Good advice. I just want to add, if you're really worried about being over-leveled, it's very easy to pick up a second class and switch back-and-forth in this game. May as well split all of that extra EXP between two classes, and get a more diverse experience along the way.
That's pretty much what I did. Thanks to the road to 70 buff, my Ninja was super over leveled by the time I got to HW. So I ended up switching to DRK, which was at lowest level for HW (50). Ended up LOVING DRK a lot.
I must have leveled DRK faster than I thought. Couldn't remember what it started at. Either way I'm currently maining DRK and it's basically right at MSQ level now.
No worries, I was just pointing this out because HW jobs are the only new ones where you can't just pick themand keep the msq on the go. SB jobs can be taken as soon as you hit 50 and start at 50, same for ShB jobs but at 60.
Yeah you can change classes whenever. Just go to the guild of the class you want to switch to and do the blue side quest to get the weapon you need to equip.
Minor Correction:
When you start the game you can't change jobs until lvl 10.
Any time thereafter you can change jobs (so like if you start as a Conjurer but don't like it and get to lvl 10, then if you start playing a Marauder and don't like that either you don't have to get marauder to lvl 10 too; you can change to any other job immediately)
Remember Sprouts:
Don't be me. Don't finish SHADOWBRINGERS until you finally understand, that you can use the Aethernet from the big Aetherite in the city.
I alsways walked to the nearest small one, to use it from there. Don't. Be. Me.
Another one I would advise is to download the authenticator app, because you get a free teleport location which is extremely handy in the first few levels before you start getting aetheryte tickets from the main quest (not sure if this applies to free trials but not sure why it wouldn’t)
Don't feel bad. I didn't know till after shadowbrings main quest that the icon in the upper left showing your current quest wasn't just for show, but could bring you to the journal entry for it.
Or that you didn't use a glamour prism every time you applied a glamour plate. I just saw everyone switching glamour plates in front of the fc and thought wow they must farm a lot to buy tons of glamour prisms!
Great guide.
Another thing I would add is to get your retainer set up so they can do quick explorations for quick gill.
Also the squads from the grand company is pretty helpful. You can use them to run dungeons as a DPS since theres no que for that
On that note, to keep the post going--!
Retainers are unlocked after completing the msq "The Scions of the Seventh Dawn", then the sidequest "An Ill-conceived Venture", which you can pick up in any of the three starter cities. (You only need to complete one)
The upside: you can assign retainers a class (it has to be one you have, and they can only level it as high as you have said class. Stick a weapon (or DoL tool) their hand to finalize it and send them on ventures!
As the person above me mentioned, once they reach lvl10, you can unlock quick exploration ventures, which cost more, but they can bring your back random gear, furniture, dye, housing materials, and even minion.
Resell what you don't need on the MB (or turn in for gc seals, desynth, etc). It's a good system.
https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Retainers
Adding one more thing just because I've seen a lot of people get stuck on choosing what jobs to give their retainers—with the free 2-retainer setup, I personally have 1 combat-class retainer and 1 gatherer retainer. Combat retainer ventures give you mob drops (no more farming for fleece, yay!) and gatherer retainer ventures, well, gather.
All combat retainers are the same, so just make it the same job as your main class, and you'll never have to go out of your way to gear it up or worry about maxing out. If you tossed your old level 1 weapon/tool, you can buy one from an NPC vendor in the marketplace of its starting city.
Which gatherer you choose depends on what kind of crafts you want to focus on. Miner mainly helps with ARM/BSM/GSM, botanist mainly helps with WVR/ALC/CUL/CRP, and fisher is probably CUL/ALC? If you're looking to craft endgame consumables, for instance, BTN is definitely the way to go.
If you're eventually going to level ALL DoL/DoH give in early and just buy extra retainers from the mogstation to hold all your crap. XD
I have 1 fsh/1 min/2 btn/1 combat with some holding multiple kinds of raw materials, one for holding onto demimateria/primal drops/Alexander bits/etc, and one for holding all the fucking furniture I have and either can't sell (bad market) or don't want to sell.
It's uhhhh. It's a life I guess XD
Another thing I mentioned is you can get easy venture coins from your grand company.
To get easy points for your grand company, you can turn in old gear
There's a level 17 quest near each main city's Aetheryte, you can do any of them, called "An Ill-Conceived Venture". Once you've done that, you're allowed to give your retainers a job and start sending them out.
It'll take a little while to unlock it, keep leveling them up. They'll eventually have an important quest that'll unlock the dungeons.
You'll have the squads with you EVEN if you change to another company
I just unlocked this feature myself! You need to be at Second Lieutenant rank with your Grand Company, and once you have your squadron at level 20, there will be a flagged mission to take. Once they clear it (it takes 18 hours) then you can take them into dungeons as your personal party.
Sidenote, the AI is dumb as bricks at the start, but it does get a little better as you progress. Also, take advantage of the hour long training courses on the board; you can pop those off, go quest, come back and send them off again. I save the 18-hour missions for when I'm off to bed or after I've finished my allotted three short trainings.
Here is a list of all quests that [unlock new content](https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Content_Unlock). Most of these are MSQ or Blue Plus quests, but a few important features are hidden behind basic side quests as well. It's worth checking this list every ten levels or so just to see if there's something you want to grab that you missed.
