Final Fantasy 14's latest patch is here, bringing more content for the MMO's dedicated community to grind through. At least, that's what fans have come to expect, but plenty are now lamenting that the new quest step for the Endwalker Relic weapon didn't take up more of their free time.
To get you up to speed, Final Fantasy 14 gets a new Relic weapon with each expansion. The journey to getting it fully powered up is spread across several quests that release across post-expansion patches. They're powerful enough to warrant the grind, but the main reason the community fancies them is more visual. They look great, sure, but they signify to others that you put in the grind to get one.
Most MMORPGs feature a mount, title, or weapon that you'll feel proud showing off to everyone else, and Final Fantasy 14 is no different.
With Final Fantasy 14's 6.25 patch, we got the next step in the Manderville weapon series, turning something like a Manderville Samurai Blade into an Amazing Manderville Samurai Blade. The thing is, though, that getting the upgrade only took 1,500 Tomestones of Astronomy to bag. You can get the in-game currency from typical daily roulette activities, such as dungeons and raids, so most players already had them kicking around. That's far kinder to your time than previous Relic weapon grinds, and players aren't sure what to make of it.
"I am feeling very conflicted about this right now," one fan says on Reddit. "On one hand, the lack of grind content seems very lacklustre this time for Relics, but on the other hand, the ease of getting multiple Glowing relic weapons with minimal effort is certainly alluring."
Another player adds: "I have fond memories and friends from every expansion Relic - Atma drop-rate conspiracies. Newborn star! Is Pazuzu up? Delubrum suffering. I will have no memories of these steps. I didn't interact with anybody to get this thing. No new friends were made. And that's what was lost. Maybe some of this is 'old man yells at cloud'. But I mean, a simple example is this fun memory with my friends doesn't exist in a relic quest like Endwalker's."
Not everyone is on board with that. While some are happy to get a cool weapon with minimal impact on their time, others flag that demanding a greater grind on weapons could easily give way to gatekeeping.
"[Final Fantasy 14] player base have gaslit themselves that running void ark 15 times half asleep is content compared to 1,500 tomes", another player says.
It's also worth noting that this step is one in a larger quest that hasn't yet concluded, and even gaining access to this quest line means being up to date on the Hildibrand quests, which initially kicked off with A Realm Reborn nine years ago. Other fans are poking fun at that, suggesting the easier quest step could lull fans into a false sense of security, leading to something genuinely rage-inducing next time.
In the meantime, there's always the new deep dungeon, Eureka Orthos, to keep everyone busy, which someone managed to solo less than one day after it was released.
Relic weapon grind or no, Final Fantasy 14 still fares pretty well in our best MMORPG list.
