It has been too long since I've posted a blog, but I felt like the time was right. After last week's capping off of Bahamut Prime, and clearing the Final Coil of Bahamut on its last week of being a lock out raid in one night literally 24 hours later I can finally go Heavensward with no regrets. To honor what has been this strange, long journey over the past year and about a half now, I wanted to look back on each patch as they were rolled out, and how the game has changed for the better (or worse) since the launch. From the gigantic flop that was 1.0, to the 4 million player accounts in 2.5 this is how we got here, and it all started with 2.0!

The Launch of something magical: 2.0

To be completely honest, when I first grabbed the Phase 4 beta code from this very forum I was merely only going to see what this was about. For a while, I was sucked back into World of Warcraft thanks to my streamer friend Brandon505, with the promise of we were actually going to build a guild and raid actual content, what ended up happening was the few of us that remained after he went back to professionally streaming Dark Souls was just us slumming up the Looking For Raid feature. Somebody from his community ended up mentioning that the release for A Realm Reborn was fast approaching and was abandoning the best MMO on the market for something that literally had no chance for redemption at this point. Yet after slamming him for his "poor choice", I got curious, I wanted to see this game for myself. By chance I saw in the recent posts of that year a thread for people handing away their codes, and I of course was refreshing like crazy and managed to grab one within minutes of it being up. Thanks to whoever posted it, the thread has been long gone for a while now and you have ruined my life.

Regardless of having the PC capable of running it or not, the platform I chose was PS3 to try it out on. To this day I don't regret it since I still play on console, as the craaaaaazy problems some people have albeit only 10% of the time on the PC client just puts my tin foil hat into full paranoia mode (maybe one day I'll just add the windows license to my account). So phase 4 I started up a Miqo'te on Ultros, since the original plan was to play with all of the duders on here. That ended up not working out because same streamer friend was going to try out this game and everyone on Twitch was rolling on Leviathan. So after Phase 4 I proceeded to move on with them as a Lalafell, since everytime I saw one running around I felt like I was missing out on something amazing (And I was). It actually wasn't a month after launch on my Birthday that I was actually able to go forward with playing this game. Yes I wasn't actually around for the first month, so that part of history still eludes me to this day, but I'm pretty sure I have the gist of what everyone did once stuff was figured out, unless there was some game changing stuff that happened, I may never know!

September 27th I finally started my journey into the realm of Eorzea proper with my friends! ... Or atleast I would have if they actually were still playing. I didn't actually see this as a huge bummer though, for when I started my fledgling WoW career back in Vanilla a month after its launch too, it was by myself. What captivated me back in those days was happening again, I was embarking on an adventure into somewhat unknown territory. Unfortunately with all the years of MMOs in my time alot of it was known, but there were interesting twists along the way to make it a little bit more exciting than your average WoW experience nowadays. Leveling up a brand new character in XIV at the beginning of the game actually wasn't as grindy as you would think. At the time Square did a fantastic job of making sure your level was most of the time caught up with the story quests, which are desperately needed to be done in order to do anything in the game (I had a friend who was level 50, but never did the story quests past Ifrit because DPS queues). Which is an insane notion. While leveling up you quickly learn that almost asking everything about when you get what was a trick question. "When do you get your chocobo?", "Yo how do I access my bank?", both of these questions were often answered with an actual level requirement most of the time, when in reality it didn't matter, it was all story related stuff. Meaning there were even more people like my friend who ran around fate grinding... ON FOOT, to 50, and had absolutely nothing to do once end game rolled around.

2.0, Level Cap, and You!

I joined an FC around level 30, ended up getting all the way to my first 50 within the first week, and began to see what everyone pretty much did with their time in this stage of the game. So around October I was spending my time slowly gearing up to hopefully one day get into actual real raiding in this game. So the thing people did included these activities to get there

Entrance level 50 Story content (Castrum Meridian and Praetorium Speedruns)

Stealing your relic weapon from Titan when he wasn't looking

Darklight and Myth gear

Rage quitting Amdapor Keep on entrance when one of your party members wasn't full Darklight

Sitting in the Dustbowl that was Mor Dhona writhing in poverty

These were pretty much the five things everyone was trying to do in their day to day activities. Which not including the people already tackling the Binding Coil of Bahamut, which I didn't even see until around November.

So to start off recapping, Castrum Meridian and Praetorium, around the time I got to it, became the fastest and easiest way to get tomestones of Philosophy, the first tier of currency not in the game anymore that you traded in for ilvl 70 gear which we know as the Darklight set. In order to do anything, like get your relic or actually raid, you atleast needed to be full Darklight. So that became my goal, unfortunately because of the fact that CM and Praetorium became the fastest and easiest way to get this currency, the horrible trend and terrible life choice was introduced to the game. At this point you either cared about the story, or decided to skip the rest of the cutscenes in the game now and forever because impatient people rule the group. This is a trend that is still continued to this day in both instances, so to any new players who actually want to do this part, and see this part... the dream died nearly years ago.