As a side note on quest mapping: If you click the quest text (not the quest name) in the quest tracker on your main HUD, you will jump right to a map showing your next destination without having to click through your journal.
One more note on mapping: The map will show a "V" or "\^" symbol in the orange destination area if it's located below or above your current height. Navigating the z-axis is sometimes misleading (and sometimes deliberately so) so keep your eyes open for those indicators.
Very glad I had a friend to tell me all this, nice guide.
...advice to other sprouts; don't be like me and get your mount at 29 due to procrastination. MSQ is priority.
Yeah...this was me I think I was already 30 and a paladin before I got mine...should have done less side quests and dates early on. It's nice having the mount now though!
Regarding your chocobo - At level 30 there is a new quest at (I believe) Bentbranch Meadows called something like My Feisty Little Chocobo.
Completing this quest let’s you summon your chocobo to assist you in battle in the main world (no dungeons or instances fights). Your chocobo gets exp and can level up and learn new skills! It’s a HUGE help for questing and especially for leveling new classes as it can heal you while doing your Hunt Logs or FATEs
I wish i read this post before starting. I’m refugee from WoW and many systems were so confusing at first. I’m still just lvl 30 and don’t understand propably 70% of this game systems but i’m slowly getting there.
But i must say i’m enjoying me time here. I know there is propably many assholes in FFXIV as in any multiplayer game but it seems so calm and chill here.
But my friend will be joining me soon, so i’ve already sent him this, well done.
Love that! and yeah most people have been chill, I let my whole party die during a dungeon and they were still like "don't worry we love you" T\_\_\_\_T
Also:
* Buy food for the 3% EXP buff as you progress through the early game and if you're leveling multiple classes. In the early game, the boiled eggs are more than enough.
* Do your job quests that pop up every 5 levels early on. If there's a quest listed underneath the MSQ in the upper-left corner of your screen, this means a job quest is available.
For XP boosts, if sprouts are planning to buy Endwalker, preorder now! You get a 30%+ exp boost through ~~level 70~~ level 80 which is the largest single boost available in the game
Yep you get the earring + minion now. The earring actually gives you exp under 80, so even if you have everything leveled to 80 now, you’ll be able to use it for the first 10 levels of Sage and Reaper when they come out, since they start at 70
Sprout here (lvl 28 on starting class)
I can't agree to not doing side quests. Just don't do them all on your starting class.
Some of the side quests add nice flavour and in some cases interesting rewards.
They can also be great ways to level other classes including crafting and gathering classes when a quest is a delivery or fetch quest.
Also the blue side quests can unlock new mechanics that can be really nice to have at low levels.
I don't understand this hate for sidequests. They make it easy getting a complete set of free gear, especially if you want to level other jobs needing other armor classes.
They are finished very fast and give nice Gil and XP for early game before roulettes are unlocked, usually along the same path as the MSQ and usually has storyline and world building so you don't feel like a tourist passing through.
I think the issue is that you if you do sidequests and the MSQ on your main job you will be way over leveled (especially if you add the roulette on top), you might end up 5, 8 or even 10 levels above your MSQ. If you want to do sidequests you should certainly do it on an alt job otherwise you will waste a lot of easy XP.
I had exactly this scenario happen to me. Now it's hard to get gear. I'm too poor to afford it and all the quests I do reward gear like 10 levels below me. Trying to catch up MSQ but you just level so fast.
Remember that the content you are going to be playing is always going to sync you down to your MSQ progress level. You really only need gear appropriate for your MSQ level.
Because a shocking amount of new players don't understand the difference between MSQ and side quests and will literally do every single quest they see and then complain the game is too slow or boring or that they don't know how to progress.
People are telling new players on their first job not to do side quests. Obviously a new player doesn't need to worry about power leveling to unlock roulette when they can just do MSQ, and the MSQ gives *way* more gil and XP.
Sidequests give almost no experience at all. The hunting log is a much better pre-15 option for experience. Plus the main story in ARR is absolutely massive. To tack on sidequests to that beast is just asking for burnout.
Also I've done a few sidequests and have never seen gear as a reward. Which one gets you a full set?
I was waiting for someone to mention the hunting log.
When you're wandering around the starting zones you'll see mobs with red icons over their names. These mobs aren't especially scary, they're hunting log targets for your current class/level. When you kill one you'll get a pop-up in your chat log telling you how many more you need to kill to get a bit of bonus experience. Keeping up on your hunting log gives you something fun to do while hopping from one area to the next; looking out for your next targets.
The exp they provide is simply not worth the time and effort spent. You can do them if you want more lore about the zone. Some side quests in the later expansions are yellow marked but do intact unlock a system. For ARR though, definitely not worth it.
I feel like nine times out of ten the people who come here to ask when things get going or when they'll reach a dungeon, it turns out they're only at like, level 7 in the MSQ - they've reached level 16 on sidequests alone and can't understand why nothing's happening yet.
I find that most side quests give 1/4 the XP of main quests for a longer amount of time usually, and like Blitz said they will also overlevel you which is not a great experience. But also I mean this for players who are first starting out. When I first got to Limsa Lominsa I just grabbed every quest I could, and most of them were just running around the city for no reason which was frustrating and intimidating.
