I’m happy to see such a warm reception from FFXIV community, and would like to respond with this contribution, aimed at my fellow WoW veterans and burnt out players who are considering to join our newbie ranks in Final Fantasy 14 in 2021.
The state of World of Warcraft as a game leaves a lot to be desired, and there is nothing wrong in finding a friendlier, more welcoming and promising home for all of us – lovers of MMORPG genre, who got used to many things in WoW over the years.
This Part 1 of my FFXIV Beginners Guide for WoW players contains 10 Starter Tips for Final Fantasy 14 that will surely help anyone brand new to the game, who wants to hear from another WoW player, using the same language, preferences and things we’re used to…
I hope this helps someone! ❤
📑 Table of Contents
00:00 – Intro
02:00 – Character and Class
03:50 – UI and Accessibility
05:25 – Maps and Getting Around
07:15 – Types of Quests
10:20 – Early Game Gear
12:00 – WoW-like Combat
13:30 – You need Macros!
14:35 – Hall of Novice
16:10 – Dungeons, preview
🔥 Let’s get connected! 🔥
https://twitter.com/gyrotexgaming
❤ HUGE THANK YOU for the Free Music by these amazing people:
NoCopyrightSounds: https://www.youtube.com/user/NoCopyrightSounds
#FFXIV #WoW #Refugees
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Ok, looks like I got a few things wrong in this guide (being a FFXIV noob and all) – thanks to all of you who pointed out these things! 👍
1️⃣ Sounds like we shouldn't be using mouseover macros in healing, as it leads to losing throughput on GCD…
2️⃣ UI is greatly customisable without any addons that we're used to relying on in WoW.
3️⃣ There apparently ARE quest arrows on Minimap, but I somehow didn't notice them… 🤷♀️
1. ARR story is meh
2. If you get a job boost while leveling you get a mount and unlocks most of the areas and dungeons. Makes leveling easier . As long as you plan to continue leveling a low level job it’s fine. You also get 100% XP boost for the lower job your leveling because you have a job at 70.
3. Find a free company ASAP for leveling buff
4. These are just a few tips I have discovered in the last few days.
Don't listen to anyone complaining about the macros here. Macros using mouseover, or target of target, are immensely useful and powerful, and will not destroy anything. They are pretty much a must-have. Macroing multiple abilities is an absolute no no, but simply macroing something to a mouseover is fine. Plenty of others use similar things, such as macroing targeted aoe abilities with a target macro to place it directly on the target, or to place it directly on the player, etc. These are perfectly fine, anyone who says otherwise is just repeating what someone told them about how macros are bad.
Also, healers are DPS. Everyone is a DPS. So yes, if you don't need to heal, spam that damage. Don't overheal, just because the tanks at 95% HP doesn't mean he needs a heal, do damage instead.
Would also like to add on to your map section you have the ability to flag a location it can help you find where to go in a area especially if your msq is just outside the current area
happy your enjoying your exprience
Hey there welcome to the game, I hope you'll have a good time here!
As a healer main I wanted to give you some advice (I played a bit healer in WoW aswell). In FF healing works a bit different that WoW but you'll experience that yourself. I just say that if there is nothing to heal in a dungeon you can utilize your dps spells to help the party 🙂 You'll have several Heal over time effects and instant heals which gives you more freedom from the 2.5 s GCD.
Edit: FATEs will give you other currecies which will be important. And if you unlock the challenge log (you can look up how to do that), completing 5 fates gives you extra XP. It is good for levelling alt classes/jobs.
The UI is kind of not great on the PC, but remember it has to work on a PS4/5 too. I also think WoW's UI isn't super great without add-ons, which alas because of the console ports aren't likely to ever happen in FFXIV. It's fine once you're used to it.
Macroing gets real complex in FFXIV because of the way it interacts with other systems. And alas in most cases you shouldn't really be using them for combat abilities. They're honestly fine while levelling but having to unlearn having them in the late game can be pretty painful. Oddly it's the same "problem" WoW used to have around TBC but they fixed it.
Healing high end you're expected to basically be a dps that occasionally heals, and healers can hit real hard (around 70% of a real dps). At the highest tier of raiding the GCD is only used for damage abilities and all your healing is done via OGCD tools (for which you will eventually get many). Many healing encounters have huge spikes but then periods of relative nothing, so you can actually just let hots do their work. But don't sweat that kind of playstyle until it matters (likely never), just fill downtime with dps and you'll be good.
