Guide for Players Coming from Guild Wars 2

Introduction

This guide is for players starting out in Final Fantasy XIV after having been active players of Guildwars 2.

TL, DR

• You can play all classes, jobs, and professions on a single character. You don't need an alt for every new class you want to try.
• FF14 offers an increasing level cap with each expansion rather than additional mechanics tacked on top of a fixed level cap. The current level cap is 90 with the last expansion unlocked.
• The weapon swap mechanic of GW2 goes beyond what you are used to - rather than changing a few skills, it changes your entire class.
• Roles are more sharply defined than you are used to. Group-oriented content revolves around the "trinity" of dedicated tank, healer and dps.
• The combat is less dynamic than the one from GW2, without dodging and rolling as escape mechanics.
• There is no distinction between story-mode dungeons and redoing the same dungeons later.
• You have access to all your abilities instead of having to pick which ones you want to use, subject to level adjustment (see below).
• The game is built very tightly around the main story, and everything is gated behind the main story to some extent.
  • The story of each expansion leads directly into the next expansion. Thus, you have to complete the entire main story campaign of a given expansion, including the post-expansion quests, before you can proceed to the next expansion.
• Mind your manners with other players. Square-Enix is much more stringent than ArenaNet when it comes to policing harassment and toxic behavior.

You will probably enjoy FF14 if:

• You want to experience a deep, intricate narrative saga spanning multiple expansions.
• You find the community in GW2 to be too fragmented, and are looking for a friendlier community.
• You like playing lots of different classes.

You are less likely to enjoy FF14 if:

• You are not interested in the story and just want to rush to endgame.
• You are solely or primarily a PvP player. PvP does exist in FF14, but it is relatively lacklustre compared to the PvP in other games.

Weapon System

FF14 features a system that is quite similar to weapon swapping in GW2, but goes much further. Each weapon type is tied to a specific class or job, so when you swap weapons, you do not change just 5 skills, but the entire lineup of skills and useful stats. Each class-weapon combo has its own experience bar, like the GW2 experience for weapons, but that experience is your actual character level while using that specific weapon. Unlike nearly all other MMORPGs, the character you create is not limited to playing the class/job that was selected during character creation. Shortly after beginning the game, specifically after completing the level 10 class quest for your starting class, you will be able to unlock other classes, and once you have done so, you will be able to switch classes whenever you want, with some limitations (I.e. you can't switch while in a dungeon or raid, or while in combat).

As a result, you don't need to roll alts if you want to try other jobs. In fact, with the exception of the level 1-15 starting story (There are 3 different starting stories, one for each starting city), you can experience nearly everything the game has to offer on a single character.

Instead of a single pair of weapons, you can swap entire gear sets, including armor and jewelry for each class, and swap the full set at a single command. To achieve this, you have a dedicated storage for each equipment slot capable of holding 25 different items (40 for main weapons and rings as of 6.0). The UI gives you helpful hints about what to include in your current set, should you have better items in that storage.

Professions

The term class in FF14 refers to basic, pre-level 30 classes. The usual term in FF14 is Profession, since you can practice all of them. Each Profession not only has its own gear and abilities, but its own stories associated with them, in parallel with the main story quest. Those stories unlock additional abilities, both passive and active.

Professions are divided in four categories:

Gatherers, called Disciples of the Land, have abilities that help them locate resources, gather more efficiently, reduce the likelihood of failure, gather more resources from a given node, and acquire special rare items. They also have stealth which enables them to work without being bothered by monsters out in the world.

Crafters, called Disciples of the Hand, craft items, as their name suggests. After selecting what to craft, they will need to use their abilities to complete the item without breaking it, while also maximizing the quality of said item. Having better gear and stats will make this easier.

Disciples of War refer to all combat-oriented Professions based around physical abilities, like tanks, melee DPS and ranged DPS.

Disciples of Magic refer to all combat-oriented Professions based around spellcasting, like healers and ranged DPS.

The main story campaign can only be advanced while playing as a Disciple of War or Disciple of Magic

Level scaling

Unlike GW2 where each zone and area is subject to level scaling, FF14 uses a per-event level scaling. In general, you will be of your current Profession's level anywhere in the world, even in starting zones. When you are scaled down to a lower level, you will automatically lose all your abilities and Profession bonus above your current level.

• Fates are the equivalent of GW2's events. If you are more than five levels above the level of a Fate, you will have a button allowing you to scale down to the Fate's maximum level. If you remain at your normal level, you will be unable to attack the Fate's monsters or collect the Fate's items.
• Dungeons automatically scale you down to the maximum level allowed by the dungeon. Some dungeons also scale down your equipment to the maximum equipment level allowed by the dungeon. There is an option to avoid that, but you will forfeit all experience and money in the dungeon from doing so.
• Certain parts of the Main Story Campaign (see below) also include encounters that are level capped.

