Letter from the Producer LIVE XX Summary

[Andromeda]

This morning, Yoshida had another LIVE Letter talking in greater detail about what to expect going forward in the expansion. There was a lot of new information, so much so that they were unable to actually get to the questions asked.

• The Au Ra have two clans like all other Races
  
  • Raen
  • Xaela
  
  
• There is no requirements for unlocking level 51, so no Genkai quests like XI.
• There is about 50 hours of new main story for Heavenwards, which they're saying is equal to the A Realm Reborn
  
  • Further updates and story will naturally come in 3.1-3.x patches.
  
  
• The in game time from the 2.55 to 3.0 story events are a few days to few weeks apart
• There are 9 new zones
  
  • Each zone is 50-100% bigger than current areas
  • Flying in the new areas will requiring attunement in each zone
  • Ishgard is the only no fly zone in Heavensward
  • 2.0 areas won't be open to flying, but are considered for later
  
  
• Flying will start when you either jump or go off a cliff
  
  • The companion chocobo will be able to fly
  • The Bomb and Ahriman mounts will be able to fly as well
    
    • But won't be ready for 3.0
    
    
  • There won't be enemies in the air
  • But you can be attacked and escape into the air
  
  
• The new jobs will start at level 30
• All jobs going from 50-60 will learn new job skills through quests, there is no new skills gained through leveling
• Crafters and gathers will learn new skills through leveling from 50-60
• There are two new tomestones for the expansion
  
  • Allagan Tomestones of Law (No Weekly Cap)
  • Allagan Tomestones of Esoterics (Weekly Cap)
    
    • Esoterics will not be available until a month after the launch of the expansion
  
  
• Crafters and Gathers will have new systems and features that will be similar to the combat classes
  
  • The Specialist role can be selected for up to three crafter classes
    
    • Unique skills will be available only while in this Specialist role
    • Designed to give people the option to focus only on one or two classes rather than forced to get all
    
    
  • Scrips are the crafter and gather's Tomestone
    
    • There are Red and Blue
      
      • Red is the No Cap
      • Blue is the Weekly Cap
      
      
    • Scrips will be used to gear up your crafter or gathered like any combat class
    • Scrips are gained from making Collector grade goods, which are a step above High Quality
    • Gathers likely have a method to gain Scrips, but it was not outlined
    • Scrips can be used to change Specialist role
    • This unlocks at lv 55 and will be with Rowena
    
    
  • Tier V Materia is coming, but may not be ready for 3.0
  • Gathers have a two new features
    
    • Favor
      
      • Special buffs that are selected
      • Once selected they unlock different materials from nodes
      • Different favors will be needed to get different materials
      
      
    • Regional Lore
      
      • The End Game content for gathers
      • Can be thought of as Master Books that crafters have
      • Learning the lore will unlock new nodes and items
  
  
• The new expansion areas will come with new content of what is already available
  
  • New Levequests
  • New FATEs
    
    • High Level like Behemoth or Odin
    • Large Scale
    
    
  • New enemies
  • New marks
  
  
• Alexander will using a new system
  
  • There is Alexander and Alexander (Savage)
  • Both raids will have unique loot systems
    
    • Reports are saying that normal Alexander will not have a weekly lock out, but the loot will
    
    
  • Alexander normal starts two weeks after launch
  • Alexander (Savage) starts four weeks after launch
  
  
• New Primals will have new mechanics
  
  • Was mentioned that players can fall like with Titan, likely referring to Bismark as an airship battle
  
  
• New Frontlines area with new rules
  
  • Opens in a month after launch
  • New PvP gear
  
  
• New Free Company Housing features
  
  • Airship crafting
  • New Housing items
  • The new workship will be bought with gil
  
  
• New adjustments to existing content as well
  
  • 20 new Triad cards
  • More sightseeing logs
  • New retainer ventures and leveling
  • Ishgard will have a Market Board
  • 2.0 content adjustments, echo and other changes
  
  
• Duty Finder changes
  
  • It will be possible to run dungeons with less than 4 players
  • New roulettes and conditions
  • New option to level sync to min level for dungeon for challenging old content
  
