If you’re planning to change your character appearance in Final Fantasy 14, you’ll definitely want to hold off until the release of Dawntrail—according to today’s Live Letter, Fantasia potions will be getting a major overhaul as of 7.0.
Currently, the appearance-changing potion is a one-time consumable item that allows you to re-enter the character creation screen for your existing character. Changes cannot be reverted once you confirm and leave the customization screen, and the only way to apply further changes is to use a second Fantasia.
In today’s Letter from the Producer LIVE, Final Fantasy 14 director and producers Naoki Yoshida and Toshiro Murouchi announced that, as of the release of Dawntrail, Fantasias will instead grant a 60-minute window in which you can tweak and adjust your character appearance at will. The timer will begin upon using the Fantasia and cannot be extended, and players will have unlimited access to the character creation screen within the 60-minute duration.
This was announced in tandem with the progress on reworking the official benchmark to incorporate player feedback. Apparently, the infamously terrible lighting in the default character creator will finally be fixed to showcase more consistent conditions. The Fantasia duration window is intended to give players more freedom in viewing their characters in different locales and various conditions in the game world itself before settling on a new appearance.
Additionally, Yoshida and Murouchi confirmed how and when the game will be distributing the free Fantasia promised to all players during the Tokyo Fan Fest earlier this year. A new tutorial sidequest will be added to Ul’dah, which explains the function of Fantasias as well as rewarding a free vial upon completion. While Yoshida didn’t say more than that the quest would have a low level requirement, it’s likely the new quest will be set at level 15 in the same vein as the other character customization sidequests that unlock Glamours and the Aesthetician.