Because of this, this also meant the two dungeons that were supposed to be the stepping stone for your gearing up process, Amdapor Keep and Wanderer's Palace were done sparingly. People only did these two dungeons to cap on the second tier of currency for the Artifact i90 gear, Tomes of Mythology. Myth tomes back in the day were set to a limit of 300 per week. Meaning getting anything you wanted could have taken up to three weeks for one piece. Crazy to think we were waiting so long for certain items with the changes they made now. For new people getting into late game you were supposed to do Wanderer's Palace first, which was the easiest of the two starter dungeons. Amdapor Keep... was another story. Amdapor Keep in 2.0 was one of the hardest dungeons to ever see the light of day. There were actual DPS checks in place, hard hitting mobs, intense penalties for ignoring what the mechanics were. This place was the epitome of anger back in the day, only behind the legacy we know today as Titan. People often gear checked if going into the Duty Finder for this place, and if they ever saw someone even without their relic weapon (which is a prerequisite place to complete for it) they would just leave instantly. Amdapor Keep is all but a joke today, but back in the day it had some pride of being difficult, and the Demon Wall had a fun time being King of the Dungeon bosses for a while (He used to summon bees!). All the while these two places also dropped gear from time to time, but none of it really good, with the exception going to some accessories, because you couldn't double up a Darklight Ring of Aiming on a Bard, and as good as the myth ring was it definitely wasn't the first piece of Myth gear you got. It's a pretty bad trend we have today that it continues to kind of be this way, most of the dungeon sets are used for other things rather than to help fledgling players in their quest to do stuff. To be fair though, there are loads more exciting ways to get what you need nowadays. I hope they tweak this a bit when the expansion comes out, to give more people a reason to actually do dungeons rather than to just hit a cap for the week.

After you saved up enough tomes for your Darklight gear, you were ready to go after your trusted buddy, your fated companion for the long trip ahead of you, your Relic weapon. Of course there were TONS OF PEOPLE who SKIPPED THAT PROCESS, and made it a NIGHTMARE for the other people trying to do this legitimately. So the relic quest back in the day was this long sprawling process of talking to an NPC, them sending you off on either 4 man or 8 man content in order to get x thing to turn in to get the next thing. The process started off with you having to beat a Chimera in Coerthas, Doing Amdapor Keep (if people were nice enough to let you), Killing the Hydra in Halatali, for some reason murdering innocent beastmen that don't care what you're doing for a while, and then the original trio of primals. All of this aside from stuff you did yourself, was all actually challenging to do back when we weren't all i130 with Dreadwyrm weapons. Chimera had attacks that needed to be interrupted, Hydra had a Wyvern that spawned that needed to be killed on time, I already explained Amdapor Keep and why that was difficult. Yet when you got past all of them, the OG team awaited you. Ifrit, Garuda, and Titan. Ifrit being the warmup of the three, wasn't actually too difficult. He posed a DPS check today we now don't even limit break to beat, and required interrupts to actually stop him from killing people (which actually doesn't work anymore, but that don't matter too much). Garuda was probably the second hardest, since she actually contained some mechanics that required people to be a bit more coordinated and know where to move, lest they play pinball with the arena by stepping in a tornado. Garuda would not be a bane to players until her EX form, but that's 2.1 and we'll cover that later. For now... We delve into the tale that still sends shivers down the spines of the players that remember these days.

The Legacy of Titan

The third of the OG group, the hardest of the three. Regarded in 2.0 pre AND post fix of Twintania in the Binding Coil as the hardest fight in the game. The primal and god of the Kobolds, Titan. No matter what platform you played, no matter what method you used to speed up your connection speed, no matter what you did, Titan Hard Mode had everyone who wasn't already in Binding Coil of Bahamut's number. Titan was the only fight in the game to that date that introduced a platform with no invisible walls to save you from falling to your death in the center of the Eorzean underbelly. If you got knocked off the platform with one of his moves you were gone from the fight permanently until the group wiped, and if that did happen your group most likely did wipe, again and again. Titan also boasted an intense DPS check where you had to beat up his heart before he did an AoE that instantly killed everyone. With almost every phase change he flew up into the air and slammed the arena, collapsing the edges making the circle smaller with every slam. He trapped people in rock jails that had to be broken to get them out, and after they were broken out had to be cleansed of a debuff that makes all of their attacks hit for the single to low double digits (Which actually STILL gets ignored even to this day). Titan was the King, he decided wether or not you got your relic weapon or not, decided if you got to raid or not. This was around the time were the Party Finder didn't exist and we were stuck looking for people WoW style in the general chat in Mor Dhona, or just going for the one in a million chance of beating it in the Duty Finder. I got lucky, I was in an all Lalafell linkshell that had alot of people doing Binding Coil and clearing it regularly. So I got my relic after a couple of weeks of trying until they made that group for a couple of us. Keep in mind too I was also a PS3 player, I took pride in the fact I could live longer in Titan compared to someone who was boasting they were running SLI GTX 680s and still dying because of the "lag". While I admit the servers even today are still pretty horrendous, I had almost all of the handicaps. I had 10 frames a second, I had the PS3 Phat's terrible wi-fi, in retrospect I should have been stuck for months, like the beginning of 2.1 without my weapon. I got lucky, but with that kill eventually like all content in the game, the pressure of having to do it gets replaced with the relaxation of I got this done and now I can enjoy the fight... if that was even possible for Titan. Because of Titan, the unfortunate trend of selling content became a thing. Linkshells were made specifically to sell clears for people having trouble with the fight. This is how most of the raiding Free Companies made their profits for their future endeavors like Large Housing. It gave alot of people who were not ready to go out on their own and raid in Coils. Nobody learned anything, nobody adapted to situations, the player pool got a little worse. In short, Titan is an asshole, but he was a warranted asshole. He was the trial by fire, something that Warcraft doesn't even do anymore. He was the gatekeeper keeping most of the players who weren't ready out while in turn teaching them how to properly do a boss fight. Wipes should never be considered as a bad thing (most of the time), you use it as a learning experience for the next attempt, to not do what killed you the run before. It helps you in becoming a better player, and is a necessary part of the game. So for us who played in 2.0, we'll always remember this dark period of our lives in Eorzea, but for the ones that got past it could hold their head high for the time being. To know what a threat Titan actually posed in his prime, is a very scary thing to go back to.

