Overview
A little guide on how to register the Steam Edition of this game and on how to get into this game, including first steps, basics and information on where to get more information :).
Introduction
Hello together ^^,
I’ve decided to do a little tutorial on the game since many people don’t want to try it out because either they are afraid of how to get into the game, they have problems with the registration or they think the game is just dead. This game is still great and thus, this guide is for anyone wanting to try Square’s most profit making game of all time out.
So now, before I do get to the registration part, some things you should know beforehand:
1. Though it says “The Seekers of Adoulin expansion pack will not be available on Steam […]”, the expansion pack is actually included in the Ultimate Collection Seekers Edition (they just wrote it back then when the game was on Steam without it’s expansions).
2. The game is only available in English anymore, but since there are mostly Japanese and English speaking players on the game, you would have to know English anyway
Everything else I will get into during the next parts.
Prologue – Changes since the 75 era
Warning: This section might be confusing for new players. So if you’ve never heard of the 75 era, you might want to skip this section and only potentially come back later once you’ve gotten to know the game for a bit.
So yeah, if you are a returning player, you probably ask yourself what has become of this game. Let me tell you one thing in beforehand: A lot has changed, but: Almost everything you acquired back in the days will still be of worth in the current endgame. So yeah, what happened?
Square Enix raised the level cap to 99 instead of good old 75. This was the time when most people quit, especially after Abyssea. So what has become of the old endgame? As you can probably guess, most of the former endgame is now easily soloable, but you still need most of it to get the gear you want. Yes, you heard me right, it’s all still a thing, Artifact Armor, Relic Armor, Empyrean Armor, Relic Weapons, Mythic Weapons, Empyrean Weapons and so on. Defending Ring is still one of the best pieces in the game. The thing is, those things are more easy to get now (Relic, Mythic and Empyrean Weapons are still very time consuming though), but you need to put a lot of time into them so you can reforge them into the versions you can use in current endgame. So yeah, you basically obtain a 75 weapon or armor piece and then spend hours to reforge it into a Item Level 119 version (Quick Info: At Level 99 which still is max level, you can equip equipment that effectively makes you a higher level, up to 121). The Artifact / Relic / Empyrean 121 armor pieces are without a doubt some of the best pieces of gear, so they are still worth it if you got them back in the days. Same for Relic Weapons, Mythic Weapons and Empyrean Weapons. They are seriously amazing weapons at 121 and almost nothing comes close to how destructive they are. With the 119 era, a new line of Ultimate Weapons has been introduced, the Aeonic Weapons (Those Weapons are called REMA-Weapons, Relic-Empyrean-Mythic-Aeonic). Those are pretty much about as good as the other endgame weapons, but are obtained in a very different way and just as time consuming.
What else happened? Well, you can level pretty fast nowadays. And you can summon your favorite NPCs to replace missing party members. What did that result in? Everyone just get’s to Level 99 on their own very fast. But please don’t stop reading yet, for the game in its core hasn’t changed. Old content can be soloed, that’s true, but endgame will and definitely will always require real people. And there’s a new kind of leveling: Job Points. Once you hit 99, you’re not there yet. In order to make the most out of your job, you have to acqire Job Points, the “new Merit Points” if you will. Those take a lot and lot of time and if you try to do this on your own, you’ll probably be playing for a year and still not be able to cap them out. Thus, the so-called “Apex Parties” have formed. They are the new Exp Parties, with the only exception that you will stay at one place all the time. It will take a lot of time to get you to capped Job Points (called “Job Master”) and you’ll be playing with other people all the time. So no, if you thought this game has become a solo experience, it definitely has not.
Due to the fast leveling, now everyone can play every job they want because it simply doesn’t take long to level them. And it’s amazing! Seriously. If you want to use a job for endgame content, you have to get Job Points for it, but if not, you can try it out all you want and still be decent without spending months on leveling it.
Unfortunately, old areas have become rather empty due to this. I personally prefer still using them to level (still fast, but not as fast as the new zones), but most other people mostly choose the quick way. But that’s completely up to you of course. Another thing that’s changed is transportation. Due to Homepoint Warp and Survival Guide Warp, you can get to most areas pretty quickly and don’t have to walk for hours anymore. That’s kinda sad at times, but also saves a lot, lot of time. SE also introduced a mount system that gives you doubled speed in not-dungeon areas.
So what about the story? Hell, this game still knows how to do it. If you liked the storytelling back in the days, you won’t be disappointed in the current storylines. They are awesome as hell. You also get some mighty bonuses for playing through all of the storylines.
One other thing to note: the combat. This is something that will surprise many players I believe. Combat has become kinda fast compared to the 75 area. You will build TP so quickly that you can fire off Weapon Skills almost all the time and if you don’t, you’ll probably die sooner than you think. Most of the mechanics build upon Weapon Skilling and Magic Bursting while doing all the other stuff you are used to do like enfeebling, buffing etc. So it’s become even more complex than it used to be. I find this to be really nice though :3.
Then you probably ask: What about making gil? Well, I would say some things have changed while some things don’t. Crafting is still probably your #1 source of income if you put enough time and effort into it. Most other ways of making money though are farming “Sparks of Eminence” through some sort of achievement system and farming the currency used to make REMA weapons. There are multiple ways so you just have to find one that suits you.
So, what if you have tried all that and you still prefer the 75 era? Well, some people play on private servers but I wouldn’t recommend that because a) they are laggy and don’t work tooooo well b) they are technically illegal and you cost SE money by not paying for the game.
