[25/10] FFXIV Patch 3.1: 10 Nov release date + everything from the Live Letter

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The latest Live Letter is over, with producer Naoki Yoshida bringing to the event a whole slew of new information regarding the upcoming patch for the game. Entitled As Goes Light, So Goes Darkness, it will come live on the 10th of November, meaning the first relinquishing of inactive player housing will indeed take place on Christmas Day! I hope you're not busy on the 25th and that your stocking is sufficiently large enough!

1. - Trailer


From Void Ark to the debut of a Lalafell Krile, the trailer essentially summarises all the major new features of the upcoming patch.

2. - New Beast Tribe Quests

If you've already helped the Amal'jaa, the Kobolds, the Sylphs, the Ixali and the Sahagins into submission and for some reason would like some more, the Vanu Vanu will happily dump a new load of daily quests onto your lap.

What would you get in terms of rewards for this auspicious assignment? Well, there's a Sanuwa mount for you to purchase with a heavy bag of Gil once you have reached a certain rank with the rabble.

There's something about new level adjustments as well, so presumably it means your rewards will be magnified if you elect to tackle your Vanu Vanu dailies at a higher difficulty level relative to your character's current job level. Monster strength will be raised should you elect to crank up the difficulty.

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3. - Zodiac Weapon Adjustments - and new Relic [Spoiler: no new Relic until Patch 3.15]

Still working towards that obsolete Zeta weapon? Well, luckily, Uncle Square have made things a little easier for you:
- Soul attunement and soul resonance from duties can still occur even when the "Undersized Parties" function is enabled. This can help speed up the grinding considerably.

- The rate at which the weapons gain soul attunement and soul resonance will be increased.

- The drop rate of items from dungeons necessary for your Zodiac will be increased to 100%.

What about the new Relic?

They will be called "Anima Weapons" (gee, Atma, then Animus, now Anima?!). The first step will apparently not be too difficult, certainly so if you already have a Zeta. The tangible advantage your Zeta will grant you is that your Anima need not be job-specific to the Zeta weapon you currently possess. Say you already have a Paladin Zeta weapon and you suddenly wish to have a White Mage Anima weapon, you can! For non-Zeta holders, I hope you're still attached to that job!

Anima Weapons will arrive in Patch 3.15, so hold your horses, eager grinders.


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4. - Exploratory Missions

How it works:
- There are three difficulties: easy, normal and hard. If one is without an FC, or an FC without an airship, you can travel to Ishgard and snap up some party members via Duty Finder to brave some islands. However, you will only be limited to the first two difficulties. Only Free Companies with airships can undertake the hard difficulty islands.
- Naturally, the strength of monsters and the chance of attaining superior gear (largely pink aether gear, so expect randomised stats and varying item levels) will increase the higher you crank up the difficulty. There will be different monsters in different difficulties.
- Hard mode is HARD...as Yoshi-P felt it prudent to remind us.
- Free Companies will be able to bring a maximum of 3 airships to the islands. 8 people in each, so a maximum of 24 people at a time.
- Ishgard groups can only go in numbers of 1-8.
- Each difficulty will require certain airship levels to enter:
Easy: 10
Normal: 25
Hard: 50
[Further caveat for Hard difficulty: you will need to have discovered the island previously on an exploration voyage]
- As long as at someone IN the Free Company is hosting the airship and there's at least two members of the FC in the party, you can invite filthy non-FCers to join your FC expeditions.
- The minimum is 2 people on an airship and the maximum is 8.
- You cannot specifically ask for which island to disembark on. You will get your island and you will like it.
- When starting an exploratory mission, you can obtain esoterics by completing three of the objectives listed on the map.
- Additionally, the starting point for each party will be different every time, and there will be 'aether turbulance' in the area in which you arrive. Attuning to three of these will grant you the ability to fly. You’ll need to do this every time you start an exploratory mission.

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There are NO restrictions on entering. The content emphasises exploration, so you won't even be pressured to clear them. The maximum time you can spend in the islands is 90 minutes.

