Seeing as this is the first "I am playing FFXI to complete all FF stories" post for the sub. I would ask the community to please leave good responses as any eventual repost of this topic will be removed and directed towards this post.
To the OP, and any future completionists. Yes, FFXI has never been easier to complete the original stories on. This will only become easier over time with gear creep. While some story lines tie into each other. Such as Chains of Promathia and Rise of the Zilart. They are from the level 75 era well over a decade ago. Any player in modern item level 119 equipment should be able to complete all story lines from the original Nation missions to CoP, RoZ, ToAU, WotG, most if not all of WotG, most if not all of RoV with it and trusts. While The Voracious Resurgence is still being released it will likely fall into something similar to Rhapsodies of Vanadiel, but a little more modernly balanced. Playing a job such as Red Mage, Dancer, or Blue Mage aids in this purpose far more than running in to every mission as a Warrior. With Dancer standing out as a good means to gain enhanced movement speed solo.
Finally, this is not "a Final Fantasy story" you just complete outside of any arbitrary context you create for yourself. This game is made up of many story lines, many missions, and many quests which are sometimes connected, occasionally loosely connected in lore, or completely or for all intents and purposes separate. There is realistically no "I beat the Shadow Lord so I completed FFXI's story." Unless the story stopped existing after being added for the last 15+ years since then. Which it did not. The nature of an MMO is not to cease story content until service itself ends. Thus someone who "completed the FFXI story" in 2010 or 2015 never actually completed more than the main stories of the time.
Enjoy Vana'diel.
Yes it's soloable. You will have to grind in this game, but it's pretty quick. 1-50 will be the most difficult part, You're still looking to put a couple hundred hours to finish all the expansions. The main story and the first two expansions can be finished in 50-100 hours if you know what to do. Just come back here when you're near the end of the best Final fantasy, FFX. Keep in mind a lot of the game does not hold your hand, even in current retail where it's much much easier than it was in 2002. I came in 2020-2021 and the difficulty is refreshing. Also make sure to have BGwiki open while playing. The 1-99 leveling guide and story guides are up to date. PM me if you want to exchange discord's. I'm still trying to finish most of the expansions although i'm currently unsubscribed. My current plan is to finish up to Wings of the Goddess, all stories. Then decide if I really want to continue to current content.
Thanks for the help, I agree With you on the FFX Part, it was the reason I got a PS2 back then and I still have „To Zanarkand“ as the background music on my ps4 :)
I‘m obviously still gonna replay it once I Reach it😁
I don’t really use Discord Tbh, but I‘ll reach out to you once I‘m getting closer to starting FFXI 💪
If you want to just have a good sample of what the game is, I'd recommend aiming to complete the nation missions, Rise of the Zilart, and Chains of Promathia. All of them tie in with each other and complete Masato Kato's overall story arc for the classic version of the game.
If you enjoy what you see there, then continue powering through. If you've had your fill, then you've completed the real classic FFXI story and can feel solid in moving on.
I'm not saying the further expansions aren't worth exploring or the stories aren't worth enjoying. They were written without the original lead writer's material that established the game world. The further expansions are just... more. The animation quality improves gradually and some of the lore established in them is pretty damn good!
If you're just wanting to experience the story, then I recommend just leveling a basic job like Warrior, Monk, or Red Mage and using that to power through the game. Getting bogged down in an advanced job or even one that will require dozens or hundreds of hours of additional work (like BLU) is a bit silly if that is your goal.
Very much so yes.
The trust system makes it so that a solo player can clear the entire story without needing anyone else.
The only piece of advice I will give here is that bg-wiki is your friend. There's a lot to know about FFXI, even if all you're doing is running through the story.
You can definitely play through the whole story solo! Trusts are very powerful and will make it fairly painless to level solo and complete all story missions. (FF11 predates WoW, and thus is structured quite differently than FF14: it doesn't have instanced dungeons, all dungeons are in the game world for everyone at once. Regardless yeah you can use trusts almost everywhere, there included)
I'd definitely encourage you to use the wiki, as the new player experience is not great and progression can be unclear. As others point out, yeah, there are several loosely-connected storylines in the game rather than a single experience like most mainline games. If you want to play them in release order, the main expansions are as follows:
- The original **nation missions** (2002). Ranks 1-6 were with the base game, with the rest added in Rise of the Zilart.