Instead, I wanna suggest you an alternative that I’ve been using which combines the positive aspects of both the 75 and the 119 area: A lvl 75 linkshell. To be honest, I don’t know if there’s another one out there, but I found a great 75 linkshell that I joined and it’s awesome people and has awesome members. We are deliberately keeping our jobs (at least the ones we want to use for that) on level 75 and just do 75 content on our own. Sky and Sea is still hard as ever, just like all the other 75 stuff that’s out there. It’s really different from Lvl 119 content, so if you wanna enjoy 75 content while still being able to level fast, make money quickly and all that, try it out. The linkshell’s name is “Genkai” and we are on Asura ;). If you are interested, try contacting Whitetank, Eloiza, Obderhode, Majestiks, Gravelands, Desialle, Fightmusician, Mesononso, Trimble, Samuriko, Preciousangel, Dragonshunter or Yojimmbo in the game or write me a quick message so I can get you in touch.
One really last thing to note is that there’s a great guide on BG Wiki that lists the major changes since the 75 era. You can find it here: https://www.bg-wiki.com/bg/Returning_to_Vana%27diel
So, to conclude, the game has changed in a lot of ways, but at its core, it stayed the same. If you find a good linkshell (which is not hard, seriously), you don’t have to worry about anything, people are really willing to help, just like always. If you can restore your account (I will get into that later on), do it, seriously! There’s so many things you can still make use of.
1. Registration and Installation progress
Quick note beforehand: The other two guides on Steam by Mostcus and TakuCED are pretty useful as well, so you might want to take a look at them as well :).
So, since many complain about the registering process and I myself had to take my time to figure it out, here’s a small guide for you:
1. Buy and download the game (of course ;).
2. Don’t do the preferences yet, you should do this first when the game is able to start up properly (I’ll come back to that later).
3. Go to [link] for the login.
4. From there, create a new Square Enix account (please note that this is not the same account as the account on [link] or on the same page in other languages, so if you already got one on that website, you will still have to create one on the website mentioned in step 3).
5. Make sure your birth date is set so that you are at least 18 years old, otherwise you won’t be able to play the game.
6. When you are done and logged in, select “Final Fantasy XI” and then “Play Online”. From there, you will be able to create a new Play Online Account. This is also where you will have to put the first code Steam has given you.
7. After the process, choose “Option List” on the same page you clicked on “Play Online”. There you’ll have to set an option for playing the game. I recommend just using one character (you’ll never need a second anyway), since you will then be able to use the 30 days test period for the game. Be sure to pick “Crysta payment”!
8. If you first want to try the game out, then you will have to cancel the option you just created, so that it will only run for 30 days. Notice that you have to do this by first clicking on “Option List” and cancel it from there. Be careful! Right under “Option List” is a Button “Cancel Service”. If you select this one, you will delete your account instead! So ALWAYS GO BY “OPTION LIST”!
9. When you’re done with all that, start the game on Steam, log in to your account (you will need both your account data for Square Enix AND Play Online as well as your PlayOnline ID so be sure to note everything down!) and wait for the endless update to finish xD.
Note that when creating a profile the settings can be a little confusing: Previously, you created two passwords, one for Square Enix and one for PlayOnline. You can of course use the same one for both. However, in the PlayOnline Launcher, when creating a profile, you have to put in your PlayOnline Password (I’d recommend choosing “save” for the Save Password option). Leave “Member Password” empty. And enter your Square Enix ID. From now on, everytime you log in, the game will ask for your Square Enix password, not your PlayOnline one.
10. After this, click yourself through the Play Online Menus until you get to the FFXI Launcher Page with the option “Play” and click on that. If the game starts up correctly and everything works, close it again and return to Steam.
11. (Optional) If you want to use an XBox 360 Controller, XBox One Controller (don’t know if it works, haven’t tested it but it should work), PS3 Controller or PS4 Controller, install the drivers now (if you haven’t done it yet) and make sure the controller works fine with any other game. Now start the game on Steam and select “Launch Play Online Config Utility”. Click on “Enable Gamepad”, save and quit. Then start the game again and select “Launch Final Fantasy XI Config Utility”. Click on “Gamepad Settings” and then “Default Setup” (this should work with all controllers, but I haven’t tested it yet, I will provide detailed information later on). Enable “XInput” and make sure that “Force Feedback” is unchecked. You can see if everything works by clicking on “Test Gamepad”.
For Xbox 360 controller: still to test, but should work without any additional steps
For Xbox One controller: still to test
For PS3 controller: works if you use the “DS3 tool” to map it as XBox 360 controller
For PS4 controller: works if you use “DS4Windows” and check “Hide DS4 Controller” (this maps it as a Xbox 460 Controller)
Strangely, although the mappings are correct for everything, the camera axes are not configured the right way. To change this, go into the game, open the upper right menu, select “Config” and change the settings accordingly.
12. Start the game on Steam and select “Launch Final Fantasy XI Config Utility”. From there, navigate through the settings and adapt the graphics to your liking.
13. Done! Now try out the game ;).
Troubleshooting:
After downloading all needed updates, the game will try to install DirectPlay which might cause a crash or freeze on newer Windows systems. So, to do this manually, hit the Windows button and type “Windows Features”. The click on the first result. Scroll down to “Legacy Components”, expand and actvate “DirectPlay”. After clicking on “OK”, the Feature will be installed. If this method doesn’t work, restart Windows in safe mode and repeat the above steps.
2. Payment
About payment:
This game needs a monthly subscription. If you don’t like subscription models, just play the game and see if you want to continue playing. FFXI doesn’t automatically continue after the trial period as long as you choose Crysta payment (see below).
If you decide on playing the game after your 30 days test period has ended, you will have two options:
1. Credit card payment
2. Crysta payment
With a credit card, the payment will automatically be done every 30 days unless you cancel it.
When choosing “Crysta payment”, it works like with any other online store like Playstation Store/Microsoft Store/Nintendo eShop: You can buy Crysta to add to your account (from 5$/€ to 100$/€) and then pay your monthly fee with Crysta. If you always cancel your payment right after buying it for another 30 days, you can freely choose the time periods you want to play and e.g. pause the game for 2 months. Crysta also has the benefit of a better management of your finances, since you see how much you pay at what time.
You can buy Crysta with either credit card, PayPal or a PaySafe card (which is extremely useful if you are still underage).