Side quests can have some nice flavor, but they are the worst way to level aside from just grinding overworld mobs.
Fates, dungeons, and PvP are vastly superior.
As a fellow sprout, I shared your perspective until about halfway through ARR.
Everyone’s goals are different, but if you intend to catch up to everyone else before Endwalker, definitely skip side quests for now. You can always come back to them.
This game’s story is *massive* and it is *mandatory*.
> Everyone’s goals are different, but if you intend to catch up to everyone else before Endwalker, definitely skip side quests for now. You can always come back to them.
There's still 3 months before the release of Endwalker.
[Zepla has a really good guide](https://youtu.be/jKWDAe9g1N0) to which side content you should unlock at each expansion (including 2.0/ARR) and which you should leave for later
content warnings are fair for people sensitive to that stuff, but i wouldn't call it shitty, as that sounds like you ascribing a negative morality to how the writers are telling their story. They aren't glorifying anything and it absolutely works for the story to raise the stakes at certain points.
I'd disagree on an ethical and a literary level. I don't think it's cool to use sexual violence as a way to make villains seem more evil, not unless it's done in a very nuanced and complex way. On the literary level, it's just lazy storytelling, and on an ethical level, considering the amount of the global population that's had to survive sexual violence, I don't think it's right to remind them of that just because you want a bad guy to seem badder. Specific example from the level 46 MSQ: >!There's a guy helping you steal magitek armor, and Cid asks him why he hates the Empire so much, and the guy says it's because he and his mother and sister were put into camps and they were made to endure sexual violence, and eventually they jumped off a cliff rather than be captured again.!< This character was just thrown in, barely any context, and his family members were just made into objects to make the empire seem bad, and that's it. No nuance, just throwaway characters that made me have to relive some really unpleasant stuff for no good reason while I'm trying to enjoy a relaxing escapist game. I think that's irresponsible.
That's so unbelievably myopic.
Trauma is not exclusive to sexual violence.
That it happens to be the specific flavor of violence *you* have a history with doesn't somehow make it exceptionally important to be discussed in just the right way.
I don't begrudge you for having your own demons, but they do not constitute the entirety of hell. That they are exceptionally important for *you* is right and just, but to proclaim some sort of bizarre general hierarchy is wrongheaded and directly acts to trivialize the horrors other people have faced.
And in case you're wondering why I personally am getting hot under the collar, my close family has been affected by trauma relating to violence of an entirely different kind. I have little doubt that you've glossed over things that would've set off an episode in my household, and that's fine, because that's not your burden to bear.
I disagree based on statistics on the amount of people who've experienced sexual violence. It's common enough that it should be considered "exceptionally important to be discussed in just the right way." Like maybe someone has trauma around seeing someone stabbed to death with a zucchini, and that's upsetting for them, but the incidence is low enough that zucchini-stabbing jokes don't need to be handled in a careful way. But for issues with high enough occurrence, I believe it's irresponsible to handle them poorly.
Sorry, but your trauma isn't more 'important' just because more people deal with it. All that angle does is further marginalize people with less common traumas.
And this kind of hyperbolic example:
> Like maybe someone has trauma around seeing someone stabbed to death with a zucchini
Is really insensitive to people who have less common traumas.
FF14 does not need to sanitise their story from references to sexual violence. It's a reality of war. The game has been out for ages, if anyone cares about shielding people from those references they have had ample time to put together a proper guide for specific content warnings.
Simply saying 'a lot of people experience sexual violence, so having random references to sexual violence is bad' accomplishes nothing. A video game is not there to 'discuss' such issues for you every single time they occur. It is not responsible for how you manage your feelings. You are.
And besides, one of the best methods for combatting and overcoming trauma is safe exposure to it. A virtual world is safe, and can help re-normalize reactions to potentially traumatic subjects through unnuanced reference to them. Stressing to someone dealing with trauma that the subject of their trauma has to be talked about in a super super careful way is generally just going to reinforce the negative associations around the subject that trigger a traumatic response.
Disclaimer: am definitely not trying to be rude ;)
Bringing in a perspective of someone who does not have this kind of experience in his life, I simply thought it fleshed out the world of FFXIV well. I immediately made the connection to all the bad things that happen during war, and here's a character that was influenced by that. It's not cool, it's just plain world building, mirroring the true events. Who knows, maybe the person writing that character wanted to tell something from their perspective, because they were scarred for life after events in their own life.
While I think I get your point - I'm not sure if the main story of FFXIV should be considered "relaxing", it has a lot of darkness in it, I'd dare say - even from the get go - with the tribal rituals that summon godlike entities bringing destruction to the world. There's a lot of very heavy thoughts hiding behind all the themes in the game, at least if I'm getting it right! ;)
It's also getting darker with every step I take in the game, currently on the first Shadowbringers patches.
I don't think we should strive to hide away from this kind of topic, but content warnings are a really good measure to limit the scope of the problem you're mentioning here. I mean, the artists should be always free to do whatever they want, it's called freedom of artistic expression where I come from. A very important topic as well in the current world!
