Final Fantasy XIV Live Letter 71 Speculation and 6.18 Patch Notes

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Final Fantasy XIV Live Letter 71 Speculation and 6.18 Patch Notes

We're close to  Final Fantasy XIV Live Letter 71 coming up soon, and patch 6.18 is also on the way. Here's all the information you'll need.


Letter from the Producer LIVE 71

Director and Producer Naoki Yoshida will once again step in front of the camera to discuss the future of Final Fantasy XIV. We can expect miscellaneous updates, details for the upcoming 6.2 patch, and the usual banter. Do note that the stream will be in Japanese only, but the slides will also be available in English. But as always, we're going to have a summary of the live letter up as soon as possible.

The live letter will be streamed on YouTube, Twitch and Niconico on Friday, June 1 2022 at 11:00 (GMT) / 12:00 (BST) / 21:00 (AEST) and as usual, those times are subject to change. We expect the live steam to be around 2-3 hours. And it will mostly be focussed around future content.

What Can We Expect From 6.2 Then?

Thanks to a slide provided by Square Enix, all the way back in February, we already have an idea of what's to come in 6.2 besides the usual. But let's get that out of the way. If estimates are correct, we can expect 6.2 to be released sometime in late August or early to mid-September.

This next patch will include the next chapter of the Pandemonium raid. This will include 4 new bosses to face in both normal and savage difficulty, as well as a continuation of the Pandemonium quest line. With that comes of course a new weekly Tomestone currency and new sets of gear to be obtained by either raiding or farming. We can also expect the start of the trial series for 6.X, which we don't know much about at this point. With that comes a new normal trial and the extreme difficulty with a new weapon rewards. Which will probably make your progress through the new Pandemonium tier a little easier.

Of course, we can also expect a new dungeon and the continuation of the main quest scenario. Which will either stay the course we set out on in 6.1, or maybe branch off into something completely different. With this patch, we'll also see the first step of the new relict weapons. While this step will probably not include something as grandeur as Bozja or Eureka just yet, it should give us a good idea for the direction we're heading. By the end of an expansion, the relict weapon will be the most powerful weapon obtainable. So it's worth investing in it early if you plan to gear up your secondary jobs.

We can also expect some new additions to the popular crystal conflict PVP mode, as well as a new season. You get once again the chance to climb the ranks, and obtain rewards. There'll probably be more maps on the way. As well as adjustments to the large-scale PVP modes.

There will also be a proper implementation of the Adventurer Plate system, introduced in the latest patch. More customization options for both the plate, and the Portrait feature. Director and Producer Naoki Yoshida has also teased, that the Portraits might be featured at the start of dungeons. Similar to how it currently works in PVP. The feature turned out to be rather popular with players, so you can assume there is much more to come.

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With 6.2, we'll also see the implementation of the long-awaited Island Sanctuary. A feature that has been teased for over a year now, but we know next to nothing about. There have been whispers that this might be that personal housing system players have been wanting years. Currently, it is rather hard to obtain a house, even harder when you're on your own. And while the Island Sanctuary is probably not going to fix all those woes, it can be a step in the right direction.

But what is the Island Sanctuary? From interviews and past live letters, we know that it is a ‘different kind' of content, according to Yoshida. And while he warned that players should not expect something on the level of a Stardew Valley or Animal Crossing. It seems like it shapes up to be something in that direction. Players can build their own houses on a private island, grow things in their gardens and interact with collected minions and mounts. It's probably going to be one of those time sinks that don't really interact with the game, outside from the market board of course. And will just add to the ‘hangoutitude' of the MMO.

Criterion Dungeons are another feature that is currently shrouded in mystery. Not replacing the Deep Dungeons, as we'll get another one of those with 6.3. Criterion Dungeons are going to be solo or group dungeons, similarly to the aforementioned Deep Dungeons. And while those are long gauntlets rigged with traps and randomly generated. The name implies that Criterion Dungeons might be a more curated experience for smaller parties or solo players. I wouldn't be surprised if they are bite-sized dungeon trials, similar to the Blue Mage Carnival missions. Bite-sized battle puzzles that require perfect execution.

Next up is the continued endeavor to implement the trust system in all main scenario related content. For 6.2 we can expect the rest of the 2.x dungeons like Snowcloak and Keeper of the Lake, as well as some 3.0 dungeons. With the implementations comes also a visual overhaul, implementing new light effects and some adjustments to the scenery. And it's probably not too far-fetched to expect some bosses to see some changes. But it's left to be seen if these changes will also relate to the Crystal Tower alliance raids.

We're also going to see a potential continuation of the newly introduced Tataru questline, and even more misadventures with detective Hildibrand. And those are just the things we know about. After the success of the Ishgard restoration during the 5.x circle, I expect that we're going to see something similar for 6.x very soon.

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6.18

We have patch date for 6.18! Relatively soon on Tuesday, July 5. Not only does this patch mark the end of the first season of the Crystalline Conflict, but also the start of the second season and some server expansions. Oh, and we're finally getting Data Center travel!

Data Center travel will finally be implemented with 6.18. The feature was originally planned to debut last year with 5.5X but had to be delayed thanks to a slew of server issues in the wake of XIV's sudden burst in popularity. Now that the feature is finally here, players can hop between data centers in the same region. So if you're on Aether, you can now visit Primal and Crystal. But you will be somewhat limited to what you can do while traveling.

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While you will be able to interact with market boards, trade and join parties. You won't be able to interact with any leader boards, like the ones for Deep Dungeons or PvP. Other limitations will be similarly to cross world travel. Means that you won't be able to access your retainers or buy houses and so on. In addition, you also won't be able to interact with any unspoiled or legendary nodes while gathering. But you will be able to join crossword linkshells, that will only be available when you're on the data center they're native to. And perhaps in the future, we might be able to visit data centers in other regions.

This patch will also see the first stage of the promised server expansions. Starting with the redistribution of the Japanese data center's. A fourth one, named Meteor, will be added and change the current 10:11:11 configuration to a 8:8:8:8 set up. For more details on what servers are affected, please check out the official post here.

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We'll also see the implementation of two more worlds to both the European Data Centers: Light and Chaos. There are also plans to add a whole new Data Center sometime next year. The purchase of houses on those new servers will however be disabled until further notice. Until Square Enix can confirm that the implementation went off without a hitch.

If you create a new character on one of those four new worlds, you'll be able to get 15 days of free playtime and a gift of 1,000,000 gil. This is only possible once per service account, but probably worth looking into. Players who transfer to these new worlds will be able to do so free of charge and can get gil of their private estates/apartments as compensation. You can find more details on the process here.

North American players will have to wait a little longer, but Square Enix announced back in January that there is an expansion for NA operations in the works. Back then, the plan was to add a new data center with 8 worlds to the region. But we haven't heard an update since. The plan back then was to add that new data center around August, so we can expect it to be added around the time the 6.2 patch lands.

As mentioned before, patch 6.18 is expected to go live on July 5, 2022. In wake of the implementation of the new data center, new worlds and the cross-data center travel system. Servers are expected to be down for maintenance for 24 hours. So make sure to finish your weekly tasks before Monday.

For more on Final Fantasy XIV, visit us here on ESTNN.