Final Fantasy XIV Getting an Official TTRPG

Square Enix leaked a pre-order page for Final Fantasy XIV TTRPG Starter Set on their online store on Wednesday morning before taking it down that afternoon and putting it back up again overnight.

The order page for the new TTRPG went live on Wednesday for around 6 hours before being taken down, but not before being archived via the Wayback Machine. It's likely the game was scheduled for announcement during the Letter from the Producer event on September 23 but was posted live by mistake. As of Thursday morning, the pre-order page is live again on the site along with an announcement page confirming a player and GM core rulebook along with an official preview page.

The new game will be based on the MMORPG video game Final Fantasy XIV, which currently has over 3 million active daily players available on PC, macOS, and PlayStation. This marks the first official adaptation of the popular and long-running Final Fantasy video game franchise to tabletop RPGs. From the product description before it was removed:

Based on the hit MMO Final Fantasy XIV, the FFXIV TTRPG is a tabletop roleplaying game that lets you experience Eorzea from a whole new perspective. Step into the shoes of a heroic adventurer or assume the game master's mantle, then cooperate to forge your own unique stories within the vast and exciting universe of Final Fantasy XIV. The Final Fantasy XIV TTRPG Starter Set comes with everything you need to dive into the game and includes both the Player Book and the Gamemaster Book. Gather your friends together to explore, battle, and roleplay--the only limits are your imagination, and the only goal is to have fun. Discover a realm of adventure reborn!

The Starter Set will include a Player Book, Gamemaster Book (including three scenarios tying into the FF14 main story), four pre-generated characters (Warrior, White Mage, Dragoon, and Black Mage), Rules Summary & Strategy Guide, encounter maps, character tokens, and ability markers. The set will also include custom numeric dice - 6d20 total (two red and one each of green, blue, black, and clear) with the Final Fantasy XIV logo in place of the 20 and 10d6 (four red, two each of blue and green, and one each of black and clear). No further information about the game system is available at this time.

The set is scheduled for a May 2024 release and is available for pre-order for $59.99.

Note: This article has been edited to update with new information as the pre-order page was taken down, then put back up again, then an official announcement and preview page released.

 

[aramis erak]

Well, they've rerun the starter set... and have the preorder for the standard edition...

Rulebook alone: $69.99 ... Book Size: 11.97 in x 8.50 in x 0.87 in
For a 380pp rulebook, not bad.

I picked it up from the post yesterday. Now to read the bloody great beastie. 300+ pp at 12×8.5...

 

[GMMichael]

I picked it up from the post yesterday. Now to read the bloody great beastie.

"Veiling the moon with the light of eternity,
it brings another promise to mother earth
with a bounty and mercy."

A bounty of pages, will take an eternity to read while the moon is out (after work) . . . you might decode the prophecy!

 

[aramis erak]

"Veiling the moon with the light of eternity,
it brings another promise to mother earth
with a bounty and mercy."

A bounty of pages, will take an eternity to read while the moon is out (after work) . . . you might decode the prophecy!

Given that it only actually has 6 levels...
After the initial skim of CGen, I'm not sure I can run this thing with the players I've got who want to play it.

 

[aramis erak]

So, a relatively good first skim done, and char gen read...
Starting Level is by group consensus - with GM agreement. One of 30, 40, 50, 55, or 60.
Starting atts are set by class and level. 0-6 scale, I think.
Char gen provides few choices; level determined by group, class picked.

No bestiary. The several sample adventures do include all antagonists' stats. this gives a total of 26 adversary stat blocks, scattere across pages 239 to 90. One of them is a double - rider and mount. 3 of them are one creature in different phases.

No character sheet download. No encounter log download, and the EL isn't in the back, but in the encounters table.

The adventures' maps are in the appendix, and marked with what size to blow them up to to get the official size. As are the NPC tokens and area effect markers - intended to be copied.

Advancement is by GM fiat.
Intermediate levels (31-39, 41-49, 51-54, 56-59) don't have any mechanics.
Job changes change all your atts to those of the new job/level, and you cannot mix/match.

I'm quite disappointed by the lack of bestiary and the one job at a time mode.
There's a 1 page index.
The print is relatively small and light - not as bad as SW EotE, but still. There's a lot of art.
There are 3 scenarios (#4, #5, and #6 - I suspect #1, #2, and #3 are the starter set ones)

Copyright notice includes permission to copy the sheets for personal use. (which is good) but doesn't mention the maps and tokens (which is ungood), despite those maps listing what magnifcation to use on a photocopier to get the standard size.

 

[aramis erak]

Some further thoughts...

Character Generation is lots of details in places that don't have much mechanical impact, and one big choice that has HUGE impact: Job.

I was hoping to run it for my online group - in such cases, I typically do cheat sheets with character gen in a minimal version... but there are too many abilities for me to do that. Now, they are fixed by class, but there are thirteen classes...
Class also sets your attributes. Not "gives you a range to spend in" but sets them to specific numbers for class and level. That's suboptimal, but not a dealbreaker.

The mechanics of combat are pretty straightforward on a third skim (first was before ordering), it looks really quite D&D-like. Somewhere between 4e and 5e in tone.

I'd happily run it in person, but for play with my sunday Alaskans? not happening.