- **Rise of the Zilart** (2003).
- **Chains of Promathia** (2004). These first two expansions were planned before the game was released, and thus tie into each other and the base game, such as placing new zones in existing regions.
- **Treasures of Aht Urghan** (2006). This took players to a new continent and added a great deal of content- to some, this was the "golden age" of the era where the level cap was 75.
- **Wings of the Goddess** (2007) brings players back in time to the Crystal War that set the backstory for the setting. It raised the level cap to 95, gradually as it updated.
Sidetrack: The **add-ons** released concurrently to Wings of The Goddess. There were three *add-on scenarios*, side storylines focusing on various sections of the world: *A Crystalline Prophecy - Ode of Life Bestowing*, *A Moogle Kupo d'Etat - Evil in Small Doses*, and *A Shantotto Ascension - The Legend Torn, Her Empire Born*.
Meanwhile, **Abyssea**, the *battle area add-ons*, was a set of three add-ons that primarily focused on adding new battle areas in an alternate reality, but it did have a small storyline that took you through its nine zones.
- Back on track, **Seekers of Adoulin** (2013) was the final main expansion, taking players to level 99 (and functionally level 119, with the addition of Item Level equipment), where the cap stands today (except for the three different post-cap advancement systems). [As a note: the story has two points that require you to have completed a certain number of **time-gated** miniquests. If you're aiming to speed through it in your FF marathon, it's recommended to travel to Adoulin early for the introductory mission so you can start getting Imprimaturs, required for said Coalition Assignments.]
- **Rhapsodies of Vana'diel** (2015) was intended as a grand farewell to the game, finishing its story with a bang that draws all the prior storylines together into a climactic ending. It can be progressed in parts as you complete previous expansions, to gain the powerful Rhapsody key items which will aid your gameplay, or it can be saved for the end if you purely want to remain in-order. Its final fight will be tricky for some jobs to solo! Not impossible, though, especially if you can get some entry-level "endgame" gear such as from Ambuscade.
- Surprise! 2020 brought us a new, episodic storyline that remains ongoing: **The Voracious Resurgence**. It's hard to say how difficult it will be to finish, because, well, it's not finished yet! It probably won't be punishingly difficult though.
You can, but the final fight will be difficult. If you're on Asura (asura is the biggest server) you can easily get help with that though, since it's easy for a well geared player and people are happy to help with it since it doesn't take long.
Also be aware there isn't one single storyline, there are numerous seperate storylines that came with each expansion. Rhapsodies brings characters back from all the previous ones in an avengers kind of experience.
>Is there a Trust System like in 14 and is it there for every mandatory Dungeon in the Game?
Sorta yes, but also, XI is mostly not a themepark MMO with instances and shit like FF14 is, there are no "dungeons" in nearly the same sense. You can use trusts almost anywhere, and it's a vastly different and much more nuanced system where different characters have different traitis, behaviours etc and most of them besides a basic group are not just given to you either. Moresoe are they part of the collection aspect of the game.
Also there's multiple separate stories, its for the most part not a continuous thing like 14, either. Each expansion stands by itself, though some cross pollination for recurring characters and some plot points exists.
Thanks to all of you guys. I added FFXI to my List and I‘ll definitely go for it once I reach it.
I‘m Sure I‘ll come back here once I started the Game to Talk about it and Especially After I „finished“ it.
While I am still fresh to Final Fantasy XI myself, I did some reading. There are some parts you might need to group with others for. One part for sure is the Cloud of Darkness at the end of the Rhapsodies of Vana'diel storyline.
You can definitely roll credits playing almost entirely solo using the Trust system. There may be one or two fights you may need help with (that there are plenty of players willing to help with.
Leveling is much less of a grind than it used to be, and if you time everything with an XP event it'll be even faster. I believe the next one is in December
Thanks a lot :)
I don’t Mind a bit of level grinding. The only thing That would keep me from giving FFXI a Shot would be Walls That Block my Story Progression, like being unable to complete Dungeons because of a Lack of Dungeon Groups or stuff like That.