The monthly fee is 12,95$/€.
3. Basics + Creating a character
Now a little help for the game itself:
1. Tutorials
Read through tutorials for beginners on the internet, this will help you a lot. I recommend this one, it was a huge starting point for me as it covers the very basics of the game:
[link]
But there’s more. This is the go to guide for everyone (don’t try to do everything it offers though):
[link]
This guide is relevant once you hit 99, it will help a lot:
[link]
And this last one is especially for returning players, but can be helpful for new players as well:
https://www.bg-wiki.com/bg/Returning_to_Vana%27diel
2. Understanding the Wikis
FFXI was created with one goal in mind: Make the game as non-self-explanatory as possible so as to bring players together in order to help each other out. Thus, some very useful websites were created that hold an immense amount on information about this game:
FFXIclopedia [link]
Here you will find a lot of stuff, especially for slightly older content. It is especially useful for a) finding out what to do in order to complete certain quests / missions b) finding out what certain items are used for. It is well maintained, but it always takes some time until the most recent content is added to it.
BG Wiki [link]
BG Wiki doesn’t have nearly as much information on items and quests / missions as FFXIclopedia, but in return it is always the most up to date source for all things FFXI. New events, items etc. will first appear here. It’s your go to website when you are doing endgame content.
FFXIAH [link]
Here you can always look up prices for items on the Auction House. You can choose your server in the top left. This website is incredibly useful as it doesn’t require you to be ingame.
FFXIDB [link]
This website is incredibly useful as well. Nowhere else will you get nearly as accurate information on drop rates for a given mob / item. And not only that, you can in most cases also look where exactly on the map you will find said mob. Sadly, it hasn’t been updated as much over the last few months, but it is still a very reliable source, especially for slightly older content.
3. Character creation
Now to the actual game: Create a character.
3.1 Race
You have to choose between Hume, Elvaan, Tarutaru, Mithra and Galka. Just pick what you like best, seriously. The stats don’t matter even one bit. I didn’t understand it at first as well, but once you hit 119, the differences are so marginal you won’t ever notice them.
3.2 Job
You have Warrior, Monk, White Mage, Black Mage, Red Mage or Thief as an option. You can change your job at any time in the game when you’re in your nation, so this isn’t too important, but I would recommend choosing now, since this will save you some time later on. If you plan on soloing your way up to 99, there’s some things to notice. First off, you don’t have to solo. Other players will always be happy to join you. But if you do want to solo, you’ll need essentially two things: (1) Sneak/Invisible and a mount (2) Some form of Reraise.
Before I explain further, you should know that in this game, you always have two jobs, one main job and one subjob. Your subjob is always at maximum half the level of the main job. You still need to level it separately though. Once you’ve unlocked your subjob (more on that in the guides mentioned above), anything can be combined, e.g. Redmage main and Whitemage sub or Thief main and Warrior sub. Your main job will get all the traits of the subjob at the respective level, e.g. a 99RDM/49WHM will have most of the traits a 49WHM has. Also, you can unlock more than the six starter jobs at a later point in game. In total there are 22 jobs.
(1) Sneack/Invisible: There are multiple ways to obtain those (all jobs get access to both of them at lvl 25): Red Mage, White Mage, Scholar, Ninja or Dancer. You should have one of these leveled so you can sneak/invis yourself anytime. This is important so you can get past high level enemies without them aggroing and thus instantly killing you.
Mount: Achieves almost the same effect just better and you move twice as fast! Use the guides listed above to find out how to get one. Why not use only mounts? – Because you can’t use them in dungeons, only in the overworld.
(2) Reraise: Really important. When you apply reraise, you can resurrect in case you die – which happens a lot if you’re sneaking around invisible and make some sorta mistake which also happens pretty often – without having to spend half an hour running back to where you got killed. White Mage gets this at 25, Scholar at 35. Alternatively, you can buy Scrolls of Reraise pretty cheap so you don’t have to have a certain subjob.
Having all this in mind, you might be pretty confused as to what you should choose now. Easy answer: Pick what you like. Like a said, you should have a job with Sneak/Invis leveled, but you can still do that later on when you need it. You also don’t have to worry about roles like DPS, Tank, Healer, since you will use Trusts to fill up missing spots anyways (also see the guides for how to get and use Trusts).
3.3 Server
Now there are primarily two choices: Odin and Asura. Odin for Japanese speaking players and Asura for English speaking players. Somehow the population has spread onto those two. You can also check out the population here: [link]
At the moment, there are always about ~100.000 players (spread across all servers) online, so the game is far from dead ;). Gotta note one thing though: You don’t have to choose Asura just because you’re english speaking. There are lots of english speaking players on Odin and other servers as well. Some people switch servers at some point because they don’t like their current one. I still thing Asura is a good starting choice if you’re new.
Secondary note: If you have a friend who’s playing this game, have them invite you via Gold Pass. See Section 5 Other useful tips of this guide for more information.
3.4 Nation
This one’s easy again: Pick what you like. Other guides mention that you get certain rings when your city (= nation) and race match, but those rings are hardly useful after you gain a few levels and can be bought anytime later regardless of race or starting nation. You will get access to the other two cities pretty early on as well, so now worrying about that either. San d’Oria is your typical RPG castle (led by Elves), Windurst is a charming little village in the woods (led by a tiny folk and cat girls) and Bastok is an industrial city (led by humes and cat “boys” ;).
4. Important things to do
The things listed below are mostly important checkmarks you should do as soon as you’re able to.
1. Go to the Tutorial NPC of your nation (-> [link]) and complete the whole tutorial, it is very useful. Also, it removes the question mark above your head.
1.1 If you want to heal, you can either press L3 on your controller or hit space and type “/heal”
1.2 If you want to store items you don’t need at the moment, go to your Mog House (“Residential Area” on the map); you can also change your job and subjob (acquired later on) there.
