A Survey on RP and PVE, as well as a discussion

[C'io Behkt]

A friend of mine is doing a simple survey for a statistics class that explores the correlation between RP and PvE pursuits and why we do it -- and which we wish we could do more of (instead, sometimes). I told him I'd help by putting it up here, so here it is:

 

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/WBPW3GC

 

But since this is a forum too, I thought maybe we could talk about our RP desires and if our PvE ones act as a foil to them. For example, my primary desire in the game is really to RP and to build those stories; however, my timezone and sometimes the dogged need to be in a queue gets in the way. Sometimes even just being in the queue makes me too anxious to initiate! What if it pops? Do I stay in the scene or do I go to the PvP battleground I've waited two (sometimes four) hours for? Even without the queues, finding RP is rare for me, which also means I queue more from lack of it. Cyclical. It's really frustrating to me having to pick, but I do know that most of that is my own fault.

 

Do you have similar experiences? How do you manage it? Let's talk while I gather data for my friend, .

 

And thank you in advance for answering the survey!

[Nebbs]

RP always as a priority, given a choice I will RP.

 

PvE is nice I enjoy it but I try not to obsess too much, I have in the past done full on PvE and PvP but realised there is little return. RP just keeps giving.

 

However, there is one important reason to do anything that is not RP... gear.. clothing.. looks! That is really important, though mostly for RP I am glamoured with lower level gear as I find the OTT reaid gear a but epix!

[Chris Ganale]

This is so a problem for me, with eight characters now in various stories, three needing to make it to 50 before Heavensward, and those three plus three more needing to get through MSQ so they can get their new jobs as soon as 3.0 hits, I have practically zero time to RP. It hurts me so, but Yuuna, Garon, and Ghost need their shiny guns they've had all along. And not one of them is even to 50 yet, let alone caught up to story.

 

I guess it's wound up being backhandedly fortunate that my characters with big RP stories are mostly privatized matters around the few people in my FC and are, for the most part, in a holding pattern waiting for Heavensward. Chao is the one character who is in stories with people outside my main group, and it kills me that I never have the time to play on her. I'm sure her Science Comrade thinks I'm actively snubbing her.

 

Hell, a lot of times at work now I find myself regretting that I've made so many characters because I don't have time to do anything 'fun' with them outside of grinding for stuff.

[C'io Behkt]

PvE is nice I enjoy it but I try not to obsess too much, I have in the past done full on PvE and PvP but realised there is little return. RP just keeps giving.

 

This is so true! Or at least true also in my experience. When I was playing World of Warcraft, I began the game in the same way I'd play any video game -- through the mechanics. I wasn't all that engaged in the world; however, after several years and when I retired from serious raiding, I moved to an RP server to give it a shot... and suddenly I was reading the quests, becoming personally involved with the world, engaging in it as a participant rather than just a viewer! My experiences as a roleplayer are really the ones I carried forward when I finally left WoW.

 

This is so a problem for me, with eight characters now in various stories, three needing to make it to 50 before Heavensward, and those three plus three more needing to get through MSQ so they can get their new jobs as soon as 3.0 hits, I have practically zero time to RP. It hurts me so, but Yuuna, Garon, and Ghost need their shiny guns they've had all along. And not one of them is even to 50 yet, let alone caught up to story.

 

...

 

Hell, a lot of times at work now I find myself regretting that I've made so many characters because I don't have time to do anything 'fun' with them outside of grinding for stuff.

 

Right? I understand this problem although I only have a single character. A lot of it becomes "just one more run..." "just one more item..." "just one more game of TT..." that it becomes easy to become lost in it. Still, I envy you for your small RP regardless. I haven't had much luck, and when I do get lucky, I think my timezone shoots me in the foot, . Perhaps my greatest regret in XIV, but at least the PvE is good, haha, .

[Aaron]

I personally need both rp and pve.  Without one and too much of the other I get bored easily.  A good mix of both is my median.

 

I also need the OOC conversations too as it's fun to joke around when you're not doing either of the above.

 

As for my situation. I only have one alt. You will never see me with more than that as that's just too much for me.

[ArmachiA]

I'm the same, I need both. I WANT to play the game as well as build a story around the game.

[DeletedUser]

PvE is nice I enjoy it but I try not to obsess too much, I have in the past done full on PvE and PvP but realised there is little return. RP just keeps giving.

 

Yes, that sums me up quite succinctly. I do both RP and PVE, and enjoy both, but I need RP or I'm not going to last long in any MMO.

[Sahb]

I've really eased off on the PVE front since I started getting back into RP properly, and to be honest I'm not too fussed about it. It could just be the lag between now and when Heavensward comes out but feel that i120 will be sufficient to get the job done whilst leveling, so it gives me a fair bit of time to just enjoy things.

 

Come release though...I think everyone is going to gravitate somewhat towards content progression. Just the way the tide is.

[Imo]

I personally need both rp and pve.  Without one and too much of the other I get bored easily.  A good mix of both is my median.

 

This. Without RP, the game gets boring as it's running out of content you haven't done yet. But if I wanted a pure RP environment, I'd play another game - a forum PbP or something, not a paid MMO.

(I actually do, but that's for scratching a different itch.)

