My FFXIV diary (Leo can post here too, I guess)
I was in an awesome Party Finder party last night. We ran the majority of the Extreme primal fights, with the exception of Ravana EX, Bismarck EX, and Sephirot EX. Sephirot EX is fucking hard. But anyway, we kept running Leviathan EX and I got a pony drop!
Iâm all caught up with the main story quest. Ready for the 3.4 patch, Soul Surrender. Although before I start the new content, Iâd like to finish getting all the Midan gear from Alexander.
Iâm hyped. Good to hear that Ala Mhigo will have a combination of desert and forest areas. Itâs going to be great to stare up at that giant statue in the game, or looking down from the hand. I like that the story is the Resistance trying to overthrow the Garlean leader who is ruling over Ala Mhigo. From what I can tell, the two characters fighting from the trailer are both monks. One of them is obviously the Warrior of Light, but the girl could either be Yshtola or her sister. Pure speculation. On that note, Yshtola might be an Ala Mhigan princess. Not crazy about a level 70 cap. The bit about a complete overhaul in the battle system is welcome. Itâs become boring at this point. As for new jobs, while nothing has been announced yet, the consensus seems to be red mage and samurai. Perhaps even dancer. I hope samurai isnât a tank. 
Possible Square is throwing us off by removing the tattoos and increasing her breast size. I think the more likely outcome is that is Ydaâs sister because Yda has mentioned that she has a sister, but she canât be found or something. When Yda left Ala Mhigo to join the Scions, her sister stayed behind to fight for the Resistance.
Also, here are all the details about Stormblood:
- Stormblood will explore Ala Mihgo
- Main focus is to regain control of Ala Mihgo from the Garlean Empire
- 20 years have passed since Garleans have had control
- Main atagonist to be Zenos Yae Galvus, XIIth Legion Legatus and de facto ruler of Ala Mihgo
- Woman depicted in trailer to potentially be revealed in future 3.X patch
- Warrior of Lightâs main job in 4.0 is Monk (akin to DRG for 3.0)
- Area shown in teaser trailer is Rhalgrâs Reach, the HQ of Ala Mighoâs main resistance.
- Multiple new jobs to be discussed at future date
- Yoshi-P wore a t-shirt of Marvelâs Scarlet Witch, said that was the only hint heâd give at this time [Red Mage]
- New Level Cap: 70 (for all classes)
- More actions for each job to go with new cap
- Revamped battle system to go with new actions
- Additional Skill System to be overhauled, with skills shared by roles instead of jobs, and can choose from shared role ability options
- Reassessment of unused/ineffective actions
- Example used is Dragoonâs Blood of the Dragon buff, where in 4.0 an icon/gauge showing how much time is left will be better visible on screen so players arenât just staring at the current icon
- New Areas to be introduced, comparable in size to Heavensward areas
- Stormblood will be a full standalone gameâs worth of content
- New Primals to be introduced, including known names and all-new original-to-FF14 ones.
- New Dungeons to be introduced with new battle and dungeon concepts to be introduced
- High-End Raids to also be added, with possibility of different story depending on difficulty, with normal on odd patches, savage on even
- New Alliance Raids to be added. Big news, but will wait until Tokyo Fan Fest, but will be, âvery, very Final Fantasyâ
- Expanded form of Exploration to be introduced: The Forbidden Land of Eureka (they really like FF3!), something different from Diadem and will expand its own entire area, unique to Stormblood. There might even be Notorious Monsters that only appear once every 72 hours.
- Eureka may also be used for next set of high-end weapons, akin to Relic/Anima, rather than upgrades in ânormal areas.â
- New Gear and Recipes, including winners of Fanâs Gear Design Contest
- Item Inventory Exansion (this got the biggest cheers so far), looking to increase âas much as humanly possible.â There is uncertainty in how this will be implemented due to the server needs, and it will be addressed in a future Live Letter
- A 4th Residential Area to be added. Where? âSorry, canât tell ya.â
- In-game footage of new areas shown
- Screenshots now being shown of new areas
- Indications are that Ala Mihgo is crossed via a wall in The Black Shroud, which will be shown in Patch 3.5. Yoshi joked that Dragoon Jump wonât work to scale the wall, but that The Warrior of Light has a lot of practice falling off of things.
- Ala Mihgo will not be just deserts and wasteland. Forests are also part of it.
- All areas of 4.0 will be accessible by flying mounts, but there was an indication that it will again by quest-based like in 3.0. At groans from the audience, Yoshi said it will be easier than Moogle Quests.
- Thatâs all the information for now from this keynote. More information will be released in other Fan Fests elsewhere, Live Letters, and so forth. âThis is just the start.â Yoshi teases he wants to say more everytime the audience cheers, but then heâd be dead and Stormblood wouldnât come out.
- Two final announcements:
- Changes to Windows version Minimum Specs requirements. Current minimum specs are geared towards components you canât even buy anymore. So, for the best gaming experience possible, theyâve decided to raise their minimum specs. âIf possible, maybe upgrade to 64-bit OSâ but they will still support 32-bit. They just suggest 64-bit will be best gaming experience.
- End of PlayStation 3 support. This got the second biggest cheers. Theyâve been examining numbers and have seen a large migration of PS3 to PS4 so they have decided it is the right time to end PS3 support. To show appreciation to their PS3 fans that helped them get to where they are now, there will be a special FREE PS3 to PS4 upgrade campaign.
Weâll have to see how it plays butâŚI could be tempted to switch. Dawg, it forms into a staff! Thatâs some Bloodborne shit.
Red Mage looks like a dope class. I like the re-imagining of the rapier, and how it can be re-constructed into a staff. Depending on what the other classes end up being (câmon DPS Samurai), I may be switching to RDM.
Swimming in Stormblood:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWG3HA_YVq4
Iâm not sure how I feel about swimming in an MMORPG. Unlike flying, it was confirmed that swimming will be slightly slower than sprinting in the game, so it may seem boring after a while. Interesting that swimming is being introduced for Ala-Mhigo. I donât instantly think water when that city-state comes to mind, but in reality, it lies nearby a coast:
I assumed that they were saving swimming for a later expansion taking place in the homeland of lalafells, a group of islands in the southern sea (guessing itâs those islands south of Ala-Mhigo).