Crafting

Crafting exists in a manner comparable to GW2, with the notable differences being:

• You can unlock and practice every Profession, unlike the limitation of 2 to 4 disciplines from GW2.
• Almost all recipes are automatically unlocked as you gain levels; there are no discoverable recipes.
• Special master-level recipes are gathered into two tomes per Profession at the max level of each expansion rather than individual recipe scrolls.
• There is no equivalent to Legendary Weapon crafting: although high-quality gear can be crafted at great expenses, it is tradable.
• Items produced can be of Normal or High Quality. the High Quality version provide better stats, or makes the subsequent crafting of another HQ item easier.

The crafting in FF14 is based on a mini-game instead of the simple "click-to-craft" method of GW2. The click-to-craft method is available, should you wish to use it, but does require a significant higher stats than required to craft the recipe, and does not provide HQ results.

Combat

Combat, notably group combat, is a much more specialized thing than the GW2 grouping system. There are sharply defined roles of tank (soaking damage), healer (recovering from damage and conditions) and DPS (dealing damage). Given that you can progress any Profession, you can freely swap between roles if you want to.

Characters cannot be incapacitated during normal combat. If you are reduced to zero health, you will be dead, and can only be resurrected by a class able to do so, or you can choose to release your body and be returned to the beginning of your current dungeon, or your current starting location if somewhere in the world.

Ground effect zone visuals are pretty similar to the way they are used in GW2, with a relatively consistent presentation. However, dodging to avoid area effects is not a mechanic present in FF14, so you need to anticipate or move quickly to avoid those.

Dungeons

Dungeons exist in multiple forms, and are very much an intrinsic part of the game, unlike GW2. Accordingly, there is no distinction between Story-Mode Dungeons and Exploration Dungeons, and it will not be uncommon to group with veteran players when doing a dungeon for the first time.

• Size: You have Light Party dungeons (4 players), Full Party Dungeons (8 players) and Alliance Dungeons - or raids - featuring 3 Full Parties (24 total Players) cooperating.
• Type: Dungeons can be linear progression, featuring packs of mobs between multiple boss encounters, or trials, featuring a single boss without anything else.
• Difficulty: Each Dungeon/Raid/Trial has a normal difficulty mode, and a higher difficulty mode ("Hard", "Savage" or "Extreme").

All Dungeons must be first unlocked, either as part of the Main Story Campaign, or as a quest requiring a certain level and/or the completion of the previous difficulty level.

Main Story Campaign

Final Fantasy XIV is first and foremost a Final Fantasy game, and like other Final Fantasy games, it is heavily focused on the story. As such, the game is very heavily built around the main story, and progressing in the main story campaign is essential to unlocking pretty much anything and everything in the game. Merely being able to walk to a location is not enough to be able to gain access to that part of the game.

A lot of the story is told via Cinematics. Unlike cinematics in GW2 which feature a simple dialog between your character and whatever character you're talking to for quest purpose, cinematics are much more involved, with multiple characters talking at times, sometimes to each other. Some quest cinematics are particularly long, and you will be prompted to set aside significant time to witness the full event unfolding.

Final Fantasy XIV tells an epic linear saga that spans the base game and all expansions up through Endwalker, and the story from one expansion leads directly into the next. The base game, A Realm Reborn, leads directly into Heavensward, which leads into Stormblood, then Shadowbringers, then Endwalker. When you complete the leveling main story campaign for any given expansion, you will have to complete the max-level endgame campaign before you can move on, as it contains critical narrative that leads into the next expansion. In other words, on reaching level 50 (Max level for A Realm Reborn), you can't just immediately jump into Heavensward, you have to complete the A Realm Reborn endgame campaign first.

That said, there is an option to purchase a skip from the store, allowing you skip directly to the start of a later expansion. If it is your first time playing through the story, it is strongly recommended that you do NOT skip any part of the main story. It should be noted that many players consider parts of A Realm Reborn (Levels 1-50), and especially the endgame story (Level 50) to be a bit of a drag, so patience is advised. The story is generally considered to become more exciting as you get into the expansions.

Starting Areas

Unlike GW2, where your race determines your starting area with an introduction story, FF14 separates its starting characters according to your initial choice of Class. There are three main city states: Limsa Lominsa, Gridania, and Ul'dah, each with their specialized Professions, both combat and non-combat. You will unlock early on direct travel - at a price - between each starting city. Those city-states are very cosmopolitan, so there are no restrictions on which races you can play for any of them.

Each of those cities feature Grand Companies (Military forces): the Maelstrom, the Order of the Twin Adder, and the Immortal Flames. After completing the level 20 main story quest A Hero in the Making, you will have to choose which Grand Company to join. Your choice of Grand Company does not affect player power in any way, so feel free to choose the Grand Company that appeals to you the most, without having to worry about choosing the "wrong" one for your favorite class or job.