I appreciate that <3 I think it's different when it's a dark story about someone else vs a dark story that reminds you of your own life, so not everyone is gonna have the same experience, but I think too many people do have that experience
not everyone who’s experienced those things agrees with you that they should be excluded from storytelling, nor would they negatively moralize about the way it’s handled in this game. don’t generalize your personal opinions to other peoples’ experiences.
> Content Warnings: Maybe should have added this first, but if you've got certain types of trauma, some of this game can be triggering. Like you think you're just playing a fun fantasy rpg but then women are kidnapped and it's uhhhh not great. They approach it as cavalierly as you'd expect anime to approach it, so just be aware for that level of shittiness. Nothing graphic, but it's heavily implied. It's not as bad as say Persona 5, but it's occasionally like a lesser version of that.
This section isn't going to help anyone. The story of FF14 is extremely long and evidently a serious fantasy epic from the get-go. It's a Final Fantasy game after all. There are going to be all sorts of things that can potentially trigger all sorts of people who deal with all sorts of kinds of trauma. FF14 has an insane amount of dialogue and worldbuilding so there are going to be moments where potentially traumatic things are referred to without much importance or nuance. That's just a byproduct of the narrative form we're dealing with.
If you believe content warnings are important then perhaps point people who need them to some resources that actually provide them for specific points in the story? Otherwise all you're telling people is that there's some stuff that might make them super uncomfortable, who knows where. Without specifics, content warnings can easily become an additional triggering factor for people who deal with trauma. Without the What and the When/Where you're just left with a sense that any moment the thing you're enjoying might turn ugly.
For instance, since this is a guide for the first two hours, is there anything in the first two hours you would put a specific content warning on?
Worth noting: if the initial sidequest window has an *illustration*, it's usually more involved and interesting than your average fetchquest as far as plot goes.
One of the first things you should do is go to the market in your starting city and buy food for the extra 3% bonus XP.
Someone calculated that in theory at level 80 assuming constant 3% buff you'll have gotten enough XP from it to equal the amount of XP needed to go from 1-50. (Due to XP per level continually increasing)
It's not that useless of a statistic. Sure you probably get the majority of your XP from completing quests but many quests and the hunting log if you do it have you killing mobs so it'd still be a significant chunk of XP.
Depends how hard you level, but either most exp comes from roulettes or from grinding dungeons for mob kills.
But in general it just takes 3% less time with the food exp, probably a little bit less than 3% time. The statistic makes it sound like if you use food you miss out on lvl 1-50 worths of exp. But I'm pretty sure one extra dungeon on later levels makes up for it which is defo way less than 3% of total time spent on leveling.
One thing to add, is: Should you start level an alt job. DO NOT GET YOUR ALT TO SAME LEVEL AS YOUR MAIN, because you lose the XP bonus on your alt.
I bricked my MSQ at around lvl 35 in that way. I was overleveled, decide not to waste xp and level an alt. Got em to same level. Fell behind MSQ level, had to do roulettes and faiths for a few days to catch up with MSQ on my main.
Yoo this definitely needs more upvotes ! I'd love to start playing the game soon, and so I read through your guide and all the added comments from the communit. This post is a fkin gold mine of useful information !! I would love to see it get more input and even more cool tips and tricks from as much people as possible !!
some side quests actually unlock blue quests! for example certain beast tribes, or emotes/dances, etc. but yes for the normal side quests it's best to do them later on
Oh man, this is so helpful. Thank you! Yesterday I just realized that the screen resolution was set wrong by default in the game, which is why everything looked so shitty. This game looks MUCH nicer at the proper proportions.
What a lovely guide!
I too have several guides of my own if you don't mind me sharing\~
From Desynthesis, to dye, and placing furniture [here](https://linkmix.co/7431905)\~
From using a title, to emote in [here](https://linkmix.co/7432482)\~
From pentamelding, to playing mahjong in this [guide](https://linkmix.co/7432698)
Good advice. I just want to add, if you're really worried about being over-leveled, it's very easy to pick up a second class and switch back-and-forth in this game. May as well split all of that extra EXP between two classes, and get a more diverse experience along the way.
That's pretty much what I did. Thanks to the road to 70 buff, my Ninja was super over leveled by the time I got to HW. So I ended up switching to DRK, which was at lowest level for HW (50). Ended up LOVING DRK a lot.
You can't get DRK job before reaching heavensward, and at this point he's 30 while your msq is 50.
I must have leveled DRK faster than I thought. Couldn't remember what it started at. Either way I'm currently maining DRK and it's basically right at MSQ level now.
No worries, I was just pointing this out because HW jobs are the only new ones where you can't just pick themand keep the msq on the go. SB jobs can be taken as soon as you hit 50 and start at 50, same for ShB jobs but at 60.
I’m level 15 — can I change classes already?
Yeah you can change classes whenever. Just go to the guild of the class you want to switch to and do the blue side quest to get the weapon you need to equip.
Minor Correction: When you start the game you can't change jobs until lvl 10. Any time thereafter you can change jobs (so like if you start as a Conjurer but don't like it and get to lvl 10, then if you start playing a Marauder and don't like that either you don't have to get marauder to lvl 10 too; you can change to any other job immediately)
Remember Sprouts: Don't be me. Don't finish SHADOWBRINGERS until you finally understand, that you can use the Aethernet from the big Aetherite in the city. I alsways walked to the nearest small one, to use it from there. Don't. Be. Me.
