Why is everyone so silent in the game?

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Originally Posted by Vav2021

so far from what I've seen in the thread, there's a consensus that there are some serious issues with people either getting easily offended or wanting to be speech police. I don't know how true this is, as i've never been banned despite several attempts to get people talking, but if this is the case, I am very shocked.

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It's not true at all.

The people who post on the forums are a very self-selecting group, seemingly with a higher proportion of people who display antisocial tendencies that get flagged by other players. I would venture that the vast majority of normal players have never been flagged, banned, or anything, but the minority of players who have tend to put the onus for their antisocial behaviors on others, citing "other people being offended" or "speech police."

Put another way, not everyone who plays the game knows how to be a person, and the forum is overrepresented by players who don't know how to be people :)

To be honest.....in other games chat just devolves into "LFG [insert instance here]", "WTS [insert item here]", and gold seller spam. There's not really any genuine conversation save for a few odd moments, and that generally is just political arguments or server drama. Try to start a conversation and get drowned out by seller spam. After playing TBC classic I prefer no chat at all to that lol.

Most MMORPGs are pretty silent. The young ones are the ones that talk a lot and tend to roleplay. The rest of us treat it as a single player experience with inner circle of friends that we may do things with occasionally. Free companies are glorified linkshells for the most part. Then there's the fact that there's a lot of snowflakes these days and saying the most mundane thing can "trigger" them. People used to talk more before they changed the rules where triggering someone was a P2P dispute not a bannable offense. So free companies either are for snowflakes or weed them out. Maybe even just don't care anymore and private linkshells are where most people talk. I just avoid talking in public for the most part, there's always a karen somewhere ready to report you for the most idiotic thing.

In my experience people are very willing to talk when not focusing on duties, they mostly just keep it to party, fc or linkshell chat. Joining a fate group and asking how peoples day is going usually starts up conversation quite quickly. Or just go insane in ultima talking about chi

"Why is everyone silent in this game?"

Because we are jrpg protagonists made by a character creator?

I often assume this comes down to two things (not counting social nuances that could be present anywhere else on the internet) :

1) Console players. Keyboards being awkward for them.

2) "Can't report what isn't said." With how deep the time and effort investment can get on a character, and now notably moderated the game is, the impression I get is that no one wants to risk getting banned, and that contributes to silence. At the end of the day, we do in fact have the "right to remain silent," and this is the best defense for some players I'm sure.

Since the new FFXIV rules, I don't argue with people anymore, I ban the incompetents I meet and we don't talk about it anymore, like SE wants me to be just "positively sociable".

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Originally Posted by Naoki34

Since the new FFXIV rules, I don't argue with people anymore, I ban the incompetents I meet and we don't talk about it anymore, like SE wants me to be just "positively sociable".

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what are the new rules?

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Originally Posted by Vav2021

what are the new rules?

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https://support.na.square-enix.com/f...la=1&kid=68216

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Originally Posted by Sinavie

https://support.na.square-enix.com/f...la=1&kid=68216

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thank you for the article... but I wish I didn't know about it now. It seems so vague in some parts, that I feel like i'm back to walking on eggshells again. So if I disagree with someone, i'm better off at pretending they said nothing to begin with?

..........

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Originally Posted by Vav2021

thank you for the article... but I wish I didn't know about it now. It seems so vague in some parts, that I feel like i'm back to walking on eggshells again. So if I disagree with someone, i'm better off at pretending they said nothing to begin with?

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And that is the debate, isn't it?

I'm not silent. I say hi and gg in dungeons!

Also, don't forget that it's just not practical to use /say when there are a lot of people around all trying to say something to their friends. Your dialog quickly gets drown out by other dialog and nobody knows who's talking to whom anymore.

Most are super quiet. Came from SWTOR which was super chatty to here and was shocked by the silence. People will even come up to you... but say nothing.

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Originally Posted by Serenitey

Most are super quiet. Came from SWTOR which was super chatty to here and was shocked by the silence. People will even come up to you... but say nothing.