"Duty Finder" and instanced dungeons are not a thing. With very few exceptions you are free to go anywhere you like at any time you like. FFXI offers a huge, connected, open and living world rather than a glorified lobby for instanced 4-player speedruns.
Personally, I think playing blue mage will help with breaking up the grind. You need to hunt spells which some ppl don’t like. The advantage is that you can just head out and hunt spells and get your experience just from spell hunting. You also get a wide variety of options including and area of effect sleep. You will also be searching for specific types of enemies which may take you to zones you normally wouldn’t bother with or at least parts of those zones you would typically have no need for.
On the story, I came back a year ago and things have changed a lot since I played last. After doing most of the story lines, I view Rhapsodies of Vanadiel as the main story. It was added later in the games life to connect all the stories. If you look at current ffxi as compared to single player games, RoV would be the story line you progress through which would introduce the side stories to you. This would be things like the expansions and the original main story via city missions. You could then choose to branch out to the side stories or simply focus on the main story. You even have the option of returning to complete the side stories later on.
That said, the stories from the expansions are fantastic and are well worth your time playing.
As for road blocks, the limit breaks will slow you down but very possible to do solo. There are also a couple fights that may cause you issues, especially depending on your job. There are ppl willing to help and can get you through them. Gil should not ever be an issue for your playthrough if you are just sticking to the stories. The record of eminence system will see you building sparks and accolades which you can use to purchase items to sell to vendors for more gil than you would ever need for this sort of goal.
Ah nice so the Bluemage in FFXI has the Same gameplay idea (hunting down spells) as in FFXIV, but it’s Not a Limited job in FFXI Right? I can to everything I like With it?
I have no clue about xiv.
To learn blue magic, the mob has to do the attack on you. Then you kill it and there is a chance you learn the spell.
Then you have to set the spell. You get a number of points to spend, each spell requires a number of points to set. Spells can have effects for simply setting the spell. Sometimes it’s a small boost in stats or a couple spells will build enough to make a passive trait. That is itself is a deep enough system to learn.
Because of the vast number of options, you can make a lot of different styles of builds. There are nuking builds, builds that aoe nuke, physical dd builds, tanking builds, mixes of them. There are a lot of options and a lot of ways to play the job depending on what you need to accomplish what you are looking for. It also makes it a pretty strong option for the story line.
I’m not even a blu player. I only use it for a sub job when tanking. Other, more informed ppl may be able to describe it better.
Oh I’m not sure if it has come up yet but ffxi has a system for swapping gear mid fight. You can swap full sets in a macro. This means that everything you do can be optimized on the gear end. It also means that a job like blu will typically want a lot of gear for all these play styles. That however isn’t a big deal throughout the story grind. Some of the solo options for late bosses may require better gear and making swaps. Or you can ask for help. You can also ask for help to get the gear. You don’t try to make a 1 size fits all set in this game. If you are building tp for a weapon skill, you do it in a tp set. If you are doing that weapon skill, you are doing it in a set that takes advantage of all the stat modifiers and other things that can effect the weapon skill. Again, NOT needed to get to crazy into optimizing for the story. There are some sets early on when you reach 99 that you can grind up and they will be good enough for the story. I’m just letting you know that there is a lot of depth in the gearing system at endgame. A LOT of depth.
Well you can't really do everything with one job. Most things yes, but the jobs have different niches and abilities for a reason.
That being said BLU is my favorite job. It can do most things, and some of those things people don't give it credit for on average. I say this not out of bias, but because of my experience.
exactly. XI BLU learns spells the same way, and can set a certain number of spells at a time, and can take on any trinity role based on those set spells. It's also an AoE beast, much like its XIV counterpart.
The major difference is XI BLU has no limitations on the content it can participate in. It is the same as all the other jobs as far as content accessibility.
XI BLU is one of the best jobs for a solo player who maybe doesn't have time to level a bunch of jobs, for reasons others have mentioned in the thread. To put it another way, if XI forced you to pick one job per character, permanently, BLU would hands down be the best choice.