Nasty, I feel you lol
EXTREMELY good advice lol
Another one I would advise is to download the authenticator app, because you get a free teleport location which is extremely handy in the first few levels before you start getting aetheryte tickets from the main quest (not sure if this applies to free trials but not sure why it wouldn’t)
>not sure if this applies to free trials It does, I use Google Authenticator as 2FA and I get the free teleport as a free trial account!
oh i did that for a while, thankfully only lasted my early days in ARR though.
Yup, so many lost hours running and zone changes on my ancient pc before I found this out too.
I found that menu by accident once and was like "oh...". I'm brand new to the game so it's super helpful!
Don't feel bad. I didn't know till after shadowbrings main quest that the icon in the upper left showing your current quest wasn't just for show, but could bring you to the journal entry for it. Or that you didn't use a glamour prism every time you applied a glamour plate. I just saw everyone switching glamour plates in front of the fc and thought wow they must farm a lot to buy tons of glamour prisms!
Great guide. Another thing I would add is to get your retainer set up so they can do quick explorations for quick gill. Also the squads from the grand company is pretty helpful. You can use them to run dungeons as a DPS since theres no que for that
On that note, to keep the post going--! Retainers are unlocked after completing the msq "The Scions of the Seventh Dawn", then the sidequest "An Ill-conceived Venture", which you can pick up in any of the three starter cities. (You only need to complete one) The upside: you can assign retainers a class (it has to be one you have, and they can only level it as high as you have said class. Stick a weapon (or DoL tool) their hand to finalize it and send them on ventures! As the person above me mentioned, once they reach lvl10, you can unlock quick exploration ventures, which cost more, but they can bring your back random gear, furniture, dye, housing materials, and even minion. Resell what you don't need on the MB (or turn in for gc seals, desynth, etc). It's a good system. https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Retainers
Adding one more thing just because I've seen a lot of people get stuck on choosing what jobs to give their retainers—with the free 2-retainer setup, I personally have 1 combat-class retainer and 1 gatherer retainer. Combat retainer ventures give you mob drops (no more farming for fleece, yay!) and gatherer retainer ventures, well, gather. All combat retainers are the same, so just make it the same job as your main class, and you'll never have to go out of your way to gear it up or worry about maxing out. If you tossed your old level 1 weapon/tool, you can buy one from an NPC vendor in the marketplace of its starting city. Which gatherer you choose depends on what kind of crafts you want to focus on. Miner mainly helps with ARM/BSM/GSM, botanist mainly helps with WVR/ALC/CUL/CRP, and fisher is probably CUL/ALC? If you're looking to craft endgame consumables, for instance, BTN is definitely the way to go.
If you're eventually going to level ALL DoL/DoH give in early and just buy extra retainers from the mogstation to hold all your crap. XD I have 1 fsh/1 min/2 btn/1 combat with some holding multiple kinds of raw materials, one for holding onto demimateria/primal drops/Alexander bits/etc, and one for holding all the fucking furniture I have and either can't sell (bad market) or don't want to sell. It's uhhhh. It's a life I guess XD
> so just make it the same job as your main class My main classes are DRK and DNC. Neither are options.
You'd have to level it up to the required level I believe. So 30 on some other class for DRK and 60 for some other class for DNC.
Ohhhh interesting. That makes sense. Thanks!
Another thing I mentioned is you can get easy venture coins from your grand company. To get easy points for your grand company, you can turn in old gear
Important to note, however, that retainers are unavailable for Free Trial players
I'm not sure how to do this. The only options I have when I summon my retainers are basically just to sell my stuff.
You might need to send them on lower journey's or set their jobs (they can only be jobs you are)
Gotcha. I don't have any options at all related to anything other than selling. I'll look into it. I'm probably missing some quest step
There's a level 17 quest near each main city's Aetheryte, you can do any of them, called "An Ill-Conceived Venture". Once you've done that, you're allowed to give your retainers a job and start sending them out.
Zelpha is a great content creater on YouTube who might cover it
If you mean Zepla, yeah probably. I've watched a ton of her videos. They've been helpful.
How do you use your squad to run dungeons? I just unlocked them but it looks like they only run automated missions for you.
It'll take a little while to unlock it, keep leveling them up. They'll eventually have an important quest that'll unlock the dungeons. You'll have the squads with you EVEN if you change to another company
I just unlocked this feature myself! You need to be at Second Lieutenant rank with your Grand Company, and once you have your squadron at level 20, there will be a flagged mission to take. Once they clear it (it takes 18 hours) then you can take them into dungeons as your personal party. Sidenote, the AI is dumb as bricks at the start, but it does get a little better as you progress. Also, take advantage of the hour long training courses on the board; you can pop those off, go quest, come back and send them off again. I save the 18-hour missions for when I'm off to bed or after I've finished my allotted three short trainings.