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SE made FFXIV like a solo player experience, you don't need people or engage with them, except if you are going to raid/savage.

Also RP's are a big red flag here, I can't stand people who randomly send tells saying " Hey cute char :3 "

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Originally Posted by Serenitey

People will even come up to you... but say nothing.

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Horror movie fuel there.

Personally I’d default to silence unless I have a good inkling that whoever I’m partied with are talkative enough to be willing to do some chatters.

Otherwise, nobody is obligated to engage in conversation.

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Originally Posted by AnnRam

Also RP's are a big red flag here, I can't stand people who randomly send tells saying " Hey cute char :3 "

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How does “RP” has anything to do with another player expressing their compliment about another’s character?

At least on my main's server, pretty sure it's language barrier issues. Lotta folks on the EU servers don't type good English, but I find that isn't the biggest problem, it's their English reading level that is, and can cause misunderstandings when faced with a fluent speaker. Thus I try not to talk at length with many of them for that reason.

Because I'm a quiet person anyway? Because I don't see a point in small talk with people I'm not likely to ever see again? Because I've been fighting that horrible beast known as depression? Because I find it difficult to interact with others on a good day? Pick your poison lol

I'm usually talkative in FC chat and don't really want to interrupt other people's time.

I have a Mentor Crown so if someone runs up to me in one of the starting town and asks "How can I start crafting" or something, I'll answer them.

But I assume from the offset people have their own things they want to do.

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Originally Posted by Sarevok_Thordin

I'm usually talkative in FC chat and don't really want to interrupt other people's time.

I have a Mentor Crown so if someone runs up to me in one of the starting town and asks "How can I start crafting" or something, I'll answer them.

But I assume from the offset people have their own things they want to do.

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Someone with a mentor crown that actually helps people? *gasps*

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Originally Posted by Eriane_Elis

Someone with a mentor crown that actually helps people? *gasps*

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I know right? I mean, I'm not about to start crafting a whole starter set for people, but I'll tell them how they can do it.

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Originally Posted by Dewslam

I think it's a cultural thing. People talk all the time in the data center I'm currently on, even in short dungeon jaunts and palace of the dead runs where we'll probably never see each other again after five minutes. But on my old data center, the only time people ever spoke in content was to insult one another for not performing well enough or messing up mechanics.

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Where are you I want to go there immedietely.

People are talking - they just aren't doing it on /say chat.

My server is pretty talkative, especially in the main cities, but there are also quite times where there isn’t much exchange. I think it just depends on the people that are present. I’m a chatterbox myself.

Community: "OMG someone tried to give me a suggestion about how to play MY job/commented on my glamour/used the wrong pronoun since I identify as an alphabet soup. SE do something before I write a twitter thread for all of my 8 followers to see!"
SE: "Alright we will ban people for interacting with each other"
Community: "Thank you"
Community:"...why is everyone so silent in this game????"

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Originally Posted by lezard21

Community: "OMG someone tried to give me a suggestion about how to play MY job/commented on my glamour/used the wrong pronoun since I identify as an alphabet soup. SE do something before I write a twitter thread for all of my 8 followers to see!"
SE: "Alright we will ban people for interacting with each other"
Community: "Thank you"
Community:"...why is everyone so silent in this game????"

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i didn't know how intense the SE punishments were until folks talked about them in the thread.

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Originally Posted by Vav2021

i didn't know how intense the SE punishments were until folks talked about them in the thread.

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It's a combination of people being overly dramatic, and people having selective memory when it comes to post-GM visits.

I'm to busy talking to myself to talk to other people. Except for last week, I offended myself and would not speak to myself for a whole week.

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Originally Posted by Vav2021

What's the reason behind the lack of social interactions?

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I've tried to get people in my FC into voice chat with no success. When I started MMOs 17 years ago, voice chat was THE THING and everyone in the guild was on it. Now, aside from the occasional Discord post and some in-game chat, everything's quiet. The Femroe LS I'm on is more active than any other channel I'm on.

