Final Fantasy 14 Patch 7.56 arrived on the morning of September 8, which brought new main story quests and the highly-anticipated Beastmaster Limited Job for players to check out. The 7.56 update for Final Fantasy 14 arrived over a month after the Berlin FanFest event.
In Final Fantasy 14’s previous 7.55 content update, Square Enix focused mostly on content that catered to max level players. The Occult Crescent: North Horn field operation zone and the Forked Tower: Magic raid provided players with additional challenges to take on. Additionally, the 7.55 update saw the conclusion of Hildibrand’s Dawntrail adventures, alongside a capstone quest series exclusive to FF14 players who have achieved the maximum reputation levels with the Pelu Pelu, the Mamool Ja, and the Yok Huy allied societies. However, Final Fantasy 14’s latest update will have something for more players to enjoy.
Final Fantasy 14’s 7.56 Update Sets the Tone for Evercold
-
Image via Square Enix -
Image via Square Enix -
Image via Square Enix
To start, Final Fantasy 14 Patch 7.56 has four main story quests that will set the stage for the upcoming Evercold expansion. After completing the main story quest “Trail to the Heavens,” players can accept a new level 100 story quest titled “A Winter’s Dream” by speaking to Tataru at The Rising Stones in Mor Dhona. These main story quests will be the last ones that players can undertake until Evercold arrives sometime in January 2027. No new dungeons or trials are expected to be undertaken with the new main story updates. Patch 7.56 requires an additional 1.2 GB of available storage space.
Find the odd one out before the timer hits zero.
Final Fantasy 14’s 7.56 update also introduced a new Limited Job for players to try out, as the long-awaited Beastmaster has finally arrived. Players interested in becoming a Beastmaster must accept the quest “Strangers in the Wood” from an “Excited Adventurer” NPC in the forest city of Gridania. However, the Beastmaster has a few caveats for players to consider. First, FF14 players must have a separate Job leveled up to 50 to become a Beastmaster. Second, Beastmaster requires Dawntrail to be registered on a player’s account, meaning it is not accessible to free trial players. Finally, since Beastmaster is a Limited Job, it cannot utilize the Duty Roulette or participate in some activities that other Jobs can.
With the release of Patch 7.56, Final Fantasy 14’s Switch 2 port has exited its beta phase. Ergo, players who purchased the game on Switch 2 must now pay a recurring monthly subscription fee to keep playing the game on Nintendo’s console. However, Final Fantasy 14’s Switch 2 subscription model differs from other platforms, as it is not included in the same monthly subscription fee that covers the PC, PlayStation, and Xbox game clients simultaneously. However, current FF14 players who do play on another system can add a Switch 2 game subscription for a 50% discount.
Although Final Fantasy 14 will have raid content from the Final Fantasy 7 Remake series in Evercold, a new mini-game called Keybound Brawler will be available at the Manderville Gold Saucer starting October 28. More details about Evercold, including a potential release date, will be shown off at Tokyo FanFest on Halloween weekend.
Final Fantasy 14 Patch 7.56 Notes (September 8, 2026)
Playable Content
Quests
New Main Scenario Quests have been added.
Four Quests, starting with “A Winter’s Dream”
- Job: Disciple of War or Magic at Level 100
- Location: The Rising Stones (X:6.0 Y:6.1)
- NPC: Tataru
- Players must first complete the quest “Trail to the Heavens.”
New Job Quests (Beastmaster) have been added.
Ten Quests, starting with “Strangers in the Wood”
- Job: Disciple of War or Magic at Level 50
- Location: New Gridania (X:11.8 Y13.6)
- NPC: Excited Adventurer
- Players must first complete the quest “The Ultimate Weapon”
New chapters have been added to New Game+.
The final quest of each chapter must be completed before it can be unlocked.
-
Main Scenario Quests
- Dawntrail – Part 4
- Winter’s Prelude
-
DPS Quests
- Beastmaster (Limited Job)
- Beastmaster Quests
Housing
New furnishings and orchestrion rolls have been added.
Miscellaneous
A new hairstyle inspired by an FFXIV Hairstyle Design Contest entry is now available.
Battle System
The beastmaster job has been added. Beastmasters forge pacts with myriad creatures and call upon them in battle as faithful familiars. Work in tandem with your bestial companions to unleash special combos.
This melee DPS job shares gear used by monk and samurai. It has no corresponding class and begins at level 1 with a maximum level of 50.
