The problem with the mentor system

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Originally Posted by Hash_Browns

Changing the symbol wont do any good. Having something to claim by your name, and offering a roulette + glam + mount will always attract people to the mentor program.

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If the symbol was a big steaming pile of horse manure, with flies and stink lines added for extra authenticity, then it would change things.

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Originally Posted by Cithaerias_pyropina

If the symbol was a big steaming pile of horse manure, with flies and stink lines added for extra authenticity, then it would change things.

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I'd gladly wear that as a symbol of the nastiness spewed by those non-mentors who judge the many by the actions of the few. The icon was never the issue. Letting bad apples turn you into one, is.

Speaking from a personal experience, novice network is just not a place I'd look to for any advice or etc. It's probably the worst when it should be a good place for beginners to ask for help or advice. I've used to be in it as a mentor, dealt with extreme toxicity in it and left it and never went back. Somewhat I agree most mentors I've seen are not suited to being a mentor but assuming every mentor is like that is invalid. I try to help anyone I can while showing a positive attitude. My advice? Stay out of novice network.

It really depends on the server, honestly.

If you're cursed with a NN where the regulars are toxic, then yeah, I'd stay away from it.

Unfortunately, just "leave this place" doesn't work in cases where you encounter toxic mentors (or those who don't wear the crown) in dungeons.

An excellent way out of the situation would be a working "black list". I wrote about this system in another topic. It allows you to blacklist a player you don't want to be in the same group with, and the system permanently excludes them from your selection.

Since the number of players on global servers is really large, this system does not add a waiting time for the formation of a random group.

Update: It's also possible that a large number of blacklisting someone would help to GM pay more attention to investigating reports related to this player's behavior.

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Originally Posted by MomomiMomi

But the icon's purpose is primarily so that a new player can spot someone and know that they should be open to be asked questions.

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People farm recommendations not to help others, but to have a shining icon. The system does not work as originally intended. Both sides suffer from this. But of course, many continue to deny the need for change.

Moreover, the aggression with which some opponents of change often respond to me shows their toxicity quite clearly and only confirms my words.

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Originally Posted by EaMett

In my years on this game I probably played with a good thousand mentors, only a handful of which were an issue. If you keep running into bad mentors, maybe mentors aren't the issue.
Also, so what if a few players farm the crown? It doesn't automatically make them bad mentors. Exacerbated mentors in alliance roulette doesn't mean anything, especially given how hard it is to tell tone over text.
Furthermore, random posts from people on reddit or the forums here also mean absolutely nothing, it's just survivor bias.

The mentor system is absolutely fine as is, NN is fine as is although it may be a little spammy; all questions get answered and mentors regularly go assist sprouts in dungeons etc. Fact is, several sprouts are in this very thread saying it worked great for them.

I wish people could just let this mentorship "failure" fallacy rest in peace.

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So what makes you're experience with mentors more valuable or truthful to the situation than people who have had bad experiences with mentors? Both are just personal interactions with people on their data center, neither seems to have any more fact behind it than another.

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Originally Posted by SoranRigel

Unfortunately, just "leave this place" doesn't work in cases where you encounter toxic mentors (or those who don't wear the crown) in dungeons.

An excellent way out of the situation would be a working "black list". I wrote about this system in another topic. It allows you to blacklist a player you don't want to be in the same group with, and the system permanently excludes them from your selection.

Since the number of players on global servers is really large, this system does not add a waiting time for the formation of a random group.

Update: It's also possible that a large number of blacklisting someone would help to GM pay more attention to investigating reports related to this player's behavior.

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A list like this would also mean that a person who has been blacklisted by enough people would end up waiting longer in queues since there would be a number of people they would be unable to be matched with. That is a good thing too since it would be more incentive for people to try and remain civil to each other

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Originally Posted by SieyaM

A list like this would also mean that a person who has been blacklisted by enough people would end up waiting longer in queues since there would be a number of people they would be unable to be matched with. That is a good thing too since it would be more incentive for people to try and remain civil to each other

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Exactly!
/at least 10 characters.

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Originally Posted by SieyaM

So what makes you're experience with mentors more valuable or truthful to the situation than people who have had bad experiences with mentors? Both are just personal interactions with people on their data center, neither seems to have any more fact behind it than another.

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Because unlike many I've actually been keeping tabs since I started. I always take note of who's wearing a crown when I enter content and what people say. Have been doing it since the first couple of months I started playing, 3+ years ago now since I saw a similar post back then and was questioning whether or not I wanted to enter the program. I've played with a good thousand (and that's an underestimation, more like thousands since it was probably around a thousand by the time I even qualified for mentorship 2 years ago) of mentors in that period and the VAST VAST VAST majority of mentors are just silent in content. They don't say anything unless someone asks or there's an obvious issue in the content being run. The reason for this is that often times if you ask others if they want advice they will just say no.
It's absolutely ignorant and ridiculous to claim that a majority of mentors are an issue as many of the people complaining in here or other posts/threads are doing. Full stop.

Survivor bias on this one is strong. People complain about mentors standing in aoes and playing poorly as if mentors aren't allowed to learn new jobs and tunnel vision like everyone else. People complain about players becoming mentors for the crown like there's some kind of correlation between that and being a terrible toxic (to quote others) mentor. Completely unrelated.

Yes there might be some NN with a base of bad mentors on some server that I may not know of, yes there are definitely some mentors that should be stripped of their title. I've witnessed only a handful myself but willing to concede my experience on aether may be a little better than others (little being the key word since I doubt any delta would be significantly wide, though euro servers with diff languages may have it differently). But anyone claiming a majority of mentors are bad, or claiming that the mentor system is full of toxicity should not be taken seriously. And that's a good chunk of people complaining.

Not saying the game wouldn't benefit from a change. Just saying people need to stop crying wolf.

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Originally Posted by Arkfrost

Yes, it is. On several servers, no matter if it's high-pop or low-pop, the novice network is mostly useless.

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I think this is a cultural difference. I had the experience that the NN is awful on EU and the player base there is super negative about it, while on NA, the NN is full of people willing to help and yes we meme about it but people are not as hostile about it as they are on EU. Every server has their own community, and I've seen some drama in the NN but I certainly see lots of people helping others in the NN all the time on NA and a lot of mentors take their role seriously. (People taking time to kick bots from the NN, and don't hesitate to kick people trolling new users, etc.)

Of course I'm sure that not all of EU is like that, and my experience on EU servers if far more limited, I only have three characters in EU, where as I have a lot of characters on different NA servers.

The system is not perfect, but saying that it's completely negative is ignorant.

I do want the crown to be changed though. I always liked the idea that the mentor symbol should be a watering can, so we can water the sprouts.

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Originally Posted by EaMett

But anyone claiming a majority of mentors are bad, or claiming that the mentor system is full of toxicity should not be taken seriously. And that's a good chunk of people complaining.

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Sorry, but you cannot tell people what to take seriously. Your experience or their own. We do not want to turn a blind eye to the problem, that's all.

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Originally Posted by EaMett

Not saying the game wouldn't benefit from a change. Just saying people need to stop crying wolf.

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These topics arise regularly, year after year, for several years. This means that there is a problem. The fact that the developers changed the number of recommendations means that they have already tried to solve this problem. We are trying to help them with this, at the beginning of the thread, adequate measures were proposed by OP and other people. You have discounted all of this, calling it a wolf’s cry.

As I said before, I like the mentor system and never had a problem with it.


The crown is very helpful for new players to identify someone who is willing to help...as long as that person who has the crown is willing to help and not as a status symbol. I have no idea how to "fix" the system so we can make that distinction.


But I will say something anecdotally:


Look at my join date. Now look at my character level. That is not because of a new job. It's been two years and I haven't made it any higher.


FF14 is intimidating to new players, and the lack of a world chat makes the game feel very isolated. It doesn't have a good recruitment system for Free Companies, so finding one is hard for some people who are shy to talk to people out of the blue.


So I play for a bit and then disappear because of that in game loneliness.


Novice Network is really helpful. But it wasn't until last month that I got into it as a "returneee" because before no mentor invited me and I was too shy to ask one to invite.


I shudder to think what I will do when NN isn't available to me. Probably disappear for a while again.

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Originally Posted by RajNish

Sorry, but you cannot tell people what to take seriously. Your experience or their own. We do not want to turn a blind eye to the problem, that's all.



These topics arise regularly, year after year, for several years. This means that there is a problem. The fact that the developers changed the number of recommendations means that they have already tried to solve this problem. We are trying to help them with this, at the beginning of the thread, adequate measures were proposed by OP and other people. You have discounted all of this, calling it a wolf’s cry.

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These threads keep popping up because FF14 is a very popular MMO with a very large player base. This coupled with the fact that people in general are far more likely to complain about something versus giving a compliment. This is just human nature. So yeah it's more likely we see threads from a few individuals complaining about mentors, but we don't hear about people peoples positive experience with mentors being posted as often even though people do have positive experiences more often, whether they realize it or not. Probably easier to recognize the bad over the good. That and there's no curated barrier from becoming a mentor. Someone who just plays the game regularly, especially if they primarily player as a healer or a tank who also leveled one of each role for something other than mentor purposes such as having the ability to fill any role in a raid or so they could get role quests done, or maybe so they could the all jobs 80 mount, or maybe they just like seeing all their jobs at 80. Anyone can become a mentor given enough time, you don't have to work for it specifically and most mentors didn't work for mentor specifically, they just played the game regularly and happened to meet the requirements. The small percentage who worked specially for mentor is not the normal, but even from this small percentage of people, I would think most came out to be ok mentors, as in not bad/rude mentors. There are more people who meet the requirements for mentor than you probably realize, and many of them choose to not wear the crown.

Also, something extra I keep having to comment on, why is it when we get these types of threads and OP runs into a couple bad mentors, that somehow those one or two experiences represents all mentors and mentors are treated as a monolith (even though we can be sure they ran into mentors they had no issue with and took no notice of, because nothing negative happened) but anyone not a mentor gets a free pass for their attitude relatively? If I run into a toxic samurai, can I treat everyone who mains Samurai as a toxic monolith? Same thing, no one is curating who can and cannot become a samurai. What if I ran into a toxic raider? Are all raiders toxic now? What about high ranking feast pvpers? Again, no one is curating these groups, it's only their own work. You may think it sounds silly and stupid but it's the exact same principle being applied.

The problem with the mentor system is that it exists.

I get why they made it, but it just doesnt work.

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Originally Posted by Cithaerias_pyropina

If the symbol was a big steaming pile of horse manure, with flies and stink lines added for extra authenticity, then it would change things.

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I would literally go get my mentor status back right now if the mentor symbol was a poop symbol.

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Originally Posted by Sathona

The problem with the mentor system is that it exists.

I get why they made it, but it just doesnt work.

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Finally a voice of reason! So true!

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Originally Posted by RajNish

Sorry, but you cannot tell people what to take seriously.

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I can suggest people listen to those with more objective opinions rather than those that over-inflate issues and appeal to hasty generalization and bandwagon fallacies. And I do.

Also, SE haven't tried to fix anything. First off, it's rare to not have the commendations required by the time you have the dungeon requirement, that change was pretty useless by itself. Furthermore, with this expansion we will have roughly triple (at least double) the amount of content than we had back when the old system was set up. At best the change was just readjusting to make sure mentors had an equivalent ratio of experience-to-content than before.

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Originally Posted by RajNish

These topics arise regularly, year after year, for several years. This means that there is a problem

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It means there's a problem in each individual case. At best you can argument that issues arise at a certain frequency which is consistent with the reality that some mentors aren't fit, and that, absolutely nobody is contesting. It, however, doesn't mean there's a systemic problem as people keep claiming.

And at no point have I discounted that the system could be improved.

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Originally Posted by SturmChurro

I would literally go get my mentor status back right now if the mentor symbol was a poop symbol.