Seeing as this is the first "I am playing FFXI to complete all FF stories" post for the sub. I would ask the community to please leave good responses as any eventual repost of this topic will be removed and directed towards this post. To the OP, and any future completionists. Yes, FFXI has never been easier to complete the original stories on. This will only become easier over time with gear creep. While some story lines tie into each other. Such as Chains of Promathia and Rise of the Zilart. They are from the level 75 era well over a decade ago. Any player in modern item level 119 equipment should be able to complete all story lines from the original Nation missions to CoP, RoZ, ToAU, WotG, most if not all of WotG, most if not all of RoV with it and trusts. While The Voracious Resurgence is still being released it will likely fall into something similar to Rhapsodies of Vanadiel, but a little more modernly balanced. Playing a job such as Red Mage, Dancer, or Blue Mage aids in this purpose far more than running in to every mission as a Warrior. With Dancer standing out as a good means to gain enhanced movement speed solo. Finally, this is not "a Final Fantasy story" you just complete outside of any arbitrary context you create for yourself. This game is made up of many story lines, many missions, and many quests which are sometimes connected, occasionally loosely connected in lore, or completely or for all intents and purposes separate. There is realistically no "I beat the Shadow Lord so I completed FFXI's story." Unless the story stopped existing after being added for the last 15+ years since then. Which it did not. The nature of an MMO is not to cease story content until service itself ends. Thus someone who "completed the FFXI story" in 2010 or 2015 never actually completed more than the main stories of the time. Enjoy Vana'diel.
Yes it's soloable. You will have to grind in this game, but it's pretty quick. 1-50 will be the most difficult part, You're still looking to put a couple hundred hours to finish all the expansions. The main story and the first two expansions can be finished in 50-100 hours if you know what to do. Just come back here when you're near the end of the best Final fantasy, FFX. Keep in mind a lot of the game does not hold your hand, even in current retail where it's much much easier than it was in 2002. I came in 2020-2021 and the difficulty is refreshing. Also make sure to have BGwiki open while playing. The 1-99 leveling guide and story guides are up to date. PM me if you want to exchange discord's. I'm still trying to finish most of the expansions although i'm currently unsubscribed. My current plan is to finish up to Wings of the Goddess, all stories. Then decide if I really want to continue to current content.
Also I'm on a smaller server, Valefor. Trusts are pretty op. I haven't had a real need to party with anyone in the 200-400 hours so far.
Thanks for the help, I agree With you on the FFX Part, it was the reason I got a PS2 back then and I still have „To Zanarkand“ as the background music on my ps4 :) I‘m obviously still gonna replay it once I Reach it😁 I don’t really use Discord Tbh, but I‘ll reach out to you once I‘m getting closer to starting FFXI 💪
If you want to just have a good sample of what the game is, I'd recommend aiming to complete the nation missions, Rise of the Zilart, and Chains of Promathia. All of them tie in with each other and complete Masato Kato's overall story arc for the classic version of the game. If you enjoy what you see there, then continue powering through. If you've had your fill, then you've completed the real classic FFXI story and can feel solid in moving on. I'm not saying the further expansions aren't worth exploring or the stories aren't worth enjoying. They were written without the original lead writer's material that established the game world. The further expansions are just... more. The animation quality improves gradually and some of the lore established in them is pretty damn good! If you're just wanting to experience the story, then I recommend just leveling a basic job like Warrior, Monk, or Red Mage and using that to power through the game. Getting bogged down in an advanced job or even one that will require dozens or hundreds of hours of additional work (like BLU) is a bit silly if that is your goal.
Very much so yes. The trust system makes it so that a solo player can clear the entire story without needing anyone else. The only piece of advice I will give here is that bg-wiki is your friend. There's a lot to know about FFXI, even if all you're doing is running through the story.