Requirements
- Quest: “Strangers in the Wood”
- Job: Disciple of War or Magic at Level 50
- Location: New Gridania (X:11.8 Y13.6)
- NPC: Excited Adventurer
- Players must first complete the quest “The Ultimate Weapon”
Limited Jobs
Like blue mage, beastmaster is a limited job. As such, there are several key points that distinguish it from other jobs.
Beastmasters cannot execute role actions. Beastmasters gain greater experience from completing FATEs than other jobs do. Unlike blue mage, no bonuses are granted to experience from battling enemies in the open world.
When playing as a beastmaster, it is possible to participate in duties with other players in preformed or unrestricted parties. However, the following duties will remain inaccessible:
- Duty Roulettes The Forbidden Land, Eureka / The Bozjan Southern Front / The Occult Crescent / Variant Dungeons / Criterion Dungeons / Ultimate Raids / Stone, Sky, Sea Squadron Missions Deep Dungeons PvP, including duels Hall of the Novice
- Limited jobs may only accept the following quests:
- Job quests Quests available to all jobs and classes
- Retainers cannot be assigned the beastmaster job.
Befriending Beasts
Beastmasters forge pacts with familiars by using the actions Gauge and Capture learned at level 1. Gauge assesses whether a pact can be forged with a targeted beast, and how difficult it may be to do so.
Using Capture will apply a certain status effect to the targeted beast. Forge a pact by defeating the beast while this status is in effect. Weakening a target before using Capture will increase the chance of success, but some attempts to forge pacts may be unsuccessful.
Forging a pact will add your new familiar to the Master’s Bestiary, which may be accessed via Character in the main menu. Here, you may review familiars’ unique abilities, natural habitats, and other useful information.
Kornago Gourds
These items allow pacts to be forged without engaging in combat with the desired beast. Players may exchange remnants of resilience (explained below) for Kornago gourds, and the variety of gourds will increase with job quest completion.
Summoning Familiars to Battle
Assign familiars to battlehorns via the subcommand in the Master’s Bestiary. Using Battlehorn actions will summon the assigned familiar to your side. Only one familiar may be summoned at a time.
Additionally, you may adjust familiar size via the Edit Appearance subcommand. These settings are only reflected on your screen. You may also adjust familiar size via text commands.
Beastmaster Combat
Beastmasters and familiars accrue TP by performing certain actions, and may execute strong instinctual skills upon accumulating at least 100 TP. Sequentially executing instinctual skills will complete combos that inflict additional damage. TP is displayed via a job-specific HUD element.Other abilities in a beastmaster’s arsenal include Tempered Release, which orders a familiar to unleash a unique attack, and Borrow, which draws power from a familiar in order to execute a separate beastmaster action.
The Crucible of the Unbroken, a duty exclusive to beastmaster, has been added.
A magicked tool conceived for training purposes, the Crucible of the Unbroken is a solo experience that will test your limits as a beastmaster. Call upon the strength of your familiars as you traverse its boards and overcome the shades of myriad foes. Requires completing a mysterious quest upon reaching level 30 as a Beastmaster.
Entering the Crucible of the Unbroken
Speak with ??? in the Central Shroud (X:21.9 Y:22.8) to challenge the Crucible of the Unbroken.
Basic Rules
Atop a special board, players must progress across spaces that each host a different happening. A board is completed by defeating the final boss on the innermost space.
Team Composition
Upon selecting a board, you will be presented with its layout and a menu with your team composition. The maximum allowance for team composition varies by board.
Select which familiars you wish to accompany you via the Master’s Bestiary, or select “Recommended Team” to have a team automatically composed for you. The Board Layout displays details on the foes you may face upon a given board. Study their weaknesses and form your team accordingly for the greatest advantage in combat.
Crucible Battlegrounds
Within the Crucible, players and familiars have individual HP that does not naturally regenerate. Special items or spaces must be utilized to recover HP. If a familiar’s HP reaches 0, they will be unable to participate in combat. If a player’s HP reaches 0, they will fail the duty.
Using the duty action Snarl orders your familiar to draw enmity on your behalf via the effects of Cover. Using the duty action Challenge draws enmity to yourself and removes Cover from your familiar. Pay attention to familiar HP as you use these duty actions to distribute damage taken during combat.
Ephemeral items
Players may receive these duty-exclusive items on a variety of spaces. Ephemeral items may be used only upon the board they are granted, and will be lost upon completing or failing the duty.
Crucible Items
Players may use these items either when traversing a board or during combat to gain different effects. One crucible item is always provided at the start of every board. You may carry up to 10 crucible items, which may be selected from an independent inventory and also assigned to hotbars.
