like 1000 of them for one just one weapon upgrade.
Even the Aeonic stuff was so time consuming since you had to do all those NM fights. I was actually working on the THF Aeonic last time I played and was stuck on Warder of Courage, attempted him several times with groups and even when we were SMN burning it we lost every time.
>but gearing for post-99 content with other people (which, you are required to) is just as fun, if not more.
Post-99 gearing is aids without getting carried through some content. No one wants to climb the gear ladders anymore. Even going from your starting i119 gear (ideally the HQ Bayld gear) to Ambuscade+2 sets requires getting carried, especially if you're not a desired job for the current month. At least from there you can work your way at the HTNM drops, UNM, and Reforge pieces.
I think this only applies to DPS sometimes, its the most demanding position by far. Not a problem if you are gearing out GEO/BRD/COR/WHM first.
It sucks on my server since people only shout for 'already geared' support, minus WHM, since its barrier to entry is so low (just have Eber+1 pants). Unless the shouter is being ass and wants you to have a Yagrush for some fricking reason. GEO? Bring an Idris. COR? Better have spent 80mil+ on R15ing a Rostam for that +8 roll/roll duration.
aerec lied
horizon died
Based
Frick horizongays
We just keep winning NotHorizon bros.
Got specifics?
People were sold on Horizon changing up the meta, they didn't actually change much.
Aside from trying to stop NIN from tanking and nerfing RDM a bit, didn't seem like they did much.
They didn't even really stop NIN from tanking, just made it harder at lower levels.
They were sold lies, all they did was buff the jobs they liked and nerfed the ones that competed with them. In the end they fricked up job balance because they are shitters who never played retail back when this content was new, they only know the game through private servers.
It was hilarious reading the initial changes and how much they buffed PLD while nerfing all other tank type jobs. It amazes me anybody who wasn't interested in playing PLD rolled there at all. Now they're gonna nerf COR hard when it comes out, they clearly have an agenda.
wings died
kupo died too
no-one wants to play XI on a new server past a couple of months when there are 10+ year old servers out there that will never die
Anyone recommending you waste your time on a private server is a fricking moron, sorry but it's true. Private servers for FFXI are autistic as frick and suck ass.
Yes, retail has its own issues and the community is a shell of what it once was, but if you just want to play the game, and the game alone, maybe play through the story, well retail is absolutely fine for that and the only way to go IMO.
The game has developed quite a few ways to help newer players, but beware if you're not used to this game you are going to feel that it's highly antiquated. You're going to go through a large learning curve in order to understand the game, but there are plenty of tutorials available such as records of eminence which will get you EXP, gil and other items to help you level up.
The game has a "trust" system for single player. You pick whatever class you want, and the as you play the game you will unlock new "trusts" that you can summon out in the field to form your own party, such as having an NPC healer that will heal you, a tank that will tank for you, a DD that will help you kill enemies faster, etc.
Really, FFXI is my favorite FF game because of the community which is sadly pretty small these days and most players have already done everything, and on most servers you might have trouble finding help quickly. There are some things in the game that still require multiple players to help you, such as the mages gate if I remember unless they patched that, it's been years since I played. But in general if you do dive into this game you're going to be using FFXIclopedia and BGwiki quite a lot in order to find out information that you need that's not easily accessible in the game.
It's been a long time since I started off new in this game, like decades ago but I do think it has a decent tutorial at the start that will feel antiquated, but will still deliver you the information you need. I think the biggest thing is navigating the very archaic menu system.
Is there any point where I have to group up to complete story content?
On retail, not really, there are a couple parts that are dicey but you can handle it. On a private server (or if you played back in 2006) yes the entire story requires you to party up.
Honestly, these days I don't think so, not anymore. You can use Trusts in almost every battlefield (boss battle) there is in the game. But other players can still help you if you need it.
I actually played through almost all the story on my character, now this was a few years ago maybe around 2014 or 2015 but I don't think the game has changed that much since then. Anyways I did basically the entire story including most recent story content at the time solo by subbing /DNC on a DD job. There might have been a few spots in the Aldouin story where I needed some help I think, but that was like a year or 2 after that expansion came out so it was still pretty fresh, but even then I don't think I needed that much help.
