Okay, so it’s the next update to Final Fantasy XIV! There are a variety of updates, and the complete patch notes are over here. Some of it can only be accessed if you have Stormblood, but I don’t know a whole lot of folks who you play, who don’t already have it. But what exactly changed? What’s the good, the bad, and the “I don’t know yet”? There are some miscellaneous things added, like more seeds, more furnishings for homes, a new special instance for treasure hunters [The Lost Canals of Uznair], which can only be acquired through treasures on gazelle-skin treasure maps. No matter how much I play of Final Fantasy XIV, there are so many things I don’t already do. Maybe I could make that into a weekly editorial column: Things Gouki Mizuno hasn’t done yet [and now I’m doing them]. I have yet to do Aquapolis, which is another of these special instances, and I kind of wish there was an easier way to access them. Kind of. I respect that you have to hunt treasures to get them; I just can’t be bothered to do them. Yet. For Treasure Hunters, this is a pretty big deal, because it’s a new fun place to explore, and it looks gorgeous.
Balance changes are here though! Who got buffed? Most everyone! In fact, only two classes really got nerfed. Ninja/Rogue took a minor nerf to the Combo Potency of Gust Slash, which I doubt will really hurt them [don’t tell them that though; I’ll never hear the end of it from Ninja mains]. And AST/Astrologians got a fair sized nerf. I think it was needed though. All I ever heard was how damn great they were, and if you weren’t playing one, you were playing the game wrong as a Healer. I already forsook White Mage for Scholar, and I’m going to go level that next because I miss being one. Astrologians lost some overall power of their cards: The Balance [Single], The Spear [Single], The Balance [AoE], The Spear [AoE], but it seems like Undraw and Hyper Lightspeed got managed a bit better. I don’t think these are serious nerfs, but more along the lines of balance. I’m not sure how I feel about the change to Plenary Indulgence though on White Mage because I haven’t played one in a while. But the Recast time went from 15 to 60 seconds. Was it that much of a game changer?
They look sort of similar…
Scholar received a lot of love and attention, from Emergency Tactics losing 10 seconds off its recast, Indomitability, Excogitation and Fey Union being buffed, and Aetherpact no longer has to inflict an effect on someone to give you charge to your Faerie Gauge. Summoner also received the same thing for their Dreadwyrm Trance, which is a nice change of pace. Quickened Aetherflow also received some attention, which was certainly nice. All around a lot of classes got buffed, but I think the Scholar one is probably the most important. Maybe I’m biased though. I’m willing to accept that. The other major addition to this update is Deltascape [Savage]! I haven’t been yet, because I need a few more points of item level, but once I’ve done it and learned it, I’ll come back to write about it. Lots of cool stuff is going down in Final Fantasy XIV: Stormblood. If you haven’t been back in a while, it’s about time you came home.