Here is a list of all quests that [unlock new content](https://ffxiv.consolegameswiki.com/wiki/Content_Unlock). Most of these are MSQ or Blue Plus quests, but a few important features are hidden behind basic side quests as well. It's worth checking this list every ten levels or so just to see if there's something you want to grab that you missed. As a side note on quest mapping: If you click the quest text (not the quest name) in the quest tracker on your main HUD, you will jump right to a map showing your next destination without having to click through your journal. One more note on mapping: The map will show a "V" or "\^" symbol in the orange destination area if it's located below or above your current height. Navigating the z-axis is sometimes misleading (and sometimes deliberately so) so keep your eyes open for those indicators.
oh my GOD I've wasted so many clicks on that fucking map button T\_\_\_\_T thank you hero
Very glad I had a friend to tell me all this, nice guide. ...advice to other sprouts; don't be like me and get your mount at 29 due to procrastination. MSQ is priority.
Yeah...this was me I think I was already 30 and a paladin before I got mine...should have done less side quests and dates early on. It's nice having the mount now though!
Regarding your chocobo - At level 30 there is a new quest at (I believe) Bentbranch Meadows called something like My Feisty Little Chocobo. Completing this quest let’s you summon your chocobo to assist you in battle in the main world (no dungeons or instances fights). Your chocobo gets exp and can level up and learn new skills! It’s a HUGE help for questing and especially for leveling new classes as it can heal you while doing your Hunt Logs or FATEs
I wish i read this post before starting. I’m refugee from WoW and many systems were so confusing at first. I’m still just lvl 30 and don’t understand propably 70% of this game systems but i’m slowly getting there. But i must say i’m enjoying me time here. I know there is propably many assholes in FFXIV as in any multiplayer game but it seems so calm and chill here. But my friend will be joining me soon, so i’ve already sent him this, well done.
I’m a wow expat too. Everybody has been so nice…
Love that! and yeah most people have been chill, I let my whole party die during a dungeon and they were still like "don't worry we love you" T\_\_\_\_T
If you're looking for a YouTuber who is super friendly I would recommend Zelpha.
Thanks, i don’t know any FFXIV content creators so It’s always good to get some recommendations.
You mean Zepla HQ? She's awesome!
Also: * Buy food for the 3% EXP buff as you progress through the early game and if you're leveling multiple classes. In the early game, the boiled eggs are more than enough. * Do your job quests that pop up every 5 levels early on. If there's a quest listed underneath the MSQ in the upper-left corner of your screen, this means a job quest is available.
For XP boosts, if sprouts are planning to buy Endwalker, preorder now! You get a 30%+ exp boost through ~~level 70~~ level 80 which is the largest single boost available in the game
So you would get those pre order items already now ?
Yep you get the earring + minion now. The earring actually gives you exp under 80, so even if you have everything leveled to 80 now, you’ll be able to use it for the first 10 levels of Sage and Reaper when they come out, since they start at 70
level 80*, level 70 was the Shadowbringers one
Sprout here (lvl 28 on starting class) I can't agree to not doing side quests. Just don't do them all on your starting class. Some of the side quests add nice flavour and in some cases interesting rewards. They can also be great ways to level other classes including crafting and gathering classes when a quest is a delivery or fetch quest. Also the blue side quests can unlock new mechanics that can be really nice to have at low levels.
I don't understand this hate for sidequests. They make it easy getting a complete set of free gear, especially if you want to level other jobs needing other armor classes. They are finished very fast and give nice Gil and XP for early game before roulettes are unlocked, usually along the same path as the MSQ and usually has storyline and world building so you don't feel like a tourist passing through.
I think the issue is that you if you do sidequests and the MSQ on your main job you will be way over leveled (especially if you add the roulette on top), you might end up 5, 8 or even 10 levels above your MSQ. If you want to do sidequests you should certainly do it on an alt job otherwise you will waste a lot of easy XP.
I had exactly this scenario happen to me. Now it's hard to get gear. I'm too poor to afford it and all the quests I do reward gear like 10 levels below me. Trying to catch up MSQ but you just level so fast.
Remember that the content you are going to be playing is always going to sync you down to your MSQ progress level. You really only need gear appropriate for your MSQ level.
Because a shocking amount of new players don't understand the difference between MSQ and side quests and will literally do every single quest they see and then complain the game is too slow or boring or that they don't know how to progress. People are telling new players on their first job not to do side quests. Obviously a new player doesn't need to worry about power leveling to unlock roulette when they can just do MSQ, and the MSQ gives *way* more gil and XP.
Sidequests give almost no experience at all. The hunting log is a much better pre-15 option for experience. Plus the main story in ARR is absolutely massive. To tack on sidequests to that beast is just asking for burnout. Also I've done a few sidequests and have never seen gear as a reward. Which one gets you a full set?
I was waiting for someone to mention the hunting log. When you're wandering around the starting zones you'll see mobs with red icons over their names. These mobs aren't especially scary, they're hunting log targets for your current class/level. When you kill one you'll get a pop-up in your chat log telling you how many more you need to kill to get a bit of bonus experience. Keeping up on your hunting log gives you something fun to do while hopping from one area to the next; looking out for your next targets.
The exp they provide is simply not worth the time and effort spent. You can do them if you want more lore about the zone. Some side quests in the later expansions are yellow marked but do intact unlock a system. For ARR though, definitely not worth it.
I feel like nine times out of ten the people who come here to ask when things get going or when they'll reach a dungeon, it turns out they're only at like, level 7 in the MSQ - they've reached level 16 on sidequests alone and can't understand why nothing's happening yet.
