So today we get the preliminary patch notes for 5.2, which you can see here for yourself. As always, I’m reading through and picking out things that excite me… and things that don’t. Purely opinion. So let’s jump in!

Yay!

New main scenario quests have been added.

Still looking forward to seeing how the story is going to work out. The trailer left a lot of questions in my mind, and from what I’ve heard, this is only the first part of the ending of the Shadowbringers story arc. That’s hard to believe. It still feels like a new expansion to me.

Qitari beast tribe quests have been added.

This was unexpected since we’d not even seen this tribe in game yet. And also an all gathering beast tribe quest kinda has my scratching my head. All of my gatherers on both characters are maxxed already – it’s pretty simple to do that. But I guess they feel Ishgard covers the need for a crafting beast tribe (to me, it doesn’t, because gathering time is still a thing).

Anyhow, more tribes. More fluff. And a great serpent mount. That’s all good with me.

Solo players may now advance production phases in company crafting.

Oh my gosh! This is unexpected and completely fantastic! I will have to try this out! I really hated bugging 3 people into hanging out in the workshop just to make stuff!

The maximum rank for free companies has been increased from 8 to 30.

I’m really looking forward to this. Our FC chest has been full for ages.

The gear set chosen in the Ranged Physical DPS Gear Design Contest has been added.

I really like this set and want it for Amon! I guess I’ll have to figure out how end game crafting actually works.

Adjustments have been made to the animation used to indicate a bite when fishing.

I actually like this quite a bit! It makes fishing seem a bit more fun.

Versatile Lures have been added. They can be used to catch a wide range of fish.

I’ve been waiting for this. I’ll have to see how this works and if that means I can clear up a bunch of space in my chocobo bag.

Ocean fishing has been added.

This seems like it would be so much fun. I really want to try it!

Nice!

An aetheryte shard for the Doman Enclave Docks has been added to the Doman Enclave (X:8.5 Y:8.3).

About time! A little late for the rest of us, though.

New chapters have been added to New Game+.

This is always nice. I haven’t used the New Game+ stuff yet. But I might go back and do the Saint Endalim’s Scholasticate stuff since I don’t remember much of the storyline, and I never finished those quests. People who enjoy Hildibrand will be happy!

New items are available from gemstone traders.

This is always nice – at least it gets people involved in FATEs a bit more. Maybe it’s time to work on FATEs for my alt.

New furnishings have been added.

I’ll have to check out the new stuff in the viewer when we get it. Right now, I see a lot of nice things in the screenshots, but nothing I absolutely have to have.

New craftable items have been added to the company workshop.

That’s interesting looking! A guild hall maybe?

Au Ra mannequins are now available.

Yay for AuRa! Do we have any more races who still need mannequins? I haven’t kept track.

New estate tags have been added.

“Under Renovation” – Thank you. I need this one!

New prizes are available for purchase using MGP.

Now that is cute. I wonder what else is available. I have a LOT of MGP stashed away.

A confirmation window will now appear when canceling gathering at legendary and unspoiled gathering nodes.

Thank you! I have made this mistake.

The following adjustments have been made to desynthesis:

“Stacked items can now be desynthesized one after another.” Yes!

Players who are inactive for more than 30 minutes in the Firmament will be logged out automatically.

Oooh… no AFKing in the restoration, folks!

Upon completing a duty, the time until players are forced to leave has been changed from ten minutes to the remainder of the duty’s time limit.

Nice change for exploration and screenshots!

The following additions and adjustments have been made to fellowships:

“A notification will be displayed upon login if any of your fellowships has a new poll or message on the General tab.” – I like this! I’m a member of a couple fellowships, but it’s easy to forget about them without a reminder like this.

The following additions and adjustments have been made to the Fellowship Finder:

“The fellowships list now allows players to highlight fellowships that fulfill certain conditions.” – Much needed! It was a real pain to find a fellowship if you couldn’t search by name.

The following additions and adjustments have been made to group pose:

Changes to group pose are always welcome!

The option “Reply in Selected Chat Mode” has been added to the subcommands available from player names in the chat log.

I’m not sure I’ll use this, but it looks helpful!

Hmm…

Angler’s prints have been added to housing.

This is interesting: Your latest catch can now be printed on a canvas to be displayed in your apartment or residence. I guess for a fisherman’s house, this is pretty cool.

The duties listed within Duty Roulette: Expert have been changed.

I was expecting Amaurot to get moved out, but not for them to cut the rest of them, too. Only two dungeons in Expert again is kinda rough. The Grand Cosmos is so-so. I hope Anamnesis Anyder isn’t painful.

The following adjustments have been made to materia.

There’s some interesting changes to materia this time around.

Lots of crafting changes – too many to list individually.

Most of this sounds good, but we’ll see how it plays out when I actually go to use it.

The following additions and adjustments have been made to waymarks:

There’s a lot of changes to waymarks. I’m going to wait and see what folks say about it. I rarely use them, so this doesn’t really bother me either way.

The /dice command has been added. It will display a random number from 0 to 999 in the current chat channel.

This already exists as /random, but I guess /dice makes it easier.

Meh.

The following duty has been added to Duty Roulette: Alliance Raids: The Copied Factory

Alliance raids are getting to be less of something I want to run the more they add to the roulette.

Gil is no longer given as a reward when submitting collectables.

This is kinda a bummer. It wasn’t a ton of Gil, but it covered the cost of buying the materials and the cost of porting around to places I normally wouldn’t go. Bleh.

Fees are now charged for items bought from the market board when the player is in the city where the item was listed.

Ah, bummer. Why? Is there any point to locating your retainer now?

Overall?

I don’t know. It’s a good solid patch, but really doesn’t have me as excited as some have in terms of the quality of life stuff. There’s a lot of good things here, don’t get me wrong! And still plenty to do.

Just nothing that really blows me away. I was looking forward to Diadem changes, but those aren’t coming until the next sub patch. Hopefully I’ll feel differently once it drops.