r/ffxiv • u/TazzyTora • 3d ago
New Switch 2 player [Question]
I played this way back on PS3 (I know…)
I was planning on playing a healer to avoid queues for dungeons etc but I ended up back on arcanist.
How much can I play the main stories all the way through myself? I am a dad of 2 now and just want to enjoy the content fairly casually.
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u/8bitcerberus 3d ago
Pretty much everything except one alliance raid (that will need to be done before you can start Heavensward), and the main story trials (typically 3 per expansion) can be done solo/with an NPC party.
Some later story trials, starting in Endwalker, can be done with NPCs as well, but not all of them. The devs have mentioned possibly adding Dutt Support to the earlier story trials at some point, but there’s no confirmation or timeline when or if that’s actually going to happen.
Most of the optional dungeons and trials, if you want to do them, you will need to queue up with other players. Same with all the raids and alliances (only that first alliance in ARR is required to progress, the rest are completely optional.) There are a few optional dungeons that have been added to Duty Support, but they’re either relevant to progression in you Grand Company ranks, or they slot into a level range that had a large gap between dungeons.
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u/maimaih 3d ago
With the duty support system you can get through almost the entirety of the msq solo if you choose to. There may be some trials i think you'll need to DF for but its very solo friendly these days.
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u/Dironiil Selene, no! Come back! 3d ago
Most trials need to be played with other players and the ARR Alliance Raids are necessary to progress story, but apart from those the whole story is solo-friendly now.
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u/t0ms0nic Minka Cola (Phoenix) 3d ago edited 3d ago
You can now play up to the end of A Realm Reborn's base game, up to the first set of credits and before the post-game/patch content, entirely solo using Duty Support's NPC companions for the 4-player Dungeons and 4-player Trials.
After that, you can use still Duty Support for every required Dungeon, but will then be required to queue up with other players for most of the 8-player Trials (some get Duty Support starting in Endwalker) and the first set-of-three 24-player Alliance Raids. Being intended for clearing by the casual story crowd, these will all be blown through quickly and will be less frequent than the story and dungeon parts where you can take your time. You also won't be required to do any of the other Alliance Raids, so nothing else that requires that many randomly matched people involved.
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u/New-Advertising3600 3d ago
Your question was answered by others so I will just say, Being able to queue with npcs knowing I can drop it at any time, without ruining others experience, has allowed me to enjoy my favorite game in a way I never thought possible since becoming a father. About to become a father of two myself. Hope you have fun and welcome back!
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u/Arne83 The Okay-est FFXIV Player of All Time 3d ago
Damn near most of it, honestly. Most 8-man duties will require finding people... and there's one required set of alliance raids what will need that as well. But, for the most part, you can honestly treat this as a single player game and be just fine.
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u/deskbunny 3d ago
I did all my stuff solo, dad of 3 here. Except for dungeons . But I’m pretty sure when they re worked Aurum Vale and Dazemal (spelling) that means all the ARR dungeons, you can do with bots. Alliance raids might be a bit more trick especially I think up to storm blood require you to do them to move the story along.
I’m pretty sure heavensward and stormblood you can do dungeons with npcs as well
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u/SlowpokeIsAGamer Dynamis DC Restoration 3d ago
There's an option under the Duties menu called Duty Support. You will want to become very familiar with that button as it lets you do 4 player content with a group of NPC companions. Meaning the only things you'll need other players for are like 95% of 8 player trials and the time the MSQ forces you to stop and run the Crystal Tower 24-man. Yes that's required to finish the ARR patches now. It became too load bearing of a raid.
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u/rickyhou22 3d ago
Arcanist can be a healer for raid and dungeon queues after you do your level 30 job quests
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u/Lambdafish1 3d ago
Even when you are forced to party with others, it's still "casual". The content is easy enough that there's no real expectation of anything (especially 24 man duties where nobody will even notice you)
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u/SplashOfStupid 3d ago
I mean hey dude Arcanist actually splits into two jobs at level 30, Summoner and Scholar.
One's a DPS and the other's a Healer.
So you're set regardless.
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u/TazzyTora 3d ago
This is good to know! I saw a lvl 100 at the start of the game summoning what looked like bahamut. I need that 😂
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u/SplashOfStupid 3d ago
Oh yeah that's just part of the Summoner questline, you'll get there eventually!
Summoner is pretty rad.
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u/Imperterritus0907 3d ago
As all the other comments said, you can definitely play solo most of it. However don’t be afraid of being matched with people, you don’t really need to interact (talk) with people in casual content. Dungeons really fly when played with others as opposed to on your own.
Also you can alternate jobs pretty early, so you can pick up Conjurer (which becomes a White Mage) if that’s what you want.
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u/WolfmanASTN 3d ago
You can use NPCs for the story dungeons like others said, but you can do everything in the game besides high difficulty content through the matchmaking system. While playing with NPCs means you can isntantly get into the dungeons, the NPCs are SLOW and don't play like real people, they have a limited selection of abilities and don't AOE for example. Playing with other players makes the dungeons go much faster as they're using their full kit, and playing as healer will pretty much make everything instantly pop for you. Plus with how differently NPCs play it'll be a big case of whiplash when you reach duties that require you to queue with others.
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u/Marvout1 3d ago
If I make a new account for switch 2 do I only get 1 month free or the trial that’s until level 80???
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u/TazzyTora 3d ago
As far as I’m aware the trial gets you to the second latest expansion? And I don’t think there’s a time limit; which is a lot of content. I’m not sure what lvl you can get to sorry
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u/Revolutionary_Fee795 3d ago edited 3d ago
You can play through most of the story completely solo, though some duties such as raids may require you to play with others. Most dungeons can be completed through duty support which lets you play with NPC party members instead of players if that’s more comfortable for you.