[FFXIV] Heavensward 1st Weekend

Progress!

The “login boss” is a tough fight, and I decided he beat me tonight, so I’ll post  blog instead of continuing to fight him and then I don’t hav to worry about it tomorrow either.  I had a couple of extended play sessions yesterday and today.  don’t feel like I’m rushing or pushing or anything, but made some good solid progress.  Nothing like the people I see who are already level 60 on the new jobs, anyway.  For me, my final tally at the end of the weekend is Dark Knight 33, Astrologian 32, Machinist 30, Black Mage 53.  I’ve done all the quests that I saw in Coerthas Western highlands, which included unlocking the ability to fly in that zone, and I’ve moved on to the Dravinian Forelands where I’m still questing merrily along.

Dark Knight impressions:  It’s a tank and seems to be a “Dark Paladin” really.  It cross-classes with GLA and MRD but the skills it can pick are really already contained in the job, so… I grabbed Foresight for an additional defensive cooldown, and then took Provoke becuz of course you take Provoke, and then all the rest I don’t actually care about, so I took Mercy Stroke becuz it’s arguably a finishing move, even if it really doesn’t do much damage.  None of the other potential cross-class skill look like they’ll matter at all.

Astrologian is a bit of a souped up White Mage.  Where at 30 the WHM has Cure 1, Cure 2, Medica, and Esuna, the Astro at 30 has analogs of Cure 1, Cure 2, Medica, Esuna, and then also an “oh snap!” heal and the class defining “Draw” ability to get a random buff to apply to a party member every 30 seconds.  So far I’m quite impressed with this class.

Machinist so far feels like it’s a weak bard.  And considering that at 30 the bard is still rather weak… ouch.  I’m not impressed with it at level 30 at all.  I’m told by FC members who’ve already leveled to 50 that it improves a lot in the late 30’s, and I know I’ll eventually work on it, but it will definitely be the last of the 3 new jobs that I level.

Finishing up a duty-instance story quest

For the Black Mage, at 50 the job quest simply unlocks moving forward.  At 52 you get “Ley Lines” which is a 30-second buff on a 90-second cooldown.  It reduces all your cast timers (including your GCD and auto-attack) by 15% while you’re standing inside the circle that it drops on the ground.  You can leave and re-enter the circle if needed to dodge a mechanic or something, but the buff is only on you while in the circle.  It’s a decent dps boost, especially on those boss fates where it’s locked down and you’re just shooting at a loot pinata.

The Dusk Vigil from above and far away

Overall impression is that it’s a nice continuation from where the game left off before.  Nothing feels super new and shiny — it’s simply comfortable moving on.  Feels natural, I guess you could say.  Mobs have a lot more HP so they take longer to kill and as a result have more time to do damage to you, but they’re still easily soloable without a companion and super-easy if your companion’s summoned to fight with you too.  I really don’t know what Bel’s going on about when he says that the mobs are hitting really hard.  I’m in my squishy robes and I don’t feel like the mobs are any trouble at all, they just take a full mana bar to kill now (and sometimes a bit more) where before they’d take 3 casts and out.  Maybe it’s becuz he’s  tank and doing less damage so they’re hitting him for that much longer?

I can fly! In one zone anyway…

My only real complaint has to do with the zone design — the zones are obviously designed with flight in mind, but you will be pretty “done” with a zone by the time you’ve unlocked flight for it, so while you’re stuck on the ground it makes it very annoying to find out how to get places when you’re constantly being confronted with massive cliff faces.  Since there’s no death from falling in this game (sure you take damage, but you never die) you can jump down from anywhere, but then figuring out how to get back up where you jsut were can really take some doing and wandering very far out of your way.  It doesn’t help that most quests seem to be along the vein of “run halfway across the zone, do your stuff, run to a 2nd location another 1/3 of the zone away, and then come back to me.”  If you had flight and could simply go as the crow flies it wouldn’t be a big deal, but having to wend through a maze all the time…. it gets a little old.

Final boss room in Dusk Vigil

I did the Dusk Vigil dungeon at level 52 and actually leveled to 53 upon completion of the dungeon, so that was kind of nice.  Up to this point the story quests have been awarding HQ i115 gear, so the dungeon dropping i120 gear is a slight upgrade for that, but my BLM is mostly in i120 gear anyway, so it wasn’t actually a difference.  But then in the Dravinian Forelands with the level 52 story quests awarding HQ i125 gear, I’m starting to see some upgrades from the quests now.  I haven’t yet unlocked the 1st trial, but I think I’m to that point, since in the story it’s talking about how to go about defeating the primal, so….. soon.  Maybe next time I get past the login boss…..

Happy gaming out there!

It’s definitely a pretty, pretty game

My 1st group from the duty finder. All new jobs 😀

I believe that I mentioned that the game is pretty, didn’t I?

I liked the framing of this shot

Don’t mess with a Dark Knight. They’re scary looking!

A closeup of the Astrolabe in combat

With DX11 turned on I sometimes get this blurring effect in combat

Still a pretty game…

An example of finding an aether current to help unlock flying

Another aether current — they’re not always easy to get to

Interesting countryside

More interesting countryside

Never deal with a dragon, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup!