Mentor Changes - Why 1500 Comms?

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Originally Posted by hynaku

I had 1500 comms back in ARR and 1500 dungeons. I think should be changed to 3000 comms. Just main a tank or healer and get that many in no time. Both those jobs get about 95% of all the comms.

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3k comms really doesn't add anything but playtime.

I made this character in January (switched from my main to play with my partner) and already have 1200 commendations. I don't play everyday and i dont necessarily run duty finder every time i do play. Theyre really easy to come by. If yoh dont have a lot after years and years of playing the same character, you may not be mentor material.

Its not all about knowing every bit about the game. A mentor should also have a good disposition, which to a limited degree a high number of commendations may indicate.

Also if youre already a mentor youre not losing access to NN. Just the roulette.

The change is for the better. It has always been too easy to be a mentor. I would even suspect that there will be a futher revisions made perhaps in the future for 7.x

Since FFXIV typically runs on history, (and if memory serves) mentors were brought in 3.1, current changes made for 5.1 so maybe next revision is 7.1

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Originally Posted by Dreggit

The change is for the better. It has always been too easy to be a mentor. I would even suspect that there will be a futher revisions made perhaps in the future for 7.x

Since FFXIV typically runs on history, (and if memory serves) mentors were brought in 3.1, current changes made for 5.1 so maybe next revision is 7.1

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Please explain why it should be hard in the first place? It's intent is not to be a challenge like a raid. You're supposed to be a symbol of guidance and assist new players with questions, be helpful when needed in dungeons and- another reason I wish it was a watering can, be someone a player can look to and know "Oh, I can ask them about how crafting works since I don't quite get it from Active Help."

When somone PUGs an EX trial, even if the mentor does not know everything because old fight, they should at least know "don't stand in the orange/purple/spoopy circle."

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Originally Posted by Gula

Please explain why it should be hard in the first place? It's intent is not to be a challenge like a raid. You're supposed to be a symbol of guidance and assist new players with questions, be helpful when needed in dungeons and- another reason I wish it was a watering can, be someone a player can look to and know "Oh, I can ask them about how crafting works since I don't quite get it from Active Help."

When somone PUGs an EX trial, even if the mentor does not know everything because old fight, they should at least know "don't stand in the orange/purple/spoopy circle."

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"Dont stand in the circles." Isnt going to help anyone in something like Ramuh, Sephirot, Zurvan, Sophia, Tsukuyomi, Shinryu, Innocence, etc, you get the point.

It should be "hard" (not that the new requirements are hard) because not every joe is really what i would call a "good representation of the community,"

I'm ok with this change, as there's a lot of PvE content and 300 comms is way too few for one to be proficient in them all. PvE mentor is quite specialized and demanding to know all the content optimally, and 1500 is the next natural threshold in the achievement tree, so it's not an arbitrary amount.

But it also means from now on when I see someone put on PvE mentor, I expect them to fully know their stuff. In whatever content I'm in.

If you play over a year as tank/healer and still dont have 1500 comms then you probably dont have what it takes to teach people...
either your play not good enought or somethings wrong woth your behaviour or maybe just your playtime...

I've been playing since 2.1 and play most jobs on and off while having a 40h week, im closing in on 7k comms now ... 1500 is doable, yes it will take a while but theres multiple factors to this.

If you are a dps chance are you get less, say hi and bye and i ensure you thats gonna boost your comm rate right away ... should it? probably not.
Also since the requirement is to have a tank and heal, chances are you know how to play those jobs ... which gets you more comms.

NN on Ragna has been overflowing with bad advice so i welcome this. If you are short on comms, just keep going you will get there.

If you cant wait ... your best chance is to spam guildhest and be nice to ppl.

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Originally Posted by Miminming

If you play over a year as tank/healer and still dont have 1500 comms then you probably dont have what it takes to teach people...
either your play not good enought or somethings wrong woth your behaviour or maybe just your playtime...

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That is really, genuinely bad logic.

Well, there could be a lot of reasons for a person to not have 1500 in even 6 months if all they do is heal or tank.

Also you may know how to play a job well.. but that doesn't mean you can teach how to play it well to another. Teaching is a skill and not everyone is good at it. I'm poor at teaching/explaining.. I am more hands on/showing how to do things.

I believe 1500 commendations is not that hard to achieve. Yes it may be frustrating but It's reasonable to get with a little effort.
Always run your dailies, alliance raid is probably the best one to earn commendations in being healer or tank
I've seen good dps get some also but chances are slim. 300 commendations is insanely quick to earn, if you play often you'd get that within nearly over a month.
Don't leave instantly right after a duty ends. I've seen people do this constantly so fast that I can't even give them a commendation.
A friendly greeting goes a long way so don't be shy to greet your party members before a duty starts.

It's not true that if you have played for 2 years and only have 750 comm, it means you need to play another 2 years. If you are not already getting one comm per run then you might not be as good or as nice as you think you were.

Honestly I am not a mentor myself (but i am a teacher irl) so whenever I randomly get paired with sprouts or it's obvious people are new, I will take the time to explain what to do, sometimes I even go google translate to translate into JP for JP players (Tts how I learnt that adds are called fishes in JP). I regularly get comm and even as DPS just doing aoe properly, being friendly, using the LB appropriately can earn u comm.

If you are not getting comm as much, improve your gameplay to earn them. I think ultimately what new players need are knowledgeable and patient/friendly mentors, which is what most ppl give comm for. I play this game casually on and off for the last few years and I am nearing 2000 comm without actively trying to be a mentor.

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Originally Posted by Gula

Please explain why it should be hard in the first place? It's intent is not to be a challenge like a raid. You're supposed to be a symbol of guidance and assist new players with questions, be helpful when needed in dungeons and- another reason I wish it was a watering can, be someone a player can look to and know "Oh, I can ask them about how crafting works since I don't quite get it from Active Help."

When somone PUGs an EX trial, even if the mentor does not know everything because old fight, they should at least know "don't stand in the orange/purple/spoopy circle."

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Pray tell me how it is hard. I have close to 2500 commendations and I only play maybe 12 hours/week. I don't care what the icon is, the fact has always been that it has always been too easy to become a mentor thus diluting the distinction and purpose of the title.

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Originally Posted by f00dl3

What is the history of commendations - do they raise the requirements with every major expansion in general and every patch?

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Only updates done, were in order to keep current the level cap and mentor roulette unlock. This is the first time the commendation requirement was raised.

More likely, devs pushed the change because the 300 comms limit became so low that too much people were joining a feature intended for less people to get in.

Look at the numbers in NN, right today we have more mentors than sprouts and mentor join is likely to be capped when you log in.

I personally think mentorship should be linked to achievement points as it's an indication of an all-round player.

1500 commendations can be hard for players who play with friends or together with FC members therefore encouraging solo play which directly contradicts one of the major purposes of an MMO.

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Originally Posted by JowyAtreides

I personally think mentorship should be linked to achievement points as it's an indication of an all-round player.

1500 commendations can be hard for players who play with friends or together with FC members therefore encouraging solo play which directly contradicts one of the major purposes of an MMO.

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If a player isn't participating in PuG content to the extent were they can receive the commendations - do they really need to be a mentor if they aren't encountering Sprouts on a regular basis?

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Originally Posted by Ilyrian

If a player isn't participating in PuG content to the extent were they can receive the commendations - do they really need to be a mentor if they aren't encountering Sprouts on a regular basis?

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I feel playing with friends shouldn't invalidate the knowledge and experience a player has of the game and as such, shouldn't lock players out of content such as the mentor roulette which in turn, helps sprouts.

There are multiple categories in the achievement menu, I personally can't see why the relevant mentor acknowledgement can't be locked behind amassing a number of points within that category. Again, with the goal in mind that a player is indeed capable of mentoring instead of being a master in spamming a guildhest (which some people within this thread have advocated), or buying levekits (in order to get the DoH/L versions).

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Originally Posted by JowyAtreides

I feel playing with friends shouldn't invalidate the knowledge and experience a player has of the game and as such, shouldn't lock players out of content such as the mentor roulette which in turn, helps sprouts.

There are multiple categories in the achievement menu, I personally can't see why the relevant mentor acknowledgement can't be locked behind amassing a number of points within that category. Again, with the goal in mind that a player is indeed capable of mentoring instead of being a master in spamming a guildhest (which some people within this thread have advocated), or buying levekits (in order to get the DoH/L versions).

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You can help sprouts by joining any of the other roulettes. If youre frequently doing those with premades, you werent helping sprouts very much anyway. Not to say that you shouldnt be playing with friends or discourage that in any way, but honestly you cant say you wanna help pugs and simultaneously hardly pug.

I mean I've only been playing since April of last year and I have well over 1,800 commendations split between healer and DPS. I know commendations are highly subjective but I seriously have to wander about people that have been playing longer than me but have less commendations than me. Maybe we need another Mentor crown designated PUG Mentor or something. I feel like you're defeating the purpose of being a Mentor in a PUG while barely pugging and just queuing with your friends or fc. Just my thoughts.

I wish Lore Mentor was an option. I'd rather side quest than spam extreme trials.

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Originally Posted by Gula

I wish Lore Mentor was an option. I'd rather side quest than spam extreme trials.

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We also need Market Mentors; they can teach us about undercutting, buying out your competition and how to sell overpriced dye! :D

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Originally Posted by Violet_Galaxy

We also need Market Mentors; they can teach us about undercutting, buying out your competition and how to sell overpriced dye! :D

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Isn't that what a Trade Mentor extends to?

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Originally Posted by Gula

Isn't that what a Trade Mentor extends to?

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...I was being facetious; sorry you missed that.

Mentor is not all about the knowlegde of the game, its about sharing the hard part pf PuG with newbies and helping them... which have little to none bussiness to people who play with friends... not saying playing woth friends is bad btw, but why do you want a title that created to help PuG when you rarely do it?

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Originally Posted by Violet_Galaxy

...I was being facetious; sorry you missed that.

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I didn't miss it. You had a clear answer for your concept. Therefore, it didn't work as well as you think it would have.

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Originally Posted by Frizze

Forgive me if im wrong about this, as ive never been interested in becoming a mentor. Why not just qualify as a trade mentor? Those requirements arent changing. You still get access to NN chat to help new players. You can maybe even still run the roulette(i honestly have no idea)? And id wager a ton that Hyomin is right that they picked this comm threshold based on achievements.

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After 5.1, Trade Mentors won't be able to access the Mentor Roulette (unless they obviously also qualify and certified as a PvE Mentor.)

Saw a Mentor died multiple times when fighting Xande last night.

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Originally Posted by AriaEnia

Saw a Mentor died multiple times when fighting Xande last night.

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And your point is...?

Yes the mentor died. We get that much. But you're not telling how or why. Did you watch them fail a mechanics? Did you speak to them and ask what the deal was?

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Originally Posted by Gula

I didn't miss it. You had a clear answer for your concept. Therefore, it didn't work as well as you think it would have.

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You're right. I should have said something more outlandish (as I thought Lore Mentor was) like Chocobo Mentor or Aetheryte Mentor so that maybe people on the spectrum/who take everything unnecessarily literal can understand that I was merely poking fun of the fact that Mentors are being broken down and separated in the first place. But I expect too much sometimes from random strangers to read in between the lines. Silly me :D

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Originally Posted by AriaEnia

Saw a Mentor died multiple times when fighting Xande last night.

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So mentor cant die in a fight... wow... guess they better raised it to 9000 commendation

Your tag doesn't stop you helping people, I don't even wear it - I just got mentor status to be able to answer PvP questions in NN but generally I don't wear the crown, because I'd rather help people without it and the general perception of people with the crown is quite poor. This post absolutely smacks of you being upset that you're losing it despite the fact it doesn't really change your ability to help anyone the way you are apparently doing. I predominantly play Feast and before Feast, I played Fold. I also play a Frontlines from time to time and I still can't AVOID getting comms. Even if I don't say anything I'll just get them for being good.

Also you meld SpS as WHM. Why.

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Originally Posted by Violet_Galaxy

I mean I've only been playing since April of last year and I have well over 1,800 commendations split between healer and DPS. I know commendations are highly subjective but I seriously have to wander about people that have been playing longer than me but have less commendations than me.

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And I've only been playing since July of last year, yet I have just slightly over 600 commendations while playing healer almost exclusively. Commendations aren't just highly subjective. They are 100% subjective. You are completely at the mercy of how other players think and feel about you, whether the reasons for said thoughts and feelings are legit or not. Everyone has different opinions on what makes a good or bad tank, healer, and dps.

And let's not forget that there are other requirements to become a mentor besides comms. Completing 1,000 dungeons is no small feat, even if you did take the "easy" method and just kept running trials. I just recently completed my 800th dungeon personally. It's still a grind either way. And then you also need to have at least 1 tank, 1 healer, and 1 dps all at max level AND have completed all of their respective class/role quests.

People need to stop pretending that increasing the commendation requirement AT ALL, let alone fivefold, is a good idea when the comm system is based on subjectivity to begin with.

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Originally Posted by Dzian

Oh I don't disagree. In a perfect world commendations would actually represent excellence and having loads would account for being an amazing player.

However this is FFXIV here. And the bar for getting commendations is much much lower than that.

In XIV you can walk out with a handful of commendations just because a few folks like your glamorous or you simply said hi peeps at the start of a duty. Hell you can get commendations just for being the last person to leave an instance at the end. So throwing out some dps as a healer or aoes as an actual dps is generally going to net you a significant amount of comms.

I guess what I'm saying then is that when the bar for getting commendations is as low as it is. Getting 1500 should be easy enough for anyone including people who play dps.

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To piggyback off of this.

When dps aren't getting comms, they say that "only tanks and healers get them." But when healers and tanks aren't getting comms, they say that "people give out commendations randomly, it could be for glamour or just a cool name or something."

If giving out commendations is as random as people think, then everyone always has an equal chance to get them regardless of role. If you haven't hit 1500 yet it might just mean that possibly you aren't running roulettes a lot, or just run with premades, and need to branch out a bit.

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Originally Posted by NintendoAnimeFan

And I've only been playing since July of last year, yet I have just slightly over 600 commendations while playing healer almost exclusively. Commendations aren't just highly subjective. They are 100% subjective. You are completely at the mercy of how other players think and feel about you, whether the reasons for said thoughts and feelings are legit or not. Everyone has different opinions on what makes a good or bad tank, healer, and dps.

And let's not forget that there are other requirements to become a mentor besides comms. Completing 1,000 dungeons is no small feat, even if you did take the "easy" method and just kept running trials. I just recently completed my 800th dungeon personally. It's still a grind either way. And then you also need to have at least 1 tank, 1 healer, and 1 dps all at max level AND have completed all of their respective class/role quests.

People need to stop pretending that increasing the commendation requirement AT ALL, let alone fivefold, is a good idea when the comm system is based on subjectivity to begin with.

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Whether someone is a good mentor or not is subjective. Hell, whether someone should be a mentor or not in the first place is fairly subjective. The criteria i lay out might be different from the next guy. If i was asked, id say someone should know what theyre talking about, be friendly, and a good communicator. How do you automate judging that? Well having several classes leveled up would mean you should know about classes(should have at least one in each role, so thatd be 5 level 80s), that one is easy to measure. Having cleared most/all of the instances(ideally one or more times in each role) could indicate you know the runs. All we have here to measure is the checkmark for clearing, and the overall number youve run. Not ideal, but the more you have finished the more likely you are to be knowledgeable of the runs. So how do we measure friendly/communicating? Comms are the only thing the game has to measure anything remotely like that. So in absence of a perfect tool, we use the one we have. And 300 was too small a number to begin with, so im not pretending when i say that this increase was overdue. If i were designing the system, id also make players re-certify regularly(probly once per patch) and id give the system better rewards(the idea i like best is cash shop credit for each full patch they stay certified - so a free outfit/mount/emote every so often for being a good active mentor) and bigger punishments for abuse.

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Originally Posted by SummonerSenah

If giving out commendations is as random as people think, then everyone always has an equal chance to get them regardless of role. If you haven't hit 1500 yet it might just mean that possibly you aren't running roulettes a lot, or just run with premades, and need to branch out a bit.

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Its also possible someone isnt getting comms because they arent very good at their main class. Are you a DPS that doesnt know your single target/aoe rotation, and when to use each? A tank that doesnt use defensive cooldowns? A healer who starts healing the second someone drops to 95% but doesnt cast a single damage spell the entire run(or alternatively one who lets the party die due to not healing at all)? Its possible you might be the problem.

Just going to throw out that not getting commendations specifically because you mostly play with friends despite having a billion hours played is entirely fair. You've spent a lot of time playing with people you seem to get along with enough and that doesn't really speak too well for one's abilities to actually mentor.

Mentors should have to be constantly exposed to people who are new, people with vastly different mindsets, and people who will test you. Not people you are comfortable with. It's not just about how well you deal with content, but how well you deal with other people. If you can navigate situations where someone might be difficult, or someone is genuinely having a hard time, or manage to get a struggling party of strangers with different learning styles through a challenge, that says a lot more than the thousands of clears you and your friends gotten farming.

Given I started playing late last year and have more than enough, I think the system is fair. With regards to playing DPS I think people do not give enough credit to what you can do to make for a pleasant playing experience on any role. Mechanical deeds like using Pelaton, interrupting stuff, or peeling something off a healer when a tank messes up, on one side of things. On the other spectrum, being a good upstanding member of the community by engaging people when they reach out, or even unprompted to compliment someone on their contributions or even something like a goofy glamour. Contribute to the outcome and contribute to good spirits. Sometimes you will do everything right and not get any commendations but for the most part people will notice.

Man, we had a healer in a dohm mheg a couple of nights back, super new, super nice guy, nervous and actually asked if we wanted him to leave after he got smoked by landsblood. So I put put a mark over my head (was playing DRG) and said "just stand on top of me and you'll be fine". Got to the last boss, explained it to him, end of the run, all 3 other members commed me, and they weren't a premade.

The point of this story? Ok not every group is like this, in fact it is especially rare especially if you don't level a lot, but the point is - you don't have to heal/tank for comms. Yeah you'll get them for free almost every time if you do, but there's literally no excuse to complain that getting comms is hard. If your reasons include hating group content, anxiety about speaking up or "I only play with friends" - you aren't much use to the mentor system anyway outside of NN.

And in Eden normal you'll get comms even as a DPS just for not dying. This isn't difficult if you just play the game and make an effort to be nice to people; and sometimes this is why I don't even know why mentor system exists, because people would do this anyway.

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Originally Posted by Gula

3k comms really doesn't add anything but playtime.

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Playtime is what you need to be a mentor. Why should one be a mentor if put hardly any effort into it. Ones that haven't played for years should not be mentors. Ones that have spent years playing and put in tons of effort should be ones that's mentors. As a healer can get 1500 comms in about 3 months playing. If been here since ARR or even HW should already have than many and more. When look at my play time compared to amount comms I have. Means every hour got at least 5 comms it average out to. 80% comms I have got from playing as a dps.

Even if comms don't translate to skill or knowledge of player, higher count sure gives higher probability of that player being good.

Not trying to say anything here, but how can people with well over 2k hours in the game not have at least 1.500 commendations? Maybe someone is not worth being commended then? Or is that rebellious thought too edgy for our inclusive™ community?

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Originally Posted by FirstnameLastname

Not trying to say anything here, but how can people with well over 2k hours in the game not have at least 1.500 commendations? Maybe someone is not worth being commended then? Or is that rebellious thought too edgy for our inclusive™ community?

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Some people do crafting, gathering, or RP more than they do the instanced battle content. So they wouldn't have had the opportunity to get that many. Sometimes you all forget that there is more to this game than just killing stuff.