All of the earliest story content like the individual stories for each nation (Bastok, Windurst, San'd Oria) are very easy these days, as well as the expansions like rise of zilart / chains of promothia / treasures of aht urghan. All of those expansions are from a time when the level cap was 75 and gear was much less crazy. Now you can get to lvl. 99 in like a day or 2 of grinding using EXP rings and records of eminence bonuses if you know what you're doing.
There's plenty of helpful guides for leveling on BGwiki if you do decide to play so check out something like this:
https://www.bg-wiki.com/ffxi/Fantastic_EXPs_and_Where_to_Find_Them
You might struggle a bit with the end fights of Adoulin or Rhapsodies. You will almost certainly struggle with the end fights of Voracious Resurgance. I soloed those, but my gear isn't total crap at any rate, even if it's not the best.
This is the correct answer. Private servers are strictly for nostalgiagays trying to capture a specific point in the game's history, and if you weren't around for it then, you aren't going to get anything out of it. More importantly, all of the shit people complain about in modern retail won't mean anything to you, so just enjoy the QoL and appreciate that you can still actually play the game at all.
Depending on your job you may need help with the ending of Adoulin and the final parts of Rhapsodies. Most endgame content will still require coordinated groups, but if you manage to get to that point at all you'll probably already be invested enough that this won't be a problem for you.
>Private servers are strictly for nostalgiagays trying to capture a specific point in the game's history, and if you weren't around for it then, you aren't going to get anything out of it.
What a load of shit. I never played FF11 back in the day, and I've only enjoyed the gameplay on private servers. Not everyone is a spoiled brat who can't enjoy games without so called 'quality of life' (read, casualised) features.
also, people will say not do go to Asura as a server, and there's plenty of reasons why because the community has the most merc groups and other players who have no intention of helping you out at all.
However, it's still the largest server and most populated to this day with English-speaking players, so you still should go there. For example according to FFXIclopedia, Asura still has 12,053 active accounts, while Odin, the next most populous (which I've also played on in the past) has 7,813. After that you have Bahamut which is a mostly JP server last time I checked and it's at 7,511.
Asura has flaws but you should still use it because you're far more likely to find other new players there, as well as older players that will be willing to help you out and show you the ropes.
>so you still should go there
why would people go to a server with unhelpful people?
and the volume of people means everything will be at inflated prices
>because you're far more likely to find other new players there
people dont need help at the begining of the game
people need help with group content at the end of the game, where everyone else is at
>older players that will be willing to help you out and show you the ropes
half the fun of these games is the unknown and if you start talking to dinosaurs that have been playing the game since inception they are going to spoil the experience for you
its as if people are afraid to hit a wall and think for themselves in a game where the individual player has the most freedom
>people dont need help at the begining of the game
You don't need someone to do content with you, but you absolutely need general guidance. FFXI definitely suffers from Too Much Shit™, and online guides tend to spiral into rabbitholes of redundant and outdated information. It is very easy to latch onto some totally irrelevant timesink and find yourself spending weeks working on something only to find out that content or gear is a waste of time.
>You better let me spoil everything for you because if you don't you may get caught up in something which I find unrewarding that you might not!
It's the only final fantasy i played and I beta tested it. I'm sorry but if you didn't play this by like 07 or earlier even, you missed out on the soul. Cope
If you're just doing the story then play retail.
Most people have said it, but echoing;
The Golden Age is long gone, and there will never be another like it. The world is still nice though, and the story is still my favorite numbered FF story by far. If you're alright with it not being the social game it used to be and are really attracted by the story or world, it's still worth your time.
This thread is now territory of the Kingdom of San d'Oria. Conduct yourselves appropriately.
I'd kill for a single player player game set in the same world of Vana'diel. Honestly IMO it's the best and most interesting FF world and there's still a lot we never got to see like the Mithra home island for example or the eastern empire east of Aht Urghan.
But it will languish and be forgotten with time... it makes me fricking sad. There would never be a market for a game set in this world anyways.