1.3 Don’t throw away any items yet, store them all in your Mog House until you know what to keep and what to throw away. I will get into this later.
1.4 Always let “Signet” be cast on you by any guardian, it will give you conquest points and crystals (those are useful for a variety of things, but if you really don’t need them, you can still sell them for a decent price)
1.5 Start with “Records of Eminence” (under “Quests” in the Menu). It will give you great rewards and also provide some ideas on what kind of stuff you can do in this game. Be sure to set the rewards you can currently make use of (e.g. “Conflict: Sarutabaruta” if you’re currently leveling in that area. Also, do the stuff listed under “Basics”.
1.6 If you need to get from A to B the first time and it is more than two maps away (e.g. going from Windurst to Bastok), take a look at the World Connection Map[ffxi.allakhazam.com] or the Extensive FFXI Map[vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net]
2. Once you’ve reached Lvl 5, go to the Trust NPC (-> [link]) and complete the quest in order to unlock your first Trust. Those are essential for soloing, so always use them from now on (you can also get Trusts by spending Sparks of Eminence, Conquest Points or by travelling to the other two nations and doing the Trust quests there). You can summon up to three at once for now, so be sure to get them as fast as possible! If you want to get the other two quickly, take advantage of the “Repeat Login Campaign”. Log in every day (resets after Japanese Midnight, more on that later) to get points which you can spend on limited availability Trusts (you can get them from the Greeter Moogle of your nation -> [link]). You should get a healer as soon as possible, so depending on your options, Kupipi, Mihli Aliapoh, Joachim, King of Hearts, Karaha-Baruha or Koru-Moru. Later on, you will mainly use your Unity Trust (either Apururu or Yoran-Oran), but it’s important to have a healer trust you can use independent from your Unity status.
3. Once you have reached Lvl 18, you should try to get to Selbina or Mhaura. If you are soloing, you should first get to at least Lvl 25 in order to arrive at the city without getting aggro’d and killed. There you can acquire your subjob (-> [link]). Since this quest is not very easy, I recommend searching for an experienced player to help you out. By the way, if you don’t know how to get to a certain place, go to [link]
4. Once you have reached Lvl 20, you are able to get your Chocobo License (-> [link]) which is extremely useful (especially for being able to use mounts, see down below). For this, you’ll have to travel to Jeuno. If you’re soloing (same with getting to Selbina/Mhaura), level to at least Lvl 25 first.
5. Acquire your first Mount. After getting the Chocobo License, you can talk to “Mapitoto” in Jeuno (right where you started the Chocobo License Quest -> [link]) in order to start a quest which gets you the option to “mount”. Meaning that after you completed the quest, you can select yourself, then “Abilities”, then “Mount” to call a monster carrying you on its back. Very useful, since it’s completely free, other than Chocobos.
6. Once you hit Lvl 50, you will have to complete certain quests in order to be able to level up any further. See here [link] for more information.
7. Once you hit Lvl 99 and start thinking about Job Points, you should know two things:
(1) The most efficient ways are the so-called “Apex Parties”. But before you can participate in them, keep in mind that meelee jobs will ned to have a certain accuracy. Look here:
[link]
[link]
Non-meelee jobs don’t need to have accuracy, but they should have the other things their job require.
Meelee jobs will have to reach the accuracy they need by getting better gear. The most efficient way to do this is Intense Ambuscade: [link]
Aim for the Armor pieces: [link]
Don’t even try to solo it, do it with your Linkshell!
(2) There’s a lot of things that make gaining Capacity Points way easier. Look here:
[link]
5. Other useful Tips
– Speak to every Home Point on your way (those big blue crystals). They are a great way of teleportation later on when you have enough Gil. You can teleport to every Home Point you’ve “spoken” to before.
– Speak to every Survival Guide that comes across your way (those floating books). They are also great for teleportation, especially when outside of town. Like with Home Points, you will be able to teleport to every one you’ve come across and “spoken” to before.
– Collect the three gate crystals “Holla”, “Dem” and “Mea” (-> [link]). They as well provide a means for transportation, although you can get there only by having a White Mage main job/subjob or by using a Ring (e.g. the “Holla Ring” to teleport to the Holla crystal).
– Get a Warp Ring (-> [link]) as soon as possible. It will save you tons of time by allowing you to warp back to your set Home Point anytime without having a Black Mage in the party. You will also aquire other means of transportation later. To get an overview, visit [link].
– Buy the relevant Maps (you can look at [link] where to buy them, it depends on the map you want to have). Also, wherever you go, if you don’t seem to be able to progress, go to [link], type in the name of the zone you are currently in, scroll down and look at the maps there. They have all the blocked paths and non-visible pathways.
– Once you’ve sucessfully created a character, you can get your “Destrier Beret” and “Chocobo Shirt” (included in the Ultimate Seekers Edition on Steam). Go to your Square Enix account management, select “Final Fantasy XI”, then “Add a service account”. Here you can enter the two codes and receive the items. You can get them from the Festive Moogle in your area (-> [link]). Those two items can be very comfortable for beginners.
– Don’t be shy to ask players questions in game. The FFXI community is mostly newbie-friendly, so they will always help you if you need help. Also, join a linkshell. You will almost at all times find a shout inviting new players to a social linkshell, which is always a good place to start. The people there will assist you and other new players will join you on your adventure.
– If you start the game with a friend or if you’ve conviced a friend to start the game together with you after you’ve played into the game for a bit, you can buy a Gold World Pass for a few Gil which will allow you to play together and get exclusive and very comfortable items. If you want to know more about this, visit [link]
Now, after all this, you should have found your way into the game already. Everything else you need can be read in the tutorials I linked in 3) Basics.
What is Japanese midnight?
This is the time when a lot of things ingame reset. Depending on where you live, this happens at a different time. Consult this webpage [link] to find out yours.
Also, this website [link] allows you to check certain ingame events without having to log in.
6. Making Gil
The question of all questions: How do I make money in this game?