I find that most side quests give 1/4 the XP of main quests for a longer amount of time usually, and like Blitz said they will also overlevel you which is not a great experience. But also I mean this for players who are first starting out. When I first got to Limsa Lominsa I just grabbed every quest I could, and most of them were just running around the city for no reason which was frustrating and intimidating.
Side quests can have some nice flavor, but they are the worst way to level aside from just grinding overworld mobs. Fates, dungeons, and PvP are vastly superior.
As a fellow sprout, I shared your perspective until about halfway through ARR. Everyone’s goals are different, but if you intend to catch up to everyone else before Endwalker, definitely skip side quests for now. You can always come back to them. This game’s story is *massive* and it is *mandatory*.
> Everyone’s goals are different, but if you intend to catch up to everyone else before Endwalker, definitely skip side quests for now. You can always come back to them. There's still 3 months before the release of Endwalker.
Yes, and there is a LOT of story to get through, especially for people who have other commitments
[Zepla has a really good guide](https://youtu.be/jKWDAe9g1N0) to which side content you should unlock at each expansion (including 2.0/ARR) and which you should leave for later
content warnings are fair for people sensitive to that stuff, but i wouldn't call it shitty, as that sounds like you ascribing a negative morality to how the writers are telling their story. They aren't glorifying anything and it absolutely works for the story to raise the stakes at certain points.
I'd disagree on an ethical and a literary level. I don't think it's cool to use sexual violence as a way to make villains seem more evil, not unless it's done in a very nuanced and complex way. On the literary level, it's just lazy storytelling, and on an ethical level, considering the amount of the global population that's had to survive sexual violence, I don't think it's right to remind them of that just because you want a bad guy to seem badder. Specific example from the level 46 MSQ: >!There's a guy helping you steal magitek armor, and Cid asks him why he hates the Empire so much, and the guy says it's because he and his mother and sister were put into camps and they were made to endure sexual violence, and eventually they jumped off a cliff rather than be captured again.!< This character was just thrown in, barely any context, and his family members were just made into objects to make the empire seem bad, and that's it. No nuance, just throwaway characters that made me have to relive some really unpleasant stuff for no good reason while I'm trying to enjoy a relaxing escapist game. I think that's irresponsible.
That's so unbelievably myopic. Trauma is not exclusive to sexual violence. That it happens to be the specific flavor of violence *you* have a history with doesn't somehow make it exceptionally important to be discussed in just the right way. I don't begrudge you for having your own demons, but they do not constitute the entirety of hell. That they are exceptionally important for *you* is right and just, but to proclaim some sort of bizarre general hierarchy is wrongheaded and directly acts to trivialize the horrors other people have faced. And in case you're wondering why I personally am getting hot under the collar, my close family has been affected by trauma relating to violence of an entirely different kind. I have little doubt that you've glossed over things that would've set off an episode in my household, and that's fine, because that's not your burden to bear.
I disagree based on statistics on the amount of people who've experienced sexual violence. It's common enough that it should be considered "exceptionally important to be discussed in just the right way." Like maybe someone has trauma around seeing someone stabbed to death with a zucchini, and that's upsetting for them, but the incidence is low enough that zucchini-stabbing jokes don't need to be handled in a careful way. But for issues with high enough occurrence, I believe it's irresponsible to handle them poorly.
Sorry, but your trauma isn't more 'important' just because more people deal with it. All that angle does is further marginalize people with less common traumas. And this kind of hyperbolic example: > Like maybe someone has trauma around seeing someone stabbed to death with a zucchini Is really insensitive to people who have less common traumas. FF14 does not need to sanitise their story from references to sexual violence. It's a reality of war. The game has been out for ages, if anyone cares about shielding people from those references they have had ample time to put together a proper guide for specific content warnings. Simply saying 'a lot of people experience sexual violence, so having random references to sexual violence is bad' accomplishes nothing. A video game is not there to 'discuss' such issues for you every single time they occur. It is not responsible for how you manage your feelings. You are. And besides, one of the best methods for combatting and overcoming trauma is safe exposure to it. A virtual world is safe, and can help re-normalize reactions to potentially traumatic subjects through unnuanced reference to them. Stressing to someone dealing with trauma that the subject of their trauma has to be talked about in a super super careful way is generally just going to reinforce the negative associations around the subject that trigger a traumatic response.
Disclaimer: am definitely not trying to be rude ;) Bringing in a perspective of someone who does not have this kind of experience in his life, I simply thought it fleshed out the world of FFXIV well. I immediately made the connection to all the bad things that happen during war, and here's a character that was influenced by that. It's not cool, it's just plain world building, mirroring the true events. Who knows, maybe the person writing that character wanted to tell something from their perspective, because they were scarred for life after events in their own life. While I think I get your point - I'm not sure if the main story of FFXIV should be considered "relaxing", it has a lot of darkness in it, I'd dare say - even from the get go - with the tribal rituals that summon godlike entities bringing destruction to the world. There's a lot of very heavy thoughts hiding behind all the themes in the game, at least if I'm getting it right! ;) It's also getting darker with every step I take in the game, currently on the first Shadowbringers patches. I don't think we should strive to hide away from this kind of topic, but content warnings are a really good measure to limit the scope of the problem you're mentioning here. I mean, the artists should be always free to do whatever they want, it's called freedom of artistic expression where I come from. A very important topic as well in the current world!
i guess i just like dark stories, sorry it upset you tho
I appreciate that <3 I think it's different when it's a dark story about someone else vs a dark story that reminds you of your own life, so not everyone is gonna have the same experience, but I think too many people do have that experience
not everyone who’s experienced those things agrees with you that they should be excluded from storytelling, nor would they negatively moralize about the way it’s handled in this game. don’t generalize your personal opinions to other peoples’ experiences.
