WoW Refugee to FFXIV Heavensward Part 7:
After 15 years of World of Warcraft, I finally took the plunge to try FFXIV around 2 months ago and it was the best decision I’ve made. This game is absolutely incredible and I’m so glad I’ve become a WoW refugee and found a new home in FF14.
As always this will contain heavy spoilers for Heavensward
If you enjoy this content I do stream 3-4 times a week on Twitch from 7pm:
https://www.twitch.tv/medievalmarty
I’ve already completed an 18 part series through FF14 ARR and this is part 7 of the FFXIV Heavensward series. The majority of this video is going through the Warring Triads and the content leading on from 3.0 to 3.3, including the dragonsong war, the huge dragon fight and the dungeons and raids in between. Heavensward story has completely thrown me, I never expected such an incredible story in an MMORPG and didn’t even realise FFXIV could make me this invested in such a small amount of time.
Really hope you’re still enjoying these FFXIV reaction and progress videos – please let me know in the comments if you want to see anything in its own video, FFXIV warring triads video, 3.3 reaction video, or anything like that, as we do have it all streamed and recorded that I’d be happy to put up in here!
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
1:05 Warrior Of Darkness
3:30 Journey through heavensward
5:30 Antitower is SCARY
8:55 Warring Triads
16:05 Cute Coffee Shop
18:20 Sohr Khai
20:30 3.3 Was AMAZING
24:15 Outro
source
Minfilia is a product of a bad writing in 2.0. You are not alone, most of the FF 14 players hate her and think that she should change fate with Moenbryda (instead of Moen that gave her life as an aether source, it should be Minfilia). The writer also realize that redemption for Minfilia is really hard, so they just throw her away in future expansion.
Paladin job quest is boring
The Antitower is my favorite HW dungeon and I absolutely LOVE Calcabrina. It was a boss in FF IV
I love this format, but I would also like to see some of your raw reactions to things
lol you can pronounce Hreavsalgr but not Tam Tara Deepcroft
Ah man, I remember running Sohr Khai for the first time. During the fight with Hraesvelgr our Tank DC'd and I, as a Monk, took over. Immediately turned on Riddle of Earth, a defensive buff, and proceeded to tank him. the healer pretty much left the other DPS, a dragoon if I am remembering correctly, die as the focused healed me. We even wound up winning. Most exciting dungeon I have ever run. It is great fun watching your playthroughs.
Calcabrina has given me nightmares since I was 13…
One of the things WoW refugees have a hard time wrapping their head around is that old areas in FFXIV are never completely obsolete. You'll be back.
Anyone that says Shadowbringers is "as good" at Heavensward is dramatically underselling Shadowbringers. HW is great, but ShB is so much more.
Much later in the game you get a few quests that cover the bits about Minfilia (and her connection to Thancred in particular).
If you do the 60-70 alchemist quests they focus on it as well. Also, if you search "1.0 uldah prologue" on YouTube you can see some of that too
I am once again requesting you to try Dark Knight. Best story quest. Also when 6.0 comes out, you should try to move your house to ishgard.
I just finished ShB, and I may be a minority, but I feel like Heavensward was much better for me. ShB is good but I resonate much more to the HW story beats and characters
Ayyy 7Sins was my first ever FC, good to see they're still kicking about on Twintania
The Warring Triads mythological ties are interesting as well.
Sephirot is a manifestation of God according to Medieval Hebrew myth.
Sophia is the manifestation of wisdom in various myths such as Hellenistic philosophy and religion, Platonism, Gnosticism, Orthodox Christianity and Esoteric Christianity.
As for Zurvan he is revered through Zurvanism as the god of infinite space and is one with all matter.
My theory is the three actually embody the pinnacles in might, mind and soul respectively.
Medieval Marty if you loved the triad you will love the Stormblood primals.
I do like these weekly highlights.. I don't think I could sit through a complete Alex clear.
HVN is amazing, to be sure.. SB will feel a lot slower – the pace is much different but it's still a wonderful story. Then you get to SHB.. which a lot of people call Feelsbringers for good reason.
The Kraken looks like a good Kingdom Hearts boss.
I definitely agree a large part of the Paladin job quests are very "okay." My favorite part of the storyline has always been the Gladiator's guild as I love the dynamic between Mylla and Aldis. They never fail to make me smile
And yeah, what you see of Minfilia at this point has been very bland. Her role as the Antecedent of the Scions is to direct everyone and do all the background tasks you never really see. Going through this helped me realize going to go see her made the Waking Sands and Rising Stones feel like home so finding out she was gone made them feel empty.