Aggro is very much old school WoW, so "overhealing" causes the same threat. So be careful about leaving hots running on tanks during pulls as you'll make a lot of new friends (one of which isn't the tank). Fine once they have aggro of course.
The game gets SOOO much better, kind of a shame people have to survive ARR to get to the great stuff.
if yall wanna be toxic you can keep your asses in WoW, thats a tip
Aww… lovely sprouts… such great things await you. Enjoy the journey.
Don't know if it's been said to you yet but regarding fates:
Once you join a grand company you start earning company seals which can purchase alot of stuff as well are used for squadrons later.
Some fates drop items including gear depends on the specific fate it's self. Not all fates are equal.
Some quests have you doing certain fates, depending on the quests this can be rather random and at times annoying.
And there are loads of other things but those are the main stand outs. They really are like wq and like wq the can be really random.
Some FATEs have special rewards or are used in special quests, but mostly they're for grinding XP on alts.
WRT healer dps: at low levels it might seem like you need to heal all the time when you only have a few skills at low level, but as you hit max level + endgame raiding, healer DPS is expected to be a lot more important than I ever saw it in WoW (through WoD). You get more situational healing abilities that are off the GCD, which lets you spend more time focusing on DPS with GCD abilities if you're smart about how you use them. With enough gear most fights can be cleared with non-dpsing healers, but at the high end healers will put out >50% of a focused DPS class's DPS. Not a big deal before endgame, but probably worth mentioning for anyone who wants to roll a healer class in XIV and expects to just be healing 24/7 forever.
For traveling before you get a mount (or if you just want to get taxied), talk to every Chocobo Keeper you encounter in all places with the big Aether crystal – these Keepers are like the Flightmasters in WoW: rent a chocobo and travel to another city. OR you can rent a chocobo and ride on your own whereever you want – but if you interact with something or enter fight, you automatically dismount and your rented chocobo is gone till you rent another.
The reason you play other jobs is simple: its fun. And comes with the big advantage that you dont have to create a whole new character with which to play the entire MSQ again (which isnt a bad thing but as in every other game, it gets tiresome after the first time). Many players have two or three jobs aligned and level them up simultanously because the MSQ gives an insane amount of XP – if you level after you're finished there, you have to look for alternative methods (like side-quests, beast-tribes, leves, fates, dungeons and dungeon-roulett). Another thing why additional jobs are useful: your own gameplay improves if you have a feeling for the other jobs and their individual strenghs and weaknesses. Sometimes your current job is just boring or you dont like your started job ("I picked gladiator because SWORD, and apparently I'm a tank now…" – fear not, just switch so another job as soon as you hit lvl10) and you want to try out something else.
Follow the MSQ, yes, thats good advice. But dont stick to it slavishly. Look around, maybe pick up a gathering job. The blue-and-golden unlock quests are for numerous features, some related to raids and beast tribes, others to just fun stuff like the hairdresser or the glamour (aka Transmog) system. These quests also unlock the other jobs, battle jobs and crafting/gathering jobs. Just interact with the NPC and the title says something like "So you want be a …". So, look around you when going about your MSQ-questing and take your time.
FATEs. Yes, in the beginning they only give XP and gil – but later, when you join a Grand Company (dont worry, its mandatory so you'll get there) they also reward you with socalled Company Seals. With them you can in the end "buy" your first mount, get emotes, armor, weapons, even furniture for your appartment (even if you cant affort your own house, for 500k you can buy a singleroom appartment – however, this is not possible if you are on a Free Trial). And venture-currency, for your retainers. FATEs dont give gear or weapons. The reward currency changes according to the expansion. And, as I said, they are good when you level up a new job without the MSQ.
In early gameplay, you dont really have to bother with gear. The dungeons are toned down (from what I've heard from veterans) and the worst thing that can happen is you're not as efficient. Jobs and role specific gear will only start in the Heavensward expansion.
Slower GCD: you can influence it with Materia aka gems. But not all jobs profit of that: like some WoW Vanilla classes profit from a slower weapon, the same holds true in FF14. A Summoner i.e. keeps his fingers off spellspeed, while a Black Mage wants to have a much as possible (sort of, there is a benchmark where too much speed hinders your dmg output). Also, you later get more skills off-GCD to weave inbetween, so weaving and double-weaving are important features (and also the reason you dont use macros…).