Well, to me, it was very difficult at first. I had no clue and no guide like this, so I was really clueless, had very few Gil and was saving up all the time. Now I know a bit more and thus I’m able to help you guys out a bit ^.^.
1. Do not throw away items you can sell, even if they get you few Gil only.
This is especially important if you just started playing, since you will need every single Gil you can get. Sell every item you don’t need anymore, those will mostly be items dropped by enemies.
Before that, though, search the item on [link] to see what potential uses it has. You may want to keep certain items that are difficult to obtain. Don’t keep everything though as your inventory will fill up quite quickly otherwise. Also, quick note here: You can increase your inventory spaces by a large amount. Look here (-> [link]) to find out how.
If you want to increase your Storage, look here: [link]
2. Before you sell any item, look up what you get for it at the Auction House (-> [link]). There are quite some items that get you tons of gil at the Auction House, but literally nothing when you sell them to NPCs.
3. Open the Special Dial every day (you get points for having an active subscription. Every five days get you enough points to open the Special Dial once). Look up the location of the corresponding NPC here: [link]
This will get you either a useless or a very rare item. I got items worth 2M Gil here yet. You mostly have to sell them at the Auction House.
Notice that it’s only possible to do this when your account has been active for at least 45 days (If you took a break inbetween, the days start counting again the day your second subscription starts).
There’s a little trick for getting unlimited points: Once you have gotten the “Rhapsody in Umber” from the corresponding Rhapsodies of Vana’diel mission, the Curio Vendor Moogle (-> [link] will start selling you Coffer Keys. You can trade on of those to the Gobbie Box NPC once per day to instantly get 50 points. Since you get 10 points daily and can open the Special Dial for 50 points daily, this means that if you trade a key every day, you will be able to open the Special Dial every day and still make 10 points extra.
Also, quick tip, the Curio Vendor Moogle sells all kinds of awesome stuff. Check back after every “Rhapsody” key item you obtain to see what new wares it has to offer.
4. Pick a craft (-> [link]). Now, at this point it’s important where you are in the game now. If you already have some money and are near Lvl 99, then you should go for any of the crafts except Cooking, Fishing and Synergy. Cooking and Fishing wouldn’t yield you much gil. Synergy can be leveled separately, so choose one of the “real” crafts instead and do Synergy on the side. Crafts require lots of money, but will give out way more afterwards. But if you’re a beginner and have almost no money in-game, then I’d not do crafting for now. You will have better ways of earning things.
Also, if you do crafting, get the Windower Addon “Craft”. It will be really helpful. I’ll talk more about Windower later on.
5. Enter your Mog Garden (-> [link]). Start doing the activities there daily. The items you get can mostly directly be sold to the Green Thumb Moogle again and will yield you some gil to help you get started. Besides, doing it is required to be able to start some really important quests for Geomancer and Rune Fencer later on, so starting soon is always a good idea.
6. Other. Well, there’s tons of ways to make gil, so I just want to give a basic idea. Lots of gil comes from “merching” nowadays, which basically means you’ll be doing things for other people (e.g. leveling) and they give you money for it.
Another way is to do time consuming or difficult battles and selling the items you obtain from them.
Yet another way is to do “Sparks farming”. Basically, you pick a time where “Gain Exp” is active, go to one of the Escha Zones and kill as many enemies as possible. The Sparks of Eminence can be converted into gil by buying as many Acheron shields as possible and selling them to an NPC. Sparks cap at 100K, so by selling all of them you would get approximately 1M gil. There are some other minor ways of course, but I think you get the gist. You will find out about most things on your own anyways. Just do something you feel comfortable with!
What are mules? What is multiboxing?
Mules are secondary characters. You can get one for 1$/€ extra a month (if you want to use only one of them later on, you can still just buy the standard subscription and activate only one of your characters). People get them for several purposes, including:
– More inventory places
– Get limited items double and send them to your main character when needed (e.g. Echad Ring)
– Level a different craft from that on your main account
– Relive the experience of starting anew, redo the story missions (trust me, the storylines of this game are awesome)
Multiboxing is a whole different story though. I personally think it is unfair towards other players, as it is essentially “pay to win”. Some one buys additional FFXI accounts (not just a character) and plays on several computers at once. That way, they can do difficult content without having to share their loot with other players. Like I said, this is not really fair, so I encourage you to play with everyone else as you should do.
7. Where to store things and what to keep / not to keep
What most players don’t know: You can store a lot of items so that they don’t occupy space. I’ll list some items you should keep and where you can store them.
Event items
You will get these by participating in limited time events (-> [link]). Almost all of them are storable via either the Porter Moogle (-> [link]) or alternatively the Item Depository (-> [link]).
Seals / Crests
Those are items dropped randomly by all enemies. Keep them in all cases! The possible drops are “Beastmen’s Seal”, “Kindred’s Seal”, “Kindred’s Crest”, “High Kindred’s Crest” and “Sacred Kindred’s Crest”. You can store them with Shami (-> [link]).
Crystals
Those are dropped by enemies as well as long as you have Signet / Sanction / Sigil on (depending on where you are leveling; the starting areas all use Signet). You will need them for:
(1) Crafting
(2) Progressing in story missions
(3) Filling up Kinetic Units for teleportation
You can store them with Ephemeral Moogles (-> [link]) in all crafting guilds. Alternatively, you can still sell them if you truly have no need for them.
A.M.A.N. Vouchers
Bronze Vouchers can be stored with A.M.A.N. representatives (-> https://ffxiclopedia.fandom.com/wiki/Adventurers%27_Mutual_Aid_Network). You get them by various means and you can exchange them for a variety of stuff.
Silver Vouchers can be stored with Greyson (-> [link]). You get them by doing certain Records of Eminence objectives and you can use them to participate in A.M.A.N. Trove, an event which acts as some sort of lottery, but can yield great rewards.