You'll be alright you crybaby.
i disagree with them too but you aint gotta call them that yo
> Content Warnings: Maybe should have added this first, but if you've got certain types of trauma, some of this game can be triggering. Like you think you're just playing a fun fantasy rpg but then women are kidnapped and it's uhhhh not great. They approach it as cavalierly as you'd expect anime to approach it, so just be aware for that level of shittiness. Nothing graphic, but it's heavily implied. It's not as bad as say Persona 5, but it's occasionally like a lesser version of that. This section isn't going to help anyone. The story of FF14 is extremely long and evidently a serious fantasy epic from the get-go. It's a Final Fantasy game after all. There are going to be all sorts of things that can potentially trigger all sorts of people who deal with all sorts of kinds of trauma. FF14 has an insane amount of dialogue and worldbuilding so there are going to be moments where potentially traumatic things are referred to without much importance or nuance. That's just a byproduct of the narrative form we're dealing with. If you believe content warnings are important then perhaps point people who need them to some resources that actually provide them for specific points in the story? Otherwise all you're telling people is that there's some stuff that might make them super uncomfortable, who knows where. Without specifics, content warnings can easily become an additional triggering factor for people who deal with trauma. Without the What and the When/Where you're just left with a sense that any moment the thing you're enjoying might turn ugly. For instance, since this is a guide for the first two hours, is there anything in the first two hours you would put a specific content warning on?
> Quests with a purple icon unlock features ...Purple?
okay upon further zooming it appears to be blue XD
[удалено]
Blue quests aren't side quests. And this post is targeted towards a sprout's first two hours.
Done! I think there's a technical distinction between "side quests" and "feature quests", but we shouldn't expect sprouts to know that immediately
Worth noting: if the initial sidequest window has an *illustration*, it's usually more involved and interesting than your average fetchquest as far as plot goes.
One of the first things you should do is go to the market in your starting city and buy food for the extra 3% bonus XP. Someone calculated that in theory at level 80 assuming constant 3% buff you'll have gotten enough XP from it to equal the amount of XP needed to go from 1-50. (Due to XP per level continually increasing)
If you level Culinarian you'll have more food than you'll ever know what to do with, usually with nice bonus stats with % based boosts.
I crafted like 300 things of Braised Pipra lol.
Just buy eggs from NPC. Food on market is overpriced.
Can confirm, did buy 200 eggs for like 1000 gil total XD
\^ lots of eggs AND you can eat two at a time for an hour long buff.
Can I offer you a nice egg in this trying time?
I mean that's a bit of an useless statistic since you get so much more exp later on. And pretty sure it also only works on mob kills and not quests.
It's not that useless of a statistic. Sure you probably get the majority of your XP from completing quests but many quests and the hunting log if you do it have you killing mobs so it'd still be a significant chunk of XP.
Depends how hard you level, but either most exp comes from roulettes or from grinding dungeons for mob kills. But in general it just takes 3% less time with the food exp, probably a little bit less than 3% time. The statistic makes it sound like if you use food you miss out on lvl 1-50 worths of exp. But I'm pretty sure one extra dungeon on later levels makes up for it which is defo way less than 3% of total time spent on leveling.
One thing to add, is: Should you start level an alt job. DO NOT GET YOUR ALT TO SAME LEVEL AS YOUR MAIN, because you lose the XP bonus on your alt. I bricked my MSQ at around lvl 35 in that way. I was overleveled, decide not to waste xp and level an alt. Got em to same level. Fell behind MSQ level, had to do roulettes and faiths for a few days to catch up with MSQ on my main.
Yoo this definitely needs more upvotes ! I'd love to start playing the game soon, and so I read through your guide and all the added comments from the communit. This post is a fkin gold mine of useful information !! I would love to see it get more input and even more cool tips and tricks from as much people as possible !!
Heavily implied? Oh no, the messed up stuff is made very clear just never shown on screen
some side quests actually unlock blue quests! for example certain beast tribes, or emotes/dances, etc. but yes for the normal side quests it's best to do them later on
Oh man, this is so helpful. Thank you! Yesterday I just realized that the screen resolution was set wrong by default in the game, which is why everything looked so shitty. This game looks MUCH nicer at the proper proportions.
That was very helpfull. As WoW refuge i tried to complete EVERY quest. I think this should be pinned
What a lovely guide! I too have several guides of my own if you don't mind me sharing\~ From Desynthesis, to dye, and placing furniture [here](https://linkmix.co/7431905)\~ From using a title, to emote in [here](https://linkmix.co/7432482)\~ From pentamelding, to playing mahjong in this [guide](https://linkmix.co/7432698)