  
• Loot changes
  
  • This for premade parties only
    
    • Lootmaster allows the leader to hand out the loot
    • All Greed removes Need as an option
    
    
  • Passing on already Needed or Greeded items will be an option
    
    • The reverse will not be an option
  
  
• Dx11 client will be separate from the main game
  
  • Free download, but it is a different client to run

Source: Letter from the Producer LIVE Part XX - Summary Digest

[che]

I may seem kinda negative, but...I keep waiting for announcements on improving secondary stats, or adding unique bonuses to items (Fire dmg+5% on gloves) or glyphs or talent points or anything to make my character unique and have a "build" other than just having RNG from gear dropping. Other than the skillspeed/spellspeed changes there is nothing. The zones look cool but after a while it'll be the same as now. I am excited about them, but this is basically a big patch

Things I'm excited for: new zones for freshness. DX11.

Things I'm not excited for: leveling again, same exact tomestone system, etc.

I really hope it's gonna be as good as everyone thinks it's gonna. So far everyone is on the hype train and nobody is asking the questions I want to ask Yoshi.

[Andromeda]

Well elements already don't do anything in game. So unless they completely redesign that part, there's never going to be anything like Fire Damage. But from everything I've seen they are pretty opposed to do something that adds that much complexity to the system. Not to mention, doing something like that would be very disadvantageous to people that have all of their jobs leveled. Because anything that introduces value to secondary stats will start to significantly increase the volume of gear you will need to carry for different situations. People are already wanting the 25 slots per spot in the Armory system increased since we're getting too many classes and jobs. Anymore specialization in gear will make it almost impossible to carry around all your gear for every single job/class which currently allows for the flexibility to change whenever you want.

But I also don't really want a XI situation where if you wanted to worth something, you had to have all those elemental staves for something like that. The macro gear changing for unique stats for specific skills to improve them is definitely interesting, but not something I want to revisit.

Cool looking gear or cute looking gear is all I really want and they've been hit or miss on that. It comes down to personal taste yes, but I want gear that I actually want to walk around in rather than be embarrassed to be wearing.

But XIV has been the same thing since it's relaunch. It should not be a surprise that things are going to be similar. We are seeing different systems for raiding and some tweaks to systems. But it is the same thing we've been doing for almost 2 years now.

[che]

Since you can't change gear in combat, there's nothing that would make it different if you add the specialization to gear. This is different from FFXI where you could change weapons even in battle. I already have like 10 BLM sets. One for each FCOB turn, one for SCOB, and a "no accuracy" set for primals, etc. I suppose I'm asking for too much in an MMORPG as far as customization. /s

edit: didn't even think of resistances, but there are tons of unused things on our character sheets. I simply meant like, you could choose between Fire dmg+5%, Crit+3% or something else, kind of like enchants in WoW) or talent points so I could make my blizzard do more damage or increase my thunder proc chance or just straight up fire damage. Something like this would be fun.

But nope. Here's the new tomes, new raid (just like a patch), now you have to cap crafter tomes too. Bleh. Where's the real change in the game?

[Andromeda]

XIV is a vertical progression game rather than a horizontal progression game like XI. So it is very unlikely we'll see any sort of specialization happen. People will min-max things and then that'll be the only build to make if you're serious about raiding. So uniqueness will often be traded for being better. It is just the nature of people in games. The only way that it would work out is if every single secondary stat was completely equal in value, which is not the case because we have resistances, crit, det, parry, skill speed, spell speed, they'd have to all be completely equal otherwise people will still value more crit or det over any thing else in the game until we find out what skill and spell speed change. Because you can customize your relic weapon, but the best builds for them are always crit and det. They have options and they still only pick the best because they've done the math and they're better.

[che]

It's true there will always be a "best" build that does the most damage for hardcore raiders. But the fun part is figuring out what that might be. It gives me things to think about and try out. More customization = better. And I think they did a great job balancing Det and Crit with Spellspeed on Black Mage (as no other class really wants skill/spellspeed). With Det being really good, it means you never have a choice between the same amount of Det or the same amount of Crit (except on relic), Det is always in a lower amount, and it's still worth it on some pieces. Who's to say they can't replicate this success with more customization?