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 Post subject: Starting Zone Discussions
PostPosted: Sat Sep 04, 2010 11:06 am 
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So!

I'm at work, and you all are having a 2 hour maintenance, so I figured I'd ramble on about my thoughts of the starting zones.

I've spent the most time in Limsa, and it was a pretty area with a confusing town and annoying NPC accents. But it was workable, and I think in our closed beta testing, we really found some nice exp areas (Sheep, Jellyfish Crystal, etc)

In Open Beta, I started off in Gridania, as many of you did, too. The town I think is less confusing than Limsa, but still fairly spread out. The forest environment is pretty, the rivers are nice and peaceful, but I think this place is going to be majorly crowded, due to the aforementioned "prettiness factor".

I decided to walk towards Limsa from Gridania last night, and passing through Ul'dah, I do have to say "wow". The surrounding Ul'dah zone was actually way more pretty than I originally thought it would be. Sure, it's a deserty-type zone, but I think they actually did a pretty cool job at making it look pretty.

What are all your thoughts on the starting towns so far? Seems like it's easy enough to walk between them, so I don't think we need to worry about all starting in the same town when it goes live, but I'm just curious people's thoughts.

I very well may start in Ul'dah. It seemed like a very relaxing town compared to the other. And the music of the surrounding area was also very nice. I think I'd probably opt to spend my time there doing gathering-related classes, simply for the environment.

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PostPosted: Sat Sep 04, 2010 11:56 am 
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i want to start where it's less crowded.

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PostPosted: Sat Sep 04, 2010 12:01 pm 
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Uldah seems very crowded right now. Though i have nothing to base that on. Running to Limsa now to see something different.


Server are back up BTW


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PostPosted: Sat Sep 04, 2010 12:03 pm 
Star-Spangled Subligar
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Im headed back to LL right now. The crowds dont bother me, but Ive gone from 1-15 a few times there so I figure ill grind quick here and head to a new town later.

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PostPosted: Sat Sep 04, 2010 12:06 pm 
Honey Muffin
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I rolled various races/jobs in all 3 cities trying to keep open minded on what would work for me and what doesn't. I'm still extremely baffled how difficult they made all the starter zones regardless of where you are. I'm far more sensitive on game difficulty is as I have almost no patience so my review likely will sound whiney.

Limsa

The city itself was a bit too large and windy. It wasn't particularly attractive either. I liked the story involving a large sea serphant, but pirates were sort of boring.
The outside area really killed it for me with the annoying to navigate ledges everywhere. I didn't enjoy having to walk 5 minutes around a gorge to get to what the map displays shoudl be directly across from you.
Granted, the mobs placed around are the best to level with of all 3 cities. There were plenty of places around the camps to helm from which was good. If you don't mind the learning curve of the maps associated iwth it, its probably the best place at launch to level quickly from.


Gridania

I had high hopes for Gridania, until SE mentioned it was within a maze. And it maze it surely is.

The city is spread out, but its really not difficult and actually quite cozy. I wish the NPCS didn't believe you were the bringer of doom and destruction though. But likely, when you can do more story line, that will change.
The city also has all the guilds I'd likely use, but I'm not quite certain what purpose they hold just yet.
The outside area though......I just can't emotionally deal with being in a constant state of lost heh. Despite it supposing to be a gorgeous forest, I feel most the time in either the city or the outter zone, that I'm just running in narrow corridors and not seeing much of any enviroment at all. Sure, there's very small open areas scattered here and there, but most are full of either other players or far too high level mobs. On the subject of mobs, making the starter ones poisonous really slowed me down in leveling.

The story is a little strange and I can't quite place if I enjoyed it or not. The two npc's you meet at the start were rather cute, and I like the bar tender. But most the npc's keep reminding me that they don't want me there, and I really don't want to be there either.

Uldah

I really thought that I'd hate Uldah and love Gridania, boy did I have that backwards.

The opening was rather dramatic, and I really like the npc characters introduced. I have a feeling that the over all story may heavily delve into beastmen tribes, which I'm not too much interested in.