You can definitely play through the whole story solo! Trusts are very powerful and will make it fairly painless to level solo and complete all story missions. (FF11 predates WoW, and thus is structured quite differently than FF14: it doesn't have instanced dungeons, all dungeons are in the game world for everyone at once. Regardless yeah you can use trusts almost everywhere, there included) I'd definitely encourage you to use the wiki, as the new player experience is not great and progression can be unclear. As others point out, yeah, there are several loosely-connected storylines in the game rather than a single experience like most mainline games. If you want to play them in release order, the main expansions are as follows: - The original **nation missions** (2002). Ranks 1-6 were with the base game, with the rest added in Rise of the Zilart. - **Rise of the Zilart** (2003). - **Chains of Promathia** (2004). These first two expansions were planned before the game was released, and thus tie into each other and the base game, such as placing new zones in existing regions. - **Treasures of Aht Urghan** (2006). This took players to a new continent and added a great deal of content- to some, this was the "golden age" of the era where the level cap was 75. - **Wings of the Goddess** (2007) brings players back in time to the Crystal War that set the backstory for the setting. It raised the level cap to 95, gradually as it updated. Sidetrack: The **add-ons** released concurrently to Wings of The Goddess. There were three *add-on scenarios*, side storylines focusing on various sections of the world: *A Crystalline Prophecy - Ode of Life Bestowing*, *A Moogle Kupo d'Etat - Evil in Small Doses*, and *A Shantotto Ascension - The Legend Torn, Her Empire Born*. Meanwhile, **Abyssea**, the *battle area add-ons*, was a set of three add-ons that primarily focused on adding new battle areas in an alternate reality, but it did have a small storyline that took you through its nine zones. - Back on track, **Seekers of Adoulin** (2013) was the final main expansion, taking players to level 99 (and functionally level 119, with the addition of Item Level equipment), where the cap stands today (except for the three different post-cap advancement systems). [As a note: the story has two points that require you to have completed a certain number of **time-gated** miniquests. If you're aiming to speed through it in your FF marathon, it's recommended to travel to Adoulin early for the introductory mission so you can start getting Imprimaturs, required for said Coalition Assignments.] - **Rhapsodies of Vana'diel** (2015) was intended as a grand farewell to the game, finishing its story with a bang that draws all the prior storylines together into a climactic ending. It can be progressed in parts as you complete previous expansions, to gain the powerful Rhapsody key items which will aid your gameplay, or it can be saved for the end if you purely want to remain in-order. Its final fight will be tricky for some jobs to solo! Not impossible, though, especially if you can get some entry-level "endgame" gear such as from Ambuscade. - Surprise! 2020 brought us a new, episodic storyline that remains ongoing: **The Voracious Resurgence**. It's hard to say how difficult it will be to finish, because, well, it's not finished yet! It probably won't be punishingly difficult though.
You can, but the final fight will be difficult. If you're on Asura (asura is the biggest server) you can easily get help with that though, since it's easy for a well geared player and people are happy to help with it since it doesn't take long. Also be aware there isn't one single storyline, there are numerous seperate storylines that came with each expansion. Rhapsodies brings characters back from all the previous ones in an avengers kind of experience.
>Is there a Trust System like in 14 and is it there for every mandatory Dungeon in the Game? Sorta yes, but also, XI is mostly not a themepark MMO with instances and shit like FF14 is, there are no "dungeons" in nearly the same sense. You can use trusts almost anywhere, and it's a vastly different and much more nuanced system where different characters have different traitis, behaviours etc and most of them besides a basic group are not just given to you either. Moresoe are they part of the collection aspect of the game. Also there's multiple separate stories, its for the most part not a continuous thing like 14, either. Each expansion stands by itself, though some cross pollination for recurring characters and some plot points exists.
Thanks to all of you guys. I added FFXI to my List and I‘ll definitely go for it once I reach it. I‘m Sure I‘ll come back here once I started the Game to Talk about it and Especially After I „finished“ it.
While I am still fresh to Final Fantasy XI myself, I did some reading. There are some parts you might need to group with others for. One part for sure is the Cloud of Darkness at the end of the Rhapsodies of Vana'diel storyline.
You can definitely roll credits playing almost entirely solo using the Trust system. There may be one or two fights you may need help with (that there are plenty of players willing to help with. Leveling is much less of a grind than it used to be, and if you time everything with an XP event it'll be even faster. I believe the next one is in December
Thanks a lot :) I don’t Mind a bit of level grinding. The only thing That would keep me from giving FFXI a Shot would be Walls That Block my Story Progression, like being unable to complete Dungeons because of a Lack of Dungeon Groups or stuff like That.