Finally a voice of reason! So true!

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I mean i play like a year but from discussions ive seen from the past, ingame , discord servers, forum and reddit discussions it just seems like no matter what they do it will be always problematic.

I'd rather they invested on something else and just remove this mentor system entirely, just create some achievements and once certain ppl achieved them they can help others in Novice Networks etc, no crowns no statuses.

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Originally Posted by Sathona

I mean i play like a year but from discussions ive seen from the past, ingame , discord servers, forum and reddit discussions it just seems like no matter what they do it will be always problematic.

I'd rather they invested on something else and just remove this mentor system entirely, just create some achievements and once certain ppl achieved them they can help others in Novice Networks etc, no crowns no statuses.

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And I've been playing since before the system was introduced and have seen a lot of positive come from it. Once in a while you get bad mentors, sure. But it isn't as frequent as people make it sound.

Ho boy here we go again.

Mentors Who are currently answering on this forum. Do not fall for this trap as you can see no matter how much you explain how many counter examples you bring and how much you deny their sayings they Will not trust you nor change their opinion. These threads are made for one and only reason to provoke you, to test your patience and to force you to act in the way they describe Just to say that they are correct. When someone can Come here and say fck all Mentors without being judged about it, when they ask that you bring proof when their argument has 0 back up behind it and not to mention when a well known troll tries to fan the flames even more, these all are enough circumstancial evidence on the foul play this handfull of peeps are playing here.

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Originally Posted by HeulGDarian

Ho boy here we go again.

Mentors Who are currently answering on this forum. Do not fall for this trap as you can see no matter how much you explain how many counter examples you bring and how much you deny their sayings they Will not trust you nor change their opinion. These threads are made for one and only reason to provoke you, to test your patience and to force you to act in the way they describe Just to say that they are correct. When someone can Come here and say fck all Mentors without being judged about it, when they ask that you bring proof when their argument has 0 back up behind it and not to mention when a well known troll tries to fan the flames even more, these all are enough circumstancial evidence on the foul play this handfull of peeps are playing here.

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Are you accusing me of being the "well known troll"? because I have checked the entire thread. Believe it or not I am dead serious in this thread. I have a strong dislike of mentors, and have made it clear for probably going on years at this point. That opinion will never change. I am laughing right now, I am literally not "trolling"! I have maintained my position in the various mentor threads that have popped up since like late 2018, I'd guess. I explained my position in there - I have no reason to repost it and argue the same points again.

Mentors are worthless, regular players who want to help can do so and have no need for this little "special club" and chat channel that they can moderate. They aren't "elite". A mentor can do whatever they want, and never lose that status - I was told as much by the mentors themselves in the Novice Network itself through whispers. I probably still have the screenshots. I turned off my own mentor status immediately after that exchange (dropped it entirely).

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Originally Posted by SturmChurro

Mentors are worthless, regular players who want to help can do so and have no need for this little "special club" and chat channel that they can moderate. They aren't "elite". A mentor can do whatever they want, and never lose that status - I was told as much by the mentors in the Novice Network itself through whispers. I probably still have the screenshots.

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They were never meant to be elite. They're just players who are making it known that they are willing to help others. That's it. The mentor system gives regular players who want to help greater tools with which to do so. It's working as intended.

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Originally Posted by MomomiMomi

They were never meant to be elite. They're just players who are making it known that they are willing to help others. That's it. The mentor system gives regular players who want to help greater tools with which to do so. It's working as intended.

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No, they weren't but that is the mindset they have adopted. On paper the mentor system is good, but without heavy moderation by SE the system is worthless. It is a glorified chat channel, a waste of time, popularity contest. Worthless in practice.

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Originally Posted by SturmChurro

No, they weren't but that is the mindset they have adopted. On paper the mentor system is good, but without heavy moderation by SE the system is worthless. It is a glorified chat channel, a waste of time, popularity contest. Worthless in practice.

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I have personally helped hundreds of new players with the novice network. That's only counting me, not anyone else. That's far from worthless.