>But it will languish and be forgotten with time... it makes me fricking sad. There would never be a market for a game set in this world anyways.
Honestly I was pretty satisficed this was kind of the theme Crystalline Prophecy and Rhapsodies dealt with. But hey, it's been almost a decade since then and the game is still going strong.
Vana'diel lives on!
Barely, they ignored pleas for merged subs or literally anything and put it on maintenance mode. Apparently we're supposed to feel sorry for the 3 people who work on the game that makes them millions of dollars a month.
Thats mostly Yoshida refusing to lend them any resources whatsoever. Game was already going to get canned after Abyssea but XIV 1.0 failure convinced them to keep the game going. Who knows what could happen in the future?
Besides, my point was a big more leaning on the side that, even should the game die, somebody else will take on the mantle. And even if nobody did, classic FF stories tend to be about the sort of stuff that lasts forever. It'll be fine.
>Apparently we're supposed to feel sorry for the 3 people who work on the game
They had 6 people, and needed all 6 to function with the limited tools they had (since they don't know the inner workings of the game engine, nor did CBU3 want to lend them the money to properly unfrick some core aspects of their toolkit). One of those 6 retired (the former Producer), do the new Producer said frick-it, put game on maintenance mode, and remains the only fulltime staff member for XI.
The day they announce they are actually closing down the servers is going to be a sad day. I know the game still has according to FFXIAH over 70k active subscribers, meaning they're making at least over a million each month off subs alone, probably more with mog wardrobes and extra characters, etc.
I think they will keep the servers going as long as it's making that kind of money, I mean a game this old making over 1 million a month before costs to run the servers is pretty impressive, and I doubt the cost of the staff / servers is more than 500k per month.
AFAIK, they have a grand total of 2 people working on it right now.
I mean actual devs, yes, but they have to keep a staff of GMs, community managers, people that run / maintain the servers, etc. There's definilty more than just 2 people involved in keeping the game running.
That's just all general shared support staff between XI/DQX/XIV. That said, good luck getting a GM's attention on retail XI at all.
Still, I do wonder how much profit the game makes each month. Obviously more than enough to keep them from shutting the game down.
Honestly the day the servers do finally shut down is going to be sad as frick, this game was such a massive part of my life growing up (in good and bad ways) and saying goodbye to that world is going to be tough even if I haven't played it in years.
All I know is XI devs shot the playerbase in the foot with the stage 4 Prime weapons, which was a lot of people's main driving force to log-in that wasn't RMT-related.
I have no idea what those are, haven't played the game in years. What does stage 4 and what is a prime weapon, different from ultimates?
prime weapons are the new ultimate weapons
they are a reskin of first ultimate weapons, the relic weapons, but they are available to the newer jobs that didnt exist back when relic weapons were released
they have better stats but they are different enough that they arent mearly upgrades
for example the relic weapons each have a unique weapon skill attached to them which may include a skillchain element the job naturally did not have access to which may allow them to perform a longer/stronger skill chain than they would otherwise be able to
the prime weapons also have unque weapon skill but instead of featuring a level 3 skill chain element, which allowed relic weapon holders to add an additional skillchain to a combo, they feature 3 skillchain elements that when the same prime weapon skill is used 3 times in a row will result in a level 3 skillchain and usually of of an element the job would not be able to perform on its own
most of the new prime weapons have some form of "Physical damage limit+" but it doesnt list the amount so i have no idea how powerful that might be
its worth noting that unlike the relic bow samurai does not have access to the prime bow, likely because the "Physical damage limit+" also extended to the main weapon even if used by a ranged weapon
the relic scythe would drain HP but the new prime scythe drains HP and MP
interesting, seems like they just keep adding new ways to keep players playing by just modifying the hardest to get items in the game, I'm guessing in the future they will do the same / similar things with other ultimate weapons to keep players upgrading shit.
>and there will never be another like it
Some people spout bullshit like "there were never any guides or wikis back then so the whole thing was different." And it's bullshit, but it's not so far from the truth. A lot was not covered in the early years, and much was still not known at large. It's really the only MMO I've ever played that didn't feel completely solved when I played it.
