Final Fantasy XIV: Patch 2.05

Yesterday the first significant patch to FFXIV went live on all servers numbered as 2.05. It was a pretty decent patch in terms of increasing the Quality of Life at Endgame. In particular, smoothing out the progression path for those that have hit level 50, but not yet put Ampador Keep on farm status. The main changes were increased opportunities to acquire Tomesones of Mythology and Philosophy to purchase end game gear, increased gil for defeating trash mobs (to keep up with repair bills) and tweaking some mob placements that allowed trash mobs to be skipped, particularly in Castrum Meridianum.

 

Before the patch I was sitting at level 50 paladin and slowly gearing up for the Hard Mode Titan fight. I had my AF gear but had replaced the leggings and boots with gear from The Wanderer’s Palace. I had just about all my Darklight jewellery, the Darklight shield from the Tonberry king and my Ifrit weapon. I kind of stalled there as my options were to run the story instance Castrum Meridianum to gear up in full Darklight Armour or start on the next tier of content with Amador Keep.  I hate the Darklight Armor though so I ended up working on some mining and Blacksmithing.

 

The great thing about the 2.05 patch is these two options are no longer my only choices. The Wanderer’s Palace rewards were upgraded to be on par with Ampador keep in terms of Tomestones of Mythology which allow me to purchase the most powerful vendor items in the game currently. So I have already begun to farm the Wanderer’s Palace. However, Ampador keep does offer some drops that are upgrades to my current main armour slots. A way to continue to Avoid Darklight pieces while working on my Artefact Armour +1 which is purchased for Tomestones of Mythology.

 

So, I have a clear path to top tier content now. All it takes is time. Particularly with a cap on the amount of Tomestones of Mythology one can acquire in a week being 300. So if I run Wander’s palace and Ampador Keep a combined total of ten times per week I’ll have all my AF+1 in 19 weeks. Sounds daunting but I should be ready for the hardest content, The Binding Coil of Bahamut before then and the rewards for completing four of the turns is 150 Mythologies so it won’t be just mindlessly spamming two dungeons.

 

Compared to Rift’s endgame at release I feel that FFXIV is a little more forgiving. I don’t have to worry about artificial stats like Toughness or Hit which gated content in Rift. I suppose a token grind is unappealing to many, however the variety I still have open to me with the Hard Mode Primals, my ‘A Relic Reborn’ quest to get my Curtana and Holy Shield (Paladin relic weapon) as well as levelling my Miner, Blacksmith and Archer really help me to remain engaged with the game and not consumed by the narrow endgame grind that most MMO’s become.

 

I do need to get back on the Mining though as experience gains were buffed in 2.05 as another part of the quality of life fixes. Levelling miner last week I did feel it was fairly slow, particularly compared to my blacksmith. So there’s another great feature in 2.05 I need to take advantage of.

 

In addition to all this we still have the promise of a lot more in the first major patch, 2.1. Extreme Mode Primals; a new primal the ‘Good King Moggle Mog’ and Daily Quests and more ways to earn Tomestones. It’s a good thing I haven’t plenty to stay busy with until then.

 

Oh and housing. They are adding housing too. I getter get cracking on my crafting so I can make gil.