A cooldown of 2 hours (120 minutes) exists, from when you first entered to when you can enter again. This means if you have only spent 30 minutes on the islands and you leave, you will have to wait for another hour and a half to be able to come back. If you stay for the whole 90 minute duration, feel free to grab a snack and a drink for that half an hour gap before you can return for some more. This cooldown can be erased or altered depending on player feedback.

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In order to accrue rewards from monsters on these islands, you will have to do damage to them, similar to that of a FATE monster. Still, even if you're in a party, you should still contribute to DPS. It is no use just standing around overhealing or spamming Flash, unless you want to completely pass up on rewards.

It will be possible to select from loot master, regular loot, and all greed when departing for exploratory missions from your free company's workshop. When departing from the landing area in Ishgard, it will be limited to greed only. It will also be limited to greed only when entering as a party.
Mitsuki; you can change your job on the island and do some crafting and gathering within that maximum time limit of 90 minutes if you so wish. Just err, don't start doing it while everyone else is busy trying to take down a tough mob.

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5. - Housing and Free Company name changing

The demolition of inactive housing system is already covered here.

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Meanwhile, there's also going to be a house sharing system. Now newlyweds can live with each other and some generous folks can accept a lazy scrounger into their humble abodes.
- Players can share the house up to 3 other players.
- Players can accept up to 2 house sharing invitations.
- Having housemates DOES NOT mean your house is safe from demolition. The OWNER has to be the one who has to enter the house else it be knocked down.

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Oh yeah, Free Companies will also be able to change their names.

6. - New mounts, new minions and new Glamour

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Pegasus mount!


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Naul mount! I mean err, wyvern mount!

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Paissa minion. This thing will devour your soul in your sleep, leaving you as a cold, unmoving stone husk.

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Twintania minion! Mini Divebombs galore!

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Oh dear god, whhhhhy?! What nightmare fuel is this? D:

Currently being planned are cute chibi Primal minions! Titan and Garuda will be a wee bit later, but Ifrit will appear in Patch 3.1!


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And of course...for those who want to pay more money to SE in the MogStation shop, you can get this:


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7. - New battle content and changes to existing ones

i) Saint Mocianne's Arboretum and Pharos Sirius HM, as covered here.

ii) Adjustments to 2.x content for the benefit of new players, e.g. Howling Eye (Garuda).

iii) Loot restrictions for Alexander normal will be lifted.

iv) You shall be able to earn EXP from level 50 dungeons.

v) Difficulty in some dungeons and trials will be eased a bit for the benefit of players who have yet to reach endgame. This will be controversial.

vi) They
’re implementing an adjustment to address the lag behavior. This will depend on the player’s environment, so they cannot guarantee the overall speed will be faster; however, it should feel much smoother than before. Feedback would be good and all, etc.

Additionally, as part of a job adjustment, they're making detailed adjustment such as Ninja/Paladin’s TP, and other adjustments to Bard and Astrologian. Because we all know Astrologians can't function without more adjustments! Dark Knights will be able to turn off their Darkside graphical effect.


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Void Ark

The first in a series of raids. The other two raids that will come later will presumably be in wildly different locations. Who knows where the Void Ark will take you? The moon?

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The Minstrel's Ballad - Thordan's Reign

Like Ultima's HM for 2.0, Thordan will be back for a much tougher rematch. He will school your arse harder than Ravana and Bismarck EX, while being on roughly the same level of difficulty as Alexander A1 Savage. It won't be DPS checks that will make this fight hard...

There will indeed be cool weapon drops from this guy and all his Heavens' Ward knights.

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8. - Quality of life changes and miscellaneous

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- Melding is being nerfed, so presumably this means base stats on good crafted gear will be higher.

- However, you will be able to affix Materia onto weapons and armour you attain from tomestone grinding and from raids!

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- Errm, yeah, who is still bothering with the Gold Saucer? Anyone?

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And ohhh, the most important new feature: a more conducive camera system for group and selfie shots:

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Now you can look even more stunning as you AFK in between content patch droughts!
 
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