(image above mithra (cat girls) scholar - wearing scholar relic gear - think school girl outfit...dirty yes i know.)
It really is true; once you leave you can never go back. About a month ago, I had an urge to play Final Fantasy XI again. What can I say I was feeling nostalgic? Comparing FFXI to WoW is like comparing apples to oranges, but many feel the need to try and dangit I will as well.
Why am I saying once you leave you can never go back?
When I went back to the world of Vana’diel for a brief stay, I was shocked as how I was not used the graphics anymore…
Sure when I was playing it the graphics were great and I would look at WoW and say…damn WoW looks horrible. However, with the ability to ramp up the appearance of WoW, I had to say FFXI looked kind of funny to me. WoW has the “cartoony” kind of feel I had grown accustomed to. FFXI had the more 3rd realistic look going on. (As if any game could look realistic lol)
General chat/Trade Chat/Names
FFXI the general chat for the most part is only full of people looking for teleports and LFM for various missions. There is no real stupid conversation going on in the general channels…if there is…..it is shut down fast. Things are a lot quieter in the towns of Vana’diel. There is no WTS or WTB shouts as well. No shouts about ninja this, ninja that (well sometimes but not often). Not very interesting to watch.
WoW on the other hand is a plethora of expletives, rude comments, and anything under the sun going on in trade chat. Things that one should not say in everyday talk are thrown out there, like it is common day vernacular. However, it can be VERY VERY entertaining.
One thing in common is some player’s desire for an unusual name, example Stabbie in WoW would be XxxStabbiexxX in FFXI. /facepalm (I do admit Orangeslice is an unusual name)
Alts and characters
In FFXI, I had no desire for an alt or to make a new character. On one character I had all the skills and jobs I could level at my fingertips.
http://www.ffxiah.com/player.php?id=1022563
My monk (this was the job i logged out in) if i had to grade it, i would give myself a B. I could have upgraded to the black belt (but I aint camping no world bosses for the 3 items needed 72 hr respawn rate), and a brutal earring. But other then that i really had most of the items a monk needed.
This was my character in FFXI, 75 white mage (healer – good single target, good AoE heals and HoTs), 75 ninja (evasion tank, although no one uses ninjas anymore), Warrior (2 handed weapon DPS), 75 ranger (think hunter without the pet), 75 Monk (punching and kicking stuff to death is fun – could also tank certain things). If I got sick of a certain job or the Linkshell (guilds in FFXI) needed a certain job I could swap on the fly.
The issue with this system, is if you got sick of your character, it was a PAIN the in the ass to get back to the same level if you were to make a new character.
When you start out you have no subjob (if you see the link above I was last logged in as a 75 mnk/37 nin), you do not gain the ability to have a subjob till you hit level 18. So as you can see your SJ is half of your main jobs level. Depending on your “Main job” you would need to lvl certain SJ to not be a gimp.
With the example of monk, a player needs to have the following jobs leveled to a minimum of 37. Ninja (VERY EXPENSIVE TO LEVEL), Warrior, and White Mage (only for 1 fight did you really need this SJ). Oh yes and dancer for soloing stuff.
While for Warrior (as main) one needed the subjobs of ninja, thief, and samurai.
So as you can see it can take some time to get to 75 as you need the appropriate sub jobs for the given situation. Now you could just take the most common sub job for your main job and get to 75, but then for endgame content you will need to get the other sub jobs leveled.
Another issue with making a new character was one had to earn your way back into certain areas of and endgame content. For access to “sky” bosses one had to get through mission 17 in the expansion Rise of the Zilart, for “sea” bosses and Limbus – one had to get past mission 7 in the Chains of Promethia expansion. Both sets of missions cannot be knocked out in a day and requires a decent party of players. Mission length can vary from a few minutes to hours.
So for many….you stuck with your character as you had a long road ahead of you.
While in WoW…I can have a load of alts and not have to worry about limit breaks (FFXI you are initially capped at 50, then you have to do a quest every 5 lvls to unlock 75), not having for the most part worry about having access to certain endgame content as it is all free to enter!! No requirements to gain entry. I was kind of shocked as to how “easy” it was to level. I could solo all the way to 80…wow….no more looking for experience points parties etc, I could quest till 80. Then again it also felt like cheating, somehow I was not really “earning” max level character. And your character is a one trick pony. Sure you have different specs, but you cannot become Zugzuug the disc priest all of a sudden.
Combat/Endgame content/Equipment
One thing of annoyance for me at least is the constant outdating of gear in WoW…new patch comes out…get new gear…new expansion comes out…get new gear. It cycles over and over it seems. Although, I admit, new purples are always nice. And the new looking gear is sweet looking.
FFXI much of the gear that came out in the 1st expansion Rise of the Zilart is still comparable to gear that is out now in its most recent expansions. FFXI seems to get the right balance and relevance of older content with older content. WoW old content is dead and redundant once something new hits the streets.
For equipment looks low lvl to about max lvl gear FFXI > WoW as far as looks. When it comes to endgame gear in WoW kicks the shit out FFXI’s gear look. (However, both games pale in comparison to the equipment look and character models in Aion)
Macros for WoW is like a foreign language and if it was not for ArI would have never figured it out. And to a large extent I still don’t get it.
Macros in FFXI were to me at least were a lot simpler.
/nin “Utsusemi: Ni”
/echo recast
What this macro would let me do is recast the spell and tell me when it is available for use again.
Combat in FFXI…we did not have any addon’s like grid, clique or DBM. If a mob was using
ability….you had best be better paying attention and run or do something to interrupt it.
Combat in WoW…I am sure you could play without addons…but they really do make the game easier to handle, not easier to play.
Crafting
I absolutely have nothing good to say about the crafting in FFXI. NOTHING.
Crafting in WoW is relatively painless and 1000000000X better then in FFXI. Nuff said.
After playing WoW….FFXI seems old and static…and in essence it had…many of the boss fights are simple tank and spank. Bosses don’t do anything too crazy…./yawn. When I logged into FFXI last…I sat around and really didn’t do anything…I did a few dynamis runs…but was boring….not the same excitement it was…..old and dependable is what FFXI is….guess I need something that is fast and unpredictable…lol like WoW I guess. FFXI is a grind, plain and simple, WoW is brisk walk thru the park.