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Originally Posted by MomomiMomi

I have personally helped hundreds of new players with the novice network. That's only counting me, not anyone else. That's far from worthless.

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Did you need the Novice Network, or the mentor system in it's current state to help these players. Or did it just make it easier? If you want to help you can help without the status symbol. I have helped quite a few people myself, and I didn't need that crown next to my name. Nor did I need to have the sense of power of kicking players, and then threatening them in PM's either. "Oh, but I hide my crown" then the crown isn't needed, right (since this thread is actually based on the status symbol)?

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Originally Posted by MomomiMomi

I would have helped maybe 3 people in all these years if it wasn't for the novice network. Compared to hundreds. If you want to call that "just made it easier," go ahead. But I would consider that a necessary tool to accomplish what I did.

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Again, was the novice network needed in it's current state, or could a general new player channel have worked just as well? Or a multitude of many other alternatives that others in the community have suggested.

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Originally Posted by SturmChurro

Did you need the Novice Network, or the mentor system in it's current state to help these players. Or did it just make it easier?

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I would have helped maybe 3 people in all these years if it wasn't for the novice network. Compared to hundreds. If you want to call that "just made it easier," go ahead. But I would consider that a necessary tool to accomplish what I did.

No im not talking about you. The well known troll was titansomething who had had lots of troll threads for a long time and also went and accused the counter examples as mentor propaganda. I have never seen a mentor thinking themselves elite ive only seen People calling mentor useless if they make any error on how they play their job. Novice network was always Just a chat were People can ask questions but for some reason People think that it should only be used as that despite the fact that 300 peeps on the same chat Will obviously talk to each other. This doesnt undermine the fact that People can answer questions. As i said everyone keeps saying whatever they want about mentor without backing it up yet when a mentor comes to defend themselves he must provide proof? For what for the 10 peeps that found a rotten Apple? If you want to actually provide an argument then you need to show more than here nn sucks and 10 mentor were toxic this isnt proof. Proof would be to find and publish info to make a statistic of the percentange of mentor that are toxic then its up to yoshi p to see if its high enough to reqcuire a rework or removal

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Originally Posted by HeulGDarian

No im not talking about you. The well known troll was titansomething who had had lots of troll threads for a long time and also went and accused the counter examples as mentor propaganda. I have never seen a mentor thinking themselves elite ive only seen People calling mentor useless if they make any error on how they play their job. Novice network was always Just a chat were People can ask questions but for some reason People think that it should only be used as that despite the fact that 300 peeps on the same chat Will obviously talk to each other. This doesnt undermine the fact that People can answer questions. As i said everyone keeps saying whatever they want about mentor without backing it up yet when a mentor comes to defend themselves he must provide proof? For what for the 10 peeps that found a rotten Apple? If you want to actually provide an argument then you need to show more than here nn sucks and 10 mentor were toxic this isnt proof. Proof would be to find and publish info to make a statistic of the percentange of mentor that are toxic then its up to yoshi p to see if its high enough to reqcuire a rework or removal

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OH! The user who will not be named (by me at least) those posts seem to have entirely disappeared.. spooky.

We can agree to disagree. Look, I think the idea behind the mentor system is good, I just don't think it is executed well enough, and would require a great deal of oversight by SE to live up to what is should be. I would prefer reforms, but those would also require SE oversight (and resources). I just think the best alternative is removing it entirely in that case.

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Originally Posted by SturmChurro

OH! The user who will not be named (by me at least) those posts seem to have entirely disappeared.. spooky.

We can agree to disagree. Look, I think the idea behind the mentor system is good, I just don't think it is executed well enough, and would require a great deal of oversight by SE to live up to what is should be. I would prefer reforms, but those would also require SE oversight (and resources). I just think the best alternative is removing it entirely in that case.

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OK then lets leave it at agree to disagree if anything im no against to a but of a reform or rather a small refining since it seems some data centers have troubles while others dont. Im only against deleting cause it would Hurt all mentor be it good or bad and against the People Who keep saying that all of the mentor are bad and that every attempt of defend against it is wrong and "mentor propaganda"

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Originally Posted by SturmChurro

Again, was the novice network needed in it's current state, or could a general new player channel have worked just as well? Or a multitude of many other alternatives that others in the community have suggested.