Beast Gear
Beast gear provides perpetual benefits simply by being carried in the inventory. One piece of beast gear is always provided at the start of every board. You may carry up to 10 pieces of beast gear, but possessing duplicates is not permitted.
Feed
You may enhance your familiars’ abilities and attributes by feeding them. The amount of feed each familiar can consume varies, but no familiar will consume duplicates of any kind of feed. Furthermore, familiars that rest on a campsite space will lose the effects of feed they have consumed thus far.
Scoring
Players will be given a score at the end of the duty that is calculated from spaces traversed, remaining player HP, and a variety of other factors. Additionally, by fulfilling certain requirements, players may boost their score with bonuses. Select “View Bonuses” from the Board Layout to confirm their requirements.
Rewards
By challenging boards within the Crucible of the Unbroken, players may receive faded or bright remnants of resilience proportionate to their score. Players may trade these items with the Kornago merchant in the Central Shroud (X:21.9 Y:22.6) to receive Kornago gourds or enhance beastmaster-specific gear.
All familiars that accompany you inside the Crucible will receive experience points proportionate to your score. For every 100 EXP earned, beast rank will increase, thereby enhancing the familiar’s attributes within the Crucible, listed below. By returning to challenge boards, you may increase your familiars’ beast rank up to a maximum of 25.
- Strength: Affects physical damage dealt.
- Intelligence: Affects magic damage dealt.
- Physical Resistance: Affects physical vulnerability.
- Magic Resistance: Affects magic vulnerability.
- Constitution: Affects maximum HP.
Leaving the Crucible
Suspending Progress
You may save your data and temporarily withdraw from the Crucible while in between spaces or on spaces you have already cleared. Select “Resume Progress” when reentering the Crucible to pick up where you left off. If you challenge the Crucible of the Unbroken anew while you have suspended data on file, your suspended data will be erased.
Forfeiting
Outside of battle, you may voluntarily leave the Crucible of the Unbroken by forfeiting. Doing so will still earn you a score dependent on your progress, and grant you rewards proportionate to that score.
Crucible Mode: Degrees
After completing all boards within the Crucible of the Unbroken and proceeding through the beastmaster job quests, you may unlock a mode of the Crucible designed specifically as a challenge for players. Degrees increase the amount of enemy HP and damage dealt, and offer three levels of difficulty, escalating from the first degree to the third. Accordingly, greater score bonuses are offered for higher difficulty levels. Giving particular consideration to team composition and ephemeral items will help you triumph when the Crucible is at its hottest.
You may adjust the Crucible Mode from the Board Layout menu before challenging a board.
Crucible Rankings
Players may choose to compete for the highest score achieved within the Crucible of the Unbroken. Scores must be recorded on a player’s Home World, and rankings will be aggregated per physical data center. To record scores eligible for rankings, players must set Crucible Mode to the third degree and check the box next to “Participate in rankings.”
Ranking scores are compiled from the last three attempts of each board within the Crucible. Speak with ??? in the Central Shroud (X:21.9 Y:22.8) to view your current Crucible Ranking Score. Crucible Rankings will be featured on a special page of the Lodestone. When the season ends, the top 300 ranking players from each physical data center will receive rewards via the moogle delivery service.
Season One of Crucible Rankings will begin Thursday, September 24, 2026, and last until the release of Patch 7.58. Preseason will follow this ranking period, temporarily preventing ranking participation. Season Two will begin after a certain period of preseason has passed. Season starting and ending times are subject to change.
The following adjustments have been made to AAC Heavyweight Tier (Savage):
- Treasure coffers will now always appear, with no reduction of rewards, regardless of whether any party members have previously cleared the match.
- The weekly restriction on rewards obtained from treasure coffers has been removed.
- The weekly entrance restriction has been removed.
- Players may now proceed directly to any match.
- Players will now receive the power of the Echo.
- The effect will be granted at the start of the battle, increasing maximum HP, damage dealt, and healing potency by 12%. Unlike other instances, the strength of the Echo will not increase in the event all party members are incapacitated.
As the delay between the release of Patch 7.4 and addition of AAC Heavyweight Tier (Savage) lasted longer than previous patches, adjustments were made to balance the duty given player gear acquisition at the time Savage released. In light of this, the Echo’s effects have been enhanced to grant stronger benefits than usual.
Extended time limits when undertaking the Forked Tower: Magic on the Occult Crescent: North Horn have been adjusted.