People are just quiet these days in general, even on other multiplayer games I've been on in the past 5 years.

MMO’s have become more anti-social single player games. No one can ever convince me otherwise, because I have experienced MMO’s back 10+ years then during the prime, to what they have become now.

For the small amount of people who do talk, they either whisper or they only talk in a party. People have grown to fear publicly talking, adding even more to the illusion that no one speaks at all.

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Originally Posted by SherlottaEryut

MMO’s have become more anti-social single player games. No one can ever convince me otherwise, because I have experienced MMO’s back 10+ years then during the prime, to what they have become now.

For the small amount of people who do talk, they either whisper or they only talk in a party. People have grown to fear publicly talking, adding even more to the illusion that no one speaks at all.

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I know that RP servers on multiplayer games yield high social interactions.

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Originally Posted by Serenitey

Most are super quiet. Came from SWTOR which was super chatty to here and was shocked by the silence. People will even come up to you... but say nothing.

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and that's a good thing, I have to mute shout chat most of the time in SWTOR because of the crap people say on general chat there.

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Originally Posted by Genbe197

Maybe its your server, Mine is constantly full of chit chat, Primal data center dungeon chit chat all the time as well.

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I'm in Primal as well, and I don't know that I'd agree with "all the time".

Now, that said, I definitely am ready with a quip or a comment when there's space to do so in a dungeon run; witness my usual "Thank you for choosing Uber; please remember to tip and review your whale." at the end of Anamnesis Anyder's first section. And when I do make those comments, it usually sparks responses and banter, at least here in Primal. (I've gotten some good quips back in return to the Uber joke, including "2 stars, whale enforced single pulls" or "1 star for safety concerns; driver was in multiple small collisions during journey" Sometimes, folks just /laugh, or will /gratuity for the 'tip' part of 'tip and review'.)

And if someone else makes a light comment first, I'll also join in with the usual resulting banter.

But if no one speaks up, I do tend to find the runs are largely silent. Because, honestly, there's not a lot of time to talk once you're in combat, and if the dungeon doesn't have enforced downtime (see, again, Anamnesis Anyder's forced pause before the first boss), you're generally in combat nearly nonstop. It's just that -- at least in my experience here on Primal -- once someone breaks the silence, the chatter starts readily enough.

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Originally Posted by Irzephyra

"Why is everyone silent in this game?"

Because we are jrpg protagonists made by a character creator?

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*nods in stoic silence, before taking one step forward and tapping a finger to chest to indicate 'yes, I'm the one for the job'*

Limsa Thot chatter is toxic, but it's much less nowadays since we got the AFK timer, not a bad thing at all.

Nonetheless you should join an FC or find some friends that share the same topics in linkshells, there is plenty of talking that goes on. Believe us when we say just because dungeon chat is silent, doesn't mean that person isn't typing in their chat room LS in the middle of falling asleep to AoEing mobs.

o/

ten characters.

It really depends on your server. I'm on Balmung and the instant I zone into Ul'dah someone posts a cringy sentence into Shout chat.

FFXIV is a lobby game. You don't need to browse through a marketplace and click on players to browse their inventories, or find people in trade chat advertising their wares and go meet up with them. You just go to a market board or an NPC vendor and buy the gear you want without having to ever interact with another person. You don't need to form parties and then spend hours out in the world adventuring together, getting to know those people and add them to your friend's list. You can do everything out in the world by yourself. Maybe someone comes along to do a FATE you're doing too but you're existence isn't important to them, and they will leave and forget you. To raid, you don't have to leave town an hour prior to the raid time to go on a journey with friends collecting buffs and travelling through dangerous territory to the raid. You queue through party finder to form a group for a trial or a raid, teleport to the boss platform, don't really building shared experiences with each other over time, just needing each other's firepower for an hour at most and then once you get your clear and your goodies, you go your separate ways. Mercenary friends. And so on.

If you wanted an MMO where people were talking to each other out in the world, you should've been playing an oldschool MMO back in the day.