The Final Steps of Faith had me so hype and the cutscenes after had me a mess. Hearing Dragonsong always rouses those feels :')
I really like the summary format Marty, it's hard to find time for full playthroughs and this helps us get a better feel of what you're doing lately. I'm excited for what's to come and I hope you continue to have a good time
Calcabrina was a boss in FFIV. Same thing where the little dolls die and become the big one.
I like the Paladin Job questline, it's more Medieval Slice of Life than the Hardcore wreck everything around you quests that are most other job quests. It's there to give you some friends outside of the Scions, or so I feel. Just a nice chill break from the breakneck speed that is everything else. Ya gotta learn to slow down and enjoy the little breaks you get =3 cuz the story just ramps up. It's like Fishing! A lot of folk dislike fishing, and then there's folk like you that just absolutely love it =3
‘Some of you say Shadowbringers is better’
laughs in ShB trailer that’s 2 years old and still gets me emotional
Marty, you didn't play 1.0 so you didn't get the context around Minfilia's character. I've watched the cutscenes on YouTube so I know, but unless you're an original 1.0 player or you've also dug up those cutscenes, there's a lot of characterization for Minfilia that you just straight up don't get in ARR. It's kind of unfortunate that the dev team didn't roll more of the 1.0 story into ARR, but that's just the way it is.
Music for Warring Triad was some of my favorites.
seeing you start at the ocean fishing boat always cracks me up for some reason, the true endgame
Minfilia is the narrator of ARR, I always felt like she talked too much and I dislike her too LOL!! Heavensward is my husband's favorite, my is Shadowbringers. Congrats on finishing 3.3
Sophia normal is pretty easy to understand. She uses the Chimera mechanics, Aero is get out, Lightning is get in, avoid the head's charges, and the scales are pushed where there is more _weight_. Larger meteors count as two smaller. You just add it up and go where the weight is less.
6:32 I have a friend that also have pediophobia (aka, fear of dolls/manequins), and he froze at Calcabrina as well. So, without spoilers, you should brace yourself while going through the second NieR raid. It's called "Puppets' Bunker" for a reason.
9:25 That's the standard for this game: You get one set of trials on MSQ, then one set of trials with a separated storyline on patches, one 12-step raid, and 3 alliance raids. Everything with story to back up their existence, which is a shame that Binding Coils of Bahamut is the only 12-step raid (13, actually) without a "story difficulty" for people to watch the story without being carried or hardcoring.
15:24 What you didn't get about the Warring Triad (or didn't commented about in the video) is that they are a cameo from Final Fantasy 6. Usually, you can guess something is a cameo when you see which Garlean legion is around the same region. Eg, Project Meteor in 1.0 was led by the VII legion, and the team on Azys Lla is the VI legion, and so on. BTW, Gaius is the commander of the XIV legion, since he is the original big bad of ARR.
"It's so brutal for an MMO, in my opinion. I've just never seen that before; and they're not afraid to do it! To go down that road of poisoning and killing and…and just Evil People Doing Evil Things and Good People Saving The Day, and I really really like where the story's gone in Ishgard. Even when what I would say are the Lower Points are just so good!
….And then I think I found a cult???"
So good dude XD
But as for Minfilia. I've talked about this with my friends and we say that the character of Minfilia suffers from "Final Fantasy women writing" syndrome. Her premise is good, and she had the potential to be written very well, but she just….isn't. I think because we're put side by side with characters who come into battle with us, and fight and get to have cool combat cutscenes and Minfillia is the one who just Sits Behind The Desk and Organizes Everyone, she doesn't get as much time to shine as the others. But in further expansion packs and more characters that get introduced, the writing and characterization of other characters become just So much more interesting.
If you're interested in learning more about Minfilia before she was the Antecedent, the writer's team behind FFXIV release short stories about the characters on the website! Minfilia's story "The Walker's Path" gives you much more insight about her and her relationship with Thancred and the Scions that you don't get to see in the game.
Wonderful video as always though, Marty. Looking forward to the next one! (And sorry about the long comment)
Well done, keep it coming
You will get to know the Warrior of Darkness very well. Enjoy the rest of your playthrough.
The funny thing was, I fought that 'creepy' dungeon many times and i never realized it was unside down until you pointed it out!
Yeah I'd definitely recommend doing the extreme trials for the warring triad. I solo unsynch Sophia ex on a semi-regular basis not because there's any loot left that I still want, but just because I find the mechanics fun. Slip-and-slide go brrrrrr.
Okay so the scales on Sophia, she'll drop meteors on them (you can see them as tethers), and whichever side has more meteors has more weight and the whole arena will tip that way.