Gear
Some, but not all gear, can be stored with the Porter Moogle (-> [link]). Also, for players that do endgame content with multiple jobs, it is possible to buy a third and fourth Mog Wardrobe for 2$/€ a month each.
Augment Stones
More precisely, Ghastly Stones, Verdigris Stones, Wailing Stones, Leafslit/-tip/-dim/-orb Stones, Snowslit/-tip/-dim/-orb Stones, Duskslit/-tip/-dim/-orb Stones and related +1/+2 versions. You will need them for augmenting Skirmish and Alluvion Skirmish armor and weapons. You can store them with Divainy-Gamainy (-> [link]).
Wings
You will sometimes get Lebondopt Wings or Pulchridopt Wings from the Mystery Box or by doing Skirmishes. Store them with Lola (-> [link]).
8. Things you can and things you should do (Part 1)
Obviously, there’s a lot of stuff. I will try to cover most of it.
General
Leveling jobs and subjobs, unlocking different jobs
This is obvious. But it’s truly fun to level different jobs and see what other possibilities there are. Keeping your subjob on the appropriate level is also really important.
CP’ing & Meriting
= Capacity Point Farming for Job Points
Really important. If you want to dedicate to a job, you should try and cap your Job Points at some point. The way to do this is Apex Parties. -> See 4) Important things to do
Meriting used to be a thing, but nowadays you will collect Merit Points along the way. If you go CP’ing, you will cap your Merits pretty fast without having to do anything for it.
Skilling
This is just as annoying as back in the days. In order to use your capabilitites to the fullest, your combat and magic skills should be capped. Luckily, this has become a bit easier. I’d recommend trying to skill as much as possible while leveling, then it will be easier to finish at Lvl 99. Your combat skills level up by simply using them, same for magic skills, whereas Evasion / Guarding / Parrying / Shield level up passively. There are certain tricks to level up some skills (e.g. having as few Evasion and Parrying as possible for skilling up Shield), so look up your skills to see how to level them. There’s some Trusts, food, equipment and some other methods to increase your skill up rate by a large factor. Look here:
[link]
The alternative is to spend lots of gil on Skilling Tomes which you can buy from the A.M.A.N. NPCs, but this is only worth it if you have lots of money. Most skills can be capped within a few hours if you equip a Lvl 1 weapon and do Lair Reives (-> https://ffxiclopedia.fandom.com/wiki/Category%3AReive).
Missions
This is, in my eyes, one of the parts of the game which on its own makes it worth playing. The story of FFXI, especially that of the expansions, is amazing and you won’t regret experiencing it yourself. You could of course watch it on YouTube, but hell, what makes it so amazing is the journey that takes you to the places where the story takes place. The hardships you have to go through to reach them. The boss fights you have to master. And you even get a +10% Capacity Point bonus for every storyline you finish! Totally worth it.
[link]
Quests
Those can be fun. Some of them have really cute stories to them, like the Star Onion Brigade quests. In general, you should only do them when you need them though.
[link]
[link]
[link]
Records of Eminence
Try to do as much of them as possible. The rewards are just amazing. Also it’s kind of a nice to see what you’ve already accomplished in this game.
Acquiring spells / songs / Ninjutsu / Avatars / Die / Geomancy
Depending on your job, you will have to learn certain things. Mages will learn spells, Bards songs, Ninjas Ninjutsu, Summoners will form pacts with Avatars, Corsairs will learn rolls from die and Geomancers will acquire their spells from plates and improve them at geomantic reservoirs. These are things you should do in order to be able to use your job effectively.
Acquiring Weapon Skills
Not all Weapon Skills are unlocked by leveling their skill, but instead have to be unlocked via quests. For further information, look here:
[link]
Work on Armor, Weapons and Augments
There are so many ways to do this, I surely won’t list them all. But to give a general idea:
(1) Until you reach Lvl 99, use only gear bought with Sparks of Eminence from A.M.A.N. representatives
(2) Once you reach LvL 99, follow the Records of Eminence Intermediate Tutorial until you reach iLvl 119. Get the Job Specific Equipment (-> https://ffxiclopedia.fandom.com/wiki/Category%3AJob_Specific_Equipment) that’s crucial for your job. Usually you won’t need all pieces, so pick the ones that are most useful.
(3) Get Ambuscade armor for your job and an appropriate weapon (the weapon depends highly on your job, it could be an Oboro Weapon, Geas Fete drop, Ambuscade Weapon, High-Tier Mission Battlefield drop, Unity NM drop, maybe even Alluvion Skirmish Weapon. Find it out by searching your job on the FFXIAH Forums.)
(4) Do the content you need to do in order to get even better equipment. I suggest consulting the “Quickstart 1-119” guide I linked in the 3) Basics part of this guide.
(5) Augment your stuff to make it even better. See [link]
(6) If you really like your job, get yourself an Ultimate Weapon (-> [link]) or Divergence Weapon (-> [link]). They are called REMA (Relic-Empyrean-Mythic-Aeonic) or, as I like to call them since the addition of Divergence Weapons, DREAM (Divergence-Relic-Empyrean-Aeonic-Mythic) Weapons.
Crafting
Like I said earlier, this is a pretty solid way of making gil. It requires some effort, but is well worth it. Should you fully dedicate yourself to it, you can make an Escutcheon. This will cost literally millions of gil, but afterwards you can earn billions. I heard that it’s really frustrating to make though.
Unlock more transportation methods
Never a bad idea. It will help you get from A to B a lot faster. You should try to get all Home Points[ffxiclopedia.fandom.com], Survival Guides[ffxiclopedia.fandom.com], Gate Crystals[ffxiclopedia.fandom.com], Open Door Key Items[ffxiclopedia.fandom.com], Mog House Exits[ffxiclopedia.fandom.com], Lycopodium Warps[ffxiclopedia.fandom.com], Abyssea Portals[ffxiclopedia.fandom.com], Voidwatch Teleports[ffxiclopedia.fandom.com](Proto-)Waypoints, Augural Conveyors, Geomagnetic Founts[ffxiclopedia.fandom.com] and Eschan Portals[www.bg-wiki.com].
