FFXIV 7.0 – What We’re Expecting From the New Expansion

Final Fantasy XIV’s Fan Fest is right around the corner which means we’re close to the FFXIV 7.0 Expansion. Not that close, but we’re gonna have some fun and speculate where this next Expansion might take us.

The first in-person Final Fantasy XIV Fan Fest since 2019 will take place this month, which means we’re also close to some juicy reveals about what the next Expansion of the Critically Acclaimed MMO might look like.

And after Endwalker finished up 10 years’ worth of storytelling, its post-patch content wrapped up any loose strings, and Creative Business Unit III finished up development on Final Fantasy XVI, this expansion might be the biggest one they’ve ever done.

Endwalker itself was already massive in scope and its patch content focused on introducing many new avenues of play to the MMORPG.

A trend that was received well by most players, even if it came at the cost of another open zone like Bozja or Eureka. The PvP rework has been fantastic and the Island Sanctuary and Variant Dungeons expanded on content rather than iterating upon it.

So what is Patch 7.0 gonna offer? We’ve got some guesses based on the most recent Patch 6.4 as well as some hints by director and producer Naoki Yoshida. Spoilers Ahead for Patch 6.4!

Where is FFXIV 7.0 Gonna Take Us?

Some of you probably noticed the Invitation that was mentioned during the Main Scenario Quest (MSQ) of 6.4. Hinting that some of your Scion friends have been invited to some sort of expedition into some far-flung corner or the star, including everyone’s favorite Gleaner Erenville.

There are still two unexplored continents that we have yet to see anything of on the Source. The immediate guesses would either be Meracydia the southern continent or the New World far west of Eorzea. And since the current MSQ still has us deal with the Void, Meracydia is the most likely contender.

But we’ve been here before. Many of us thought at first Shadowbringers would take place in a grim alternative future (which to be fair, it kinda did) before it took us to the First which was introduced in Heavensward’s patch content.

What speaks against it however is that Meracydia doesn’t really add anything new. We’ve covered Dragons and their problems aplenty in Heavensward and dealt with the Warring Triad and Allagan leftovers in that expansion as well. So going to Meracydia feels more like retreading old ground in unfamiliar territory.

The New World, just like its name suggests could be new territory. Save for some bits of the Blue Mage Questline, we know very little about the place. Only that it apparently has Cities of Gold, Two-headed rulers, and Blue Mages. So if we want a fresh start adventurer story, there are worse places to go.

But there is still much more to see. Be it all of Ilsabard, Nagxia, Ivalice/Dalmasca, the rest of Hingashi, or even the frozen wastes beyond Bozja. Not to mention all the other Shards we haven’t been to yet. So we should wait and see.

7.0 Jobs

Looking at the current makeup of Jobs, it’s hard to say what will be added and what will be changed come 7.0. At this point we half expect the entire combat system to be flipped on its head and reshuffle how everything works, similar to how the transition from HW to SB or SB to SHB.

Personally, we’d like to see another Tank because introducing a new Healer will be a nightmare balance wise and there are already DPS aplenty.

Maybe a Tank with a pet? The Puppeteer comes to mind or a caster like the Battle Mage from Final Fantasy’s past. Beastmaster has been a job teased in Bozja so that could be in the works.

As for DPS, we might get another Caster and or Scouting DPS. A pure Striking DPS could also be considered but what could that be? We have to come up with a job that fulfills a role while not stepping on anyone else’s toes, or in some cases just straight up steals another Jobs entire gimmick and saps them of all personality, looking at you Reaper.

Time Mage could be fun, similar to the Machinist it could focus on burst windows. But that might be a little too similar to Red Mage or Summoner. Geomancer is also up there but it was already gobbled up by Astrologian.

Or maybe, we get no new Job and the level 100 cap will return us to the glorious FFXI days when Support jobs were an option.

The Things We Do Know

We do know for certain that Final Fantasy XIV’s 7.0 patch will bring a slew of changes to the MMORPG. The biggest of which will be the graphical overhaul and while MMORPGs are no strangers to graphical updates, FFXIV wants to go big and bold into the next 10 years of its life.

New textures, reworks of all old zones and dungeons (some of which have already been introduced in the past few patches) to feature more detail and new shaders, lighting for characters, and the environment. We’ve seen some of these planned changes in a very early stage way back in February of 2022, but a lot of it was subject to change.

One guess could be that a lot of the tech from Final Fantasy XVI will be ported over, some rumors suggest that the newest entry of the iconic franchise runs on a heavily modified version of FFXIV’s source code.

While we don’t expect to see those kinds of visuals, we would love to see some features of FFXVI come over to the MMO. Be it the Active Time Lore which already kinda exists in XIV’s Codex or the way it handles it with more arcade elements.

But we’ll have to wait and see till Fan Fest to learn more about 7.0, which we’ll, of course, keep you updated here on ESTNN.