When players enter the Forked Tower: Magic or defeat boss monsters within it, the time limit for the Occult Crescent: North Horn is extended for each player. While time extensions were previously retained, adjustments have been made to subtract extensions upon exiting the Forked Tower: Magic. In cases where subtraction results in less than 5 minutes left in the duty, the time limit will be set at 5 minutes.
Windurst: The Third Walk has been added to Duty Roulette: Alliance Raids.
The weekly limit for Allagan tomestones of mnemonics has been increased from 450 to 900. The maximum store of 2,000 tomestones has not been changed.
PVP
Series 11 will end and Series 12 will begin. Series 12 will be held from Patch 7.56 to the release of Patch 8.0, during which time you can earn Series EXP and increase your Series level by participating in any PvP duty. Increasing your Series level will unlock various Series rewards.
Rewards from Series 11 can only be claimed until the end of Series 12. To claim rewards, select Series Malmstones from the PvP Profile window, then select Previous Series.
Items
New items, mounts, minions, fashion accessories, and facewear have been added. Items added in Patch 7.56 will be listed at a later date.
System
- In order to prevent server congestion, we will be implementing multiple field instances for the Central Shroud and the area newly added in Patch 7.56. We will monitor server activity and remove this feature when congestion is determined to no longer be an issue.
- The division of Tuliyollal into multiple instances, added to alleviate congestion in Patch 7.51, will be removed.
- New achievements and titles have been added.
-
The following additions have been made to portraits:
- New accents have been added.
- New adventurer plate accents have been added.
- The text commands /beastsize and /bestiary have been added.
- New trophies (PlayStation 5) and new achievements (Xbox Series X/S) have been added.
- New music, sound effects, and voices have been added.
Resolved Issues
The following issues have been addressed.
- An issue when playing the quest “In the Shadow of the Tower” on the Occult Crescent: North Horn wherein the icon above the NPC’s head did not reflect achieved objectives upon attaining the necessary knowledge level of 40 on the Occult Crescent: South Horn.
- An issue when viewing the Occult Crescent guide wherein some help text under Elemental Weaknesses for Enemies was incorrect.
- An issue with the cosmic exploration mech op directive “Eradicate Toxic Weeds” wherein the delivery range of field scanners did not display under certain conditions.
- An issue when playing as a fisher wherein Surface Slap and Identical Cast could be used under certain conditions upon catching a fish as a collectable.
- An issue wherein the item icon for the dark knight arm Figment of Spring displayed incorrectly.
- An issue wherein the order of certain chapters of New Game+ was incorrect (Nintendo Switch 2 only).
- An issue when undertaking certain duties wherein the Active Time Maneuver gauge did not increase via touch screen functions (Nintendo Switch 2 only).
- An issue wherein certain colors of face paint was also applied to other parts of the body such as the neck, horns, hair, and scales (Nintendo Switch 2 only).
- An issue wherein active hours displayed on the adventurer plate were not reflected correctly when set from a different gaming platform (Nintendo Switch 2 only).
- An issue when using touch screen functions wherein the reaction speed while moving a character in the Character or Portrait menus was incorrect (Nintendo Switch 2 only).
- An issue when purchasing FFXIV Coins via the launcher wherein customers were not transferred to the respective Nintendo eShop screen even after selecting the desired product (Nintendo Switch 2 only).
- An issue wherein the intended error message did not display when a system’s time and date settings differ greatly from reality (Nintendo Switch 2 only).
- Other various issues have also been addressed.
Known Issues
- An issue when playing as beastmaster wherein the help text for the action Snarl does not include the effect that nullifies player enmity generation.
- An issue when playing the Crucible of the Unbroken wherein certain enemy graphics displayed on the Board Layout are incorrect.
- An issue when playing the Crucible of the Unbroken wherein attack indicators do not display in correct locations for the following actions if the player character is in mid-jump:
- Earthrender / Void Thunder III
- An issue when playing the Crucible of the Unbroken wherein players can still move under certain conditions even when suffering from the Stone Curse status ailment.
- An issue when playing the Crucible of the Unbroken wherein being hit by Burst as executed by the mogsong sphere does not result in damage taken under certain conditions.
- An issue wherein the icon for beastmaster’s earrings does not have an appearance that indicates it is unique. This is an issue only with the icon appearance. The item is unique.
- Released
-
August 27, 2013
- ESRB
-
Teen / Blood, Language, Partial Nudity, Sexual Themes, Use of Alcohol and Tobacco, Violence, In-Game Purchases, Users Interact
- Engine
-
Originally the Crystal Tools engine, but currently it’s a custom engine using parts of the Luminous Engine.