A bit longer then I thought, but hey, if you put in the effort to make a video, I can put in the effort to write a thing or two… or seven… 🙂
Regarding FATE rewards – early on, FATE's are just an xp source. Eventually when you unlock your Grand Company – which is kind of an NPC military order based in one of the three starting city states – you'll be able to acquire company seals from doing FATE's. These in turn can be traded into your GC quartermaster for all sorts of stuff from xp-boosting consumables to gear to crafting materials to stuff that can act as a steady source of income via the market board. Some FATE's do give rewards for a gold completion, with one notable early game example being the giant ochu FATE in the Eastern Shroud, east of the Hawthorne Hut just south of the friendly Sylph town. This particular fate rewards a minion if completed with a gold rating. Other similar FATE's exist throughout ARR, but it's not until 50 that you start finding rare FATE's with longer (24hr+) spawn timers that reward tokens to purchase rarer stuff.
These rewards are all almost entirely cosmetic and include glamour items, minions and mounts.
Once you reach the 5.0 areas though the FATE system takes on a new role with the addition of what's called "bi-color gemstones." These are special FATE currency awarded in addition to any other rewards a FATE would give, and can be used to exchange with a local zone vendor for stuff like orchestrion rolls, crafting materials, minions and other stuff. Doing a set number of FATE's in an area (6 and then 60) unlocks additional levels of goods from the vendor. It creates a solid incentive to spend time doing FATE's in the 5.0 zones as the currency can be used to purchase exclusive items that can't be acquired anywhere else. Once attaining maximum rank in all of the 5.0 areas you get access to two additional vendors in the 5.0 cities that stock the rarest stuff, including chocobo bardings to change the look of your choco. My hopes is that they'll continue the bi-color gemstone approach in 6.0 as it took FATE's from something that – for a lot of players – was just kinda there into a much more regular, relevant activity.
My ADD having brain froze at the mention of "a metric mile"
So I actually kind of laughed a bit when you said that the Brand New Ring was a "massive" increase to your leveling speed. 30% is peanuts compared to how insane EXP bonuses can get in FFXIV.
First, the game does have Rested EXP. Whenever you see a crescent moon icon next to your EXP bar, that means you're gaining Rested EXP. Rested EXP is a +50% bonus to Combat EXP.
Then, the game also has something called the "Armory Bonus." The Armory Bonus is +100% increase to EXP earned from combat, Leves, and FATEs on all Jobs that aren't your highest level Job until you hit level 70, at which point it becomes +50% EXP.
Then, you have the Road to 70 Buff. Basically, whenever Square notices that a server's population is starting to get a bit low, they mark that Server as a "Preferred World" and anyone who creates a character on that Server gets a buff called "Road to 70." It's a +100% bonus to ALL EXP earned whenever on any job below level 70. It lasts for 30 days and if you get a Job to level 30 before the buff expires, you also get 1,000,000 Gil.
Then, every time a new Expansion is coming out, they give anyone who pre-orders the next Expac a pair of earrings that give a +30% buff to Combat EXP earned up until the current level Cap (for example, the next Expac will increase the level cap to 90, and the earrings given for pre-ordering give an EXP bonus up to level 80).
Finally, eating food also gives you some minor stat buffs and +3% EXP from kills
And all of these bonuses stack (additively, not multiplicatively). if you have all of these EXP bonuses, plus the Brand New Ring, you'd get +313% Exp from kills, +200% EXP from FATEs and Leves (+150% after level 70), and +100% EXP from everything else.
Well as a healer i would probably recommend to avoid macros unless they are used to quick cast ground circles and swiftcast combos ex. all healers can battleres in FFXIV but ressurections are a 10 Sec cast so we usually combine it with quick cast(Natures Swiftness).
The reason for this are the spellqueue system(antilag system). When you use macros some commands interfer with that queue system making you lose valuable time. So I'd recommend you learn how to use the cast@targets-target toggle instead. This allows you to quicker weave in multiple heals or swap from healer to dps. Healers in FFXIV are afterall expected to deal damage, once you get used to the game you are dpsing way more then you are healing especially in bigger group content.
One big point I disagree with in the video is the fact that you said not to dps too much as a healer. That's not quite true. You are encouraged to dps as much as possible and just heal the tank whenever he gets low.
Did you just click through an MSQ? That was painful 😄
I know there is a hidden function in fates where if you do a certain string of them it can unlock a harder world quest. And those sometimes give you stuff you can turn in for minions, mounts, glamour items, or titles.
I dont agree with your ui comment at all.