9. Things you can and things you should do (Part 2)
Fun or not so fun things to do (but not necessary in any way)
Acquiring and leveling your Adventuring fellow
Those are pretty irrelevent nowaday since Trusts were introduced, but if you are bored for some reason …
Fishing
Seriously, this can be quite fun at times, but to get the legendary Lu Shang’s Fishing Rod or even Ebisu Fishing Rod, you will have to either fish a lot or buy a lot of fish as you will need 10,000 Moat Carps / Forest Carps in total. Should you truly go for it, look here:
[link]
Chocobos
This can truly be fun if you dedicate to it. You can raise your own chocobo and participate in races with it. Or go digging for some items. Look here:
[link]
Monstrosity
I like that event. It’s sad that it has so little use nowadays. You play as a monster and travel through the world killing other monsters like that. It can be really fun for a while, so be sure to try it out :).
Hobbies
You will rarely need those, I only needed them for doing Coalition Assignments (more on that later). You’ll surely not get rich by doing that.
Battlefields
FFXI offers a variety of those. Most of them are from older content, but some are still relevant (e.g. for getting Kraken Club, one of the most famous and expensive items there are). You can do the old ones for fun or the new ones for item drops:
[link]
More interesting I think though is to play through old endgame content. If you have a Linkshell that does this stuff with Lvl 75 jobs, even more fun!
[link]
Also, if you’re a collector, you might be itching to get your hands on the most visually stunning (and extremely rare) pieces of equipment: The Tartarus Platemail, Gyve Doublet and Gyve Trousers.
Note: I might do an additional section of this guide in the future where I explain all the battlefields and what they are used for.
Special Events
Seriously, give those a shot. They are usually quite fun and a completely different experience from the usual FFXI. You often have to work together with others to complete certain mini quests:
[link]
Hunt Registry and FoV Notorious Monsters
I think this used to be relevant for augmenting gear, but nowadays it isn’t. I haven’t tried it yet, so I can’t say much about it. If you want to try it out, look here:
[link]
[link]
Mannequin Quest
This is a nice to have thing. It not only grants extra storage options, it also is a nice display for you Mog House. You should wait until a Mog Gardens Campaign rolls around and hope to get the pieces from Flotsam. This is about the easiest way to do it.
[link]
Regular Stuff (highly recommended)
Gobbie Box
Open the Special Dial daily. It’s absolutely worth it:
[link]
Login Points
By simply logging in daily, you accumulate points. You can spend them on various stuff, and it sure is worth logging in daily, even if you don’t do anything else in the game. You can only carry over 1500 Login Points every month, so be sure to spend excess points before the next campaign starts. Check the currently available items here:
[link]
Mog Garden & Monster Rearing
This is a fun little daily side thing to do that is accompanied by a fun sidestory with the Green Thumb Moogle. It also unlocks exclusive mounts, however it will take some time to get them. Most important is the Flotsam though. It’s similar to the Gobbie Box in that you can open it once a day and it can get you some neat items you can sell.
[link]
More interesting is Monster Rearing. You unlock it after doing some quests in your Mog Garden. It is particularly interesting because it allows you to raise a Behemoth which will eventually give you a Capacity Points +9% bonus. I’d recommend doing this on a daily basis as well.
[link]
A.M.A.N. Trove & Deeds of Heroism
Like I said before, you can participate in A.M.A.N. Trove in order to potentially be rewarded with awesome pieces of gear. Although you won’t win everytime, it will get you a huge boost if you do it regularly. As a beginner, always use Mars Orb for now, and do it every month:
[link]
Deeds of Heroism is similar in that you do tasks to earn a currency, just that you directly know which rewards you will get (and they are really worth it!). Do it monthly as well:
[link]
Coalition Assignments
You should start doing these as soon as you can if you plan on ever playing Geomancer or Rune Fencer seriously. Because for that you will first have to complete all Adoulin quests and get all Coalitions to “Legend” rank. And since the imprimaturs you have to use in order to accept missions only replenish every 6 hours, it will take at least 104 days to achieve that goal. Doing it isn’t hard and doesn’t take too long, so I’d to them on a daily basis or at least every few days so that no imprimaturs get lost (they cap at 15).
[link]
10. Windower and HD mods
Most of you might have heard about Windower already. It’s seriously a great program that I can only recommend. Basically, it will allow you to do two things:
(1) Play the game at max graphics (better than possible with the settings the game provides you)
(2) Run certain mods that clearly enhance the experience.
There’s an ongoing discussion between players, but most will tell you that it’s okay to use certain mods as long as you stick to the rules. Which means, for example: It is okay to use GearSwap. It’s a huge quality of life improvement without giving you an unfair advantage. It is not okay to use any kind of mod for botting (= doing all the work for you, e.g. farming experience). Botting has always and will always be punished with bans if you get caught and it is only fair to not do it.
Basically, you will have to decide for yourself. Despite some people claiming that, there has not one single case been reported where somebody got banned for only using Windower. Everyone who got banned got banned because they cheated or botted. If you still don’t want to take the risk, that’s up to you of course. I can’t take responsibility for anyone getting banned. So I will recommend using Windower, but at your own risk. If you use it to cheat, you’re to blame. If you use it fairly, you shouldn’t ever have problems. Everything I recommend is considered fair among the masses.
Plugins I can recommend:
DelayMeNot
Eliminates the delay when opening the macro bar with the keyboard.
FFXIDB
Displays a minimap. Seriously, you won’t be able to play without this ever again.
Timers
Nearly mandatory when playing together in a party. It shows you buff durations and recast timers in a way you won’t need to get your face 2cm in front of the screen to be able to recognize them.