Well all that's done, now what?

Well just for the sake of things I'd like to just cover the ever changing face of Mor Dhona. Mor Dhona is the place everyone hung out at before the housing and Gold Saucer were introduced, but is still a prevalent hangout spot to this day. YET Mor Dhona wasn't always the sprawling capital of adventure we know today, in 2.0 Mor Dhona was a HOLE IN THE GROUND. Yes, just for a moment lets remember what was there when we first started hanging out there. Instead of the Tradeposts and Rowena's secret castle house there was a plot of farmland, a literal pile of dirt! Rowena and her group of gear sellers operated out of a goddamn tent! There were no summoning bells here in 2.0 either. The Seventh Heaven wasn't introduced until 2.1 so there was absolutely nothing sitting in that spot either. Mor Dhona has come a long way since 2.0, but its always fun to go back and remember the fact that place used to suck bad, like real bad. The only thing to do there was be a Lalafell and sit in a circle with other Lalafells. (Unfortunately do to the time spent playing a a piece of shit platform I have no pictures of any escapades from that far back). As we move into new cityscapes in 3.0, let it be known that Mor Dhona was the little town that could, it literally started from nothing and became a real hip happenin' spot. We'll be covering what actually got added from patch to patch as well in future posts. Its fun to remember sometimes!

Another aspect I'd like to also cover was the HORRENDOUS POVERTY (Atleast for my server)everyone went through. So for the longest time Leviathan has been known as one of the poorest highest populated servers in the history of the game. 2.0 was a mysterious time for alot of people who didn't craft because... well there was no gil anywhere! Alot of the people who made their gil held onto it, and all the gil being generated was from the new 50s who didn't have to buy anything to get to 50. Gil was a rare commodity, not alot of people had a ton of it at any given time in 2.0. What you got from your journey to 50 was mostly what you got, and the gil you made on the market board came from the same place. The chats of major cities ran rampart with gil sellers before Square fixed that issue and they started operating in tells. 2.0 also was the point where there was no quick /blacklist command, you had to do all of that manually. This was actually a thing that broke the experience of the game for a handful of people. It was fucking CHAOS incarnate, the wild west of the marketboard until it became this highly manipulated controllable thing of the people who made their fortunes in 2.0. The market eventually got better yes, but it never truly recovered from this debacle. If anything WoW shows is that Blizzard knows how to deal with... most of it. Square just continues to let the players manage it, and unfortunately this game out of all the games of this genre I've ever played has some of the most manipulative people I've ever seen.

2.0 in a Nutshell

All Glory to Titan and his Demon Wall. A Long loot grind barred by hard but necessary Guardians of the End Game. People don't really care that they're hanging out in a ditch with no money. Of course honorable mentions that I didn't cover would have to be the FATE farming parties from certain level groups that filled the gap when you didn't meet the level requirements for your next story related thing. The communities of Quarrymill, Costa Del Sol were sorely missed, but 2.1 brought us a great way to not burn out on that bullshit once and for all. I would eventually see my first raid as a co-leader of a raid group into Binding Coil in late November, Early December just before the EX Primals and the way we played the game changed yet again. We'll cover all of that next time though, for this probably is running on longer than it needs to be, especially with no flash to go with any of the paragraphs, which probably won't happen until the 2.2 recap. So thanks to everyone who decided to read this, I'll hopefully be doing 2.1 sometime tomorrow, as it feels good to wrap up what was the best Vanilla experience I've had in an MMO in forever. 2.0 was somewhat of a hot mess of a time but all in all, it was a great mess, it was fun to go through the game's growing pains since the beginning. Again, thanks for reading, and tune in next time!