There was still mystery in how some things worked, zones that seemed forbidding and largely mysterious, and a meta that didn't seem like a settled meta at all.
I want that hit again, just once more.
>A lot was not covered in the early years, and much was still not known at large.
Even after I returned a few years ago, there's still obscure info about this game the English Wikis didn't cover that makes me look into the JP Wiki to find any info for.
FFXIclopedia is pretty bare bones these days and not really updated anymore. It's only really useful for older information on the older areas of the game that you don't really go to anymore except to do the story missions.
Official servers are soloable and have a ton of quality of life changes. The only problem is the mobs are unbalanced as hell.
A private server will be like going back in time 10 years ago when the game required a full party to do anything and you'll have to work much harder for the same reward, but the mob balance is still there.
Dont listen to the bitter homosexuals shitting on pservers, they probably said Black person to an admin and got banned. Im new to XI and horizon has been the best mmo experience ive ever had, aside from a few elitist homosexuals.
My biggest complaints about Horizon are that the endgame community is total dogshit and the server has had major bugs for weeks at a time.
The leveling experience was honestly great, but it doesn't last forever.
The shell im in seems chill as frick and they do endgame, havent made it there yet though
Pornography consumption rots your brain and turns you into an idiot. I'm happy private servers exists because they filter out most gross degenerates from retail.
I only coom once a day, now that ive been playing 75 era XI, not enough time in the day for more than one
Hell there isn't enough time on retail, the grind still exists in FFXI to this day man, especially if you're working on anything like an ultimate weapon, there's no time to just relax you're always going to have some bullshit to do / farm especially since there's still time-gates on almost all the hardest content such as limiting how many Omen runs you can do in a day.
Be honest, how many attempts did it take you?
I have no fricking clue but I still remember there was one section where I repeatedly fell off and raged. I don't know how people figured out this shit before there was a guide for it. That entire area was a nightmare to navigate.
Yeah, FFXIclopedia definitely existed back in the late 2000s I think, as well as sites like Killing Ifrit which I used a lot to get help from other players.
I mean you could also always just /shout in Jeuno if you didn't know how to do something and would get spammed with /tells from other players willing to help...
>SMN buddy of mine and I made a small linkshell to guide people through the main story of RoZ and CoP
>after helping 6 people through the story, we would invite some of the more prepared to the LS
>HNM Linkshells start asking us for prices to get their new members to Sea
>got to the point where we had well over 15 people and 4 groups guiding folks through CoP
>started charging guilds 10 million gil per person through the story, with all gear and items needed supplied by us, and 5 million if they bring all their gear and items
>was able to buy all the beast coins needed for my Relic on my WHM and on my DRK
>also got a K.club as well
Once Wings of the Goddess was announced, prices to guide folks through tanked, so we stopped the LS.
Best 5 years of my high-school and college life. I wish I could go back.
Two, because I found out the hard way using a mount after picking up the item from the ??? before climbing will render it null and void. The climb itself is not hard, just don't be a sperg about it.
Maybe half a dozen or so.
Once and I was sweating the whole time
0 because I just followed someone the entire time and had no fricking clue what was happening. Only ever did it once for that CoP mission
i did it every week for the Hagun ENM duo with a friend
once you do it 2-3 times regularly you never frick it up
Oh man that brings back memories.
we got 3 dropped in 6 months
we got pretty lucky
There is a reason why nobody ever had a Forager's Mantle
I remember just buying that shit
Surprisingly only two, but there was some luck involved.
One, it's not that hard.
Horizon/Eden are huge time wasters that I couldn't be bothered making a second life again. Retail for all its gutted soul at least has it so you can do shit at your own pace.
Don't listen to anyone ITT.
Retailgays are shills whose only goal is to get you to pay for their dying old dog of an MMO. They want you to contribute to extend its lifetime even by just a month.
Pservergays are also morons. There's no perfect pserver for FFXI. Some of them are on very old versions to "relive the glory days" but those servers suck and still made changes to the core game = unfaithful. Some servers are more modern but still lagging behind in expansions and updates because they're cucks who fear to get shut down by big bad Squenix.
