Final Fantasy 14 Releases Christmas Update to Address Some Outstanding Issues

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Even after a quick update on Christmas Day to fix bugs and issues, some players were still getting disconnected from the North American servers of Final Fantasy 14. Luckily, some players have found temporary solutions to stay connected while the developers continue to work on a permanent fix.

A quick update for Final Fantasy 14 arrived just after Patch 7.4, titled “Into the Mist,” launched worldwide. Patch 7.4 moved the game’s storyline forward, building toward the upcoming 8.0 expansion, and concluded the popular Arcadion raid series. This update also adjusted how different character jobs play, with a notable rework for the Gunbreaker. Gunbreakers now have a burst damage cycle that repeats every minute, with changes to their abilities Bloodfest and Gnashing Fang. The Red Mage job received updates to its Manafication abilities, and ranged physical damage dealers received overall buffs to help them compete with other damage-focused jobs.

Final Fantasy 14 Fixes Some Issues, Though Server Issues Persist

On Christmas Eve at 11:00 PM Eastern Time, the servers for Final Fantasy 14 went down briefly for some quick fixes. When the servers came back up around 3:00 AM Eastern on Christmas morning, players downloaded a small update. This update fixed the popular “MissingNo” glitch, which caused a level 1 deer to appear in the Coerthas Western Highlands – returning the deer to where it belonged. The patch also resolved some visual issues with outfits for the Summoner and Scholar classes, and fixed problems with how certain outfits appeared in the game’s glamour menu.

The latest hotfix for Final Fantasy 14 addressed important problems with the new Strategy board, the Worqor Chirteh (Triumph) Frontline PVP mode, and the main story quests in patch 7.4. However, the game continues to experience server issues, causing players to disconnect unexpectedly. While the hotfix also resolved problems with retainers and Cosmic Exploration that could crash servers, these ongoing disconnections are mainly affecting players in North America. California servers have been intermittently unstable since November, shortly before patch 7.4 launched on December 16.

FF14’s Ongoing Server Issues May Have Potential Workarounds

Recent reports of DDoS attacks impacting Final Fantasy 14‘s North American servers after Patch 7.4 might not be entirely accurate. While many players experienced disconnects on the Aether, Primal, Crystal, and Dynamis data centers, not everyone was kicked off the game. Final Fantasy 14 uses a network of servers maintained by NTT, a Japanese telecommunications company, and players connect through different nodes, meaning issues aren’t always widespread. Players on PlayStation haven’t seemed to be affected as much as those on PC and Xbox, but the community is still actively monitoring for any server problems.

As players prepare for the final raid tier of Final Fantasy 14: Dawntrail launching on January 6th, many are trying to find ways to deal with ongoing server issues. Popular Final Fantasy 14 content creator iTrolledU shared a Twitter thread detailing how VPNs like NordVPN and ExpressVPN can help maintain a connection during disruptions. The post, which is updated regularly, also recommends services like ExitLag, Cloudflare WARP, and Mudfish. With demanding raids requiring stable connections, players are waiting to see how and when Square Enix will fully resolve the server problems in North America.

Final Fantasy 14 Patch 7.4 Hotfix Update Notes (December 24, 2025)

  • In Frontline campaigns, the time to return to the landing point after incapacitation has been reduced from 5 seconds to 0 seconds.
  • In the Frontline campaign Worqor Chirteh (Triumph), the maximum number of triumphs appearing within the first 10 minutes of the match has been increased. Accordingly, the appearance rates of triumphs for each rank have been adjusted.
  • The following issues have been fixed.
    • The cutscene for the main scenario quest “Into the Mist” contained incorrect text in certain scenes.
    • The cutscene for the main scenario quest “Into the Mist” contained incorrect text in certain scenes.
    • In the cutscene for the main scenario quest “Into the Mist,” ambient sounds were played in sections where they should not.
    • In the Skyrise Celebrations “Toy Hunter” and “Presents of Mind,” as well as the main scenario quest “In from the Cold”, the player character could appear in the carrying state even after the carrying status is removed.
    • In AAC Heavyweight M3, the floor became invisible in certain situations after the party was defeated while the boss is casting Arcadion Avalanche.
    • In Frontline Seal Rock (Seize), when information on an occupied tomelith was depleted, the next tomelith immediately became active.
    • Crystals could be gathered at the legendary gathering nodes added in Patch 7.4.
    • Certain monsters that should not normally spawn were appearing in Coerthas Western Highlands.
    • When a male Roegadyn or Hrothgar equipped with the Alternative Shirt draws their weapon as a Black Mage, part of their left arm appeared to clip through the clothing.
    • For certain equipment featuring emblems or logos, the emblem or logo was displayed incorrectly depending on camera distance.
    • In the “Try On” and “Cast Glamour” menu windows, the following outfit sets were displayed with Dye 2 applied when stored or being stored as outfit glamours, regardless of the number of pieces added to the outfit. Wayfarer’s Attire／Mirage Attire／Phantasmal Attire／Alpha Wolf Attire
    • Equipment added to an outfit glamour could not be used for glamours until the player character moved to a different area.
    • Under certain conditions, summoning retainers caused server outages.
    • In Cosmic Exploration, the server would crash in rare instances when completing Mech Ops under certain conditions.
    • In the Strategy Board menu, the “Import” and “Close” buttons were reversed on the Share Code import window.
    • When using gamepad controls with the Strategy Board, the cursor would sometimes jump to the Strategy Board List even when it is not displayed.
    • When using gamepad controls with the Strategy Board’s display lock enabled, the cursor would sometimes jump to the Strategy Board window in situations where it normally should not.
    • When a blacklisted player shared a strategy board using the real-time sharing feature, the display confirmation window was not displayed and the strategy board would disappear.
    • Under certain conditions, the name of a strategy board on the Saved List was incorrectly displayed as the name of a different strategy board.
    • Under certain conditions, the Strategy Board Settings window may could not be opened or closed.
    • Under the following conditions, Adventurer Plate portraits could not be saved due to an error stating that “requirements have not been met”:
    • Having a scholar’s arm glamoured over an arcanist’s grimoire while playing as a summoner or arcanist.
    • Having an arcanist’s grimoire glamoured over a scholar’s arm while playing as scholar.
    • Having job-exclusive equipment that cannot be equipped by classes while playing as a class
    • Under certain conditions, when the resolution ratio in System Configuration was set to wider than 16:9, taking a photo in Group Pose’s portrait mode without “Remove Aspect Ratio Limits” enabled would sometimes cause the game client to freeze. (Windows®/ Mac version only)
    • An issue with a voiced cutscene during AAC Heavyweight M3 (Savage) wherein a specific line of NPC dialogue erroneously plays twice in an overlapping fashion.

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2025-12-26 01:36