Now that I’m taking a break from most roulettes to avoid the Mogtome Grinder Hate Plague (I exaggerate, but the game really is a less congenial place than it was a couple months ago), I’ve been spending more time on other content. Aside from a daily leveling roulette on a sub-81 job, I’m spending more time on tribal quests for a little extra XP and some lore. I’m almost done with the Pixies’ storyline in Shadowbringers, I think, and I’m pretty far along on the Vanu Vanu in Heavensward, but I’ve also just started with the Ananta and Kojin in Stormblood. Overall I like the Pixies — they’re fun with a lethal edge, like a lot of things in Shadowbringers. The Ananta quests are also starting out pretty engaging after having to slog through Miqo’te tribal drama — young male cats are so often dumbasses, even when they’re anthropomorphic. The Vanu Vanu are pretty meh, both in terms of story and rewards, but I want to see their storyline through at least. Overall it’s been a decent time.
One thing I’ve noticed is that my rested bonus XP pool has been growing rather dramatically. It seems that tribal quests and the occasional FATE grinding I’ve been doing don’t draw from it. After looking up how it works (looks like only XP from killing enemies, crafting items, or gathering materials can use the rested pool) I’m taking a tip from @arbitraryreign’s job leveling post and queuing specifically for the highest level dungeon I can on a job I’m currently leveling. It seems like this is working to get some use out of that pool, and it’s nice to use my new abilities in small scale party combat. Definitely better than taking them into an alliance raid!
All in all, this has been a nice downshift into a more relaxed mode of play before patch 6.5. I’ll probably do a little more crafting for the market too, I might like some gil for one thing or another…