The truth of the matter is that FFXI is dead. "The glory days" are long over and most players from then are gone. Retail isn't the same as that and pservers can't emulate it either. The options are to play on unreliable small pservers that try to be faithful but change shit and ultimately are lesser of a game by being behind, and retail which is a lot more active and alive and up2date but is very different from what people used to love about FFXI, it's not the same game though still has a pulse.
If you pick pserver you get a limited experience with tiny communities and the risk of shutting down any time.
If you pick retail you get a more living world full of morons but you have to paycuck until it's gone and you're left emptyhanded.
Either way you'll never experience the real FFXI of old, just an imitation. Which is fitting for FF because every new game under Squenix has been shit, FFXIV 2.0 included being one of the worst MMOs, and... playing nu-FFXI in any form in 2023 is like playing FF1-12 for the first time but as Pixel Demasters, with encounter/damage/limit cheats and speedups, or as the ugly X HD Remaster that removed all expressiveness of the character models' faces. It's a secondhand fake fantasy experience. Except you can always play the original FFs but you can never play FFXI original or FFXIV 1.0. They're gone because MMO live service crap.
>le heckin pixel demasters
discarded
What a terrible post, you should feel bad.
retail is unironically better than it ever was in the past, I just wish the retail game of today existed back in 2007-2010 when the community wasn't as small as it is now. It's literally the same game with QoL improvements. All of that old content is still there for a person to enjoy, which is why I don't even understand the private server obsession in the first place.
If you really wanted to have a lvl 75 cap experience, you could do just that by just not advancing certain quests and playing the game with the old gear which is still freely obtainable.
>exp/missions with npcs is the same exact thing as with real people
There's like 3 different kinds of EXP in FFXI retail now, you still have to party up to get capacity points which are used to buy job points, it takes a long time to max it out. Not to mention like all of the even easier end-game content requires parties / alliances still. Omen for example when I was playing last was extremely difficult even for a reasonably well geared party depending on which boss you were fighting.
>Hand and hand together
>Across the limitless eternity
>We will no longer be put asunder
>We will no longer be separated!
>Vana'diel! Vana'diel!
when does the plot get interesting? i killed the shadow lord and cringed so hard i quit the game
When you go to Norg.
The game has like 8 storylines. You did the very first fricking one (and technically didn't even finish it as the nation storylines go to rank 10 and the shadow lord fight is like rank 5 or 6). That said Rise of the Zilart is kind of boring but also super short. Things start getting good with Chains of Promathia. You can technically just dive into any storyline you want though - you don't need to do them in order aside from Rhapsodies forcing you to at least start the storylines before it, and Resurgence being the end cap for everything.
ok, i will prob resub this winter and prog some more. if i finish it, and its shit, i will make fun of XIgays for the rest of my life
if you like the caladbolg on DRK but want the fusion linker from ragnarok you can use the exalted crossbow for heavy shot which provides fusion
Resolution>Torcleaver>Heavy Shot>Resolution>Torcleaver
with DRK/BLU you can use Herculean Slash>Sickle Slash>Torcleaver to MB Drain III on
The shadowlord ends the base game story which they promptly soft retcon the ending to start the first expansion storyline and build off it directly when
as the very next quest.
HorizonXI
horizonxi is the best, relatively new still (launched last sept?) and is set in 2006
>horizonxi is the best
Nah, horizon is a scam propped up by eceleb gaygory, they talk a big game but always under deliver. Catseye is the true peak FFXI pserver, they actually make shit and put it out regularly.
>200 (characters) online
And how many do you think are multiboxing?
Just play retail for the story.
Private servers may emulate the game as it was back then, but they'll never be able to emulate the community of the game or the internet as a whole from that time. Not to mention corrupt mods and admins engaging in blatant nepotism with their buddies.
>Just play retail
I'm not paying a monthly fee.
Still better than was that XIV has with monthly fees and a cash shop.
Also best to wait for that seasonal discount where the entire game is purchasable for $10.
>If you really wanted to have a lvl 75 cap experience, you could do just that by just not advancing certain quests and playing the game with the old gear which is still freely obtainable.