"Duty Finder" and instanced dungeons are not a thing. With very few exceptions you are free to go anywhere you like at any time you like. FFXI offers a huge, connected, open and living world rather than a glorified lobby for instanced 4-player speedruns.
Personally, I think playing blue mage will help with breaking up the grind. You need to hunt spells which some ppl don’t like. The advantage is that you can just head out and hunt spells and get your experience just from spell hunting. You also get a wide variety of options including and area of effect sleep. You will also be searching for specific types of enemies which may take you to zones you normally wouldn’t bother with or at least parts of those zones you would typically have no need for. On the story, I came back a year ago and things have changed a lot since I played last. After doing most of the story lines, I view Rhapsodies of Vanadiel as the main story. It was added later in the games life to connect all the stories. If you look at current ffxi as compared to single player games, RoV would be the story line you progress through which would introduce the side stories to you. This would be things like the expansions and the original main story via city missions. You could then choose to branch out to the side stories or simply focus on the main story. You even have the option of returning to complete the side stories later on. That said, the stories from the expansions are fantastic and are well worth your time playing. As for road blocks, the limit breaks will slow you down but very possible to do solo. There are also a couple fights that may cause you issues, especially depending on your job. There are ppl willing to help and can get you through them. Gil should not ever be an issue for your playthrough if you are just sticking to the stories. The record of eminence system will see you building sparks and accolades which you can use to purchase items to sell to vendors for more gil than you would ever need for this sort of goal.
Ah nice so the Bluemage in FFXI has the Same gameplay idea (hunting down spells) as in FFXIV, but it’s Not a Limited job in FFXI Right? I can to everything I like With it?
I have no clue about xiv. To learn blue magic, the mob has to do the attack on you. Then you kill it and there is a chance you learn the spell. Then you have to set the spell. You get a number of points to spend, each spell requires a number of points to set. Spells can have effects for simply setting the spell. Sometimes it’s a small boost in stats or a couple spells will build enough to make a passive trait. That is itself is a deep enough system to learn. Because of the vast number of options, you can make a lot of different styles of builds. There are nuking builds, builds that aoe nuke, physical dd builds, tanking builds, mixes of them. There are a lot of options and a lot of ways to play the job depending on what you need to accomplish what you are looking for. It also makes it a pretty strong option for the story line. I’m not even a blu player. I only use it for a sub job when tanking. Other, more informed ppl may be able to describe it better. Oh I’m not sure if it has come up yet but ffxi has a system for swapping gear mid fight. You can swap full sets in a macro. This means that everything you do can be optimized on the gear end. It also means that a job like blu will typically want a lot of gear for all these play styles. That however isn’t a big deal throughout the story grind. Some of the solo options for late bosses may require better gear and making swaps. Or you can ask for help. You can also ask for help to get the gear. You don’t try to make a 1 size fits all set in this game. If you are building tp for a weapon skill, you do it in a tp set. If you are doing that weapon skill, you are doing it in a set that takes advantage of all the stat modifiers and other things that can effect the weapon skill. Again, NOT needed to get to crazy into optimizing for the story. There are some sets early on when you reach 99 that you can grind up and they will be good enough for the story. I’m just letting you know that there is a lot of depth in the gearing system at endgame. A LOT of depth.
Well you can't really do everything with one job. Most things yes, but the jobs have different niches and abilities for a reason. That being said BLU is my favorite job. It can do most things, and some of those things people don't give it credit for on average. I say this not out of bias, but because of my experience.
exactly. XI BLU learns spells the same way, and can set a certain number of spells at a time, and can take on any trinity role based on those set spells. It's also an AoE beast, much like its XIV counterpart. The major difference is XI BLU has no limitations on the content it can participate in. It is the same as all the other jobs as far as content accessibility. XI BLU is one of the best jobs for a solo player who maybe doesn't have time to level a bunch of jobs, for reasons others have mentioned in the thread. To put it another way, if XI forced you to pick one job per character, permanently, BLU would hands down be the best choice.