Welcome back to Final Festivus XI, a news show to discuss the HorizonXI private server news and player content. 

Before I start, I ask you to follow the HorizonXI and FFXI rules as it relates to these news items. Don’t use this as a reason to go out and bother anyone. I’ve attempted to keep all names redacted as much as possible.

I have some corrections from prior weeks’ news items so I want to hit those first. I originally misstated that GM Ah Puch nuked a HC player, per the screenshot below: 

It was brought to my attention that this was incorrect. Someone had reached out to GM Ah Puch to ask and apparently the GM clarified that this was not true. The player killed themselves, more than likely via poison pots or something similar.

The second correction comes from shorthand. I talked about not using Shorthand to claim things like NMs with the screenshot below.

However, it was further clarified this week that Shorthand is not to be used on mobs no matter what. That includes normal mobs, even if after a claim, and with 0 competition. I highly recommend just not using Shorthand at all to avoid accidentally breaking the rules. 

I know the Horizon staff further mentioned they were going to clarify it just to avoid confusion, as you can see in Dash’s post. 

For not so new news, claim shield is still having issues. I got a screenshot of a staff member sharing there’s some known issues. I’m expecting this will be fixed during the Friday maintenance this week or next, hopefully sooner rather than later. Of course, as I drafted this, the staff did fix it during maintenance this week.

Another fix was around latent effects on gear. See below.

However, shortly after the server coming back up, the staff confirmed it was still broken and we have an emergency maintenance at the time of this broadcast to fix it. 

This week, I managed to catch the first RMT advertisement. If you play other MMOs, you’ll know these are common and super obnoxious. FFXIV has them quite often in global chat and in direct messages. I’ve obviously censored the RMT site, I’m not going to share that.

I did ask folks about the prices that were offered, and they’re quite steep. Highly recommend not RMTing, it’s not worth it at all. 

The good news is that these rates reflect how difficult it is for RMTers to collect and sell gil. Obviously the person advertising was banned. Hopefully those who partake in RMT are banned, too. 

I’ve noticed many people are slowly progressing towards the end game of FFXI. Much of the game is about the adventure rather than the destination, but end game is a load of fun. I’ve managed to unlock sky, the Rise of the Zilart end game area, this week and have had a blast. Though, it is also really crowded. 

This was raised as a concern during the burning questions session for the Mog House Meeting last month. The HorizonXI staff addressed it, saying they knew it could be a concern and were keeping an eye on it. Someone shared a screenshot of Faust, one of the sky NMs used to spawn Suzaku, one of the sky gods. It’s pretty crowded for a NM that is critical to doing end game content. 

Based on the screenshot, I’m hoping the respawn timers for these NMs and gods are adjusted to make it more accommodating to lots of people. There was also complaining today that BSTs are affecting end game zones, with a couple hours of discussion around balance of the job.

Sky is one of my favorite zones and end game content. I unlocked it first when I played way back when in retail days. It’s pretty easy to unlock if you get a group of 6 with someone who can sorta tank (doesn’t have to be PLD or NIN) and someone who can sorta heal (doesn’t have to be WHM or RDM). If you spend 6-7 hours grinding out the fights you can go from starting it to getting sky access and participating in the end game. I recommend level 60 minimum, but 65+ makes it easier. 

Next end game zone possible is referred to as sea, or part of the Chains of Promathia expansion. This content can be started at level 30 and slowly progress as you level. It’s worth doing to get access to more zones early on and then you can slowly progress, especially since it takes so much time and effort. I know right now there are bugs with certain missions, but it’s worth trying to do it if you can. 

Other end game includes zones like dynamis and limbus. I know currently dynamis is disabled after multiple end game linkshells tried it out and faced multiple crashes. The GMs tried to be involved to make it more manageable but it became burdensome so they disabled it for now. I believe limbus is operational, I’ve seen groups running it and  haven’t seen lots of complaints about it not working. Hopefully dynamis is fixed soon so players can start participating in it, again. 

As always, if you’re struggling with disconnects and black screens, stay out of Lower Jeuno. I prefer Upper Jeuno but pick whichever zone is easiest for you. This has been your weekly PSA. Though it does seem the staff have fixed the daily backup r0s, which is good! 

I’ve seen lots of questions around Patch 1.1 set for March 31st (aka a couple of weeks from now). This is all the information we have as of right now for the patch, so not a lot of info out. All we can do is sit and wait. 

Anyway, that’s all for this week. Take care and see you next Friday o7