Also, your choice of Grand Company has extremely little impact on the main story, mainly being used for a few side activities, and you can change your Grand Company later on should you so desire.

PvP

Grand Companies are tied to the PvP system. Unlike GW2's grand PvP system of World-vs-World long battles, PvP in FF14 revolves around shorter-duration small instances, "Frontlines", which are 3-faction battlegrounds between each of the three Grand Companies. The reason for this is explained in the level 30 quest Like Civilized Men and Women (Maelstrom) and its equivalent for the other 2 Grand Companies, which unlocks said Frontlines. Certain strategic areas are disputed, and the Grand Companies have made a mutual agreement that hostilities would be strictly limited to those areas, and that killing would be strictly prohibited.

It should be noted, however, that in the interest of keeping queue times reasonable, you will not necessarily be grouped with your own Grand Company while in a frontline, i.e. a Twin Adder member may be put on the Maelstrom team.

The instanced PvP areas feature a very different level of play. First, you get a completely different set of actions, with its own action bars, for PvP. Many of these actions are very similar to their PvE counterparts, even having the same names and animations, but they are designed and tuned specifically for PvP. The rotations are simpler than their PvE counterparts, but you receive the full set of actions immediately on unlocking PvP, regardless of your level. You will also be able to select 2 PvP talent abilities.

Second, and perhaps most important, all players of any given job are equalized in power. In PvP duties, your max HP, attack power, or all other attribute will be fixed, and will not be affected by your level or gear. Even your max HP will be a fixed round number (I.e. 20,000 for tanks). Also, as previously mentioned, you will get your full PvP action set immediately on unlocking PvP. As a result, a level 30 player who just unlocked PvP will be on equal footing to a level 80 player decked out in high-end gear, so who wins will be purely a matter of skill, not gear or level. Apart from talent choices, every warrior will be as powerful as every other warrior, every white mage as powerful as every other white mage, and so on and so forth.

Appearance

FF14's equivalent to the Skin/Outfit system is called Glamours. It functions relatively similarly to GW2's system, allowing you to use a different appearance than your current item's, at the cost of a consumable. The main differences are:

• You do not have a list of unlocked skins. You can store an item's skin in a type of storage called Glamour Dressers, but that is limited to 400 skins, and storing one requires payment of a Glamour Prism
• You can only use a skin of lower or equal level than the item on which you are applying it.
• You must be able to use the item whose skin you are applying.
• Glamour Prisms can be crafted by players rather than being mainly purchased at the store.

The dye system is based on consumable dyes rather than unlockable dyes.

User interface customization

FF14's user interface offers plenty of built-in customization options. You can choose between a dark theme, light theme, or retro Final Fantasy blue theme. You can also move, resize, and customize individual elements.

Rules and Enforcement

Mind your attitude when interacting with other players. Square-Enix is significantly more stringent than most companies when it comes to policing player behaviour, especially with regards to harassment and toxicity. A permanent record is kept of all violations, and repeat offenders are punished more severely. More details may be found here.

Being nasty to "sprouts" (New players, named for the icon that appears next to their names) is punished especially harshly, so don't do it.

Also, vote kicking (Called "vote dismiss" in FF14) a player without justification is a punishable offense, and the vote dismiss prompt displays a warning to that effect.

Damage meters and other third-party addons

There is no official addon support, and damage meters and other third party software are against the terms of service.

It should be noted that especially among high-end players doing difficult content, such as Savage and Ultimate raids, it is common for them to use third party damage meters (which shall remain unnamed in this guide), even showing them on stream, and Square-Enix tends to turn a blind eye to such usage, so long as they aren't bothering anyone else. If you choose to do this, do not mention them in game, and especially do not meter-shame other players, even if their performance is absolutely awful.

Report toxic behaviour!

As previously mentioned, Square-Enix is much more stringent than most companies, including ArenaNet with regards to policing player behaviour. Many acts of harassment and griefing that may have been ignored in other games will not be tolerated in FF14.

Here are some examples of toxic behaviour that is punishable and should be reported:

• Insulting players and telling them to uninstall the game
• Posting story spoilers in any non-private chat channel, including the Novice Network
• Telling players that their DPS sucks and to f---ing Google their job rotation (This also violates the ban on damage meters)
• Kicking players from groups without justification
• Pressuring new players to skip cutscenes in group content such as dungeons
• Offensive or inappropriate names (This includes names for player characters, chocobos, free companies, player houses, apartments, airships, submersibles, etc.)
• Griefing via in-game mechanics, such as deliberately aiming a boss cleave to kill the party or using Rescue to pull a player into deadly AoE
• Rolling Need on an item after having previously agreed to only roll Greed
• Win trading, match fixing, or deliberately losing in PvP
• Racial, ethnic, religious, homophobic, ableist, or other slurs
• Real money trade

To report a player, open a support ticket through the Help menu. Square Enix generally responds to reports within less than an hour, so stick around if you can.