The HUD and UI in ffxiv is extremely fluid and customizable. And in WoW you are basically required to implement mods into the game to make stuff better. In FFXIV most of those mods are just built into the game.
Keep in mind that this game is built with thr idea that 50% of players will be playing with a gamepad. And with this everything is very easy to play this game with a gamepad with all functions, even the map and others, accessible by a simple button press.
As a person who's been healing since 2.3
Ive never used a macro and never found the need to use the macro.
biggest and most important tip = do not go to ffxiv expecting it to be like wow . it is not wow if it was wow you would be leaving it to play something else. so do not expect it to be wow that is counter productive . ( from a personal standpoint the idea of me me me and treating others as npc's is an entirely toxic point of view so one myst know the community is very much alive and personal expectations are just that personal not law so do not subject others to it as law no different then real life )
For new players I recommend to level one job to max, this is because there is a hidden "veteran experience buff" that means any other job gets a buff in experience based on the highest level you have in another job. Sure, you are welcome to try other jobs, I went from MNK to SAM which I leveled to max before I started to level up the others.
The UI is not just super customizable, it can be assigned to a job with a macro. For example, on my healer jobs I use UI 2 which brings player frames closer, and any other job used UI 1 which is pretty much the same, but with the player frames far in the top left corner. I do not do a lot of RP, but if I did I could assign UI3 with some different hotbar positions, a job and a glamour plate. These are the moments when macros shine.
I have a tip: when you see a damage area move away, and when it disappears you can go back to your position even if the boss or mob hasn't done its attack, the moment the area disappear you are not affectedby the attack, only if you stayed there. This is also true the opposite, if you stay until the area disappears and move away, you'll get the damage regardless if you telephoned to Kualalumpur. The area of damage is just an indication of what is going to happen and that you need to move. Some areas last less than others, with time you'll learn them and plan accordingly. This is particularly useful for melee dps with positional combos.
Also, the skills you cast go off a bit before their cast time allowing you to move away from a damage area and still cast that cure you need. It takes some practice, but you'll see how more effective a healer you become with this simple trick.
I disagree with the point of needing to use macros.. you just have to train a bit..
Healers do use some "macros" to announce things to other healers in higher level content. Basically "I'm raising x" so there's only one healer per dead person casting a long cast-time spell. I'm sure experts on this would explain how they use it — it might just be an announcement macro that they hit after starting the spell or something. (I play dps, not healers)
Aren't you the host of Hot Ones?
Personally I recommend starting on a tank job, something like Marauder or Gladiator is the perfect starting job. they are fairly easy to play and you have very high survivability and do decent damage. once you get to level 80 sand finish the main story, you can play anything else you might like. personally, I'm playing a Gloadiator/paladin at the moment, then I'll switch to Dark knight at level 50 and level that to maximum. Of course, if you are more of a dps person, then by all means pick something else. Archer/bard is fun too.
gonna disagree on the requirement of macros. Been playing for about a year and never needed one. In fact, i dont run anything on ff14. Never felt the need for them. Granted, i dont run extremes, but even in raiding I've never felt like it was impossible to react fast enough. You have an entire list of players you can click on based on missing hp right on your screen. If i was ever unable to keep up, it was usually because i wasnt prepared properly or wasnt burning the right cooldowns(thin air and presence of mind, for instance) and you can even burn a swiftcast cooldown for an instant rez
You are so well spoken.
You are amazing dude
I have to say 90min in and all I've done is read dialog boxes… so far I am unimpressed, bored and hungry
Seen a lot of comments about macros and they're right. As for the healing: It IS admittedly harder in lower level dungeons as everyone has a smaller toolkit to work with, but it IS absolutely fine to throw in damage whenever you can. Unless there is constant groupwide damage going out, people dont need to be healed immediatly, at least waiting out a GCD is fine usually. Usually suggested rule of thumb is ABC – always be casting. If no heals need to be casted, cast a damage spell.
It's fine on your first few levels because as said, smaller toolkit means fewer options, and a new healer will probably have limited "feeling" for what is safe and what isn't. But that's a bad mindset to keep up for midlevel to maxlevel. Take your time getting used to healing and getting a feel for it but remember that what expected of you is to deal damage
If someone is dying because you were casting a damage spell and is dying during the same rolling GCD either you did something wrong beforehand (i.e. leaving people at 20% health) or they did (i.e. standing in the bad).
(healers can do about 50% damage of a DPS class in endgame! If that means the fight ends earlier and/or it safes you from hard enrage, that's very good)