[Warren Castille]

Roleplay is freely available on any chat client as well as in-game and on the forum. I pay my monthly sub to play the game, though, not RP. That's just an excellent sidequest that never goes away after the patch content dries up.

[Tiergan]

I'm also in the "Need Both" camp. If I can't RP in an MMO, I quickly get fidgety, anxious, and quit. If I can't PvE in an MMO, I get bored after a while and quit.

[Caspar]

I haven't really sunk my teeth into PVE on Balmung because I already am really progressed on Hyperion. Generally, that satisfies my PVE needs, but I enjoy the PVE content in FFXIV and will inevitably look to progress on Bal when my gear fills up on Hyp. To me the challenge itself is enough reason to do endgame content, but my MNK is already i130 in Hyp and Final Coil will be farmable soon. Progression on Bal might  may be sooner than I previously thought...

[Kurt S.]

I tend to prefer a good mix of both, leaning on RP than PvE. My timezone is a big factor in that since I have entire later afternoons to late evenings to do PvE stuff meanwhile I only find RPers at ungodly hours of my time. I prioritize what I don't see most of the day. 

 

Also doing too much PvE content on one character really just makes me sick of their face. Which is why I have alts which is kind of a bad decision on my end. Doing the monumental task of bringing 5 people to Heavensward readiness and possibly be WoD geared with their Zeniths isn't the hard part. The hard part is trying to split my already small RPing window time across 5 characters. But that's beside the point.

[Steel Wolf]

I have found striking a balance between PvE and RP in this game stupendously challenging, more to the fault of the game's design and its narrative. While the world itself is beautiful and the setpieces laid out divine, the narrative all but gets in the way. Not having a truly open space where adventuring and storytelling get along with each other instead of being forced to sit near each other, in my view, is probably the biggest impediment to making roleplay goals and gameplay goals mesh.

 

...I guess what I'm saying is I want a RPvE sandbox wearing a moogle suit.

[Dravus]

RP alone isn't something that could keep me invested in MMO's. If I just wanted RP then I'd invest in forum RP or Skype RP instead.

 

I enjoy indulging in the PvE side of the game. I like soaking up lore, killing enemies and overcoming challenging fights. Very little of that actually has an effect upon my RP but I find it fun and a great way to relax if I'm online but not necessarily in the mood to invest in RP.

 

It was the same back when I played WoW - when the PvE side of the game and the lore began to stagnate I couldn't bring myself to stick around purely for the sake of RP. In Wildstar's case I loved a lot of the game brought to do and became quite attached to my character there based on the RP I engaged in. Yet the PvE required far too much investment for my liking and I ended up taking my leave of the game entirely.

[BlackmoreKnight]

RP to me is an amusing side-aspect to the game, not the main attraction. I am a PvE-er first and foremost, and if FF ever takes a nosedive in PvE content then I'm probably not long to last. I pay to play the game, and I love raiding and progression and getting shinier loot. There's a very good reason Sigrid tends to wear endgame gear for RP purposes, because I like showing off that I have it and that I put in the work for it, instead of hiding behind a plain shirt or whatever. 

 

That said, I also love RP and it's an -important- side-aspect of the game to me. But it can't sustain me indefinitely. There comes a point when I need something to do, and thankfully FF has an excellent balance of things to do and ways to facilitate RP that I can balance both aspects of the game out well.

[Arelian Solin]

I used to lean far more heavily onto the PvE over RP side of things. Playing the game to play it--that sort of thing. But these days I heavily, heavily, heavily favor RP over PvE. I literally do PvE content to get clothes for RP purposes. If something doesn't reward me with things that I can feasibly use for RP, chances are I'm not going to care much about it.

 

It's terrible.

[Melkire]

I want and like to do ALL the things.

 

...

 

...

 

*starts dragging people out of the gutter*

[Haven's Fox]

I first came to FFXIV to rp back when I found the beta's. Though now as the game has progressed with the patches it's been interesting. I've slowly added on levels, classes, and I've found the game to be pretty fun to mess around in outside of rp. Still totally here for the rp first!

 

:chocobo: _{r10 choco!}

[Aya]

Honestly FF just isn't the PvE game for me!  I have been enjoying trying out Coil, but I can't imagine spending more than a couple of hours a week on it.  It just doesn't suit my tastes :-]

 

I guess if I were really being rigorous I'd try some other melee classes, since part of my dislike is that its kind of slow, but Dragoon (I think) is the slowest melee DPS class.  But! Its okay, I RP, RP, RP, and run stuff with people I like!

[Shoshopu]

I used to lean far more heavily onto the PvE over RP side of things. Playing the game to play it--that sort of thing. But these days I heavily, heavily, heavily favor RP over PvE. I literally do PvE content to get clothes for RP purposes. If something doesn't reward me with things that I can feasibly use for RP, chances are I'm not going to care much about it.

 

It's terrible.

 

This is basically my stance too. I'll try new things when they come out but I likely won't repeat them unless I've got nobody else to RP with or they provide me with something I can use in RP.

 

 

However, the little time I've had ingame lately has mostly been spent playing Triple Triad with the Indolent Imperial, saving up MGP for the tortoise mount (because that's major important for my character), but before that it was sitting in Binding Coil Turn 2 queues for hours trying to get the Allagan Tunic of Casting. It never ends but I get to RP eventually