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I don't see the difference other than that we wouldn't have moderation, which would result in the chat being overrun by bots, rendering it useless.

The problem with the mentor system is too many people either expect too much out of it or don't actually understand what it's actually for.

As for mentoring itself.

If someone is actually asking for input I have no problems providing it. I rarely provide it unsolicited in game simply because there are too many lazy bad players that have no desire to get better and I choose not to waste my time trying to help people that refuse to help themselves or have any desire to improve. If you don't give a damn about yourself they why should anyone else? And a number of those people are mouthy little brats that think they know everything when it's plainly obvious to anyone with functioning eyes they're completely clueless...

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Originally Posted by MomomiMomi

I don't see the difference other than that we wouldn't have moderation, which would result in the chat being overrun by bots, rendering it useless.

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Just do what WoW does: Enough reports and the player gets silenced.


But FF14 desperately needs a chat channel where someone can ask questions. NN doesn't work because it's invite only (unless you're a returnee) and a lot of new players (I am one of them) never got invited to it.


A world chat is the best resource that I can see that would fill this need.

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Originally Posted by Thamorian

These threads keep popping up because FF14 is a very popular MMO with a very large player base. This coupled with the fact that people in general are far more likely to complain about something versus giving a compliment. This is just human nature.

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Now you yourself are inclined to generalize and see the bad, even in those messages that are constructive and where there are suggestions for improving the system. I'm not even talking about your systematic depreciation of all the above theses that speak about why people want to change this situation.

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Originally Posted by EaMett

SE haven't tried to fix anything. First off, it's rare to not have the commendations required by the time you have the dungeon requirement, that change was pretty useless by itself. Furthermore, with this expansion we will have roughly triple (at least double) the amount of content than we had back when the old system was set up. At best the change was just readjusting to make sure mentors had an equivalent ratio of experience-to-content than before.

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Numerical correlation makes me doubt this thesis. The number of recommendations required for the status of a mentor has increased to 1500 (5 times). This was probably an attempt to defend against players who farm recommendations only for the crown.

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Originally Posted by EaMett

It, however, doesn't mean there's a systemic problem as people keep claiming.

And at no point have I discounted that the system could be improved.

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And again, logically does not converge. You say that there is no problem, but do not deny that the system needs to be improved. But, as we know "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".

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Originally Posted by RajNish

And again, logically does not converge. You say that there is no problem, but do not deny that the system needs to be improved. But, as we know "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".

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Anything can be improved. And again, I'm defending the stance that there's no systemic issue and calling out people who claim otherwise. I don't know what else to say, seemed pretty clear.

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Originally Posted by HeulGDarian

I have never seen a mentor thinking themselves elite

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From the search information of one of the mentors.

https://i.imgur.com/WX40gq9.png

Now you have seen it.

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Originally Posted by EaMett

Anything can be improved. And again, I'm defending the stance that there's no systemic issue and calling out people who claim otherwise. I don't know what else to say, seemed pretty clear.

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You can deny the obvious as many times as you want, threads will appear. Moreover, they will appear if GMs are advised to write on the forum, as was in my case. And how would you improve the system, let me ask?

The only main problem with the mentor system is to many complaining about it. All mentors is there for is to answer questions if ones need help with something.

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Originally Posted by hynaku

The only main problem with the mentor system is to many complaining about it. All mentors is there for is to answer questions if ones need help with something.

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Complaints and reports do not arise from scratch.

I agree with you! I’ve always thought of the crown the same way you have. Changing it would be a great first step.

Another wonderful person with a crown. Except that he pulled the boss before the whole group was in place and ready for battle.

https://i.imgur.com/NnvP2Hk.png

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Originally Posted by hynaku

The only main problem with the mentor system is to many complaining about it. All mentors is there for is to answer questions if ones need help with something.

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And you can't even do that right.