The city itself isnt very pretty, and the music is that of a shopping mall, but everything was very well laid out. From the bar/inn that you're dumped at from the start, almost everything you need is within a few steps of there which I really really liked.
The outside zone isnt much to speak of. However, its the only zone that felt open to me. Even if there were rises in the terrain, the system let me drop down from making it very easy for me to walk from point A to B without headaches. Neither music of the town or outter zone seems to match, may have to change the files around when retail comes out.

I couldn't find hardly any mobs to fight, I'm not sure if that's because most people settled in there or if its by design for it being a desert.



That being said, I'll probably start in Uldah, and probably do most my leveling in Limsa if its still mostly vacant at retail. Uldah was just the only place of the three which I felt I could find something if i needed it, or I could get back home from exploring outside without having to restort to porting. I haven't tried any helm there as of yet in Uldah so I hope there's enough points for harvesting.

I'm not really in love with any of the cities or zones. Making each so frustrating makes me feel the entire game will be and makes me quickly lose interest. Ishgard better be damn awesome, so I can bail out of the starter cities as soon as possible and hang out there.


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PostPosted: Sat Sep 04, 2010 12:22 pm 
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Kioko,

A lot of what you say makes complete sense. I was disappointed with the narrowness of Gridania's open area. I mean, it's a forest, and if it were to be wide open, it'd be a plain instead, but still... It did seem a bit too narrow for me.

And the ease of traveling between the towns really isn't that bad. It's sort of like making the Jeuno walk of FF11 time-wise, but without constantly worrying about goblins and aggro along the way.

I'm going to try real hard to find a Lighthouse Sheep like place for Gridania and Ul'dah. Finding a good place to quickly grind out to 10 on the starting war/magic classes you need to level I think will really be key. Fighting with other players for start up monsters will be terribly annoying.

Also, it does seem as if the Levequest timer is drastically shorter this time around. I'm not sure if it's by design for testing purposes, or it's how it's going to be live. But people are posting 6 hour waits, or even just doing the Gridania ones, then going to Ul'dah to do 8 more there and then go to Limsa and do 8 more. Something to keep in mind.

But definitely I'm interested in getting a good feel for doing the starting ranks as quickly as possible on live to just sort of separate myself from the pack at launch. We should all keep an eye out for good little Exp gems, like the Lighthouse Sheep and the Jellyfish Crystal and keep a list of them (and their level ranges).

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PostPosted: Sat Sep 04, 2010 12:34 pm 
Honey Muffin
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That's a good idea Rid :)

As for Gridania's forest, I dont mind it being cramped in or even having narrow pathes if the pathes weren't always between two rock walls. Why not have a tight path between a thick grouping of trees and shrubbery?
I have a feeling all the rock walls has something to do with the loading strain of all the greenery. Will have to ask Ket about it later.

I do like the creepy music for the forest, I wasn't expecting that at all. Actually, I was pretty sure that Uldah's telephone newage hold music would have been the forest zone music. But it works for me.
For some reason it reminds me a lot of Sephiroth. >.>


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PostPosted: Sat Sep 04, 2010 12:53 pm 
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I'm going to have to poke around Ul'dah a bit more, because I wasn't put off by the music. It felt it relaxing. It reminded me of quietly fishing in FFXI, for whatever reason. I guess maybe elevator music can't be that bad all the time. hehe.

I did hear what I thought were wolves howling every now and then. That was pretty interesting.

As for the rock loading thing, yes. It's much easier on resources to load a nice, flat shaped rock and slap a texture on it than it is to deal with multiple different shapes of lots of visual objects. Especially with the viewing distance provided by having an upper "canopy" section overlooking lower elevation spots that they do have all over the place.

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PostPosted: Sat Sep 04, 2010 1:02 pm 
Honey Muffin
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I'll help too, if I can ever get the last 1% of this patch complete haha. It's been almost an hour, silly SE.


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PostPosted: Sat Sep 04, 2010 1:52 pm 
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Try doing that thing suggested in other thread. Kitty (tehkai) and I do it, and it works wonders. we just download the updates with utorrent now

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PostPosted: Sat Sep 04, 2010 2:24 pm 
Honey Muffin
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I got the update via a zip file. Playing with a friend on a new character in uldah. We're going to go exploring in a bit. Anyho in that general area whom can give me a pearl?


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