Addons I can recommend:
AutoRA
If you play any kind of jobs that uses Ranged Weapons, esp. Ninja, Ranger or Corsair, you will go mad without this mod. It allows you to perform consecutive ranged attacks without having to spam X on your controller (or A on your Xbox Controller) every 2 seconds (I mean that quite literally btw). I made my own mod for it btw:
Update for AutoRA+ from ffxi
Battlemod
Organizes your chatlog in a way that makes it a lot easier to read.
Craft
Makes crafting a lot easier. Especially useful if you are leveling a certain craft and have to repeat the same craft over and over.
DistancePlus
This is more of an advanced plugin, but almost mandatory for endgame content. It displays your current distance to your target. You will need that e.g. to evade attacks that hit in a certain range or if you need to know how far you can position yourself while still being able to cast magic on your party members / the enemy.
DressUp
Almost mandatory as well, at least for healers. This allows you and others to change equipment without “blinking”. During this time frame of 2~3 seconds, you would be untargettable else. Which is important if you want to use a spell, ability or item on another player who is currently changing equipment. And in endgame fights, you change equipment a lot.
GearSwap
This one is awesome. It allows you to specify which gear gets swapped for which other pieces of gear when certain events like weaponskills are performed. See here [link] for a guide. Technically, you can replace this with well written macros and equipsets, but in general Gearswap is just more comfortable due to not having to use macros for everything.
LatentChecker
Far from mandatory, but still pretty useful. It allows you to check Weapon Skill points. You’ll know what I mean when you get there. You basically have to perform a certain Weapon Skill a certain amount of times, but the game doesn’t tell you when you’re finished. This addon allows you to look up your progress.
MountMuzzle
The least mandatory, but I wouldn’t want to miss it anyways. By default, the game plays a certain music track when travelling on a mount. However, lots of players – like me – prefer to still listen to the zone music instead. This addon allows you to do just that.
Porter
Shows items you have stored with the Porter Moogle. Saves tons of times.
Pouches
Allows you to use all of one kind of item at once.
TParty
Shows an enemy’s percentage of health left. Also shows TP of other party members including trusts.
Trusts
Allows you to save and summon a set of Trusts.
Others
These depend on your job. Some like Beastmaster have special addons that are relevant only to them. You will find out about them on yourself. Generally, it is a good idea to only use addons that are installable via the Windower application itself. Anything you have to download from GitHub first and install manually might be a cheating tool.
Which brings me to HD mods. There are three ways to achieve better graphics:
(1) Windower
Simply by using Windower and tweaking the settings a bit, you will achieve amazing results already.
(2) Reshade and DgVoodoo
Those are mostly for lighting and effects. They don’t change too much, but can look pretty neat.
https://balanceffxi.fandom.com/wiki/DgVoodoo2_%26_Reshade_Setup
[link]
(3) DAT swapping
This is the most official form of modding as it allows you to mod the game without having Windower or any kind of external program.
[link]
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKJ4a33wIHWadqXW7SP87aQ (grab the Megapack, the AI Upscale Pack 01 and the AI Upscale Pack 02 for the best experience)
11. Some other useful things + Final Words
Lastly, some little extras ;).
[link]
Here you will find some jokes about FFXI. I think they are pretty funny, but you have to know the game quite a bit to understand all of them (e.g. why Elvaans used to be laughed at for their accuracy).
Also, I want to link some of my favorite YouTubers. I think they make great videos and you should definitely check them out!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChlcLh8S36H2WhCpqEUhLAg
I used to watch Huntin4Games when he used to have <200 subs. He is an amazing guy and I love his videos. He talks about how the game used to be, how it has changed, what he loves about it, what made FFXI be specia etc.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIF5q-zLzQdRhYPSnriWfBQ
This channel is for true FFXI fans. It covers some of the lore you can find nowhere in the game and lore that has been released in Japan exclusively. Also the videos are made pretty well.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKJ4a33wIHWadqXW7SP87aQ
There is no way one can not subscribe to this channel. Except for if you are playing on a laptop that can’t even handle FFXI without mods very well … *ahem*. Anyways, if you subscribe to this amazing dude who has done so freakin much for the community already, you will immediately know once he uploads one more of those amazing HD mods!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCEg2gnysc6Ze_WPHJKSBeA/featured
Ruaumoko has some awesome job guides which you should check out if you play on doing endgame content :).
Eijiin is probably one of the best non-Japanese players I’ve ever seen. Whenever any kind of new extremely difficult content comes out, you can be sure he’s one of the first in the world to beat it. To Normies like me, his channel is mostly interesting for checking out his Ambuscade strategies (those change every month).
Lastly, before I get to my final words, I wanna address something that rarely gets addressed when it comes to MMOs: Like all other MMOs, this game can be quite addictive. To be honest, even when playing solo it’s able to suck you in because of its fantastic world and mesmerizing storytelling. And to be able to enjoy this game, it’s important to not let yourself get completely sucked in. Decide beforehand how long you want to play it at max. Don’t sit around playing this game all day and night. Go out and live your life, do your stuff! And only come back to this world if you need to calm down for a bit in the evening. Don’t use videogames as an escape. Use them as a second home you visit every now and then. That makes them much more valuable :).
So, this was my little guide for you guys 🙂 I sat here for multiple hours just redoing it because I know so much more about the game now compared to when I originally wrote this guide. I hope this guide still helps people out and that people are able to enjoy the game despite it’s graphics. If you didn’t know, the developers plan to have it run for many years to come, so they might have a plan in mind for the graphics as well. At least I hope so :). This game inspired so many people, and it’s fantastic to hear from nostalgic FFXI fans who tell their stories. Nobody who played this game could forget it. I hope it will stay that way. And I look forward to see what the developers have in store for us next …
If you’ve found any mistakes or have suggestions for this guide, feel free to contact me anytime :).
Buy the way, if you want to find me ingame, I’m on Asura under the name “Eaglestriker”. I’m not playing as regularly as I used to, but should you indeed come across me, I’ll gladly help you out ;).
Have a great time,
Eagle