This. It's best as a self-imposed restriction on an alt, but you can keep certain jobs on your character at level 75 forever thanks to Merit Point EXP modes and with level sync, you can set an entire party at that level.
There's also the job adjustments since then that affect 75 and below such as Dancer's recast for Waltzes getting delinked, a new ability for level 70 Paladins that turns Cure and Protect into AoEs, and spells obtained from Merit Points becoming regular spells, which may deter era purists. Not to mention how all the altered spawns after the level cap was raised; have fun climbing up Promyvion now.
What's horizon's population like now? Shit was insane back when I hit 50 and got distracted by other games, like 6k players at peak.
It's good fun, even if you are completely new to this style of MMO. If this was Pre-Trusts, I would have otherwise said don't bother, because it would have been too arduous for any newbie. Old players should also know the old leveling experience is still there in Mastery Levels, which allow you to limit break your Sub-Job making for some completely broken combos.
Honestly the only criticism I have is that there needs to be some gap closing for a brand new 99 to at least get gifts faster. As is, it's almost insurmountable for newbies. It's otherwise fantastic.
XIV fricking WISHED it had something as kino as ark angels. As much as I hate modern era XI there's a childish glee in me being able to use a full party of the AAs via trust
>XIV fricking WISHED it had something as kino as ark angels.
It has MANKIND'S FIRST HERO. And Fourth Spitewarden is way more kino than Ark Angels anyway.
>Fourth Spitewarden
You mean yourself?
That's the one.
Its a very aged game. If you played it when it was relevant its enjoyable, but I think most people will feel not enjoy the game simply because of its old fashioned design.
The story is still good, even if the community is different.
I never understood why people are still able to regularly play FF 1-7 with no problem but act like the controls/UI for 11 is an obsolete mess. It's just fricking regular RPG menus
Because it's an MMO on PC so they try to play it like WoW and then get frustrated that it doesn't work that way. I always tell people to just use a gamepad and play it like a single player FF using the menus.
Hi.
PlayOnline in clunky for sure but that's outside the actual game, every time new players pick up the game I see people complaining about the "controls" when it's arguably more streamlined than FF7 which the same people revere are timeless
I reached 99 on PLD and 49 on WAR a little while ago, but stopped playing for a bit and I'm thinking of hopping back in
what should I do as a fresh 99 who wants to try tanking endgame shit
Here's the secret, you've not reached endgame. You have to essentially level to 99 about 2-3 more times to even get close. Grind up them Merit, Job, & Mastery Points.
Find some people to play with. DD is one thing, but trying to learn how to tank/heal with trusts won't teach you much. But anyway, your ambuscade gear and Oboro shield should do well enough for the time being.
I don't think I've even done an ambuscade, sounds spooky
I remember there being a few new-player friendly linkshells last I played, guess j can start there
It can be spooky, sure. It rotates monthly, and there's always a lot of mechanics to learn for each fight. In my experience though, people are patient with you learning, because nobody wants to tank themselves. I was the only tank on my LS for the longest time. It's fun though, you're pretty much always engaged. At least for RUN, but I think PLD is a little more relaxed.
I want to resub and finally finish the storyline which I was never able to do during 75cap, but I'm working as a full time live-in caretaker for an elderly person so I can only play games where I can pause and stop playing at any minute
>Is there a recommended private server to jump into?
Eden, Era or Jova are your best options
They're solid, stable servers that have been around forever. Era's been open well over 12 years at this point. Just pick the one that suits what flavor you want and go for it.
Nasomi is autistic trash where you'll get banned for not playing how the server host wants you to play, he doesnt like builds outside of his cookie-cutter and it has one or two weird custom changes.
Horizons is a new server that is a fanfiction version of the game with everything changed for literally no reason and all balance thrown out of the window.
It gets shilled to frick and will die in a few months just like ever other heavily-shilled recently-opened FotM server, just like Wings, Kupo and others did that tried the same shit.
i just wish the open world PVP server that one streamer was working on actually saw the light of day, that wouldve been fun
t.ive sunk 1000s of hours into every private server
I did all the main expansions and loved them, is it worth it to go back and to TVR? What about the other minor expanions? Do they measure up to the main ones in story quality at least?
