| Final Fantasy XIV | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Release Date | Gameplay & Story | DLC & Pre-Order | Review |
Final Fantasy XIV Gameplay
Being an MMO, players can engage in many different activities in the game like quests, dungeons, boss fights, raids, open-world events, and other social-related activities. FFXIV has always been noted to be a game that has a good balance of accessibility and difficulty, where it has a multitude of things to do and accomplish for casual players, social roleplayers, hardcore raiders, and others.
The unique part of Final Fantasy XIV is that it is a story-focused game, where most content is gated through the player’s story progression. To put it simply, you can gain access to newer content by completing the game’s story which spans from A Realm Reborn all the way up to the most recent expansion, Dawntrail.
Job Classes and Roles
Final Fantasy XIV’s unique to other MMOs since you have the ability to use every job on one character. The game has a basic multi-role system, which separates the game’s Jobs into the same categories, consisting of the following:
| Role | Jobs |
|---|---|
| Tank Mitigate damage using defensive cooldowns and maintain enemy aggro |
Paladin (PLD) Warrior (WAR) Dark Knight (DRK) Gunbreaker (GNB) |
| Healer Heal the party and mitigate damage using various cooldowns |
White Mage (WHM) Scholar (SCH) Astrologian (AST) Sage (SGE) |
| Melee DPS Deal high damage up close consisting of many offensive cooldowns |
Monk (MNK) Dragoon (DRG) Ninja (NIN) Samurai (SAM) Reaper (RPR) Viper (VPR) |
| Ranged Physical DPS Mobile ranged physical jobs that have light support abilities |
Bard (BRD) Machinist (MCH) Dancer (DNC) |
| Ranged Magical DPS Spellcasing jobs that focus on dealing magic damage and weaving cooldowns with their spells |
Black Mage (BLM) Summoner (SMN) Red Mage (RDM) Pictomancer (PCT) |
The game also has different crafting and gathering classes, namely: Disciples of the Hand and Disciples of the Land, respectively. These jobs focus on creating high-quality items for use or for profit and collect resources from the game’s large world. Similar to combat jobs, crafting and gathering jobs also have their own unique rotations, where the former uses more specialized rotations to craft complex recipes.
| Type | Classes |
|---|---|
| Crafting (Disciples of the Hand) |
Carpenter (CRP) Blacksmith (BSM) Armorer (ARM) Goldsmith (GSM) Leatherworker (LTW) Weaver (WVR) Alchemist (ALC) Culinarian (CUL) |
| Gathering (Disciples of the Land) |
Miner (MIN) Botanist (BTN) Fisher (FSH) |
Combat
Final Fantasy XIV’s combat is tab-target-based that uses global cooldown abilities (GCDs) and off-global cooldown abilities (oGCDs). Similar to games like World of Warcraft, Throne and Liberty, and other MMOs, classes tend to have skill rotations where you would want to sequence your actions for optimal damage.
FFXIV also has role skills which are shared abilities unique to each role, and positionals for melee DPS jobs which increases the damage of certain abilities when done on the enemy’s rear or flank. Lastly, the game also has Limit Breaks, which are powerful role-specific abilities that is used by one player in the party to turn the tide of battle (e.g., Tanks mitigate damage, DPS deals massive damage to a single enemy or an area depending on the job, and Healer heals and revives the party to full at maximum charge).
Progression
Every class and job has its own level and experience can be gained through many different activities like:
⚫︎ Main Scenario Quests (MSQ) - Main story quests that should be completed to access most of the game’s content.
⚫︎ Daily Duty Roulettes
┗⚫︎ Dungeons - 4-player content that involves mob-clearing and simple bosses.
┣⚫︎ Trials - Mostly 8-player boss fights that have party wide mechanics.
┣⚫︎ Normal Raids - 8-player boss encounters that have a separate story.
┗⚫︎ Alliance Raids - 24-player raids that have interconnected mechanics and encounters.
⚫︎ Hunts - World bosses that grant experience points and endgame currency.
⚫︎ FATEs (Full Active Time Event) - Timed world events that grant bonus experience points.
⚫︎ Levequest and Beast Tribe Quests - Repeatable quests that grant bonus experience points.
Gearing is also straightforward as stronger gear can be obtained through dungeons, crafting, raids, and other vendors. Stronger gear equates to a higher Item level (iLvl) which determines your overall strength and could grant you access to even higher-level content.
Hardcore Content - Savage and Ultimate Raids
The game also features different hardcore content, namely: Savage Raids and Ultimate Raids. Savage Raids are harder versions of the Normal Raids that have more complex versions of mechanics introduced in the normal version. These raids also have the strongest pieces of gear available at a given patch cycle.
Ultimate Raids, on the other hand, are the hardest party-based content which have encounters that last up to an average of 13-15 minutes which requires completion of the patch’s latest Savage Raids. These are fights that require a great amount of teamwork to solve a combination of complex mechanics and dealing enough damage to get through each phase.
Special Content
The game has other solo and group content that players can partake in like:
⚫︎ Deep Dungeons - procedurally generated dungeons with independent progression systems.
⚫︎ Eureka and Bozja - Large-scale areas with unique mechanics and progression, designed for cooperative gameplay and other rewards.
⚫︎ Gold Saucer - A mini-game hub which houses seasonal events, lotteries, and other arcade style games.
⚫︎ Limited Jobs - Unique jobs that have their own exclusive solo questline and progression system that differ from the standard jobs.
Final Fantasy XIV Story
Final Fantasy XIV Plot
Hear, Feel, Think.
You are the Warrior of Light, a hero chosen by the gods themselves to protect Eorzea and fight against the darkness. You’ll start as an adventurer, which exposes you to the realm’s histories, mysteries, and politics as you journey through the realm and face many different challenges that grow increasingly in scale. The narrative is delivered through episodic arcs in between patches, which has persisted since the game’s release.
Final Fantasy XIV Setting
Set after the Eighth Umbral Calamity, the game takes place in the world of Hydaelyn; in the vast continent of Eorzea, which has diverse cultures and a long and tumultuous history. It is home three major city states, namely: Ul’dah, Gridania, and Limsa Lominsa. Several of the game’s expansions expand on the world outside of Eorzea, where it has imperial empires, trade-centric and scholarly cities, and even realms that defy conventional reality.