TVR closes so many threads, it's more like an epilogue. So it feels like a mish mash of ideas and Egg memes. The rewards are actually pretty amazing though.
I was playing during the golden age and it hurts to remember because I learned that social anxiety / autism is still just as much of a problem in the game world. I was never able to make lasting friends because I had no other interests or life outside the game. All I could talk about was quests I needed to get done or dunk on people wearing bad gear. Everyone else I know who played during that period made friends they still talk to today... but I had nothing. I even fumbled shit hard with a girl who had a crush on me.
I'm thoroughly convinced that all the shit on Gardening is wrong and the only things that matter are the crystal recipe, pot, and moon cycle. I keep seeing schizoshit about the day you plant them yet I got 6 Saplings each among 3 players on my first try not giving a frick except harvesting on a full moon
I resubbed to play something before BG3 comes out. Doing Nyzul to work on my mythic is comfy.
>Galka got replaced by Roegadyn
>Mithra got replaced by Miqo'te
>Tarutaru got replaced by Lalafell
REMEMBER WHAT THEY TOOK FROM YOU
Why are 14's races worse in nearly every way? Even the human analog race got a worse name. What the frick is a Hyur? The sound Mithras make when they cough up a hairball?
please tell me there's a way you can scroll up the chat menu and see past messages
Press shift to highlight the chat window, press enter to make it big, then you can scroll.
thank god, I'm reinstalling the game now
yeah
F
Enter
use cursor keys to go up and down
I remember playing retail back in ToAU era and it being near impossible to get a group together for the RSE Earring ENM. It's actually surprising when it was a fricking easy fight on top of Taru and Mithra getting ridiculous earrings. iirc they were both basically the only STR boosting earrings in the game besides Cassie's
why the frick do you still have to sub to this 20-something year old game
make it a bonus to the xiv sub like wow does with classic and you'll have thousands of people willing to play
XIV players do nothing but b***h about Eureka which is like a watered down version of XI inside XIV. Really the overlap for people who enjoy modern MMOs and people who enjoy a game like XI is close to zero. Maybe they'd pop over out of curiosity but none of them would become serious players
I came from XIV, eureka and bozja were my favorite content in the game. The lack of an exploratory zone this expansion has completely jaded me.
I just hit 60 in XI and am finishing obtaining my af pieces.
god no. the casual filter of a more popular mmo is half the reason 11 is so good
>and you'll have thousands of people willing to play
What benefit would that bring to them?
I'd be able to experience this amazing story without wasting 15 leafs a month
>Is there a recommended private server to jump into?
Horizonxi.com
>Or is FFXI one of the few mmos that hasn't totally been ruined over time,
/laugh
>so retail is a viable option?
Retail does have one purpose still; it's where you can go to do the story at your own pace. But it will feel hollow as you walk through an empty world, insanely overlevelled and summoning an army of NPCs to play the game for you. When they announce it's going offline forever, I'll probably hop on to play through the full story start to end on easymode. But when I want to play with real human beans, it's on Horizon.
>When they announce it's going offline forever, I'll probably hop on to play through the full story start to end on easymode.
It's officially on maintenance mode ever since TVR ended as they fix some things with their development stations and figure out what to do next (which might be the end of service). So you may as well start now.
The new producer is the one responsible for a lot of technical improvements to the game, and in his letter he wrote when taking the producer job it sounded like he wanted to continue that. My pipe dream is for real single player, not just trusts, but decoupling XI from POL would be huge if they ever managed that. Most POL features don't even work anymore so it's just a hinderance for no reason. I know they don't want to put in the time/money for a project like that, but I can dream.
I think they released a private server you can run on your own pc, you can probably just multibox it at this stage since its atb. The live servers have been nerfed into the ground and everyonr playing is ultra optimised
if you want single-player offline FFXI just download the server hosting code from the DSP community github
install it, make yourself GM, enjoy
i have a confession, the mmo's are the only ff games i like, 11 being one of my favorite games ever made.
I play both 14 and 11. I sometimes play on horizon but mainly the main servers are still good and trusts are such a good way to experience all of the game.